Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or Harry Potter.
AN: I'm sorry, it's another short chapter.
It was the greatest challenge that Harry had undertaken. A challenge so immense that, to Harry, it rivaled the Twelve Labors of the great Greek hero, Hercules himself. An impossible task that would take all of his willpower to achieve. Harry wasn't sure if he could do it, wasn't sure if the task would break him beyond repair. But he was determined to go through with it anyway.
He would politely ask Professor Snape for Occlumency lessons.
Harry shuddered just thinking about it.
"Harry, why are you reading up on Ambient Sound Charms?" Hermione asked, looking over his shoulder to see what he was reading. "And why Ominous Chanting versions?"
"Just trying to get some appropriate background music," Harry told her. Let's see, Ominous Hebrew Chanting, Ominous Latin Chanting, Ominous Russian Chanting, German Chanting...
Hermione gave him a strange look.
"Harry, are you okay?" She asked the Boy-Who-Was-Reading.
"Course, why do you ask?" Harry responded, not looking up from his book.
"You seem to be a bit different lately..." She began.
"I've just decided to have a better outlook on life," Harry replied. "Don't worry about it. I'm fine, really."
"If you say so." Hermione didn't look convinced.
"Well I do say so. Now can you help me get one of these charms down? I'm going to be asking Professor Snape for lessons in a bit."
"Suddenly your reading material makes sense."
Wizards and witches slowly filed into the Order of the Phoenix's meeting room at Grimmauld Place. Severus Snape, Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, Albus Dumbledore, and Danny Phantom were already waiting inside for them. Albus sat at the head of the meeting table, Phantom idly floated overhead (glad that he was the original for once, there would be less negative side effects to staying in the room warded with his own power), Snape sat at the end of the table opposite from Dumbledore, Lupin sat in one of the seats on the right side of the table, and Sirius leaned up against a wall.
The canine shapeshifter had a wild grin on his face. He was also whistling a jaunty tune and tapping his foot.
"Why are you so happy?" Danny asked the reluctant Black heir as more members filed into the room.
"First chance to get out of the house and see some action in a long while," Sirius replied. "It feels good."
"I guess I get that," the halfa returned.
"And I suppose some men never lose their bloodlust," Snape spoke up. "Although it is somewhat reassuring that it's directed towards a mutual foe, I'm also worried that it might drift towards... individuals who are valuable allies. I do hope we have some way of muzzling and leashing the mutt when that time comes."
"Why you!" Sirius reached for his wand, but stopped himself before he could draw it.
"You know, I probably should have asked about this before," Phantom began, "but what's with you two?"
"He tried to feed me to Lupin during a full moon," Snape told the spirit. "A mere youthful indiscretion, I'm sure." He said that last part while shooting Dumbledore a dark look.
"Severus, we've been over this many times," the elderly wizard told his friend.
"I'm merely-"
"You tried to get Remus to eat Mr. Snape?" Phantom said. "Dude, that's... well, just sort of evil."
"In my defense, it was a bit of a complicated situation," Sirius replied. "But that doesn't really excuse what I did to Remus... or Snivellous for that matter."
"Can we please drop this subject," Dumbledore cut in as the last of the Order members who would be attending the debriefing filed in. "We need to move on to other subjects soon."
Although the affirmations were reluctant, Dumbledore was still pleased to hear them. Maybe there was still some hope for this terrible feud after all.
Everyone was silent for another half minute while they waited for stragglers. Then Dumbledore cleared his throat.
"This is just a quick debriefing," the silver bearded wizard said to the room. "The two team leaders and Remus will inform everybody of what they found at each of the locations where Voldemort was storing his gifts for the giants. Alastor, would you start?"
The scarred, odd eyed retired Auror stood up from his seat on the left side of the long table.
"Nothing much," Moody told the assembled members. "There were five wizards guarding them, talent-less scum with no official ranking within Voldemort's organization, and some minor wards around an old cottage in the moors. We apparated to a point just outside the wards, bulled our way through the defenses, and stunned all five before they could even draw their wands. The gifts consisted of one goblin made giant sized gauntlet, an old Celtic grail, and some jewelry enchanted to shine. We quickly investigated the premises for anything else of note, but did not find anything. We destroyed the gifts and then departed."
"Thank you Alastor," Dumbledore said. "Shacklebolt, what happened with your team?"
"It was an operation similar to Moody's," the dark skinned Auror answered. "Two weak wizards and a witch camping out near an old shed. There were no wards so we could apparate directly into their midst. We were also able to stun them before they could put up any resistance. The shed contained a large enchanted mirror, a pocket mirror for a giant. We weren't able to determine the nature of the enchantment before we left. We also did not discover anything of note in the area."
"Thank you Shacklebolt," Dumbledore inclined his head to the man. "And finally, Remus, what happened with you, Sirius, and Phantom?"
The werewolf cleared his throat and stood up.
"Phantom, may I tell the others about the powers you displayed during the fight?" He asked the spirit floating above the table.
"Yes," Danny replied, rolling his glowing green eyes. "Sheesh, why are you all like that? If I want something kept a secret I'll tell you."
"Sorry," Remus apologized. "But it's the standard protocol for dealing with spirits. Most of them don't like information about their abilities leaking out to anyone, the temptation to seal them and use their power can be very strong for some wizards."
"Fine, fine fine," Danny said. "But I'm pretty public with my powers. It's not my fault none of you watch the regular news, you'd already know a lot if you did so."
"And luckily Voldemort and his supporters don't either," Dumbledore cut in, "they consider muggle new sources to be below them, and even if they didn't, I suspect that they may be somewhat loath to use an American new source. But enough about that, can we continue with the debriefing?"
"Yes, sorry." Remus turned back to the table. "There were between seven and twelve witches and wizards on the premises, along with four crude stone constructs, and two earth golems. The location itself was by the Asine river in France, littered with 'duds' as Phantom called them, unexploded muggle weaponry. We used a portkey to appear within their wards, wherein we had Phantom attempt to rush the barn where the gifts were contained. He was intercepted by one of the golem. He engaged it and we discovered that it was a new model that had the ability to regenerate using the soil. Phantom was set upon by the other golem and the constructs while the wizards attempted to cast some sort of spell, a ritual or a longspell. Sirius and I disrupted the spell, the blacklash knocking out the spellcasters. Phantom managed to overcome the golems' regenerative ability by freezing them and was able to dispatch the constructs with no difficulty."
"Phantom broke the wards protecting the farmhouse," Lupin continued, "and retrieved the humans within. Sirius and I investigated the barn. Within we found an enchanted club and something infinitely more interesting. " The werewolf reached into his robes and took out a sheet of paper. "There was a silver, gold, and mercury circle set into the ground and obviously active. I managed to quickly trace it before having Phantom destroy the barn."
He place the paper in front of Dumbledore. Danny took a peek.
It looked like arcane gibberish to him, but then again so did some of the second year material he was supposed be learning did as well. It was a series of three cocentric circles, with a ring of differing strange scripts in-between each circle. The out circle was labeled g, probably the gold, the middle s, and the center m.
"So what's it supposed to do?" The spirit asked the schoolmaster.
"I don't know," the old wizard replied in a curious tone. "The inner script is some form of ancient Etruscan, the middle is cuneiform, and the outer one is Akkadian. Whomever created this circle certainly has done their best to make it difficult to discern its function. This will take quite some time to translate. Severus, do you have any idea as to its function?"
"Unfortunately I do not," the double agent answered. "Whatever the Dark Lord is up to with this, he is playing this very close to the chest."
"Very well," Dumbledore addressed the room at large. "I must ask all of you to be on the lookout for similar items from here on out. It appears our foe has another plan in the works."
"Great," Danny groaned. "We've got to stop him from getting the prophecy, recruiting Dark creatures, his blackmail and intimidation schemes, reaching out to old allies, and now whatever he's up to with this?"
"Do not get too concerned," said Albus. He kept the worry out of his own voice. Truth be told the new development and the new possible front to the war was depressing news, but he couldn't let it show on his face or his tone. He needed to keep the Order's morale up. " Voldemort's resources will be just as stretched as ours. If there's nothing else anyone feels like bringing up, I do believe this meeting is adjourned."
Harry was waiting on the stairs, watching as all the adults left the room. Phantom had floated off at some point, probably to consult with the Fentons, Harry was busy psyching himself for the immense task that lay before him.
"Be polite. Be polite. Be serious. Be polite. Be polite." Harry chanted under his breath. "Be humble. Be humble. Probably should turn off the ominous chanting at some point."
Honestly he'd rather be throwing down with a couple of Death Eaters, particularly blonde ferret like ones with extremely punch-able faces. Yes he could curse Malfoy into slime, transfigure the slime into a weasel, and then set Sirius on the weasel.
No! This wasn't the time for pleasant fantasies! It was time to ask Snape for Occlumency lessons. And speak of the Super-Devil, right hand man of his arch-enemy the universe, the terrible bat himself, Professor Snape himself was exiting the room now. Time to face the music.
Well time to shut it off actually.
Harry canceled the charm, took a deep breath, and headed over towards his professor. Snape saw him out of the corner of his eye.
"Potter, this is an unpleasant surprise," Snape said to the boy. "Isn't there some life threatening and attention grabbing trouble you should be getting into?"
Harry forced himself to ignore the barb.
"Sir, I have a request of you," Harry said, the bright green eyes he had gotten from his mother meeting Snape's black ones. He kept his tone respectful, but firm. "Will you teach me Occulmency?"
Snape flinched. Harry, still meeting the professor's eyes, thought that Snape was just surprised that he was being so respectful.
"And why," Snape began, his gaze turning uncertain and loosing its usual hardness. He quit meeting Harry's eye for a moment, rallied himself, and then met them again, eyes once more containing their usual hostility. However it dissolved once more when they met Harry's.
"And why," the professor repeated, this time sighing, "do you want to learn Occulmency?"
"Because I'm a security risk," Harry told his least favorite, okay second least favorite, he liked Snape more than Lockhart, teacher. "Because I should be helping, in anyway I can, but I can't because Voldemort and his lackeys can just pick anything I know about the Order right out of my head."
Snape looked at him for a moment.
"You really want to help?" He asked Harry. "You aren't just seeking thrills this time?"
"Yes, I really want to help," Harry answered. "I mean I'd really like to fight, but if I can't do that, I'd like to help in anyway I can. Preparing reagents, translating, fetching books, anything. It's not right that everyone else is risking their lives and I'm just sitting here."
Snape regarding Harry a little longer. And then he sighed.
"As refreshing as it is to see some signs of maturity from you Potter," the Potions Master said, "I'm afraid I must decline. I'm not going to be here often enough this summer to do more than weaken your mental barriers. And I would first have to consult the headmaster in any case, I have to take many liberties for my duties as it is-"
"Professor! Professor Snape!" The two enemies turned to look over to where Hermione was shouting from. The bushy haired girl was rapidly descending the staircase. Harry stepped out the way just in time to avoid being steamrolled by the girl.
"Professor! I need your help!" Hermione began, speaking a million words per minute. "The Fenton's have access to fresh pure ectoplasm, and according to Professor McGonagall you're the only one with all the qualifications to supervise experiments with it-"
"Fresh, pure ectoplasm," Snape said slowly, one eyebrow slowly rising. "Did I hear you correctly Ms Granger?"
"Yes!" The girl replied excitedly. "Both impure and pure ectoplasm! They can even synthesize the stuff! Just think of all the-"
Snape cut her off.
"I'm well aware of the potential Ms. Granger," the greasy black haired man said. He sighed and turned back to Harry. "It looks like I will be staying here after all. I will speak to the headmaster about giving you Occulmency lessons. But I warn you now, I will accept nothing but your absolute best, both in behavior and effort."
"Yes sir. Thanks you sir." Harry answered, still keeping his tone respectful. "Good day to you sir." He turned around and walked away.
That had been less unpleasant than he expected.
There had been some more cleaning to do that day. As mentioned before house was absolutely infested with all sorts of magical pests, but what hadn't been mentioned was that they pretty much formed a closed ecosystem. They continued to work on the drawing room after the meeting.
Harry thought if it hadn't been for the violence inflicted on the room, they wouldn't have made as much progress as they did. They cleaned wrecked Black heirlooms, pixie corpses and other foul things. It was so much easier when everyone could use magic.
Halfway through the process Danny Fenton came into the room and volunteered to help.
"I just feel sorta bad sleeping all day while you all work," he said to the room. "So what can I do?"
"Help your friends collect all the mundane items," Mrs. Weasley told him. "They're putting them in bags so we can sell them or burn them later."
Fenton complied. Sam and Tucker were busy clearing out a large set of cabinets next to the spot Harry was disinfecting a dressing table with a cleaning flame spell he had decided to learn one day while bored. Sure there were other simpler spells that he could be using, but on the other hand it was sometimes nice to clean via fire.
"So," the American boy began awkwardly, "other than the Dementor attack and that Voldemort guy's return, how's your summer been going?"
"Other than those horrific, possibly life altering events?" Harry replied. "It's been fine, a bit boring actually. But it's been looking up ever since I got here. I'll have plenty of time practicing magic, learning new spells, and I'm going to make sure to get plenty of dueling practice in. Oh, and I'm no longer totally isolated isolated from the war, kept in the dark, and waiting for Death Eaters to swoop in."
"Err... that's nice to hear," Danny returned. "Do you think you could help me and Sam with some of the DADA spells? Hermione told us that you're the best in your year for Defense Against the Dark Arts, so..."
"Sure," Harry answered, shrugging. "It'll be nice practice and review for me as well. And you're welcome in advance."
He used a quick Blasting Curse to kill a Pixy that had been peeking out of one of the unexplored cabinets. Danny, Sam, and Tucker yelped at the detonation.
Everyone continued their efforts until it was nearly dinner time. When the time to start cooking rolled around they had nearly completed the decontamination.
It had been exhausting.
That was to say, stopping himself from making any snide or blunt comments to Sam and Danny about just snogging and getting it over with. Honestly it was annoying to work next to them with all the shy glances, blushing, and accidental touching. But Harry felt that he should be a decent fellow and not comment on it.
But they were so obvious about it, Harry thought to himself as he watched the Americans leave, standing with Ron and Hermione, that it was possible that even Ron was starting to have an inkling-
"I think those two like each other," Ron commented to Harry and Hermione. "I'm not sure, but-"
Harry and Hermione's jaws dropped. Harry was glad that no accidental magic had gotten involved, otherwise their jaws may have actually reached the floor.
But it would have been called for. Ron had noticed it! Just how bad was it for Ron to notice it?
"What?" Ron asked, looking at the faces of his friends.
"Y-y-you noticed it," Hermione said. "Are you really Ron?"
The red head gave them both a look that plainly said he was not amused.
Harry found himself staying up later than usual that night. He had sequestered himself into an empty room that hadn't needed to be cleaned because it had contained absolutely nothing of note. It had a bare wood floor, bare wooden walls, and a bare ceiling. The boy-who-was-staying-up had also taken one of Hermione's extra-curricular DADA books.
"Let's see..." he said to himself, sitting cross legged on the floor and flipping through the pages of the book. "Advanced blasting curses. Elemental blasting, force blasting, disruption blasting, goo blasting... bodily fluid blasting? I either really need to look into that one or dedicate myself to erasing every last trace of its existence. Let's go with elemental blasting, how about wind..."
A simple quasi-Latin incantation, with different wand movements for effect. A jab for a quick fist of air, a long swish for a stream of wind, a slash for a crescent blast (with practice one could make it a blade), and finally whirl it for a spinning blast. Harry thought it would be best to start simple, with the jab, and work his way up from there.
He conjured up a couple of squares of wood, a bit of simple transfiguration nothing fancy. He arranged them on the end of the room opposite the door to the hallway. He made them different heights, from up to his calves, to half as tall as himself.
The wizarding child returned to the other end of the room and drew his wand. He looked over the incantation one last time, repeated it to himself, and then he stood up.
"Ven Flatus!" Harry said, jabbing his wand forward. An invisible ball of wind shot forth and knocked one of the larger targets over.
"Right, I probably should do something about the noise," Harry said to himself. "Quietous Protogo!" He pointed his wand at the door as he cast the spell. He repeated the action for each of the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. It wasn't a muffling spell, but it would create a noiseless area where it was cast. One could use it as a barrier to prevent noise from escaping.
"Alright, back to buisness," Harry turned back to the targets. That first blast had been far too weak, or at least based on the description he read. Time to try again, putting more umphf into it.
"Ven Flatus!" Harry threw more of himself into the spell this time, and was rewarded by a stronger, large blast of air sending one of the smaller blocks flying into the wall, leaving a large dent. Harry winced. Oh well, once he looked up the proper spells he'd only have to wave his wand and it would all be fixed.
"What you up to?" Someone said from right behind Harry. Harry jumped and spun around, instinctively pointing his wand at the source of the noise.
It was Phantom.
"What are you doing here?" Harry asked the spirit, lowering his wand.
"Dumbledore asked me to stay here more often," Phantom replied shrugging. "I guess the war will be heating up soon or something, so he wants me on hand. So what are you up to?"
"Just practicing," Harry replied. "Thought I'd have some fun with advanced- Flatus Ven!- blasting curses." Another blast of wind. This was a pretty easy spell actually. Or at least the air fist bit was. Time to move on.
"Air blasts?" Phantom said. "Don't think I've run into that very often. There was this one guy who control weather I guess..."
"Let me guess, when it came to elements you mostly had to deal with fire and ice powers," Harry replied, choosing his next target. "Ven Flatus!" He swished his wand this time.
A small breeze made one of the wood blocks wobble.
"Alright, this will need a bit more practice," Harry commented. "So are you allowed to tell me what happened today? Ven Flatus!"
"We smashed up some things," Phantom replied. "Not going to say what though."
"Any trouble? Ven Flatus!" Harry briefly noted that Ron would have probably found the incantation amusing.
"Nothing much. Mind if I take a shot or two?"
"Be my guest. Ven Flatus!" This time the breeze knocked the block down.
"So, are you trying to call up a windstorm?" Phantom asked. He pointed one finger like a gun and let loose a small green blast. The block was sent flying up, with a small black smoking hole in the center.
"Good shot," Harry said. "Nope, a wind blast spell with different effects based on the wand movement. Ven Flatus!" He shouted and threw his all into the spell. He accidently swished the wand a bit too far upward. But he at least had gotten the power bit down. This time the wind stream scooped up the block and threw it against the top of the wall.
"Hmmm..." Harry looked back at the book. He didn't remember reading anything about that. Maybe it was simply obvious. "Ven Flatus!" He swished the wand downward this time.
Yeah, he'd be definitely working on the power of this spell for a while, but a jet of wind that could keep someone pinned down could be very useful. Time to move on to the slash.
"I take it you weren't expecting that?" Phantom asked, freezing one of the targets.
"Not really," Harry responded, raising his wand. "Ven Flatus!"
Whoops, tried a bit too hard with that one. He missed the targets and left a gash in the wall.
Phantom looked over at the wand.
"I still have trouble with people doing things like that with those fragile little sticks," the spirit confided in the boy. "Seems like they should break easily and leave you helpless."
"They're stronger than they look," Harry informed the spirit, "but yeah, that can be a problem. However-" Harry raised his left hand and flicked his wrist "-Ven Flatus!" A whirling ball of wind knocked over several blocks.
"We're not entirely helpless," Harry said, looking somewhat smug.
"From what I've been told, wandless magic is pretty hard," Phantom said. "I guess that's impressive."
"Not really," Harry replied. "That was pretty much spontaneous magic."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that was sorta like accidental magic. I only could do that spell like that because I felt like I could do the spell like that at the time. It was all on instinct." Harry looked at his hand. "Wandless magic is consistently repeating that on demand."
"So how do you do it?" Phantom asked. "Wandless magic that is."
"There are a couple ways," Harry replied. "Emotional control for instance. I could learn to recall this feeling on demand. Or meditation. A lot of wizards learn martial arts for that reason."
"Really? Martial arts?"
"Yeah. There are two common stories about that. One where the wizards tries to charges his enemy and gets cursed to jelly. And one where two foes end up next to each other by accident, and the one who studied martial arts crushes the other guy's throat before he can react." Harry looked at his hand. He formed it into a fist. "But most do it for the mental aspects. I should look into it." The wizard turned back to the targets.
"Ven Flatus!" He thrust his fist forward. Nothing happened.
"Heh," Harry shrugged. "I wonder if anyone tied wandless spells to martial arts before. Maybe elemental spells... Nah."
"It might make a nice TV series," Phantom suggested.
"It would be a horrible idea," Harry shot back. "And what network would host it?"
"Nickeldon?"
"That shitty network? I haven't seen much of it here in England but-"
"Hey! It's not that bad," Danny Phantom protested.
"Sure. Ven Flatus!" This time Harry whirled his wand. A blast of air like a sideways tornado shot forth, blasting the block backward, and making it spin like it was in a dryer.
"You know, I could use some practice with fighting non human opponents," Harry said. He waved his wand and recollected the blocks. "Feel like practicing sometime?"
"I don't think that's a good idea," Phantom said a bit warily. "My powers aren't exactly safe to practice with on humans..."
"You could use a bit of practice with dealing with wizards though," Harry pushed. "And I just really need practice with inhuman movements, in case I have to fight a werewolf or vampire or something. I we could stick with sparks on my part and possibly goo on your part, until we figure something else."
"I guess," Danny gave in, "but not tonight. I've got other things to do tonight."
"Do you have to visit an old geezer to remind him about the spirit of the summer solstice?" Harry suggested. "Were you roped into the part of the Ghost of Summer present perhaps?"
"You know they didn't mention your sense of humor when they recruited," Phantom mentioned.
"It's a new development," the boy who lived told the ghost hero. "See you tomorrow night. Meet you here."
"Fine. See ya." With that Phantom turned intangible and left.
Harry looked at his left hand.
"Ven Flatus!" The blocks tumbled.
Harry smiled. This summer was really looking up.
AN: Sorry for the short chapter again. I'll hopefully make it up in the next chapter.