Chapter 25

AN: Content warning: Vague mention of suicide. Don't worry it won't be gratuitous and hopefully won't be upsetting.

Schrodinger spent several minutes curled up in Harry's lap crying. He'd been so overwhelmed he could barely take it. Zorin, Rip and Seras were not much better off, and they were all enchanted watching Harry comforting their shared son. Seras didn't think she could fall in love more with him and yet here she was doing just that.

"You ok there kiddo?" Harry asked. Schrodinger nodded without lifting his head from Harry's shirt.

"This was an amazing idea, Harry." Zorin said, reaching out a hand to stroke Schrodinger's hair.

"I'm just glad everyone's on board. This just feels, I don't know... Right I guess." Harry said. Schrodinger lifted his head and looked at Harry.

"Would you be mad if I chose to be Schrodinger Blitz?" Schrodinger said. Zorin gasped, and Harry smiled.

"Of course not. Just remember that being a Blitz doesn't make you any less my son." Harry said grinning at him. Zorin let out a sob and Schrodinger looked up at her, worried.

"Happy tears, my beautiful son." Zorin said. Schrodinger climbed out of Harry's lap and into Zorin's, and Rip leaned forward and hugged them both. Seras took Harry's hand and squeezed it.

"So, Schrodinger Blitz will be the first of our ungodly horde of children to descend upon Hogwarts. I think I should give Minerva a raise." Harry said, grinning. Everyone laughed at that.

Reggie McReggerson, formerly Sir Reginald, was at his wit's end. Every night something new would happen. He'd wake up at midnight to see the ghosts of hundreds of those that died in the battle of London milling about his house, blaming him for their suffering. The next night, just as he fell asleep the sound of a cannon going off right next to his head would leave him temporarily deaf and terrified. One night after Alucard watched the Shining for the nine hundredth time, Reggie opened his cupboard only to be nearly drowned in thousands of gallons of blood that mysteriously disappeared as soon as the police arrived in response to his frantic call.

On more than one occasion, Alucard himself would make an appearance and menace him directly, paralyzing him with terror and explaining in graphic detail the excruciating torment that awaited him. Combined with the nightly horror show, he was tormented by the guilt of having betrayed his country, and once or twice he considered ending it all. However, he could never summon the will to do so. After the hundredth sleepless night, this time being awoken by thousands of scarabs dropping off of his ceiling and onto his bed, he gave up the fight, called Sir Penwood and confessed to it all.

He could not be tried in a public court, because doing so would expose all of the supernatural things he'd been a part of, however the Queen was not feeling very charitable towards the treasonous pig. She had originally ordered death, but a plea from Harry stayed her hand. It was decided that his punishment would be life imprisonment, in the very cell where Walter had been detained previously. This time with 24/7 suicide watch. When he was transferred, the entirety of the Hellsing staff as well as a hundred or so magicals stood glaring at him watching the whole time as he was roughly dragged into the building and down through the elevator into the subterranean dungeon.

Once he was secured, and the guard assigned, the Hellsing staff dispersed and the magicals, after saying goodbye to the many present that they'd befriended during the battle and after, returned to their lives. Reggie, though obviously distraught about his fate, was feeling better having confessed his crime, and was settling in on his cot for the first night of uninterrupted sleep he'd had in months when he heard a most unwelcome voice.

"Heya Reggie!" Harry said, his smile didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Fuck you, Potter." Reggie said.

"It's Potter-Victoria. I hope you got your affairs in order.." Harry said. Reggie ignored him.

"More than a million human beings died that day, in no small part due to the information you passed along to Millennium. Almost all of those people have family and friends that miss them." Harry said, his smile fading.

"This included a few close to me. Your actions took my friend's father away from her, and another friend's grandmother from him. You took away the captain of the Queen's guard, who was also the uncle of another friend of mine. Above all of it though, a million Londoners were turned into ghouls." Harry said.

"Who do you think took care of the Ghouls, Reggie? How do you think we took care of them? I had no choice but to incinerate thousands upon thousands with fiendfyre, and that represents just a fraction of what had to be dealt with. There isn't a man or woman in this building except for yourself that didn't have to look into the clouded over eyes of an innocent civilian and destroy them." Harry said.

"I have done everything in my power to do what's right for this world, I've risked my life, I've fucking lost my life twice for this world, and despite all that I've suffered and all that I've sacrificed, now I have to carry the weight of thousands of innocent dead with me for the rest of my life. You're aware of my nature, Reggie. That is going to be a very, very long time." Harry continued. At this point Reggie looked horrified, as though the magnitude of what he'd done hadn't sunk in until now.

"It would be so easy for me to rip that door off, gut you, and suffocate you with your own entrails, or even torture you to death with magic, and no-one here who would stop me. But I'm not going to. Quite the opposite actually. You are going to be kept, safe and healthy for as long as we can keep you alive. You're only in your early forties, Reggie. With magical intervention, It would not be unreasonable to say you've got eighty or more years left in you. And each and every day, someone here is going to remind you of the millions of people whose blood is on your hands." Harry said. Reggie was sobbing uncontrollably.

"Have pleasant dreams, Reggie." Harry said before apparating out. The exchange had been recorded, and was made available to anyone who wished to see it. Those who did could tell that Harry had derived no joy from it. When the Queen viewed it, she acknowledged that death would have been too kind. One thing was for sure, anyone who had considered lending aid to the enemy was now having second thoughts.

"I hear congratulations are in order." Integra said. She was sitting in the cafeteria with Harry, Seras, Pip, Hermione, and Alucard.

"Oh?" Hermione asked. Integra looked at Harry who nodded with a grin.

"I've been informed that on both the magical and muggle side, the paperwork has gone through and been accepted. Schrodinger Blitz is now legally the child of Harry, Seras, Zorin and Rip." Integra said, beaming.

"Congratulations!" Hermione said, getting up and hugging him. Harry grinned.

"We all love him so much, it only made sense to make it official. The records department on the magical side was all kinds of confused, not only does he have four parents but he's older than two of them." Harry said with a grin.

"Have we figured out how old he really is?" Hermione asked. Harry shook his head.

"The only one who knows for sure is Mengele. Schrodinger's memories from beyond around 11 or 12 years back are fragmented, and Zorin and Rip didn't meet him until they started moving forward with the vampire attacks. For all intents and purposes, he's 11. We're calling his birthday March 12, the same as Rip's grandfather." Harry said.

"Where is he going to live, with Zorin and Rip?" Integra asked. Harry nodded.

"He's going to have a room Potter Manor of course. He doesn't know about that yet so keep it under your hats for now. I'm also working on a tricky bit of magic as a surprise for him.

"What's that?" Hermione asked. Harry grinned.

"It's like our magic closet. The doorknob to his closet, when turned to the right will open to a large and very well-stocked clothes closet at both houses. Turning it left, however, will reveal another door, that when opened, will lead to his room at the other house." Harry explained. He looked over at Hermione and cringed.

"Harry just how far have you gotten with this project?" Hermione asked.

"I uh... So conjured animals arrive on both sides still alive and intact. I just have to tie the trigger for the magic into the knobs." Harry said nervously. Hermione's eye twitched. She took in a deep breath and harry held up a hand.

"Not in front of the pregnant woman." Harry insisted, his voice and expression more stern than Hermione recalled ever seeing them. It didn't sway her though. She stood up, dragged Harry over to another table, threw up a privacy ward and started berating him.

"What's going on?" Pip asked.

"I suspect Harry just broke another one of magic's unbreakable laws." Seras said, looking at Harry with concern in her eyes.

"Does she always do that?" Integra asked.

"Yes, and quite frankly it's starting to piss me off. Excuse me." Seras said, storming over and entering the bubble right as Hermione was building up to her peak.

"Enough!" Seras shouted. Hermione looked at her in shock.

"Excuse me?" Hermione asked incredulously.

"It's ok, Seras." Harry said, looking defeated.

"No, it really isn't Harry. You haven't done anything wrong. In fact it sounds like you've achieved something revolutionary again, and instead of praising you, she's screaming at you and interrogating you." Seras said.

"I'm not screaming." Hermione said.

"Yeah, you kind of are." Harry observed.

"Oh so you're taking her side now?" Hermione said.

"Do you even remember why you were yelling at me?" Harry asked.

"I WASN'T YELLING!" Hermione yelled.

"Yes you were, and you are now, Jesus Christ. Is this how you reacted every time he accomplished something?" Seras asked.

"WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE YOU STUPID-" Hermione started but was interrupted.

"ENOUGH!" Harry bellowed, his eyes glowed brightly and the force of his shout shattered the privacy bubble. Hermione and Seras stared at him speechless.

"Hermione, I tolerate you yelling at me and grilling me when I do these things because I love you like you're my sister, but I will not tolerate a single word from you against the woman I love. I don't care if you yell at me, I don't care if you hate me. You will NOT speak ill of my Seras." Harry growled. The glowing in his eyes only faded a few moments after he finished speaking.

"Oh my god I am so sorry, Seras. I don't.. I don't even know what came over me." Hermione said on the verge of tears.

"It's okay, Hermione, we were getting heated. I just can't stand by and let you hurt him like that." Seras said.

"Hurt? Harry I was hurting you?" Hermione asked.

"Not really-" Harry started to say

"Harry I saw your face, you looked like you'd been slapped." Seras said. Harry shrugged. Hermione paled and rushed forward hugging Harry who accepted the gesture.

"Hermione I adapted the magic used by the floo network. I was able to stabilize it quite easily. The floo network is ancient, and the magic woven into it is primitive. With a few stabilizing runes, a crystal lattice to smooth out the flow of magic and a buttload of power, we can essentially build a portal between any two points on earth. If I wanted to put on one the moon I would need to create an entirely new floo network, and while I'm not doing now, it is on my bucket list." Harry explained.

"That's it?" Hermione asked. Harry nodded.

"You can have my notes once I finish testing it. All you ever had to do was ask." Harry said, before squeezing Hermione one more time, then taking Seras' hand and walking off with her. Hermione collapsed back into a chair and wept. Integra walked over and sat down next to her, squeezing her hand.

"You know he's already forgiven you. Give him some time, and everything will be fine. Trust me, I know, I did worse to him." Integra said.

"Why do we do this to him? I don't even know what I was thinking. He's never done anything to deserve that." Hermione said.

"Harry is... well if he weren't as intelligent, strong and capable as he was he'd be completely infuriating. The problem is he keeps doing the impossible. In your case his achievements defy logic, and that is crucial to what it is that makes up Hermione Weasley. My problem is I was convinced I knew his limits better than he did, so when he got run through by Yumie I just lost it. You saw the aftermath of that. Even with that sword in his belly he knew he wasn't in danger, and he saw an opportunity to help someone who desperately needed it, and it was in his power to do so. Unfortunately I thought I knew better and that he was just being reckless and stupid." Integra said. Hermione nodded.

"And I also know you saw how quickly he bounced back. Not four hours later he was in my office comforting me. As long as you remember, and try your best not to repeat your mistake, it will be ok." Integra said.