//------------------------------// // Ch. 38. As If Things Weren’t Bad Enough // Story: If Wishes Were Ponies, Book II // by tkepner //------------------------------// Major Castor Searle and Princess Twilight were already seated when M.I. Five Director General Sir Patrick Jeremy Walker and the Head of the British Secret Intelligence Service, M.I. Six, Sir Colin McColl came into the conference room. Both had sour expressions. They were accompanied by their respective assistants. It wasn’t a surprise, given the suddenness of the call and the fact that it was late on a Saturday. Not wasting time, Walker started with, “Well, what happened this time,” immediately after greeting the other three. It was said in an offhand manner. One would almost think he was joking except for the hard lines around his eyes. Princess Twilight blushed, and cleared her throat. “Nothing on the portal side of things, fortunately,” she said briskly, and with a bit of relief. “This time the problem is on the wizard’s and witch’s side.” Both directors raised their eyebrows. “I’m telling you because the Minister of Magic doesn’t believe this is a serious problem. Having dealt with the individual, Tom Riddle, before, I know he isn’t to be taken lightly,” she said. “I’ll make this brief.” She slid two thick folders across the table to them. “I don’t want to make you any later for dinner than you already will be.” She huffed. “Neither of you were in charge, so you may not know this. In the very late 1970’s and first two-years of the 1980’s, the wizarding world had to deal with a home-grown terrorist who called himself Voldemort. He liked attacking non-magicals, new-magicals, those who were half-bloods, and anyone who disagreed with him. He was rather indiscriminate in his methods. He sought to over-throw the ministry and install himself as king.” She shook her head. “Most of his and his followers’ misdeeds were attributed to gas explosions, Irish terrorists, or flaws in construction to hide the truth from the non-magicals.” She nodded at the folders. “Those are a summary of the time, and the crimes of his and his followers. You will find that many of the incidents attributed to him that affected the non-magical society were blamed on the Irish or gas explosions.” She paused to let that settle. “Supposedly, in October of 1981, he was killed. We discovered last year he had somehow survived, and he made a brief reappearance. We apprehended him — the details are in the folders — and thought the matter settled.” She sighed forlornly. “We were wrong. Yesterday, we discovered he had somehow split himself decades ago and stored part of himself in an artifact.” The other four all gave her incredulous looks. “Yes,” she said, nodding, “I know it sounds impossible by your standards, but it is magically possible to do this. It’s extremely painful and tends to drive the person insane, I gather.” She gave them another moment to think, then continued. “He has apparently been using one of the students in Hogwarts as a stooge for the last seven or eight months. Yesterday, he came out into the open, caused a great deal of damage to the Great Hall at Hogwarts when it was full of students, and escaped in the confusion. Again, details are in the folders. “I was, naturally, in Equestria. Headmaster Dumbledore, unfortunately, had travelled to London for an unrelated matter. “Here’s the problem. Tom Riddle, Junior, his real name, is a half-blood, and well acquainted with the non-magical society. He won’t make the mistakes that most other wizards and witches are prone to do when among non-magicals. He will be able to blend in almost seamlessly. “However, his view of it is extremely dated. He last lived in it in the early 1940’s, in the area around London. So, he is familiar with the city, to a certain extent. Any mistakes he makes will be through unfamiliarity with modern society. He will underestimate the government’s ability to communicate and possibly track him.” Again, they were giving her incredulous looks. She ploughed on. “His information, while old, is more than sufficient for him to adapt to the non-magical society quite quickly. We have searched for him in the magical community, and with magic, but so far there hasn’t been any signs of him. The closest heading we have on him is that he is likely in London. I fear he has snuck into your society to escape, or is lying-low until he can do that.” They had grim expressions, now. “He views non-magicals as little better than beasts, and has no qualms about killing anyone who displeases him or gets in his way. He is very clever, very smart, extremely dangerous, and knows very deadly magics. Your police forces should be warned not to try to apprehend him, if they see him. They need to call in backup if they even suspect he might be nearby. I understand there will be many false alarms, but as dangerous as he is to non-magicals, it can’t be helped.” She picked up a box from beside her and slid it across the table. “There are a thousand emergency beacons disguised as cellphones in that box. Distribute them to as widely as possible to responsible people. When a sighting of Tom comes in, pressing the button will connect them directly to the Ministry of Magic’s police, and someone will teleport there immediately.” She gave Walker a steady look. “I know you have all the wizarding enclaves under surveillance — I would if I were you. Go over the recordings for today, starting at about nine-thirty A.M. until three P.M..” She again indicated the folders. “There are several photos of Tom in there, both what he used to look like in 1945 and the boy he has taken. He will appear as one or the other. Do not be taken in by his appearance, he put down a full-grown wizard who suspected him, almost instantly, and caused great damage to Hogwarts. They were lucky no one died. If not for magic, dozens would have.” She sighed. “Unfortunately, he should know the disillusionment charm. So, even if you don’t see him, he might still have passed through your recording. Look for anything that one of your Technical Specialist would call unusual — doors opening for no reason, and so forth.” She stopped for a moment. “That’s basically all I can tell you. He is a threat to everyone.” She turned to Walker. “I’m sure he suspects that staying in Britain is foolhardy. He would eventually make a mistake and be captured. So, I expect him to make a run for either the continent, or elsewhere.” She looked at them. “The magical avenues for leaving the country — portkeys, apparition, the floo-network, even the Knight Bus — are being closely monitored for signs of him.” She frowned and shook her head. “We aren’t taking any chances. I think we’ve closed all the magical avenues, so he won’t be able to escape through magical means. Which means his only way to escape has to be non-magical.” She made a wry smile. “Knowing the attitudes most magicals have for non-magicals, especially in his time, I’m sure he will conclude that escaping via the non-magical world will be a piece of cake. After all, in his day the magicals would never think to warn the non-magicals that a magical criminal might be trying to sneak out of the country. So,” she looked at Walker and raised an eyebrow, “if you could have agents watching the airports and ferries, we might catch him when he tries to leave.” She paused and waited expectantly. “I suspect that he will assume he doesn’t need to hide from the magical police in the middle of a non-magical area, so, hopefully, he won’t be trying to conceal himself with an illusion.” Frowning heavily, the man nodded. He understood the gravity of the situation. Twilight looked over to McColl. “If you could alert your foreign agents that a dangerous fugitive is out, and have them watch the arriving flights and ferries from Britain, we might catch him that way.” He nodded impassively. “I would offer some of my Guards, but I think their unfamiliarity with both your society and magical that they would be more of a hinderance than a help,” she said apologetically. “Do you have any questions?” “So, which of these is what he looks like?” asked Walker’s assistant, holding up a photo of Tom, when he was in Hogwarts, and Goyle. “The one on your left is how Tom looked when he attended Hogwarts in 1945. The other is Gregory Goyle. Tom could look like either of the two in public.” She could see he didn’t understand. “I told you he had split himself in half, which means, as the papers in the folders explain, that he split his soul in half.” The men exchanged wondering looks. “He put it in an artifact that has been hidden since 1945. Because he did the split in early 1945, the soul piece in the artifact has been frozen in time, you might say. That piece has no memories beyond the moment it was split off. The only information it has on the modern world is what it, he, has learned this year at Hogwarts. Based on the information we have, we believe he will look exactly as he did in 1945 — he will look like a typical teenager.” She stopped and took a breath. “Albeit, one who will act annoyingly superior to anyone he meets.” “That’s fortunate for us because it means most of his magical knowledge will be at Hogwarts level.” She frowned. “Maybe a bit above, as he appears to have been an exceptional student in 1945.” The man slowly nodded. “So,” he said slowly, “a teenager with gun who isn’t afraid to use it, at any time, on anyone? Maybe psychotic?” She nodded back. “Yes, I’m afraid so.” “We’ll need to bring in as many Special Technology people as possible,” he said to his superior. Walker sighed. “I’ll ring Sir John, bring him up-to-date, and get the necessary clearances. We can have soldiers, out of uniform, posted by morning. Perhaps call in Interpol wth him as a ‘person of interest — do not approach’.” Twilight nodded. She knew that Sir John was Chief of the General Staff, the professional head of the British Army. “What about funding? Will this . . . Riddle . . . be able to pay for transport anywhere?” asked McColl. “It seems highly unlikely that the boy would have easy access to pounds, given that he’s been living in the magical world.” Twilight shook her head. “He’s not stupid, and he’s had over seven months to prepare. I don’t think we can assume he is destitute. Not with how quickly he has moved and managed to escape detection so far.” She sighed. “His parents claim not to have seen him since he went to Hogwarts in September, and they appear truthful. He might not have a lot of money, but I would be surprised if he didn’t have enough to make it to France or the Netherlands. If he has enough for a plane ticket, he could go to almost any big city on the continent. Assuming he discovers how easy and far he can travel by plane, that is.” She grimaced. “When he was around, passenger airplanes were for the rich, and the magicals mostly ignored or belittled the concept. Many still do. Without access to the non-magical world, I doubt he has learned of all the changes your world has gone through in the last fifty years. That ignorance, however, won’t last for long if he is in the non-magical world for any length of time.” Walker sighed and slumped in his chair. He gave McColl a sympathetic look. “Looks like none of us are going home soon,” he said dryly. Twilight grimaced. “Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I thought you should know as soon as possible, given Minister Fudge’s truculence on the matter.” On that note, the meeting ended and the directors and their assistants hurried off to their offices. None of them expected they would be home before dawn. ^-~-^ Lights-out had been some time ago. Harry had been staring at the underside of the canopy on his bed since then. The room wasn’t completely dark, however. The full-moon was less than a week away, and its light through the windows was more than enough to illuminate the room. He’d’ve had to draw his curtains tightly-closed to get it really dark. Or if he had wanted real privacy. The other boys, Ron, Dean, Seamus, and Neville were all asleep. Last year’s complaints of Ron’s snores not letting then sleep had been dealt with when Harry had complained to his mum over the summer. She had disappeared into the Ponyville library on the ground floor for hours before returning with a solution. It was called “The Wife’s Perfect Rest.” It was a simple spell. It detected when someone started to snore, and prevented anyone from hearing it. All other sounds came through, both ways, without impedance. So, you could hear the snorer wake up, sneeze, cough, what-have-you, but not be kept up by a buzzsaw in your ear. Likewise, the snorer could hear everything around him, so they could wake to an alarm, cock’s crow, or the wife telling the lazy gob to get up. The book carefully did not mention that husbands could also use the spell on their wives if they were the ones snoring. It was a nice night, too. If he listened carefully, he could hear the occasional hoot or call from the owlery or Forbidden Forest. Unfortunately, Harry couldn’t seem to relax. He was as wide awake as if it were noon and he was in the Great Hall. That hadn’t been the case earlier. The adrenaline rush of the disaster in the Great Hall had worn off well-before lunch, leaving them all tired. However, the tense atmosphere of the interviews hadn’t helped any of them rest in the afternoon. He’d especially had been worried the entire time the aurors had been interviewing his herd and friends. Would they mention something that he wouldn’t want out? He had been anxious even when Ginny had gone over for her interview. He wasn’t sure why, just yet. It wasn’t like he felt the same way about Hermione and Ginny as he did the fillies, but they were his friends and he felt protective of them. They were all weary and sleepy by the time they finished the evening meal. He had been yawning and slightly muzzy hours before curfew, as had been most everypony. Many had even gone up early. But the moment his head hit the pillow, the events in the Great Hall had stampeded to the forefront of his mind. No matter how much he tried to shove them aside, into the little boxes that held all his memories, they kept crawling out. He had been barely conscious of putting up a shield when he saw Goyle lifting his arm. One second it wasn’t there, and in the blink of an eye, it was. That was fine. They had practiced for many hours getting to the point where their shields came up every time, at full power. However, he had been simply furious. Enraged that someone had attacked him and Hermione. Yes, the spell had been aimed in his direction, but it could easily have hit Hermione if she had moved in the wrong direction in the exchange of spells between Goyle and Gilderoy. Him being the target wasn’t that much of a shock. He had always been the target, both in primary school and out. His home had to be included in that group, too. About the only place he wasn’t a target was in Equestria or the Gryffindor Common Room. His cupboard, prior to that, had never been a place of security. It was where he was expected to be. Any safety it provided had been accidental. He had been allowed to stay because the adults couldn’t legally toss him out. A lot like Tom Riddle. Harry had never really had a safe place — until he had arrived in Ponyville. But, even then, Ponyville had its share of dangers. But they never singled him out. He had always been simply one of the crowd. Anonymous. Just like the rest. He could handle being attacked. What wasn’t so fine was his immediate desire to return that red-spell that had splashed so on his shield with another, but with twice the power. A spell with more than enough power to shatter most shields, he knew, and throw the one shielding to the floor. Once they were on the floor, then he could deal with them at his leisure. There had been several spells for him to choose from for that leisure, at the very edge of his conscience. He couldn’t recall them now, but they hadn’t been nice spells, he knew. Survival of the wizard or witch on the receiving end was questionable, at best. The pain before the end, though, would have been intense. How had he known those spells? He couldn’t recall reading any books with such spells in them. The first in the group he thought of certainly hadn’t sounded like a Latin-based curse. That meant it couldn’t have come from any books in Hogwarts, or at least those that weren’t based on European or Egyptian heritage. There might be books from other magical societies in the Restricted section, but he had never noticed them. Was it odd that he remembered a secret passage from the dungeons that led to the Restricted Section that Madam Pence guarded so jealously? As careless as his mum was about leaving books for Spike to reshelve, he knew his mum would never have left out a book with such dangerous spells in it. Especially, when he might come across it before it was put back. The spell had sounded in his head like de-sa-dal. That rage . . . it worried him. He didn’t know where it came from. For sure he had never been that angry in Equestria. None of the monsters there had ever singled him out. If they went after him, it was because they felt he was invading their territory. Or, they had been driven out of their territory and were attacking him because he was in their sight and they were scared. All very reasonable reactions, all things considered. With the exception of Timberwolves, most could be either escaped or driven off with a concerted effort by him and his friends. Only timberwolves went out of their way to hunt ponies. Oh, sure, he had a few run-ins with other ponies, but they had never gone after him with the intent to kill. Embarrass? Insult? Yes. Definitely. But never kill. Ponies didn’t think that way. Once an enemy was down, they quit fighting. They would much rather have friends than enemies. He had no doubts that the spell Goyle had cast at him had been intended to cause great harm, if not out-right kill him. But while he and Goyle had had their disputes, Goyle had never seemed to dislike him on a personal level. Everything had been at the instigation of Malfoy. The very few times they had met without Malfoy or Crabbe being around, last year, he had been cordial. Or, at least, as cordial as a muscle-bound thug could be when he had no orders. The longer Harry considered it, the more certain he was that it wasn’t Goyle he had been enraged at, but something else. The spell, he had recognized it just from its colour, was a cutting spell of a particularly nasty sort. It wouldn’t be easy to heal any cuts made by it, and the pain it caused would linger. How did he know this? How did he recognize it? He didn’t think like that, he didn’t react like that. He was a good pony! Wasn’t he? Goyle had been possessed. There wasn’t any doubt of that in his mind. During the entire “class,” Goyle hadn’t moved like Goyle did. He had been smoother, more graceful, lighter on his feet. Things no one had ever accused him of doing previously. So . . . yeah. Possessed. Those . . . . books . . . that Sunset had brought over had gone into great detail on horcruxes. The books had mentioned how the one in the diary, in book two, had been designed to take over another person. Could it have been given to Goyle, this time? The books had made it quite clear that Malfoy Senior had never known what the diary really was — only that giving it to someone in Hogwarts would cause a calamity and greatly harm Dumbledore in some manner. He had focused mainly on the first-years. Even after Elly’s warning, it hadn’t sunk in except to make him work harder on their spells. That he really might have been the horcrux hadn’t really registered. So. The last horcrux, the diary, had taken over Goyle. He should have realized it. He should have told his mum. Elly had warned them to watch him. This was his fault for not telling his mum. That was why Elly had had a feeling of familiarity about the situation, the feeling of possession. Somehow, she had unconsciously picked up on Goyle’s changes, just as she had noticed the Head Boy’s mis-actions last year. Or, perhaps, had her magic somehow reacted to the possession? Had her magic, somehow, detected the same magic in Goyle that had been in Quirrel? Had it given her subconscious clues that not all was right with the boy? That Tom Riddle was again about to make an appearance? That would explain much, actually. Her magic had picked up the subtle clues of possession and compulsion in the others’ magic, and brought it to her attention as a feeling that something was “wrong.” The clues fit. The next time she said something, he would listen. Tom Riddle, a young Voldemort wannabe, was loose in the world. And he had a grudge against Harry. Which meant he would be after Harry’s herd, too. Elly might notice before he did that something was coming. He should have realized it. But nothing in the books had been happening all year. There were no mysterious attacks — the basilisk was long gone. There weren’t any other attacks, either. Plus, there was none of the tension and terror that the books had mentioned had been the hallmarks of the book’s second-year. If not for Elly’s warning, he would never have suspected anything was wrong until it went wrong. And, despite the warning, he had still been surprised at Tom’s competence and planning. In the books, Ginny had been acting . . . well, not suspicious, but unlike herself. Goyle, on the other hoof, hadn’t overtly changed at all this year. Or, at least, any changes had been so slight that they were things no one but his closest friends would have noticed. But it was highly likely that Tom had been confunding and obliviating his “closest” friends. They probably never remembered noticing anything different about the boy, in either word or deed. Plus, even if Harry had suspected Goyle had had the diary, who here would have believed him? Harry would be accused of over-reacting, as he had last year with the centaurs. The Professors just couldn’t start casting detection spells. The parents would have been involved. And who knew if the wizard hiding in the diary couldn’t have bluffed his way out of it? Or even, forewarned, managed to conceal himself and the diary? If Tom had realized the professors were suspicious of Goyle, he could have had one of the other two cast that fidelius spell on the diary and himself. Then he could have obliviated them of having done it. With that, it wouldn’t have mattered that the spells detected him, the casters and witnesses wouldn’t “see” that he was possessing Goyle. The perfect camouflage. As he had heard, hindsight had twenty-twenty vision. The only saving grace, as far as Harry was concerned, was that this version of Tom had only a Hogwarts education. He hadn’t spent nearly forty years combing the world for dark magics to wield and slowly building up a following of pure-bloods. Well, then, Harry resolved, the only solution was to match his magical growth to Tom’s. At this point in time, Tom was only three years ahead of him. If he applied himself, he would finish third-year, easy, by summer. If he started the fourth-year books this summer instead of waiting for school, he would be able to finish fifth-year by next June. Then he could start sixth-year over the summer. By the time he started his fourth-year at Hogwarts, he would have caught up with Tom. He questioned whether Tom would have as easy access to magical books as Harry had here. Plus, Tom would be traveling, not studying, plus having to secure some way to live. Not to mention trying to evade notice in the wizarding world. In two years, Harry calculated, he would be ahead of Tom on the magic on this side of the portal. With the fillies help, and access to his mother’s library, he was confident he would leap-frog ahead of the other boy! The fillies wouldn’t like that, nor would his mum, he was sure. But the alternative would be to leave them at the non-existent mercies of a psychopath with no concept of mercy. One who, they had just seen, could strike with no warning. It would be a difficult sell, but when he presented his final conclusions, his mum would have no choice but to teach him Dark Magic. He shuddered. Dark Magic wasn’t a nice toy. It felt dirty and, well, distasteful. Harry vividly remembered the feel of the magic Quirrelmort had used to hurt him. Actually, now that he thought about it, it reminded Harry of Tirek. He shuddered again. Now there was a centaur he had no interest in ever seeing again! He remembered the helpless feeling he had had as his magic was . . . wait. Now that he thought about it, what had happened? He had felt a drain on his magic, but his magic wasn’t the same as the ponies, they all knew that. His mum had even scanned his magic before they had “found” the portal. His magic had always been slightly different. Tirek had known magic to drain a pony’s magic, not a human’s magic. So, why did that remind him of Dark Magic? Tirek hadn’t actually used Dark Magic. King Sombra had used Dark Magic, and he had been dealt with well before Harry had arrived in Equestria. It suddenly felt as if Harry had ice-water running through his veins. He had trouble breathing, broke into a cold sweat. Yeah, now he remembered. When Tirek had tried to take his magic, something else had fought back. It had been a dark and unsavoury, but he had been relieved, at the time, that something was fighting to let him keep his magic. Together, they had fought. A black mist had temporarily surrounded him before disappearing as Tirek moved on. Tirek apparently hadn’t noticed his resistance, or thought it was the same futile resistance other ponies had shown. He had taken the fall-off in magic from Harry as being the colt running out of magic instead of him successfully resisting and keeping a bit. The dark and creepy feeling had persisted for a few minutes after the monster left, before slowly dissipating. He had felt quite sick and weak. But later, he had felt as if a dark fog in his head had disappeared. A fog he had never realized was there. Everything was sharper, clearer. That had been his horcrux! In his scar! He started shivering. His mum had never mentioned anything being different about his scar, either before or after the Tirek incident. Despite the scar becoming less prominent. However, now, from the books, he knew he had had not only part of Tom’s magical abilities — speaking to snakes — but also a part of Tom’s soul. And his memories. How much of him was Harry? How much was Tom? He had been in a bit of a panic when Sunset had first produced the books from her world. However, his mum had reassured him there wasn’t a single trace of the evil wizard in his scar, at all. Her scans on his magic would have revealed any different magic in his scar, she had said. Just to alleviate his worries, she had re-done several of her scans. The results had shown that there weren’t any signs of either magic in his scar, or a separate piece of soul in his head. There was only Harry’s magic, Harry’s soul. The only one in his head was Harry. Of course not, he now realized. Tirek had greatly weakened both their magics. Without the magic to reinforce it, Voldemort’s piece of soul had been too weak to do anything. According to his mum, that soul-piece in his head would have been only about one-and-a-half percent the size of his. If he had had a piece of it in his head. Far too small, she had reassured him, to ever pose a threat to his soul. Even with magic, it would have been too small to affect him. If it had ever been in his scar to begin with, she had said. But, then, she had never previously scanned him for a piece of someone else’s soul. You can’t find something if you never think to look for it in the first place. Just as they had never thought to look for the diary before Sunset had shown them the books. How much of him was Tom? How much of him was Harry? ^-~-^