Harry Potter - Hellion!

 

The next morning, the newscasts were abuzz with the overheard police exchange recorded by the media. The Daily Mirror had its front page covered with a huge article on sharks, and speculations as to where that shark came from.

November first, 1981

A Shark in the Whey River!

By Jonathan Weir, reporter.

A police radio communication, captured and recorded by an amateur radio operator, was sent to our news desk in the early morning hours, forcing us to replace the current scandal with the Royal family in favor of informing the public of this astounding news. According to the recording, a police patrol rescued a citizen, whose identity is being kept secret until his family is informed, that had been bitten by a shark while doing something in the Whey River. Our reporter tried to get on-site but was severely rebuffed, police claiming the area was now a crime scene. Why is getting bitten a crime? This reporter tried to penetrate the hospital to investigate the victim, but was promptly ejected, on charge of trespassing. Are hospitals not supposed to be publicly accessible? This reporter will continue to investigate that cover-up for our readers.

This reporter also visited the London Aquarium and talked to an employee, who told him a police officer was currently meeting with their leading ichthyologist. After enquiring as to the meaning of the word, the employee said it described the study of fishes. So, the police officer was meeting with a fish specialist. Why not say it right from the start? Was it another attempt at cover-up by fancy words, that seem to be the profession of scientists the world over? After making my way to the offices of said aquarium, I managed to secret myself in a broom closet and hear part of the exchange between the scientists and the police officer. One guy, identified by the others as Danielson, and claimed by the others in the room as the leading shark specialist in the Commonwealth, claimed the type of teeth was from a thought-of extinct shark species, the Carcharodon Megalodon Magnificus, the biggest shark to have ever roamed the seas, and a living relative of the dinosaurs! According to that specialist, which refused any interview after the police left, said to the investigating officer that the Megalodon would have made quick work of the Tyrannosaurus Rex! And it was the only one that had serrated teeth that allowed specialists to tell the age of the shark that lost these teeth. Again, from listening to the exchange, this reporter learned that this shark was a baby, yet measured a good five (5!) feet long. The shock was that the tooth still had some meat in the root canal, clearly indicating that the shark had been alive shortly before the tooth got extracted from the hand of the victim! According to the specialist, the tooth was promptly replaced as it was left behind, so there was no chance of meeting a shark with dentures. Very funny, Mister shark specialist, very funny indeed! According to the scientist, sharks usually have up to five rows to teeth, one after the other, ready to replace those falling off from a bite, but the Megalodon, due to its prey, had seven! And what prey was that? Aquatic dinosaurs, unfortunate land dinosaurs caught crossing a sea strait, or, after the collapse of the dinosaurs, sixty-five million years ago, whales. Yes, whales! The Megalodon died out barely two million years ago, as the sea cooled down for another ice age in its domain. That lets this reporter speculate on their survival until today, as one fish, also considered extinct, has been found in remote sea areas: the Coelacanth. If that living fossil is still around, by what reasoning can the Megalodon be declared extinct?

Again, this reporter must ask what the government is hiding? Have they begun recreating extinct species, with one escaping into nature from a sea-water tank?

---

While the reporter was sniffing at the Aquarium, a squad car moved to Privet Drive and its occupants began interrogating the neighbors of Vernon. To say their comments were detrimental to his image would be an understatement. From what the neighbors said, his wife’s attitude and snobbishness had made them a whole slew of enemies that were more than happy to stab them in the back with innuendos, small things that were inflated to major events, and blatant rancor and tongue-lashing were rampant.

Finally, two officers moved to four Privet Drive, to inform the lady of the house of what had happened, The officers watched her from the front yard with interest: she was seen washing the fireplace with a vengeance, using a steel brush. Strange behavior, given that water and fireplaces usually do not mix. Then she was seen deposing a pail in the back yard by another officer that had been interrogating their rear neighbors on Crescent Drive, the same pail that had been seen near the fireplace by the officers from the front yard. As she moved to eye her handy work, the officers rang at the front door, radioing for someone to check for the pail’s contents.

Petunia was surprised to see it was already seven AM, and that Vernon was not back yet. Maybe he had left his house keys on the table in the rush to get rid of the Devil Spawn. She quickly rushed to open the front door, and was surprised to see constables on her porch.

"Where is Vernon? I am sure that devil spawn must be the cause of anything wrong with him! I told him to kill it!" she said, without thinking.

"Mrs. Petunia Dursley, née Evans?"

"Yes, but forget Evans! I will never acknowledge them since they produced that witch! I hope she burns in Hell for eternity!"

The two officers were abashed by her language, her face, and the ferocity she showed. Something was definitely wrong here.

"May we come in?" asked the lead officer.

"Why? I should wait on Vernon, my husband."

"It is about Vernon we are here, lady Dursley."

Petunia began shaking violently, opening the door wider to let the officers in. The two officers followed her to the kitchen, where she began to make tea and prepare baby food for Dudley.

"Before we begin, Mrs. Dursley, may I use your bathroom? I have been on the road since five AM, and the coffees are looking for the emergency exit."

"Sure. It is the third door down the hall, officer," replied Petunia, forgetting about the blood-soaked wall and carpet at the end.

The officer made his way to the bathroom, did his business, and then suddenly smelled the hallway. Fresh blood, lots of fresh blood was somewhere. As he left the bathroom, he eyed the hallway and spotted the dark stains on the carpet and on the wall, dark rusty stains that reminded him of blood. Instead of going back to the kitchen, he radioed for assistance from the Criminal squad that had already begun tracking Vernon’s moves by interrogating people along the path from Privet Drive to the Whey River. Quickly, a specialist in crime scene moved and rang at the door.

"I shall answer, Mrs. Dursley, continue preparing your child’s food," said the officer, quickly moving to the door and letting his colleague in. He took the crime scene specialist to the carpet and pointed.

"Blood, lots of it from what I see."

"Yes. Let me check if it is human in origin."

It took barely a minute for the diagnostic to fall: that was human blood. Another patch was found at the bottom of the stairs, and along the steps’ edges, along with skin scrapes. Samples of each spot were taken for testing, using a new technique, called genetic mapping. It was yet in its infancy, but had proved invaluable in solving some cases already. Bioluminescence also revealed blood splattered around a deformation in the panelling consistent with blunt force, as well as blood on the kitchen counter and the sink.

"That smells of a heinous crime, Willy, and we must call in the big guns."

Meanwhile, Petunia kept her rant against the Devil Spawn, unaware she was torpedoing her own ship with her description of finding ‘it’ on her doorsteps, that magic was an act of the Devil, and on and on.

"Mrs. Dursley, where is that Devil Spawn you keep referring to?" asked the officer, as Petunia fed Dudley a ration of pablum that would have filled a whale.

"My husband took it away."

"To do what?"

"To dispose of it, as the Church prescribes! I am a true believer, and devil spawns must be removed by any means necessary! I do not know where he took it, nor do I care, but I am sure Vernon did the right thing, or tried to." She then realized she had been talking for half an hour and still had not learned of where Vernon was. "Where is he?"

"Who?"

"Vernon, officer! Vernon! My husband!"

"Your husband is at Holy Mercy Hospital undergoing emergency surgery. He was severely maimed."

"I am sure this is the work of the Devil Spawn, officer. My husband is a careful driver. If he was involved in a car crash, it had to be ‘it’."

"He was not in a car crash, Mrs. Dursley, but in a fishing incident."

"A fishing incident? My husband hates fishing! The only use he sees for rivers is to drown unwanted animals! He can barely stand fish and chips!"

The officer was getting more and more disgusted by what he was hearing, and as the other officers made their way to the table, he decided to bring Petunia to the Metropolitan Investigation Offices in downtown London. That case was way above his pay grade.

"Mrs. Dursley, would you accompany us to the hospital where your husband is being treated?" That would leave the house free for in-depth investigations by the coming Criminal Brigade. "Do not worry, we will lock things down when we are done around here, and your house is under police protection."

"Okay. I shall prepare Dudley. He needs to burp, and then a new nappy. That boy could clog the drain with how much he produces."

The officer looked at her with wide eyes. She was surprised that baby whale made so much waste? After watching her feed the boy, he was surprised the clogging did not occur in the intestines!

"Lady, I suggest you take all you need for a long trip. You will not be back here for a while." Not if I have anything to say about it, he thought.

By the time Petunia made her way to the patrol car, just about every neighbor was in their front yard, pointing at her, and murmuring between each other, exchanging ‘facts’ that were more of the bad-mouthing they had served to the investigators in the early morning hours. The patrol car left, sirens blaring and light flashing, and headed for the Holy Mercy Hospital, a good eighty miles off.

---

Around 8:30 am, a crack was heard in the park near the school on Roses Street, which gave way to a short alley leading to Magnolia Lane, surprising everyone still outside discussing the morning’s events. Some rushed to the park, expecting to find a crash. Nothing of the sort was found, and the incident was forgotten, drowned in the morning’s events.

A tabby cat leisurely made its way to Crescent Lane via Magnolia Lane, currently filled with garbage cans, bags opened by roving cats during the night, and a few dogs let loose by negligent owners. It crawled under the hedges toward four Privet Drive by way of the back yard. It sat for an hour on the corner post, watching carefully. It noticed activity in the house, but could not see clearly inside because the day was sunny and the inside dark. It then left by the way it had come, following Crescent Lane to the park, then disappeared in another thundering crack. Minerva McDonnagall had missed the crowds on Privet Drive by taking the shortest route from the park to the Dursleys’ property.

---

Two hours after leaving her house, Petunia was finally at her husband’s bedside. There was a huge traffic accident that had blocked the highway and the police car had resorted to driving in circles to escape the logjam. The police officers parked in the wait-to-pick-up area and escorted Petunia to the reception desk.

"We are here to escort Mrs. Petunia Dursley and her son to the bedside of Mr. Vernon Dursley," one of the officers told the receptionist.

"Oh. He is just out of surgery. The doctors are still in his room, I guess. That is room 520, the reanimation room."

The officers accompanied Petunia to the room and one stayed outside while the other stayed with Petunia. Three doctors were talking to each other near the bed where Vernon was laying with enough tubes to drain an olympic pool. As Petunia made her way to the bed’s side, the doctors turned to her.

"Mrs. Dursley?" the reconstruction surgeon asked.

"Yes. What happened? When will he be out of here?"

"Mrs. Dursley, we have good news, not so good news, and some bad news. Which ones first?"

"Keep the bad news for yourselves, and give me the good news."

"The good news is your husband is still alive. The not so good news is that it is still too early to know if he will survive. He lost a lot of blood, suffered several heart attacks during surgery, and had to be resuscitated several times since leaving the operation room. Let me be blunt, Mrs. Dursley. Your husband is too fat, suffers from several arterial blockage of the heart, and we will need to do bypass surgery as soon as we can."

Petunia turned white.

"He always had a healthy appetite, and never left a scrap of food in his plate! That must be the Devil’s doing!"

The doctors looked at each other with raised eyebrows, and blinked repeatedly.

"Mrs. Dursley says their home was visited by a Devil Spawn and that her husband left to dispose of it," the police officer that had accompanied her in the room informed the doctors.

"Psychotic paranoia..." muttered one of the doctors, too loud for his well-being.

"I am not psychotic! I am not a mental case! I saw the Devil’s work in my own home! My sister herself is a witch, and some lord disposed of her, for which I will forever be grateful!"

"They all say that," muttered the same doctor, eyeing the officer. Moving closer to the other doctors, he whispered: "I will call security. Those cases can turn violent in the blink of an eye and you would not be able to stop her unless you used deadly force."

Shortly, the internal speakers of the hospital were heard:

"Code gray, 520. Code gray, 520. Code gray, 520."

"What happened to my husband?" asked Petunia, ignoring the alarm code.

"He got bitten."

"I knew Snakes were the embodiment of the devil. I would not have been surprised if it had a forked tongue."

"He got bitten by a fish, Mrs. Dursley. And from the skin, or more what was left of it, the teeth were triangular, matching a shark bite, a large shark bite."

"I told the officers my husband hates fishing! I stand by my declaration!"

"Maybe so, Mrs. Dursley, but I stand by mine. And I am not done with my report. I am sorry to inform you that your husband lost both hands. They were too damaged and we had to amputate both. It will be a long while before he can leave the hospital, and longer still until he can use artificial hands with any chance of success. Rehabilitation is measured in years, Mrs. Dursley, not days or weeks."

Just as Petunia launched herself at the doctor, security made its way into the room and restrained her with a double arm lock. It did not stop her from trying to bite the security officers, who had no choice but to push her to the floor violently and stand on her back as she tried to kick and assault everyone in the room.

"Move her to the psychiatric wards, gentlemen, and have her put in a straight-jacket before locking her up in a cushioned room. I shall have the resident Psychiatrist log her and examine her."

"Doctor?"

"Yes, officer?"

"Record anything she says. She is under criminal investigation, as well as her husband, for a murder. The charges are forthcoming."

"Okay. I will also notify CPS. There is a representative dedicated to the hospital’s pediatric wing. That child is well on its way to join his dad in the necrologic column if his diet is not changed. He is way above his weight class, more fit for living in the Arctic Ocean with his blubber than on land."

"That is fine by us. Just note whom handles the child so it can be added on the police record. I am sure the court case will include some references to child endangerment... by overfeeding! The police department will send a photographer to register the child’s state. From the name, I think it is a boy, but I could not swear on it. The child is so fat any male genitalia is hidden by the fat down there."

"Oh?"

"She changed the diapers in front of me, and I checked the middle section. That child has tits that would make my wife jealous!"

"I see. I will have the gender checked. Genetics can not lie."

"Okay. I will leave you to your work, doctor. A colleague of mine will be in this room shortly, while another keeps news reporters at bay. Help us by keeping mum on the case, please."

"No problem there with us, as we are bound by patient confidentiality. I can not, however, insure that other staff members, not bound by such an oath, will keep quiet. Rumors spread faster than contagious diseases in this place."

"It is okay. We have the same issue at the station, and it causes us a plethora of troubles, especially when a ‘client’ is rumored to be a child molester. Good day, doctor."

The police officer moved out of the room just as a detective made his way down the hall toward his location.

"Hey, Murdoch. If you are here to interrogate the suspect, you are early. He is still in the cloud, and probably will not be out for the day. His wife is on her way to Psychiatry, with a pending charge of assault on a medical officer and murder or complicity to commit murder on an unknown individual. A nurse took the kid to pediatrics."

"All this way for nothing. I hate this kind of out of town work. Yes, heard of that. They are dredging the Whey river in search of a body, but so far, it is been unsuccessful. By the way, your replacements are on their way up, guys. You can take off to write your reports as soon as they sit their asses around."

"Thank god! I am getting as hungry as that shark. Maybe it had a good idea and it will save that beached whale in the room. He will not be able to eat by himself for years. Never seen someone so fat! I think the bedsprings were bending under the weight. See you," as the elevator doors dinged and two officers moved out, making their way to room 520.

---

"So, Minerva, what do you have to report?" asked Dumbledore.

"Nothing much. They are in the house, that is for sure. I did not move to watch in the kitchen window, but I think I saw a big man’s back, wearing a black coat of some sort. Vernon will probably be late to work today, as he has to drive to his office and, from what that snitch you hired told us, it takes him an hour to reach it in the morning."

"That snitch, as you call her, has a vital role in protecting Harry, and has a name, Minerva."

"I could care less, Albus. Witch-hunting was caused by busy bodies that played snitch for rabid idiots."

"But Mrs. Figgs is a squib. She would not turn on us!"

"Albus! Were you asleep while Binns gave his history courses?"

"No, unfortunately. He was still alive when I was a student. He was boring but we could not fall asleep without getting points taken. We kept stinging each other to prevent such an event."

"Well, you sure sound like you fell asleep when he covered that time. Most snitches were squibs, because they knew who the witches were, having been thrown out of their own family. If you think things have changed, you are sorely mistaken."

"But there are no burnings!"

"But the resentment is as strong as ever. If Voldemort had not been such a fool, he would have used that resentment to forward his goals. Who says he will not the day he comes back?"

"Minerva! Keep that idea under lock and key and throw the key in the deepest ocean!"

"Oh, I do not think of it in good company. I am quite sure ligilimacy is practiced left, right, and center in our world, and that quite a few of Voldemort’s followers have acquired the delicacy to listen in without our noticing. Anyway, why did you send me to check on Harry this morning? After all, we delivered him late last night and nothing could have gone wrong so fast, could it?"

"The issue is that the ward sensor is not gaining speed, a measure of the level of charge of the wards. It was gaining until 8:30 this morning, at a much slower rate than expected, but it was gaining. Now, it is losing power. Something is wrong with either the wards or the sensor. I will visit tonight, when everyone is in bed, and check the wards. They should last long enough, as Petunia is there to anchor them."

"Okay. Should I go too, as backup?"

"No, you need to stay in school in case an issue arises."

Noon came and Albus left his office, to the soft sound of the ward sensor. Barely had he taken his first bite of pork chop that an alarm began blasting across the castle.

"What is the problem, Albus?" Severus Snape asked, as he saw Dumbledore’s face turn ashen.

"The wards protecting Harry Potter crashed! Minerva, call the Order. The others, follow me, we must rush to the place where I put him off for his safety!"

The professors, minus Minerva, ran out of the castle to reach the edges of the wards, and ported directly in the back alley leading to Privet Drive.

"Why did we not port directly where he is?" asked Snape with a sneer.

"I am not sure if the alarm is a false one, and porting through them would shred us to ribbons," replied Dumbledore. "Let us move. Follow me!"

The strangely dressed group made its way to four Privet Drive, getting called freaks and nut-cases due to their looks. Dumbledore was not much into the Wizardry Secrecy Act, given the emergency. If things came to a head, they had obliviators to rely on after all. As they made their way to their destination, sirens could be heard from afar, converging toward their destination. Just about everyone had called the cops within sight of the group, and a confrontation was in the offing.