Muggle Summer
A/N: While this story may have broken new fanfic ground when the Royals got involved in Chapter 2, there have been a few stories that have had Harry and friends join the muggle military. My favorite, by far, is Old Soldiers Never Die, by Rorschach's Blot, and I'd like to acknowledge that story as inspiration for some of this chapter and others to follow. That said, some of the spotted similarities will have more to do with logic than plagiarism (e.g. Harry and Neville's commissioned ranks).
Disclaimer: Not my characters, no money being made, etc., etc.
Chapter 53: Wolf hunt
Sunday, July 8, 4:30am
Moray Firth, Scotland
Harry and Hermione badge-jumped to the Scottish coastline, where Fred was still busy banishing crude oil as it flowed from the wrecked tanker's hold. Hermione used a satellite phone to confirm that muggle salvage and clean-up vessels were on their way. Knowing that there'd be little that the muggles could do to quickly contain the oil slick, she suggested that they disillusion themselves and remain on clean-up duty even after the muggle ships arrived. Harry agreed in part, noting that they still had a few minutes until the Phoenix Teams would arrive at Dartmoor. But he also observed that Fred was managing well enough on his own, and told Hermione that there were a couple of other reasons why he had rescued her from the Prime Minister's war room.
Harry's first stop was a few hundred yards off the tanker's port bow, where a bit of crude oil had escaped Fred's notice. After hearing a description of the mysterious glowing footprints that had been left upon the petroleum, Hermione suggested an experimental reenactment. Sure enough, the Patronus that sprang from Harry's wand left dull-orange marks behind as it pranced along the slickened surf.
As Harry swooped down for a closer look, Hermione lifted up her legs and cried, "Mind the boots, Harry, it's not like we're wearing surfsocks!"
Harry looked over his shoulder and smiled. "As Ron might ask," he replied, "are you not a witch?" He then pointed his wand towards his passenger and cast a head-to-toe Impervious charm.
Hermione let out a deep sigh as she leaned down to get a closer look at the orange goo that was drifting along with the waves. "Look Harry," she said. "The color is fading once Prongs moves on."
Harry looked farther up the trail and agreed. "The footprints also look to be bigger than his actual hooves," he added.
Drawing her wand out from a rubber sleeve, Hermione reached down and poked the glowing material.
"Doesn't physically act any different than the other oil," she noted. "We should grab samples and let Q-branch take a look."
Conjuring a couple of capped plastic bottles, Harry made the gallant gesture of getting his own hands dirty and skimmed both orange and black versions of the oil slick. He loaded the containers into his rucksack (which Harry always transfigured into a saddle bag when he flew), and asked, "So we're good to go, then?"
"I think so," Hermione replied.
"Good," said Harry. "Because we've got one more spot to visit."
"Where's that, Harry?"
The Queen's Wizard smiled. "To a place where moonlight is still a good thing."
+++
The pod of Atlantic bottlenose dolphins were only a mile or so from where Harry had first come upon them earlier in the night. They weren't at all difficult to spot as they jumped into the air under the full moon, and slapped their tail fins down on the sea's surface. It was as if they were unaware (or, if Douglas Adams was correct, uncaring) of the night's troubles for their land-bound mammalian cousins.
"They're beautiful," Hermione sighed, as Harry marked the pod's speed and bearing from a respectful height.
"Want to join them?" Harry asked with a grin.
Hermione shook her head. "Oh, we can't…it's against the law."
"Really?"
"Yeah…funny bit of law…it's illegal to approach wild dolphins by boat, but it's not illegal for them to approach you."
"Don't imagine the dolphins would care too much even if it were," Harry replied. "Like a boat, eh?" he added, as he drew his wand and cast a shield spell against his lower legs.
"Harry?" Hermione asked. "What are you doing?"
"No worries," he replied. A slight shift of his weight altered their position, until they were about thirty feet to the right of the lead dolphin.
"Far enough distance?" Harry asked, as he once again matched the pod's speed and bearing. When Hermione nodded, Harry dropped the broom tip down until he could drag his toes in the water. The magical shield of air anchored to his legs cut through the water, creating a noticeable wake and no small amount of spray.
"What are you doing?" Hermione cried out, as she squinted over Harry's shoulder.
"Pretending to be a boat," Harry replied, as he conjured two pair of swim goggles.
With a burst of acceleration Harry raced ahead of the lead dolphin, as if they were riding a magical jet ski. The dolphin didn't fail to notice. Thrilled to find a new way to play, she changed course and led the pod into the wake formed on either side of Harry's feet.
Hermione let out an unabashed cry of glee. "I've seen this on vacation!" she shouted. "They can swim faster when the wake helps carry them along."
Harry shared Hermione's delight. He really hadn't expected the dolphin's reactions (as the Dursleys left him at home whenever they made their day trips to the shore). He got even more excited as some of the dolphins began to leap into the air as they followed along.
"Wow, look at that, Hermione!" he exclaimed. They're almost jumping high enough for me to…"
"Harry, don't you….aaahhh!"
A sudden burst of speed ate the balance of Hermione's warning, as Harry timed a nearby dolphin's jump and zig-zagged straight under it. As a different dolphin jumped to their left Harry veered course and shot the gap under that one as well.
Hermione's anger over Harry's recklessness was quickly squashed by her respect for cetacean intelligence (not to mention her own unabashed pleasure). The dolphins weren't afraid of Harry's flying…in fact, they seemed to encourage it, with five or six offering him multiple targets as they played a form of leap-frog along the Scottish coastline.
"If they're having fun," she thought to herself, "then why can't I?"
Harry had hoped that this brief escape from the night's stress and strife might boost Hermione's spirits. He worried when it seemed as though he was enjoying things more than she was, and didn't relax until he felt her squeeze tight up against his back, reach her hands down between his legs to grab the broomstick, and begin to nibble on his left ear.
"Am I distracting you, Harry?" she shouted into his ear.
He laughed as he leaned into a corkscrew roll.
"Harr-eeee!"
+++
Aboard "Phoenix 2"
En route to Dartmoor National Park
The "thump-thump-thump" of the rotors rang in Lee Jordan's ears as he made the return trip from the helicopter's loo. A bit of turbulence caused the aircraft to lurch and he fell into Katie Bell's lap.
"Sorry about that Cupid," he said with a weak smile.
"No worries, Rasta," she replied.
The dreadlocked wizard righted himself and headed back towards his seat, not catching the glare that Katie sent across the cabin towards her friend. Alicia responded with a "Who, me?" grin that might have provoked a minor jinxing, had there not been the risk of frying their tranport's electronics.
When the Clan Air Force's muggle co-pilots had announced that all of the squadron's witches and wizards needed proper nicknames, Alicia claimed "Comet" before anyone else could, using her first broom for inspiration. Once Seamus's Phoenix Team partner "Blade" heard that, Katie's nickname was set in stone.
Her only consolation was that the nickname "Prancer" had been reserved for Angelina, should she ever join the squadron.
Lee's broom-buddy, "Stout" Downey, offered up an opened barf bag as the queasy-looking wizard strapped himself back into his seat.
"Here you go, Rasta…wouldn't do to get puke on any of that lovely hair of yours."
Lee scowled at Stout. "That's Rasta, Sir, now isn't it?"
"Oh yes, Sir, sorry, Sir, won't happen again, Sir!" the muggle replied with a smile.
That all of the teen-aged Phoenix Team witches and wizards now outranked their muggle counterparts had been something they all laughed about when the announcement was made. It was established tradition that only commissioned officers could pilot British military aircraft, and the Clan Air Force's brooms were obviously aircraft. Fortunately there were no hard feelings; they had already flown and trained together, and come to respect each other's skills and capabilities.
"You do realize, Sir, that now that you're official Army you'll need a proper haircut?"
Lee smiled. "Got that cleared up straightaway, Stout," he replied. "Since my work with you muggles is classified, I'm a secret agent wizard, right?"
"Yeah, so?"
"So if I followed your example and shaved my head to look just like my arse, everyone would want to know why and I'd blow my cover!"
Neville laughed at the banter, appreciating the joke a bit more than the others. The boys had been especially proud of selecting "Buzz" as his nickname, playing on the irony so often used in these situations. Just as a short soldier was nicknamed "Legs," or a bald airman, "Curly," someone with the surname "Longbottom," needed to be called some variant of "Short-top." The consensus choice, "Buzz," reflected not only the preferred military hairstyle (short back and sides), but also Neville's job as a pilot. And that "Buzz Longbottom," wasn't all that far off from the Toy Story character's name….well, that put the nickname in the running for "moniker of the year."
"Alright there, Rasta?" Neville asked.
"Been better," Lee muttered. "Blasted bouncing about."
Neville tried to lighten the mood with a self-deprecating story.
"Hey Lee, I'd ever tell you how we got from Hogwarts to the Department of Mysteries?"
Lee shrugged as he leaned back into his seat. "You flew, right?"
Neville nodded. "That's right, but not on a broom."
"What did you use, then?" asked Scott "Andy" Anderson, Neville's partner.
"Thestrals."
Lee's eyes went wide. "No bloody way…thestrals?"
Neville nodded as his partner asked, "What's a thestral?"
"It's a kind of flying horse," he replied. "Ugly as sin…skin feels like a snake's…I couldn't see'em, but Harry says they look like a 'goth pegasus,' if that makes any sense to you."
"What, they pull a carriage, or something?" Lee asked.
Neville shook his head. ""No, we flew bareback.…so anyway, I don't know if was the flying bit or the fact that we knew we might be heading straight into a trap, but I was sicker than a kneazle the whole trip." Nodding towards the barf bag that Lee still held, he added, "Those things would have been right handy that night."
"Why is that? Couldn't you just lean over to the side and let the puke fall to the ground?"
"Yeah, I tried that…but half ended up on Ginny flying next to me and the other half hit my thestral's wing and snapped back to hit me in the face."
Lee laughed at the image. "Clumsy git…no wonder you never had a chance chasing that witch last year!"
Neville got a bit chuffed. "Hey, I'd like to see how much control you'd have when you're hurling vomit off a thestral's back at ninety miles an hour."
Andy jumped in. "Wait a minute…I'd like to think I've gotten used to the idea of your world, but….you're saying that you rode on the back of an invisible flying snake-skinned horse from Scotland all the way to London?"
"Yeah."
"And that once you got there you still had enough in you to knock off a pack of Death Eaters?"
"Well," Neville replied modestly, "it wouldn't have turned out nearly as well if we hadn't gotten some help once there."
The muggle warrior shook his head in disbelief, and chided himself once again for forgetting that at least some of the kids he'd been assigned to work with were battle-hardened veterans.
Momentarily forgetting his ill-ease, Lee looked over at Katie's snoring broom-buddy.
"Oy, Stout," he asked, "How in Merlin's name can 'New Six' fall asleep with all the noise?"
His partner wryly replied, "Better now than in the middle of it, eh?"
"Rather noisy, though, isn't it?"
The muggle shrugged his shoulders. "Me, Andy and New Six have had a few years of practice."
Neville squinted at his partner; for all of the training that they'd undertaken over the past few weeks, he knew precious little about Sergeant Major Anderson's background.
"So, Andy, that's why your maroon caps don't look like they came right out the box like the rest of ours?"
The wizened warrior grinned. "Noticed that, did you?" he asked. "Good spot, lad…we were Paras before The Regiment came calling…still are, depending on who is asking."
Having received a crash course on muggle military and counter-terrorist unit organizations, Neville was able to make sense of this response.
"So you three were in The Parachute Regiment when the SAS recruited you, which was where MI-5 ¾ found you and asked you to join the Clan Air Force, but now that the Phoenix Teams are regular army attached to The Parachute Regiment, you're back where you started?"
"Bit of a boondoggle, eh, Buzz?" his partner asked. "When 'Sport and Social' invites you to visit Hell and back, it's all Official Secrets-like, so on the books it's like you never left your old unit."
"That means…your undercover assignment is to act like you're assigned to your official unit?"
The army man laughed. "Gotta give the REMFs some paperwork to push across their desks, now, don't we?"
The helicopter started to drop and banked to starboard. Katie's Phoenix Team partner woke instantly, as if the directional change was an alarm clock. He immediately checked his gear and began searching his jumpsuit for more places to stuff silver bullets.
"Oy, New Six, sure you've got enough spares?" asked Katie.
Sergeant Beemer looked up at his partner and smiled. "You know what they say, Cupid…you can never have enough ammo, beer or sex."
"Hey, New Six," Andy called out, "Mind their tender ears."
"Oh, sorry, forgot," the Para replied with a grin. "Never have enough ammo, fizzy drinks and feel-ups."
In response to his partner's fish-eyed glare, New Six muttered an unapologetic apology. "Sorry, Cupid."
Katie chuckled. "No worries, New Six…just take care to remember what my boyfriend can do with his wand."
"Didn't think you the type to kiss and tell, luv…erm, sorry…Ma'am," her partner replied sheepishly.
As Katie and her muggle partner were bantering, Sergeant Major Anderson looked out the cabin window and spotted a green flare shoot sparks up into the darkened sky. A quick radio exchange with Ron, who was in the other helicopter, confirmed that they'd arrived at their destination. He stood up in the aisle and grabbed a chair back for balance.
"Alright Ladies and…Ladies," he yelled (acknowledging Katie and Alicia's presence within the cabin), "we've got the go to land…make sure your food trays are up and seats locked in an upright position."
Three Apache attack helicopters hovered as protective guards as the two 33 Sq transport helicopters discharged its passengers onto the top of a large hill that overlooked the hamlet of Bellever. As the rock outcrops that sat atop this tor were too uneven for a hard landing, the Phoenix Team members had to load all of their gear onto their backs and jump down a few feet whilst their helicopters hovered just above the surface.
Sergeant Major Anderson took point and headed for the hilltop, with Ron and the others close behind with wands and rifles drawn. They were met by Luna and the squadron leader of a Royal Marine commando unit (deployed from their nearby barracks in Plymouth). Captain Ronald Weasley found it hard to salute to the marine commando and hug his girlfriend at the same time. That he chose to kiss Luna before acknowledging the squadron leader didn't do much to improve on the muggle military man's first impressions of the teen-aged Deputy Commanding Officer.
"Suh!" he shouted. "Lieutenant Nightsong, Four Two Commandos, Suh!"
Ron shrunk back a bit from the shouted greeting, then recovered just well enough to approximate a responding salute.
"Erm…Ron… Captain Ron Weasley, First Paras…nice to meet you."
"Suh, the landing zone perimeter is secure…ready for your additional orders, Suh!"
Ron thought for a moment as he scanned the horizon and took in the positions of the helicopter gunships. "Are the tangos still down there in the woods?"
"Suh, yes suh!"
Luna interrupted while Ron was looking over the potential field of battle. "Danny, why don't you be a good little color and go back inside your tent before the pixies come back?"
The burly Royal Marine gave the witch a frightened look. "Yes, ma'am," he replied. He then turned towards Ron.
"Dismissed, Lieutenant," said Neville's broom-buddy.
Too scared at the thought another "pixie attack," the commando ran off without realizing that an NCO had dismissed him.
Sergeant Major Anderson, who had come to enjoy Luna's eccentricities over the few times that they'd met, turned to her and asked "Good little colour?"
The witch nodded. "He did say he was a royal marine, didn't he?" she asked. "Although I can't see how a muggle could be two shades of blue at the same time."
"Where did you send him off to, then?" Ron asked.
"Oh, he has a tent set up on the other side of the hill," Luna replied. "He called it an 'empty-tent,' which was weird since there seemed to be plenty of things inside of it."
Anderson grinned at the reference to the "EMP-tent," a mobile structure designed to protect electronic communication equipment against pulses of strong electro-magnetic radiation. Whilst originally designed for the nuclear battlefield, the same principles were involved when it came to screening sensitive electronic gear from disabling magical energy fields.
"The tent's where they've got the muggle communication gear set up," he explained to the witches and wizards. He then asked, "Is there a reason why he's worried about the pixies?"
Luna smiled, "Not really…the werewolves have scared them off of the moors, at least for tonight."
Ron nodded as he activated his Art Club badge. "Time to bring in the others," he said. Fred, Harry and Hermione popped in a few moments later. Once Hermione arrived she immediately sought out her parents for a group hug.
"So what have you got for us?" Harry asked.
Luna smiled as she led them to a large wooden box. "Your goblin friend dropped this off about a half-hour ago…it was the funniest thing when Danny the muggle thought the goblin was a Cornish pixie." She then added, "Well, I thought it funny, even if Earchewer didn't."
Ron laughed as he opened the lid of the container. "Okay the goodie bags are here, one per team," he announced.
The muggle members of each Phoenix Team stepped up to the box, swapped out their cow-leather gloves for dragonhide, and threw a dragonhide bag over their shoulder. Within each bag were quaffle-sized silver balls, each covered with sharp barbed hooks.
"What do you think, Andy…something you guys can work with?" asked Harry, as Neville's partner hefted one of the balls in his hand.
"Bit heavier than our silver frags, but we should be able to manage…any flash when these go off?"
"Don't think so," Harry replied. "They activate on contact, but there's no explosion."
"Well that's good," Andy replied. "Won't have to worry about the thermal's blinding us."
"Don't have to worry about the shrapnel this way, either," Ron added. He then turned towards Fred, who was still flying solo with Brian in hospital.
"Think you can fly and bomb at the same time, Lieutenant?"
Fred snorted at his younger brother's cheek. Fishing out a beater's bat from the equipment cache, he replied, "Like a day on the pitch, Captain Ickle Ronnikins."
Harry smiled as he looked towards the lightening eastern horizon and then down to his watch. "Right, we've got forty minutes at best before daybreak. Hermione…any chance we can get anti-app wards over the forest in time?"
Hermione looked over towards the woods and shook her head. "Need a good hour and a half, and that's with us getting some help from the goblins."
"Fair enough," said Harry. He turned towards Ron, and gave him a tight-lipped grin. "Let's go, Captain."
Ron returned the smile and saluted. "Yes, sir!" He then turned towards the others. "Oy, you heard the Major, grab your brooms and mount up!"
The Phoenix Team pilots, who had already spread their gear out in preparation for this order, all stepped over to their modified Bluebottles and yelled, "Up!"
The brooms that would carry them into battle that night were a bit different from the Firebolts that Harry had provided the Phoenix Teams for their first mission. While the racing brooms could accommodate two riders, they were really designed for solo flights above a Quidditch pitch. Having found it difficult to maintain turns and near impossible to provide the co-pilots the space needed to perform their tasks, the Clan Air Force had switched over to Bluebottle Nines soon after the Battle of Little Wizarding.
The Bluebottle family of broomsticks were something like the minivans of the wizarding world. At close to seven and one half feet in length, they weren't pretty and couldn't travel half as fast or maneuver a third as well as a racing broom. Bluebottles were, however, just the thing for the magical family intent on safety and comfort. Standard features in the Nine line included three rows of bench-style cushioning charms, never-full saddle bags, semi-permeable windshields, surround-sound WWN, and six-different cup-holders (ever-full pumpkin juice cups optional). Given the intended customers, these brooms were also incredibly durable and reliable, with intensive internal shielding in place to ward off accidental magic (something not uncommonly discharged from infant witches and wizards when they're flying about with mum and dad).
The Weasley Twins had been scheming big schemes on how to adapt these brooms for military use, but with only a few weeks of time (and AK-resistant armor a more pressing priority) they had only been able to make a few simple mods to the seating and steering.
The front bench of each Bluebottle broom was replaced by a single pilot's seat, and pushed back a good two feet down the handle (almost to where the ripped-out middle bench use to be). The steering zone was then expanded significantly, so that the pilot could fly the broom with hands positioned anywhere along the first three feet of broom handle. This allowed the broomstick pilot to fly either sitting upright mid-handle, or to lie down in an aerodynamic prone position (with chests magically cushioned along the top of the handle).
While the upright flying position was more comfortable, once the enemy was engaged the pilot leaned forward and flew by their bellies. This not only gave their co-pilots a clear forward field of fire from the rear bench, but got their trigger fingers within reach of the belt-fed M240B machine gun that was fix-mounted just off the handle. Each of these machine guns was fed from a never-full saddlebag stuffed with an obscenely long split-link belt of 7.62 mm bullets that offered more than twenty minutes of sustained rapid-rate fire. The broom's gun mount also had a dragonhide scabbard attached to it, from which the wizard or witch could safely store (and quickly retrieve) their wand.
As the pilots and co-pilots of each broomstick swung their legs over and belted into their cushions, Ron gave Luna a flight helmet (with the moniker "Radish"). With a smile and kiss she grabbed her own bag of equipment and hopped behind Ron. After a muggle and magical communication check, The Prince's Own First Magical Squadron lifted off the ground.
They were barely ten feet off the ground when the muggle soldiers began humming a tune over the radios. Hermione couldn't help but laugh when some of the witches and wizards joined in.
"So I take it that viewing Apocalypse Now was part of Phoenix Team training?"
Sergeant Major Anderson replied. "Yes, Ma'am…just a bit of introduction to muggle arts & entertainment."
"Dare I ask what other bits of muggle culture you've exposed them to?"
Roger Granger laughed at his daughter's question. "Of course you should dare, you are a Gryffindor, aren't you?"
"Don't you dare, Roger," Emily chided.
"Yes dear," he replied. "Guess it's up to you, then, Dean."
"You got it, Doc!" replied his wife's broom-buddy, using a voice that, to Hermione, sounded a bit cartoonish. She soon found out why, as her fellow muggle-born led the squadron in singing Elmer Fudd's adaptation of the Wagnerian aria.
"Kill da wee-wolf! Kill da wee-wolf! Kill da wee-wolf!"
+++
The mission was vitally important, but also relatively simple, which suited the Phoenix Teams just fine.
Ron had given Luna a warning just before bugging out to St. Mungo's, and she had responded by grabbing her broomstick and flying over to the Burrow. From there she was able to track the werewolf pack on broomstick to Dartmoor, which was the largest and wildest expanse of open land within all of Southern England. Fenrir Greyback had planned on waiting out the night with his pack in the Park's moorlands. But as it happened, Luna shared message mirrors with Ron, whose Art Club badge connected him to Hermione, who had spent most of evening under 10 Downing Street elbow-to-elbow Britain's Minister of Defense, who had his own ways of communicating with those under his command. And so it came to pass that several hundred soldiers and marines who were presently training at Dartmoor's commando training center, wilderness survival school, and artillery training grounds were hastily mobilized for an unplanned live-fire exercise.
As Her Majesty's Armed Forces were a bit short on silver ammunition, the immediate orders for these ground and air forces were to guard the inhabited areas that bordered the Park until wizards could arrive. Helicopter gunships were sent aloft, and tasked with keeping visual contact with the pack (using thermal imaging video equipment), as well as encouraging the werewolves to stay together within an uninhabited portion of the Park.
There had been a brief, but spirited debate on whether silver weapons were really needed when an Apache helicopter pilot was armed with twin machine guns that delivered 30-mm bullets at a rate of 10 rounds per second. There was little research on the regenerative rates of werewolves, and an overwhelming desire to keep the werewolves from scattering (the last thing anyone wanted was werewolves running off in fifteen different directions), The question was therefore tabled for future examination, and the helicopters were ordered not to fire directly on the Pack.
The Apache gunship pilots quickly learned that the werewolves paid no heed to warning shots, and could only be shepherded away from inhabited areas with strafing fire that drew blood. The werewolves, in turn, learned that 30-mm bullets stung like hell.
Fenrir took two bullets in the shoulder the first time he ran into a spray of canon fire, and a third to his thigh a few moments later. Without an obvious way to retaliate against an unseen opponent, he quickly decided to run for forest cover. The gunships followed along, using their guns as airborne sheep dogs. By the time the Phoenix Teams arrived on the scene, nearly every Pack member was licking a bullet wound or two within an isolated area of plantation woodlands (which, by strange coincidence, was owned by the Prince of Wales and the Duchy of Cornwall).
Had this been a natural woodlands, Fenrir's pack would have been safe even from magical attack. For despite aspirations and comparisons with Luke and Leia's Speeder chases through Endor's forests, TPOMS' broomsticks and their pilots weren't nimble enough to bob and weave around trees haphazardly growing within a "normal" woodland…especially at night.
But this wasn't a wild woodlands…it was a managed tree farm, with conifers that were planted in straight rows and trimmed of all branches less than ten feet from the ground. In addition, each Phoenix Team member was wearing the same kind of thermal imaging eyewear that the gunship pilots had used to find and track the pack. As so it was quite manageable to have one-half of the Prince's Own broomstick cavalry enter one end of the woods and to act as muggle "beaters" by driving the pack out to the other side, where the balance of the squadron would wait with silver weaponry.
George, Katie, Alicia and Lee peeled off from the squadron and formed a four-abreast line that swung gracefully around and down towards the ground surface just south of the woods. Neville, Seamus, Fred and Dean continued on and swung down into a four-abreast position on the opposite side of the plantation. Ron and Luna hovered above the "beaters" while Harry and Hermione stood sentinel above and slightly behind the "catchers."
Harry counted out thirty-five rows of trees that formed thirty-four different corridors. "Oy, Keeper, any intel on which of these rows the tangos are holed up in?" he asked.
"Negative, Seeker." Ron replied. "We'll need to scout 'em out."
He then ordered Katie and Alicia to fly into the woods, just far enough to determine how well their thermal imagers could spot targets in adjacent rows. Two minutes later, Ron announced that the heat signals of adjacent broom pilots could be spotted six rows apart.
"Roger that, Keeper," said Harry. He then ordered Neville and Dean to fly down the east and west forest margins, checking for tangos along the plantation's edges. When they reported that no heat signals could be spotted from the sides, Hermione did the math.
"Ron, line the beaters up five rows apart, starting from the tenth row."
"Tenth row from which side, Hermione?"
"Doesn't matter," she replied, swallowing her annoyance at Ron's inability to logic out the answer himself."
"Copy that."
As the beaters spread out and started to fly down the rows of evergreens, the squadron heard Lee's partner call out a warning.
"Be vewy, vewy, qwuiet…..we're hunting wee-wolfs. eh-eh-eh-eh!"
"Pipe down, Stout," admonished Seamus's partner, "or you'll be hunting fwoaters on watrine duty."
"Woger, that, Bwade," the muggle warrior replied cheekily.
Katie Bell announced contact before the dialogue could deteriorate any further.
"Got two piles of tangos, three rows to my right and about two hundred feet ahead."
"Targets confirmed," announced Alicia, who, being on Katie's right wing, spotted the werewolves a few rows to her left.
"What's the count?"
"Can't tell for sure," Alicia replied. "They're in two dog piles…I'd say at least ten total."
"Comments?" Harry asked over the radio.
Sergeant Major Anderson took this as a request for advice and replied. "Have the flanking beaters continue down their rows to check for strays or sentinels. Then have them pull back and take attack positions in rows between Comet and Cupid."
"With the catchers all waiting on one end," Sergeant Beemer added, "might also want to have the gunships cover the east and west flanks, in case they run sideways."
"Number One?" Harry asked.
Radio silence indicated to Hermione that the squadron's muggle cultural training hadn't included Star Trek, The Next Generation.
"He means you, Ron," she stated.
"Oh." The wizard strategist paused for a moment. "Sounds like a plan to me, Major."
"Well, then Number One," Harry quipped. "Engage."
+++
When military historians were finally allowed, several decades later, to compile an official history of The Prince's Own First Magical Squadron, great care would be taken to accurately and honestly portray the group's exploits. As a result, there would never be references made to a "Battle of Dartmoor," as that would imply having an enemy that actually fought back, or having injuries sustained.
In reality, there was neither.
George and Lee's reconnaissance of the enemy's flanks confirmed that Fenrir and his pack were huddled within adjacent open paths in the near center of the plantation. They pulled back to the south and, with Katie and Alicia on their wings, reentered the forest along the target rows. Without any real need for fancy acrobatics Lee and George were able to steer one-handed, such that they could wield barbed silver portkeys along with their co-pilots.
The werewolf pack was quite literally in the dark, and licking their wounds gained from the Apache's gunfire. The magical energy that usually powered their were-enhanced senses was instead being used to heal non-lethal bullet wounds and manage the associated pain. When coupled with the beater's silent, above-ground approach from the downwind direction, the werewolves never saw, nor smelled, nor heard the attack coming.
The four Gryffindor pilots pulled their brooms up to a full stop about a hundred feet away from and ten feet above the two groupings. The high-tech muggle thermal imaging equipment that was strapped onto their helmets fed high-definition false-color images of not only the targets, but each other. It was therefore easy for all eight members of the four attacking broom teams to follow Stout's hand signals, as he silently counted down from three, to two, to one.
George and Lee watched the signals from prone positions that gave their broom buddies a wide-opened field of fire. When the count went to zero they tossed their spherical portkeys underhanded towards the targets. Not waiting to see whether they were on target, the two immediately urged the brooms forward, closing the distance to the packs in order to make any follow-up shots easier to complete.
Grenade training ensured that the portkeys lobbed by the SAS-trained co-pilots sailed true, with each striking the flank of a resting werewolf. The silver barbs drew blood that immediately activated the portkeys, and sent the target off towards Gringott's. But as the targets were part of a pile, and in direct contact with several others in the pack, these initial two portkeys bagged a total of seven targets.
The remaining pack jumped up off the ground and separated. Half of the werewolves turned tail and ran in the opposite direction, where they were met by the catcher's hurled portkeys. The other half decided to stand and fight, and leapt towards the attacking beaters. This, however, placed them within the sights of the broom-mounted automatic rifles, which, unlike the helicopter's guns, were loaded with silver bullets.
In the end, none of the werewolves managed to get within twenty feet of a broomstick. Four were instantly killed by gunfire; two more died from silver bullet wounds after they were transported to the secured vault beneath the goblin's bank. The balance, including Fenrir Greyback, were tagged by silver balls and swept from the field of battle.
Not wishing to drag the werewolf carcasses out of the words, or to risk a surprise regeneration, the Phoenix Team sent the now-transformed bullet-ridden were-cadavers off to the goblins with portkeys tossed towards them from point-blank range. The squadron reassembled atop the tor, where Danny the Royal Marine informed them that their transport was waiting for them at Camp Okehampton, some five miles west.
The eastern horizon was a mixture of greys and light blues as the squadron left the field of battle. Calls to London established that there were no ongoing battles, or need for the Phoenix Teams to immediately deploy elsewhere. Harry, acting as the squadron's Commanding Officer, therefore ordered the squadron to report to Windsor Castle for some much needed breakfast and rest.
+++
As the others loaded their equipment and flew off to meet their helicopters, Hermione asked Harry, "Think we have enough room in the Round Tower to house all of the troops?"
Harry smiled. "Oh, I imagine the Queen might have a few spare bedrooms, if need be." He then added, "Pity you weren't offered a commission, or I'd order you straight to bed."
"So you're assuming," Hermione replied, "that they'd have offered me a lower-ranking commission than yours?"
Harry snorted. "Well, I am the commanding officer."
Hermione stepped forward and pulled Harry into a hug. "What you seemed to be forgetting, Major Potter, is that the Britsh military serves the Queen under the direction of her civilian government."
"So? You aren't Prime Minister yet," Harry teased.
Hermione reached down and gave Harry's bum a squeeze. "No, but I am the Prime Minister's Senior Advisor…shall I put in a call and ask him to order you into my bed?"
"You wouldn't dare."
"I wouldn't? After all, Tony is a close friend of the family."
"True…but wait…this is the same bed we're talking about, isn't it?"
"Maybe," Hermione teased.
Harry looked off over the moors. "So how long will it take for the Pumas to get the Squadron back to Windsor?"
"Forty minutes, or so…why?"
"Oh," said Harry, "I was just thinking about having a bit of fun in the water."
Hermione shook her head in disbelief. "Haven't we played with the dolphins long enough for one night?"
Harry looked down, shook his head, and waggled his eyebrows. "Sounds kinky, but I don't think that they'd all fit."
And before she could banter back, he pulled Hermione close and side-along apparated her directly into the Love Shack's hot tub.