//------------------------------//
// Chapter 81:  Upgrade 
// Story: The Accidental Invasion 
// by computerneek 
//------------------------------//

It was a disaster.  Yet…  Maybe it wasn’t?  Padma wasn’t sure exactly what had happened.
Exactly as she had predicted, Parvati had easily been able to serve her part in the spell.  They had easily been able to accumulate the power required to open the portal, and even a bit more.
However, the Divine Energy had not behaved as she had expected; it turned out that the more of it there was, the slower it dissipated back into the Divine Plane.  As such, it had blasted both of them from the mere three-inch portal she had opened.  Parvati had let out an oddly echoing scream of pain, but miraculously, had not dropped the spell.  Padma gritted her teeth and concentrated on the magic, rushing it along.  She couldn’t rush the portal closing; as a matter of fact, she couldn’t close it.  She could only stop supporting it, causing it to collapse naturally- and she’d already designed the spell to be as brief as possible with the portal.
Unfortunately, her magic scanning spells weren’t able to discern much through the portal…  But fortunately, they were able to pick out Hailey’s signature.  There seemed to be a lot more, but that was all she could discern.
Then, the portal had closed…  and before the Divine Energy had stopped burning them too quickly for them to regenerate in the water, she had found herself, quite suddenly, standing on something solid.
She tried to let out a cry of surprise as she collapsed, but her vocal cords weren’t working.  Neither were her eyes- but her ears had survived.  They were ringing madly, and badly distorted, but she picked out the heavy thump of Parvati hitting the ground as well.
The landing hurt.  She landed on her side, and her head jerked against her shoulder.  At the same moment, a searing pain appeared in the already-burned back of her neck.  Probably a sprain.  She tried moving her arms to try and feel out the odd surface she was lying on, but to no avail- her burned muscles weren’t nearly strong enough to move her arms.
So she lay there, hoping that someone would find her and Parvati, wherever they were, and throw them in the lake.  It wasn’t something she’d ever even dreamed of hoping before she’d become a water elemental, but that didn’t really matter.
Somewhere around a minute later, the ground disappeared- then promptly re-appeared.  Painfully.  This time, it felt like grass.
She lay, unable to move, for about a minute before somebody seemed to notice.
What felt like the footsteps of a few people ran up to them.  “What the-?” someone cried.
“They look badly burned,” another observed.  “We need to take them to Madam Pomfrey!”
If her muscles had been working, she would have winced.  She needed the lake, not Madam Pomfrey!
But they picked her up, rather roughly, and started carrying her.
By the time they mentioned seeing the Hospital Wing, her heart was beginning to burn.  These idiots were going to kill her and Parvati- assuming Parvati hadn’t already died, of course.
They opened the last door.  “Madam Pomfrey?” someone asked.
“She’s not here,” answered a strangely familiar voice.  “What is-?  Why are you bringing those two to the Hospital Wing?”  It took Padma a few seconds to place the voice, but then she realized who it was.
Silversong.
“Because they’re hurt…?” one of the girls carrying her answered.
Silver sighed audibly.  “Well, they’re water elementals.  Throw them in the lake.”
“The lake?” someone asked.
“At this point,” Silver muttered, “they’ll die before you get there.  Allow me.”
She felt a sudden flow of Equestrian Raeth magic- levitation, it felt like.  The hands got peeled off of her…  then a far faster thaumic shift that she recognized as direct manipulation of the finer magical principles, and she could feel the breeze on her skin.  Then…  Silver dropped her too.
She supposed that she was about to die- but as soon as she did, she landed with a splash.
Cool, refreshing water flowed around her, instantly curing the aches and pains throughout her body, mending her.  Her eyes, muscles, everything returned to normal in a matter of seconds.
She promptly surfaced, sticking her head out of the water to look for Silver.  She found her, standing calmly at the water’s edge.  “Hi,” she began, then paused.  “Um…  Thanks.”
“So, what happened?” Silver asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Good question,” Parvati said, sticking her head out of the water as well, then looked at Padma.  “Last I remember, you were just starting to build that spell?”
Padma sighed.  “You must’ve been knocked out when we landed,” she muttered.  “The spell worked.  I must’ve missed an important property, so I miscalculated the safe distance, and we both got blasted.  Not sure how we got back to Hogwarts, but we did.”
Silver sighed.  “So how’d it look?”
She shook her head.  “Detected her signature again, and it was definitely her this time- but the damn thing burned my eyes out too fast to actually see.”  She sighed, and leaned back in the water, keeping her face above the surface so Silver could hear.  “And I don’t think I’ll be able to do it again, the safe distance will be too far for us to handle without at least three raeths.”
Suddenly, a girl with pink and dark blue candy floss hair and a Slytherin badge jogged up behind Silver.  Padma recognized her immediately, but couldn’t remember her name- they’d never spoken, she’d only seen the girl talk to Hailey a number of times during her studies of the finer magic principles.  And always in hushed tones that she couldn’t hear, to boot.
“Hey,” the girl greeted.  “Padma, Parvati, Hailey is going to want you both to meet her in her office at five o’clock, in about two hours.”  She smiled.  “And my name’s Bonbon, by the way.”  She turned to leave.
“She’s back?” Silver asked her.
Bonbon paused to look at Silver, and her smile widened.  “No, but she will be.  If you join Hermione after your shift, you’ll be one of the first to meet her.”
“After my shift, huh?” Silver muttered, raising an eyebrow.  “Alright, I’ll take it.  Thanks, Bonbon!”
Then, Silver vanished into thin air, using what Padma now recognized as Hermione’s Misty Step spell, and Bonbon trotted away.





Hermione glanced up as some footsteps approached, but it was only Silversong.  “Still not getting anywhere,” she grumbled.  “I swear, this thing is Hailey levels of crazy.”
Pinkie Pie, sitting next to her, sighed as well.  “And I thought I was the crazy one,” she muttered, before leaning back.  “I miss the days when I was the crazy one.”  She chuckled softly, then looked back down.  “Hangon, it’s stabilizing.  We might be able to get somewhere.”
Hermione looked back down.  “It is.”
Very suddenly, the fluctuations within the Room of Requirement…  stopped.  That was, the fluctuations within the glass marble embedded in the wall across from the Room, which also happened to contain the Room.  It was positioned directly in the middle of the core Castle ley line, making it part of a virtually indestructible magical column- and incredibly difficult to reach.
“It’s stopped,” she muttered, then scowled.  “It looks almost normal.  But we should be able to-!”
“Uh, guys?” Silver asked.
She looked up…  then followed Silver’s gaze to the opposite wall, where a large door- one she recognized as that of the Room of Requirement- had appeared, still closed.  She rose to her feet, stepped forward…  and, slowly, opened it.
It opened into a truly massive, empty room, large enough to fit the entire Castle a couple of times over.
And there was Hailey, lying spread-eagle on the floor in the middle of the room.
“Hailey!” she cried, and bolted forwards.  Silver followed right behind her.
When they reached Hailey, it was to find that she was awake, and staring at the ceiling.
“Hailey!” she repeated.  “Are you okay?”
Hailey sighed, and closed her eyes.  “Yeah.  Just…  Adjusting.  Give me a moment, please.”
They waited, somewhat impatiently.
Finally, Hailey sat up, flexed her fingers, took a deep breath, and let it out.  “Alright, you may hug me now.”
Pinkie laughed, but neither Hermione nor Silver really cared too much about the specifics of her wording, and both hugged her at once- moments before Pinkie wrapped them all in a massive bear hug.
“What happened?” Hermione asked, once they had drawn back.
“I probably should have seen it coming,” Hailey answered.  “This is- or at least, was- the Full Castle Record.  That function has been broken, though, because it accomplished its purpose:  To overload the space-time continuum with pure information density.”  She sighed.  “And idiot me had to be so careless as to get caught in the middle of it.”
“At least it couldn’t hurt you,” Silver observed.
Hailey laughed.  “In a manner of speaking, maybe, I suppose,” she told her.  “Fact is, it did hurt.  My invulnerability was magic-based, so anything higher than magic- say, breaking magic- can go right through it.”  She sighed.  “I’m lucky I survived.  I guess it remains to be seen exactly what effects it will have…?”  She sighed.





“Good evening, Sadarina,” Hailey greeted, as she stepped around her desk and sat down.
Sadarina looked up from her screens.  “Hailey,” she observed calmly.  “You’re back.”  She hopped out of her seat, and walked towards her.  “You seem…  Different.”
“I know,” Hailey answered.  “I am.”  She sighed.  “I really should have seen it coming.  I even commented, a mere ten minutes before it started, that I must have been due for a ‘surprise power-up’!”  She reached down, and lifted Sadarina into her lap for a hug.  “I was unconscious these last three days.”  She chuckled.  “It’s a good thing you don’t actually need me, isn’t it?”
“I do need you,” Sadarina corrected, returning the hug.  “If you were to die, all of Dementor Kind, including myself, would be devastated…  and it’s a distinct possibility that I and some others might become Husks after such an event.”
“Well, I certainly don’t plan on dying,” she told her.





“Come in.”  Hailey gently set Sadarina back on her own feet and rose to walk around her desk.
On cue, Bonbon entered.  “Good evening, Hailey,” she greeted.  “I hope it wasn’t too much trouble?”
“Nah, not really,” Hailey shrugged.  “One moment, I stepped into the Room…  and the next, I was waking up on the floor while Hermione and Silver ran in.  But how about you?”
“The Room of Requirement acted up,” she answered.  “We were able to arrive through it, but for departure, we had to use the common room fires again.  Celestia asked me to invite you to dinner with her as soon as you got back- I think she’s also curious about what happened.”
“I take it you haven’t told her?”
“No, I have not.”
“Thank you.  I’m probably going to, but you’re right, I’d like to keep it as strictly need-to-know as possible.  Oh, and before I forget, may I ask your past self to show up here a minute ago, and have Padma and Parvati show up in a minute or so?”
Bonbon smiled.  “You may.  You should also know the future has gotten, er, muddy around you, so I’m not sure how reliable my fortune-telling is going to be.”
She scowled, and rubbed her chin.  “Hmm…  Yeah, that could be a problem.”  She sat on the end of her desk.  “I accidentally rewrote my entire magical core, so who knows exactly what effects that’s going to have.”
Right on schedule, a knock sounded from the door.
“Come in,” Hailey called again.
The door opened…  and the Patil twins entered, Parvati first.
Hailey chuckled.  “Don’t worry, you’re not in trouble,” she told them.  “If anyone is, I am.”
They blinked in surprise, glanced at one another, took deep breaths, and walked closer.  “So,” Parvati muttered.  “Why did you…?”
“Well, I heard what you were doing.”  Hailey hopped off her desk and walked up to them.  “You were digging at the barrier into the Divine Plane, right?”  She sighed.  “If you really want to get there, the unholy offspring of the Misty Step and the Time Turner magic will push the divine energy out of the way, since the divine energy simply can’t be controlled with normal magic, though it does require Alicorn power levels, which…”  She paused.  “It feels like you both ascended?”
Both twins blinked.
“Is that why I have wings?” Padma asked.
“I’ve…  ascended?” Parvati muttered, then sighed.  “Damn, I didn’t want to do that.”
Hailey laughed.  “It could be worse, you could have accidentally rewritten your entire magical core and possibly even your entire being like I did.  I’m going to have to relearn everything.  And that’s if I’m lucky.”