HP (AU) : Wizard with a Mutation

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Hogwarts, Principal Chambers [1980]

–Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore–

He leaned back in his comfortable chair that didn't look even remotely comfortable, a quirk of his that he designed when he had first taken over this hallowed office. Back then, the chair of the Headmaster was ridiculously comfortable, yes, but also very over the top. Dippet sure loved his chairs, something about adequate lumbar support being the secret to life itself.

While he did not share the man's obsession with chairs and their appropriate support they should provide, that did not mean that he could not appreciate a nice chair. So, the very first thing, that he did when he took office was bring in the oldest, rattiest chair he could find in the Castle and made it his personal mission to make it as comfortable as possible, while maintaining its dashing, vintage looks.

"Alas…" He sighed as he rubbed his forehead. All he could do nowadays was reminisce, reminisce about the days when he had the magical and more importantly, the mental bandwidth to go about doing passion projects, even while holding multiple prestigious offices in Magical Britain.

Nowadays, his days were filled with meetings, war meetings, strategies, funerals, Oh the Funerals. He hated it, he hated it with all his might and yet, he was powerless to stop it.

Magical Britain had fractured under his leadership, that was the truth. It left an incredibly bitter taste in his mouth and yet, it was the truth. Despite holding on to more magical authority than any other single person in all of Britain, he had done…what?

Jack shit!

His magic roiled for a moment at the sheer anger he felt and then, he slumped, too tired to be even angry at himself.

TRILL

He smiled tiredly at Fawkes as his song did its best to calm him down and while it did calm his body and magic down, his mind was still there, reliving his failures as he failed to rein in the cracks that were widening more and more as the days went by. Even now, he noticed the cracks, the damage and yet, he was powerless.

Powerless to bring about any change. Frankly? Because he simply didn't know how to. He was not young anymore, he simply did not have it in him to bulldoze through every single person who would undoubtedly stand in his way, and then forcibly bring about change. He didn't have it in him to spill any more blood.

Even in the battle he was fighting with Tom, he was losing. Badly. Oh sure, he could directly match Tom spell for a spell, even with his old and battered body, but even then, Tom was not the root of the problem, just its most recent and visible symptom.

Magical Britain was on the precipice of Civil War. Everyone knew what Tom was talking about and while he appreciated the faith that was put in him to put down the Boogeyman that Tom has styled himself as, he did not have the confidence to truly achieve that feat.

No, that was not in his hands. He was simply too old, too tired, too weary, and too much of a FUCKING COWARD!

He took in deep breaths as he finally said it to himself, confronted himself about it. He was afraid of change and that was why he didn't do anything to save Magical Britain.

"It was me…" he whispered to himself, horrified, tears streaming down his face, as he realised that it was him.

Albus fucking Dumbledore, the Vanquisher of Grindelwald, was responsible for what was happening nowadays. Just yesterday, they lost yet another noble house, simply because they didn't vote for the bill to have Muggleborns to be treated as Magical Animals and to corral them into habitats upon detection, irrespective of their age, targeting everyone from newborns to old wizards.

This time, even Fawkes' trilling didn't help him as he simply wiped his tears and looked at the Wand resting on the table.

The Elder Wand. The one thing that gave him the edge over Tom. Tom could fly, Tom had magical might even surpassing his, Tom had esoteric knowledge and yet, the one thing that Tom did not have is an Artifact of Death itself, or so he had been told.

Frankly, he did not know the origin of the Wand, nor the origin of the tales that had been passed down generation after generation. He knew where two of the items were though, and not once, he had the temptation to go after them, to try and see if he could somehow become the so-called Master of Death.

He snorted at that, through the snot, as if someone could Master Death itself. It was the ultimate end, the release from this world, something to be respected and revered, not insulted or to be Mastered.

No, he only held onto the Elder Wand because he won it, fair and square, and so, felt like it was his personal responsibility to ensure that the wand didn't fall into the wrong hands.

Hands like Tom's. There would be no one and nothing capable of stopping him in Magical Britain if he felt like walking up to the Ministry building and slaughtering the Minister, right after having tea and biscuits in the Malfoy Manor.

"If only," he sighed at the treacherous thoughts that entered his mind, thoughts that no doubt entered the minds of many muggles who read science fiction about time travel and thought of the ways they could have "prevented" the tragedy of the Nazis ever being a thing.

If only he had "Taken care of" Tom when he had the chance. If only he had recruited Tom for the DADA post, if only to keep a closer watch on him. If only he had tracked down Tom after the disastrous interview and set him straight.

Going back even further, if only he had not forced Tom to have his first interaction with the magical world to be of fire, of fear. If only he had shown Tom the wonders of magic at first.

If only…

If only and so many more what ifs swirled his mind and yet, in the end, he received no answers.

He groaned and leaned back into his gnarly chair, which detected it and turned itself into a self floating rocking chair. He would have grinned at his own genius but alas, times were not right.

All he had going for him was a prophecy, from a genuine source, yes but he was a little worried about the prophecy. Some of them tended to be quite self fulfilling and he had no intention to play his part in a prophecy that might result in something tragic happening to some people just so Tom could be brought down.

He popped in another one of his lemon drops—oooh strawberry, and was about to turn in for the night when the Floo opened up, directly in his office, showing the lovely yet harried face of Minster Bagnold.

"What can I do for you on this fine eve–"

"Albus! There's been an attack on Diagon Alley!"

His eyes widened as he called on his most trusted ally at the moment, "Fawkes!"

With a flash of Phoenix Fire capable of penetrating any ward scheme, he appeared right in front of Ollivander's shop, wand in hand, ready to cast a spell chain.

His crouched form straightened up as he surveyed the scene in front of him with a vigilant gaze and yet, his face morphed into one of confusion as he stood upright and saw that while the street was littered with holes and even some bodies, they were mostly dressed in all Blacks and the masks clued him in on the identities of those bodies anyway.

Just then, he saw the Aurors on scene rush towards him, with Moody being at the forefront, with his Magical eye rotating in every single direction to provide Moody with a dearth of information that he no doubt used to frighten some poor new Aurur with "CONSTANT VIGILANCE!"

"Albus."

"Alastor. What happened here?" He greeted Moody while looking closer at the craters and some of the bodies. One particularly gruesome one had what looked like a hole punched through its chest, with the wound cauterized so no blood was flowing through it.

"Fucking MACUSA happened. What else?" Moody spat as his eyes narrowed at that piece of information.

The last time he dealt with MACUSA, it was about their actions of safely transporting any and all muggleborns their so called charities could reach in time before whisking them away to the Americas, something that had irked the Politicians greatly but had only served to relieve him as he knew that the muggleborns would be treated fairly in America, unlike Magical Britain where they would be second class citizens, if not on paper then atleast in real life.

"Tell me more," And tell Moody did.

---

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Manhattan, MACUSA [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Are you sure you want to go right now?" He could still hear the question asked by his handler because yes he did have a handler because he was a bit of a special case, in all of MACUSA.

He nodded, hefting his bag before common sense kicked in and he used his handy dandy wandless magic to lift it behind him, "Yes, I have to go. They are the last remaining family I have in this world. However distant they might have been, Uncle Frank did fund my education to the last pound."

His handler, John, an unassuming looking man nodded back at him, knowing that if he decided on something, he would see it through, despite all the obstacles. That was what allowed him to undergo downright brutal training for the past two years that turned him from an admittedly middling Wizard into a Hit Wizard capable of duking it out with the strongest Auror Hit squad of MACUSA and coming out on top, something that no other wizard in MACUSA was capable of, as far as the public knowledge went.

He just knew that there were at least two or three people hiding much stronger than anyone he had ever met. MACUSA would not be so easy going with him and they would most certainly not go as far as training him with their best if they didn't have someone who could control him.

Sure, he was a naturalized citizen but they knew that he still had family back in Britain, which could compromise him but so far, they had treated him with nothing but respect with only a vague promise of defending the country if required.

John sighed, held the door open for him to get out of his apartment, MACUSA provided of course, "Alright. But you have to meet with the Director before you leave."

His face twisted in a grimace at the thought of meeting the prickly dictato–Ahem, director before he left. No matter what John said, he definitely did not whine, "Do I have to?"

John took pleasure in his suffering as he took the heavy suitcase, plucking it out of thin air. Chuckling, John replied, "Yes, definitely. Now, let's go. We are going to pass through the No-Maj area, wouldn't want anything to go wrong."

Rolling his eyes, he slapped John on his shoulder and went forward, "Oh, please. You do realise that I have lived here all my life and not a single incident has occurred."

He could hear John shuffling behind him, dragging the heavy ass suitcase, the same tattered one he had bought with his very first income, which was very heavy even for someone well built like him, let alone John who was the equivalent of an 'HR with Minor Police Training' so it was inevitable that John would mutter in frustration, "What is this filled with, fucking rocks?"

He smiled at that, putting his hands behind his head, whistling jauntily, as he usually did in these halls, especially since he had lived here for the better part of a decade, "Come on. Keep up, old Man."

He heard curses behind him as he sensed the telltale signs of magic being used behind him, even though the burst of magic was very negligible since John probably only used a levitation charm. Serves John right for forcing him to meet Director Rothschild.

__xx__

"You know you're mean." He smiled as he drove to their HQ, John sitting beside him, with a heavy bag on his lap since the rest of his tiny car was filled with stuff that he had to take back to Britain. His car was already positively tiny and since he was travelling by a flight, he had not shrunken down anything, resulting in a spillover of his stuff into the front seat, right into John's lap, something that gave him no small amount of joy.

…….

……

"Mr.Winters," He resisted the urge to roll his eyes as he stood in front of the Director. The Director who had to be wrangled into managing him because no other person was willing to take on him, given his odd powers and the spotlight that had shown on him when he first approached the Auror department with a new Bloodline power.

"Yes, Director."

"You do realise that you are creating a minor stir in the chain of command by going to foreign lands?"

"Sir, with all due respect, I am only travelling because I have to. Personal commitments, I am afraid."

"Yes, yes. I am well aware of your personal reasons. While I would have loved nothing more than to keep you here simply because of your propensity for escalation."

This time, he did roll his eyes, "Come on, it was one time and the man–no–rapist, survived."

If anything, the glare became even more pointed, "Mr.Winters, do I have to remind you that the man is now nothing more than a vegetable?"

"...but Alive."

Director Rothschild sighed and removed his glasses, "Scott, look, I know you have to go and with the recent events in Britain, I can't in good conscience stop you. It's just that *sigh* the situation there means that there is a chance that you might encounter one of those two people, and that is the last thing we want, are we clear?"

He nodded, his voice uncharacteristically serious, "Yes, sir. I am aware of what is going on and I can assure you that the only reason I will act is if my life is in danger or if an innocent person is in danger. You have my word for that."

THe only response he received was an even deeper sigh, "Why did I expect anything else? John?"

"Uh, Yes, sir?" John hastily stepped forward, almost saluting but stopping at the last minute. The Director was known to be a hardass in the entire building and being the person who had to not only run the New York State division but also coordinate everything so that the HQ of MACUSA remains standing and not in rubble, like the last 4 headquarters they had to abandon, Director Rothschild had to be hardass on everyone, just so things can work, however barely.

"You are going with Winters."

He bristled at that, that was not what was agreed upon.

"B-but sir, I don't think Winters wants me to–"

"Agent John Smith, did I stutter?"

"No sir."

"Good, you can leave. I think Mr.Winters here has a flight to catch. Get yours arranged with

Jenny."

They were both dismissed as he stiffly walked out of the Director's office.

"Look, Scott, you have to know that–"

"Meet me in the Parking Lot."

He stormed out of the office, everyone getting out of his way. His temper was already legendary as was his audacity simply because he wasn't afraid of butting heads with every single person of authority he could find.

He had a problem with people in authority, especially those who didn't do their jobs, simply sitting on the chair and letting atrocities happen.

It was no wonder that the Director didn't let him go alone.

After all, he was going to meet Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorcerer, Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, and Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

A person with too many positions and accolades to count and yet, the most amount of deaths on his hands, that too borne out of inaction.

His lips curled in disgust as he headed to the sparring ring, to blow off some steam before he left for the Airport. It would take time for John to make his arrangements and they still had about 6 hours till his flight. MACUSA had a direct tunnel to the airport along with an Apparition zone hidden in a rented store, so they didn't have to worry about traffic much, especially since they were now going to travel on official business.

Well, John was but that gave them access to Bureau resources.


If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Manhattan, MACUSA [1980]

–Scott Winters–

He entered the general purpose Sparring ring in the Auror department, clad in his office clothing. It was not like he needed anything else to defeat anyone else in the entire building and yet, he couldn't help but feel frustrated at the fact that even after all this time, all the time he had spent working for MACUSA and for Rothschild in particular, he was not trusted, not for a week long trip to Magical Britain.

"Mr.Winters, I haven't seen you here in a very long time. Don't you have your own fancy sparring ring?" A snarky voice entered his ears as a mop of hair entered his vision and only the hair remained in his vision. Stifling a chuckle, he looked down upon the senior most Auror trainer in MACUSA, Jimmy.

Jimmy was the oldest Auror in the Manhattan department, with accolades from virtually everyone and for everything. The man was clearly very competent and very smart as well, just a little….short.

Short in temper, short in height, and much more. Jimmy was the first person who had approached him for a spar when he had first been introduced as a Hit Wizard to the Manhattan Auror Department with a hidden identity of course, he wasn't as strong as he is now back then. As one could expect, Jimmy was summarily defeated, not because Jimmy was weak but because he was trained to fight wizards much stronger than a Wizard afflicted with Dwarfism, in his 60s.

Apparently, everyone else in the department really respected Jimmy so they never let him lose and he defeated him on the first try. As one could expect, his welcome in the Auror department after that was…less than welcome. Which was perfect because he was looking for a willing sparring partner today.

"I do have a personal sparring ring but not here. Also, I was hoping to let off steam, anyone up for a spar? Standard rules." He addressed the rest of the crowd with his last words, clearly disregarding Jimmy which would further antagonise the crowd, something that worked in his favor at the moment.

Once upon a time, he would have loved to get the validation of these people but now? Now it meant nothing to him, especially since Rothschild just stiffed him, so the Director could deal with a bunch of angry Aurors complaining about someone who was no longer even in the country.

"Alright, big guy, you want a fight, you got it?" he turned around and had to immediately look up as the poster boy for steroid usage somehow came into his vision.

"Wow! You look like you eat raw meat for all your meals and then use steroids to bloat yourself." He couldn't help but comment, taking a step back as he took in all of what he was seeing. While he did make that comment, he could not find any pattern that was consistent with steroid usage plus the department had a strict no drugs or alcohol policy, especially on the job.

"What?" Oh, that was so cute. He could actually see the guy's two brain cells rubbing together to generate some understanding of the situation. Oh well, his rage was gone now but for appearance's sake, he could do a match.

Chuckling, he replied, "Nothing. Come on big guy, let's get in the ring. Oh, Scott Winters by the way," He offered his hand.

"Clark Kent."

His eyebrows rose as he looked deeply at the man, trying to see if he was joking. He looked back at Jimmy who just shrugged in exasperation, "Like, in the comics?" He asked the man incredulously.

"Yes. Is there a problem?"

"Oh-whoa no on, No problem. No problem at all. Just surprised, that's all. Anyway, let's get in the ring, my man!" He patted the man on the shoulder and headed to the ring which was now empty, presumably because of the earlier debacle.

Clark entered the ring, devoid of his shirt and instead topless with a loose pant below. His eyebrows raised at the quick wandwork. Maybe Mr.Kent was not just muscles then.

"You are so going to regret this, Winters." Jimmy hollered from the ground, "Clark here was sent here as reinforcement for an upcoming event. He was groomed to become the personal bodyguard of Seraphina Picquery herself,"

Well, wasn't that a surprise? Someone capable of being the President's bodyguard being sent here just as security for some event? He was sure that there was something else going on behind the scenes or Jimmy simply wasn't privy to the information, which would be rare but not unheard of. Either way, he was not going to be in the States for that so not his problem.

"Ready?" he nodded at the unofficial referee who was not Jimmy as a small handkerchief was tossed in the air. The second it hits the ground, the spar would begin. Standard rules mean no intentional torturing, no severe injuries, no broken bones, no use of Unforgivables, and most of all, participants can declare surrender at any point and the other one has to agree to that.

Violation of any of these rules can and has resulted in an infraction or a memo or outright ousting from the Ministry itself for severely injuring another Government employee, depending on the extent of the injury and the disobedience observed from the employee. All in all, quite fair rules for a safe spar, which was fine with him, even if his normal spars with his teachers did not start like that and it definitely was not like that when he was sent to hunt down Dark Wizards in all of America when he was deemed "Sufficient trained".

Spoiler alert, he was not.

"Ready." "Ready."

The second the handkerchief touched the ground, he jumped from his spot, a dozen feet up in the air. He could see the red outline of the stunning spell on the spot he was previously standing on.

Man, what a fast caster. He could see, in slow motion, as Clark looked up, his wand already moving up before his gaze could keep up. It was another one of the nifty tune ups given to his body, allowing him to go into thinker mode for a moment, his body operating at normal speeds but his brain becoming much faster in data processing, creating this slow motion vision.

By the time his brain caught up, both of their wands were pointed at each other, with him in the air, subtle bursts of air from his feet keeping him aloft in the air for a limited period of time, as he cast a piercing hex along with a levitation charm.

As expected, Clark dodged everything while retaliating with yet another shield piercing-stunner combo but unfortunately for him, he was no longer in the same position. He cut off the flow of the magic keeping him up and dropped down rapidly, letting gravity do its job as his eyes gleamed because of the magical feedback he received.

His wand was still pointed at the spot where his previous chain cast had impacted, something that no doubt confused Clark.

He dropped down once more, letting the spells fly over his head, and then had to lean to the side as Clark predicted his tactic of falling down in a controlled manner to evade his spells. After that, he simply let the spell go and dropped to the ground, immediately ducking as yet another chain cast of spells designed to break through shields and immediately knock someone out passed over his head.

Smiling at Clark, he took his hand and stabbed it into the ground. Clark, anticipating that something was happening, cast a Protego charm which actually became visible as a blue medieval shield with hexagonal patterns on it. He mentally noted that particular variant as something he had only seen in the Eminence Aurors, top Aurors who had trained him for a while before releasing him to the world of hunting.

'To teach someone that spell, this Clark must be some serious combatant.' he thought to himself as the sparring ring itself rippled lightly before a shockwave rocked both of them, travelling into the surrounding ground as well, judging by the gasps and groans around him.

Locking eyes with Clark, he said, "Watch this!"

The Wand stabbed into the ground, he mentally cast the spell for—

"Winters! What the hell is happening here?!"

"Aah!" He groaned as he stood up, cancelling the spell. It would have been totally awesome to finally cast it in a public setting but nooo, Director Spoilsport had to arrive at the exact same moment he was about to win.

Clark recognised the voice as well as he stood upright, cancelling the shield spell. They both looked at the incensed DIrector, who was practically red faced by now.

"Kent! I haven't authorised any activity for you. You know that anything you do has to go through me first. And you!"

He noted that piece of information before raising an eyebrow at Rothschild, signalling him to get it over with.

"Don't you have a flight to catch? Get out of my face!" He practically shouted.

Oh yes, he did have a flight, didn't he?

With a light spell, a burst of shockwave at his feet had him soaring over everyone, even the Director whose vein should finally burst at his stunt, before he landed right in front of the double door entrance.

Turning around, he cheekily waved at everyone who was looking at him with shock, "Bye!"

Ah, that was fun.

He ran around the corner and came face to face with John who was holding onto a small backpack that was filled to the brim and a ticket in his other hand.

"Hey! Where were you running to? Anyways, have you seen the Director?"

He made a face at that, "Uh, no. Anyway, I will be in the car, see you there!" Saying so, he ran away, laughing at the fact that the Director will be pissed off.

Serves him right for trying to saddle him with a babysitter. He was perfectly capable of defending himself.

It was not John who had saved a pride of Sphinx from Dark Wizards who were trying to create a truth serum by breeding them in an illegal facility.

'No, it was ME.'

He spotted his old tiny car and entered it, starting the ignition with nary a sound from the engine. It was more silent than some of the luxury cars, courtesy of silencing charms and vibration absorption charms.

Sometimes, little magic introduced on muggle items can create something that is the best of both worlds.

Cheap car + Magic = Luxury feeling drive.

VOILA!


If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

He sighed in relief as he stretched out his joints. As a big boy, as his college mates used to call him, he had trouble fitting in the Economy class seats of the airplane, so getting off the plane and stretching his body was a very enjoyable experience because while magic could do almost anything, it could not increase space, not without creating a pocket space and if he did something like that, on a plane?

Well, he did want to meet the President of MACUSA but not as a traitor to Wizardkind all around the planet because as much as the No-Majs took their flying machines lightly, wizard kind had long since made rules for such things and the astonishing thing was that these rules were enforced worldwide, making it impossible for any wizard to break these rules and then hope to live in any magically civilized nation.

He knew for a fact that part of the reason why many ICC member civilizations discourage or outright stop wizards from getting proper No-Maj identities is because they wish to stop exposure and also because using No-Maj transportation comes with its own inherent risks, risks that the wizards might try and mitigate using magic, and that would be, in a word, disastrous.

MACUSA, for one, does not do much to stop wizards except throwing a ton of paperwork their way along with regular checks to make sure that the wizards are not abusing magic on No-Majs in the States, because they too realised that the No-Majs simply have much better looking and more importantly, much better looking cities.

Also, the dating pool was much wider and his natural physical characteristics coupled with his confidence meant that he got around a lot in the dating pool.

"Alright, where we headed?" He looked to the side as John asked him, holding both of their luggage. He figured since the man was asked to babysit him, why not make use of him? Ergo, Magic less luggage lugged around by John.

He looked to the side and whistled, calling a cab, "To Brown's Hotel, please."

He sat in the cab, with John joining him after he helped the cabby load their luggage, most of which was just cheap stuff so he didn't have to worry about the planes destroying his precious collector's collection or his comic books collection or his rock collection.

Yup, he was a nerd. Certified one.

"So, this Brown's Hotel? Is it any good?" John asked him while he looked out the window like a bloody tourist though his accent made it easy for anyone to point out that he was an American. He had not used his British accent yet, mainly because he was very rusty and wanted to practice a bit before he met his family, distant as they might be.

He deadpanned at John and the cabby spared him from going into a huge tirade about the comparison between the American hospitality industry and the British hospitality industry by laughing at John, "Sir, Brown's Hotel is a posh place, for all the Rich people. Don't you worry, you will get anything you ask for in that castle?"

"Alright, I get it, you are splurging for this trip. Anyway, when are we going to the office? I thought we needed to get that thing done ASAP." John did an admirable job at masking the foreign wizard registration process in Magical Britain, which was mandatory otherwise it was grounds for them to either deport you or imprison you, depending on the country of origin.

"Don't worry about that, my family has a bit of pull there. We can go there tomorrow, once we are well rested." He shrugged and then leaned back on the seat, closing his eyes as he thought of his so called family, whom he had only met once when the Lord of the family had taken his "interview" of sorts, found him lacking, and then shipped his ass off to the States to an elite boarding school, run in part by MACUSA.

The Winters family was a minor noble family, who emigrated to Britain from Norway centuries back. By the time he was born, they were firmly recognised and settled as British nobility. Due to their old ways, the Winters family was a bit of an oddball when it came to nobility in Britain.

Magical Britain had the preconception that nobility should always be prim and proper, not getting their hands dirty, either in their businesses or in their illegal dealings, living with dignity, decorum, and with a stick up their asses.

The Winters family was an antithesis to all of that. They liked to get their hands dirty, in their business, hence the still running Winters fisheries, both in the No-Maj world as well as the Magical world. That meant that the Winters family held significant sway in the No-Maj world, allowing them to buy business, run new businesses as well as interact with the No-Maj world far more than an average Wizard, let alone a noble Wizard who very rarely ventured out into the No-Maj world. He knew that, unlike MACUSA which had representatives from multiple magical enclaves, it was all about the blood in Magical Britain, and hence the nobility had little reason to interact with the lower rung of wizards, let alone the No-Majs which were little more than animals for many nobles.

It was their loss because, unfettered by any noble competition and with a corrupt Ministry more than willing to look the other way, the WInters family quietly built their fortune, both in the No-Maj world as well as the Magical world, by breeding magical species as well as No-Maj species.

They were not a monopoly by any stretch of the imagination but what they earned was more than enough for them, since the family was very small anyway.

The Winters family were a family of rugged warriors, having inherited their genes from wizards that had to survive in the Wintery Norway, infested with magical Polar bears as well as various other magical animals that constantly threatened their tribes, forcing them to take the perilous journey to Britain.

Those same genes as well as the work ethic remained in the family and the last time he saw the family, the two sons of the Family Head were over 7 feet tall and both of them had to exit their teenage years. The Family Head was even more exaggerated, reaching a mind boggling 8 feet in height along with muscles the size of John's torso.

They utilised specialised charms to ward away any attention and also had multiple ways to appear much smaller than they actually were. He, if they recognised him anyway, was the runt of the litter, so to speak. He was not adopted, just illegitimate, if the Family Head's words were to be believed by because his mother was the Family Head's sister and she had died giving birth to him.

He was only found because of his name somehow appearing on the Family tapestry, a marvellous piece of soul and blood magic that he still hasn't cracked. It was notoriously hard to get hands on that and there were very few of such things in the States.

"Sleep tight, buddy." he nodded at John as they entered their respective rooms. He had been on autopilot all the time they had been together, thinking of why he had come here and for whom he had come here.

See, he was not just a Hit Wizard, he was the Hit Wizard, the boogeyman of the MACUSA, sent to deal with rogue Black Wizards, punctured animal sanctuaries, and entire rogue native settlements in various parts of the continent, and he succeeded.

EVERY. DAMN. TIME.

So, when news hit the States that some Archmage level Wizard had taken birth in Magical Britain who was wiping out entire lines of families for not agreeing with him, he knew he had to do something.

Not something as in official action, that was off the table because Britain was Dumbledore's turg, as was internationally recognised. Nobody wanted to piss off the Old Archmage, not just because he was strong but also because of his reputation. Taking on the Old Man would mean taking on half of Magical Britain sans the stuffy nobles.

So, no, he was not here in an official capacity and he was also not here to fight Dumbledore's battles for him. No, he was here to make sure that the only remaining family he had in this world did not end up as a footnote in Magical Britain's history.

They had not returned any of his letters so here he was, in London, dreading meeting the same people he had to protect because they were family.

And you should always be there for family.



If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Alright, what's on the agenda today? More importantly, do I need to be with you once we are done with the formalities? I have never been to London before, kinda want to see all the attractions before we leave." John asked him as they had their breakfast in his room, the downstairs hotel being too public for them to discuss what they were going to do for the day.

"Really?" He deadpanned at John who was stuffing his face with some Indian dish that he really loved back in the States and wanted to try here since it was a five star hotel and all that. It was good, but he was in the mood for something lighter since he was meeting his family later in the day, hence, the salad.

"What?" John asked him defensively, "I know you can handle yourself. The Director only sent me here just in case your people needed a direct Ministry contact, just in case they get really handsy or something."

"What?" HE asked John, utterly befuddled as to why he would do that. It was not like those pompous fools in the Ministry would listen to John anyway. For them, Dumbledore was the ultimate shield, and any tough questions from foreign powers were anyway answered by Dumbledore anyway, who never really went tough on the Dark Oriented nobles, emboldening them even further. His fists clenched as he thought of the paperwork after paperwork he had to fill, just for the opportunity to send a letter with evidence to the British Ministry of some of their Lords being involved in various crimes in the States.

They never really heard back about any of that ever again. Typical.

"Hey? Hello, Scott?" he blinked as he looked at a concerned looking John. He sighed again, John couldn't have possibly known that, he was just supposed to handle his missions and evaluate his mental states after each and every mission just in case there was a chance that he would go insane or worse, rogue. He didn't know the depths of the corruption in the British Ministry.

But Rothschild did but he never explained anything to John. He snorted at that, typical of the hard ass director. Sending in his people with only the information he deems useful, nothing more than that. He probably thought of information as currency, something that he wouldn't hand out until the last moment.

Since John didn't know much, he set down his salad bowl and set about explaining the nuances of the British Ministry and how it worked. How it was a cesspit of corruption with its very design being to favour the ones already born with a silver, golden, or even a diamond spoon. The truth of the matter was that while not all nobles were filthy rich like the Malfoys, who transferred all of their wealth from France where their family was guillotined, resulting in a small couple of members suddenly gaining the wealth of a family that once had hundreds, resulting in them being the rich new family in Britain, most of the families in Britain were rich.

And the ones that were poor but were still "pureblood" got generous stipends from the government for basically everything, not to mention the death of government jobs available for the "right blooded" people who didn't have wealth to support their families for multiple lifetimes.

Sure, there were "light oriented" families who cared for the rights of the many but even that was not right, in his book. Even the so-called Light families, who were always in opposition to the Dark side in the matters of the No-Majs or even the No-Maj born, did not do so out of the goodness of their hearts, mostly.

Some of them did it for the money, some of it for the optics, some of it to gain Dumbledore's favour, and a tiny amount who actually believed that aside from the lack of magic, the No-Maj were actually humans as well and as such, worthy of basic fundamental rights, same as the one that wizards did.

"Oh, Ohhhh," That was all John had to say as he sort of processed the crap that had been dumped on his lap at the last moment, "And you say that we have to go deal with them today?"

"Yes but don't worry, we are the "right" sort according to them so they won't do anything, especially since news of us coming here has already reached the Ministry. I am sure they don't want any diplomatic incident, especially since rumours have no doubt reached DUmbledore's ears that MACUSA already has a replacement ArchMage for their outgoing one." John nodded along at the information except at the last bit, where his eyes widened dramatically, trembling pointed fingers and all that.

"Y-y-you don't mean?"

"Yup." He took great pleasure in breaking some clearances as he told John the whole reason he got special privileges, even though he didn't abuse it to do something irrational like he totally wanted to do, like fire Rothschild or more like transfer him to some minor Shit shoveling department, if the MACUSA had one.

Then, John's HR mind kicked in as he immediately whipped out his wand and cast all manners of detection spells, for charms, for curses, for actual human beings, for elves, for magical tools, for animagi, and more. After casting dozens of such spells, accounting for even obscure humanoid species like the Centaur, John finally sighed in relief and slumped in his seat, wand back in its holster.

"You should not have done that. Now, I am stuck with you, forever." John said as he stabbed into his food.

He grinned like a loon at that, "Yup. Remember, FOREVER!"

"Alright, finish your food, we have an appointment and yes, you can take off to see your tourist attractions after we are done at the Ministry, just be careful of pickpockets."

"Ha! Who do you think you are talking to?"

"A wizard mediocre in the field of combat magic and above average at best in support magics? With zero regular physical exercise and little to no experience in combat? Magical or otherwise?"

"....I hate you."

"That's what I thought."

After that humbling experiment, they both went down to the Ministry the normal way. Leaky Cauldron way.

"Wow. That was…wow." He laughed at John's reaction, who looked at the Diagon Alley, now that the wall had slid away, revealing the wonderful chaotic order that was Diagon Alley to the fellow American John.

"That's not the last of it," He quipped as they entered the Ministry building, after undergoing a thorough scan that resulting in nothing since both of them were not idiots and were given brochures by their departments on what to do in these situations, so all his "extra" weaponry was kept back in the hotel, part of the reason why he had chosen a fine establishment to stay in.

"Once again, wow!" John exclaimed once they entered the foreign immigration counter in the ministry. It was…bare. Yup, it made sense that nobody came to London, it was a soaking wet hole of a place but still, there should have been someone here.

"And after all that action we saw with the flying papers and howlers and everything." John turned to him and said in a mocking tone.

"Hey! Don't diss my heritage!" He shouted in mock outrage.

"Nghh, who's there?" He looked at the booth, the wizard who was sleeping there finally waking up. His senses told him of the man immediately, as fast as his mind categorised the man as a non threat immediately. His wand was not even on his person. It was lying in a drawer of the table and not even the closest one.

A complete non issue if it comes down to combat. Sadly, his mind always thought like that now, no matter how much he tried to do so otherwise, such was his life.

A head of ginger popped out of the booth, with drool on their face and completely unfocused eyes that stilled when their bleary eyes finally saw that they were not sitting on a completely empty floor of the building.

He saw the person blink once, twice before with a terrible screeching sound, the chair was pushed back as the person stood upright before them, fumbling with his glasses and discreetly trying to wipe his drool.

Spoiler, they both saw it anyway.

"Uh, Hello! Welcome to the Immigration department, what can I do for you today?"

Well, that was…something.

"Hello, we are here for the foreign wizards registration?" John led with it.

The man, who they still didn't know the name of, looked blankly at them for a moment before his mind lit up with an Eureka.

"Oh, I see! Americans, right?" The man tried for small talk while fiddling around for forms of some sort.

He sighed explosively. This was going to be a while.

…..

…

–A while Later–

"Alright, you know the rules. Have a safe trip," He gave the man a strained smile at the absolutely unnecessary but still mandatory three hour disclaimer that the British Ministry gives anyone about what and what not to do while in Britain. No wonder that no wizards ever visited London of their own volition.

Who would go through such torture for some mediocre tourism? Especially with how wet everything was?

"I trust you got the rules?" He asked a glassy eyed John.

"Huh? Oh! Yeah, I got it!" John tapped his front pocket which held a pocket version of the rules which also had a nifty little enchantment on it that would warn the tourist about any incoming magical place or establishment.

"Great, I will see you at the Hotel. Have fun!" He waved at the man and then turned around, ready to enter the Den of the Goblins.

Gringotts.




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I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Gringotts London Branch, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Hello, I would like to make a deposit to this account please," He quickly handed over an enchanted card that he made sure to keep on his person anywhere he went. The GOblin made a face at the card but took it all the same and quickly scanned it on this table, which was not in his vision.

That card was an initiative by the various bankers around the Magical parts of the world to create something akin to a central Bank account. It was not there yet but with the help of that card, any branch could quickly create an account as the card had all the details required and was periodically verified by all the banks connected to the initiative on a turn-by-turn basis.

None of the Goblins or Gnomes or even some of the wizard run banks around the world were eager to create something akin to a central account repository as they were deeply untrusting of each and every one of their competitors and opening up their accounts ledger would mean giving up some of their advantages, which was a big no on in their business. Thus, this compromise was born. Sure, President Seraphina made it possible, coming out of her retirement to become President once more because there were no other candidates but most of these days, all she did was sign documents that her team prepared for her. This initiative was a brainchild of a lovely woman named Jill, who travelled around the world and made it possible and also made sure that MACUSA was the first customer of this initiative, giving them an edge in global cooperation.

It helped that Jill, just like him, grew up in a mixed environment. In fact, both of them were the first generation to get the privilege to grow up aware of the people with whom they shared the planet. It also helped them borrow the creative ideas from the people not blessed with magic but blessed with magical reproductive capabilities and marvellous creativity.

Jill probably saw the level of cooperation that countries around the world had and wished to replicate that level of cooperation, at least in terms of banking and foreign currencies. At Least the Galleon was universally used because of its gold composition, something that all the bankers around the world agreed on, something of a rarity.

"Your credentials have been verified and a temporary account has been created. How much would you like to deposit and in what currency and denomination?" The Goblin's voice was scratchy and the glasses on its eyes, which were not in use, were amusing. He swiftly answered, wanting to get this over with so he could get in touch with his family.

"I would like to deposit 10 thousand dollars in 100 dollar bills. I would also like to withdraw 100 Galleons right now."

The goblin didn't stop looking at him while his hands flew under the table, out of his sight, "Hmm. The first two withdrawals of the month are free. The rest are charged. Deposit the money on that counter, give him this receipt and he will give you your Galleons." The aged Goblin handed him his card and a piece of paper that had something written in

Gobbledegook on it. He thanked the Goblin and went to the Goblin that was pointed out to him, in a corner of the room. The floors were all white, with high ceilings, and yet, somehow, the corner seemed to darken the moment he crossed an invisible threshold.

The Goblin at the station didn't even look or speak to him, just thrust his hand forward. He too handed his receipt over swiftly and removed his pouch, the one that was enchanted to be a spatial holding bag. John liked his to be a fanny pack, which was hilarious. He tried for a wallet but something about that shape didn't work so a small pouch it is.

"Here." he handed over the cash as well. It disappeared under the claws of the Goblin in an instant. He could hear nothing but with the motions of the goblin's hands, he knew that he was counting the cash.

"Fine. Here," Within a minute, his cash was counted, and a bag was thrown on the counter, "100 Galleons. The bag is free on the first transaction. The next one will cost you. Thank you for doing business with Gringotts."

"Thank you."

He exited Gringotts, 10 grand lighter and a 100 Galleon heavier. He knew logically that the only reason Gold was used in the currency was because it was the only metal that couldn't be affected much using magic, even of the highest caliber. IT was somehow an immutable law of magic that Gold could be used in magical rituals or for transfiguration, only that it would use exponentially more magic and the effect will wear off as soon as the magic holding on to its form is over. Nothing else can actually be converted into Gold using any magic.

He didn't believe, even for a second, that the Philosopher's Stone from Flamel actually turned anything into gold, it just couldn't. If it could, Nicholas would have solved the puzzle of what magic actually is where it comes from, and how to manipulate it without being a wizard. All things that would have either catapulted him into being the God Emperor of Mankind or insane from the knowledge. Since he was neither, and the knowledge had not trickled into the research community, he knew that there was some other trick to turning anything into Gold part.

And he had met Nicholas Flamel, the man was an avid researcher and was a huge blabbermouth. He couldn't even imagine the man holding on to such phenomenal research and not jumping around everywhere, bragging about his discovery.

Shaking his head, he banished those thoughts and was about to head to the Knockturn Alley, to see if anything interesting had hit the markets. Magical Britain was host to more than a few lowlifes who always imported all the poisoned and tainted magical crap from Africa which usually dealt with human, blood, or soul sacrifices. Something all three at once. It was nasty business but since they couldn't actually force other countries to adopt their rules, he couldn't do much about it. If he encountered one though, it was fair game to kill it, after buying it, of course, it wouldn't do for him to create an incident on his first day, before even meeting the Winters.

Sighing, he paid his bill and exited the ice cream parlour. As he turned around, trusting his senses to tell him where the largest gathering of dark magic was, he froze as he came face to face with the WInters Family Head.

Nathaniel Winters. With his two sons, Rick and Morty Winters.

All three of them looked like they were on a shopping spree, with all three of the giants holding onto a ton of bags, manually for some reason.

His confusion must have been evident because Rick, the younger brother, spoke up, "It's punishment. Mom thought it would be appropriate to get us all shopping."

"Ah.." he made that sound and hesitantly walked towards them. He couldn't feel their disdain, anger, resentment, or any other cold feelings from their magic or from their faces, although their faces did seem as if they were carved out of granite, especially Nathaniel's face.

"Why are you here, Scott?" Speak of the Devil. The Devil being an 8ft giant in this case, made him rather jittery for some reason.

"Uh, I heard some bad things and decided to come see you guys."

"I see. Now that you have seen us, you can go back to America. I hear you have a great job there, don't mess it up. Come on boys."

"Uh.." He stood there, flabbergasted at the cold reception. He saw mamma Winters joining them with yet another dozen bags. She dumped the bags and skipped away, the three of them following her.

He saw various people looking at him. Feeling conscious and not wanting to create a ruckus by teleporting, he cast a charm on himself and quickly exited the Alley.

"To Brown's Hotel, please." He told the cabby as his mind felt numb about the whole thing. He needed to reevaluate his priorities, if that was what they thought of him.

Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes, leaned on the backseat, and thought back on his encounter with them. The entire team, Nathaniel, didn't show an ounce of emotion. He could feel the bite in Nathaniel's words but not in his magic. The brothers were fine, they didn't have much of an opinion of him, probably because they never interacted before.

For some reason, that interaction didn't feel right to him, as if it was incomplete. And why did he even leave? He should have followed them and snapped at them. Something. It was not like him to flee.

His eyes snapped open as he all but shouted, "Wait! Take me back!"

"What?"

"Take me back!"

"Alright Alright, man. Christ!"

Soon, he was back at the entrance. Hurriedly doing the whole wand pattern, he opened the wall and expected to come face to face with the vibrant and chaotic yet somehow orderly Diagon Alley.

Except, all he heard were screams.

His instincts took over as he hurriedly cast multiple charms on himself, took out his wand, and cast multiple spell chains at the nearest mask wearing assailant, dropping him in an instant.

That was not enough, his senses told him of dozens of magical wizards but only 14 of them had some sort of identical Dark Energy magic cast on all of them.

Taking that as a cue, he began targeting them. The man near the entrance was solitary, it would seem because he did not find any for seconds.

Sprinting, he abruptly froze as he heard a bloodcurdling scream before he shook out of it and ran towards the sound, towards the direction of Gringotts. The bank would be fine bu—

His eyes widened as he saw a single wizard, writhing and screaming on the ground as four wizards surrounded her, casting the Unforgivable spell.

His wand fired spells almost instantly, disarming all of the wizards and then knocking the poor woman out as well.

"Wh-What?"

"What is this?"

"Who are you?"

"Unhand me! I demand it!" For the last one, he simply tightened the conjured ropes around his neck, shutting him up.

"Who do you work for?" He asked the first one, the one who was trembling the most and also had the weakest magic yet the strongest Dark Magic taint.

"Shut up! Don't you dare–Mhmmm" He shut up yet another one of those as he gestured for the portly man to speak up.

His instincts blared at him as he ducked, dodging a nasty curse that hit one of those wizards, going through the man's torso, and gouging a huge hole into it.

He turned around and saw a dozen other wizards wearing the same get up. Worst of all they had hostages.

"Release them! Or I will release her." The man said in a slimy voice that instantly didn't sit right with him. The other three were still captured but the one most likely to speak was the one who was dead, killed by his own people.

His mind tried to think of something but he couldn't think of any way he could come out of this with both him and the hostages alive without resorting to some lethal means.

Well, time to get lethal then, he thought to himself as unbeknownst to the bastards in front of him, his hands began glowing red.


If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Diagon Alley, Magical Britain [1980]

–Albus 'Too many names to type' Dumbledore–

"I see." He told Moody who nodded at him and went right back to ordering the rest of the Aurors to help clean everything up. The Diagon Alley was officially closed for now and it was termed as a terrorist attack for now, with the identities of the assailants yet to be disclosed.

Yet he had a hunch that even if the Auror department figured out their identities, they couldn't do much to their families because they would swiftly be disowned by Tom's people. He sighed at the count of dead people, 17 dead with only a single assailant alive, that too barely. He was missing both his arms and had part of his chest caved in with what was most definitely a punch.

"Jesus!" He heard more than a few exclamations and some vomiting as he crouched and examined each and every one of those bodies. There were only a few near the entrance of the alley. The majority of the bodies were gathered near…

"Gringotts. They closed shop at the first sign of trouble after force evacuating all wizards. Also, they claimed to have seen nothing and–"

"We can't force them to reveal anything because of the Banking Treaty, I know." He intoned to one of the other senior Aurors who was accompanying him.

"Sir, we have never seen anything like this. According to all the reports we were able to get from eye witnesses plus our analysis tells us that it was just one man."

He nodded at that. After looking at the wound angles and the damage done to the surroundings, he was sure of that as well. "It would seem so, Mr.Robards"

"The victim?" He asked Robards who hesitated at that part. He peered at the man, from his kneeling position as he examined the traces of magic used. He didn't like to exert his authority over such trivial matters but this was no longer a trivial matter, it was something that might make or break the nation, if it was someone other than Tom who did this.

"Sir, the victim…she is in a coma, sir. Heavy exposure to Unforgivables has damaged her nervous system. We found her unconscious, surrounded by dead bodies with various gruesome wounds."

He sighed sadly, "I see. I have a meeting with the Minister now. Please tell Alastor to come meet me once this is all cleaned up."

"Yes, Headmaster."

……..

…..

"How could this happen, Albus?" He sighed internally as he tried to console the Minister who was still new to all of this. Harold Minchum knew the reality of what was happening outside and what it would lead to, he was not blind to the aftermath of the war that TOm was waging on Magical Britain.

A hollow shell of a nation that would soon be discovered by muggles, leading to either planetary destruction or the destruction of Magical Britain by the ICC. Alas, that man knew where the tide was turning and abandoned ship, knowing what awaited him should he continue to go against Tom now that Tom's agents had infiltrated all parts of the Ministry.

Bagnold was only elected because both sides knew she was untouched, by either party and was recommended by him. Had he recommended anyone actually competent, it would have never passed and they would have had to go through this whole war without someone at the helm.

Something was better than nothing, was what he thought when he helped Bagnold get elected, hoping that even if she did bend, it would take time for Tom to sink his fangs into her, mostly because he had been remarkably restrained about using only soft power to manipulate the highest authorities of the Ministry.

He had a free hand when it came to committing atrocities elsewhere but at least that meant that Bagnold was relatively safe. It also meant that Bagnold was simply unaware of many things.

At this point, while magical Britain did know about Voldemort and his terror, it was subdued by the sudden periods of inactivity that Tom enforced, just so he could get the breathing room from the ICC who had begun taking an active interest in the killings of the muggle-born, leading to the creation of a program in the MACUSA that he wholeheartedly approved yet couldn't condone simply because of the posts he held.

"Relax, Minister Bagnold. We will have a full report from Alastor soon then we can think of how we want to proceed from here. Here, have some Lemon Drops." He told her, leaning back after keeping a few of his favourite candies on the minister's table, his mind already thinking of what Tom's response would be after this, even as he smiled at Bagnold who took the candies with a shaky smile.

Tom would not sit still, he was certain of that. This short lived period of shaky peace was only obtained because both sides had gotten credible information about something that might mean upheavals in the British magical world itself, irrespective of the light and dark sides.

An Archmage, a wizard so far above the average wizard that they fell into a classification of their own. There was not an official exam or certification that one had to get to be called as an Archmage.

Archmages just…were.

They just existed and the way they interacted with the world made it abundantly clear to anyone watching that it was an Archmage. Wizards who can decide the fates of smaller nations and bolster the might of larger ones.

One such large nation was MACUSA. Up until now, they only had a single Archmage. Charles, while an excellent combatant, still fell short of him as he was armed with the Elder Wand. Also, Charles was old, something that allowed Magical Britain to thrive because while he took down Grindelwald and gained the allegiance of the Elder Wand, Charles couldn't do anything because MACUSA depended on him and also, he was old.

He was old back then and he was much much older now. That meant that while the ICC had rules that most member states abide by or at least tried to abide by, the ones with Archmages at their helm could bend or break a few of them without getting any meaningful penalties on them.

Magical Britain was one such nation. There were many ICC rules that he had flagrantly violated and so had the Ministry, all because he was the recognised strongest member of the ICC. Tom, in his wisdom also knew that the only reason he was able to target and tragically kill so many was because Magical Britain had two Archmages with them, allowing them to outright ignore some of ICC's rules, such as the rule where member states would have no choice to accommodate the armed forces of other member states if any threat began to spill over into the muggle realms.

Tom's actions most definitely did spill over into the muggle world and had even forced multiple visits from the current Minister of Magic to the Prime Minister to help smooth things over, another red glad in ICC's rulebook.

But up until a few years ago, that was the situation but now? Now the situation had changed, irrevocably.

MACUSA now had a new Archmage, someone who was rumoured to be much younger and also more powerful than Charles, or rather, more powerful than the very old Charles. He was sure that had Charles been in his prime, even Tom would have been hard pressed to defeat the old man with his usual tactics.

No, he knew and had checked with his contacts within MACUSA that yes, they had a new Archmage now and he was much younger, the youngest one to ever be recognised, according to some of his contacts.

That gave MACUSA a lot of power they had lost previously, allowing them to pressure Magical Britain into solving its issues before MACUSA, along with other member states, sent in their own Archmages to resolve the issue one and for all. That would be…disastrous, in a word.

There was no scenario where they would have foreign Archmages on their land in a military operation and not have a bloodbath, on both sides.

That would all mean all but the destruction of Magical Britain. Something that both sides wanted to avoid, hence the ceasefire.

Why Tom felt the need to attack Diagon Alley in broad daylight, he didn't know but he knew that it was the start of something, something that might end up changing the whole of Magical Britain, for better or for worse.

He didn't know but he was certain that he was going to find out.

After all, someone capable of the violence he had witnessed earlier was sure to be an Archmage or at least someone infinitely close.

He sighed as a headache reared its ugly head. He feared that the ICC or MACUSA had already gotten involved in their situation and the shadow war that he had been fighting for so long was now going to spill out into the open, spilling even more blood in the process.

"Albus, we are ready for the briefing." Moody popped into the office and exited, without even addressing the Minister at all, let alone with some respect.

Something that the Minister noticed, judging by the grimace on her face. He offered a consolation smile, "Please don't mind Alastor. He is the best man for this situation, he just doesn't do…well with authorities."

Minster Bagnold stood up, smoothing out the creases in her dress, "I know that Albus. Now, let's get to the meeting."



If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Conference Room, Ministry of Magic, Magical Britain [1980]

–Albus 'Too many names to type' Dumbledore–

"According to what limited eye testimonies we have, it was all the work of a single man. They were using an advanced version of the Disillusionment charm, making them quite blurry but what I can tell you is that they are male, reasonably young, and of above average height." He nodded along, as the lead analytical member of the Auror team delivered his report.

"We have 17 confirmed casualties and 1 person severely injured. Last I heard, the severely injured person was up due to an emergency authorization of forced awakening to get their memories before they die. Their identities…"

"Moving on…" One of the Aurors said sharply, reminding the presenter of something, causing the presenter to move on. He sighed internally at that. It would seem that Tom's network has gone far too deep. He knew that most of them were just members of noble families openly casting the Unforgivable curse in the middle of Diagon Alley, something they would not be able to come back from, no matter what defense was presented in the Wizengamot.

"...Y-yes, moving on, we will have the memories of the event soon enough but before that, I can confidently say that they were using some sort of spell that allowed them to generate an immense amount of kinetic as well as heat that punched through the wizards as well as cauterised their wounds, leading to…that," The presenter pointed to a series of reports on the tables. He absentmindedly picked it up and read through it, pausing a bit to see the images.

He had seen much worse during his travels but the rest of the room was a little more green, especially the Minister who turned green almost immediately.

"Christ!"

Christ indeed. Apparently, six of the 17 confirmed deaths had been caused by the exact spell. He hadn't seen or even heard of a spell with such effects, which was rare for him. He might have to ask around a bit, see if some new spell had emerged out of the woodworks.

He turned his head as the door opened as an Unspeakable indeed the room, holding on to a tray that held a large bowl and multiple vials that held silvery memories alongside it.

That was the ministry pensive, the largest one that Magical Britain had on record, not in size but in the capacity to use. This pensive could be used by 4 people at once to view the memories.

"These are the memories extracted from one Reginald Mulciber—" There was a sharp intake of breaths in the room as the identity of the noble torturing people was revealed. The unspeakable ignored the reactions as well as the anger of some of the wizards in the room as he continued, "---before he died due to his injuries. According to his own testimony, these are all the memories he has of their attacker. Please, Go on."

It was good that the Minister enlisted the help of the Unspeakables for this, who immediately fired it up the chain that Reginald was dying and would be of no help even if he awoke. So, the Minister gave the rapid authorisation to force feed him two things, the composition of which even he didn't know. A way to awaken him from his coma and also to make him more compliant to provide the memories. The only reason something that like was allowed to exist was because it could only be used when the wizard's body was shutting down naturally, meaning they were on Death's door, something that even Phoenix's tears struggled to heal.

If the person on Death's door was aged or with a weak body, they would die no matter how many Phoenix tears are used but if the user was young and healthy, they could survive with a couple of tears as well.

The unspeakable then gestured for them to view all the memories. Normally, they would just view it from the upside, allowing all of them to look at it once but this resulted in a far deeper investigation than normal so it was advised for all of them to get the perspective required, just in case they missed something.

He was from the first wave to see the memories. Diving into the pensive, his vision returned as he saw himself from the perspective of one Reginald Mulciber. He remembered the child that he was before he entered Slytherin and by the time he graduated, he was practically unrecognisable from his past innocent self.

He saw Reginald keeping watch over the entrance of Diagon Alley, even as multiple screams and spell explosions kept entering his senses. He heard people screaming and yet, Reginald didn't move, even as most of the people entered the stores that would take them.

Then, with no sound whatsoever, Reginald's vision blacked out. He felt the telltale sign of the next memory being automatically slotted in with Reginald's eyes opening. The view was slanted since Reginald was on the ground.

They saw Reginald heading towards the sound, which was of people screaming in fear and pain. Only this time, it was exactly as he feared it to be.

Three people were lying on the ground, with their masks on, with multiple holes in their torso and bodies though they were bleeding out so it was probably not the work of that spell.

Reginald moved ahead, where the telltale signs of a spell battle was heard. What Reginald saw shook him so much that he staggered back.

Even for a split second that the person was visible, they all saw him. It was one person, as expected but he was all but invisible, only visible because of all the blood spattered on them. Blood no doubt of his enemies.

Reginal's wand entered his vision, very shakily.

His eyes widened as he saw the person casting spell chains expected from top ICC combatants as he effortlessly killed all his opposition. There was an efficiency in his movement that could only come from training specifically meant for killing someone.

No country in the world trained their Aurors to kill people so efficiently. The man had clearly also decided that all of them were going to die because there was no hesitation at all.

'There!' He thought to himself as a red light shone in the middle of the battle, creating streams of energy that punched through the wizards, leaving behind holes that didn't bleed.

Reginald shrieked in fear as he stepped back multiple steps, seeing the dead body of that wizard topple over. The rest began fighting back in a desperate frenzy, casting any and all manner of Dark spells coupled with the Unforgivables sprinkled in.

The fight didn't last over a minute as the man effortlessly dismantled everyone in sight, leaving behind six dead wizards. Reginald, as if finally gathering his courage or as if knowing that he was next, cast the Killing Curse.

All of them watched the wand glow green before the spell was flung in the direction of the human covered in blood. The man was stationary. His interest peaked, he watched the spell fly in almost slow motion towards the man, only for him to raise his wand towards the spell and let loose the same stream of red energy.

The red energy clashed with the Killing curse, dispelled it, and then went on to punch a hole in Reginald's chest.

That was all they saw before they were ejected out of the pensive.

"Holy shit!" He excused the use of the curse in the Ministry building because the situation was aptly described.

Not only was the wizard willing to kill, he was supremely capable of doing it, very efficiently even. He had excellent spatial awareness along with a mastery of spell chains.

That new spell gave him pause as it allowed the wizard to somehow counter the Killing Curse without using a physical object as a stopgap. That was revolutionary and yet, this was the first time he was hearing of this.

There must be something he was missing.

He looked to the side as Bagnold sighed in relief at someth–Ah, that's why. The emergency authorisation of forced memory collection could be used in times of emergency by the Minister but then they also had to justify it to the Wizengamot later on. Those memories they just saw, in them, Reginald was not only a part of a terrorist group but also someone who definitely cast the Killing Curse, one of the Unforgivables.

That helped the Minister's position immensely and with his testimony, she would be fine.

"Albus, we need to talk." Moody's serious voice raised alarm bells in his head.

Maintaining the same expression, he nodded, "Ofcourse Alastor."



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Brown's Hotel, London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

He paced in the room, waiting for John to come back. After all, London had become a whole lot more dangerous for John because of his actions. He had no idea where he was off to but they had decided to meet for dinner so he should be here soon. He had already informed the receptionist to inform him once John was back so that should not be an issue.

The issue at hand was what he had done and the consequences of doing so. As his de facto handler, John would most likely be punished though not severely because there was no way John could have controlled him if he wished to do something else. No, John was simply here because he knew the law and also because Rothschild knew that Scott liked John so he would exercise more caution, knowing that one of the few people he liked in the world was safe enough.

If only he wasn't so high handed with the criminals, there might have been something that they could have done to just sweep this whole thing under the rug but as things stood, he had left behind 17 corpses with the 18th one barely alive.

He would consider himself lucky if the 18th one didn't survive long enough for the Ministry to collect his memories but then again, he never considered himself lucky. He might have to make preparations for…what exactly?

He asked himself. Could he really leave his only living family in such conditions? Where terrorist groups, in broad daylight, attacked the premier shopping district in London, the capital of Britain. The answer was clear there, no, he could not.

And yet, could he abandon his duty back in the States? The place that trained him and made him into the wizard he is today. Granted, he was not aware of his extra talent right up until he enrolled in No-Maj university to gain more knowledge.

Even then, the couple of years he spent under their training meant that he had become a wizard with a couple of combat classes under his belt to a borderline ArchMage level wizard. Yes, he was not yet an Archmage yet but that was only when it came to magical accomplishments and some sort of vague esoteric barrier that every wizard came across when they peaked. Something that Charles always says to him, that the one barrier that wizards have to cross to become an Archmage was already wide open for him and yet, he had to just step across the threshold.

How, Why, and When? He did not know and the old fuck never clarified. From their studies, the analysts in MACUSA could confidently say that he could fight on the same level as an ArchMage and probably even defeat unaware ones with ease, with his special ability.

He had one signature spell that blasted every single unforgivable out of the park, even the Imperius, as his lasers could break through everything. The only thing was that it consumed magic like nothing so he preferred using his wand to channel the lasers since it was much more efficient that way.

But if push came to shove, he could use his entire body to unleash an omnidirectional wave of lasers. He could also use them for many other delicate uses but he couldn't get the output modulation quite right.

That was why he used a wizard staff that MACUSA commissioned from some shamans in Africa, which helped him control his lasers with much more ease than just using a wand or even just his body.

Leaving Magical Britain as is was impossible and yet, leaving MACUSA behind was also impossible. For one, all his friends and important contacts were in MACUSA. The only people he knew in Magical Britain personally were the Winters Family and even then, he had only met after almost a decade. The last time he met them was when they shipped him off to a boarding school.

They never replied to letters but all his bills were paid for, before time and since he did not have any incidents in boarding schools, his guardians were never called. Once he started earning on his own, in the No-Maj world, he never bothered with their money, only sending monthly status updates.

Eventually, the update style evolved from a hopeful family to a soldier sending a report to his commander. Even so, he never stopped, hoping that a reply would come, holding on to that foolish hope that maybe, just maybe, he was not an orphan in all but name.

He was quite stupid in being so excited to come here but then again, he was one stubborn bastard. So what if they didn't acknowledge him? He would protect his family all the same, by hook or crook.

So, he vowed to–

The door creaked open, "Hey, the lady at the front desk said you wanted to meet me?"

His lips twitched as he took in John's tourist appearance. He wore a large T-shirt with the British Flag proudly displayed across it. A red, white, and blue oversized heat over his head and to top it all off, a camera proudly slung across his neck, probably already filled with snaps from wherever he went in London.

"What are you wearing?!" He asked the man.

John let himself in and gestured at himself, the ridiculous monstrosity of a giant "Look at me!" getup that he had put up on himself. "What, this? I thought, when in London…."

"No!" He shouted at that nonsense reply, "No, this is not what you do in London. This is not what you do anywhere." He slapped his forehead in exasperation as the man joined in on his laughter.

"Its London, Baby!" John shouted with his arms splayed apart, making Scott break out in hysterics as he collapsed on the bed behind him.

"Tha–That is not–HAHAHA" He broke down before he could complete his sentence for some reason. John joined in as he collapsed in the chair by the door.

As the laughter subsided, both of them took a breath. He wiped the tears as he sat upright.

"Man, that-that was something, I tell you. Please tell me you took pictures?"

"Oh, there are so many pictures I will need an entire week to show everyone at the office all my photos," John said, making him crack a smile at the image.

His smile dimmed at the thought of the office and everyone in that office.

"Hey, what's wrong? Something happened after I was gone?" John asked him, removing his ridiculous hat and sitting right beside him.

He shook his head, "Yeah, something happened but don't worry, I will sort it out with Rothschild. We are going to have to cut this trip short. First thing tomorrow, we'll be going to the Embassy."

"Oh, we are returning, so soon? Did you even meet your family? I know you have been wanting to meet them for ages?" John asked, concerned.

He corrected him, "No. I am staying, you are going back."

"What? WHY?"

"Not important. What is important is that you are unsafe here. We will get everything arranged with the embassy tomorrow, so why don't you remove that ridiculous T-shirt and get some sleep? See you at 7 tomorrow."

"B-But, at least tell me why. Why are you sta-" He shut the door on John's face at that point.

He sighed and went on to freshen up and also to make sure that nobody tracked him here, just in case. After all, while he was confident in his own skills, he didn't make it this far by not being paranoid.

After all, it is not paranoia if they are really out to get you.

And in his case, they most certainly were out to get him.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Brown's Hotel, London, Magical Britain [The Next Day, 1980]

–Scott Winters–

His eyes snapped open, on the dot at 6:00, he could tell without even looking, especially since the alarm began beeping a moment later. Counting small victories since that was the secret to remaining happy, he hopped off the mattress and landed seamlessly on the ground or rather, that was what should have happened.

Instead, he almost fell face first if not for the wandless charm he cast on his clothes, saving him from a swollen face or a broken tooth. After that, he, or rather, his advanced magical freshening up kit did its magic on his face as he bathed and got dressed up.

After all, today he had to go to the embassy and if the things he had heard about the US consulate in London were right, John was in for a pretty shocking experience. It would shock most people about how often Americans thought of the rest of the world, even if they were wizards and then those people would realise the simple vastness of America, understanding why Americans didn't bother to go abroad or even get a passport for most people.

It was simply because America was so vast and so varied that they simply didn't need to go anywhere else. They could cross a State and it would be as if they entered a different English speaking country, such was the variation.

That is probably why even wizards like John, who could teleport or get someone to teleport them for a fee, were so awestruck by going to foreign countries. It was simply cheaper to roam around in America instead of getting on a flight.

Doubly so for John, since most Wizards didn't trust the flying contraptions that the No-Maj built, and a worrying amount outright refused to believe that they existed. He had even met some people, in Greenwich Village itself, telling themselves and anyone who would listen, that there were squads of wizards in each and every one of the planes, powering it with their magic so that it could fly, and someday, the wizards were going to make a mistake and metal planes were going to rain down on everyone.

"Ah, finally." He said as he saw John arrive for breakfast, which opened up at 7 sharp. The man looked harried yet also was dressed impeccably, knowing that they were probably going to meet Rothschild today, and the man was anything but pleasant to talk to, especially since they were only going to add to the pile of paperwork he had on his desk.

He counted that as a small victory as well.

"You're late," He said as he took a sip of his freshly squeezed orange juice. Funnily enough, Oranges tasted different here and in Manhattan.

"Well, forgive me, dear sir, someone thought it appropriate to dump some information on me and then shut the door on me without giving me any context," John snarked as he ordered the Omelette and also Orange juice.

Copycat.

"I just thought that you would need all the sleep you could get since it would be a long flight home." John rolled his eyes at him so hard he feared that his eyeballs might fall out of his head.

Plus, he also had to stay up and guard their rooms and the hotel at large because he knew there was a possibility that he was tracked, especially since the British Ministry still had their time trackers.

But he had something they didn't and that is the ability to blend in with the common population, something that almost no wizards in Magical Britain have, not even the No-maj borns because Magical Britain and Hogwarts as a whole had a primary purpose that worked excellently.

The education and the political posing were all secondary. The primary purpose was to make sure that the majority of new wizards, the No-Maj born integrated perfectly into the wizarding society, so much so that Hogwarts basically crippled their ability to go back into the nonmagical world and stay there for long periods of time.

Even their yearly breaks were barely a week long and the rest of the time, there was total magical silence on both ends. Letters were all screened, not the noble kids no but the No-Maj borns were fair game since they had no authority they could complain to and also because their parents could disseminate the information to other unsuspecting No-Majs.

It was all a very successful scheme since the nobles needed someone to do the jobs that no one else would and they would never bring in No-Majs to do their jobs. Hence, the No-Maj born came into the picture. Their educations were all sponsored, with the stipulation being that they completed all the seven years of Hogwarts, without fail. Oh, they could fail and even take drops but they had to get a certificate from Hogwarts and Hogwarts was very good at brainwashing everyone that entered its hallowed doors, no matter how bad the education might be.

Yeah, he had a very bad opinion of Hogwarts, contrary to what the wizards in MACUSA thought about it. Yeah, it was old and yes, it did house many mysteries, which was compounded by the fact that Dumbledore lived there, and had a fan following worldwide but it was not even close to being the top in either coolness factor or even education.

Japan's Mahoutokoro was much, much better. He had a harder time against Japanese criminals than any other criminal on the planet simply because their school had a much more rigorous and strict combat training program that every single wizard had to take and pass, without fail. They were not allowed to practice magic in the No-Maj world without it.

It was also much more balanced as it included close combat skills as well, something that was only given to Aurors in MACUSA, and even then, it was nowhere near as rigorous as Mahoutokoro's training.

That school made sure that each and every one of its wizards would be able to fight for itself since the wizards had abandoned the Emperor before Japan was defeated by the No-Maj using a weapon that he could only describe as apocalyptic. To this day, there was a permanent squad of ICC researchers and Unspeakables who worked on reversing the damage done to Japan.

They had limited success and were on their way to getting a complete solution in a few decades if they were lucky. It was all very fascinating as he had read their research a bunch of times using his high clearance given by MACUSA.

One of the many things that he would miss if he strayed in MAgical Britain.

He shook his head slightly, "Are you Ok?"

He looked up as John peered up at him in concern, mid sip of his Orange Juice.

"Yeah, don't worry about it. Now, eat up, I hear that the ride we are going to take is a bumpy one."

"Bumpy?"

He just smiled mysteriously.

…..

….

"Oh. Ohhhh," John could only say that as they stood right outside the real US Consulate with the No-Maj coming in and out in droves.

"Are we at the wrong place?"

"Nope!" HE smiled cheekily and pushed John inside.

He followed the "Commercial Foreign Immigration Services Bureau for Others" sign, climbing two floors and finally reaching a floor that was almost empty save for the one desk manned by one man.

"Oh, please come in," The man said with a plastic smile on his face that was reminiscent of the average service industry worker back home, in the States.

"It is my genuine pleasure," He grinned back, only his was much more real as he pushed John to go past the desk, the man returning to his desk with the same plastic smile as if he was a robot and then strode to the door that appeared in his vision as soon as he crossed a black line on the ground.

"Where are we—Ohh," John said as the door, the shiny golden door appeared in front of them.

He gestured at the door to John"After you," John looked suspicious but did not question it as he opened the door and put one foot inside, and then…..fell down.

"AAAAAaaaa!"

"Hey! You fell down yet?" He shouted into the tunnel before faltering as he too felt an impact on his back, pushing him into the tunnel. Turning around, he gave the middle finger to the wizard who was looking at him with an all too pleased of an expression with his wand pointed at Scott.



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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

MACUSA Consulate, US Consulate, London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Do you have any fucking idea how big of a mess you have made? He made the deliberate motion of cleaning his ears as they stood in a conference room of some sort, with specialised screens set up for long distance branch to branch communication, with Rothschild on the screen, red faced. Well, it was not colour but he could imagine what state the Director's face would be, especially in the face of this event.

"And you!" Seeing that Scott was not even looking at him, Rothschild turned to John who immediately winced. After all, Scott's job, while secure, was still within the authority of Rothschild while he himself was expressly under the President's rule, with only partial authority given to Rothschild because he was partial to New York and wished to live there, no matter where his job took him.

"How could you let this happen? I told you that you were there to iron out any issues between the ministries, and the second he gets his British registration, this happens in the same alley. How could you be irresponsible? What were you even doing when Mr.Hotshot over here was popping off Wizards' heads using his special ability like there were hundreds of him in the world so identifying him with a specialised illusion charm would just be too damned difficult." The room shook from the voice of the speakers as Rothschild roared for all his old voice box could do.

"Ahem," he cleared his throat, drawing the attention of the Director to him, "Can I just say that his presence or absence wouldn't have meant a thing since the wizards were a threat and I would have either hidden John away before going back, because there's no way I would leave women under the Cruciatus curse, or I would have killed the people with much more ferocity, possibly leaving behind clues about my identity."

Rothschild sighed. Damn, these systems were way too accurate to be installed everywhere. Standard issue must be like the Floo system but apparently, that system could be compromised so MACUSA had ordered for something like this to be built, an isolated connection from the rest of the world. He would have to look into it in his downtime, if he got lucky enough to have some free time going forward, it was quite interesting.

"You fool, you have now exposed yourself and your powers to Dumbledore. That man is the single most dangerous man in the ICC and that is not because of his powers but because of his mind. When worked properly, his mind can bring about miracles and that is exactly what we are afraid of because he would need a miracle to defeat or contain you, something that the President has expressly forbidden, as I am sure you know."

He understood it, he really did and yet, he couldn't stop himself. There was no way he could let something like this continue to happen, especially this close to his last left family in the world. For some reason, despite their continued indifference towards him, he couldn't just leave that behind. It was as if something was hard coded in his mind, forcing his mind back to the same topic every other month. It was quite tortuous, forcing him to do something that he had never done before, letting down the barriers in his mind to a skilled mind healer and letting them inspect if some sort of compulsion was laid on his mind before he figured out how to manifest his powers in his mind as well, creating an impenetrable barrier.

The result was as he had expected. Nothing, nada, zilch. There was no sign of any compulsion or anything in his mind or if there was, it was part of his personality, so tight wound with who he was that it would be all but impossible to separate it.

Either way, the only answer to that problem was to come back and figure out what was wrong. He could somewhat keep the burning curiosity at bay when he was in the States but now that he was here? He couldn't even imagine returning for some reason.

He had to figure out why and he finally understood what Charles was telling him regarding becoming an actual Archmage instead of the pseudo one he was now. So, he looked up at Rothschild, who had gone silent because of the red wisps of magic that had unconsciously begun leaking out of his body as his emotions were excited.

"Director, with all due respect, it is my decision and it will remain my decision. I will of course be a part of MACUSA and anytime the President needs me, I will be there instantly, she knows that and you know that as well. But, I need to be here, for my family. I will personally write a letter to the President explaining the situation but for now, just get John out of here, it is not safe here." He informed the Director resolutely as the red wisps dissipated around him.

"And if I force you to return? There are exactly 32 Combat wizards of all specialties surrounding the conference room. I just have to give the order and they would all try their best to subdue you. What would you do then?"

He grinned at the Director, "Well, I think you answered your own question there, Director. They will try to subdue me and they will fail, just like the Native American community that devised that blood ritual, as you no doubt read from the reports you have access to."

Rothschild slumped on the screen, "Very well. Agent Smith, travel arrangements will be made soon, remain in the Embassy until then. As for you, I will be expecting a letter from the President giving you express permission to pull the stunts you are no doubt going to pull, and also to authorise me into letting you remain a full time employee despite not showing your face for who knows how long."

He gave the man a thumbs up, "You got it. See ya!" saying so, he left the building, and flinched minutely as the Director stopped John from leaving with him, no doubt for another tongue lashing.

He sighed in relief as at least that was done. All that was left was to write a letter to the President who would understand after he would hint in the letter about him needing to be in Britain to become a full fledged ArchMage, something that MACUSA had been salivating over for years, decades at this point. They had all the people, all the resources, and all the soft power in the world, and yet not a leading entity with an overwhelming power that could wield all of the resources and help MACUSA flex its might.

Charles was all but retired, sending in his son for all the ICC meetings as his representative and only ever appearing in the school that he founded after WWII, and even then, the world could see that Charles was in no position to fight a protracted battle with any other ArchMage, without dying in the process.

MACUSA also could not afford a rogue Archmage that didn't wish to be constrained by the chains of authorities. That was why he was expressly ordered to put down the person who had become mad with power after his community had devised a blood ritual to empower a single person using the sacrifices of hundreds of young and old wizards.

Obviously, that ritual resulted in a botched person but that wizard still had ArchMage level powers and had to be put down because the President was terrified that MACUSA would have to bow down to a bloodthirsty Archmage.

Apparently, she has had plenty of experiences with mad Archmage and wanted to avoid a repeat at all costs.

"Thank you," he nodded at the guard who opened the door for him and looked at the cloudy, dour, and downright depressing weather of London, compared to sunny New York, and sighed.

"Yup, for the foreseeable future, this is home."


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Brown's Hotel, London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Yes, he will be back in a bit, and make sure to put the food and drinks tab on his room. I'm sure he will understand."

"Sure, sir."

Flashing a quick smile at the receptionist, he turned and entered the elevator to get to his room. While it was not the most expensive or flashy room in the hotel, no, that would be the presidential suite, his room was more than roomy enough with space for everything he might need to do, including work.

Putting on the Do Not Disturb tag on the door, he cast the locking charms, as well as the anti surveillance charms on the room before cracking his knuckles and getting to work.

Sitting cross legged on his bed, he let himself dive into his mind, his mind shielded by a giant glowing red shield. It only looked like a shield but upon closer look, it was more along the lines of innumerable laser lines criss-crossing across his mind, creating an almost impenetrable barrier.

He had yet to meet anyone who could make him feel the attack on his mind. He was the natural counter to any legilimens in the world, it helped a lot as a spy because his mind could literally not be branched. No mind magic worked on him, be it ritual powered, wand magic, or even Arcane magic left behind in the ruins back in the States.

Who knew that manifesting his ability which had the power to block and break through all magic, could help make his mind impenetrable?

He sighed as he phased through the giant red sphere. He was immune to it obviously but anyone else would find their minds shredded by the sheer force behind his lasers.

After crossing the sphere, he came across a picturesque landscape, with trees, grass, a small river, mountains, and the sun. It was the same picture that little him drew whenever he was instructed to draw a landscape, from his boarding school days.

Ah, those were the days!

Opening his eyes, he looked at the sun, the red sun. He imagined that sun to be the source of his otherworldly powers, otherwise what else could they be? The ability to break through any and all magic. Runes, enchantments, spells, unforgivables, even Obscurus were broken through using his magic, allowing the States to remain trouble free for over three years at this point, courtesy of him.

The sun worked as, even in the material world, the Sun was THE source of energy in the world. The sun grew larger in the backdrop as he grew proficient in the use of the Kinetic Lasers, as he had taken to call them after reading about them in a MACUSA report.

The Lasers were something that he could call upon from any point in his body, and unleash them to various effects. They still drained his magic and as expected, were very much heavy on his stamina. The odd thing about his magic was that they looked like lasers but they did not burn through everything.

No, they punched through everything. After extensive study in MACUSA, they realised that his lasers were full of kinetic energy, allowing him to use the lasers to push matter. It allowed his lasers to act like a bullet for example. Extreme and sudden application of his lasers did heat the target but that was more because of the sudden conversion of all that kinetic energy into heat.

He didn't know how the people at MACUSA were going to handle things from now but that was not his main focus for now. Plus, they were doing just fine before he came along, even though the Internal Security department was a tad bit more stretched than they were comfortable.

Looking at the sun, he sighed once more. For the past three months, he had no growth in the Sun, or more accurately, in his energy. He could feel it, the sun refused to grow any larger and he might have been content with that power level in the States since there were barely any people who knew about him and what he could do, reducing any chances of vulnerability.

In London though, with Dumbledore and the other mystery ArchMage around, he needed all the power he could get. He had no contacts in the ministry, who could help him anyway, and even if he did know anyone, their first choice would be to report to Dumbledore rather than to him, a Foreigner in all but blood.

Getting out of his mindscape, he got up from the bed and removed a letterhead. He had that letter to the President to write, explaining why he would remain in London for the foreseeable future.

He had to protect the WInters Family from harm, no matter what.

_____xx____

Winter Family Manor

–Nathaniel Winters–

He read the reports disseminated by the ministry employees in the Auror department, to all the nobles. In theory, it was supposed to be a secret and completely classified, considering the nature of the incident but the Ministry was riddled with so many holes and leaks that it would be impossible for it to be plugged in his lifetime.

Case in point, the Auror Department had an unofficial service where they would leak the reports to an assortment of Noble families, be it Light, Grey, or Dark oriented families, it mattered not.

"That idiot." He muttered to himself, in his office as he read through the report, depicting the death, injuries sustained, and even who were killed. It was hard not to see all the names with the big Surnames. All of them related to Dark Families, all of them probably belonging to that shadow organisation backed by the Malfoys and even the Blacks, to a certain extent.

He couldn't believe Arcturus would do this, even as his own family had been reduced to such a small number.

"Tweety?" He had to contain this and also, see if he could not get in touch with MACUSA, to make sure that his nephew was deported back to the States as soon as possible. It was…hard, to think of his nephew.

That brought back bad memories, of his half-brother and his wife, laughing happily with him and his wife, in London. His face dimmed as he thought of what had happened, resulting in only him being left alive, with an arranged marriage wife, his brother gone and only Scott left as a reminder, a very painful reminder.

He knew it was cowardice and yet, he could not face Scott, so he sent him away, to the States. They still had some of their contacts and his family was a minor stakeholder in a muggle boarding school. So, he set things up to make sure that Scott grew up with friends but was also watched over by AMCUSA contacts.

Who would have known that Scott would inherit…that woman's power? His eyes flashed with fury as he thought of the accursed woman, the one who brought ruin on him and his family, only leaving him alive, behind, alone in this world.

"Honey, dinner's ready!" Martha, his wife, her voice reached him through the doos.

"In a minute!" He yelled back as he set the letter down. He would have to deal with it tomorrow. They also had an important vote in Wizengamot tomorrow so he would go to the MACUSA consulate on his way there anyway.

Closing the doors to his office, and locking them with his magic, he tried to ignore the pang of sadness in his chest as he thought of his brother, and how ashamed his brother would be of him, for sending his son away.

Sighing, he resolved to deport Scott back to the States, irrespective of his reasons to be here, and once he was ready, once his eldest took over his position, he would visit Scott and tell him the truth.

The truth of his birth, of his accursed mother, and about his accursed powers. After all, he had seen his mother use similar powers to wreak havoc on anything that even dared come close to the Winters family.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Leaky Cauldron, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"All ready?" He asked John who was standing in his room, holding onto two giant suitcases. He only had one when he came to London but apparently, John is a bit of a spendthrift when it comes to vacation purchases.

"Geez man, you were only out for, like, a day at max. When did you even get the time to buy all of this crap?"

"...I, uh, had it all delivered?"

…Okay, the cab is downstairs. Let's go,"

He escorted John to the cab waiting for him downstairs and made sure that he was safe and sound before he slipped back into his room. He hadn't detected anyone tailing him or John yet so it was safe to assume that at least John would be safe on his way back home but just to satisfy his paranoid, he had tagged John with an advanced version of Revelio charm, telling him the state of John's health at all times with a limited range.

It had a range of about 20 miles in every direction, which could be boosted quite a bit if he had attached a wardstone to it but that much was enough for John to reach the airport.

He stayed alert in his room, ready to bolt at a moment's notice, right up until he felt John's charm fly out of his range, meaning John's flight had taken off.

"Great, now, next order of business," He muttered to himself as he cast a wide area cleansing and sterilising spell on his room, getting rid of anything that he might have left accidentally, hair, skin cells, or anything else, before getting out of the room and heading straight for the Leaky Cauldron.

First order of business, he needed information. Real time information about the current workings of the British Magical Society. He couldn't rely on second hand recounts that reached MACUSA because they couldn't afford to offend Dumbledore by setting up a proper Spy nexus in London.

Bars were the best place to gather local information and fortunately for him, the Leaky Cauldron was the bar in London to get more information about the ministry. If he wanted to learn about teenagers and their affairs in Hogwarts, he might have headed to the Three Broomsticks Inn for that sort of gossip.

Unfortunately, he was not a teenager anymore and he had more pressing matters to attend to, hence, Leaky Cauldron it was. Plus, it was on his way that he found the US consulate building, so he resolved to send the letter to the President on his way back to the Hotel.

He might have to change places soon because he couldn't afford to be predictable, not against a fully realised Archmage, especially one well versed in the Dark Arts.

Sure, Dumbledore knew of the Dark Arts but the man's well known dislike of those arts was practically an open secret but the new Archmage was rumoured to live & breathe the Dark Arts, so much so that his entire being had been warped due to his magic, making him extremely strong but turning him into something else, something more than human and yet, all the more animalistic.

He winced as he read the sparse reports that MACUSA had been able to gather before both sides of the conflict went underground after MACUSA secretly spread the information that MACUSA now had a much younger Archmage in their arsenal. This new Archmage, dubbed Voldemort, was much more cunning, and ruthless and seeped into Dark Magic than any other Archmage he had heard of, to the point of being incapable of casting normal magic with the same strength as his fabled Dark Magic.

He had no idea why they had gotten so bold as to sponsor an attack on the biggest shopping district of Magical Britain on the same day that he had arrived but he knew that it was the sign of something bigger, the sign of things beginning to heat up again.

Magical Britain had already shed so much blood, from both sides before it was temporarily put to stop by the arrival of news of a much stronger MACUSA but the conflict was beginning to thaw out again.

And that meant that Dumbledore and Voldemort would both be looking to hire people for their causes. Which meant an opportunity for infiltration.

"Fate indeed," He muttered as he paid the cabby and came face to face with the Leaky Cauldron. Due to his sensitivity to magic, he could sense the charm cast on the outside facade and had to raise an eyebrow because somehow Tom had gotten the Ministry to cast the undetectable plotting charm on his private property and probably gotten away with free regular maintenance as well, all in the guise of maintaining the entrance to Diagon ALley a secret.

Shaking his head at the brilliance of Tom's ancestors, he entered the Pub and was immediately assaulted by the smell of cheap beer, Butterbeer, and perfumes, both cheap and expensive.

Taking the free newspaper, he got one big mug of Butterbeer, unlimited refills of course, and sat in a corner, getting ready to spend at least a couple of hours sitting in that uncomfortable chair to hear something useful when his eyes landed on the headline topic of the Daily Prophet, a horrible propaganda piece of the Ministry and the rich, according to his knowledge.

'Wizengamot voting tomorrow - Important Population control Bill'

'The Wizengamot to vote on an important piece of legislation brought forward by the Malfoy Family Head to decide on the fates of the magically disadvantaged children of the muggle people. According to Ministry sources, the bill aims to create a central repository of all magical children born under the Ministry Net, with talks of expanding the Net further inland so more magical children can be rescued from muggle upbringing. The bill further aims to create special Pre-Hogwarts schools, supervised by the Ministry, to make sure that the children receive appropriate magical education so that they are ready to…..'

By - Rita Skeeter

He sneered internally as the horrible, clear to anyone propaganda was on the front page of the only newspaper that mattered in Magical Britain. It was no wonder that most of their population consisted of sheep and yes men, more involved in their own lives rather than what was happening around them.

The bill was also rather deplorable, something that MACUSA was doing, but on a much smaller scale. He had found out long ago that, excluding the Native settlements, the magical births in Britain were far, far larger than MACUSA, despite having a fraction of the resources.

That had led to some pretty ugly operations that led to wizards in orphanages being rescued by MACUSA authorities, also going so far as to give away free scholarships, no strings attached to magical children from financially disadvantaged families, particularly from the No-maj families, something that Dumbledore put up a token resistance to. The operation was publicly denied but he knew that it was still ongoing, judging by the new admissions that his college friend had to deal with in her new mixed-education school.

The Net around MAgical Britain was a well researched phenomenon. It was horribly inefficient and resource consuming but it also did its job, especially considering that Magical Britain had 1.5x the number of MACUSA despite being so tiny in land mass.

The ability to track wizards within the Magical Net was a costly affair, which is why it was only used during wartime. This bill would increase that expenditure, to snatch children away from families and then send them to concentration camps.

Yes, he knew that they would call them schools but they would all be concentration camps, designed to churn out cheap and uneducated labour for the elites.

'Atleast MACUSA gave them the best possible education.'

At the end of the article, there was a line that caught his attention.

'This bill is an open bill, hence, there is a public gallery that can be used to see the proceedings. Open for all citizens of Magical Britain.'

He smiled as he tossed the newspaper on the table, enjoying his Butterbeer.

He had his in.

Now, all that was left to decide. Which side would benefit the most from a small internal culling, be it a bloody culling or an ideological culling?

He had a hunch that it would become pretty clear to him tomorrow morning. Paying the bill, he set out to go to a real cafe in the No-Maj world. They had much better coffee than Tom did and they would also have modern pen and paper.

After all, he still needed to write that letter to the President.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

US Consulate, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

Dropping the letter for the president after labeling it an important delivery, he stood outside the US consulate, debating where to go. The hearing for that new bill was tomorrow and unlike MACUSA, where every piece of legislature was available freely in the public domain, there was not even a peep of what the bill's precise language was, outside the wildly biased piece on the Daily Prophet.

The only other comparable piece was completely private and owned by a single family, as far as he was aware, and yet, the Quibbler was not the go to source of information for most people in Magical Britain. It was mostly written by someone who preferred looking into more imaginary magical creatures rather than writing about politicians who were about to declare the No-Maj born as magical creatures.

No, that wouldn't be right. After all, Magical Britain gave some of the Magical Creatures more rights than they were proposing to give to the No-Maj born wizard kids since it was actually illegal for any ICC member state or any ICC registered sanctuary to separate the kids from their mothers for a number of animals, at least not until they were fully grown adults.

As such, he returned to his hotel, packed up his stuff, thanked, and more importantly, tipped the front desk staff before setting off to another hotel in the city. His training wouldn't let him stay in one place for too long. A palace preferably more discreet than the hotel he was staying at. After all, he would need to mingle with the seedy areas of London now that he was here, those guys had the most fresh information and were the easiest to bribe.

After all, he was paid handsomely by MACUSA, not to mention the mission fund he had access to, on top of all the bounties he had cashed in already, so money was not exactly an issue for him. It was just that he was naturally frugal by nature, having realised the importance of money early on in his life once he realised that his uncle was footing all his bills back in the States.

Shaking his head, he got into his second choice of hotels in London. It was a decent one, with monthly options, provided you paid upfront, which he did, for their Deluxe room, which was not that Deluxe but only had the name up to trick any tourist who had not yet seen the rooms. Settling down, he unpacked his stuff and freshened up.

Changing his clothes into something more casual, he set out to tour the city. He would have loved to drive around but he did not have his license here and getting a rental would be more hassle than it would be worth, especially since he already had a lead for tomorrow.

Tomorrow, he would finally lay his eyes on Albus freaking Dumbledore, the big bad of Britain that everyone and their mothers in the ICC feared. The man was a legend who had hundreds of strong students in every facet of the government, even in the ICC, that was on top of the many, many people he knew who would gladly do him any favour.

Honestly, he knew that he should be cautious in dealing with Dumbledore and therefore, remain in the shadows until he was sure that he had a direct line of shot but that would not work if he had to fight against Voldemort because Dumbledore would think of him as an enemy as well.

Fighting one fully realised Archmage seeped in Dark Arts? Difficult, but doable.

Fighting two? Impossible. Not even Albus Dumbledore would be able to get out of that fight with his limbs intact, and if all of them were fighting to the death, no one would probably get out of it alive.

The Leaky Cauldron was set but that was the face of Magical Britain. There would hardly be anything illegal happening there. No, he had to look for the more isolated areas of London, which were more likely to be held by wizards.

So far, he had narrowed down his search to a couple of locations, the first of which he was headed to right now.

The Docklands were full of empty warehouses right now, and so were the factories in Thames Estuary. Then there were the old WWII bunkers, either sealed off or forgotten, along with closed off tube stations.

All in all, he had the day ahead jam packed for him.

Grinning, he entered the Docklands. Casting a chameleon charm on himself, he cast a featherlight charm on his shoes, erasing any sound or light as he waltzed into the area, looking for any movement but more importantly, relying on his magical senses to look for any magical spell or enchantment being cast, to either make people forget the place or to ward off the place from magical damage.

Both of these things could be done, but they were notoriously difficult to cast and also expensive to maintain so they were probably only reserved for Noble Houses, or more strategic locations, like Diagon Alley, Hogwarts, and more. Doing that level of protection for a drug house or something equally low value was unthinkable.

Also, it was much easier to sense through the Net that Magical Britain had all around its mainland.

Alas, it was not meant to be, as even after running around the entire Docklands for hours, he had yet to find anything even remotely resembling a magical signature, not even near the areas where it would be easy for wizards to make underground structures.

Just like that, it had already become dark, even though it could barely be called evening according to his body's timetable, which was more accustomed to Manhattan's time.

Sighing, he caught a cabby and returned to his hotel room. Ordering room service for dinner, he freshened up and got into his PJs.

While eating his dinner, he read up on the previous weeks' worth of newspapers, from both the Daily Prophet and the Quibbler, just in case he needed to know something for tomorrow.

As it turned out, the Daily Prophet was nothing more than a sensationalising piece of newspaper with no regards for accuracy whatsoever. It was, as expected, a propaganda mouthpiece, and the hottest pieces were always written by one Rita Skeeter or by her senior.

The Quibbler meanwhile focused more on Magical Creature sightings all across the world and how the author wished to go to different countries to try and find the new creatures, sprinkled with the occasional interviews from people who claimed to have seen the so called mysterious creatures, namely the Wrackspurts, Nargles and more.

So, tomorrow, he would hopefully meet his family as well, and maybe, it would not go as disastrous as it did, and who knows, even if the Winters Family wanted nothing to do with him, he could at least learn more about his parents and then leave, once this Voldemort problem was taken care of anyway.

He didn't think he had it in him to change the fabric of Magical Britain because they were moulded for generations to become the sheep that they were now. Lethargic, afraid, and wary of acting out, in fear of what? He did not know but he knew that it was not his problem to handle the very systemic issues in Magical Britain.

That would take more than a powerful mage to achieve. It would take someone of…Dumbledore's stature to do.

That's what irked him the most about that man. Unlike Magical Britain who looked up to him with lenses full of admiration, he looked at the man and his actions with a more clinical gaze.

The man had practically everything he could ever want to bring about more lasting change in Magical Britain, if not through force then through his position as the Headmaster of Hogwarts which gave him ridiculous amounts of influence over the next generations of magical generation.

He could have single handed brought Magical Britain to the forefront of Magic and yet, what did he do? Keep his hands tied and his mouth shut, and went along with the flow. A flow that the previously corrupted generation decided. They too probably exercised some restraint because of Dumbledore but that was vastly overshadowed by what Dumbledore could have achieved.

He exhaled in frustration before he crawled into his bed. After, casting his usual bedtime security spells, obviously.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

Waking up before his alarm rang, he swiftly checked the spells in his room and after topping them up so they would last the entire day that he would be out, he got to get ready for the Big hearing today, the Wizengamot bill voting was not usually an exciting affair but today's bill was certainly very controversial and there would probably be a queue to enter the gallery, and he most certainly wanted in.

After all, he would have to scope the people he might have to take out in the future and also take some amount of measure of him.

Albus fucking Dumbledore. The man would most certainly be present and he kind of hoped for the man to do something concrete, finally, to make sure that this bill does not pass but from what little intel he could get his hands on, The Dark Faction was coming out swinging this time and while the Ministry leadership, along with Dumbledore himself obviously were against this bill, the nobles that made up the Wizengamot were almost overwhelmingly dark aligned.

The light aligned families used to dominate it but over the past five years, they had all been mostly snuffed out, with only notable lines like Potter, Longbottom, Bones, and Abbott to name a few. The Prewett family had been wiped out, along with many others who opposed the various renditions of the same bill that was brought in the Wizengamot.

The Winters family was not a light aligned family. They were a politically neutral, the grey aligned family, that focused more on their business rather than politics, thus, they were mostly spared the Light vs Dark fight but even their interests would be harmed if the bill came to fruition.

After all, there were smart people in the Grey Faction who would realise that this would only harm their business prospects. After all, the new No-Maj born wizards that came into the Magical Britani were the ones who were the primary source of workforce for the majority of the magical businesses.

He knew, for a fact, that the ICW mandated completely magical staff on hand for sanctuaries that had even a single magical creature, and it took a lot of staff to run a sanctuary, even if it was mostly used to harvest parts from the creatures.

The Greengrass would lose most of their staff if this bill was passed, not because of the workings of the bill, but because it would instantly create a centrally available list of future No-Maj families who can be slaughtered wholesale by the Dark Faction before they stopped foot into the magical world and became low cost labour. Thus, cutting off profits for their business since wizards from noble families, even the ones in poverty, didn't work very hard and couldn't be exploited much.

As he had his breakfast (Omelette), he couldn't help but think of the response to today's bill voting. Even if the Dark Faction did win, he knew, now that Voldemort had decided to become active, he would end up targeting the families that opposed him today, taking that as a slight to his reputation.

That narcissistic asshole. Then again, reaching the level of power that 99.99% of the planet's population would never even get to see, is kind of an achievement worthy of being arrogant over.

Paying the bill for his breakfast, he looked at the time and saw that it was 8:00 in the morning, plenty of time for him to reach Wizenfgamot since the voting was not scheduled to begin until 11:00 AM and that was if all those pompous assholes bothered to show up on time.

The assembly was obligated to make individual announcements for the absence of all active house member seats and then had to wait for an hour after making the announcements, before they could start the vote without the absent people.

The importance of noble seats in law making could not be understated in Britain. It was totally different back in MACUSA and he appreciated the system for it for a while it was inefficient and could fail at times but it was leagues above what Magical Britain had currently.

If, and that is a big if, he had the opportunity to guide some change in the right direction in Britani, he would advise them to look at MACUSA's electoral system and try to integrate that into their processes.

Grabbing a cab, he reached the Leaky Cauldron, and entered Diagon Alley. With a couple of minutes to 9, the Alley was very sparsely populated, with only the shopkeepers present inside the shops and some shops not even open yet, with Gringotts being the exception as all the Gringott banks all around the world closed at exactly 7:00 PM and opened exactly at 7:00 AM, bar none.

They followed the timetable like it was their religion and in a way, it kind of was their religion. The religion of money.

Knockturn Alley was the same, charmed with a concealment spell, to make the entrance blurry and unpleasant to first time visitors but to the people who knew what they were looking for. It was clear as day to see the sheer amount of Dark Magic coming off of that place.

It was fascinating and shocking that the Ministry had not taken any concrete steps, not towards the existence of the Knockturn Alley, no something like that existed in every country and it was infinitely better to know where it was so it could be at least somewhat regulated, but towards the location of Knockturn Alley.

It should not be right smack dab next to Diagon Alley, easy to see for any person in Diagon Alley who knew of the Shady lane's existence. The Ministry should relocate it someplace else but then again, there was no other place in Magical Britain that would give them the discretion.

He sighed and moved on, trying not to think of all the things that were wrong in this place.

There was an official Floo entrance to the Ministry in Diagon Alley that could be used during emergencies but also during public events that would require a wider, public entrance to the Ministry building.

It was just a Floo terminal, manned by Aurors and a Ministry employee, who took a minimal fee to facilitate the exchange, probably just to recoup the cost of the Floo Powder.

Once inside the Ministry, he shrugged the soot off his coat and saw that the lobby was already filled with people, with heavy Auror presence throughout the lobby, with two people stationed at every entrance and exit, along with some in civilian get up as well.

He could recognise them from a mile away. This was adequate security set up right here.

"State your name and your purpose of visit, please."

"Scott Winters, Gallery for the Bill voting."

The scribe quickly wrote that down and handed him a badge that had his name and his purpose printed on it, "Show this to any auror that asks for it and they will guide you to the right place."

"Thank-" "Next!"

His smile strained as he was interrupted mid greeting by the employee, which was unfair since there was only a single person behind him in line.

He sat on one of the many sofas arranged, which were not comfortable at all. It was only 9:30 now and he realised something.

He was early. Way early, because there were only 6 people in the lobby and the four that had come before him were clearly in a group, mingling with each other, and the one who came after him was a journalist of some sort, with a camera with him, and a Quick Quill floating behind him.

That was a banned item in MACUSA. Not exactly illegal but anything written by a Quick Quill was banned from being published anywhere, so it had quickly fallen out of fashion for its glaring inaccuracies.



If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Wizengamot Gallery, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

He stood in the Gallery area, impatiently tapping his foot, along with a dozen other people as they all waited for the vaunted Wizengamot to begin, once all the members had gathered, obviously.

The time was now 11:30 AM and there was still no sign of any members of the Wizengamot, let alone the pompous nobles who he expected to be late. The problem was that none of the people who were with him in the gallery were acting as impatient as he was, as if this was all within the norm.

Bunch of self important bastards.

He rolled his eyes as he finally heard the door creak, his attention shifting to the massive door that could probably house three lines of people at the same time, opening.

He noted various people coming in, their clothing suggesting they were nobility, and yup, they sat in the nobility section. As far as he could tell, the Wizengamot was not completely rigged to be in favour of the Noble houses, at least on the surface.

The seats were a mix of hereditary and appointed seats.

The Warlock had one, aside from cases where he abstained from voting due to some conflict of interest or whatever.

The Minister of Magic, Head of Magical Law Enforcement, Head of Transportation, Head of Education, and more, every single departmental head had a seat, which was an appointed seat, in theory, but the appointed people danced to the tunes of the nobility sitting in front of them so what difference did it make?

Then, Hogwarts actually got a seat, which had been empty for decades at this point because Albus bloody Dumbledore already occupied the position of Chief Warlock.

The distribution between hereditary and non hereditary positions was skewed in the favour of the nobility as well, with 35 seats being assigned to them and the rest 15 being appointed officials. Though, out of those 35, maybe 7 would be independent of the nobility votes as, more often than not, the ministry officials appointed with a Wizengamot seat were recommended by the nobles and were members of the poorer pureblood families who had fallen out of their fortunes.

He sighed as more and more of the nobility entered the Chambers, the hub hub increasing proportionally. The senior Ministry officials arrived soon as well, all coming at the same time, probably trying to project a strong front of their faction, though their positions were laughably compromised.

Then, he came.

He instinctively straightened up as he felt the atmosphere in the chambers change abruptly. His eyes narrowed as he looked at the opened door.

With a dramatic entrance, Dumbledore entered the Chambers, silencing the entire place without even doing anything, with the nobility looking at Dumbledore with barely repressed awe or hate, depending on their alignment on the moral as well as magical spectrum.

Dumbledore, was followed by multiple people, belonging to the more prominent families of the Light Spectrum, though his most ardent follower, Lord James Potter was notably absent, as he had been for the past year or so.

There was a hushed conversation within the nobility as an unassuming looking woman took the seat of Lord Potter.

Whispers that were quashed by the gavel of Dumbledore who began speaking. He had to hand it to the old woman, even benign this far way, he could feel the old man's magic, perfectly controlled and restrained and yet, polished and sharp, ready to be unleashed at a moment's notice.

That was not something that could be built within a few decades. No, Albus bloody Dumbledore probably had been training since he got a wand, relentlessly. That kind of prowess could not be built by just being magically talented or just hard work. The man probably worked himself to the bone, and then some.

Usually, even that doesn't guarantee becoming an Archmage but the man had gone ahead and become that as well. An Archmage, the strongest one alive, if the reports were to be believed. Albus Dumbledore and Voldemort, two active Archmages in the same era, both of similar prowess though it is common consensus that should both of the mages fight to the death, none would escape alive, such was their prowess.

Alas, this Voldemort fellow was quite crafty, never meeting Dumbledore head on, with the intent of finishing the fight. Most of the time, it was only because he was there to stall Dumbledore to stop him from single handedly stopping whatever assault the Dark Lord had mounted on some innocent shopping district.

Though his presence was surprisingly lacking on the raid in Diagon Alley. He had half expected to fight Voldemort himself when he saw that his members were attacking Diagon Alley in broad daylight and that was why he used lethal force with his lasers. He didn't want to have any distractions in his fight with an Archmage level wizard. Alas, the man didn't show up at all, which was good.

Though, judging by the magical feedback he was getting from his enhanced senses, if Voldemort was just as strong as Dumbledore, he was getting genuinely worried about his ability to truly kill off this guy, because these guys were monsters, so far ahead of Charles that it was not even funny.

Even that Native American guy who had gorged himself on over 300 wizards and a thousand No-Maj was no match for these guys in terms of pure magical disposition, which was all that guy had going for him.

"Since we are waiting for the rest of the members to arrive," The amused, yet firm voice of the Chief Warlock reached every corner of the chambers, "..might as well get some announcements out of the way. Unless anyone has any issues with that?" The way he peered at everyone in the nobility gathering without his glasses on must have been intimidating because everyone agreed.

"Good. Now, we have a substitution here, to vote in place for Lord James Charlus Potter, one Ms.Chamberlocks. Aside from that, we have some absentees, some who had sent in their votes in advance, and more." Dumbledore gestured to a stack of paper sitting in an unlocked chest on the right of him.

"Those will be opened after the present members are done with the voting. Now, as per standard procedure, we are to wait an hour after each and every announcements, provided that a majority is not reached to start–"

"Ahem," A smooth voice interrupted Dumbledore's speech/

"Yes, Lord Malfoy?"

"With all due respect, Chief Warlock. We already have a sitting majority of 47 people here and I see two advance vote proceedings in the protected Ministry chest. I think it is safe that we get things expedited, especially since the bill is of such importance with ramifications across all sectors of Magical Britain. So, I propose waiving off of the announcements to create a one time exception, for today."

"I second the motion." A portly man sitting right behind Malfoy stood up enthusiastically and shouted his support for the motion. Kiss ass.

"I see, Lord Malfoy, Lord Carrow. All in favour of the motions to be waived for expedited voting?" Dumbledore asked everyone in the gallery and he watched as all the sitting members drew their wands and tapped something in front of them, with a small circle lighting up green, indicating that the votes had been recorded, and it was an affirmative.

According to his knowledge, it was fairly basic, with green being YES, red being NO, and Blue abstaining from voting.

As expected, most of the votes were green with only two being red, which were wizards so old that they probably would have been closer to the founding fathers of the USA.

"I see. The motion is passed with a majority. Waiving off the announcements, we now move on to the flagship bill for the day. The bill will now be distributed in writing to all the members as well as the members of the Gallery." Dumbledore announced as a series of ministry employees began distributing the bill to every single member.

____xx___

Meanwhile, in Malfoy Manor.

"My Lord, what do you think of the bill being passed today?"

He glanced at one of the many minions, who immediately bowed when their eyes met, too terrified to meet the eyes of a known legilimens who could tear the secrets out of their mind.

He then twirled the wand in his hand, "A commendable effort, Lucius has put up but it is all useless."

"Useless, my Lord?" Ah, the minion was trembling now.

"You see, Lucius and his father, to an extent, have been holding on to the notion that revolution, true lasting change, can be brought about in a civil manner. They still think that needless bloodshed can be avoided to fulfill our goals."

"Is it not possible, My Lord?" Hmm, two questions in a row. This one might have some spine in him, after all.

"No, it is not possible simply because you can't fight the system with the system, not with Dumbledore at the helm. You can't rip apart the society without at least ripping apart the pillars that propped that fake world up. You need blood, sacrifice, and death of the few to save the many."

"So, Lucius was doomed to fail?"

"Crucio!" He smiled at the screams that filled the room. After he felt like it was enough pain without permanent damage, he stopped, "Yes, he was going to fail and that was to be the point of that futile exercise, that unless and until you can dissolve that affront to society and instill a True LORD as the head, lasting change cannot be bought."

"Understood?" he leaned down as the man's entire body was wracked with spasms from the spell.

Even so, the man tried to bow, "Y-Yes, My Lord"

"Good, now Leave. I need to be ready to educate Lucius once he returns, defeated."

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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Wizengamot Gallery, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

Amidst great cheers, he saw the world around Lucious Malfoy crumble down, in an instant as the votes were counted and he had lost, not by a lot, by a single vote, but he had lost. For a bill like this, that sought to not just add a new law but also to repeal and replace multiple existing laws, they needed 2/3rd of the seats voting for the bill.

To be exact, they needed 34 votes to win. Now, he could see that Malfoy had done a lot of groundwork in preparation for this vote and he most certainly had expected 34 votes but as it turned out, reality was a lot harsher than dreams.

His eyes narrowed as he saw Lucious stand up, trembling with fury as his gaze was locked on to…Nathaniel Winters

His pupils dilated as he realised something. His uncle had voted against this bill. IT made sense since Nathaniel had a lot of holdings outside the Magical World and this bill, among many other things, would seek to control the movements or interactions of wizards with the No-Maj, a huge No-No in business.

He saw that DUmbledore had not yet left the chambers, instead talking with an assortment of light oriented families who were all smiles as they cheered the destruction of yet another bill that would have classified those born without magical parents as second class citizens, or in the case of the No-Maj, little more than animals.

He wondered if they knew that they would almost certainly face retaliation for this. That was why he had expected Lucious to glare at them, direct his killing intent at them but apparently, he was wrong. Somehow, Lucious was most angry at Nathaniel, instead of the light families.

With a no doubt supreme effort, Lucious tore his gaze away from Nathaniel's cold daring eyes and stomped out of the chambers, the rest of the Dark Faction following behind with uncertain steps.

He sighed and headed straight for the exit, knowing that he would have to establish contact with Nathaniel today. He had the address from day one but he had been hesitating to go straight to their home, it felt oddly personal and he did not feel like their relationship allowed for that.

But now? He was almost certain that the Winters family would get attacked somewhere, sometime by the Dark Faction, simply because his uncle voted against the bill. Clutching the copy of the failed bill in his hand and the identity card allotted to him at the entrance, he exited the galleria and went to the same Ministry employee who gave him the ID card, presumably to submit the ID card as well.

There was a line, and as expected, the Ministry employee was being so efficient that it beggared belief.

He was third in line when he heard a voice speak directly into his head.

'You should not have come here, Scott.'

His neck whipped around as he tried to trace the source of the transmission.

'Don't bother. This is not the same as normal mind magic. This is something far more advanced, something otherworldly, like your powers.'

'What are you talking about, how can you speak directly into my head like that?' The voice was Nathaniel, who was somehow speaking directly into his mind. He was sure that his shields had not been breached and more capable wizards, wizards who had dedicated their life to the mind arts had not been able to breach his shields, so Nathaniel doing so was out of the question.

'I am not reading your mind if that is what you are worried about. Think of it as nothing more than a speaker and a microphone, in muggle terms.' Nathaniel snorted, even as he looked around, craning his neck to see if Nathaniel was in sight or not.

'What is this? And Why didn't you tell me anything about it? What is going on?' He hissed through the mental link, as he hastily gave his ID card to the ministry employee who quickly swiped it and allowed him to exit the Ministry.

'Not here, not like this. Come to the Winters family Manor, tomorrow morning at 8:00 Am sharp.' The voice then faded away, no matter how many times he tried to call out to Nathaniel, he did not respond.

He had half a mind to just barge into the Ministry and ask him point blank but that would not go over well. He was not that hot headed. So, stifling a sigh, he headed to the Ministry exit that would lead to the public area of London.

It was lunch time and while he was not hungry, he needed the food because he was not going to stop his training just because he was in a foreign land. Already he had missed over three days of his training which was a sin in his dictionary.

He smiled as he bit into the absolutely greasy American Cheeseburger along with fries that the McDonalds here sold. He had to travel over half an hour for this but it was so worth it, he thought to himself as he finished his first burger within seconds.

After eating three large burgers, two large orders of fries, one sandwich, and two cokes, he finally burped, feeling sated. Ah, it was awesome being a wizard. Especially one that also trained physically as well as magically.

He smiled as he thought of the fact that just a single session of his heavy duty training would almost creatine erase all these calories, without any side effects on his body. Ah, the wonders of extremely high metabolism. Though, considering that for most of human history, wizards as well as humans had to hunt for food since it was always in scarcity, he sobered up as he would have been a goner in that time period, or would have had to establish himself as a cruel warlord who hoarded all the food.

"Thank you," He said to the doorman as he exited the chain and came out to inhale the fresh-ish air of London. Well, it certainly beats LA with its brown smog.

He had located a patch of forest nearby that would be perfect for his training, provided he cleaned up afterward, which took more time than it took to train. It was remote as well as hidden away under large trees, along with having no discernible path meant that he could train there remotely.

With a sigh, he headed into an alley, ignoring the three people who were tailing him, No-Maj thieves and twirled on the spot, disappearing with a crack, and reappearing right in the middle of the clearing he had created the other day.

He cracked his knuckles and patted his semi bloated belly, ready to do this.

Seeing that the enchantments be cast yesterday to isolate this whole space were fine, he snapped his fingers, and a single beam of light was emitted from the back of his head, hitting a specific spot in the enchantments that acted as a diffuser, that dispersed his lasers across the sphere of enchantments that he had created.

It was difficult to modulate the output because his lasers would always burn through most magic but that was once again, a training in and of itself.

Whipping out his wand, he closed his eyes and imagined his opponent to be Charles, the most accomplished ArchMage he had ever fought against, and with a chain combo spell, began the training.

The spells harmlessly splashed against his lasers as he cast spell after spell at the imaginary opponent all the while maintaining his laser output, so as to not burn down the whole isolation sphere.

It was good training.

___xx___

–Lucius Malfoy–

"So, Lucious, I've been informed of your defeat." He trembled, prostrating at the Dark lord's feet as he had come to this meeting he dreaded the most. Even in his own house, he was not safe.

Getting his teeth, he sought to defend his actions, to tell the Dark Lord it was not his fault but the second he opened his mouth, "Crucio!" Pain wracked his entire body as his vision swam, his nerves lighting up on fire as the worst kind of pain assaulted his mind and body.

After what felt like an eternity, the pain stopped, "I told you Lucious. The civilised way will not work, not with the sheep being led around by Dumbledore. We have to take what is rightfully ours and if in the process, some blood is spilled, so be it."

His blood chilled at the casual disregard of pure blood being spilled in this fight. Isn't that what they were fighting for? To save their culture? Their noble dogma? The pureblood families?

At that moment, as he was face down into the ground, prostrating at the Dark Lord's feet, even with his trembling body, he realised that his father was right. His father predicted something like this would happen. His father warned him before his death that the Dark Lord was not what he seemed, that they would stand to lose far more pure blood through the Dark Lord's actions than they did through the filthy muggles.

"So, Lucious," His attention was brought back to the present, and with that, the pain came as well, "Why did you lose? I thought you had all the votes you needed and some."

He grit his teeth, the teachings from his father holding him back from implicating any more pure blooded families but the pain at the moment telling him that if he didn't do something, he was going to leave with more than some temporary pain spasms.

"The Winters Family." So, he spat out, he threw them under the bus. Even though Nathaniel did betray him, he did not want his family line to be erased, which is what he feared would happen.

"Hmm, Nathaniel Winters. They are but a minor family. Why would they not heed your advice, Lucious?" The voice was soft, whisper-like but he knew it contained unbound bloodlust.

"M-My Lord, they have businesses with the muggles. They make their income, primarily from muggle fishing. Also, they are highly respected within the Grey Faction, his vote turned the tide of the Grey Faction my Lord."

"Hmm. I see. Prepare the men, Lucious. I think the world has forgotten that the Dark Lord still exists. It is time to instill my fear in lesser men, once again. Gather everyone. By tomorrow night, the Winters Family shall be no more."

He closed his eyes in defeat, silently mourning the Winters Family and more importantly, the loss of yet another pureblooded family to the monster in front of him.

Yet, he couldn't show that to the monster. When he opened his eyes, all that was left was anger and cold determination, as he stood up, nodded at the Dark Lord, and left the room with trembling limbs.

He knew that the Dark Lord drew a perverse pleasure from seeing him, Lord Malfoy, the rightful owner of the Manor, walk away with an injured body with nobody to help him.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

He whistled as he got ready, to meet his family, finally. After years of non contact, he was finally getting to meet his family. Sure, he had a family back in the States, a family he chose and he would always love those bastards but somehow, this felt even more personal than that.

He ate the boiled eggs he ordered, all 10 of them because his body needed protein and almost every other nutrient in excess quantities to sustain his physique, and thought of what he would say to Nathaniel.

If it was before today, he would have had a laundry list of questions to ask Nathaniel, to finally get the answers to some of the questions that had been burning a hole in his brain for years but after what happened yesterday?

After he saw how Nathaniel used some sort of unknown magic to communicate directly into his mind over long distances, without eyesight, his interest in that was piqued. One of his statements stuck with him the most, which was about the power being otherworldly for some reason, the same as his powers.

He knew that the people in MACUSA, especially the more zealous ones who knew of his prowess had advocated severing his ties with London and one of the ways they wanted to do that was to have Nathaniel disown him somehow and they could have told him that his powers were a curse or something to persuade Nathaniel to kick Scott out of the family but that sentence felt far too precise, far too sure.

Otherworldly. That did not bode well. His powers could certainly be called otherworldly since they could break and burn through all the magics he had encountered so far but it still ran on magic. Sure, completely new and unseen magic but magic all the same.

That mental technique, on the other hand, had somehow bypassed his powers which would destroy most magics with ease, and had been used to communicate directly with him, at the core of his being.

He was most curious about that technique, it was marvellos, and he had gone back to check on his mind shields and had figured out that the technique had somewhat of an anchor, embedded deep into his mind, his core personality, something that Nathaniel no doubt used to bypass everything.

That only created more questions, rather than answer any of his existing ones but no matter, he had a hunch that many of his questions were going to be answered today, and that thought filled with equal parts excitement and equal parts fear as he exited the hotel.

"Thank you," Thanking the doorman, he walked a bit before he got a cab and told the man the address of the Winters Manor. He had the address memorised ever since he became an adult in the eyes of the Law back in the States and got to go through his own file that the Embassy had.

It was in Richmond, which made sense since the WInters family was rich, both in magical as well as the No-Maj terms, so they could afford the space and as far as he was aware, most of the magical family Manors of rich Lords had some sort of magical element to them, be it from a magical botany garden or some Magical creatures.

For that, they needed space and in London, Richmond was the place to be to fulfill those criteria.

"Thank you," He paid the cabby and gave him a handsome tip as he reached the Winters Manor with 10 minutes to spare. Nathaniel told him to be here by 8.

He saw the expansive garden wall that spanned on both sides, as far as his vision could reach as there was a giant plaque that said the WInters Family Manor, clad in golden letters. Tasteful.

Expanding his magical senses, he couldn't feel a single magical enchantment on the property as far as his range went. No protection at the entrance, or any traps in the bushes, nothing.

No magical creatures in sight, nor any hidden contraption. Nothing.

That was…odd.

Well, there was a bell right next to the Plaque so he rang that bell, watching as the gate began opening on its own immediately.

Seeing that no one came out of the gate, he looked both sides and walked right in. After all, he was invited to this place so he didn't have much to worry–

"Whoa!" He ducked as something fast passed over his head, the sound of laughter reaching his ears.

His neck was on a swivel as he tried to locate what it was but it seemed to blur past his vision and he knew those were not brooms because he could sense brooms because of their magical constitution. Whatever that was, it hid its magic so well that he could not sense it before it came way too close for comfort.

Still, he walked ahead on the pavement, which led to the giant house in the distance. Sidestepping multiple pools, a pond, a water fountain, and even a maze, to finally reach the stairs of the Manor. His eyes narrowed as the area around the doors glitched before he saw two people standing in front of the door as if an illusion had been lifted, and it probably was an illusion.

Nathaniel stood at the forefront with some sort of butler holding the door open, all with the stereotypical garb and everything.

He hastily climbed the stairs and came face to face with Nathaniel Winters, his uncle, and bearer of the answers he was so desperately seeking.

"Uncle," He greeted the man with a light bow.

"Scott. Welcome to Magical Britain. Come, we have much to talk." Nathaniel said and gestured for him to enter.

Upon entering the Manor, he was expecting the rest of the Winters family but it was pretty much deserted, the living room. Nathaniel passed him and headed straight for a series of stairs that headed straight down.

"Follow me."

He hastily followed Nathaniel as they descended multiple flights of stairs, the area darkening as they went deeper, only illuminated by magical flame lanterns installed on the walls.

"Um, where are we going?"

"We are going to get your inheritance," Nathaniel answered in the same tone one used to answer a question about the bloody weather.

"E-excuse me? What inheritance?" He couldn't help but immediately ask but he received no answer, only continuous flights of stairs that never seemed to end.

Rude.


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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Winters Manor, London, Magical Britain [1980]

–Scott Winters–

"Whoa!" He exclaimed as they finally reached the end of those damned stairs and came across a giant underground space, flush with ceilings and made with brown tiles on all sides, including the ceiling.

"It was made by your mother," His neck snapped to the side as Nathaniel finally said something about his parents, the one thing he didn't know a thing about.

"What?!"

Nathaniel sighed, "Look, this is going to be a long story and full of shocks so please keep the questions to a minimum." Right after Nathaniel finished speaking, there was a beeping sound that echoed all around the cave.

"It's done. Let's go now," Nathaniel took a step forward and he had to choke back a gasp as the entire space lit up veins of blue energy that criss-crossed across the entire space, before converging at the bottom of…a ship?

He tentatively followed Nathaniel, taking ginger steps, making sure to avoid the glowing blue veins, "What is that?"

"That….is your mother's ship. I've tried to repair it over the years with the manuals I was given but it has proven to be an impossible task to do it while keeping it hidden. Maybe you can have more success with it."

Nathaniel's words rang in his mind. His mother's ship?

"What do you mean my mother's ship? And why is it spitting out glowing blue energy? What, was my mother an alien?" He couldn't help but shout hysterically, his voice echoing in the gigantic cave they were in. His whole life, he wanted these answers….

"Look, Scott, let me tell you the full story before you faint out of shock. I didn't think an ArchMage would be this weak, to be defeated by mental shock rather than by magic."

He opened his mouth to reply and closed it several times before just following in silence, his mind racing towards the worst possibilities.

He was an alien? Was he some sort of vanguard for future invasions? Was he even human anymore? How could he use magic if he was an alien?

"Put your hand there," He was brought out of his thoughts by Nathaniel's commanding tone as he gestured to a small rectangular panel that he could swear was not there when they started walking. Nathaniel was waiting by the side of a similar panel on the other side, with his palm poised to be placed on top of the glowing blue, translucent panel.

"Okay," he muttered as he placed his palm on the panel, looking to the side as Nathaniel did the same, both the panels glowing slightly as a result. He felt a slight static feeling on his palm as the same blue veins crisscrossed across the panel, leading straight down and back into the ship, which was massive and very much futuristic looking.

His theory about him being an alien, or worse, some sort of half alien half wizard bastard came roaring back into his mind.

"Access granted. Welcome: Scott Winters, Nathaniel Winters." A robotic voice jerked him out of his thoughts as he looked at an invisible shield appearing right at the edge of the panels before it dissipated.

"Before your mind runs itself into the ground, let me assure you, your mother was human. Just a different kind of human. Your father was Nathan Winters, my younger brother."

He nodded along, not wanting to interrupt the only source of information he had about his parents.

"Your mother, she was not from…around here. She was different, powerful, vastly more powerful than any person I have ever met. My brother met her when she had just come to Earth, and had found herself in the icy winters of Norway, where Nathan used to go for fun because there would be no one but him there, giving him full freedom." Nathaniel spoke with a touch of nostalgia in his voice.

"Betty," Nathaniel turned to him, "Your mother's name was Betty, never knew her last name. She married my brother and had you, someone with the potential to surpass even Betty."

"Wh-What are you saying? What do you mean she was more powerful than anyone on the planet? How could she have remained unknown then? You said she was human but different, how different?"

"Your mother was a wizard, but somehow more. Even I don't know the whole story but I do know that she was the reason you were born as you were and….she was also the reason I lost my brother, your father." Nathaniel spoke in a somber tone as they crossed the threshold and neared the ship's bay which had opened on its own.

He stopped himself from asking yet another question that would not be answered.

"I've never been granted access to the things that mattered in the ship's memory. It was always meant for you and you alone. Go, the ship will guide you on what to do. Your inheritance…is waiting."

For some reason, the room darkened at those words and he looked at the ship. It seemed so tall now, so out of reach, the stairs on the platform so steep to climb.

"I'll be waiting outside," Nathaniel said before stepping out of the boundary of the ship. He nodded at the man, and entered the ship, curious as to what it had in store for him.

One thing was clear though, he might have yearned for these answers for most of his adult life and yet, when the time came, when the answers were plausibly within reach, he didn't feel so excited about them.

All he could feel was apprehension, worry, and anxiety about the whole thing, especially after he was told that his mother was the reason his father was dead. Was she even alive?

Well, only moving forward would help, so he took the first step and immediately steadied himself as the landing bay moved up on its own.

He could not see inside as the door had some sort of blue glowing shield. The stairs deposited him right near the door, and he hesitated as his hand hovered about the blue shield. Bracing himself, he put his hand on the door and was surprised to find it passed through.

Taking a step through, he found himself passing the door and entering the ship, his brows furrowed in confusion as all he saw was a nice living room with a burning fireplace in the center, with an old nobility living room feeling.

"Greetings, Scott Winters." The same robotic voice echoed throughout the room as he immediately took out his wand and looked around, trying to stop the speakers or even any invisible spirit that could be speaking.

He had encountered those before, even though they could not harm anyone on their own, only use their voice to speak.

"Who is it? Come out." He spoke out loud, with his magic pressing down on the area in a trick he learned from Charles. It created a physical pressure on the area using one's own magic power and could only be countered by the same curtain of magic with magic surpassing his own. It helped to immediately identify any creature or wizard in range who was weaker than him.

It had worked multiple times when people were under advanced variations of the Disillusionment charm or any Invisibility potion but to his surprise, he found nothing. Even the fire in the fireplace didn't waver for a second.

"I am Athena. My purpose is to…"

_____xx____

Outside the ship, underneath the Winters Manor

Nathaniel sighed as he saw the ship close on its own before the giant shield reappeared around it, protecting it from anything his magic could throw at it.

Yes, even the Killing Curse. He was not ashamed to admit that when he got the news that his brother was dead, because of that otherworlder, he had, in a fit of rage and grief, cast the Killing Curse on this same ship, in a bid to destroy the last remaining trace of that woman's existence.

He couldn't even bear to look at his own nephew but he couldn't destroy his brother's legacy so he sent the boy away, paying all his expenses to a contact he had in MACUSA, as long as the boy never came back to London.

Well, that was when he was a minor and also not an Archmage. Now that he had grown into who he was, there was no one who could control him. His mother's genes had also been clearly passed down as the boy could do magic that none on the planet could.

Since the boy was here anyway, might as well fulfill the purpose of the ship and get the damned thing out of his home because while he might have mellowed out over the years, and thought deeply about the entire incident, his anger at the woman was still not gone and he would prefer to have that thing out of his home, as soon as possible.

Timing the clock, he sat down on a platform that appeared beneath him as soon as he tried to sit down, glowing the same blue as the shield that covered the entire ship.

"Athena, will he be fine? In all these years, you've never told me what the inheritance actually is." He spoke out loud as the shield rippled in front of him, emitting a familiar robotic noise.

"Designation : Nathaniel Winters. Scott Winters is the designated Inheritance candidate of this pod. I can guarantee zero physical harm but mental harm is not within my parameters."

He sighed once again, leaning back as the back part of the bench materialised behind him. The first time it happened, he had freaked out and scanned the entire thing using all the spells he could find but now that it had been over two deceased, he was used to the things that Athena did, things that could be classified as miracles or very advanced form of magic in the Magical World.



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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don't mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP.

Malfoy Manor, Magical Britain [31st October, 1980]

– Tom Voldemort–

His eyes snapped open as he felt someone entering his chambers, the very chambers that had been all but abandoned the day he educated Malfoy and he let them be. After all, he was a superior being, not like the animals and the lesser humans, who were the wizards. He could go on for weeks without food and days without water, much farther than what the monkeys would be able to.

He hadn't expected a visit for yet another day, wherein he would take great pleasure in educating the person unfortunate enough to meet his gaze but apparently, something had happened. Something for Wormtail Pettigrew himself to meet him.

He had never expected that snivelling rat to be the one to approach him, on his own no less.

"Wormtail," He said with his eyes closed, radiating magical pressure naturally, making the rat freeze on the spot.

"My Lord!" The rat immediately prostrated, so far away from his throne, that it amused him. That fear, he liked it. It was delicious and one day, soon, he hoped to have that fear directed towards him from everyone in Magical Britain and once he had Britain in his grasp, then he could move his gaze to the rest of the world.

After all, once Dumbeldore was removed from the game, there were hardly any wizards worth mentioning in the rest of the world and even if they were, they would be no match for the army he would then raise, or Dark Creatures and Dark Wizards, ready to tear apart anyone their Lord pointed at.

"Come closer, Wormtail. I can't hear you,"

The rat whimpered as he crawled towards him, keeping his head bowed at all times. His smile grew as he sheathed his wand, the glow dying from the wand. Wormtail would not taste Crucio today. His grovelling pleased Lord Voldemort and for that, Lord Voldemort would be most gracious and spare him the education.

"My Lord!"

"Yes, Wormtail? What do you have for me?"

"T-the location of the Potters! My Lord!"

He stood up in an instant, magic roiling around him as he pressed the rat into the ground with a thought, without the use of any spell.

With a twitch of his hand, Wormtail's hand rose to circle around his neck as he was dragged forward to meet the eyes of his Lord.

"Tell me, Wormtail. Tell me the location,"

Meeting his gaze, he ripped apart the pathetic mental defenses before he found what he was looking for. The location of the Potters, the end of the prophecy that had been bugging him for months. Hmm, the Fidelius charm, quite ingenious.

Godric's Hollow, huh?

"Lestrange!" He spoke in a whisper and yet, that voice undoubtedly reached the outside of his chambers as multiple of his servants came pouring in. The Lestrange brothers being at the forefront of all of them. They were decently powerful and more importantly, far more willing to get themselves drenched in the Dark Arts without losing their sanity like Bellatrix.

She was one of the more powerful of his lieutenants but her ability to let loose without care for anything in return, while valuable in an all out attack, was not suited for the current task, which required finesse.

Dumbledore must have something that will alert him about the status of the Potters and this was a task very important, he couldn't have Dumbledore interfering in any way.

The prophecy applied to the Longbottoms as well and conveniently, Bella was very near that location and could take care of the Longbottom couple since they were not that powerful. No, while the mudblood witch and her husband, James Potter were both supporting the wrong cause, they were very much powerful, just as powerful as Bella.

No, for them, he needed to go there himself. As much as it pained him to admit that the mudblood witch was a skilled magic caster, specialising in esoteric magic, it was the truth, having seen the woman cut down more than one of his people in fights while Dumbledore distracted him.

During any raids, both him and Dumbledore were the ones who were entangled with each other because both of them knew that should one of them get free reign over the opposing side, it would be a one sided battle that would either result in imprisonment, temporary as it may be, or death.

So, he could do nothing as he watched that woman kill more than a dozen of his people during the course of several raids. That is why he will go to the Potters' himself, to make sure that they die.

Releasing his hold on Wormtail, he let the snivelling rat crumple on the ground, his mind probably damaged from the aggressive mental probing but he was far from caring for Wormtail. He was a turncoat in all but name, ready to convert to the side with the most power, the side that seemed to win.

He was very much an acceptable casualty of this war.

His servants took a step back as Peter slid off the stairs and collapsed on the ground in a heap of dust, unmoving. He was still alive, of that he was sure. How much longer would that be the truth? He did not know.

"My Death Eaters!" He raised his hands as he activated the Mark, the Dark Mark that he had seared on the body of every single Death EAter, letting them know that he was calling them. He limited the range of the broadcast to just the Malfoy Manor and the base they had built up in the neighbouring properties.

He smiled as he felt multiple pops just outside his chamber as the doors were flung open, revealing rows of Death Eaters in appropriate garb rushing into the chamber.

All of them gathered and bowed at him.

Hmm. These should be enough.

"My Death Eaters! Rejoice! For today, we are to rid the magical world of not one but two blood traitor families!"

He smiled as he felt the manic joy and rage in the crowd, roaring out into magical waves. He then smirked as he suppressed the collective magical might of the Death Eaters with his own, by lonesome. Smiling at the unease, awe, and fear at his feat of magical strength, he began addressing them individually.

"Lestrange brothers, you will lead a team to take care of the Longbottoms. Make sure that no one is spared, not even infants. The Longbottom bloodline ceases to exist today."

"Yes, My Lord." "Yes, My Lord."

"Dolohov, you are with me."

"Yes, My Lord!"

"Dismissed." he smiled, feeling the joy of having snuffed out one of the threats to his reign, as he sat back down on the throne, "Get ready Dolohov."

---

A/N - Yes, the birth and death of the Potter family is a year earlier.

There are a plethora of reasons for that, mainly the small period of peace between Volde's and Dumbles' fight because of the overall political pressure exerted by MACUSA after it was revealed that MACUSa had two Archmage wizards, something that would have allowed them to force through a motion to have foreign wizards on British soil, something that neither Dumbles nor Volde wanted.

There will obviously be some changes, such as Vodle taking a team, the very existence of Scott, and more, stay tuned for that!


If you guys would like to support my writing or just want to read ahead of the public release, you can head on to my P*treon

I already have upto 10 extra chapters published there.