Chapter 28: Year Five (III)Summary:Voldemort and Holly escalate their mental fight, the effects of sleep loss begin to pile up, Holly deals with the cost of her decisions, and meets her match.
Notes:I'm not sure if I'll be able to post next month, my semester isn't going well and college is absolutely kicking my ass. Depends on how much writing I get done over spring break.
Edit: Just realized that one of my professors assigned a major project deadline for right after break. So sorry, but that's going to take up a ton of my time.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter TextSleep loss is an insidious thing. Under normal circumstances it was harmless. Hogwarts implicitly required it thanks to their (pointless) astronomy classes at midnight.
But these weren't normal circumstances.
Over the summer, when Adult Tom attacked her mind nonstop for ten days, she hadn't suffered too badly. Sure, it was a miserable and painful experience, but she'd acclimated to the constant pain. Meditation, naps, and potions dulled the worst of it. It worked then and she forced Adult Tom to back off.
After that failed he'd switched tactics to random attacks. His nonstop attack felt like a drill boring against her head; now, at any random moment, she felt like she was being stabbed in the forehead with a molten knife. The unpredictability made it worse since it stopped her from being able to brew potions; potions that, until then, had relieved the worst of it.
Despite that, she'd known even then that it'd get worse- he wasn't disrupting her sleep schedule with his attacks yet. Adult Tom wasn't stupid. She knew he'd figure it out sooner than later.
That day had arrived, Holly knew, when she was forced awake in the middle of the night feeling like her brain was on fire.
It hadn't even been a week since she'd attacked his mind!
She hadn't taken advantage of his weakened mindscape because she'd wanted to sort through the memories she'd stolen; something she was regretting now.
Could he really have repaired his mindscape already? Or was he reckless enough to lash out without protecting his mind first?
'Only one was to find out' Holly thought, and sank into her own mindscape.
---
Standing on her mindscape's metaphysical outer wall overlooking their mental connection, Holly was finally about to 'see' what Adult Tom's mental attack looked like.
'Or not,' she thought, as she was immediately forced to cover her eyes with her not-arm.
Conjuring eye goggles on her avatar, Holly looked around.
Adult Tom's attack had taken the form of a sandstorm. Her mental wall was blocking most of it, but the fierce winds still managed to blow across the ramparts.
That… was probably a bad sign. Maybe it was the metaphysical representation for her not being able to completely block out the pain?
Whatever it was meant to represent, clearly she needed to reinforce her defenses further. Especially with how she could see sections of the metaphysical wall being worn down by the wind. That was certainly a bad sign.
Interestingly, she didn't see an avatar of Adult Tom attacking, but felt his attention or perhaps his awareness within the not-sandstorm. That wasn't surprising. Holly herself had gotten the idea of using an avatar from video games.
As for as she knew, 'normal' mental attacks took two forms: using brute force to completely overpower someones defenses – like Adult Tom's metaphysical sandstorm – or were precision strikes, where the attacker found a weak point in the defender's defenses and forced their way in there.
Neither of those methods, however, accounted for having a mental link between the two.
No form of metal defense or offense did.
The most obvious effect of the link was that they could use it to attack each other's mind no matter the distance. Their very souls were connected after all. There was no escape; no breaking it.
The link also changed their mindscapes at a basic level.
Normally, the outer defense of someone's mindscape was just that: an outer defense . It was the boundary between a person's mind and the nothingness beyond. An attacker couldn't (metaphysically) sit outside it and observe their defenses with conjured binoculars from afar like Holly had done to Adult Tom.
That was another difference: conjuring metaphysical objects outside your own mind was normally impossible. It was supposed to only be possible within your own mindscape. Because of that limitation it was normally limited to building your mindscape's structure and defenses.
Holly, and Adult Tom once he realized it, could conjure things inside each other's minds due to the mental spillover the link created.
Unfortunately, the ability grew weaker the further they were from their own mind or else Holly would have conjured enough not-plastic explosives to vaporize Adult Tom's mindscape.
Then there was the link itself acting as a metaphysical open road between their minds. Not only that but it could be used as something of a staging ground. If Holly wanted, she could conjure a column of tanks just outside her mindscape and have them drive over to attack Adult Tom's mind.
Actually… why hadn't she done that already? Saving that idea for later, Holly focused her attention on reinforcing her defenses.
Sometime later the not-sandstorm suddenly fell back. Instead of going back to sleep Holly began conjuring a metaphysical army into being.
---
Creating her army took longer than she expected despite using the Diadem- nearly a week's worth of free time.
The only reason she wasn't upset with herself is because Adult Tom's hadn't let her sleep more than a few hours at a time since she'd started. Her accumulated sleep loss, combined with needing to stop and repel Adult Tom's attacks, training with Hermione, and attending her classes, had distracted her enough to considerably slow her progress.
Or so she assumed. She didn't exactly have a standard control group she could compare herself to. Maybe if she taught Hermione they could-
'Stop getting distracted, Holly' she told herself, 'it's time to attack.'
With that Holly mentally commanded her conjured army to start moving down the metaphysical road towards Adult Tom's mind. In perfect synchronicity a column of not-tanks, crewed by conjured soldiers, started rolling forwards. Behind them Holly heard the metaphysical engines of her not-bomber squadrons start as they took off into the air.
Holly's avatar was, naturally, manning the turret on the lead tank.
'This should be enough to seriously damage Adult Tom's mindscape again. Maybe even enough to destroy it so I can break and steal more memories.'
'Hopefully it'll catch him off guard too. I doubt he's expecting me to launch a major attack out of nowhere like this. I've only attacked him while he's been distracted leading attacks before.'
That was the only change in the last week: Adult Tom had changed his attack's targets. Instead of leading attacks against magical targets, now he exclusively led attacks against non magical targets. Suburbs, tube stations, business districts, and apartment blocks were destroyed and covered up as freak disasters. Since no wizards were being targeted any Order or Ministry response was inevitably too slow to respond.
It seemed like he didn't want to risk getting into a serious fight if he knew Holly could sabotage him.
The worst part is that the attacks – which certainly had killed at least several hundred already – only received small mentions in the papers. Apparently people being massacred was hardly worth mentioning if they didn't have magic.
Holly hated it. Hated wizarding societies' collective superiority complex, made even worse because they didn't have the self awareness to realize how much wizard's depended on normal people for survival.
Hermione, anytime she saw the paper and how dismissive people were of the attacks; how relieved people were that Adult Tom changed targets, turned into rage and fury incarnate.
The first time someone implied they didn't care if Adult Tom targeted normal people, Hermione cursed the boy to vomit shit for hours.
The second time Hermione cursed the upperclassman girl with permanent bald spots and branded 'Muggle Genocide Supporter' to her forehead.
The third time Hermione got creative with partial human transfiguration and the whole group needed to get treated at st. Mungos.
Nobody talked about it around Hermione again after that.
(Even Holly was… concerned . Hermione was a ball of suppressed rage, ready to lash out at anyone for saying the wrong thing. Thankfully she spent most of her time distracted by classes or worrying over Holly, but if Hermione was left alone… Holly wouldn't be surprised if she ended up killing someone for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and place.
Holly would help her cover it up of course, but that didn't mean she supported it. Not when it'd be so easy to get caught. Not if they were still too young to know better. Not when it didn't serve a purpose.
So Holly kept Hermione close where she was too distracted fretting to be angry. It was sorta like that famous phrase, only not. More like 'Keep your friends close, and your potentially murderous best friend even closer.'
That didn't exactly roll off the tongue but Holly didn't have the spare brainpower nowadays to think of something catchier.)
Holly knew Adult Tom changed focus to attacking normal people because he was avoiding fights, but a childish part of her hoped it was because she'd stolen his memories of most of his supporters' names, so he was trying to relearn them away from any enemies who'd notice his mistakes.
Imagining Adult Tom trying to order his minions around while desperately covering up the fact he didn't know their names never failed to make her smile.
His supporters were pureblood supremacists that highly valued their family names; they'd be offended if Adult Tom forgot their prized incestuous lineages. Or maybe not. Who knows what goes on in the mind of cultists?
Caught up in her thoughts, the trip to Adult Tom's island mindscape seemed alarmingly quick.
Holly was pulled out of her thoughts as the not-tank jolted, the metaphysical road meeting the rocky outcropping overlooking the not-ocean of Adult Tom's outer mindscape.
Looking closer, Holly almost immediately saw the defensive upgrades Adult Tom made to his mindscape. Raising her not-binoculars, Holly looked closer.
A swarm of not-dragons flew circles over his island mindscape; in the water, massive dark shapes moved beneath the surface; the not-walls circling the island had masked not-Death Eaters patrolling them. Even the not-castle atop the hill had changed, it looked less ornate and more practically defensive.
That… wasn't good.
It seemed like he'd spent every free minute this week conjuring himself an army too.
Attacking now would be tougher than she'd hoped. Unfortunately, she could feel his attention focusing on her, could see his not-dragons breaking their pattern to intercept her not-bombers. It was too late to turn back and go unnoticed.
Holly launched her attack.
Rows of not-tanks fired. Not-bombers' turrets filled the sky with not-tracer rounds as their not-bombs fell. Not-dragons roared in fury and pain. Massive not-tentacles emerged as the leviathans attacked.
Almost immediately the sky was filled with dead not-dragons and flaming not-bomber wrecks as they fell en mass from the not-sky; smoke, tracer rounds, and falling debris ruined visibility; cannon-fire, explosions, and dragon's roaring deafened her.
It was chaos like Holly had never before seen.
Holly didn't know how long it lasted; she was so overwhelmed by the chaos she was almost crushed by a not-leviathan tentacle aiming for her not-tank. She managed to dive away, but not fast enough since her right not-foot was crushed.
It hurt. A single thought healed the damage to her avatar, but it couldn't erase the phantom pain.
Looking at her remaining forces, Holly could see necrotic not-bodies slowly emerging from the not-water as they started climbing up the not-cliffside. Because of course Adult Tom would put not-inferni in the not-water of his outer mindscape.
Holly really should've expected that.
Seeing the not-inferni, the best course of action was obvious.
'Time to retreat,' she mentally ordered as she ran towards a nearby not-tank. Several not-tanks and not-bombers continued their attack to serve as distractions while the rest, with Holly leading them, fell back towards her own mindscape.
When they were at a safe distance pulled out her not-binoculars again to inspect the damage. Or, what she could see of it considering the not-smoke still filling the air.
'Oh damn, looks like I fell back at the right time' she thought, immediately seeing the still growing swarm of not-inferni swarming her remaining not-tanks. With a thought she directed her few remaining not-bombers towards them, blowing most of them to bits.
'Looks like nearly all his dragon constructs were killed, his inferni swarm was exposed and decimated, and I bet at least some of the not-bombs landed on his inner mindscape too. But it cost me the majority of my forces.'
'Seems like an inconclusive fight. Or maybe slightly in my favor? Or possibly a complete failure since I showed him a new way to attack me?'
Either way, she was exhausted both physically and mentally without much to show for it. Plus she still had to go to all her classes today.
Good times.
---
After (barely) managing to stay awake through the days' classes, Holly took Hermione back to the Room and told her what happened.
She… didn't seem to take it too well. Holly understood, she wasn't happy how inconclusive it was either.
For some reason mentioning that caused the Room to summon several fire whiskeys and (even more) thick pillows around Hermione.
Was the Room glitching? It was supposed to summon what you wanted but Hermione didn't need to disinfect any wounds. Maybe she should start studying the Room to make sure it wasn't breaking. Holly did not want to know what'd happen to them if the magically expanded space collapsed with them in it.
Holly said as much out loud and it seemed Hermione agreed because she shoved her face into a pillow and started screaming into it. Holly gave her a couple supportive shoulder pats.
---
Not even a day later Holly was already rebuilding her decimated metaphysical army.
In hindsight, she realized she'd shown her hand far too early. Now Adult Tom would use her idea for himself, increasing the effectiveness of his attacks against her.
The secret was out and Holly would have to deal with the consequences.
---
Like she'd expected, it wasn't long until Adult Tom struck back.
In the middle of professor Flitwick's lecture Holly felt her head explode in pain. Not the usual 'getting stabbed in the forehead' feeling; it felt like her head was burning from the inside out while simultaneously being crushed.
That… wasn't a good sign.
Abruptly standing up, Holly muttered some excuse and hurried out of the classroom before anyone could stop her.
'I have to get to the Room,' she thought. 'I need the Diadem.'
Holding the wall for support, she started moving forwards. One foot in front of the other. She could do this. She would.
The alternative was death; that was unacceptable.
The Room wasn't that far away, she could-
"Not so arrogant are you now, Potter?" Looking up (when had she looked down?) she saw a small group of older Slytherins sneering at her. "The so-called Girl-Who-Lived can't even stand up! How could anyone think you could fight the Dark Lord?"
"He ordered us to kill you but I don't see why he bothered. You look like you're about to fall over and die anyways!"
Holly, if she was able to form coherent thoughts, would have been insulted.
Did Adult Tom seriously think these idiots could kill her? Yes, she was in a debilitating amount of pain and they had suspiciously good timing, but did he really think she'd roll over and die to them? That she'd let herself die before Adult Tom and his cultists were dealt with?
Just as she was about to attack the laughing group she heard a familiar voice shout "Holly!" and heard footsteps running closer.
"So the mudblood bedwarmer came to help. Just when I thought you-"
Ignoring them, Holly attacked. Flicking a finger, Holly tried to wandlessly tried to throw them into the wall.
Keyword being tried - she only succeeded in knocking them over. Thankfully Hermione was already throwing stunners to knock them out. Flicking her wand into her hand, she and Hermione managed to stun and restrain them all before they could properly fight back.
Soon as the fight was over Holly lurched forward, blood freely dripping from her nose.
Holly blinked; Hermione suddenly was right next to her with Holly's arm slung over her shoulders.
"We need to get you to the Hospital Wing Holly! Maybe Madam Pomfrey can-"
"No hospital wing. Need the Diadem." Holly's eyes were barely open but she could feel Hermione give her a Look. That didn't make sense: she was suffering from a mental attack and the Diadem would help her repel it. It was that simple. Was she missing something?
Whatever, she could ask Hermione later.
"Going into my mindscape now."
"Wait, Holly!" Was the last thing she heard before she opened her avatar's eyes, standing atop her mindscape's outer wall.
An outer wall that was currently crumbling under the onslaught of several massive not-basilisks and hordes of not-giants. Judging how behind them she could see countless not-giant corpses littering outside the wall it was clear her defensive conjured army hadn't gone down without a fight.
'Well, first things first' she thought, and conjured a not-rooster into non-existence.
It might have been influenced by how furious the last rooster Holly met was because it immediately crowed and started pecking her avatar's hands. Job complete, Holly tossed it away to watch the not-basilisks scream their death throws as they flailed in pain.
Flailing that her crumbling outer wall couldn't handle as it finally collapsed as the dying not-basilisks fell on it.
The not-giants roared and pounded their chests as they ran forward; straight into Holly's inner garrison of not-tanks. The not-tanks, finally able to fire without the wall blocking them, open fired, cutting down the front row of not-giants.
Holly herself was forced to jump off the wall before it collapsed, retreating towards her remaining forces while frantically conjuring more.
'This is my mindscape,' she reminded herself, 'I'm the one that can endlessly conjure more, not him.' Despite that, Adult Tom's not-army seemed endless.
Tanks, Holly could see, were not meant for melee range. They were great at killing not-giants from afar, but once they closed the gap they were almost useless. The not-giants' skin was too thick for her not-soldiers guns too, but thankfully that didn't stop them from targeting the not-giants' eyes.
Behind the not-giant shock troops Holly could see hoards of faceless not-Death Eaters, not-inferni, and transformed not-werewolves.
Mercifully, she couldn't see any conjured dementors. Thankfully it seemed Adult Tom wasn't insane enough to conjure unkillable, soul sucking abominations inside his own mind.
If this wasn't her own mind, Holly would cast fiendfyre at the army and be done with it. But considering fiendfyre was capable of destroying souls, using it inside her mind would be a terrible idea. Instead, Holly concentrated as she willed a sea of spikes into metaphysical existence, impaling the approaching not-army.
Her lapse in awareness meant she didn't notice when a not-giant got close enough to smack her avatar with the not-tank it was carrying. Holly, or rather her avatar, went flying backwards until she crashed into rubble, turning into a not-pile of shattered bones and bloody flesh on impact.
The pain was indescribable .
Fear wasn't the mindkiller, this all-consuming pain was.
It was all that existed for some immeasurable moment until Holly willed her avatar back to health. The phantom pain lingered but she powered through it.
Forcing her not-self upright, Holly took the shaky break to survey the not-battle. The not-giants were still raging, nearly all of her defenses proving ineffective at close range. The crowd of not-Death Eaters and not-Inferi she had impaled were still stuck in place, but that didn't stop Adult Tom's reinforcements from climbing over the corpses to join the fight.
She needed to conjure herself reinforcements fast or she'd be overrun soon. If they got past here into her inner mindscape… Sure, her inner mindscape was an endless labyrinth that didn't even lead to where she stored her memories, but she hadn't designed it to handle this many foreign invaders at once!
She needed a way to beat the not-giants; everything else was fodder. She needed to think bigger…
Holly facepalmed. This was a metaphysical reality, nothing was limited to being its true size.
Focusing on her avatar, Holly willed it to grow not-giant sized. It was strangely difficult and made her not-vision go fuzzy, but Holly soon found herself not-giant sized. A second burst of concentrated effort made an equally massive not-rifle appear in her arms.
With bullets conjured from willpower and spite Holly screamed her defiance as she open fired.
---
Looming over the wrecked battlefield over her outer mindscape, Holly didn't breathe a sigh of relief. She didn't feel triumph for beating Adult Tom back. Wasn't upset with herself for letting his attack do so much damage.
All she felt was strangely emotionally numb. It seemed her mind was too tired to feel much of anything.
She'd felt the Diadem being put on her at some point, but even with that boost she'd all but reached her limit.
She was utterly exhausted.
Her mental defenses were in tatters. Adult Tom was undoubtedly going to attack again before she could properly recover. If that particular attack didn't work he'd simply repeat the process until it finally worked.
She'd be sealing her defeat if she let Adult Tom keep the initiative.
She needed to damage him in turn. Something that could maximize damage with the last dregs of energy she had left. Or maybe the right term was 'magic?' Or 'willpower?'
Eh, whatever it was, Holly's fuel tank was damn near empty.
But how could she strike back? Her conjured army was annihilated, she was beyond exhausted, and Adult Tom's defenses were untouched. She'd need something relatively small but extremely damaging. Long ranged too.
Well, there was an obvious choice, but, well, a nuke would be her absolute last resort. The very literal (metaphysical) nuclear option. That meant she'd have to do the next best thing.
Glancing at her still not-giant sized hand, Holly willed an equally massive hand grenade into not-being.
Turning towards Adult Tom's mind, she looked down the mental link.
It… was sort of like standing at the end of a bridge on a foggy day and trying to see the other end. Difficult, but possible under the right circumstances.
Maybe.
Holly was too tired to care about the accuracy of her metaphors at the moment.
All she cared about is that she could vaguely see Adult Tom's island mindscape in (metaphorical) distance.
Pulling the hula-hoop sized not-pin, Holly lunged, throwing the massive not-grenade like an American football player. She watched as it arced through the not-sky, eventually disappearing into a speck.
Holly may have dozed off for a second. One second there was nothing, next there was a massive not-explosion in the distance. It was slightly off target but judging from the size of the not-explosion, it should have still damaged Adult Tom's not-castle fortress.
Hopefully that would buy her some time.
Time that wouldn't matter if she wasted it sleeping without repairing her mental barriers first.
Fortunately, she had a Brilliant Idea for that. The fact she'd gotten it from Adult Tom only made it better.
Shrinking back down to her normal size, Holly used the barest scraps of energy she had left to do something she should've done after her first mental attack: Holly willed a construct of herself into being.
One second there was nothing but an empty battlefield, the next Holly was face to face with a mirror of herself.
'Weird.' She thought, 'I never noticed my-'
"Go to sleep already" Construct-Holly said without prompting. "I'll fix this place up better than ever."
"Bold words from somebody five seconds old."
"Five words: Star Wars force field generator." Well shit, that was a damn good argument and they both knew it.
"Don't forget the air defenses."
"Of course."
"And something heavy hitting for future not-giants."
"Naturally."
That.. was everything she could think of in her deteriorated state. Except-
"I'm not going to go full Skynet while you're asleep."
"Sounds like something Skynet would say." Construct-Holly raised a single eyebrow and gave her a condescending look.
(Was that really what she looked like when she did it?
…
Eh, she could check later after sleeping.)
"You created me to automate protecting your mindscape while you're not here. That's my purpose, my sole reason for existing. Harming you, Prime, would violate that."
Holly could sort out how accurate that was later. Would sort that out later, assuming Construct-Holly wasn't lying.
"You're claiming you don't have the autonomy to rebel? Sounds like something a true A.I. in hiding would say."
"Bitch please, you're in such bad shape I could've already kicked your ass and replaced you as the real Holly Potter if I wanted to."
"I could totally-" Construct-Holly, the traitorous bitch, walked up and poked her not-forehead, making Holly stumble and flail her not-arms to keep her balance. "Ok, maybe you have a point."
"Of course I do, I'm you. Or, we're us?" They both paused at that, each thinking it over for a second before giving up. "I don't know, get out of here already."
Relenting to her (obviously imperfect) mental copy, Holly closed her avatar's eyes and drifted back to her real body.
---
Her real body, it turned out, wasn't in great shape either.
Trying not to choke, Holly spat blood out of her mouth and smiled at Hermione. The other girl seemed pretty worried, so Holly tried to comfort her friend.
"It's all good, I won."
Or, that's what she tried to say. For some reason the words didn't seem to come out right, so Holly settled for smiling at her friend.
Judging from Hermione's expression and the renewed babbling it didn't help for some reason.
Before Holly could say anything else she sneezed, tried to blink, and fell asleep before she could open eyes again.
Notes:Holly vs the wannabe assassins this chapter
Holly and Voldemort's relationship summarized
Holly's brilliant idea, pictured
Anybody have a good idea wheat to name Not-Holly? I have a working name but I'm sure ya'll can easily come up with something better. My only qualifiers for the name are: (1) its short; (2) ideally similar, but won't be confused with Holly; (3) time period accurate; and (3) its a pop-culture reference or acronym.
And yes, the moral/ethical/existential issues of mentally duplicating yourself completely went over both Holly and Not-Holly's heads. Holly's struggling? Clearly the solution is more Holly. Granted, Not-Holly isn't exactly a duplicate of Holly, more of a Holly-flavor (barely) limited AI antivirus program.
Other detail you might have noticed: Holly hasn't once said the term "muggle" this fic, instead saying "normal people" or something similar. This is intentional: Holly has never bought into the wizard-centric worldview nearly everyone else has. She knows wizards are a tiny fraction of the global population, that makes them the weird ones, not everyone else.
Chapter 29: Year Five (IV)Summary:Holly continues to deteriorate further as war rages on, Chekhov's Gun pops up yet again, an Informant fails a stealth check, Deals are offered, and a Grove is visited.
Notes:Hey people, rumors of this fic's death have been greatly exaggerated. Writing this was way, way harder to than I thought it'd be and I struggled, overthought it, lost confidence in what I'd written, and wasted way too waiting for a breakthrough instead of actually writing. It wasn't fun. I'll spare you the details but I'm doing much better now.
Heads up to old readers, I've added a bunch of tags because things are getting pretty dark. Also decided on a theme song for my post-resurrection Voldemort, I Can Do Anything/Finale by Christopher Lennertz (Spotify link, youtube video NSFW)
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text"Have you ever thought about what wizards achieve if they really tried?" Holly asked, staring at the Room's everchanging ceiling. "Like, if they weren't inbred idiots, do you think they could've already had a moon colony?"
"Possibly," a nearby Hermione answered without looking up from her book.
"Think about it, Hermione, we could be living on the moon. Or in space! We could reenact Star Wars! I already made that Force Choke spell and I bet I could make a lightsaber if I tried! We-"
"Holly," Hermione interrupted, finally looking up, "I think you should be trying to catch up on sleep instead of daydreaming about reenacting Star Wars. Sleep loss is making you scatterbrained."
"I'm not scatterbrained." The war must really be getting to Hermione, she was making more and more comments like that recently. Sure, Holly was perpetually exhausted, but that was fine.
Holly was fine. This situation was temporary, she could manage. Would manage.
Had to manage.
"Last Defense class you kept calling your dueling partner variations of 'incompetent' and jinxed him until he cried."
"He said he could beat me." That it had taken him about two seconds before he realized he was outclassed was irrelevant. "Besides, Sirius shouldn't have separated us in the first place."
"Cormac McLaggen is an arrogant braggart, you should've known better."
"Who's that?" At Hermione's Look she put it together. "His name's Cormac? What kind of a name is Cormac? Who names their kid that? Fucking wizards-"
"Holly," Hermione interrupted again, "you're getting off topic. We were talking about you being scatterbrained."
"I am not!" For some reason Hermione didn't seem to believe her. "What did you tell me to do again?"
"...Just take a nap or work on your occlumency already."
"Fine, fine" she muttered and closed her eyes to sink into her mindscape.
-
In the weeks since Adult Tom's first major offensive, her mindscape had been transformed. Gone were the days of Holly needing to consciously conjure all of her defenses, most of that was handled without her conscious input by Construct-Holly.
Her construct-self named Mads, short for Mental Attack and Defense System.
(They'd had a fierce debate over Mads potential name. Originally Mads wanted to be called Artoo because "he saves everyone's asses behind the scenes" but accepted Holly's counterargument that it would make discussing Star Wars confusing. Holly suggested the name Aqua, stylized from abbreviating Holly 2.0, but Mads argued she wasn't a true copy of Holly.
After much debate they settled on Mads, shrugged at each other, and figured it was good enough.)
"Prime!" Mads called out, waving Holly over to her strategy table.
That was the biggest change Mads had made: her outer mindscape defense was a proper military base now. There was a distinctly Star Wars themed command center, complete with a holographic table monitoring the battlelines. She'd created a proper radar system, artillery support, missile air defense system, and X-wing fighter squadron; all under the protection of an invisible forcefield straight from star wars.
Beyond the heavily fortified wall, the mental link connecting her mind to Adult Tom's was still visible, only now it looked like a scene from the battlefields WWI. The link's once flat road was filled with blast craters, trenches, and defensive embankments dug into the not-ground. Even now Holly could hear artillery firing and armies clashing in the distance.
And manning the base and fighting on the front lines? More constructs of Holly.
They were similar to Mads in that they didn't have true independence, but with less even autonomy and no sentience. Essentially Holly-shaped drones, which is what gave them their catchy name: Clone Drones. They had all her knowledge, but lacked her raw power and a true sense of self.
It was still a bit weird being surrounded by dozens of herself but she was getting used to it.
"How's the fighting going?" Holly asked Mads once she approached the strategy table. Holly could see the holographic table displaying the battlelines but that couldn't give a proper summary.
Accepting a drink from an assistant drone Holly, Mads started her briefing.
"We regained the ground we lost after Adult Tom's last offensive with the nundu swarm, but it was a distraction so he could put a forcefield around his mindscape. Looks like it's based on Hogwarts wards so we can't bring it down without serious effort."
That… was pretty bad news. Her airforce and artillery would be handicapped for the foreseeable future. Holly herself would probably need to personally help bring it down too. Or maybe not. Holly wasn't sure what the real Hogwarts wards were capable of, let alone a metaphysical imitation of them.
"How's the reserve troop buildup going?"
"Not great," Mads admitted. "I had to send most of them out to reinforce the right front after the Nundu charge. Their poison breath forced all the Drone Clones to conjure gas masks for themselves. That took a good amount of power and slowed conjuring everything else."
Also bad news but understandable.
"Any clues on how he's overpowering us?" Because the fact was Adult Tom clearly had both more raw power to throw around and recovered faster than her. Too quickly to be natural.
Obviously he was doing something to empower himself. The only question was how and if Holly could replicate it without whatever unambiguously evil bits it undoubtedly included. Once she did… Well, it would certainly help to even out their battle. Until then-
"Nope," Mads said, popping the 'p,' "I've managed to increase efficiency by recovering some of the magic from destroyed constructs. The Clone Drones are reabsorbing the power from their fallen dead too."
Because of course even mental constructs left a 'body' behind if they got 'killed.'
(Both Holly and Adult Tom had killed before; had seen their enemies drop and become a lifeless body, just another piece of debris on the ground. Thus, whenever anything died in this mental battlefield it left a body behind.)
'Dead' or not, every construct was still made of magic; magic that (apparently) could be reabsorbed and reused.
"Good idea. Can you-"
"Do the same with Adult Tom's dead constructs too?" Mads finished. "Yep, I have some rat swarms and other parasitic constructs subtly doing the same across no man's land."
"Brilliant! Keep at it. I'll try to conserve energy so you have more to work with, maybe even enough to start working on a secret weapon that'll give us an advantage." Holly didn't specify but she knew Mads got the message: Project (Miniaturized) Death Star is a go.
Nodding to each other, Mads turned her attention back to overseeing the battlefield as Holly returned to her physical body.
-
Opening her eyes, the first thing Holly noticed was a concerned looking Hermione staring at her. "Anything new?"
"Eh, still fighting a war of attrition but Mads had some ideas to improve that. Besides that, Adult Tom put something like Hogwarts wards around his mind. That'll completely block any long-range offensive options." Hermione made a sour face.
That was something she'd noticed: Hermione didn't like Mads and seemed wary of her, even after Holly explained that Mads wouldn't go full Skynet. Hermione went on a whole spiel about it that sounded like she thought two Holly Potters existing is a terrible thing.
Holly tried not to take that personally.
After saying she wasn't getting rid of Mads, Hermione had held her silence but was watching her closely, like she feared Mads would bodysnatch her or something.
It was weird.
But, like always, life went on.
—
When the semester started Holly was already sleep deprived but still functional. When she'd created Mads she'd hoped to finally sleep properly again.
Unfortunately, in the last few weeks she'd learned that even with Mads, the mental defenses, and everything else; Adult Tom's attacks still woke her up, dooming any attempt to properly sleep. He conjured sandstorms or lightning storms- things her defenses couldn't (yet) completely block.
She'd copied the tactic and had Mads interfere with Adult Tom's sleep too of course, but for some reason it wasn't working.
She'd hardly recovered from those 10 days without sleep over the summer before Adult Tom destroyed her sleep schedule again!
Now? In the last few weeks she'd gone from averaging 5 hours of sleep a night to getting maybe an hour of sleep a day, even with trying to sneak in naps whenever possible. Adult Tom seemed to be able to detect when she fell asleep because she couldn't sleep for more than a few minutes without him waking her up.
This, according to Hermione, was very, very bad for her mental faculties. Holly would've been offended if it wasn't obviously true. Even Mads had reported feeling it: she had less and less 'fuel' to conjure defenses.
She was doing the same thing back to Adult Tom but for some reason he wasn't struggling like she was. The man seemingly didn't need sleep for all the good trying to deprive him of sleep did her.
Clearly he was doing whatever the wizard equivalent of cocaine was.
(Well, that and probably some blatantly evil magic to empower himself.)
Someone else might've declared it unsustainable and given up. Holly agreed: if the current situation wasn't working then she needed to force it into becoming a winning situation.
(And build a metaphysical Death Star, but details.)
As the days and constant mental attacks passed Holly tried her hardest not to falter. A potion or concentrated thought could temporarily clear her exhausted mind. Could temporarily make her eyes stop drooping closed and reinvigorate her. Could temporarily keep her hands steady.
It had to work. It was all she had.
It wasn't enough.
—
Holly had to admit, the sensation of feeling her conscious mind pulled from her body was quite strange. Carefully, sure, but without consent or the possibility of resistance. Her body fell into (obviously enchanted) sleep where she'd been laying down in the Room, but her mind itself got kidnapped from her body.
(That was weird even by magical societies' strange standards. Astral projection existed in rumor as a lost art, not something wizards actually knew how to do. It was relieving knowing wizards couldn't be involved… but that just meant she had no idea who or what was.)
Unable to do anything else, Holly waited.
-
An unknowable amount of time later, Holly blinked, suddenly finding herself sitting in a chair by a fireplace. Before she could react to that she noticed she wasn't alone.
Sitting across from her was the most stereotypically devilish looking guy she could imagine: red skin, slicked back dark red hair, and wearing a maroon suit with an extra tall popped up collar.
Oddly, he didn't have horns. Weird. Someone hadn't quite committed to the 'sophisticated devil' look quite yet, despite his everything else.
Holly… probably should've been more surprised by that but she'd read a couple books that'd mentioned extra-dimensional beings existing and old laws that made "summoning magic" illegal basically everywhere. Combine those facts with a few history books referencing harm caused by cults to various supernatural entities and tada!
Demon cults.
(Or devil cults? Holly hoped the terms were interchangeable and there aren't multiple species of evil, extradimensional beings to summon.)
Thankfully it seemed largely unknown, only getting alluded to in a few ancient and extremely questionable books she'd read.
" Holly Potter," the devil started, already grinning, " a pleasure to finally meet you! My name is Mephisto! At your service," he said, greeting her with a slight sitting bow. " You're a smart girl; I'm sure you know why I took the liberty of bringing you here. "
"You're here to sell me power so I can defeat Adult Tom and in return you want something, probably my soul or a vague favor in the future." Because really, what else would it be?
" A very smart girl." Mephisto grinned even wider. "Hardly any wizards try to make Deals anymore. So few even know I exist! So scared of what they couldn't control they banned all mention of beings like me centuries ago."
"Gee, I wonder why. It's not like every story of bargaining with demons ends badly," Holly said, rolling her eyes. Maybe she should've been more cautious but eh, if wannabe Lucifer is offering a deal then all she has to do is refuse it, right?
" Now, now. That's hardly my fault, " he said, hand on his chest, fake contrition in every word. " I never lie; I give people exactly what they ask for; and I fulfill every contract to the letter. "
"Not even trying to hide how you screw people over, are you?" Because damn, he might as well have said 'you won't win.'
" Making Deals with fools is like taking candy from a baby: easy, but not fun, not interesting. No," he continued, gesturing at her, " it's people like you that are fun to Deal with: smart enough to genuinely get what they want so that they'll be happy to hand their soul over when the Deal is done. A mutually satisfactory Deal," he said, throwing his hands out wide, smiling even wider, " now that's fun. "
Right. Ignoring the whole… everything… implied in that.
"You can stop trying to flatter me by calling me 'smart' anytime now. Only an idiot would think they'll win against you."
" Now who's flattering who, hmm? Tell me, Holly, " he started, his ever present smile shifting to something more sinister, " do you think your own mother, Lily Potter nee Evans, was an idiot? "
.
.
What?
Did he just say…?
"Oh, now there's a look of confusion. Tell me," he continued, Holly barely hearing him through the ringing silence in her head, " how do you think you survived that night, hmm? "
That… she had…
" Your mother knew you weren't safe under the fidelius charm. Desperate and willing to do anything to protect you, I offered to make a Deal with her and she accepted. Brilliant and crafty woman, your mother. Negotiating and writing that Contract was thrilling! That Contract was a work of art. Most excitement I've had in decades! "
"You- you're lying," Holly barely managed to say. He had to be. He had to be.
"But Holly, I told you already: I. Never. Lie. " he said, still smiling wide. With a snap of his fingers an impressively long contract scroll appeared in a flash of fire and hovered before her. Taller than Holly herself, the details were illegibly small except for her mother's signature, signed on the dotted line at the bottom. " After she died, I–as stipulated in our Contract–allowed her to ensure I held up my part of the bargain and you survived. After that she happily gave me her soul knowing you'd survived ."
Another fingersnap and the contract vanished with another burst of fire.
"How's that for an example of a mutually beneficial Deal that left everyone happy, hmm? "
.
.
Holly tore her eyes away from where her mother's signature had been and glared at Mephisto. She wanted to know more; about that Deal; about how her Mother apparently beat Mephisto at his own game; about how to beat Adult Tom; and more.
But most of all she wanted to punch Mephisto in his smug face. Unfortunately, that wasn't going to happen so she could only glare at him instead.
"I'm not expecting you to accept my offer now; no no no, " he continued, ignoring her glare. "Go ahead, try anything and everything you can think of to defeat Tom Riddle yourself. And when none of it proves enough and you're out of options… once you realize exactly how outmatched you are…know that all you have to do to win is accept my offer."
"I'm going to prove you wrong," Holly vowed. This smug bastard wasn't right. Couldn't be right.
She'd beat Adult Tom without him.
She would.
Could she?
"Alright," he accepted with a shrug before smirking at her again. "Just remember, everything that happens from now until your little war ends is because of your choice."
With another snap of his fingers Holly was back in her physical body, still exhausted but more determined than ever.
(When she told Hermione about her encounter later, she seemed terrified. Apparently she hadn't read any books that covered more esoteric beings? Weird.
Regardless, Holly recommended some books to her.)
(Conspicuously missing from their conversation was any discussion of what her mother's soul being in Mephisto's possession meant.)
—
"Holly," Sirius whispered, leaning in close as the rest of the class left, "are you alright? You know I'll do my best to help you with anything, right? I'm here for you."
That was sweet, but considering she hadn't told him anything about her mental offensive against Adult Tom… She didn't plan on changing her mind about that.
He wouldn't approve.
Which meant all she could say was, "I'm fine, Sirius" Holly lied(?) "I just haven't been sleeping well."
Heh. Now there's an understatement.
"Ok," Sirius accepted, "but if you change your mind, I'll be here."
Traitorously, her first thought was I won't , followed by you can't guarantee that. It felt like a betrayal to even think but she couldn't - wouldn't - take it back. Sirius would stop her; would reject her plan; would be horrified by it.
Blinking away the sudden weird feeling in her eyes, Holly nodded to him and left, Hermione joining her from where she'd been waiting nearby.
Neither of them commented about her watery eyes.
—
It started innocuously: one moment Holly randomly blinked back to full awareness, finding herself standing in her dorms' running shower, water raining down on her.
That wasn't where she last remembered being. Naturally, she assumed the worst.
'Shit! Did I just get possessed?!' But before she could panic Mads sent calm, reassuring feelings from the back of her mind. Ignoring that completely, Holly dropped into her own mindscape ready to do battle-
Only to find nothing wrong.
Standing in front of the strategy table, Mads glanced over at her. "You didn't get possessed, you just sleepwalked into the shower. Or, maybe your unconscious mind woke up but your conscious mind didn't. That's just my best guess; I don't have any examples to work off of considering our situation."
"Seriously?" Because that would be the best case scenario.
"Seriously." Mads answered. With a gesture, a TV appeared before them, playing a low quality 1st person view of Holly stumbling out of her bed and towards the showers.
"The memories are there but the visual bit is complete shit because your eyes were barely open," Mads explained. "You didn't immediately consciously remember it either because you weren't properly awake. I bet you can vaguely remember it now though."
Holly tried and… yeah, she had a vague impression of the missing chunk of time. It was fuzzy and had a sense of unreality like a half-remembered dream, but it was definitely there.
"Good," Holly managed to say, "That's good."
Now there was massive understatement.
"You're lucky this happened somewhere private, Prime. But this will continue to happen as you keep losing sleep and I have to constantly expend so much energy." Mads explained, "if this starts happening with other people around… you'd be begging for more assassination attempts."
"You already know why I'm still going to classes," Holly immediately said, not bothering to explain what they both already knew.
Her stupid 'Girl-Who-Lived' fame made her a figurehead for fighting Adult Tom. A rallying cry. If she disappeared from public view then everyone but the Death Eaters would catastrophize and panic.
Sure, it might not be that bad… but Holly didn't think so. Wizards were dumb and panicky at the best of times. Hermione didn't like it but begrudgingly agreed and promised to help ensure she survives.
(Friends… were pretty great to have sometimes.)
"And I agree, but it's not sustainable unless something changes. Even with you chugging potions to compensate and me trying to be as efficient as possible… Adult Tom has wayyyy more raw power to throw around in here." Mads explained, looking more and more stressed. "You're deteriorating while he keeps getting stronger through whatever bullshit he's doing."
"I even had to halt progress on Project: (Miniaturized) Death Star because you don't have the energy to spare!" Mads shouted, hands tugging at her hair. "Considering that's our only viable win condition… we're not on track to win unless something major changes."
"...Fuck"
"Cheers to that!" Mads mockingly said, making the motion with an empty hand. Guess she was serious about conserving energy if she didn't even conjure a drink.
…
Wait. Drink.
Now there's an idea.
-
Sneaking out of Hogwarts was as disturbingly easy as ever. One apparition and some searching later, Holly found herself here.
At a small store carrying a handheld basket packed with coffee and energy drinks.
If magical stimulants weren't working, why not try some normal ones too? Or even try adding them in her energy potions. Maybe caffeine powder would be better?
Shaking herself out of her thoughts, Holly set her cart in front of the oddly chipper cashier. Which was weird considering it was… maybe 3am? And she forgot to shapeshift into an adult first.
…Fuck.
Thankfully the old man working the register didn't seem to think a young girl buying tons of caffeinated drinks late (early?) at night weird and started ringing her up. Clearly he'd seen some shit.
Desperately avoiding eye contact by randomly looking around, she absently noticed she was the only customer in the store and that the ceiling had some water stains.
Interesting. Very interesting.
"Sometimes, when I'm struggling with something and want to give up," the cashier started out of nowhere, "I find it all the more rewarding when it's over."
"That's nice," Holly glanced down at his nametag, "Stan."
"I normally don't get involved in things, but sometimes I gotta root for the little guy, ya know?"
…Holly wasn't good with people but that seemed like a weird thing to say without prompting. Right? Eh, maybe she's just tired and out of it.
"You've got this, girlie!" he said with a wide smile as he slid her bags over to her.
Ok, now that's suspicious.
Picking up her bags without taking her eyes off him, she slowly walked backwards towards the door. She extended her mind to sense if her had any hostility-
Only to fail to sense his mind whatsoever.
Her mind reading–which could detect people no matter how they were concealed–failed to pick up even the slightest thought or emotion from "Stan."
Even weirder was the weird something that he radiated. He didn't feel like a normal person, a wizard, any magical species she'd met, or even a magical animal. Which… only left options like an alien, extra dimensional being, a god, or- ok, so maybe he could still be a ton of things.
Whatever "Stan" was though, was completely outside her paradigm of 'normal.' He could-
"Aw shoot, now my bosses are going to say I Interfered. Sorry missy, unprofessional of me" he said out of nowhere. Did she look afraid? Or maybe he noticed her mental probe?
At least "Stan" didn't look aggressive. He hadn't made any move to stop her from leaving.
It was probably safe to say something then.
"That's weird. You're weird."
Without another word she apparated back to Hogsmeade and snuck back into Hogwarts. Ignoring whatever the hell that was, Holly dumped her purchases next to her bed and crawled back into her bed to fruitlessly try to sleep.
(When Holly told Hermione about her second encounter with an esoteric being–albeit a seemingly benign one–the poor girl Did Not Handle It Well. After all, she'd just been reading the few books Holly had on the subject, all of them emphasizing exactly how badly meeting one could go.)
(Neither of them needed to tell eachother that if multiple esoteric beings were paying attention it could only mean things were going to get much, much worse.)
—
Unfortunately, after chugging several energy drinks early the next morning they quickly turned out useless.
Worse than useless since she was jittery all day but still mentally exhausted. Her heart felt weird too, like it was beating too fast. She also, rather obviously, couldn't stop literally vibrating with excess energy in her classes all day, making her body look somewhat indistinct. Like a blurry TV screen.
What happened after that… Well, potion side effects get weird sometimes.
Yep. Totally.
-
"Note to self: unexpected interaction (potentially caused by human error or incorrect dosage) between energy drinks, my stamina elixir, and other assorted potions seems to cause mania, along with decreased rationality and empathy. Looks like energy drinks are a bust."
"No shit, Holly! You sicced bears on people as 'exercise encouragement!' The hospital wing is overfilled! Everyone thought you were Imperioused and trying to massacre the school!"
"...at least people might be more scared to try and assassinate me now?"
"..."
"The Ministry being too busy with the war to bother arresting me is extremely convenient. That would've gotten ugly."
"..."
"Ok ok, I'll apologize and compensate everyone for what I put them through, including Madam Pomfrey."
-
Thankfully, after apologizing to everyone she hurt (along with giving them a few galleons) people didn't look wary when they saw her anymore. A few still tried to curse her but that wasn't new… probably. She hadn't been keeping track of people's names, let alone if they were the same people whose parents she'd killed or not.
Her second attempt at cafinating herself went significantly better: drinking a single coffee every few hours more or less kept her eyes forced open. Her mental exhaustion didn't go away in the slightest sadly though.
The result was her feeling permanently disconnected from her body, like she was a weary mind puppeteering a mannequin. It was disorientating, but it kept her functional enough to attend classes and able to protect herself, so she ignored it.
It was necessary.
And if, as the days blurred together, it took more and more coffee to force herself into functionality? Well, she'd known it was a stopgap measure to begin with.
So even as her caffeine dependency endlessly increased, she kept considering her next move.
—
"So, we've known for a while my problem isn't purely physical; it's the mental and physical effects of prolonged mental stress and chronic sleep loss." As usual, Holly was laying on a lounge with an arm over her eyes, thinking out loud as a nearby Hermione acted as a sounding board. "Everything I've tried so far has only mitigated the side effects, not addressed the cause. What I really need is a way to properly sleep, or, failing that, erase my exhaustion."
"I've read everything even tangentially related to sleep but there's nothing talking about situations like this. Sorry, Holly." Holly couldn't see her but the other girl sounded disappointed with herself. Shit.
"It's okay, Hermione. My situation isn't exactly something most authors would consider."
"That's an understatement. Anyway, you were saying…?" Hermione prompted.
"Right!. Proper sleep isn't going to happen so I need to erase my exhaustion. Not temporarily reduce or delay it; erase it. That's not easy. Seems like no potion (not even my Stamina Elixir) can."
"Memories can easily be removed and stored," Hermione offered, "could something like that work?"
"Its a good idea but… memories are naturally malleable. That's probably a big factor in why effecting memories is so easy with magic: we already know they can change over time. But exhaustion is both mental and physiological… and potentially lethal. I guess it makes sense that it's harder to deal with."
Holly drifted off as Hermione thought, her eyes stinging as she forced her eyelids up to blink before closing them again.
Fun times. Sleep loss sucked. The second she killed Adult Tom she wanted to sleep for a week straight and murder anything that woke her up.
"If exhaustion can't be erased…" Hermione suddenly started, an odd tone in her voice, "do you think it can somehow be transferred to another? Or that you could rejuvenate yourself by stealing energy from others?"
Hmmm. Now that she thought about it… she did vaguely remember a ritual in the Black library that sounded similar… but that was for an infertile woman to steal another woman's fertility.
(Because of course there were so many varieties of infertility curses wizards devised a 'universal counter' to them all. Fucking wizards.)
Creepy, but maybe similar enough they could adapt it to her needs. She told as much to Hermione, except-
"We'd have to alter it to stealing other people's energy… or sleep backlog or stamina or whatever the fuck you want to call it. That'd exhaust them so badly they'd sleep for several days… if the shock wouldn't kill them outright. Hell, anything in between could happen. That's… not great."
"Doing to opposite and offloading my exhaustion onto someone else isn't an option either," Holly continued, "we would have to design a whole new ritual for it. That's… a finicky, non-quantifiable process that would take more time than its worth. I wouldn't know where to begin trying to start."
She could try to use animals as subjects to make finding targets easier… but that'd mean she had to rework the ritual even more.
Eh, it was worth a try at least.
—
It took a few days but Holly and Hermione a few days but they managed to rework the fertility stealing ritual to suit their needs. Given that most rituals worked on the logic of 'if I feel lucky after standing in a pentagram chanting "make me lucky" three times then The Lucky Ritual works!' Holly thought it was damn impressive they managed it that fast. Granted, that was an exaggerated, fake example… but not by much.
Which is how Holly found herself in a random UK forest during the middle of the night, sitting in a ritual circle, with a hibernating hedgehog across from her.
How is this her life?
As Hermione chanted some bullshit, Holly tried to consider the logic that brought them here.
They needed something living to offload her exhaustion on. Obviously a human would be best, but this was a trial run. So they chose a hibernating animal because… it had a large backlog of sleep? Something like that. A hedgehog in particular because it happened to be close by and more complex than other hibernating animals, like frogs.
Each step kinda sorta sounded reasonable… but it still led them here.
With Holly nodding off as Hermione ominously chanted some shit about 'stealing lifeforce' or something in Latin.
The weirdest part was that it kinda (marginally) worked.
As Hermione wrapped up Holly felt the slightest trickle of something enter her, leaving her blinking in surprise and feeling just slightly better. She wouldn't have even noticed it unless she'd been waiting for something like that to happen.
Unfortunately, it was so negligible her eyes were already drooping seconds later. Saying as much had Hermione frowning as she cast diagnostic charms on Holly.
"Sounds like the proof of concept worked, but not to the point of viability. Not surprising given our sacrificial subject." Glancing at the hedgehog, it was pretty obvious even to Holly it hadn't survived. KIlled by shock and exhaustion apparently.
That didn't bode well for any future human subjects. Sure, Holly could find suitable scumbags to kill easily with her mind reading… but that took time, concentration, and effort…all of which were in limited supply.
Well, they still had to see if it worked, right?
"I'm going to find an asshole so we try it for real." Hermione, apparently completely unfazed by the idea of kidnapping and (probably) killing some bloke, nodded back.
(…that girl could be kinda scary sometimes.)
Regardless, it didn't take too long to teleport to London, find a random nightclub, spot a guy trying to spike a lady's drink, and kidnap him without a trace.
Dumping the asshole into the ritual circle, Holly took her spot, Hermione immediately starting without any prompting. As she chanted, Holly closed her eyes, focused entirely on the energy flowing into her.
Unsurprisingly it had a greater impact than using a hedgehog. But…
"I feel slightly better…but its like I got a short nap in. Nowhere close to feeling rested. Guess it shouldn't be surprising considering my sleep debt." Holly rationalized. "I mean, I haven't gotten a proper night's sleep in… how long?"
"Two, almost two-and-a half months," Hermione immediately answered. "Halloween's in two weeks."
"Ah. Guess it shouldn't be surprising it did so little." Because the attempted rapist she's kidnapped died just like their hedgehog subject before him: massive shock and exhaustion. "I mean, a normal person dies of exhaustion after how long?"
"Over ten days, but they'll be impaired after the second day and incoherent after the third." Hermione crouched down in front of her, staring at her seriously, "The fact you're even this coherent is insane , but its getting worse."
"I'm no doctor but I'd guess you're at roughly the equivalent of 72-96 hour stage of sleep deprivation right now. If it gets worse or you experience any new symptoms you need to tell me," Hermione begged.
"Right. I can do that." Holly promised… but wasn't sure if she meant it. Hermione had been relying on coffee and potions to stay awake lately too. If she started worrying over Holly even more… it wouldn't be too long until they both exhausted messes.
"At least we know this is a bust and cross it off the list," Holly changed the subject to. Because even though it did help, it wasn't enough to offset the effort it took to set up and kidnap someone. Fucking opportunity cost.
Maybe if she found multiple people to kidnap at once… but, that'd be much harder and take even more time and effort. Not to mention having to cover it up so nobody looked into it.
She could dramatically save time by using random innocent people… but no. Some lines aren't meant to be crossed. Even if it would make using the ritual viable Holly refused to accept indiscriminate mass murder as necessary.
Hermione nodded despite looking disappointed, clearly understanding as well. Without a word they transfigured the corpses into pebbles, erased all signs they'd been there, and left.
(The fact that had been their last potential idea to turn the tide was left unsaid.
They'd find a way. They would.
They had to.
Mephisto couldn't be right. He couldn't.
He might be. )
—
"Miss Potter," Professor Flitwick said once they were inside his office, "It's understandable that current events are affecting you particularly badly. You're far ahead in all your classes; I have no doubt you could take a hiatus from your classes without falling behind."
That… was nice, offering her an easy out to take care of herself. He didn't even know about her mental warfare either.
Unfortunately, "I'd prefer to keep attending classes, Professor. I'm worried that if I disappear from the public eye rumors will spread and make morale plummet."
"Very well," he offered, looking saddened but resigned, "but the offer remains open."
—
Mechanically eating her breakfast most of Holly's attention was on not falling asleep. Or leaning on Hermione too heavily. Or face planting into… whatever she's eating.
Holly rubbed her face, absently glancing down to see a half-eaten slice of toast in her hand Huh. Apparently that's what she's chewing. Cool.
Next to her Hermione made something like a 'hmph' noise and shoved the morning's paper into her face.
"What do you think about this, Holly?" she asked, pointing to a specific subheading.
Pushing the paper out of her face and blinking several times, Holly ignored the other headlines full of terrible news and read what Hermione pointed out.
"Several people abducted-" blah blah blah "-latest in string starting several weeks ago-" something something "-taken alive-" wait, that's "-no apparent connection between-" Following that was a list of abductees Holly skimmed, a sinking feeling in her gut.
Every person on the list was (presumably) relatively powerful; all of them experienced aurors or Order fighters.
The date of the first disappearance roughly lined up to when Adult Tom started ramping up his mental attacks, tirelessly attacking her.
Those two seemingly unrelated facts clicked together like puzzle pieces in her exhausted mind.
Well then. She'd wanted to know how Adlut Tom had been empowering himself, hadn't she? Guess she has her answer. Or at least, a rough idea of it: Adult Tom was somehow growing stronger from the people he kidnapped. Through whatever bullshit he'd found a way to siphon energy/magic/sleep/whatever from the kidnapees to himself. Why else would they be taken alive?
The exact details of how weren't important, no matter how undoubtedly horrific it was. What mattered is that Holly finally knew why Adult Tom had the advantage.
Whispering her suspicion to Hermione didn't exactly improve the other girl's mood if the way she dragged Holly out of the Hall and to the Room was any indication.
Holly, as was now customary, flopped face first onto a suddenly-there lounge chair while Hermione started furiously muttering to herself and pacing.
Trying and failing to sleep, Holly groaned, turning her head towards Hermione so she didn't suffocate, and blurted out her first intrusive thought.
"I hate that he's trying to brute force a win with raw power. That's lame. I mean, I expected that whatever he was doing was wildly fucked up but I was hoping it was something more creative, ya know? Like- like inventing a cure for chronic exhaustion loss made from orphan tears, or- or eating brains for more brainpower. But noooo, he's being unambiguously evil and taking the easy way out. What a hack ."
"You get what I'm saying?" Holly asked, refocusing on Hermione. "Fucking wizards. So unimaginative."
Hermione simply stared back for a moment, expression completely blank before slowly massaging her temples.
Dragging her hands down her face, Hermione eventually said, "...I'll keep researching anything that might help. You rest and we can brainstorm when you wake up, okay?"
Holly, without bothering to respond, put on a sleep mask and tried to fall asleep.
After a minute, Adult Tom's mental attack woke her back up. Real sleep wouldn't be coming anytime soon.
—
"I have a head and a tail, but no body. What am I?" the door knocker to the Ravenclaw Common Room asked.
Holly, leaning on the wall to stay upright, blinked and tried to think.
...
Snapping awake as she started falling, her arms flailed for a second before she caught her balance.
Right, the riddle! She needed to think.
...
"Overthinking can be as dangerous as underthinking," the door knocker said, waking her up again.
Holly… didn't have an answer.
Shit. Guess she's trapped outside her dorm now?
Wait, no. There's a perfect solution to this! Why didn't she think of it earlier? Besides, climbing the staircases up Ravenclaw Tower was annoying anyways. Nodding to herself, Holly turned around and started the long descent.
Sleeping in the Room would make everything easier. It's not like she'd been able to properly sleep anyways. Laying in bed would just waste time.
Time she could use for fighting Adult Tom.
(It wasn't until Holly was already back to the Room she realized all her stuff was still in her dorm. Thankfully Tilly the house elf was happy to move everything to the Room for her.)
—
"Miss Potter, I haven't said anything earlier hoping you'd come to your senses on your own," Professor McGonagall started apropos of nothing after class, "but I will put it plainly now: attending classes while unfit for lessons is unproductive. Please check yourself into the Hospital Wing. No professor will fault you; Poppy has made her professional opinion extremely clear."
Holly blinked. Took a second to realize Professor McGonagall was done talking.
Slowly tried to parse her words.
Somewhat succeeded.
"Miss Po-" started at a moment too long.
"Sorry Professor but I can't. I need to-" but Professor McGonagall cut her off.
"Filius has explained your reasoning. While undoubtedly noble, you do not need to martyr yourself."
Huh. It probably did look like that from the outside. Maybe they were even right?
Eh, whatever. She had solid reasoning. Right?
—
The end of Holly being able to attend classes safely came exactly as she expected: with another assassination attempt.
Trudging out of Charms class, the only thing keeping her upright was Hermione's arm looped through hers as Hermione supported most of her weight. Even worse than that Holly kept blinking only to find they'd moved several steps already. Oh, and her hearing felt muted, unable to register anything besides muffled background noise.
Altogether it meant Holly felt mostly divorced from her body.
Hermione had been half carrying her around a lot recently. Probably great exercise for the other girl. Maybe Hermione could use a Strength Elixir after all?
Holly's half aware musing was cut off as she vaguely heard someone scream nearby. Hermione suddenly yanked her to the side and several spells whooshed by but it wasn't enough.
A spell punched through her chest from behind, blood and chunks of viscera following it; splattering everything in front of her. Pain exploded through her chest and she took a second to realize it was bits of herself that just went flying.
Holly rocketed back into full awareness for the first time in days(? weeks?) as adrenaline flooded her veins and the world seemingly slowed to a crawl around her.
Holly glanced down to examine her injuries and, uh, found them pretty quick.
Instantly even.
After all, it was hard to miss the fact she had a tennis ball sized hole punched straight through the upper left side of her torso. Really, if it'd hit a few inches over it might've pulverized her heart. Blood had already started pouring out and filling her ruptured lung, metallic smell flooding her senses.
Well then. Shit.
Holly blinked and suddenly the world was moving fast again as the stone floor rushed to meet her.
She briefly registered absolute agony as she collapsed before she mercifully knew no more.
—
Holly came back to awareness lying in a bed feeling like shit. Unfortunately, that was normal and didn't mean anything.
Yet something had obviously gone wrong considering she's laying down in a bed. Holly hadn't wasted her time with a bed for…days? (Weeks? Eh, whatever.) No point when it was impossible to sleep anyways.
The next thing Holly noticed was the large mass of curly hair at her bedside. Even in her current state Holly could effortlessly identify it.
"Hermione," Holly said and nudged her. From underneath the mass of hair Hermione's face appeared. The next instant her vision cut out agaIn as Hermione lurched forward, hair blocking out her sight as Hermione babbled into her ear.
After several long moments of Holly failing to reassure her, Madam Pomfrey appeared and practically dragged Hermione off of her. That done, the older woman glared down at Holly with what looked like exhausted frustration.
"You're quite lucky, miss Potter," she started. "If you'd been hit with a curse instead of a piercing hex… well, with your healing you might've survived but have certainly lost a lung. As it is, your lung, several ribs, musculature, and breast have all been regrown between myself and your accelerated healing over 3 days."
"Three!" she suddenly shouted, "Not even a scar to show for it! I assume your incredible self healing methods are impossible to replicate without phoenix tears?" she asked, focusing on Holly as if ready to dissect her. Which, damn, Holly could see why any medical professional would want to know.
"You could make a Regeneration Elixir without phoenix tears… but it'd be so much weaker it'd be useless." Holly answered. Madam Pomfrey, thankfully, didn't look disappointed but resigned instead, obviously expecting that and left with only a nod goodbye.
Alone once more, Hermione tackle hugged her again. "I thought you were dead Holly. If I hadn't heard that scream and tried to pull you out of the way… I doubt Madam Pomfrey could regrow your spinal column, not to mention your heart. Please, please, prioritize yourself and stop going to classes."
Holly… really couldn't argue with that. Dragging herself to classes so people could pretend things were fine clearly couldn't continue. Not when it almost got her killed.
Plus Mads was radiating stress and relief from the back of her mind. That certainly wasn't a good sign.
"Ok ok. I promise I'll stay in the Room and focus on kicking Adult Tom's ass."
For some reason Hermione didn't look much happier hearing that.
—
Holly settled onto the meditation platform the Room created. It was quite nice, both comfortable and practical. That wasn't surprising.
What was surprising was seeing a bed, trunk, and other furniture in the Room too.
A bed that Hermione had already tucked herself into, day clothes and all.
"Uh, Hermione? Are you sleeping here tonight?" Her needing extra sleep made sense, it didn't look like she'd gotten much sleep while Holly had been healing in the hospital wing. But that didn't explain the trunk…
Rolling over, Hermione glared at her for some reason. "You're daft if you think I'm leaving you alone here. I'm going to help any way I can…even if that means staying in here and shaking you until you eat and drink something."
Hmm. It seems being 'aggressively helpful' is a thing. Interesting.
"And your classes?"
"They don't matter. I'll get permission to skip them and stay with you."
"Imagine if your younger self heard you saying that." Huffing out a laugh, Holly dropped the conversation so Hermione could sleep.
Dropping into her mindscape, she joined a grimly determined looking Mads at the command table. Conjuring herself a seat, Holly settled in for the long haul.
—
"Hold the line!" Holly shouted to the nearby Drone Clones. She didn't need to verbalize the order for them to know it, but it helped it feel more real. Like making a hand gesture for wandless magic.
Forcing herself to focus, Holly cut down an attacking werewolf while using her empty hand to shoot lightning at several more. As she kept fighting she absently noticed the fallen bodies of nearby constructs being consumed by rat constructs, feeding their energy back to her.
That power leeching was the only reason she hadn't been overpowered long ago. It'd bought her invaluable time..
But it wasn't enough.
That's why Holly had decided to try something new.
"It's ready!" Mads shouted through her earpiece. A new, seemingly normal Drone Clone ran forward, nodding to her before throwing itself into the frey.
Only, where normal Drone Clones would get injured and bleed red, this one revealed its innards to be made of a metallic, silvery liquid before automatically morphing back to normal.
T-1000 Holly was a success.
Sure, it took more effort to create and it wasn't indestructible… but it was quickly showing itself to be a worthwhile investment. Especially when it turned its arms into massive blades and started slicing down hordes of enemies.
Oh yeah, she wanted a bunch more. Smiling, Holly lifted her lightsaber and followed T-1000 Holly's example.
—
Holly saw movement out of the corner of her half open eyes, making her twist her head so fast her neck cracked.
"Oh. Hi, Luna. Sorry I've forgotten to say anything to you this year." Then, "that probably makes me a bad friend."
"Maybe, but I don't think so. You've been quite busy." She said, casual as anything else. "It's ok."
Holly blinked, finding Luna now suddenly crouching in front of her with a flower crown in her hands. DId she have that earlier?
Somehow not making eye contact despite being so close, Luna set the flower crown on her head before backing away. "There. You're a dear friend, Holly. Please don't die."
"Thanks, Luna. I'll try."
—
"Is there some tactic we've missed? Something we haven't considered before?" Holly asked Mads, words almost incoherent given that she was laying facedown on the command centers' floor.
"We haven't tried any psychological torture in a while," Mads immediately answered.
"Doubt that'll work since he'll know we're trying to mess with him."
"Hmm… actually, I might have a Great Idea" Mads said, making Holly look up and see the gleam in the construct's eye. "The Geneva Conventions don't apply to mental warfare, do they?"
…
"You're a genius! Let's commit some war crimes!" Holly shouted, giving Mads a high five before abruptly pausing. "Wait… do we even know what's all considered a war crime?"
Mads shrugged, "just ask Hermione."
(Hermione knew it, as expected, but for some reason seemed unnerved after Holly said she was looking for inspiration.)
-
Unfortunately(?) for Holly, the only war crime that might prove helpful was chemical weapons. Technically a false surrender/truce could be used too but there was no way Adult Tom would fall for that.
Eh, even a single new idea was still better than nothing.
"Launching white phosphorus artillery shells in 3, 2, 1-" artillery batteries fired, sending their shells overhead and deep into Adult Tom's side of their mental link.
Looking with binoculars, Holly watched as they detonated. A hazy cloud covered a wide area, enveloping it in white smoke.
Inside everything from werewolf packs to low-flying dragons were affected, hacking on air they suddenly couldn't breathe. Death Eater constructs tried using the bullethead charm, only to realize it didn't work. The inferni hoards weren't affected, but that was expected.
It was almost perfect. Adult Tom's entire stream of reinforcements decimated before they could reach contested territory.
…Which is when Holly noticed the wind kicking up, sudden hurricane force winds blowing the gas away from his mind; towards the frontlines and her side.
"Fuck," Holly and Mads said simultaneously.
"The T-1000 Holly's will be fine, but the rest all need protective gear immediately!" Mads shouted, already wearing said gear. "Get outta here Prime, I'll handle this."
Nodding, Holly left her mindscape.
(In the end chemical warfare proved too risky, at least until she replaced enough Drone Clones with T-1000 Holly's. Disappointing, but yet another reason to continue relentlessly upgrading her construct army.)
—
Holly had to admit, having a fireball randomly appear directly in front of her as she dozed off was pretty startling. It even managed to get some adrenaline flowing and heart pounding; quite the feat in her condition.
Trying to jump backwards, Holly tripped but thankfully landed on some suddenly-there pillows. (She really needed to thank the Room after this somehow.) Laying on her back, Holly blindly drew her wand and shakily pointed it at the… bird?
Wait no, she'd seen it before somewhere…
"You're Dumbledore's phoenix," Holly muttered, getting an impressively offended sounding "SQUAWK!" back.
Why?
…Oh.
"Wait… even if Dumbledore's super old… you're immortal. You aren't Dumbledore's bird; Dumbledore is basically your pet dog, right?"
Nodding in agreement, the massive bird flapped its wings, filling her view with feathers. Before she could react it flew towards her, tailfeathers hitting her in the face. As Holly sputtered and flailed it turned around on top of her head in a circle a few times, and kinda just… plopped down. LIke a cat.
Ok then.
"Does my hair make a good nest?" Holly asked, getting a happy chirp back.
Before she could say anything else the bird started singing.
Its Song echoed through the Room, each beautiful note laden with revitalizing power. Holly could feel herself sitting up straighter, her weariness beginning to wash away as the Song worked its magic. She didn't need Mads to say anything, already knowing the construct would be busy putting her newfound energy to work.
Despite not saying a word Holly still understood what the phoenix was trying to convey.
It spoke of the struggle of Life. How the fight to survive couldn't be extinguished. How Death was natural and not to be feared. How Life and Death are not opposites but each necessary for the other to exist. That everything ends… but that end is also a new beginning.
That Life is beautiful and should be enjoyed… but will come to its natural end one day.
Holly didn't know when she started crying but suddenly tears were flowing down cheeks as she sniffled. Grabbing blindly, Holly pulled the bird off her head and shoved her face into its feathers. The bird probably wasn't happy about her sobbing into it but it didn't try to escape so it was probably ok with it.
Holly cried. Let herself finally express her bottled up stress and fear. Let her admit her frustration with the so-called 'wizarding world' for being so dependent on her. Let herself admit that she might lose to Adult Tom and die… but that she'd drag the bastard down with her even if it was the last thing she did.
Eventually, Holly cried herself out and pulled her face away from the now-disheveled bird. As Holly wiped her face with her sleeve the bird hopped away and kinda just shook itself, somehow making its rumpled feathers perfectly neat again.
Huh. Either an innate phoenix power… or it spent who knows how long practicing. Either seemed possible.
"I think I get what you're trying to say, Mr Bird," Holly said, throat still raw, "I might get killed doing this but until then I should keep fighting to survive. Right?"
The bird, unable to speak, stared back for a moment as if inspecting her before half heartedly nodding, as if saying 'eh, close enough.'
"I guess I mostly understand then?" Holly asked, "thanks for coming and Singing for me. I feel so much better."
It was true. Oh, she felt awful by normal standards, but compared to before her thoughts seemed clearer, her migraine had lessened, her stiff body no longer ached, and her eyes no longer burned with exhaustion. She hadn't even realized how badly it all hurt until it was eased.
Giving her an inscrutable look, the phoenix nodded at her and disappeared in a flash of fire.
Somewhat revitalized and refreshed, Holly sunk into her mindscape to continue the fight to survive.
(It wouldn't be until a few days later that Holly understood exactly what she'd missed in the phoenix's message: that while she might get killed and would have to fight for the chance to die naturally one day… so did everyone else, regardless of her actions.
That people were always going to die and it wasn't her fault.)
—
Holly knew she'd been losing track of the days. After all, since she never left the Room, had all her food delivered, was in a trance-like meditation 24/7… time quickly lost all meaning.
(Frankly, the only way she could guess the time was if Hermione told her or if the Room conjured a window while she ate.)
But there had been an upcoming date she'd asked Hermione to remind her of though.
One date she knew better than to lose track of.
Halloween.
Adult Tom was clearly fond of symbolism considering his horcruxes. It made sense that he'd do something on the anniversary of his defeat. Something major. Probably something aimed to strike at Holly. Something that might assure his victory.
Obviously Holly herself would be a potential target. But with her living in the Room nowadays, was physically safe herself. Mentally… not so much.
Hermione would've been a major vulnerability, but with her living in the Room as well she'd be completely safe.
Her allies-the Ministry and the Order-would both be on high alert.
She knew he'd launch some major attack. Everyone else expected it too according to Hermione, with security increased at Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley, and the Ministry itself. Preparations were made in advance, everyone collectively holding their breath knowing it was the calm before the storm.
Unfortunately, Holly, along with everyone else, failed to predict both the target and scale of the attack.
-
Holly, having been braced for attack within her mindscape, felt it the second the attack started.
One second their battle was raging as normal, the next it stopped almost completely. The unending hoards of metaphysical magical creatures and wizards Adult Tom sent to attack her slowed to a trickle. Instead Adult Tom's side of their connection began leaking sadistic glee. That wouldn't happen unless-
"He's focusing on whatever he's physically attacking!" Holly shouted, then asked Mads, "Can we go on the offensive?" But before the construct could respond, Adult Tom started projecting his view down the link, letting her see through his eyes.
Though she'd never been there before she recognized it on sight. She'd been vaguely considering visiting for years but never seen it in person.
Godric's Hollow.
In real time she saw Adult Tom's and his followers surrounded Godric's Hollow, flames leaping from their wands.
Saw as the Grove's several thousand residents were dragged out of their homes.
Was forced to watch them beg for their lives as they were corralled.
Was forced to watch the realization sink into his victim's eyes just before they cut down every last man, woman, elder, and child.
Was forced to watch, despite fighting with everything she had, the ruined cottage where she and her parents once lived burned down by Adult Tom's own hand.
(All the while Mephisto's words of her choice seemed to echo in her ears, making every crackle of burning homes and scream for mercy that much worse.)
Notes:Behold, my memes:
My inspiration for Mads
Voldemort POV of Holly
Voldemort's plan summarized
Holly at ch's end
Hermione POV of ending
Credit to The Art Of Dying by The_wig_is_a_metaphor for getting me thinking about how far Lily would go. I'd already planned on making her smart and pragmatic, but that fic (along with some metas by TheCarnivorousMuffin and Vinelle) made me think "Yeah, I'm totally making Lily willing to make a deal with Marvel's knockoff Lucifer and sell her soul trying to protect her kid." (Also, pay very, very close attention to what Mephisto does and doesn't say. No lies isn't the same the truth.)
I'm surprised Godric's Grove dosn't get more attention in 2nd war fics. Sure, Voldemort had Nagini puppetting that old lady… but the monument to the Potters and his 1st defeat got left untouched? Really? Easy PR victory for Voldemort to destroy it.
Burning down the rest of Godric's Grove is just for impact value and my Voldemort being an overconfident, frustrated asshole.
Credit to AO3 user SoMETIMES for the T-1000 idea
Credit to FF.net user Rakeesh's fic A Long Journey Home for inspiring some of the phoenix bits. (Ya'll should read this right now)