Pandemonium.
That was what Amanda could call the reaction to her words. Two of her three children, Daphne, Tracey and Hermione had begun to bicker and yell over each other for explanations. Not a single one maintained a cool head in the face of an impending crisis; and that, she could not abide.
It took her slamming her fist on the kitchen counter to silence the shouting match that ensued. "Are we done bickering?" she said icily, glaring at Zoe and Aveline, who both hung their heads. Orianna had stood quietly by, looking at her for orders. "Get your wands, your trunks, and what clothes you can pack in thirty seconds. Lucille, you will do the same with our things. Get the...package...out of the safe. We will need it,"
"What about you?"
Amanda glanced in the direction of her study. "I will try to contact HQ and see if there is anything heading in our direction – and if there is, how much time we have. Go!"
As each of them scattered throughout the house, Amanda dashed for her desk. Reaching under it, she yanked out a pair of Pip-Boy wrist computers from a cardboard box and slapped one onto her wrist. "Come on, come on," she muttered, watching the device go through its boot-up sequence. As soon as it had gone fully operational, she flicked its radio on and toggled it to her private communications channel. "There we go. HQ, come in. This is Raven-113; message, over,"
"HQ to Raven-113, confirm identity. Over,"
"Raven-113 to HQ, code alpha-omega-thirteen-epsilon. Over,"
"HQ to Raven-113, identity confirmed. State your request, over,"
"Raven-113 to HQ. Request long-range radar signal scan for high-altitude craft. Authorisation code, omega-epsilon-six-six-delta,"
"HQ to Raven-113, confirm command. Initiating scan, please hold,"
A few moments of silence followed. The voice that came after trembled with fear.
"Charlie-charlie, this is HQ. We have multiple inbound contacts, high altitude. All combat units, move to defensive fighting positions. All anti-aircraft and fighter units, scramble, scramble! Non-combat assets, make your way to designated safe zones. Estimated enemy flight objective is London; ETA is ten minutes. Over and out,"
Ten minutes. Amanda's eyes widened at the realisation of just how little time they had left to get to safety. She kicked open her desk's lower drawers and hefted out the box of medical items and a small box of pistol ammunition. Clutching her partner's Pip-Boy and cradling the rest of the things in her arms, she walked back out into the kitchen to find Orianna and Zoe hefting a stack of trunks down the stairs. Behind them were Aveline and her three friends, helping Lucille with several bags and packages.
"Alright, that's enough. We're going now," Amanda said curtly. "Follow me closely. We have only ten minutes before what I believe are nuclear weapons will hit London,"
"Nuclear weapons? In ten minutes?" Hermione cried in anguish. "But—that can't—that can't—what about my parents? Or Tracey's? Or Daphne's?"
"Unless they can get here in two minutes, we are all going to die. So unfortunate as it is to say, there is nothing we can do about them,"
"I call hippogriff shite to that!" Tracey yelled. Her eyes were ablaze with anger as she glared at Amanda, "Daphy, you've got a house-elf, right? Can't you get them to...you know, pop them here or something?"
"I am sure that our war wards will hold, Trace. There is nothing that the muggles could make that could harm us. I mean, Greengrass Estate had been under siege at least five times by muggles in the last three hundred years, and they have not succeeded in breaking through even once,"
Tracey's look of disbelief put some doubt in the blonde. "Daphy, you don't get it. These...these weapons—they don't just destroy a building or two. They blow up entire cities,"
"And an overpowered blasting curse can do the same,"
"Ugh. Look, do yourself a favour. Just get your parents out of there. Grab mine too, while your elves are at it,"
"Fine. Dipsy!" she called out. A bat-eared creature, diminutive and hunched in posture, appeared with a crack in front of her. It bowed deeply, before glancing questioningly into her eyes. "Fetch my parents. Inform them that it is an emergency, and that it would be best for them to come to me. And while you are at it, please get Mr. Davis and Mrs. Davis as well from the nearby house,"
"Dipsy will do as young mistress commands!" the house-elf squeaked, bowing again before disappearing with another loud crack.
"Wait, what about my parents?" Hermione protested. "Why can't you send the house-elf to them?"
"I am truly sorry, Hermione, but the house-elves will obey my parents' orders over mine, since I am just Heiress Greengrass, not Lady Greengrass. They are on orders to not visit anyone that my parents have not authorised them to visit. My instructions would simply be ignored if I tried to order them to,"
"That's not right! You can do something – anything – can't you?"
The blonde sadly shook her head. "No—no way. You're lying! You can get them, can't you? You have to be able to!"
"No. I cannot. I can't apparate, Hermione, and our broomsticks would take at least twenty minutes to get to St. Albans,"
"So...my parents..."
"I'm sorry, Hermione. I really am,"
"Come on, Hermione. We've got to go," Aveline whispered into her ear as soon as she saw Amanda moving the front door. When Hermione did not respond at all, she sighed and tapped her foot. "Mum will leave you here if you aren't going to follow us. We really don't have time,"
"It's just...it's just so unfair—Aveline, put me down!"
"Nope! If you're not going to walk, I'm not letting you just sit there, Hermione. You're coming with us,"
The sight of numerous people bursting out of the unassuming house of Number Three, Privet Drive, laden with luggage and appearing highly flustered drew curious glances from the nearby civilians. Doubly so when one of them was a girl who had another slung over her shoulder, protesting loudly all the while.
Perhaps they had not been listening to the radio broadcasts about the nuclear attacks on the major cities of the United States of America. Or perhaps they did not believe that what had happened over there would repeat itself in Britain. They did, after all, have just had a twenty-five year war against the Arabs, and only a few dozen nuclear weapons had been utilised. To them, it may have seemed completely outrageous an idea that any nation would attempt a full nuclear exchange capable of destroying an entire nation.
The hapless fools, she thought to herself as she led her group down towards the local park. She had heard from her university colleagues that worked in Washington that the Vault-Tec company had built numerous nuclear shelters throughout all of America, each one capable of protecting over a thousand citizens. England had invested in them too, in the form of heavily reinforced concrete bunkers deep beneath the city; but most were geared for the protection of military assets, not the protection of civilians. Even if the city's populace were issued a warning in time, there would be little that they could do aside from saying their last goodbyes. After all, an explosion in the hundreds of kilotons could scarcely be stopped by a simple brick wall or a wooden table over one's head.
"Down here," Amanda said, pointing at a rather ordinary-looking manhole in the middle of the park, just in front of a broken wooden bench. Orianna hefted the heavy steel manhole cover up, revealing a dark vertical tunnel with what looked like a tiny pinprick of light at the very bottom. A simple steel ladder ran down its side, apparently all the way down. "Throw in the luggage. There is a pile of mattresses at the bottom, they will not break. And Aveline, set Hermione down. If she will not come willingly, I will not have a potential liability where we are headed,"
A little cold, perhaps, given the look of indignant disbelief that the bushy-haired brunette gave her. But in times of crisis, sometimes one had to forgo sentiments to succeed.
Daphne was hardly a person that would turn her nose up at less-than-savoury smells. Despite her refined and cultured behaviour and appearance, it was drilled into the minds of every Greengrass that their wealth and status derived from the earth itself. Yes, that kind of earth – that almost unbearably putrid mixture of well-moistened dragon dung, rotting bits of shredded puffapod and broken mooncalf nightsoil. Pecunia non olet – 'money does not stink' – her family's ancestors had as a motto; and a successful one it was, if the contents of their vault in Gringotts were any indication. And after her three full years of education in Hogwarts, planting all manner of magical herbs and fungi in the Herbology greenhouses, she thought herself adept at resisting the gut-churning effects of noxious fumes.
Yet she could not help but gag at the most abhorrent stench that filled the dark tunnel that they had fallen into. Grabbing her wand, she gave it a quick flick and muttered, 'Lumos'. A narrow cone of light illuminated the vaulted concrete tunnel that they were in; smooth and featureless, seemingly going on and on as far as the eye could see. The musty old mattresses that they had all fallen on were in a small square side chamber, which had four blinking orange lights in little metal-and-glass cages, one in each corner.
"Ugh, I'm never going to be able to get that smell out of my hair," Zoe groaned. The copper-haired girl stumbled to her feet, awkwardly pulling bits of broken mattress spring out of her mottled camouflage pants. "Daphy, 'Mione, Trace – you girls okay?"
A chorus of 'yes'es followed her question. "Oh, good. I thought I might have landed on one of you girls by accident. Anyway, where are we going next, mother-in-chief?"
"I will need to get to Vault M-3's control centre to initiate lockdown before the nuclear bombs come down. That manhole cover will not do much to stop a nuclear blast if it happens to land too close by," replied Amanda. The curious metal-and-glass device on her wrist was emitting a sickly green glow that lit the way in front of her, though only barely further away than her arm's reach. "Pick up your things and follow me closely; and whatever you do, do not run. The sentry bots will not fire on you as long as you remain within five metres of either myself or Lucille,"
"Sentry bots!?" yelped Aveline – Daphne had to take a look again in the darkness, just to make sure that she had a scarlet ribbon tied in her hair – who jumped up in fright when her mother mentioned them. "There's some down here?"
"Three, to be exact. One just outside the vault, and two inside the vault's antechamber. Let's continue on; I would rather not breathe sewer air longer than I need to,"
"Ori, what are these...'sentry butts' that your mother is talking about?" whispered Tracey as she walked closely behind Orianna. Her voice was somewhat muffled, thanks to the fact that she had a sleeve tightly clamped over her nose and mouth.
In the dim light, Daphne could only barely make out the black-ribboned redhead's pursed lips and furrowed brows as she attempted to make an answer. "Sentry bots, not butts, Tracey. They are high-tech automated defence machines. Non-magical war golems, if it would be easier to think of them that way. They've got three wheeled legs, a whole lot of armour, and lots and lots of heavy weapons. I have only seen them once or twice at Salisbury Plain, and they are definitely not something that I want to be on the wrong side of,"
"But what can they actually do?"
"Let's just say that they can make a blasting curse look like a weak knockback jinx. And that's when they're not using their rocket launchers,"
Making a blasting curse look like a weak knockback jinx. Daphne made a mental note to not to cross one. Especially in such a narrow tunnel.
In the magical world, the more flamboyant the effect, the more gaudy the spells tended to look; and the same was true for many magical creatures. In that sense, she found that proved true even for non-magical constructs. When she encountered the sentry bot, it took every ounce of willpower Daphne had to not turn around and flee. With a single glowing red glass eye, a hulking troll-sized body of black steel and a menacing mechanical rumble every time it moved, it was as terrifying as an acromantula in the Care of Magical Creatures textbooks that she had. It stood in front of a gear-shaped door of steel, guarding a brightly-painted yellow and black rectangle that she recognised as a muggle 'control panel'.
"MOVEMENT DETECTED. YOU HAVE TEN SECONDS STATE YOUR BUSINESS," it boomed in a stilted, halting voice. The three-barrelled weapons in its 'hands' glowed a bright emerald green – the exact shade of a killing curse – and it had raised them, aiming straight at the group.
Amanda simply waved it off. "Colonel Amanda R. Flynn, British Army Medical Research Corps. Authorisation code alpha-five-niner-charlie. Stand down,"
"AUTHORISATION CODE RECEIVED. PROCESSING...AUTHORISATION CONFIRMED. RESUMING PASSIVE PATROL PROCEDURES,"
"What had just happened?" Daphne asked Aveline, eyeing the 'sentry bot' suspiciously as it wheeled about and took up a position to the side.
"Mum just made it not shoot at us. I think it's supposed to shoot at anything that isn't supposed to be here," Aveline whispered back.
A most horrible squeal of metal grinding against metal filled the tunnel as the gear-shaped door shuddered and shook. Little flakes of dust and concrete fell from the ceiling as it slowly moved inwards, an inch at a time. A final, deafening clang thundered through the entire tunnel when the gear-door finally opened; a metal catwalk slid out from inside, allowing them access to the vault proper.
Daphne, Tracey and Hermione all gaped in awe as they stepped through the vault's threshold. Inside was a brightly-lit entry hall, covered entirely in sterile white tiles. Crate upon crate of glass vials, jars, bottles and retorts filled one corner, while another corner seemed to be filled by all sorts of plant specimens in clear plastic boxes. Four robots, shaped like hovering spheres with arms – Mister Handies, the muggle house-elves, she corrected herself – were busily moving things down the hallways to the right. A large round window loomed over the main entryway, reinforced by a thick steel mesh.
"Follow me, and stay close. The sentry bots haven't been instructed to recognise your faces yet, and they may decide to shoot if you stray too far," Amanda ordered them curtly.
Where the Mister Handies had been taking things to the right, Amanda took them down a narrow corridor to the left. Daphne could see what looked like a muggle version of a potions laboratory through the windows on her left, while on her right was a strange room that had three man-sized glass tanks full of a glowing sickly-green goo. A roaring, white-hot furnace was just barely visible beyond the glass tanks. "Chemistry laboratory and the cloning facility are off-limits to everyone," Amanda warned. "There are chemicals inside that will kill you in seconds if handled improperly, and others that will kill you in a few years. Without prompt medical intervention with facilities that are not present in this vault, you will die. So please, Zoe, do not even think about going inside without a HAZMAT suit; and especially without myself or Lucille around,"
"Aye, aye, mother-in-chief, I hear you,"
"Orianna, make sure that she obeys if I am not already inside,"
They climbed up a set of stairs and into a comfortable-looking office. A circular desk with a single high-backed swivel chair sat in the middle of the room, with several smaller chairs arranged in a semicircle about it. Piles upon piles of books were stacked on top of the table, some precariously perched on its edge.
"Excellent, we've made it to the vault, and the bombs have not dropped yet. Daphne, what was that-"
A loud crack interrupted Amanda's question as Dipsy popped into the office. With him were Mr. and Mrs. Davis, and Astoria, Daphne's younger sister – and nobody else.
"-Well, I suppose that answers my question. Hello, Valerie, William – and who might you be?"
"That's my younger sister, Astoria," Daphne answered quickly, while the three new arrivals gawked at their odd surroundings. "Dipsy, where are my mother and father?"
"Dipsy is sorry, Miss Daphne! Dipsy asked Master and Mistress if they would like to come as well, but they said to not bother them. Dipsy was banished from the house when Dipsy asked twice! Dipsy is a bad elf!"
Daphne's eyes widened as she realised what Dipsy was about to do. Lunging forward, she caught the house-elf by the scruff of his turtleneck jumper and held him up in the air with difficulty. Unable to grab anything to punish himself with, Dipsy howled in anguish and started beating himself up with his fists. "Dipsy, stop!" Daphne ordered, in the most imperious voice that she could muster. "You have tried your best and that is all that matters. I order you to stop!"
With great difficulty, the house-elf strained and strained – and eventually fell limp in her hands, howling in anguish. "Dipsy is bad elf! Dipsy failed Miss Daphne. But Miss Daphne orders Dipsy to not punish himself over his failure. What will Dipsy's master think?"
"You do not need to inform him of anything, Dipsy. I order you to stay with me for now," Daphne spoke carefully, hoping to not set him off again. She sighed in relief when Dipsy nodded and straightened up. "Now, I will set you down – and I want you to stay in that corner until we are done. Tori, what did mother and father say?"
"They said that they still had things to do, Daphy. I went with Dipsy because I thought you were at Ori's place," Astoria replied, looking around confusedly at her surroundings. "This doesn't look like someone's house? Where are we, Daphy?"
"That, I can answer. Hello, Astoria," Amanda said as she typed in a command into the computer on the circular desk. "You are currently in Vault M-3, a secret British government facility underneath Surrey. Think of it as...my second home. One that's safe from nuclear explosions when I seal it – which is...done,"
Several loud clanks came from downstairs, from the direction of the entryway. Daphne cast a glance to the circular window in front of Amanda; she could see orange strobe lights flashing, accompanied by the infernal blaring of a muggle siren. The gear-shaped door shifted ponderously closed, lifted into place by a gigantic steam-spewing piston. With a final, ringing clang, the door finally ground shut; half a dozen bolts, as thick as she was tall, slid into slots around the gear's rim, holding it firmly shut.
"Nuclear explosions? Like the ones that destroyed half of the Middle East?" chuckled Mr. Davis weakly. "I'm pretty sure it won't come to that, will it?"
Amanda's response was to simply check her wrist-device. "Two minutes to three," she murmured quietly.
"I'm sorry, but—what?"
As if on cue, the earth shook violently. Despite being dozens of feet underground, encased in a massive concrete-and-steel vault seemingly built to withstand even the most powerful of gouging curses and blasting hexes cast by Grindelwald himself, Daphne screamed in terror as she was hurled to the ground by a powerful tremor that felt as though a hippogriff had tackled her about the midriff. And judging by the confused shrieks and terrified screams of everyone else about her, so too had everyone else. The electric lights around them flickered on and off; a cable or two around them snapped and let off blinding showers of sparks. Rumbling and cracking noises filled the entire room, punctuated here and there by the groaning of the steel beams that held up the entire vault. Bits of crumbling concrete and built-up dust came down from the ceiling; she threw up her hands to shield her eyes from the worst of it. To top it all off, her entire world was plunged into darkness when every one of the muggle lights in the area suddenly switched off, only to be replaced by dull red ones that were apparently embedded into the ground.
Numerous more tremors rocked the vault; less violent than the first, but still enough to stop anyone from rising to their feet. The blonde heiress simply lay on the floor, fearing for her life with her arms feebly protecting her head. She had no idea just how long had passed before the last of the tremors had stopped, and the ceiling had stopped raining dust on her head. When it did, Daphne peeked through her fingers to see if nothing else was going to fall on her.
Thankfully, she only saw the near pitch-black darkness of the ceiling above. Groaning, she sat up and took a look around. Books had tumbled off the table, and their trunks had all fallen over
Silence. The entire vault had gone silent. The previous constant hum of whatever machinery lay within its bowels had gone away, replaced by eerie nothingness.
"I—is that it? Is it over?" asked Mrs. Davis, in a shaky voice barely more than a whisper. "That...that was an earthquake, wasn't it?"
"I do not know for sure. I certainly hope that my predictions are wrong, and that you are right," Amanda muttered. She sat up and climbed back to her feet, tapping a few times on the computer at the desk and giving an annoyed click of her tongue. "Wonderful. It appears that the main reactor had been taken offline by the shocks, but at least the backup power cells are still functional. And...there. Air purification and water purification systems appear to be fine. It seems we are safe for now,"
The loud hum of something – perhaps the 'reactor' that Amanda had spoken about – thrummed through the halls of the vault. One by one, the ordinary white lights flickered on again. She slumped back into her chair in relief. "I suppose I owe you all an explanation, don't I?" Amanda said ruefully. "Well, perhaps when we are all a little calmer. Lucille, please lead them down to the living quarters. Level 2-B, on the west wing of the vault; take their luggage there. There is also a dining room opposite the bedrooms; I think a pot of strong tea is in order to calm our nerves. I shall join you all there once I have more answers from my superiors,"
A brief pause. She coughed and corrected herself. "...If my superiors still live, that is,"
That answer truly did not make Daphne feel any better. Not at all.
A/N:
The first nuclear missiles have struck London. It will be some time yet until the full effects make themselves known. For now, there will be much tension within the vault itself. Tension for answers about what is happening; about friends and family that they hadn't been able to save; and what life holds for them in the years after. Stay tuned for the aftermath of the Great War.
-ArcturusWolf