Of Wizards, Akuma, and Exorcist
Thirty-One: A Day of Celebration
Disclaimers: I do not own any D. Gray-Man or Harry Potter characters/settings. They rightfully belong to Mr. Hoshino (D. Gray-Man) and Ms. Rowling (Harry Potter). Also, some conversations between the Harry Potter characters are direct quotes from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, and that also does not belong to me!
"You should go see them," Allen and Lenalee told Mrs. Weasley. Mr. Weasley, half asleep, bandaged, and slightly greenish in complexion, nodded his head in agreement. The Weasleys' son and a member of the Order of the Phoenix, Bill, smiled assuringly at his mother, who was also very pale and shaking slightly from shock. Allen didn't blame her, seeing her husband in his state must have been a hard blow for her.
"They'll be worried sick," Lavi added, grimacing at the bandaged wound Mr. Weasley wore around his torso. "Sorry I didn't see the attack-"
"It's...fine," Mr. Weasley grunted.
"You should go reassure your children, Mrs. Weasley," Lenalee urged. "We will stay with Mr. Weasley."
"I'll be fine, Molly," Mr. Weasley slurred. "Go tell...the kids."
Mrs. Weasley still looked reluctant to leave her husband's side, but she sighed and said, "Alright. I'll go. I promised them, too."
"You should get some rest as well," Allen told her. "You must be exhausted with worry."
"Oh, you're very sweet," Mrs. Weasley smiled weakly. "Thank you for being here, and- Lavi, was it?"
"Yes?"
"Thank you, if you weren't there, Arthur might have bled to death..."
"Hey, gee, we're comrades, right?" Lavi said, grinning. "We'll be here all night. If something happens, you'll be the first to know."
"Thanks again, I'll be back tomorrow with the children," Mrs. Weasley said and left the ward.
Once she was gone, Lavi let out a deep breath and slumped down in a chair beside Bill. "What a way to spend the holiday, ne?" he asked them all. "How're you feeling, Mr. Weasley?"
"Numb," he replied, and turned to Allen and Lenalee. "The doctors said I'm going to be moved to another ward later-"
"We'll stay," they replied promptly.
"Will you?" Bill asked them gratefully. "I really can't skip out on work- might cause suspicions- so I'd be really thankful if you could stay with my father."
"No problem," Lavi said, waving his hand in dismissal. "So far we're still waiting for news from Komui, too. He should be arriving at headquarters soon, and the others would be coming back from their own missions. I don't think they'll visit you, though."
"Especially not Kanda," Allen said darkly.
Bill raised his eyebrows. "Well, thanks anyway," he said and yawned.
"Get some rest, Bill," Lenalee said. "We'll wake you up in the morning or when anything- if anything happens."
Nothing happened during the few hours during which both Weasleys slumbered. Sometime around seven in the morning, when the sun had just risen and was peeking through the windows, Mr. Weasley was moved to another ward on the first floor, and the Exorcists followed after waking up Bill, who, about three hours later, left for work. It was around this time that Lenalee left for the visitors' tearoom on the fifth floor to grab them all some coffee.
Sometime after noon, Mr. Weasley was propped up on several pillows and reading the Daily Prophet Lavi had grabbed for them when Allen thought he heard familiar voices outside the ward door.
"We'll wait outside, Molly," a woman's voice said. "Arthur won't want too many visitors at once...It ought to be just the family first." Somebody growled in agreement, and Molly Weasley, opening the door, said as she pushed a black haired boy through it, "Don't be silly, Harry, Arthur wants to thank you.."
"They're here," Lavi smiled, standing up from his seat. Allen and Lenalee followed suit, moving away from the bed as the Weasleys and Harry approached them.
Mr. Weasley looked up from his Prophet and, upon seeing his family, beamed brightly. "Hello!" he called, throwing aside the paper (Allen caught it). "Bill just left, Molly, had to get back to work, but he says he'll drop in on you later..."
"How are you, Arthur?" Mrs. Weasley asked, kissing his cheeks. "You're still looking a bit peaky..."
"I feel absolutely fine," Mr. Weasley said cheerfully, hugging Ginny with his non-bandaged arm. "If they could only take the bandages off, I'd be fit to go home."
"Why can't they take them off, Dad?" Fred Weasley asked.
"Well, I start bleeding like mad every time they try," Mr. Weasley said, reaching over for his wand, waving it, and conjuring up chairs beside his bed "It seems there was some rather unusual kind of poison in the snake's fangs that keep wounds open..."
"They're sure they'll find an antidote," Lavi explained, "though, they say they've had much worse cases than his, and until they find that antidote, he has to take Blood-Replenishing Potion every hour. But that bloke over there-"
Mr. Weasley waved his hand, beckoning his guests closer. Lowering his voice, he said, "Bitten by a werewolf, poor chap. No cure at all."
"A werewolf?" Mrs. Weasley repearted in an alarmed whisper. "Is he safe in a public ward? Shouldn't he be in a private room?"
"It's two weeks till full moon," Mr. Weasley reminded her softly. "They've been talking to him this morning, the Healers, you know, trying to persuade him he'll be able to lead an almost normal life. I said to him- didn't mention names, of course- but I said I knew a werewolf personally, very nice man, who finds the condition quite easy to manage..."
"What did he say?" George asked curiously.
"Said he'd give me another bite if I didn't shut up," Mr. Weasley answered sadly.
"He's just like Kanda," Allen said with an edge to his voice.
"But you seemed to get along quite well with him-" Lenalee told him.
"That's because he doesn't talk as much as I do," Lavi corrected her. "I almost did get bitten by the bloke-"
"And that woman over there," Mr. Weasley interrupted, rather loudly, "won't tell the Healers what bit her, which makes us all think it must have been something she was handling illegally. Whatever it was took a large chunk out of her leg, very nasty smell when they take off the dressings."
"So, you going to tell us what happened, Dad?" Fred asked, pulling up his chair.
"Well, you already know, don't you?" Lavi asked, glancing in Harry's general direction.
"It's very simple," Mr. Weasley said. "I'd had a very long day, dozed off, got sneaked up on, and bitten. At first I thought it was Lavi here sneaking up to me like he'd been doing for the first six hours, he and that hammer of his, but really-"
"It is in the Prophet, you being attacked?" Fred asked.
"No, of course not," Mrs. Weasley chuckled bitterly, "the Ministry wouldn't want everyone to know a dirty great serpent got-"
"Arthur!" Mrs. Weasley and Lavi said hastily.
"-got- er- me."
"So where were you when it happened, Dad?" George asked.
"That's my business."
"It's a place where Allen will get lost in," Lavi teased.
"Huh?" both boys blinked.
"That'll be about everywhere," Lavi said.
"Hey!"
"I was just reading about Willy Widdershin's arrest when you arrived," Mr. Weasley said. "You know Willy turned out to be behind those ergurgitating toilets last summer? One of his jinxes, backfired, the toilet exploded, and they found him lying unconscious in the wreckage covered from head to toe in-"
"When you said you were 'on duty'," Fred cut in in a low voice, "what were you doing?"
"You heard your father," Mrs. Weasley hissed, "we are not discussing this here! Go on about Willy Widdenshins, Arthur-"
"Well, don't ask me how, but he actually got off on the toilet charge," Mr. Weasley said grimly. "I can only suppose gold changed hands-"
"You were guarding it, weren't you?" George pressed quietly. "The weapon? The thing You-Know-Who's after?"
"George, be quiet!" Mrs. Weasley snapped.
"Anyway," he said, "this time Willy's been caught selling biting doorknobs to Muggles, and I odn't think he'll be able to worm his way out of it because according to this article, two Muggles have lost their fingers and are now in St. Mungo's for emergency bone regrowth and memory modification. Just think of it, Muggles in St. Mungo's! I wonder which ward they're in?"
"Didn't you say You-Know-Who's got a snake, Harry?" Fred asked Harry, glancing at his father. "A massive one? You saw it the night he returned, didn't you?"
"That's enough," Mrs. Weasley said, with a glare. "Mad-Eye and Tonks are outside, Arthur, they want to come see you. And you lot can wait outside. You can come and say good bye afterward. Go on..."
"Hey," Lavi said in an oddly low voice, and the Weasleys and Harry turned to look at him. "Quit sticking your head where it don't belong, Fred. War isn't a game like Quidditch. If your parents are insisting on not telling you, you'd better leave it. Naive brats will just get in the way, they can't tell who's on their side and who's not, and we can't trust anything to them."
"Lavi," Lenalee said disapprovingly. "You didn't have to say it like that-"
"He has a point though," Allen said. "Fred, George, chances are that you will eventually find out what happened. For now, let your parents keep their confidential information. Things in the Order, in wars, aren't supposed to be told so carelessly to outside people.
A tense silence fell, and then Mr. Weasley cleared his throat loudly. "Why don't you guys stay with us?" he said to the Exorcists.
"Aye, they're allowed to stay, are they? Still kids," said a grouchy looking Mad-Eye Moody, who was looking at Allen with curiosity as he limped into the ward after the bright haired Nymphadora Tonks. Allen saw the man's strange right eye, and, feeling slightly subconscious, turned his head to hide his left eye.
"It'...okay," he said. "We ought to go, Lavi, Lenalee."
"Where?"
"Just..."
"There should be a way to contact Komui," Lenalee helped out. "We should inform his of the situation."
Comprehension shone in Lavi's eye as the three of them left the ward, but that didn't stop them from overhearing part of the conversation between the adults.
"...they searched the whole area, but they couldn't find the snake anywhere, it just seems to have vanished after it attacked you, Arthur," Tonks said. "But You-Know-Who can't have expected a snake to get in, can he?"
"I reckon he sent it as a lookout," Mad-Eye growled, "'cause he's not had any luck so far, has he? No, I reckon he's trying to get a clearer picture of what he's facing and if Arthut hadn't been there the beast would've had much more tim eto look around. That Exorcist being there was another obstacle for it. So Potter says he saw it all happen?"
"Yes," Mrs. Weasley said uneasily. "You know, Dumbledore seems almost to have been waiting for Harry to see something like this..."
"Yeah, well," Mad-Eye said, "there's something funny about the Potter kid, we all know that."
"Dumbledore seemed worried about Harry when I spoke to him this morning," Mrs. Weasley whispered.
"'Course he's worried," Mad-Eye grunted. "The boy's seeing things from inside You-Know-Who's snake...Obviously, Potter doesn't realize what it means, but if You-Know-Who's possessing him-"
BAM.
"Allen?" Lavi said worriedly as Allen slammed the door loudly behind him. "What's up?"
"It's...nothing," Allen said, the overheard words echoing like a bell in his ears. He looked up and met the eyes of Harry and the Weasleys, who were all wide eyed and looking terrified. "I guess you all heard that too?"
-------------
Allen still rememberd the conversation he had with Harry on the day Ron had become Gryffindor's new Keeper. The boy had been troubled about why Albus Dumbledore was neglecting him, not meeting his eyes. On the way back to Grimmauld Place, Harry was very quiet, maybe he thought he found the reason why Dumbledore wasn't looking at him anymore-
Maybe he came to the conclusion that Dumbledore feared the Voldemort inside him. Maybe he felt...
"Invaded, comtanimated," Lavi muttered, his gaze on the silent figure of Harry. "I'll bet he feels that way."
"I think he feels like he's that weapon we've been told about," Allen said grimly. "Because he saw Arthur Weasley's attack through the eye of the snake, he probably feels as if he's the weapon that Voldemort is after."
"That makes sense as well," Lavi nodded. "Just like we're God's hands- his weapons- on Earth."
Allen only smiled in return.
"Sixteen..." Lavi suddenly said.
"Huh?"
"Your age," Lenalee explained with a chuckle. "Your birthday's coming up in a few days, isn't it?"
"Oh, yeah," Allen said, realization dawning on him. "Yes, um, on Christmas day. It's actually the day Mana took me in, and I don't really know my exact age, but..."
"What should we get you?" Lavi asked excitedly, appearently not listening. "Do you want a Christmas present or a birthday present? Aw, I'll just have to ask the twins for money, but I wonder if they have anything...wait, maybe I can beg Komui. I'm sure good ol' Dumbledore's got something up his sleeve, like...ka-ching!"
"N-no. I mean, I really don't-"
"We'll have to ask Mrs. Weasley to make an extra large feast!" Lavi said to Lenalee, who laughed. "Too bad Kuro-chan and the others are still stuck in school. They'd have been great in the party. But Yu wouldn't come anyway-"
"Guys...!"
But it was to no avail...
Christmas Eve came and went merrily. Hermione arrived a couple days before, confessing that she wasn't really into skiiing anyway (she had at first gone on a skiing trip with her Muggle parents), and she'd successfully dragged Harry out of his dark mood, and by the time they all went to sleep on December 24, there wasn't a gloomy person in the house (unless, of course, Kanda was here, but he never came, despite the fact that Komui, Krory, and Miranda had all dropped by for a small holiday greeting as well as a meeting.)
Allen woke up on Christmas morning lying a small mattress provided by Remus Lupin the other night. He and Lavi were squished into Harry and Ron's room, but since they were both used to less than comfortable nights due to their missions, weren't complaining. The mattresses were comfortable and the blankets were also warm, anyway. But what surprised them most of all were the boxes stacked up at the foot of their makeshift beds.
They were rather large, almost the same size as Harry and Ron's, but Allen noticed that he had almost double the size.
"Wha-?"
"Yeah, some of us got you two each," Lavi said to Allen's confused face as the boy picked up two large boxes, both of which were from Lenalee.
"Good haul this year," Ron said to Harry. "Thanks for the Broom Compass, it's excellent, beats Hermione's- she's got me a homework planner-"
"I got a new eyepatch," Lavi said cheerfully, tying the string behind his head. "It's more comfortable, I have to say."
"Hmm," Allen said absentmindedly, carefully putting aside the mince pies given to him by Mr. and Mrs. Weasley. "It's a compass," he muttered, opening the small package from Ron.
"I heard from Lavi you get lost a lot," the boy said with a grin. "What's that? A potion?"
"From Fred and George," Allen said, reading the card. He grimaced. "Heightening Potion, they invented it- gee...Harry, thanks for the cards. The old deck was getting a bit frayed..."
"Yeah," Harry said.
"What are you doing?" Lavi asked the boy, watching as Harry turned and squinted curiously at a canvas.
"It's-"
"Merry Christmas," George said, suddenly appearing- Apparating- at the foot of Harry's bed with Fred. "Don't go downstairs for a bit."
"Why not?" Ron asked.
"Mum's crying again," Fred said bitterly. "Percy sent back his Christmas jumper."
"Without a note. Hasn't asked how Dad is or visited him or anything..." George added.
"We tried to comfort her," Fred said, trudging through the pile of gifts around Harry to peer at the picture on the canvas. "Told her Percy's nothing more than a humongous pile of rat droppings-"
"-didn't work," George sighed, helping himself to a Chocolate Frog. "So Lupin took over. Best let him cheer her up before we go down for breakfast, I reckon."
"What's that supposed to be anyway?" Fred asked Harry. Allen moved over to them and took a look: The picture was horrible.
"It's from Dobby-"
"I can't tell what it is-"
"Looks like a gibbon with two black eyes," Fred said.
"It's Harry!" Geroge gasped, pointing at the back of the picture. "Says so on the back!"
"Good likeness," Fred said, and dodged the homework planner Harry threw at him.
Lavi, taking a peek at the picture, burst into a laughing fit and rolled around on the floor. Allen continued to squint and peer at the painting, trying to see an inkling of similarity between teh real Harry and the Harry in the portrait.
Q: Are Allen and the others going to make any difference or changes to the book's original plotline? Like...Sirius NOT dying? That'd be nice...
A: I doubt there will be any changes like that. The final conclusions of the story (who's going to die/live, what happens) will be the same, most likely, even if I change things around a bit in the middle.
Q: Kuro-chan's last name is Alaster or something is'nt it?
A: This is a question that actually has nothing much to do with the story, but Krory is his last name. Our beloved character's full name is Arystar Krory III (the third).