A/N - Once again it is Sunday which means it's time for a new chapter of this story.

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.

Quotes taken from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

20) AURORS IN THE DANGER ROOM

When Harry got back to the X-Mansion he decided not to wait on that bath but immediately started filling the tub before undressing, picking up the egg and stepping into the bath. Once he sat down in the tub he opened the egg and pushed it down under the water. The change was immediate. Instead of screeching the sound changed to a gurgling which Harry soon realized was the sound of people singing underwater. He couldn't understand the words and thought that maybe he needed to stick his head under water to hear the song properly. As soon as he did this the words became very clear:

"Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour- the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back"

Harry's head came up out of the water as he caught his breath. He quickly submerged again to listen to the song a second time and then a few more times to make sure he had the whole thing memorized. Once he had it down he got out of the bath, dried himself off, drained the tub, and went back into his room. Before he got dressed again he pulled out a piece of paper and wrote down the words of the song. After that he got dressed, picked up the paper and went to see Professor Xavier who then called all of the team to his office. When they were all there Harry began the conversation.

"The thing with which I needed to fill up the egg was water" he told his teammates then went on to explain the reasoning he and Ororo had used to arrive at a possible solution to the egg – which had turned out to be right.

"Well done" said Hank, "it sounds like this Ororo is a smart girl."

"She is" said Harry, "but you helped too Hank. You pointed me in the right direction."

"When you finally solved it" asked Warren, "what did it say?"

"I wrote it down" said Harry who passed the paper around the room so everyone got a chance to read it.

"Hmm" said Sirius when he read it, "I think that's pretty straightforward."

"Yeah" said Harry, "I needed water to solve the clue. That means water is involved and the biggest body of water near Hogwarts is the lake. I'm probably going to have to go into the Hogwarts lake and recover – well I don't know what but something that somehow is going to be taken from me. I'll have an hour to do it."

"If it's the Hogwarts lake" said Warren, "are there people who live in it? The song seems to say that there are since someone had to sing it."

"There's a colony of mer-folk who live there" said Sirius, "I remember learning that back when I was a student."

"It can't be so simple as just swimming down and back" said Harry, "there will probably be challenges along the way. Sirius, what else lives in the lake besides the giant squid?"

"That lake has a giant squid in it?" asked Jean.

"Yes, but it's friendly" said Sirius, "it doesn't hurt people."

"That's right" said Harry, "I saw the Weasley twins playing with it during my second year. But what else lives in the lake Padfoot?"

"I don't know of everything" said Sirius, "I know grindylows live in the seaweed on the bottom so you need to watch out for those. There are lots of fish of course. I'm not sure what else. Hagrid would know."

"Hagrid can't tell me though" said Harry, "since he's a teacher now."

"I think you're forgetting one really important point" said Scott, "how are you going to breathe down there?"

"Not just that" said Warren, "how are you going to keep from getting hypothermia by diving into a lake in Scotland in February?"

That made everyone fall silent as they all thought the matter over. One thing was for sure, Harry thought to himself, the wizarding world really did lack common sense!

"I think you should leave it for now" said Professor Xavier breaking the silence, "you have three months to work on the problem. No one said you had to have it all figured out immediately. Considering you only got the egg yesterday you're very far along with things."

"You're right" said Harry, "thanks for all of the help."

"It's what we're here for" said Scott, "professor, was there anything else you wanted to discuss with us?"

"Actually yes" said Xavier, "thank you for the reminder. This will concern all of us. As you know Auror Moody has been studying our Danger Room because he wants to create something similar for the British Auror Academy. He put the project on hold when he was supposed to be teaching at Hogwarts. We all know how that turned out. After his rescue he decided not to be a teacher and went back to his auror academy project."

"Which was good for Remus" said Sirius, "as he's gone back to Hogwarts to teach DADA."

"We miss having him here though" said Hank.

"Even so" said the professor getting things back on track, "Moody contacted me yesterday with a request. He made his proposal for the academy danger room to Director Bones. She likes the idea in theory but she wants to get an idea of what such a room would be like. In other words she wants to see the Danger Room in action for herself."

"Is that a good idea?" asked Bobby, "how would we arrange that without risking our own security?"

"That's a good question" said Xavier, "I asked Moody the same thing. He said that Mr. Weasley, when he was visiting us, had suggested to him that people could portkey directly into and out of the Danger Room. They would be in here for the whole visit. They would not leave this room so would not see anything that might give our location away."

"That's all well and good" said Sirius, "but what would stop any of them from making portkeys later on to come back here, go through the door and get into the rest of the mansion?"

"We thought of that too" said Xavier, "except for Moody anyone who is going to come here would have to swear a magical oath never to do anything like that. Whatever they learn about our location and identities they would have to keep to themselves unless I give them permission (through Moody since they don't know me) otherwise. This would also include returning here without permission."

"Okay" said Sirius sounding satisfied, "so when do you want to do this?"

"The first question" said the professor, "is do we want to do this at all?"

"What exactly would we do?" asked Jean.

"Just your normal training session for the most part" said Xavier, "which they would watch and during which you might take time to answer questions. I won't be there since they don't know me. Scott, you'll be in charge."

"I probably shouldn't be there either" said Sirius, "Amelia knows me pretty well. If she meets Mage she might recognize me."

"I find no dilemma in doing such a presentation" said Hank, "it might be fun."

"If it helps improve the performance of the aurors" said Sirius, "I'll back it. Their fight against the Brotherhood last April was dismal."

"When will this be?" asked Scott, "and will anyone else be there besides Moody and Director Bones?"

"Moody suggested early December" said Xavier, "in addition to him and Madame Bones he mentioned bringing the following people: Rufus Scrimgeour who is the head auror and whose support would be a good thing. Also two senior aurors named Kingsley Shacklebolt and Gawain Robards. Lastly a junior auror named Nymphadora Tonks."

"I definitely can't be there in that case" said Sirius, "Tonks is my cousin. Word of warning: she hates her first name so don't use it. Just call her Tonks"

"Right" said Xavier, "any more concerns?"

"Yes" said Harry, "what if one of them needs to go the bathroom?"

"They'll have a choice" said Xavier, "they'll all have emergency one way portkeys back home just in case of that."

"If they use those they won't be able to come back here without another portkey" said Sirius.

"That's right" confirmed the professor, "the other option is to simply hold it in until the session is done. To avoid that Moody will warn everyone to relieve themselves before they come here."

"Sounds like my mom's warning every time we took a long drive" said Jean.

"I think that happened to all of us" said Bobby.

"With that out of the way" said Xavier, "does anyone have anything else?"

There were no other concerns so it was decided to allow the visit. Xavier contacted Moody and they arranged for Monday, December 5th to be the day. Moody, in turn talked to each of the people who were coming with him and got them all to swear the required oath. Some of them were a bit skeptical at first but they all came around when Moody explained why the oath was needed.

On December 5th all of the X-Men except Professor Xavier and Mage were suited up and in the Danger Room waiting for their guests. At 9 AM precisely there was a "pop" and six people of varying ages appeared in the room.

"Hello" said Cyclops as he stepped forward to greet the visitors, "welcome to our training room. For those of you who don't know us we're the X-Men. I'm Cyclops, the team leader. My teammates are Iceman, Angel, Lightning, Beast, and Marvel Girl." When Cyclops said their names each team member raised a hand in greeting to the aurors."

"Thank you laddie" said Moody stepping forward and shaking Cyclops' hand, "it's good to see you all again. You know Director Bones of course. With us are Rufus Scrimgeour," – Moody pointed to an older man who had a wild mane of hair that made him look a bit like a lion – "the head auror, Kingsley Shacklebolt" – Moody gestured at a tall, broad shouldered black man who looked a bit younger than Scrimgeour – "who was at Hogwarts the day the Brotherhood tried to seize the school but he was up in the hospital wing most of the time after you got there so you probably didn't meet him."

"They didn't" put in Shacklebolt, "which is too bad for me."

"Moving on" said Moody pointing to the next auror who was also an older man like Scrimgeour, "next to him is Gawain Robards who is a senior auror, and last, but not least is our youngest member Nymphadora Tonks who just recently graduated the academy."

"That's just Tonks if you please" said the young auror with a frown as her hair cycled from brown to pink to red in a few seconds which caught the attention of all of the X-Men.

"How do you do that?" asked Marvel Girl.

"I'm a metamorphmagus" said Tonks, "I can change my appearance at will."

"Handy" commented Lightning who thought how nice it would be to sometimes change his appearance so people didn't recognize him, especially his scar.

"I think so" said Tonks with a smile before Cyclops took over again.

"We understand you want to see what our training room is like" he said, "as Auror Moody is proposing to create a magical version for your academy. We're glad to help you. First, however, I have to lay down some ground rules for while you're here. We call this room the "Danger Room." That doesn't mean that everything we do in here is dangerous but there are a lot of things in here that can be dangerous if not used properly. We have safeguards in place of course, but nothing is perfect.

"The first rule is this: no matter what you see, no matter how dangerous it may look, don't interfere. We know what we're doing – even if sometimes it doesn't look like it – and we would appreciate not being distracted.

"Please keep your wands holstered at all times. If our mentor were here he would insist you leave your wands outside the room. We won't go that far. We trust that you will respect our wishes in this matter.

"If you have questions don't hesitate to ask one of us. Not everyone will be actively training at the same time so ask whoever happens to be resting at the moment when you want to know something.

"Does anyone have any questions right now?"

"Do you have any chairs?" asked Scrimgeour.

"I'm afraid not" said Cyclops, "but you may conjure some for yourselves if you want."

"Thank you" said Scrimgeour who did just that. The other visitors did the same except for Moody who remained standing.

"All right, let's get started" said Cyclops. He walked over to the wall and touched a spot. A panel opened up. He reached inside and pulled out a portable control box / remote.

"Beast, let's start with you today" he said before turning to Lightning and Angel, "in the meantime you two can do your usual warm up game."

"Yes!" said Lightning with enthusiasm and he immediately took off and began circling the room. Angel followed right behind him and very soon they were chasing each other around the ceiling of the room in their usual game of aerial tag while the magicals watched them. Those who had not seen them before looked up at them with expressions of surprise on their faces.

"They do this every training session" said Iceman to the magicals while chuckling a little, "I doubt there are two people in the world who love flying more than they do."

"How do they do it?" asked Shacklebolt, "I mean I can see how Angel can fly but what about Lightning?"

"He's very good at telekinesis" said Iceman who pointed at Marvel Girl, "she is too, she doesn't fly much though."

"Impressive" said Robards. They then heard Cyclops talking to Beast again and looked back at them.

"Okay Beast" said Cyclops pointing to a set of rectangles on the floor, "we'll start with a trapdoor obstacle course. At the end of it swing up to that wire, spin around three times and balance yourself on one finger. You have one minute. Go"

"He'll never do that" said a disbelieving Scrimgeour.

"Oh yes he will" said Iceman, "watch."

The magicals all watched as Beast, walking on his hands at first, began moving down the course. Every second rectangle turned out to be a trap door which would open and shoot up an obstacle of some kind which Beast either leaped over, caught, punched or kicked out of the way. It was obvious that he was well practiced at this exercise because he moved down the course quite quickly. He landed on his feet when he reached the last rectangle and then jumped high into the air where he caught a taut wire stretched between two poles. He swung himself up and over the wire three times. The fourth time he went up he stopped himself in a handstand position on top of the wire, put all of his weight on one finger and balanced himself like that. The wizards watched all of this in amazement.

"Good work Beast" said Cyclops, "one minute exactly."

"Thank you fearless leader" said Beast as he pushed himself off the wire, did a roll as he came down, and landed on the floor on his feet.

"A perfect two point landing" said Iceman approaching Beast and giving him a high five.

"Thank you my frigid friend" was the reply.

That was the beginning of a very eye opening morning for the British magicals. They watched as one by one all of the X-Men was put through their paces doing exercises to hone their powers and their skills. Each one had a training routine set up just for them like Beast did. After their game was over Angel and Lightning both practiced their flight maneuvering skills by working with something called a spanner which was a large fan-like contraption that came down from the ceiling and spun around either faster or slower at different times. The two flying X-Men had to fly up and down between the various fan blades without being hit. It started out slow and got faster and faster before slowing down again. When it finally stopped both X-Men were a bit winded but pleased as they had both flown it without a hitch.

"Wow" said Scrimgeour, "I've never seen anyone fly like that before. You wouldn't be able to do such tight maneuvers on a broom."

"They've had a lot of practice" said Beast who was taking a rest.

"That's obvious" Scrimgeour replied.

Marvel Girl and Iceman had similarly taxing exercises to endure and even Cyclops had his own routine. After that there were team exercises where two or more X-Men worked together to take down a peril of some sort. It was these exercises that had really helped them learn to work together as a team rather than just powerful individuals in a group. And there were some spars in which two X-Men faced each other and one tried to beat the other in whatever the exercise was. These were not necessarily dangerous. For example Lightning and Marvel Girl had a telekinetic tug-of-war with a long piece of rope that both tried to pull to their side with their telekinesis. Ironically that spar was a draw because the rope split in the middle after being pulled too hard in both directions for too long. Both Lightning's and Marvel Girl's telekinetic strength had been growing over the more than a year they had been at the mansion and they were both quite a bit stronger now than they were when their powers first manifested. In hindsight it was easy to realize that something like splitting the rope was going to happen sooner or later.

The whole training session took, as usual, most of the morning. The audience asked questions now and then but all of them seemed to be pretty impressed with what they were seeing.

"You think any of you could do that?" Moody asked the other aurors.

"I don't know" said Tonks, "it looks more intense than anything I did at the academy."

"Same here" said Shacklebolt.

"You want to try it before we leave?" asked Moody with a smirk.

"No!" said both aurors. Scrimgeour, Robards, and Madame Bones didn't say anything.

"I hope you now fully understand why I would like to create something like this for the academy" said Moody, "if I have my way no cadet will graduate without being able to handle the room we create. It will be a final exam of sorts but it should also be something cadets have to use on a regular basis during training under an instructor's guidance. Some older aurors would probably benefit from it as well."

"I agree" said Madame Bones. She had been silent during most of the training session letting others ask the questions while she simply observed things.

"Now all we have to do is get proper funding for it" she added, "that will be the hardest part."

"Do you think Fudge will go for it?" asked Robards.

"I don't know" was the answer, "it's not really him I worry about so much as his 'fiend' - I mean 'friend' – Lucius Malfoy. He won't want something like this to be created."

"You're right" said Scrimgeour, "especially after being exposed as a willing Death Eater even if he was pardoned. Skilled, competent aurors are not something he and others like him would want to deal with."

"Somehow we'll find a way" said Bones with conviction, "if we'd had something like this during the war our aurors might have done better against You-Know-Who and his minions."

The X-Men finished their training for the day and came over to talk with the DMLE people.

"We hope you found today useful" said Cyclops.

"We did" said Director Bones, "you've given us a lot to think about."

"Does anyone have any more questions?"

"I have one" said Scrimgeour who looked at Lightning, "I wasn't at Hogwarts on the day the Brotherhood invaded nor could I attend the feast afterwards but I heard later on that you were able to create shields that repelled spells. Is this true?"

"Yes" said Lightning, "Marvel Girl can do it too."

"May I see?" asked Scrimgeour.

"I don't see why not" said Lightning who turned to Marvel Girl, "do you want to do it? Or should I?"

"He asked you" said Marvel Girl. Lightning shrugged. He turned to Cyclops and asked him to bring up one of the training dummies before gesturing for Scrimgeour to approach it.

"I hope you understand that I'd prefer you to not try to hex me" said Lightning, "just fire some spells at the dummy and you'll see."

Lightning showed Scrimgeour and the other magicals the various shields he could make: the weak one that slowed a spell down a lot but didn't stop it completely, the normal strength one which stopped spells and caused them to dissipate, and the really strong one which bounced spells back at the caster.

"Impressive" said Scrimgeour after casting spells at Lightning's shield and then scanning it with his wand, "it's a lot like a shield charm but more powerful and not made of magic."

"It's telekinetic in nature" said Lightning.

"I see" said Scrimgeour, "can your shield stop the unforgivable curses?"

"I don't know" said Lightning, "we've never tested that and I wouldn't want to try it now. There are too many people in the room who could be hit by an unforgivable being bounced back."

"That's true" said Scrimgeour, "if you ever do test that please let me know the results." Lightning nodded. After that the magicals said good-bye to the X-Men and portkeyed back to Britain. They all agreed that the academy needed a Danger Room of its own. The next step was to get the money needed to build it approved by the Wizengamot and that would take some selling.

Back in the Danger Room the X-Men went over the session.

"I think it went well" said Cyclops, "while there's always room for improvement for all of us no one made any big mistakes today. Our guests seemed impressed,"

"I can't wait to see what Moody comes up with for a magical Danger Room" said Lightning.

"Maybe we can give it its trial run" said Beast, "facing unknown obstacles is something we do. This would be no different even if it's magic." The others agreed.

(To Be Continued)

A/N - The spanner was used in X-Men #1 and the trapdoor obstacle course was seen in X-Men #19.

That's all for this week. As usual please take a moment to leave me some feedback. Constructive comments are always welcome but no flames or trolls please. As always stay safe and well everyone.