Review Replies for Chapter 8:

Replying to Son of Whitebeard: Yeah, Albus couldn't get away with disrespecting the Wizengamot like that but guess who can? Its our boi Moody!

Replying to nsaifnabi: How badly can I bring justice down(read: torture) Umbridge and get away with it in this fanfiction? Harry is going to have a worse time of it in canon for a bit though.

Replying to tjjenkins: I will tell you this: first things are going to get far worse because of how much more Harry will hate Umbridge than in the movies. But Umbridge won't last as long I can assure you.

Replying to Mandarrin: Oh wow I'm so glad you are enjoying this. Unfortunately I can't find a way in which you have a war of the magnitude I'm planning without deaths, but not all will be lost. Every death adds strengthens Harry's ability to fight Voldemort, remember that as well; the saying digging his own grave could easily apply to Voldemort here.

Replying to BookFan98: I'm glad you liked the chapter. I am a HUGE fan of Moody, he is awesome. Right now he is also one of the only characters I haven't decided on their fate in the story. Either he dies close to the very end, or he lives through it and the sequel. Not sure yet, but regardless he is becoming such an important character to the story I am adding him as one of the main characters.

Replying to SgtKinch: like he would have any other name, the dude is like a navy seal instructor who has gone slightly insane and mentorly to Harry.

Replying to Rose099: You rang milady? The main course is served!

Replying to Guest: True, but there is always that one person lol. It really won't matter very much.

Chapter 9: And So It Begins

August 15th - August 31st

Before that summer, Harry thought he knew pretty well how to use his surroundings to his advantage.

But the way Albus did so in a duelling situation was simply incredible to watch, and more importantly, learn. From the very beginning, the old man had impressed upon him that for wizards with powers like themselves, duelling needed to be approached in different way. Never should he use straightforward spells if able and anything else as a possible asset. Only use direct curses if necessary, always put transfigurations, conjurations, physical attacks and defences first. This was how he was taught by Albus, and it paid off. Of course he needed to get to the point of using each and every piece of magic fluently without a second thought to be useful, but not only did he have plenty of time to practice, that was his main job during the school year; know it like the back of your hand so it can be used as easily as speaking english(for an english person).

"What a wizard is capable of and the creativity they show in a fight is what makes them powerful," Albus preached. "Always remember Harry, the creative wizard is the one who lives to fight another day. An example of someone who would not do well in a fight I fear would be your dear friend Hermione Granger."

"Hermione is brilliant," Harry defended heatedly. "She is the best in our year!"

"I am not insulting your friend Harry, and as headmaster I am quite aware of her talents," said Albus placidly. "Indeed, she is an exemplary student, if a bit overenthusiastic. She reminds me in many ways of a friend of mine, Bathilda Bagshot."

"Who is..."

"The author of A History of Magic Harry." supplied Albus. "Clearly you have the same aversion to textbooks I had."

"You didn't like textbooks?" Harry asked, amazed. Albus chuckled.

"Oh yes, I was too busy off inventing new magics to ever bore myself in such a fashion in my youth," he said reminiscently, and added conspiriatorally, "Do me a favor my boy and don't tell Minnie I said anything of the sort or she would have my head." Harry nodded seriously -

Mcgonagall was not to be crossed on such matters - and Albus gazed off into the distance - this time meaning across Masai Mara National Park in Kenya, on a cliff - a faraway look in his eyes. After a couple minutes Harry waved his hand in front of Albus' face.

"Er, Albus? You there?" he blinked and his eyes refocused on Harry's face.

"Hmm? Oh, yes, sorry Harry, I do seem to get lost in my memories more and more lately. Now, where was I?" Albus paced back and forth along the cliffside, now fully back in Professor-mode.

"Ah yes. Like Hermione she has a brilliant mind and extensive knowledge. However, despite the fact that she probably knew more spells and magic in her third year than most NEWT level students she never could do anything outside the book, and had no talent for fighting. Still she is perhaps the most brilliant witch of her generation despite her shortcomings."

Albus stopped and peered at Harry intently with that X ray look of his. "For all the talk of being more open minded and superior to muggles in intellect, the vast majority of wizards are remarkably unimaginative. On the other hand, most muggles are incredibly intelligent and have a strong intellect. The fact that we can do magic has nothing to do with our minds, merely what we are capable of with it. People like you and I Harry are incredibly dangerous that way."

Harry and Albus finished their review of manipulating the environment that day, Albus praising his creativity in entrapping a returning Sirius(from yet another date with Sarah). However, before bed that night Sirius also informed Harry that Remus and Tonks were getting quite close; but Remus was resisting because of his condition. Harry promised Sirius that the next meeting they would have a little chat with Remus.

Monday Moody and Remus pitched in for rounding off survival skills. Harry made sure he could give himself temporary fixes and healings in the middle of a fight, could be stealthy enough to get pass Remus' enhanced sensory capabilities, and survive in difficult situations.

The next day he was paired up with Moody for teamwork exercises against Remus and Sirius, who knew each other like the back of their hand. He did fairly well in communicating with Moody though, and had no problem letting the more experienced fighter take the lead, though he was a bit uncomfortable leading himself.

Harry found that he was actually quite skilled at creating portkeys, though he admitted to Albus that when it came to apparition and portkeys he didn't know nearly enough places to travel to. At this Albus' eyes lit up but he refused to share his idea and instead continued with something else quite important.

Albus taught Harry a modified concealment charm, a highly advanced spell that even Harry struggled to master, though master it he did after a while. This spell was far more powerful than a disillusionment charm, rendering the user utterly invisible, unheard by others and undetectable by most revealing charms, and all that without any of the drawbacks of an invisibility cloak. Harry recalled Albus' words years ago: "I don't need a cloak to become invisible." Well, now he didn't either Harry thought, but Albus was adamant that Harry keep his cloak on his person at all times. Harry suspected that there was more to it than just to help others but decided it didn't matter.

After that was the last day of increasing his spell repertiore, during which Albus taught him some of his favorites; all extremely advanced magic that he would learn to use well when training during the school year. One was a spell that combined the element of fire focused by a spell into an extremely intense whip that could slice through steel if needed. Another was what Albus called the Reflecting Wave, capable of collapsing apartment buildings with its power and with people of Albus' calibre could collapse several dozen enemy protegos at once, like popping a bubble.

The morning after Albus gave Harry a perfect solution to his teleportation issue.

"We will not be training today Harry," he said softly as Harry made to warm up. "I believe I have something that will satisfy you with your 'needing to know a location to apparate to' problem," Albus said, his eyes twinkling merrily.

"How would we go about that sir?" Harry asked curiously. In response Albus held up a large glass container with the largest string of memories he had ever seen; but the strangest thing about it was it seemed to be made up of thousands of tiny specks that were all different shades, as opposed to the usual long pure white or grey strands. "Wouldn't using memories take too long?"

"Ah, but the memories in your sleep are anywhere from a couple minutes to a couple hours long each," said Albus brightly. "This vial contains thousands of locations for you to apparate to, each one a tiny fraction of a second in duration. It may take a while to sort them with occlumency but once completed you will be able to travel to any of these places at your leisure."

Indeed, Harry spent the rest of the day continuing into Saturday morning digesting this sizeable gift.

That Order meeting was mostly uneventful except for still more reports of issues operating with the Ministry.

The whole next week Harry did nothing but fight. He fought like he never had before with those he could. For those that didn't and should not know about the Room he simply duelled at Grimmauld Place in the space Sirius had cleared.

That Friday Albus called a halt after Harry managed to actually hold him back for 90 seconds.

"You're ready for a true challenge Harry," he said gravely. "This Sunday we will test your skills and where you are at so be prepared. Until then, I wish you to take a well earned rest. You are no use in a fight if you waste away from the strain of overworking."

The last meeting before school the finished communicators were handed out; the research team had been working overtime to complete them before September 1st. They looked like watches but were so much more than that, since bringing it p to your face would allow you to communicate with others. There were charms to keep anyone but the person the watch was keyed to from listening or delivering messages, so no one would hear or notice anything.

Harry, Fred and George were also reminded to keep their heads down around Umbridge, but Harry gave them a simple answer: "No."

Everyone stared at him.

"Mr. Potter, Professor Umbridge has the authority to do quite a bit at school. She wants you to take offense, you cannot allow your temper to get the better of you." Mcgonagall stated irritably.

"Keeping my head down and accepting whatever rubbish she is gonna tell everyone is exactly the wrong thing to do." He turned to Albus. "Its the choice between doing what is right and what is easy."

"And what is right is playing into her hands?" Snape sneered. "Your stupidity reaches new levels every day Potter!"

"Make sure to be that unpleasant in class please, wouldn't want Voldemort to get suspicious," Harry said mildly to Snape. He addressed the rest of the group exasperatedly. "Look, I agree that the twins need to lay low and not draw attention from Umbridge. But for me its totally the opposite. If I bend over and accept the lies of the Ministry who will everyone look to when it turns out I'm right?" he shook his head in annoyance and grimaced. "I really hate how much of a figurehead I am. But someone has to stand up to Umbridge, to show the wizarding world that we will not back down because the going gets tough. I won't deliberately provoke her but I won't let her silence me either like she wants."

"And at what cost?" demanded Sarah. "She would torture someone to death if it benefited her somehow and she could get away with it. The woman is a menace!"

"We all have to make sacrifices." Harry said looking around the room and meeting everyone's eyes. "I've already made some in this war and I know I will make more. I'm willing to bear whatever she throws at me for the sake of us all."

There was a stunned silence as the group digested his words, then Sirius began to clap. Others followed to, drowning out the protests of Molly that he was just a child and such. But this time Harry did not blush or falter; he stood proud and after nodding to them all retook his seat.

What was also discussed was that the twins were to take a portkey (keyed to the Hogwarts wards of course) to Grimmauld Place when alone in their dorm to work on projects in their spare time. If necessary, Professor Mcgonagall would assign them detention for some supposed prank to give them time to work on the projects and attend meetings. The same courtesy was offered to Harry but he refused, citing that "I will be under the scrutiny of Umbridge at all times and have no reason to risk so much by attending. I will ward my bed and attend via mirror." The group agreed that this made sense but warned him to be absolutely sure no one was watching.

Privately after the meeting he confided to Sirius yet another reason he had made his decision about Umbridge; that "If I can't stand against Umbridge, then I will never be able to stand against Voldemort. She will keep me sharp."

Harry did not observe any more fights that night. He wanted to be in peak condition for his test tomorrow, and not exhausted by carnage.

That morning he woke up bright and early and after stretching and breakfast Albus arrived, and with company. Harry made sure he had all his gear on before walking over, even if most of it could not be used for this test.

Harry was quite surprised to see Professors Mcgonagall and Flitwick with Albus and Moody.

"Do they know about the Room professor?" he enquired, as at the moment they were standing in a largely bare stone space.

"Albus has told us of its properties," Professor Mcgonagall said crisply, "But I have not witnessed it in action."

Five minutes later, and Professors Mcgonagall and Flitwick had seen it in action. They were suitably impressed by what it could do and it took a while for Professor Flitwick to stop raving about the magnificent charms Rowena must have used to create it.

"Can I have your attention please," Albus called out, silencing the others. He gestured to the forest they had suddenly appeared in. In the distance Harry could see the faintest shimmer of the sun upon water.

"First, Harry, I wish you to leave us and wander the forest until the attack," Harry nodded but before he could go Moody put a hand on Harry's shoulder.

"Lad," he said intensely, staring into his eyes, "You better aim to kill at all times. Do not hold back. Do you understand?!"

Harry matched his gaze and said just as intensely, "As if my friend's lives depended on it." Saying this, he ran off into the forest at the speed of an Olympian runner, already immersing himself in his magic in preparation for the fight. I never thought I would be excited for a Harry-hunt, he thought wryly.

Flitwick and Mcgonagall were not happy with Moody.

"What in Merlin's name are you thinking, telling Mr. Potter to aim to kill!" Mcgonagall screeched, and Sirius just looked on, glad for once it wasn't him that was the target of the professor's ire like of old.

"Please Minerva, Filius, just listen and all of your questions will be answered," Albus pleaded. "No one is going to die, or will even be capable of dying for that time." Reluctantly the quieted.

As soon as Harry was out of sight Albus continued.

"Today I wish to test the skills of Harry Potter," he called out in an authoritative voice. "Sirius, Moody and I have been raining him this summer in the Room as a means to prepare him for his future. You know of the prophecy concerning Harry and Voldemort; but what some of you may not know is that in the end it will come down to a fight between Voldemort and Harry for the fate of the world."

There were gasps of horror from Professor Mcgonagall and Professor Flitwick, but Albus plowed on. "As such, it is our moral duty to prepare Harry for his future. I made many mistakes regarding his life," Albus said shamefacedly; he looked at the ground, and suddenly looked up again, power almost glowing from his eyes. "But I am doing my best to change that. And we are changing that."

"No matter how much you have trained him," came the squeaky voice of Professor Flitwick, "And no offence to the skills of Harry, but there is no way he could withstand one of us, let alone us all together!"

Moody and Sirius smirked. "You might be pleasantly surprised," Sirius commented drily, "And in any case we will not be moving in at the same time. Albus?"

"Indeed, Sirius is correct. Sirius will move in first and give Harry everything he has in straight up duelling. Immediately afterwards Filius and Minerva will take him on together if he is not already down, and if Harry overcomes them both, then Moody, and after that myself."

Professors Mcgonagall and Flitwick were still wearing sceptical looks on their faces, and Sirius couldn't blame them. In the past few months Harry had transformed into an entirely new beast, both magically and in self. He wouldn't believe it if he hadn't been there ever step of the way... well, every step since the graveyard, Sirius thought darkly, but was jerked out of his musings - which had increased since his time in Azkaban - by the others.

"Now, I need you to all hand over your wands to me," Albus ordered. Bemusedly, Flitwick and Minerva did so; he and Moody had done so before, though Sirius would bet just about anything Moody still had a real wand on him somewhere.

Albus explained to them that because of the user's control over the Room, lethal magic can be used with non lethal effects, simply disabling a limb or knocking them out. However, they were still pretty wary about doing so until Moody had had enough and, putting his wand to the back of Minerva's neck while disillusioned, Yelled, "Sectumsempra!"

After waking up with her head still attached, there were no more objections. The group relocated to a room with a screen that showed Harry in real time.

"Go Sirius," Albus said, "and don't hold back."

Sirius gave him his best prankster grin. This was going to be so much fun. Transfiguring his clothes into Death Eater robes and mask, he took off cackling "A-Harry Hunting I go!"

Harry was just a few yards from the lake when he sensed Sirius closing in in front of him. Raising his wand he prepared for any tricks Sirius would surely fight with.

But even with everything he knew about Sirius he most certainly did not expect the room to suddenly transform from a lush dark forest into the street just outside Grimmauld Place.

Harry however still however danced out of the way of the stunner with ease that shot down from the rooftop of Grimmauld Place and stopped the next with a quick Protego, returning fire with an Incendio to the cloaked Death Eater above. As expected Sirius apparated directly behind him and fired a sickly yellow curse at him.

Only to get caught with a banisher fired even before he appeared.

Spinning in the air he muttered something and stopped before even being launched a yard, already firing several powerful bludgeoning curses at him. Harry snarled and raised several Fortis Aegis' in quick succession, ducking to the side and returning fire. Grinning he gave the Marauder a jaunty salute before a pit opened up underneath him, sending the dark blue dissolver curse sailing over his head. He apparated as soon as his head was out of sight next to Sirius.

Now over the summer he had spent every spare moment popping around to practice. The more skilled someone was at apparition and the more they used it gave the user several advantages that Harry had determined to have by the end of the summer. Consequently when apparating he would appear nearly instantaneously instead of over the space of a few seconds, it was not even uncomfortable, and completely noiseless. Harry wished his cloak's magic could help him improve that further in a fight, but it wouldn't matter for now. Fortunately Sirius, with his flair for dramatics, was about as subtle as an incoming summer thunderstorm with his apparition.

"Incarcerous!" Harry said, but Sirius somehow whipped around and banished them back at Harry in time. Harry leaned fully back, the ropes sailing inches from his nose, and he casted a secretive transfiguration on them as they passed that Sirius wouldn't know about. The ropes, or now snake, wrapped itself around a large streetlamp out of sight behind Harry, waiting for its masters' signal.

Harry let Sirius push him back to the pole, lights flashing from their wands as they duelled. It was all Harry could do to shield, parry or dodge

the barrage of spells Sirius sent at him, as soon as he was within a couple feet of the pole he began to push back hard, returning fire with a couple of piercing curses and a powerful Pyrus Impactus that pushed Sirius back and took everything the old man had to withstand. with a roar Sirius managed to wrench the spell at a house slightly behind him to his right. The curse blasted the second floor of the house apart in a thunderclap of spewing flames that sent cinders everywhere and caused the structure to collapse.

Sirius had no reprieve though as Harry turned and leaned to the left as his large snake whizzed past him from behind to strike Sirius, but again his Godfather was not so easy to stop, and, recovering his wits, apparated a little to his side. Harry followed suite and they exchanged a couple more blows.

Suddenly his surroundings changed, he was standing in a massive gym with all sorts of exercise equipment and a metal roof with plenty of criss-crossing pipes and beams. Sirius, about 15 paces in front of him collapsed a section of the roof above him.

Harry snarled again as Sirius sent an area splash stunner around and towards him. Harry simply ducked behind his newly conjured shield and raised his wand, in a feat of strength stopping the entire section of roof mid fall.

He pushed the debris between them and apparated behind Sirius, however Sirius simply teleported onto a roof beam. Harry sent a wave of magical yellow fire that he would have liked to see Sirius try a flame freezing charm on.

The thing about personal protective enchantments like Flame-Freezing Charms and the like is that maintaining them for more than a few seconds was not only draining and required extensive concentration, but didn't work against most kinds of fire.

Unfortunately, the champion duellist wasn't fooled and fired an extremely powerful version of the Augamenti charm in front of him, blowing a hole in the wall of flame and diving through it. The Marauder cracked out of the way of Harry's follow up lethal piercing charm and appeared right next to him.

Sirius dodged Harry trying to swipe his head off with the sharp edge of the shield and Harry wasn't fast enough to entirely avoid a cutting curse that grazed his stomach. Gritting his teeth he sent a blast of energy through the glowing lightning bolt in his shield throwing Sirius back and catching him by surprise. Harry had been saving that particular feature for the right moment, and that certainly qualified. Again they continued to duel, jets of light flashing from their blurring wands at superhuman speeds, only to be stopped by an equally varying amount of shields.

Harry sent a storm of hail at Sirius with a cry of "Onis!", but Sirius flipped his wand around his fingers and the softball sized hail turned to yarn, strands snaking across the ground towards him. Harry did his best to keep the duel up and send cutting curses at the yarn, sure that separating the pieces would break the animation. But somehow they kept coming. Harry wondered how the hell Sirius managed that before remembering that the man was practically a prankster for a living. Casting a protective field around himself while barely managing to keep up with Sirius he concentrated and turned the mat to acid, vaporizing the yarn.

Harry was about to return fire to Sirius when he realized that the man hadn't cast any protective charms on himself and was just standing their, grinning. Only his extensive knowledge of SIrius' tactics, and the fact that he could no longer sense the man's magical core there saved him from defeat. Turning to his right he lunged to the side out of the way of an Entrail-Expelling Curse - right into an enormous boar. His senses told him their was another one behind him, too, and Sirius to what was now his right.

Great. Just perfect.

Then the most peculiar thing happened. Harry wished for a sword, something to take the boar down. He needed it.

And the Sword of Gryffindor responded. The air rippled around his wand hand and suddenly he was holding both a wand and a sword. Harry wasted no time gawking and, pouring all the magic he could into enhancing his limbs, sidestepped the boar. Even with that he still was grazed on the chest by a tusk, but the cloak protected him from harm. Harry sliced downward with the sword, cleaving the boar's head off as it stumbled past, and through it at the other boar. The sword struck true and landed between its eyes.

Harry looked over to where Sirius was and instantly braced himself behind his shield with no time to do anything else, his gut clenching in fear.

His worst fears realized... Sirius with a rocket launcher.

"FUCK NO!" Harry screamed as Sirius, laughing maniacally, discharged a never ending stream of RPG's, courtesy of magic.

The first RPG flew through the air and, upon hitting Harry, blew him back through the gym, wall, and into the parking lot outside. Even with the shield, if not for the dragonhide cloak with its many protections Harry was sure he would have broken every bone in his body, not to mention be a smoking pile of ashes Room-wise. As it was Harry felt like the Hogwarts express had run over him with flaming wheels. Sirius apparated to the hole in the wall and let off more rockets rapid fire, drenching the air in an apocalyptic firestorm.

Harry let his magic seep through his body and leapt up and out of the way of another, snapping off sharp shots at the rockets that turned them into tuna faster than Sirius could magically fire it. Sirius got caught with a bone breaker to the trigger finger and yelled in pain. Almost instantly Harry's surroundings changed, now he was standing in a prairie dog field that was(surprise) in a prairie, wheat fields fluttering all around. Harry knew Sirius was hiding out there, but Harry had had enough. Growing up the way he had instilled in himself the brutal need to win fights, after all.

Harry let out a gutteral cry, but no fiery wave emanated from him like Sirius undoubtedly expected. Instead, Harry slammed his wand down in one of the most powerful spells he had ever cast. From the Prairie dog holes lava shot forth, a hurricane of it surrounding him on the field within seconds, the only place spared the eye in which he stood. Harry heard Sirius scream and smiled grimly.

Reaching out he snapped Sirius' control of the room from him and locked it down back where they started, slamming down anti apparition wards as he did so. And just in time too, as a cutting curse came at a very sensitive place. Harry was forced to jump and do the splits in mid air to avoid what would have been a very painful injury.

"SIRIUS!" he yelled indignantly, and the man's barking laugh answered him.

Harry was soon pressed harder than he had ever been, parrying spells at a rate he never had before. Sirius was giving him all he had, and while the Marauder couldn't manipulate the environment like Albus or Voldemort could, no one, save maybe Bellatrix Lestrange, could fire dueling spells faster and more skillfully than Sirius. There was a reason after his supposed betrayal that people feared him nearly as much as Voldemort.

Harry sent spells into the shadows and weaved in and out around and again, his wand twirling and twisting so fast the red lighted tip of his wand from parrying blurred and seemed to form glowing shapes in the air. Sirius was forced out of the shadows and the duel began to progress to the lake shore.

Sirius attempted to lay tripping traps along the ground but Harry easily nullified them. Using a charm on himself Sirius ran along the side of a tree. Leaping from tree to tree Sirius attempted to once more down Harry but it was not enough. If anything, Harry felt like his movements were even more fluid than before, immersing himself as deeply as he had in his magic. Concentrating, he made out a pattern of which trees Sirius leaped to and anticipated his next one.

Pressure forced the sap out of Sirius' present tree, which Harry promptly turned to rapidly expanding goo that was sticky and grew quickly trapping its victims. Ironically, this spell was created by Remus, Sirius, and principally his father during the last war. Sirius, recognizing the danger, was forced down to the side of the lake.

Now fighting along the sands, water lapping at the edge, Harry finished Sirius off. Getting an opening Harry threw his shield with all his might at Sirius' head. Sirius ducked the throw and taunted Harry.

"Not this time sucka-" He got no further as Harry, with his shield hand behind his back, had wandlessly exerted his control on the wind and

forced the shield to immediately reverse directions, smacking Sirius in the back of the head. The man fell like a sack of potatoes. Harry didn't think about the fact that he had just outright beaten one of the best fighters in the world, nor the time to gloat, but instead looked around carefully and spread out his magical senses. He knew the next attack would be coming shortly.

And it sure did. Two more cloaked figures - Professors Mcgonagall and Flitwick he assumed - came from the front. They quickly fell into a dueling chain together and gave Harry a difficult time keeping up with their spells. The duo steadily pushed Harry backwards a couple steps and Harry belatedly realized that his tactics with Sirius did him no good here.

A fist of water the size of a toyota Corolla came jetting out of the lake towards him, and Harry summoned a fist of flame of equal size to meet it. A large cloud of steam appeared and Harry took the opportunity to disillusion himself; no time to use the concealment spell. It wouldn't really hide him for more than a couple of seconds from those two, and would wear off with him expending so much magic, but that was all he really needed.

Gathering up the immense clouds of steam he took an iron hard grip on the wind. twisting his wand around he created an enormous vortex that, catching up the superheated steam, went roaring at the two supposed Death Eaters.

Professor Mcgonagall however was not phased and whipped her wand around and down at the ground, breaking the swirling cloud and it parted in two to either side of them around her.

Harry cursed. Of course they, of all people, would be elementals; now he had to see what they were capable of with it. The disillusionment gone, Harry used several Abverto shields to deflect a couple spells that he knew could not be parried.

Months of time being with Sirius, Moody and especially Albus had taught him to use his mind strategically. Harry surmised that they had somehow witnessed his entire duel with Sirius and knew of his forte with parrying. Thinking fast, he decided to test them using an element that few bother to use because of how uncontrollable it is; lightning.

Not the new spell that he had invented in the graveyard; Harry and Albus weren't even sure it was lightning at all judging by its behavior and look. Lightning is practically never used in a duel because of its almost untameable power, inaccuracy, and the fact that if not shielded could hurt or even kill the user.

The lightning bolt flew from Harry's wand towards the two with a thunderous crackle, but the two professors were quite ready for him. Professor Flitwick summoned two sticks that hovered a few feet in front of each of them, and Mcgonagall turned them to metal at the same time. Flitwick cast some charms Harry had never heard of between the sticks as the lightning hit, but whatever it was bounced the energy between the sticks so fast in moments a glowing ball of energy was concentrated between them. With a jab of Professor Mcgonagall's wand a beam with a shockwave positioned at the front shot towards him.

Harry, recovering from his shock too late held his shield in front of him and poured all his magical might into protecting him through it. The blast slammed into him with enough force to disintegrate a modern military tank; all the power that Harry held could not fully stop it either. He flew through the air away what had to be around forty feet. Just before landing he managed to cast a cushioning charm on the ground and immediately flipped up, only to get caught with a banisher sending him towards a tree that reached out to grab him with a multitude of limbs.

Harry let a whip stream from his wand and it wrapped around a rather large boulder, halting his momentum towards the tree and bringing him to the ground. Instantly the whip turned into a thin stream of fire that Harry whipped about behind him, slicing apart all the tree limbs attempting to ensnare him. He winced, looking at his now bare left arm; the shield must have dissipated from the earlier blow.

Professor Mcgonagall turned the leaves above him to stone, which fell towards him. Harry's face contorted in concentration and just before the brick-leaves hit a bubble of incinerating heat and flame encased him. Fortunately all the heat was refracted outwards, not in, and the falling missiles were vaporized.

Harry strained to keep the bubble up; opening the back of it he stepped out and immediately fired a confringo blast at them, letting the sphere dissipate hoping to surprise them. However, Professor Flitwick used water to muffle the explosion and Harry was hard pressed to shield

against the next barrage of spells. Finding an opening he turned a tree near Professor Flitwick to sand which attempted to encase him, but the Professor was fast for his height. Dodging, as the tree came around behind him Flitwick summoned the leftover water and dew to ripple through the sand, and then cast a powerful freezing charm that froze the attack.

Four boulders on either side of him were transfigured by Professor Mcgonagall into lions that she obviously commanded to attack him. Harry had no time to sort them out either as the two professors fell into an impeccable suppressing fire tactic. However, Harry was not perturbed by this; he had quite expected some transfigured creatures to attack him if fighting Professor Mcgonagall, and had a plan for this.

Harry wandlessly imperioed the lions with the hand behind his back(a tiring endeavor for him magically) and then casted an enormous fog cloud obscuring him and the surrounding area from the supposed Death Eaters. He made it seem that the creatures were still attacking him

within the fog when in reality he was preparing for his next move.

Gathering up the winds he released it from his wand in an impressive burst that sent the fog bank and the four lions thrown through the air at the duo. He then commanded the lions to attack them, and hoped the fog would confuse them enough as he prepared his next spell.

But it was not to be. Professor Mcgonagall swiped her wand at the ground and rose up on a pillar of earth twenty feet high. Chains flew from her wand towards Harry with unbreakable charms; a powerful arresto momentum ended that threat.

Professor Flitwick in the meantime had used a leaping spell to jump onto the pillar as well; the charms master sent a spell into the fog which made it twinkle a sinister purple. The bank began to roll back towards him, but Harry had another personal ace up his sleeve that the Professors wouldn't have encountered before. The winds whipped around him in a maelstrom, trees being stripped of their branches and the fog dissipating in the vortex. Even at a distance the two Death Eater-Professors struggled to keep their footing.

Harry poured out his magical power like a river and with a couple wand motions the hundreds of sticks transformed into snakes, which he threw at the pillars.

"Take them down!" he hissed in parseltongue, and the snakes complied, slithering up the pillar and grabbing the teachers' legs before they could respond. Professor Mcgonagall was busy vanishing the snakes, but for every one she took out two more took its place. Professor Flitwick, who had to be exhausted at this point, continued to fire spells at Harry at a level that would scare most aurors.

Harry conjured a marble slab about the size of his shield in front of him. With his left hand behind it he cast a powerful rebounding spell on it, sending Professor Flitwick's joint dislocator spell towards Professor Mcgonagall. He left Flitwick no time to block it as he played his ace card - the Die Bitch! spell.

The small teacher made a tree bend into the way of the spell and turned its bark to metal, as turning the entire ttree to metal would be almost impossible.

Professor Mcgonagall was struck by the joint dislocator and fell. The tree exploded as the golden tendrils seeped through it, sending shrapnel everywhere. His spell wasn't exactly lightning, but Professors Flitwick and Mcgonagall didn't know that. Harry noted that his spell was tinged with green, but decided it was irrelevant at the moment.

Mcgonagall was caught by the lions and kept down. Harry in the cloud of dust and splinters pointed his wand at several logs and threw them into the earthen tower, crumbling it.

Professor Flitwick, who had only just shielded himself from the hail of shrapnel, fell with the tower and was also taken down by the lions.

Harry had almost never felt so exhausted but prepared once again for another attack. He had no reprieve as from behind him a bone shatterer said towards his head. He turned his shoulder and leaned slightly away, letting it pass inches from his face. No sense in wasting energy dodging more than strictly necessary after all.

Harry dove behind the remains of the earthen tower as Moody unleashed his barrage. Harry's lions were disintegrated faster than he could command them.

And Moody didn't waste time pinning him down like anyone else would. Two of the spells that went over his head weren't what Harry thought they were. They struck two trees to either side behind them and a mirror transfigured itself from the bark. Moody sent one blood popping spell(about as lethal as the Avada Kedavra and takes even more energy) and a second heat fueled blade curse(which could cut a car in two, very draining as well) over and they bounced off the mirrors toward him. Without his magical senses he would have been utterly screwed.

As it was Moody was lunging around the side towards him at the same time. Harry, prioritizing which spell to dodge first, ducked the first spell and tried to roll under the second losing his wand, and though he received a bloody gash along his back/side from being grazed he still lived and was ready for Moody.

No self respecting wizard would expect any physical contact in a duel; that is what set Moody and Harry apart from others and much more dangerous. While not having perfected the skill the two were developing a style to use, as during the middle ages there were in fact quite a few wand to wand hand to hand fights. However Harry was given no time to summon his wand.

Harry used Moody's momentum to slip him over and past him, taking a glancing blow at the jaw but sending him past.

Moody instantly stopped though when his fake leg touched the ground, which as Harry well knew was enchanted to hell and back and then some. A Freezing curse(not the temperature one) nearly caught him in the head as they clashed again.

The difference between the two was that Moody was incredibly experienced but was not in good shape at all. Harry had magically enhanced strength and reflexes but eighty years of knowledge, however out of shape the person was, could not be tossed out of hand.

Harry quickly grabbed Moody's wrist and twisted the wand out of the hand and flying away with a tiny wandless banisher. Wandless magic needed to be used sparingly, even for someone of Harry's current caliber. Moody tried to knee Harry in the groin but Harry turned his right leg so the hit glanced off the outside of his knee.

Their hand to hand fight went on for a short while, neither of them able to use wandless magic in such proximity. But Harry made one of the dumbest mistakes ever in a fight, which for him was saying a hell of a lot. He tried to hook his leg around Moody's fake leg to trip him, which Harry knew was booby trapped beyond all rhyme or reason.

He probably would've died instantly if he didn't have dragon skin shoes on. As it was a crater was blasted into the ground and when Harry came to a swirling knife tripod extending from the bottom of Moody's leg was about to press through his chest. In sheer desperation he raised his hands to grab it and a golden greenish light swirled around his fingers. It burned straight through the tripod but Harry felt a wandless drain on himself like nothing he had ever experienced before. He swatted with his hands which sent the Death Eater Moody sailing through the air and into a tree where he did not move again.

Harry, tired beyond belief, summoned his wand when plants suddenly sprung up from the ground binding him bringing him to his knees. He tried to release a wave of fire but it was too much and he slipped into darkness.

Harry woke up to the smiling face of Albus Dumbledore. Groaning, he sat up and looked about the room, noticing everyone watching him.

"How did I do Albus?" he asked nervously, and everyone laughed.

"Kiddo, you did better than we could possibly have imagined!" Sirius said proudly. "Just like your father, always going above and beyond." The others were nodding fondly in agreement.

"What I want to know," said Alastor gruffly(even in the room his eye was looking for danger constantly), "is how Harry summoned the sword of Gryffindor."

"That," said Albus, "has a great deal to do with the lore of the sword itself. Harry, try to summon the sword to your hand please." Harry knew better than to argue with what should be impossible by now and willed that the sword appear in his hand. He nearly dropped it in surprise when it actually did come. Professor Mcgonagall, head of Gryffindor House, stared at it in reverence.

"How is this possible, Albus?" she asked in a shaky voice. "The sword was lost for centuries, and yet it comes to Harry as if he is Gryffindor himself."

"When Harry left it in my office after killing the basilisk in his second year, the sword disappeared as soon as he left the room until reappearing again today. The sword can only be summoned and controlled by someone who is worthy to wield it, and exhibits all the characteristics of a true Gryffindor - honor, bravery, selflessness and righteousness. Harry is the first person the sword has both accepted and been needed by since Godric himself died."

"Just one more surprise for Voldemort," Harry said.

After reviewing the duel and getting some last tips of advice from his teachers, everyone but Sirius left the room.

"I really cannot thank you enough for this summer Sirius," Harry said softly. "Being with you and actually having a fighting chance now - I just wish it could be this way forever."

"I do to, Harry. And after the war I'll stay with you no matter what. What are you gonna do after all this ends?" Sirius asked.

"Leave," Harry immediately answered. "Go to America and stay away from the Wizarding World." Sirius was not entirely surprised by Harry's answer.

"I confess I feel the same way pup," Sirius said. "But there's no way you'll ever be able to stay out of the fight for long."

"Who said I would be leaving the fight?" Harry challenged, though the corners of his mouth were quirked upwards.

The next day Harry spent almost entirely resting. After that incredible fight, he was bone tired and needed to recover.

The day after that he made sure everything was packed and ready to go for school, as this was the last day he would have before the start of term.

Sirius and Harry were at Grimmauld place of course; him staying at the RoR, especially with Umbridge prowling about would be too dangerous.

They were in the sitting room when Albus came in.

"So is this it?" I asked them with a pang of sadness.

"Not quite," conceded Albus. We have two places to go first." he gestured to the door and stepping outside apparated away to a beach in southern England. He and Albus stood with their feet in the water as Padfoot gamboled around them.

"Professor, why are we here?" Harry asked looking at the ocean in slight fear.

"We are here to remind ourselves of something all too easy to forget," Albus said, leaning down and running his hand through the water. "Walk into it," he said gesturing to the ocean before them.

"Er, I'd rather not if you don't mind," Harry said nervously, but then a banisher(from Sirius) hit him and he flew a long ways into the sea.

Harry panicked. Sirius still had his wand and wandless magic could do nothing for him here. But the real issue was rooted in his past.

When Harry was six, the Dursleys had taken them to the pool, where few people were. They dotingly held Dudley so he thought he was swimming but tossed Harry in hoping he would drown in the deep end. Harry panicked and shot out of the water, but in front of quite a few people. For a while after that they were talked about in the way that the Dursleys detested. He was immediately dragged home and, as with all accidental magic, beaten badly(they had long since learned his accidental magic would heal it by the next day), this one far worse than others for doing this and starved in his cupboard for near a week. He was told if this happened again

The second time they went to the pool Harry tried so hard to just stay and drown but the same thing happened, causing an uproar. At Privet Drive he was beaten so badly and thoroughly he was barely alive when thrown in his cupboard. At this point he begged that whatever made him a freak would just kill him, please let him die but it wouldn't. Most of his beating scars were from that time, and Harry was deathly afraid of swimming beyond any and all reason. The difference during the Tri-wizard tournament was the gillyweed, which he had taken early, flipped his perspectives of water and air in his mind(plus his friends were in danger, the only thing worse to him than being in water was his friends being the same.

Thus, Harry utterly panicked. But soon he had floated to the bottom as the water receeded around him by Albus, standing twenty feet below the top in a circle of dryness.

"Sorry for freaking out," Harry muttered shamefully. "I just..."

"Ssh, you don't have to explain yourself to me Harry, I really should have known better," muttered Albus with his wand still raised warding off the water. Padfoot was still whining at their feet. "I needed to show you the true power of love." He gestured to the water around them. "The power of nature is incredible, you have experienced that for yourself; now think about just how much more infinite the power of love is. Just what you can do with it." Harry looked at the sheer power of the ocean and reached through his magical senses, overwhelmed by what he felt.

"Sir?" Harry started.

"Albus," he corrected him.

"Albus- I know what you've told me about why you refused to become minister, what having too much power has done to you before - but the only people I'd consider deserving of leadership are those who fear what they could do with it. And who fears that more than you?" When Albus remained silent Harry pressed, "just think about it, okay?" Albus looked at Harry with pride and sorrow and promised to do so. When Sirius transformed from Padfoot briefly to tell Harry he sounded like Albus now Harry was somewhat horrified.

Soon after Albus apparated them in front of a statue of Harry and his parents in a village; Godric's Hollow. This visit would change him forever.

"And so it begins, Voldemort," Harry whispered standing where he had received the scar. "And so it begins."

HARRY'S TIME IN GODRIC'S HOLLOW WILL BE PUT IN A SHORT STORY I'M NOT LEAVING IT OUT I'M JUST BUSY AS HELL RIGHT NOW! ALSO THE CONVERSATION WITH REMUS!

A/N:

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, the next one is the first of phase two. it is titled Chapter 10: New Person Old Troubles