Remove ads

Wands and Warframes

Reader mode
Remove ads
Negotiations
  • Threadmarks

    • Negotiations



    Aurora walks into her quarters after breakfast and tries to sleep. Running through her mind is the magical trip she took to the moon, her mind full of the views of the different stars and planets. Along with the possibility of visiting those planets. She was, no is, quite prepared to sign a marriage contract to get whatever it is she needs. She's also not too humble to think that she's one of the driving forces behind Astronomy still been taught at Hogwarts. She eventually falls into a restless sleep filled with dreams of Saturn's rings.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    For Harry and Hermione, Potions, Charms, and Transfiguration all pass as expected, even down to the fact that Professor Snape is abrasive and picky. For Harry his day is a little uncomfortable for a couple of reasons. He is still feeling constrained by being in a female frame, but he knows that he will have plenty of time to relax in a different frame over the weekend. In addition, he keeps second guessing his own feelings as he wonders if he's ignoring Wisp.



    In the afternoon, before Transfiguration, Hermione confronts him.

    "Harry, what's going on? You've been off all morning."

    "I'm, getting uncomfortable in a female frame. I didn't think it would get this bad, but this is the first time I've not been able to just change. Also, last night Wisp was, reluctant, to go into the Arsenal. Oh, yeah, I transferred Harrow Prime to you last night, I wanted to have you transfer out of your Titania to Harrow so that we could see what she can do without you present. We kind of got side tracked."

    Hermione looks doubtful, so Titania sends her a feeling of reassurance.

    "Ok, but why did you send me Harrow?"

    "When I was looking for parts for the Prime Titania and Octavia, I happened to come across them and got lucky."

    "I'm really not sure about that."

    "I understand, I really do. You'll need to cross the gender divide at some point."

    "It's not that, I've read about Harrow, and. I don't think I can get behind the philosophy in his design. I was talking to Kitty, and her Nezha is a frame that I think would balance me. I, I don't know, well I didn't anyway, know how to relax and have fun."

    Harry shakes his head, "Hermione, I know you've been better with not going with what you read. However, you can't judge a frame by their description. Can you imagine being without your Titania?" – Hermione shakes her head vehemently – "Be honest with yourself, would you have ever picked her as your frame in September?"

    "I, no, I don't think so."

    "I, acquired a Harrow when I freed Rell from his self-imposed guard against the Man in the wall. I had to kill him in the end, because he gave up everything, his body and his sanity, to hold the man at bay. When I put him back together, there still wasn't enough to make a full person, and he'd wrapped himself up in his own chains. It was hard, I have memories of him, but I was only a few years old and they were fleeting moments. The other children, they kicked him out for being different. Then Margulis did the same thing. I love her, my first mother Margulis that is, but she wasn't a good person. Though, I think she was a good Orokin, and they killed her for that."

    "Oh, Harry. Have you ever spoken to anyone about this stuff. I don't mean like we're talking about it, or you talk to your mother. Rather, spoken to a psychologist or councillor?"

    Harry laughs, "Don't need to, neither will you. It's another 'gift' the Orokin gave us. We literally can't lay down traumatic memories, can't have flashbacks, can't have anything that might endanger us if we remembered it at the wrong time. How many times have you died now?"

    "Loads, and it hurts, oh god does it hurt, every single time."

    "And when you think about the times you died?"

    Hermione sounds confused, "It's like it happened to someone else. What the hell?"

    "As I said. I'm sure that's why they were so bad. They cut so much of themselves away that the majority of them lost their conscience."

    "Harry, I think that despite the implants you can still have issues you need to resolve. I'm only 14, but even I can see that your childhood is something that keeps coming up, time and time again. Maybe talk to my mum or dad, and they can give you a healthy human adults view on things. But I think that stuff with school has brought up memories and feelings that weren't ever resolved.

    "Changing the subject, as the Orokin built the Prime Warframes, would it be possible to build them here?"

    Harry shakes his head, "No, not without the right equipment. We'd need to find a surviving Orokin research tower and then generate a blueprint for the computers and machinery they used. There were hundreds of thousands of towers, and only a few handfuls of research towers. It's either that or design our own Warframes, even there we don't have the knowledge they had to make them as good as the Prime Warframes. Look at Caliban. He was one of the early experiments the Sentients did on converting people. We found him on Earth, insane from pain and unable to die or live. We Tenno, and my mother, were able to convert him to a Warframe so that our presence could soothe his pain and allow his mind rest. He's not the first person we've had to save like that, but he was the first that we had to convert to a Warframe ourselves. But he doesn't have that extra something that the Prime Frames do that sets them apart."

    "How could. No, I don't want to know."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    The rest of the day passed quickly, and Harry was only mildly surprised to find Aurora camped out in the common room just before curfew for the lower years. Between her feet is a large carpet bag, and she is wearing an outfit that screams 'Mary Poppins'. In her hand she holds a scroll, that she passes from hand to hand occasionally. As Curfew arrives, and the prefects start herding the first years up to the dorms, Aurora looks over to Harry and Hermione hopefully. Much to the consternation of the upper year students, who are hoping to be able to have some fun, she doesn't leave.

    Harry and Hermione choose to finish their homework rather than pander to Aurora's hopes and expectations. Once it's finished, they take it up to their respective dorms and store it in their trunks. On the way back down, they pass a dejected looking Aurora, and Hermione is just passing through the portrait hole when she turns back and says, "We're leaving if you're coming."

    In a manner unbecoming of a pure-blood witch of her breeding, Aurora hurries after the two Warframes as they make their way downstairs.



    Once they've docked with the Railjack, Aurora is far too nervous to pay attention to anything beyond watching the grey tunnel that they seem to be travelling through. Harry and Hermione, on the other hand, made their way down to the modified arsenal, where there are currently 5 Warframes in storage, as well as one spare pad.



    Hermione looks at the empty space with no small amount of terror. Faced with the reality of changing frames, she discovers, is vastly different from reading about it. Intellectually, she knows that it will be just like customising the flows and components of Titania. However, this has been her body for the last 3 years. She can't imagine it not being her body.

    "It's easier if you just do it." Harry's voice makes her startle, "I've mentioned it before, but I never had my memory wiped. The others, they didn't know any different. For me, it was like this. You need to just trust that you will still be there, you're just changing your clothes, in a manner of speaking."

    Reaching out hesitantly her hand hovers over the control panel, then it nudges forward and she finds herself looking down at Titania. Even in the future, she'll never be able to state for definite if it was her that activated the panel. She hesitantly activates the option to change warframe, and selects the harrow. As the frame appears in her view, she doesn't feel any different, so she exits the arsenal and stumbles. Her body feels off, like it's not right in some indefinable way. Turning her head, she sees Titania floating where she left her, Harry, out of his warframe, looking between them expectantly.

    She says, "I'm here."

    "How is it?"

    "Everything feels, off."

    "That could be your synchronisation level. It's a new warframe to you, so it's going to feel off. When we get home, take him out to earth a few times, it should start feeling more comfortable after that." – Harry turns back to Titania – "Titania, if you can understand me, and are able to act on your own. Can you raise your hand?"

    Both of them watch, and Harry is about to find his implants when, slowly one of Titania's hands lifts. Hermione squeals and leaps forward to pull Titania into a hug, "I knew you were there, I just knew it."

    "Hermione, you need to let her go. Remember, she doesn't have the experiences of being independent."

    Reluctantly she pulls back, "But she does, she remembers overriding her operator."

    Harry shakes his head, "I think that she remembers the original doing that. She's obviously not the same as the original, as she'd have been able to do it when you first joined her."

    "Harry, why does this feel like my body?"

    Harry shakes his head, "Because it is. If you took your wand and cast Lumos it would, work, the, same…", he trails off as Titania turns the hand that holds Hermione's wand over slowly. She then takes the wand and says "Lumos" before then holding the glowing tip of the wand up to her face.

    "Harry."

    "Yes Hermione, I'm seeing the same thing."

    "I was going to say that this is a little beyond the stories of what they're supposed to be able to do."

    "That too. Titania, is it easier to understand us if we talk like this?"

    Titania takes a moment, then shakes her head slowly before pointing at Hermione, "Want…back.".

    Harry glances back at his Wisp with some trepidation, will she feel the same way? By the time he turns back Hermione has already switched back into Titania, and is muttering to herself, well probably to Titania.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Once they arrive at Lua, a 5 minute walk to the living quarters takes 30 minutes as Aurora keeps looking around at everything she sees. When they do arrive, Harry is bowled over by an Octavia, her beatbox trailing behind her.

    "Harry, I missed you. Good news, I now know everything I need to start work, so I'll be coming with you."



    Hermione looks over at her parents, who are wearing tabards to preserve their modesty. They're floating in place with parts growing out of their backs, slowly forming into their main chassis. Her pause is only momentary, but they flinch none the less.

    "Mum, Dad, it's not the appearance. I was just trying to work out how to hug you without hurting you. Does it hurt?"

    Danjell shakes his head, "No, it's just weird. Like I've got a dead leg, arm and weirdly, head."

    "Is it ok to hug you? I'm not going to damage anything am I?"

    Amelia flies over and pulls her daughter into a Hug, "As long as you're gentle you'll be fine. We're still squishy at the moment."



    Aurora stares at Danjell and Amelia, her mouth agape, and then over at Natah. After a few moments her expression firms up and becomes full of resolve. Deciding to stay quiet rather than make more of a fool of herself than she already has, she conjures herself a seat. Unknowingly drawing the attention of Natah at the same time.



    Recovering his footing, Harry looks up at the Octavia, "Hey Kitty. Octavia?"

    "We've been watching the films that Emma brought, so I've tried to reproduce some of the music. I've also been practice me English."

    "I think it's 'my English' but well done'"

    "Thanking you."

    Harry laughs, "Almost. This is weird, I've never thought about a relationship before, but now I feel happy to see you."

    "I'm glad. It means that it could work. I've seen enough people having relationships to know that much anyway. Who's the lady?"

    "Oh, we should speak English as she doesn't know our language yet."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    "Mum, this is Aurora. Aurora, this is my mother Natah."

    Aurora starts slightly at being addressed after the reunions, but swiftly gets to her feet and goes into a deep curtsy, "It is a pleasure to meet you Mrs Natah."

    Natah looks down at her curiously, "Aurora, what are you doing?"

    "It's a curtsy Madam."

    "Why are you doing it?"

    "It's a woman's sign of respect, especially to one higher socially than you are. A man would bow instead."

    "Stand up, that can't be comfortable. Dan, Emma, do you know anything about this?"

    Amelia nods, "It's a bit old fashioned, and something you'd expect to see people doing when they meet the Queen. Even then, I wouldn't have ever imagined seeing such a deep curtsy outside a show."

    "Why have I never seen Pandora do this?"

    Aurora ventures, "If I may Madam?"

    Natah looks a little confused, "Me?" – Aurora nods – "Just use my name, or if you must be formal, call me The Lotus. Also, you don't need to ask for permission to speak."

    Aurora looks a little nonplussed, "If you are talking about Madam Lovegood, then it is probably due to her social ostracization for marrying into the Lovegood family."

    "Ostracization?"

    Danjell says, "Excluding from a group or country by general consent of the other members."

    "Why would they do that?"

    Aurora grimaces as she tries to explain the fear of a family line being infected by their blessing, "It's… hard to explain without going into the importance of families, bloodlines, and how the blessing could affect a family. The Weasley family has a similar issue, as historically they have only given birth to boys over the last 5 generations. Though it's less severe. Please would you give me the same Elixir that you gave Madam McGonagall, I have here a pre-signed and sealed Marriage Certificate if you need it." – She holds out the scroll.

    Natah takes the scroll and opens it, her systems scan and translate it in milliseconds as she stops pretending to be human due to the shock of what she read. She comes back to human speeds in her subframe while her main chassis continues to go over the implications of what's written, and the fact that the signature is written in blood.

    "Cephalon's Cy, Suda, Ordis, and even you Sark, I can feel you skulking around in the background. If even a whisper of this conversation makes it out into the wider solar system, I will hunt each of you down, and ensure that the one that let it slip wished they had been trapped in their Oubliette, do you understand me? Don't think that the anthem will protect you either, I wrote it."

    "Cy/Suda/Ordis/Sark understands."

    "Sorry about that, I need to know, what are the implications of this contract for you?"

    Aurora shrugs, "Depending on the clauses you add, I could be one step removed from a slave, and my own magic would enforce it."



    Everyone that understands the conversation just stares at her in disbelief.

    Kitty whispers, "What's going on?"

    Harry says softly, "Aurora has just given Mum a blank debt bond that can't be bought out, traded, or expire. The implication being that the same thing could be done to anyone."

    Kitty transfers out of her Octavia and grabs Aurora by the lapels "Are you insane? Do you know how many have freed from debt bond. You willing put in non free bond? You lucky Natah not Corpus."

    Natah takes Kitty's arm and gently, but irresistibly, pulls her away from Aurora, "Kitty, please. She comes from a world where they've never had the Corpus or Orokin. Aurora, I think that I will keep hold of this and teach you our language. You can then visit Venus with a few Tenno and talk to the people there. If, after meeting them and talking to them about their lives and what's happened to them, you still want to use this scroll we will talk about it."



    Aurora nods and is led off to learn the language in a pod.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Geno515 said:
    Would it even work for Nonmagicals?
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Canonically it does. More precisely, canonically, muggles are individually helpless in the face of magic. As such, whether they can or cannot be bound by a magical contract that they sign doesn't matter when they can just be enchanted into obeying anyway. You'll see in the coming chapter, that the ability to use magic is a property of the soul, and that things that have been infused in magic for long enough can develop sentience spontaneously, such as certain magical books, or Hogwarts. As such, a magical contract will work on anything that has a soul.
     
    Reality Check
  • Threadmarks

    • Reality Check



    "Aurora?" Aurora looks up from her diary as someone calls her name. In front of her is a clearly male Warframe with grey and black colouring. On his arms and legs appear to be bone loops, and it's face looks uncomfortably like a skull.

    "I'm Digger, this is Roofie." Aurora turns to look at the other Warframe and looks up and up, this one appears to be built far larger than any of the few that she's seen, with grey skin and bulging shoulder muscles. His red surcoat falling between his legs in a pair of tails.

    She squeaks, "Can I help you?"

    "The Lotus asked us to be your escort to Fortuna on Venus. We have a change of clothes, and we've been told to ask you for your wand. Pandora says it's to prevent you doing anything stupid and ultimately suicidal. Pandora is The Lotus' apprentice if you weren't aware."

    Aurora shivers at Diggers voice, as it reminds her of the sound of bones in a bag, "Thank you sir. Do you realise that you're more than a little intimidating?"

    "It has been mentioned, given that this frame was designed after legends of necromancers, I'm not surprised."



    Aurora takes the clothes from Roofie, and unfolds a one-piece armoured uniform in blue and red, "Do you have anything with a skirt or dress?"

    Roofie shakes his head, "They don't wear skirts or dresses. We are trying to avoid you being taken by one of the taxmen."

    Swallowing her pride, she transfigures a chair into a screen and gets changed into the outfit. When she comes out, Roofie hands her a rusty brown helmet that looks a bit like a muggle video camera.

    "What's this for?"

    "It attaches to your clothes and will make it look like you've had some reclamation done. You don't want to look like you're an unaugmented human that hasn't had any debt reclamation against them. In some parts you'd be lynched for parts, in others you'd be lynched for being a corpus exec out of their depth. I've been told that a lot of this won't make sense until you've been there and spoken to them."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Aurora had to marvel at the fully enclosed helmet, it didn't restrict her ability to see or hear. This awe lasted until the three of them touched down and took the elevator to Fortuna. There, everyone she saw was sporting some sort of obvious prosthetic, from a too small head to what seemed to be a full body replacement. She shudders just looking at them.



    {Roofie} Relax, you're standing out



    She jumps as something in the corner of her vision blinks at her, looking down she then looks up at him reproachfully.



    {Deathdigger} He's right, try to relax. Take several slow deep breaths.



    Once they're happy that she's not a problem anymore, they take her over to see a Golem with no arms.

    Digger waves at the Golem, "Hey legs, how's it swinging?"

    "Tenno, my favourite customers. How's things, is there anything you need?"

    "Not today, we've got a probie, found 'er on a ship out deep. Knowing 'em, she was prob three days from being charged rent for her own imprisonment before having a fullbod. Legs, this is Lights."

    "Lights?"

    "Yeh, after the northern ones on earth."

    Aurora closes her mouth to the objection she was about to voice, instead she waves stiffly, "Hi."

    "Hey, welcome to the stinkhole of the solar system. Not that anyone here could smell it. This is where you live if you don't own a bucket load of debt and you want to stay free. The poor sots in the outer planets? They might say they're free, or they're managing their debt, but I've watched enough index vids to know it ain't so. You couldn't pay me to run against a Tenno, but those guys do it just for the hope of wiping out the debt. 'Ere let me close up and I'll show you to the racks and pods. 'Course a couple a years ago I'd only lost me head to debt. Traded it in to make me debt manageable after me folks died in a rift on the surface. Any how, business was a bit slow so I asked a coupla Tenno to 'elp me by getting some 'salvage' from the surface I could sell. Went and run me mouth didn't I, and Nef was listening. Called all my debt in. These two, they bought me debt, what was left of it. Course, all I had left was me brain, but I'm still free. Ticker and Eudico found me this bod, and now I make MOA for anyone who wants one.

    "Right, I'm done, this way folks."



    Legs leads them off the main concourse to an unremarkable door. Through the door they take a couple of corridors before getting into a lift. From there they go down, and the temperature goes up. As her breasts start to sweat, Aurora not only wishes she had her wand, she also becomes aware that her suit doesn't actually have breasts, or space for them.

    As she picks at the chest of her suit, Legs says sympathetically, "Yeah, it's bad down here for those that still have their organics. At least you're not a woman." – She's about to object when one of the Tenno steps on her foot – "Those poor sods are pregnant 9 of 12 months. The lucky ones managed to scrounge enough to put it off a month or two, but one missed payment and hey presto they're pregnant again. Then there's the ones like Eudico and my parents, Pa saved enough for me Ma to recover enough to take a job on the surface. It's risky work, you hear of deaths every day, but if you're one of the lucky ones, you can pay your debts of in a couple of seasons. Course, if you're not so lucky, your seasons wages will go on getting you new parts that will allow you to work up there. Here we are, watch your step. Some folks can't afford a pod regular like, so they catch a wink where they can. If ya see a taxman coming wake up anyone near you."

    Curiously, Aurora asks, "How do I know what a taxman looks like."

    Legs just looks at her for a moment, "Jeese, no wonder you guys are showing her around down here. Down here? They're be the ones that are mostly organic and have five or six heavies with 'em."

    She nods, "What happened to your accent?"

    "I exaggerate it cos I get more customers if they think I dunno what I'm talking about. Course, the Tenno don't care, they just like the accent. Sometimes I wish I was a Tenno. Then I see a new reel and realise what they have ta wade through. Oh, this is the ol' man." – They come across a man that seems to be fixed in place at a console of some description – "He's been here as long as anyone can remember, and rumour has it he's over 300 years old. Course only a few of the other oldies have ever spoken to him, as his voice box broke round 50 years ago."

    "Why doesn't anyone help him?"

    "We do, anyone has any spare creds come debt day we help each other down here. But ya learn quick that ya never go into debt for someone else. Here's one of the kitchens, if ya got a coupla creds or something to barter ya can get some slop. I know it don't look great, but trust me, accessing your own injection port is a damn sight better than the free stuff you get in the pods. If you DIY ya get paid when it comes out the other end. If ya don't have the credits ya can use the pods for free, but then ya have to put in 12 hours organic processing for the man. Speaking of pods, here we are. Ones at the bottom are more expensive."

    Opening the doors, Aurora and the Tenno look inside, and the hose at the head, and two hoses at the bottom make it clear what organic processing meant. Especially when one of the pods they looked into had someone hooked up to them.

    "Annywaay. If we head over this way you've got my rack. Costs me a credit a night, and I'm number 17/20."

    They look into a dark corridor that literally has a rail along the top with hooks hanging down.

    "If you think it looks undignified then you're right. Once you're in it automatically plumbs you in and refills your organics. Course, only those that have had a torso and head replacement can use these. But it's still better than losing 4 hours or more earning for organic processing. Anyway, that's is for the living spaces, bit further down you've got the geothermal mines, but you wouldn't survive the trip. On the levels above you've got the processing facilities. If you can survive a few seasons on the surface, you may even land a foreman job there. Still, let's get you back to the concourse and I can come and get me rest."



    In the elevator Aurora asks, "Why don't you fight the validity of the debts?"

    "What did they get you on Lights? There ain't no way to fight the debt using the system. The contract is 100,000 pages, and it references multiple other documents. There ain't no one down here that has enough time to read even a fraction of that, and if ya lose the cost of fighting it gets added to your debt. Course, you hear about the people on the ships and stations who scrounge enough together to pay a Cephalon to check their contract. Some of them even manage to get their organics back, well not theirs but organics anyway."

    "Why doesn't someone call them on it?"

    "Oh they try, but the execs have all been in power since the old war. Rumours have it that some have been around even longer. The only other powers in the solar system are the Grineer and the Tenno. The Tenno ain't exactly recruiting, and ya have to be born into the Grineer. Other than that, a ticket to one of the colonies costs money, and ya can't buy one if ya got debt. Look, whatever the Tenno are offering ya, no matter how bad it looks compared to what ya had. It's still better than this. I do ok down here, I'm debt free thanks to the Tenno, and I'm earning enough that I could buy some arms back in a year or so. Though I'm thinking of saving it for when I meet someone, so we can buy her debt."

    They pass a woman waddling the other way, obviously gravid, "How many this time Miss Suzy?"

    Suzy leans against a wall, "Quints, got a good deal this time, a 4 month debt holiday."

    Aurora shakes her head, "Before you use it, check to see if they're still charging interest. I've almost been caught by that before."

    Suzy laughs, "Thanks for the advice man, a few holidays too late for this one. These days I take the holiday and put the payments aside. Almost got enough to buy one of me debts now."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Natah stands in a darkened room away from any of the complexes, "Father, I know you can hear me."

    Her father, Hunhow, answers, "I can, daughter."

    "What I told the Cephalons applies to you too."

    "You would hunt your own father?"

    "I would, I would then give you a soul and make you sign one of those contracts. Make you live as a human on Cetus until you die of old age."

    "Sentients don't die from old age."

    "Agreed father. And you're a sentient aren't you."

    "I take your point daughter. You hardly called me just to threaten me."

    "Is Erra still alive?"

    "Your brother?"

    "He is no brother of mine. Not after what he and Ballas did to me."

    "What are you going to do to him?"

    "Ensure that you get grandchildren. You'd like that wouldn't you. To have your species continue, to have your line continue despite what we gave up to come here."

    "What did you do?"

    "I worked out how to reverse our sterility. Of course, because you were so hell bent on destroying my children, you allowed Erra to sacrifice Mother. But it's not too late for me. And it won't be too late for Erra if he accepts banishment."

    "Why, after all these years, why fight now?"

    The Lotus laughs, "Because I have something worth fighting for now. Because I feel, I know, and I want. You have never acknowledged my children. When I bear my own children, they will never know you exist. You will never be part of their lives, and you will use the spark you infected me with to see them and know that you can never know them. You know where to find me when you want to talk. Until then, enjoy your death."

    As she's leaving the room, she adds, "Oh, and if you send your pet Tenno here, I will kill it. If you kidnap one of the new sentients, I will erase you and kill your pet. If your pet attacks one of the new Tenno before they're experienced, I will find and kill your pet, then shove your sword into what remains of your corpse."

    In his tomb Hunhow wonders where this fire was before, maybe he wouldn't have needed to send her in to subvert the Tenno if she'd shown it then. In his tomb, Hunhow fails to understand his daughter yet again.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • History and Theories
  • Threadmarks

    • History and Theories



    Once she finishes, talking, to her father, Natah calls for Pandora to meet her in the living room with Harry and Hermione.



    Once Pandora arrives, Natah says, "Pandora! Aurora approached Harry and Hermione about taking the elixir that we gave Minerva. In and of itself this isn't that problematic, and I would be inclined to do it anyway as there's only a handful of Sapient Sentients left in the solar system. However, she handed me a nearly blank marriage contract with her signature already on it."

    "Would you mind if I had a look?"

    "Certainly." Natah hands the contract over to Pandora.

    Pandora opens the contract and starts reading, "Oh, she didn't. She did! This is priceless." After a few comments she puts the contract down and starts laughing while the others just look at each other.

    Kitty, who still hasn't let Harry out of her sight, asks, "What's so funny?"

    Once Pandora finishes laughing, she wipes a few tears from her eyes, and separates from her main chassis so she can sit down.

    "Right, where should I start… Aurora is a pureblood, albeit from a minor house. A sheltered one at that. While there are some, like myself or Andromeda Black, now Tonks, who married for love. For the vast majority, love is a secondary concern compared to business. In the muggle world this style of marriage was quite common amongst the upper classes, around the time that the Statute of Secrecy was enacted. For them, placing a marriage contract on the table as an opening gambit shows how much they want something, or that the deal is secondary to securing the continuation of the family. In this case, the expectation would be that either a name gets added and then signed. This would signify that the contract was considered sufficient payment for the services requested. You'll note that Aurora explicitly said that she would still be able to study the stars. This is her hedging her bets against an unfavourable match, as if her husband to be prevents her from that, it would void the contract, and free her.

    "Or, if they wished to add additional terms, such as limiting when she could study the stars, that would be the start of negotiations. During which the marriage contract could be withdrawn. I was laughing because it's such a pureblood thing to do, to assume that another culture would work the same way. I was picturing what Nef or the Grineer Queen would do with that contract. Where is Aurora anyway?"

    Natah smiles, "I had Digger and Roofie show her around Fortuna."

    Pandora winces, remembering her own visit with Xeno. Only the fact that they were Sentients saving them from a lynching or worse, being taken in for a systems check by the taxmen, and not having the needed coin to release herself. It's one of the more insidious ways that the Corpus get those that have recently become debt free, and are now trying to leave Corpus territory.

    "Don't worry, she's been provided clothes, and they're not going to leave her to her own devices."



    Kitty shakes her head, "Sorry, I'm still trying to get my head around the contract."

    Pandora smiles sadly, "In the magical societies of earth, knowledge is quite literally power. The noble families all stay that way by being the only ones that know how to do certain things. Whether it's the Potters techniques for brewing potions that shouldn't work, the Blacks Curses, or the Greengrass's Greenhouses. Often their secrets and techniques are written in books. Books that can only be opened by those of the right bloodline; as recognised by the head of house ring. I would imagine that Aurora equated the elixir as a secret of a noble house, and so felt she needed to show she was willing to join the house in order to gain it. Again, it's a form of arrogance in believing that other cultures would work the same way and respect her own cultural norms."

    Natah sighs, "She also said that you'd been excluded from your society."

    Pandora smiles and nods, "At some point in the past the Lovegood matriarch at the time seduced a fae. A being of the void. According to the family history, they stayed with them for as long as they could and fed off the Matriarch's life. Things went as they normally do in a relationship, and they were blessed with children, both of whom were seers. For a while, other families tried to marry into the family, or have a Lovegood marrying into theirs. This lasted until the flip side of their heritage made itself known, they are able to perceive things that the rest of us can't. They also tend to lose their connection with reality as they get older, as their seer gifts, combined with their ability to perceive other things, distorts their view of the world. Many of Xeno's moments occur because he's acting on information that isn't true yet, or acting on information that is no longer true.

    "Because of this, others see them as insane. Gifted but insane. This leads into their next fascination, continuation of their lines. While it's true that you are more likely to get a magical child if both parents are magical, the existence of muggleborn children proves that it's not a rule. So once again, something that used to be a matter of keeping the family strong before we officially withdrew from the world, became a social norm, and then an expectation. However, if you have family members that are on the wrong side of conventional sanity, it becomes difficult to find them spouses. Families, like the Blacks, had the power and influence needed to pay the exorbitant bride prices that were needed to get their less stable family members married off. Families like the Lovegood's couldn't afford it."

    Hermione looks up from where she had been nodding along, "Bride price?"

    "Oh, yes, the father of the bride is expected to pay a dowery to the husband's family. Originally, it was supposed to be an insurance so that their daughter could support themselves if something happened. Now, it goes straight into the family's vaults."



    Harry groans, "Totally changing the subject here, but last night we found out that Hermione's Titania can cast Lumos on her own."

    Hermione puts her head in her hands as Kitty, Pandora, and Natah all look at her in surprise.

    Pandora starts to cast some diagnostic spells, "I'm dreading the answer, but how did you find this out?"

    Harry explains the situation with his Wisp and then the subsequent test he did with Hermione's Titania. Natah then goes on to explain the A/B test that she performed after seeing the anomalous readings from Hermione's Titania and Harry's original testing.



    Pandora stands up abruptly, "Right, we're all going to your Railjack, and we're going to run some tests. Hermione, once we're there I'm going to perform a couple more scans. Then you need to take your Harrow out to get used to him. I will need to see if it's proximity."

    "Titania doesn't like that idea."

    "Why?"

    "She's, showing me memories… It's of her time defending the forest, and I'm kneeling in the grove instead of Silvana's body. How do you know what I look like? I didn't realise that. Apparently, they get memories from us as well as the ones we get from them."

    Harry and Kitty both nod, "That makes sense."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    A few hours later, Harry finds herself cuddling a distraught Titania who is desperate for Hermione. On the other side of the room, Pandora and Natah are discussing the results while Kitty is listening and providing clarifications from the view of an Operator.



    "According to my scans, Titania has a newborn magical core."

    Natah looks confused, "What's a magical core?"

    "This could get a little complicated, so bear with me. We, researchers and healers, refer to a magical core for convenience. It makes a lot of the spellwork and diagnosis easier if you assume a core. Instead, a persons magic is suffused throughout their body and generally concentrates more around the heart and the brain. However, by the fact we use our wands in our hands and not our mouths, it's demonstrably not only in those two places. In our studies we've found that it is separate from the soul, yet it seems to manifest from it."

    "How did you determine that?"

    Pandora shudders, "Dementors, they are a magical abomination that we have no means to destroy. They feed on souls and they project an aura of despair around them to prevent their prey from running. Incidentally, it's also how we know that muggles have souls, as there's 2 or 3 deaths a year from a rogue Dementor."

    "How do you have a rogue Dementor?"

    "Long enough ago that the records are now lost, every Dementor in the world was located and forced onto an island off the coast of Scotland. There is an ancient fortress there that was erected to try to contain them. When that proved to be impossible, they turned it into a prison, and the prisoners the bait that stops the Dementors from roaming. Every few decades a young witch or wizard will demand that we stop using the prison, and they will get the same answer every time. 'Find a way to kill the Dementors and we will'. It's also how we know that the soul is either infinite or it heals itself faster than a Dementors passive feeding. While we have developed tools that allow us to control Dementors over the years, those tools aren't perfect, and they aren't permanent. As such we only ever use them sparingly. Because of that, a Dementor will occasionally leave the island to find a more filling meal. This leads to a rash of mysterious deaths until we find out they're missing, and return them."

    Kitty asks, "Why not just chuck them in the sun or something?"

    Pandora chuckles, "Humans have only recently visited the moon. Magicals haven't even got that far."

    "Oh, yeah, I looked at their landing site. Sorry, it's just so hard to imagine not being able to visit the solar system."

    Natah nods, "I agree with Kitty, but I think we've got side tracked. You were talking about how magic is separate from the soul."

    "Oh, yes. The department of Mysteries has done extensive family tracing for some of the muggleborn that enter our society, and have found no magic born in their history as far back as they can tell. Couple this with the fact that a dementor feeding removes the soul, but the diffuse magic in the body remains, and will continue to remain for as long as the body survives. It suggests that magic doesn't actually come from bloodlines, rather it's something that appears spontaneously, or is possibly induced in a developing foetus. Now that I know about DNA, I'd love to scan some squibs. They are people that are born to magical families but have no magic of their own, beyond slightly elevated levels of magic defused through their bodies, compared to muggles that is.

    "As you can probably guess, the shorthand of Magical Core came from the fact that only magicals have those two concentrations, or cores of magic. We also know that bodies need magic, but not souls to survive, as the killing curse works by momentarily removing all the magic from a body. The only person thought to have survived that is Harry, and that's only the most popular theory. It is more likely that his mother, Lily Potter, developed a hither to unknown protection. Albus likes to say it was her love, but while emotions have power, they don't have that sort of power."

    Harry calls across the room, "What was that about Potter?"

    They all go over to where Harry's sitting, "I was saying that I think your birth mother developed a spell or ritual to protect you from the Killing Curse."

    "How would I know one is being used?"

    "It's a very distinctive green, and."

    "I've seen it."

    "You have?"

    "We were taught different techniques to try and control our void abilities before they resorted to wiping our memories. Some combination of them has allowed me perfect recall of most of my life. Though I don't know what people were saying when I was a baby before the Zariman, probably because I didn't learn English until I got my Hogwarts letter."

    Natah nods, lost in thought. Thinking aloud she says, "I wonder if the Oro is related to the soul as well. As the Orokin used continuance to continue to live past the death of their body, but Tenno never have."

    Pandora asks, "What's that?"

    "Oh? What? The Oro?" – Pandora nods, so Natah continues – "It's a void construct. Everyone that has survived void exposure, like the Tenno, and now myself, have one inside them. I actually needed to construct a synthetic version while I was creating souls in Sentients. It was the only way to anchor the soul long enough for it to latch onto the Sentient, you have one too. One thing that's true is that every living creature that has an Oro is effectively immortal, as the Oro returns to the body once dislodged and they come back to life. I can also confirm that the artificial one doesn't protect against void damage."

    Kitty laughs, "That explains Vor then. He haunts the towers in the void near Pluto, and keeps talking about how he has the true key to the void."

    Pandora muses, "You know, it might be possible to transplant an Oro. That way we could find out if it's linked to the soul or not."

    Natah adds, "Are you suggesting that it might be how Titania gained her own magic?"

    "Yes! That could well be it, it could act as a tether and conduit to the soul. Allowing magic to transfer from one soul to another."

    "So, if we transplanted an Oro it could give someone else magic?"

    "Or move the original person into the new body."

    "Either way, we'd know one way or another."

    Kitty looks at them both, "Try it."

    "What!?"

    "I know your type, you've probably got more than a dozen theories going around your heads, and you're developing more as we speak. Given you're both Sentients, I wouldn't be surprised if you're sharing data right now, refining the theories and coming up with ways it could work or not.

    "But you can't know unless you test it. So take Harry's Oro and put it in me. If she gets up then you know it holds the soul, if I get up then you know it's something else. Either way, you can just put them back again."

    The two of them share a slightly guilty glance, and Pandora cautions, "This is to do with your soul, we have no idea what it might do. For all we know it could kill you, permanently."

    "I don't think it's going to do that, if being hit by an Eidolon's blast didn't kill me I don't think moving my Oro will."

    "It could drive you insane, it could do anything."

    "And you won't know until you try it. I also know that there aren't that many people that aren't Tenno you can try it on, and you can't do it on one of you two. As if something goes wrong, you're the ones that will have to fix it."

    Harry says, "If my opinion counts, I don't mind helping. It might allow us to find out what drives warframes insane, and why Titania here is actually gaining sanity."



    Titania looks up as Hermione comes in wearing his Harrow, "What did I miss?"

    "Mine, need mine."
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Tea and cake
  • Threadmarks

    • Tea and cake



    "No!"

    Kitty whines, "But why? You know you need to, so why put it off?"

    Pandora pinches the bridge of her nose, "Kitty, we still have no idea what could happen to you. Until we are reasonably sure it won't out right kill you, or drive you insane, the answer is going to continue to be no. Once Harry and Hermione return to school, Natah and I are going to head to earth and capture a few wild Sentients."

    "It still sounds strange when you say that."

    "By all reports they're thriving and helping to keep the remnants under control."

    "What about the Grineer?"

    "Them too."

    "That's not. You know, I don't care. Why are you going to capture them?"

    "We want to see if they've inherited the artificial Oro, and check them over to see how they've adapted to having a soul. If they have an Oro then we're going to take pairs and transplant them to each other. Give it a few years to see what happens, and then we should be able to make a decision."

    "Years?"

    "It won't feel like that for you, as you said you're going with Harry. Besides, if we're not done for the Christmas Holidays, then we probably won't do it until the Spring Break when Harry has two or three years to recover here before returning to school."

    Kitty's face falls as she realises she's getting the same answers as The Lotus gave her.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Aurora sits staring sightlessly at a wall, her thoughts millions of miles away on Venus. She startles when Amelia sits down awkwardly next to her.

    "Penny for your thoughts?"

    "Huh?"

    "It's a saying, means I'm interested in what you're thinking."

    "I don't. It's just. They've got all of this magical technology, and there are people living worse than house elves."

    "I confess, I have no idea what a house elf is."

    "They're a servant species that loves to work. They bond themselves to a household and remain loyal no matter what. Some purebloods treat theirs as little more than slaves. Others treat them as treasured members of the family. But even the worst families make sure that they're at least nominally healthy and never take more than they can give. Far too often the reverse is actually the case, where they're trying to get more work than you've got. But on Venus, people were living. That's really all I can say about them. The Corpus, when someone can't give any more they start to take body parts. There's no debtors prison, you just keep getting bits taken away until you can't afford to live. They've even turned sleeping into a profitable venture.

    "Did you know their debt contracts are 100,000 pages long. I asked the invisible voice, Cy how much parchment that was. He took me to a room and made an illusion that was taller than I can reach."

    Amelia puts her hand on Aurora's, "What's really bothering you?"

    "I'm afraid I'm going to end up like them. Treated like cattle, and then discarded when I'm no longer of any use. I…I…I gave The Lotus a signed marriage contract. I can't help imagining being plugged at each end while I look at the stars forever."

    "The Tenno aren't like that, and The Lotus is their mother. If you saw all of that, it was probably as a lesson. Dan and I, we're just Dentists from Crawley. This world seems amazing, and it is. The technology here, it might as well be magic. The social issues are exactly the same though. Can you honestly see the people at the top, treating the people at the bottom well?"

    "Of course."

    "What about muggles?" Amelia spits the last word.

    "What about them? Oh! Oh. It's the same isn't it."

    "It is, someone once said, give me a sec. Hermione will skin me if I get it wrong. 'Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.' The people at the top tend to see those below them as less deserving, whether it's because they don't work hard enough, or they have less talents, or even that they are just lesser beings than them. I bet there's people in the magical world that you wouldn't even dream of putting a marriage contract in front of, let alone a signed one."

    "You heard about that."

    "You told me not 5 minutes ago. Look, let's go and find Cy or Ordis and see if they'll take us to one of the Tenno relay stations. If they're not around, which could be true as Luna is trying to build a Railjack, and I think Harry and Hermione are trying to do the same. Well, if they're not around we'll just collar Kitty and get her to give us the tour."

    "Will I need to pretend to be male again?"

    "You shouldn't need to. At worst you'll probably need to wear a full body suit with a face mask."

    "How do you stand it?"

    Amelia laughs, "It has been acceptable and normal for women to wear trousers since the 50's. With the nanites, bathroom breaks are optional. So why not enjoy the increased freedom of movement?"

    Aurora looks uncomfortable, "What's it like?"

    "What's what like?"

    "The Elixir? The change."

    "Oh! Weird because it doesn't feel weird. It's been three or four years just to get to this point, and the first thing it affected was my spine followed by my brain. After that it just progressed slowly through everything, replacing it bit by bit. I think the first change I noticed was when one of my patients came in and I realised that I knew how his teeth were, what fillings he had, and that he needed a small M2 filling. I still went through the process, but it was a box ticking exercise rather than actually checking for anything wrong. It took a while to learn to tune it out, like you do background noises. Then I could hear radio. Every time I got used to something, the next thing got added. And it's added so smoothly that you can't imagine ever not being able to do or sense it." – Amelia forms a ball of energy in her hand and stares at it – "I can't explain what it's like properly, because you just lack the capability to understand it. How do you explain the feeling when a gravitational wave passes through you, or Cephalon Sark starts listening in. I look at the stars and I can calculate how far away each one is. I can look at a distant galaxy and make out its structure."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    As Aurora walks around Strata Relay, with Kitty and Amelia, she has to fight the urge to fiddle with her skirts. She can tell that this is a place of relaxation as much as it is of business, with workers and visitors mingling and chatting casually. Most of the Tenno are easy to spot, given the way they tower over everyone else. What does seem to be missing is any sort of café or other eatery.

    "Kitty."

    "Yes?"

    "Why isn't there anywhere to buy a drink or get something to eat here?"

    Kitty looks confused, "What do you mean?"

    "Somewhere you can eat cakes and biscuits and drink tea or coffee."

    "What you mean real food, not just the nutrient powder made into different shapes? Are you insane? No, scratch that, you just don't know. Since the end of the old war, the only places that have the plants and animals needed for that are the Corpus colony ships. Their location is such a tightly guarded secret that I've never seen one. You'll occasionally see one of the Execs drinking from a cup in a vid, but that's the closest that anyone you'll meet will ever come to it."

    "Would it be alright to use magic here?"

    Amelia frowns, "I don't know, better to call The Lotus and ask."

    Kitty shakes her head, "Cilus, could you contact the Lotus and put her through to the three of us?"

    Her ships cephalon replies, "Of course Operator."

    Pandora's voice comes over the com, though her image is very close to that of Natah, "Tenno, how can I help you?"

    "Lights was just wondering if it would be ok to use magic here."

    "One moment I am confirming the security of your location. There are no known spies or taps currently on that station, so it should be fine if you're discrete."



    Finding an unoccupied meeting room, Kitty shows Aurora back to the lander while Amelia keeps the room occupied. Just after they've got to the Lander, Kitty and Aurora arrive back at the meeting room with a pop. Kitty falls to her knees, "Ugh, that was rough. Don't you people know how to void travel properly?"

    Aurora looks down at her sympathetically, "It gets easier the more you do it. The skill is called apparition, and is one of a few forms of instant magical transportation."

    "That was horrible. Like a railjack tunnel but only large enough for a Kuaka."

    Aurora shrugs and transfigures the chairs in the room to an elegant wooden table with ivory inlays on the surface, along with comfortable seating to match. Opening the bag she brought back from the Lander, she summons a large picnic hamper and takes out a tiny paper bag and an equally tiny jar. Looking at the two items, she frowns and conjures a small wooden bowl.

    "Kitty, would you mind filling up this bowl with some of what passes for food here?"

    Clambering to her feet, Kitty asks, "Why, what's going on?"

    "We're going to have afternoon tea out on the veranda. I'm starting to feel a little peckish for the first time since I got here, what, two weeks ago? How?"

    Amelia mutters, "Orokin Nanites."

    Kitty shakes her head, "Oh, ok." She then does a double take at the furniture, "How?"

    Aurora sighs, "Short answer Magic. Long answer can wait until we're sitting down enjoying tea."

    Eyeing the table pointedly, Kitty says, "This better be good."



    Once Kitty gets back with the bowl of food, Aurora places it on the table and conjures a bone china platter. Unshrinking the bag, she takes out a couple of sandwiches, some biscuits, and a slice each of fruit and chocolate cake. A couple of swishes of her wand later, and a few muttered incantations, the plate is overflowing with identical cakes and sandwiches. Several more waves, and there is a tea service with boiling water in the teapot, into which goes a few leaves from the pot. With the pot of tea leaves shrunken down and put away, Aurora banishes the bag back to the lander, then turns to the others, who are just staring at her.

    "Right, Kitty, could you give me a hand with the table. Amelia could you bring the chairs?"

    As she carefully gets the other side of the table, Kitty mutters, "This better be a good explanation."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Explanations, it turns out, need to wait until they're on their second or third cup of tea. Initially, it's because Kitty isn't in a position to pay attention to what's being said, as she's absorbed in what she's eating. Then it's because the table generates so much interest from the people visiting the concourse, that the managers are forced to open another floor. This allows people to visit an identical concourse that shows a projection of the three of them instead. Something they usually only need to do when Baro Ki'Teer visits.



    After discretely waving her wand, beneath the table, to place a privacy bubble around them, Aurora begins her explanation.



    "Where would you like me to start?"

    Amelia says, "The food." While Kittys says, "The table."

    With a laugh Aurora begins, "Both of those things were produced with a field of magic called Transfiguration. If you want a good in-depth discussion you should talk to Professor McGonagall, who is the Transfiguration Professor at Hogwarts. There are some restrictions on Transfiguration, you can't make anything living, you can't make good food, and you can't permanently transfigure something. What I used on the food was a spell that intersects the discipline of charms in order to make a duplicate of something. In this case the food. It gets around the law that says you can't make good food, by instead copying it."

    Cocking her head in confusion, Kitty asks, "Does that mean you can make bad food?"

    Aurora chuckles, "It's old English, so it means good as in healthy rather than good as in nice. Back to the spell, being an exact duplicate, it also means that it is also a permanent change. This is one of the ways that poorer families manage to feed themselves, as they can buy smaller quantities of the required food and make more of it. It's never quite as good as non-duplicated food, as something of the original food is spread around. But for sauces and fillers like bread, it's a good way of increasing the amount of food on the table.

    "The tables were performed with direct transfiguration, this changes one thing into something else based on the image that you're holding in your mind. How long a transfiguration will last depends on how much magic is having to hold things together. So these chairs will probably last a few weeks, while the table will last a few days. There's a lot of theory that goes into being able to do something as complicated as these, most people only learn enough to do an emergency patch on their home, or make a crude seat for a guest.

    "The last skill I used is called Conjuration. It's a related field to Transfiguration, and requires a great deal of competency with Transfiguration to start with. With one exception, everything that's conjured is temporary as it is literally created out of magic. I didn't put too much effort into creating the tea service, so it will probably vanish on its own in a few hours. The exception is water, nobody knows why, but you can make pure water with conjuration. Never ever eat anything that has been transfigured or conjured, as when it reverts to normal it will be part of you."

    "So wait, is there anything magic can't do?"

    "Lots, magic is limited to your knowledge and imagination. Spells and incantations are there because magic can be formalised, but only to a certain extent. Children perform accidental magic to get results that have proven impossible to reproduce by spellwork. Not because it's impossible to do, but because it doesn't conform to any rules or logic. The Lumos spell that everyone does in charms is an example. Arithmancily it doesn't make sense as half way through the spell equation it resolves to 1 no matter the input values. Yet the output requires that step to resolve to something other than 1. However, it works, we know it works because it can be taught. We know it works in different languages too. It's one of the reasons I prefer the stars, they don't jump around and do different things depending on who's watching."



    After a long pause, Kitty shakes her head, "Enough about the headaches, how would you even serve things like this?"

    "I'd commission a farming trunk in the Farmers market, hire a few House Elves to work the farm and in a few months you'll have all the basic grains and vegetables you want. Fruits and things like olives would take 20 years or so for the trees to mature. You may even be able to get chickens going, in order to have a source of fresh meat and eggs. My family never kept cattle, so I don't know how well they'd do in such an environment."

    "Are they used a lot?"

    "Oh, yes. Most noble houses will have two or three, though they take a few generations to pay for themselves. They're massively expensive and take two or three years to build. They also don't grow magical plants, so it's no substitute for having actual land if you want to make a reasonable profit. However, it's a steady and regular income and often pays for its own maintenance as well as a modest parcel of land. The only trouble is needing to pay for them up front, as you're essentially paying for the craftsmen to only work on this for the entire time it takes to craft."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Towards the end of the weekend, with only a few days before they return to Hogwarts, Aurora approaches Natah.

    "Natah, may I have a word?"

    "Certainly, how can I help."

    "I," – she hesitates for a moment before straightening her spine – "I would like to withdraw the marriage contract. Instead, I would like to vassal the Sinistra house to your own."

    "What's the difference?"

    "The short version is that we would owe you loyalty first, and provide you with a percentage of our earnings each year, as well as granting you any of our votes or political power. In return you promise to protect us from other houses and look after our interests as you would your own."

    "How does this apply to Clans?"

    Aurora thinks for a moment, "I believe it works much the same way, though there are slightly different social implications. I think that it was generally considered to be a precursor to joining the clan after a few generations."

    Natah nods, "Gringotts is working on setting up the Potter Clan for Harry. Once they have, we will accept your vassalling?"

    "Vassalhood. I'll note that in my culture, being a vassal is more like the muggle term vassal state then the muggle term vassalage. This means that while we are obligated to pay you tribute and honour your call to arms, you gain no ability to say how the members of my house live their lives."

    "And you have the authority to do this?"

    Aurora nods, "I am the last of the main branch of the family. My parents died in the last war, though I was old enough not to require regency when it happened."

    "Then I accept your offer. I can perform the operation right now if you wish."

    Aurora nods and follows Natah to a medical pod.



    Once the process is finished, Natah hands Aurora the marriage contract. Which is vehemently vanished. As she's leaving Natah calls after her, "You still made a mistake, and one I hope you learn from. In this solar system, never offer a price. Always ask for something and then haggle from the asked for price. If you'd just asked me, I'd have done this for free. Now I understand that your family has a few farming trunks. I would appreciate it as your Lady if you would relocate one or two of them here, we will pay you a fair price for the produce that they produce."

    Feeling chagrined, Aurora turns around and curtsy's, "As you wish my liege."

    "Oh, and no apparition or something called port keys, for the next 6 months. Pandora says that it will take that long for your new systems to stabilise enough to survive the process."

    "Thank you for the advice my liege."
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Hey now. Trade chat isn't that bad.

    ...but yeah, usually the first person to offer an amount is going to be over/under bid.
     
    Family
  • Threadmarks

    • Family



    Minerva looks up from her paperwork when the lander returns from the Orokin system. She returns to her paperwork with a slight smile. Once they've returned Aurora to Earth, she waits another hour before walking to her quarters.

    Knocking briefly, she opens the door and enters without waiting for a response. Inside she finds Aurora sitting at her table with her head in her hands.

    "How did it go?" she asks softly.

    Aurora looks up at her, "I made horrible mistakes."

    "You didn't get what you wanted?"

    "Oh, I did. It just cost me a price I didn't need to pay."

    "Do you want to talk about it?"

    "I went in with an offer."

    "I see, you treated it as one noble house treating with another."

    "Exactly, you get it."

    "Aurora, you're supposed to undervalue the product. It's supposed to be an offer to show you can afford to play the game, but you want to know what they're looking for. Merlin, your parents should have been able to teach you this stuff."

    "But they did."

    Minerva lays a gentle hand on Aurora's shoulder, "They taught you enough to know the steps of the dance, and you've picked up bits here and there. But you have been protected by working here pretty much out of your NEWTs. What did you end up paying?"

    "I vassalled my house to hers."

    Minerva nods, "I think it's probably going to work out as a good deal in the end. She has been dealing with the worst of her solar system for centuries and now she's your Liege lady. You have centuries of life ahead of you, so being able to do what you love while someone else can do the heavy lifting must be a good thing, right?"

    Aurora sighs, "I know, it just feels like I was the only one that would have made that mistake."

    "That's probably true, however they would have made their own mistakes. Did you talk to Hermione about how she got wrapped up in all this?"

    "No, they weren't really around that much. Her mother said that they're trying to put a railjack together for her."

    Minerva nods, "Makes sense, it will be easier than trying to find another orbiter."

    "It doesn't make sense. The whole world's stopped making sense. How do you do it?"

    Minerva extends the chair and pulls Aurora into a hug to cry out her frustrations.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    A few weeks later, for the first time since her parents died, Aurora walks into her family's home during the school year. Normally, she only comes here during the summer in order to deal with the necessary duties as head of house.

    With a pop, a house elf appears, "What can Lousy do for Starry? Starry is different."

    "I am. I have been given a, gift, yes a gift. I was taught a lesson at the same time. Our house is now a vassal to Clan Potter."

    Lousy looks at her with suddenly old eyes, "This hurt you."

    "It did, the way a child is hurt when they learn the world isn't the way they imagined it."

    "No, you are different."

    "I am changing, when the change finishes, I won't be a witch anymore. I'll still have my magic, but I'll be something different."

    "Is you leaving?"

    "I don't have any plans to leave, this is still my home, and you are still my family. I will be spending time elsewhere, but I hope that I will always come back here."

    "Lousy will attend you."

    "Thank you Lousy. Would you mind preparing the family room, my cousins should be arriving soon for a family meeting."

    "Lousy will."

    "Also, while I think of it. Get the Elves in charge of each of the farms to attend the meeting too. As they should know what's going to happen in advance."

    As Lousy pops off to do their tasks, Aurora heads into her study and locates the family charter. Reading it through, she smiles when she finds the passage she thought was there.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Aurora sits at the head of a large table as the family files in over a period of half an hour. Beside her is a certified copy of the families vassal agreement to Clan Potter, as well as the family charter and an Orokin computer. Around the top of the room, a balcony has been added for the house elves to watch the meeting from. Standing on a chair to her right, and looking very uncomfortable, is Lousy.



    Marcus, the current heir apparent, looks at her scathingly, "So, have you finally seen sense? Are you going to hand over the family to someone that will manage it properly?"

    She looks at him coldly, "Marcus, you can either take a seat, and accept me as the rightful head of the family. Or you can leave now and be excluded from the business opportunities that have come our way."

    Marcus stares at her, a stare that she calmly meets until he grunts and sits down. With the contender to the Head of House seated at the other end of the table, the rest of the family start to take their seats in the elaborate dance that is pure blood pecking order politics. Aurora can see that she doesn't have much favour, as all of the higher status members are sat near her cousin.



    Once everyone is seated, Aurora stands, "Good afternoon everyone. I've called this meeting to inform you that we are now vassals of Clan Potter. I have here the signed and sealed documents. Part of being," – Aurora raises her voice as a few members of the house start to object – "Part of being aligned with the Potter Clan in this way is that we gain access to a non-magical market that is Not covered by the statute of secrecy."

    Marcus leaps to his feet, "Impossible, we'd already know if there was anywhere on earth that we could do that."

    Aurora smiles a smile that a goblin would be proud of, "Are you so sure of that?"

    "Yes. Everyone knows that the muggles have been encroaching on our territories and we've been losing land to them. If there was anywhere that wasn't covered by the statute, don't you think we'd have found it by now?"

    "Sure enough to pass on your heirs ring if you're wrong? Of course, if you're right I'll give you the head ring."

    Marcus pauses at the sudden chasm that has opened beneath him. He'd just called the Head of house out as a liar, and she was now forcing him to either back down and lose credibility with everyone else, or double down and potentially lose everything. Reluctantly he takes his ring off his hand and places it on the table. As he does so a white sphere comes down from the ceiling.



    "This, and the computer controlling it, is made from Orokin technology. The floating orb is an Orrery, and it was specifically designed so that non-Orokin people could see its projections. This is the solar system where we will be trading."

    Marcus scoffs, "That's clearly just our solar system."

    "Really? Where's the asteroid belt?"

    "It's just not a good model, I've had enough with your Knockturn alley knockoffs."

    "It's a Knockturn alley knockoff is it? Then you'll be able to cancel the enchantments on it long enough to cause it to fall."

    "Of course, I was a curse breaker you know."

    "Well, be my guest." Aurora takes a seat and starts to work on the computer with her implants, idly activating the other feature she had added to the Orrery, sentinel shield. When Marcus resorts to more destructive spells, she just raises an eyebrow at the rest of the table and says, "Please keep the spells localised, and unlikely to harm anyone, including the house elves, in this room." Marcus just scowls at her before continuing to try and affect the sphere in any way.



    Eventually he calls "Accio sphere!" and promptly goes flying wand first into the shield around the sphere, before landing on the table cradling a broken hand and wand.

    Aurora sighs, "Lousy, would you mind setting the bones in his hand please?"

    "Certainly Mistress." With a snap of his fingers and a yowl of pain from Marcus, Marcus is back in his chair, his hand a ball of bandages.

    "I hope that the rest of you have seen enough to give me the benefit of the doubt. I would like a representative of each of the different trades our family specialises in, to meet me in Hogsmeade on Friday evening at 7pm. You may bring family members if you wish, and if you want to pack anything, we'll be gone for around 7 months, and return early Monday morning. We will be passing through what we call the fae realms and they call the void. Any questions?"

    Garland, one of the family's matriarchs, says, "Why did you sign a vassal agreement with Clan Potter?"

    "You may have heard that there are a couple of students that wear suits of armour to Hogwarts."

    "Hard not to when one of them is Harry Potter."

    "Indeed. Professor McGonagall took a, let's call it an elixir even though it's completely inaccurate, that has been changing her so that she can handle things safely if either of them are provoked into a violent altercation. I have taken the same Elixr, and the vassal agreement was the cost. By the end of the process I will no longer be human, though I will still be a witch."

    Marcus raises his healthy hand, "Ha, you must abdicate then."

    "I have the charter right here, would you care to point out where it says I will have to abdicate?"

    Aurora could see when the rest of the house started to view her as an actual Head of House, rather than the figurehead she'd been before. Garland takes the proffered charter, rather than passing it on to Marcus, and opens it. Taking her time to read it, she looks through the whole thing twice.

    "Aurora is correct. There are two passages that could apply, 'In the event that a named heir is not available upon the death of the Head of House, only witches and wizards in good standing will be eligible to participate in the selection of a new Head of House.' The second passage concerns expelling a Head of House, 'Any Head of House that is found to be participating in the Black Arts, such as Necromancy, will be expelled from the Family and Handed over to the closest authority or killed if there is no governing authority.' I'll note that there is no mention of being non-human precluding a member from being Head of House."

    "Thank you Garland, as I was saying. I have taken the same elixir as Professor McGonagall. Otherwise known as the Matriarch of Clan McGonagall. Marcus, you would do well, in future, to remember that we're not just teachers at Hogwarts." – Marcus winces at the not so subtle slap – "Where McGonagall went as a teacher, to Mr Potter, I went as a supplicant. When The Lotus, the Potter Clan Matriarch, found out about the existence of farming trunks, she requested that we relocate two of ours to Lua."

    The Orrery zooms in on Lua with its massive structures holding it together.

    "They have promised that they will pay competitive rates for our goods. This means that they will be paying for food in refined goods that we can then sell here. We will not be trading in precious metals, as the two markets don't match up. As an example, gold is relatively common, and considered a commodity. I would like you to encourage your children to follow the enchanting path. If they can land a job making expanded trunks, or the speciality trunks that are used for farming trunks, all the better. We would be in business for 600 years and still not make a dent in the market. I also want some of you to look into how we could use their technology to make our own production faster. Can they be used to pre-carve the runes or whatever it is you use for anchoring enchantments? Can their technology be used in our farm trunks to help the elves with the work? If they can, are our elves willing to hire out to help with the work they need doing?"

    Garland looks askance at Aurora, "Where are you going with the elves?"

    "House elves aren't our slaves, they are part of our family, so where the family profits from their labour, they should profit as well. I have seen the results of debts being taken too far, and being handed down over the generations. I refuse to be party to anything that seems like exploitation. In recognition of the work they've done, our house elves will receive 2% of the profits of anything they have helped to produce going forward. This isn't a wage, it's a reward. It's a recognition that their work is valuable to us, and no matter what else they get out of it, they should get some of the proceeds. I would offer more, but I'd imagine that I'm going to have a long argument with Lousy about this as it is.

    "Marcus, I want you to see about purchasing an island legitimately through the non-magical government. You'll be working with Cy, after this weekend, on ensuring that it is suitable for our imports and exports. You will also be our point of contact as you have the most business experience. Any other questions?"

    Garland asks, "Why aren't we trading in precious metals?"

    "A few weeks ago I commissioned a mokeskin pouch. Last weekend I sold it for gold out of interest. I want everyone to conjure a wooden ball the size of the amount of pure gold I got for it."

    A variety of balls appear, none larger than the size of an orange. Aurora smiles and looks up at the balcony, "Would one of the elves on the balcony mind getting the lump of gold that's on my desk please?"

    A lump of gold the size of a football is placed in the centre of the table, "This is why we're not trading in precious metals. In the short term we would appear to become wealthy, the bankers at Gringotts have assured me that in the long term it could irreparably harm the wizarding economy. Copper is currently more valuable to these people than gold is, simply because they have more uses for it."

    Besides Lousy, the only person at the table not staring at the lump of gold is Garland. Instead she's looking at Aurora with a measured expression. When Aurora looks at her, she taps her wand against her temple and mimes pulling something away. To which Aurora nods.



    It doesn't take long after that to wrap up the meeting, and Garland lingers after the others have left.



    "You've changed, far more than a few weeks or months can explain, I want to see what hit you so hard to cause this change."

    "Yes aunty, I'll get the pensive."

    Garland nods approvingly, "Better, you'd have invited me to the office before."



    When Garland comes out of the memory, she shakes her head, "I can see how that made you re-evaluate a lot of things. You've never really been exposed to that side of society before. You do realise that it's the bottom rung of their society though."

    "I do, however that bottom rung is still a billion people. It's also very easy to fall into that bottom rung, for everyone in their society. For around 2/3rds of their society, actual food that we take for granted is a pipe dream that they'd buy if they were rich. For most of the rest it's a luxury item that is only bought as a treat. One of the things we're going to do is open cafés, on the Tenno relay stations, that serve basic sandwiches, biscuits, and coffee. Some of the proceeds from that will go to buying out debt bonds on Venus. The rest will go into our pockets after we've paid our tithe."

    "You've picked a good Liege if she's helped you come up with this plan."

    "I have. The computers I use are Orokin technology. The rest of you are likely to end up using Corpus technology, but even that will look like magic to you. If it means anything, Gringotts is quietly acquiring as much corpus technology as they can, because it makes them more profit. That, is strictly between the two of us."

    "I see, that does put a very different emphasis on things."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    The following weekend, Aurora meets most of the people from the family meeting, along with their spouses and children, at Hogsmeade. Shaking her head at the fact they're pretty much depopulating the family's presence on Earth for the weekend, she signals the house elves that have the farming trunks to follow along as she leads everyone into a clearing of the Forbidden Forest. There Cy is waiting with the lander, the airlock open and a couple of unicorns looking at it curiously. As one of the children treads on a stick the unicorns startle and, rather than running away, enter the lander. Talking to Cy, it becomes obvious why they were behaving that way, as a foal was already inside having a look around.

    Aurora pinches the bridge of her nose, "Ok, I need everyone to get into one of the trunks, as we're not going to get those unicorns out until they're ready, which won't be while we're here. I'll take them aboard the lander and then let you out in a few minutes."



    Once everyone is in the trunks, it's plain sailing getting them all to the Railjack, and then getting the Railjack, Lander, and Unicorns to Lua. There Luna accompanies the lander to earth with the assurance that she knows the perfect place to lead the unicorns. The entire family take turns in getting the language upload as well as basic implants so that they can function on Lua.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • So I've a feeling that some grineer are going to get cursed from killing a unicorn in the future also might want to make sure to let simaris know not to kill them
     
    Interview
  • Threadmarks

    • Interview



    Kitty is wandering around the castle that Harry and Hermione go to school in, wearing Nezha. Around the corner comes a kavat of some description, clearly well kept by the plump middle. It takes one sniff of her and before disappearing back round the corner as though a bigger cat had just turned up. Probably smelled her own kavats. Before she can continue, an old man walks round the corner, back bent with age, but still standing with a wiry strength. The cat from before is perched on his shoulder.

    "Ere, what are you doing?"

    "Oh, I'm just looking around. I'm Kitty of clan Potter, who are you?"

    "Argus Filch, caretaker of the school. How did you get here?"

    "Oh, I came with Harry and Hermione. They're in class at the moment, so I decided to explore."

    Argus grunts, "You'll have to come with me to see the Head Master, I wasn't notified about any guests."

    "Oh, certainly, lead the way."

    Consideringly looking at the weapons attached to the Nezha, Argus turns and walks back the way he came, Kitty following good naturedly. Eventually they come to a stone gargoyle, where Argus says, "Filch to see the Head Master."

    After a few minutes the gargoyle steps to one side, revealing a spiral staircase with moving stone steps. Stepping on the steps, they are carried up to the Head Masters office.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    "Good afternoon Mr…"

    "Hi, I'm Kitty. I just love your school."

    "I'm sure you do, however I do have to ask how you found your way here."

    "We landed in the forest over there, and I walked in after having a look around the forest for a bit. Did you know you have some very aggressive spiders out there?"

    "Indeed, I did, though most who find out are unable to ever report that fact. It is, in fact, one of the reasons it is forbidden. That still does not explain how you were able to get past the wards."

    "I have no idea what you're talking about."

    "Ah, I see. Would you by chance be afflicted with the same condition as Miss Granger?"

    "Kind of, more like Harry though."

    "Hmm. Would you humour an old man, and exit your magical armour?"

    Kitty shrugs, and transfers out, "Sure."

    "No confusion, still tracking the items in the room. Mr, ah, my mistake, Miss Kitty, are you experiencing any feelings of fear, disorientation, or visual hallucinations?"

    "What? No why would I be experiencing those?"

    "Not even a sense that you left the oven on at home?"

    "I have no idea what an oven is, so no."

    "Would you be willing to indulge me once more in an experiment?"

    "If it involves blood I'm back in my Warframe before you can say corpus exec. I've heard of the things you lot can do with blood, and na ah, not happening."

    "That was my first idea, but I think I have a trinket called a Merlin orb. Though it was invented in the 17th​ century, and nobody called Merlin has ever touched it. It was all the rage for a few decades until people realised that it had no practical use. You see, it measures magical potential. However, as it doesn't work on children, the only age group that people would want to use it for, all it really tells you is how long you could last in a slug fest. Which given how many people in the duelling circuit were winning with scores that would suggest they should lose. Ah, here it is. If you could just hold this in your hands for a few minutes, it will begin to glow. I will then be using a small spell to read the result."

    Kitty decides to humour the old man and hold the glass orb. Sure enough it starts to glow, a tiny pinprick of light in the centre.

    "Absolutely fascinating. You score 2, which is below average for a muggle."

    Kitty smirks and void jumps to the other side of the office, "Just because you can't detect it, doesn't mean I don't have magic of my own."

    "Absolutely fascinating. That would also explain how you were able to walk around the castle. I will write you a note for today, but if you are visiting again in the future, would you please turn up at breakfast, or find myself or Hagrid so that I can notify the relevant staff that you're here."

    "Sure. Hey, one question. How comes Harry's disappearance was never noticed?"

    Albus sighs, "It was, by myself. I was the only one that could notice. You have to understand that Harry's parents were dear friends of mine, and I would have raised him myself if I wasn't such a public person. Death eater attacks were still happening for a year after and the trials didn't conclude till 1984, though we advertised the end of them in 82. I have devices linked to his health and wellbeing, and when I couldn't find him within 6 months of searching I concluded that as he was healthy and mostly happy, he'd probably found himself in a better place than his aunts house would have been. Sadly, I'd have left him at his aunts even if it wasn't the perfect location. As the only other places that would have been hidden enough to keep him safe would have been a workhouse or orphanage, and I've already seen the results of growing up in one of those places."

    "Well, I'm going to be around for the rest of the week, and probably next week too which I think leads up to. Oh what did Hermione call it, that was it, Christmas Holidays."

    Albus sighs and conjures another sheet of parchment before writing the note again, "You may want to visit the village of Hogsmeade rather than just sticking to the school. It probably won't be that interesting walking around on your own all day."

    "Oh, don't worry, I've got plenty of things to do on the Moon. I've just been coming down when I need to stretch my legs and relax my brain."

    "I see. Have a nice day Miss Kitty, if you're on the third floor. Please try to avoid opening any locked doors. There are some things there that would be dangerous for students to just stumble across."

    Kitty pulls her Warframe around her so that the old man won't see her shock, before taking the note and walking out.



    Once she's left, Albus leans back in his chair and considers what he saw in her mind. A laughing wall wasn't expected in any way. Then there was the fact she just disappeared from the wards and his own monitoring enchantments when she demonstrated her own magic. Maybe that's the secret of the new magic that Minerva has found.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    The last few weeks before Christmas passed quickly, and in the Orokin system Amelia and Danjell's main chassis's grew in perfectly much to Natah's immense joy. The fact that they are not magical means that Xeno and Pandora weren't flukes assisted by their own magic.



    Pandora's and Natah's experiments in transplanting Oro's hits a minor snag in that the natural born sentients on earth don't have them. This doesn't slow them down for too long, as they are able to implant artificial Oro's in Kubrow's and Kavats without any side effects. With carefully controlled, humane testing, they find that the Oro's are working as expected.



    "Pandora, I think we're ready to try transplanting now."

    "Indeed, Sofa and Plush?"

    Natah thinks for a moment, "Because they have such different personality traits?"

    "Yep. If sofa starts begging for food rather than her toys we know there's personality bleed."

    "We should do Scritch and Scratch too in that case."

    "I see, trying the same thing with Kavat."

    "Who shall we use for the control?"

    "Blackie and pounce?"

    Natah nods and makes a note in the computer, "How long should we allow the experiment to run before we conclude that it's not deadly for humans?"

    "I think a year and a day should do."

    "Why the extra day?"

    "Magical significance. It's the naturally weak point in any long-lasting magical ritual and the main reason why learning astronomy is so important. As it's the sidereal day that matters, not the solar day. There are echoes of this that can be used, and careful probing of an active ward can tell you when the next weak point is. If you're really good, you can even calculate the exact time the ward was cast. It's much harder with contracts and curses, but if the person is still alive after that time, it is much easier to break them. Though with contracts, that doesn't help much, as your own magic is keeping the contract alive as much as the initial magic used. As such, it's something only usually used in breaking slave contracts, like the ones forced on Veela."

    "Veela?"

    "A human subspecies that originates from a type of nymph that is now extinct. They had the beauty and charm of a Siren, and the ability to fly and use magic of a Harpy. They were hunted down and exterminated by witches, due to the fact there were very few wizards that could resist their charms. Charms that invariably proved fatal to the wizard. They found the half breed babies and mistook them for stolen children. Being raised in a human environment allowed them to retain their human features. Over the last 2000 years or so, they have become more and more human. However, they are still all astonishingly beautiful, and they retain some of the magic of their ancestors."

    "That's fascinating, I'd love to look at their DNA to see if I can find anything that separates them from humans, or if it's all magic."

    "I hadn't considered that. How are the farming trunks doing?"

    "Marcus Sinistra has moved his entire family here, something to do with feeling disgraced. Maria has opened a Café on the Strata Relay with a couple of the house elves from the trunks, and some of the staff who want to learn how to cook. They signed contracts saying that they wouldn't go to work for the Corpus for at least 10 years after they've finished learning how to learn to cook. Revenue on that station is already up 20% outside what the café is bringing in. The Tenno only take the rent from them, and Clan Potter receives 10% of their profits."

    "That's astounding, how are they making so much money?"

    "They've priced themselves as they would in your home world rather than as the luxury goods they're actually selling. I've heard them talking about setting up a butchers and greengrocers, what ever they are, with a sign clearly stating that the produce is for personal consumption only."



    Natah thinks for a moment as they're making their way to the pens where their experimental animals are kept, "How's your leyline project going?"

    Pandora laughs despairingly, "It wasn't until the farming trunks arrived. Now a leyline has started to develop naturally between the Rookery and the Sinistra holdings. That single event has thrown out every single theory they had on Leylines in the Department of Mysteries. Until now, the assumption has been that leylines caused magical creatures to start to exist. Now it's become a chicken and egg situation."

    "I don't understand that metaphor."

    "You've seen the chickens in the trunks?"

    "I have, though I don't see how that is relevant, as all avian species lay eggs, so it stands to reason that they evolved from a common ancestor."

    "What you're missing is the fact that the people that came up with the question didn't know about evolution."

    "Oh. Oh! So, you're saying that you no longer know what causes magic to appear in plants, animals, and leylines, and it could well be some undiscovered third thing that ties them all together."

    "Essentially, yes. Though I hadn't considered the latter."

    "Maybe we can import some other magical plants and creatures and make an enclave on Earth for them."

    "There's a lot of primordial forest down there, I'm sure we could. Though doing so without them being wiped out before they can reach sustainable levels could be problematic."

    "Start with the small animals, and those herbivores that are good at remaining unseen. Same with the plants."

    "Garden gnomes and fairies should be easy enough to come by. Maybe some of the magical mushrooms and vines."

    "There you go, what about the infestation?"

    "So far as we can tell, it doesn't really exist on Earth. I'd be more worried about the trees and other plant life that Silvana developed. Once we get over the hurdle of the local plant life outcompeting the magical plants, you'll probably start to see Ents and Dryads start to appear naturally in areas where Leylines exist."

    "Maybe we can transplant some Sentients to those areas and see what happens to them too."

    "Why don't you head back with Harry and Hermione next weekend and see about gathering some plants from the forest."

    Pandora laughs, "Oh Natah. Redo your calculations."

    "Oh, it's the holidays, so they'll be here for a few years."

    "That does have me thinking though, Marcus' children are going to need a magical education. By the time they get their Hogwarts letters it will be far too late for them. Maybe I can put out an advert for muggleborn to emigrate here, non-magical family included."

    "What if you get magical applicants?"

    "Doesn't really matter, I just want to keep the bigots away. I'll need to talk to the people of Cetus though, as I think I'd want them to join their community first."

    "Why not one of the other earth colonies?"

    "They're already a high profile Grineer target, so adding a magical community isn't going to change that. The others all survive because they're hidden or live in locations the Grineer don't want."

    "I suppose, there's also the Quills representative there. They might be able to help design a new magical focus. They did design the amps for the Tenno after all."



    Reaching the pens, the two of them turn back to their research.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Harry frowns as Tau appears in front of him the day before the Christmas holidays starts. Opening the letter, he scans it and then sighs.

    "Kitty, have we introduced you to Ironclaw or his son Ironjaw yet?"

    Kitty looks up from Orokin desk toy she's practicing with, "No, not yet."

    "Right, here's their details. I'm going to include you in chat, and you'll want this letter too."



    {Harry} @Ironjaw @Ironclaw Good morning. Sorry for contacting you so early.

    {Ironclaw} Gringotts is open at all hours. What can we do for you?

    {Harry} First, I'd like to introduce you to @Kitty, one of our clan members.

    {Kitty} Hi.

    {Ironclaw} May the blood of your enemies flow as swiftly as your vaults are filled.

    {Kitty} And may their entrails make good sausages.

    {Ironclaw} asdfghjkl;

    {Ironclaw} Sorry, I was laughing too hard to type properly, I will have to remember that one.

    {Ironclaw} What can we help you with?

    {Harry} My mother wants you to buy out all the stock in a couple of nurseries and magical component farms. She also wants 2 dozen each of Garden Gnomes, Fairies, Pixies, Nifflers, Bundimun, Billywig, Horklump, Clabbert and Jobberknoll.

    {Ironclaw} She is aware of the fact they can't be owled?

    {Harry} She is, though we have successfully transported two farming trunks and 3 unicorns using our own transportation. We will want all of those in an expanded trunk. As Hermione and I are in classes for the next two days, can you work with Kitty on this?

    {Kitty} @Harry How am I supposed to help? I'm not magical.

    {Ironjaw} Good morning.

    {Ironclaw} @Ironjaw Good, just the person I needed. You need to meet @Kitty in the Three Broomsticks and escort her back to Gringotts. We have an urgent commission.

    {Ironclaw} Harry, if you are willing to transport a shipment to Cephalon Simaris we will waive the Gringotts fees.

    {TheFairyQueen} That explains a lot.

    {Harry} Sure, just make sure it's separate from our lot and labelled clearly.

    {Ironclaw} Do you know why your mother needs this stuff?

    {Harry} Not entirely, but they say they're planting them on Earth as an experiment.

    {Ironclaw} We'll include a few boxes of flobberworms too. Just pour them out on the earth and they'll burrow in.

    {Harry} Thank you.

    Harry has left

    TheFairyQueen has left

    {Kitty} That's just not fair of them.

    Ironclaw has left

    {Ironjaw} Do you know where the three broomsticks is?

    {Kitty} I've been there, the village isn't all that interesting though.

    {Ironjaw} It mainly exists for the school and forest.

    {Kitty} ok, how about I message you when we get to earth?

    {Ironjaw} I await your message.



    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Kitty spends the next couple of days cursing magical transportation and moving all around the UK buying things from different farms and nurseries.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Darkphoenixlady said:
    Once she's left, Albus leans back in his chair and considers what he saw in her mind. A laughing wall wasn't expected in any way. Then there was the fact she just disappeared from the wards and his own monitoring enchantments when she demonstrated her own magic. Maybe that's the secret of the new magic that Minerva has found.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Wally making fun of him trying to Legilimens her, perhaps?

    Also, this scene kinda-sorta paints Dumbledore in a more favorable light than the earlier fic did; yes, Harry was gone and he couldn't find him, but he did know Harry was happy and healthy, and if he couldn't find Harry then the Death Eaters couldn't find him, either.

    Of course it helps - or doesn't help, perhaps? - that Dumbledore has had a month or two of Harry's surface appearance and skimpy background knowledge, while McGonnagal has had subjective years.
     
    I want to outfit a legion of Garden Gnomes with shrunken Grinny Weapons and armor, and then make a Specter ball out of it. Arise my Gnome army.
     
    Operation
  • Threadmarks

    • Operation



    Natah is waiting for them when Harry, Kitty, and Hermione all disembark from the Railjack at the beginning of the winter holiday, Minerva will be returning tomorrow as she has an end of term meeting to attend first, granted tomorrow is almost 3 months from now but still.

    "Hey Mum, we've got trunks full of animals for you, I thought we got breeding pairs when we first did our shopping."

    Natah nods, "We did, which are fine for study, but we want to set up stable populations."

    "I see, so you want the increased genetic diversity. What brought that on?"

    "We have a Leyline developing on Lua, and we want to see if that's because of something we've done or it happens naturally. So we're going to establish locations with magical plants and creatures to see if leylines develop naturally or not."

    Kitty fair bounces on her toes, "How's the testing with Oro's going?"

    Hermione laughs, and heads off to do her own thing before they remember she's supposed to be acclimatising to other frames. Natah on the other hand sighs, "Yes, we've finished our initial research, and we think that it's safe enough for the two of you."



    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    A few hours later, The Lotus looks at Harry and Kitty seriously, "Are you sure you want to try this?"

    Kitty nods emphatically, "I am."

    Harry shrugs, "I'm still game. There's profit to be made, to borrow a Corpus phrase."

    Lotus looks over at Pandora, who shakes her head slightly, "Very well," – she takes of her helmet moving to a less formal posture – "These two transfer pods have been specially designed to prevent you from using physical transference, only the pod driven transference. If something goes wrong, we do not want to have to try and transfer you out of your Warframe to fix the problem. Additionally, the lids have been modified to be cut out with a surgical interface for Pandora and I to use. When we've done this with Kurbow, we've had them sedated, however we need immediate feedback from the both of you, so instead you'll be in your Warframes. I want you both to pick a Warframe with an instant cast non-sustained first ability."

    Kitty smiles, "That's easy, I'll just use my Nezha. Just make sure there's something I can throw my disk at."

    Harry laughs, "Kitty, that's not the first ability."

    "It's not? Wait? Damn it, I never use the fire walk. Ok, I'll fish out Excalibur."

    Harry has to think hard about her available Warframes, finally settling on Invra, as her noise arrow is just shot from her bow and stops when it hits something.

    "Now that you've got your Warframes selected, the next week is going to be very boring, as we need to calibrate the amount of void energy reserves they allow precisely. So that you have just enough excess energy to use your abilities twice before the reserve is empty."



    A few days in, Kitty complains, "Why do we need to do this again?"

    Pandora sighs, "We're trying to detect if there are any ill effects on you or Harry after the operation. We've not detected any shifts in personality with the animals we tested this on, but humans are not animals. And you've got abilities over and above the normal human. We're not just calibrating our void condensers for each of you, we're also taking scans of your bodies and brains, as well as including personality test questions. Anyway, two uses, again."

    Kitty stalls after only one use, "That's not enough energy, even though my overlay says I have enough."

    "That's because the overlay doesn't work as precisely as we are, let me just add the decimal points to your overlay and you'll see what I mean."

    "It's now reading at 49.491530."

    "Try it again."

    "Uh, ok? Hey it worked! And it says I have 0.000323 left."

    "My instruments give a slightly different reading from that. The issue we have is that while we can measure to 6 decimal places, the accuracy of your Warframes is within 0.0005 units. Our equipment is down to 0.0001 units, and we're trying to improve the accuracy of our devices to at least 5 decimal places. Here, I'll have your Warframe recalculate it's reserves a few times."

    "0.000052, 0.001037, 0.000873. Why do you need so much accuracy anyway?"

    "We want to know if there are any measurable differences between before and after. So far, you're both very consistent in your own frames. But if we don't know how much energy we're feeding you, we can't tell if a change is because of us or because of you. We're also going to have you both swap Warframes and activate the same abilities to ensure that once it's calibrated for you, we can get a good calibration for the other frame."

    "Um, why?"

    "We already know there are differences in the way that the two of you channel energy. So we need to know if that difference is distinct to you or to manufacturing tolerances in your Warframes."

    "Oh, I see, so you're trying to get to a point where your equipment measurements fluctuate less than the Warframes do, so that you can tell if a change that's happening is because of who's piloting it or not."

    "Precisely."

    "Why didn't you just say that?"

    "I did, repeatedly, when we started."

    "Sorry."

    "Don't be, you're not a researcher, so no matter how smart you are, we can't expect you to understand the subtleties of what we're doing immediately. Natah and I have both had years to study this, you and Harry have been at this for a few days."

    "Why is this so hard to measure anyway?"

    Pandora sits back in her frame to think for a moment, "While void energy was well studied during the few thousand years before the old war, Natah's people were sent to Tau using a void jump drive after all. Most of that research was focused on how to use it for travel, and how to protect against it. It wasn't until the Sentients returned that they started looking at using it for an energy source. First in weapons, and then in equipment. Before that, it was just a fringe science that a few Archimedieans pursued using microportals and the like. The Zariman was supposed to be a Military experiment on the long-term effects of void exposure, until the experiment turned deadly real, as the translation to the void without the void shielding in place caused catastrophic damage to the drive systems. It's still there, in the void, waiting."

    "Why bring up that ship?"

    "Because it's an example of what the Orokin were willing to do to speed up their research into the void. They had to basically redesign their entire technical base because Sentients were far too able to just take over their previous technical base. The fact that your Warframes, and the necromechs before them, used void energy is what enabled you to be so effective against Sentient targets. Even then, it wasn't until Margulis' death and the decision to turn you all into weapons that the tide of the war changed for the Orokin the first time."

    "Yeah, yeah, I know all that." Kitty grumps, "Can we get on with the testing rather than dwell on horrible history?"

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    After a week of calibration, they managed to get the lab equipment down to 4 and ½ decimal places tolerance. Harry and Kitty both swapped Warframes for a few days after that. An experience that they both agreed was highly uncomfortable. However, it did highlight that their energy usage differed very slightly, and it was able to be measured accurately enough to satisfy Natah and Pandora.

    Also out of the whole thing, they found that Harry's energy usage waxed and waned. This seemed to correlate with where their gender was at any point. Kitty's on the other hand, stayed solid the entire time. They made a note to check next time she was menstruating to see if that made any difference.



    Finally, it was time for the surgery, and Harry and Kitty are both staring down at their unconscious bodies.

    Kitty shakes her head, "I don't think this will ever not be weird."

    Harry nods, "I know what you mean. I think that's why our pod suits were designed with sensory deprivation in mind. Can you imagine what it would have been like if you came across your own body sleeping in the pod?"

    Kitty shudders.

    "Ok you two," – Natah comes over with Pandora trailing behind her, both of them naked and in their full frames – "We need you to get back behind the line, everything inside is going to be sterilised when we activate the surgical field."



    The two of them walk back to the area with the training spectres, before turning back to watch. A shimmering green light flashes in a dome indicating the danger of the field, it then settles to amber and finally violet, to indicate it's active and safe to approach.



    Inside the field, Pandora says, "Activating life support systems, enabling spinal block. Their brains are now isolated. Natah, proceed when ready."

    "Activating 4th​ dimensional isolation field. Rotating skin, muscles, ribs, front lungs. How's Kitty looking?"

    "Vitals are looking good, Kitty how do you feel."

    "Queasy watching this, but apart from that, I'm fine. It's nothing I haven't seen before, only it's my body."

    "Understandable."



    Natah turns around to Harry's pod and repeats the process, "How's Harry doing?"

    "Vitals are good. Harry, how do you feel."

    "It's just weird watching this."



    Pandora nods, before turning her attention back to the monitors, "Activating phase stabilisers, their Oro's should now be visible."

    "I can confirm. Removing Kitty's now."

    Kitty shivers violently, "Void, I feel cold."

    Natah puts it back, and Kitty's shivering subsides, "Do you want me to stop here?"

    "No, no. I…'ll be ok."

    "Very well. Removing Kitty's Oro now. Removing Harry's Oro." – Harry shivers violently but says nothing – "Placing Kitty's Oro. Placing Harry's Oro."

    Harry can't help letting out a moan, as the warmth he/she feels is amazing, like the best hug ever. Kitty joins them as well. And Natah removes the Oro she'd just placed in Kitty's chest. Immediately they both growl and start shivering.

    Kitty says, "Put that back right now, it felt so nice."

    Natah and Pandora share a glance and Gigabits of information before Natah puts it back in.



    With the Oro's in place, but all the fields still active, Natah walks to a console on the edge of the sterilisation field and activates it. "Harry, you first. I want you to make two shots with your noise arrow. When you receive another energy charge, I want you to repeat the process."

    She monitors as the system goes through the pre-programmed tests, with a random 25% of the energy charges being only a single charges worth, but the overlay adjusted to show the expected charge. As expected, Harry fires all 40 shots with no difficulties."

    "Thank you, there is a minor shift in your energy usage, just above our error bars, so we'll want to keep an eye on that. Kitty, you're up."



    Kitty starts to go through her own tests, though hers takes longer as she can't just stand by the dispenser. It's all going swimmingly when, 5 iterations in, she hits the first single charge. Zipping through the spectres, she cuts them down and turns as the second group walk into position, and activates her ability again. As she does, she feels a tearing sensation in her chest and staggers through the manoeuvre, still accelerated but in agony. At the end her Warframe collapses, and all of the fields wink out. Including the ones keeping the Oro visible. Curling up in her pod, she clutches her hands to her chest and screams. Void it hurt, it hurt so badly.

    Harry vaults out of her own pod and rushes over to Kitty. As soon as she touches her in concern, Kitty's pain reduces to almost manageable levels.

    "Stars and void, this hurts."



    Natah spins around as she accelerates her thought processes to try to deal with this situation. Pandora accelerating to match her. In seconds they've got the fields activating again and are gently pushing Kitty back into the pod. When they activate the life support, it's fine, as soon as they activate the spinal block everything shorts out again, and Natah is thrown violently backwards. Drawing her wand, Pandora casts Stupefy and knocks Kitty out with magic.

    Once she's unconscious, Harry goes to remove her hand and Pandora shouts, "Don't you dare remove that hand. Natah, I'm starting a scan for Kitty's Oro. Scan has come back negative. I'm going to check her over with magic, if it turns out to be a magical problem, we'll need to bring in a Qualified Healer."



    Hed flies in and lands on Natah's frame, and Natah shakes her head, "How do they do that?"

    "I have no idea, and it's got worse since they learnt how to void travel."



    Harry watches cautiously as Pandora does a few basic diagnostic spells, only to find that Kitty has virtually no magical reserves, which is vastly more than she should have. With a sigh, she conjures some parchment and ink, "Minerva hasn't left yet has she?"

    "If she has, then she's still in transit. It will still be quicker for them to turn around than for us to send her back."

    Pandora quickly pens a note to Minerva requesting that she asks a fully qualified healer to make a house call, and outlines the symptoms.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    Minerva is just packing her bags for the morning when Hed appears in her room and holds out a leg with a letter grasped in her foot. Giving her a scritch, Minerva takes the letter, reads it, reads it again, and then swears, heads to her Floo and calls out "St Mungo's"
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Healers
  • Threadmarks

    • Healers

    Minerva steps through into the last place she wanted to be, before her changes had finished. There are a number of healers here that will diagnose first, check to see if you're a patient afterwards. Making her way to the front desk, she looks the receptionist in the eye. "Miss, would it be possible to speak to the director. I need to hire a healer for an extended visit, it may be life or death."

    The receptionist rolls her eyes, before writing a note and tapping it with her wand, so that it turns into an aeroplane, and flies off to the Director.



    The Director, a swarthy man with a defined girth, arrives fairly quickly. Though whether it was down to the word hire, or the words life or death, no one will ever know.

    "What can I do for you Professor?" he says in a broad Yorkshire accent.

    Putting on a smile, Minerva just hands him the letter she received.



    After reading it, he looks up, "How long do you think they'd be gone for."

    "Probably the Christmas holidays. Though, the Potter Clan is willing to pay for 3 years of their time."

    The Director chokes, "You what?"

    "There is time magic involved."

    He nods understandingly, "I wish I could help you, but I have so many staff taking breaks, that we'll be running on the bare minimum over Christmas as it is. The only Healer currently in the Hospital that isn't needed over Christmas, is Healer Tonks, and that's because her shift ends in an hour, and then she's off for Christmas."

    "Would you mind if I spoke to her?"

    "Not at all, if you'll follow me, I'll lead you to her office."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    "Tonks, I have Professor McGonagall here to see you."

    Minerva sighs as she's hit by a brace of diagnostic spells and Andromeda's eyes widen noticeably. Quickly stepping into the office and closing the door, she erects her own privacy charms.

    As soon as she's finished, Andromeda is on her feet, wand under Minerva's chin, "What are you?"

    Minerva physically disarms Andromeda faster than she can blink, "I am Professor McGonagall, and I always have been. I am also changing into something different. But that's not why I'm here."

    "How did you get my wand so quickly?"

    Minerva laughs, "I told you, I'm changing into something different. If you want more information, agree to this job." She passes over the letter.



    Andromeda reads it, then reads the signature line more carefully, "Pandora? The Lovegoods dropped of the face of the planet back in September."

    Minerva chuckles again, "Not exactly dropped, more like flew. In a spaceship."

    "Don't tell me you've been watching muggle TV shows."

    "I haven't, I don't even know which TV show's you're talking about. However, clan Potter is willing to pay you 3 years wages for this."

    "I can't, this is the last Christmas before Nymphadora joins the Auror's as a trainee."

    Minerva shrugs, "Bring her along, and I'll give her 3 years on and off personal tutoring as well. Your husband too."

    Andromeda narrows her eyes, "That seems awfully specific."

    Minerva smiles, "Time runs approximately 81 times faster where you're going than it does here. Hence the urgency."

    "Fine, I just need to let Ted know."

    "Are you able to Floo him? If not, send him an owl to meet me at Hogwarts tomorrow morning, I need to send an owl to arrange for your transport anyway. Second thoughts, I'll just ask the account manager to send them an owl, while I'm at it, can you floo or do you need to send an owl?"

    {MissKitty} Account Manager @Ironjaw

    {IronJaw} Hello professor, how can I help one of our most profitable customers?

    {MissKitty} Would you be able to send an owl requesting pickup from Lua?

    {IronJaw} That was almost instant, what's the hurry?

    {MissKitty} We have medical emergency that involves a non-magical having very low magic reserves.



    Andromeda steps over to her office floo and calls home



    {IronJaw} I thought that's what they were supposed to have.

    {MissKitty} According to the letter, they should have no magic reserves.

    {IronJaw} I see. I am writing the letter now, I'm also going to ask one of our Healers, and a contingent of guards to meet you at Hogsmeade, they'll be bringing their families. We may have experience whoever you found doesn't.



    "Thank Merlin you're already at home. Christmas has just turned into a working holiday, so pack everything and meet Minerva at Hogwarts tomorrow with Dora."



    {MissKitty} Very well we'll go back via the three Broomsticks then, if you have any apartment trunks I can borrow that will make things quicker, as I can then go directly from Hogsmeade.

    {IronJaw} I'm not even going to ask.



    "No, no, you'll be meeting me where we're going. I've got Professor McGonagall here and I've already packed my bag, so I'm just going to grab a few reference books."



    {MissKitty} I'm going to fly myself to the Moon to meet them, if they arrive while I'm on route then they can meet me half way.

    {IronJaw} the owl has been sent

    {MissKitty} Thank you, take whatever we owe you out of the accounts.

    {IronJaw} already done.



    "Love you, and I'll see you soon."



    {MissKitty} Thank you, how long do you think your healer will be?

    {IronJaw} Give them 15 minutes.

    {MissKitty} Will do, and thanks again.

    {IronJaw} You're paying for it, all part of the service.



    "Minerva, it's done now. I just need to get some books and I'll be ready."

    Minerva smiles in relief, "The goblins will meet us in Hogsmeade in 15 minutes."

    "Oh good, I've got time then. Wait what?!"

    "The goblins will meet us in Hogsmeade in 15 minutes."

    "That's what I thought you said. How can you know that?"

    "I contacted them while you were using the floo. It will make much more sense later, for the moment, just accept it happened and get your books together."

    "…"



    Andromeda busies herself and gathers the books she thinks she might need. While she's doing that, Minerva start scanning all the books that Andromeda has passed over, getting a few strange glances from Andromeda while she's at it. When Andromeda indicates she's done, Minerva allows the scanner to return to her digital storage.

    Andromeda's eyes widen, and she mutters, "The explanation better be bloody good."

    "Trust me, it needs to be seen to be believed."

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    A few minutes later, they're in The Three Broomsticks, when the floo activates and a single goblin comes through carrying a shrunken trunk.

    "MissKitty?"

    Andromeda looks at Minerva who smiles, "That's me, are you coming as well?"

    "No, I'm just handing over the healer and escort."

    "Thank you." Minerva takes the trunk and unshrinks it, "In you go Andromeda, and would you put a bubble head charm on yourself and all the occupants please, there's no air where we're going."

    "What?"

    "It will make sense later, and I'm sure there's about to be enough gossip about myself that I'd rather not add to it thank you."

    Andromeda looks around at the patrons silently watching the drama unfold, before primly lifting her robes, stepping inside the trunk, and climbing down with her shrunken bag. The Goblin leaves through the floo, and Minerva leaves through the door, casting her own bubble head charm before casting a rain shield protego.



    Once outside, she slips her shoes and stockings off, to reveal the bare sockets on the back of her legs. Putting them into a pocket, she looks up through her shield and starts flying upward, heedless of the witches and wizards staring at her. Once she's high enough that she's not going to harm anyone on the ground, she activates her internal drive system, and prays that her internal reactor has enough energy to get her to escape velocity at the very least. As she rapidly picks up speed, the shield starts to develop a corona of superheated air, as the blunt form of the shield causes a supersonic shockwave to form ahead of her, and curving around her to meet below her feet. Which neatly answers that question, as she's now approaching escape velocity, and still accelerating. It is a relief when, a second or two later, the shockwave dissipates as the atmosphere is no longer thick enough to sustain it. As soon as she feels the last of the resistance against her shield disappear she cancels it with some relief.



    {LunaLiscious} @MissKitty I have just transited to real space around Luna.

    {MissKitty} I'm just leaving the atmosphere, if you could meet me that would be grand.

    {LunaLiscious} You're not supposed to be doing that.

    {MissKitty} The letter sounded more than a little urgent, so I'm conscious of the fact that it has already been a day or maybe longer on the other side.

    {LunaLiscious} Well, good news, Kitty isn't dying. Cy is just plotting an intercept course

    {Cy} Cy would request that you cut your acceleration and just maintain your current velocity.

    {MissKitty} Reducing thrust. Would I be able to take the Lander with me back to earth?

    {Cy} Cy will not be able to guide it in to land.

    {MissKitty} I'll risk it, as I don't want to overstress my reactor any more if I don't have to.

    {Cy} Eta 2 minutes



    Two minutes later, the Railjack does indeed match her speed and an airlock opens next to her. Changing her vector slightly, she drifts into the airlock and falls to the floor as the artificial gravity kicks in. Crawling into the engineering floor, she puts the trunk on the floor and unshrinks it with her wand. A quick spell opens the lid, with a hiss of air rushing in. Luna comes from the pilots area wearing a Wisp.

    "Are you ok Minerva?"

    "I'm fine, my legs are just repairing themselves, as this frame isn't designed for those sorts of forces."

    Luna leans over the top of the trunk, "Are you ok… Fair enough." She quickly ducks back as a spell comes shooting out the opening.

    In response, Minerva drags herself up the trunk and leans over, "Andromeda, Healer Tonks. It's ok, that was just Luna Lovegood. It's safe for everyone to exit now."



    Carefully, the occupants of the trunk all climb out and lie on the floor in various states of distress. Andromeda rounds on Minerva, "What did you do?"

    "If you can walk, go through the door at the top of that ramp, left or right, it doesn't matter. There's a window you can look out."

    "I need to finish setting broken bones, I have never heard of anything inside a trunk being affected by what's happening outside. Then the air disappeared, I almost didn't get all the bubble heads replaced in time."

    Cy says, "Miss McGonagall was accelerating at 61.47m/s/s or 6.268 times gravity at sea level. Conclusion, you are lucky to be alive."

    Minerva looks shame faced at that particular bit of news, "I'm sorry, I didn't consider that the trunk might not be able to keep up with me."

    The goblin healer speaks up from where he's working on the warriors, "It was good training for the meatheads here, and now you know. Just keep it slower next time."

    "Have you all got everything you need from the trunk, and Luna, do you have any Health Pizza's with you?"

    Andromeda looks confused at the switch in language, though Luna just drops a health restore beacon on the floor, and Minerva can feel the energy working to accelerate the healing in her legs.



    Once she can stand, she climbs down into the trunk and levitates out everything that's inside it, that isn't furniture. Climbing out she shrinks the trunk again, "Right, I'm heading back to Hogwarts, Luna will have more up to date information about what's going on, so see you in a few weeks."

    Andromeda looks up from the goblin that she's healing, "Wait what?! I feel like I've been saying that a lot."

    Minerva doesn't look back as she jumps up to the deck that leads to the landing craft.

    ═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

    "Transiting to real space in 10…9…"

    Andromeda tunes Cy, the cephalon that looks after the ship, and seems to be like something straight out of one of Teds Si Fi shows. Digging through her bag, she pulls out a headache potion and downs it. Pulling out another one she offers it to Straightseam, the healer.

    "Thank you but no. I've had a few months to come to terms with this information."

    Andromeda sighs in relief as the potion kicks in, "How comes you're so…"

    "Pleasant?" – Andromeda nods – "Simple. I have no doubt that by the end of this, you will no longer be a witch. You be too hungry for knowledge for that not to be true. The goblin nation has no reason to dislike those outside the wizarding world. We have been expanding more, and our population growing since we met Clan Potter, than in the previous 200 years combined. Only 4 of us are guards, the other 20 are our families. If we can, I will be looking to negotiate a space to start a colony of our own here. Come, we've just landed."

    Mouth open in shock, Andromeda just follows Straightseam out of the ship, where someone seems to have added a makeshift footbridge to the platform outside the ship. Pandora is standing on the platform holding a ring of some description.

    "Andromeda, Straightseam?" Straightseam nods, and she continues, "Please take hold of the portkey, it will take us to the surgical area."



    They arrive in a bare area where there are two pods, two small slanted tables on sticks, and an inlayed circle surrounding the whole area. Above them they can see glittering stars and the planet earth as a small blue marble. In one of the pods, is an old teenager, or young woman. Her cheeks are sunken, and pulse visibly erratic in her throat. Holding her hand is a young man with green eyes who can only be Harry.

    Immediately Andromeda pulls out her wand and starts casting diagnostic after diagnostic, while Straightseam does the same thing. After nearly 30 minutes of casting and referring to her books, Andromeda conjures a chair and sits down heavily. When Straightseam straightens up a few minutes later, she conjures another one for him, along with a goblet of water.

    She looks over at Pandora, and the other woman that arrived while she was casting, "She's dying, and I've read about this before, but I have no idea where."

    "I know what it is," Straightseam says softly, "it's the Assarian Marriage of Equals. Our curse breakers have found stories of it, and this is one of the ways it can go wrong."

    The new woman looks worried, "How can we fix it?"

    "I'm sorry, but you can't. See, they developed a ritual that would take a portion of a persons soul and place it into a container. They did that for the people to be wed, and then released the fragments into the other person. After a day, they would take the fragments back and return them to their original hosts. Occasionally, one of the fragments would get lost, and the owner of that fragment would start to absorb the soul of the other person. The only comfort was that maintaining contact made the death quicker and less painful."

    Almost faster than they can see, the new woman has tackled Harry and dumped him in the other pod, "Pandora!" she calls before her arm turns into a scalpel.

    Desperately Pandora rushes over to one of the slanted tables, throwing out a stupefy on the way, "Life support is active, spinal block active. Natah what are you doing?"

    "Getting Kitty's Oro back. Activate the phase stabiliser, I need to be able to see what I'm looking for."

    In the other pod, the now named Kitty starts crying in pain in her sleep.

    "It's active!"

    "Got them, there's two here."

    "Get them out and show them to the healers, they're the experts here!"



    Andromeda waves her wand a couple of times, and shakes her head. Straightseam on the other hand, concentrates for the moment, "That one's purely female. The other one is mixed."

    Natah doesn't even wait, and turns before shoving the mixed one back onto Harry's chest. With the other one in her hand, she turns to Kitty and forces her on her back before slicing open her abdomen and forcing the Oro up into her chest.


    "Turn off the phase stabilisers."

    "Activating life support for Kitty, activating spinal block, deactivating phase stabilisers." As the phase stabilisers shut down, Kitty falls into silence and sleep.

    Andromeda fires off a few diagnostic spells, "Well, she's not dying anymore. That's a good sign."

    Natah visibly slumps in relief, turning back to the healers, she says, "Thank you for coming, especially you Andromeda. I know your plans were interrupted. We'll still pay you for the full three years, but if you want to return to your earth we can get you back with only around 20 minutes past since you left."

    "Hell no, there's no way I'm going back until I understand how you were just handling somebody's soul."

    "It's not their soul, it's an Oro, an… what's the best way to describe it, anchor for the soul, refuge, recording, I'm not sure how to describe it in English, as there are so many layers to its meaning. Void and stars, it's hard enough to understand it in our language."

    "Well, apparently, I've got 3 years to find out. And also find out what happened to you Pandora."

    Straightseam chuckles, "While I would like to know myself. I have brought my wife and child, as have my guards. We would like permission to seek a place to build a colony in lieu of payment."

    Natah pinches the bridge of her nose, "This is such a useful human gesture. Fine, before we move them to healing pods, can the two of you examine them to see that they are both stable, and what side effects we should watch out for."

    Andromeda casts a spell and a glittering line appears between the two of them, "Well, they're married. Pandora could have done that."

    Straightseam waves a hand, "At the moment, until they are both healed and walking around again, I couldn't tell you. The damage to their chests is life threatening, so my own diagnosis won't be able to tell you anymore than that. And witch magic is much better at stopping someone in this state from getting worse than goblin magic is."

    "You seem to be much better at diagnostics than we are though."

    Straightseam laughs, "Only because we're not allowed wands. Need to be much better at sensing magic. But maybe we can have these sorts of discussions during your stay."



    Natah mentally detaches the pods and sets them to levitate behind her, the life support switching over to internal reserves. "Well, if you'll follow me, I'll show you to the healing pods. Which also happen to be where you get the nanites and implants you'll need to interact with the technology here, as well as understand the language.""
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Reader mode
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top