I thank everyone who has reviewed so-far. A special thank you to PappyOldGuy, I hope you enjoy this chapter, and I'm flattered that your introduction into the Grim Darkness of the 41st Millenium (Warhammer 40k) comes from reading my story. There was a slight spoiler for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (book) in the last chapter. The Eldar, Eldar Corsairs and Dark Eldar are the property of Games Workshop. Harry Potter is the property of JK Rowling. Further spoilers in this chapter.
Hogwarts- Top of the Astronomy Tower
Neville Longbottom stared at the blackness around the castle. The constant guard duty had been hard on all of them. Not long after the strange magic that had been released had transported them here, the combined efforts of the older students and Professor Sinistra, the Astronomy professor, they positioned the castle in the Milky Way Galaxy, but lightyears away from Earth. The castle was drifting slowly through the blackness, though no breeze or wind seemed to blow through the castle. Everyone was mourning the losses from the battle, Hagrid keeping to himself after the loss of Grawp, many of the Weasleys inconsolable. Neville, by comparison, was hailed as a hero. People stopped what they were doing to watch him pass, and many asked to hear his story about how he had killed Nagini, and his other exploits throughout his years at Hogwarts, expecting his story to be as much of an epic as the tale of the Chosen One. He still kept the Sword of Gryffindor on him, as a memento, and a reminder to the people around him to keep going, to be brave. That they could conquer their fear. The sword didn't just represent bravery, it represented hope.
Neville checked his watch and signalled to Seamus. He opened the door to the staircase, as Neville took one more look out at the blackness, only to see a flicker of colour.
"Neville?" asked Seamus "Something wrong?"
"I thought I saw something," said Neville "I'll tell the next watch. It's probably nothing, but you can't be too careful. I'm going to take the next watch with them."
Neville followed Seamus down, to where Parvatti and Dean were casting bubblehead charms on themselves.
"Neville thinks he saw something," said Seamus, as he dispelled his own bubblehead charm "He's going to take the next watch with you."
Parvatti nodded "We appreciate the warning, Neville. We'd be glad to have an extra pair of eyes."
She led the way back to the top of the astronomy tower.
Prince Arunion's Capital Ship
"We're about to push back into reality, engage holo-fields," said Arunion, as the shifting currents of the Warp resolved itself into the strange anomaly. It appeared to be a building. Of Terran design, that much was certain, but ancient. By Terran reckoning, the building was almost 40000 years old, from a time before the Emperor of Mankind was even born, before interstellar travel had been discovered. This strange building shouldn't exist, it came from a time where the inhabitants of Terra hadn't even discovered space travel, and yet his readings showed that it had a working life support system. He could feel psychic energy practically radiating off the building, like a beacon drawing every psychic creature in the universe towards it. It felt as if the Warp wanted to open up and swallow the building whole, but for some reason, it was being kept at bay.
"Alara, scan for lifeforms," said Arunion, as the steersmen directed his ship closer to the building.
"Scans are unable to penetrate the castle, Captain," said Alara "If there are any lifeforms on that rock, I can't detect them, psychically or with our scanners."
"We'll have to go inside," said Arunion, pulling down his Voidsabre from the wall, and buckling it on, as he pulled the shadowfield generator from a nearby hidden wall panel "Prepare my boarding vessel, and gather my Voidstorm. There may be no lifeforms, but I'd still like to know how it got here, and why?"
"The Voidstorm are on their way," said Alara, after a moment "Your ship will be ready by the time you get to the docking bay."
Arunion left the bridge as Alara went to the armoury, retrieving her own shadowfield and arriving at the docking bay a few minutes before Arunion did, her witch staff over her shoulder. As Arunion walked in, he saw his Voidstorm already waiting, fully armed and armoured. Alara passed him his jetpack. He began putting it on as he spoke.
"Remember, this is a reconnaissance mission. We're going in to find information, not to start a war. If we find any lifeforms, do not engage, we need to find out about this anomaly, why it's here, if there are lifeforms, what they want. I'd rather not turn a potential ally into a definite enemy."
Arunion stepped into his ship, sitting down in the pilot seat, as Alara sat in the co-pilot's seat.
"Engage holofields," said Arunion, as he started up the ship's engines. Alara pressed some buttons, and then signalled wordlessly. The two had worked together so long, they flew the ship with one mind, mostly not needing to speak. Arunion and Alara guided the smaller vessel towards the building. They brought the ship up to float beside the door, and attached the ship to the doorframe. He grabbed his helmet, as Alara did the same. The Voidstorm were already geared up, so Arunion punched the release button for the ship's ramp. Soundlessly, the ramp opened, and Arunion pushed out into the void, correcting his course slightly to push open the doors, landing inside the room. Alara and the five Voidstorm followed, closing the door behind them.
"Atmosphere breathable, First Prince," said one of the Voidstorm, removing his helmet and deactivating his jetpack "There appears to be some form of artificial gravity."
"This building is ancient," said Alara, as she, too, removed her helmet "Where did they get this technology?"
"Remember, this is a reconnaissance mission," said Arunion "Avoid killing unless absolutely necessary."
Outside the closed castle doors, none of them saw as the holo-fields flickered off, revealing the tear-shaped ship they had flown to get there.
They were in what appeared to be a large, stone room, with five or six doors on each wall, all about three times the size of the average Eldar height. Also to the right, were four hour-glasses: one red, one blue, one yellow and one green, although the green one had been smashed at some recent point in the past, by the fact that Arunion could still see the remains of powdered glass on the ground below the glassless hour-glass. In the centre of the room, a grand staircase led up to higher levels.
"Two groups, check doors, search pattern: trillec," said Arunion. Two of the Voidstorm paired up with Alara and went left, checking doors on the left-hand side of the hall, and Arunion and the other three Voidstorm started checking doors in the opposite direction, both working towards the grand staircase in the centre of the room. It didn't take long for Arunion's group to find something of note. The set of large double doors, second after a room that appeared to be full of ancient Mon-keigh cleaning equipment.
With the help of one of the Voidstorm, Arunion pushed open the doors, which thundered as they opened, making a lot of noise in the otherwise silent hall. The hall was massive, dwarfing any room built on the Craftworlds, but not beyond their capabilities. Five long tables were the main features of the room, four stretching from the door almost to the wall at the other end, and the other laterally to the other four. Above, the ceiling reflected the stars outside, and hanging from the ceiling, and decorating the walls, was a set of banners and tapestries depicting a serpent, similar in appearance to the Cosmic Serpent of Eldar myth, what appeared to be a hawk or falcon, or some other bird of prey that Arunion did not recognise, a lynx-like creature, but different enough that Arunion suspected it was not the same creature, and a strange creature he suspected of being a burrowing animal, judging by its appearance, but also that he didn't recognise, all of these creatures resplendent on the four colours of the hourglasses he'd seen before- lynx on red, serpent on green, falcon on blue and burrowing creature on yellow- and surrounding a large letter 'H' in the human alphabet.
"Is that one of their Knight's crests?" asked Alara "And why are they the same colours as these hourglasses?"
"I don't think this place was ever part of the Imperium," said Arunion "Despite recent battle damage, it's still far too advanced to be a part of this era. I suspect this structure has been displaced not just in space, but in time."
"What do you mean, my Prince?" asked one of the Voidstorm "Surely it must be from the past, not the future."
"Listen for a second, Voidstorm Pelora, what do you hear?" said Arunion. There was complete silence for a moment.
"Nothing, my Prince," said the nervous Voidstorm, wondering if this was the right thing to say. Arunion sighed exasperatedly.
"Then how, my idiotic Voidstorm, are we breathing?"
"My Prince?" asked another Voidstorm "What do you mean? This building must have some kind of life support system."
"A building this large must have a huge life support system, we should be able to hear it, human technology is always so loud," said Arunion "It also moves against the solar current we rode in. What force draws or propels it, I do not know, but I do know that the likes of the Imperium of Man neither have the means, nor the motivation to develop technology like that in this time period. Therefore, this castle must be from the future, a time where their technology has sufficiently advanced to allow it to propel itself, and life support technology has sufficiently advanced. Anyway, we'd better head back. This place seems to be deserted, and we'll take too long to search this entire castle, let's get back to…"
Arunion's voice was drowned out, as several jets of red light filled the air, from every side, one struck Voidstorm Pelora, and although it didn't appear to scratch her armour, she fell to the ground. The rest of the Voidstorm jumped into the air, climbing above the jets of red light using their jetpacks, as his shadowfield activated, deflecting the remaining light beams that came his way. The Voidstorm immediately took aim at the black-robed figures that had appeared from seemingly nowhere. They were wearing crests on their robes bearing the same animals as the three un-smashed hourglasses. The shards, coated in non-lethal poisons that would incapacitate rather than kill, were deflected as one of the figures stepped to the front and put up some kind of shield Arunion didn't recognise, then returned to throwing jets of red light at the group.
"Blades at the ready!" shouted Alara, as each of the Voidstorm dropped one of their pistols, drawing their Venom Blades in return, and the seven of them appeared behind the robed figures. One nick was all that was needed to knock one out, and the Voidstorm didn't hesitate, taking out five of the figures before they had a chance to react to this new tactic, but eight of them still remained, and they focused their fire on Alara. The Voidstorm closed ranks, firing their pistols at everything that wasn't Eldar, but none of their pistol shots were getting through the shields their assailants seemed to be producing from thin air. Arunion searched around for the source of these shields, and noticed that when they were producing shields, they weren't shooting back while they were defending, and he traced both the shields and jets of red light to sticks of wood held in their assailants' hands, he heard another voice shout above all the others. "Protego!"
A much longer version of the shield that the other robed figures had been using to defend themselves extended between them, preventing them from leaving the archway they had used to get behind their assailants.
"What did you think you were doing?!" said a stern, female human voice "We arrive in this new galaxy, a way to make a good first impression, and the first residents of the galaxy you encounter, you respond with violence. What does that tell the residents about us?"
The shimmering shield vanished. Arunion cautiously re-entered the atrium of the building, and when he saw that the humans inside had holstered their sticks, he sheathed his own weapons, as the other Voidstorm did the same. He immediately went to the side of Voidstorm Pelora, checking her vitals and finding her to still be alive.
"You are lucky, Mon-keigh, if you had done grave harm to one of my crew, my mercy would not have gone so far."
"Like you did us the same courtesy!" said one of the ambushers, and the woman, without question the woman who had chastised them before, gave the offender a stern look, and he squirmed.
"Your friends will be all-right," said Arunion "This was simply a reconnaissance mission. The poison coating our weapons is a mere sleeping poison. They will awake in a few hours."
"To extend you the same courtesy, I offer you this," said the stern woman. Kneeling down in front of Voidstorm Pelora, she touched her own stick to the Eldar and muttered a word under her breath. Voidstorm Pelora immediately woke up.
"I hope our… courtesy, does not put you off wishing to negotiate an alliance with us," said the stern-looking woman, holding out her hand in what Arunion knew as a human gesture of greeting "Professor Minerva McGonnagall, Deputy Headmistress at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
"Prince Arunion," said Arunion, reaching out to shake Minerva's hand "Captain of the Doom of the Void, and advisor to Craftworld Merekwoad."
"Pleasure to make your acquaintance," said Minerva, formally "But you'll have to forgive me, what are you a Prince of?"
"In our language, 'Prince' just refers to a ship captain that has many ships under his command, which he is responsible for," said Arunion "You may just call me 'Arunion', if it makes you more comfortable."
"Very well," said Minerva, slowly drawing her wand from her robes "I'm going to draw us up some chairs, if you don't mind?"
"By all means," said Arunion, as Minerva proceeded to conjure a table, and two chairs. Arunion knew he was dealing with technology far beyond even some Eldar technology.
"You must tell me how you built this technology," said Arunion "Our Craftworlds can grow some furniture, but only under the guidance of several of our own seers."
"It's not technology," said Minerva, sitting down in one of the chairs "Well, where we come from anyway. We call it magic. You don't have that here?"
"Oh, we have it," said Arunion, sitting down, too "But I imagine what we have is very different to what you have. We'll discuss it later, but I think we need to discuss what your next move is. If we picked up your signal, it's almost certain others will have, too. I am happy to leave a few escort ships here, but there are much worse things in this galaxy than we are, and there are certain things we'll find it hard to protect you from."
"We have our own means of protection," said Minerva "But what would you suggest?"
"This building moves too slowly," said Arunion "We can attach some thrusters to it and move it, but it's attracting too much attention. My suggestion is that we evacuate the castle, as a temporary measure until the energy output from your arrival has dispersed. We can set up temporary accommodation on the Craftworld Merekwoad for you, and return you when the energy subsides."
"That is not something one takes lightly, Prince Arunion," said McGonnagall "You could not know this, but we recently fought a battle to defend this castle, losing many friends in the process. I can promise nothing, but I will try my utmost to convince them to leave to your Craftworld."
Prince Arunion reached into a hidden pocket in his armour, and pulled out a communicator. "I will take my leave, but if you wish to contact us again, press this button, and we will answer."
Arunion made to walk out of the castle and back to the ship, but Alara stopped him "I would stay with them. Having an emissary to speed up the process would speed up the process towards an alliance."
"Be safe," Arunion said, simply, before opening the castle doors, returning to his ship with the Voidstorm.