Chapter 12
Jingle Bells.
11:12 am 10th December, Meeting Room no 14, French ICW base.
Never in all the time he had known the man had Lone Wolf seen the Director look so disturbed, the man who was capable of keeping calm even when confronted with goric scenes that caused even the most battle hardened and deranged members of their division to be disturbed he looked quite unflappable. Oh he knew that this man was just as vulnerable as any other, he just did a better job of hiding it, because if the leader panicked so would the soldiers, so to see the man in his current state made him quite uncomfortable, and not a small amount of terrified, they had arrived here 2 hours ago to discuss about their young charge and the stray that he had picked up this morning, quite literally so given the said stray was right now sleeping propped against his shoulder, it had taken them a whole 25 minutes to give him a summary of the events that had taken place after which he left them in the room after telling them to wait for him and then he returned 5 minutes ago as disturbed as he was now.
He took one of the bottles of water available in the room and slowly started to take sips from and then let out a sigh and began, "I didn't name him Hades you know?"
The others in the room didn't say anything waiting for the man to continue.
"I was planning to name him something like Arthur, or perhaps after some god like Hercules or Prometheus, hopefully plant a hero complex," he continued. "But no! That woman! Scarlet Witch, just had to have a vision, damnit! And she waltzes into my office telling "name him Hades, or you won't live to regret it" and then she disappeared, her usual MO."
That explained the whole situation to them, Scarlet Witch was an infamous woman who was liked by no one except herself, few if anyone knew her real name, she was 157 years old but didn't possess the decency to look like it, anyone who didn't know how old she is would presume her to be in her early 20's, at most, she had an hourglass figure that she was extremely proud of, her moniker wasn't for her powers but for her personality, when she was younger people would call her a scarlet woman, so rather than let it get her down she took up the name Scarlet Witch, but the most important thing about her was that she was a seer, one of the few of the same caliber as Grindelwald, and she was even rarer as she only had visions related to her death, more importantly how to avoid it.
So now when a self preserving woman like her has visions relating to her death with their most powerful and unpredictable combatant in the mix, the least to say the situation becomes quite volatile. If it were any other seer, they would have tried to work their way around the vision as2 the risks would have been worth taking, even though it'd be a shot in the dark, but not when that woman got involved, information from her visions were always accurate, though she passed it on a need to know basis, more in the sense she was the only one who needed to know things, and rarely when she says something to you, you make it a point to listen to her, or tragedy and destruction follows, though it helps that she never causes harm to anyone intentionally because she believes "Guilt is the slowest poison to strangle someone, and personally i prefer Bourbon aged at least 100 years for myself".
"I found her at one of the bars she frequents, she was expecting me, and when I told her about the stray he picked up, she was smiling, and I've never seen her smile like that, like I just told her that Flamel was going to give her his stone, and then she just said this much "let things happen as they will", and then again disappeared on me, portkey," he continued, "and now, while I know that not following her lead will result in death and destruction, it goes against every fibre of my being to even possibly place a child in such a dangerous position, i know Hades will never hurt her intentionally, but unintentionally he might just end up doing worse."
It was a well known fact that Director never took chances with innocent lives, especially children, and his dilemma was quite understandable, which was the reason they had approached him in the first place though they didn't have the complication of the Scarlet witch….. Now things were going to become troublesome to say the least.
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02:17 am 12th December, Room of Requirements, Hogwarts.
Harry was standing in another pocket dimension of his creation, if he could have been he would have been really thankful for the existence of the three natural Ley Lines Hogwarts was built upon, which allowed him to perform feats which would have otherwise required him to use either a lot of power or create artificial Ley Lines of his own. But as it was right now he was standing in the dimension he had created and the girl that had come to him on his last mission was sleeping on a king size bed he had conjured, the girl had simply stuck to him, and wouldn't leave him, whenever someone tried to pull her away from him she would get distressed and start crying.
It was protocol that any and every child found by any agent was their responsibility and they were to ensure that the child remained healthy and happy. He had read enough Psychology and Medical Science to take care of a child, fortunately for the girl and unfortunately for the Director's blood pressure he didn't possess the common sense to know that the child was supposed to be handed over to the local authorities as soon as it was safe to and this wasn't written in the protocol guidelines, something the Director would ensure to rectify when he finds out.
He had been advised by certain members of his team like Poseidon, Baba Yaga, and Izanami, to simply hand over the girl to them to take care of her as he wasn't an adult and couldn't take care of her, there were two fallacies with that logic, as soon as he had been registered as a Shadow Hit Wizard he had been emancipated in the magic world and as he had detected the girl was magical just like them so that meant he could take care of her and secondly and more importantly the girl would be distressed as long as she was away from him and it seemed like she had developed an attachment to him, as the psychological books informed him and as such should she be separated from him she could develop abandonment issues and that would in turn cause her further distress, hence it was his duty to ensure prevention of such a scenario, ergo the girl had been brought to Hogwarts with him.
And now when the girl was sleeping which meant that she couldn't get distressed from his absence he left her to conduct his studies on the souls he had collected yesterday when he had killed a gang of rapists in Tibet, though before leaving he set appropriate alarm spells to notify him should she be distressed or awake in general.
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10:07 am 16th December, Near the Black Lake, Hogwarts.
Neville, Daphne, Susan, Ron, Tracey, and Hermione had decided to meet here today in order to discuss the ongoing attacks in the school, as everyone except Ron and Neville were leaving for home tomorrow they wanted to have a final meeting today to discuss their plan of action, they had become good friends after meeting both the slytherins, though Daphne was still a little skeptical about them, Tracey more than open enough with them.
"So dumb and dumber are going to stay at here to research whatever they could about the Chamber while the rest of us are going home, and out of us everyone Except Hermione can ask their parents if they know anything about it, or if they know someone who knows about it, atleast more than we already do," began Susan, who had taken up to occassionally call both the boys to remind them of the stutn they had pulled off.
"Hey!" exclaimed the aforementioned dumb and dumber in offense, though there was no real heat behind it.
Snorting at their antics Tracey said, "yeah let them be, and to be honest I'm kind of glad to be away from here for a while, as long as it may be, the atmosphere was starting to get creepy here."
And that was a point none of them could refute, what was starting to become their second home was now starting to feel like a dark and cramped space, it was almost strangling their spirits.
"It's unfortunate I cannot take any library books home to search them for any clue about the chamber, and if I could have, I would have stayed with you guys, but my parents are also important, you know how complicated the situation is," said a downtrodden Hermione.
While they solemnly nodded to her, Neville and Susan were frowning internally, they had heard from Hermione about how her integration with the Magic world was causing rifts between her and her parents, it hadn't been anything major but it was getting harder for them to relate to each other, and she had hoped that this vacation would be able to help them fix things, or at least start fixing them.
Daphne began, "my dad said he had some things he could share with me, but they were too dangerous to be written down, so he is going to tell me over vacation, I hope you guys have been practicing your occlumency exercises."
Daphne had introduced them to the art soon after they had become friends, she had said it would take a lot of years before they become anywhere close to truly competent in the art, but they were old enough to at least start with the basics to detect a legilimency probe, with the help of a good dose of luck, of course. Everyone had been troubled since the attack on Creevy, and they were determined to get to the bottom of this, for a while the quartet had suspected the Malfoy heir to be behind these attacks but confirmations from both the slytherins in their group put that notion to rest.
"Very well so now that we have our tasks handed out should we go to our usual spot?" said Neville, they had found a room near the Hufflepuff dorms where they could pass time undisturbed, and could call house elves from Neville, Tracey, Daphne and Susan's homes to get snacks and stuff.
"Yep!" exclaimed Ron and Tracey quite enthusiastically much to others humor, both of them loved eating.
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01:57 am 24th December, Hogwarts.
While all the welcomed residents of the castle were sleeping, the one resident that had been highly unwelcomed, was awake and prowling the halls of the ancient castle, he went down to the fabled chamber of secrets as he had been prepared to in order to carry out his sinister plans, he was really lucky that the host he had selected had older brothers who knew some ways out of the castle, using which he had been able to sneak out during the weekends to collect the ingredients needed for this ritual.
It was a lordship ritual, he was going to become the Lord of Slytherin tonight, normally the ritual would have been quite simple, but given his current situation the ritual had to be modified quite a bit, where earlier he simply had to use 3 drops of his blood and an incantation, now he needed to sacrifice 3 pregnant women who were in their third trimester, now that wouldn't have been all that hard for him normally but given the challenges he was facing at the moment he had to be careful in gathering them under Dumbledore's nose, not to mention keeping them sedated and preserved, it had taken him 3 weeks to gather them all.
He would have preferred if there were rituals to speed up the energy transfer from the girl to him or if he could absorb from more than one host at a time but both were impossible, so he was going to use other rituals to get as much as he could at the moment, first most importantly the Lordship Ritual so tat Hogwarts would become less… uncooperative, it seemed years of Dumbledore's mishandling of this magnificent castle caused it to rebel against those who want good for it, those who would get rid of the muggle filth infecting it.
In time everything will be as it should be, in time the castle would be his, to rule, he the one who is worthy of it, the one who will accomplish Salazar's dreams. It was a pity he didn't have the body he used to but that mattered little, he would soon start the rituals necessary to make this body capable of hosting all of his power.
Very soon.
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06:05 am 15th December, Mcgonagall's office, Hogwarts.
Today's beginning had been unusual was an understatement to things, Mr Potter came to meet her in the morning, at the literal dawn of sun, sure she had told him that he was free to approach her whenever he needed, including nights in case of emergency, but she hadn't expected him to be knocking on her door at the literal first ray of light, despite being bleary eyed and still sleepy she invited him in her office which was adjacent to her quarters while she went back and got refreshed, when she returned she saw that as expected Harry had taken sat down where he usually did whenever he visited her so taking a seat opposite him she began, "so, given that you waited till sunrise, yet approached me as soon as you could, I will assume this is an important discussion but not an emergency?".
Harry simply nodded back in turn.
"So may I know what this is about?" she said.
Then Harry wrote to her, "Children."
She read what he had written and then blinked once and then again, then she furrowed her eyebrows and looked at him for a while, and then in a flash it came to her that it might have to do with the children back at the Law household, particularly young John as he would be going back there for the winter holidays, so she asked him to elaborate on what he wanted to ask.
He replied, "I do not understand children, they appear to be distressed even when there should be no reason for it, they're nor hungry nor are they suffering from any physical agony yet they remain distressed, why? And then on their own they would stop being distressed and lapse into a manic mood, what is the cause of these mood swings?"
She blinked again, and took a few seconds to formulate an answer and then after taking a deep breath she began, "well Harry, first of all, I mean no offense to you but you must understand that everyone is different, and that they have their individual personalities, secondly while you are quite academically inclined you might fail to understand the common nuances of others - and sometimes yourself - because they work more on emotion and less on logic as I've come to understand you do."
Harry simply nodded to this.
For a second Minerva was surprised that he wasn't offended at being told that he had failed at something, then thinking about it she drew the conclusion that he either simply thought that it was logical for him to fail at something too just like everybody else, or he had come to realize the difference between his personality and that of others around him beforehand, then she continued, "children tend to need more than simply being physically being attended to, most likely they want attention of those around them - or in your case your attention - hence why they might get distressed because they aren't receiving what they need."
He thought for a few seconds and then tilted his head towards right - what she had come to recognize as a sign for him being confused - then he wrote to her, "then why do they not stop being distressed when i come to attend them? I check over them and do everything I should, I check for diaper accidents, and I check if they're hungry or are suffering from any agony is that not giving them attention? And hence i come back to where I started."
Minerva hmmed to herself for a while and then slowly she began, "Harry when i say that they want your attention it doesn't simply mean they want you to check them over for any physical remedy but to be let's say held by you, to have your attention in the sense that you would attempt to do more than simply checking them over, I'd advise you that next time you face such a situation you hug the child, if possible prop them against you shoulder and run you hands in a circular motion against their back, or if you're finding that a child is distressed around the time when they need to sleep read them a story or alternatively show them a picture book, or if they wake up from a nightmare then give them a small hug and again move your hand in a circular motion on their backs so that they would calm down."
Nodding at those points he began to write them down.
Then she said to him, "what are the plans for christmas at the Laws?"
He wrote back to her, "I've not been made aware of that."
Not really surprised given to the best of her knowledge he hadn't sent any letters to them and nor had he received any, she said, "are you excited for it? The children there would be."
He wrote back "why?" something which really confused her.
Instead of directly answering with what came to her mind first, she asked him to first elaborate what he thought again.
So he replied, "well to the best of my knowledge the children are neither devout Christian nor Germanic, so why would the birth of Jesus of Nazareth or Óðinn."
She started to say something in response only to stop and then consider the fact that she didn't really knew the Dursleys, or much about Harry's life before Hogwarts, so it was well within the realms of possibility that he had never celebrated christmas like others did, so she slowly began, "it is not about either one of them to most of the people now a days - though there are those who truly do worship them and care - these festivals have become an excuse to have a merry time with family, especially for children who will receive gifts, and treats and have a feast with their family, it's about family time and spreading joy to those less fortunate around you amongst other things."
Then he wrote to her, "am I obligated to present gifts to children under my care? And the adults around me too?"
At this point she stopped for a few moments to think about what she would say because it could either make the situation an easy sail for the boy in front of him or drop him in the center of a storm, "no Harry you're not obligated to do anything aside from being polite, that is, let them know that you do not celebrate christmas if it truly makes you uncomfortable, otherwise treat it just like any other day, and as far as buying gifts is concerned they're called gifts because they are given willingly by one to another, under no obligation."
A few seconds passed where Harry sat still and then started writing again, "I understand." and then he stopped for a few seconds and then he started writing again as if he just remembered something, "thank you."
Minerva gave him a small smile and then Harry packed his bag and started to leave her office, apparently his questions for now had been dealt with, and as he reached the door she called out to him and said, "Merry Christmas, Harry!"
He turned to look at her for a few seconds and then started to open his bag at which Minerva stopped him and said, "it's alright Harry, I understand."
Leaving his bag, he looked at her and again gave her a nod and left her office.
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05:16 pm 17th December, Kings Cross Station entrance, London.
Harry was waiting there for Alex and Alex to pick him up as he had been instructed to wait, though he had more luggage with him than when he had gone to the school, after the talk with Mcgonagall he had went and brought all sorts of gifts for the girl and the people at the Law household, of course while being mindful of the statue of secrecy, and soon at quarter past five, the couple arrived at their destination, having commuted to the station in their car, and their son Arthur was with them, he had been settled down in a pram which was being pushed ahead by the couple.
On the font of the girl he had stored the gifts he had bought for her in the other dimension alongside his experiments, and would present them to her on the christmas as they were to everyone else.
Now he needed to figure out how to manage handling both the fonts, taking care of the girl and attending to the Laws household as was expected of him, like that had told him when he had left for the beginning of the school year, "so see you again at the Holidays!" he hadn't understood what they had meant by it back then but now when Mcgonagall explained him about christmas he understood that with it being a family time he was expected to be present with the people he lived with.
A/n : that's it for today folks, I usually post on 2nd Tuesdays or Sundays if i'm lucky, but yesterday it was raining cats and dogs in my area and there was not internet so i couldn't post sorry for that.
Yes it was a short chapter but since i plan to make it more action oriented for the next few i thought this was a good place to let it end, and I do have a proper christmas chapter planned for our green eyed enigma but that isn't until the 4th year.
I named both the Husband and Wife Alex on purpose as I find it somewhat cute, and i know a couple whose first names are the same so...
And I know that it sounds somewhat weird that Harry went from being frankenstein obsessed with wanting to bring his parents back to the dead to someone worried about christmas but it will be explained soon, to keep it simple he is redirecting at the moment, what he's redirecting I'll elaborate on that later.
So see ya ciao! And thanks for reading.
