Team: Wigtown Wanderers

Position: Beater 2

Prompt: [thriller] A tense narrative full of suspense, often based around a crime or deception

Additional Prompts: [song] The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel; [emotion] Scared

Word Count: 1843

Author's Note: I definitely took "The Sound of Silence" literally, and bits of the lyrics, especially those from the second and fourth verses, are peppered liberally throughout the story—many thanks to Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel for their words. I'd really recommend listening to the song while you read the story (because that's definitely how I wrote it). Also, please heed the warnings—they're there for a reason, and I mean that sincerely. Thank you so much for your support!

Warnings: I won't lie, this is incredibly dark (for me, at least). There are lots of mentioned character deaths, mentions of torture, an on screen death, etc. It is a serial killer AU, after all.

Disturbed

"And no one dared

Disturb the sound of silence"

— Simon & Garfunkel, "The Sound of Silence"

Neville crept slowly down the narrow cobblestone street. He was thoroughly out of his element here in Muggle London, but he was certain this was where the clues were leading him. He had no choice but to follow them. Someone had to.

Five other Aurors had been down this path and ended up dead. He alone was willing to do the job, and that task had been his sole focus for nearly five years now. He would have to be the one to apprehend Harry Potter.

No one was sure how it came to this. Some say it was the stress of Voldemort's return and reign. Some believe it was the catastrophic losses during that final battle. Some swear it was inside him all along. Whatever it was didn't matter to Neville. All that mattered was that something inside Harry had snapped.

Not to say that Neville didn't have his own theory. Looking back, he wasn't even all that surprised when he learned Harry had slipped into the comfort of what he knew: darkness. Losing both Hermione and Ron in the Battle Hogwarts combined with the malicious repetition of history had been too much for Harry to bear.

Just like the end of the last war, several prominent members of Voldemort's circle managed to buy their way out of trouble. It was the wizarding world's worst kept secret, but there was nothing the general public felt they could do about it. When unconvicted Death Eaters began turning up dead on the Ministry's doorstep, everyone had internally applauded the unknown vigilante. After all their community had suffered, they deserved to see justice served.

Opinions quickly shifted when the bodies started showing signs of dark magic and torture. Minister Shacklebolt quietly put together a task force to find the individual responsible, and of course Harry had been at the helm. Who better to stop a budding dark wizard than the Boy-Who-Lived?

As months dragged on without any leads, the state in which the Death Eaters' bodies were left rapidly deteriorated. When pieces of the last of the known Death Eater were left in the middle of the Ministry atrium, the entire world shuddered a sigh of disgust and relief. They no longer needed to be afraid. The killer had finally accomplished his objective.

Still, new victims continued to surface. Nathaniel Borgin, Daniel and Morgana Greengrass, Marcus Flint, Walric Selwyn— people who simply had ties to certain facets of society were found dead in their homes. There was no sign of torture with these victims, but that fact brought little comfort. The killings were enacted with a cold, clinical efficiency that had the magical community terrified.

Through it all, Neville watched Harry's mental stability nosedive. At first, he thought it was the stress and nerves of trying to capture the vigilante that made Harry's hands shake and his temper flare. He was always the first on the grizzly scenes, investigating and questioning and scanning for magical signatures, all to find nothing.

It wasn't until the murder of Dolores Umbridge that everything went sideways. For the first time, Harry wasn't first on the scene. Instead, Neville responded to the call to Umbridge's house and found John Dawlish already scanning for magical signatures. They were both shocked when he found one. Dawlish immediately headed back to the Ministry to identify the signature while Neville finished looking over the scene. The next morning, Dawlish was found dead at his desk. The dark haze of the Killing Curse hung over his body, just like the killer's other victims. His crime scene notes were a pile of ashes on his desk, both a forensic countermeasure and a smoldering warning to anyone else who dared to investigate.

What the killer didn't know was that John Dawlish had already sent Minister Shacklebolt a copy of the signature and the identity of its owner: Harry Potter.

Shacklebolt sent four of his best Aurors to Harry's flat to try to bring him in peacefully. An hour later, their bodies were sent back through the Ministry's communal Floos, and Harry had disappeared into the darkness. The only sign that he was still alive was the ever-growing trail of bodies left in his wake.

Some people were calling Harry a hero, and others were calling for his blood. Either way, they were all too terrified to face him. No one other than Neville was willing to hunt him down and try to take him in.

He shook his head at the thought. He knew Harry would only be taken when and if he wanted to be, but he felt sure the time was drawing near.

Neville turned his collar up to block out the cold and damp, losing his thoughts for a moment in the ever-present mist that rose from the cobblestones of London. Then he pulled the slip of paper from his coat pocket—his hope for delivering Harry from the darkness of his own creation. The delivery slip was the latest in a series of small clues he'd found at Harry's crime scenes, each one leading him closer and closer to the Boy-Who-Killed. The address on it was for a flat in this apparently seedy neighborhood. The last few clues had led directly to another dead body, and Neville tried hard not to think about what he was walking into. Instead, he mentally recited all the arguments and explanations he planned to use to bring Harry in.

He was so focused on his preparations that Neville almost missed the streetlight behind him blink out. The light from it zipped down the street and disappeared into nothingness. The same thing happened to the streetlight just in front him, then another, and another, all the way down the narrow street. Neville forced himself not to break into a run. There was only one tool that could do that. He'd only seen Harry use the Deluminator a few times at crime scenes, but it was something he would never forget.

Quickly, all the lights on the street had been swallowed by Dumbledore's creation. All save for one.

As Neville approached the only remaining pool of light, he felt a powerful wave of magic wash over him. He gripped his wand tighter, but, despite everything that had happened, Neville wasn't really scared. He understood why Harry left all those signs, all those clues for him. Harry needed help, and he knew it. If Neville could just explain that he wanted to make sure Harry got the help he needed, everything would be fine.

Taking a grounding breath, Neville called out, "Harry?"

The pool of light rippled as Harry removed his father's invisibility cloak. From far away, ringed in a warm halo of light from the streetlamp above, he looked so much like the boy with whom Neville had shared a dorm for six years.

But looks were deceiving.

With a single flick of Harry's wrist, Neville felt the powerful magic that had washed over him almost solidify behind him. The sounds of the cars on the next street, the noises of people moving about their late-night routines, everything immediately disappeared. All he could hear was the blood pumping in his ears. His own slightly ragged breathing. The rhythmic sound of his footsteps as he crept ever closer to Harry. This was no ordinary Silencing Charm.

"Like it? It's a little something of my own creation," Harry said in reply to Neville's unspoken question. "I found it a lot easier to torture information out of Death Eaters if I knew no one else could hear them scream."

"Did you like to hear them scream, Harry?"

Harry tapped his wand against his chin thoughtfully. "I won't say I enjoyed it, but I didn't mind it so much. It meant I was on my way to getting results."

He was close enough now to see the empty, unbothered expression on Harry's face as he talked about torturing people. It was so much worse than Neville had imagined. Still, he refused to be afraid of Harry—Harry, who'd once trusted him enough to help save his godfather and take out a horcrux. "What about the others, Harry? You've killed a lot of people that weren't Death Eaters."

"I never made them scream," Harry said softly. "They got what they deserved, nothing more, nothing less."

Harry's words felt like frigid raindrops rolling off Neville's skin. "You can't make that kind of unilateral decision, Harry. No one gets to be judge, jury, and executioner."

"You say that, but it's exactly what I've become. I think it suits me, don't you?"

The smirk on Harry's face made Neville's wand hand twitch, and the movement didn't escape Harry's notice.

'Now now, Nev," he tsked. "I can't have you disturbing our lovely little reunion with an attempt to arrest me."

Before Neville could draw his weapon, Harry flicked his wand, sending Neville's own wand flying into his hand. Neville himself was tossed backward as though he weighed nothing. He hit the solid bounds of Harry's silencing spell with a thud and crumpled to the ground in a heap. He fought to regain his breath and tried not to focus on the footsteps that echoed like snapping bones through the silence. As Neville gingerly raised a hand to his ribs—definitely cracked, probably broken—a shadow fell over him.

"You shouldn't have come for me."

"Harry," Neville rasped. "Why would you do this?"

"I thought it would be obvious."

"But you left me clues. The notes. The hints. I thought—"

Harry laughed. It was a hollow, soulless sound. "What can I say, getting away with everything for so long has made me a bit sloppy. But be reasonable, Neville. Did you really think I wanted to be caught?"

Neville felt the blood drain from his face, and for the first time cold dread trickled down his spine.

"You really believed that," Harry said, looking a bit surprised at the revelation. "Why would I want to be caught?"

"So that you could finally stop this madness. So that I could bring you in safely." Neville implored him, "Harry, you need help. We can get you the best Mind Healers, and there are potions, and—"

"You would have me spend the rest of my life locked up in a maximum-security ward at St. Mungo's and drugged out of my mind," Harry spat.

"It would be better than murdering at random," Neville said harshly.

A beatific, terrifying smile spread slowly across Harry's face. "It's not random. I've never killed anyone that didn't deserve it."

"What about Dawlish and the other Aurors? What did they do to deserve death?"

"They got in my way."

Harry's cold words were the final piece of the puzzle. True fear coiled tight and cold in Neville's gut.

"The trail that led me here," Neville whispered, praying he was wrong, "that really wasn't a cry for help, was it?"

Harry shook his head slowly and raised his wand. "Sorry, old friend. You shouldn't have gotten so close."

A streak of neon green split the night and echoed in the well of silence.

Stacked with: ToS; Star; Trope Bingo; Spring Bingo; Chimera Creator

Individual Challenge(s): Short Jog (Y); Old Shoes; Gryffindor MC x 2; Zed Era (Y); Writing with Music; Going Dark

Representation(s): Auror Neville Longbottom; Serial Killer Harry Potter; The Sound of Silence

Primary & Secondary Bonus Challenge(s): Middle Name; Unwanted Advice; Chorus ( ; Second Verse (Pear Shaped; Wabi Sabi;

Tertiary & Generic Bonus Challenge(s): T3 (Toad);

Word Count: 1843

Trope Bingo—3B (Card Carrying Villain)

Spring Bingo— 3C (Warmth)

Chimera Creator

Chimera: Mars

Part (Prompt): Actions (Arguing/Debating)