Gateway 60

Luna

It was with dismay that Luna watched the third task start.

She and everyone she’d talked to about it thought the organizers would have realized their mistake with the second task, but it seemed that they had decided to double down instead.

The people around her grumbled as they noticed it, and at least one couple left when the last competitor entered, and no way to watch their progress materialized.

With a sigh, she settled down to wait for the task to end by herself.

Ginny was with her housemates, and the girls from Beauxbatons were with the rest of their school, but Luna had a book to finish, so she wasn’t that bothered about being left alone.

At first, she would glance up every so often to see if anything had changed. Still, as time went on, Luna did it less and less until she was completely engrossed in Archibald the Ready’s book on military tactics during the war against Grindelwald.

Luna had lost track of time when cheers started to erupt from the crowd. She looked up from her book to see Harry kneeling beside a face-down, knocked-out Fleur with the Triwizard Cup in hand.

But something was wrong. She couldn’t hear what he was saying because of the cheering, but Harry looked panicked.

Luna quickly stood up and started moving in his direction, trying to hear what he was screaming while she searched for anything wrong with him and Fleur.

She had almost reached him when the crowd went silent, allowing her to hear him clearly.

“Voldemort, he’s back! Voldemort’s back!” His voice rang out for everyone to hear, but Luna wasn’t paying attention to that anymore.

Ever since she looked up from her book, she had been gazing at Fleur.

At first, she’d thought it was a trick of the distance, but with each step she took closer, the reality of the situation became more apparent.

Fleur wasn’t moving.

Fleur hadn’t moved since she and Harry appeared.

And as she got close enough almost to be able to touch her, she realized:

Fleur was dead.

___

Severus

He knew what happened the second Potter showed up with Miss Delacour’s unmoving form in tow.

The Dark Mark had been acting up throughout the year, and not only his, as Karkaroff and Lucius confirmed that theirs had been getting stronger as well. However, he was still surprised to feel the call through it during the third task.

He discreetly warned Dumbledore, of course, but they had no way to tell what was happening or where. All they could do was hope that casualties would stay to a minimum and that not many would respond.

Potter’s appearance confirmed his worst fears, and he was beside him before he finished his first warning about the Dark Lord’s return.

“Potter! What happened!?” Severus demanded, distantly hearing the crowd’s cheering turn to silence and then panic.

Potter’s look of despair flashed to anger at seeing him, but one glance at Delacour’s body and another at something to the side wiped it off.

“We met at the final corridor and raced to the Cup,” Potter hastily explained. “It was a tie. We touched it at the same time. But it didn’t take us here. It took us to a graveyard where Pettigrew and Voldemort were waiting.”

The wails of Delacour’s family distracted them for a moment, and he pulled Potter to his feet and off to the side to let them grieve. It was then that he noticed her, Luna, staring sightlessly at Delacour’s dead eyes.

She was in shock, but he’d deal with that later. He needed all the information he could get if he wanted the plan forming in his head to succeed.

He barely turned his attention back to Potter when Dumbledore’s grave voice rang out: “And then what happened, Harry?”

“Voldemort said: ‘K-Kill the spare,’ and Pettigrew cast the killing curse on her,” Potter said, sighing in relief at Dumbledore’s presence. “He then tied me up in a statue above Voldemort’s father’s grave and did a ritual to bring Voldemort back to life.”

“And how did you escape?” Moody asked as soon as he arrived.

“He called his followers, and when almost no one showed up, he got mad,” Severus allowed himself a moment of satisfaction that his and Xeno’s plot to deprive the Dark Lord of followers worked. “He untied me, gave me back my wand, forced me to bow with the Cuciatus, and then we dueled.”

“You duelled the Dark Lord and managed to escape!?” Moody exclaimed in surprise, fumbling for his ever-present flask.

Severus’ blood turned to ice.

The only ones to call the Dark Lord that were his followers, someone like Alastor Moody would never call him that without being controlled or…

Severus pulled out his wand, but Dumbledore was faster; by the time he was ready to cast, Moody’s wand was sailing to Dumbledore’s outstretched hand, and Moody was already restrained, his open flask falling to the ground and spilling its contents.

He took the flask and smelled its contents: polyjuice potion.

Severus should have known. He had noticed ingredients for the potion missing and had thoughtlessly blamed Potter due to his having done so two years before. If he had paid more attention, he’d have caught the impostor much sooner and prevented the Dark Lord’s return and Miss Delacour’s death from happening.

After Dumbledore apprehended Moody’s impersonator, the panic amongst the crowd turned into full-blown chaos. The Minister was trying to calm it down, but his empty platitudes and assurances that Potter was lying fell on deaf ears.

Seeing his chance now that it was clear he wouldn’t be able to get any more information from Potter, Severus quickly grabbed Luna’s hand and took her to an empty classroom inside the castle.

As they walked, he felt her come back to herself and start crying, her quiet sobs increasing in intensity with every step until they reached their destination.

Closing the door behind himself, Severus guided Luna to a chair and knelt in front of her.

“Miss Lovegood,” he said, trying to catch her attention. “Luna, there might still be a chance of saving Miss Delacour, but I need you to calm down.”

It took a few moments of Luna taking deep breaths and swallowing her sobs, but she managed it, giving him a nod to say she was ready.

“When was the last time you talked to Alex?” He asked.

“A-An hour and a half before the task started,” she said, swallowing another sob.

Severus cursed internally. It’d have been too much to ask for more time.

After a wave of his wand to check the time, Severus pulled the Time-Turner from underneath his robes, stretched its chain to include Luna, and gave it the number of turns needed to take them to after Luna’s last conversation with Alex.

___

Alex

I didn’t think twice before opening the locket, just in time for a wave of confusion and panic to hit me.

The conflicting emotions coming from Luna increased my sense of urgency, and I willed ink to form on the locket’s page with the message I wanted to send.

“Luna! What’s going on!? What happened!?”

It didn’t take long for two responses to come.

“I don’t know!” Was the first, but the second was illegible.

“Miss Lovegood, please close the locket and go warn my other self that the worst came to pass. I’ll also recommend you tell him to give you something to sleep for the next hour.”

“Fine,” came the response.

“Severus? What’s going on? Is Luna ok?” I knew his handwriting from his journal, and from what he wrote, I could already guess what was happening.

“Miss Delacour died at the end of the third task, killed by one of Voldemort’s followers right before Voldemort was resurrected.”

“Fuck,” I muttered.

“How long do I have?” I asked, getting up and noticing Nanao, Isane, and Kyoraku looking at me in concern.

“3 hours,” Fuck.

“I’ll be there,” I sent before closing the locket.

“Alex! Is everything ok?” Isane worriedly asked.

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “There’s an emergency, I need to go.”

I just had to find a way to bypass my Authority’s cooldown first.

“Talk to your Zanpakuto,” Kyoraku said, looking knowingly at me. “Ukitake told me everything, and I figure if there’s an answer for your question, that’ll be the place you’ll find it.”

“How did yo-” I shook my head. How Kyoraku knew what I was thinking didn’t matter. Ukitake told him so he might as well have guessed. What mattered was that he gave me an avenue to pursue.

With a quick motion, I drew my Zanpakuto and sat down to perform Jinzen.

___

I opened my eyes to a darkened library.

Not the central area I usually appear in, but the major library where I first arrived. The bookshelves at my sides looked foreboding without the warm lightning from the last time I saw them.

The darkness didn’t bother me, and I could clearly see the Librarian standing before me, Zanpakuto in his right hand.

I drew my Zanpakuto. If he wanted to be difficult, I was more than willing to force the issue.

“Good,” he said, giving me a nod of approval. “I was worried you had come to beg.”

The next instant, his sword clashed against mine while a bolt of lightning burst from his left hand in my direction.

But I was ready, my own left hand forming the Shield spell just in time.

Seeing this, the Librarian smirked before appearing beside me faster than I could react, his sword slashing deep into my side and Flash Stepping back to his initial position.

“What was that!?” I demanded, waving my hand over the wound to heal it.

“Did you think I am as limited as you?” He taunted. “I have full access to everything you’ve ever learned, I’m just better at applying it.”

I forced my irritation at his comment down. He was trying to rile me up for a reason. Better not to fall for it unless I could turn the tables on him.

With an annoyed huff, I sent a Knee-Reversal hex his way, waiting for the moment he either dodged or blocked it to attack.

But he didn’t do either. The hex hit him, and passed through, as if he wasn’t even there.

I took too long to react to it, and by that time, his Zanpakuto was already cutting into my back, sending me sprawling to the ground.

“Were you so used to having a passive defense against Aizen’s illusions that you forgot your protection is against mind-altering effects?” He sneered. “Or were you so ignorant as to believe I wouldn’t use illusions against you?”

Casting another healing spell on myself, I stood up. If this was how he wanted to play it…

“I just never thought a part of myself would resort to trickery like that,” I said mildly, not really meaning it, while I blinked once to activate the Eye of Wisdom. No way for him to catch me off-guard if I had that Authority active.

What I saw when I opened my eyes was the Librarian smirking at me. I tried to Flash Step away, but my feet were stuck on the ground.

I didn’t take my eyes from him as I cast Finite on the Sticking charm gluing my feet to the ground, waiting for him to make his move. It was only after my spell took effect that I realized my mistake.

Runic Arrays materialized underneath me, anchoring me to themselves as lines of light burst from them to bind my limbs.

“Really?” The Librarian laughed. “You never thought a part of yourself would be smart enough to sidestep direct confrontation and instead decided to subtly subjugate his enemies?”

With a wave of his hand, a dozen other Runic Arrays appeared around me.

“One simple illusion,” he lectured. “That was all it took for me to cast these and still have time to attack you from the back. And what did you manage to do? Bleed all over the floor?”

I stayed silent. Giving him a hurt look while I tried to think of a way to get out, while letting him monologue.

“Oh, don’t give me that look,” he rolled his eyes. “You’ll get there someday, maybe,” he shrugged. “But right now, you failed. Sorry to say that Luna’s little friend will have to die. Maybe if next time you’re better, you might save her the heartbreak.”

With a snap of his fingers, the Runes surrounding me started glowing ominously while the Librarian turned to walk away.

But I wasn’t paying attention, my focus on a spell to get out of these binds.

And as the Runes discharged their attacks, I screamed:

“Hado #89 Saishū-Tekina Eradication!”

A wave of black light burst in all directions around me, erasing everything in its path and hitting the Librarian in the back and launching him away.

The result of my spell was over one hundred yards of cleared space, the Runes just a distant memory.

Cautiously, I made my way in the direction the Librarian had been sent. I wasn’t taking any chances anymore.

At the edge of the ‘clearing’ I had made, I found a few destroyed bookshelves, but no sign of the Librarian anywhere.

And that’s when I heard him.

Whoops of joy and laughter coming towards me from further away. Not from the Librarian, but from the Punk.

A moment later, he exploded out of one of the bookshelf corridors, standing on a large piece of wood, and rushing towards me at breakneck speed.

He kicked off the wood to appear in front of me, but instead of blocking, I deflected his swing to the side, letting the spell he had cast hit the bookshelves beside us.

Instantly, every bookshelf in that direction was obliterated as far as the eye could see, a sea of broken wood and torn paper left in its wake.

“That wasn’t Diffindo,” I commented, staring at the Punk warily.

“What can I say? I liked what you did in your fight against Kenpachi,” he shrugged. “I just think that attack needed a little bit more spice.”

“Sectumsempra,” I said.

“Yep,” he smiled. “You have some great ideas when you’re pressured. That mix between Saishū-Tekina Konzetsu and Eradication was a stroke of genius, and I’m not saying that just because you put the old man out of commission well enough for me to take over.”

“Is that how the two of you work?” I couldn’t help but ask. I had been curious about their situation for a while, but they never said anything, and I never asked.

“Nah, I usually let the old man take charge, but we’re equal partners here,” he said, lightly knocking on his head. “Also, thank you for this.”

“For what?” I asked, tilting my head to the side.

“Giving me time,” he laughed, and with that, hundreds, if not thousands, of torn pages erupted from the bookshelves behind him, all of them glowing different colors as they rushed towards me.

My next few moments were spent desperately trying to avoid getting hit. Each page discharging whatever spell they held when they got too close to me.

I had barely dodged a nasty-looking purple curse after jumping over a torrent of ice that froze everything it touched when I chanced a glance at the Punk. He was muttering to himself, books floating around him, as he methodically used his Zanpakuto to draw Runes in the air.

Fuck. That.

One Flash Step, and I appeared behind him, my Zanpakuto cutting through two of his books and digging into his back.

“Wha- NO!” He screamed, the surprise of my attack having made him slip while drawing and destabilizing whatever he was trying to do.

I quickly Flash Stepped as far away as I could as the destabilized Runes exploded in a conflagration of colors.

The glowing pages fell limply to the floor, and from my position, I saw him lying face down at ground zero, smoke billowing from his form.

As I approached him, he slowly turned himself around before, with a wave of his hand, conjuring a large white flag.

With a sigh of relief, I quickened my pace until I was looking down at him.

He didn’t look injured, and for a moment I thought it was a trap, but he just laughed and said:

“You win.”

___

A while later, I opened my eyes to see the Captain Commander standing in front of me, Kyoraku and Ukitake at his sides.

Standing up, I put my hand on the hilt of my Zanpakuto, letting the feeling of power flow through me as I asked:

“So, how long was I out?”

___

A/N: And that’s that.

As always, thank you all for your support! See you again next week.