This one is yet another answer to a challenge (and remember, I do not take any suggestions from people, so don't offer any challenges: any challenges I do take up are wholly on my terms). This one is from whitetigerwolf, whose Protector Challenge was what grabbed me. It's a WBWL story (a bit more stereotyped than Hammer into Anvil) with a twist: when Harry is discovered to be the real BWL, he is brought back to Britain, with a protective lover who isn't afraid to kill to keep Harry safe. For details, please peruse whitetigerwolf's forum here:
topic/83467/146190424/1/Protector-Challenge-Harry-Potter-Various
I originally intended to do X-23/Laura Kinney/Laura Howlett from X-Men, but my motivation ran out pretty quickly. However, another possibility intrigued me, one whitetigerwolf suggested from the pages of the manga series Black Lagoon.
Despite having never gotten that far in Black Lagoon, I had heard of Sawyer the Cleaner, and seen a couple of clips on YouTube. A cute goth girl wielding a chainsaw and an electrolarynx? Why not? Now, I dunno how far this story will go, so whether it becomes a full story is up in the air. But maybe you'll like it.
Some may see the DNA of No rest for the wicked by Arawn D Draven, but I didn't use it as inspiration. Though I did keep it a little in the back of my mind. Harry and the Pirates by Technomad was more of an influence.
KILLING FLOOR
CHAPTER 1:
A STRANGE PAIR
Roanapur. George Lucas, when writing of Mos Eisley, had Obi-Wan Kenobi describe it as a 'wretched hive of scum and villainy'. He may very well have been speaking of Roanapur. A city in southeast Thailand, it was very much a hub for many criminal activities, and indeed had a number of criminal gangs, some vying for supremacy, others willing to keep the status quo. It was at once a violent and yet strangely stable place. It was filled with life not in the same way a corpse is filled with life, with maggots and scavengers and the like, but filled with life in the way a jungle was.
Life was hard and harsh on the streets. This wasn't to say one couldn't live here legitimately, and earn a legitimate livelihood. But the criminal element was somewhat more pronounced here than usual around the world. It may not be the most crime-ridden location on the Earth, perhaps not even making it into the top ten, but it was certainly at the extreme end of the bell curve.
The thing about crime, especially violent crime, is that it is messy. This is a result of the human body containing a lot of mess. Blood, viscera, faecal matter, urine, etc. Mess tends to draw comment, and while the crime bosses have considerable sway in Roanapur, there are times when they need messes cleaned up, and someone to deal with the bodies and blood. Sometimes, they need someone to also mess up a perfectly intact and alive body, and turn it into a mess, as a message.
There is one person who fits these criteria. Known pseudonymously as 'Sawyer the Cleaner', very little is known about this silent sentinel, only that they are frequently clad in surgical scrubs and goggles when they are met, and are rather slender. On occasion, they are accompanied by a somewhat more verbose assistant, though he (his voice is that of a young man) generally only helps with cleaning up corpses, not dealing with the living. He also works as the face of the front of Sawyer's business, calling himself Hal Evanson.
Hal speaks with a British accent that hasn't quite gone away in the decade or so that he has lived in Roanapur. How he got here was something out of legend. Ten years ago, at the age of nine, he was taken here by his uncle on a business trip, only to be attempted to be sold into the child sex trade. However, the criminal leader he had tried it on was one of those who detested the trade, and had murdered said uncle. Hal had fled into the night, and had fell in, for a time, with the Triad of Bai Ji-Shin Chang. He left the Triad, though he maintained links with them, shortly after meeting, quite by chance, Sawyer. He even sometimes acted as a go-between for the Triads, the Russian Mafia branch known as 'Hotel Moscow', as well as a number of organisations, some criminal, some not, some small-scale, some big-time.
Few people in Roanapur knew that the feared Sawyer the Cleaner was actually a girl of about twenty, one Frederica Sawyer. And even fewer knew, let alone suspected, that the two were lovers. But stranger things had happened in Roanapur.
Light peeked in through the bedroom, where a pair of forms were curled up on the bed, both naked, both about the same age. The young woman had her scarred arms around the young man's body, her breasts pressed into his back. On the wall was a movie poster for Army of Darkness, and another for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Tattered forensic science journals were on the floor and a desk, with said desk also having, amongst other things, a disc-like device on a choker.
The young man was about nineteen, with a messy mop of black hair, his handsome, if rather lugubrious, features were marred only by a jagged scar on his forehead, like a lightning bolt, and some stubble. The young woman had short, brown hair, and a face that would have been considered beautiful, had it not been for the usually-apathetic or morbid expressions that were on it normally, though the blissful repose helped soften up features hardened by life before and in Roanapur. A massive scar marred her neck, and there were scars here and there all over her body.
As light entered through the window, the pair stirred gently. The young woman opened her eyes first, and then her smile widened a little. She closed her eyes briefly, inhaling the scent of her lover through her nostrils, savouring it like a bouquet of flowers, before she sighed in satisfaction. She clambered off the bed, just in time for the young man to open his eyes, and get a wonderful view of her callipygian rear. "Morning, Frederica. Sleep well?" the young man asked in a sleepy voice.
She gave a smirk that seemed to speak for her, before walking over to the desk, and taking the choker and placing it around her neck. She activated it, and spoke, her voice given a buzzing monotone by the device. "Very well given last night, Harry. If I didn't need this, the neighbours would be complaining."
"Not that we really have any, which is just as well," Hal said. "Between our business and our pleasure, well…" He shrugged as he got off the bed, stretching. "Incidentally, apparently Dutch got himself a new crewmember. Some Japanese salaryman that Revy snatched along with some disk. Nice guy, a bit out of place with the Lagoon Company, but apparently he managed to figure out a way to destroy a helicopter attacking them with the torpedo on their boat."
Sawyer looked like she was about to call bullshit, before she said, "Did you manage to get a memory from them?"
"Yeah, Dutch was cooperative. You know what Revy's like when I have my wand out. I did it to the Japanese guy too. Rokuro something or other, so Dutch calls him 'Rock'. Balalaika likes him. She's got that look in her eyes that she had when she talks to me and some of her men."
Sawyer scoffed, the sound having the air of a Cyberman coughing when she did so(1). "She sent us the bodies of some fools she had interrogated recently, and I've heard rumours that Chen is trying to usurp her."
"Chen talks a lot of shit. And he screwed over Dutch once before. Dutch hasn't exactly forgiven him for that," Hal said with a shrug. "Chen's probably going to be taken out by Hotel Moscow, and considering that Chang thinks Chen's rocking the boat, he'll probably let it happen. Balalaika's nice to those she likes, and is polite and courteous to everyone else, save for outright enemies. If you're her enemy, you might as well bend over and kiss your arse goodbye. I prefer dealing with her than Revy, though. Revy's like a bottle of nitroglycerine with tits."
Sawyer snorted at his frequent and not inaccurate assessment of Revy 'Two-Hands', infamous for her skilled gunplay. While Hal was on relatively good terms with the mercurial gunwoman, Revy was known for a hair-trigger temper, and a bad relationship with Bao of the Yellow Flag bar, partly because Bao blamed Revy for whatever happened when a massive gunfight or something happened. Revy, however, was freaked out by the fact that Hal was a wizard, and knew magic. The Statute of Secrecy was looser here in Roanapur than in most other places in the world, so Hal could get away with more things here. And in a town filled with strange criminals, magic was just seen as another advantage…as long as you could survive.
Hal had been taught magic by a friend of the family's who had tracked him down to Roanapur some years ago, and while heavily disturbed to learn that his godson was the boyfriend of a mildly-deranged and sadistic killer, he at least cared enough about Hal. Balalaika now employed the man as an accountant for her legitimate concerns, after the last one was caught skimming money. That man was given to Sawyer to deal with: Balalaika usually preferred to do things in house, under the aegis of Hotel Moscow, but on occasion, she did retain Sawyer's services.
Sawyer was not volatile, not like Revy. True, she was possibly insane, and certainly morbidly-obsessed with the macabre. She had regaled Hal in the past with tales of her cleaning up various rooms and other things that had had corpses in there for far too long. She didn't speak about her past, how she got her scars or ended up in Roanapur, with Hal only talking about his own. Hal had gotten used to it, as well as her sadistic streak. You couldn't exactly be choosy in Roanapur, and for all her darker side, Sawyer was a loyal, intelligent, and, scars aside, beautiful young woman.
Plus, she was brilliant at using a chainsaw as a weapon. Which is far harder than it sounds: chainsaws are dangerous enough to use even when they are being used for their intended purpose of cutting through wood. They had a tendency to kick back in a way that would possibly end up with the user getting a face (or another body part) filled with chainsaw, not an amenable state of affairs as one would imagine. Being used as a weapon, despite what Hollywood would tell you, was even more dangerous than using it as intended. But Sawyer could swing that thing like Leatherface or Ash Williams. Not that she generally had call to use it as a weapon.
"Well, we had best finish off those corpses Balalaika sent us," Sawyer buzzed. "We can't keep them in that freezer forever…"
As Sawyer went about her grisly work, whistling beneath her surgical mask as she sawed through the limbs of the latest idiot to piss off Balalaika, Hal heard the buzzer for the 'service door' ring out. He sighed, and went over to the door, and opened it, still in his own scrubs, pulling down his mask. "Oh, hello, Shenhua."
"Hi, Hal!" the Taiwanese enforcer said with a grin. She was a buxom young woman with dark-hair and a frequent smile on her face and a cheerful demeanour, employed by Chang of the Triad. Unfortunately, her broken English made her sound like a bad Chinese stereotype. "How you and Sawyer? You busy?"
"Yeah, Balalaika's sent us a couple of examples. What's the matter, Shenhua?"
Shenhua looked pensive, before she asked, "You put translation charm on, yes? I sound like retard in English."
Hal sighed, before he took out his wand, and cast the charm on himself, remembering to set it to Taiwanese Hokkien. "This better?" he asked.
"Of course it is. Like I said, I sound like a retard in English." Shenhua sighed. "Anyway, I got news from the boss. Mr Chang told me that we've got wizards from England sniffing around, including some old fuck with a long beard and twinkling eyes. We used Occlumency just in case, but they're looking for Harry Potter."
Hal felt a chill at hearing that name. His old name. "Anyone else?"
"Yeah, two of them looked a bit like you. I'm guessing they're family. One's probably your father, as he looks like you, only with no scar and hazel eyes, while the other one's a boy who's pretty tubby and has brown hair. There's also this wanker who tried to hit on me, called himself 'seriously black' or something."
Hal frowned. "Sirius Black?"
"Probably. I told him that if he wanted a girl to have a one-night stand, he can go and find Revy."
Hal snickered at that. He had been told of Sirius Black's supposed skill at being a playboy, and Revy generally didn't take kindly to would-be suitors. "Anyone else?"
"Some greasy-haired idiot with a big conk and who seemed to think everyone was beneath him. Called himself 'severest snake' or something. Seriously, these British wizards have stupid names. There were a couple that looked like cops. They had the look. But here's the thing. Remember that Granger girl, that smartarse, who came here once? And that weirdo Lovegood? They've been here too."
Hal considered that. Hermione Granger had come to visit the teacher they both knew about a year ago. Hermione didn't know who he really was, not at the time, anyway. Maybe that had changed. Hal had thought her a bit of a know-it-all, but with her heart in the right place. Unfortunately, she was also overly enamoured with Dumbledore, who was one of those here.
Luna Lovegood had turned up not long after Hermione had left, in the company of her father. Easily one of the most eccentric people Hal had ever met (which was saying something in a place like Roanapur), she had recognised him on sight. Surprisingly, she seemed to inveigle herself into a little sister role for Hal and Sawyer, whom she met, and seemed utterly non-judgemental about.
"Thanks, Shenhua," Hal said. "Looks like we'll be having visitors soon. But try to stall them for as long as possible if they try to get more out of you. Has Mr Chang told Balalaika?"
"Yeah, he rang her up to warn her. Anyway, I thought I'd let you know. Oh, and they tried to warn us about some supposed Dark Lord's followers. That snake-faced fuckhead your teacher told us about? Full of Malt, or something?" Shenhua said.
"Voldemort, but yes. His followers have a rather tacky tattoo of a skull fellating a literal snake," Hal remarked. "Think Magical Nazis. Oh, and if any do come to call on you…give them a Roanapur welcome, okay?"
Shenhua grinned viciously. "It'll be my pleasure. I'll see you later, okay, Harry? And give my regards to Sawyer."
"Will do," Hal said. "Bye."
As Shenhua left, Hal returned to where Sawyer was still dealing with the bodies. On her glance at him from behind her goggles, he said, "British wizards are nosing around, including the sperm donor, the so-called Boy Who Lived, and the old goat Dumbledore. Hermione and Luna are with them too. Oh, and Shenhua set up a horny wizard to be shot at by Revy."
Sawyer snickered quietly behind her mask, her electrolarynx currently not being worn. She beckoned Harry closer, and then pulled down her mask, and hissed in a hoarse whisper, little more than her breath being shaped by her lips and tongue, "Then we will have to give them a suitable welcome, shan't we?"
Harry chuckled. He had to admit, he was looking forward to it…
CHAPTER 1 ANNOTATIONS:
So, here you have it. Harry's shacked up with Frederica Sawyer, but his past has come back to haunt him. Then again, maybe he has come back to haunt his past…
1. For the Doctor Who stories The Moonbase and The Tomb of the Cybermen, Peter Hawkins used a primitive form of electrolarynx to provide the voices of the Cybermen. It was actually more like a false palate that could buzz on cue. Unfortunately, Hawkins recalled in interviews that it had a bad habit of clogging up with saliva. This method was also used by Hawkins for the Cyberplanner in The Wheel in Space, with Roy Skelton using a different method for the Cybermen proper.
