"I'm not doing it, no matter what you say," said Walter flatly, crossing his arms.

"This coming from someone who worships the goddess Cerridwen and still idolizes Cuchulain?"

Walter couldn't look his brother in the eye, but he always was a stubborn one.

"Look, we haven't had a proper pagan ritual in years, and it never hurts to remind the gods that we still remember them. Who knows, they might take note of us and heal Megan."

"Or they'll notice us and take offense because we haven't prayed to them in years," countered Walter.

Adrian didn't want to say anything, because Walter was extremely overprotective...and with good reason.

"I've meet the gods of death. Twice, in fact."

Walter turned to face him, and his eyes spoke volumes. He was not happy, but then again he really hated the way the British idiots had yanked Adrian into their war and refused to let him leave.

"The first time was shortly after I was taken...they appeared after the idiot known as Voldemort somehow found a resurrection ritual that worked for his purposes. He used some of my blood to come back to a semblance of life. It was as I was escaping the graveyard that I saw them."

"Who?"

"Every god of death still worshiped or remembered. And they were all staring at the graveyard, their expressions clear as day. Every god from Hades to Kali to Osiris. They all watched Voldemort with such anger and revulsion that it terrified me. Then one of them noticed me. I was petrified, and I've never felt more terrified in my life. That was when something happened that I will never forget as long as I live."

Walter was listening intently now.

"One of them, the Jackal headed god Anubis approached me. I could hear the howls of the dead and the sound of the raging wind in his voice. He told me that soon I would have to make a choice, whether to accept the gifts given to the three brothers, or to reject them and allow them to fall into less worthy hands."

"And the second time?"

"When I gained the allegiance of the so-called Deathly Hallows. The moment I picked up the wand and held the stone, they arrived. Considering I had allowed Voldemort to temporarily kill me in order to destroy the soul fragment he left, I was the only one who could claim them. They awaited my decision rather patiently."

"And what decision was that?" asked Walter.

"I accepted them, of course. It's why the wizards were so afraid of me, despite the fact I would have happily moved back home and forgotten about them. Then that red haired twit found the perfect way to contain me until Draco realized the real issue."

Walter looked at his brother with concern.

"I'm fine brother O 'mine. All that happened was that I can see death now and that my natural abilities were boosted...that and I can now do this..." said Adrian.

Walter blinked twice before he realized he was looking at an almost perfect double of himself.

"What..."

"Bloodline gifts from the family...and I can awaken the gifts of any bloodline I chose, though it means my empathy will skyrocket past normal and be a little wonky."

Which was why he didn't dare use it after the war...not that he could have, being trapped in his own mind.

Walter considered another option.

"Could you properly awaken Megan's gift of magic?"

Megan's ability towards magic was iffy, at best. Her core remained fractured despite the treatments, but her control had improved to the point she wasn't considered a squib anymore.

"Huh... I would have to ask some of the gods or goddesses in charge, but I think it's doable. When's her next treatment anyway?"

Walter's concern eased from his face.

"Her last treatment is scheduled to be around Christmas," he said.

And by treatment, he meant the last dose of phoenix tears 'donated' by Adrian himself. Because Megan usually drank the tears under the supervision of the healers, the muggles still didn't know what was slowly but surely reversing the side effects of her disease.

They had been able to cover it by claiming Walter had found a recipe that worked and that she was taking an experimental treatment with Megan as the guinea pig.

They couldn't exactly get it cleared by the FDA, because there was no way they'd be able to figure out what was actually in the medicine. But if necessary, or if they were really strapped for cash, they could easily offer the same 'medicine' to people claiming it was an herbal remedy that had to be made in small batches.

None of the O'Brien clan would deny anyone the chance to be healthy, even if they had to be sketchy about what exactly was in the medicine...and they made certain that the person who needed it wasn't just trying to steal the recipe. Not that they could, but it was the principle of the thing.

"That reminds me! I still have to get you a decent present to make up all the years I've missed!" said Adrian.

"I sincerely doubt you'd be able to find anything," said Walter, his usual personality returning to normal.

"Ah, but brother O 'mine, I know you better than most," said Adrian with a playful laugh.

He was so getting Walter a crow familiar for Christmas, just to see the look on his face...or maybe an Irish wolfhound.

"So Ralph, have you ever heard of Zombie Fest?"

Paige shot Adrian a look. He shot her a reassuring one.

"Zombie Fest?"

"You've heard of zombies, right?"

"The undead. They don't exist though, right?"

"Actually..."

"I really don't feel comfortable with my eight-year-old talking about the undead," said Paige.

"Zombies are cool though...besides, the bloods all fake and it's just for fun. Teddy and I are going and I figured Ralph might have a bit of fun acting like a normal kid. Not to mention I know four people are going to be bringing their kids, two of which are younger than Ralph or Teddy."

That seemed to reassure Paige.

"Besides, it's not like someone would be stupid enough to release Inferi anyway."

"What's an..."

"Inferi are the magical equivalent to a zombie, but they're not infectious and you'd be lucky if a head shot took them out."

Surprisingly this came not from Adrian, but from Teddy.

Seeing the looks on their faces (Paige more than Adrian) he shrugged.

"Grandma made me study some of the darker books saying that every Black had to know a minimum of magic best not mentioned. Inferi were disgusting, but still better than some of the things in there. I mostly learned how they were made so I could figure out a spell to put them down permanently," said Teddy.

"...Why hasn't she said anything about this to me?"

"Something about how most of the spells you learned during the war were enough to qualify, since you've never really shown interest."

"If it weren't for the fact that most of what I used came from that library after I threw Dumbledore and his merry band of morons out of the house when I was sixteen and refused to let them return...not to mention Walburga's contributions, I would."

Walburga Black was a nasty, rather cruel and spiteful witch. But if she hated the fact that the new head of the Black family was a "filthy half-blood", the fact of the matter was that she hated Dumbledore and Molly Weasley more than she did his blood status.

That and they got along far too well upon learning he wasn't fooled by the old goat for a second, and was paranoid enough to make even Mad-Eye Moody proud.

Dumbledore attempted to forge Adrian O'Brien into his personal weapon. His arrogance cost him dearly, as the teen went behind his back and forged alliances with the neutrals with the agreement that he would never join either Dumbledore or Riddle, and would do his best to topple both.

He also didn't anticipate Adrian to have fail-safes in the event he tried to erase the memory of his brother and sister, or have fake memories implanted.

The first and only time Dumbledore attempted that trick, he found himself in a very long, nasty duel which had Fawkes breaking their familiar bond in favor of freedom.

Anyone stupid enough to try and force a phoenix animagus into becoming a mindless weapon wasn't worthy of a familiar bond with one. And upon seeing that, Dumbledore was swiftly booted out of the castle.

Unfortunately the Ministry still wouldn't let him leave.

Walburga had grudgingly admitted, before the war ended, that Sirius might have been a poor excuse for a son, but his heir was at least worthy of his Black blood. The fact Adrian openly worshiped the older, bloodier pantheons had actually endeared him to the woman. The second she found out he was an empath who had been torn from his anchor, she had told him of spells only a pure blood would know...and the location of certain tomes only an empath could use.

It was because of her that he survived at all.

At least he didn't have to deal with Kreacher. Upon getting the seal of approval, the house elf died in defense of the house... ironically not from Voldemort, but from Dumbledore. He had attempted to use the power of the secret keeper to gain access, but Kreacher proved once more than even weakened elves were still more powerful than an amplified human wizard.

Dobby and Winky had been happy to bind themselves to Adrian, once he proved a worthy master by burying Kreacher according to the old ways.

If he had to, Adrian could easily mobilize most of England's house elves behind him...not that he could when the screams and emotions overwhelmed him in St. Mungo's.

"So is this zombie thing safe?"

"Again, all of it's fake blood and both of them will be wearing trackers at all times. Besides, Teddy will be carrying his mace just in case," said Adrian dismissively. "This is mostly a chance for Ralph to be a normal kid for a little while."

Paige was absolutely for anything that helped Ralph function normally as an eight-year-old. And if Adrian was right, then this was something he could brag about to the kids at school and they would actually want to hear more.

"Tell you what, you can join us. I managed to convince Sylvester, Toby and Happy into coming, mostly because Happy is allowed to terrifying anyone that hits on her."

"Do I have to dress up as a zombie?"

"It's either you go as a zombie, or dress up like a victim. Sylvester's going as a zombie, as is Happy. Toby said he'd go as a victim. I wasn't really listening to why, but I think he's hoping Happy will try to 'eat' him."

"And Walter?"

"Catching up on Mythbusters, funnily enough. Well that and the last time I dragged him into something like this, he ended up in a rather amusing cosplay of Lancer from Fate/Stay Night."

Walter was a die-hard fan of Cuchulain, the Hound of Ireland. So when introduced to the series Fate/Stay Night and the fact that they introduced his favorite hero, well, he got hooked and soon fell in love with the series. Especially when he learned how technical they made magic... it was almost as bad as when Adrian introduced him to the Nanoha series, which was heavily based on math.

Adrian was reasonably sure that if Walter was any real sort of Otaku, he'd try his best to recreate the Devices from the Nanoha series.

He had already managed to more or less recreate the "lance" from the Fate/Stay Night series.

"I don't know...I'm not really a horror fan."

"Come on, it'll be fun. How often to you have a proper family outing with Ralph?"

That was the part that sold Paige. It had been a while since she had a proper "family" outing with Ralph, as she had had trouble properly connecting to him. And Ralph was clearly interested in going.

She just hoped he didn't get any nightmares from this. He already had weird dreams from all the sci-fi series Adrian introduced him to.

When Paige first saw Adrian dressed up with Teddy, she nearly had a heart attack because she honestly thought he had been injured or even killed. Fortunately he rubbed off the dye he used as blood to prove it was a very clever use of food coloring in the right portions. Teddy was equally dead-looking, and even his clothes looked like they had been slightly torn.

"So Ralph, you two ready to get dressed?"

"Actually I'm going as a 'victim'," said Paige.

Ralph went upstairs with an eager Adrian while Teddy waited downstairs. When they came back down Paige had to fight her instinct to believe Ralph was hurt.

"There is such a thing as too convincing," said Paige.

"Maybe, but it'll all wash off later and he'll get tons of complements from the other zombies...plus he gets to show off to the kids at school."

Paige drove to the zombie festival, and had to admit that Adrian had the best costume out of the ones there.

She was actually rather happy seeing Ralph acting like a normal kid. Adrian had told her there would be younger kids there, and she saw people bringing their two-year-olds with them, and none of them looked even remotely scared. Well, tired and cranky, yes, but not scared.

"This is a total gore fest," said Toby.

"You're only saying that because you're a victim, not one of those eating the others," said Happy.

Sylvester was rather happy he was one of the 'undead', as Adrian had worked his surprising magic (not the real kind, but it sure seemed like that) on him, turning him into one very dead zombie.

Happy had declined, and did her own make up and costume.

"I still don't get how you managed to convince us into coming here," said Toby.

"Bribed Happy and told Sylvester I'd help him turn into Super Fun Guy for Samhain in two weeks," said Adrian.

"Samhain?" said Paige.

"The original Celtic name for Halloween, which is also called All Hallow's Eve. Samhain was traditionally a harvest festival to celebrate the end of the growing season. People also believe it to be the night when the boundaries of the living and the dead were at their thinnest...which it is, by the way. People would dress up in hopes of confusing the spirits and the evil creatures into ignoring the living, while people would leave small sacrifices of food at doorsteps. Then the Christian's came, turned November 1st into a holiday called All Hallow's Day...which lead to Samhain being called All Hallow's Eve."

"Wow...you know a lot about pagan mythology," said Paige.

"I'm Irish, and our family has a habit of worshiping the old gods on the side, while attending Mass to keep the neighbors from wondering about anything weird they see. It's hard to condemn others as a witch if they regularly attend Church and aren't hit with lightning or other bad luck," said Adrian dryly, before adding "I mean Walter still worships the goddess Cerridwen, who watches over wisdom and knowledge, as well as transformation."

"So what are the pumpkins for?" asked Toby.

"Actually it was the Americans who started using pumpkins. Originally it was turnips or gourds that were used, but no one has ever really been clear as to why," admitted Adrian. "Some say it was to ward off evil spirits, other claim it was to symbolize Bran the Blessed, who was decapitated and asked that his severed head be placed towards France to repel enemy invaders from Celtic lands."

"That's...a bit disturbing," said Paige.

"You think that's horrifying, you should hear some of the older stories about faeries. The Sidhe can be very nasty when they want to be, and it's never a good idea to attract the attention of the Fae, especially if they're from the Unseelie courts."

The Scorpion team were all surprised when Walter showed up...as a zombie.

"I thought you were catching up on Mythbusters?" asked Adrian.

"I would, except I realized that if I stayed at the garage it would only be me and Cabe for several hours. Coincidentally..."

Adrian looked past his brother to find an uncomfortable Cabe Gallow wandering around. It was clear he hadn't been aware of where the team had gone for the day, or that Walter had been prepared with a quick change of costume.

"Oh this is going to be fun. We so have to get him into the zombie run for a quick laugh," said Adrian grinning evilly.

"I thought it would be beneficial if the whole team participated in today's events," agreed Walter.

Watching Cabe, Paige and Toby run from the 'zombies', hilarious. Seeing Ralph and Teddy taking pictures from on top of Walter and Sylvester's shoulders so they could have a good laugh later? Priceless.

Ralph was very popular at school the next morning with Teddy beside him, as some of his classmates had been lucky enough to go to the zombie festival and none of them had recognized him until he said something.

Apparently his costume had been VERY convincing.