Harry thought he knew where to go from there. It was a terrible choice, the one he'd been given, but not a very difficult one when it came down to it. The Dursley's hadn't done shit for raising him but his friends, his mentors, his family had instilled a set of morals not so easily broken by backstabbing wizards and a literal Nazi. He would choose what was right over what was easy. Always. And he was prepared for the consequences that would come after.
But then the wizards came.
It was before his first meal, the night guard was only just switching out with their relief when an entire contingent of the magic users stepped through the fireplace. Aurors and unspeakables and the team of representatives Strucker had been working so closely with marched through the halls, men on a mission. They came to Harry's cell and when the guards blocked their entrance, Robards was there with an unforgivable for each and a command to follow.
"Open the cell, then make sure we are not interrupted."
With serene expressions they did as ordered, a swipe of the keycard unlocked the cell then they took up posts along the corridor, guns poised and backs to the wizards.
When they entered, Harry was still seated, legs folded to his chest, arms rested on his knees, and chin settled atop it all. It was like before, in the barn, when they'd come to take him back, take him here, only this time he wasn't afraid.
"You're here to kill me."
Diggory looked grim, Robards mean, and the rest uneasy.
"We aren't-"
Harry cut off Cedric's father before his words could fully form. "That wasn't a question. You've taken everything you could from me, you've used me and bled me dry and now you've come to dispose of me. Who'll be the one to do it?"
"I will."
Despite himself, Harry smiled. "You, Auror Robards? I guess I can't say I'm surprised. You've treated this all so personally."
The greying Auror grimaced. "None of us are getting any satisfaction from this. Not even me," he said. "Even with all the destruction you've caused, you're still only a boy."
"And you did much to stop the dark lord," a lovely witch with an accent as thick as Fleur's stepped up to Robards' side. "We haven't forgotten that."
"So as thanks you'll offer me a quick death."
"A dignified one." Robards countered. "You think we've bled you dry? These muggles won't be done with you until you've given every bit of blood, flesh, and bone to their cause. You've nearly destroyed our world with your carelessness, but without the magic you've given we wouldn't have a chance to rebuild. We're thanking you by giving you a painless way out."
Harry's smile grew wider and wider and he laughed. It felt ugly and cruel and the wizards flinched away from him. "You haven't done anything," his voice was tinged with a hysterical sort of frustration, because they never learned. "There's no rebuilding. I've told you before you're done. Your world, your people are finished, and everything you do from here on is only making it worse."
He wanted to carry on, to rage and scream at these men who were fools, because at one point he had wanted them to succeed, he would have given his life willingly to stop the destruction of his world. But in taking the choice from him they'd damned themselves, he couldn't help them. More than that, he didn't want to.
But before he could spit his rage at the wizards, Strucker arrived, with twice the guards and an anger as ugly as Harry's twisting his face. The rattle of gunfire started up in the halls as the imperiused muggles followed their orders. The aurors at the back raised shields for when their guard inevitably fell, they wouldn't hold for long, but it would buy Robards the time he needed.
He drew his wand, a frown cut deep into his face but his hand didn't shake.
"How will you do it?" Harry stared the Auror dead in his pale eyes. Tension wound knots in his stomach but he still couldn't find the fear that should be there when facing the end of a wand. Death had said he couldn't die, and he didn't doubt him, but if he proved to be wrong…well, that wouldn't be so awful. "An AK? What if it doesn't work?"
Robards swallowed thickly, and Harry found his first sign of uncertainty. "Will you stand?"
"Of course." Behind them, the last of the wizards' defending guards fell and Strucker's men moved forward, weapons now aimed at the shields barring them entrance. Harry rose and tucked his hands neatly behind his back.
Diggory cleared his throat, he looked heavy with guilt, but not doubt. "Would you…would you like to say anything?"
He didn't really, he was never one for dramatic gestures. But then he looked over their shoulders once more, at the muggle men working furiously to break through the shield and Strucker, who stood amidst them all, so still but furious in a way Harry had never seen. This was not something he would forgive. "I hope," he said softly, "for your sake, that this works."
There was a sound like lightning impacting the ground and the shield crumbled, but it was already too late, Strucker rushed into the room and a familiar green light washed over Harry.
"What have you done?"
None of the wizards paid the furious muggle a glance, they were been consumed by the sight of Potter and how still he was. They'd spoken of this in depth, discussed and debated if it truly was the best course, but the fact that they planned to kill the Boy-Who-Lived didn't seem like a reality until it was actually done.
Months of captivity in this underground facility had left him all pale skin and bird bones, his body had barely made a sound when it hit the ground.
"This was a matter we agreed merited further discussion."
Robards was the first to recover, he hadn't worked closely with Strucker but he did not like his tone. "It was. And it was decided that putting the boy down was our safest option."
"Do you realize what you have wasted? He could have been of so much more use."
"Yes," Moreau agreed, never one to be outdone. "But you have your mages, and they will be just as useful."
"Not nearly." Strucker ran a hand over his head, this was the least composed they'd ever seen him. "We are meant to be allies. Equals. That requires a certain degree of trust between us, but you've broken that trust and spat in my face while you did it."
Moreau was unfazed. "Trust can be earned again. This needed to be done and you were not ready to see that."
"Leave. Do not return until you are called."
They could have argued, for the principal of it really, this muggle had no right ordering them about. But their work was done, and they would all benefit from some space, so they did. Robards flicked his wand, levitating Potter's body for transport.
"Leave him." Strucker demanded. "There are tests we need to run, then he will be disposed of."
Diggory shook his head, ready to protest. "That's not-"
"Earn my trust." The words were more snarl than human inflection. "Leave him."
Moreau made the choice for them, they had no use for the body, perhaps conceding to this simple demand would appease the muggle somewhat. "We'll await your call, Baron Strucker."
The body was lowered on his cot and the wizards left, escorted by a good dozen of his guards, just to make sure they didn't get any further ideas.
"This is unfortunate," List said, kneeling at the boy's side to check his vitals and confirm that, yes, he truly was dead. "We had such plans for him."
"We should have killed them once we had our last mage. It was arrogant of me to keep them around any longer." Strucker heaved an enormous sigh. "There's nothing to be done for it though, three forty-eight will have to be enough."
"What do you want done with the body?"
"Samples." Strucker hadn't argued for the boy's body because he had any real plans for it, it was the principal of the matter. "Whatever you can think to collect. And perhaps a final EEG, to see if all traces of his magic have gone upon death."
"And after?"
"We begin our work." Strucker turned, left the room without another look lest his fury rear its head in a way he might regret later. "They've lost their lead but the mages will need to be strong nonetheless, our time with the wizards is through and the split will be messy."
If he was being honest, part of Harry didn't expect Robards to cast the curse. It was murder, simple as that, and these notoriously light wizards had balked at such an act even when they were at war facing Death Eaters happy to eviscerate them without a thought. So when his wand lit that telltale green, and his lips formed the worst of the Unforgivables, Harry was mildly impressed. Not all wizards were the simpering cowards Fudge had been, and it was nice at times to be reminded of that.
A room of white didn't wait for him after. And a reaper didn't come to collect his soul. The curse hit, there was a moment of disorientation, then he was outside, with dirt between his bare toes, fresh air filling his lungs, and a sea of trees reaching higher than he could see. And in the shadow of two of the leviathans, stood Death.
"What a mess you've made, quark."
Harry didn't move from where he stood, not in a rush to do anything in case it broke the beautiful illusion and he found himself once again in that awful cell, but he at least turned so he faced the entity fully, and he offered him a smile.
"I hadn't ever thought I'd be happy to see you," he said. "Where were you? I called."
"Beyond your reach."
"You couldn't hear me? Was it because of the…." Harry touched his throat and found it free of the collar he'd grown used to. "They bound my magic, but how? They're muggles, mortals, and I'm supposed to be your equal."
"You should be," Death agreed. "But you weren't when they caught you. You spent so long suppressing my Heart, fearing it, that you denied the very thing that made you my equal. Without it, you're just another mortal. Easily bound, easily contained."
"But I wasn't." Harry thought grimly to the awful procedures he'd endured with Howard to force the magic of the Hallows to manifest. "I accepted them."
"Not in their entirety. You wanted their power so that you could separate them again. You didn't want to be my equal, you still don't."
He had nothing to say in response to that because it was true. "So will you reap my soul then? Take the Heart back?"
"I won't. I can't."
"But you said…"
"You aren't yet. But my Heart has already taken root within your magic, and no matter how much you tried to ignore it, tried to let the link between you and it atrophy, you would have eventually succumbed to its power."
"And now that I've lost all access to my magic?"
Death looked grudgingly impressed. "Whatever those mortals have done to dampen your magic has equally affected my Heart. It is from your magic that it draws its strength, without it it's progress is slowed significantly. But it is still an object of immeasurable power, it adapts and it grows stronger every day."
Harry perked up at that. "It would grow strong enough to negate the collar that's stopping me from accessing my magic?"
"It's the heart of the universe, even if just a fragment of it. No mortal is strong enough to bind it forever. Your world learned that well enough. As you are now, bound and weakened, it will be a few decades or so before you've reached full power."
Just like that, all the wind left his sails. "A few decades?" Of course that seemed like no time at all to an entity as ancient as death, but Harry hadn't even been alive a few decades. To have to wait that long in Strucker's hands, with all the horrible things the man had planned…it was unthinkable. He could certainly do it if there were no other option, he was immortal as far as he could tell, but what state would the world be in when he finally escaped? Would it even be one he wanted to continue to live within?
Death shrugged, entirely unperturbed. "My Heart was used up by the Mad Titan, destroyed until only a sliver of it remained, then it was fragmented into three even tinier pieces and separated for centuries, and now it is bound to a mortal who has no desire to use it to its potential and who has had nearly all access to his own innate power suppressed. It's only understandable it might be a bit slow in allowing you the full use of its power."
"And if I weren't?" Harry asked just a touch desperately.
"Weren't…what?"
"Bound? Weakened? How long would it be then?"
Death looked intrigued. "Not long at all. A few years. If even that. You have a way free from your restraints?"
Not free, but Strucker wanted him to lead his army. To fight for him and HYRDA. Harry had intended to refuse, to do everything in his power to keep the man from being able to even force him into fighting for him. But if he were to fight for him, Strucker would have to allow him some access to his magic. If he could suffer under his rule for a few years he could be free.
"It would not be so easy," Death said when he relayed the idea to him. "It would work, yes. With access to your magic my Heart would grow stronger much quicker, but you would not come out untouched.
"I have seen into that man's soul and he is wicked. He will unmake you, strip away all you believe in, all that you are until you are no longer the man who stands before me now. Is that something you're willing to sacrifice for your freedom?"
Harry wasn't entirely sure it was. He'd given up so much already, too much, and now he was expected to give up more? And for what? An eternity of loneliness? Of watching what few friends were still alive wither and die, watch his world crumble under the curse he unleashed and be chained to a deity who seemed indifferent to his existence most of their time together? It wasn't worth it.
"Kill me." He looked at Death, sure in his decision. "Take your Heart and reap my soul. You said the only way it might work was if we were both in agreement and you said there would never be a time you didn't want to take my soul. So do it."
"No."
Harry was stunned into total silence. Had he heard the being right? Had Death just said he wouldn't reap him or had he just heard wrong?
"We are no longer in agreement. I don't want your soul."
No, that was exactly what he had said.
"Are you…you're joking?"
"Between you and I, this is the most fun I've had in eons."
"This is a game to you." Harry was quickly getting over his shock and moving on to fully fledged anger. "I'm suffering miserably and all you can think of is how much fun you're having?"
"One day, when you're as old as I am, you'll look for amusement in whatever you can and you won't feel guilty about it."
Harry crossed the space between them and reached for Death, he was too deep in his anger at that moment to realize he'd never made such a move before, they'd shared contact before, but Harry had never been the one to initiate it, and never out of anger.
"Reap me."
Death smiled, or as close of an approximation of a smile the being was capable, full of sharp teeth and endless mirth. "No."
The landscape around them shifted, no, it rotted. Harry felt his anger burn bright and cold and the dirt beneath him churned with decay, the trees withered and curled into themselves, turning soft and white with rot, all the while Harry's gaze kept locked with Death's infinite black.
"Reap me."
"Look at you, quark. So powerful, so much potential." Something in his expression softened and Harry felt suddenly wrongfooted. "I won't, not because it amuses me but because I do not waste."
Harry's breath caught in his throat, maybe it was intentional, or maybe Death had no idea what he'd done, but his words were a direct repetition of Strucker's from just the night before and he did not like it.
"But more than that, it won't work. Once I said that it might, but the Heart is fond of you. Even now, weak as you are, you create such beautiful destruction, it won't be rid of you so easy. There will be no reaping because my Heart would never allow it."
"So I have no choice then. I'll suffer and there's nothing you'll do about it."
Harry almost flinched when Death folded a hand around the one Harry still had locked around his wrist. "No. You'll endure." The entity had never sounds so kind as he did now. "It feels like cruelty in this moment, but you will be all the better for my refusal. You are not meant to die, quark. You don't see it yet, you don't want to, but you were meant for things much greater.
"But first you will suffer, you'll be unmade, stripped down and cobbled back together into something not quite you. But you will be all the stronger for it."
"Please." Harry's anger had fled, leaving him desperately tired. "I just want to rest, I just want to see my friends, I just want to be happy again."
"One day. You will, I swear it and so much more, but first you must face these trial and you will overcome them."
Harry wanted to argue, to plead some more to just try, try and take the Heart, he would endure the pain if there was just a chance. But Death was set, and part of him knew he was only speaking the truth, begging for what he would never have would only lessen him in Death's eyes and prolong what was already sure to come. So he bowed his head, forced back his tears of frustration, and nodded.
"I will."
"You will what?"
"Overcome."
A cold hand touched his cheek. "Yes you will. Now quark," the hand slid higher until it rested above his eyes still screwed shit. "Let's begin."
Harry woke on a table, cold and metal, with the familiar bright white lights of the lab hanging above him and two aides and Strucker's second command hovering around him. He sucked a greedy breath into lungs that had been deprived off oxygen too long and the three around him fell away, going as pale as the entity he had just left behind.
Harry groped for his left arm where a dull but centralized pain was throbbing at the crook of his elbow, and found a syringe hanging unattended from a vein. They'd been collecting blood samples, and others from the look of the vials lined neatly on a tray beside him, before he'd woken from death and scared them halfway to it.
"Alert the Baron." Harry's head felt stuffed full with wool but he was coherent enough to hear List's strangled words and turned his head just in time to watch as one of the aides ran from the room and away from him.
A light shined into one eye, then another, then a finger pressed into the juncture of his throat, searching for the pulse Harry could feel rabbiting beneath the tight press of his collar.
"You were dead."
He blinked up at List, still trying to see around the spots dancing across his vision and offered him only a half formed smile in response. What was he supposed to say? And then Strucker was arriving, and all need to respond was forgotten.
"Doctor List?"
"He was dead. No neural activity, no pulse, no oxygen intake, the first of rigor was setting in." Well that explained why he felt so stiff. "He was dead. But he's not anymore."
"Could we have been mistaken? There are curses that can mimic death…"
"We saw the light, it was green, and he said the words; Avada Kedavra. We weren't mistaken."
Strucker moved closer until he stood directly over Harry, he was so close Harry had no choice but to make eye contact. "You've come back to us."
It took a moment for his vocal chords to cooperate, an after effect of the rigor List had mentioned, and his voice still croaked even when they did. "The Killing Curse never worked on me. It was my legacy, if you remember."
"So I've been told." A fascination Harry did not like lit Strucker's face. "Why is that, I wonder."
Harry tried to shrug, an awkward feat considering he was still prone. "A mother's love, I suppose."
"Doctor List, what do you see?" Strucker spoke to the man lingering a few steps behind him but didn't break eye contact with Harry.
"Nothing we haven't seen before. He's running cooler than normal, but everything is working as it should."
"Then this is a very fortunate turn of events." Strucker put a hand at the nape of Harry's neck and another at the small of his back and helped him to sit upright. "And how are we feeling, Harry?"
It was a misleading question. Strucker couldn't care less that Harry's bones weighed like cinderblocks, or that his heartbeat couldn't quite find its usual rhythm. Harry knew exactly what he wanted to hear, and to eventually get what he wanted, he would have to give the Baron this.
"It was as if it were easy for him." The aching rasp of his throat lent a pitifulness to Harry's performance he might not have been able to achieve on his own. "I didn't have a wand, I didn't try to fight him, but he killed me anyway. And he didn't hesitate when he did it.
"I saved them. My family gave their lives for them. And in thanks they've subjected me to this torture and then they killed me when I wasn't any use anymore."
"They're not your friends." Strucker's spoke so softly, so soothingly, the hand still at his neck was bracing, almost comforting. "They're not your people. We can be."
Harry wanted to curl in on himself, to shake himself free of Strucker's touch and return to that peaceful place after death, because he had done it, Strucker believed him and what came now would be terrible. But he had promised Death, and that was not one to be so easily broken, so he looked Strucker dead in his eyes and he said. "I want to kill them. Let me kill them."
And when the man smiled, like Death, Harry saw his wicked soul. "You will."
"He's keeping secrets. I don't trust him."
Strucker and List stood side by side, watching as Potter was prepared to be moved from the lab. Keeping him exposed in the open room with its glass walls wasn't a risk they were comfortable with. Strucker had banished the wizards with orders not to return until he called for them, but they were a stubborn group and on the chance they decided to make an ill advised appearance Potter could not be seen.
"You would be a fool if you did," Strucker said, addressing the concerns his second had voiced "and I know already you are no fool, Doctor List. He shouldn't be trusted. He's submitted only because he has no other option, but the moment he is presented another…"
"He'll betray us."
"He will."
"So we'll do away with that last bit of defiance?" List looked to him for approval. "The conditioning of the mages worked remarkably well, we could have him sit the same lessons as soon as tomorrow evening."
Strucker hummed in disagreement. "Too mild. He'll require a much firmer hand."
"Fenhoff's methods?"
"I was thinking more along the lines of Zola." Strucker felt himself smile at the understanding that dawned upon List's face.
"If we're all he's ever known, he won't want to fight us," the scientist whispered. "A brilliant idea. I should contact our brothers?"
"At once." The last restraint tightened around Potter's ankle and finally the procession from the lab began to move. Strucker stayed put, simply tracking Potter's move and the grim, determined set of his jaw. He was glad the boy was not yet quite broken, he would need that fire to take on the full force of his world. "And tell Pierce…this one will be a challenge."
A/N: Finally, finally we're getting somewhere! I know these past few chapters have been angst, exposition, and more angst, and don't get me wrong there's still going to be more angst, but we're finally going to see something come out of it. And trust me, I've been just as eager to get to this point as you all.
In other news, Endgame is here sooooo I might actually die and we'll never see anything more of this story. It was nice knowing you all.
