Chapter 126: Year Five - Chapter Twenty-Two
The concussion wasn't that bad. Honestly, I managed to get my name right, and remember the day, all the while doing my hardest to ensure no silly Devil Snare ended up gifted to Harry or me during our brief stay there. We had to wait until our guardians would be notified before checking out, but even so, it didn't mean we weren't free to walk a bit around the room.
I did have twitchy fingers, admittedly, but the fact was that I felt safer with my wand in hand than I did without it.
I might have thrown a bed pan as a deadly shuriken in the direction of the fool that opened the door with a sharp noise, but I also did redirect said deadly shuriken to plant itself halfway into the wall rather than neatly behead Sirius and Remus both in a combo-kill that would have probably seen me land in hot waters.
"H-Hey!" Sirius all but snapped, but I had my wand already pointed.
"Identification!" I nearly growled the words out. "Could be Polyjuice! I'm not taking chances with anyone coming through that door, so give me something only the real Sirius or Professor Lupin would know or I'm going to curse you seven ways to Monday and nine ways to Wednesday by the time I'm done!"
Sirius blinked, and looked towards Remus. "Mister Umbrus, your boggart is Headmaster Dumbledore's displeasure with you," Remus said.
"My animagus form is a big dog," Sirius said instead, "That enough to get you to bring the wand down?"
I narrowed my eyes, and then exhaled. "Guess so," I did lower the wand, and take a seat. "I'm keeping my eyes on you," I continued with a huff. Harry nervously laughed at that, but Sirius was already over him, checking for any signs of wounds and permanent disfigurement. When he found none, he exhaled in relief.
"What happened? How does one go from having lunch to getting into a fight with Dark wizards?" Sirius asked.
"I don't remember much of it," Harry muttered. "We went for lunch, then to buy groceries, and then a wall exploded?"
"Bombarda against the wall near us," I took the cue to answer. "They wanted us alive, or at least, they had to bring one of us back alive more than they had the other," I continued trying to sound calm. "The spell hit the wall, and everything exploded. They thought I was down for the count and so they neared. My Mantas got one," as I said that, and twitched my fingers, one of the Mantas left the safety of my robes to walk its way onto the palm of my hand. It flexed its tail and stared with its beady eyes upwards, glimmering ever softly of a pale, greenish fire. "The other tried to hit me with a couple of curses, but I managed to hold him off."
"That's-" Sirius muttered. "Then, Albus was right." He actually looked pained, all things considered.
Harry's expression took a turn for the sour. "I'd rather get kidnapped by dark wizards than end spending another summer with the Dursleys."
"Sure, who doesn't enjoy torture at the hands of the unforgivables," I dryly answered. "Or getting maimed, potentially killed, and whatever else a dark wizard can think of."
"That is no laughing matter, Mister Umbrus," Remus said, and I simply shrugged.
"I'm not laughing," I retorted. "The only thing you've got going for you is that I was there, but it was a hair's breadth thing we still didn't get captured. You'll need to charm up Grimmauld Place some more, make it safer." I glanced towards Sirius, "Perhaps get a Fidelius charm working."
"I'll speak with Albus about that," Sirius said, "It won't help if one's out, but at least it should make sleep easier," he grimaced, "If anything had happened to Harry-it's a good thing you were, Shade."
I wordlessly shrugged. Ironically, I did wonder why the attack had happened in the first place. Was this the best suitable moment? Why send only two Death Eaters and not a whole group of them? If they had send dozens, and then dozens more, we would have been caught with ease. They hadn't, thus either someone had lost an incredible amount of intelligence in his dastardly plan, or there had been something else at work there.
Whatever that something else was, I couldn't pierce through it. Maybe it had been an attempt, maybe it had been just a random event, perhaps these would have happened with or without Voldemort, a mere extension of Harry Potter's protection coming less. Crabbe wasn't the wisest of them all, and MacNair was a bloodthirsty man. Perhaps it was just two old, grudge-filled Death Eaters who now somehow found the way to hunt down Harry Potter, and decided to try.
Dumbledore arrived half an hour later, looking at us both with an unsettling combination of worried, and also displeasure. Whether it was for the situation at hand, or what would have to be done at a later date, I couldn't find out from his face alone.
"It appears something very wrong is going on," he said in the end, "though I suspect this will not make you feel any different, know that Mister Crabbe has died from blood loss. The healers could not save his life."
"I'm not really sorry," I said in turn. "He probably hurt a lot of people in the past war, and I don't think Azkaban's the solution for those like him."
"Crabbe?" Harry muttered. "You mean..."
"Crabbe Senior," I said. "I reckon if it had been Crabbe Junior and someone else from the gang of dunderheads, I might have captured them. Might have been able to, at least."
"It is the mean of his death that has me puzzled," Dumbledore said, "The wounds were deep, and bled copiously, but there were no traces of a curse or magic being used."
I sighed as I gestured at a Mantaguard to scuttle its way off my body and onto the floor. It looked peaceful, made of bright stone with a strange softness to its feature. Then, I snapped my fingers and the Gargoyle's stony exterior exploded into sharp spikes, steel fangs and the large stinger behind it rising like a miniature blade. The flaps were sharp on both edges, and spiky.
"It's a trigger within them," I said, "Though they do keep a soft underbelly to avoid puncturing me, they're taught to aim for specific points in a human body, like the arteries, the lungs, the heart and the neck." I tapped my knee, and the spiky Manta returned to its harmless stone state, scuttling back up to its fellow friends and diminishing in size until it could easily slip back within the sleeve of my robe.
"I've been working on my gargoyle making skills whenever I get the time, and since I'm away from my precious little Draghuls, I-"
"Mister Umbrus," Dumbledore spoke, and his voice was equal parts rough and yet determined, "You are not clearly expecting such attacks to happen at Hogwarts next year, are you?"
I blinked. "You'd rather I didn't bring them on my person back at school?"
"I prohibit you from doing such a thing," Dumbledore said instead, quite firmly. "It's a dangerous risk for all the other students involved. All it would take is a misstep, a single wrong thing, for them to believe they need to kill an innocent. What if one of your friends hopped on your back? Would that make them stab him? What if you were practicing in a duel, and forgot to remove them?"
"I don't wear them during school hours," I answered with a blink. "Only during Care for Magical Creatures, and that's because one needs all the help one can get when Hagrid decides that Manticores are cuddly beast that need snuggles!"
"Be it as it may," Dumbledore retorted, "Those gargoyles are a dangerous thing, which should be treated with proper care."
"That's all right then," I said. "I'll keep them somewhere safe, I also realized they're kind-of dangerous when the enemy goes with a Bombarda. I either need to get the Interceptor thing to work, or I'll have to shelf it all for the time being."
"The...the what? What is going here?" Sirius muttered, glancing from Dumbledore to me, and then backwards. "You can't be serious about this, Albus. He saved Harry with those things! If we had a dozen-"
"No, it's quite all right," I said instead. "He's right," I continued, a grimace on my face. "I need to further better the triggers, and as much as they're a functional prototype, I need to get them to work flawlessly before bringing them near children."
There was a small sigh of relief from the Headmaster himself.
Had he known my Interceptor was coming along swimmingly well, he might have not been so happy.
It wasn't my fault; whereas other people enjoyed their vacations, I couldn't help but tinker, and work.
I was, after all, Dumbledore Umbrus Shade...
...the incredibly tinkering Ravenclaw.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
OmnipresenceBeing
OmnipresenceBeing Like it ? Add to library！
Like it ? Add to library！
Like it ? Add to library！
Like it ? Add to library！
Like it ? Add to library！
Like it ? Add to library！
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone