Disclaimer: Do I give off the impression that I own this series? If so, I'm terribly sorry for misleading you. Also, completely unbeta'd.

Summary: Kaz, I'm already a wizard.

Midnight Blues

Part II: Among Thieves

9.) Fission Mailed
or,
Obligatory Prison Chapter

The cage shuts.

"Sorry about eye," the man says in broken English. "Orders are orders." He tosses a black scrap through the metal bars; it flutters down, down just close enough for my hands to grasp. When I make to do so, my hand grasps nothing but air and the scrap lands weakly at my feet.

"It takes time to adjust," says the man, his face covered by shadow and voice garbled by the ambient noises of the volcano. "Best tell soon, no one knows when you lose other one."

With that, he turns and leaves, jackboots echoing, reverberating throughout the dankness. I grasp at the scrap, looking as intently as a newly mono-sighted man can: three straps, for extra hold; a patch made out of hard leather stitched together neatly. It's well-made, so I put it on and salvage what dignity I have left and clutch at my side. Goddamn that hurts.

"Still alive, then?" A voice to my right whispers, amused. "But I spy with my little eye they didn't leave you unscathed."

"I always wanted to be a pirate," I reply, tapping the eyepatch as if to test its solidity. "ever since I was a kid."

The voice laughs, a rough, old masculine sound; it's like listening to breaking dry wall or the night-creaking of an old house. "I suspected you might say as much. You must be driving Robards insane."

"Robards?" I question, turning in the direction of disembodied. "So he's the one who—" I trail off and make a scooping gesture in front of the eyepatch. The voice, belonging to an old man with hair the color of ash and a dirty, stringy beard as long as a waterfall, nods slowly. He wears rags and had quiet brown eyes. For a brief moment, I wonder what he did to end up in Hozhen's house of horrors.

"England's best kept secret, I would wager. But that does not matter," he says.

"Oh?" I ask, "Then what does?"

"Entering the lock box."

"The lock box?" I ask, humoring the windbag.

The old man smiles, revealing rotted teeth. "What is man but his experiences? But the things he processes and feels inside his head, inside that locked box of his? What is he but his dreams? Of pain, of beauty, of adventure, and meaning?"

Great. Out of all of the people in the world to get stuck next to in a prison cell, it's a fucking existentialist. In a prison cell. An existentialist. In a prison cell. God, what a fucking cliché.

They say all our stories are written by angels; well, fuck you to whoever's writing mine.

"All of those experiences," the bastard rambles on, "are just you by yourself in that lock box. Everything you perceive is right. In. Here." He taps his forehead with each word for emphasis.

"This going somewhere?" I ask, not intending to be rude, but sometimes you just can't help it.

"Pain is just another form of experience," he says. "If you don't fear it, if you don't acknowledge it, you don't feel it."

If you don't fear pain, you don't feel it. Has this man ever been in pain before? It doesn't matter if you choose not to fear it, or choose to not acknowledge it, pain still hurts like a bitch.

"Uhhh... okay. How about, we play the silent game? Just meditate for the next however long."

"Don't fear it; don't acknowledge it," the man continues, his voice dropping. "It's all in your head."

You may be wondering how I ended up in Hozhen's dungeon, missing an eye, considering we left off with Team Were-pire's offer. Well, that's a bit of do in explaining. You'll have to give me a second to regain my bearings.

Hozhen's Base
Four days earlier

"How does shipping work in the magical world?" I asked Ron (back in his identikit disguise) as I eyed a couple of crates we passed on the way to the most secluded bridge of Hozhen's compound, which lead to an armory that wasn't in use. Ron raised an eyebrow at the question. "I mean, is everything just shrunken and portkeyed? Or apparated with a couple of workers between docks?"

"Of course bloody not!" Was his response. "They're shipped by boat."

"Really?"

"Well of course; think about it! A portkey just can't carry that many items, or, at least I don't think it can; and the amount of power it would take to apparate crates around the country all day is fucking immense. I could think of much better jobs for people with that amount of power. Besides, would you want to deal with the fallout when some bloke splinches himself with a crate of wands?"

"Jesus. You're right." I replied. "Though it does make sense; most wizards still think the Industrial Revolution hasn't happened."

"The what?" Asked Ron.

"The Industrial Revolution, you dolt. You know, a change from an agrarian society to a manufacturing one? Textiles and coal mining? The only time in history Manchester's been relevant? When peo—"

"Focus!" Interrupted a third, annoyed voice.

"Sorry, mum," Ron groused at Tracey, before he turned to me and whispered conspiratorially: "Merlin, she's just as bad as Hermione." Which, of course, brought up Hermione, and Ron suddenly turned pensive.

Tracey, however, didn't seem to notice. "I wouldn't have to be if you two idiots focused for once in your miserable lives."

"Shut up. We're nearly there," I said.

"Yes, about that... where is 'there'?" Ron questioned.

"And why did we need invisibility cloaks and all our gear?" Continued Tracey for Ron, giving them an odd twin-like quality reminiscent of Fred and George.

"Because after that, we're going to be making a detour."

"A detour? A detour where?" Tracey asked.

"Never mind that. Do as I ask," I replied.

Tracey, however, didn't look convinced. "Are we sure this is how we want to play it? Mercier and Lombardi could be assets, but they could also drag us down, and drag us down hard."

"I think they're our best shot," Ron threw in his own two cents. "but we're going to have to play it careful."

"Easy enough. Distract, and then get the hell out of Dodge," I said, earning two blank looks. "Nevermind; distract them and leave as quick as possible." At that, both nod, looking considerably less confused.

As we approached the armory, Mercier seemed to materialize from the shadows of the night. I really hoped that wasn't a vampire ability, traveling through shadows; I never had much to deal with them in America. She stood like some sort of devil guarding the entrance to hell and awaited our arrival, at which she said:

"Have you considered the offer?" Lombardi slunk from another dark corner of the building and I was struck with the thought of how ridiculous it must have been for them to coordinate hiding in the shadows and, suddenly, neither of them seemed particularly imposing.

"Yeah," I replied, feeling lighter. "We'll help you, so long as you can guarantee the price we're to be paid." Tracey shot me a disgusted look, as if I should have been ashamed to want money for that. Mercier, of course, showed no change in expression:

"Five-thousand galleons each."

Ron and I looked at each other, knowing that if we pulled this off, we'd be set for quite some time. "Done," Ron says, after the moment of conference.

"Good," replied Lombardi, as he handed me what appeared to be an engraved lighter. "You'll be able to contact us through this. Hold down the tab and speak into it when you're ready to collapse the wards."

"We will."

Hozhen's Dungeons
Present Day

Chains rattle, looping their way around my chest and torso; round and round they go until they settle tightly, like Boa Constrictor squeezing the life from me. A man with a handsome face and an ugly smile looms above me, his white robes clinging to him and his hood lowered.

"My, my, you are a difficult fellow to crack," the man's smile widens, his accent a gruff Mancunian. "How can I not be flattered by the resistance you're putting up? You barely even made a noise when we took that eye of yours." He pauses to give my eyepatch a tap. "We've already found that your natural eye color is green and you suffer from myopia. Won't be long before we find out exactly who you are. Why don't you save us the trouble and just tell me?"

Three more of his white-robed friends, incidentally the ones I had noticed at the party several days ago but forgot to mention to Ron. As if it really mattered, Ron's not gonna be a whole lot of help right now and Tracey's equally... out of commission. So, I need to find a way out of here all by my lonesome.

Unlike my cell partner, who's an idiot, and thinks you can somehow control pain, I have found that throwing an interrogator off his game generally works in teasing out some of those escape routes. So, I take a deep breath... and, here goes nothing:

"Why don't we talk about you, Robards?"

Robards blinks, and then smiles. "Ask away then, just remember, I'm going to be asking the questions soon."

I survey the man: tall, with a mat of brown hair draping over his forehead; his forehead is gently sloped, his nose pointed and Roman, his cheekbones high, his goatee trimmed, and his grey eyes crystal clear, devoid of any inkling of conscience or compassion. People love to talk up Voldemort, but he was ultimately a man consumed by his passions; these eyes I'm staring into, they hold true, unvarnished evil. Evil that is tangible through absence, not experienced through the lock box brain. And I immediately know the disease such symptoms lead to:

"A Blood Mage, are you?" I ask, indicating the other Whiterobes as well. "You and your ilk? All of you?"

"Clever, clever," Robards chuckles.

"Any relation to Gawain Robards? The Auror summa cum laude?"

"My idiot father is of no concern to you," replies Robards. "He doesn't matter to me and I most assuredly do not matter to him. Any more questions? Because I'd so like to rip your teeth out."

"That won't be necessary, Thomas," Another voice interrupts, an accent carrying the Orient with it. Robards and I look to the door and find Hozhen, in all his middle-aged-dad glory, holding a placid hand up for peace. "Will it, Mr. Potter?"

One of the White-robed blood mages stiffens, a delicate jaw wires shut underneath her hood.

"Mr. Potter?" I question. "And who might that-"

"-Don't play dumb, I already know," Hozhen rebukes mildly and walks over to the chair in which I am chained. Something pointed presses against my throat hard enough to draw blood. "With this, I can be very persuasive to the right people."

"Shame I ain't one of them," I retort with more bravado than I feel.

Hozhen shrugs. "There are ways of rectifying that," he turns to Robards. "Lashes and the Cruciatus for today, I have heard that this little bird here is a messenger from the English. I want to know why they sent him, of all people."

"Done," Robards says lazily.

"Do use this time to think carefully, Mister Potter," Hozhen says. "We'll be coming for your other eye tomorrow."

With that he turns away, and Robards readies his wand: "Crucio!"

Hozhen's Base
Four Days Earlier

We used a different method of reaching the volcanic floor than we did yesterday, after having learned some of the alternate routes to the vault. Namely, jumping off the side of the armory bridge, were no sentries had been posted and no wards monitored the fall.

"No," Tracey said, "Absolutely not!"

"Don't be Hermione, Miss Davis," I replied. "There's only so much chickenshit about heights I can take." Boy, was I glad Herms wasn't around to hear that. Tracey, perhaps galvanized at being compared to Hermione, crossed her arms and stepped up to the ledge, activating the Warder to make sure we weren't jumping right into the ward's defenses.

Thankfully, our luck held and we were wardless.

Tracey wrapped her arms around Ron and settled onto his back, mine already encumbered by several rucksacks and my own weapons, including the flintlocks I stole from that drunken pirate. With a flick of my wrist, my wand shot out from the wrist holster of my combat robes and I prepared myself for the jump.

"Are we ready?" I asked unnecessarily, earning a nod from Ron and a 'fuck you' from Tracey. "Well then, let's do it." Without hesitation, I fell backwards off the bridge and down into the bowels of the volcano.

Ah, I missed this! The feeling of falling, of the ground rushing up to meet you. It's a good feeling, absolutely fucking life-affirming.

I turned around to see a veritable mountain of rock in hurry to impale me, so I used an underpowered version of the arresto momentum Dumbledore used to keep from turning into hash third year, and eventually coasted to a stop behind the rubble, about fifty feet from where the lift Tracey and I had used the night before stood. Moments later, Ron landed quietly beside me and Tracey hopped off his back; wobbling from the dive, she stumbled and nearly pitched forward into me. When I caught her arm, however, her glare immediately convinced me to let go.

"So," Tracey said peevishly, once she had regained her bearings. "What next?"

I was about to say that we should check on the wards, but something immediately struck me as being off. It wasn't by sight, but eventually I could hear a slow rumbling. Ron and Tracey seemed to have heard it as well, as all three of us looked up to see the lift slowly descending down into the belly of the volcano.

"Shite," muttered Ron as all three of us ducked behind the rubble.

Peeking out, I saw the lift land on the solid bedrock and the chained-gate open. From it, stepped out two bodyguards, likely part of the quartet Tracey and I obliviated the night before. Once out, they immediately formed a protective line on either side of Hozhen, wore a small smile. The wards were disabled one-by-one as the trio moved toward the looming vault doors.

"Great, I spent all night thinking of ways to disable those," Tracey muttered angrily, earning an incredulous look from Ron. Hozhen touched the door and I could feel the Blood Ward disintegrate, at least until Hozhen reset them. After the ward fell, the vault swung open far faster than any monolithic slab like it should have; like an overlarge saloon swinging door.

"Doesn't matter," I replied as Hozhen and his flunkies entered the vault, "I don't want to be anywhere near that vault until Hozhen's gone. For now, we wait."

And wait we did, though not for long, as in a matter of minutes, Hozhen reemerged. However, the Dark Lord carried something with him this time. A long, object that looked very much like a dagger with an expertly applied engorgement charm to it. Something like:

"A spear tip," Tracey said in shock.

"Shite!" Ron exclaimed, none-too-quietly, and looked apologetic when both of us leveled a glare at him. "That's it, isn't it? That's the bloody Lance, innit?" He continued in a whisper.

We both looked to Tracey, who nodded. "That's it," she whispered. "But why would he take it out? Especially now?"

Hozhen returned to the lift, and the cage closed behind his bodyguards as they made the long trek back up. Why indeed would Hozhen take out the Lance, which he previously had no interest in, then of all times? And, suddenly, as things are wont to do in the absurd life of Harry Potter, all of it clicked.

"Something about pher-o-mones being released," Said Ron, "Anything the user orders is followed."

"Exactly! Revolution, Mr. Müller, revolution should... must come next!"

"A real Dark Lord, minions and all."

"Oh, fucking hell," I breathed. "That's why he wanted the world's greatest criminals to come together." I turned to Ron and Tracey, the latter of which seemed to have come to understanding, the former of which looked befuddled. "Come on guys. Fuck the money and fuck Mercier and Lombardi. Time to get the fuck out of Dodge."

"What?" Both purebloods asked; I really have to stop using that expression.

I palmed my face exasperatedly. "Not for the first time I wish Hermione was around, you two are fucking idiots."

"Oi!" Exclaimed Ron.

"Let's move, China's about to have a really bad week and I don't want to be a part of it," I enunciated slowly, as if talking to two retards. When Ron still looks confused, I dumbed it down further to cocknified (is that a word?) parody of my accent. "Let's fuckin' hightail it, youse cunts."

Ron nods and made to follow. Ron's not often as dense that, but when he is, he's monumentally fucking stupid.

"Wait!" Tracey whispered harshly, "Where the fuck are we going!?"

"Back to England, Tracey." I replied. "This 'weekend getaway for the criminal upper-class' bullshit is just that, bullshit. Hozhen's using the spear to get all the people trapped in this fortress to fight for him. He wants to start a revolution in China."

"Merlin," Ron said. "And does he want to install himself as supreme dictator?"

"Probably," I answered. "But I don't intend to find out. Let's go, some galleons aren't worth the risk becoming a mindless slave to some bloke's Bolshevik power fantasy."

Tracey looked unconvinced. "And you don't think the fall of an entire government, as well as the other three-hundred people here who are going to be those 'mindless slaves', is worth saving?"

"No," I said remorselessly as I reached into the bottomless bag I brought along with and pulled out my combat robes and a broomstick. "I don't think it's worth it. We tell Boris what happened, he passes it along to some connections he has in the government, they give it to M.I.7.. That's the long and short of what we need to do." I put on the coat of my robes and the boots, fixed the bracers, threw up the hood over my head, and started to walk away when Tracey dropped the bombshell:

"No, that's not the long and short," she said, stopping Ron, who had started to put on his own robes. "Not when you're already on contract with M.I.7.!"

And that, dear friends, stopped me dead. I whirled on Tracey, grasped her by shoulder, and shoved her much harder than I would have normally done to any woman into the rubble we had cowered behind minutes earlier, a flick of my wrist and my wand was pointed at her.

"What did you just say?" Ron growled for the both of us, his own wand jabbed into the pulse-point of Tracey's throat.

Hozhen's Dungeons
Present Day

"Another day and still nothing, Potter," Robards says, running a hand through his silky brown mane as he and another man drag me back to my cell. The cold dungeon air stings at my shredded back. "I'm torn: should I be amazed at your resilience, or disappointed in my lack of persuasion?"

I wisely refrain from responding, though that's probably more due to the blood welling in my mouth than any sort of restraint.

"Potter, eh?" Asks the other man, a Northman twang to his English accent. "Saw Weasley, tah. Where's the third? That mudblood who was always following yeh like a lost puppy, eh?"

"Granger, was it?" Robards continues.

The other man sucks in a sharp breath and then sighs, as if reminiscing. "Granger, that's the name!" He wears a lecherous little smirk. "Now there's a pretty galleon if Ah've ever seen one. Ever get her to suck on your cock, Potter? She looks like she'd be real canny at tha—oof!" I don't let him get any further with that, spitting the blood that had been collecting in my mouth into his face, and take advantage of his surprise by headbutting him (due to my restrained hands). Robards makes no attempt to restrain me when his partner's hits the deck, taking a savage stomping.

Best he learn. No one talks about Hermione that way.

No one but me, that is.

When the chuckling Robards finally pulls me away, I'm fairly sure I've broken that disgusting jaw of his and the once brave man curls up, spitting up small spurts of blood. Delicious.

"Temper, Potter, temper," chides Robards smilingly. "Though it is refreshing. Most prisoners just curl up and wither, or they spill their secrets through Veritaserum. But you, you just don't submit, do you?"

I flash a bloody grin in return, ignoring the pain radiating from shoulders due Robards lashes. "Thought that if I ever did get captured, might as well acquaint myself with the Potion so I wouldn't give anything up." I poke the gasping man's body with my big toe. "No concern for the injured?" I ask the torture specialist.

"None," Robards replies, tone suddenly severe. "The man has done nothing that warrants his attitude. A beating like that will be good for him. Though I don't know if it'll be good for you, later on."

"I'm not worried."

"No, no you shouldn't be," Robards says as we stop at my cage, where the resident Philosopher-King sleeps fitfully on the jagged ground, groaning and turning. "But you should be worried about your prospects. Death or submission, those are the only ways out."

The door opens without prompting and Robards pushes me in; I trip over a loose rock and land painfully on my back as the door closes with a loud, metallic clang. It wakes the Existentialist.

"We have ceased to exist," he moans aloud as he awakens.

I stop focusing on the pain long enough to gasp out a "What?". The man looks back at me pityingly:

"The moment you leave this world, the moment you enter the lock box." Oh, Jesus, not this again. "When you realize it is transient, a shadow. When you realize it is immaterial, you are immaterial, you are nothing."

What? What the fuck is he on about? He may have been weirdo before but at least he was sane then!

"You don't exist," he whimpers, repeating it over and over again like the mantra of a scared child trying to convince himself the sounds coming from the closet are just 'the house settling'. "You don't exist. You don't exist. Speck of dust in cosmic wind. You don't exist. I don't exist. You are nothing. You are nothing, you-are-nothing..."

Hozhen's Base
Five Days Earlier

"You know something?" Tracey said, seemingly unmindful of the two wands jabbed at her throat. "They told me you two were slow on the uptake, but I think it's just willful blindness."

"Speak sense woman before I turn your face into lasagna," Ron growled.

She laughed. "How could you not see it?" Upon seeing our expectant faces, Tracey brushed her hand at our wands, and I tentatively withdrew, though I still kept her in my 'crosshairs', so to speak. Ron eventually did the same, after a long glower at the brunette; Tracey stood straight and brushed the grime from her robes:

"Leaving aside all of the other jobs you've done for 'Boris'," Tracey started, rubbing at her throat, "let's go recent. You killed two hitmen responsible for murdering a judge in France. That judge was about to 'ascend', so to speak, to the French version of our Wizengamot. He had a long history of pro-muggleborn and anti-war sentiment. Furthermore, he had family ties to the British, just the opposite of what any conservative wizard wanted on their highest governing board."

"This going somewhere, Davis?" I drawled and Tracey glared:

"Of course it is," she said. "Someone had your 'poufs' off that judge to keep France and England divided; we couldn't let that happen. So we sent out some of our worker drones to take care of the poufs while we found out hired them from the sister."

"And who was it?" Ron asked.

"That is none of your concern," the brunette grit out. "Even now, you're stealing a lance, and for what? To sell it to the Department of Mysteries! Seriously."

Christ. That makes sense. That's why the government always seems to be tangentially involved in most of our contracts. I wouldn't be surprised if our esteemed Minister is keeping us under his watchful eye by doing this. Fuck me, how could I be so blind?

"Jesus," I breathed appropriately, the surprise in my voice giving me a country bumpkin twang that I incorrectly blamed on my year-and-a-half in Godric's Hollow: 'Jay-sus".

"Jaysus is right, you hick," Tracey snorted.

"So, what then?" Ron questions, "does any of that really matter?"

"Course it doesn't," I reply, turning around. "We're still getting the fuck out of here. If she wants to stay, she end up like the rest of them."

"If you leave without that spear," replied Tracey. "You won't be allowed back into England. Minister's orders."

Oh, shit. "Fucking Shacklebolt." I growled. "He asked me when I came back from America if I wanted a job in the Secret Service. I said no. And he found a way regardless." I stop and think for a moment. "So all those other people that work for Boris?"

"Some of them are legitimate M.I.7. agents, like me. And the others are actual criminals, like you," Was Tracey's smooth response.

"We could get in through Heathrow like muggles," I said to Ron, unmindful of Tracey. Worse came to worse, we could just off her. "Lay low for a couple months, then try to make contact with Hermione or something."

"Months?" Ron deadpanned. "I'd rather take the risk now than spend months on the run."

"Wouldn't recommend it anyway," Tracey said. "We'll give your pictures to the muggles, make up something about you being terrorists or whatever. That always gets them up in a snit."

"Ron?" I asked.

"Yeah?"

"Remind me to cut Shacklebolt a new cunt when we get back. Treason or not, I'm gonna gut that wanker."

Tracey smiled a humorless smile. "Well, it only took threat of exile, but glad to see we're still working together, M.I.7. or not."

Ron glared, but the M.I.7. agent remained predictably zen in the face of his ire.

I sighed, defeated. "What would you have us do?"

"Well, first let me get my combat robes on."

Hozhen's Dungeons
Two Weeks after Capture

I wonder if Hermione's worried about us.

Actually, who the fuck am I kidding, she and the Weasleys must be going stir-crazy since we were supposed to be back a while ago. I don't know how long it's been; time seems to pass strangely, or not at all, within dungeons.

In any case, that's not even including Tonks, who's probably organizing a search party to find us. Hopefully those two haven't blabbed to anyone about our real professions. Bill and Fleur would castrate me if they knew I was responsible for turning Ron into a hitman.

Thankfully, the Existentialist is asleep. Or, at least, I think he is; I can't tell if he's breathing or not. Over the last two weeks, this wanker has done nothing but moan and groan his crazy mantra and spew that shite about a lock box and a place where there's no pain. All of this is interspersed with periodic Absurdist lectures on meaning and futility.

And the weirdest part is that it's starting to make sense. I need to get out of here before I turn into a blubbering mess like old Aristotle over there. And that means grassing. Just a bit, just enough that I can get a few days reprieve from Robards's torture show and so I can get my head on straight again. I've already taken lashings, cruciatus curses, starvation, chinese water torture, the loss of an eye, and others. But thank God for small favors, they've left my junk alone.

Sanity is completely slipping, but maybe that's not so bad. Is it?

The cage door opens with an unholy groaning. A quiet, mocking voice comes from the doorway. "Wakey, wakey, little magpie. Time for your breakfast." A low laughter is heard; the man finds his own joke hilarious. "Two weeks. Two weeks of nothing but pure silence. I wonder who has earned such loyalty..."

Two sets of strong arms with villainous intent pick me up, my head lolls, too weak to do anything but submit. I am placed in the rickety wooden chair I've become so acquainted with and hear the words: "Crucio!".

Pain sears at me. Knives stab me, my throat runs dry, caught soundless scream. I remember the Existentialist's words; the mind is the only thing that's real. Everything else, ephemeral, transient. I retreat from the pain. It isn't real. It isn't real. Nothing is real. Nothing but my mind.

And then, I am falling. The night sky is inky but kept alight by millions of twinkling stars, like diamonds on black silk. For someone who hasn't seen the sky in quite some time, it is... a sight to behold. The wind rushes past me, I am falling, but in a stroke of genius, I turn over. And then I am flying.

The Thames stretches hundreds of meters below me, curled and slithering through London like a python laying in the brush of tall, metallic grass. Lights dot the streets and the skyline in the distance. The Gherkin winks like an oddly colored bullet and cars travel to and fro, the size of ants from my throne of currents.

Thousands of conversations in the past, half-remembered, become the sounds of the city below. Conversations about coffee, about magic, about love, and life and death, millions of late-night tales amid the menacing din of London-town's arc lamps and growling machines:

"Did you stab her?"

"That's for calling me the heir of Slytherin, you fucking twat!"

"I'm not Mrs. Potter yet..."

"...Is my cooking really that bad?"

"What a terribly complex life he lives for such a simple fellow."

"Why? It's not like anyone else will be watching. Just you and I."

"Then you fucking stabbed her."

London shifts around me, me feet land aloft on the 'naked shingles of the world' and those white cliffs, those famous white cliffs breathe their last and collapse into the ocean, a great rumbling noise and then, the inky swell of the ocean swallows them and nothing remains but still waters and whispers of what once was.

The water rises, covering my feet, and I am pulled down through the water and into an idyllic countryside. A small cottage rests in the background as a young boy with messy blonde hair and blue-green eyes chases a brown-eyed, auburn-haired girl through the yard. To my right sit Ron and Hermione on a wooden picnic bench, arm-in-arm, smiling and each whispering sweet nothings into the other's ear.

To my left, she reclines in a pure white gown, blond hair and blue-green eyes twinkling back at me. "Is this what you want?" She asks, her voice like cool water to a man lost in the desert.

The water rushes up again, submerging me. I almost forget to breathe. Above me float corpses, some bleeding and tortured, others at peace in death. I swim up, up, as the water clouds red. When I reach surface, I am on a body-strewn battlefield, a huntsman's hatchet in one hand, my wand in the other. Far in the distance is some faceless horror, trudging up toward me in the late afternoon glow. I look up.

And I am staring at Robards's face, back in the midnight-dark dungeons. A sole light hangs above Robards and I. I don't feel any pain, and yet, Robards looks satisfied. So that's the power of the Existentialist's 'lock box'. Amazing. He was actually right.

"Well done, Mr. Potter," he says. "It's not much, but it will do for today. You've earned yourself a bath, at least, and you need one. By Jove, you reek. Someone will be by tonight to clean you off."

Hozhen's Base
Two Weeks Earlier

We didn't have much time to prepare, as the lift came down almost immediately; ten more guards stepped out with us in plain view. These weren't the lumpy-faced arses Tracey and I made short work of the night before, these were the well-trained, sword-wearing cunts I noticed on gate duty. Hozhen's personal guard.

I'm quaking. Totally.

One guard noticed Tracey wriggling into the stitched dragonhide trousers accompanying her combat robes and immediately made to fire. Ron, has always been a reflex duelist, dropped him quicker than the man could shoot. I pushed Tracey behind the rubble and transfigured a stray bit of rock into a handaxe before all hell broke loose. If they had a blade-fetish, so would I.

As the first guard crashed to the floor, the other nine immediately turned on us. Already running, I had to dive to avoid a volley of stunners, and was back on my feet within a second, dropping the closest guard with a stunner and driving the short axe into his partner's head. It took a little bit of elbow grease to take the axe out of the man's head, and Hozhen's men took full advantage of it. Since they wanted to take me in for questioning, as the last two weeks have proved, all manner of stunners and blunt force hexes and severing charms sped toward me, but I managed to throw up a shoddy shield charm and had Ron on my side.

A jet of furious orange light, indicative of Ron's signature Anemoi spells, centered around the use of wind currents and turning them into tangible cutting spells, whizzed by me and hit a guard advancing on me. The Anemoi is, to this day, one of the most awe-inspiring and deadly set of curses I've ever seen. For some reason, Ron's the only person I know that can cast it, but perhaps that has more to do with my shitty elemental manipulation and Hermione's lack of interest in lethal curses than his genius; my talents lie elsewhere.

In any case, the Anemoi spell is actually a group of spells, all of which, as you might have thought, are named after each of the Greek Wind Gods (Hermione's influence, naturally). This particular Anemoi was a Notus variant. It didn't cut or rend as his Boreas spell would, and the heat of the wind desiccated skin faster than desert itself. The guard struck with the Notus resembled a shriveled prune after the spell was done with him.

Obviously, he collapsed to the ground with nary a struggle, but the whimper of an old man heaving his last.

I flashed a thumbs up at Ron, winked as Tracey decided to get in on the action. Figures she'd come in after Ron and I thinned the crowd to six. She threw a very interesting spell, not too different from a lightning bolt, though the guard was able to dodge it. It would be interesting to see how that spell might combine Ron's Eurus spell, which brought about some pretty unexpected, and pretty fearsome thunderstorms. They're great for tactical retreats, but with Tracey's spell, it could have a combat use.

Thankfully, Tracey didn't miss her second time, nailing the guard with that thunderbolt spell, he seized painfully, emitting sparks from time-to-time; I didn't need to look any further to know that man was out for the fight.

I had decided that I'd had enough watching Ron and Tracey and used my own special talents:

"Dominatus," I intoned, aiming at one of the three guards opposing me. He clutched at his head, and screamed. His partner eyed him worriedly when the spellbound man raised his head, eyes glowing a bloody red color and a far-too-wide grin plastered on his face. Without a second thought, the red-eyed guard drew his blade and made to attack his fellow comrade.

While those two were taken with each other, the last guard facing me looked on in fear. He said something in Chinese and drew his sword, charging wildly and slashing at me. I brought the hatchet up and trapped the wide, swinging arc of the sword between the haft and blade of the hatchet. I forced the strike down and took advantage of the guard's disarmed pose. He tried to make an awkward stab but I pirouetted around the blade and drove hatachet's blade into his throat. Warm blood spurted onto my robes.

My little slave took care of his friend and took my charge and two hatchet strokes to the the ribs.

The last two guards were taken out by a combination of Ron's Boreas Anemoi and a well-aimed cutter from Tracey, slashing at the guardsman's unprotected throat.

"I believe that's enough," another voice called out. The voice. Hozhen. I let the guard go, hatchet still embedded in his ribs as he clattered to the ground, eyes wide open and glassy and regarded the Dark Lord.

He stood in the lift, an unfamiliar man I now know as Robards and one of the Whiterobes that had been watching me the night before this one (the woman), flanking him. In Hozhen's hand was the spear, a large and ungainly thing, more rust than metal at this point and seemingly so dull it couldn't cut through butter.

"So, you're the one sent to steal the Spear," Hozhen said, fingering one of the most important relics of the Christian faith. "So, how much did they pay you, Mr. Müller, if that is indeed your real name.?"

"It's not. And a fair amount," I replied. "More than most get in five years."

"Mmm..." Hozhen agreed. "The Prophets do know how to make money move."

That caught me off guard. I took a look at Ron, who shrugged; Tracey frowned, indicative of her confusion just the same as mine and Ron's. "Prophets?" She questioned.

Hozhen looked surprised by the question. "You don't know The Prophets?"

"No," I shook my head. "They're not the ones that paid me, whoever they are."

"Huh," Hozhen said, reaching some sort of understanding in that head of his. "Well, sent you does not matter, whether it was The Prophets or the Chinese, like that Vampire and her beast."

"Mercier and Lombardi, I presume?"

Hozhen nodded. "A ferocious pair. Still, not enough. And you three, whoever you are, are very powerful. You'll make excellent additions to my army." With that, he raised the spear and some kind of alien-green magic was released into the air. I looked around, feeling no different than before, but Ron and Tracey seemed to have gone rigid.

"Nice parlor trick," I commented, placing my hands on my hips. "But it didn't seem to do anything. Sure it ain't broken?"

Hozhen merely smiled. "You're special aren't you?"

"I like to think so."

"Ever a comedian," The Dark Lord growled, all traces of friendliness gone. "They say the spear doesn't work on non-humans. It's why the spear doesn't work on Sophia Mercier or Andrea Lombardi, or that ridiculous Veela upstairs. But you, I sense you are none of them." He walked calmly to me, placing out his palm. I let out wordless accio and transfigured the rock into a tomahawk once more, raising both it and my wand at the Dark Lord. Robards and the woman made to attack, but Hozhen raised up a pacifying hand.

He stopped, and instead made a complicated series of symbols that glow green in front of me. A stunner formed at the tip of my wand when suddenly the symbols disappeared and Hozhen grinned maniacally:

"Ah, Blood Mage," He nodded. "You are special, indeed." Oh, no. I whirled around to see if Tracey or Ron had heard that, but they only stood facing forward, unaffected. "Don't worry," Hozhen said as he tapped the spear. "It affected them. They're conscious; they can hold conversations, love, laugh, live. But their minds are mine. And they don't care about your little secret.

"It makes sense; I've been noticing signs blood magic all around my vaults. It just took me some time to locate the source." He continued. "And it just so happens I have a few of your kin in my employ."

I fired the spell at the tip of my wand. A pale green jet of light just missed Hozhen's cheek and splashed off the metal of the lift harmlessly. Hozhen's bodyguards moved faster than I expected; two, three, five jets of light coming at me at the same time. It was only then I realized they didn't send all five, one came from Hozhen, the last two from Ron and Tracey.

Fuck. The Power won't work against other Blood Mages, so I'll just have to rely on grit and tenacity.

"Yari!" A wispy lance of grey shot from my wand at Robards, dodged it easily. He shot another curse back reflexively, and it took some crazy contortions to avoid being hit by it. "Confringo! Bombarda! Obscuro!"

Two more useless spells, but thankfully my smokescreen bought me some time to escape. A rainbow of spells flew through the smoke, looking like the entrance to an acid house rave, but they were all poorly aimed and missed. But, of course, a hand grabed me by the hood, dragging me back was Ron, with an odd look gleaming in his vacant blue eyes. I'd always wanted an excuse to hit Ron, so I did it, swiping the hatchet at his leg, headbutting him. When he fell to his knees, I finished it off with a kick to the head and dragged him behind the rubble in a sleeper hold.

Once in the relative safety of the rubble, I dropped Ron, fell like a sack of bricks. That was one down, four to go. Tracey stumbled out of the smoke, coughing and sputtering, and was an easy target for a stunner. Hozhen had disappeared, and I heard the lift crawling back up the long climb back to the palace.

Figures. For all that talk of revolution and freedom, Hozhen was a coward like the rest.

I turned around from the lift to see the white-robed woman's fist fly into my face. I stumbled back into the rubble. She raised her wand for the killing blow as my identikit faltered for a moment, but for some reason, perhaps because she thought she saw Harry Potter, the Whiterobe froze.

I, for one, wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth and returned the favor, sent a blunt force hex at her and embedded the tomahawk into her shoulder. Her frozen look morphed into one of pain as I used the weight of the blade in her shoulder to pull her in for a clothesline to the face. She landed in heap next to Ron. I pulled the little axe from her shoulder, stained with some of her blood.

Something barreled in from my right, breaking a protego shield that was cast just in time to prevent me from becoming shish-kabob. Robards neglects his wand in favor of wrestling with me, though I am much larger than he is. I simply shoved him back into the rock face of the rubble and raise the axe, only to see Robards smile and feel raw, hot, unyielding pain lance through my back. I looked down to see a blade jutting out from my side; I turned, and Ron let go of the handle of the dagger, that weirdly vacant look in his eye was the last thing I saw as darkness consumed me.

Hozhen's Base
Two Weeks Later (Present Day)

The Existentialist is gone when I've been returned to my cell. Robards probably whisked him away. I wait for several hours before the cell door opens, revealing a woman in white robes. The one that had fought me with Robards and my brainwashed partners. She favors her left side, where I had crushed the transfigured axe. In her other arm is a cloth, and another man carries a large bucket of hot water.

"Leave us," she says to the men, who are only to happy to comply, nearly tripping over themselves to leave. She looks at me, expression indiscernible underneath the hood. "Robards did a number on you, didn't he?"

The voice sounds familiar, but in my state, I can't place it. I just have to settle for saying: "Too true."

"Few men survive this long under Robards' torture," she says, almost impressed. "Fewer still that could withhold information for that long."

"One-in-a-million," I drawl.

She nods, an ironical smile on her face as she moves over, divesting me of the rags I call clothes and soaking the cloth in the hot water, squeezing it out and running it over my back. I hiss in pain.

"Be still," she says, oddly soothing.

She washes my back, my underarms, my chest, my legs. It stings, but nothing feels better than washing away the grime and filth accumulated over a fortnight. When wiping my shoulder, the woman speaks again:

"So, a Blood Mage. You." she says tonelessly.

"Yeah. Me. A Blood Mage," I repeat sourly.

"How did that come about? Saint Harry Potter a Bloody?"

"Why do you care?" I ask, giving her a scrutinizing look.

"You're a Blood Mage; I'm a Blood Mage," she begins. "I know how I became one. It interests me to know how you became one."

"I reckon it ain't much of a story," I say, seeing no harm in it if I'm going to be stuck here. "Someone hit me with a killing curse. I died; someone thought I didn't need to. I took their offer. And here I am. You?"

The Blood Mage shakes her head. "Someone killed me and a lot of other people, same as you. I died and left a lot behind; someone thought I didn't need to. I took their offer. And here I am."

I chuckle. She's not horrible company for a Blood Mage who works for the world's biggest douche. She laughs too, before leaning into my ear.

"Stay awake tonight," she says. "The door will open and you'll get your robes. My advice would be to take your friends and go home."

"What?" I ask dumbly. "Who-"

She places a finger against my lips and takes my hand in hers. "Neither friend nor enemy. Not another word. Be on guard."

The blood mage stands and makes to leave, when I realize we've been too quiet for too long. "Say, uh... what happened to the guy who was sharing the cell with me?"

The woman blinks. "Sharing your cell?"

"Yeah, you know, the Existentialist guy. Kept on screaming about a lock box?"

"Mr. Potter," she enunciates slowly. "You don't have a cellmate. You never did."

A soothing aura passes through me, one I had merely taken for being cleaned. Some of the rawest and bloodiest cuts from the lashes have faded into pinkish, painless scars. Whatever the blood mage put in that water probably just saved my life.

She opens the door, leaves, and closes it behind her. I stare at the corner the Existentialist usually occupied, more confused than I've ever been.

Some time later, I don't know how long, the door opens once more, and freedom beckons.

A/N: So a lot happened this chapter. It wasn't a funny chapter, but I the subject matter wasn't really supposed to be funny. You were introduced to Robards, who is Gawain Robards' (an Auror in canon) son and a MAJOR antagonist (no, you have not met the big bad yet), the Blood Mages made a few appearances and we finally found out what Harry's "Power" was. Tracey's an M.I.7. agent, which explains what Mercier was talking about last chapter. Ron's a badass at elemental manipulation, but ain't so great against the spear. An annoying absurdist who was never really there, and a Blood Mage who is 'neither enemy nor friend'.

The Eyepatch: Yes. Harry lost an eye. Scooped out. It's his right eye. An homage to the upcoming release of MGS: Ground Zeroes. Real Big Boss stuff. Also, Harry fails to catch the eyepatch due to fucked-up depth perception because he's now monosighted, a reference to Big Boss and the butterfly in Snake Eater, for you MGS fans.

Anemoi: Ron's a badass, yeah. There are four main Anemoi spells. Boreas, named after the biting north wind is an icy cutting wind, which nicks the body all over. Notus, is a dessicating wind by hyper-dehydrating the victim of the curse. Eurus causes some pretty awesome storms and fog. And, last but not least, is the Zephyrus, a healing wind.

Blood Mage: If you look for it, there are many scattered references throughout the fic pointing to Harry being a Blood Mage. Points if you can figure out when he became one. EDIT: If you're feeling confused on exactly what a blood mage is, fear not! You're not stupid; I'm just shitty at explaining things (my bad, I know). Harry will explain exactly what being a blood mage entails over the next two chapters.

"Naked shingles of the world...": From Matthew Arnold's "Dover Beach". Harry stands on the shingle beach and witnesses the famous white cliffs collapse into the Dover Straits during that mushroom samba sequence.

The Spear and Ron and Tracey: They're gonna be a pain in the ass next chapter.

"Neither enemy nor friend": Why? Is it a Blood Mage doing another a solid? Or something more? Also another reference to Metal Gear.

Team Were-pire: Don't think I forgot about them! They'll be making a crucial appearance next chapter due to their immunity to the Spear.

Eight-thousand words! And it only took me about a week! Aren't you proud?

Hope you enjoyed the chapter and have a sexy week.
Geist.