tlhIngan maH! (We Are Klingons)
by Polydicta
Summary:
Harry knows that he will meet Voldemort. With the headmaster dead and the underage magic detectors damaged, he decides to give himself an 'edge'. A Crossunder between the worlds of Harry Potter and Start Trek fandom.
What happens when Harry is exposed to a fictional character with a worthwhile warrior ethos? What happens when Harry and company decide to emulate a fictional warrior race. What happens when their training makes them physically strong, immune to pain and magically powerful?
tlhInganpu, is what.
Author's Forward:
This is NOT a Star Trek / HP crossover! – it's a HP/Trekkie crossunder. The Klingon stuff is based (loosely) on Star Trek (Next Generation) material.
In speech, text enclosed in square brackets [ ] is the Klingon/English translation
Disclaimer:
All fiction is derivative and fan fiction doubly so. I make no claim to own any part of any of the following, all I have done is an attempt to put together the elements in a novel fashion, using words and ideas like Lego ™ bricks.
Star Trek, Klingon and everything pertaining are copyright items and the property of Paramount Studios and the Estate of Gene Roddenberry. No infringement on those rights is intended.
There is no money involved – all I do is to share what I do for my own amusement.
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tlhIngan maH! (We Are Klingons) - Part 4: Ascension
The end of October arrived, and with it Halloween. Neville, Luna and Ginny had been training with Harry and Hermione.
The fat boy, Neville was being slowly replaced by the athletic youth Neville. His physique was becoming muscular rather than soft. Ginny was becoming more muscular, but in the same pleasant way that Harry saw in Hermione. Luna had lost some of her vague, willowiness and was becoming a more positive personality, her strange looks now becoming less strange as her body grew in new ways.
Ron, on the other hand, had drifted ever further from the duo.
"Harry, I need to talk about Ron."
"I know. I'm sad that he's drifted away from us, 'Mione. But it was Ron's choice. I'm sorry that he wasn't willing to commit himself to anything."
"That's not what I want to say, Harry."
He looked at her quizzically.
"I wanted to tell you that it's over between Ron and myself. Heck, Harry, it never really started. I suppose I was jealous of other girls dating fellas."
"Oh? Well, I'm sorry it never worked out for you, 'Mione. Really I am. Is there anyone you fancy now?"
She could hear the sincerity in his voice. He really was concerned for her.
She blushed slightly.
"Well, Harry, yes there is."
His head drooped.
She continued, "there always was someone. Ever since he leapt on the back of a fully-grown mountain troll to save me."
Harry's head snapped up again, his eyes alight with something Hermione couldn't really identify.
"Hermione, do you really mean that?"
She nodded.
"Well, 'Mione, I have a bit of a confession to make … when Ron called you a nightmare, I nearly punched him then and there. As soon as I heard you choke, I wanted to go to you, but you were too fast. And then the chance was past, and things were happening too quickly.
"Besides, I didn't want to lose my first ever friend, but I have known for a long time that you were more important to me than Ron. You were always there for me.
"I wish that I'd asked you to the Yule Ball before Viktor, but I didn't really see you as a girl, as a young woman until that night. Until then Hermione, you were my best friend in all the world, even more than Ron.
"I love you, Hermione, and I always have."
She threw herself at him and bit his cheek, drawing blood. He never flinched.
"Tasting my blood and getting my scent then?"
She giggled. "I already knew what you smell like. Pine forests, woodland ferns and sandalwood soap."
He pulled back and looked at her. "Really?"
She nodded.
"It's funny, you always smell of libraries, beeswax, vanilla and roses. And some …"
He inhaled deeply.
"… yes, ancient stonework."
"Tease!"
"No, truthfully. You smell like that amortentia potion that we had to brew last year."
"Pardon? But you smell quite different, and you smell … um."
"How amortentia smells to you?"
She nodded mutely.
"If we took it together, it would make no difference, would it?"
She stared.
She stared some more.
He kissed her to stop her staring.
"I love you, 'Mione…"
"Mmmmm."
.
Being Saturday, they had an extended training session in the Room of Requirement. Harry needed to re-charge the pain sticks, and added an extra curse to two of them. He added the cruciatus curse. Moody watched him perform the re-charging.
"These are the ones we use when training together. You notice that the crystals are red instead of blue. We decided to make just the two for this purpose."
"That's some nasty magic you're using there, Harry. Very advanced dark magic."
"There's a muggle saying, Professor, know thine enemy. We can't train against most of the curses and hexes that could be used against us, but the cruciatus and imperius curses are two of the Death Eaters' favourites, and we can learn to throw them off."
Harry touched his thigh with the stick he had just completed and grunted.
"May I try that, harry?"
"Sure thing, Professor."
Moody pressed the crystal to his own thigh and screamed.
Sweating profusely and looking shaken, he handed the weapon to Harry.
"If I thought that you intended to use that on anyone else, I'd have you shipped off to Azkaban here and now. That is a seriously nasty piece of work, Harry. What else is there in there?"
"Well, the cruciatus curse is accompanied by stinging hexes, bludgeoning curses, shocking hexes, avaraka and a few others I picked up. Nothing that causes physical damage."
"Harry, the bludgeoning curse causes damage."
"Not if it isn't cast directly. If you could slow the curse to a snail's pace, it would just hurt the same without bruising. That's effectively what happens when it's in the crystal."
"That stick of yours, Harry, is worse than any crucio that I could cast, even if I could cast it on you with any real force. I don't hate you enough."
Moody grinned. "How do you get the hate behind it?"
"Oh, while I put the curse into the crystal, I just think about using the pain sticks on Voldemort. Now him I hate."
The five trained hard and at the end they used their pain sticks on each other, Neville, Ginny and Luna breaking off after a few seconds.
Harry and Hermione simply stood, staring into each other's eyes, tense but silent. After a few minutes they withdrew the sticks.
"How do you do that?"
"It's just a part of the training, Neville. Tolerance to pain is good. Neither of us enjoys the pain, and neither of us enjoys inflicting it, but we intend to be able to throw off the cruciatus curse by the time I have to face Voldemort. It also helps us to reinforce our mutual trust. You three are well along the road, too, where Hermione and I were in mid-August. Once you're past the first half minute, you will be able to hold off ending the pain for minutes at a time."
"Um, Hermione, why are your crystals a different colour to ours?"
"It's because these are a lot more powerful than yours, Ginny. Harry has put the cruciatus curse into ours on top of the other hexes."
"May I?"
"Be careful."
Ginny yelped and then tried it again, this time only letting out a grunt of pain. She passed the stick to Neville and Luna who did the same.
Moody looked on. "Can I try that?"
Bracing for the pain, he touched the crystal to his thigh and yelled.
"I have no idea what you five have done, but I'm impressed. Harry, Hermione, I think it's time I fulfilled our agreement."
"In which case, Professor … I, Harry James Potter, hereby request before witnesses, upon my magic, that my friend Alastor Moody uses the unforgivable Cruciatus Curse and the unforgivable Imperius Curse upon me as a part of my continued programme of training. So Mote It Be."
Hermione stood forward.
" I, Hermione Jean Granger, hereby request before witnesses, upon my magic, that my friend Alastor Moody uses the unforgivable Cruciatus Curse and the unforgivable Imperius Curse upon me as a part of my continued programme of training. So Mote It Be."
She produced two memory vials and Harry and she extracted copies of the memory of their magical oath for their professor.
"Last chance to back out, people."
The both nodded. "Do it," they chorused.
"Crucio!"
Harry stood looking mildly at Moody, raised his wands and cast his Patronus simultaneously with both. Moody broke off the curse. He cast the same curse on Hermione who also cast her patronus while under the full force of Moody's curse.
The old auror was flabbergasted.
"Never before have I seen anyone able to resist that curse beyond a few choice words between screams. You didn't even flinch, either of you. Now, I'm going to try to get you to do something that you'd be happy doing, and I want you to resist."
"Okay. Let's try it."
"Imperio!"
Harry felt the warm fuzziness settle over his mind and then he was suddenly angry. The anger passed immediately but the influence of the curse never returned.
He turned and looked at Moody who was massaging some feeling back into his hand.
"I have no idea what you just did, but it certainly worked. It was like that pain-stick to my wand hand, and it was from my wand."
"Sorry, professor, I'm not sure what happened, but I didn't intend to hurt you."
"Damn hurting me Lad, that was impressive. I could feel the curse affecting you and then you simply threw it off. You want to try, Miss?"
Hermione nodded.
"Imperio!"
Suddenly Moody yelled and was disarmed.
Without any apparent consultation Neville then Ginny and Luna made the same formal request of Moody.
"Are you sure?"
All three nodded. "We have to know," was all that Neville said.
Each in turn stood before moody under each curse. They stood unflinching under the cruciatus curse, letting out a small grunt of pain as the curse was applied. Each nodded and said thank you while under the curse, indicating that they had experienced sufficient pain.
All three threw off the Imperius curse, though without the backlash that Harry and Hermione had sent.
Moody bowed to the five of them.
"That was frankly startling. You five are certainly a force to be reckoned with. I just hope we never find ourselves on opposing sides. Your next stage of training must be many against one, as death eaters have no love of even odds."
"Thank you Professor. Hermione and I would like to invite you and Professor McGonagall you our Rite of Ascension tomorrow afternoon, in here. And you Neville, Luna and Ginny. Plus of course a guest each."
Luna looked at them. "You're planning to go through the rite? With the pain sticks?"
Harry nodded. "It is a rite of passage that we both feel that we need. You know that we have immersed ourselves as fully as possible, so you will understand that it is part of what we are doing."
"We'll be here, both of you. We wouldn't miss your Ascension Rite for anything. Are your parents coming, Hermione?"
"Yes, Luna, but they're not sure what it is. Will you tell them?"
Luna nodded. "I'll prepare a pensieve memory for them as well as for the professors."
"Thank you Luna. There will be party nibbles after."
.
Later that afternoon, working quietly in the library, the Headmistress interrupted the pair.
"Professor Moody has told me what happened this morning. In the long years that I've known him he has never expressed concern and delight that someone could actually best him in a duel. He also tells me that you have invited me to this rite of passage tomorrow.
"Of course I will be there, but what does it involve?"
"We will be walking a gauntlet of twelve individuals who will use our pain sticks against us, attempting to prevent us from completing the fifteen yards from one end to the other. It is simply a rite of passage, the completion of our journey to become warriors. Proof, if you will, that we are ready. Neville, Luna and Ginny will almost certainly hold their own rites when they are ready.
"There will be a few other friends attending. The gauntlet will be magical simulacra of twelve adult wizards and witches, but that is all they will be, simulacra."
"But the pain will be real?"
"Yes professor, the pain will be real. It wouldn't be a Rite of Ascension if the pain were less than real. The ability to endure pain is the ability to assault death eaters when they think they're going to torture us."
"Now, what about Albus's special project?"
Hermione smiled. "Harry found one while searching through the junk-room aspect of the room of requirement. Another was in HQ, in Kreacher's possession."
"Oh? And the others?"
Harry pointed at his scar. "That's one," he said. "the cup is another, but it's in a vault at the bank. The last one is in his snake. The ring and the diary are already gone."
McGonagall nodded.
.
Sunday morning dawned clear and bright. The five were out in the grounds working out before breakfast. Unusually for Ronald Weasley, he was up and about, and he approached the five.
"What's this rubbish then?"
Ginny answered. "It's muggle martial arts. Physical fighting techniques that benefit us physically, mentally and magically."
"Makes you look like a load of idiots, that's what it is."
"As you wish Ron. If you don't like it, just stay out of our way."
Suddenly, he was rounding on her with his wand drawn. As Ginny side-stepped his reducto, she cast a stunner on him that threw him fifty yards across the grass.
Moody, who had been disillusioned and watching the training session saw and heard all.
Reappearing, he said, "that's excellent Miss Weasley. I saw and heard. I'll deal with your brother if you wish. Molly told me what happened before the beginning of term. Oh, and fifty points to Gryffindor for not using a lethal charm."
Ginny blushed.
"Thank you, Professor," she managed.
Moody bent over Ron Weasley and pulled up the unconscious boy's sleeves, revealing a tattoo on his left forearm.
Ginny gasped and the other four groaned.
"Ron, you prat. What have you done?"
"Betrayed you all, Harry. At least he won't be any problem here now."
Moody cast levicorpus and took their stunned ex-friend away.
After lunch the five were called to the Headmistress's office where they found a magically manacled Ron, several aurors and an incandescent Molly Weasley.
The five were all politely asked to show their forearms and told to sit.
"You know why we're here, so I won't bother beating around the bush. For those who don't know me, I am Auror Shacklebolt.
"Since this person here appears to have taken the Dark Mark, I need to obtain pensieve memories from the five of you. Preferably covering the whole term, if possible. Professor Moody has already supplied his. Are you willing to give this testimony?"
The five nodded and began drawing out memories as requested. Hermione had taught the others how to draw out copies of memories, rather than removing the details altogether from their heads.
Ginny supplied memories from the summer holiday as well, allowing them to conclude when he had taken the mark.
"Why Ron? You were our friend? What did Tom promise you?"
The evil in Ron's eye glinted coldly. "He said I could have the mudblood bitch to do what I wanted with just so long as she died eventually."
Harry stood and looked into Ron's eyes.
"You have proven yourself faithless and dishonourable. You have betrayed your friends and your family, assuming that we ever were truly friends. I curse you and your memory, I curse your being and your spirit. If I ever see you again I shall kill you without remorse. There will be no other warning."
He spat on Ron's boots and pointedly turned his back.
The others, each in turn, repeated Harry's words and actions. The five stood facing away from their former friend with their arms folded.
Molly Weasley walked around them and looked at them.
"What about the rest of the family?"
Harry smiled thinly. "Unless there's something you need to tell me about affiliations with Moldivort, I have no quarrel with you or yours, other than your son. Indeed, quite the opposite."
Molly smiled wanly before going and slapping Ron's face, splitting his lip and making his nose bleed. He would have a black eye by tonight.
"You have proven yourself faithless and dishonourable. You have betrayed your friends and your family. I curse you and your memory, I curse your being and your spirit. If I ever see you again I shall kill you. You are no child of mine."
She turned her back on her son.
"Kingsley?"
"Yes Harry?"
"Just before you go, I'd like you to attend our Rite of Ascension ceremony this evening, if you would? Hermione and I are celebrating ours together."
"I have no idea what it is, Harry, but I would be delighted to attend. Here at the school?"
The headmistress replied. "Yes. If you floo here, we will go up together."
The arrangements were completed and Ron was taken away. He was never again seen at Hogwarts.
The afternoon was occupied by Harry and Hermione preparing for their coming of age ritual. Harry charged up the two pain sticks almost to overflowing, and planned to geminio them immediately prior to their rites.
"These are more potent than we've been using, 'Mione. Remember that the object is to reach the end, not to do so in silence."
"I know. I'm looking forward to the rite being over. I'm looking forward to … afterward."
Harry smiled at her. "So am I."
.
Harry called Dobby and Winky to him, and warned them what he and Hermione were going to do that evening. Harry warned them to not try to save them because the pain was an important part of the ritual.
Dobby's eyes were wide with wonder and became tear filled when Hermione invited him to attend their ceremony as a friend.
.
When their guests arrived at the Room of Requirement, the door was open and they were amazed to see a dimly fire-lit chamber built of dark, greenish stone with complex inlaid patterns in the floor. There were nine green-cloaked and hooded figures standing impassively on blocks of stone, each with a metal rod in his or her hand, and each rod bearing a glowing, red crystal.
Neville and Ginny greeted the guests on behalf of Harry and Hermione and asked them to stand to one side.
The headmistress noted grimly that there were house-elves present as well as Griphook representing the Goblin Nation. She placed herself close to Molly Weasley.
"Molly, this will be startling and, quite possibly, harrowing for you. These two have done remarkable things this term, and believe me, what they will go through today is intended to burn out the last vestiges of their fear. I have seen them training, and incredible though it may seem, they can withstand this."
"What are those wands?"
"They are pain sticks. Harry invented them. I have seen them use those things on each other without flinching, and they made Moody yelp. They have actually made themselves immune to the cruciatus curse."
Molly looked terribly afraid and held tight to her husband whose eyes were grimly taking in the brutality of the setting. A setting that bespoke of harsh times and an even harsher, well, he supposed, religion.
Poppy Pomfrey emerged from a screened-off part of the chamber with Harry's pensieve. She stood to one side.
Once everyone was present, the door was closed with a resounding thump, and Luna began the ritual, explaining that the Rite of Ascension was a rite of passage for warriors, and that the rite had existed in one form or another in every warrior culture known.
"In the mists of time long gone, the one law was the strongest shall survive. All children who lived to adulthood were by definition strong.
"When mankind began to live in cities the trials of daily survival no longer existed, but still the one law was the strongest shall survive.
"When men began to wage war, the trials of war also determined that the one law was the strongest shall survive.
"In war, the strongest warrior must be beaten on the anvil of battle and tempered in the fires of conflict. At each stage the warrior must be tested. Today is that time of testing.
"Today, two warriors come of age and take their battle names. Harry James of the House of Potter claims the battle name Q'rzan. Hermione Jane of the line of Granger and consort to the House of Potter claims the battle name Lenkja.
"To prove their worthiness, they must pass the fifteen yards of pain. So mote it be."
She, Neville and Ginny took station on the last three stones, and brought out their pain sticks. The twelve began a low, gutteral chant. The words were unclear to the witnesses, but the emotion behind the words was clear.
.
The first to emerge from the screened area was Harry. He was stripped to the waist, muscles rippling. Below the waist he wore a pair of skirt-like floor-length trousers.
"I Harry James, being of age claim my name by rite of passage!"
He walked to the path between the two rows of wizards and witches, and began to walk. Each pair of attendants pressed their pain sticks to Harry's body, making him writhe somewhat and to cry out occasionally with the pain.
It took several minutes for him to reach his three friends who did him the honour of applying their own sticks to his flesh. At last he was through, and the twelve hailed him as Q'rzan.
Next came Hermione. She was dressed as Harry, but for a linen wrap around her breasts. She too endured the gauntlet of pain, taking the same time as Harry, and was eventually hailed by the twelve as Lenkja.
Luna collected the pain sticks from the simulacra and placed them in a box, so that the collapse of the geminio would result in just the original two pain sticks being present.
Then there was the reception. The two teens were damp with sweat, their torsos being covered with bruises from the intense magic used in the ritual.
Pomfrey was incredulous, she had managed to get the two to allow her to monitor them as they went through the rite. Both had, indeed, felt incredible pain, but neither had ended with an unduly raised heart rate or blood pressure. They could have been for a brisk walk for all that she could tell.
.
Dobby and Winky were in tears, and Griphook was the first to commend them.
"This rite is not unlike the Goblin ceremony for the coming of age of our young warriors. I welcome you both."
As the guests were leaving, Moody took Harry aside.
"What was the difference? Those sticks don't normally elicit a sound from either of you."
"I turned up the juice a bit. Right now these sticks are capable of delivering multiple simultaneous crucios at the same time as the other curses and hexes. These are about as powerful as I can make them without bursting the crystals."
Moody picked one of the sticks up and brushed his thigh with it. He yelped loudly and collapsed into a chair, visibly dazed.
"You two … but … those are … minutes!"
"Professor? Look, it's just practice, right?"
"Harry, that was like being hit with a reducto. No, worse! I hope I never feel anything like that again, but you …"
"Like I say, Professor, its just practice."
Moody nodded vaguely and finished his drink before levering himself up and heading to his quarters.
The Grangers were talking to McGonagall and Hermione.
"Harry, Hermione's trying to explain those sticks. How much of a punch do they actually pack?"
"Mr Granger, I can't really describe it, but if I were to touch one of them to your body then there is a good chance it would kill you. The crystals were at maximum capacity when I finished charming them earlier."
"And you allowed …?"
"We have no illusions, Sir. We know how much we can take, and we have been training together since the summer. Hermione was quite safe."
"There's one other thing, Hermione, Consort to House Potter?"
"It has a slightly different meaning in magical terms. A magical consort if the person who stands beside you, who binds him or her self to you. The relationship is not necessarily sexual.
"I have, however asked Hermione to consider our formal betrothal. As a consequence, I would like to ask your permission to ask for her hand in marriage."
Mr Granger spluttered while his wife smiled.
"But you hardly know …"
Harry cut him off. "We have known each other for the past six years. For most of that time we have been almost inseparable. In that time we have become friends and more than friends. We have stood side by side in battle. That friendship and trust has steadily become love – first the love between close friends and battle partners and gradually that has turned to romantic love.
"We may not be terribly conventional in our behaviour. Our dates have hardly been the traditional teenage dates, if our classmates are anything to go by. We have done our share of snuggling under trees in the grounds and, no, we don't feel the need to put the broom closets to the more common usage.
"The point is that we are secure in each others' love and we want to make it official, if you like. Hermione is already named as my heir; should I die she will get everything."
Emma Granger looked at her daughter. "Darling you're not …?"
"Mother! I'll have you know that …"
"Well, Dear, I'm glad that I can still get a rise out of you. Just be careful, and be sure of what you're doing."
"We are, Mum. Besides, there's no divorce in the wizarding world."
"Pardon?"
"There is no divorce for wizards. For death us do part or forever is mean precisely what they say. It's called a wizard's oath, and is enforced by the magic. That is why the wizarding wedding oaths don't specify exclusivity. Besides, promising to love and to honour are also enforced. Once the oath is made, you will love and honour."
"Oh," was the whole of the Grangers' response.
.
By Christmas Neville, Luna and Ginny were ready to undergo their own Ascension Rites. By this time, Harry and Hermione were using the ascension pain sticks in their regular training. Harry had ordered more titanium bar from the aerospace company and had made sets of weapons for the three. Outside of company, the five of them barely spoke a word of English.
Neville had ceased to be the overweight teenager he had been, and his Gran barely recognised him when she saw him on the day of his Ascension Rite.
Luna had invited her boyfriend to attend her Ascension, and the others were surprised to find that said boyfriend was an American muggle. He was fascinated by the fact of the rite, being a fan of the television series.
"I never realised that the wizarding world had these rites in. I mean, I thought they were just fiction."
"For the most part, they are, Gene, it's just that there are a few of us who have found that it is appropriate for us to base our training on the Klingon ethos. Learning to ignore pain gives us an edge against the Death Eaters."
"So, the pain sticks … ?"
"Are a lot worse that you can imagine. You're welcome to try one of the introductory ones if you really must."
Luna handed him a pain stick with a blue crystal. He touched the crystal on his thigh and yelled.
"If that's low power, what are the ones you use in the rite like?"
"They could kill you quite easily. Even after training with the higher powered sticks, these will still raise bruises."
And so were born Torras, Katja and Skanna of the house of Koorg.
.