A Vampire Legacy

Chapter 16

Author's Notes: Here we are at chapter 16. There will be a little time skip since there's not much else to describe for the first year, with Harry not participating in the school drama, not enrolled onto the Quidditch team and absolutely not interested into Slytherin House politics or the mystery of the third floor corridor. Remember, this Harry is not the downtrodden and neglected orphan who was friendless until then. He has neither reason nor the desire to go looking into something that doesn't concern him and doesn't menace the wellbeing of his friends, even less to play the hero. Magic for him is only another tool to add on his tool belt, so he really doesn't care whose feathers he ruffle with his stubbornness. XD Add to that situation that the Hogwarts staff have nothing to hold against him to make him compliant and you have the most independent eleven year old in all the castle. Now for the stats! We have 198 reviews, 838 followers, 735 favourites, 21C2 communities (My God, I never saw a story been put in so many of those!) and finally 84 554 views. Thank you very much to everybody who took the time to read my humble work. Ah, a little something, I also borrow another weapon from Bleach. Now let's get this show on road.

Harry had pretty much adapted to his new routine. Get up early the morning, shower, get dressed, a kiss on the cheeks of his mothers, breakfast, a dash to his room to get his magic school stuff and to make his bed, then a quick dive into the shadows in direction of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Waiting for Daphne, Tracey or Blaise to be ready in the Slytherin common room, then walk with them to breakfast, ignore Nott's pathetic attempts to put him in his "supposed" place, talk politely with Draco, Vinny and Greg if they were sufficiently awake, seriously those three were the Zombie Trio of Slytherin before at least two cups of black coffee most of the time in the morning, then go to class after having made his rounds at the other Houses tables to talk to the rest of his friends. He would eat at school for lunch and after classes were over, if he didn't have any extracurricular activities planned with the Weasley Twins or the rest of his clique, he would go home. It was a very repetitive routine, the only things that would really change was the assigned lectures or the homework or the said extracurricular activities. But something had got his interest when he walked into downtown London last weekend. There were a few nice movies he wanted to see at the cinema. The Addams Family was coming out this Friday, November the 22th and seeing as it was the last day of the week, he could technically stay up later than usual. He had enough pocket money for it, he wasn't in any sort of trouble that he knows of (Did lacing all of Grandpa Vlad's alcohol bottles with fresh holy water count? From the way his mothers were laughing and Grandpa Vlad was cursing a storm, he guessed that he was not in trouble with the authority of the house but was at risk from a revenge prank from the older vampire.) So nothing would stand on his way to have a nice outing.

The problem was that he was in the mood to risk some good ol' chaos into the school. No, not a Wunschpunsch spell, but something simpler, but still chaotic if caught. He could go see the movie easily alone, but where was the fun in that? He wanted to have a new experience with his new friends. So he had concocted a plan to help his group of friends to escape the school for a few hours and go with everyone to downtown London to see said movie. He had even managed to sell his idea to Hermione, who was frankly quite fed up with the Victorian Era feel of Hogwarts and missed electricity and central heating and other modern entertainments dearly. With the cold weather outside, she couldn't play soccer anymore and the gang had not found so far, a place where they could play inside. A night out in the city would do some good to everybody. So as a group, after swearing everybody to secrecy so they wouldn't be busted before they could take their leave, they pooled their allowance and as Harry was the most mobile one with his shadow travel ability, he had gotten tickets for everybody. To not draw unwanted attention, Harry had instructed everybody to act like nothing was out of the ordinary. He even asked George and Fred to be as chaotic and wild as any other Friday, just in case. Needless to say, the Weasley twins had no problem at all with that directive. To also limit the risk of being caught by a teacher or a tattletale, Fred had the good idea to round the group to an adjacent classroom near the library. Everybody was expected to make their way to the abandoned classroom after dinner either on their own or in small groups, to not arouse the suspicions of Filch and/or the patrolling teachers. They also have to be dressed muggle. For the purebloods without experience with muggle clothing, like Daphne and Blaise, they were referred beforehand to Parvati for Daphne and Harry helped out Blaise. Parvati and Lavender were very good on the fashion topic, following both mundane and Wizarding fashion magazines, so she was quite able to do her part. The magically raised, with the exception of Fred and George, had a bit of a problem with the muggle money, but it was handled quickly with an in depth explanation from Hermione.

The Weasleys twins were used to mingle in the mixed magical/muggle community at Ottery St Catchpole, so had no difficulty to blend in. Once everyone was in the classroom, with Hannah and Susan the last to make it, they turned to Harry, since he was the one who would be the ride. Taking the parole after George made sure to cast privacy charms all around the classroom, he said

"Well, first thing first, the rules. We will be in an exclusive muggle area so no pulling wands for any reason except a critical emergency. For you Weasleys, no magic pranks either. If you don't follow them, well it's too bad; you won't be in the next outing."

At their groan he responded rapidly

"Hey, do you want to get busted before we see the whole movie? We're not technically supposed to leave the castle grounds unless it's a holiday, an emergency or a Hogsmeade weekend! If you let go a magical prank in the whereabouts of the cinema, the Ministry will be on our ass faster than we can say Quidditch! I don't know about you, but I don't want to be caught! Jail time is not in my agenda, thank you very much! My mother would tan my backside black and blue if she has to come bail me out of jail! So if you want to go to another movie in the near future, you have to be on the straight and narrow for a few hours. Tell you what; once we're back you'll be able to double the level of the usual chaos inside the castle. Is that a good enough deal?"

After their eager nods and grins and promise to be on their best behaviour for a few hours, Harry continued

"We stay grouped. Downtown London is very big; it's easy to get lost, so no wandering around. We have to act like we belong here and we won't have to answer awkward questions as to why we don't have any adults with us."

What Harry didn't tell the group, was that he had already hypnotized the employees on the evening shift of the cinema where they were going to not ask any questions, just in case... It was better to be safe than be sorry.

"We will arrive early so everyone will be able to buy some snacks. The movie will last for about an hour and half, so better go to the washroom before it begins. Once the movie is over, we move together and I will bring you back here in this classroom. After that, still not one word to others! Any questions before we go?"

When there was none, Harry instructed them to form a circle and to hold hands. With a Weasley twin on each end of the circle, Harry took both their free hands before calling the shadows. Padma, who was the closest to him just after Fred on Harry's left, saw his green eyes glow with power for a second, before everyone was sucked in into the shadows. Traveling that way was weird in everyone else opinion; it was like they had stepped in into one of those old black and white shows that was airing on the old black and white TVs of the Sixties. Everything was in shades of black, white and gray, nothing seemed solid, and everything seemed to shift constantly with no recognizable landmarks in sight. They could feel themselves moving, but it was quite baffling on the senses. They could breathe just fine, that was at least that? Time also seems to have no meaning here. Then, some colors were seen and a moment later, they emerged again in the real world, in the back of an out of the way back street. They broke the circle and Harry gave his friends a moment to get their heads on straight. Hermione had traveled that way a few times, but she had always closed her eyes and the trips had always been shorter. Now they had moved from northern Scotland to downtown London in a few minutes! It was crazy!

Harry then spoke

"Okay everyone, time to go. The theater is about five minutes away, so let's move. The movie is starting in about thirty minutes, enough time to go to the washroom, buy some snacks and find good seats. And remember, stay grouped! Weasleys, no pranks for a few hours, remember?"

The instructions Harry gave wouldn't really be needed for those used to the Mundane World, but it was better to address the group, just in case. If they wanted to have more outings like that, they had to stay organized. If the adults in charge found out, they would be in so much trouble it wouldn't even been funny! Well, Harry wouldn't be in as much trouble as the others because after school hours he wasn't the responsibility of the Hogwarts staff any longer and his mothers gave him the permission to go see a movie, but as the one who organized the non approved field trip, he would be nagged constantly by the Hogwarts staff. So yeah, nobody wanted to be found out. The cinema was five minutes away, just as the Potter scion said. Those used to such things helped herd those who weren't inside before they could make a scene. Anonymity was there best friend right now. The group did manage to buy their snacks and find good seats. Hannah had to make a side trip to the women washroom, so like a pack, all the girls currently with them decided to follow her. The boys all looked at each other's and concluded silently that girls were weird. Why do they have to go to the toilet in a pack when only one of them had an urgent need? Of course, Fred, George, Blaise and Harry had already learned to keep their remarks silent. The girls were all very proficient at the stinging hex and had long memories and very good aim.

The ladies were back in time for the start of the opening credits. The gang was snacking on pop corn, chocolate bars and other candies. They had soft drinks in carton containers with a straw. Everyone was watching attentively the movie. Once it was over, they stayed a bit, watching the credits roll, letting the room emptying a bit more before leaving. Once in the clear, they started to follow the crowd, dispensing of the garbage in the appropriate dumpsters. This time, it was the boys who made a mad dash to the nearest washroom, observed by the rolling eyes of their fairer companions. Boys, all the same. Once done, they put back their coats and winter gear and made it back to their back alley, all the way discussing their favourite scenes. Blaise was quite impressed by the Mamushka, Harry also was but he stayed silent on this one. Maybe he could bribe Grandpa Vlad to do a satire of it on his next hunt? The scene with the knives would surely interest him. Fred and George were more interested by all the booby traps and the hidden passages in the mansion and toward the family vault. Everyone had enjoyed the movie and when they would be another one that everyone wanted to go, they would again pool their pocket money. But now, the fun was over, they had to get back.

Forming the circle again, this time it was Daphne and Hermione who saw Harry's eyes illuminate with power, before they were all sucked again into the shadows. Not one moment too late, since two minutes later, a confused Remus Lupin was faced with a deserted back alley. He could have sworn that he saw a few Hogwarts students! But what were they doing outside of school before the holidays? And how could they have escaped the castle grounds and Hogsmeade? He knew by experience that at this hour, the gates of the grounds were closed. Even if they had managed to go down in the village by a secret passage, it was still kilometres away from any other cities! And the Floo accesses were monitored by the barkeeps of the pubs. Shaking his head he told himself in a low voice

"Moony, old boy, you're getting crazy. Seeing a group of boarding school children out and about in London, when they should be up there in Scotland and you know it's not possible to come back to London without an adult. Yup I'm getting definitively bonkers. Wonder what I drank or ate to hallucinate like that?"

The Marauder left, muttering to himself. While in fact, he was quite right. He would not learn it for a few more years though.

The gang emerged back safely into the classroom. Less disoriented, they took great care to hide their outside winter gear to not get busted, since they were not supposed to be outside at this hour. Fred and George used the Marauder's map to help guide the gang back towards their Houses. While it was not yet passed curfew, they would have to hurry to make it. Now that they could let loose, the Weasley twins decided to let out enough fireworks to the other side of the castle in a manner that would look like the said fireworks exploded accidentally to make sure all the teachers head that way, permitting the Gryffs except themselves and the Claws to make it back without problem, thus giving the First Years at least a small alibi. Seeing as the Snakes wouldn't make it in time and that Snape had for habit to make a head count on the curfew of Friday, Harry took back Daphne, Tracey and Blaise with him into the shadows and dropped them near the entrance of the Slytherin common room. Saluting his friends, Harry dove again swiftly in the shadows and came back for his partners in crime. Once there he said

"Do you want a lift or you're gonna make this a cat and mouse pursuit? Better hurry guys, I have to be home in like fifteen minutes or my mother will tan my hide."

George looked at his brother and both shared a silent conversation, only interrupted by hands movements. Finally they turned toward their partner and George said

"Yep, bring us near the Gryffindor Tower, dear partner! That way we can build an alibi! We don't fancy a detention for the weekend."

Harry shook his head. If they didn't want a detention, they shouldn't have used fireworks. It was almost like their call card now. Oh well, it wasn't his problem. He did took a dive into the shadows with his co conspirators and let them out a few corners before the portrait entrance. Not taking time to come out and wishing them good night, he plunged right back into the Shadow Realm to travel home. He would make it with ten minutes to spare before his curfew. Now, they just had to hope that his friends' absence had not been discovered. It was a good evening and a nice way to get away and decompress. Getting changed into his night attire, a loose t-shirt and a pair of boxers, he put a pair of slippers on his feet once he removed his socks and went toward the closest living room to watch a bit of TV before bed time. By the fact he couldn't smell Integra's perfume and that the mansion felt lighter than usual, he could guess that she and Alucard were gone on a hunt. Maybe mother Lily was accompanying them; he wasn't totally used to her brand of perfume yet, even if her natural smell was familiar but somewhat foreign at the same time. After all, if she was to be a Hellsing Operative, they had to give her a baptism by fire and put her to use. He wasn't really worried, Grandpa Vlad was the most powerful thing still roaming the face of the Earth, he would never let anything happen to Integra and for Lily, well she was a fully certified and powerful witch that had tangled with Moldyshorts a few times and lived to tell the tale, so she could likely take care of herself. Maybe she will learn how to fight like a vampire?

Elsewhere in Wales, on the same night, a company of soldiers were gunning down ghouls with blessed bullets left and right, never breaking formation and making extra sure to never leave their backs exposed. Integra and Walter were sitting down calmly in the car; the woman was smoking one of her cigars while the man was pondering if he could join the festivities and do a bit of exercise. He would benefit to lose a few kilograms. Alucard was cackling like a maniac, his red eyes illuminating with glee, he was having so much fun! His foe was a somewhat powerful vampire and a bit older than his usual targets who was inspired by his "legend" and tried to continue were he left off when he was "enlisted" as a Hellsing operative by Abraham. He had been even smart enough to fly under the radar until recently, because he thought he had created enough ghouls from the undesirables and the dregs of society from all over Europe to drown the United Kingdom in fire and blood. He had even hidden his ghouls in a series of no longer in use old military bunkers.

The only hiccup in his plan was that he hadn't known of the Wizards and the Aurors and Hit Wizards of the Ministry of Magic had stalled this vamp long enough to call Hellsing to help after decimating much of his ghoul force. It was how they got, the Hellsing Organization, into the current situation. With Alucard taking care (read playing with) of the Master, while Lily was testing her vampire powers on the three brides of the Dracula wannabe. So far, she wasn't even breaking a sweat but by her sweet savage smile, she was having fun. He dodged a pathetic lunge of a particularly tacky sword from the would be Lord and saw his teammate grab the blonde tart by her long luxurious hair and send her swinging hundred of metres away after swinging her around in circle a few times with a loud

"OOOORAHHHH!"

Then she moved faster than Harry could by turning around to catch a sloppy punch in her right palm from the brunette slag with makeup slated all over her face by a shovel and with a powerful pull, she literally ripped the offending arm away! Vlad was about to applaud her; for his descendant had let her blood-lust out and tasted the blood from the limb she ripped by biting in it! Of course, the brunette was wailing like a bitch, writhing around the floor in agony. As if the loss of an arm was going to kill a vampire, even one as pathetic as those three sluts! The blonde vampire woman joined back the fray, but Lily absently backhanded her across the face with the ripped arm of the brunette, sending her back from where she came from before gracefully turning around to grab the third wife who was charging toward them like a rhino, by the throat, while the brunette was still wailing and trashing on the floor, wailing about her lost limb and making empty threats on Lily's health. The third wife had red hair, not the same shade as Lily though, who was more on the auburn side. But that one had red hair, almost like fresh blood that showed some Irish descent. But she was not even more skilled than the others. With a powerful punch in the solar plexus, she sent her third foe flying all the way back from the improvised ball room in which they were fighting.

Seeing his copycat try to flee and cut his losses, intelligent decision but futile since he had been ordered to exterminate the riffraff, Alucard tore his gaze from the fight of his many times great granddaughter and casually lifted his Casul gun and shot in quick succession the kneecaps of his foe, not paying attention to his horrified yells. He would be fine in a few minutes. Contrary to the wives, this impostor could regenerate. Seeing Lily going for her nōdachi, Alucard had a massive grin on his face. She was pretty resourceful he had to admit, to find a magical weapon smith who could make her a weapon like that. A weapon that with the right command and movement, could transform into something else! Lily jumped back about two hundred metres backward, drew her nōdachi in one hand, took her scabbard with the other and went to sheath it again upside her head, but strangely, she smashed the pommel of the sword in the mouth of the scabbard, not the blade. With a bloodthirsty smirk, she said out loud while starting to twirl her weapon at great speed

"Smash, Haguro Tonbo."

While she was twirling her wrongly sheathed blade and its scabbard at high speed that was showing hours of training, the nōdachi started to lengthen into an exceptionally long pole arm outfitted with a blade reminiscent of that of a Monk's spade on one end, and a heavy ball on its other end. This allowed the bladed end to be used much like an axe, and the weighted end to be used as a smashing implement. Which she did quickly when the blonde slag came back for more, said blonde vampire received for her trouble the heavy ball in the ribs, shattering quite a few with the strength Lily put into the hit. From there it was a one sided bloody massacre. Lily twirled her weapon to get some G-force and the three brides had to team up to try to stay alive. Well, technically alive, since they were undead. In the end they only delayed the inevitable and not by much since their teamwork sucked. Haguro Tonbo had been blessed and forged to fight all sort of supernatural creatures. The end result was that the three brides of the Dracula wannabe were cut in multiple bloody pieces. Once the weapon was back into an nōdachi, she sheathed it correctly and took her wand out of its holster to burn the remains of the vampires. It was done with a quick incendio. She then looked at Alucard and said

"Will you finish off your fan boy please? I'd like to be able to go home before dawn. If you're too disgusted, I can always finish the job for you if you want."

She was talking calmly, like she was discussing the weather. It was like the blood bath she made was not important at all. Yep, Vlad really liked his descendants. They were pretty interesting to have around. Snorting in derision at her offer, he turned back to his job and gunned the impostor down with a bullet in the brain and one in the heart. Let see that fake came back to un-life after that. Lily didn't take any chances and with a quick flick of her wand, the corpse was set on fire. She did douse it once there was nothing more than ashes though and to be very thorough, she made it vanish magically anyway. Once the job was done, Alucard radioed to Sir Integra for a quick report while Lily went to see if the soldiers were okay. In her months of being back to life, Lily had let out her motherly love for everyone who needed it. She took over the kitchen from an amused and baffled Walter and often baked many homemade desserts for the soldiers to snack on. There was nothing more hilarious to see a rough and tough S.A.S soldier being bashful and ultra polite. But God safeguard you if you made a mess in her kitchen! Harry had learned it the hard way when she caught him making himself a snack and not putting everything back where it was belonging after he was done!

She was his biological mother after all and had the authority to ground him and to take away his TV privileges just like Integra! But her son was very hard to ground, with his shadow travel ability that he inherited from Vlad, he could travel anywhere and anytime without restrictions! She was a bit sad that said ability was one she didn't inherit, so when he made a run for it in the shadows, she couldn't catch him. She was stronger and faster than him as a vampire though. It was normal, she was an adult after all and he was still growing.

Back to Hogwarts, their little outing wasn't discovered. If they had left on the regular means, the wards would have alerted the staff and everything would have failed. Since they left by a mean that wasn't traceable and came back before curfew, everything went without a hitch. The Weasley twins weren't even blamed for the fireworks of Friday night, by sheer coincidence; Peeves did the same thing on the fifth floor on the west wing at the same time! Needless to say, they didn't look at a gift horse in the mouth. They kept quiet for once and didn't try to take credit. It wasn't like the staff could put the poltergeist in detention after all. Things stayed as routine, heck it was even more calm than before since none of the pranksters could find a good enough prank idea to use the Wunschpunsch spell casting potion. Since it was an artifact that was using mega magic in place of regular magic, they just couldn't cast anything that came to their minds. The spell had to be properly constructed and the instruction grimoire was very clear that a miscast spell could do a lot of irreparable damage. So they had to prepare everything in advance. On the other hand, a long time project was coming along nicely. They would be able to cast a spell to change the rules about the Hogsmeade week-ends near the end of the school year. That way it would look on the level and the school staff could prepare adequately. They could likely cast the spell earlier, but a change of rules like that in the middle of the school year? It would look suspicious. Also Fred and George wanted to be sure that if a spell became permanent, they could always cast again after.

The research was fruitful, since he did find the passage that said that in case of a spell which became successfully permanent, the two parts of the magic parchment would materialize again in a few hours, to let the mega magic recharge. It was also specified that once a spell became permanent, nothing could undo it, not even another permanent spell, so the author of the grimoire was preaching extreme caution. So knowing that messing with the mega magic would have serious consequences, George, Fred, Lee and Harry decided to play relatively harmless pranks, like dyeing Ron's hair a bright green and silver, dyeing Nott's hair a bright red and gold, having the absolute brass to put a whoopee cushion on Ms. Pince's chair in the Library and run like hell when she sat on it, convincing Moaning Myrtle that haunting the Headmaster's private bath facilities was more interesting than her usual location and many other things. Well, life at Hogwarts was always bound to be interesting when you have some inventive pranksters among the student population.

Hermione was not very fond of her best friend new past time though and she was not shy about sharing it with him, out of hearing of any form of authority though. She might disapprove, but she wouldn't rat Harry and her fellow housemates for something that minor. She also had to admit that the dyeing of Nott and Ron's hair was funny. Well, more their reactions to the prank than the prank itself was funny in her book. But she had learned a long time ago that she couldn't really control her friend. She could redirect his energies though, which she did by roping him to come with her to the library to look for some light reading. Wanting to talk about something that was bothering her, she asked

"Did you figure what is kept on the forbidden corridor Harry?"

He answered

"Well, I know there is some sort of very big dog there from the smell and from what I heard, but as it doesn't concern me, I decided to not poke my nose further in that business. It was more interesting exploring the secret passages or talking about the Hindi culture with Padma. Did you know that for those of her religion, beef is sacred, thus forbidden to eat? "

Hermione shook her head. Her friend could be so inconstant sometimes. When something had his interest, he would pursue knowledge on it until he's satisfied but in contrary, when it's something he doesn't care about, he won't go looking for more than the basics. She decided to drop the subject, it was likely something that could them killed or worse, expelled.

On The Ministry of Magic's side of things, the recent campaign with Hellsing was quite a boon. The Dracula wannabe had hoarded quite a few treasures that were enchanted, thus transferred into their custody. They had a team of experts curse breakers analyzing and cataloguing everything. Once they were done, the Ministry could then redistribute anything belonging to another country and gain goodwill and favors in exchange of their Good Samaritan act and everything else that wasn't a national treasure would be stripped of all magic and sold to the highest bidder and the profits would go to the Ministry's coffers and redistributed among the departments at the next budget.

For the Black case, things were finally in motion officially! Due to a recent change of management staff at Azkaban prison, the new warden had found proof of records tempering and bribes taken to keep certain prisoners in highest or/and lowest security wings than required. Fudge, wanting to make up for his blunder in the Potter case, reviewed personally the files of each prisoner. Thus when he found out that Sirius Black had been in jail for more than a decade without trial in the maximum security wing, he was white as a sheet! Thus when he learned of the already taken decisions made by his D.M.L.E department head on the case and everything he needed to know, even the fact that the true culprit was possibly still at large, he was very glad for it and unlocked enough founds to give the man the best treatment possible. While this was the precedent administration's blunder, Fudge took it as a personal offense. He had many vices and many faults, but to let a man rot in hell without a trial wasn't one. Every citizen of the United Kingdom had the right to his day in a court judged by his pears. Once Sirius Black was healthy enough, he would get his day in court. It would limit the scandal if they could find Pettigrew though...

"Question Black on Pettigrew's habits. You said he was relatively sane of mind? See if he can't give your Aurors and you some solid leads. Put your best on that case, Amelia. Also forbid them to talk to the press. This stays in house. If a peep of that is leaked on the press, the culprit will find itself jobless quicker than he can blink, mark my words. See if you couldn't put Mad-Eye Moody in charge of the team you wish to put on that case. "

Amelia couldn't contain her ruthless smile and answered

"No problem at all, Cornelius. Let me do my job and don't send Dolores tell me how to do it and everything will be fine."

The Minister waved his hand and said

"After her last stunt, I had her reassigned has a foreign ambassador. She won't get in your way."

Needless to say, Amelia wisely decided to not bring Cornelius' part on said stunt. She dismissed herself, turned around and left the Minister's office in direction of her own. Amelia Bones was on a case. Beware Peter Pettigrew, beware. Justice was coming for you.