Chapter 2:Marvel
Rock of Eternity
The lightning bolt had come as big as ever, but when it was gone, in young Harry Potter's place was a titan of power. He stood at six foot eleven – seven foot even. His wild black hair was smoothed back into a slick style. His green eyes blazed with hidden power and knowledge. His weak and childish frame had been replaced by that of a man, and not just any man. From a certain angle and maybe with a side-by-side photograph, one could still see 'Harry' in this adult man, but with allusions and metaphors of gods made men and ancient heroes of old mixed in. Muscles, strength, impressive jawline, he had it all. This was the body of an idealized adult Harry James Potter, and then some.
His clothing had also been changed, from his poorly fit school uniform, he now sported a red and gold ensemble that only enhanced his already impressive features. He wore a deep, crimson red body suit, stretched tight against his bulging muscles. A stunning white, metallic gold-lined cloak draped across his back, held by a gold chain across his neck, the cloak ending just below his waist. A sash of woven gold fibers circled his waist, tied in an intricate knot with bands falling freely from his left hip. His shoes had become heavy-soled boots, colored the same metallic yellow-gold, and across his forearms, bands of solid gold added protection to his arms. The most notable feature, however, was the large emblazoned gold lightning bolt across his chest.
"What... just happened to... me?" the boy-turned-man asked, noting even as he spoke his voice was just as changed as the rest of him. The voice of an adult, of a strong man even.
"What needed to happen... Harry," the old wizard said. "Or perhaps it's best to call you by your new name; Captain Marvel."
"Quickly now, there's not much time left. I'm sorry it had to be this way, but I had no other choice. You will understand it all one day, but for now, what you must understand is that there is a threat to the world. A threat you must face and vanquish before it is too late. To change back, you need only say my name, and again, to transform yourself once more into Captain Marvel." As the Wizard Shazam spoke, a small tremor shook the room where they resided.
"You have many powers beyond mortal man, beyond even those that already have supernatural powers. I wish I could help teach you how to control and learn of them, but there is no time. All my power, all that I have left, is now yours. Unfortunately, that includes my responsibility to safeguard the world against those that would use magic to destroy it. Trust your instincts. Follow your heart. Find the Dark Lord and vanquish him before he can gain too much of a power base." The tremors became shaking, and Captain Marvel looked around, spooked out of his mind.
"I'm sorry to have to burden one so young," the Wizard Shazam mourned. "There was no other option, and we are out of time. Remember, young Harry Potter, none of this was your fault. It was all decided long ago. All you need to concern yourself with... is the future... and stopping... the Dark Lord..."
Almost as though those last words were the trigger it had been waiting for, the shaking culminated in a violent display. The giant rock, which Captain Marvel had not noticed until now, crashed down and squashed that which was beneath it like a bug beneath a boot. Unfortunately, it had been the Wizard Shazam and his throne that had sat beneath the Rock of Eternity.
"NO!!" Captain Marvel screamed. "NOOOOO! Please, oh god, no, no no no no no no no NO NO NO!"
He surged forward with amazing speed, his muscles bulging as he worked to clear the wreckage and move the giant rock from its final resting place, but it refused to move. Not that his strength wasn't working, or that he hadn't noticed he was a lot stronger than he should've been, but that the Rock literally refused to move!
Finally, after an enormous effort of trying, Captain Marvel succumbed to the inevitable, and he fell back, tears of mourning and helplessness falling as he cried for the man that he'd just met. He sat there crying, until he remembered the old wizard's words, and what all that he'd been told, before the Rock had fallen.
"Find and stop the Dark Lord," he said as he got to his feet. A feeling that was unfamiliar to Harry Potter suddenly exploded within Captain Marvel's being. A feeling of rage, anger, sorrow, and wrath. A feeling of vengeance. "The last request of my predecessor. Find, stop, and vanquish the Dark Lord. Vanquish the thing that killed my parents. Oh, I'm gonna vanquish him all right. I'm gonna vanquish him so hard, his next three lifetimes are going to be feeling it!" He surged to his feet and wiped his tears away.
"First step... finding him. But... how?" the newly inherited superhero asked himself. Surprisingly, his mind provided him with an answer almost immediately. "Scry, using the Pool of Viewing. Look for any uses of dark magic and anything that would match with the Dark Lord's signature. How in Hades do I know all this stuff?"
Momentarily stunned, he shook it off and stepped back before waving his hand over the space where the pool had been before. It reappeared instantly, showing a satellite view of the British Isles. After only a moments concentration, the pool immediately began to zoom in on London, until a pinpoint of black was highlighted near downtown in one of the back alleys.
"Found you," he almost growled.
Going with his instincts, as he'd been told to do, he jumped up, and was nearly shocked back onto his backside when he found himself hovering above the pool, yet he remained aloft and in full control. "Wicked," he smirked to himself, before, continuing with following his instincts, he then dove into the pool head first.
London, England
The transition for Captain Marvel from the Rock of Eternity, to the alleyway where he'd tracked the dark magic to was the same as walking through an open doorway from one room to the next, or from inside to the outside. Nothing really special or different about it, beyond the scope of the change that is. To everyone else, it seemed that London was experiencing quite a bit of cloudless thunder and lightning today. Each one either taking away or dropping off a person with every echoing boom.
"All right, now where is...?" Captain Marvel started to ask himself, only to be interrupted by a loud scream. A woman's scream, which seemed to be coming from the alley he was flying over.
Without hesitation, he quickly dove through the air as fast as he dared. Hey, he was in the middle of modern downtown London, and he knew that if he flew as fast has he could, not only would all the glass shatter from the sonic boom, but a few streets and concrete buildings might be torn to shreds from the force of his passing. So, instead of instantly getting there, he got there in less than two seconds.
What he witnessed was something straight out of the comic books. Or anime, given the uncanny realism of the sight. A large demon, for it could be nothing else, stood threateningly close to a young woman, who cowered against the alley wall.
The demon stood at just over nine feet tall, had pitch black skin, even in broad daylight, though currently it stood in shadow. It's features included a wide mouth filled with glistening black fangs, large muscles, blood red eyes, distorted face that included horn-like protrusions at the top, and a series of fin-like spikes starting at it's crown and going all the way down to the tip of it's four-foot prehensile tail. It's hands had only four fingers, yet each was curved and razor sharp so it was better to call them talons. It's feet were double-jointed like a dinosaur's, yet it only had two talons instead of three or four. It also growled like a hungry lion and even from a distance away, he could tell that it's breath smelled like a whole bunch of something crawled in and died.
The young woman was, by best description, a goth. She had bright purple-dyed hair, lots of jewelry, and was wearing a mismatch of clothes including a ballerina's tutu, leather biker jacket, fishnet top, ribbed corset, four inch high heels and striped stockings. She was also, quite clearly, scared out of her mind.
"Get away from her!" Captain Marvel called out, hoping to distract the demon from attacking her.
Surprisingly, it worked. The ugly demon reeled back at his shout, further recoiling when the crimson and gold clad superhero punched it in the face, forcing it to let go of the young woman. Captain Marvel did not hesitate in grabbing the demon by the only point where it was safe to do so, though he couldn't begin to say how he knew that, and tossing it back into the shadows. He knew it was stronger in those shadows, but at least it was away from the victim.
He turned to her, his eyes full of command and conviction, and ordered, "Go! Don't worry, I'll take care of it. Go!" She ran off, screaming her way down the street. Captain Marvel hoped she would be okay, but for right now, he had more pressing concerns.
His face etched in steely-eyed resolve, he stepped into the shadows, knowing only one of them would not be stepping out of them by the time this was through. He was counting on it being himself.
Unfortunately, it turned out that there was a whole clan of shadow-walker demons waiting there for him. Unfortunate for the demons that is.
"Heh-heh-heh," the one he'd punched earlier chuckled evilly. All of the demons had surrounded him by this point, their eyes glowing red in the shadows, their claws gleaming from the limited light available. "I don't know who you think you are strongman, but flying around in a costume isn't like what it used to be. Not only do you still get killed just as dead, but now you get laughed at while we eat your entrails! Yah-Hah hah hah HAH HAH HAH!"
"I want his fingers!" one of the demons cried out, sparking a competition to see who would get 'what'.
"I want his toes! And his ears!" another cried, and soon the whole alley was echoing with various body parts, some not worth mentioning while others were just plain disgusting.
Captain Marvel just stood there impassively, waiting for the demons to make the first move. They were Malckeavailee breed, an offshoot of the original Shadow Demons from the Realm of Darkness, Earth Demons with physical forms and limited spiritual influence or powers, sensitive to light and stronger than a trained ox in overall physical strength, but with the speed and reaction time of a cougar, making them fairly dangerous in groups greater than three. More than that and one would need an army or a serious advantage to take them out.
Captain Marvel counted 33 in the alley around him. He walked up to the one that he'd punched and had just mocked him. The demon scowled at this strange human's indifference and lack of fear. If they weren't so cocky, they might have recognized the anger brewing in his eyes at that moment. He then slammed his right fist into the demon's head, it's head slamming around from the blow, silencing all the chuckling in the alley. The red and gold clad superhero then swung his left fist hard into the demon's gut, actually throwing it up off the ground and into the air so that it's inverted head was now level with his hard green eyes.
"For the record," he said as the demon hung there in the air, "I'm called Captain Marvel."
With even greater strength than before, he struck with both fists into the demon's chest, driving it to the ground and forcing it to explode in dark energy as it was vanquished on the spot. Thirty-two left.
"Who's next?" he said casually, even as they all growled and dove upon him like a pack of wolves.
Three punches each, a total of 96 hits, not counting the last few he had to drag back into the alley, and altogether less than ten minutes later Captain Marvel flew out of the dark alley, which was now demon free, and back into the sky over London. Unfortunately, the newly christened hero was now more frustrated than satisfied as he was quite certain that while the demons he'd just vanquished were of the Dark Lord's creation, were not directly related to him in any way. In fact it wouldn't be a stretch at all to say that they were less than foot soldiers to him, pawns of pawns even.
Which left him right back at square one in searching for the evil creature he was looking to vanquish.
He opened his mind and senses to ways of tracking down this Dark Lord, plans and options passing through his mind by the thousands as each second passed, but each idea he came up with were all dead ends. The only explanation that he could come up with was that the Dark Lord was suppressing his magical signature behind containment and protection wards. How he knew that in the first place, he couldn't begin to explain, but he couldn't deny the knowledge being there.
Before he could actually go about trying even the simplest of his plans however, he heard another scream from not too far away. Immediately he flew through the air and using senses that he'd never imagined having before, quickly zeroed in on the source. By that point a few more screams had joined the first.
It was at the First National Bank of London, a large and ancient building that had a large percentage of the nation's currency pouring through it on a daily basis. An armored van had pulled up just in front of the steps and six heavily armed and armored gunmen stepped out and started firing wildly into the crowd and all across the street as they steadily made their way up the steps into the bank.
By the time Captain Marvel got there, three of them were already in the bank and shooting the place up, subduing the hostages and taking out the guards there. The tall magical hero floated there above the bank for a minute, fear entering his green eyes as he looked down on something he'd only ever seen in movies or on TV before. These... criminals were hurting people, all just to satisfy their own greed!
But, he thought to himself, he had a mission to complete. He had to find the Dark Lord and defeat him now! But... those people... who would help them?
The police, a cold, logical part of him stated.
The police weren't there, and more people would get hurt before they resolved the situation. He was already there and he could resolve it right now! And wasn't that what heroes were supposed to do? Wasn't he supposed to be some kind of superhero now?
Solomon, the magical force of great wisdom, the cold logical part of Captain Marvel's mind, remained silent. Achilles, the magical force of immense courage on the other hand had plenty to say.
Captain Marvel glared down at the bank and was moving at the speed of thought. He crashed through the front of the bank and knocked out the three stragglers at the front, and for good measure took away their weapons. Unfortunately in that time, the other three gunmen turned around and unleashed hell upon the crimson and gold clad superhero.
Captain Marvel bravely stood to face what he was sure was his death, he was still a young boy and one who knew bullets could kill and was most definitely afraid of being killed by them, but he stood strong and did not flinch as the bullets hit. Well, after they hit he did flinch, but mostly in surprise. He barely felt a thing. He felt the impacts, but just that, his skin didn't even bounce from the projectile's impact while the bullets fell away like they'd hit a titanium steel shell!
A full three minutes later, the gunmen had expended their entire supply of ammunition and could only stare in shock and dismay as the man they'd just shot with enough firepower to lay waste to an entire army calmly stood there and brushed some dust off his crimson red and metallic gold uniform. In a flash of red and gold movement, the gunmen were all knocked unconscious and tied up for the police to pick up, who had just arrived at the scene.
Seeing nothing else he could do, Captain Marvel quickly left, taking to the air like a red and gold bolt of lightning. His day wasn't over yet though, as there were at least a dozen more crises happening all over the city, some domestic or human criminals, while a few were demonic or magical in origin.
Finally, as he was flying past Big Ben for the third time, he realized the time and his eyes went comically wide as he exclaimed, "Oh no! I'm late for school!"
Wasting no more time, and shooting through the air like a living thunderbolt, he flew to his school and aimed for the spot behind some of the dumpsters behind the main building. That he sometimes was known to be 'dumped' back there by the school bullies on occasion was fortunate as it would make explaining why he was so late much easier.
Once Captain Marvel was on the ground, he cast one last look around before looking to the heavens and, his same instincts of before guiding him as much as anything, cried out, "SHAZAM!"
While there were a few clouds here and there, there certainly were no thunderheads nearby, so while people looked curiously at the sound of thunder and maybe even at the lightning bolt striking down somewhere near a London school building, they quickly passed it off as the sounds of the city depending on wherever they were at the time.
Harry Potter looked down at himself in amazement after the lightning had left, changing him back to normal. He wasn't even singed! His clothes, shoes, even backpack were all exactly as they had been from the moment he was taken from the street to the Rock of Eternity. He almost thought that the whole thing might have just been a dream of some kind, but at the same time he just knew in his heart that it was all real. A man had died in front of him, granting him a great gift and asking only that he use it wisely and to protect the world from this Dark Lord.
Stepping out from behind the dumpsters and racing into the school building for his morning classes, Harry promised once more to do just that. After all, what else would the power of Shazam be used for?