Harry Potter 1. In Medias Res

**Author's notes: I had this idea years ago, but didn't write it up because the villains seemed a bit too OP to me, but the idea just kept bothering me; partly because Voldemort wasn't a good villain-anyways I read the books years ago, so OOC is going to be more due to that than me trying to get some result.**

**I'm bringing up this problem now in the hopes that maybe commenters/reviewers can give me ideas...**

**I wanted to make the conflict more interesting by creating a melee a trois with 3 different sides all fighting each other, with my new one based on 12 methods of nigh-invulnerability I realized were almost completely within the rules of the books, this was eventually cut down to the 2 shown here to make it more interesting. Although Roth is OP, I figured that''s okay because if a villain is OP then it makes their downfall all the sweeter.**

**But as I write more in the story I'm realizing the Melee a trois isn't going to happen, while the order of the phoenix would figure out how to get around their invulnerability without getting OOC-(attack the world around them); Voldemort just isn't, he would try to use stronger dark magic-like how he kept trying to use the killing curse rather than just getting a gun-which is going to have no effect. The way the most in character battle with Voldemort would play out is that my villain Jessica would walk up to him, ignoring the unforgivables being cast at her, bash his face in with a shovel, and leave.**

Roth looked on as Jessica created her doll. She started with a pouch she applied the Undetectable Extension Charm to, which she then very carefully flipped inside out. Then she applied transfiguration to the pouch to shape the whole thing into a likeness of herself, and applied a similar charm to what the vanishing cabinets used to connect it to herself. She very carefully shaped the doll, applying charms connecting it's body to her senses as she went-she always moved oddly when she started seeing through the doll's eyes rather than her own-until it was an exact likeness of herself, and Jessica appeared to have fallen asleep.

"You only took about an hour that time," Roth said to the doll, "how does it feel?"

"It feels like it's my real body already," Jessica replied, "connecting to the dolls gets easier each time."

Roth took the doll's hand and apparated them to outside of the target. He hated trying to get through anti-apparation charms, as apparation was the only technique he knew. If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail, but more importantly: if you hit anything hard enough it will break. And he practised his apperation for more than four hours each day.

They had chosen a well known pure blood family as their first target, it was their way of announcing to the wizarding world that they existed. Previous events had tipped everyone off, their attack at Hogwarts six months ago, their experiments on Diagon Ally that led to the red liquid four months ago, but no one really knew who they were. They stood admiring the ornamental grounds for a minute before Roth apparated past the anti-apparation charm, and into Malfoy Manor.

No one was around, so he dissapparated and reapparated onto the same spot; he side along apparated a section of the ground below him, and splinched the furniture standing on it apart for good measure, producing a satisfying crash. A house elf was the first to come in and notice them, quickly disappearing to tell it's master. Lucius was next to rush into the room, wand at the ready. He immediately yelled "Scum like you have no cause to be in my house!", maybe because Roth and Jessica always dressed like muggles. Regardless, he raised his wand and attempted to fire a spell, but Roth apparated in front of him, grabbing Lucius' arm with one hand-Roth considered splinching it off for a second, but that would be unnecessary-and upper-cutting with the other. He got a syringe full of ruby red liquid out of his jacket and prepared to inject it into Lucius.

"What are you doing? GET OFF OF HIM!" Yelled Narcissa, before casting a curse "_crucio_!" Jessica had intercepted it, it would have been torturous for a human, but had no effect on the doll. As Jessica charged at Narcissa, the latter tried many spells, _sectumsempra_, _levicorpus_, and even a fire spell, but all were intended for physical objects-and Jessica's use of the Undetectable Extension Charm made the skin of the doll a dimensional boundary, not a physical object (Author's note: I'm getting this idea from the _fiendfyre_ in book 7 not burning through the door of the Room of Requirement, or burning through the floor and falling, dimensional boundaries must not act like physical objects based on that)-so they had no effect. Jessica grabbed her and tried to hold her down as she struggled.

Roth proceeded to inject the solution into Lucius, who appeared to be having a seizure in response to the potion. Roth turned his attention towards Narcissa, who was panicking and begging: "take anything you want just leave my family alone!"

Narcissa's screams seemed to attract the young Malfoy, he started firing every spell he could think of at Jessica in an attempt to save his mother, but to no avail; he had tears in his eyes, seeing his mother in such a helpless state. She cried out "get out of here Draco!" as Roth apparated behind him and injected the potion into him.

Jessica meanwhile had gotten Narcissa under control and injected her, then she started looking for the house elf. Lucius appeared well enough to get up again, and tried to fire spells at them again, but this time no spells were produced at all. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME!?" he demanded.

"Not much," Roth finally spoke to him, "Just turned you into a muggle is all."

Lucius appeared deeply disturbed by this notion: "no, no you haven't, that's impossible," while trying to get his magic to work. But Roth knew it wouldn't. It never would again.

Jessica had found the house elf, she incapacitated it and injected the potion into it as well. It would not just lose it's magic, but the magic that made it subservient would fade into nothingness. Their task complete Roth and Jessica disapparated again.

They hoped wizards would come looking for them after that, it would be a lot easier than tracking them all down. Regardless, they had to free the people of the world from magic. By any means necessary.


	2. Attack on Christmas!

Author's note:this is really hard to write because the events have to be linearised in time, so I feel like everyone's OOC as an artefact of them having to take turns. Also the reason he's good at apparating rather than doing a different but similar technique is that I would never have thought to have spinning as part of the process, I just assumed the wizard just thought about it. And I realized that detail could add a lot of balance, as shown here. But yeah it does bother me that I'm violating continuity that way, but I couldn't help it once I realized the oft-unexplored tactical capabilities of apparition.  
\- 6 months earlier...

Harry awoke to the feel the warmth of the sun on his skin, as he drowsily looked around the dormitory he panicked for a second. No one was there: he was going to be late! He shot out of bed and was half dressed, and began wondering why Ron hadn't woken him up, before his half-asleep brain put together that Christmas break had already started.

Although with the sun as high as it was there was still a danger of missing breakfast. He rushed down to the common room and as he approached it he heard some of the faculty still speaking worriedly about the matter of Sirius Black... How had he gotten into the castle last month?

The topic changed as he entered the room, he supposed they didn't want him to know they were worried about the matter. He had wanted to talk to Lupin, but he wasn't there today, which wasn't uncommon, so he sat near Dumbledore and eagerly started serving himself some waffles. He was about to start a conversation with the headmaster when he realized the table had gone silent, and they were looking at something on the other side of the room. Harry could actually see Dumbledore's brain working, his pupils narrowed as he examined whatever it was.

When Harry looked over he saw an odd man with greyish blue skin, and black hair, he was muggle clothes in a way that suggested he was muggle-born. The man sighed and seemed annoyed, grumbling "I was hoping this place would be empty at this time of day..."

"How did you get in here?" McGonagall was the first to ask.

The man shrugged, "It's a legitimate question."

"Who are you? Are you with Sirius Black?"

The man thought for a second, before replying "I'm not sure, he could be useful, I guess it depends if he's really a Death Eater." Harry assumed he wasn't sure if Sirius was on his side, rather than not being sure who he was.

"What do you mean if he's really a Death Eater?" Harry asked.

"He went to jail without trial is what I mean. Didn't you know requiring a trial to be jailed is a muggle invention? Wizards are too full of themselves to bother with such things." Harry wondered how anyone could doubt that someone who had killed so many with so many witnesses was innocent.

The man looked around as he moved towards them, "hmm... the person I'm looking for isn't here, I'd better let them know where I am." As he said this two of the tables in the great hall cracked in half, long ways, collapsing with a loud bang. Harry felt very unsettled seeing this, he hadn't seen the man so much as draw a wand, let alone see a spell reach from him to the tables.

Dumbledore started looking at the tables, they looked like they had been cleaved with a knife, perpendicularly to where the man was standing. "How... from that angle?" he muttered, before focusing on the man, "what do you want?"

"Freedom," it was a simple reply. It was very irritating to see him dodge questions by ignoring the context, but Harry made a note to try that in the future.

"ENOUGH!" snapped Snape, pointing his wand at the grey man "who are you and who are you looking for?" Harry realized that he had pulled out his own wand too at some point, but he wasn't sure what he was planning to do with it.

The grey man flickered for a second before asking, "What happens if I don't tell you?" Trying to seem genuinely confused, idly spinning Snape's wand between his fingers. When did he do that? Harry wondered, getting more unsettled by this man, he wanted to run away, but he was already next to Dumbledore, what safer place could there be?

The grey man was half way to them as Filch entered the room, "What was that noise?" he demanded. The grey man's expression darkened upon seeing him, and Filch just... fell off of his knees, for lack of a better term, as if they had been sliced off. It would have been comical if it weren't for the blood spraying out from where his limbs disconnected. Dumbledore seemed to be looking over the ground between the two.

Professor Sprout rushed to him, yelling "I'll get him to Mrs. Pomfrey!" Snape tried to stop her, keeping his eyes on the grey man, but the man seemed to have no interest in this. It seemed like McGonagall had had enough of him as well, as she raised her wand and shot a spell at the man, as it got close to the grey man he seemed to flicker for a second, and the spell just passed through him. This was followed by several other spells with the same effect.

"Oh! Not a bad shot are you?" The grey man seemed quite amused.

Harry looked to Dumbledore, worried, it looked like Dumbledore had had an insight, as relief and triumph crossed his face for a second. Dumbledore pointed his wand at the ground and silently shot a spell from it, at the same time he grabbed Harry's wand and pointed it at the man with his other hand, beginning an incantation.

"AGH! FUCK!" Harry heard the grey man shout, he was now behind Dumbledore, with his hand gripping Dumbledore's arm as he collapsed, pulling Dumbledore down with him. Who bumped into the table which fell over and slid away comically, and Harry, bringing down the table and causing all involved to tumble and slide across the room.

Dumbledore said "that's called a fake," looking at the grey man, who was now cringing from the pain, he was doing a split with one of his knees bent at a wrong angle, and trying not to scream. Dumbledore shot another spell at the ground before getting up and rubbing his bruises.

As Dumbledore helped Harry get up, who was still too confused to deal with the situation, Harry exclaimed "Sir! shouldn't you focus on him?"

"No, I don't think he can do anything right now," came the reply, the grey man looked annoyed by this.

"Why?"

Before Dumbledore could answer someone asked "What just happened?" confusedly.

"Simple. I cast a charm that removed friction from the floor of the room, when that man apparated he slid out. If he can't spin round properly, then he can't apparate, and I'm pretty sure that's his only trick. Is everyone okay?" The grey man seemed too concerned with his leg to protest this.

"Apparating?" was the question several people asked in disbelief.

"Yes, apparating. I'm not sure how he's apparating in Hogwarts, but that's what he was doing. He apparated to next to Snape and stole his wand, then apparated back to his previous position, that's why we saw him flicker."

"You saw that?" The man interrupted, before grumbling "I must have underestimated how much anti apparation charms slow me down."

Dumbledore continued, "He also used side-along apparation to move a section of the floor and half of those tables a fraction of an inch above their previous position to split them." He pointed at the ground, "You can see the cracks in the floor where he moved it."

"Your as clever as they say aren't you?" the grey man inquired through a grimace, having almost gotten his legs back into a less painful position.

"No one can be as clever as they say I am," came the reply. "How were you apparating in Hogwarts?"

"I practice four hours a day," his reply was dripping with sarcasm, much to the annoyance of Dumbledore.

"Exactly four hours?" Harry asked, humouring him.

"Harry I don't think that-"

"Not every day..." the grey man started, then seemed to realize he said something he shouldn't have.

"Oh... I see?" Dumbledore began.

Suddenly a female voice shouted "I'm here Roth! Let's go!", as a young woman with jet black hair and piercing blue eyes dashed into the room, holding some kind of tiara. She was gorgeous in a way that Harry couldn't help but imagine her in ad for... something.

The professors drew their wands again, save for professor Flitwick, whose eyes widened as she stared at the tiara and said "the diadem..." The grey man-Roth?-cried out in pain as he began to do a handstand, Harry saw a small orange bottle fall out of his pocket while he did so. Once only his hands were touching the ground they both disappeared.

Harry seemed to be the only one who noticed the bottle; so he picked it up and read the label: 'Prozac'. Where had he heard of that before? It brought his aunt Petunia to mind, but he couldn't quite place it.


	3. The Medicine Bottle

After all the commotion Harry went off to find one of the elves, still not having had breakfast, as he thought about what had occurred. He made a note to find the anti-friction spell Dumbledore had used in the library, if he had known that last year he could have made the Basilisk slide past him and break it's skull against the wall. The thought of defeating that monster so easily made him chuckle a little; as did imagining the look on Hermione's face when she found out he went to the library over break.

He looked down at the bottle he was still carrying, he would have to give it to Dumbledore later, but all the professors were preoccupied, and he figured it could wait. Harry's first thought upon hearing Roth's name was how similar it sounded to 'wrath,' and had assumed it was a sort of fake name, like Voldemort, that dark wizards came up with for themselves to sound scary. But judging by the bottle that really was the man's name.

He realized he had gone too far, and was going away from the kitchens at this point, and had to turn around again. His memory wasn't telling him much beyond "somewhere below the great hall," and he hadn't brought the marauder's map with him.

Thinking back to what happened, what disturbed him most was how the man had attacked Filch like that, Harry certainly didn't like Filch, but as a squib Filch was essentially helpless. He remembered Ron had told him squibs get discriminated against, but the man had also called wizards full of themselves; why would he say that if he had something against squibs? "What do you keep pacing around here for?" A painting asked, interrupting his train of thought.

"Err.. I was just looking for the way to the kitchens..."

"Hmph..." The painting rolled his eyes, "Head back the way you came until you find a painting a of a fruit bowl, tickle the pair and it will let you into the kitchens."

"Thank you!" Harry waved back to the painting as he ran off, he soon found the painting and tickled the pair. He was a bit surprised when the pair laughed and turned into a knob; he had been expecting it to just swing open like the painting of the Fat Lady.

There were only about a dozen elves in the kitchens, cleaning the dishes from the breakfast that was. Harry started to feel guilty upon seeing them, wondering idly why they didn't just use a washing machine. Hermione had once said that machines don't work properly in magical places, but Ron had a radio at home, and the car was a machine...

They started to take notice of him: all either bowing or curtseying upon seeing him. "Err... do just you lot serve the entire student body?"

"No, some of us were told to help clean up after something happened upstairs, but many were recruited to search the castle again." The response remove most of the weight Harry was feeling, "Did Sirius Black return?" The elf inquired, several of them looked worried at the mention of his name. Harry could imagine where they were coming from, the idea of all Voldemort's followers treating the elves as poorly as Dobby turned his stomach.

"No he didn't, someone else came in and destroyed breakfast before I got any." Harry started wondering if Siruis Black had apparated in, he hadn't considered it before, as Hermione was so adamant that it wasn't possible. But then he realized that attacking the Fat Lady wouldn't have made sense: he could have just apparated past her. Hagrid had once said that Hogwarts was the most secure place in the wizarding world, the idea that dark wizards had ways they could ignore those measures and force their way in wasn't one he wanted to dwell on. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."

"Can I get you anything?" The elf repeated itself.

"Err... pumpkin soup?" Harry started, before remembering his manners, "please?" The additional word changed the elf's demeanour from being eager to please to being thrilled. The elf was surprisingly quick at producing the requested soup, he thanked the elf as he took the soup, who beamed in response. He quickly wolfed down the soup, worried he was in their way, and made sure to thank them again as he handed it back. "Do you want any help cleaning up?" He asked.

The elves seemed taken aback at this, and insisted they didn't need any. Harry apologised to them as he dashed off, he wondered if Lupin would be well enough to speak to him today. He had to slow down a bit when he saw Filch coming the other way. "Filch, you have both your legs!" he started.

"What's it to ya?" Filch glowered at him, he wasn't sure why he felt bad after seeing Roth attack anymore. Harry wouldn't be surprised if he got called a liar and punished if he admitted he felt sorry for Filch.

"I was just worried: what would happen to Mrs. Norris without you?" Harry lied, like most students he'd considered punting that cat across the room. Filch looked almost touched by the comment, his glare softening considerably.

"Well... I'm sure someone would take her in...", he looked down to where Mrs. Norris was, if Harry didn't know better he'd say Filch looked loving.

"Sir, do you know who that man, Roth, was?"

"Yeah, I remember Roth, he came here about fifteen years ago; he was a real piece of work. At first he refused to go to potions class because it wasn't clean. Before long he was late for every class: took convoluted routes to get there, said if we went right to class the number of steps would be wrong. After about a month after that I found him rearranging the paintings," he reported grumpily. "Of course back in those days, we could use all manner of punishments on the students, I had him flogged, transfigured, even held up with thumbscrews for a night; he always behaved even more outlandishly afterwards. Felt entitled I guess; got kicked out before his first semester ended because he wouldn't behave."

"Thank you, sir." Harry left Filch and started heading back to the common room. He thought back to his uncle Vernon complaining about a man at the office, who never did any work, and just washed his hands all day. His aunt called the behaviour OCD, but they both agreed it was just an excuse for him to be lazy. Harry reasoned that if the Dursleys spoke of something that disparagingly, it must be a real problem. He wondered if that was why Roth apparated often enough to get that good at it.

It took a few minutes of struggling with the knight before he was let through the door. Once in his room he started three letters: two to Ron and Hermione describing the events of the day, and one to Roth, which had no contents, no signature, just Roth's name, and had the orange bottle attached to it. He debated with himself for an hour before sending it, but ultimately: he couldn't keep medicine from someone, it didn't matter who they were, or who they turned out to be.


End file.

Harry Potter, Adventure