Chapter 10:

Activating the Crazies

Edge Warning:

There is edge in this chapter. Don't hurt yourself on it. You have been warned.

Harry stood there, beside this Slughorn lawyer guy, as they waited to be let into the ICW grand chamber.

The solicitor was out of his depth, which is why Harry hired him. He had never represented anybody in international court and was used to only representing people who were being railroaded into a guaranteed conviction. He was having very obvious moral misgivings about poorly representing the "Savior" of the wizarding world in a trial that could very well ruin his life. This was problematic.

"You do know that you will be expelled if convicted, right?" Hecter pleaded.

"So you have told me." Harry said with an annoyed sigh. "Repeatedly."

"Wand snapped. Unable to ever run for office, or hold any decent career in magical society, or likely marry into any decent family. Expelled." Hecter prodded.

"And unable to compete in a deadly tournament I was forced to take part in against my will." Harry retorted. "If I win, I have my adulthood recognized. If I lose, I am exempt from the Triwizard tournament and am free to leave to another nation that will gladly reinstate my wizarding status and let me finish my education there. This is what we young people call a "Win-Win" situation."

Add to this fact his Quidditch talent, substantial inheritance and psycho girlfriend and he was guaranteed a decent enough life no matter where he went. Wasn't her grandma some big shot in Taiwan? What's their magical school like? He thought he recalled reading they shared a school with Japan, the Philippines and South Korea on Iwo Jima. Could be interesting. Famously big on Quidditch and, shudder, Baseball.

Unfortunately, this entire conversation all went to make Hector fidget even more violently.

"And if I'm being completely honest, my experience in wizarding Britain has been shite. I honestly could not get worse treatment by a community unless they actively tried to outdo you. If I get convicted, it'll be a whole lot of egg on a whole lot of faces of a whole lot of assholes who deserve it, many of whom are waiting for us in that room." He went on. "Only real inconvenience will be getting a new wand. I like the one I have now."

And there were his friends. But he would be sure to visit. And write. And invite them to wherever he ended up.

"But don't you understand?!" He whispered. "I'll be known as the man who got you convicted!"

"Again, win-win. Isn't it kinda your bread and butter to represent and lose? In what way does this not benefit you?" Harry asked.

What his opinion on that argument was would remain a mystery, as it was at that moment the watery bell sound indicating they ought to enter. They entered, and the room was about what he expected it to be. Whole lot of old people in a whole lot of chairs in a circular formation. With all the nations of the world, and their flags, represented it greatly resembled the united nations building, minus the tower-of-Babel-insult-to-God layout.

Harry had never seen people so old in his life, with many of the people present making Dumbledore look Snape's age by comparison. A few were even reading copies of a dragon-slaying manual as if to advertise themselves to him. Classy.

They followed the obvious path to the center of the room where two tables waited for them. One was already occupied by the prosecutor, who Harry had hired for the job initially, so they naturally took the second. Dumbledore wasted no time in sanding from his seat and announcing the order of business.

"We are here today to conduct an emergency trial for one Harry James Potter." He announced. "I should warn you all that the entire proceedings with be broadcast as per the ICW's agreements with a number of international wizarding wireless companies to allow coverage of all events related to the Triwizard tournament. Unfortunately, this qualifies, and the defense declined to file a motion to exclude these proceedings."

Dumbledore waved his hand to indicate a booth near the very top of the room above the door Harry had entered through. Inside said booth on the side were a whole host of reporters, some of them with obvious microphone-like devices connected to what looked like a haphazard satellite dish. The rest had quils and parchment at the ready, and held breathless expressions.

Sharks hoping for chum. From where he was sitting, chum thinking itself the diner instead of the meal.

"Representing the defendant?" Dumbledore called.

"Hector Slughorn." Harry's solicitor answered, standing up at full attention.

"And the prosecution?"

"Malcolm McGonagall." The younger brother of his favorite transfiguration teacher answered from where he sat in the adjacent desk.

Everybody present seemed to pause as the sound of shuffling paper filled the auditorium-like room. Were they only now organizing their desks? Seems like something they ought to have done before he entered.

"Will the prosecution please read the charges?" Dumbledore requested.

Malcolm did as instructing, rising again and holding his notes up to read.

"Truancy, multiple counts of underage magic and breaking of the statute of secrecy." Prosecutor Malcolm listed.

"Objection." Hector interjected, having waited politely for him to finish the list of charges.

Dumbledore turned to Harry's defense.

"On what grounds?"

"Harry Potter's alleged truancy and alleged use of underage magic are outside of the purview of this court and is the domain of local prosecution within magical Britain." Hector explained. "We are in this courtroom today for charges of the breaking of the statute of secrecy, and only here because his forced participation in the Triwizard Tournament makes it an international incident that only the ICW is qualified to mediate."

Well said Hector! Looks like he actually intended to win this case for a change. Harry had wondered if he'd ignore his conscience and play his usual role of incompetent defense attorney or show off how brilliant of a law practitioner he actually was. Sad it didn't turn into a longer, drawn out struggle. That would have been entertaining to watch.

"Very well. Will the distinguished members of this court deliberate on whether the charges of truancy and underage use of magic should be excluded from this prosecution." Dumbledore ordered in his ever-polite way.

That watery bell sound rung again and the area at the center of the room went silent. It was clearly some kind of enchantment or ward that only effected the lawyers and Harry, as the entire room around them became rather animated with debate. People stood, yelled, banged on tables, and yet Harry could not hear a word of it. Eventually they all settle down and that calming jingle range again. When sound returned to the room Dumbledore addressed the crowd.

"We have deliberated and decided that truancy, being a misdemeanor at most and seeing as you were performing your duties as a Champion at the time, shall be excluded from the charges." Dumbledore explained. "However, the charge of underage magic shall be tried, as without it the charges of breaking the statute of secrecy are dubious at best."

Harry was then called to the stand and took his seat in the chair directly in front of the supreme Mugwomp, facing the rest of the court. Having Dumbledore sitting directly behind and above him was oddly intimidating.

"Please state your name for the court." Dumbledore instructed.

"Harry James Potter." Harry said dutifully.

Malcolm came up to the stand with papers in tow.

"Mister Potter, I have some questions about the night you were arrested. Has your attorney explained to you your responsibility to be truthful and the consequences you will face if you fail to do so?" Malcolm asked.

Harry nodded.

"We require you to verbalize your answers for the benefit of the broadcast and our copytyper." Dumbledore said from behind him.

"Oh! Yes sir. Perjury, being under oath as soon as I passed the ward line, I got it all." Harry answered.

Malcolm moved right along/

"On the night of your arrest, you had in your possession a brand new mokeskin pouch. A rare and expensive purchase. We matched the serial number with records from Mokeskin LTD, and they show you are not the person who purchased said mokeskin. Would you care to explain how you came to be in possession of it?"

Wow! Going straight for the attack on his character? The British authorities were smart enough not to waste the paper with an accusatory charge of grand theft. Clearly, this man had not inherited his sisters' smarts, but let's see

"It was an early Christmas present from my girlfriend..." Harry began, only to stop at the eruption of mumbling and frantic quill writing that came from the media booth.

Harry looked over at them and gave them a look. The same look he suspected Dumbledore was giving them from above.

"Whose identity I would like to remain a secret, but I can affirm in writing the purchaser of said pouch and you can write her to confirm that she gifted it to me, if it pleases the court." Harry offered.

Malcolm waved a dismissive hand.

"That won't be necessary, the court has full faith in your honesty. But I have more questions about the contents of said pouch." Malcolm continued. "Amongst the confiscated items were a petrol-powered chainsaw, pine tar, ammonia, a spade and a phosphine bug bomb.

"Oh, those are for the upcoming tasks. The Phosphine and ammonia I plan to use on the mermaids." Harry explained nonchalantly.

Several members in the stands stood up straighter.

"Um...Mermaids?" Hector clarified.

"Mermaids. They live in the black lake at Hogwarts, where the second task will be held, and they'll be my opponents. Did you know ammonia is especially toxic to fish? Isn't that interesting?! It also reacts strongly with water to produce an even more toxic gas. And phosphine is water soluble. And also, very toxic. And flammable!" Harry explained in his best Hermione impression.

Malcolm himself held an expression very similar to a stunned fish out of water after that explanation, as did many of the elderly faces Harry could see behind him.

"Mister Potter, I cannot stress this enough, but you really should not massacre an entire tribe of mermaids." Some random person with an Australian accent spoke up from the stands.

"Hmm. I also REALLY should not have been forced into this deadly tournament against my will facing lethal opponents like dragons and mermaids." Harry retorted. "So until such time as whoever is put my name in that goblet in order to kill me is executed, how about I meet you in the middle and just murder the ever-loving shit out of whatever, or whoever, you put in my path? Sound like a plan?"

It took a moment for the translators on standby to explain what he'd just said to all of the earpieces present, but once that moment passed the entire room went into an uproar of profanity and yelling in at least 53 languages. Chairs flew, paper burned, and a few wandless spells were cast (Everyone had to disarm before entering the room. Smart policy.) and one woman seemed to be crying next to an ancient Russian wizard whose laughter drowned out everything else.

These were adults?

Bao Li stumbled into the recess chamber in a tizzy with the rest of her quadrant of the Old Ones.

Rasputin followed in closely behind her, still laughing so hard that every breath of his ancient body came out as more of a high-pitched wheeze. The sour looking Flamel was one of the few to have kept her cool in the auditorium during the fighting and didn't put up a fight when the entire contingency of aurors came in to break them up.

"The boy is planning to start a war with the mer!" Said the delegate from North Korea. "Nobody has been stupid enough to do that since the kingdom of Epidauros!"

While Bao understood her as a polymath, it took most of the others the time it took for the translators in their ears to repeat what he said.

"His designs aren't so ambitious or cruel, not as such. He's just lashing out at an unjust world." Said Perenelle. "Not at the Mer, they are just an obstacle he is willing to tear down if they threaten him, much like the dragons."

None disagreed with her, the boy's motives were plain. They didn't come to the most powerful positions in the land without being just a little bit smarter than the average bear. This fourteen-year-old brat had managed to railroad the entire international wizarding government into a no-win situation. The lesser loss would have them look weak silly, the latter like the biggest assholes on the planet. And the worst part? They very much deserved it.

"Then who is he lashing out at?" Asked Elizabeth Johnson. "Us?"

"Well... In a just world WE would be the ones on trial for child endangerment due to our failures in regard to this tournament." Perenelle reasoned. "So, per chance he is making justice of his own? His history and profile do not paint him as somebody who takes pleasure in the prospect of killing magical creatures, sapient or otherwise. This act of his is disturbing."

Bao had to give it to her. She actually used the word "Justice" with a straight face despite here nearly seven hundred years on this earth. Either she was even more sociopathic than the rest of them, or else she had somehow managed to retain some form of innocence, naivety or the worst of the four-letter words, hope. Call Bao a pessimist, but she doubted it was the latter.

"You seem more invested in the boy than the rest of us consummate politicians." Said Rasputin. "Do you have a history with him?"

Perenelle glared.

"Indeed. My husband and I owe him a great debt. Organizing a tournament that puts his life at risk and ruining his teen years is a piss poor way of repaying him." She retorted.

"Spare me the details." Rasputin said dismissively. "I will remind you that we are under oath to interpret and apply the law that we all nurture and protect. Your personal feelings are irrelevant. We convict him based on the testimony given, and humorously enough, he seems to wish to be convicted and expelled. Per chance this display is, in fact, his ploy to escape the injustice of his forced participation and throw a pie in the faces of everybody responsible? If you care about him, why not give him what he wants?"

It was an intriguing argument. And Bao agreed, the boy wanted conviction over acquittal, and was clearly trying to railroad them into giving it to him. Unfortunately, this would be a disaster for them. Beyond the optics of prosecuting a fourteen-year-old, one who honestly had been through enough shit sandwiches from reality to last a lifetime, he was also a celebrity, and the fervor of his fans could be enough to lose many of them their seats. A lot of powerful, wealthy people lived vicariously through celebrities, and Hary Potter had some of the most obsessive. If the moral objection to their making such a decision from the normal riffraff or political apparati of their individual nations didn't lose half of them their jobs, the lobbying and blackmailing of the fanatical fangirls in their own peer group would do them in.

Then her secretaries' voice spoke in her earpiece.

"Ma'am. You have an emergency letter from your granddaughter. It has the passphrase Samson written on the cover."

Bao nodded, even though her secretary couldn't exactly see her.

"Send it in." She ordered.

She felt the parchment of an envelope fill her coat's inner pocket. With a smooth motion she retrieved it and ripped it open. It was a short missive.

"He is my boyfriend. Acquit your future grandson-in-law or say goodbye forever to any chance at repairing our relationship."

Love, Your Thoroughly Fucked-Up Granddaughter.

... Those rainy isles have done nothing to improve that girl's temperament. She never would have used such blatant emotional blackmail on her before, let alone use such few words to strike every single neve with pinpoint accuracy. At least she hadn't gone to any detail about the incident that sent her away. Just insinuating it enough to stick the knife in.

Acquittal it is then!

But regardless of how this trial went, this letter would find its way into many conversations with her granddaughter in the future. After all, the unspoken insinuation that being corrupt for Sue's sake would lead to repairing their relationship was one she would have to make a bit more explicit.

Mexico City, Mexico: December 19th, 1994

"Isn't that fascinating?" The voice of Harry Potter said over the wizarding wireless.

David Rojo paused in his skull carving to pay closer attention to the broadcast. He looked up from the pile of peeled skin and facial muscle to the other end of the Santa Muerte church where his sisters sat around the radio. They were supposed to be practicing with the AK, both the pretty green spell and the sleek soviet piece of machinery. Buty they could be forgiven, as the subject matter of the broadcast was all of their favorite little heartthrob.

He drew his wand, readying to blast the radio into bits, but the next words stayed his hand.

"How about I meet you in the middle and just murder the ever-loving shit out of whatever, or whoever, you put in my path? Sound like a plan?"

He smiled. Tossing the skull of the smalltime cocaine dealer who thought to sell in the wizarding section of the city, and worse, thought he could try and play grab ass with his favorite sister, he advanced onto their group. They startled when they noticed him.

"This is Harry Potter?" He asked.

He had never understood their obsession with the Boy Who Lived, but then again, he preferred the company of Muggles and lowlifes, so he wouldn't.

They nodded in unison, breathless in fear that he might strike them. Their celebrity warship had always... irked him so.

"I never understood what made you so obsessed with him, but now... I think I see it. And I approve." He told them. "Tell mum I'll be wanting a ticket to... whatever city the ICW meets in."

They looked at him like he was crazy. They gave him that look a lot. Was it the skull carving? The Mexican sugar dancing? Or did he just have a weird voice?

"It's like an early Christmas present. All this time I've been waiting for a sign from Santa Muerte in the form of a neon skull and snake above a villa, but this seems like so much of a clearer message."

Uganda, Africa: December 19th, 1994

Mustafa Adrisi Abataki sat up straighter in his Arua district home. Hsi rocking chair, for once, not betraying his rare movements.

What had he just heard over the radio? His English was a bit rusty, and he never could catch up with all the magic culture of his fifth and eight wives - even after entire decades of politicking with them - but he could have sworn the boy on the radio just mention massacring an entire village of mermaids and killing a dragon through chemical warfare.

"How about I meet you in the middle and just murder the ever-loving shit out of whatever, or whoever, you put in my path? Sound like a plan?"

He stood up, and the whole room noticed. They always took notice when life returned to his depressed, lifeless body.

"This boy. He is wizard?" He asked his eighth wife, the youngest and best witch.

She nodded hesitantly.

"What is hez name?" He demanded as the sound of an entire courtroom of wizards and witches fighting came over the airwaves.

"He eez Harry Potter, my husband." She answered deferentially.

Her temperament had so improved with the latest pregnancy. It could do that to some women, turn them sweet instead of fiery. He preferred the fiery and argumentative. Reminded him more of his mother. He loved his mother.

"And where is this... Harry Potter?"

"In Britain, my husband." She answered.

Interesting.

He took a deep breath and felt his body stretch wider, his chest feel fuller and every bone and piece of spine crack. Anticipation of blood, like the coming of a fight in the leadup to his and Idi's ascent into higher office, was like a drug he had forgotten the taste of. Life filled him for the first time in over a decade.

"Fetch me my machete. These... noisy upstarts have been keeping me up with their gunfire lately, I think it is time I showed them

Aum Colony, Japan: December 19th, 1994

Tomoko Matsumoto squeezed her husband's shoulder as he drank deeply of the matcha she had painstakingly prepared for him.

She hoped she wouldn't have to throw another imperius curse at him to get him to take his love potion this month, like she had last month. But he did hesitate as he brought it up to his lips.

"Oh Shoko dear, do you want to hurt my feelings again?" She cooed into the overly bearded and severely mentally unwell man. "You know how I get when you hurt my feelings!"

An unexpected creek made her jump, but when she turned around it was just the new ceiling ornament. For a dead pharmacist just hanging there, he sure did make a lot of noise. Her husband, hand shaking so violently he nearly spilled her matcha, finally brought it to his mouth and drank it dry.

"Gooooood boy." She cooed again. "Come. Let us go for a walk through the colony."

She lifted the increasingly manic man to the door and out into their personal mountainside village. Down along the main path they walked, their culti... followers quiet at this time of day. Except one house they passed, where the telltale static of wizarding wireless came to her through the open window.

"Please state your name for the court." Came the voice of their Supreme Mugwump, Albus Dumbledore.

The voice that answer nearly made her squeal like a little girl who wasn't too busy with 12 children and a husband to keep up with celebrity gossip.

"Harry James Potter."

She took a deep breath and let it out in slow ecstasy.

"Haaaaaarrrrry." She breathed. "Darling."

It was the first time she had ever heard the boy's voice. And she spent the next few minutes listening to it say such beautiful things. And Shoko had been such a Debbie Downer about her obsession with toxic chemicals, and gases in particular.

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