Books » Harry Potter » A trip down to memory house B s : A A A
Author: quirky-but-kewl90 1. A pumpkin juiced letter and a pledge2. An alluring set of robes and the flight3. A grumpy TimeKeeper and rudeness4. An awkward kiss and the awful truth5. A snobby mansion and reality6. A terrible impression and consciousness7. A feathery doona and alot of questions8. A belated dinner and an odd meeting9. A greasy haired fellow and taunting10. A picturesque grave and empathy11. A midnight foray and the past
Fiction Rated: K+ - English - Mystery/Drama - Reviews: 150 - Published: 11-25-05 - Updated: 02-25-06 id:2674720
Ha-row fan ficcers! I'm ultra sorry i've taken so long to update, and sadly, it's going to keep getting this way. School is becoming increasingly demandin (much to my displeasure) and i just can't seem to find time! TRAGIC! yeah, so if you don't want me to chuck in the fic UPDATE! THIS IS YOUR FINAL CHANCE OR THE FIC SHALL DIE! (oh...tear.) But yeah. I know it sucks. Life or death decision. Review, or don't review. Quite a hard one.Bhahaha...gosh, i'm getting all emo...tional. So tell me your thoughts pretty please!
DISCLAIMER: Has everyone gone to mugglenet and had a gander at the actors playing Luna, James and Lily? Luna: meh. James: I like, i like (not as hot as Danny though. And he looks NOTHING LIKE HIM! They're meant to be like identical, aren't they?) Lily: No! I'm ultra sorry, but the Lily in my head does NOT look like that! They better dye her hair real quick or there will be some broken noses. But, if i had the rights to HPtm, i could choose whoever i wanted for the roles! But...alas, i do not. Pity. Jake Gyllenhaal would have done a spiffing job as James.
Have waves of joy! Ready, set, go!
"What?" stammered Harry.
Lily could only just make out his shadowy face from the ground through the cemetery's darkness and the tears stinging and blinding her. His face was a shadowy blend of fear and disbelief. "No. I'm…I'm sorry…Lily. I can't take you there."
She bunched up her hair in a panic-stricken fist and pulled it taunt from her skull. Why is he not helping her? He's just standing coolly above and judging. He is heartless…he doesn't care… "Why?" she growled, he hands now scrubbing at her agitated face. It was hot to touch. She felt she was teetering on the edge of one of her panic-attacks, when the world narrows and closes around her while her breathing catches and her head spins sickeningly…like that day at the station…
She became dimly aware of Harry sitting down beside her. He crossed his legs neatly beneath himself so not even a toe poked over disrespectfully onto her mother's grave before them. After a while, Lily found her breathing had eased up but was still rasping and laboured. It was fogging up before her and she suddenly realised how cold it had suddenly become. Harry shifted awkwardly closer to her, his eyes peering concernedly through the darkness. "You ok?" he asked, his voice little more than a tentative whisper.
She nodded, her eyes closed and rested her head against his arm. She felt him tense but then relax. "Why won't you take me to Petunia?" she whispered. Cold midnight gales blew through the quaint cemetery's trees and softly lifted the hair against their faces. It was some time before Harry spoke.
"I'm not taking you to the Dursley's until…until you answer some questions."
Ooo00000000000oooooo
"James! Geeze, James! Halt! Someone'll see you!" Don hissed from the landing above James, but he ignored him and continued down the stairs at a brisk pace.
Part of the momentum of the brisk pace was the half-formed half-hope of running into someone so he could strip the shrouding cloak of secrecy from this whole fiasco. He was sick of hiding and sick of being on the sidelines. Being involved was James' sort of thing. Besides, why let that brown-noser Harry hog all the adulation? The other part was that he wanted to put as much space between himself an that terrible lurking presence he felt in that hallway out from the Plotting Room. James shivered involuntarily and lengthened his strides, his footsteps echoing dully on the stair. He did not know what had caused such a horrible, chilling terror to rear inside him, but he had the surmise that anything boded by an unseen looming terror would not be at all favourable.
Rather sooner than he had expected (they were lengthy strides nonetheless) he had arrived at the topmost stair of the staircase which lead down into the main entrance hallway of the ancient house. James let his hands flop limply to his sides and his eyes expand and gawk at what he was seeing.
The whole of the bottom level of the house was bustling with hurried frenzied movement, shouts and activity. By the dim orange flickering light of the sparse oil lanterns upon the shabby walls, he watched agape as dozens of people rushed past in groups, hefting heavy loads of what looked like wooden crates before the front doorway, which was already obscured by piled up crates, smaller cardboard boxes and, what looked to James, an array of weird-looking spy-like equipment .
Many more people yelled, ordered and argued in the shadows and the rooms beyond, their voices meshing up together to create a frenzied din which James did not understand how he could not have heard before. More of the wizards flicked in and out of the insubstantial globs of light cast by the oil lanterns, all looking harassed and anxious, their faces puckered up and foreheads pinched in worry. There was a jerky taut air of nervous worry.
James stood there at the crest of the stairs, feeling confused and obsolete. Why was everyone on such a rush? Should he be helping? Presently, Granger and Don appeared at James' side, breathing deeply at having run after him. James shot a quick glance at them and concluded straight-away that they already knew of the covert midnight operation…whatever it was. Their faces appeared neither shocked or frightened by the jumpy atmosphere and their eye-brow remained at a neural altitude, unlike his which were so far up he felt pop-eyed. So they already knew of this.
"So," said James, in somewhat accusatory tones. "Want to let me in on this lil' midnight-foray, eh?"
Don grinned at him. "Still got some of that bravado left?"
Ooo000oooooooooo
Lily rose to her feet, like Harry taking care not to tread on the grave. She felt she would have a knotted feeling that she was stepping upon her mother if she did. Harry's sudden kindness had elevated any sort of attack she might have had, but she still felt agitated and clammy. She kept shaking her hands out before her like she was trying to shake off water. "What questions do you want to know?" This was a highly inappropriate time to have an interrogation session, but if Harry was anything like James, she knew he would not budge even an inch towards her sister's house unless he got his way.
"Snape!" Harry suddenly exploded. He shot to his feet and started feverishly pacing before her. "What on earth did you mean: "He's my half-brother."? Snape? and then you just leave it at that? I mean, why? How? I don't…Snape? You can't be serious. No, you're mistaking him for someone else. Snape?" He stopped abruptly and faced her, his arms folded derisively. She could only partly see his face from the very faint glow of the way-off highway streetlights, but his face (which differed slightly from James' the more you looked at it) had taken on a scalding expression she could never see James achieving.
She bowed her head slightly and drew her cloak more tightly around herself. Then, she unearthed the words from deep inside her. They hollowed her out as they rose and she felt more hot tears prick her eyes.
"I guess I owe it to you to tell you the truth. I mean, my future self has obviously not had enough guts to tell you so you'd be better off hearing it from someone who will disappear soon anyway…," She took a steadying breath, keeping her eyes fixed on the wet grass below her, unable to look Harry in the eyes. "Snape...or Peruses (as is his actual name) is my half-brother. My father was never home. He had a high-flying job that would have demanded a lot of attention, but his absences exceeded normal workaholic's schedules by a staggering amount, so my mother began to wonder..," The tear slid across her eyes, threatening to fall. " She hired an investigator. He did some background checks on my father. It turned out that there was no existing record of him before he turned 19. No birth certificates, no primary enrolment forms, nothing. It was like he just popped out of the ground one day. The investigator could find nothing of his parents either. My father always said they died when he was younger and were buried in his home town which he said was near Cambridge. The investigator snooped around the cemetery there. He found nothing. He also found no trace of the aunt who allegedly took Dad in after they died. She didn't exist. So Mum decided to have Dad followed. That's when…," They rolled down her face, and down the slope of her chin and under her neck. One after another. A deluge of tears. "She found out about his other life. His other family. He had lied to us. All our lives. Lied to them as well. My mother handled it all so admirably. She cut up my father's expensive business suits, dumped all of his possessions on the footpath, and cut his face out from every photo in our house. All while he was on one of his 'business trips'. Then we moved. Back to where Mum grew up, Surrey. I was eleven." she brought her hands over her anguished face and tears leaked out between her fingers.
Harry stayed silent. He did not know what to do in an emotional uphaul like this. Awkward pats on the back and mumbled words of comfort would fall away meekly. So he sensibly stayed silent. Lily continued from her behind her hands, her voice a plaintive wail of despair. Unfortunately, Harry could now only understand half on what she was saying.
"We n'va saw him arfa that. O'ly once or twice a yea. We harda (- here, her muffled sobs reached a wretched crescendo which blotted out all coherency in her voice-) ….an th'n I saw him at the sation. Seein Perseus off, no dowt. I saw him. An' he look'd at me. And I juss start'd screamin'! I screamed and I screamed and screamed. About how he juss lef us! About how he nva contact'd us! About wot he di ta Mum…ta our family…ta me." She thankfully lifted her hands from her face and Harry saw it was torn with pain. "Harry, I need to talk to Petunia." she sobbed. " I don't know how that will help, but it has to do something. That station incident was the reason I'm here right now. I felt terrible for it because…because he died 2 months later. They were the last things I ever said to him. Harry, please help me."
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"Well, you know about the Horcruxes, don't you?" asked Granger as they stood above all the frenzied chaos and yelling and bustling.
"What?" squawked James. This was really all too much. Perhaps he could just slink back upstairs to his doona bed and pretend this was all a highly coloured and convincing dream. "Uh, I've heard you all vaguely speak of them. Some sort of of reunion has to go on between them all achieve sort of enlightened peace…I don't know. I tuned out, There was an interesting bug on the wall."
"Be serious! Well, I don't have time to take you through it now, but… yeah I guess that a fairly terrible yet withstand-able synopsis. We think we've located the final one (-Don grunted at the word 'we'. Granger frowned.) "Oh, ok then. Harry found the final one. But the only problem is, it's situated in a rather tricky place."
"Do tell of it's tricky-ness."
"Be serious! It it's self is actually in a iron-bolted chest. But that chest was stolen years ago from your-…I mean, someplace. By someone who was of the Dark side. And now, the Dark side are guarding it most heavily. So, we've prepared all of this to have some sort of faint, distant chance of stealing it back and putting a halt on Voldemort's (-oh, get a life Ron-) reign of…," she searched for an appropriate word.
"Terror?" supplied Don helpfully.
"Thank-you. Yes, terror. That's certainly what it is since he secured that bunker thing."
James stared as a bunch of wizards lugged another crate over to the huge pile before them, sprinting off as soon as they had dumped it, presumably to fetch for another one. "You mean to tell me," he said slowly, "that this is the organisational basis of a full-scale attack on those styling themselves collectively as "The Dark Side" ?"
Granger and Don nodded as Sirius and Moony tramped down the stairs behind them, looking put-out and irritable.
Suddenly James discovered his bravado had well and truly shot off. He felt cold and way in over his head, an unwelcome feeling which flourished horribly as an unwelcome person plodded out of the darkness and up the stairs, saluted formally, and seized James by the hand, dragging him off into the dark drawing room.
"Ok! Ok, ease up there Zeichy!" said James. People wound around them in the darkness, holding armfuls of maps or even more boxes of varying sizes. Zeichman plonked James down in an armchair (-which he vaguely registered as being of the same set of the one he had reclined on in the Plotting Room-), lit the closest oil lamp with his wand, and then stood stock still, hands clasped together, as if waiting for James to do something. "Erm…I say, what are you doing?" asked James irritably. He was sick of people acting oddly and secretly. At first, it was a great novelty to snigger at them inwardly, but now that novelty had worn thin, he was back to being heartily sick of the whole thing. James, as we know, had a terribly short attention span and when it comes to espionage, he was no different.
"I'm awaiting your order," murmured Zeichman, his posture rigidly erect, the oil lantern's light reflecting off his aviators and the gold buttons upon his cuffed solum blazer, his corded arms folded afore him as a butler.
"Oh, good." said James happily. "I really don't mind. Bring me anything. I'm hungry as hell. I think perhaps someone brought Evans food during the night, but she's taken off to Merlin-knows-where now, leaving us an empty plate. Charming girl. Oh, and some Butterbeer would be nice, if it's not too much trouble," he reclined back in the comfortable armchair. So this was all Harry had to do? And people called him a hero. Well, being a hero's rather easy, thought James. Who knows, if I order something else perhaps I'll get a medal.
Zeichman had laughed mechanically at James' answer but stopped abruptly. He placed a bare arm either side of the armrests on James' chair and brought his tight, hardened face right up close to James'. "Listen, Potter. This is getting deep. You're getting in deep, kid. I want this clear. We are taking a risk backing you! You might be wrong about the Chest, I don't know, but if we stuff up, it'll be loaded heavily upon your scrawny little shoulders. You got that?" he growled in a rumbling voice.
"I have got it. It is well and truly here and I think it's swell. Thanks for it." James said coldly as he slid himself past Zeichman and out of the chair. He crossed his arms as Zeichman turned around. He hoped to look imposing and important, but Zeichman was rather taller, broader and had his bared arms were folded too and unimpeded (also they were a unsettling hands-grasp away from James). After Grangers pincers, James was never going to view hands the same way again. "Mr. Zeichman, do you have a family?" asked James innocently. It had the effect he desired.
Zeichman's brow deepened beneath his aviators and he straightened his already impossibly straight posture. "No. " he finally said. "They were all killed by the dark side." he injected no feeling or emotion into this sentence whatsoever.
"So, who are you fighting for, then" asked James.
"I'm fighting for the better good, Potter." he replied evenly. "Who are you fighting for?"
"My parents." retorted James promptly.
Zeichman grunted. "Voldemort has secured the use of the Icia's underground station, all her guards, footmen, armies, and basically anything else the vacuous fool has bought her way into. Even her Reapers. We need order from you now, Potter. Put that strategic head up to a challenge," he gave James a curt nod and walked over to a desk strewn with maps and complicated diagrams. "Or you parent's will be even more dead than they are now."
Oooo0000000ooooo
Harry inhaled deeply. He brought up a fist to knock upon the rippled glass panel of the front door. He paused and shot a glance at Lily. "Sure you want to do this?" he asked. Clearly, Harry was not learning his lessons when it came to his mother. Had he known her better, he would have surely foreseen the answer to this question.
"Of course not!" whispered Lily crossly. She stretched out a hand and rapped clearly upon the door. Harry hadn't known better, which is why is face fell and he braced himself as he heard bare feet upon the parquet floor beyond the door and the lock unlatch.
Aunt Petunia stood there, in her familiar white cotton nightdress, her blonde hair scraped severely back into a tight bun. "You!" she shrieked upon seeing Harry on the doorstep. "I though we were shot of you! I was going to give your things to that wretched owl of yours that keeps appearing, but I-," her speech stuttered to a halt. Her narrow keen eyes had spotted Lily lurking behind Harry. Her face scrunched horribly up. Her mouth sagged. And she staggered forwards with a cry into Harry, who caught his aunt by the upper arms, heaved her up onto her feet, and steered her into the house and into one of the Dursley's comfortable living room recliners. Aunt Petunia sagged in her chair, her eyes closed, making odd burbling sounds with her slack lips.
"She's in shock," stated Harry knowledgably. Lily glanced around her sister's home. It was large and absurdly tidy: plastic upon the lounge chairs, spotless tabletops, shining parquet floors and many strange hi-tech appliances Lily hadn't seen before, but which looked terribly expensive. The house was dark, but for the loungeroom's bright overhead light. She had the feeling there were others upstairs, asleep-
"Well, Petunia's done well for herself." said Lily mildly, observing a video recorder.
"You wouldn't say that if you met the guy who makes it well," said Harry darkly. "Why do you want to talk to her?"
"She's the only family I have left. I need to find out what's happened, and if she knows anything about how I might get back. It's a long shot, but stranger things have happened." She spotted a box full of objects near her feet and bent forward to inspect.
"She's still out of it," said Harry. "And I don't fancy waking up Uncle Vernon to try to get answers out of him…Brr., it's suddenly really cold! Hey, what are you doing?"
For amidst the pile of old school books, jumble of clothes and other things Aunt Petunia had been meaning to give back to Harry, Lily had spied a photo album bound in shiny red leather. She had flipped it open at random to reveal a photo of her own wedding day. There she was, smiling out with a beam of pure unlevelled joy, her white gown glowing in the garish overhead light. And James, his arm wrapped protectively around her waist, looking stately and handsome, his crooked grin of unbridled happiness bounding across his face. "Wow." she whispered softly. "Is that really us?" Harry nodded, but did not speak. Lily gazed back down at the photo, her eyes misted over. "We look so happy…,"
"Yeah, you do," said Harry in a odd voice.
But at that moment, an ear-splitting shattering of glass exploded behind them, and sharp shards hailed down upon their heads. Lily threw her hands over her head as she screamed, Harry grabbing her roughly and pulling her to the ground. She heard someone hurl through the broken window behind them and land just before them.
Slowly, her heart beating a panic-stricken tattoo in her chest, she looked up, her breath all of a sudden fogging up before her. What she saw made her blood freeze over. It was a figure, human in shape though 8 feet tall. It was swathed in a black tattered overcoat, which seemed to suck in the darkness around them. A length of blood-red ribbon criss-crossed it's middle, and lined the sleek black top-hat it wore pulled over it's face. Harry shifted and tried to get to his feet, but the thing suddenly lashed out a pale white arm into the folds of it's coat and unsheathed a great sickle with terrifying agility. The sickle was as tall as the Thing and it's blade shone with a dazzling intensity that was not from the garish overhead, which was spluttering and blinking, throwing an insubstantial flashing light upon the horrid scene .
It placed the curved blade directly under Harry's chin. "I'll be taking her, and leaving. Do not pursue me, wizard." The Things spoke in chilling tones, which froze to Lily's core and made her bones ache. It swirled a dashing cape around itself from nowhere, and was suddenly nowhere to be seen. The room returned to it's normal temperature. The overhead stopped spluttering and returned to full power. Harry got gingerly to his feet, helping Lily up with him. "What…what was that thing?" she asked in a petrified voice even below a whisper. Harry let go of Lilly and started forward.
Then he turned a round with a horrified face that made Lily suddenly feel ill. "Whatever it was, it's taken your sister."
Oh, the suspense! Bhaha! Well, i must put forward my pledge again incase you've forgotton: show me reviews or i shall become downhearted and stop the fic and concertrate on school work (EEWWW! eurgh, i'm not liking this!) So, review for bum's sake! Oh, has anyone seen Brokeback Mountain? I saw it tonight and utterly adored it! Till next time (it's up to you and your review skills if there is a next time! oooh, big threat.) tooodles! xoxoxox