Three Days Later,
St. James's Park,
London
Whooping cries of exhilaration split the tranquil silence of the night as several teenage boys skateboarded down the formerly peaceful pathways of St. James's Park. Their parents thought them asleep in their beds, and they were riding high on the exhilaration of freedom and disobedience. Their leader was a tallish boy of about 15, his brown hair painstakingly gelled and styled, his black jeans artfully torn, exactly the right amount of a rock group's band shirt showing from under his immaculate leather jacket. His lips were quirked in the self-assurance only a 15-year-old boy who believes he is the object of every woman's desire can muster. Blissfully unaware of precisely how obvious it was that he spent hours every morning making it look as though he didn't care how he looked. The boy's shouts stopped abruptly when, while judging the distance for a particularly foolhardy stunt, he noticed a hunched figure moving through the trees toward the towering facade of Whitehall.
"What's the matter, John?" The boy's friends were quick to notice his sudden silence. Something about it worried them: John was never silent. Even in class he was always grinning and making sardonic commentary under his breath, no matter how frustrated it made his teachers.
"There's someone there." Even hunched over in the dark of the night, the figure was still enormous, easily the largest person any of them had ever seen; as one, the boys stepped closer, trying to see the features of the giant. It was concealed by the darkness between two lampposts, each step was accompanied by the loud sound of something hard impacting on pavement, and a dark mist seemed to be spreading out along the ground before it. The boys looked over at each other nervously, was the figure wearing hobnailed boots or something?
"Does... Does that sound like a horse to you?" Tyler asked his friends, running a nervous hand through his untidy blonde locks. His other hand tugged nervously at his blue denim jacket, as if tempted to pull it tighter around him like a blanket.
"Mate, just because your little head got all the brains, that doesn't mean you shouldn't at least use your eyes. Do you see a horse anywhere, Dumbarse?" Peter tried to maintain a casual tone as he bantered with his friend, but the slight tremor of his voice belied his attempts. Despite being the tallest of the group by a head, Peter always carried himself hunched forwards, as if trying to hide among his shorter companions. To compensate for his spindly frame, he made adept use of his biting wit to ensure he stayed one of the tormentors rather than the tormented.
"At least I get to use my lower head sometimes, 'Millimeter Peter'." Tyler teased back, momentarily forgetting the figure still advancing toward the group.
John hadn't forgotten about the figure though, and he stepped forward to make the challenge his adolescent pride demanded, "Hey, Mister, what're you doing out here this late?" The figure made no response to the query, continuing it's slow progress, drawing inexorably closer to the pool of light cast by the nearest lamppost. The boys felt the first prickles of fear raising the hair on the back of their necks. Some vestige of the days when their ancestors had cowered away from predators at every turn warning them not to disturb whatever hunter they had stumbled upon.
After a few moments, the complacency of civilisation banished the warnings of the past and John called out, voice shaking, but filled with bravado, "You here to report us, Mister?" The boys laughed among themselves, each trying to pretend they weren't terrified. Then the figure stepped forwards into the light, and the boys screamed, all pretence forgotten in the face of the creature before them. The monster straightened, looming high, higher over their heads, it's crest moving upwards toward the bulb of the lamppost, nearly seven meters off the ground. In the seconds before the crest punctured the glass and extinguished the light, the boys saw four wickedly sharp blades appear in the creature's quartet of arms, then, with a screeching of shearing glass and metal, darkness consumed the boys and the monster. Moments later a blinding flash of bone and crystal silenced the boys' screams, and their bodies fell to the floor, each slashed into two pieces.
Harry was moving toward power, his new instincts were driving him toward the power, seeking to find and consume its source, he needed biomass. Needed to begin reproducing, creating soldiers and breeders and carriers for his mission, to continue perfecting his genetics, to evolve. His instincts drove him onwards, pausing only to consume the valuable biomass of his most recent kills, heading toward a red phone booth that stank of the power he craved. Upon reaching it, Harry somehow managed to cram his enormous bulk into the small box, which seemed to expand around his massive body as a female voice inquired as to his business in the Ministry of Magic that day. In response to the question, Harry roared, a bloodcurdling sound that woke the slumbering primaeval fears of all creatures, memories of hours spent huddling in the dark, hiding from certain death at the hands of an apex predator.
"Thank you, please take your badge and be prepared to surrender your wand for inspection." The voice answered pleasantly, as a badge emblazoned with the words "Being of Unspeakable Horror, RARGH" clattered down into the small receptacle beneath the phone. Moments later, the box began juddering downwards into the depths of the Ministry of Magic.
Same Time,
Ministry of Magic,
London
Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody nodded goodbye to the bored official sitting behind the desk in the Ministry atrium as he walked toward the apparition point, on his way to his heavily warded home. The clattering sound of the lift descending from the streets above rang through the almost empty room, shattering the sleep-laden silence. The official didn't bother raising his head, it was probably some worker arriving for a late shift. Moody, however, felt a prickling on the back of his neck.
Why would a Ministry worker be using the lift? And if it wasn't a worker, who would be coming to the Ministry at this time of the night? Something didn't feel right. Perhaps it was merely his ever-growing paranoia, as some of the new recruits had been muttering when they thought he couldn't hear them, but, as Moody had growled into their faces, his paranoia was the reason he was still alive when so many other aurors weren't. Moody flicked his wrist, and his wand dropped into his waiting hand. Simultaneously, he ran across the room and vaulted over the official's desk, catching the startled man in the chest with his wooden leg and bowling the man over, chair and all, to land flat on his back.
"Stay down," Moody growled at the official, ignoring the stream of wheezing obscenities the man choked out at him. Crouching, so that the heavy marble of the desk was between him and the slowly descending lift, Moody trained his wand at the place where the lift doors would eventually open and waited. The lift finally lowered into sight, and a lesser man than Moody would've screamed at the horror visible through the glass panels.
Beside him, the official did.
"Sweet Merlin's saggy left testicle!" Moody swore under his breath, the creature in the lift was clearly an apex predator, and the fact that it had gained entrance to the Ministry proved that it must also be intelligent and magically powerful. Ducking back down beneath the desk, Moody grabbed the official's robes and yanked him down too, silencing him with a spell before sending a silvery patronus toward the auror department, calling for reinforcements. Turning to the shaking man next to him, Moody growled "Listen to me, I'm going to lift the spell. When I do, DO NOT scream. Under ANY circumstances. If that Thing doesn't already know we're here, the last thing we need is for you to ring the dinner bell before reinforcements have a chance to arrive. Wait for my signal and then start blasting every damn spell you know that might hurt it. Understand?"
The official was shaking so much Moody couldn't tell if he nodded or not, but he chose to assume he had. Moody removed the spell, and together they waited, listening to the lift's slow descent, and, finally, the clattering of the opening doors.
"Level One, Ministry of Magic Atrium." In the dead silence of the room, the voice of the lift rang out loudly, followed by a thundering, clattering footstep, and a deep, low growl.
The beast had arrived.
Same Time,
Auror Office
Amelia Bones had graduated from the Auror Academy two years earlier, under the tutelage of the legendary Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody, as some of her fellows had taken to calling him. Unlike her compatriots, Amelia didn't think that Alastor was losing his nut, she knew that he was the greatest auror they had ever had, and that his 'Constant Vigilance!' was one of the main reasons he held that title. Amelia had every intention of being paranoid herself, she was going to run the Department of Magical Law Enforcement someday, after all.
She was jolted from her pleasant daydream by a sudden outpouring of silvery light, looking up, she watched a bear made of silvery light burst through the ceiling. Halting in front of her, the bear spoke in the voice of her mentor.
"To any and all aurors currently in the building: there's something in the Atrium. Bipedal. Approximately 7 meters tall. Looks Armoured. Four arms. Big swords. Bring as many people as you can and sound a general alert. I don't know how this thing found us, or how it got in, but I've got a feeling we're going to need all the help we can get. NOW GET A MOVE ON! IF THIS THING TAKES OFF ANYMORE OF ME THAN I'M ALREADY MISSING HEADS ARE GONNA ROLL!" Amelia jumped at the rebuke and quickly shouted to any aurors who hadn't heard the commotion to get their arses moving towards the atrium. That done, she sprinted into the Head Auror's office and slammed her hand down onto the emergency button, sending an automatic buzz to every auror badge in Britain. Next, she turned and apparated into the atrium. She was met with a scene of utter carnage.
The monster Moody had described was standing in the centre of the atrium, one hand holding the limp body of an auror off the ground as its jaws swiftly devoured it. Two other hands were flashing faster than she could follow, using its swords to deflect the hail of spells being sent its way by the other aurors. The fourth hand was efficiently dismembering any wizard foolish enough to stray within reach, while the creature advanced towards the nearest knot of aurors, sheltering behind the check-in desk.
Even as she watched, a foolish young black haired auror attempted to apparate behind the beast in order to take it unawares, only for the beast's arm to swing back, slicing through the man's legs so quickly and effortlessly a trail of vaporised blood followed in the sword's wake. The auror collapsed, clutching the stumps where his legs used to be, his scream barely had time to tear itself from his lips before his head was seized by the creature's bifurcated tail and half-crushed, half-bisected with a terrible cracking of bone and a wet schnikt.
Six plumes of thick smoke were gushing from chimney-like protrusions on the creature's back, slowly carpeting the atrium in a dense mist. Fortunately, the size of the atrium seemed to have so far prevented the cloud from reaching past the ankles of the aurors engaging the beast. Every swing of the creature's swords stirred the growing cloud, drawing trails of ebony darkness around the monster and giving it the appearance of a nightmare emerging from the mists of sleep into reality.
Abruptly, the creature's tail lashed out once more, seeming to latch onto thin air; and, for a moment, Amelia thought it was merely an expression of emotion from the beast. Then, she noticed the blood that appeared to be trickling down mid-air from within the tail's grip, the disillusionment charm faded as the auror flickered back into existence, her hands futilely attempting to pry the creature's claws from around her throat. Without bothering to look at its captured prey, the creature thrust the woman's face into one of the trails of smoke erupting from its back. After a few moments, the tail released and the woman collapsed, skin blistering, mouth foaming, and her eyes bulging and leaking a mixture of blood and brain fluid as she convulsed and clawed bloody trails in her throat and chest.
The knot of aurors continued to send dozens of multicoloured bolts of magic toward the advancing monster, ranging from simple stunners to a particularly nasty-looking Entrail-Expelling Curse. In their midst, she saw the unmistakable figure of Moody, sending curse after curse at the beast, pausing only to transfigure nearby pieces of rubble into lions, wolves, and even dragons to attack the creature. The monster didn't even slow down, slicing the transfigured creations to ribbons without breaking stride. Within moments it had finished devouring the slain auror and stretched out its hand toward a sword it had left buried in the wall. The sword yanked itself from the enchanted stone, leaving the body it had been pinning to slide down into a boneless heap, and smacked into the creature's palm, joining its fellows in their macabre dance of dismemberment.
"Moody! We can't stay here! We need to pull back and figure something else out, nothing we're doing now is working!" Amelia yelled at Alastor before sending a Bombarda Maxima at the ground in front of the monster, hoping to disrupt its footing enough to create a gap in its otherwise impenetrable defence. The creature swatted the sizzling bolt of crimson magic away with one of its swords, sending it sailing off to impact with the last vestiges of the Fountain of Magical Brethren, atomizing it.
Neither Moody nor Amelia had waited to see the results of her spell, the former giving a growl before nodding his assent and turning to order the other aurors to fall back to the lift. Amelia's shout and spell, although ineffectual, had caught the attention of the beast, and it turned toward her, it's flashing arms still deflecting spells carelessly, as it studied the latest arrival with intelligent eyes. An odd influx of emotions flashed through her mind before she shook herself and, swearing, apparated behind the desk with her fellow aurors, appearing just in time to see a scything blade of bone carve through the air where she had been standing moments before. A sharp pain in her arm caused Amelia to look down; a cut, roughly half an inch deep from the feel of it, had been opened on her arm. Clearly, she hadn't been quite fast enough. Gritting her teeth against the pain, Amelia conjured a simple bandage and wrapped it tight around her arm, staunching the bleeding.
Turning her wand toward the creature that had wounded her, Amelia cast a series of Bombardas and Reductos, which were deflected by the spinning blades without causing so much as a scratch. From beside her, a jet of poisonous green light erupted, streaking toward the creature only to impact against one of the spinning weapons. On impact with the spell, the crystal protruding from the blade of the sword began to glow, milliseconds later the weapon was slashed toward the retreating aurors and the light arced out in a wide slashing beam of energy, sizzling through the air. Swearing, the aurors ducked, but one, a young woman with platinum blonde hair, wasn't quite fast enough and was knocked off her feet. She landed on her back with a dull thump, her hair limp and her eyes staring glassily up towards the ceiling. Amelia turned to look at the source of the spell and found Moody's grisly face staring grimly back at her.
"We need to go to the Department of Mysteries. Nothing we can do is stopping that monster." Moody told her, the barest hint of remorse shining in his one dark eye, as it glanced towards the woman his spell had inadvertently killed.
"Why don't we just apparate out? We could leave it here without anyone to kill! Come back later with a plan, maybe some new spell to destroy that thing. Hell, we could get Dumbledore, surely he could do something about that monster!" Amelia argued, her voice rising even as she continued sprinting towards the lift.
"Because if we leave now the thing might escape! Go back out into muggle London maybe! Imagine the harm it could do! Even the muggles will realise that thing is not of their world, there'll be no keeping the Statute of Secrecy if it's slaughtered thousands of people!" Moody growled back at her. As he did so, he turned back towards the creature and waved his wand in a complicated pattern. In response, the stone of the floor rose up and formed a dome around the creature, trapping it within. For a moment, everyone in the atrium paused. Could it be over? Was the thing trapped? Then there was a white flicker of movement and a chunk of the dome fell away, sliced effortlessly free by the monsters blades. The creature stepped through the hole, unscathed. If Amelia hadn't known better, she'd have sworn the beast was smirking. Then it charged.
The monster crossed the atrium with a speed that revealed its earlier efforts as merely toying with its opponents, each gargantuan stride eating up several meters of ground as it pounded toward the panicked aurors. Its prey fled into the golden lift, and frantically smashed the button for the 9th level as the beast stalked towards them, its speed only increasing as it realised its prey was attempting escape. One sword was flung forwards toward the desperate aurors, and the freed hand swept down to grasp the body of the downed woman, lifting it up to the monster's mouth. Amelia managed to summon her strongest shield spell to block the flying blade and, although it sunk in to the hilt, the shield held.
With a flick of her wand, the sword spun around and flew back toward the creature, which caught the blade in its tail, holding the weapon almost delicately. A moment later, the lift doors closed to the grisly crunching of bone as the woman's skull was squished between the abomination's jaws.
As the lift descended the sound of shearing metal erupted from above them. The monster was carving its way into the lift shaft. Within moments, there was a clatter of metal as the severed sections of gate fell to the floor, and seconds later the lift shook as something heavy landed on the roof. The aurors only had time to glance at each other in horror before the first blade appeared, carving through the magically reinforced metal ceiling of the lift as if it were made of tissue paper.
KILL! A voice roared, causing several aurors to flinch at the sudden outburst of noise.
"Everyone! Cast your strongest shield! NOW!" Bellowed Moody as he threw himself down onto the floor of the lift and took his own advice, a shimmering silver shield appearing above him as his fellows did likewise. Amelia looked to the side as her own glimmering gold dome appeared above her, the display by the gates shined with a glowing number 8, only a few more seconds left before they arrived outside the Department of Mysteries.
Returning her gaze to the roof of the lift, Amelia watched as the metal was peeled back to reveal the hideous maw of the monster pursuing them. It's emerald green eyes glowing with predatory hatred and its mouth stained red with gore. The beast roared at them, sending a single blade hissing down through the air toward their combined shields. The shield, composed of over a dozen different spells from some of the most powerful wizards in all of Great Britain, cracked like glass. A spiderweb of fractal lines spread across the surface of the shield, but the sword was deflected, veering slightly away to screech along the shield's surface.
FEED! This time, Amelia realised that the word had been uttered inside her mind, and none of the aurors around her were likely to be screaming 'feed' through legilimency. Before her mind could fully come to terms with what this development meant, several things happened.
The doors of the lift opened. The shield shattered. The aurors scrambled out of the lift, and the beast dropped into the space they had vacated only moments before with a thundering crash of hooves on metal. Seconds of frantic sprinting later, and they had reached the black door at the end of the corridor, the thundering steps of the demon close behind them.
"Death Room!" Moody yelled as soon as the last member of the group had barrelled through the door. The door promptly slammed shut in the monster's face as the walls began spinning. When the walls came to a halt the door directly in front of them flew open, even as the one to their left was blasted off its hinges to slam into the opposing wall, crushing the two unfortunate aurors who had stood in its path to a pulp. Charging through the door in front of them, the aurors found themselves in a room filled with stone benches, descending towards a stone arch in the centre, with a fluttering sheet hanging within it. "Get to the Veil!" Moody ordered, "But DO NOT pass through it!"
There was no time to question the strange order, the group sprinted down toward the veil with the roars of their pursuer ringing in their ears, the slowest of their number cut to ribbons by the creature's slashing weapons. When they finally reached the arch, the group threw themselves around it, fully expecting the creature to simply bull straight through the structure and slice them all to shreds. Moody had certainly condemned them all to death, but that was a certainty anyway, they could not stop the creature, they could hardly even slow it down. But their deaths never came. Amelia, who was crouched just next to the to the opening of the arch and had expected to feel the sharp bite of a blade bisecting her body, slowly opened her clenched eyelids. The monster was gone, the only thing she could see in the chamber, other than her paralysed compatriots, was the fluttering fabric of the veil.
"The beast's gone." Moody panted, with absolute certainty.
"Where?" Amelia asked.
"Nowhere we'll ever be hearing from, and that's all that matters. If we're lucky, the Veil's lived up to its name and the thing's dead, if not? Well, some poor bastard somewhere's about to have a really bad day." Amelia nodded her head in grudging assent, she hoped the creature was dead, but so long as it was never seen on Earth again, it didn't really matter.
A Really Bad Day,
Wolf 1061d,
13.8 Light Years from the Sol system
Ha'raak spread his arms wide, the bone blades jutting from the ends of his arms glinting darkly with the purple blood of his vanquished foe as he roared his victory to the approving screeches of the watching females. His challenge for the right to be considered by the strongest female of the pack had pitted him against the most energetic young bloods, but it was his final fight against the grizzled Chief Warrior that had pushed him to his limits. One of his horns had been cracked and the armour covering his back bore several deep grooves from the blades of his vanquished opponent, but he had emerged victorious! He felt as if he were growing as the magnitude of his accomplishment settled upon him, the faces of his pack falling away beneath him as he grew to dwarf them all. Even the Chieftainess seemed to have shrunk, staring up at him with an odd expression. It wasn't approval, arousal, or even awe as he had dreamed of seeing in his wildest imaginings: it was horror.
A strange coldness was spreading from his chest, robbing him of the warm glow of victory that had suffused his body since the Chief Warrior had gasped his submission moments earlier. Looking down, Ha'raak saw a strange bone growth had sprouted from his chest, dripping a purple liquid that he dimly recognised as his own blood. What's more, his feet appeared to be hanging high off the ground, almost level with the heads of his nearest packmates. The approving screeches around him had transformed into whimpers of terror. Twisting his head around, Ha'raak couldn't stop a horrified chirp from slipping between his teeth, he was face-to-face with a monster holding a bone sword in each one of its four hands. It was one of these blades that had been thrust through his chest and hoisted him off the ground as easily as he might lift a hatchling.
FEED! A terrible voice roared in his mind as the creature's jaws opened wide, wide, wider, until they filled his rapidly darkening vision. The last thing Ha'raak saw was the sinuous red tongue reaching out to wrap around his skull. The last thing he heard was the cracking crunch of teeth punching through the armoured shell around his head and the screams of his pack as they swiftly joined their new champion.