CHAPTER 12:

WHO IS AFTER THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE?

Despite his decision to not actually pursue the Stone, or at least not what was being guarded by Fluffy the Cerberus, Harry decided to make a list of possible suspects for anyone who'd want to steal the Stone. He did so partly as a diversion, something he could work on when tired of homework, something even he could be (but not, seemingly, Hermione, who seemed to be a homework masochist, for want of a better term).

Given his interest in something that could make people immortal, he facetiously put himself at the top of the list, followed by GLaDOS. However, he listed other people, mostly staff members, but also students. He used ROT13 as a basic cipher to prevent anyone from reading it(1). Then again, ROT13 was a pretty basic cipher by Ravenclaw standards, and he was sure more than a few here could potentially sight-read it, albeit in the higher year levels.

Firstly, Dumbledore. Harry wasn't convinced the man wanted to steal the Stone. Flamel and Dumbledore were known to be friends, after all. It was possible Dumbledore made a lot of noise protecting the Stone, true, while planning to use it for himself, but Harry wasn't quite sure of that. He was certain the old man had some sort of hidden agenda, but stealing the Stone wasn't it. In fact, the more and more Harry thought about it, the fact that the Stone was here rather than at Gringotts suggested that it may have been brought here as bait. But for whom?

Harry dismissed most of the House Heads, if only because of lack of evidence. McGonagall was a stickler for the rules, Harry knew Flitwick well enough to reckon that gold and immortality didn't interest him much, and Sprout was altogether too…nice.

Snape was another matter entirely. Harry remembered, shortly after that whole fiasco with the troll, Snape was limping pretty badly. And now that he came to mention it, not long afterwards, he had headed to Snape's office to deliver some extra-credit homework he and Hermione did on the Draught of Living Death, only to find him being tended to by Pomfrey. He had been in a foul mood at that point, so Harry merely handed him the essays and left without comment, though he had wondered why Snape seemed to have bite marks on his injured leg, and he briefly overhead Snape mentioning something with multiple heads, something that could very well have been Fluffy. Which meant he had been attacked by the Cerberus at around the same time the troll had been wandering the school. Snape was a rather strict and snide man, but Harry wondered if it was possible for him to be a thief as well. But to what end?

Harry heard from some students that Snape was a former Death Eater, a follower of Voldemort's. And it was a fear of much of Magical Britain that Voldemort was not actually dead. Hagrid, during one of their meetings for tea, had remarked to the effect that he didn't think Voldemort was human enough to die. Perhaps the Stone could be used in some way to revive Voldemort? Of course, the fact remained that Snape had been outed, apparently, as a double-agent by Dumbledore after Voldemort was vanquished, and if Dumbledore trusted Snape, that was a mark in the man's favour. And Snape, for all of his acid tongue, respected intellect, albeit when displayed outside Gryffindor.

Hagrid was dismissed swiftly. Despite his keeping a newspaper cutting of the Gringotts break-in, he wore his heart very much on his sleeve, and seemed to be incapable of keeping a secret. If anything, he just was incompetent at keeping the Stone secret.

Quirrell, though…Harry couldn't quite dismiss Quirrell, despite the man's seeming timidity. It had been Quirrell who had announced a troll being loose in the dungeons, but according to the rumour mill, the troll actually ended up near a girl's bathroom, and Harry wasn't sure whether it could have gotten there as fast as it was supposed to have gotten there. The man varied between long periods of stuttering imbecility and flashes of lucid brilliance. The more Harry watched the man, the more he became convinced that it was, partially at least, an act. He had even asked around about Quirrell, and found out that the man had once been a Muggle Studies teacher, but had offered to become a Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. He had spent a year on sabbatical, travelling and gaining practical experience, as the man already had theoretical qualifications. He had been somewhat nervous back then, apparently, but nowhere near as bad as he was now.

Then again, there was still the possibility that it wasn't an act, and he really was a stuttering coward. And he was known to have been in Ravenclaw rather than Slytherin, and wasn't known to be in the Death Eaters.

He didn't know enough about the rest of the faculty to make any judgements on the matter. Of the student body, he was sure most of the strongest suspects would be in Slytherin, if only because they were known for their ambition and willingness to bend or break the rules more than any other House. Of those, Draco Malfoy topped the list. Harry and Draco had entered into a détente of sorts since Christmas and the astronomy poster Harry had gotten Draco. While it was unlikely they would be friends for the foreseeable future, they had basically agreed to disagree. But the Malfoys were rich, though the sort to use a lot of money for greasing the palms of various officials in the Ministry of Magic, so more gold would be welcome. Then again, one thing Draco lacked that stealing the Stone required was subtlety.

Harry did consider one of the Weasleys, given how Ron often spoke of how their family hadn't much money. But he decided to dismiss it. The Weasleys, with the exception of Percy, wore their hearts on their sleeves like Hagrid did, and he couldn't see Ron Weasley as planning, let alone successfully completing, a heist of a well-guarded object. And the twins seemed just as likely to booby-trap the Stone even further. Besides, Ron was a friend. So was Neville. And the twins were getting that way.

And Hermione? Harry didn't really consider her. She'd want it for the immortality and for it being a fascinating alchemic object, but he knew her enough that she was emphatically not on the list of suspects.

It was after a Quidditch game between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff that Harry got an intriguing lead. He had been discussing broom types with Oliver Wood, the Captain of the Gryffindor team, when he saw Snape leaving the castle. Although the man was wearing a hooded cloak, Harry knew it to be him, given the distinctive way the man walked. Harry made his excuses with Wood, and used the Cloak of Invisibility to follow Snape to the edge of the Forbidden Forest. He knew how to be stealthy: years of being GLaDOS' test subject, even if she favoured him, had taught him how to be stealthy to avoid her cameras and microphones. Rattmann had been an excellent teacher.

He followed Snape through the Forest, careful not to step on anything that could alert him to his presence. He found his quarry in a clearing, and settled down, quieting himself as much as possible, before listening in. The voices were those of Quirrell and Snape. "I d-don't know why you wanted t-t-to meet here of all p-places, Severus…" Quirrell said.

"Oh, I thought we'd keep this private," Snape's resonant nasal drawl rang out. His voice was colder than that experimental test chamber designed to simulate snowfall. That one made the oxygen freeze out of the air, and thankfully, GLaDOS never made anyone go in there without insulated heated spacesuits with oxidization protection. "Students aren't supposed to know about the Philosopher's Stone, after all."

So the Stone IS in Hogwarts! Harry thought. He could hear Quirrell mumbling something faintly, but Snape interrupted the man.

"Have you found out how to get past that beast of Hagrid's yet?"

Harry blinked. He didn't like the way this sounded. It sounded like Snape was coercing Quirrell to help him with stealing the Philosopher's Stone.

As Quirrell stammered some excuse, Snape said ominously, "You don't want me as your enemy, Quirrell."

"I-I don't know what you…"

"You know perfectly well what I mean." An owl hooted overhead, but Harry caught most of what Snape said afterwards. "…Headmaster and I know about your little bit of hocus pocus." After a moment, Snape said, "I'm waiting." Quirrell stammered some other excuse, before Snape interrupted. "Very well. We'll have another little chat soon, when you've had time to think things over, and decided where your loyalties lie."

As Snape stormed back to Hogwarts, Harry realised, given what he just heard, that Snape wasn't the guilty party, or at least was engaged in misdirection. He heard 'Headmaster and I know about your little bit of hocus pocus'. And Harry was willing to bet that meant that Snape and Dumbledore suspected Quirrell of being up to something, namely stealing the Stone.

Carefully, he picked his way back to the castle, acutely aware that Quirrell may very well be his enemy. That, and it was getting dark.

Still, he reflected, if he was right, then not only was Quirrell the one after the Philosopher's Stone, but Dumbledore and Snape were aware of that fact. Assuming Snape wasn't a rival claimant for the Stone, anyway, and was lying to try and intimidate a rival.

So Harry resolved to keep an eye on Quirrell, and told Hermione to do the same, albeit discreetly. She had been mortified that once more, he had broken the rules, but conceded that learning that the Philosopher's Stone was present and Quirrell may have designs on it was, if not worth it, then pursuing the unofficial Ravenclaw creed of doing what it took to learn. And as long as she viewed it as helping the teachers keep an eye on someone who was up to no good, then she could tolerate Harry's flouting the rules, as long as he didn't get them into trouble.

Harry burned his suspect list soon after that incident, and began writing a new list of reasons regarding Quirrell and Snape as suspects. Quirrell was still prime suspect, given what he had heard, but he couldn't dismiss the possibility of a double-bluff.

One bright spot in all of this was that news had reached him that Sirius Black had nearly finished his treatment at St Mungo's. That, and, apparently, the Minister of Magic and Madam Amelia Bones had finally agreed with GLaDOS to send Peter Pettigrew to her. His trial was pretty much a fait accompli, and while he was originally sentenced to the Kiss for betraying the Potters and leaving Sirius Black to rot in Azkaban, Pettigrew was startled to learn that his sentence was commuted to 'lifetime community service as research associate at Aperture Science'. He thought that he was getting off easily, perhaps even able to escape and help Voldemort rise again, Harry reckoned.

Oh, how wrong he was. The only thing worse, Harry reckoned, would be a stint in Azkaban. Harry felt little pity for the rat, especially after the Veritaserum was administered, where Pettigrew admitted to a litany of crimes, as well as admitting he wanted to stay close to Harry in case Voldemort rose again, to offer him. Harry could understand cowardice and having a self-preservation instinct, but there were degrees of cowardice that he detested, and Pettigrew had betrayed his parents and let his godfather be sent to Hell on Earth for a decade. What GLaDOS had cooked up for him was too good for him.

Pettigrew woke to find that he was naked (save for a couple of medical monitoring patches, a urinary catheter and a rather larger tube inserted in another VERY intimate and humiliating place) and encased in some sort of plastic tank, currently empty of water or anything else, save for himself and breathable air. Worse, there seemed to be two Muggles, one with a neat beard and a neurotic disposition, and one with a wild beard and a manic disposition, staring at him. Oh, and there was a strange metal sphere with a blue light reminiscent of an eye. "Oh, wow," the sphere said with a Northern English accent. "You'd think he was a big fat ol' rat even now. All he's missing are the whiskers and tail!"

The man with the neat beard looked down at, and wrinkled his nose. "He looks like he stinks like one, too, Wheatley. GLaDOS, how many times did you wash him?"

A lilting, vaguely mechanical-sounding voice of a woman, sounding like some mad computer from Doctor Who or Out of the Unknown(2), spoke. "He went through a dozen iterations of Aperture Science's Ultimate Sterilisation Process. And when we say sterilisation, we mean sterilisation. He hasn't got any viable spermatozoa left, and the world will probably be thankful of his newly-found inability to breed. He may get cancer eventually due to the radiation exposure, but that will be the least of his worries."

"Who said that?!" Pettigrew demanded. He looked at the vast chamber that the tank he was in had been placed in. He turned (the tubes inserted into his body thankfully moving with him, and thus avoiding considerable pain) to find a strange structure swooping in from the roof of the chamber, a vaguely feminine-looking construct with a single yellow eye.

"Greetings, Peter Pettigrew, otherwise known as Scabbers, otherwise known as Wormtail, and soon to be known hereafter in perpetuity as Animagus Test Subject ASS-WTF-01. I am GLaDOS, the head of Aperture Science, the great-aunt of Harry Evans, aka Harry Potter, the aunt of Lily Evans, the woman you betrayed, and, more importantly to you…" The light-like eye narrowed. "You are going to be my bitch, little rat."

Pettigrew whimpered, and he knew he was using the two tubes inserted into his body just that moment. Another mechanical voice, this one male, remarked all too-cheerfully, "Urine and faecal samples collected."

Pettigrew, after a moment, said, in a very small whimper of a voice, "This is going to hurt, isn't it?"

"If that is your only concern, then you can rest assured," GLaDOS said. Pettigrew emitted a premature sigh of relief, before she added, "I will feel no hurt or discomfort. You, on the other hand, will experience some mild discomfort to severe nociceptive stimulation, depending on the tests involved."

"Noci-WHAT?!" Pettigrew yelped.

"She means you'll be feeling a lot of pain, rat-boy," the man with the neat beard said with a smirk(3).

"Thank you, Doctor Freeman," GLaDOS said graciously. "Now, test subjects are encouraged to scream and utter expletives loudly, as such actions have been shown to boost endorphin levels. However, given that you will soon be breathing liquid, that will not work. Still, the endorphin levels of those observing the tests will not only boost endorphin levels, but also morale. As I no longer have endorphins, as I do not have a body, I will take the morale."

"Please, just let me go," Pettigrew whimpered.

"In the immortal words of Queen, 'Bismillah, no! We will not let you go(4)!'" GLaDOS said.

Freeman then said, "Oh, I will pay you money to hear you sing Bohemian Rhapsody!"

"Well, this is the real life, as much as Pettigrew hopes this is just fantasy." GLaDOS then glared at Pettigrew, who quailed. "Are you sitting comfortably? No? Then we will begin…"

CHAPTER 12 ANNOTATIONS:

Sadly, Azkaban is worse than Aperture, especially with a more sane GLaDOS in charge of the latter. Oh, and I've written a scene with a naked Peter Pettigrew. Have fun getting THAT mental image out of your minds, people. Heh heh heh…

Anyway, I hope you liked Harry's bit of detective work. Quirrell and Snape's dialogue in this chapter was mostly taken from The Philosopher's Stone, but I added a little bit of dialogue just after the owl hooting. Here, Harry managed to hear this. Much of GLaDOS and Pettigrew's exchange at the end of this chapter was derived from an idea my frequent reviewer, Zane Tribal Tyne Alexandros, had for the dialogue for when they met, specifically the 'this is going to hurt' exchange.

Review-answering time! Jostanos: Not gonna happen. There's plenty of Harry Potter and Fullmetal Alchemist crossovers out there anyway.

mkeider1: I knew this from Wikipedia.

1. ROT13 is a very basic substitution cipher, basically meaning rotating letters by 13 places. In other words, each letter of the alphabet is changed into a letter halfway through the rest of it. A becomes N, B becomes O, and so on.

2. While Doctor Who needs little explanation, Out of the Unknown does need a little explanation. Out of the Unknown was like The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits in that it was a science fiction anthology series, only British.

3. Nociception is the technical term for feeling pain.

4. As Freeman points out, GLaDOS is quoting from Bohemian Rhapsody.