//------------------------------//
// Ch. 45 Hidden Frenemies 
// Story: If Wishes Were Ponies, Book II 
// by tkepner 
//------------------------------//

Rather than head back to their common room, considering they had already shown that to the relatives, the herd decided to give everypony the grand tour of the castle, and perhaps visit Professor McGonagall’s classroom and the Greenhouses. Hopefully, Professor Sprout wasn’t too overwhelmed with earth ponies inspecting her work areas to talk to them.

The rest of the afternoon promised to be rather pedestrian for Harry, but he didn’t mind. He knew he would quite enjoy watching the fun the others had introducing their relatives to the Castle’s quirks. Ginny probably felt the same way, based on her grin at their reaction to the shortcut slide from the basement to the seventh floor!

The moving stairs in the main stairwell were startling, but the stairs that you went up one flight to go down two had even the unicorns scratching their heads. Most hadn’t heard, yet, of some of the “improvements” Luna had made to Canterlot castle. The nobles were trying to pretend they didn’t exist.

The slide to the pool was an instant hit.

Considering the age of Hogwarts, a thousand years, the moving classrooms, staircases, walls that pretended to be doors and doors that pretended to be wall, passages you could only use on certain days or certain times, and the length of time Discord spent as a statue in Equestria, Harry had to wonder if Discord might have been here, instead. Or, considering some of the things they had seen in the Two Sisters’ Castle, maybe Nightmare hadn’t been as stuck on the moon as everypony thought. It would have been easy for her to escape Luna’s attention. Although, her “fun” seemed to have been more cruel than confusing, so maybe not.

Several times they ran into Elly and her guardian or her cousins. They seemed to be acting as tour guides for some of the groups of exploring ponies. They even pointed out one or two hidden rooms or “secret” passages no one else knew about.

Elly told them about one passage that seemed to be no longer than a classroom, but it put them on the other side of the castle! She said several Hufflepuffs liked to use it to get to the common room faster after their last class.

They arrived at the Room of Requirement just in time to see a seventh year put the room through its paces. He happily demonstrated that you didn’t need a wand to use the room by having one of the earth-pony parents recreate their living-room in Equestria.

By the time dinner came around, they were all a bit hoofsore, especially Hermione’s parents. The ponies, at least, were used to walking everywhere, just not going up and down so many stairs.

Towards the end of the meal, just before dessert, the Headmaster stood and tapped his goblet to bring everypony’s attention to him.

“It is my pleasure to inform all the parent’s currently present that if you desire to stay the night instead of going home, quarters for you have been arranged just down the hall from each of the four Common Rooms.”

A cheer went up from the ponies, and quite a few of the muggle-born’s parents, too. The Headmaster let it continue for a few moments, then raised his arms to attract their attention.

“Plus, in view of classes being cancelled tomorrow, the Hogwarts curfew tonight has been changed to ten o’clock.”

Another cheer went up, this time from all the students. Again, the Headmaster let it continue for a few moments, then raised his arms to attract their attention, again.

“Naturally, for all the adults, there is no curfew. So, if you wish to talk with the other parents, feel free to visit each other.”

There wasn’t any cheering this time, but the parents appeared pleased.

Harry could tell that the Headmaster was milking the good feelings he was creating for all the good will it might create for him.

He lowered his arms, took a theatrically deep breath, and slowly let it out. “Unfortunately, it is my sad duty to inform you that the body of Gregory Goyle has been recovered by the aurors.” He paused for a minute at the many expressions of shocked outrage. “The one responsible for his death has not been found, but the Ministry assures me that they will put all available resources into tracking down this wanton killer.” He paused.

“Might we have a minute of silence to reflect on what we have lost in our deceased friend and student.” Dumbledore folded his hands, and stood quietly with bowed head.

Many of the students emulated his bowed head.

There was dead silence. While many might have had a problem with the boy’s bullying, none of them had ever, seriously, wanted to see the boy dead.

After the minute had passed, the Headmaster sighed. “It is my sad duty to inform you that Professor Lockhart, while he has fully recovered from his injuries, yesterday, is currently being held in the Ministry for ‘irregularities’ regarding the events he has recounted in his books. The Ministry has requested, and I have agreed, that the former Auror, Alastor Moody, will take his place in his classes, starting Tuesday.”

Harry nodded to himself. That explained why they had Monday off. Professor Moody would be settling in and it would unfair to expect him to immediately begin teaching classes.

The Headmaster sat back down. As he did so, the main meal-dishes were replaced with desserts. Truthfully, though, at the pony-ends’ of the tables, the dessert selection presented differed from the main dishes only in that there weren’t any soups or platters of vegetables.

Knowing they could stay longer made a difference to many of the visiting parents. Feeling re-energized, they returned to exploring. Harry and his herdmates were surprisingly tired by the time they did head inside the dorms for curfew that night.

The next day was just as much fun, they all thought. Most of the adults tried out the trebuchets by the lake, having heard the stories from the foals and rumours back in Equestria from the Guards. Most also weren’t from Ponyville and hadn’t had the chance to test the entertainment devices installed at the lake.

To the surprise of everypony, a small herd of unicorns, no more than seven, appeared along the edge of the Forest, and watched the ponies playing on the lawns. What attracted everypony’s attention, at first, was that three of the foals were shooting sparks. The Equestrian unicorns quickly congregated and started showing off some of the very basic spells they had learned as foals, themselves. It wasn’t long before the wizards and witches were watching from a short distance away.

The cheer that went up when the first foal levitated a leaf startled the Forest unicorns away. That earned a disapproving glare from the others. It took another hour to coax the horses back to the lawn’s edge.

Many of the older wizards were making serious efforts to meet with and talk to the parents. They were feeling out the possibilities for business connections and possible employment. Many of the Seventh Years were definitely planning on taking the next year off and visiting Equestria. Having a close understanding of just what the ponies did in their daily lives would be a big boost to any careers they might choose to pursue in the witchery world. The insights into how they think would be invaluable.

However, as all goods things did, the day came to an end and the parents and siblings all went home.

For the ponies, the glee from seeing their parents at Hogwarts carried over for the next few days.

Professor Moody was as different from Lockhart and Quirrell as anypony could imagine. His first class was revising every spell that they should have learned in First Year. His second class, he promised, would have them doing the entire Second Year, as well. Harry thought he and the girls had done quite well, as did the rest of the Gryffindors — they had worked quite a lot together last year. Plus, the book-walking spell had made a big impact in internalizing their study of magical theory. The only one who felt she could have done better was Hermione, of course.

To say Moody was surprised at the book-walking spell was an understatement. It took him only a few minutes to master the spell — he swore his assistant to guard him while he experimented with it the first time. He gave Harry ten points for telling everyone about the spell when he could have kept it secret and given himself a big advantage.

To which, Harry responded, with a blank stare. Like the others would have let him keep it a secret? The only way he could have kept it a secret would have been to not use it! The wizard was clearly as idiotic as all the other wizards and witches. A lot more paranoid, but still idiotic. 

However, at least this wizard was competent, he had to admit. The urge to hex him when he wasn’t looking was strong, however, just to see if the wizard’s reaction time was anything like his paranoia seemed to suggest.

But he wouldn’t do that. He knew his herdmates would disapprove. Only if the not-quite-incompetent wizard looked like he was going to attack any of them would he act.

Besides, if he hadn’t shared book-walking spell, then they wouldn’t be able to surprise the Professor next week. Harry was looking forward to watching his expression when he discovered that they had already mastered Second Year. And then started on the Third Year’s material back in March.

Despite the . . . inconsistent . . . methods of Lockhart, they had spent more than an hour a week going over The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 2) and, more lately, The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 3). Those books were on the official Hogwarts List for those years, after all. Fortunately, most of the sixth years, and a few of the seventh years, had been more than happy to tell them the books their DADA professors had liked. Those, with what the older students had told them about their OWL DADA tests had been a big help. 

That information had let them look up the books left to the library after each previous year, which had the other spells they needed. With the OWLs being administered by the Ministry, and not their Hogwarts’ Professors, knowing what they might find on the tests was vital.

Seeing how much damage resulted from the previous Saturday, both to the building and other students, there was a heightened interest in protective spells. As a result, Harry and the girls found themselves as temporary unofficial instructors in the different shielding charms, and non-lethal methods of stopping an assailant. It made for rather busy afternoons after classes let out.

Their expertise in the Great Hall had not been missed by everypony.

Professor Moody probably would approve when he learned of that, if he hadn’t already.

This Saturday, though, just as breakfast was ending for Harry and his friends, Elly came over from the Hufflepuff table and asked if he could help her and her cousins with a certain spell. 

It was rather anticlimactic, actually.

The fillies all knew how to teleport with their wands, they had practiced assiduously in Equestria over the summer. 

As a result, Ginny and Scootaloo took off for some recreational flying. Scootaloo was determined to match Rainbow in some of her stunts, with Ginny as a willing and supportive critic of her attempts. Hermione took off for the library — she wanted to research what spells they needed to detect possessions, and their drawbacks. She knew Lockhart had to have only been mentioning a few of the ones available. 

This was the second time this had happened to Harry, and she was determined that it wouldn’t happen again!

So, accompanied by Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom, he went with Elly and her cousins as they led the way around the lake.

“How do you know we’re far enough,” he asked when they finally stopped in a clearing beside the lake.

Elly shrugged. “We asked the seventh year Prefects where the detection spells stopped, so we wouldn’t accidentally wander into unsafe territory,” she said, looking back in the direction of the castle. It was hidden by the trees, at this point. “They told us how far they reached.” She grinned mischievously. “One of them suggested we check out a book in the library that dealt with detecting stationary ‘freestanding’ spells.” 

Earl, beside her, smirked. “It was a book on curse-detecting for aspiring Curse-breakers,” he said.

“We checked this location out yesterday,” Essie said smugly. “Not only can’t we been seen from the castle, the trees hide us from anyone who isn’t close enough for us to easily see them.”

“The castle’s spells peter-out about ten yards that way,” Elly said, pointing.

Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle looked as impressed as Harry felt. “Any chance we can see that book when you’re through with it?”

Elly smirked, “I thought you might be interested,” she said as she took a book out of her rucksack and handed it to him. “Because you’re teaching us this teleportation spell, I figured I should at least share this.”

It was an old book, Curse Detecting and Breaking For Fun and Profit, its condition betraying that it clearly had been donated by a former curse-breaker.

Harry popped the book into his robe’s inside-expanded pocket.

“So,” he said, “Are you ready?”

Elly nodded nervously.

“Like I said last time, picture the spell matrix in your mind.”

She nodded again.

He moved up in front of her and stood up on his tiptoes as she bowed her head to press his forehead against hers. She didn’t close her eyes this time. For a moment he was confused, then he realized the other time they had been standing on an incline, and she had been at a lower level than he had been at.

Quickly enough he was studying the matrix and comparing it to his. They were an exact match. He stepped back. “Okay, now,” he pointed at a tree. “Imagine you are beside that tree.” He paused. “That is, you are beside that tree, not beside me. Make it real. Push your magic into the matrix, and let it go.”

There were the soft, tinkling sounds of tiny bells, and Elly was standing by the tree. She stared at them, blinking. Then there were the sounds of bells, again, and she was beside Harry.

He grinned at her. “With enough practice, and more power as you get older, you won’t have to hold your wand to do that. By the time you get to be an adult, you might not even need the wand, anymore.” Then he frowned, thinking, “Unless that’s something only the unicorn tribe can do . . ..” his voice trailed off as he thought about it.

She was fairly bouncing with glee at her accomplishment. Her cousins were clapping their hands and praising her.

Harry turned to Essie. “Let’s see how you are with your matrix.”

“Me?” she squeaked, pointing at herself with one hand, and looking incredulous.

He nodded, and a minute later he was pressing his forehead to hers. Her image of the matrix needed a bit of tweaking, so he told her to work on it, like he had Elly the previous Sunday. Earl and Emmie received the same advice.

He reached into his pocket and took out several pages of parchment. He handed them to Elly. “These go into far more detail than I gave you, telling where the safety routines are, what each routine does, and how to disable a routine and what the risks are for doing so. If you disable them all, it is very possible to teleport inside a solid object, or leave parts of yourself behind.” He pursed his lips. “My mum was worried that somepony could cause a tremendous explosion if one of their atoms coincided with another. However, when she did the numbers with the magic, she discovered that magic won’t let that happen. They would simply be interposed between the other atoms in the object they intersected.” He took a deep breath and let it out. “Death would probably be nearly instantaneous as the extra material would immediately disrupt your brain’s connections.” He paused and thought a moment. “If only part of your body intersected, you might be able to teleport out. But, then again, the teleport might consider whatever you intersected as part of your body and try to bring it with you. If it were something big, you’d be stuck, unable to teleport.” He shook his head. “Obviously, no one wants to experiment with that, so, nobody really knows. So, don’t disable all the safeties.”

Everypony was staring at him in shock.

“Twilight never told me that!” Sweetie Belle exclaimed.

He looked at her. “Would you ever want to experiment with the teleport?”

“No!”

He shrugged. “There you go,” he said simply.

He looked back at Elly. “When you think they have the spell-matrix suitably memorized, we can do this again.”

She slowly nodded.

“Well, we’ll head back now,” he said, starting to walk back to the castle. “The spell is a bit tiring, at first, so make sure to rest for a while after each teleport. There’s no reason to push it, it’s not like you can use it in the castle.” 

Sweetie Belle had been unable to teleport any distance at all, no matter how close.  He could, but he still didn’t understand why. Everypony in the herd agreed that that was one secret they wouldn’t share with anypony, as frustrating as they’re being unable to do it was. Based on what had happened to Harry, twice now, having that secret could save his life — and possibly theirs.

“Plus, you’ll have plenty of time to practice it over the summer.”

Elly and the others nodded. “I’ll take it easy,” she promised.

The Hufflepuff girl was turning into an interesting person, he decided.

He gave a casual wave as they left her and her cousins behind, and headed back to the castle at a trot, not even really noticing he was now a pony.

There was a certain book in his pocket that he wanted to wander through.

As would all of his herd.


^-_-^


 

Major Searle was waiting patiently in the meeting room at Number 10 Downing Street. He was meeting with The Foreign Secretary, Douglas Hurd, the Home Secretary, Kenneth Baker, Sir Patrick Walker, head of Military Intelligence Department Five, Sir Colin McColl, head of Military Intelligence Department Six, and the Prime Minister John Major. It was a briefing for the Secretaries and Prime Minister, to bring them up-to-date on the Riddle situation, and a few other things.

Walker and McColl arrived first, one after the other, and quickly took their seats, each setting a stack of folders on the table from their briefcases. Hurd and Baker arrived next, conferring about the successful Mars Mission. 

The Buran had performed flawlessly, Castor knew, having landed back at Heathrow the previous Wednesday, to great fanfare. 

The Yanks were apparently chomping at the bit to put an entire research base through the “special technology” transport system. The landing site was quickly turning into a boom-town, almost as fast as the two bases on the Earth’s Moon had grown.

Every scientist with even a casual interest in off-planet sciences was in the queue to stay at one of the three bases, if not already scheduled to visit all three. 

Terra-forming was even under discussion.

The U.K. had edged the U.S. out as the country that the rest of the world was watching for new innovations. While the bases were all “international” in scope, everyone knew that without the U.K. none of the bases would exist.

And no one knew what was coming next, in engineering, astronomy, physics, or commercial applications that threatened to revolutionize entire industries.

The U.K universities were drawing the most promising of graduates in the sciences to the U.K. for their post-graduate studies, especially in the mathematics, high-energy, and theoretical physics fields. For the first time in decades, the so-called brain-drain had reversed. It was almost like the sixties and seventies all over again. Only this time it was the sciences that put the U.K. at the forefront of the world’s consciousness, not rock-and-roll music.

Plus, Castor had recently heard of a student at Cardiff University, in Wales. Miguel Alcubierre Moya was in its graduate school, and his professors had brought him to the attention of the physicists in the BNSC. He was in the process of putting together a paper proposing a “warp” drive that would allow the equivalent of faster-than-light travel between stars. There were just as many physicists ridiculing the proposal as there were who were praising his preliminary calculations.

The Special Technology people, and the Equestrians were extremely interested.

Alpha Centauri and its sister stars might not be as far away as everyone thought. Was it a race to see which would get there first? The as-yet unbuilt, warp-drive-equipped ship or the Bristol Bloodhound, Ad Astra II?

He idly wondered how long it would take to retrofit the Buran, once they moved out of the testing phase for the warp drive. Or would it require a completely different physical design? Something purpose built, but which could land like a plane?

The fight to be on that ship, whatever it’s configuration, would be legendary.

The Prime Minister finally made his appearance. He didn’t wait to mince words. “What’s the status of Project Gilgamesh?”

Walker sighed and tapped his stack of folders with one finger. “He appears to have either slipped out of the country, or gone to ground so thoroughly that we can’t find him.” He slid a folder he had over to the Major and the two Secretaries.

“The full report is in these.” He shrugged. “I believe he left the Leaky Cauldron at ten-thirty hundred. He took a cab and checked into a small bed-and-breakfast off Bexley High Street at about eleven-thirty hundred. He took a room and wasn’t seen until the next morning at zero-six hundred hours. He used ‘specialty tech’ to confuse the on-duty clerk, walked out, and wasn’t seen again.” He looked at each of them in turn.

“Major Castor and his teams arrived at the Bexley High Street Post Office Building at roughly zero-six hundred, and it took them the better part of an hour and a quarter to locate the bed-and-breakfast where the suspect had overnighted, another seventeen minutes was lost planning and evacuating that building and the ones on either side.” He shook his head. “The boy, Gregory Goyle, was inside, dead. The coroner put the time of death as the previous day, sometime between noon and fifteen hundred. Princess Twilight, using special technology, had managed a brief contact with the boy at about fourteen hundred, but the contact cut off before she could get a location. She believes that that was his time of death.”

He paused and looked around the table, again.

“I had teams of our Special Technology people working with our new Infiltrator Specialists at all the major ferry terminals and airports in England, Scotland, and Wales. Most were in position by zero-five hundred. None of them detected the presence of our target.” He gave a wry shake of his head. “We did catch twenty different attempts to smuggle cash and goods out of England on Sunday, alone, though.” He flashed a brief smile. “The Infiltrator Specialists were the only reason we caught any. They picked them out almost as soon as they saw them.”

His audience was not happy at the revelations, so far, as their scowling expressions indicated. The Prime Minister was leaning back in chair, one arm across his chest, his other elbow resting on it while his index finger covered his mouth.

“I had to curtail the patrols as we had insufficient personnel to maintain a watch at all locations during all their hours of operation, primarily the airports. The Infiltrator Specialists were willing to stay at work the entire time, most said they could stay awake for days without a problem. However, we discovered they had burned through their rations because none were available for food runs. There was some danger of collapse if we continued past Tuesday if some weren’t released to collecting more.

“If the target hasn’t already fled the country, then he probably won’t, based on the personality profile we were able to work up. It’s in the folders.” He stopped and looked down for a moment. “We will continue to monitor the ferry crossings for the next few weeks in case he does try to flee. Those are, after all, the methods the target is most familiar with, and most likely to use. Plus, they require the fewest resources.” He shook his head. “We simply don’t have the ‘special’ resources to cover the airports twenty-four hours a day.”

Then it was McColl’s turn. “I managed to get agents to all the ferry crossing by zero-seven hundred,” he said with a sour expression. “I also had agents at the five largest airports in Western Europe, but they were unable to detect our target.” He slid three folders down the table. “No one matching any of our photographs was seen at any of the locations we monitored.”

Walker resumed speaking. “The Invisible World’s agents believe that a,” he stopped and cleared his throat while saying, “vampire,” he cleared his throat, again, and continued, “was responsible, because of what happened when the target was revealed. The target took advantage of that mistaken belief and arranged the crime scene to fit their expectations. They believe the boy was killed in the night, and the suspect fled before daylight, confusing the bed-and-breakfast clerk into believing that he hadn’t yet left.” He shook his head. “Because the Headmaster has not confided his suspicions to the Ministry regarding the suspect being the terrorist surviving the 1981 attack, there is no way to convince them of either their error or the danger this target presents to both our worlds.” He glanced around the table. “The only bright side to this is that the Equestrians have promised us assistance should we ask for it. The Princess has said they have around five hundred trained Guards who will be ready to go on patrols with our own people in another month. In addition, she is working on a . . . special technology that should be able to detect our target if he comes close enough. When she finishes it, she thinks that we should be able to find him if he is still in England. Or be able detect him when he tries to sneak back in.”

He shifted forward and put his folded hands on the table.

“We are carefully monitoring unusual incidents across the country, in case he hasn’t fled.” He shrugged. “It’s a small hope, but one we can’t overlook.”

The Prime Minister slowly nodded and pursed his lips. “And we can’t warn our allies that he is on the loose.”

“Not without breaking the Statute of Secrecy the Invisible World hides behind,” Walker said, shaking his head.

Hurd leaned forward and pressed his forearms against the table’s edge. “Could we say a criminal or enemy of the Equestrians managed to sneak through the portal, and use that to disclose some of this man’s abilities?”

Walked and McColl exchanged a quick glance. “I’m not sure that would be wise,” McColl said slowly. “It would tip-off both our allies and enemies to abilities we have at our disposal that we wouldn’t want them to realize. The yanks, especially, would have problems with their version of the Invisible World, who are even more reclusive than ours! As it is, their Invisible World is already very put-out with our Special Technology devices being on that borderline. The only reason their . . . Congress . . . hasn’t interfered on the international scene is because we have done such a good job of disguising what we’re doing as just advanced science. For it all to suddenly disappear would raise more curiosity about why than just keeping quiet about what we’re doing.

“We can’t even warn them of the truth about our suspect,” McColl continued, “The British Ministry for the Invisible World would just contradict us.” He huffed, “And all of them are notorious for not having believed anything our non-special techs have said in the past, so why should they believe us now?” He leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling.

Major sighed. “Do your best.”

Castor leaned forward. “Princess Twilight wanted me to pass on that the Blackpool facility is going through final testing procedures. They’ll use a standard-sized shipping container on rails that can be lifted directly off flatbed railcars. She has built a series of special technology devices that scan for, and remove, any living matter bigger than a bacterium. The devices will then sterilize the container and its contents. If anything magical is detected, they will seal and quarantine the container and alert the operators.” 

Major was nodding approvingly, as were both the Home and Foreign Sectaries.

He looked around the table. “She said they have something similar on their end. She also asked if you wanted to make this an official inauguration of the facility. If so, the earliest would be Wednesday next, although she thought doing it the following Friday next or on that weekend might be better. She could even put it off for another week or two. She will gladly coordinate with whomever the Home Office sends to arrange the details. She did suggest the first official shipment both ways be books, records, and movies, as a symbolic representation of the intellectual growth this will bring to both cultures.”

He coughed with his hand covering his mouth, and looked at the Prime Minister from under his eyebrows.

“She also said that they intended it to be a big open-house celebration for the city, with an extensive party planned for the workers and their families. She thinks it would be a big morale booster for the region. Plus, the Equestrian Embassy will be escorting several other Equestrian races to examine the facility for their use, too. She said that would include Zebricans, Saddle Arabians, Griffons, and Minotaurs.”

Major stared at him with wide eyes and raised eyebrows, then he smiled broadly.

Castor ducked his head down, then took an envelope out of his expanded coat pocket. He slid it across the table. “That is Princess Twilight’s invitation to the Queen. She wanted me to ask you to pass it on to her.” He took a small bundle of envelopes out next. “These are your invitations,” he said sliding the five envelopes to their respective personages. “If there are any others you think should receive invitations, she said to contact the Embassy.”

The Prime Minister pursed his lips. “I’ll contact the Embassy about what protocols we will need to put in place. Pull some of the personnel from the Embassy in Canterlot for more direct information on what to expect.”

Castor nodded.

Walker spoke up. “One thing we need to consider is how to reward our Special Investigators. They are integrating nicely into my department, and as soon as Colin’s department finishes their training, I think they will be an invaluable aid there, too.” He exchanged a glance with his foreign service counterpart. “The usual rewards of bonuses and time off just don’t work for them. Most don’t know what to do with money, they don’t seem to understand the concept of personal possessions beyond a few trinkets, and they get quite uncomfortable and nervous if they haven’t an assignment.” He sighed. “I’ve been told by one of them that not having an assignment was usually a sign of coming punishment from their queen.”

The meeting lasted the rest of the morning.


^-_-^