Chapter 22 - Victory

Narcissa blinked. What had happened?

"Hello," Harry's voice said softly. "Deep breaths, get your bearings."

Narcissa felt as though everything was suddenly off kilter, like gravity changed by a few degrees. She was frantically coming to grips with the abrupt disappearances of the foreign presences in her mind... but how was she 'awake' if she didn't have the Horcrux on?

"Deep breaths," Harry repeated.

Narcissa's eyes seized on the voice. It was Harry... but he looked different. Older, somehow - like 3 years had passed since she had last seen him.

His words finally registered, and she forced herself to inhale.

And then she stiffened; she felt almost caged. Where was her wand?! She carefully controlled herself, not wanting to make any threatening motions. "What did you do with my wand?" she asked in a neutral voice.

Harry sighed. "Can we talk inside my mind? There's something important we need to discuss."

Narcissa's eyes tightened a fraction more. But in the end, she tensely nodded. Looking Harry deeply in the eyes, she descended into his mind.

It was a seascape, yet there were differences from their mental interaction moments prior. Before, the rocks along the shore were jagged; the house at the top of the hill looked like it was freshly constructed; the winding driveway made of a pristine cement. Now, though, the rocks looked rounded, the house looked lived-in and comfortable, and the driveway was gravel. It didn't feel as though it were merely older, as much as it had a worn homeliness. A sort of tranquil peace to it.

Narcissa soaked it all in. She wasn't sure if Harry knew this, but he was revealing a lot of his interior self at the moment.

"I know this is a lot to absorb in a short time," Harry gently said, "but may I show you some memories? I'd like to show you what's happened in the world the last few years."

She started a bit at 'few years', but nodded; And with that, the first memory played out in front of them.

Harry was sitting in the ruined Hogwarts great hall with what looked like a Hogwarts professor. It took Narcissa a few seconds to place the face: Septima Vector. Why was Harry talking with the Arithmancy Professor?

"So what do you think?" Harry asked eagerly.

"It's... big. Are you sure there aren't any incremental steps?"

"Not really, though I wish there were. If we tell the muggle world about ours, and then wake up the wizarding world as it was before, it'd be mass chaos. If we wake up the wizarding world first, and try to prepare them for integrating in with the muggle one, they'd simply stop us. Maybe even imprison us."

Vector frowned. "Still, it feels wrong, stealing their magic."

"Not stealing," Harry said firmly. "Sure, they won't be witches and wizards anymore when we do this. But someday, it might be possible to safely destroy the Fidelius in full. And if we do? Well, they all get back their ability to cast magic. The problem is..."

Vector finished the sentence. "The problem is, if we do that now, they'll just hide back away from the world." She sighed. "I almost wished you hadn't shown me the muggle world, Harry."

Harry smiled. "It was worth it to see the look on your face when you saw a mathematician in Dijon face-timing with an aerospace engineer on trajectories for a new spacecraft."

"It was humbling," Vector grumbled. "I was well known as the premiere arithmancer in all of Europe. And those two casually made me feel like a first year student. And the casualness is what killed me - it's not that they were so much more knowledgeable, but that they just took it for granted in order to talk about larger concepts."

"That's what worries me the most," Harry admitted. "All those former wizards are not going to have the skillsets for the muggle world."

"Oh, don't worry about that, Harry," she said with a laugh. "Yes, they won't have a lot of the muggle-specific skills... but people-skills will translate just fine. Given that we'll make sure their basic needs are taken care of with magic? They can spend all their time getting on their feet however they wish. I'd imagine most of them will end up being small business owners or in service positions, to be honest."

Memory Harry was watching a strange contraption with a moving picture on its front. It seemed to operate like a muggle television - except it was far too thin to be one. It was only 3 inches thick.

"It's a flat screen television," the real Harry chimed in, obviously seeing Narcissa's confusion. "Right now, it's displaying the news - current events at the time."

The television anchor continued talking. "Yes, as amazing as it is, Magic has been officially confirmed to exist. Monica, would you walk us through the list? And, again, I remind viewers: this is not a hoax or a prank - this has all been reviewed by Downing Street as well as the British Skeptics Society. Monica?"

"Yes, Laurie, the two magicians - named Harry Potter and Septima Vector - first started out with something they called Transfiguration. They began altering the substances of items, changing them from one base material to another. Since this was the first demonstration, there were nearly 2 hours worth of testing to verify the changes. Then they got a bit more outlandish, turning regular materials like wood into living creatures. At that point, the skeptics society threw in the hat. Following that were a few dozen different things they called 'charms'. The finale was when they turned a willing volunteer from the skeptics society into a cat for 10 minutes. Who, after being returned to human form, was able to relay his experience as having been a cat for that time."

"Thanks, Monica. After the 5 hour gauntlet, they were asked the most important question: what now? To which Septima Vector answered simply: To start making the world a better place."

"I'm glad you could come see this," Septima said in an almost gushing voice, standing up from the desk with a laptop and seemingly hundreds of random pieces of paper filled with printouts, math equations, and notes.

Harry smiled. "To be honest, I'm surprised you're not going up with them."

"No, no, I'm much happier here on the ground. Besides, they probably wouldn't have let me even if I had wanted to - way too much of a risk. If the BSP chaps thought they could get away with it, they'd bloody wrap me in bubble-wrap and keep me in a padded room.

Harry knew that Septima was exaggerating; he'd never seen her happier than when she'd started working alongside the British Space Programme.

"So, can you give me the quick rundown, Septima? The news has been pretty light on the specifics of what you've actually been doing."

"Yeah, BSP's being pretty tight-lipped - and for good reason. NASA and CNSA are already pretty intolerable about getting access to my skills - and they'd be ten times worse if they knew some of the details we're planning."

Septima shuffled through some papers on the desk until she found a rough diagram of the new Merlin Class Space Vehicle (muggles had a sense of humor, it turned out.) "Okay, so space exploration is littered with problems that magic has already solved. The three big ones are: weight is the enemy of getting to space, you have to figure out how to regulate heat, and you have to perfectly balance your systems - because you can't just grab more oxygen or water or fuel from around you. I mean, these are easy for us wizards to get around, yet it's been the main muggle roadblock to doing anything serious in space. With just a few simple charms, we were able to jump start things by decades."

"Makes sense - I read the British Programme was quite a ways off from any non-earth-orbit capable craft, but now they're already ready to start sending out planetary probes."

Septima nodded, then glanced around to see if anyone was watching. "Keep this to yourself, but... take a look at this."

She pointed at two other pieces of paper - which had markings that wouldn't make sense to anyone who wasn't a wizard.

"Expansion charms, conjuration runes, wait... stasis charms? ... and is that a plant growth spell? What on earth... I thought you were doing a Mars survey!"

"We're keeping it tight to the vest, but the next few missions are not just exploratory. BSP's not doing this half-arsed - there's no reason to, since Magic is making all their obstacles disappear. We're sending all the supplies and spellwork that would be needed to colonize. If everything goes well, Mars is going to have 2,000 people living on it within 5 years."

"You can't leave now, Harry!" a dark-skinned woman semi-pleaded, though she had a hint of a smile on her face. "We just finished making you a junior assistant biologist! In a few years, you might actually do some real work around here!"

Harry smiled, ignoring the traditional ribbing. "I don't want to leave, Aliné" Harry replied. "It's just that I can't stand being away from England's beautiful weather; Brazil is just so dreary."

"Quitter," she chided. "Just like you English to cure the easy ones and then leave. And it's not like Malaria and Tuberculosis were the only diseases around, you know."

"I know. And don't get me wrong. It's not like I won't still be helping - you can still request mass duplications, transfigurations, and nanoscopic conjurations and I'll be more than happy to do them. You'll just have to wait out the mail system instead of getting them instantly. It's still better than the old way, right?"

"Babaca. Part of me wishes you were a real pharmacologist, Harry, not just a lowly assistant. Then you'd know how difficult it is to do vaccine trials without your little wand-waving, and you wouldn't dare leave us real scientists without it."

Harry smiled. "I'm going to miss you too, Aliné."

"Harry!"

Harry grinned, seeing Septima run up to him and give him a friendly hug. "Septima! I didn't think you were coming back to London until next month?"

"The charms work was a lot easier than I thought. I was able to recycle some of my earlier work for BSP. The nightmare was the logistics - setting up deliveries to all the remote places on the globe takes quite a bit of doing. If I hear one more person talking about supply chains, I'm going to hex them. Still, it was worth it to get Bibe taken care of. Some of the horror stories..."

Harry blinked. "Horror stories? I thought Bibe was just about making devices to create clean drinking water?"

"It is. To be honest the reason I started it was you mentioning how you were surprised when Aliné told you diarrhea was the largest disease in the world - nearly a million children dying each year - all because some people don't have safe water. But some of the stories I heard - not just of the diseases, but of the labor. I mean, can you imagine, hauling a large jug for 7 kilometers and then hauling it full of water another 7 kilometers back - every day? Me taking plastic barrels and having them conjure water was already child's play, and the effort looks laughable compared to that sort of craziness."

"Speaking, er, of supply chains... do you mind if I steal them?"

"What?"

"Well, your thing is relatively one-time, but the project I'm working on promises to be a bit more recurring and a lot heavier."

"Oh?" she said, smiling. "You've got me curious. What are you working on now?"

Harry couldn't help but smile. The situation was unintentionally hilarious. Here he was, the CEO of a new company, and arguably one of the most known people on the planet... yet the person working the front desk reception didn't realize who he was - merely having told him to wait in the lobby while his party was called.

Harry kicked back in one of the lobby chairs, then nearly choked when he saw the pamphlet on the nearby coffee-table.

"'Magic Sugestion Line'?" he read in disbelief. He opened the colorful pamphlet up and groaned good-naturedly. Septima hadn't warned him about her latest project, and he had to admit: she might have bit off more than she could chew.

"'See something wrong with the world? Something magic might make better?'" Harry read aloud from the inner jacket. "'Give us a call or send us an email, and we'll see if we can help out.' ... oh dear lord, she's listed Runic Energy on here as a 'success story' and we haven't quite gone public with it yet. Well, I guess that explains why they've got a copy here in their lobby..."

A few minutes later, a rather formidable man in a suit walked through the front doors; Narcissa let out a strangled yelp - it was Lucius Malfoy!

"Sorry for my lateness," Lucius quickly said to Harry. "I didn't know the receptionist wasn't going to send you up."

Harry heard a small squeak coming from the receptionist. "It's okay," he replied, "it's not their fault, they just didn't recognize me. Anyway, were you able to get up to speed on the financials and logistics? Did Septima's people give you everything you needed?"

"For the most part. I didn't quite understand what was going on with some of the African shipping routes. I've got a meeting tomorrow to get some more information on that for you."

"Oh, the information's not for me," Harry corrected.

"Pardon?" Lucius asked, an eyebrow raised.

"For you. Lucius, I haven't been grooming you to be my right-hand man. You're my replacement. Be honest - do I make a good CEO for Runic Energy?"

Lucius frowned. "You're certainly not a bad one. Maybe... atypical... would be a better word?"

"But you would be a good one," Harry said. "And Runic Energy is going to need you a lot more than it's going to need me."

Lucius raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Runic Energy can't function without your..."

"No, no, I don't mean that," Harry interrupted. "I'll still do the runework to make the actual power units. And I've got some ideas how I can churn the runes out quite a bit faster to accelerate production. I mean, it's going to need you with the enemies this company is about to get."

"Enemies?"

"Lucius, everyone assumes we're opening Runic Energy as a mere competitor to regular energy sources - and it's an assumption I let them run with because there are a million people on this planet that depend on the status-quo and are already worried about having to compete with us. But there are a billion people that desperately need a form of free and clean source of energy - and once the world finds out that we're not aiming to make a profit and that Runic Energy is actually going to be run more like a charity for the next decade... well, they're going to dig in their heels, they're going to resist change with all their effort. I need someone slippery and intelligent and, well, a bit ruthless to defeat them. You're going to have quite a fight, keeping this free for everyone."

Lucius smiled; it melted Narcissa's heart to see that look of confidence once again.

"There's another thing we need to talk about," Harry said slowly. "It's about your wife. I'm going to be waking her in a few days."

"When you woke the rest of us," Lucius said firmly, "you told me there was a reason you couldn't wake her, there was a reason I couldn't remember who she was - and that you refused to tell me why."

"And you're wondering if I can tell you now."

"Yes."

"Lucius, it's because she's a witch. She has magic, like Septima and me."

Narcissa's mind reeled as the final memory stopped. It was... insane. Lucius... as a muggle businessman. Muggles and wizards mingling. No, not just mingling - excelling. Muggles accepting magic, embracing wizardry.

And, the strangest of all... how much bigger things were now. Voldemort's epic struggle was for what? A fight over who got to rule the 1,000 people who lived on one measly island. Septima Vector took that, doubled it, and let them move to another planet. Harry Potter took that, multiplied it hundredfold, and prevented them from dying each year. Septima took that, multiplied it by a thousand, and saved that many children each.

And Harry took that, employed it, and gave it to Lucius to lead... in order to improve the lives of everyone. Her husband was already leading as many people as Voldemort had aspired to. But it wasn't just that... Lucius was doing something that left his mark, that actually made a difference in how the world played out.

It wasn't just Lucius. Septima was leaving her mark. Before, she was known as the premiere arithmancer... which meant that a few dozen people throughout Europe respected her math skills. Now, she had direct impact on billions of people. As did Harry - who otherwise would've been a fresh Hogwarts grad trying to find some small shopkeep job.

"You once said," Harry softly said, "that wizards and witches were able to work at a higher level of existence. That society was being drug underfoot by stagnation, by trying to copy muggleborn concepts and shoehorn them in to how wizards lived - that wizards weren't free to reach another plane of existence. Well, none of that exists anymore. Whatever you want to achieve, whatever you want to make of the world... you can. If you could accomplish anything, Narcissa, what would you take on first? Everything I just showed you was done with just a pair of warlocks."

Harry smiled, and held out a wand. Her wand. "I wonder how much more the world could achieve with a third?"

Author's Note: I have to admit, I'm pretty happy with how this story turned out. This is the first time I've written in this style - I've usually put a good amount of weight on making sure the reader knows what's going on plot-wise... but I think I could grow to like this style of "describe observations and reactions, but don't necessarily explain underlying reasons". I got a huge smile on my face from a lot of the reviews, especially the ones where someone suddenly realized why something in chapters past had happened. (Reviews are always appreciated)

Anyways, I hope all of you enjoyed and were entertained by the story! :-)