A/N - Hello everyone and welcome to the newest chapter of Lightning, Part 2. I just checked on the stats for Part 1 and found out that this week it passed 200,000 views! Thank you everyone for reading this story. I hope you continue to enjoy it.
Now it's time to check in with Dr. Strange and see what he'd been up to.
Disclaimer: The X-Men were created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and belong to Marvel Comics. Harry Potter was created by and belongs to J.K. Rowling. I make no money from this and the only thing that's mine are the original parts of the story.
13) HORCRUX HUNTING
It was the 1994 Fall Equinox and in his Sanctum Sanctorum Dr. Strange was preparing to go horcrux hunting for the third time. The Ancient One had advised him that the best times to do what he was doing were on days that were magically powerful. The two equinoxes and the two solstices were among the best days for this sort of thing as they were not tied to any specific field of magic such as how Halloween or Samhain was associated with death (which actually would make it a very bad day on which to go looking for soul shards) or Beltane which was connected with the beginning of summer.
Having already dealt with two horcruxes Dr. Strange knew for the most part what to expect but also knew that anything could happen during the hunt. He cast his mind back and recalled the two previous hunts.
FLASHBACK 1: March 20, 1994 – Spring Equinox
Dr. Strange and the Ancient One stood in the latter's private study looking at the silver box that contained a piece of Voldemort's soul. The five uncut black streamers that radiated out from it were still there. Ever since he and the Ancient One had cast the spell revealing them the Ancient one had kept the box and maintained the spell when necessary. Although casting it had been taxing maintaining it required minimal power and effort.
"I will monitor you from here" said the Ancient One, "but once you are in one of the streamers there will be nothing I can do to help you so be on your guard."
"I understand Master" said Dr. Strange.
"Then good luck my son" said the Ancient One. Dr. Strange sat in a chair and slipped into a trance. Not long after that his astral form slipped free of his physical body. He floated up into the air and hovered above the box and the streamers. Choosing one at random he lowered himself toward it and touched it with one hand. A force shot out of the streamer, wrapped itself around his astral form and pulled him into the streamer. As he merged with the streamer his vision went momentarily dark.
When he could see again Dr. Strange looked around where he was. He appeared to be standing in a dirty, dimly lit hallway that stretched off into the distance ahead of him. There was a sense of evil in the whole construct but it was a passive evil, an aura that permeated the place but did not feel like it was going to attack him or inhibit his progress, at least not right now. As he considered this Dr. Strange figured that it was likely that this streamer led to one of the soul fragments rather than to Voldemort himself so it would be less likely to be aware of him.
He turned around to see what was there and saw a solid black mass at the end of the hallway behind him. There was a sense of evil radiating from it and Dr. Strange realized that this must be the soul fragment of the horcrux already in their possession. As he moved away from it the sense of evil he felt coming from it lessened somewhat but it didn't go away completely no matter how far away he got from it.
Dr. Strange began traveling down the hallway. In his astral form he wasn't limited to the speed of his physical body. He flew down the hallway at almost the speed of thought. The length of the hallway showed that he was traveling a long distance. If he had to guess how far he traveled it would be probably all the way to Britain.
The hallway went on and on, seemingly without end but eventually he noticed that the light was dimming in the distance. He could see up ahead an area that was completely black. As he got closer to it he saw that it wasn't a continuation of the hallway but rather the solid black mass of another soul fragment indicating he was almost at the end of his journey. The sense of evil he could feel coming from it increased as he approached it. Not wanting to actually touch the soul fragment itself he stopped himself before he could hit it. It was time to leave the streamer and see where the horcrux was and what it was.
He concentrated and began moving up through the ceiling of the hall. There was a moment of disorientation as he briefly fended off the force that had first pulled him into the streamer and now tried to stop him from leaving. He was easily able to repel it and then he was floating above the streamer in a dark and dusty room in a house that seemed like it had not been lived in for a long time. It looked to be an old-fashioned drawing room but all of the furniture was filthy and the carpet was dirty. The streamer led to cabinet with a glass door. Inside the cabinet were numerous objects which all had dark auras. Dr. Strange ignored all of the other objects as he focused specifically on the one that the streamer led to. It was a locket of some sort with a picture of a snake on the front of it and it had a much greater, darker aura than any of the other objects in the cabinet by far. Strange could sense the soul piece inside it. He looked around the whole room as if memorizing its appearance before nodding and shooting up through the ceiling and up through the upper floors of the house before exiting out through the roof. He took a second to glance around and saw that he was somewhere in London. Exactly where didn't matter as the first part of his job was done. Now he needed to rejoin his physical body in order to do the next part.
At the speed of thought Dr. Strange flew back to the Ancient One's temple in the Himalayas. As soon as he arrived he returned to his body and opened his eyes. The Ancient One was still watching him.
"Welcome back my son" he greeted his disciple, "you found the piece?"
"I did" said Dr. Strange with a nod, "it's a locket of some sort. I must return there in my physical body so that I may cleanse it."
"Rest for a little while before you do so" said his mentor, "after your journey you will need some replenishment."
"Very well master" said Dr. Strange. The Ancient One called for his servant who brought tea and a light meal for the two sorcerers. While they ate Dr. Strange described where he had found the horcrux and what it was.
"You tell me about a house of dark magic" said the Ancient One, "and one where it has been allowed to fester without any taming hand. Be careful when you go there in your physical form for it can be attacked as your astral form could not."
Dr. Strange nodded his acknowledgment of this point. When the two sorcerers were finished with their tea Dr. Strange concentrated on the room he had been in, made a portal to it, and stepped through. Now that he was in the room in his physical body he could tell that the room was even dirtier than he had thought before. In his astral form such things as dust, dirt, and stink didn't affect him. Now, though, he smelled the odors of the room and felt the dirt in the carpet. There was enough dust that he had to cover his mouth and nose to keep from breathing it in. He decided that the sooner he dealt with the locket the sooner he could leave. He made his way over to the cabinet where the locket was and opened it.
"Who are you?" screeched a scratchy, squeaky voice, "how dare you enter the House of Black!" Dr. Strange spun around to see an old, decrepit house elf dressed in a dirty and torn sheet staring angrily at him.
"My apologies" said Dr. Strange in a calm voice, "I did not know anyone still lived here. I am Dr. Stephen Strange." The house elf gasped in recognition.
"You be the Sorcerer Supreme?" the house elf said, "Kreacher did not know Sorcerer Supreme was coming."
"Yes, well, next time I'll call ahead" said the sorcerer, "now, Kreacher was it? You serve in this house?"
"Yes, or what's left of it" said Kreacher sounding a bit downcast, "there be no one living here since mistress died."
"I see" said Dr. Strange, "then maybe you can help me. What can you tell me about that locket?" He pointed to the locket in the cabinet. Kreacher saw where he was pointing and his eyes got wide.
"Sorcerer Supreme wants to know about Master Regulus' locket?" the old house elf asked.
"Yes. Do you know what it is?"
"Master Regulus took locket from bad dark lord" said Kreacher starting to wail, "Regulus told Kreacher locket was very bad dark magic and asked Kreacher to destroy it before he died but Kreacher hasn't been able to do it. Kreacher failed Master Regulus. Kreacher is a bad elf!"
"No you're not" said Dr. Strange trying calm Kreacher down, "I'm sure your master thinks very highly of you. That locket contains a piece of the dark lord's soul. Such an object is very difficult to destroy."
"Locket is horcrux?" asked Kreacher sounding shocked.
"Yes" said Dr. Strange, "one of several I am trying to find and destroy."
"Sorcerer Supreme can destroy horcrux?" asked Kreacher sounding hopeful.
"I can" said Dr. Strange, "if you wish to watch you may do so but for your own safety step back and stay out of the way."
Kreacher nodded and stepped back from the cabinet but stayed where he could still see what would happen. Dr. Strange stared hard at the locket and concentrated. The amulet housing the Eye of Agamotto opened up showing the eye which detached itself from the amulet and floated up to embed itself in Dr. Strange's forehead. After this a bright, warm yellow light came out of the eye and fell upon the locket lighting it up.
"By the power of the Vishanti" intoned Dr. Strange, "and the strength of Eternity I summon the evil soul out of this locket. Come forth now." A small screech sounded from the locket as black smoke started to ooze out of it and coalesce into a small, evil looking cloud. It tried to fight its way out of the light of the Eye but it could not and was held there by the Eye's power.
"You cannot do this" said a voice coming from the cloud, "no one can defeat me!"
"Begone Voldemort" declared Dr. Strange, "may the virtue of Agamotto cause this evil to lose existence and fade into nothingness. So do I command. So mote it be!"
The soul piece gave a piercing scream but it couldn't escape and it soon faded away until nothing was left of it.
"It is done" said Dr. Strange as the light of the Eye went out. The Eye detached itself from Strange's forehead and returned to the amulet which closed over it. The next thing Dr. Strange knew his legs were being hugged by a very grateful house elf.
"Thank you" said Kreacher in an emotional voice,"thank you. Sorcerer Supreme finished Kreacher's task. Kreacher is so happy and can never thank Sorcerer Supreme enough."
"No need" said Dr. Strange, "it's my job." He looked around the room. The horcrux must have been influencing the atmosphere of the house because with its destruction the room seemed somewhat lighter, the air felt cleaner, and even Kreacher looked better, as if a weight had been removed from him.
"I suggest you clean this place up a bit" said Dr. Strange to the house elf, "maybe no one lives here now but sooner or later I have a feeling someone will live here again. You don't want the place to look bad for them do you?"
"Certainly not Master Sorcerer Supreme sir!" exclaimed Kreacher standing taller than before, "Kreacher will begin cleaning at once!" The elf snapped his fingers and suddenly a magical vacuum cleaner was in the room vacuuming up dust from the carpet. Dr. Strange nodded his approval and said good-bye to Kreacher before making a new portal and returning to the Ancient One's temple. He arrived back in the study to find his master waiting for him.
"Well done my disciple" said the Ancient One greeting him and sounding pleased, "you were successful. Behold." He pointed to the silver box and the streamers coming out of it. Where before only one of the streamers had shown signs of being cut there were now two streamers that had been cut.
"That's a relief" said Dr. Strange who sat down in a chair and told his master about what had happened."
FLASHBACK 2: June 21, 1994 – Summer Solstice
When Dr. Strange's astral form popped out of the selected streamer on this day he found himself in the biggest junk storage room that he had ever seen. The room was at least as big as St. Patrick's Cathedral and it was full of discarded objects, many of which looked like they'd been in the room for a very long time. On closer inspection it was clear that this was a room of magical. There were old spell books, potions equipment, robes, broken furniture, even discarded broken wands and money scattered around and all of it was piled up in huge mounds that rose high up over his head with paths in the junk leading in all directions like some kind of bizarre maze.
Fortunately for Dr. Strange there would be no need for him to go wandering around the big maze as the streamer that he had followed terminated right in front of him at what looked like a jeweled tiara of some kind that was sitting on a bust on a shelf near the end of one path. Dr. Strange took a long look at the tiara. There was no question that this was the horcrux. After another moment the sorcerer flew up through the ceiling of the room and on up through the roof of the building. One quick look at it was enough to tell him where he was.
"Hogwarts Castle" he murmured to himself, "interesting." He didn't stick around to ponder this. Instead he sped back to the Ancient One's temple to reunite with his body.
After talking things over with his master he made a portal back to where the horcrux was and stepped through it. He stood in front of the tiara and was preparing to deal with it when he had a thought. Turning around he made another portal which led to Dumbledore's office. When he looked through it he saw Dumbledore sitting at his desk looking back at him in surprise.
"Stephen?" he called through the portal, "this is unexpected. Is there a problem?"
"No Albus" was the reply, "but would you please be so kind as to come through? I want you to see something."
"All right" said Dumbledore who got up from behind his desk, came over to the portal and stepped through it.
"What is this place?" he asked as he looked around at all of the piled up junk.
"I don't know what exactly this room is" said Dr. Strange, "but it's somewhere in Hogwarts."
"It is?" asked Dumbledore in surprise, "I've been with this school for many years and I've never seen this room before. Of course Hogwarts has many secrets that even now I've never discovered so perhaps I should not be so surprised by that. But why have you brought me here?"
"One of Voldemort's horcruxes is here" said Dr. Strange.
"What?" demanded Dumbledore looking at Dr. Strange with an expression of horror on his face, "here in Hogwarts? Where?"
"There" said Strange pointing at the tiara. Dumbledore turned and saw it and his expression changed to one of amazement.
"That?" he said, "can it be?" He started to reach for the tiara but Dr. Strange stopped him.
"Don't touch it" he said, "I haven't cleansed it yet. Who knows what it might do to you? Do you recognize it?"
"It looks like the lost diadem of Rowena Ravenclaw" said Dumbledore, "if it is how did Voldemort get it?"
"That's probably something we'll never know" said Dr. Strange, "I assume you don't intend to ask him?"
"I wasn't planning on it" was the reply, "but I'm sure it would be an interesting story."
"No doubt. Now stand back."
Dr. Strange focused the Eye of Agamotto on the horcrux and performed the same spell and actions on this horcrux as he had on the previous one. The soul piece was soon forced out of the tiara and destroyed. When the ceremony was done Dr. Strange took a deep, steadying breath.
"You may touch the diadem now" he said to Dumbledore, "it's safe." Dumbledore stepped forward, picked up the diadem and examined it closely.
"I'm right" he said holding the diadem out for Dr. Strange to see, "it is Ravenclaw's diadem. Look at what's inscribed on it." Dr. Strange took the diadem from Dumbledore and looked at it.
"Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure" he read out loud.
"It's well known that those words are inscribed on the diadem" said Dumbledore, "there's a statue of Rowena wearing her diadem in the Ravenclaw common room and those words can be seen on it. This is an incredible find."
"Then I will leave it in your hands" said Dr. Strange, "as I would assume it's Hogwarts property."
"I would think so too" said Dumbledore, "I wonder why it was hidden here?"
"If you want to hide something" said Strange, "you could do worse than a huge junkyard."
"Perhaps" said the headmaster sounding a bit dubious, "have you found any of the other horcruxes?"
"This is the second one I've found and cleansed" was the reply, "the first one was a locket with a picture of a snake on the front."
"Hmm" said Dumbledore, "Salazar Slytherin was said to have a locket like that. I wonder if that's what it was. Could you bring it here?"
"I would not like to remove it from where it is without the owner's permission and I don't know who that is" said the sorcerer, "it was in an old, dirty house somewhere in London. There was house elf there who said it was the 'House of Black.' Does that mean anything to you?"
"It does" said Dumbledore, "if I'm right I know the owner of the house. He might let us take the locket. What was the house elf's name?"
"Kreacher."
"I don't know any elf by that name" said Dumbledore, "but if the owner is who I think it is he will know it. Give me some time to contact him and I'll see what he says."
"All right" said Dr. Strange."
END FLASHBACKS
It had taken some time but not long before the Quidditch World Cup Dumbledore had finally managed to talk to Sirius about the locket. Sirius had been quite surprised to learn that his younger brother Regulus had gone against Voldemort and stolen one of his horcruxes. He readily gave Dumbledore permission to remove the locket from the Black family house at 12 Grimmauld Place and had gone with the headmaster to the house to personally see it done. He was surprised when he got there to find that the house wasn't as dark as he remembered it being when he was growing up and Kreacher wasn't as nasty to him either. Both he and Dumbledore put this down to the cleansing of the horcrux and the removal of its influence on the house.
The locket had indeed turned out to be Slytherin's locket and Dumbledore wondered if Voldemort had specifically looked for items that had belonged to the founders of Hogwarts to use as his horcruxes, the diary notwithstanding. He wondered what the next horcrux that Dr. Strange found would be. Knowing that all he could do was wait to hear from the Sorcerer Supreme about that he put it out of his mind for the time being and brought the locket back to Hogwarts where he put it into a cabinet in his office alongside the diadem. He would keep their presence secret for now so as not to possibly tip off Voldemort. He looked forward to revealing them to the school again after the dark lord was gone for good.
It was now September 22, 1994, the Fall Equinox, and Dr. Strange was again traveling to the Ancient One's temple to deal with another horcrux. Unfortunately when he entered the Ancient One's study he found an unpleasant surprise waiting for him. There should have been six streamers coming out of the box with three of them being cut and three intact. The three cut streamers were there but rather than there being three intact streamers there were now four instead.
"He made a new horcrux" Dr. Strange said in disbelief.
"Yes, my son" said the Ancient One with a grim expression on his face, "it would seem so."
"Does he know that someone has been hunting his other horcruxes?" asked Dr. Strange, "is that why he made a new one?"
"I do not know" was the reply, "but I doubt it. If that were the case we would have seen a new streamer appear right after you cleansed the locket, but that did not happen. I think that he always meant to make six horcruxes for a seven part soul as seven is the most powerful magic number. The one you removed from Harry Potter's scar was an accident, one he probably did not know about. That means that as far as Voldemort knew he had only made five horcruxes at the time he attacked the Potters. This new one would, finally, be the last one he would intentionally make."
"I hope you're right" said Strange, "which streamer is the new one?"
"That one" was the reply as the Ancient One pointed at one of the streamers, "I would not advise going after that horcrux now as it would be more likely to tip off Voldemort that someone was looking for his horcruxes."
"I agree" said Dr. Strange, "but it might be a good idea to see what it is even if I don't cleanse it right now."
"Do not waste your time with that" said the Ancient One sounding stern, "you know that what you are doing is tiring. It will keep for now. Instead focus on getting one of the other horcruxes."
"As you command master" acquiesced the disciple who considered which streamer to pick now.
"One of these streamers leads to Voldemort himself" said Dr. Strange, "is there any way to tell which streamer it is?"
"Not from out here" said the Ancient One, "but if you enter that particular streamer I think you will find it to be somehow different from the others in some way. Remember what you told me of the passive evil you sensed from the first two streamers you entered. The one that leads to Voldemort will probably not be so passive and you will have to be much more careful if you enter that one."
"I agree master" said the disciple. Without saying anything else Dr. Strange chose a new streamer and entered it.
After traveling down another dark hallway Dr. Strange's astral form exited the streamer and looked around. His first quick impression was that he was in another junk room as there were lots of objects here and some of it was piled up on the floor. A longer inspection of the room revealed that this was not the case at all. The piles on the floor were almost exclusively piles of wizarding money, mostly galleons but there were a sizable number of sickles and knuts too. Around the walls of the room were shelves upon shelves filled with objects and artifacts of many different kinds, all of them magical, as well as several shelves of books, some stands of armor and weapons and a few open boxes of wands.
The room was a vault and as Dr. Strange turned around he saw the door. It was a big, heavy door of the kind used for large safes. Ten to one this was a bank vault which most likely meant that he was somewhere in Gringotts. That was a bit concerning since Gringotts was well known for its security. It was true that he couldn't be detected by the bank's security while in his astral form, but when he had to come here in his physical body? That remained to be seen.
For now he focused on the object that the streamer led to. It was a golden cup with a handle on either side and a badger engraved on its surface. He recognized it at once as it was a well known magical object even outside of the British Wizarding World. This was the cup of Helga Hufflepuff. That this was the third horcrux he found gave a lot of support to Dumbledore's guess that Voldemort had been looking for objects owned by the founders of Hogwarts to use as his horcruxes.
Dr. Strange shook his head at Voldemort. What an egoist! The sorcerer flew through the door of the vault and emerged in a deep underground passage. He then flew up through the rock ceiling and went up, up, up before finally emerging into the outside air over the London Gringotts building in Diagon Alley. He sped back to the Ancient One's temple and returned to his body before telling his master what he had found.
"Do not worry about the security at Gringotts" said the Ancient One, "their alarms are all designed to detect someone breaking in and catch them before they reach a vault. They do not monitor the insides of the vaults themselves. If you portal directly into the vault from here you will not be detected. But do not go outside of the vault because then they will know that you are there."
"I have no reason to step outside of the vault" said Dr. Strange, "but thank you for the advice all the same master."
"If you remove the cup after cleaning it" continued the Ancient One, "leave a replica in its place. They might not detect what is happening inside the vault but sooner or later the vault will be opened and you can be sure that whomever uses it will notice if something is missing – especially an artifact as famous as that cup."
That's what Dr. Strange did. After cleansing the cup he created a replica and left it behind in the vault in the real one's place. While he was still in the vault he noticed other items that had the name "Lestrange" on them and figured this was probably the vault belonging to that notoriously dark family. After that he had no qualms about removing the cup which he then secretly sent to Dumbledore who put it in the cabinet with the locket and diadem.
There were now only two horcruxes left. An attempt to get the next one would be made on the winter solstice in December. Until then Dr. Strange had many other things to deal with. When you were the Sorcerer Supreme work never really stopped.
(To Be Continued)
A/N - That's all for this week. Next week Halloween arrives and the X-Men are in the field, just like they were on Halloween in Part 1. In the meantime please take a moment to leave me some feedback. I like hearing what you think of my story and sometimes I even take your suggestions. Constructive comments are always welcome but no flames or trolls please. As always stay safe and well everyone.