Pack!

Chapter Forty Three

Harry ducked back into his room to grab his broom, coming back out to mount and lift himself to head height.  A quick Sonorus and a bellowed “Oi!” had silence spreading in a wave. He cancelled the Sonorus then asked, “Could someone, one someone, please, let me know what’s going on?” As it turned out, three quarters of the chatter had been people asking each other the same thing.  He grimaced when he realized he’d reacted as if he had the right to take charge of things, he wasn’t supposed to be doing stuff like this anymore.  Mentally he flicked a finger at his own forehead in silent reprimand.

Bill Weasley stepped up to answer, climbing onto a coffee table to make sure he could be seen and heard.  “Hello everyone.  My apologies for the confusion, but as you already know, things got weird this morning.” He paused as chuckles broke out at the understatement. “We haven’t meant to exclude anyone from the conversation, but it took some time to deal with the immediate situation. Once we had it contained, there was a lively discussion going on as to what the storm was, what the cubes were, and why it happened at all.  Until we had at least one of those answers worked out, there truly wasn’t any information we had to share.” Another pause as murmured conversation swelled, then quieted as he raised a hand to call their attention back. “We don’t have all the answers.  Or rather, we still don’t have any of the answers, but after kicking it about for the last few hours we think we have a pretty good guess on one of them. If that guess is correct, we needed to have a community wide emergency meeting so we moved everyone up here.  Taddy, would it be possible to serve something simple for dinner while we discuss the problem?  The great hall isn’t an option, for obvious reasons.”

Taddy soon had the room reconfigured, long tables and benches appearing with the other elves distributing platters of sandwiches and mugs of soup.  After everyone had food, Bill continued.  “To start at the beginning means starting with the elves.” All eyes turned to their nearest elf, each shifting uncomfortably under the stares. “Our elves had been working these past weeks to save the Hogwarts elves that hadn’t come with us.  And I know it’s Indicia Academy now, but it was Hogwarts then. For the purposes of this story, I’m going to continue using Hogwarts. So. Those who came with us were free elves who chose to bond to Remus, Harry, and Neville, and the Hogwarts elves who travelled with the main group were meant to follow us, just not right away. Our elves had talked to the Hogwarts elves once it was known that Hogwarts was going with us, and they came up with a plan.  That plan was disrupted after arriving here when our elves found that they couldn’t reach back to the Hogwarts elves. They’re not sure why, but knowing the people involved, our elves think Dumbledore likely altered the bonding ritual and bonded the Hogwarts elves personally, rather than to the castle.  Without knowing the exact situation the Hogwarts elves might be in, they didn’t know how much time they had to find a solution. If they were in a location that didn’t support elven magic, at most they had three months.  Worst case was maybe thirty days, so our elves were desperate.  They cobbled together a hybrid summoning and banishing ritual that should work to get the elves from there to here, but it had to be implemented on their end. They chose a Hogwarts elf they all knew personally, then pooled their magic and did their best to send the instructions through to them.  For those wondering, our magic isn’t compatible with elven ritual magic, so they didn’t see much point in asking us for help; they didn’t want to worry us if there was nothing we could do. They couldn’t tell if the information made it to the recipient, so they’ve been spending near all their time in the room they’d set up to channel the energy, sending again and again. Which brings us to this morning.

“Our elves are hoping the cubes were sent by the Hogwarts elves, and it’s the reason for the emergency meeting.  Not because of the arrival per se, but because the cubes may contain the elves themselves.” Bill broke off to let the crowd absorb that, then moved on. “But, and I’d like to stress that, we don’t know that for certain. It’s a possibility they came from somewhere else entirely and we would then have no idea what they contain, if anything. For all we currently know, the cubes could be a solid block. We haven’t been able to get any sort of analysis on the cubes themselves as our measures to render them safe to examine have taken an unexpected turn.” 

Bill apologetically looked at Harry, who nodded back in resignation before saying, “I know it’s not been widely known, and I’ll preface the following by saying I firmly believe they’re not a current danger: We have a number of gelatinous cubes that crossed over with us.” He hesitated, as if waiting for an outcry, but was only met with curious and expectant gazes. Bill didn’t know if they simply took him at his word or if they didn’t know the history of cubes and how capable they were at causing rather horrific damage on a whim. He continued with intent to reassure, “They’ve been very well behaved and supervised since they were found.  I know a few of you have encountered Bubbles during the past rainstorm, even if you didn’t know her name at the time. Many of you have also probably seen Kazoo, even if you didn’t recognize him for what he was; he seems to have permanently appropriated a space on Harry’s broom.” Gasps of recognition surfaced from those who had indeed seen him and dismissed him as some sort of ornament. “Pongo was in the hall when the cubes arrived and was asked to smother the electrical discharge on the first box, so we asked Doodle to handle the second.  Both are now securely enclosing the cubes, however our difficulty at the moment is that they won’t let go.”

*-*-*-*-

After opening the floor to discussion for half an hour, Bill then asked Harry to cover the personalities of Pongo and Doodle and how they’d responded to various requests since arrival, after which Bill asked for ideas on what might be causing the two cubes to refuse to release the blocks.  “No idea too ridiculous to consider,” he said.  Chatter started immediately and multiple ideas were enthusiastically tossed around for the next hour.

It was, oddly enough, Newt Scamander who asked the question that eventually supplied the solution, raising an aged hand to enquire, “Did you ask the cubes, that is, Pongo and Doodle?”  At the voluminous assurances that yes, they’d definitely asked the cubes to retract themselves, he continued on. “So you asked, and when they didn’t do as requested, you took that as a complete refusal and didn’t actually question them further?”  At the perplexed looks on Remus and Bill’s faces, he rolled his eyes and huffed, moving to elaborate. “They’re sentient to at least some degree as they complied with a request to engulf the box.  They can exercise a measure of reason and self control as they didn’t immediately eat the box they’d been asked to surround, and they allow Harry to handle them and ask things of them when they’re much better known for being negatively responsive to human poking and prodding.” He shifted to face Harry, “You’ve stated they have preferences, likes and dislikes, and based on your reporting, they have exhibited what I wouldn’t hesitate to label emotions. They must be able to communicate even if in a limited fashion, we simply need to determine a common vocabulary.” With that, he rose from his seat, pulling his grandson Rolf with him, and asked Taddy for a door to the Great Hall. 

Bill and Percy hastily rose to follow, calling for Harry to join them. Bill asked that the rest of the group remain in the room, they didn’t want to crowd Pongo or Doodle.  He also asked the elves to accompany them, just in case they were correct, and the Hogwarts elves had sent the cubes; they might need elven magic on hand. Percy waved to the gathering, assuring them he’d report back as soon as possible, before closing the door behind the small parade.

Once in the Great Hall, Newt asked Harry to please introduce him to Pongo and Doodle, which Harry did, albeit a bit awkwardly.  He felt ashamed to realize he’d been essentially treating them like he might a particularly clever hamster, and hadn’t given a thought to trying to have a conversation with them beyond basic housepet instructions. He cleared his throat and after the introduction sincerely added “-and I’m very sorry for not trying to communicate with you earlier, that was wrong of me.”  Both Doodle and Pongo pulsed a faint gold, in Doodle’s case it was a simple brightening of his usual aureate coloration. Harry had been interpreting that color as a sort of happy/thank you, and as he was standing nearest to Doodle’s crate, Harry stroked a finger along the nearest bit of Doodle he could reach. Mid motion, Harry halted, was he maybe being patronizing? “Er – sorry again, you might not like being petted. From now on, I’ll ask first.”

To everyone present’s absolute astonishment, Doodle curled a bit of himself around Harry’s hand, patting him back. Newt and Rolf immediately pulled out parchment to start making notes, Newt moving over to Pongo, talking to himself more than Pongo as he circled him, writing furiously.

“Oh aren’t you absolutely enchanting, just marvelous.  Look at that coloration, you’re gorgeous, you are. Are each of you unique in color?  Do you choose your own? We must sit down for a long chat, yes, yes we certainly must.  So many things no one has ever thought to ask you, you must have fascinating stories to tell. Just think of the things we can discover, you and I.” He stopped short, looking at Pongo with a slight head tilt, then slowly reversed his circle, walking his previous path backwards for a few steps. He took a step forward, then four steps back, six steps forward. “Well look at you, you have a spot following me!” Newt sounded delighted, reaching out a hand to Pongo and asking “May I?”  Pongo stretched up the bit of himself under Newt’s hand until the two touched, then Pongo gracefully flowed off the cube and up Newt’s arm to sit in his customary squared off shape on his shoulder, wiggling in what Harry took as excitement. Immediately, Harry’s heart skipped a beat or two in fear, then he relaxed when he remembered; Pongo wasn’t on Ms. Anderson’s list, he was safe.  He drew in a breath of relief at that because it was clear to see Pongo had found his person.

In contrast, Doodle wasn’t currently showing any signs of letting go of his cube, so the focus turned to the now uncovered cube, the elves standing by nervously. Remus and Bill both went going over it with a fine toothed comb and every detection spell they knew.  Between the two very smart and very experienced men, it took a long while to run through their combined list. After the last spell, the two huddled up, then sent a patronus back to the room for the WTF to join them, who, after arrival, sent another round of detection spells at the box. 

As they gathered into a cluster once again, with only Newt and Pongo moving off to the side of things, Percy was feeling rather superfluous and moved over to the second box, politely asking Doodle if he would’t mind letting go just a bit so he might take a look at the container?.  Without warning, Doodle let go, returning to his typical form and jiggling before bouncing a few times, springing onto Percy’s head.  Percy jerked in surprise, and Doodle fell, sliding down Percy’s arm, catching himself on his sleeve before winding himself into a wrist cuff. Percy raised his wrist. “Um. Mr. Scamander? Harry?  Help?  What do I do?”

Attention was now being pulled in several different directions as people and elves were chattering excitedly about the various phenomena of the last thirty minutes and they were all getting sidetracked. Bill sent Newt, Rolf, and Percy off to with orders to “Go commune with the cubes and fill us in later.” Harry’s reason for being there had been to help with Pongo and Doodle and that was resolved, so he was sent, decidedly unwillingly, back to the room, and the rest of the group turned their focus on the boxes. If the Hogwarts elves were in there, they needed to get them out. Caution was still very much called for though, this had the potential to get very dangerous very fast. Of course, they shouldn’t rule out that it might a box of nothing.

Sam Wiggenstein, in his typical “poke it with a stick to see what it does” behavior that had seen him assigned to the WTF team in the first place, pressed an ear to the side of a box, then knocked to see how the sound resonated.  He tipped arse over kettle when a return knock came from inside.  Everyone froze, regarding the crate warily.

Metaphorically, Bill hiked up his pants, moving to stand next to the box and tapping out the ubiquitous rhythm of “shave and a hair cut”. The universally expected reply of “six bits” came back, followed by a very hesitant sounding “Hello?  Harry Potter, is that you?”

One spell thrown over the crates and ten minutes later, everyone was once again clustered in the Great Hall, staring at Bill.  He’d thrown an immediate silence bubble on the crates at that most unexpected name coming from inside, dispatching the elves to herd everyone back to the Hall, where he’d just finished filling them all in.  “-to recap, it’s almost certainly a faction from the main group, but that wasn’t an elven voice. The other and much less likely possibility is that it might be a group that didn’t make out when everyone else did.  Highly improbable, but not impossible. There isn’t anyone else who’d know Harry.”

He gave a final look around.  “Is everyone in favor of opening the crates here and now?” 

Three hundred and seventy hands went up in unison.