THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE

CHAPTER 2:

FUSCHIA AND EMERALD

Rose stared at the painting in sheer incomprehension. Taking advantage of her silence, James said, "I know this is a bit of a shock. Not many people knew that you weren't actually our child. Outside of Sirius and Remus, only Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall knew that you weren't our child. I was hit with a curse that rendered me sterile when fighting the Death Eaters."

"My own husband willingly joined Voldemort," Catriona said. "I knew Professor McGonagall, and through her, James and Lily. I became unofficially known as a Marauder shortly after they graduated from Hogwarts."

Rose nodded. James and Lily had told her about the Marauders while explaining about Sirius and Pettigrew, along with Remus Lupin, a werewolf associate of them. "So, why did you give me to the Potters?"

"I got a curse myself. When I killed my husband, your biological father, he placed a curse on me with his dying breath. I had a choice to make: either save myself, and cause your death, or else allow the curse to progress beyond the point of no return so that I could give birth to you. I made the decision. The Potters were delighted to have you. They just wished it wasn't at my expense."

"And what is a Cat Sìth?" Rose asked.

"The term literally means 'fairy cat', and is used to denote a cat that walks upright. In truth, we look more like humans than cats, with magical affinities that grant us special abilities, in addition to magical ability like those of wizards and witches. I, for example, had an affinity with electricity, or rather, electromagnetism. You, however, have what is the rarest affinity of all: 'void', or, if you'd prefer, 'potentiality'. Astonishingly, two had been born with this affinity this century. It's rare for one to even be born in one century."

"What does void affinity mean?"

Lily smiled. "There's an old saying that 'nature abhors a vacuum'. Like Catriona said, a better term would be 'potentiality', because where there's nothing, something has to exist eventually."

Catriona nodded, before adding, "The first thing about having such an affinity is that you're immortal, especially where accidents or malice are concerned, as long as you have the will to live, to perceive that you are alive and unharmed. You'll grow until you are an adult, and then, you'll simply cease to age. There are ways to kill one such as yourself, but they require someone to know what you are."

Rose suddenly had a flashback to the Basilisk. "That's why Fawkes let me die from the Basilisk venom."

"Fawkes? Dumbledore's Phoenix? Wait, what, a Basilisk?!" Lily demanded.

Catriona, meanwhile, while she looked shocked, she also looked thoughtful. "Basilisk venom can destroy many things, though a Cat Sìth with a potentiality affinity isn't one of them. If anything, it would have destroyed any enchantments or bindings on you, or at least weakened them terminally. Maybe that's why Fawkes did so. We'll get back to that later. Now, I said one of your abilities was near-immortality and invincibility. The other is being able to go literally anywhere. It's like Apparition, the wizarding teleportation ability, only stronger and more versatile. As long as you can envision a destination, and you'll be able to see where you're going first so you don't end up in danger, you can go there, anti-Apparition wards be damned. As you can imagine, that's a powerful ability. You are effectively everywhere, and nowhere."

"We'll talk about that later," Lily said. "Rose, I need to know…what has happened to you? Why did you have to fight a Basilisk of all things?!"

Rose sighed quietly. This was going to be a long story…

Once she had finished telling her tale, her parents, adoptive and biological, were livid. James Potter had a major scowl on his face, while Rose's mothers both had this eerily calm look on their face. Rose, however, knew that they were angry, and not with her. They were furious with the Dursleys, with Snape, and especially Dumbledore.

"But I don't understand! Why are you so angry with Dumbledore?" Rose demanded.

"Besides leaving you with the Dursleys? If you were actually of our blood, then maybe he'd have an excuse: he could have used blood wards to help protect you, as long as you stayed with someone with my blood," Lily said. "And even then, there are so many others you could have stayed with. Even if Sirius was in prison, and Remus was excluded because he was a werewolf, there's others, like the Longbottoms, the Bones family…at the very least, Dumbledore has made some pretty poor decisions," Lily said. "Leaving you with the Dursleys is just one of them, especially if there have been bindings on you that the Basilisk bite released. I fear something else, though. But enough about him for the time being. You're home now, where you should be, and damn the Dursleys. Of course, there's another thing to consider."

Catriona nodded. "We set this painting up with a special charm that would bring you here when your powers were unleashed, just in case, so when you teleported from somewhere, you'd come here. But it's a fairly general charm, like a homing beacon to all Cat Sìth with a void affinity."

"You mentioned there's another like me, with the same ability, though it is rare," Rose said, trying to take her mind off the accusations against Dumbledore.

"Yes. He was born shortly after you were. I know this because I was on holiday in Brazil with his family when he was kidnapped, and his parents killed. It was one last holiday before I died of the curse. I fled back to England using a Portkey when I couldn't find him. About a year ago, he ended up here. It was horrible, what his kidnappers had done to him."

"Had they tortured him?"

"Worse," Catriona said. "When he first appeared, he was wearing the uniform of the Hitlerjugend, better known as the Hitler Youth, the sole youth organisation of the Nazis, and a paramilitary group. He has been back here multiple times, and we've managed to get his story out of him, such as it is. During the Second World War, there was a group of Nazis who intended to weaponise vampires and other supernatural creatures, working in Warsaw. Their operation was destroyed by members of the Hellsing Organisation."

"Hellsing is also known as the Royal Order of Protestant Knights, and was founded by Abraham van Helsing, one of the men instrumental in defeating Count Dracula," Lily said.

"Wait, Dracula was real?" Rose asked.

"Yes, he was, and he was a vampire, albeit later in his life," James said. "However, unlike the book, instead of killing Dracula forever, van Helsing managed to bind him as a servant to his bloodline. The Potter family were amongst those van Helsing consulted in experimenting on Dracula, who was renamed 'Alucard', to enhance his strength. Alucard was one of those sent to destroy the Nazi experiments in Warsaw. But many of the key personnel of that Nazi group escaped to Brazil, where they became known as 'Millennium'. This was the group that kidnapped the other Cat Sìth with your affinity."

"Fortunately, while the indoctrination Millennium put him through was pretty thorough, I don't think he's beyond redemption. I think he's beginning to have doubts about his mission, now that he has this place to…well, be a kid in."

"Plus, he's practically a Marauder," James said with a smile. "Apparently he's quite the prankster in Millennium. Serves them right. They're trying to ensure he will sacrifice his existence for the cause."

"I thought you said that those of us with a void affinity cannot die or be killed normally," Rose said.

"Yes, but there are some exceptions. One of them is if a vampire feeds on your blood, or at least an older one. You see, vampires can absorb the souls of their victims if they wish, rather like Dementors. But unlike Dementors, who merely feed on souls, the vampires actually can use the souls as their own army of familiars. Someone like Alucard would have millions of souls within them. But if a Cat Sìth with a void affinity is absorbed by a vampire…well, your ability depends on your ability to assert your own existence. Imagine doing that while amongst so many other souls. You would sink into the void, and take with you the vampire that fed on you," Catriona said. "Millennium wants to defeat Alucard for once and for all, using the other Cat Sìth as the means. He doesn't deserve to die like that."

"Are you sure?" Rose asked. "You said he belongs to a Nazi organisation, and you know that Voldemort…"

"Yes, I know. But I think it's because he doesn't know any better. And I think he's also been magically bound to someone in Millennium, possibly given potions. Sadly, we gave our House Elves away to others shortly before we went into hiding, or else we'd ask them to try and remove the binding," Lily said.

"We can help by giving you a purgative potion to give to him first," Catriona said. "I'd suggest taking that purgative first, it flushes you of any potentially harmful potions."

"There's some under a stasis charm in the potions cupboard in the kitchen," Lily said. "Just make sure you're close to a sink or a bucket when you drink it. If there's anything in you, you'll be vomiting it up."

"Great," Rose remarked sourly. Still, might as well get this over and done with.

Finishing vomiting into the sink, Rose wiped her mouth, and glared angrily at the results as she washed it down. Son of a bitch, she HAD been dosed with potions!

There was another portrait with her parents in it, as they had shifted to this one's frame. Lily was scowling. "Judging by the colours, there was a compulsion potion and a suppression potion in you, and they've been in you for some time."

"English, please?" Rose rasped.

"A compulsion potion is often keyed to a single person, and foments near-complete loyalty to that person. The effects are like the Imperius Curse, but more subtle."

"Imperius?"

"Mind-control spell," Lily said apologetically. "The suppression potion suppresses…well, intelligence, magical and physical ability. Both potions have been used together by the darkest of families to control their servants and even unruly family members. The Blacks had been notorious for using them until the beginning of this century. I remember Sirius saying that his mother wanted to go back to the 'good old days'. It'll be some time before the effects wear off completely."

"I don't want to go through that ever again," Rose said emphatically. She looked at the exquisitely-crafted bottle sitting there, looking like some elaborate alcohol bottle, like the scotch bottles Vernon had. There was a half-filled glass of the potion she had already drunk from, a clear water-like liquid, next to the bottle.

"You shouldn't have to," Catriona said. "This is your home now, as it should have been. You won't have to go back to the Dursleys ever again."

Before she could say anything, the door to the kitchen opened, and Rose found herself looking at a boy about her own age walking in. She froze, and so did he. He cocked his head after a moment, peering at her, his ears twitching. Yes, he had cat-like ears, like her own, protruding from a messy mop of blonde hair. His face was cute, even slightly feminine, and she would learn that it often had a smile or a smirk on it. He was dressed in a uniform that Rose would later learn was a Hitlerjugend or Hitler Youth uniform, with a beige shirt and dark shorts, a black tie and epaulettes, and an armband with a swastika on it. But his most striking features were his eyes, a beautiful fuchsia colour that seemed to shine faintly.

After a moment, he said, in a lilting voice that still carried a Teutonic accent, "That is rather naughty of you, Fraulein, raiding the liquor cupboard." He smirked as he reached for the glass, sniffed it, and then drank it. "Hmm, a bit bitter. They won't let me drink back at home. I have to wonder why."

"Drinking's bad for you," Rose said. "And that wasn't alcohol. That's a purgative potion."

"Was zum Tiefel?!" the boy demanded. Suddenly, he heaved, and rushed over to the sink. It was kind of funny to see the boy begin puking copiously into the sink, his eyes comically wide. After nearly a minute of this, he eventually stopped, and then glared at Rose. "Verdammt Scheisse! What did you do that for?!"

"You were the one who drank the potion without asking what it was."

The boy suddenly seemed to notice her ears properly, or at least it seemed to occur to him to ask. "…Fraulein, why do you have ears like mine?"

"Because she's like you," Catriona said from her portrait. "Rose, this is Schrödinger. Schrödinger, this is my daughter, Rose Potter. You're both Cat Sìths. Now play nice, kids."

Once more, Schrödinger cocked his head quizzically. And Rose had to wonder what the hell she had gotten herself into now…

CHAPTER 2 ANNOTATIONS:

And here you have it, at long last: Rose meeting Schrödinger. And in case you're wondering how it was so easy for Schrödinger to drink the potion, well, Kouta Hirano does put in quite a bit of humour into Hellsing, and I thought that very much like Schrödinger. He's very much like that mischievous sort of cat that ends up exploring or playing with something, only to get hurt or embarrassed (or both) in the process. His immortality doesn't help matters either. I think of him as being a little klutzy. This does show a little in Hellsing: witness him losing his handbook for Millennium's invasion.

Anyway, the stage has been set for Schrödinger to defect from Millennium.

No numbered annotations for this chapter.