Disclaimer: HP & Co. are property of JK Rowling N Cash, Inc.
THANKS FOR THE REVIEWS! Keep 'em coming, and I'll keep the chappies coming. I am particularly intrigued by SACHA, who submitted a review in German. I had babelfish translate, with some success, but I am sorry to say that I do not actually speak/read any German. Now French I could probably handle, maybe even a little Italian. . . Anyhoo, on with the show.
Chapter 23: Day 11, Part I: Into the Wastelands
The next morning was pandemonium in the Gryffindor tower, as it was in most of the school. The boys in particular had failed to thoroughly pack the night before and were now doing so at the last moment. Many of the youngest years were crying for fear of leaving the safety of Hogwarts, and for fear that they and their friends may not all live to see each other again. The seventh years who had opted to decamp with Dumbledore did not make matters any better with their rowdy war cries and excited posturing. Harry was particularly aggravated by their behaviour: they were really acting like idiots, and hadn't a clue as to the true, and atrocious, nature of war. Surely it wouldn't be very long before someone they knew and cared for died, then their laughter would be silenced, maybe permanently.
"You look just like two ogres. What's with the Snape-scowling?" Ron asked, dragging his trunk into the common room.
Hermione nodded towards two seventh years, Darva and Will, that were pretending to punch and kick one another. "Boys are the same everywhere. They all glorify fighting, until the day that they are actually in a fight."
Her words reflected Harry's own thoughts quite accurately, but Ron just rolled his eyes. "Whatever, 'Mione. You wish as much as me that we weren't leaving Harry."
Harry met the redhead's eyes and they exchanged a sad smile. "It'll be alright, mate," Ron continued, trying to sound confident. "There isn't anyone better qualified to get rid of You-Know-Who than you. I bet some of my brothers have signed up, so you'll have good people watching your back. We'll be seventeen, and back beside you, before you even know it."
Harry tried to smile again, but it was too hard; the last thing he wanted was for his friends to be fighting, and possibly dying, beside him. Impulsively, he threw his arms around Ron and hugged him tightly. "Thank you," he choked out. "You've been a good friend, Ron. . . the best."
They drew away, both trying (successfully) to maintain their manliness by not crying. "It's not good-bye, mate. Just. . . see you later."
At that moment, Professor McGonagall strode in, and began ushering the departing students out of the Gryffindor common room. Harry quickly turned to Hermione, who didn't hesitate to throw her arms around him. "Oh, Harry! Please be careful! Don't go doing anything foolhardy, and getting yourself hurt! Or worse!"
Hermione squeezed him, and Harry returned the pressure. "I won't. You take care of yourself too, and Ron as well if you can."
Finally, Hermione drew away, the only one of the Golden Trio freely able to sport tears in her eyes. "I'll figure some way to help, even from the sidelines. Dumbledore left some books on my bed that might be of use."
Harry smiled at Hermione's display of typical behaviour. "If anyone can find an answer in a book, it's you."
Now McGonagall was ushering out the fifth and sixth years, who were calling out farewells to Harry, and wishes of good luck – and good hunting. "Kill a death eater for me!" Seamus exclaimed, waving as he hauled his trunk through the door.
"You can do it, Harry!" Ginny cried out as she bustled after Dean.
Then was hardly anyone left in the common room, and it was time for Hermione and Ron to follow their housemates. Hermione was openly crying at this point.
"Goodbye," she whispered, before turning and walking away with a determined stride.
"Later, Harry," Ron said casually, but the weight of the moment could not be reduced by flippancy. Reluctantly, he too turned and departed, leaving Harry alone with a handful of now solemn seventh years.
"Goodbye," he mouthed silently.
! BREAK !
Shortly after, all the remaining students had gathered, with their trunks, in the Great Hall. Harry quickly scoped out who was staying – five adults (Dumbledore, Hagrid, Pomfrey, McGonagall, and Hooch), eight Gryffindors (excluding himself), five Ravenclaws (including Cho, he noted with some interest), four Hufflepuffs, and a whopping sixteen Slytherins. Despite having just yesterday been in conference with all but four of the Slytherins, Harry was still impressed that so many had actually chosen to fight beside Dumbledore, and rather concerned to note that the four he had not seen in Snape's quarters were almost certainly fifth years.
Of course, the seventeen members of the other three houses were rather shocked and appalled to discover that Slytherin was making up nearly half of the total number of students that were not returning home. Indeed, many were glaring angrily and suspiciously at them, and whispering noisily and snidely that they certainly did not believe the snakes trustworthy in the least. The block of Slytherins, on the other hand, stood stiff and silent, eyes and ears taking in everything, as though they were already soldiers; Bulstrode in particular appeared ready to kill someone with her bare hands. Meanwhile, Dumbledore was conversing with the teachers instead of addressing the dissention that was rapidly growing amongst his recruits. Surely he was aware of what was going on, why wasn't he intervening?
"Shut up!" Harry found himself demanding crossly, and loudly, and everyone's attentions instantly turned to him. Harry was surprised that he had said anything at all, but was too pissed not to continue now. "I don't want to hear any more public slander against fellow students! All it does is create problems! The Slytherins have better reasons to be here than most of you lot! And they have no where else to go! The moment they leave Dumbledore's protection, betrayal or not, Voldemort will kill them!"
The Slytherins remained impassive, but Harry could sense their approval – and Dumbledore's as well. After all, if he was going to be a leader, he would have to lead. Most of the other students looked somewhat cowed by the telling-off, but of course one ballsy Gryffindor just had to comment. "And what if one of them is a spy?" he asked, with blatant disrespect.
Harry could barely believe the seventh year's gall; he had to be stupid to get on his bad side on the eve of war against Voldemort. He fumbled for a response, but Draco beat him to it, "Then that person will be executed, and the same is true if one of you is a spy. The punishment for treason or espionage during wartime is death by the Killing Curse. Torture is not condoned, but can be arranged in order to determine what has been leaked, and any other information that might prove useful."
His cool, matter-of-fact delivery left no doubt that, if necessary, he would be willing to conduct the torture and execution. Actually, it was a little disturbing, and the only ones not alarmed by his words appeared to be his fellow housemates. Even Dumbledore felt it was time to interrupt, "Hopefully it will not come to that. Torture would make us little better than Death Eaters, but Mr. Malfoy is right, the penalty for treason or espionage during times of war is death. Mr. Potter is also right, the Slytherins have good reasons for being here and I would not have let them stay if they had not. I would encourage tolerance, if not acceptance, as discord within the ranks can only hurt our common cause."
The old headmaster paused, looking at his students as though peering straight into their souls. "As of this morning, you are no longer my students. You are recruits of the Order of the Phoenix, in allegiance with the Ministry of Magic and their small army of Aurors. Once you have passed through training, you will be considered soldiers of the Order of the Phoenix, and be expected to fight loyally beside one another, and to die if necessary. If you haven't the stomach for these responsibilities, then it is still not too late to change your mind – though you are unlikely to find much better in the civilian realm. However, if you depart today with myself and the other professors, you will be taken to a military camp, and any attempt to leave without explicit orders or permission will be considered desertion and be treated as possible treason. If any do not feel that they are up for what is to follow, now is the time to speak."
There was a long, uneasy pause in which the Hogwarts students eyed one other curiously and warily, as if to weed out any individual too weak for war.
Not a single student spoke up, and Dumbledore looked pleased. "Very well, recruits. Your first assignment is to abandon your trunks. They will not be needed where we are going. You are permitted to bring three items of personal value, in addition to your wand and the robes you are wearing. Provisions will be supplied upon arrival at camp."
There was some minor groaning from one or two of the recruits, but most took to the assignment in stride: they knew they were to be soldiers, warriors, and none had been fool enough to expect pampering.
Harry barely needed to consider what he wanted to bring. He opened his trunk and dug out his invisibility cloak, the scrapbook containing pictures of his parents, and the two way mirrors given to him by Sirius (which he had never used, but cherished nonetheless). Stuffing them into his school satchel, he looked up to see that everyone was taking substantially longer to deliberate over which items they should bring – except for Draco, who stood tightly gripping only one personal affect: an ornate dagger. Harry frowned, vaguely recalling an alternate universe in which the blonde had used a ceremonial dagger to stab his father dozens of times. Was this one and the same?
Draco caught Harry staring, and their eyes never parted as the former slipped the dagger into his robes. Then the Slytherin grinned mischievously, and Harry smiled back weakly, torn between the thrilling way Draco's face had lit up, and his general freakiness. Harry just didn't feel entirely comfortable fancying someone so obviously disturbed. And if not disturbed, well. . . Harry was a poor student of psychology, and had some difficulty understanding Draco's sometimes oscillating and often antagonistic behaviour – not that his libido or his emotions seemed to depend on any understanding at all.
Shortly thereafter, the recruits were ordered into five groups of six or seven, which inconveniently required two Slytherins form a group with recruits from the other houses. Reluctance was obvious all around, so Draco took the lead.
"Come on, Pansy," he stated, nodding away from where she was trying to be the eighth member of one of the all-Slytherin groups. Pansy scowled at her selection, but couldn't be surprised – with Vincent and Greg gone to join the Death Eaters, she was now his strongest supporter and closest friend. So she followed him as he moved towards the other groups, where two Hufflepuffs had failed to make it into one of the non-Slytherin groups. Harry was pleased, and instantly gave up his spot in the group that had magnetically materialized around him. Cho followed him (he didn't even want to think about the implications of that!), they picked up the two free-floating Hufflepuffs, and they gathered around the Draco and Pansy.
Harry couldn't restrain the giddy smile that broke out on his face, however bizarre it must have appeared to everyone else. Draco, of course, was his usual unpleasant self and sneered, "Merlin, Potter, flash that shit-eating grin at the Dark Lord and you won't even need the Killing Curse."
Harry's expression quickly mutated into a hurt scowl, and Draco felt a little ashamed of what he had sorta intended as a greeting. He wasn't even sure himself why he was always such an asshole; it just felt, well, safe, and by now, natural. The matter was just made worse when Cho added her two cents. "Merlin, Malfoy," she imitated in a whiny voice, "show your ferret face on the battlefield and the Death Eaters might be incapacitated with laughter."
This time Draco's trademark sneer was replaced with a genuinely malicious glare, and he said the nastiest thing that came to mind. "Shut up, Chang, you dripping cunt. Suck Potter's dick on your own time, no one here wants to witness it."
Things were rapidly escalating out of control and only Pansy appeared amused; even Harry was offended by the Slytherin's words. "Stop it," he said calmly, but forcefully. "We're trying to get along here. If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."
Draco's lip curled in contempt. "How quaint. I think I preferred it when we weren't trying to get along." Fuck, it was as if he was helpless to stop the river of poison that spewed from him mouth! Was he trying to make Potter hate him!
Harry rolled his eyes, but he was growing both exasperated and irritated. What a bloody git. "Just ignore him," he suggested to Cho and the Hufflepuffs, but even his own mind retorted: yeah, right.
Draco hated the idea of being ignored, which is arguably one of the reasons he was always such an unbearable arsehole. Still, he bit his lip and forced himself not to care. What did it matter to him what a bunch of Gyffindorks and Hufflepoofs thought of him? He was here to kill him some Death Eaters and be free of his father's allegiances.
Pansy leaned closer and whispered, "Why don't we just ignore them? We can be, like, an independent squadron or something."
Draco turned to look at the smirking Pansy, brooding thoughts vanishing. Actually, it wasn't a half bad idea, especially considering that the Slytherins would be more willing to choose from a much wider and more dangerous selection of curses, hexes, potions, and magical weaponry. Taking the idea and running with it, Draco's own smirk gradually mirrored his housemate's.
"Pans," he said smugly, not even trying to whisper. "We're going to make a great team." She was certainly smarter and more intuitive than blasted Crabbe and Goyle, not to mention more attractive. It did sting a little to lose his childhood, and virtually lifelong, companions – but they were submerged too deeply in Death Eater culture, and without the personal fortitude and strength of character to escape as Draco was attempting to do. If there was one thing Draco had in spades, it was character.
Harry watched the exchange between Draco and Pansy with some jealousy, telling himself that he had no right to feel hurt that it wasn't him who Draco considered part of his team; that the whole Quaero Tempus affair did not entitle him to any sort of relationship with the fine Slytherin. He was relieved when his own brooding was cut off by the arrival of Madam Hooch, who was carrying what appeared to be a shoddy, unstrung squash racket.
"Recruits!" Hooch barked, doing an excellent impersonation of a drill sergeant. "This portkey will take us to the camp, and your new home, so put away your animosity long enough to gather around and take a hold on this muggle contraption."
Everyone grabbed the racket rim, Draco and Harry's gaze meeting and burning intensely, then they were all felt the pull on their navel that heaved them nauseatingly up through a magical vortex that literally dropped them –
Harry glanced around quickly. The other groups had also been transported, and all the recruits were looking a their surroundings. It was ridiculously, unimaginably cold, and flat, snowy ice stretched in frozen waves for as far as the eye could see, desolate and uninterrupted except for dozens of tiny tents and a handful of large tents that were barely discernable from their surroundings. A strong shiver racked Harry's body, and he caught sight of Pansy and Draco casting heating spells on one another. A profound feeling on loneliness swelled suddenly in his lungs: his friends were far away, and his only classmates in this austere land were a bunch of Slytherins that likely hated his guts.
Harry pulled out his wand and cast a heating spell on his clothes, then followed the professors and the recruits towards the collection of tents. At the perimeter, Dumbledore stopped and was met by a young man dressed in full-length, off-white wool robes; indeed, now that Harry was looking more closely, a few other, similarly dressed individuals could be seen standing guard around the perimeter of the encampment. After exchanging a few words with the centurion, Dumbledore turned to his former students. "Stand in single file to pick up your tents and provisions. You will then set up your tent within the boundary of the camp, and change into your uniform. At 1200 hours, report to the mess tent, which is that large one over there." He pointed to the pavilion in the centre of the encampment. "You will get further orders then."
Dumbledore turned to leave, and the recruits began filing past the centurion. Once in the perimeter, Harry watched closely to see how the ex-Hogwarts students were segregating themselves; and sure enough, the Gryffindor seventh years (with whom Harry was not very close) all found spots near each other, with the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs forming mini-groups nearby. The Slytherins, on the other hand, continued to walk through the camp, clearly scoping out potential locations. Eventually they selected an isolated area near the perimeter, which would give them plenty of privacy to conduct whatever nefarious activities they so wished. While Harry felt a little guilty for doubting them, it was not enough to counteract his suspicious curiosity. He certainly wasn't going to let that group of shady characters hide themselves in some hole, only to pop out at the worst time imaginable and lay waste to everyone else's well laid plans.
Reluctantly (and a little apprehensive of his own motives and reasoning), Harry strategically chose a spot sufficiently near the Slytherin group to keep an eye on them, and yet far enough away not to be blatantly intrusive. Still, Clairdon and Zabini glared at him as he set up his tent.
The tents were tiny. They had been magically enhanced so that the insides were slightly larger, but it certainly wasn't anything to write home about. Harry could barely stand within the tent's confines, and there was only room for a cot (resting on top of two shelves) and a small desk with a dim lamp. The outside was as white as snow, but the inside was a gloomy grey; the only good news was the thorough heating. Harry sighed, bending over to stuff his satchel into one of the shelves, then began to inspect the kit be had been provided with – toothbrush and paste, a comb, everlast deodorant, a watch, fours pairs of white underwear and socks, two pairs of thick white water-resistant pants, two thick white cotton shirts, one pair of heavy-duty boots, and one very thick white robe with a hood. There was no mirror, but once he was changed, Harry figured that he almost certainly looked like a snowman. At least the hood hid his unruly hair.
At noon, all the recruits had congregated in the mess tent, where most were unnerved to find Alastor Moody eying them with contempt. "I don't think I've ever seen a more sorry group of recruits!" he barked. "Some of you can't be more than fourteen!"
Sadly enough, it was almost true: four of the Slytherins were only fifteen, and they looked particularly small in their heavy wool robes. "Never matter. This here is Camp C, which was set up three days ago to accommodate the influx of volunteers prompted by the attack on Hogwarts. There are thirty two other recruits who are at the practice range right now, but will be joining us shortly. Auror Mackin and myself are your drill sergeants. You will follow our orders, or be expelled from this camp to find your own way back to civilization. Is that clear?"
A spatter of pathetic affirmatives sounded, which clearly displeased the creepy Auror. "When you are asked a question, you are expected to answer. In this case, the appropriate response is, 'Yes, sir' or 'No, sir'. Is that understood?"
This time there was a chorus of "Yes, sir!" and Moody nodded gruffly. "Then you may eat! I suggest you do so hardily, for you will need the energy."
! END OF CHAPTER !
PLEASE REVIEW. What do you think? I know I am going slow, with lots of detail. Is it too slow and too much detail? Should I hurry the plot along? Are you bored? I'm hoping that the detail will compensate for outlandish plot jumps: am I succeeding? Whatever your opinions, the next chapter is almost completed, and should be up shortly!
