A/N: Welcome back to the Adventures of Harry J. Potter. I've brought with me chapter the fifth in this excitingly riddiculous saga, in which Harry returns to merry old England with about seven years of knowledge and skill. We'll see how Harry shakes shit up. And I'm extremely sorry in advance for what I'm about to do to one of everyone's favorite characters. If you want to attack me with a hot iron pitchfork, I won't hold it against you. Here's the reviewer replies.
sirius009- Like I said before, clichés make the world go around. I'm so flattered that you think of my writing as only sub-par instead of absolutely dreadful, that just warms the cockles of my heart to no end. And I already know that I skewed the timeline from early nineties to the early years of the new millennium because I'd rather have a time frame that I know better, and the nineties are when I was just a wee tyke just learning how to use a bong. Peace.
lego-king- Lol, thanks for such an incredible honor. I'm drunk at five a.m. in Cali reading your review, and I've gotta say, that's dope as fuck. Reading fanfiction drunk is the best thing to do. Harry eventually ends up in Hogwarts this chapter, but it'll be an action-packed chap. Thanks, and I'll keep writin' as long as you keep reviewin'.
oz- From your writing and your signed name, I can surmise that you're an Aussie. Maybe. And I'm nineteen, although I have a ten-year-old's mentality, so you're not too far off base. MTV never really did much for me, but there are some pretty okay shows on there. Anyway, I don't know what you mean about reviewing my own story, so I can't comment there.
Jrf Steel- Thanks for the support, buddy. I don't know if you missed it, but the Dursleys are hanging out in the company of a flock of dementors. Hope that that's good enough karma for you.
HP-DG-SB- Again, thank you kindly for the review. They're always dope as fuck. I'm trying to set shit up for some epic scenes later on, and I hope I'm able to deliver. The Worg Animagus thing is a stroke of brilliance, if I do say so myself, but I've seen Harry being given a rhino form. Don't know what fanfiction it was, but it was pretty damn cool. Morpheus is an awesome creation of mine that I think is pretty cool. Thanks again, and I look forward to what you think about this one. And sorry in advance for what I'm gonna do to Sirius. Sorry.
Disclaimer: Don't Own Shit, people. Try and sink that concept into your heads.
Chapter 5: Go to Hogwarts. Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect 200 Galleons
17 September, 2003
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, somewhere in Northern Scotland, United Kingdom
Everyone had known that Albus Dumbledore was old. In the last eight years, however, the old wizard had gotten ancient. It was visible how the wrinkles and liver spots had begun marring his face and skin, but the most noticeable change was his eyes. The once-trademark twinkle that entered his electric blue orbs now lay dormant within.
Albus sat at his desk, alone but for his faithful phoenix, Fawkes. The firebird's current state seemed to mock Dumbledore's own: plumage brilliant and slightly gleaming with his proud, wickedly hooked beak and glaring eyes turned in concern for his master. Dumbledore'd made so many mistakes in the past two decades of his life, he'd lost count twelve years ago.
Seven years he'd been doing all he could to find the young Harry Potter, whom he'd so foolishly entrusted to those loathsome Muggle relatives of his. Incidentally, Petunia and Vernon were now incarcerated in the lowest-security area of Azkaban, where the more common criminals were kept. Still, he'd visited them a few months ago, and without any magic, they could do little more than shiver in fear as the dementors (invisible to them) passed by every hour or so. As for their son, Dudley had been sent to a Muggle boot camp in his parents' absence. If the military couldn't put that boy straight, then nobody could.
For several years after Harry's disappearance, Albus had been in an almost perpetual state of nervousness, waiting for the moment Voldemort reared his ugly head. With no child of prophecy to carry it out, there was nobody stopping Tom from taking over completely.
But after a while, when nothing seemed to happen, Albus began to slowly relax. Riddle must be biding his time, figuring out how to return from his state of quasi-life. Dumbledore had a fairly good idea of why Voldemort hadn't crossed over completely, but it was the only thing that he had to go on.
So he threw his entire being into discovering Voldemort's secrets, his weaknesses and strengths. The Dark wizard set too much store in that prophecy, when in reality, the child mentioned by Sibyll could very well be Neville Longbottom. And so it was that when not seeking any and all strips of knowledge pertaining to Tom Marvolo Riddle Jr., he was helping the young Longbottom heir become the best wizard he could be.
Neville, while not having much innate talent for Transfiguration or defensive spells, outshone all others in the fields of Herbology and Charms work, especially after they found a better wand to match his particular style. The young Gryffindor was truly living up to his parents' names, and Dumbledore's hope was steadily growing once more.
He was reading an overview of Professor Snape's new lesson plan for his NEWT students, which was rather droll and left no room for the students' development as potioneers when someone tripped the alert wards he'd placed just behind the gargoyle that guarded his staircase.
With a quick flick of his wand, his desk was straightened up, and he relaxed in his chair. Moments later, Remus John Lupin, a former member of the Order of the Phoenix and dear friend of Harry Potter's deceased parents, burst into his office, a wildly ecstatic expression on his face.
"Hello, Remus," Dumbledore said politely as he steepled his fingers. "To what do I owe this pleasant, if unexpected, surprise?" Just as he finished speaking, a young man with James Potter's hair, Lily Evans' eyes, and a slightly rangy look about him stepped in after Remus, looking forlorn.
He wore a beige traveler's cloak with multiple pockets over a dragon-hide armor set and on his belt hung a strange-looking wand not unlike the Muggle guns he'd seen. Also on the belt were two blades, one on his back, the other on his hip, the hilt of the later looking oddly familiar to him.
"We've found him, Albus," the werewolf said, pulling the boy close as he spoke, gesturing to him. "We found Harry!"
For the first time in his life, Albus Dumbledore's eyes twinkled of their own accord.
16 September, 2003: One Day Earlier
White Sands, New Mexico, United States of America
Harry Potter and Sirius Black sat gathered around a conjured flame, waiting. They were in the dip of a circle of sand dunes of the purest white. The dunes around them sparkled in the firelight, and beyond their circle of flame, the quartz sand was bleached silver by the waning gibbous moon as it danced its celestial waltz across the sky.
"So what're the specs for this one?" Harry asked. In the past year, he'd had a change in wardrobe. After working in the bounty hunter's line of business for as long as he had, the sole remaining Potter had come to realize that black was only good in certain situations. At the moment, he was wearing a sandy-colored trenchcoat, with a pair of white, baggy cargo pants and matching boots.
A hand-width belt was slung across his left shoulder and looped around his right hip. There were elastic loops that held vials of necessary potions like Pepper-Ups and Rejuvies, as well as the 'Boom Juice' that Sirius had taught Harry to make and the more questionable potions, like the Draught of Living Death. A zipper hid a pocket for equipment such as Insta-Ice blocks, little packets of powdered Erumpent horn, a few clumps of gillyweed, and several bezoars, as well as a peculiar, yet versatile broom called the Aerohawk that Sirius had given him for his twlefth birthday and the Kawasaki Ninja motorcycle his godfather had bought for his most recent birthday, both shrunken to the size of toys. At his hip was the trusted dragon-hide holster, and on his back was a matching sheath. Residing in them were his most prized possessions: the shinboku wandgun and Punitor.
Sirius grunted, stoking the fire with his wand as he tossed a manila envelope to his godson. Harry opened it and began reading the files. This was precisely their five hundredth mission as partners, and it was one hell of a mission at that.
"So apparently," Sirius began as Harry started his studying, "some wanker's started to fancy himself as the next American Dark Lord. Necromancy, Dark rituals, the works. Goes by the name of Ectheleon, has a group of followers called the Harbringers of Doom. Their base of operations is somewhere around here."
Harry looked up from the papers when he heard the crunching of paws on the fine sand. His senses had gotten much sharper since the Animagus transformation, so much so that all he used his glasses for were the various enchantments layered into glass and steel and stone.
Moments later, a massive Siberian tiger padded into their campsite with five jackrabbits clamped firmly in its jaws. After depositing its catch, a shiver went down the creature's spine as striped fur became dark green scales and massive paws became miniscule claws.
"What took you so long, Morpheus?" Harry asked when the transformation was complete. The smallish dragon alighted on Harry's shoulder and began realigning its scales in a strange mimic of a bird's preening.
I wish we were in a forest, the metadrake complained. Big game, easy targets. This desert, on the other hand, has only one source of edible meat in these stupid rodents. It took me all that time to get them in my tiger morph.
"Y'know," Sirius reasoned, "you could've turned into that rattlesnake morph and just gone into their burrows to get them." Morpheus stopped his realigning and hissed at the dog Animagus.
If you knew anything about being a metadrake, you would know that it takes time for one of us to grow accustomed to a new form. Seeing as how I acquired the tiger two days ago, and our lives might depend on it, I took it upon myself to figure this animal out. So excuse me for not taking the easy route.
"Whatever," Sirius said, grinning. "I was under the assumption that you just hadn't thought of that particular course of action. My mistake."
After laying out the papers for Morpheus to read, Harry turned to Sirius. "So what's the plan?"
Sirius thought on it for a moment. "Well, the only thing that we know for sure is that at the moment, he has fourteen followers, three of which are powerful enough to be any threat to us. Then, there's the horde of inferi that he's spawned, and the chimaera he's created-"
"Wait, wait, wait, wait," Harry interrupted. "He's made a chimaera? What are the components?" Chimaera were amalgamations of different animals, fused inseparably by alchemy. It was a taboo art, especially with sentient creatures, and Ectheleon had completed his Dark persona by making one.
"He used a blade dragon, a lion, and a great white shark," Sirius answered heavily. "Some of the most dangerous animals in the world. It's there in the mission specs."
Yes, right here, Morpheus said, pointing with a clawed finger at the paper he was bent over. "Height is fifteen feet at the shoulder, weight is roughly one ton. Fangs, claws, tail blade, elbow blades, fin blades, wing blades, dentricles. This chimaera is just a walking, flying, swimming weapon.
"So what I propose, is this..."
The Dark Lord Ectheleon was very happy. His army of inferi had finally reached the set number of corpses, his chimaera had been perfected into the most efficient fighting machine possible. His followers were becoming very powerful in the Dark arts, and he himself was feeling rather potent himself.
Not only was he ranked as a Great Mage on the Warbler Scale, but he was also devilishly handsome, something acquired through rigorous rituals, many of which involving young, nubile virgins. At first, all Ectheleon had wanted was to look good. Not too much to ask, seeing as how he'd never had consensual sex not involving money. But the more he looked into cosmetic rituals, the more he realized that the ones that permanently fixed his looks required taboo ingredients.
Naturally, during his transformation, Ectheleon turned toward the Dark side, amassing several devout followers in the process. Out of these followers came his right hand, one Bellatrix Lestrange. The woman was astonishingly, remarkably insane, but in the most wonderful of ways. She'd come to him just months before, and yet she was one of his most faithful subordinates.
Looking in a mirror, Ectheleon smirked. Dark, wavy hair framed a perfectly proportioned face with eyes that shone like sapphires and plump lips that hid extremely white teeth. This was the face that would soon be known throughout the world as the visage of the most powerful Dark Lord this century, maybe even this millennium!
He was still staring into the mirror when a concussive blast rang through his underground base of operations. The mirror cracked perfectly, creating a vertical line that passed right between his eyes and down his nose. Growling angrily, Ectheleon stormed off to find out what had ruined his reflection and, by extension, himself.
If the budding Dark Lord had taken Divination, he might've seen the flawless crack in his reflection as a very serious omen. The crack in one's reflection was more often than not an early warning of death or a serious head injury.
He spotted Bellatrix as he stalked through the network of subterranean caverns and tunnels and beckoned for her.
"What's the meaning of this?" he growled as another explosion shook dust from the ceiling. "Who is responsible for this?"
Bellatrix retrieved a scrying glass from her bodice and whispered an incantation. The glass showed two hooded figures blasting away at his minions, cutting through them as easily as a hot butter knife through snow.
As he watched, the taller of the two stumbled, and an inferi swiped off the hood, revealing a dashing man with dark hair and clear, sky blue eyes. He heard a sharp intake of breath next to him, and he turned to Bellatrix.
"What's the matter, Bella?" he asked her.
Her visage twisted into a feral grin as she gazed upon the scrying glass. "Nothing at all, my lord. But I do believe it's about time for a Black family reunion."
"Padfoot, duck!" Without pausing, Sirius dove to the floor just as a Firewhip sliced through the air, cutting straight through five inferi. It was a testament to the trust that had formed between godfather and godson that Sirius hadn't questioned the order at all.
Sirius' plan had been the ever-popular forward charge with just a bit of a twist to it. After finding the underground base with a simple Radar charm, Harry and Sirius had simply walked in, wands a-blazin' and swords flashing. At first, all they had to worry about was a massive crush of dead bodies, but minutes into the fight, hostile spells started whizzing over their heads.
"Get back, Jetpelt, I'll take care of the cadavers," Sirius shouted over the din of the zombies and spellfire. "You worry about covering me."
Sirius saw Harry pull up granite walls to shield them and cast Transparency charms on them so the young man could see what his enemies were doing. He barely had time to feel proud of the little bugger before he started up the Vacuum curse.
The spell erupted from his wand, and the stupid zombies were sucked into the vortex by the dozens. By the time Sirius had recovered from the energy drain, Harry was finishing off the last of the inferi. Picking off some of the spellcasters, he spotted their target storming in from a side-cavern with a buxom witch who would've been beautiful but for the fact that she was his cousin...wait, what?
Harry saw Sirius do a double-take on the woman striding purposefully next to the Dark wizard Ectheleon, and wondered if his godfather had just seen an old fling, possibly an ex-girlfriend.
"Why, if it isn't my dearest little cousin, Sirius!" cried out the witch, slinging a Bone-Shatterer quicker than lightning. "How've you been, Padfoot?"
"Woudn't you like to know, Bellatrix?" Sirius growled, bringing up a Mage Shield to counter. Harry's mind whirred like his computer as he comprehended Sirius' words. Bellatrix Lestrange was one of Voldemort's supporters, his cousin, and convicted and sentenced to Azkaban for the torture of Frank and Alice Longbottom.
If she was out, that either meant that she'd also found a way to escape and was on the run, or Voldemort had sprung her and was planning something big back in the United Kingdom.
"Harry, you take care of Ectheleon. I've got a score to settle with my cuz," Sirius muttered, beginning a destructive spell salvo. Nodding, Harry focused his attention on the handsome wizard next to Bellatrix. Blackie was a big boy. He could handle himself.
"So, they send a boy to kill me?" Ectheleon snickered. "What are you going to do, bore me to death with the details of your everyday life?"
"No," Harry replied conversationally while digging into the alchemical energy around him. "I'm going to crush your skull before you can cause any harm. I'm known as the Exterminator. They call me when others aren't able to handle the big infestations of bugs like you."
"Please! A mere child can't hope to defeat me, Lord Ectheleon!" The man drew his wand and cast a pain curse known fondly as the Iron Maiden. Harry simply raised his hand, and the bolt of silvery energy halted inches before his outstretched palm. With a wave, the spell vanished, leaving Ectheleon to stare dumbly at the hitherto defenseless child.
"What were you saying just a moment ago?" Harry asked, a smirk playing across his face. "Wanna try again? I'll give you another free shot."
"Avada Kedavra!" screeched the Dark Lord. Harry very nearly rolled his eyes. It was always like this. They try a spell, he diverts it with apparent ease thanks to an alchemical trick Flamel had shown him, and they never, never fail to whip out the Big Green Death on him. Greatly challenged minds must think alike.
Covertly using a ninjutsu known as the Rock Doppleganger technique, Harry created a clone out of rock and replaced it with himself while he snuck around to the side. The jet of green smashed into 'Rocky' and he broke apart, becoming rock once more.
"What the-?" Ectheleon started, but had to dodge the flying metal discs that Harry was conjuring for him. After bringing up a physical shield ornamented with a bear's paw, Ectheleon called out, "Release the chimaera!"
Harry cast a quick glance around while continuing his pounding on Ectheleon. Two wizards in dark blue robes raised their wands and dispelled the illusionary wall that masked a colossal steel cage which held the monstrous chimaera.
It had the head and rear legs of a lion, the body and front paws of a blade dragon, and the tail, scales, and teeth of a shark. Uniformly grayish-green scales that were sharper than knives were raised from the furry skin they protected. The tawny mane that wrapped around its neck gave it a fierce look that was only added to by the massive claws on all four legs, the blade on the end of the shark's tail, the ones at the edge of its membranous wings, and the ones jutting out of the joints of its forelegs. In short, the chimaera was something out a demented child's nightmares.
The cage was opened, and the chimaera immediately burst out, roaring in exultation. Thinking quickly, Harry slammed his palms into the ground, calling up his alchemical energy. A thick spike of rock shot out from the ground beneath the chimaera, but it simply took to the air, dodging the attack easily.
After conjuring several lions to keep the creature busy, Harry started forming his golem, this time giving it spikes on every inch of its body before transfiguring stone to steel, and conjuring it a massive halberd instead of a club. The golem was going to need all the help it could get against the chimaera.
Switching his attention back to Ectheleon, he started animating the decimated remains of the inferi army. The budding Dark Lord's wand started erupting with Knockbacks and Blasters to give himself space from the zombies.
But Harry kept up a relentless assault, mixing elemental magic, offensive spells, and Transfiguration to throw the ponce off his game. Harry glanced to the left to see how his golem was doing against the chimaera.
Several wounds were visible on the chimaera's body, most noticably the bleeding stump where its left dragon leg had been. The golem was not without damage, either, but it was doing much better than its opponent.
Ectheleon pulled up a Mage Shield to give himself a brief respite, but Harry was ready for that. The young wizard slammed his palm into the floor and sent a massive Knockback jinx miliseconds later.
A rune-carved spike of rock erupted out of the ground, angling toward Ectheleon. The Mage Shield halted it for a moment before the 'shield-breaker' alchemical attack smashed the magical conjuration like a boulder through single-pane glass.
Ectheleon was so surprised he failed to notice the large greenish jinx as it zipped ever closer. The Flippendo crashed into him, sending him flying back into a wall of the cave. He cracked his head on a protruding rock and his eyes fluttered closed before he even hit the floor.
Grinning, Harry turned to see Sirius in a spot of trouble. He was weathering a sickening onslaught of evil curses originating from the darkly beautiful Bellatrix Lestrange behind a heavy-duty version of the Mage Shield that traded maneuverability for durability.
Sighing and rolling up his sleeves, Harry started toward his godfather when his precognitive senses went haywire, and he leapt back instinctively just as the massive tail blade of the chimaera came crashing down where he'd been not a moment ago.
Punitor was out again, and Harry performed the Flash Step to get close to the chimaera. The blade took on a silvery sheen as magic flowed through it, and then it was brought down onto the base of the abberation's tail. Supernaturally-enhanced steel cut easily through the sinew and bone of the tail, and it flopped off with a horrendous screech of rage and pain from the chimaera.
Harry suddenly realized his mistake, and before he could act, an enormous, clawed paw slammed into his chest, knocking the breath out of him and pinning him to the floor. If he hadn't been wearing the Chinese God armor, he would've just been so much bloody spew on the floor.
As it was, his lungs were in serious need of a fresh breath and he was aching all over. One of the chimaera's claws had ripped into his arm, cutting the biceps and triceps. This effectively hobbled his sword-arm, and Punitor lay useless a few yards away. He'd kept a grip on his wandgun, but his wand-hand was pinned at his side, underneath the massive paw.
He stared up at the chimaera, who was regarding him with cold, almost intelligent eyes. Harry heard a dull, sickeningly wet thud, and those eyes widened suddenly and dramatically, then lost the luster of life as the eyelids drooped. Steaming blood dripped down from the creature's open mouth, burning his skin where it fell.
Turning his head to the side, Harry saw the fallen golem, missing three limbs and most of its torso, holding the stump of the chimaera's severed tail, the blade of which now resided in the miserable creature's neck. Summoning up its remaining strength, the golem hurled itself at its dying foe, tackling it and freeing Harry while digging its spiky hand into the chimaera's chest before the magic left it, and the golem reverted to the rock it had once been, leaving a large, broken abberation behind.
"That'll do, golem," Harry said, patting the motionless rock. "That'll do." Struggling to his feet, he picked up Punitor after holstering his wandgun, and started stalking toward the still-battling cousins.
Bellatrix smirked, casting a spell Harry vaguely remembered as being called the Devil's Pendulum. Sirius sidestepped it, casting a cursed Cutter which caused the skin around the initial laceration begin to decay unless treated immediately.
The Dark witch ate the curse with her left forearm, screeching in what Harry was surprised to admit was pleasure. Sirius grinned triumphantly when he saw his spell hit. He was still wearing that grin when the Devil's Pendulum separated his head from his body.
The Devil's Pendulum was classified as a boomerang spell, named thusly because of the way the magic moved in a U-shaped trajectory. If one such spell missed the first time, it came around for another go. The Pendulum, however, was different from most boomerang spells. The majority of them are rather weak, since most of the magic is centered around creating the swing effect of the spell, but the Pendulum's strength is dependent on the level of malevolence put into it by the caster. In the hands of someone like Bellatrix Lestrange, the Pendulum was tantamount to an Unforgivable.
Before he could even think, Harry's wand was out, and he'd cast a Stasis charm, which enveloped his godfather's head and body in a calm, blue bubble of energy, then turned, furious, to Bellatrix Lestrange.
He launched into a repetitive spell salvo, which cycled his five most destructive spells: Bone Exploder, Poison Cutter, Burning Hurricane, Plague Cutter, Killing Curse. Three of the five were undisputably Dark and the other two were pretty questionable to say the least.
To her credit, Bellatrix was able to dance and shield her way through the first few cycles of the salvo, looking like an undead ballerina as she twirled her way through the Bone curses and Dark Cutters.
So Harry switched around a few spells to throw her off. His Hurricane charm caught her in the hip, spinning her around and setting her dress alight, her wand flung from her hand by the momentum. This allowed the Bone Exploding curse, the Poisoned Cutting hex, and the Plague Cutting curse to hit her left arm, right leg, and torso. The multiple strikes tossed her around, and as she rolled across the floor, the fire was put out.
Effectively crippled, Bellatrix leaned against the rocky wall behind her, panting heavily. Her arm was only a bloody mess, thanks to the Bone curse, and her leg was slowly turning black. The skin that the burnt dress exposed was an angry red and was split and burned in most places. Harry could see where his Poison Cutter bit into her side, and revelled in it.
He raised his wand, the AK on his lips, but Bellatrix raised her one good hand. "Wait."
"Why should I? You killed Sirius. You tortured Frank and Alice into insanity. You've commited countless horrors against humanity just by siding with that witless, half-blood piece of filth you call a master."
"Kill me, if you must," Bellatrix murmured. "I just want to see the face of the man who killed me, that's all."
Harry's hair had covered his scar, and his hood had miraculously stayed over his head during the fight. Bellatrix watched in morbid fascination as the man who'd trounced her so badly removed his hood, revealing messy black hair that hid his eyes. At first, she thought she was seeing a ghost of the fourteen-year-old James Potter.
When he swept the hair from his forehead, Bellatrix gasped audibly. Standing before her, clad in battle armor and holding a strange wand, was none other than Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Couldn't-Be-Found.
After Dumbledore's announcement that Harry Potter was missing, and not under the protection of the blood wards surrounding his relatives' house, the Dark Lord had sent his minions to the four corners of the Earth. His only orders were to find Harry and bring the boy to him.
Bellatrix knew that she needed to bring this information to her master. As Harry raised the wandgun, she dug into her bodice, retrieving a small, gold ring. She muttered a single word, and the Portkey pulled her into the limbo. She was in pain, but that was irrelevant. Her Master's orders came first and foremost in her mind.
They were sitting in the lobby of the most prominent magical hospitals on the North American continent.
Morpheus was still quite stunned by what had transpired within the last hour. He'd transformed into his strongest battle morph, a Mountain Firedrake that could burn a ten-foot-cubed piece of solid steel into a shiny puddle in thirty seconds. Then he'd gotten into the subterranean warren of Ectheleon, ready to bring down the pain on any who stood in his way.
And that was about when he saw Sirius' head and Sirius' body in a stasis field while Harry screamed at some woman named Bellatrix Lestrange to come back and fight him. After some quick thinking, Morpheus changed himself into a blink dog and transported them to the Phoenix Tear Healing Center, in several mid-distance jumps across the country in a space of a few minutes.
Now, Morpheus was perched on Harry's shoulder as a beautifully regal snowy owl while Harry sat in complete silence. The metadrake knew that Harry was using every fiber of his being to try and will Sirius back to life. He was already holding onto Padfoot's wand and sword, Ferocia, for when he woke and could use them again.
But the small draconian was aware of the limited capabilities of stasis magic. It was a spell which many, many brilliant magicians had worked in tandem on creating, and was used only when a person's death was sealed. Mainly for battlefield injuries, the stasis would wear off in around an hour unless recast.
Morpheus's superior hearing in the snowy owl form picked up the unsteady footsteps of Healer Thread, the senior Healer in charge of the emergency ward at Phoenix Tear, and he cocked his head to the side.
Moments later, an elderly man with no hair and dark, intelligent eyes pushed through the doors, and by the look on his face, Morpheus could tell that there would be no good news coming from this man. He limped his way to Harry and stood there in silence until the boy acknowledged his presence.
Clasping his hands together in a gesture of respect for the young man, Thread bowed to Harry, who stood up, a hopelessly hopeful expression tingeing his visage.
"Lord Potter," Thread started. "Forgive me. We did all we could for Lord Black, but the stasis had been placed too late. I'm so sorry for your loss." Harry's legs buckled, and he fell back into the chair, mind blank but for one thought.
He's gone.
Healer Thread was speaking again, so he figured that since the man had at least done something, he should listen.
"...Black's solicitor has been reached, along with the United Kingdom's Aurors," Thread was saying. "Would you like for me to arrange his cremation here, Lord Potter?"
"If you could," Harry replied. "Thanks for all your work, Healer Thread."
"I'm sorry there wasn't more I could do for him," the Healer said. "Do you need accommodations for tonight?"
"No, I'll get a room at a hotel. I'll drop by tomorrow, Healer. Goodbye." He gestured for Morpheus, whose body shivered for a moment before metamorphosing into a tawny-furred dog with rather large, hairless ears. Harry grabbed onto the blink dog's tail, and Morpheus blinked them to the front of an expensive hotel in magical Boston.
After checking himself in at the front desk, Harry Apparated up into his room after temporarily being keyed to its wards, leaving Morpheus behind.
Knowing that Harry would want to be left alone for the time being, Morpheus went the slow route by taking the stairs as a flea. Being a flea was much more difficult than many people would expect. First off, fleas had a very poor sense of sight, and it was infinitely troublesome trying to time and execute a perfectly arcing jump when you couldn't see where you were going.
Nonetheless, the flea had been one of Morpheus's first acquisitions, and he'd grown rather good with it. The senses of smell and hearing were top-notch, and after the fifteenth jump or so, he smelt the unmistakable scent of werewolf blood.
Morpheus knew that Sirius used to run with a werewolf named Remus Lupin, and allowed the flea to be drawn to the large vein that ran up the lycanthrope's left forearm. He made sure not to bite down, not only to stay unnoticed, but also because most bloodsuckers weren't able to tolerate cursed blood.
Sure enough, when the werewolf went up, the bond Morpheus shared with Harry as his familiar told him that his master was getting closer. Morpheus shifted into a dragonfly to get a better view of where he was going, and saw that he was in a large, well-lit hall with electric wall sconces shaped like seashells and whatnot. American wizards were much more progressive than their European counterparts in the Common technology department, and put the electricity to work quickly, but much more efficient because of the use of magic. Trust the bloody Yanks, thought Morpheus, who had hatched near Newcastle, England.
He saw the werewolf, who turned out to be a rather lean-looking, middle-aged man with more gray in his mousy hair than he should, and a sparse smattering of stubble stretched across his cheeks and chin. The clothes the lycanthrope wore were simple and threadbare, and he had a small box clutched in his hands.
As he watched, the man went up to a door and knocked softly. "Jus' a mo'," came a voice Morpheus recognized as Harry's. A few seconds later, the door opened, and the jamb framed an extremely inebriated young wizard with a tiny bottle of liquor in both hands.
"You room service?" Harry asked, regarding the werewolf with a bleary eye, then looked at the box. "That better be the Jaegermeister in a shrunken box, or you ain't gettin' a tip."
"Harry?" asked the man with no small amount of hesitation. "Are-are you drunk?"
The young man forced a belch, moved the bottle in his right hand to his left, then put his palm up in front of his eyes. "Not yet," Harry muttered, tossing back the contents of both bottles before throwing them over his shoulder, then added, "but that ought to do it in a bit."
Harry scrutinized the werewolf with a focus that he shouldn't have, judging by the amount of alcohol Morpheus detected, then sighed heavily. "Come in, Mr. Lupin."
"You know me," Remus John Lupin said as he stepped into the hotel room. The minibar on the small bureau only had three miniature bottles left in it, and he couldn't be entirely sure, but he thought he smelled a trace of the Muggle plant James had introduced to them in their fourth year he called 'pot' for some idiotic reason. "How?"
"Padfoot," Harry said, then, without warning, burst into tears. The fourteen-year-old flung himself onto the bed and had himself a good cry. Remus was at a loss for what to do. He'd never really been the best at emotions, and he didn't even know why the boy was crying.
"Black?" Remus muttered, bewildered. That was the last answer he expected to hear, especially since he'd heard that Sirius had last been seen somewhere in the Siberian wastes, not America. "Where is he? We can have you out of here in no time."
Harry didn't even pause in his watery misery, wailing, "He's dead! That stupid bint Lestrange killed him!"
"Why would you care?" Remus shot back. He was angry at the boy, despite his vulnerable state. Here he was, Harry James Potter, crying over the man who sold his parents out to Voldemort. "In effect, he killed your parents!"
"You don't know anything!" Harry shot back. He wiped his tears away angrily as he leapt from the bed. "It was Pettigrew. It was always Pettigrew! He's probably still alive somewhere, laughing his ratty little arse off for tricking the entire magical world!"
"Sirius killed Peter, too!"
"No, Wormtail faked his own death and blew up half the bloody street to get away! Sirius was going to kill him, though, so you've got it half right. But that was only because he'd ratted out my mother and father! God, you're stupid, considering his Animagus form's a fuckin' rat! Couldn't you make the damn connection?"
"What proof of that do you have?" Remus demanded. He was torn between stunning the boy and believing him. He couldn't help but wonder if he'd done not two, but three of his friends wrong, and that thought hurt him more than he already was.
Harry reached into a pocket and shoved a newspaper clipping dated over a year prior into Remus' hand. It was from the Daily Prophet, about the family Weasley going on a trip to Egypt after winning some drawing at the Ministry of Magic. There was even a picture of the redheaded family, waving and smiling. He personally knew Arthur and Molly, and had taught all but two of their children last year at Hogwarts.
If the clipping did anything at all, it made Remus even more confused. "Er, how exactly does this count as proof that Sirius Black didn't sell out?"
Growling in frustration, Harry pointed at the small, brown rat on the youngest boy, Ron's shoulder, and Remus felt his fingers go numb. He saw the telltale signs of Peter Pettigrew's Animagus form, from how the lowest whisker on his left cheek was longer than all the rest to the large hole on the top of his ear when James and Sirius tried to pierce his ears with nothing more than a poorly-aimed Percutio and an uncut diamond they dug up in the Forest. What caught his attention more than anything, however, was the missing digit on the rat's left paw.
The largest part of Peter the Aurors found after the devastating blast Black had supposedly set off was his finger.
Oh...My...Lanta...
It was as if the pieces of a sliding puzzle snapped into place all at once. Remus was literally knocked off his feet by the realization, and he landed on the couch, dazed. "But...how?"
"They switched Secret Keepers," Harry mumbled, heading back to the minibar and tossing the werewolf a tequila shot after downing the other two bottles. He picked up the phone without dialing a number and yelled, "Jaegermeister, please!"
"Wait, James and Lily chose Peter over Sirius as their Secret Keeper? They chose him over me?" He considered the small container in his hand for a moment before drinking it up.
"Peter convinced them that you were the snitch in the Order of the Phoenix," Harry said, stumbling to the couch to sit next to Lupin. "That's why nobody told you about the switch. I'm sorry you had to find out like this, Moony."
They sat in silence for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts. Then Remus spoke up, his voice rather tremulous. He never could hold his alcohol as well as his friends. "So...two Marauders down, two to go."
"And pretty damn soon, it'll be down to you," Harry growled. "Lestrange killed Sirius, and Lestrange works for Voldemort. Her sudden reappearance could only mean that Voldemort's not far behind. And since Peter was one of the Dark Tosser's followers, he'll be close by." He turned, eyes blazing, to Remus. "And since I'm destined to off that sheep-shagging maniac, I might as well avenge the Marauders as well. You with me, Moony?"
Remus stared in amazement at the transformation that had occured. One moment, this boy had just been a shit-faced kid, and now Lupin could see James and Lily, and even Sirius shining through in this young man. At that moment, he decided that he was going to stick with Harry Potter through thick and thin, and try to do his friends' memories proud by doing right by the boy.
"To the end, Harry," he replied, nodding and shaking his hand. "Now, maybe if you would actually dial the number to room service, we can get that Jaegermeister and celebrate the life of a great, if sometimes mangy man."
Don't forget utterly lecherous, Morpheus said, shifting to his natural form. Remus started, then relaxed when Morpheus glided over to Harry's shoulder. Good evening, Werewolf. My name is Morpheus. I am Harry's familiar and traveling companion, along with Sirius Black.
"Hello, Morpheus. I'm Remus Lupin. Forgive me for asking, but are you a metadrake, by any chance?" The shapeshifter nodded, and the lycanthrope looked extremely impressed. "Harry, I'm surprised that a metadrake would even consider being anyone's familiar. You must be very strong magically to gain such a strong familiar."
"Padfoot taught me well," Harry said, grinning.
Over the course of several hours, the three traded stories about the dog Animagus they all knew and loved, from the time he was caught cheating on his then-girlfriend Celeste Sinistra with one Marlene McKinnon in a very compromising situation in a broom closet to the very memorable day when Sirius was almost smothered to death by someone who thought that he was the lead singer of the band Hobgoblins at the Los Angeles Zoo.
In the end, Morpheus, who was the only sensible one among them, had to tuck in an extremely inebriated Harry, and throw a blanket over a rather less drunk werewolf, who'd passed out on the couch.
A/N: Okay, so let the name-calling, stone throwing, shit-hurling, and anything else you've got begin. I know, Sirius didn't deserve to die, but it's a cleverly inserted plot device I needed for the story to come to fruition later on down the line. And since Bellatrix offed everyone's favorite Snuffles in canon, I figured, what the hell, let's let the psycho bitch have her fun. Anyway, next chapter is the big return to Hogwarts, and it only took me five chapters to get Harry there, too. Not bad, considering. Well, till next time, everyone. Adieu, adieu, parting is such sweet sorrow.