7Harry Potter and the Fractured Veil
Chapter 2:
Universe: I G Y - 6 5 9 - 0 3 2
Location: Downtown London
Date: June 5th 2004
Harry potter stood before the shattered window he just flung the desiccated remains of a then still living Fletcher through moments earlier. Imagine his surprise when whoever was unfortunate enough to be standing below as the disassembled bones, organs or worse rained down on the streets below laughed hysterically. As bad as the world as he knew was, raining gore was still NOT a source of good humor.
His cuiosity piqued, he stepped through the broken window and hung out of by one hand to survey the world beyond and gasped.
London. Alive. With people walking the streets. ACTUAL people, not hordes of undead. Not mad shades brought back into unlife upon the earth. No endless dust storms of grey ash and darkened skies. A living, breathing world with PEOPLE!
He knew, somehow knew, that he wasn't dreaming and knew this wasn't another time anomaly brought by HER incessant nihilistic experiments. Unless she altered the timeline so dramatically that it created a world of only wizards, because that's what this was. London looked like what would happen if Diagon alley grew like a tumor and consumed it all. Witches and wizards walked the streets, flew the skies on their contraptions of choice, and magic was all that could explain the impossible architecture, virbrant banners and tarps of all kinds making up shopping stalls on all levels of the layered city, and the noisiness of it all.
The Weasley house was more architecturally sound than the hotel down that street. And was that... yup, that was a walking, chicken-legged house. Baba Yaga must have been in town.
He turned back into the room with the two nice ladies he loved dearly and the an whose jaw and throat were... somewhere.
Noting that Gabrielle seemed somewhat more conscious than the metamorph, and past experience telling him she's easier to get information from, he made a beeline for her bed and sat down. Only now did he recognize the enslavement chains. Goblin forged artifacts they normally only use on their kind. It was like a full bottle of vodka being injected right into your veins at all times, just pure disorientation and destruction of mental faculties to make even the idea of escape or resistance impossible. IT combined well with the imperius, which he had no doubt they would be under.
It would probably be easier to break the imperius before trying to remove the shackles.
Fortunately the imperius was the simplest spell in the world to break. You just have to cast a new imperius on the victim, one more powerful than the one originally cast, then cancel it. Couldn't be easier. Unless somebody like Voldemort or Dumbledore had personally cast it, but Harry sincerely doubted that.
Deciding not to take any chances, he withdrew the Elder wand from his inner cloak pocket.
"Imperio!" He incanted, pointed his wand right between the young woman's eyes.
He felt his control slide over and the telltale rush of power and euphoria rise up his arms.
"Mites." He said next, the less-well known cancellation incantation for the imperius. The Nox to its lumos.
Now onto the chains. This part was going to be significantly more difficult, for her at least. Being the kind man he was, he stunned her before beginning his amateur surgery. A quick set of cleaning charms on her and the surrounding bed and he was ready to begin. Holding her limp hand with his free one and propping her forarm against his wrist, he managed to coax his want into
"Sectumsempra Coagula." He intoned the altered cutting curse.
The coagula phrased tacked on at the end was to prevent bleeding. A nifty little spell add on for cutting and piercing curses and their varients as used by medical professionals. of course they used them very accurately in advanced surgeries and he just use it to cut off a young girls hand to remove a shackle, so he was about as much of a mediwizard as the field soldier was a doctor for dead medics scalpel to amputate his friend's mangled limb.
Keeping both the hand and forearm above the sheets to do as much as possible to avoid an infection he let the shackle slip off of her wrist and quickly brought her amputated hand back to her wrist. Trying ot hold the two pieces together withone hand was made easier by how tiny of a woman she was, and skinny from malnutrition on top of it. He drug the tip of his wand across the wound and began chanting.
"Vulnera Sanentur" Thank you snape. "Vulnera Sanentur"
And on his chanting went. He almost sang it, as was required for the counter curse. And this was the reason he chose it over the basic severing charm. The counter curse to the sectumsempra curse actually healed the wound. The diffindo didn't have a counter curse, on account of being a charm. Same for most medical spells. Really makes you think.
And yes, that is the only distinction between curses and charms. Curses have counters, and also usually don't do nice things, but sometimes charms didn't either.
The coagulated wounds fused together slowly but surely, and soon enough her arm was good as new. He repeated the process with her other hand and cast a pair of numbing charms on both. Oh yeah, she was going to feel that later.
Still working under the assumption that this wasn't a dream and that he needed answers he rennervated the silvery blonde. She came to quickly, her eyes snapping open to stare blankly at the ceiling. She blinked tiredly for a moment, lethargy from lack of real exercise could be a bitch.
She turned her head listlessly and, upon recognizing him, smiled.
"You came back for us." She said in a broken voice. "I knew you would. You always do."
"That's right." He lied, pretending to know what she was talking about. "Now, tell me. Do you know your name?"
"Gabrielle Delacour." She answered immediately.
"Gabby?! Little Gabby! I thought you were Fleur!" Harry said jokingly and enthusiastically. "My goodness you got so big! And yet so very skinny! Need to get you to Molly to fatten you up1"
She laughed, she really did, but it wound up in a choking cough. So he moved things along.
"But first, do you know where you are?" he pressed on.
Gabrielle was still blinking away her delirium and confusion, but recognition seemed to be dawning on her, and the disgust with it.
"Cage." She said. "Taken, with the other half-breeds immune to the plague, into slavery. Veela for... our most obvious designated purposes."
She looked around at the filthy room that reeked of sweat and other bodily fluids and Harry could tell memories of her time there were starting to return to her.
"Sounds like a whole lot of raping took place here, some of it involving you and Bellatrix over there." Harry summarized. "Is that about right?"
Gabrielle shivered and gagged at his words, but nodded, then sat back up abruptly.
"Wait... Who's belaltrix?" She asked, looking to the other bed. "That woman's name is Tonks. She is nice."
Harry looked back over at the chained woman and tilted his head.
"Andromeda?" He asked to try and get a response from her, but getting none he tried her real name. "Nympha..."
"Don't... call... zzzzz." Tonks tried to mumble a broken response before passing back out.
Well, she's definitely still in there. He ought to get her out of those chains too, but she looked too cute asleep, and he wanted to do a bit of hunting before babysitting. He turned back to Gabriella.
"Can you be a deer and keep watch over Tonks while I do some cleaning?" He asked. "I need to go have a talk with your coworkers and supervisors."
She flinched away at the malice and cheer in his declaration, and the obvious insinuations behind them both. He waited for her to nod in the affirmative before standing up and walking to the door. He turned back to see the girl still sitting helplessly in her own bed. She caught onto his staring pointedly at her but didn't seem to figure out what he wanted until he made a motion towards Tonks' bed.
When she finally stumbled over to comfort the other enslaved woman, he opened the door and stepped out, closing it behind him and casting the red x spell Hermione had once used in the department of mysteries.
He took in a deep breath through his nose, savoring the disgusting smell of the slave brothel and the sounds of moans crossed with cries from every direction. Straightening his rotted through clothes he stood up tall and pointed his wand to his throat.
"CAN A GUY GET SOME CUSTOMER SERVICE HERE OR WHAT?!" He shook the building with his sonorus charm amplified voice.
Telltale crashes and stumbling noises from all over the building followed his announcement of war.
A man came stumbling out of the next room, by the state of his barely on pants he was probably just a John, but he was a good enough fuckwad to start with.
"Accio."
Fun fact, you cannot summon living things nor any part of them. But you CAN summon the clothes they are attached to and bring them in for a high-speed chokeslam. Of course Harry doesn't do plain old chokeslams, hence him apparating fifteen feet into the air above the building and ten feet horizontally to the edge of the building to choke slam him down onto the outer wall, allowing the stone ledges, metal guards along the windows, and breaking windows themselves the shred him to pieces.
Harry had nailed the distance perfectly as he was just beyond the door and only had to worry himself with casting a simple arresto momentum as the ground became uncomfortably close and the remaining bits of human being in his grasp grew smaller.
Now on the first floor instead of the third and outside of the establishment he intended to bullzone instead of inside, he remedied the latter by flattening the exterior wall and walked through the cloud of dust and shattered stone, splinters and dust into a common room of sorts. It was lined with more beds that contained chained men and women, and a few boys and girls to boot, all in the process of actively being abused.
Harry turned his wand on an elderly woman who just crawled off of a boy no older than fourteen and began his slaughter anew.
"Diffindo, Avade Kedavra, Evisceria, Castrata Erupto, Sangui Glacius..." After the fifth 'person' fell dead he paused to take in an exaggerated yawn, seemingly ignoring the two overly muscular brothel guards who charged in with wands raised, before casually continuing his good works. "Sectumsempru."
The spell rips through not only the two guards, but also the entire ten-meter-long wall, demolishing it entirely. He was worried he might have accidentally brought the whole building down - shoddy craftsmanship - but the lack of multi-ton building crashing onto his head assuaged him of that fear.
"Wow, really goes to show the importance of paying more for a decent carpenter am I right folks?" harry asked to the room.
The fresh corpses remained silent and the chained, drugged slaves moaned pitifully.
"Hm. Rough crowd." He said sardonically before waving his wand at the room at large.
The thick layer of dust, splinters and particularly glass he had created from his carnage to date all levitated into a wispy cloud at his chest. With this weapon at the ready, he marched out into the hallway and towards the first door he could find.
"Housekeeping." He yelled after knocking on it once.
The shotgun shell that blew through the door where he knocked came as a bit of a surprise to Harry. The animated cloud of crushed glass and splinters he sent back through it came as an even bigger surprise to whoever had fired said shell. The screams of the shitbags inside dying painfully as particles of silicate and wood filled their lungs were sweet, sweet music to his ears.
He made sure to keep the cloud near head level so as not to accidentally kill any slaves tied down though. He wasn't a monster.
His housekeeping went on for a few more minutes. He vanished all ruined furniture he came across and scrubbed clean the walls and floors of dirt, grime, feces and worse with his sourgify variant of his choice. He didn't encounter many more customers or employees of the fine establishment. What few he did encounter he dispatched dispassionately with boring old killing curses. These men and women neither knew how to dodge nor aim and were all rather sickly. Black pustules and varicose veins covered most of their exposed skins and Harry didn't like the look of any of it.
The only people unmarred by whatever sickness seemed to be affecting everyone were the prisoners, who were notably nonhuman. Veela, werewolves and half-breeds made them up in their entirety. Much like the muggle sex slave trade there was a similar number of people of both sexes. It also implied that he, as a pureblood(ish) wizard was probably not immune... Would a werewolf bite serve as innoculation against whatever these people had?
He'd resort to that later if the need arose. He wasn't THAT averse to having to lose three days of his life every full moon. With the right dose of wolvesbane and pcp he could spend it wrecking vampire shit until no more vampires. Lemon? Meet lemonade.
With his cleaning duties done he returned to the room where he'd left Gabrielle and Tonks. Seeing that they were both in the same state he had left them he closed the door behind himself and took a seat on the unused bed.
"So. What's this about a plague?" He asked without preamble.
He studiously ignored the scared look on Gabrielle's face.
Universe: G Y A - 0 5 8 - 3 3 3
Location: Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Great Ha
Date: October 30th, 1994
"If this is an elaborate prank, it is a rather sick one." Dumbledore finally said after digesting what the woman claiming to be Lily Potter had said.
His office was more crowded than it had ever been before. All four of his heads of houses, Alastor Moody, Cornelius Fudge, Amelia Bones, Rufus Scrimgeour and the grey-robed head Unspeakable for the Department of mysteries Death and Time divisions were clogging up the standing area. There was barely enough space for the two Harry Potter's, Lily and Voldemort to sit down in their chained chairs and half a dozen wands at the ready pointed in their general direction.
The discomfort was amplified by the half hour half of them had loitered silently as they waiting for the emergency summons for two of the busiest people on the planet, Head Unspeakables Time and Death, to drop what they were doing and rush to Hogwarts. It took the combined political might of the Supreme Mugwomp and Minister of Magic to do this, and nothing else would have.
Amelia and Rufus had arrived just in time for Time to pronounce that were, in fact, not time travelers and Death to confirm they were, in fact, not undead. When the two head Auror's then confirmed they weren't under the effects of any form of disguise they could all only conclude they were who they claimed they were. Which was pretty much impossible, even by Albus' standards.
"You must know, your story is hard to believe?" Minerva said consolingly. "Even with the supporting evidence."
"What's worse." Said Severus. "If they are indeed from alternate universes, we cannot verify their identities by merely questioning them on things only they should know."
"Well Sev, let's test that shall we?" Lily said cheerly and overly fondly to the potions professor. "Did you and I kiss underneath the old pier and get so grossed out by it that we didn't talk to each other for the rest of that summer?"
Severus stared at her with a look of horror as the Voldemort look-alike howled with laughter so genuine Albus couldn't believe for one second that he was actually Voldemort. Further confirming his suspicion.
"Now, with Snivellus put back into his place and sufficiently distracted from his eternal desire to fuck my mother, can we get back to the issue at hand?" The Voldemort doppelganger said. "We have a universe destroying being of godlike power rampaging across the multiverse and he is after US. We should probably get on top of that."
Severus wisely left the room as Lily mirrored her serpentine son's laughter.
"Harry Potter?!" Minerva asked in surprise as the man revealed his identity.
"Hi, Professor." Harry said bashfully.
"What in the world happened to make you look like that monster?!" Minerva continued her line of enquiry.
"Oh, um... I kind of ate him." He said.
The whole room turned to stare at him in silence. Even the portraits of headmasters past broke character with their fake snoring as they tried to contemplate what Harry had just said in shocked silence.
"He made it pretty easy, breaking himself into SEVEN," He yelled the word looking pointedly at Albus " bite-sized pieces."
Albus nodded his understanding to the man and put the pieced together.
"So, you destroyed all six of his pieces, but because of the seventh one in your scare you merely absorbed them instead of destroying them?" Albus verified, ignoring the questioning and suspicious looks everyone.
The elder Harry Potter present nodded int he affirmative.
"You." The head unspeakable of the Death department said with an accusatory finger pointed at Albus. "Will be reporting to my office at the ministry after this. And YOU." This time he pointed at Harry " will tell us everything about your universe."
Albus nodded his surrender and Harry relented.
"So, we're actually just accepting that these are visitors from a different universe?" Amelia asked disbelievingly.
"Universes, plural." Said the Head Unspeakable of Time. "And yes. We have encountered beings from alternate universes before, usually just mirror universes where everything is exactly the same except for orientation - hearts on the right side, pancreas on the left - and they usually just pop back to their original universes in time. Usually. But this is the specialty of the Space division. We've never encountered beings from universes so radically different to our own."
The eldest Harry retook the floor while everyone digested that.
"Well, first of all, I think we should get names in order. With three Harry Potters in this school, we need proper nomenclature for distinguishing us." He said. "I go by Pottermort, a hilarious nickname, I know. You can thank Remus for that one. The kid there should just be called Harry. Your Harry in the mirror should just be referred to as mister Potter. Is this acceptable?"
Everyone merely shrugged and nodded. It was reasonable.
"Great, now. Mister Time." Harry said, addressing the cloaked unspeakable. "Will my telling about events in my universe that occur in your future adversely affect the timeline here?"
"Nope." Time said simply.
"... You seem quite sure." Pottermort said as if to plead for a more detailed explanation.
"I am." Time said, refusing to elaborate further.
"Okay... Well, in that case." Pottermort said, turning on Alastor. "In my universe Alastor Moody was kidnapped by Peter Pettigrew and a strangely alive Barty Crouch junior, the latter of which then impersonated him for the entirety of the school year under polyjuice potion. He hoodwinked the Goblet of fire into taking a fourth champion and slipped my name in, forcing me into the tournament."
Everyone slowly turned to Alastor at that pronouncement. Moody stared at the boy in surprise but slowly raided his hands in surrender.
"He kept polyjuice on himself at all times in a flask and held the real Moody captive in a locked box in his office."
Albus nodded to Filius who fled the room, presumably to Moody's office like he intended. In the meantime, Pomona patted Alastor down and sure enough, found a silver flask on his waistcoat. She brought it up to her nose and opened it, taking a deep breath. She then made a confused frown and smelled it again. A split second later she shocked everyone in the room by taking a swig from it and smacking her lips.
"Mmm! That's quite good. What is this, Alastor?" Pomona asked cheerily.
"A fine little concoction I make at home." The grizzled Auror said. "Just some whiskey, broth and apple cider vinegar brought to a boil with a vegetable of choice, usually beets and red cabbage."
Pamona took another sip of the disgusting-sounding concoction.
"Just regular bone broth?" She asked.
"Nope. I use a nifty little product called Better than Boullion. It's a condensed base you can get from any store and lives up to its name. One teaspoon makes an entire bowl of soup." Alastor explained, turning on Pottermort. "Now what's this about Peter Pettigrew and Barty Junior being alive?"
"Pettigrew was the secret keeper for my parents, not Sirius." Pottermort explained. "He faked his death when Sirius went after him and went into hiding in his animagus form, a rat missing one finger. In my third year Sirius Black found out he was alive and escaped from Azkaban to hunt him down, succeeding. I was there and convinced him to spare the wretches life. He escaped and later rejoined Voldemort."
"Sirius is in Azkaban?!" Lily asked in a panic.
"Indeed." Said Rufus Scrimgeour. "Should he not be?"
"Pettigrew was the traitor in my universe too." She explained. "I killed him myself after Voldemort killed my husband and child from his betrayal, and never set foot in a courtroom for it."
"Mine too." Said little Harry from where he huddled beside Lily's skirt.
The room turned to him.
"He... Uncle Peter was captured by You-Know-Whoand gave the secret, but escaped and came back to warn us, with uncle Sirius and Lupin. Dad, Sirius and Remus all died fighting him, but... they saved mom and me."
Albus absorbed this new information and sighed deeply.
"Three universes with a common factor sets a trend." Albus said, turning to Amelia and Rufus. "I think you should open an inquiry and interrogate mister Black on this matter. Mister Pottermort, do you know where Peter Pettigrew hid during those years?"
Pottermort sat up stock still with a look of horror in his eyes.
"HERE!" He said. "He is here, now! In the castle. He is the pet rat of Ronald Weasley, hiding and waiting for Voldemort to return."
"Scabbers?" Minerva clarified.
"YES!" Pottermort confirmed.
Albus turned to Minerva with a commanding look. She nodded and left.
"Ask Fred and George to borrow their map to find him if he isn't in the dorms." Harry said, at the questioning glances he added "Ask them and find out."
Lily turned to look at him questioningly and the young man nodded.
"Yeah. The pair pilfered it from Filch's office." He confirmed. "Later passed it onto me."
"Wicked!" She breathed mischievously.
Albus cleared his throat to get their attention and motioned for him to get back to the story at hand.
"Oh, um... Barty Junior?" He asked.
"Barty Junior." The room growled back as one.
"His mum and dad visited him in Azkaban, sick and dying mom polyjuiced as him and him as her. Dad snuck him out, kept him drugged and Imperios'd in his basement ever since. Escaped earlier this year, at least, in my timeline." He explained simply. "During the Quidditch cup actually. Cast the dark mark over the stadium after the game. Did that happen here too?"
"No." Said Amelia, but she still turned heel and marched to the fireplace all the same.
A quick handful of Floo Powder and utterance of "Crouch's office" and she was gone.
That woman did not like to waste time.
"Any other world-shattering revelations to share today?" Time asked rhetorically.
"Chamber of Secrets?" He asked.
"Dealt with." Albus said without preamble.
"Prophecy?"
"Safe in the Department of Mysteries." Said Time.
He went into thought for a moment.
"How are Ron and Hermione? And how did I get shoved into the mirror of Erised?" He asked. "I'm guessing it happened in first year with your trials on the third floor we demolished?"
"Worrying endlessly about you." Said Albus, smirking at the intentional hubris the young man put into his question. "And correct. As to how, we have been trying to figure that out ever since it happened. Near as we can tell, Quirrell.."
"Quirrelmort." Pottermort corrected.
"Quirrelmort." Albus smiled at the correction. "Cast an ill-advised killing curse at your counterpart while he held the stone. Somehow this reversed the enchanted on the mirror into reabsorbing the stone, with Harry still holding it. The killing curse undoing the enchantment releasing the stone makes sense. But the mirror reabsorbing a person as well as the stone? We do not know why, but we think it had something to do with the sacrificial protection interacting with the stone."
Pottermort nodded.
"Did his killing curse rebound and hit him right in his face?" He asked.
"Oh yes. And before you ask, yes, I can show it to you in a pensieve." ALbus confirmed.
'Didn't need to be a master legilimens to know I was going to ask that, did you?" said Pottermort. "In fact, we should probably get a few pensieves. Mum, me, me and I can each provide a separate memory of events for interested parties to check out. I'll provide yours, Albus. Then one for the DMLE, one for the Unspeakables and... would anybody else need one?"
"No, that should do it." Rufus said. "If Mrs Potter would provide one for the DMLE and Mr Potter, from the mirror, provide one for our Unspeakable friends that may be best."
"How many people of different universes did you say were forced into this battle rotale?" Time asked.
"About a hundred, and none knew each other as you know each other. It may be safe to assume each was of a different universe entirely." Pottermort said. "I am fairly certain all but the five of us died."
"Five?" Albus asked, eyebrow raised.
"Yeah. Me, me, me, mum and..." Pottermort said, before pausing. "I swear there was somebody else.
"Your missive said four interlopers as well, Albus." Death said, withdrawing a letter. "We have four individuals who cannot be in the great hall of Hogwarts. come immediately to ascertain if any necromancy is at play for two of them. Four plus our Harry makes five."
Albus took the missive he himself had sent. Indeed, it said four individuals.
"Is it possible you counted our Harry as one?" Pomona asked.
"Maybe..." Albus said concernedly. "That or there was a fifth person among them, and we all somehow forgot?"
"Impossible!" Cornelius finally piped up.
How the man had managed to contain his disbelief at all of these revelations up until this point was a mystery even to Albus. Though he suspected the much greater and more knowledgeable individuals in the room made him deferential up to a point.
"You-Know-Who being alive is hard enough to believe, let alone all the rest these supposed visitors have said." Cornelius claimed. "But somebody being capable of obliviating everyone in this room without anybody noticing or stopping them?"
Lily butted in.
"I don't know. We saw people with abilities I would have considered impossible up until a day ago during that battle." She explained. "A person capable of obliviating an entire Great Hall of people, or at least this room? Well within my definition of possible at this point."
"But who?" Cornelius asked. "Who could possibly be so powerful in the mind arts as to obliviate not just all of us, but Albus Bloody Dumbledore and his faculty, which includes three masters of the mind arts?"
Nine-year-old Eileen Snape skipped through the halls of the magic castle humming a happy tune.
Her matted red hair and tattered, dirty dress drew stares from cleaner or posher of the students who apparently went to school here. Especially the green ones, although even the occasional green and silver students would stop her in her journey and question her. They and the other teens with vibrantly-colored ties would ask the same things as adults always did.
"Why are you barefoot?" Or "Oh my goodness, you're filthy. What happened?!" Or "Where are your parents? How did you get in here?!"
She ignored them and walked along, knowing full well that they would forget her entire existence the moment they could no longer see, hear or touch her. Just like everybody always did.
But this castle! With its moving staircases, talking paintings, ghosts and flying objects? This castle didn't forget her. With each footstep she could feel it feeling her. Looking at her. She only pumped into a harshly-edged railing once before all railings in her path became smoothed and softened to her touch until she pathed.
She liked this castle. This castle was kind. This castle remembered. Not like people.
"Oh! Did Nargles steal your shoes disappear too?" A dreamy voice said from behind her.
Eileen turned around and came face to face with... the most beautiful fairy she had ever imagined.
"Your parents are supposed to protect you from them though." The fairy girl went on. "Did you get separated from them? Are they enrolling you?"
For a moment, Eileen could only stare at the barefoot and golden-haired creature. And what lovely earrings! But she eventually answered.
"Mum and dad are in the principal's office. They haven't been together in a long time." She answered. "I hope they enroll me here. The castle is kind."
The fairy nodded knowingly.
"She is kind, yes. And attentive. But so very playful." Said the fairy. "She will take you on all the adventures you could ever want. I'm Luna, by the way. Would ou like to go soak your feet? Mine are cold and I think we could both use a warm soak. And then, we can go fetch your parents!"
Eileen didn't have enough time to answer before Luna took her by the hand and guided her down the hallway to their left. But if she had been given the time, she wouldn't have refused.
Luna dragged her down a hallway that might have been the fourth floor, but Eileen hadn't kept track. Soon they were at a door beside the statue of a confused-looking man and Luna said something to it. Eileen didn't quite catch it as she was preoccupied coughing something up. It took a few goes but eventually she spat out a nasty grey something and shuddered from the taste.
"Oh! Are you okay?" Luna asked. "That looked like it could have been boubutour puss."
Eileen didn't know what that was, so she shrugged and nodded to say she was okay.
"Good! This is the prefect's bathroom. My brother Cedric, well, not real brother, but neighbor. He is head boy and captain. He shares secrets with me." Luna explained as she opened the door.
Inside was a pool. An awesome pool! More like a giant jacuzzi with copper wiretaps. The walls and windows were like a church.
"Are all bathrooms in the school like this?" Eileen asked.
Luna shook her head.
"No." She said sadly. "But good girls get to become prefects, and prefects can use this one whenever they like!"
Eileen nodded. She could be a good girl. She'd done it before for short stints. She could do it for longer ones.
"Now, why don't we go inside to wash up? But leave the door open." Luna advised. "I'm hoping some prefects come by so we can ask for their help."
Eileen wasn't completely paying attention at that last bit. She was a bit preoccupied staring at the grey sludge she had just coughed up. After all, it wasn't every day your phlegm grew spindly legs and crawled away.
Universe: I G Y - 6 5 9 - 0 3 2
Location: Downtown London
Date: June 5th 2004
Harry whistled slowly at the end of Gabrielle's story and he busied himself with cleaning Tonks in preparation for her own surgically-imparted freedom.
A war with muggles ending in biological warfare. Hell of a way to end the world. genetically engineering a dragonpox crossed with the common flu and syphilis? Brilliant move. What's more, it would only affect wizarding, as Muggles were immune to dragon pox. As were most nonhuman magical creatures. The double pronged approach of the disease weakening its victims ability to due magic and driving them insane with the brain-eroding effects of syphilis must have seemed like a stroke of genius.
Until wizards found out and decided to return the favor of extinction with far more immediate and efficient means.
"What is the incubation period for the disease?" Harry asked. "Before I'm as mad as all these people?"
Gabrielle looked at him more suspiciously by the moment.
"A year for those of compromised health. Two for healthy individuals." She said. "Harry, what's wrong with you? Do you have amnesia? Has your mind been erased?"
Harry raised his eyebrows at the girl. Interesting conclusion to come to, and a reasonable one at that. He could lie and roll with it but decided to keep things above board.
"I am not your Harry Gabrielle." He said. "I am either a time traveler from a VERY different timeline or else a universe hopper. I'm leaning towards the alternate universe theory at the moment, but it's too early to tell."
He gave her a moment to digest this news.
"So is every wizard and witch on the planet effectively suffering from late stage neurosyphilis and madder than a hatter?" He clarified. 'And I have two years to come up with a solution?"
"With the exception of half-breeds and a few special cases, like her, yes." Gabrielle said, "And the diseased do not... like the non-diseased. Lock us away, or worse. They are mad, and weaker to the effects of Veela. Unable to control themselves but capable of the cruelty of beings with higher thinking."
Harry turned his head away fro mteh teen in order to scowl. He knew what was coming.
"Did you have to kill them?" She asked.
"No." Harry said, before turning around with a challenging grin. "I chose to. And would do so again in a heartbeat for what they have done and would continue doing to you."
To his surprise, she actually puffed up at his challenge and scowled at him.
"They could not control themselves. Not around us. They needed help. And you killed them." She accused.
"The chains, business of prostituting you out against your wills and more shows intent to me." Harry countered. "All of which make your insanity defense on their behalf untenable. I kill evil people. It is the only thing I enjoy in life anymore, and I deeply enjoyed doing so here, today. I promise not to do so with every infected , especially those clearly beyond the pale. But these ones?"
He motioned to the man with half a face on the floor.
"These ones were aware of their actions and your Veela Allure does not excuse them nor make you responsible for them or their actions." He declared.
She wilted beneath his glare, and her meek response was so quiet he barely heard it.
"But I cared about some of them." she said. "Years of knowing them like that? ou come to have feelings. Some... came to care for me and were tender..."
Harry openly gagged.
"Okay. This conversation is reaching levels of fucked-uppedness that I am not qualified to handle." Harry said before he heard much more. "When this is all said and done, I'll get you to a mind healer. But suffice to say, you are wrong, your feelings are wrong, I am right, and we have a LOT of shit to do. So I'm gonna go ahead and free Tonks here before moving onto the other prisoners if that's alright with you."
Gabrielle withdrew further away from him as he readied to cut off Tonks' hands.
"Now, is there anything else about your world I should be made aware of? Daily nuclear storms? Multiple dark lords warring? Biblically accurate angels turning cities to salt?" He asked half jokingly.
He lifted Tonks' left hand and readied to cast Snape's greatest invention when she ansered.
"Well, there's the Fool God?"
Harry put the woman's hand back down at her side and turned to Gabrielle.
"The WHAT?!" He demanded.
"Oh. Well, you know how poltergeists are made right?" She asked.
Harry nodded. An artificial being formed from the coalesced mischievous and madness of a place over time. Like Peeves with the madness and mischievousness of a thousand children and teenagers.
"Well... imagine what would be created if an entire planet suffered from syphilitic madness all at the same time." She said with a cutesy shrug. "And you'll get the picture. We call him the Fool God. Because everyone worships him... and he's a poltergeist."
Harry leaned back as he soaked in what she had just said. Then he leaned forward with his hands clasped together in a concenred expression. He stayed like that for a few moments before leaning back again. He repeated this error loop for a whole minute before he shook himself out of it.
"Well... fuck." Was all he could say.
"Welcome to our world." Gabrielle said consolingly. "Literally."
I tried to write each scene in the tone of the character it followed. I think I failed partly with Albus. I kept mixing Pottermorts tone with Albus' and it shows. but otherwise? nailed it! Especially with Eileen. Hope I captured her childlike wonder in describing the castle as a nine-year-old with the mental maturity of a five-year-old would.
Next chapter we get to see the Lily from little Harry's universe fight with the terminator, with help of course, and we get to see some other survivors of the Amaranth Sentire.
Amaranth Sentire:
Amaranth is a fictional flower that never fades. Often attributed to alchemical immortality.
Sentire means sensor. Same root as a sentinel, but instead of just watching with eyes and guarding, a sentire uses all senses.
So, Amaranth Sentire means Eternal Watcher or Immortal Watcher.