Mist of Shadows
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Dawn and Reincarnation Part 44
🕑 Added 2021-01-09 05:32:44 +0000 UTCTara Potter nearly dropped the vial filled with syrup of hellebore she was holding over her cauldron when she had yet another bundle of 'memories' burst into her awareness.
"Are you okay?" Rose Potter asked in a whisper as she reached over and steadied her sister's shaking hand, not wanting to give Snape an excuse to take points as he seemed in a particularly foul mood.
"Do we need to take her to the nurse?" Neville asked nervously, glancing at where Snape was watching Draco's cauldron and whispering suggestions that were just loud enough to hear but not understand from where he was working with Puck.
Tara handed Rose the vial and grabbed the table, doing her best not to look like she needed the support. "I'll be fine, I just need a minute."
"You're as bad as Rose," Puck Granger muttered as he watched Rose add the sap to her cauldron, keeping half of his attention on his and Neville's cauldron. "Just keep stirring Neville."
"Potter, take your sister to the nurse," Snape snapped, looking delighted that he was going to get to give the siblings a zero for the day.
"I'll do it, Neville can finish our potion," Puck offered, trying to save his friend from yet another zero.
"Mind your own business," Snape ordered as he pulled out his wand and vanished the contents of Rose and Tara's cauldron, smirking at the annoying wizard that liked causing trouble for his snakes.
"Serves you right mudblood," Draco said with a sneer on his face.
Tara felt a strange tingling sensation in her fingers a second before the magic escaped and Draco's cauldron shattered, spilling the boiling hot potion over Draco, Snape and Nott and pelting them with fragments.
"Potter!" Snape screamed as he waved his wand and quickly vanished the potion covering his robes.
"Damn it!" Nott cursed as he grabbed his robes and held them away from his skin, doing his best to keep the hot liquid from burning him worse than it already had.
"What?" Rose demanded, glaring at Snape.
"This is your fault!" Snape accused the red haired girl that looked like a disturbing mix of James and Lily after waving his wand and vanishing the potion from Draco and Nott's robes.
"It's hardly my fault that Draco can't brew a decent potion without you whispering in his ear," Rose replied as she picked up her and Tara's bags. "Let's go."
"500 points from Gryffindor and detention!" Snape screamed.
"For what?" Puck demanded, more than tired of dealing with the bastard, especially since he had a headache.
"For reckless use of magic," Snape snapped as he glared at the Gryffindor half of the class. "Get out! You can all take zeroes!" He glanced at the Slytherin half of the classroom. "I'll need some help cleaning up, anyone that helps will receive credit for the day's work."
"I'll help," Fay Dunbar offered.
"Competent help," Snape said, making it clear he meant Slytherins only.
"Screw talking to McGonagall, I'm lodging a complaint with Dumbledore and the board of directors," Puck said as he grabbed his bag. "Let's go, we'll start with the Headmaster."
"This is your fault," Seamus accused, glaring at Rose.
Rose ignored Seamus as she headed towards the door with Tara, wishing Snape could behave like a civilized human being.
"I'll write to my grandmother, maybe she can make the board of directors fire him," Neville said as he collected his tools, knowing that no one wanted to deal with his grandmother while she was angry.
"You think that's going to help?" Draco demanded as he pulled his wand. "I'll write to my father, I'll see you in Azkaban!" he shouted, not sure who he was talking about but knowing that someone needed to pay for the exploding cauldron.
Tara stopped walking towards the door when a spell struck her in the back.
"Don't ignore…" Draco trailed off when he realized the banishing spell he'd tossed at Potter had merely fizzled against her back rather than toss her out through the door.
Tara turned to glare at Draco who was giving her a look of shocked disbelief along with everyone that had seen the spell fizzle. She turned to look at Snape. "How many points are attempted murder worth?"
"That was hardly," Snape started, wishing he could strangle the little shit for complicating his plan to have everyone gone before Umbridge showed up.
"No?" Tara asked, cutting Snape off. "I'm sure someone would be willing to donate the memory, Dumbledore and the authorities can judge for themselves."
"You have no proof that anyone did anything," Draco sneered angry, missing the unhinged look in Puck's eyes that promised pain and suffering.
Puck's smile was ice cold. "Twenty galleons?"
"What?" Draco sputtered.
"Twenty galleons if someone wants to come with us to testify against Draco and donate a memory to a pensieve," Puck offered, knowing it would be money well spent even if it would eat into his book fund.
"No one…" Draco trailed off as half the Slytherins raised their hands. "What?!"
Tracey smirked at Draco then walked over to the door with the Gryffindors, more than happy to take Draco down a couple of pegs and make some money. "Let's go."
Snape glared at Tracey. "Sit down Miss Davis, you don't have permission to leave."
"You cancelled class," Tracey replied then walked out, fairly sure she was going to have to write her parents about Snape and Draco but tired of putting up with substandard lessons with extra reading on the side just so that he didn't have to teach any of the other houses anything of actual use. "Let's go."
Rose glared at Draco then left with the rest of the Gryfindors. 'Maybe I can hire Sirius to kill Snape, nah, he'd be at the top of the list of suspects if he dropped dead.' She ignored Seamus's bitching about the lost points as the group headed towards Dumbledore's office, seeing no reason to 'bother' McGonagall as she'd never been willing to deal with his unfair behavior before.
"I'm just saying this is Potter's fault," Seamus said a bit louder than before when he realized no one was paying attention to his point of view.
Puck scowled at his dorm mate, tired of listening to him repeat his mother and the paper. "Seamus, if you can't keep your mouth shut, go fuck a duck."
"What?!" Seamus sputtered, stopping in the hallway to glare at Puck before he realized no one had even bothered stopping. He ran up and grabbed Puck's arm. "What did you say?!"
"I said shut your mouth or fuck a duck," Puck snapped, easily pulling his arm out of Seamus' grasp.
"Give it a rest Seamus," Rose snapped as she handed Tara's bag off to Neville so she could help Tara who was having trouble walking straight thanks to her headache.
"Stay out of it bitch!" Seamus snapped then glared at Puck. "You're just defending her because she spreads her legs!"
"The hell?" Dean Thomas asked as he took another step away from Seamus, just to make sure he was clear of the fallout.
Puck stared at Seamus for a couple of seconds then spit on the ground in front of Seamus and turned and walked off. "Let's go, we want to tell our side of the story before Snape has a chance to come up with an excuse."
Dean shook his head. "You should probably leave."
"You too?" Seamus demanded.
"We've been in the same year with Rose for four years, if you can't tell that she isn't an attention seeking whore by now, you're denser than Crabbe and Goyle," Dean replied then followed the rest of the group.
Tracey drew her wand and hit Seamus in the back with a stunner when he reached for his wand, figuring no one would care and it was one of the few times she'd be able to get away with it. "If anyone asks, he just fell over."
"Fair," Ron agreed then headed after the group, slightly annoyed that she'd beat him to it.
Tracey smiled as she slipped her wand back into the holster concealed by her sleeve and followed the group.
0o0o0
"Die!" Bethany shouted as she charged down the hallway towards the intruders that had dared defile the sacred temple with their very presence. "Your magic will avail you nothing fiend!" she shouted at the black robed necromancer she could see at the entrance to the dungeon.
The man smirked as he flipped Bethany off.
"Die!" Bethany screamed as she put on a burst of speed, raising her soul sword so she could strike the mage down. The first sign of trouble was when her blade cleaved through the image and it flickered, the next was the explosion that tossed her through the exit of the dungeon.
Elizabeth blinked as she went from talking with one of the girls on the island to stumbling out of a dungeon with vague memories of walking around a temple before chasing a group of adventurers. She tucked and rolled, springing to her feet as a large man in armor charged her with a hammer. She reached up and grabbed the hammer by the handle, stopping it cold. "What the fuck is your damage?"
"What?" one of the cultists sputtered. "Since when do NPCs swear?"
"Kill it, it's just a dev fucking with us," one of the other mages shouted as he tossed a ball of fire at the miniboss they'd lured outside of the dungeon away from the rather annoying room mechanics that made her a nightmare to fight.
Elizabeth yanked the warrior's rune carved hammer away from him as she stepped to the side, easily dodging the ball of fire. "Shiny!" she said cheerfully as she lunged forward and kicked the warrior in the nuts, causing him to fold in half and crumple to the ground. "Next?"
"What the fuck!" one of the mages blurted as he tossed a lightning bolt at Elizabeth. "Kill it!"
Elizabeth made a mental note to thank her sister for the resistance gear as the lightning washed over her without damage or anything more than a pleasant tingle. "My turn." She tossed her new hammer at the mage and lunged towards the next mage, ignoring the spells that washed over her without effect thanks to her necklace.
"Fuck!" one of the other mages shouted as he watched his party get ripped apart, shocked that the devs would cheat this badly instead of just having the miniboss reset like most of the games he'd played.
Elizabeth worked on stripping the unconscious mages, figuring they didn't need their gear.
"What the fuck was that?!" one of the mage's players demanded over the guild's voice chat.
"I'm going to kick Devin in the nuts," one of the other players complained, fairly sure his 'friend' had known they'd get their asses kicked.
"Did it just steal Max's gear?" one of the players asked when Max's robes vanished, leaving his character in his underwear.
"Fuck this, I'm out!" one of the other mages said as he quickly hit alt F4 and shut down the game.
Elizabeth sighed when one of the unconscious mages vanished before she could loot him. "Damn contingencies," she muttered as she quickly worked on looting the rest of the unconscious cultists.
"Fuck it's not a glitch!" one of the other players shouted as he frantically exited the game, wincing when his mother yelled from upstairs to watch his mouth.
"That's annoying," Elizabeth grumbled as the rest of the mages vanished before she could loot them after she finished looting the second one. She glanced around the small clearing to make sure no one was hiding to ambush her. 'Looks like it was just this lot, now I just have to figure out where I am and why I have vague memories of walking around the temple and a scattered collection of skills.'
She took a minute to try to recall more details about the world but gave up after she realized she didn't have any 'new' memories of being outside of the dungeon and had less than an hour's worth of memories of walking around the inside of it. She glanced at the dungeon entrance set into the cliff then started sorting through the cultist's gear, figuring they probably had something she could use.
0o0o0
"Five hundred points? I don't need this shit Severus," Albus Dumbledore muttered as he finished reading the quickly scrawled note a house elf had handed him. He absently tossed the note into the fireplace and set it on fire with a wave of his hand as he walked over to his cabinet. 'Of course even if I try to expel Draco, Lucius would just bribe Fudge into causing more trouble,' he grumbled as he opened the cabinet, carefully picked up his pensieve and walked back over to his desk.
He set the pensieve on the desk so it would be easy for a student to use but wasn't so close it could fall off then spent a minute straightening up his desk while he waited for the group of angry students to get to his office. He grinned slightly when he heard Rose trying various muggle sweet related 'passwords' to get the door open, not realizing that none of the passwords actually did anything.
"Maple bar?" Rose tried, running out of ideas.
Albus gestured and mentally commanded the gargoyles to spin so the students could walk up the stairs, figuring he might as well deal with the problem before Umbridge decided to stick her nose into things that didn't concern her. "Ah, miss Potter, what brings you to my office so early in the term?" he asked as Rose walked in with most of the Gryffindor fifth years.
"I want to lodge a formal complaint against Draco Malfoy and Professor Snape," Rose said, doing her best to stay calm.
Albus glanced at Tracey then back at Rose. "On what grounds?"
"On the fact that he's biased against my father and Gryffindors to the point that he's an unfit teacher. He allowed Draco to attack Tara without taking any points or offering any punishment, vanished our potion because I had to get Tara to the nurse rather than let Puck take her so Neville and I could finish the potions and blamed us when Draco screwed up his potion badly enough that it exploded," Rose stated, trying not to rant.
Albus turned to look at Tara. "Do you need to see the nurse?"
"I'll survive," Tara assured him, wanting things dealt with before she got stuck in a bed for a couple of hours to relax.
"What spell did he use?" Albus asked.
"He used a banishing spell," Tracey spoke up. "I heard him whispering the incantation, I'm prepared to donate the memory. I'm also prepared to testify to the fact that Professor Snape gives Slytherins extra reading to make up for his lack of instruction in class."
"I doubt your fellow Slytherin's are going to appreciate this," Albus pointed out, making a point to ask Severus about the extra reading.
"They'll get over it and I've been thinking about transferring to a different school that can actually keep a decent Defense teacher and doesn't have a ghost for a history teacher," Tracey replied with a shrug. "Umbridge is a monster and should never have been allowed near children."
"I'll be sure to mention that when I talk to your parents about your slander," Umbridge said as she walked into Dumbledore's office with a smirk on her face.
Tracey laughed, knowing that her parents were more likely to curse the bitch and hide the body before having a civil conversation with Fudge's lackey. "Last I checked, slander implies lying. You're a shit teacher and a worse human."
"Detention for your disrespect," Umbridge snapped.
Tracey turned to look at Dumbledore. "Yeah, either she's leaving or I am."
"Down with the toad," Puck said cheerfully and loudly, causing everyone in the room to stare at him and distracting Umbridge from Tracey.
"What did you say?!" Umbridge demanded, her face turning purple with rage.
"I said down with the toad. Are you hard of hearing or just stupid?" Puck asked, smirking when she drew her wand. "If you cast a spell at me, I'll ask for an honor duel and I'll kill you, you degenerate piece of shit."
"Don't be absurd, I'll have you arrested for threatening a ministry employee," Umbridge taunted.
"You're a bitch and you're probably fucking Fudge but-" he smirked when Umbridge's stunner fizzled against his chest. "That counts as an attack against a minor, as per the 1754 dueling code, section 9B, I have the right to demand a duel to the death."
"What is he blabbering about?" Umbridge demanded, shocked that her spell hadn't done anything to the annoying child.
Albus sighed when he realized he wasn't going to be able to convince people to work out their problems like civilized individuals. "One of the old dueling laws allows the head of a household to call for a duel if someone attacks their children, because of various ministry provisions that only recognize witches and wizards as important, he counts as the head of his family which allows him to legally call for a duel because you attacked an underaged member of his family."
"Don't be absurd," Umbridge snapped. "I'm a ministry employee."
"I'm afraid it doesn't matter, the law is quite clear if recently unused," Albus said, less than happy with the whole situation but sort of proud of Mr Granger's research skills.
"Fine, I'll call in a ministry hit wizard as my second," Umbridge said smugly.
Albus smiled cheerfully. "That is within your right, however I will be offering my services as his second in such a case."
"You can't do that," Umbridge sputtered, knowing she'd have a hell of a time finding anyone that would be willing to duel him.
"Technically, anyone can but I'm still the headmaster of Hogwarts and I take the safety of my students very seriously," Albus replied calmly, his twinkling eyes looking far less grandfatherly than normal.
"I wouldn't object to the help, there's a difference between fighting a trained hit wizard and an incompetent witch with delusions of competence," Puck said, smiling at the soon to be dead witch that had caused his sister to end up in the infirmary.
"I suggest calling the Minister as a witness," one of the portraits suggested.
"By all means," Albus agreed as he gestured towards the fireplace, fairly sure they'd already gone past the point where they could talk things out but willing to try to talk some sense into Fudge if it meant keeping one of his students safe.
"Just think of it as a way to put a mudblood in his place," Phineas Black suggested, wanting the bitch gone from Hogwarts as she was interfering.
"Phineas," Albus complained, wishing he wouldn't encourage her.
"Fine." Umbridge smirked as she stalked over to the fireplace, grabbed a handful of floo powder and tossed it into the fire. "Fudge's Office."
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Rose asked Puck in a whisper.
"Actions have consequences," Puck said coldly, thinking about his sister's hand and the bitch's blood quills, knowing things would just get worse if someone didn't take a stand.
"We could just transfer schools," Tara suggested, wishing her headache would go away and take the random fragments of memory with it.
Puck glanced at Rose then shook his head. "I'm not going to run and hide."
Tara Potter smiled as the pieces of memories twisted and everything came together, her headache vanishing as she stopped fighting the magic that was trying to make her remember who and what she was. "Never mind, we'll be fine."
"Damn straight," Puck agreed, glad that Tara was finally awake.
0o0o0
'Buffy and Willow are going to flip when they see the schematics for the stardrive and the gravity manipulation systems,' Dawn thought excitedly as she slipped through the crowd towards the civilian docks, happy to have a chance to explore on her own but also happy that Hermione had given her a small magic mirror that would let them keep in touch in case she ran into trouble.
She stopped walking when she noticed an alien in a neon pink environmental suit that was arguing with a large alien that looked like a blue skinned humanoid hippo in surprisingly normal looking coveralls. 'Yeah, no sense of style,' she complained as she scanned the alien's environmental suit, figuring she could fix the color without too much trouble.
Dawn pulled the suit's schematics up on her HUD once she finished scanning it and looked over its systems. 'Nice kinetic barriers or they would be if they didn't rely on a substance that shouldn't exist,' she mused as she looked at the system that kept the alien at a 'reasonable' temperature. 'Huh, decreasing the temperature to something more reasonable would actually increase the life of the suit,' she mused as she 'casually' walked over to see what the aliens were arguing about. 'And getting rid of the methane would probably help.'
"I don't care how many times you ask, I do tours of the junk fields of Ki-dara, not salvage," the hippo-like alien complained.
"I know you have a salvage permit, we could make a lot of credits if we found something interesting," the other alien suggested.
"I have a class two salvage permit, you need a class five to salvage Calnarri vessels which means it's not worth the hassle." The hippo-like alien glanced at a Calnarri male that was sitting at a nearby cafe sipping some type of beverage and 'pretending' he wasn't listening. "Even if I found something interesting on a non Calnarri vessel, I'd have to hand it over to the station managers and I wouldn't see a profit for a couple of weeks."
"You wouldn't-" the alien started before the hippo-like alien glared at him. "Fine, I'll find someone with a spine."
"Best of luck," the hippo-like man replied, knowing none of the regulars would want anything to do with the man's plans to poke around for something worth stealing.
"I couldn't help overhearing, you do tours to a space junkyard?" Dawn asked the humanoid hippo.
"Indeed," the man replied cheerfully. "I take people out to the junkyard, stick them in a suit and let them explore some of the safer wrecks, you get to bounce around in zero grav and pretend to be a treasure hunter and leave with some salvage and a good story to two, are you interested?"
"That depends on the price but it sounds fun," Dawn said, trying not to look like an easy mark.
"Don't worry, my prices are quite reasonable as long as you don't want to salvage Calnarri ships," the man replied.
"Not without the proper permits and a Calnarri guide to make damned sure I'm not going somewhere I'm not supposed to be," Dawn replied, not willing to pick a fight with an empire of magic users without a damned good reason.
The man laughed. "Excellent, let's talk price."
