Chapter 3
Chapter 3
Perhaps it hadn’t been the smartest thing to upend all of the empty bullet casings all over the floor. Probably not his brightest moment when Harry hunted them all down and picked them up by hand rather than using his wand and magicking them all back in to the box.
Perhaps it was a good thing he had finished and put the box down on the desk before it dawned on him. Harry sighed to himself and slumped back in his chair as he stared at the box. Silently, he grabbed the lid and put it on top. A bit of movement out of the corner of his eye had Harry looking back up at the aquarium.
The red octopus had drifted in close. Its red body sticking to the side of the aquarium as it peered up at Harry with its bulbous eyes. Harry shifted and reached out to touch the glass where the suckers had latched on. The octopus shifted, seemingly nuzzling closer to the hand even though they were separated by glass. Harry shifted and pulled his hand away. If an octopus could look forlorn, Harry would bet that this octopus was feeling it.
“You are a nice shade of red,” Harry mumbled to himself, even as he glanced back to his desktop. Well, he had gone through his clues and he didn’t find much about the person he had been under the graft. Harry glanced over his shoulder at the suit, before he turned to the motorcycle. It was still toy-sized, but it looked big. Harry glanced at his room and decided to unshrink the vehicle once he found a nice open space. It was nice to think that he finally fulfilled his ambition of learning how to ride a motorcycle, even if he couldn’t remember such a thing.
Harry regretfully pulled the books closer.
He paged through the table of contents of his history books. Of course, an hour of staring at his pages didn’t help the fact that apparently three years after he gave his handlers the slip, there had been a goblin war against wizards. Harry hesitated to even look in to that further. Seeing the bank was more than telling enough that the goblins had lost terribly. It smelled like trouble, and Harry just knew that he didn’t want to stir this hornet nest. (But did that mean he should just let sleeping dogs lie?)
Harry took some time to pace, stretch, pop out and get some sustenance (a quick snack from the bar)—and then forced himself to sit down and really gather some information.
The Great Goblin Galumph, as it was called. (Harry squinted at the word ‘Galumph’ and had to wonder if that was a wizard made word or an actual word.) The book only dedicated a few pages to that, and didn’t go in to explicit detail other than stated that the goblin nation’s self-importance and self-entitlement had brought down the might of the ministry and inevitable hostile takeover. The goblins were ousted and human bankers were set in to place. In fact, the bank was the largest place of employment for squibs—where the Aurors were security, and enchanted objects were used to make up for the squibs’ lack of magic.
Harry didn’t know how to feel about this. He didn’t have the best relationship with the goblins, but for the goblins to be taken out the way that they were? It sounded awful.
This was also a system that had been in place for a few decades, too.
It seemed to be working?
Hermione Weasley nee Granger became a very famous political activist. While she never made it to the chair of minister of magic (despite campaigning at least two times) she had been minister in all but name due to her political clout and how much she shaped society with new bills, laws, and the general distribution of knowledge. That was the sum Harry got from the paragraphs he glanced through under Hermione’s chapter title. He didn’t dare go to the end of her chapter, and flipped over to the next one. To the chapter under his own name. A significantly shorter chapter. A single page.
Harry got a tiny blurb in the modern history book. Killed on the job—not even a ‘MIA’ stamped down. He had just been put down as ‘killed’.
… that seemed terribly fishy. Harry leaned back in his chair, even as he squinted at his page.
Harry frowned. His ‘handlers’ he was said to have given the slip. But they had declared him dead rather than missing? If they had said he was missing, then perhaps it would have been easier to find him with more people? Unless… unless in his altered state, he knew something that the unspeakables couldn’t take the chance of spreading. Harry pressed his lips together, his stomach fluttering in nervous tension as he thought back to his re-arrival back to the wizarding world.
None of this seemed very… good.
Harry just—he had to know what had happened. “Even if I have to hunt down everyone I ever met…” Harry quietly vowed to himself. Maybe it wasn’t that his memories had been lost, so much as they had been forcibly destroyed. Harry dropped his face in to his hands and spent a moment just to rock back and forth. Harry had always had a strong gut instinct, all of his life. But it was making him jittery now, especially when he didn’t know what exactly was throwing him off so thoroughly.
He was here, alive and now, in an era beyond his friends. (He refused to believe that anyone had… passed, from old age. He refused to even look. He didn’t dare. Harry knew that it would be just too much. Too much too soon.) Harry understood that even just the absence of the driving force of good could let evil in. And all those he had trusted had either retired or—(not going to think about that).
“What’s the peacock for?” Harry blinked at his hands, and then hooked the book closer to search for that answer.
Apparently, it was donated during the prosperous reign of Scorpius Malfoy when the boy attained the seat of Minister of Magic. He lasted three terms before he joined the International Federation of Wizards. Teddy Lupin succeeded him, and held the title of longest reigning Minister of Magic. The peakcock was to be the new symbol of the Malfoy line, or so it says.
Harry scoffed, as if he could attribute anything but a skull to the family. Even Draco Malfoy. Still… Draco Malfoy was old and feeble now. And apparently Scorpius wasn’t too terrible a person. Albus had had good taste even at a young age it seemed for friends. Harry raised a hand and put pressure against his eyes with his palms.
He warred with himself. To find out more about this segment of history… or to focus on himself.
In the end—it was a bit of both. He was obviously out of the wizarding world for a long, long time. And the Wizarding World had advanced to the point where it could catch him. And somehow he didn’t age in the between years.
… why had they let him go? Why wasn’t he attached to some table somewhere?
Harry had to find out.
Being a curious boy had always been a problem for him. And being a curious man wouldn’t help him either. Harry eyed his wand on the bed. As great as the purple hair was as a disguise… he should probably change things up. Change it up… and slip back in to the ministry.
The Unspeakables made the mission he had been on. The Department of Mysteries wasn’t that hard to break in to… when one had an invisibility cloak.
“Aw fuck.” Grumbled Harry. Complication after complication!
“Okay little octopus… first thing is first! We’re going to break in to the Department of Mysteries—somehow—and then we’re going to find out all we can about what they had me do. And what they did to me.” Harry held up one finger to the octopus. And Harry could swear that the octopus was watching his hands intently. It was almost eerie how fixated it was on him, and Harry wiggled his fingers in front of the octopus and watched the thing dance its tentacles around in some kind of mirror response. Harry felt better talking about his plan out loud, but was also a bit weirded out by the pet. But he was thankful that the octopus was there, because if nothing else it wasn’t crazy as long as someone was listening. Or, was it he wasn’t crazy as long as he was actually talking to someone?
(Animals counted as ‘someones’.)
“Well, even before that… New disguise! In order to look not like me…. Red hair sounds nice.” Harry touched at his short hair. The purple wasn’t so bad. He was actually getting used to it, really. A quick glamor would be fine for this. And… Harry eyed the leather motorbike suit.
“If I had a helmet, I wouldn’t even bother with the glamor.” Harry grumbled.
And dropped his hand in to his face. “And I’m a wizard!” It was like Hermione’s witch moment during the gambit to save the philosopher’s stone! He was a wizard and he could make a helmet!
Or, well, Harry thought he could. He went through five failed attempts of helmet construction from his pillow before having to give it up as a bad job. He’d never actually handled one before… attaching a hood to his motorcycle suit would just have to do. Harry ran his fingers over the rips, and vowed to learn some household spells to fix things like this. Ginny had—Harry inhaled sharply and shook his head. Nope. He wasn’t going there. Not yet. Not when there were things that needed to be done. Harry checked himself in the mirror. Suit and glamor in place. He transfigured his scrubs from the day before in to a nice cloak that would cover his suit.
“Okay. Steps to plan one have been successful. So, disguise is good. Now… I have a whole day. To, um, loiter…” Harry trailed off and dazedly looked out the window of his hotel room. As if he would try to get in to the ministry during the day. Of course he was going to go at night! Just like before. And just like before, he had a bit of a mess of a plan to somehow make it so he accomplished something. Harry found his wand and slipped it in to the tight sleeve of his motorcycle suit.
He carefully re-packed his things in to his bag, thankful for the wizard space. When he got to the aquarium, well, his Octopus was making a sad face at him. “Don’t look like that,” Harry cringed, even as he nudged one end of the aquarium in to his bag. “It’s just for a day, okay? After this, we’ll go to Germany.” That’s where it was said his mission had taken place. He would confirm the location once he got his hands on his file.
(Even the unspeakables had to have files. They were still a department. Even if the files never left the department—right?)
“After all… Octopus uh… little guy? Yeah, little guy—we’re just going to double check, nick something… I think this is what Hermione always talked about. My refusal to listen to authority and follow the general laws.” Harry murmured as he nudged the aquarium in to the bag and buckled it shut. He shouldered the bag and drew the cloak around himself so it covered himself and the bag.
He looked in to the mirror, “well, having a hunchback will help the disguise.” Harry swished his wand and added some grey strands to his hair and wrinkles to his face. He chuckled and added a bigger nose just for fun. With that, he did one last check over the room.
Oh, right.
The guns. Harry paused before he stuck the two pistols that had remained on the desk in to the large pockets of his suit. His bag was already on his back, and he would just put it away later. His bank card went to the zipper pocket on his chest. Best not to lose that.
In fact—Hermione was always going on about being prepared. Perhaps Harry should do the same. He had the whole day to get ready in case things went wrong. And get some potions. Harry would find out the history behind his scars and erase them, so he needed to get something that would do that.
Harry cleared the room of all traces of himself, and strolled on down to the bar of the Leaky Cauldron. It was closer to lunch than breakfast, so he got himself a nice hot meal and listened to the conversation around himself in the pub. Nothing really interesting was being spoken about (was Harry hearing about Cauldron bottoms again? Percy had always been going on about that, had no one ever investigated that? Harry snorted, that was silly) and Harry kept his eyes down and to himself.
But a flash of familiar red out of the corner of his eye had him minutely turning his head to the side. There was a sizeable squad of ten Aurors clustered around the barkeeper. She eventually pointed to the stairs of the second floor. Harry kept his face toward his food, but watched how all but one of the Aurors camouflaged themselves, and the one non-camouflaged one walked to the stairs.
A grim faced Frank.
That… could only mean one thing. Harry placed his coins on the table and smiled to the lady behind the bar. He lowered his voice to something thick and gave her a slurred thanks before he fake ‘limped’ from the bar to go out the back and in to the alley.
Well. Harry didn’t believe in coincidences. And he could only guess the squad was for him. And no one looked ready to celebrate. Once out of sight, Harry forwent the limp and looked around the alley.
Okay.
Quick plan.
He spotted a cash machine with a short line near the alley entrance. Harry got in to the line and scrambled to bring out his money folder. He flipped it open and cursed as everything dropped to the floor and scattered. Harry used his old-man-voice to thank everyone that scrambled to help, and laughed at their easy smiles and gathered everything back in his arms. He fished for the pamphlet that told him how to work the cash machine.
Scrawled on the back of the pamphlet was a tiny message.
‘Get out’.
It sent chills down his back. Why hadn’t he noticed that the night before?
Harry’s hands didn’t shake as he inserted his card and his PIN. Get as much as possible seemed like the best idea for things, really. He opened his bag and got his enchanted shoebox full of bullet shells, and let the galleons pour in to it. Until he switched to notes, and he just stuffed that on top as much as he could. Until the numbers ran low. People were giving him strange looks.
He stuffed everything in and scampered off with determination. He turned a few corners, dropped the folder and card in to the trash—and changed the glamor to have black hair and a small pointy nose. No wrinkles. A dark purple cloak instead of red…
Harry could do this.
After all, how hard was it to evade some Aurors for a day?
The Granger library came to mind.
Harry checked his bag and charmed the bag to a black color. And then took off at a jog. The Department of Mysteries would be his objective for the night. For now, it was time to pray that he hoped they thought he absconded in to the muggle world the night before. Of course, the fact that there were Aurors clearly stationed outside of the Granger library had Harry checking a pretend watch and doing a turn-about to go in the opposite direction.
Okay. Well. Harry Potter would obviously go there.
In fact… there were a lot of Aurors everywhere. Harry could spot the reds of their uniforms easing through the light crowds and headed in the direction of the Leaky Cauldron. Harry took a deep breath and let it out slow. He glanced to his hands and found them steady.
“Well… I’ve always done well flying by the seat of my pants.” Harry grumbled to himself.
To the ministry, then.
It was terribly easy, sneaking in to the Department of Mysteries. The ‘back door’ to the Auror department was still there, although rather thickly coated with dust. Harry suspected that it had not been used in a long, long time. Perhaps it had even been forgotten in the grand scheme of things. A quick twist of his wand had Harry looking like an Auror, a plain face situated on him as well as a few enchantments for anyone who spotted him to ignore him.
It was where you were most comfortable at, the ministry. It was supposed to be a safe place. From what Harry had gleaned, the wizarding world has been at peace for a while. The ministry had been safe once the corruption had been ousted in Harry’s time. Harry had made sure of that, along with Hermione, Ron, and the rest of his generation. This was a safe place, and Harry would gladly take their ease for granted to solve this mystery.
They were hunting for him—it didn’t feel so long ago that the ministry had been after him before.
(It stung that even Frank was hunting him now—)
The ministry was emptying for the lunch hour, and Harry slipped in to the lift behind a gossiping pair of secretaries and made his way down. Harry pressed himself against the back of the elevator and made his breathing slow.
“Did you hear about the new street ordinances?” The blond woman on the left asked the brown haired man at her elbow.
The man raised an eyebrow, “the one about the cars, yeah?”
The blond clapped her hands with a grin, “yes! How did you know I was talking about that one?”
“Well, you’ve only mentioned it over a hundred times since it was signed in to law three days ago.” The man must have rolled his eyes, but Harry couldn’t see his face.
The woman let out a breath of air and drew her shoulders up, “well! Excuse me, but I think that it’s great that they’re enforcing a quality control.”
The man hummed his acknowledgement as he shifted.
“Come on! When that Gracy Riggs hit that boy with her truck—that was a catastrophe!” The lift doors opened to the first underground floor, and the duo stepped out. Harry watched them go, “I mean, that little boy had to regrow an eye! It’s a good thing that Potter boy made that potion.” The woman went on, and Harry barely stopped himself from lunging out through the closing doors of the lift.
Harry let out a shaky breath before he used a finger to poke at the numbered panel to the side.
Down one floor.
Harry watched the doors open, and didn’t let himself hesitate to step out on to the dark tiles. This place was exactly like he remembered it. Harry shivered, and found that he wasn’t thankful for the temporal stability as he thought he would be. He glanced down once to the tiles under his feet, and got the disconcerting view of the seemingly black water moving under the tiles as the golden light of the lift disappeared with the shutting of the doors.
He looked to the walls, and found the same effect. The blue light of the torches was not helping the sea sick effect that he was getting. Harry inched a foot forward, and then another foot went forward—and he walked to the end of the hall quickly. Thank goodness for the silencing effect on his shoes, Harry’s twisting stomach would not be able to survive the sound of that in the void of sound that was the department.
The black door groaned after he shut it, and Harry closed his eyes against the spinning of the hall. Harry counted to ten and opened his eyes.
The blue candles and light did not help penetrate the gloom. Harry pressed his lips together, and resisted lighting the tip of his wand. At least he was smarter than when he was a teenager.
The first door led right to—the hall of prophecies.
Harry shut the door behind himself. He couldn’t truly see the depth of the room. But the walls were lined with shelves that were not as high as he remembered. But there were still orbs. Harry pressed a hand to his stomach, and if he wasn’t sure he wasn’t cursed, he would swear the sensation in his stomach and chest was someone else’s intent.
It felt like… a direction.
And it felt like… he should be quick.
Harry jogged forward. The door to another room should be close. He jogged for a bit, and followed the sensations. His instincts weren’t wrong too often, so Harry hoped that it was helping him here. And now. Harry slowly came to a stop when the feeling suddenly dissipated. Harry frowned as he looked around.
It caught him out of the corner of his eye.
‘HARRY POTTER’. Harry paused and looked on the little plaque again. Harry looked to the slots above his name and found… three.
Only the person whose name was listed could pull them out or risk madness.
Harry pulled the first one off. He stared at it a moment before he numbly let it drop and shatter. The sound was muffled, and Harry felt his head ache as he focused in on the soft glow of the little man that appeared. He was middle aged perhaps. He opened his mouth and—
“Harry Potter burns.”
And then he was gone.
Harry felt his breath hitch as he reached for the next one.
A woman came out of the shattered remains of this one.
“I prescelti sette.”
Harry stared at the glass graveyard at his feet. Was that even allowed? Prophecy in another language? Harry reached for the last one, and was about to let it tumble when he heard the brief snap of a door opening. Harry held his breath, and calmly stuck the last prophecy in to a pocket.
He nudged at the glass, gently sweeping it under a rack to hide the evidence against the least observant.
Right. He could freak out later. (Harry was starting to feel like he was deciding to freak out later was becoming a common decision for him. If he didn’t watch out, this was going to become a life choice rather than a snap decision.)
Harry took off on a jog.
Overall—things weren’t so bad.
Harry found a door and slipped through it. He slowly turned the handle and inched the door forward. It opened easily. Harry pressed his eye to the crack, and kept his ears open for behind him in case someone spotted him. The next room was… empty. Harry paused and pushed the door open.
Across the way was a door… in a room with no floor.
Harry inched a foot out and tapped the ‘floor’. Or he tried. It wasn’t just an invisible floor. It was just gone. Harry bemusedly looked down and squinted in to the dark. Well, this room went somewhere. Sometimes Harry wondered how wizards could be so frustrating. Still, Harry took a step back, and followed his instincts.
His body was all for jumping. So the rest of himself would just follow along for now.
If he couldn’t trust himself, he would be in a very bad place right now. (Don’t think, don’t let your mind go there—)
So he jumped.
Hopefully that file will be somewhere close.