Chapter 23: Keep Your Enemies Closer

"You!"

Harrison turned around and he saw Saeviour standing at the top of the stairs. His wild, unkempt pink hair was matted with sweat, as beads of sweat were posed on his forehead. HIs pale face was almost the shade of beat tomato red, if it was more redder. His dark robes were caked on the ends with dust, rips and tears. Saeviour's round glasses contained several spots, and dust.

"Why are you here?" Saeviour asked, suspension rising in his voice, "Where's Snivellus?"

He looked around the room, probably expecting to find Professor Snape, with his shoulder-length greasy black hair, swallow skin, and black flowing robes, as if he was about to suddenly appear right next to him. Saeviour turned his attention back to Harrison as soon as it became really clear that Professor Snape wasn't going to reveal himself any time soon.

Realization quickly dawned on Saeviour's face, as his eyes widened and his mouth was wide open. He pulled out his wand from his pocket, and held it by his side. His brown eyes narrowed.

"I knew you couldn't be trusted, but I thought I'd give you the benefit of the doubt," Saeviour started.

Harrison raised his eyebrow, "The benefit of the doubt? That's rich coming from you in particular."

Saeviour's features turned into confusion as he knitted his eyebrows together, "What do you mean?"

"You cannot be that daft? I was never given a chance. I was never given the benefit of the doubt as you oh-so proclaimed…." Harrison said in a rather bored tone, "Why would you ever think that I would want to come back as a Potter or even go back to the light?" He let out a laugh- a cold laugh- as soon as he said that. The laughter rang through the room, as it almost sounded like a maniacal laughter, if he truly cared to do so.

"Quit acting like you're a victim!" Saeviour snapped. "You act like it's so fucking hard that it was awful that mum and dad never loved you at all, and it's their fault that you were sent to Azkaban? You deserved it all since you slaughtered those muggles."

"There was no evidence that I did all those things, but do you want to know what truly hurt the most? I was fine by the abandonment, it was-" His voice turned into barely a whisper, that was truly chilling, "the fact that mum and dad simply watched as I was taken away that day, and never intervened. That I was truly expendable and that no one cared that I didn't do that…. Now if you don't mind me, I'm going to leave."

Harrison was about to head towards Saeviour and out through the door where the room with the potion bottles on the table was at. He stopped in his tracks as soon as he saw the red sparks of a spell shooting out of Saeviour's wand and he was forced to protect himself, by raising a shield in front of him. He watched as the red color of the spell hit the shield, and reflected off of it.

"I did not say I was finished!"

Harrison rolled his eyes at the statement that Saeviour had made. Exactly like a child , he thought.

"I, however, did… Now, if you excuse me, I would like to leave as I have other things to do," Harrison told him coldly.

He was almost a couple of meters away from reaching the door, when he felt a spell hit against him and felt his legs give out from under him. He landed harshly against the stone floor, pain radiating on every surface of his skin as he gritted his teeth, from the pain. He tried moving his legs to support him, but found that they were very useless in bearing any weight. It was like they were very made of jelly…

"Didn't your mother teach you to show respect to others especially if someone's back is turned?" Harrison said, canceling the spell on his legs that made his legs out of jelly.

He got up from the stone floor, dusting off any of the dust that got onto his robes before he looked at Saeviour, his green eyes shining brightly.

"My mother is dead, thanks to you," he heard Saeviur mutter. He grinned as he slowly started to taunt him back. Two can play this game. Even if it might be a dangerous game he was playing.

"The jelly-legged curse?" He didn't bother waiting for a response, as he quickly added, "Where did you learn that curse? And here, I thought you were incapable of learning any spells or these kinds of curses?"

"For your information, dad taught me this in case you or anyone else tries to do anything to me," Saeviour added rather smugly.

"I am impressed," Harrison said, sarcasm lacing his voice. "But if that's the only thing you can do, that you can not really stop me."

"I know you stole the stone," Saeviour stated. "I'm going to tell Dumbledore that you tricked me and made me go on the third floor."

"I don't know what you're talking about. The stone is still in the mirror… I didn't do anything," Harrison lied, without any hesitance.

"You're a fucking liar!" Saeviour cursed, "Stupify."

Harrison quickly dodged the spell as he watched as the spell hit the wall. He watched as Saeviour put his wand down right next to him.

"That's all you could do, Potter? How about this- if you truly think you know what spells are…. Here's one- Crucio."

As soon as the spell was cast, Saeviour fell to the ground, his back hitting the stairs- writhing in pain, and screaming. It was so loud that Harrison wondered how a human could possibly scream like that. It was much louder than what the volume he used with the dementors. He waited for about one more minute, feeling satisfied with every passing second, until he canceled the spell.

He knelt down beside Saeviour and looked at the brown eyes that were now watering with tears. Brown eyes met green eyes and Harrison whispered, pointing his wand at Saeviour's temple,

"Obliviate."

He carefully only obliviated Saeviour's memory of anything about the stone- particularly tonight with him in it, and especially with him setting the Cruciatus curse on the boy-who-lived. He didn't want Dumbledore to go digging through the brat's head, and finding him as the culprit of stealing the stone.

He ignored the slumped body and glanced briefly at the silvery, silky cloak that was lying discarded on the floor, right by Saeviour. He was tempted to grab it for himself, but instead left it as he knew it was Potter's prized possession and he had his own means of invisibility. He headed out of the chamber, out through the third floor, and to the second floor where Fred and George were located at.

…

Harrison met the twins on the second floor, right in the girls' bathroom where the Chamber of Secrets was located. It was one of the weirdest meeting spots to meet at, but it's also one of the very few places that people would not go willing to enter on their own. It was probably because a ghost haunted it, and was always wailing.

He spotted Fred in George near the wall, testing one of their pranks to see how useful it was, or if it actually worked. He didn't really want to know what sort of prank they were working on as long as he wasn't the target.

"Good evening, gentlemen," Harrison interrupted the silence that filled the room.

Fred and George looked at him in shock, and had the biggest grins on their faces.

"Did you-" Fred started.

"Get the stone?" George finished.

Harrison nodded and pulled out the small, blood-red out from his pocket. He looked at the stone more closely, with its smooth edges in his fingers, how it carefully gleamed in the direct lighting. He could see its value seeing how this was the elixir of life. The elixir of life that would turn metal into gold, and give people immortality. It was almost a shame how this object of this importance was being guarded with such pathetic protection, and was now going to be used to help bring the Dark Lord back into power.

They broke in the biggest grins as they marveled at the stone.

"Now to find the Dark Lord," Fred commented.

"Leave that to me," Harrison told him. "Here's the map."

He handed him the blank map that looked like an extra piece of parchment and handed it to the twins. The twins looked at each other and talked amongst themselves,

"You know Gred, I wonder where Dumbledore is?" George suggested.

"You're quite right, Forge… Perhaps we should really see if Dumbledore made it back to the castle," Fred told his twin.

They pointed their wands and said the words "I solemnly swear I'm up to no good" and the map showed various names and their locations.. They spent a few minutes trying to locate Dumbledore's name so either he was off the map in the castle or he was still out of the castle.

"I honestly think he's in the castle," Harrison stated.

"Probably is…" Fred started.

"Perhaps we should off to bed before someone gets too suspicious?" Harrison suggested.

They agreed and headed their separate ways.

…

Dumbledore entered the brightly-lit chamber as he looked around the room. He paid no attention to the limp form that belonged to the one boy-who-lived, his right arm sprawled on the stairs, with the occasional twitches here and there. It looked like he got beat up, but as long as the boy-who-lived still had a pulse for right now , that was what counted. It was the stone that he was the most worried about.

The stone was the most important piece in all this. He knew something was up when he went to the Ministry of Magic, for an emergency Wizengamot session . It turned out there wasn't and there was no way he was going to talk to the new Minister of Magic, so he remained at the ministry for several hours, talking to some of his close friends instead. He rushed back as soon as the spell casted over the Philosopher's Stone being removed from the mirror, was activated.

He stepped over Saeviour's slump body and headed to the mirror. Dread was starting to sink into his stomach as he approached the mirror. HIs worst fears were realized as he felt the enchantments around the mirror disturbed and the spell to reveal the stone wasn't working.

Someone figured it out.

He thought it might have been Tom, eagerly wanting a chance to regain his body. He knew Tom was still anxious to get his body back after that fateful night years ago. It's why he set up this entire scheme to see if Saeviour was able to vanquish the Dark Lord. It was a major setback as soon as Professor Quirrell gave him the resignation letters, claiming that being the Defense of the Dark Arts professor was becoming too much, and broke down on his way to pack up his stuff and left.

That meant two things: someone must have told Quirrell it was a trap and that someone was working for him. Tom wasn't that bright to realize that the philosopher's stone was a trap, not when he was still too obsessed with getting his body back by any means.

Dumbledore clenched his fists, with baby blue eyes stopped twinkling as he turned away from the Mirror of Erised, and out of the chamber with the limp form of Saeviour being levitated behind him, still unconscious.

He realized with this new realization, he was going to let his followers know what truly happened tonight, while he did a little search on his own to find the culprit who stole the stone.

But the real question remained:

Who truly stole the stone?

This was a struggle trying to get to the 2k words minimum I'm doing. I hope you enjoyed this chapter as it's going to be the last one for a couple of weeks as I will be going on vacation! Drop a review and let me know what you think!