The Three Kings: Strike

Disclaimer (1): Yu-gi-oh! Duel Monsters is owned by Kazuki Takahashi, Studio Gallop, Nihon Ad Studios, and TV Tokyo. Harry Potter is owned by J. K. Rowling, Bloomsbury Publishing, Arthur A. Levine Books, and Warner Bros. Please support the official releases.

Disclaimer (2): The Crucible and all it's characters are owned by Arthur Miller.

Warning: Mentions of imprisonment without cause, mental and physical torture, starvation, racism, homophobia, alcoholism, gore, non-consensual body modification, and past minor character death.

Chapter 5: Renegade

Kisha Borrego doesn't really know how long she's been down here for. If she had to guess, she'd say about three, maybe four days, but that's only going by how often she notices the guards bringing her food. Sometimes after they take her in for questioning, Kisha loses a lot of time, and it's only when Delphine starts to push food towards her mouth does she realize it's meal time.

Unspeakables had broken into her apartment the evening after she'd thrown one of them out of Putnam's, dragging her from her bed and whisking her away to this hellhole. Kisha wonders briefly about her roommate, who'd been out that evening and missed the whole thing. She hopes she's okay, that she's not dead or worse, because who knows what these Unspeakable thugs are capable of.

"Kisha," Delphine whispers, "You need to drink something."

"You need it more than me," she says. Delphine has at least forty years on her and has been looking far too pale ever since she was brought back from her last questioning.

They don't even ask her anything. A Legilimens sits down across from her in a tiny room and spends what feels like hours crawling through her brain and picking her memories apart in the most painful way possible. Kisha tries to throw up what meger shields she can, but she's never been trained. Not only that, but she's missing her wand. They took it from her somewhere between her apartment and the prison cell.

"Here," Delphine presses a cup to her mouth. "It's okay, sweetheart. Just drink. It'll be fine."

Kisha takes small sips of the lukewarm water, wetting her throat and filling her empty stomach. On the other side of the wall, Royce wakes up screaming for his boyfriend.

That's something that he admitted to a few days ago, after he'd had a panic attack and screamed at any passing guard where Shawn was. He refused to say where he'd met Shawn or even what his last name was, but Royce clearly loved this boy with all of his being. And while Kisha can't find it in herself to care - Merlin knows that they have more problems on their plate - Royce's cellmate, Morgan clearly takes issue. He refuses to go near him.

Then again, Morgan refuses to talk to Kisha because she isn't white, so he's probably just an assbackwards bigot in every way possible.

"Royce, it's okay. You're safe, I promise. I swear," Ellen calls from the cell beside Kisha's. She's been alone in there since they dragged the brain-dead man that lived in the cell before her out into the hallway, never to be seen again. None of them knows who's next.

Ellen continues to talk Royce down, speaking softly and sweetly until his breath evens out. He's wiping the tears from his cheeks when the cellblock door slams open. Kisha's stomach drops when she recognizes the new prisoner.

The large blond man came to Putnam's the day of her abduction, demanding that she turn over receipts from earlier in the week. Kisha would have cooperated, if it weren't for the fact that the man wasn't clearly drunk. She'd just thought that he was some homeless guy pretending to be an Unspeakable- it wouldn't be the first time that happened.

But here he was, being placed into a cell by woman he clearly knew, a woman so shaken and terrified that he was trying to calm her down. Kisha pulls herself towards the bars and watches as the woman locks Drunk Guy in and proceeds to throw up all over herself.

"Tilla, look at me," Drunk Guy clutches at the metal so tightly that his knuckles are white. "Look at me."

The woman - Tilla - raises her gaze to lock eyes with him, "I'll take care of our team. I promise."

"What did you see? When he…?" Drunk Guy gestures vaguely towards one of his eyes, his jaw clenched and teeth grinding. "Did you see…?"

"Just shut up, you've got bigger things to worry about now," Tilla hisses, her voice hoarse. "I'm going to protect them."

"I need you to tell me if you saw-"

"Keith, shut up already!" Tilla snaps, "You're in enough trouble. We're all in such deep shit and you-" She covers her mouth with her hands, "You need to watch out for yourself now."

She stands and turns away, only to have Drunk Guy reach out and grab her wrist through the bars.

"You did see it, didn't you?" He says. Tilla goes stiff. "They wiped our memories. They tortured us. They-" his voice catches in his throat, "We didn't chose this."

"Keith, let me go-"

"We didn't want this. None of us did. We're- We're not real, Tilla."

"Keith-"

"Don't tell Coppermine," he says suddenly. The woman swallows hard.

"I'm not going to tell him," she eases her hand from his grip and takes a step back. "Watch your back, Keith."

"You too," he nods. Tilla leaves him there. Kisha watches as the man stands still for all of three minutes before screaming and starting to trash his cell, waking up some of the other prisoners- Mages, Kisha thinks. They're all mages, waiting to be shipped out to the camp after they failed to convert. She's so terrified of them- Morgan snaps at him sometime after he bloodies both fists against the brick wall.

"Shut the fuck up, there's no way out of here. We've already tried."

Keith slams his foot into the division between their cells in response. KIsha decides to take a gentler approach.

"I know you…" she says. Keith's eyes snap to hers and widen.

"The girl from the store," he whispers to himself before coming to the bars to talk directly to her, "What are you doing…? No, fuck, of course you're down here. You're a witness."

"They keep searching my memories for those people you were asking about," she tells him. "It's the same with everyone else who's here. They're searching our memories for these kids. Why?"

Keith turns his head away, jaw clamping shut. Kisha wants to punch him in his stupid face.

"Who am I going to tell? Seriously, I'm probably going to spend the rest of my life in this prison. The least I can know is why!"

Keith turns away from the door and stocks towards the back wall, only to kick it again in frustration. His shoulder heave as he pants from exhaustion, before turning back to the bars.

"Do you know about what happened at the Ministry the day those kids walked into your shop?" He says through gritted teeth.

"We were there. The Ministry went into lockdown," Delphine says behind her. Kisha startles, almost having forgotten she was there.

"Auror Ambrose said before she left that some people had stolen our wands to break past Ministry security," Royce continues. "That was the last we heard of anything. Another Unspeakable, this older guy in a suit, rounded us up afterwards. We've been here ever since."

"The papers were saying that there was some kind of an experiment that backfired, but everyone I talked to said that there was some kind of an attack," Kisha says, leaning her forehead against the bars.

Keith nods along, "Yeah, there was an attack, alright. But it wasn't wizards. It was a group of mages."

Kisha's jaw drops, "What?"

"Mages?" Morgon spits, as if oblivious to the identities of those in the cells around them. "Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. Mages haven't been a threat to us for a thousand years! How could they possibly have done something like this?"

"Mages are stronger now than they've ever been before. Ever wonder why travel to San Francisco has been impossible for the last five years? It's because they took the city and have been using it as a haven ever since," Keith spits. "They broke into the Ministry to steal classified information from our Archives and then left a path of destruction in their wake so that we couldn't cover it up. And it was all lead by-" Keith freezes, his face contorting into the picture of utter rage. He spits out a name, "Bakura."

"Who's Bakura?" Kisha asks.

"He's probably one of the most powerful mages in history. And…" Keith's fists curl at his side, "He killed my friend. He used me. And when I see him next…

"I'm going to kill him."

Tilla finds Depre in the middle of his search of the island for Solomon Mutuo. The old man disappeared from his cell sometime after Coppermine brought him back to it after questioning. Tilla's surprised that Coppermine's still alive - after everything that's happened, she'd have guessed that Pegasus would have killed him.

Maybe Pegasus doesn't know that Coppermine's the reason he escaped? She wonders before cold realization settles in her stomach. All that man needs to do is look at me and I'll end up killing the kid.

The last she saw of Coppermine, someone had woken him up, pulled him into the break room, and given him some chocolate - if it worked for dementors, it would work for nervous breakdowns. She hopes he'll be okay. Tilla doesn't have many allies anymore; while Depre will follow her into hell and back, she needs another wand, a stable wand, at her side.

"Can I talk to you?" She asks, touching Depre's elbow gently. His eyes flicker to her hand and then up to her face.

He should say no. He should say that he has a mission. But instead… Tilla almost feels guilty but she knows what's going to happen the moment Depre opens his mouth.

"I can," he nods stiffly. His hands are flickering around his wand. Tilla can see the gears in his brain shifting, going from mission-status to the calm of a briefing. Except… that's not what she wants to talk about.

Tilla leads him to one of the balconies and sits him down in one of the chairs. He watches her patiently as she tries to find the words she needs to use. Finally, she looks up.

"What do you know about the Plant program?"

He tilts his head at the question, his stare unblinking and focused, "I don't understand."

"You remember how you were trained, correct? I want to know how."

"You misunderstand me," Depre says robotically. "I don't understand why you'd want to know."

Tilla frowns, but then takes a good look at him. She's known Depre Scott for just over five years now, so even though he may come off as stiff and emotionless to those who don't know him, he's actually quite easy to read when you knew what to look for. Normally, he'd be the picture of calm, but Tilla can see the tiny tick of tension in his jaw. He's uncomfortable. He doesn't want to answer.

Cold settles into her veins. Depre could recount missions where he'd done things that made her feel ill. But this… His hesitancy scares her more than anything else.

"Depre," she says, teeth grinding together. If what Pegasus made me see was real… Oh Merlin, what am I going to do? "Was there another group that was trained with you?"

Depre blinks, pauses for a second, before blinking again - that's what surprise look like on his face. Then, in a move that utterly terrifies her, he swallows.

He's frightened.

"Yes," he answers. "We were separated into two groups when I was…" he thinks about it for a second, "...eight. Those in my group went on to become Plants."

"Do you know what happened to the others?"

He shakes his head, "No."

It's a quick answer. She believes him, but she has to ask, "Are you sure?"

"I don't know. We didn't need to know," Depre says, a little more intensely. He doesn't break eye contact with her. "Do you?"

Tilla's throat tightens, choking her until she feels like she can't breath. Her eyes water uncontrollably, thinking about what she'd seen when Pegasus had turned to Millennium Eye on her-

"Seedling 123-37F," the man calls and she pushes herself to her feet. She's shaking so badly, beaten and bruised and bleeding. She has to stand. They'll cut her from the roster if she doesn't stand. She doesn't want to die. "Seedling 123-37F. Now."

She rises to her feet. The man blasts them out from under her. She feels her bones snap under the pressure. Her left arm is bloody stump.

"Seedling 123-37F. Stand."

She's twelve years old-

She gasps, shuddering out of the memory, only to find that Depre has moved, grasping her hand and slipping into some persona, something different than exactly who he is and she doesn't want that right now, she just wants-

No, she thinks. Don't do this. Not now.

"Don't," Tilla tells him and Depre pulls his hands back like her skin burns him. Except… she doesn't want that either. She reaches for his wrists, pale fingers wrapping around skin black as night. Tilla feels the tension that wracks through his body, feels the shock that her touch sends through him. "Just don't."

"Do you know what happened to them?" He asks, his voice surprisingly hoarse. Depre's hands are shaking.

She nods and thumbs his pulse. It's racing. "They… they called me Seedling 123-37F."

Tilla has seen Depre Scott have an all-encompassing emotional reaction exactly once before, back in Belfast when he'd abandoned his mission and came to get her. There had been fear in his eyes then, awe and love and utter terror at the thought of losing her. Now she watches as it happens again, feeling breaking through years of torture, eyes widening and breath shortening. Depre's grip on her wrists is tight but not bruising.

"What?" He sounds utterly destroyed.

"Pegasus pulled these memories past a… a block," she tries to explain the feeling. She knows what a Obliviation feels like, to have the memories return to you after they've been shoved to the back of her mind. What the Millennium Eye did feels like that, only a thousand times from painful. "He did it to Keith as well. We remembered… I don't want to say-"

"They hurt you?" Depre whispers. "They hurt all of you?"

Tilla expects the first admission from him. She does not expect the second. She'd always known that Depre had a soft heart, even for a Plant, but to think that he'd bonded on some level with the members of their team astounds even her.

She nods again, unable to speak. And then-

Depre takes a very controlled breath, loosen his grip on her wrists before pulls away. He stands suddenly and pulls his wand from his thigh holster. He stalks towards the door.

"Where are you going?" She asks.

Something shifts in Depre's shoulders and when he turns back to her, it's the fluid, cocky persona of the gold-hearted pickpocket with the Cockney accent.

"Got a job, sweetheart," he grins at her, walking backwards with a confident swagger. "The boss gave it to me. I gotta man to find."

"Depre-"

"Don't you worry. Just 'cause I gotta find him doesn't mean I gotta turn him in," Depre's grin turns into something fierce. "Maybe I just wanna talk to him."

He's abandoned the Department, just like that, she realizes. He's aligned himself to our team. To me. It gives Tilla a little bit of hope that if the Plant program didn't kill off every ounce of humanity in him, then there's something real inside of her as well. We're all in the same boat, always have been.

"I'm going to go check on our people," she tells him. "Be careful."

"Careful? Where's the fun in that?" He laughs, turning and disappearing down the hall with a wave. "I'll see you later, doll."

His loyalty is terrifying, she thinks. Thank Merlin for him. We're going to need him in the wars to come. And I… Tilla pauses in her thoughts, trying to find the right words ...I will be glad for that.

He'd left Monthu - Mokuba Kaiba - in the cell. Shimon doesn't think he'll ever be able to forgive himself for that.

He rationalizes it, though, and hopes that Monthu will understand. He's barely walking as it is and he can't use his right arm. If he gets out of this alive, there's no telling if he'll ever fully recover - as much as Solomon doesn't want to think about it, he's pretty sure they'll have to amputate. But then his thinks of Monifa, who was is his daughter and Monthu's own mother, and knows that she'd never speak to him again if she knew.

None of his children, his grandchildren, his family (and there had been so many once, before the wars and the plagues that had felled them) should forgive him for leaving Mokuba Kaiba behind. Shimon hates himself, but he has to keep moving forwards.

Atem. The name rings in his mind as he stumbles through a doorway and into the hallway beyond it. The Lady Pharaoh walks the earth again and it's all he's ever wanted, but he can't help the pit that settles in his stomach. If she has returned, then that means…

Yuugi had fallen. Solomon's throat tightens until he can't breathe, eyes watering until he can't see. His granddaughter is dead. Gone. He's never going to see her again, never see her laugh or smile. Solomon remembers all those late nights that they'd spent leaning over the Millennium Pendant, shattered into puzzle pieces, talking about how they could possibly peel away the seal just enough to free the Pharaoh without setting loose the Destroyer.

I wanted both of them, but I think I knew that this is how it would always turn out, Solomon thinks. Yuugi had been so stunning, so smart and confident and wonderful, and to think that she was dead… He just can't.

He's thinking so much that he almost misses the Unspeakable slumped on the floor. Solomon freezes, then ducks into a small alcove in the wall. The wizard doesn't move, doesn't breathe. Solomon swallows hard. Is he dead?

Solomon creeps towards the felled man, getting close enough to see how pale and stiff the corpse is. His eyes are wide with terror. He died scared and alone. Solomon wishes that he could bury the boy - because that's all he is, just a child - but he has to keep going.

"Hey!" Damn it.

Solomon pushes past the pain and forces his body to run. He doesn't even look back as he dashes through the closest door. It's a mistake because he appears to have walked into some kind of meeting room, because there's about five witches and wizards blinking at him. There's a beat where everyone stares at each other before they reach for their wands.

Solomon's never been much of a fighter, but right now he's caged, hurt, and sick with fear. So when the wizard who caught him in the hallway catches up to him, Solomon grabs the man and drags him in front of him, using his body as a human shield. Spells rack the wizard's form, shaking and twisting him into nothing more than a shredded hunk of meat.

Solomon throws what's left of his shield at the closest witch, launching himself at her and pummelling her with his single working fist. He rolls, narrowly avoiding getting hit by an incoming spell. He grabs at one of the bloody splittered bones on the floor and stabs one of the wizards in the neck.

The man coughs and sputters as he collapses to the ground, but Solomon has no such luck. He keeps moving, keeps punching and kicking and biting until there's no one standing but him. He spits blood on the floor and sees chunks of the white bone that were his teeth in the pool on the floor.

Damn it. I can't even move. He can barely think. The pain crashes into him like a truck and drives him to his knees. The world spins around him. No, not now. Not like this.

There's a figure looming over him. They're saying something, but Solomon can't hear anything but the ringing in his ears. The earth tilts and the ground rises to meet him as the world goes dark.

[Mission Report
Capture/Kill Solomon Mutuo
Status: Aborted]

[They hurt them]

[They hurt them
They hurt them]

[They hurt me]

[Mission Report
Revenge
Status: Ongoing]

Solomon Mutuo passes out just as Depre finds him amongst the fallen bodies of his enemies. Depre takes a moment to evaluate the situation and deems Mutuo's actions to be in line with someone running on adrenaline and fear. He doubts that the old man will be as dangerous if Depre has to fight him when he's whole.

He flicks his wand and locks the door, before turning to the old man. Depre was taught healing during his training - he'd had to, if he wanted to live. He remembers taking his wand to himself to mend all sorts of injuries over the years. After he'd been deployed, he'd taken relief in the fact that Tilla had never had to go through that.

[They hurt them
They hurt me
They hurt her]

Depre's fingers involuntarily tighten into fists.

Mutuo's injuries are extensive and, in some cases, life threatening. It takes all of Depre's concentration keep him alive long enough to stabilize his condition. It's worrying. Depre can stop the bleeding, knit his skin back together, and rebuild bone, but his mind is another thing entirely. He knows just how impossible that is to heal.

[#85,470 did well in training. Not too bad, but not perfect. He's average. #85,470 has never been anything special and he's had to fight for that rating ever since he'd entered the program and had to kill #85,471 to prove his worth. He's never been able to get her blank, lifeless stare out of his head.]

Physical wellness will have to do for now. Depre taps his wand in between Mutuo's eyes and they open. Before the old man can move, Depre casts a full body bind and slips into the mind of Malik Abadi, the pickpocket from the East End.

Malik grins, "Don't you go running on me, old man."

Mutuo can't talk, can't move, which is the damn point, but is a little counterproductive when it comes to negotiating and shit. Malik sits down next to him, leaning on his arm, and looks at him, "Got a deal for ya, if you're willing to listen."

Malik looks Mutuo dead in the eye, pushing with legitimacy, trying to get a gauge on the situation.

[Even the most unpracticed of occlumens could, if given the opportunity, empty their minds of thought and plunge a legilimens into an empty void. More skills occlumens could redirect a legilimens into a different thought or emotion, pushing them away from the thoughts they were hunting for. But what #85,470 barrels headfirst into is-]

"~A spell of safety here I cast. A word of might to hold us fast,~" a man's voice, Matthew Jacques voice chants on the outer edge of Mutuo's mind. "~A shield before us and behind. To right and left, protection bind. To we may no harm or ill whit come. By power of three, my magic is from. With the sacred light around me. As above- So below, Blessed Be!~"

A monster looms before Depre, a burning figure with four heads and a thousand wings and a body made entirely out of mouths and tongues. It reaches towards him, millions of voices screaming, and Depre-

He pulls his mind back, throws himself backwards, skin drenched in sweat and chest heaving. Depre feels his spell lift off of Mutuo and the old man scrambles away from him.

"Wait… wait!" Depre- Malik- he tries to get back into the persona of Malik, but he can't, he just can't- Jacques, he's protecting them all, somehow, with some god-

[Control your fear. Control. Control. He feels too much. He is too much. Failure. Failure. He can't fail, but he already has-]

"Listen to me!" Malik gasps, "Listen, I'm trying to help you."

"Get away from me," Mutuo growls.

"I healed you, just- just listen!" He reaches forwards, trying to grab at the old man. Damn it. Damn it all. I am Malik. Malik Abadi. "Mutiny!" Mutuo pauses, just enough to allow Malik to get another few words in, "We're planning a-"

"I don't care," Mutuo snaps and stands up, swaying a little once he gets his feet under him.

"Just let me help you!"

"I don't care," the old man says again, heading towards the door. And suddenly, Malik Abadi- Depre Scott knows what to do.

"Will you trust me if I tell the truth?" He asks, the pickpocket's persona gone. His voice is flat, his expression schooled. It's enough to shock Mutuo into turning back towards him. Depre stands up, ramrod straight, not bothering to blink.

Mutuo takes a step back, "It's been a long time since I've seen one of you."

[#85,470 believes that Mutuo is referring to the mission in Egypt twenty-five years ago, where a pair of Plants were instructed to watch Mutuo's progress as he researched the tomb of the Lady Pharaoh. #84,967 and #85,101 had never returned from that mission. Mutuo had.]

He tells Mutuo that he knows this. The old man isn't shocked by that, but he does comment on Depre's disloyalty to his masters, "Mr. Hajjar and Mr. Wasem were the Department's down to their final seconds. You… You are not."

"I am loyal," he says, because he is.

"You're planning mutiny. How can you be loyal?"

"I am loyal," he says again, as if it was obvious.

[To Pete Coppermine, who is older than him but so much younger. To Keith Howard, who tries but needs help more than anything. To Reiko Kitamori, who must have her reasons.]

[To Tilla Mook, who cared for his wounds and smiled with lines around her lips and had his back even when it would have been easier for her to not.]

[He loves her.]

[It's terrifying.]

[It's still the simplest truth he knows.]

"But not to the Department," Mutuo realizes. Depre offers a blink of acknowledgement.

[They hurt them.
They hurt her.]

[They hurt me.]

"And what would you have me do, during this mutiny?" Mutuo asks, eyes looking for betrayal.

"Exactly what you're already going to do," Depre says. "Just with a little help."

He tosses the old man the enchanted keys to the cells. Mutuo catches them, turning them over in his hands.

"I was going to escape," Mutuo tells him plainly. Depre believes him.

"You need incentive to stay. You have it."

"I do," Mutuo sighs, resigned. Then he looks up, "What's your name?"

[#85,470 has many names.]

"It's best we don't exchange that information," he says instead.

"You're right," Mutuo nods. "Beware of the man with the Millennium Eye."

"I will take that into consideration."

"Good," Mutuo says and disappears through the door, leaving Depre with the question, What is your name?

[#85,470 has been assigned names. His number, his covers, even Depre Scott.]

[He's only been given one.]

Jonathon hopes he's made the right choice.

Hello again!

I'd like to thank those who reviewed for the last chapter: vorpalraven, MathiaSweetSlaughterArkoniel, Tz342, CrimsonStrawberry17, dragomira, green lilah, JERSUALEM's Bride, Rita Mu, anita15, Moonfirekitsune, Dana Sto Helit, Unformal Sorrelle, and Eliphas-Chaos. You guys are awesome!

I'm really sorry for being away for so long again guys. Some crazy stuff has been going on at my job because a couple of people are no longer working with us (one was fired and the other was transferred to a different location), so I've gotten a promotion, which is very exciting! I've been adjusting pretty well, it all happened so fast and I'm a little nervous, but everything is going well so far.

Also, if you have been following me on ao3 (I'm AlcatrazOutpatient over there as well), then you also know that I've been doing some podfics for SoloMoon's Animorphs series, Eleutherophobia. So, if you want to go hear what I sound like, you can head over there and check them out.

On a final note, I've been doing some preparation of the Ancient Egypt arc, even going as far as to write out the first two scenes. I'm also in the middle of putting in the final details of the royal family tree. I'm mentioning this because one of the characters on it (Monifa) is mentioned in this chapter and if anyone wants to know a little bit more about her or her relationships to the other characters on that family tree, you are all welcome to ask.

Until next time,

AlcatrazOutpatient