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The Next Lord of Kobol

Chapter 19 – Goodbye isn't the Hardest Word to Say

(Eight Years Six Months and Three Days until the fall of the Colonies)

"So you're that determined to flush your frakking life down the toilet! I can't believe that you have the nerve to show up unannounced and just dropped this on me."

As far as opening shots go, this was about as expected. Maggie hadn't counted on the fact that her mother would be under the weather when she and Kelsey arrived for this little talk. Nancy Edmondson was pleasantly surprised for all of 5 minutes before demanding to know the reason two of her daughters suddenly showed up at the door to her living area.

Maggie retorted, "What did you want me to do, Mom? If I called you on the phone or send it to you in a message then I'm an inconsiderate little shit who doesn't have the courage to come and tell you to your face. If I told you about it before I put my application in we would have been having these kinds of arguments for the last two months and I might never have scored high enough to transfer. Look! I get it! You hate head father Isaiah and all the rest of the adults in the group family and you've got your reasons. I understand! But your reasons aren't my reasons. I didn't have the same experiences that you did, so don't ask me to hate them for you. I won't do it!"

Truthfully, Maggie had practiced her responses in her mind the entire trip ... well technically the entire last month in preparation for this moment. Even though her mother was more Ave manager then a practicing psychiatrist these days, she did not want to get verbally backed into a corner and tripped up over sentences and phrases.

Like so many times in the past, she thought.

Nancy's face might have already been red and puffy from the cold she was experiencing, but it seemed to be becoming more inflamed by the second.

"Oh grow up, Maggie! For someone who thinks she is so smart you are going to let them run circles around you and you won't even realize it until you're hip deep in their bullshit."

Maggie's ire began bubbling to the surface. "I don't even know if I'll actually rejoin the family. Maybe they are the grifters and scam artists you've made them out to be, or maybe you're just bitter! Either way, at some point you've got to start letting me go. I don't see you giving Sue or Kelsey this kind of shit!"

The two angry women in the room ignored the groan of the third woman as the possibility of calm and peaceful discussion disappeared faster than the toasters on Armistice Day.

"Well maybe that's because I haven't had to go to the police station and get them out of lock up ... ever! You're a trouble magnet, Margret, or are you expecting me to turn a blind eye to the past five years. How's one good semester at University supposed to balance all the garbage you've put our family through since we moved here? Have you even told poor Harry about this plan of yours? You're going to crush him!"

"I'm planning on talking to Harry while I'm here, for your information. I've got a few months before I leave and I'll make sure he understands."

"Of course," her mother coughed out. "With all your worldly experience."

Now Maggie was in a fighting mood. "I can see you give more of a frak about Harry than you do your own daughter. Play your little mind games elsewhere, Mom. It's not like you can really do anything about it!"

"I can't? I can't! Says who? Who exactly do you think controls your educational fund?"

"Maybe you should read the small print, Mother!" Maggie replied in a hiss. "As long as I'm enrolled in a premier class University, you've got no grounds to freeze it. Check the grid and see how many parents run into that concrete wall every term. I got into HERMIT! The best University on Virgon and every bit as good as Cap U! Better if you ask me."

"Okay. Okay," Kelsey said. "Let's take a moment and calm down, Mom? Mags? This yelling isn't getting us anywhere."

Her plea fell on deaf ears. "You are an ignorant. little, girl, Margret. I will look at the paperwork and instead of checking that digital cesspool you're so fond of, I'll talk to a real live lawyer and we'll just see who has the last laugh. In the meantime, get out of my sight! I'm sick and I'm tired, but not of you. You I'm disgusted with! So carry your smug little ass off the property before I call security and have them escort you from the premise!"

"Fine!" Maggie exclaimed wanting to punch something - all her calm planning and rational thought banished from her mind. Turning to storm out of the room, she probably should have just kept her mouth shut, but she didn't.

"Makes me wonder what stories the family has about you and how close they are to the truth!"

Fishing her keys from her pocket, she stopped by the garage and reclaimed her motorcycle, figuring a ride would clear her head.

And if that doesn't there's always liquor, she thought and revved the engine loudly.

(TNLoK)

Harry walked the perimeter of the scrapyard, mainly because the walking constituted his regular exercises. The virtual world offered exercise programs, but he found it stupid and kind of missed all the laps around the pitch Oliver Wood made the team do when someone blew a play.

Wood came from the school that when one player messed up, the whole team messed up and they'd all land to start running. If no one messed up, then the Keeper would do something wrong just to make them run. There was even a rumor that Katie Bell started dating him just to get him to calm down.

Harry didn't believe it, though. He saw the way Katie would look at Oliver. That wasn't taking one for the team, as Fred and George aptly put it. Harry briefly wondered if Katie had been Captain in her final year and what kind of team she'd been able to field with the talent remaining after Harry and all the Weasleys had left the school.

He almost wished for a copy of the Daily Prophet to see what lies the so-called newspaper was currently spewing.

Did anyone stop Lucius Malfoy's ascension to Minister and the bigoted agenda he was pushing? Were Dumbledore and the rest of my friends still alive and fighting? Some hero to the wizarding world I turned out to be! I'm not much better than that idiot working the Knight Bus right now.

The laps around the scrapyard looking for intruders that his alarm wards would have alerted him to helped calm him and put his problems in perspective. Somewhere out there, people were dying and he was annoyed at having a crappy job and problems with a girl. Harry used to look down at the people who kept their head down and stayed out of trouble when he was on the run with Sirius and Dumbledore.

Then again, I didn't ask to get thrown through the Veil. I killed Riddle, for good this time, and if they let themselves get frakked by a piece of shit like Malfoy, maybe they deserved it.

He continued his nightly wanderings until he felt his wand vibrating and heard the engine of a motorcycle at the front gate. Bev, one of the autocrane operators, rode a bike, but Mr. Kelso hadn't mentioned any night time work before he left. It seemed odd that the woman would be here now.

Several impatient beeps of the horn sounded and Harry began a light jog toward the front gate to see what the fuss was all about. All this time working at the scrapyard and not a single person had actually trespassed onto the property after working hours until now. Just to be safe, Harry felt for his wand to know for certain where it was in case he had to draw.

The motorcycle's beeping horn continued until Harry reached the gate and even his patience was being tested by the noise.

Instead of the female autocrane operator, he saw the slim figure of an angry Maggie Edmondson waiting for him. Her helmet was cast aside and she was drinking a brownish liquid straight from the bottle – hard liquor.

"Maggie? What are you doing here?" Harry shouted opened the gate and regarded her.

The young woman struggled with the kickstand and killed the engine. Her steps were slightly uneven as she dismounted and wobbled toward him, taking a long pull on the bottle.

"Surprised to see me?" she asked a question in a slurring voice. "You used to drop in on me all the time unannounced, so I figured that I'd return the favor. Unless you have someone here already. Do you Harry? Do you?"

"What? No! I'm here by myself. What's gotten into you?"

"What's gotten into me? You want to know what's gotten into me? I'll tell you! All the sudden you're Mr. Important and you keep standing me up! So, I came here to give you a piece of my mind and tell you off!"

The only experience Harry had with drunks really came down to Sirius Black. Because of his tough life, Sirius was a "crying in his cups" kind of drunk and not the "loud and angry" drunk that he was currently dealing with. He made a quick plan to get her to his camper and hit her with a sobering charm. Maybe then he could sort out what was going on.

"Come on inside, Maggie. You shouldn't be out like that. You might hurt yourself or someone else. I'll wheel your bike in."

"Just leave it," she muttered, but he ignored her, collected the discarded helmet, and pushed the motorcycle through the opening.

Maggie followed, glaring at him all the way.

Harry set the kickstand and turned to lock the gate. "Let's go inside and talk this out. You can tell me why you're upset and we can take care of it."

Her answer was to scowl and drink some more, but at least she followed him.

Holding the door for her, he helped her up the two small metal steps into the cramped insides of the small living space.

"What a dump!" she exclaimed, as he folded the table out of the way so they could both have a spot to sit on the couch that converts into a bed.

Harry tried to take the bottle from her hand, but she resisted and the contents ended up spilling onto the carpet.

"Now look what you've done! I wasn't finished with that!"

"I'm pretty sure you've had enough. Sit down and I'll get a towel to soak that up."

"You're not the boss of me! Neither is Mom! You both can just frak off for all I care!"

So that's what this is all about, Harry thought. As he took two steps to the bathroom, he slid his wand from the enlarged pocket of his pants.

"Is that a light outside? Is someone looking for you?" he said and pointed over Maggie's shoulder. The bleary-eyed girl obliged and rolled her head. Harry whispered the sobering charm, using his holly wand and stashed it while his girlfriend sputtered out that she didn't see anything.

He made a show of opening the door to the camper and looking out for a moment, giving the charm a chance to take effect.

"Guess it must be just my imagination," he said. "Okay Maggie, you have my full attention and something's wrong. Tell me what it is and maybe I can help."

(TNLoK)

Maggie looked for the light that Harry mentioned, before she prepared to lay into him about all the shit he's been putting her through when it felt like the massive buzz she'd been building caved in quite suddenly.

What the frak am I doing here? Harry's saying he can help. How did I end up here?

"I … I … Uh" She remembered the liquor store and the two bottles. She'd driven up to the trails where her friends used to have all those races and polished one of them off. Somewhere along the line, she'd decided to find Harry and give him a piece of her mind. That didn't seem to make much sense now and she was very confused.

"Normally, I'm the one with the speaking problems," he said and held up his hands. "Joking. I'm joking. Start from the beginning. Why did you come all the way to Delphi and why are you so upset?"

She was slightly irked that he made fun of her, but Maggie could tell that he was just trying to make the best of an awkward situation.

"I took the train out here with Kelsey," she said slowly. "I wanted to talk to Mom and we started screaming at each other."

"You told her you're going to Virgon?"

If she wasn't already suffering from a sudden bout of sobriety, his calm statement would have done it. As it was, that cleared the rest of the cobwebs in her mind. "How did you know?"

"Do you really think I'm that dumb?" Harry parried her question with one of his own.

"You knew?"

"Yeah, I figured it out," he admitted.

"How?"

"All the little things," he said and spread his hands. "They just added up eventually."

Was I that obvious? She wondered. "Is that why you've been avoiding me?"

He nodded at her. "Yeah. I figured you would want me to do that. What do you want me to do? Beg you to stay? Beg you to take me with you? I'm feeling bad enough as it is. Do we really need to make it worse?"

She felt a pang of guilt through the shock that he'd seen right through her for probably the last month and had been holding onto it in silence.

"No. No, I don't want it to be worse. I just came from worse," she said and felt her shoulders start to quake.

Harry sat next to her and pulled her tightly into his embrace. "Tell me what happened."

Maggie prided herself on being tough, but between the shouting match with her mother, the heavy drinking, the strange sense of sobriety that had washed over her, and the unexpected acceptance that her boyfriend was displaying, her entire night all came tumbling out in a torrent of sobs.

Through it all, Harry held her and patted her on the back. He didn't try to tell her it was going to be all right and quite frankly, it would have made things worse. She was almost certain that her mother didn't have the right to deny her access to her educational fund, but there was enough doubt in there for her to be genuinely scared or at least concerned.

After about thirty minutes of bawling her eyes out, she finally clamped down and cut her tear ducts off, backing out of his hug, she saw the large damp spot where she'd burrowed into his chest.

"I've soaked your shirt," she said, with a sniffle while still being amazed how easily Harry was taking all this. In all the scenarios, she'd played out in her mind; this was not one of them. She'd grossly underestimated him.

"I have others. I can change," he replied and pulled it over his head.

He tossed it aside, smiled at her and started to stand. Instead of letting him, Maggie impulsively put her hand down on his thigh and gently pushed down. Harry gave her a confused look that she answered by leaning in and kissing him.

It was impulsive, but it felt right. The few seconds blended into several minutes before they separated. He'd been more mature than she'd given him credit for.

"Maggie?" Harry asked, cautiously. "What are we doing?"

"I'm not going to stay," she stated.

"I know," he answered.

"Even if we do something, right here, right now, I'm not staying."

"Are you saying you want to do something?"

It'd been a rough night. Other rough nights in the past had driven her onto the grid where she'd engaged in all sorts of rebellious activities.

She wasn't connected to the grid right now, but she didn't care.

Maggie stared deep into his eyes and she felt that same connection that she'd felt that one time in the grid with Harry. "Say it, Harry."

"Say what?"

"Say you know I'm not staying. Say that you know we won't be together because I'm leaving. If you can say that and make me believe it then I'll answer your last question."

He did and then she did.

Soon after that, they did.

(TNLoK)

Harry came to when the door to the camper was thrown open and the angry face of Mr. Kelso appeared. The man was seething red with rage. He looked down at the empty bottle of liquor and up at Maggie who was hastily pulling a sheet to cover herself.

"You gods dammed little shit! How long has this been going on? I don't care. Pack your shit and get the frak out of here! You're fired! I don't want to see your ass ever again."

The door rattled in the frame as the angry man slammed it shut and there was an empty silence left hanging in the air.

"Oh Gods!" Maggie exclaimed. "I got you fired! I didn't mean …"

Harry shrugged, annoyed more that he got carried away and forgot to raise the perimeter wards around the camper. "I was going to quit in a few months anyway. It's not that big of a deal."

He didn't have to rely on his skimming to see the disbelief all over her face.

"Seriously, Maggie. I didn't plan on staying here."

"But where will you live? How will you live? Maybe if I talk…"

He put her hand on her arm. "You don't need to talk to your mom. I don't need Nancy to fix this. I have friends who can put me up and I've saved most of my pay from while I was here. I can get another job after the Goldkiller tournaments end, or I can just ride it out and see if that one guy has room for me to crew on his ship."

"This really isn't upsetting you?" she demanded.

He just grinned. "If I had to choose between last night and keeping my job, I'm still going to pick last night."

Maggie blushed. "I thought you had second thoughts when you went to the bathroom."

"No, I just really had to go to the bathroom," Harry said, before thinking, and remember how to cast a contraceptive spell. Thank you, Sirius!

"I'm glad," she said.

"Pretty sure that was my first time," Harry joked. "I'd like to think I'd remember something like that. I tried to go slow so it didn't hurt. Did it?"

She patted his arm. "It wasn't my first time, Harry. I'm fine."

"Oh," Harry said, surprised. He'd had the impression that she'd only ever done virtual sex and not the real thing.

"But it was my best time," she added. "You don't have anything to worry about, I have an implant."

"Oh that!" Harry said, not considering that she had a form of protection of her own.

"All right," Maggie said. "We're not going to sit here and be awkward. Let's get dressed and go find something to eat."

He couldn't help but look while she put her bra and shirt back on.

"Gods! You're such a guy!" she declared.

"I need to remember this to make sure I don't get hit over the head and forget it," Harry said, trying and failing to hide a smile.

She rolled her eyes at him. "Fine, make sure you take a long look at this then."

Maggie stood to put on her underwear and pants. "Your turn now, Harry. I don't get to see the goods all the time either, so fair is fair."

It was Harry's turn to be embarrassed, but he did believe in being a good sport.

"Do you need help packing?"

"Not really. Just stow my gridbox and take it out to your bike. Better move it out into the parking lot and wait for me. I'll throw the rest of my stuff together and go speak with Mr. Kelso. Give me about fifteen minutes."

"Okay," she said, grabbing the padded storage case for his only valuable piece of Colonial technology. Harry reasoned that he could store it at Freddie's.

As soon as Maggie stepped out the door, Harry grabbed his wand and cast the pack spell. He scourgified the carpet and sheets, while casting an air freshening spell. Summoning Little D, he sent his belongings with his elf and would tell Maggie that Mr. Kelso was letting him keep his meager belongings here until tomorrow.

Waiting five more minutes and taking in the Spartan layout of the tiny recreational camper, Harry detached any feelings he had left for this place. The perimeter wards were on a timer and were already off, which contributed to his firing. The ones surrounding the scrapyard had shut off at sunrise. He'd come back under the cloak and retrieve them this evening. Both sets could be reused somewhere else.

This part of his life had ended abruptly, but what he said to Maggie was true. He wouldn't trade last night for this crummy job.

But that decision left a bigger problem in its wake. Should he offer the truth to Maggie or just let her go without a saying anything, never knowing if it would have made a difference? He could be a spacer based out of Virgon just as easily as Caprica. It could work.

Glancing in the mirror, he looked older than the last time he'd worn the red and gold tie, but he'd heard McGonagall address the seventh years in the common room before the leaving feast every term. He could still hear the witch's fiery words even now.

"You will walk out of those doors tomorrow and no longer be students. Your formal education has ended and now it is time to learn the lessons that can only be experienced outside this castle. But make no mistake, each of you are still Gryffindor's legacy and though you may never set foot in this common room again, you shall always be Gryffindor where it matters the most."

(TNLoK)

"I like it up here," Maggie said. They were up on the trails, a few kilometers from where the Caprica Buccaneers have their high altitude training camp.

"Except for the heat," Harry added.

"Well yeah, but it reminds me of the forests of Virgon, even if it is so damn hot. Are you sure your boss … well ex-boss isn't going to pitch your stuff?"

"Yeah, he calmed down. If I don't go get my bags by midday tomorrow, it's another story."

"What about your final paycheck?"

"He hadn't calmed down that much," Harry answered, snapping a twig and flipping half of it away. "If I get it, I get it. If I don't, I don't."

"But he's still firing you with cause, so you won't be able to get any unemployment."

"I'm not worried about that. It wouldn't be much anyway. I don't give a frak."

She wasn't used to Harry just speaking his mind like this. He seemed different and she told him as much.

"Maggie," he said, and she suddenly wondered where this was going. "I need to tell you some things. I need you to hear me out."

"You're not trying to get me to stay? We agreed."

"No, but you might reconsider after I tell you. Either way, I need to get this off my chest."

"Ok. Lay it on me, Harry."

"Do you believe in magic?"

"Magic? Like card tricks, illusions, and misdirection?"

"No. Real magic. People with 'Gifts from the Gods' and all that?"

Maggie cracked her knuckles. She didn't want to mention the times when her father had told her that she had done some odd things as a child and that maybe she had been gifted. After he died, all that stopped. There was too much pain there and she didn't want to reopen those wounds - ever.

"I don't know, maybe."

"I can do real magic," Harry said.

"Prove it," she challenged.

The next fifteen minutes was nothing short of astounding. Harry had her throw a rock as hard as she could away from them, then waved a stick and made it stop in midair, before making it return to her hand. He changed the rock into a chicken and then into a cat before turning it back into a rock. Then he conjured a bench for them to sit on and sent a stream of water into the forest around them. He told her how he could just will himself to be in Caprica City and he'd be there and that he'd never ridden the train except that one time with her.

Struggling to find her voice, she asked, "How did you learn all this?"

"There's a secret school where people are trained to do magic. I can't tell you where it is."

"So there are others?" She felt like he was still holding back things from her.

"Yes, but not many."

"And you never had any memory loss?"

"No, but I can never go back to where I come from, and we never learned about technology. We even had our own language. I had to start from scratch."

He stopped and spoke in a strange tongue for a minute and then he called for this creature named Dobby.

That was when Maggie became frightened. Seeing that little gremlin like thing appear out of nowhere and speak to her screamed unnatural. The thing was excitable and that only made her more concerned. She tried not to let it show, but Harry seemed to realize it and tried to calm her down. He asked Dobby to leave.

"What about the dead woman?" Maggie didn't mean for her question to come out as shrill as it did, but she was having difficulties keeping herself under control.

"She …" Harry paused and he looked like he'd been caught in a lie. "Some people didn't want me to leave that school. "Her name was Bella and she tried to kill me. I did what I had to do."

"You killed her with magic," she accused.

"No, it was a physical fight, but yeah, I killed her. It was her or me, so I chose me."

A dark thought crossed her mind and her voice spoke before she could stop it. "Can magic make people do things they don't want to?"

"Yes, but …"

"Did you make me sleep with you last night?"

"No, I wouldn't …"

"But you could if you wanted to, right? Don't lie to me, Harry?"

He seemed to visibly deflate.

"You can! You could wave your stick and make me do whatever you want. You could make me decide not to go to Virgon if you wanted! How do I know you haven't been doing this all along? How do I even know what's real?"

All those times that I thought about breaking up with him, but didn't. Was that my choice or him doing magic?

"Maggie, please, I'm not like that. I told you because you're important to me. I didn't want us to end without giving you the truth. The only thing I've ever done to you with magic was I cast a spell to sober you up last night, so I could find out what was wrong."

She didn't really process much other than he admitted that he had done magic on her. That made her feel violated on some primal level and drove her hysterics to dizzying heights. Maggie felt the urge to throw up. She was on her feet and backing away, blocking out Harry's pleas to calm down. Her panic was an all-consuming fire that burned through the core of her being.

She needed to get away from him right the frak now!

As she turned to run, Maggie heard Harry say something else she couldn't understand.

And then she slipped into unconsciousness.

(TNLoK)

"Hey, rise and shine sleepyhead," Harry said.

Maggie bolted upright. Her eyes flitted around the surrounding area, searching for a threat. She could feel the pounding in her chest.

"Are you okay?" He asked, worried.

"Yeah, it was … I had a bad dream. I've got a fierce headache again."

"Well you've been busy the last day or so, it's no surprise. Maybe it's just the altitude up here getting to you. I was just sitting here talking and I was going on for probably ten or fifteen minutes before I realized you were asleep. Are you sure you are feeling okay?"

The young woman was quiet for a minute. "I can't remember what it was, but it scared me like I'd never been scared before. I'm fine now."

She was lying, but it seemed to be the response both of them wanted to hear.

"Well, you won't have to worry about that now that you're awake," Harry offered. "Did you want to hang out some more or head back into town?"

Maggie still glanced around nervously … expecting … she wasn't quite sure what she was expecting. "Let's get out of here. Something about this place just doesn't seem right anymore."

Harry stood and held his hand out to her. She hesitated for a second before she took it. She thought he noticed and his wide smile seemed a little fake.

"I hope your life on Virgon turns out to be everything you hoped for. I'm going to miss you, but as long as you're happy, it's worth it."

"You're so sweet, Harry." Maggie gave him a peck on the cheek as they walked back to the motorcycle. "We can still meet each other on the grid up until the time I leave."

"I don't know," Harry answered. "I know you're not staying, so maybe we should just make a clean break now and not complicate things more. Let's just play it by ear. Now that I don't have to work, I can go full bore on Goldkiller and see if I can get through the Level Three and into the Level Four."

"Play it by ear then. I can do that," she replied and put her helmet on.

(TNLoK)

Harry gave her another forced smile and slid behind her. Resting his head on her shoulder, he breathed deeply. He'd only done this kind of magic a couple of times when fighting Death Eaters and he worried he'd gone too deeply or not deeply enough. He'd tried the truth and it had been an unmitigated disaster and he hadn't even gotten to the part about his really being from Earth. He hated himself at that moment. His Gryffindor bravery or perhaps stupidity in this case caused this. He'd allowed himself to believe that Maggie would be just as accepting of magic as Zoe Graystone, and he had been so terribly wrong.

Goodbye isn't the hardest word to say to someone you care about; Obliviate is.

(TNLoK)

Author's Notes – Hey again! Gut punch time for Harry. I see a ton of stories where Harry does the whole, "I can show you the world" shtick with his magic and the crowd goes wild. Heck, I even did that with Zoe in the previous chapters, but she's a ghost and a little more open to the idea of magic and the supernatural. Obviously, since I was breaking them up until the fall, I wanted to go a different direction.

Chapter 20 is done and will go to editing shortly. Thanks for the reviews and all the congratulations on the possible TV series for my professional work. Nothing new to report on that front. My Amber Cove Publishing company did just release the second novel in the Technomancer series by M.K. Gibson called Flotsam Prison Blues. The kindle version came out a few weeks ago and now the paperback is ready to go. It is a Post Biblical Apocalyptic Cyberpunk novel. (Yeah that's a thing!) So if you ever wanted to see Cyborgs fighting the Legions of Hell, give it a look on Amazon. He's a great author and I'm proud to be his publisher.