Standard Disclaimer: I own nothing in regards to Harry Potter or Invincible. All properties herein are those of their creators. I am only a writer working on my skills with worlds and characters that I love.

Note: Apologies for the wait on this one. My interest went in a different direction for a while.

Note: Using the comics version of Amber in this story cause, let's face it, the show did her dirty. Not only did they saddle her with a cheap race swap but they also nuked her otherwise pleasant personality and mature behavior.

Note: Next chapter will introduce the Hogwarts crowd.

Chapter Six - Steps Taken Toward An Objective

"Talk to me, Donald. What do we have here?" Cecil Asked as he made use of his government funded teleporter to warp into the subterranean cesspit that had formerly been the lab of the creator of the Reanimen. The cyborg monstrosities that Berserker and his galpals had dealt with so handily a few weeks back.

He arrived to the sight of over a dozen technicians still pouring over everything in sight with his number two man hunched in front of the only computer. Already the corpses had been thoroughly autopsied, but there had been nothing in the results to show exactly how they had been as monstrously effective as they had been.

For his part, Donald refused to answer his boss for the few remaining seconds it took to finish the last page of notes the deceased had been working on before the end and then leaned back fully in his chair. "Well, not near as much as we would if the bastard had been taken in alive, but accidents happen I suppose."

"Accidents?" Cecil walked over to him with his arms crossed over his chest. "You really think that's what it was? These 'accidents' seem to follow Berserker like a plague."

Donald shrugged. "Until we see otherwise it seems the safe thing to call it. We still don't know how effective Nolan's hearing is, and I don't believe he'd be happy to hear you badmouthing his pride and joy."

"Maybe not, but the question still stands."

Donald pointed a finger at the screen he'd just been manning and explained, "We've got all of the clinical notes the kid made, as well as video recordings of his process. The implanted robotics made these Reanimen things durable, but the strength… that appears to be the implementation of a homegrown serum derived from a series of eight incredibly rare mushrooms and fungi. It kind of explains why he needed to make his subjects cyborgs in the first place."

That got Cecil's attention at once. "Why?"

"Because a regular human's nervous system would shut down in seconds if exposed to even two of the eight ingredients listed in his files. The kid needed stronger subjects, so he made stronger subjects."

"Hm." Deciding to get to the point, the government man asked, "Can the process be replicated?"

Donald nodded. "With time, yes. Though I doubt the final product would be 'as' good as the originals. We just aren't as keyed into the process as the creator was. As sick as this operation is, the perpetrator was an artist of knife and flesh. And then there's the question of our own test subjects…"

Cecil waved a hand negligently. "We've got an excess of death row inmates that Uncle Sam is getting tired of paying for. We got clearance to use as many of them as we want."

Donald raised a brow slowly. "You do realize that we'd have more money to spend on them, and other services, if you stopped raiding the taxpayer's pockets for near constant teleportation travel, right?"

For the first time that morning, Cecil grinned. "Sucks for them. I earned this." A moment later he teleported out again for good measure.

Meanwhile

"Okay, Eve, just like we practiced." Harry encouraged his friend as the two of them hovered in the air two miles above his house. "You can manipulate the atomic structure of pretty much anything, including your clothing, so you should be able to do the same with the air around you. Make it thicker just in front of you and softer on the part that touches you. Your power is versatility in motion, but its biggest drawback is a lack of defence. If we do this right you won't need to worry about that for much longer. Let me know when you've done it."

The redhead nodded seriously, held her hands out in front of her, and concentrated on the effect she wanted to see occur. In preparation she'd watched three documentaries on the composition of earth's atmosphere and changing air currents.

When she was somewhat certain she'd reached her desired goal, the heroine gave a nod and Harry immediately bull rushed her position shoulder first. Eve braced herself, folded her arms in a defensive X in front of her, and pushed more of her power into the 'shield' but the impact still sent her skidding back a hundred yards through the sky.

Harry watched until her motion finally ceased and then floated back over to her. "How was that?"

"F-Fine." Eve gasped, rubbing her forearms as she did… until Harry reached out to take them in his hands. As the girl began to blush at the contact, he gently rolled up her sleeves to show a pair of long bruises rising against the skin of her forearms. Then, contrary to her fears, the boy smiled.

"These bruises are a sign of how far you've already come, Eve. This is our first partial spar and you've already withstood ten percent of my impact power. And all you have to show for damage is something that will heal in a few hours." His eyes were full of enough pride to have made the redhead's knees buckle had she not been floating. "How are you feeling now?"

"J-Just a little winded." Eve admitted ruefully as she forced herself to get more of a grip on her emotions. "I've never tried something like that before and it's new, kind of like flexing a muscle I've never trained before. I think it'll get easier with practice."

Harry nodded and (regrettably for her) pulled free of her arms to start soaring back to his starting position. "Then let's do it again, and again, and again, until the muscle memory feels fluid."

Eve nodded and crossed her arms back in front of her. "I'll give it my all."

The half-Viltrumite smirked and lowered his center of gravity. "I wouldn't expect anything less."

Two Hours Later

Debbie had just finished with the latest load of laundry and, as was her way, she'd insisted on taking care of Eve's as well. The poor girl had been through so much since all that had happened in Africa and, in the mother's opinion, she shouldn't have to trouble herself with such a mundane task if the burden could be lifted by another. That was something she had learned over years of being the wife to the world's greatest superhero: Those that pushed themselves the hardest required peace at home to level themselves, and even the smallest things could mean the world to them.

So it was that after folding the last article she piled up all of the redhead's items and made her way into the basement where the spare bedroom was located. Though she stopped at the cracked door as she heard the twin sounds of the intro music for the local news being played within along with a light accompaniment of sniffles. What could that be about?

Her curiosity getting the better of her, Debbie folded the basket more securely under one arm and gently pushed the door the rest of the way open with the other. She was met with the sight of her unexpected houseguest sitting cross-legged on the bed, her arms were hugging a body pillow to her chest as if it were a security blanket, and her sniffles continued as her eyes stared unblinking at the screen as an emergency report showed her son and his girlfriend rushing to the scene of a man with lava powers attempting to hold a bank hostage and melt his way into the vault.

It suddenly occurred to the woman that Eve might still be suffering PTSD from the Africa disaster, and the glistening sight of the lights in the ceiling reflecting off of fresh tears falling down her face informed the elder woman that she had been right. At once she dropped the basket, entered the room, and before the redhead could react to being interrupted so suddenly she found her face being mushed into Debbie's chest as the mother leapt up beside her on the mattress and pulled her close.

"Shhh." Debbie soothed as she ran her hands through the teenager's hair. "It's okay."

For her part, Eve had frozen for a moment, but the sheer kindness being shown for her sake broke through her defenses in a matter of seconds, and soon enough she was clutching her host close as her body began to shake.

When she'd learned her husband was a superhero, Debbie had started reading books on trauma response, on the off chance Nolan would ever end up in such a similar state from his battles. He'd never needed the care, but it eased the Grayson matriarch's heart to finally be able to put those skills to use for the betterment of another. She held the child until her sobs ceased, and finally, when she started pulling back, she leaned away but kept one of her hands in her own as they both leaned on the other. She supposed it was probably easier on the child now that the fighting on the screen seemed to have wrapped up. Her son certainly was good at his work.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Debbie asked softly, as if to a startled foal.

Eve appreciated the gesture, and slowly wiped the trails of her tears away. "I'm so sorry you had to see me like that, Mrs. Grayson."

"It's alright, dear. You've got a tough job. Tougher than anyone else will ever know, but I do. And after what happened to all those poor people in Africa you helped, what you saw there, I'm sure there's more going on in your head right now than the average hero. It's only natural you'd have some problems sorting through it all."

"Yeah, I guess you're right on the mark." The redhead smiled miserably, her eyes alternating between her host and the television to keep track of the reporters moving into the scene. "It's just… I thought I was alright, you know? I was supposed to be out on patrol with Harry and Kate today. We trained together earlier, but when it was time to head out I told him I was too exhausted from using my powers in a new way while sparring."

Debbie nodded that she was keeping up. "But that wasn't the real reason you stayed back, was it?"

"No." Eve sniffled. "I was… afraid. Afraid of freezing. Of seeing… what I saw in Africa all over again. And of saving more people… only to watch them die all over again. I thought I was ready. I thought I could help them right away and be the hero they think I am, but I-"

"Need some time to heal first." Debbie finished for her, a small, understanding, smile as warm as the sun doing a great deal to ease the younger girl's stress on her face. "There's nothing wrong with that, dear. If you aren't right here-" she leaned forward and tapped the girl's forehead, "then you won't be able to do much out there." she pointed to the door behind her. "Nolan used to complain a lot about heroes that insisted on going back into the field too soon after personal losses. He said they always lost it in the heat of the moment and got in the way of saving people. Apparently the Immortal is a big example in his book."

"B-But will Harry and K-Kate just forget about me if I'm not out w-with them?"

As one, the duo's eyes turned to the screen where a brave reporter had managed to scamper across the rubble strewn floor with his cameraman in tow. Their eyes were met with the image of an unconscious supervillain lying on the ground with Harry floating above him, Kate moulded into his side and his grip around her waist keeping the girl from falling to earth.

The aspiring realtor would have had to be blind to miss the desperate yearning in the red haired teenager's eyes. Interesting. Her mind flashed back to a particular conversation she'd had to have with her husband before they'd walked down the aisle together. "You know," she offered softly, "Just because you wouldn't be in the field with them right away, doesn't mean you couldn't be 'with' them." She put just enough emphasis on those words to catch the redhead's immediate attention.

"I-I don't know what you mean, Mrs. G-Grayson." Now her tears had been replaced with a full face blush that was downright adorable.

Meanwhile, on the screen, they could both hear the reporter calling out, "Berserker! Do you have a moment for the press?"

Harry's voice sounded back, "Always, Dan. Your outlet has been incredibly good to me since I came on the scene."

"Excellent. Now, I've got a few questions about how you feel that fight went, but first… I see you're looking awfully chummy with your partner there, and the people desperately want to know, are the rumors about you and Dupli-Kate being an item true?"

A hearty laugh followed before Harry answered, "No comment…" then, "But yes!"

After that everyone in earshot was laughing too, but Debbie saw that Eve wasn't. No, she just looked depressed. She'd guessed right. Still not releasing the hold on the dainty hand she'd maintained so far, the Asian woman found the remote with her free hand, turned the screen off completely, and then took a gentle hold of her charge's chin to make her look at her. "You should know that Harry takes after his father more than might be considered… normal, by earth standards. Nolan likes to say that our boy's mind is nearly eighty percent Viltrum in the way he sees the world."

"I don't see what that has to do with-"

"I'll get to that. Eve, Viltrumites aren't typically monogamous by nature. They live a long time, and tend to travel the breadth of the galaxy in their mission for intergalactic harmony; and as such they tend to take multiple partners at once as a matter of necessity. They don't tend to do well emotionally on their own. A lack of companionship apparently feeds into their genetic anger issues. It's also their way of breeding stronger offspring. They see the inclusion of foreign blood as something that offers a chance to enhance their own. Then their people can send stronger heroes to worlds that need them after."

Taking a deep breath, Debbie admitted, "Nolan told me about that after he asked me to marry him. Honestly, after the surprise of Harry coming into the picture nothing else could shock me about him, but while I was ready to be a mother, I wasn't ready to share what was mine. I told him that if he was serious about marrying me, even if he lived longer than me, as long as I lived I was going to be his one and only. He agreed."

Eve gulped suddenly as the import of those words hit home. "So if Harry is Viltrumite in his thinking and habits-"

"He's open to more partners."

"Kate… mentioned something like that. I thought she was just teasing me."

"True, she's a playful one, but I don't think she'd play you like that, dear." Releasing the girl's chin, she settled the free hand on the back of the one she'd been holding. "There's something broken inside you, Eve. I can see that, and you can clearly feel it. And if nothing else, my son is really good at putting things back together. Whether he does that as your friend, or as your boyfriend, is up to you, but I see the way you look at him, and forcing yourself to be more miserable than you have to be is not going to do you any favors."

"I… I don't know how to…."

"You don't need to decide right now, but think about it."

"I… I will. Thank you, Mrs. Grayson."

"Please, just call me Debbie."

"Then Mrs… Debbie…."

"Yes?"

"Can I have another hug?"

"Of course, dear."

Some Time Later

When Berserker and Dupli-Kate flew back into his bedroom through the window they found Eve waiting for them sitting on his bed. Harry was a bit confused, but Kate was all smiles. The moment her feet hit the ground, the asian girl ran over and took the redhead's hands in her own.

"You finally made up your mind?" Kate asked eagerly.

Instead of answering verbally, Eve smiled, leaned in, and planted her lips softly against her friend's. Then, as they giggled lightly at the sight of Harry's floored look, she crossed the distance between them and did the same for him. "I'm tired of being left out. Can I please join you two?"

"Y-Yeah," Harry gulped slowly and nodded. Eve hadn't moved more than an inch from his face, and her eyes were just… enchanting. "I would really like that."

"Me too!" Kate skipped over and pulled them both into a group hug. "This is going to be awesome!"

Meanwhile, on the other side of the door, Debbie pulled her ear away with a smile and started walking back down the hall to start working on dinner. She liked both of the girls, and she honestly believed they were good for her son. And maybe the experience would be enough to help Eve start healing as well. Normally she'd have raised hell for a closed door with girls inside, but Nolan had assured her that he'd let her know if he heard anything untoward occurring with their son. Emotional healing or not, she was far too young to be a grandmother just yet.

Not for the first time she thanked heaven that her kids had not seemed to inherit their father's excellent hearing. It only now occurred to her to be mortified of what 'they' might have heard from her room if they did. Nolan was quite the vocal lover….

That Night

Dinner went off without a hitch, though Harry pointedly didn't look at the smirk both his parents were giving him as he subtly held both Kate and Eve's hands under the table. Though when it was all said and done, and everyone retired to the living room for their family movie night (Harry would fly Kate home after) the half-Viltrumite found himself pulled aside by his father.

"Dad? What is it?"

Nolan made a show of looking around before pointing straight up. Four seconds later the two were soaring up amongst the clouds and effectively safe from any prying ears or listening devices that might have been placed around the house. "Our uplink just got a return ping. Anissa has been sent by the High Command and will arrive here in a few weeks. Are you ready to face her?"

"I'm ready to try, though I have no realistic hope of besting a warrior of her caliber."

"Don't sell yourself short, son. Remember what I always say, any warrior can defeat another on the right day… as long as both warriors hail from Viltrum." The two shared a bit of a laugh before the elder man noted, "Honestly, holding your own against her attacks long enough would likely impress her more than anything else. From what I understand, none of her prior husbands could stand against her more than a few seconds in sparring matches, and she only mated them because she got bored. But aside from testing you for mating potential, she will also be testing you as a Viltrumite in general. It will be your first real chance to show the empire what you're made of."

"I will not let you down."

"The thought didn't even cross my mind. Case and point, you seem to be getting pretty chummy with Eve…" He waggled his eyebrows and laughed out loud as his son turned away to hide his smug smile. "Anissa will be just as impressed by this development as I am. You created a harem of two women with unique and useful abilities that, our gods willing, will transfer to your young. You have made good strides toward strengthening the future of the empire through your eventual bloodline."

"I try."

"And they both have agreed to aid us well, something that even I did not expect. You have done good work and made solid strides toward preparing Earth for conquering. Remember to tell Anissa of it when she asks."

"Why wouldn't she ask you?"

"As the agent assigned to review our progress on this world, she normally would, but I imagine once she sees you she'll lose a lot of her interest in me. It is her way. It's all instinct with Anissa."

"A fine way to be."

"In most cases, yes. Just prepare for any coupling, should she find you worthy, to be… violent."

"I expected nothing less. Now was there anything else? I've got an evening of epic cuddling planned sandwiched between two lovely beauties."

"Still not as beautiful as your mother."

"Ugh." Harry pulled a face at the thought and started speeding back toward home before his father could mentally scar him any further.

Later

"Hey, uh, Harry?"

The hero known as Berserker blinked as he flew through his window for the second time after returning from escorting Kate home. His brother was waiting for him in the doorway to his room rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "Oh, hi, Mark. What's up?" He finished coming through the window and closed it after himself.

"Well, uh," He leaned against the doorway. "Amber and I have been talking and going out for a bit now, and she really wants to get to know my family. I've never brought a girl home, and I was hoping you might have some advice?"

Harry grinned and moved to slap the side of his bro's head with the absolute lightest amount of force possible. "Dweeb, you didn't have to be nervous to ask your big brother for advice on the ladies. I'm doing pretty well in case you didn't notice."

"Believe me, we all noticed. But I'm being serious here. Amber is… just the best. I really don't want to blow it with her. But we could make dinner plans for any day of the week and you, dad, and Eve can get called away at a moment's notice for any number of disasters. With our luck it seems almost certain it'd happen the one night I have my girlfriend over. Then it'd just be me, Amber, and mom, and you just know mom would start grilling her once she had her alone."

"Yeah, that does sound like mom." Harry agreed. "She means well, dude."

"Maybe, but I'd really rather ease Amber into it before the maternal inquisition comes for her."

"No one ever expects the inquisition."

"I'm seriously worried here, Harry. Can you cut the jokes please?"

"Hm." Harry thought about it for a moment. "You did say you wanted to do a double date sometime. Eve and I need to have a one on one too, now that we're a thing, so how about we start with me. You and Amber, me and Eve, we can get burgers. Start slow. If me and Eve get called away then the worst thing that happens is you and Amber are still having a grand time out on the town. How's that sound?"

Mark's eyes lit up. "That sounds epic! Thanks, bro."

"Anytime man. Say, have you seen Eve?"

"Yeah, she said she would be waiting for you on the roof. Something about wanting to look at the stars. I got the feeling something was on her mind."

"Yeah, mom said something might be. Well, I'm gonna get on that. Need anything else?"

"Nah, how does Friday sound?"

"Works for me. It'll be a night to remember."