Nick Kane
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Gateway 9
🕑 Added 2024-10-22 18:09:53 +0000 UTCI want to preface this chapter by thanking every one of you who subscribed, y'all are awesome!
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I kicked off to the closest source of chaos I could find and arrived almost instantly, although I may have to avoid going this fast in the future if possible, considering the crater I created and the fact everyone surrounding it fell down when I arrived, I might hurt someone by accident if I don’t.
When I started to look around, I barely paid attention to my dispatching of the black-cloaked cultist, instead paying attention to a middle-aged woman crying while clutching the limp body of a small child to her chest with the body of an elderly man lying in front of them.
By the time the others in her group got up to assist, I was already gone.
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My next target was a female cultist torturing a man, while a woman was tied up and crying over the scene.
I just kicked the cultist in her midsection without bothering to stop.
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I repeated that three more times, moving from one cultist to another while not paying attention to the people they were harming.
I’d already seen enough suffering for that day and gave up any thoughts of disabling them non-lethally when I saw that child’s body. Now, my goal was to minimize the damage they could do by maximizing the damage they received.
And that’s when I found what seemed to be the main attack force: four cultists levitating a non-magical family while five more surrounded them and cast curses at anyone daring to approach.
‘This… is a more complicated situation than I expected, although not unsurprising considering how little regard they’ve shown to the lives of others.’
What did surprise me was how uncontested they were, there were over ten thousand people in the campsite, and so few of them were fighting back that they were being outnumbered.
'What kind of pathetic society gives their children the ultimate weapon when they’re eleven and doesn’t bother teaching them to stand up for themselves or each other?'
It was while I was thinking that that I saw them, four redheaded men rushing towards the cultists, with Mr. Weasley leading the charge.
“Mr. Weasley!” I called, quickly approaching their group, still a ways away and out of sight from the cultists.
I was met with four wands pointed my way, the redheaded men suspiciously looking at me.
“Who are you!?” The one with glasses demanded.
“I’m Alex! From the portkey ride!” I said while raising my arms.
“Alex?” Mr. Weasley asked, recognition lighting in his eyes before shock and fear took over, his face turning white. “Are you alright? Where’s Xeno? Luna?”
I was confused by his panicked tone before it dawned on me, the blood. I was too busy dealing with the cultists to care about cleaning myself up from all the gore that got on me, or even noticing it altogether past the first man I hit.
“They’re fine! We were ambushed while leaving the wards but no one was hurt, I made sure they went home before cleaning out the cultists throughout the campsite, these are the last ones.” I quickly explained, indicating the group of cultists with my head.
“Dealt with?” The taller, long-haired Weasley started to say before shaking his head. “Doesn’t matter, we need a plan to deal with this.”
“Bill’s right.” Mr. Weasley said before turning to the stockier redhead of the group. “Charlie, you have the best restraining spells, how many of them can you catch at once?”
“From how they’re spaced? I’d say two, or three if we’re lucky.” Charlie replied.
Mr. Weasley nodded before turning to the one with glasses.
“Percy, how’s your levitating charm?” He asked.
“I can catch two of them.” Percy replied with a nod.
“And I can catch the other two,” Mr. Weasley nodded. “Bill?”
“I can deal with the two Death Eaters levitating them.” He said.
“And I’ll distract them all so you guys can do your parts.” I said with a smile.
“Alex, I don’t think this-” Mt. Weasley started.
“Relax old man,” I said, rolling my eyes at him before becoming serious. “The only reason I haven’t dealt with these ones like I dealt with the others is because they have hostages. So with you four taking them out of the equation, I can do my job.”
I looked the men in the eyes, pulling up every ounce of authority the mages back home said that I had.
“Now go position yourselves,” I commanded while turning to leave. “You’ll notice when I start.” I finished before kicking off and disappearing from their vicinity.
‘Heh, I always wanted to do that.’ I snorted at the thought as I got into position right behind the cultists.
It barely took a few moments before the Weasleys got into their positions, two on each side at a diagonal of the cultists’ path.
Seeing that, I kicked off the ground in a running leap towards the lone one covering the cultists' backs.
My landing was, explosive, but extremely effective in drawing attention. What little was left of the cultist showering his fellows thanks to my landing angle.
As the cultists turned to me, the Weasleys started their attack. I had just kicked off to go to the next cultist when he twisted himself away with a pop like Xeno did. This time, it’s almost like I can feel the direction he went.
I turned from the spot the cultist disappeared from to see the same happened to the others, even the ones I know Charlie and Bill had caught.
It was at that time that I heard multiple pops and the area around us was suddenly filled with people wearing red robes with their wands ready for combat.
I relaxed as I noticed one of them, a tall black man, approach the Weasleys to help with the non-magical family.
“Bloody hell!” I heard from behind me, I turned around just in time to see one of the red-cloaked wizards point his wand at me, he was standing just beside the remains of the cultist I flattened.
“You there! Hands where I can see them!” He ordered as I held my hands up.
Three other cops noticed what was happening and were quick to join their colleague.
I sighed internally, I could see where this was going.
I tried to think of an exit strategy: no floo or portkeys, I could probably run except I don’t even know where I am or where the Lovegood home is-
It’s when I think of the Lovegood home that it happens, the familiar feeling of The Door changing from the one I kept locked in place since I arrived here, my room’s door, to the entrance to the Lovegood home, which has an almost nonexistent cooldown.
‘I am a moron’ I thought. ‘Ever since I got here I never once thought of using my authority to travel around.’
Although it wasn’t entirely my stupidity at fault, apart from the fact I was using my room’s door as a countdown, I also never actually needed to use my authority ever since I got here, since the Floo worked just as well for what I needed.
Until now.
Finally letting out a breath I didn’t know I had been holding, I let my arms down and looked at the cop still making ever more frantic demands out of me.
“Yeah, I don’t think so.” I said before pushing the Door in my head open and instantly stepping inside the Lovegood home.
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As I stepped into the kitchen, Xeno was there, waiting for me with his wand in hand.
“Alex?” He asked, the tip of his wand subtly pointing in my direction.
“It’s me.” I replied.
It was all he needed to hear. His shoulders sagged in relief before he quickly approached me.
“What happened? Are you ok?” He questioned as stopped about a foot from me. Before he started casting cleaning spells at me.
“They’re dealt with, although some escaped by the end, and I’m fine.” I replied, finally fully relaxing.
“Good, good.” He said, still casting cleaning spells at me.
“Xeno, that won’t work.” I said while rolling my eyes at him.
“Oh! Yes, yes.” He sighed.
I turned around and stepped outside, moving to the side of the dirt path leading to the house.
“Come on, use the water-conjuring spell to help me clean up!” I said, taking out my shirt. “And how’s Luna? After all that she must be pretty shaken up.”
“She was pretty frantic when we arrived, so I gave her a dreamless sleep potion to help her have a full night of sleep and let her process what happened in the morning.” He explained while casting the spell at me.
I spent the next hour cleaning myself. Unfortunately, my clothes were unsalvageable, even with magic. Which was a bummer since it was the clothes I came here with, with all the others I’d been wearing being borrowed from Xeno.
After that, I sat down in the living room while Xeno worked. After I explained everything that happened after he left in excruciating detail he claimed he had a special edition to make, so we stayed together working on it deep into the night.
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By the time morning rolled around, I was sitting on the porch thinking over what happened, Xeno had gone to sleep a few hours before so I decided to enjoy the fresh air while I was at it.
The pile of cigarette butts that I vanished when the sun started rising had nothing to do with it.
I was wondering if the man who taught me the cigarette-conjuring spell had made it out ok when I heard light steps from inside, Luna.
I quickly get inside, where I find her just standing there in her pajamas. Her red, puffy eyes were a clear indication of how she was dealing with everything.
“Luna” I mournfully whisper, although not quietly enough as she suddenly is hugging me.
“Alex!” She cries as I hold her, letting out all the emotions she must have been holding onto since I woke her up last night.
I somehow maneuver us to a small nook in the kitchen, where there’s an armchair for us to sit comfortably.
We stayed that way for a while, me sitting in the armchair and she curled on my lap while softly crying on my chest.
It was after the point where she fell asleep after spending herself that Xeno woke up and, seeing our position quietly made some breakfast.
When breakfast was ready I quietly woke Luna up and led her to her usual seat.
The silence, contrasting heavily with the usual life and laughter in the kitchen while we ate, was broken by Luna.
“Daddy, are they back?” She asked in a small voice while staring at her plate.
“I don’t know Pumpkin.” He said, reaching over to hold her hand. “But if they are, they just received a massive blow in their opening move.”
Luna rose her head to look at him and, at his nod, turned to look at me.
“D-did y-you?” Her voice trembled as she asked. And even though she didn't elaborate, I understood.
“I did,” I confirmed and quickly moved on to preempt her crying. “This time things were much simpler though.”
“How?” She asked, her confusion over my nonchalance pushing the tears that were threatening to spill back, although her lip still trembled slightly.
“No one was really at fault in the Colosseum except Janus, the guards were just as confused as we were, and no one there was really trying to de-escalate the situation, so everything got out of hand.” I said. “But at the campsite? A bunch of evil people show up to cause chaos and directly threaten both of you? Ridiculously easy decision to make: remove them as a threat and make sure you’re alright.”
“I can’t say that I planned to go as far as I did,” I shrugged. “But I also can’t say I’m too bothered by those scum not being around anymore.”
She slowly nodded in understanding, although I knew it'd take a while for her to internalize it.
“Now, let’s do something to take your mind off things, I’m pretty sure the Weasleys will come around at some point today so we could get something ready for that.” I said with a smile.
It was a hesitant, small thing, but she managed to smile back, and as I led her out of the kitchen I noticed Xeno sighing in relief.
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A/N: One thing that always bothered me in fiction is the fact that children can watch and/or participate in the most fucked up shit imaginable and come out as if it didn't happen.
Well, not this time, Alex may be immune thanks to being the Campione but Luna isn't. I won't make the story revolve around it, but it's something that'll impact some characters and their interactions.
Again, thank you all for subscribing! It means a lot to me. I'll try and have the next chapter ready by the end of the week.
