The Bat Returns From Hell
- Chapter 11: Death Be Not Proud
Harmony's mobile skidded towards the sewer, slowing noticeably as it slid. It clattered against the slightly raised grating, teetered on the edge and … flew straight up three stories….
…Into the grasp of a disembodied hand.
His Invisibility Cloak slipped part way off as Harry examined the mobile, tastefully monogrammed "H.F." Below him the three men in the old van were almost ready to depart - leaving Harry uncertain. Should he follow the van, where Hermione's purse surely was? Or should he have a look inside the house, where she probably would be if separated from her purse?
With his earlier Tracking Charm, following the van was no trouble, but once he Disapparated in pursuit, he would surely destroy the mobile's electronics.
That is, if not already fried by his Summoning Charm. But it just rang….
Harry flipped the mobile open. It seemed to work. He needed some back up. He only had his wand and the Cloak. He had planned on nothing save talking to Hermione - no matter what; he had not intended to defend himself. She could hex him into oblivion if she wanted, or more likely, empty a can of Muggle mace into his face.
He had not anticipated walking into a … situation. All his magical communication devices were back at the house.
Trying to decide what to do, Harry absent-mindedly scrolled through the contacts programmed into Hermione's mobile.
Amongst all the meaningless names, he recognized one.
That cinched it. The chief difference between houses and vans was that houses did not move - not Muggle ones, anyway.
* * * *
The Muggle telephone rang, startling the inhabitants. Almost nobody they knew used such devices. Before Remus could move, Tonks leapt for the console. She immediately recognized the number on caller ID.
"Hermione!" she croaked breathlessly. "I'm so relieved you called. Did you take my advice about Harry? Please don't hang up…."
Almost the last voice in the world the no-longer-so-young Auror expected to hear answered. "Actually, this is Harry…."
She gasped aloud. Getting her voice back, she chirped, "Harry! Congratulations! I guess she did…."
"Actually, not," Harry interrupted. "I haven't time to explain, but I think Hermione's in trouble. I know for sure her purse has been stolen. I need your help right away. There's nobody else…."
Tonks was immediately suspicious. "How do I know this isn't another of your tricks, Harry?"
"Umm … you don't. Either you trust me or not," he stated flatly." "This is serious. I need some Aurors here right away to search the house where I think Hermione was robbed…."
Tonks made the split second decision her occupation demanded. "All right, I trust you, Harry. Where's here?"
"Paris, 54 Passage des Cloÿs. It's a townhouse. There's a silver Jaguar parked out front."
"France?" Tonks spluttered. "But I don't have jurisdiction."
"You didn't let it stop you before," Harry persisted. "Remember Rome?"
"That was a life or death situation," Tonks countered.
"This might be too," Harry hissed into the mobile. "I've a very bad feeling about this…."
"How will we recognize you?" Tonks asked, implicitly conceding the jurisdictional point.
"You won't," Harry replied quickly. "I have to follow a car. Just … please come, quickly. Bye."
The van turned onto a larger street. Harry closed the mobile and shoved it into an inside pocket of his robes. It clicked against something else that was hard, flat, and solid.
That something had brought Harry back to Paris.
* * * *
A couple of hours before, Harry had Apparated into a pitch black room. Blinded - as much by his mental state as by darkness - Harry lurched forward, tripped over something, and slammed into some furniture, badly bruising his thigh. He was a raging mass of emotions, all of them bad, and was on the verge of pulling out his wand and bellowing out random Reductor curses.
But Harry stopped himself. As devastated as he was, he had to maintain control. Molly was doubtlessly asleep upstairs.
Breathing hard; trying to keep from bursting into bitter tears, Harry performed a Lumos Charm. He had landed in Potter Manor's informal dining area, and he had collided with a table. Deegie, his head house elf, popped in within seconds.
"Mister Potter, sir - can I help?" the uniformed elf (all Harry's elves had clothes) squeaked. "You's … you's looking awful."
"Believe me, I feel twice as bad," he muttered, "but there's nothing you can do…. Nothing anybody can do…."
"I is sorry, sir," Deegie replied. It took years, but finally she was not calling him "master." He had kept at it because he thought Hermione would approve.
Now, she would never know - and worse, she no longer cared to know.
"How's Molly?" Harry switched to the only happy subject he knew.
"Asleep, as you `xpected," reported Deegie. "The former mistress brungs her back early. Not sure why. She be upset."
"Why was Molly upset?" Harry worriedly inquired.
"No, I means the former mistress," Deegie corrected. "Maybe because Molly, she's a-writing again."
Harry knew Deegie meant Molly was writing more poetry. His brilliant little daughter started creating verse when she first got sick. Some of it was surprisingly good - for a girl who yet to turn ten.
Deegie excused herself and popped out. Harry noticed a sheet of ruled paper on the table, filled with Molly's handwriting. He read her latest:
Why?
Although they tried, the doctor said I would die.
I don't know why.
Nothing they could do, I was through.
I don't know why.
Then someone found a way around.
I don't know why.
A lady gave and I was saved.
I don't know why.
Dad says she's my Mum, but she won't come.
I don't know why.
Strange behavior from my savior.
I don't know why.
She never came, but I've got her name.
I don't know why.
First one mother, now another
I don't know why.
My real Mum's sad. It must be bad.
I don't know why.
Know in my heart I drove them apart.
I don't know why.
Her daughter's scrawls brought home what, in his turmoil, Harry was overlooking. Finding Hermione was not just about him. Now it was not remotely about him. Even if Hermione would never see him again - realistically, he deserved that after pursuing her like a fugitive for years - he needed her to see Molly.
Both Molly and Hermione deserved closure.
At least.
Then and there, Harry knew he had to try again. He had to go back and be a Gryffindor - to face the inevitable consequences of his obsessions. If anything were salvable from the wreck of the most profound friendship in his life, he had to try.
For Molly. Neither his dreams, nor his follies, mattered anymore.
Feeling at once condemned and liberated, Harry took from his desk drawer something else that would have upset Ginny. The week before, at another play date (a phrase almost outgrown) at the Lupins, Molly and Tommy had decorated plates - the kind you ate from. Tonks bought a kit.
Since assuming custody, Harry had shown Molly pictures of Hermione. Tonks evidently had a similar picture available, because Molly drew a surprisingly good likeness - for a nine-year-old, meaning it was identifiable - of Hermione on the plate.
Harry planned to show Molly's plate to Hermione, should he ever be fortunate enough to meet her again. With a sigh he took the plate from hiding, cast an Unbreakability Charm, and for good measure affixed Molly's little poem to the back side with a Sticking Charm.
He slipped the plate inside his robes, took a deep breath, and Apparated back to Paris, guided by the Tracking Charm he had slipped into Hermione's purse.
* * * *
Pursuing the van, Harry noisily Apparated to the street's end. He could Apparate quietly, of course - a skill learned in his accelerated Auror training program … back when he thought Hermione might come back if he locked up enough Death Eaters to make the British Isles safe. Silent Apparition, however, took time. Besides, he Apparated to another roof, and he was unlikely to encounter a Muggle in such an odd place well after midnight.
Spotting the target vehicle, Harry Apparated again, to a deserted street corner up ahead. Unfortunately, the traffic signal turned green, and the van barreled through. He Apparated to the next street corner. This time, luck was with him; a red light halted the van.
Donning his Invisibility Cloak, Harry Apparated - this time quietly - atop the van itself. Pressing against the roof of the moving vehicle, Harry strained to hear what the occupants said. It was a bad job. He was trained in apprehension, not reconnaissance, and did not know any Surveillance Charm that could amplify voices enough to hear them over the road noise. Nor had he brought any Extendable Ears.
He still had no idea whether Hermione was in the van, the house, or somewhere else. He only knew her purse was in the van. That was insufficient to justify breaking Wizard law and confronting these Muggles with magic.
The van accelerated, forcing Harry to abandon eavesdropping and to apply a Sticking Charm to himself to avoid being bounced off.
With horror, Harry realized that these Muggles were making for the Boulevard Périphérique. He redoubled his Sticking Charm, gathered the Cloak around himself, and held on for dear life.
The next few minutes felt like hours as 130 kilometer-per-hour gusts buffeted Harry while the van cruised the almost deserted six-lane motorway in the early morning hours.
Maybe it was his imagination, but during moments between wind blasts he thought he might have heard an argument going on inside.
But for the vast majority of the ride, the air howled so loudly as to convince Harry he was hearing things.
He might have been seeing things, as well, for all he knew. It seemed darker.
Suddenly, the van lurched to one side and slowed. It exited down a ramp to a relatively small cross street. Reaching the intersection, the van abruptly stopped, without any signal. Caught by surprise, Harry almost hurtled onto the van's bonnet.
The scene was most un-Parisian. Instead of the City of Lights, Harry felt somehow transported into the midst of the Forbidden Forest. If he could make out a street sign….
Harry heard a sliding noise, and a thud. A man exited the vehicle, obviously angry. "Sorry mates … can't do that. Take my bloody share then…," the unidentified man growled at unseen companions. "Yeah, I'm a thief, an' a bloody robber too. But I ain't no rapist and I sure as hell ain't no murderer…."
Inside the van another rough voice replied, "Go ahead then. Get lost. Bloody poofter, ya are…."
Harry's blood ran cold. They could only be talking about Hermione. She was in this van - and in mortal danger.
With a roar, the van started up again.
Adrenalin pouring through every capillary, Harry Apparated from the moving van's roof into the middle of the road just around the next curve. He had barely turned around and drawn his wand when the harsh light of the onrushing vehicle illuminated him.
Harry threw up out his arms, signaling the van to stop. For a moment, it seemed to comply. But when barely ten meters distant, the driver stomped the accelerator instead and bolted straight for him.
Harry's wand slashed through the night. "Munire lapideus parietinarum!" he yelled. Darkness instantly bathed Harry, shadowed by a stout stone wall that appeared from nothing.
He heard the squealing of brakes as, with a loud crash, the van collided with the wall.
Harry vanished the wall and made for the crumpled and smoking vehicle.
But the Muggle driver had worn his seat belt. Through the shattered windscreen he pointed some sort of firearm at Harry.
The Muggle never had the chance to use it.
Never in his life had Harry intentionally tried to kill anyone (even Bellatrix Lestrange), except once - at least not in his human form. Tonight, that changed. These Muggles intended to rape and murder Hermione. "Inflammare!" Harry howled.
The van's cab burst into intense flame, engulfing the still-buckled Muggle.
Ignoring the Muggle's screams, Harry Apparated to the rear of the vehicle.
"Alohomora!" Harry cried. He lunged and wrenched the rear door open.
The sight shocked Harry. The other Muggle - who had earlier kicked Hermione's mobile into the sewer - stood there, not quite facing him. His trousers were around his ankles, but Harry's attention was elsewhere. The same hand that grabbed at his belt held a long bone-handled knife.
The blade of that knife dripped with blood.
The horrific scene gave Harry pause, and that pause very nearly cost his life.
Strapped over the Muggle's right shoulder, cradled in his right arm, was an Uzi submachine gun. The gun only came into Harry's view as the man whirled around. It's barrel blazed as Harry's wand slashed across.
Harry felt the white hot burning of a bullet through his side as he screamed, in pain and rage, "SECTUMSEMPRA!!"
The firing instantly stopped as the force of Harry's magic literally cut the man in half. Blood spurted everywhere as he began falling - in two pieces.
By then Harry paid him no more attention. His wand flashed back upwards, and a Banishing Charm flung the still partly standing corpse against the far wall of the van.
"Mobilicorpus," Harry incanted much more gently, aiming his wand at the high-heeled feet on the floor of the wrecked Atego.
Harry nearly passed out at what he next saw. His first close look in a decade at Hermione's face was marred by a gaping slash across her throat - from one ear to the other. Blood was all over, her blood, and every second more of it spurted from a severed artery in her neck.
Hermione was dying. She would bleed to death in a couple of minutes.
Harry caught a flicker of recognition in her rapidly fading eyes. At least she would die knowing he had tried….
- 9 -
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents\HP & The Fifth Element.Bat from Hell Ch 6 Endings and Beginnings.doc.doc 12/28/06
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