Magic Knows No Boundaries Chapter 51 (Patreon)

Chapter 51:

Madmen, Found

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Voldemort floated in nothingness.

Not blackness. Not empty space. Nothingness. A realm of unmade things. Buildings, landscapes, and planetoids floated all about him. They clashed and fused into anachronistic composites of different time periods, past and present. Architecture from that of ancient Rome fused to some far of dystopian future with television screens for windows. Ancient Asiatic palaces merged with Victorian houses. Grassy fields folded over themselves with mountains piercing through them. And all of these things merged into an infinite labyrinth of bullshit.

One moment you're walking through a ruined, but ornate, temple to Osiris and then you take left turn and travel incalculable miles to your right. Odds were, you stepped through a doorway, and in a place of abstractions, abstract ideas like doors and windows create their own kind of magics. Connecting to different doors and windows seemingly at random. It was like Hogwarts, but for adult wizards. An infinite trick room maze, with tricks deadlier than any his first home ever devised.

He knew such realms existed, as anybody who investigated the deeper layers of high magic must. But to experience it first hand was Euphoric! Well, for the first few minutes it had been. After being here for what must have been a month or longer? Not so much.

"Marco!" He heard Hadrian's voice call out to him from somewhere both near and far, left and right, loud and quiet, all at once.

"Polo!" Voldemort yelled back.

In a realm where space and time aren't exactly working as they should, where a single step can take you a million miles, intent held a special power. Voices ought not to carry so far, but the two quickly discovered that the spoken word when wielded with intent held power here. For instance, being able to reach the person you are calling out to no matter how far away they were.

More interestingly, when two people did this, it created new pathways through the winding labyrinth of doors ensuring they would reunite. It would have been almost romantic were it not for the ugly son of a bitch he was stuck having as a partner.

Voldemort walked toward the annoying voice of the annoying man. They had already decided on the protocol of the person saying "Marco" to remain still and for the ones saying "Polo" to come to them in an ironic reversal of the children's game. They shared a sense of irony, which made the boy all the more hateable. But, if he was calling out to Voldemort then it must be important.

He walked along a random path with no sense of direction, save that he had in mind Hadrian Morrigan as his end goal. The path obliged. Doors took him to places most strange, trees growing directly out of icebergs that were place inside of Egyptian architecture, ornately decorated with a more roaring twenties art deco style of rugs, tapestries and furniture. He passed through a few other notably strange places, but each was becoming more mundane to Voldemort the more time he spent here.

The danger of going outright insane if they stayed here too long was mounting. The inability to sleep, tire, hunger or thirst was already taking it's toll. Sleep and food especially helped to regulate mood and were vital to mental health. Going an extended period of time without either, even if one did not need either, was a dangerous game to play. Just ask any ghost.

He eventually wound up at a lake. But it was not a lake like any he had seen. For one it was underground, or perhaps under a building? He could see tree roots and stone medieval blocks in the ceiling above. More interesting was the lake surface itself. It was pure black and perfectly reflective, save for the sparkling of stars beneath its surface.

Morrigan stood at the edge of the 'water', pacing. His pacing ceased when he saw Voldemort approach.

"Do you know what this is?" Morrigan asked.

"Haven't the foggiest." Voldemort admitted.

Hadrian then did the unthinkable. He reached out and, with his bare hand, touched the surface of the black lake.

The surface ripple as if made of water, but his hand did not sink into it. The effects on Hadrian were instant, with him growing visibly sleepy. He then removed his hand and stepped out onto the lakes surface, which supported his weight effortlessly.

He took a single step out and stopped, wobbling in place, before turning around. He looked like he oculd barely keep his eyes open.

"You have found a place where we can take shifts sleeping?" Voldemort asked.

Harry shook his head, fighting a yawn.

"I have found an entrance into the dream realms." He said. "Through which it is possible to travel anywhere, though with even less direction than here. But we could probably use it for that to."

"You believe this is our ticket out of here?" Voldemort asked.

"Maybe. More likely it is a way to communicate with people elsewhere who can help us." Hadrian said. "By lucid dreaming, we can contact the Unspeakables working in the Dreams section of the DOM."

It sounded like grasping at straws to Voldemort, but it was at least plausible. They were banking on the idea that the Dream section wasn't among the traitors who defected with Time. If that gamble turned out poorly, they might make their situation worse by letting the enemy know where they were, and with their skills and experience they might be able to come to them.

"You can lucid dream at will?" Voldemort asked.

"Anybody can if they have somebody cast the imperius on them." Harry said.

Voldemort blinked at the man.

He considered himself a master of the dark arts, and the unforgiveables in particular. It was a rare day indeed when he learned a new utility for one of them.

"You can command people to lucid dream with the imperius?" Voldemort asked for clarificaiton.

"Oh yeah! The imperius has a lot of weird psychological utilities. You can kind of aid people in learning new spells or skills with it and even treat mental illnesses with it. Or, well, mask them. I once cast the imperius on a pair of cruciatus victims who were driven to idiocy by the curse. Commanded them to act normal, and they did." He explained. "There was actually a bit more to it than that, and it took some memory charm shenanigans, but I got them as close to their original selves as possible. Their son never knew the difference before they died a month later. They were dying, that's the only reason I did it."

That was incredibly fucked up, even by Voldemort's standards. And simultaneously the sweetest thing he ever heard. He risked life in prison to a give a friend his parents back before they died? That was lovely.

That Morrigan felt the need to justify his actions at the end there was also adorable. "Please don't judge me negatively for using an unforgiveable for good, mister Dark Lord." He couldn't wait to tell his inner circle about this. They were going to get a kick out of it.

"You're really going to let me cast the imperius on you?" Voldemort asked.

"Allow, being the operative word. I can break your imperius with ease." Hadrian boasted.

Voldemort snorted at the man's hubris.

"I don't mean to brag, but I am considered exceptional at the imperius. And Cruciatus. And Killing curse." Voldemort warned.

"So I have experienced firsthand on all three accounts." Hadrian said with a dangerous tone to his voice. "I broke your imperius at the age of fourteen, and I am much stronger now. And you were much stronger then."

Voldemort gaped at the man. With every piece added to the puzzle of Hadrian Morrigan he became an even greater mystery. Even ignoring the claim he'd survived a killing curse, let alone one cast by Voldemort himself, all of what he just said did not compute.

"Okay, I've been patient enough until now, but I really, REALLY need that explained." Voldemort said.

"Indeed Harry, you have much explaining to do." A new voice echoed through the place they were in.

Both Hadrian and Voldemort jumped at the new voice and drew their wands, only for Hadrian to seemingly recognize it and smile before lowering his weapon.

"Morpheus?" Harry called out.

A face appeared in the black surface of the lake. It was merely an indentation with no discernable features, and was quite large.

"Please tell me that is not the actual god Morpheus." Voldemort pleaded, not wanting to discover those existed today too.

"Heavens no!" Said Morpheus. "I am the head Unspeakable of the Department of Dreams. Harry just liked to call me Morpheus because he's a prick. My counterpart from your world and I have been scouring for you ever since you both vanished."

Voldemort's brain gave him another error at this man's words.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, oh esteemed Lord of Darkness, Voldemort." Morpheus said with thick sarcasm.

"We have met before." Voldemort reminded the man.

"No, you have met my counterpart from your world. I am the same man from Harry's original world." Morpheus told him.

And then it all clicked. All at once, he understood.

"You're not a time traveler! You're a universe hopper!" Voldemort accused.

"Hey! He figured it out." Harry and Morpheus said at once. "Yeah, still don't know how that happened. But wait, you said you're in contact with the Morpheus of his world?"

"Indeed I am, and have been since the day you arrived in their world." Morpheus said.

"Oh! So that's how they knew my name." Harry said. "But because of their oaths they couldn't bring me in and debrief me. I'm amazed you've been able to say as much as you have."

"When dream walking oaths need not apply." Morpheus said with a wink. "One of the many ways to work around it. And yes, we have been working tirelessly to bring you back. We had a plan to put you in a time flux but it seems somebody else hijacked that plan for their own gain. Time, Space, Prophecy and Life on our side are all mortified by their counterparts betrayal."

And now they knew the identities of the enemy. Good. More information was always appreciated.

"How long have we been gone." Voldemor asked.

"Almost two months now. It is almost Christmas." Morpheus' voice told them, only his mouth did not move this time.

A second face appeared on the surface of the lake and it didn't take a genius, which Voldemort was thank you, to guess this was the Morpheus from his world.

"Well now it's a party!" Hadrian said. "So. Any explanation as to how you're going to get us out of here?"

"I would first like to know how you got into my world in the first place. And based on how the unspeakables were in contact since you arrived, I think they may have had something to do with it." Voldemort accused. "And maybe some more information on what's happened while we were gone."

There was a pregnant pause as Hadrian, sorry, Harry considered Voldemort's words before nodding.

"So, you flummoxed an experiment. One that involved me without my consent. And sent me to another planet." Harry summarized.

"That's about the gist of it." Said Harry's Morpheus.

"Well, I won't ask for the details about what you did. Only that you fix it. I too would like to know what we missed while we were gone." Harry said.

Way to completely bypass the most important topic of conversation there kid.

"Statute of secrecy is done. Dumbledore gave a threatening speach to the UN calling for peace under threat of Muggle annihilation. Some of our national forests and zoos are open to the Muggle public, and they love it. The Purebloods are working to create Muggleborn magical schools in the Muggle half of the world. It's looking like an outright expulsion of Muggleborns is on the Horizon and Lucius is doing his best to head it off and seek a less heavy-handed course of action, but even the Muggleborns are all for it." His Morpheus explained.

Voldemort wished he had a notepad to write all of this down. That was a whole lot of bullshit for just two months. Still, this was by far more peaceful of a transition into a world without the statute of secrecy than even Voldemort had dared hope for. Simply expelling Muggleborns back to Muggle society and have a proper immigration system was an improvement over the forced integration that Purebloods had suffered under for so long. He saw nothing but upsides for the wizarding world, and nothing but downsides for the Muggleborns.

"They must know Muggle governments are going to fuck with them." Voldemort voiced his thoughts. "Who is working towards preventing that."

"The younger Hadrian Morrigan." Said Voldemort's Morpheus.

Harry and Voldemort shared a glance.

"But, I don't have a younger counterpart in that world." Harry said.

"Apparently you do, or at least somebody pretending to be. He's claiming that the time anomaly de-aged him, including his memories. The Flamels are even providing the cover story for him. But it seems like your parents faked your abortion all these years and there was another you running around this entire time."

And then Voldemort figured out Harry's last name.

"You are the son of Lily and James Potter." Voldemort declared. "Harry Potter eh? It has a nice ring to it. Very catchy. But there was no sixteen-year-old running around with that name... is your universe more forward in time than mine?"

"By about twelve years, yeah. And a lot of differences besides." Harry said. "I've been running on half-correct information this entire time and figuring things out as I went, but I am damned certain there wasn't another me running around."

Voldemort hummed.

"Was there anybody else from your world who wasn't around in my universe? Or somebody in my universe who wasn't in yours?" He asked.

Harry thought on that.

"Well, Mrs lovegood died young and only ever had Luna, but Xenophilius Junior definitely isn't me." Harry said.

What a waste of a brilliant mind. Pandora was a joy to chat with on magical things, and one of the few people on the other side who was never bothered by a tea visit from the Dark Lord. There was a time when Xenophelius thought she was having an affair because they kept meeting for purely platonic magical experiments.

"A lot of foreign exchange students I never noticed but could have been around." Harry said. "For the life of me I can't think of anybody the right age, let alone one who could be me."

"Romulus." Voldemort concluded. "Romulus Lupin is your counterpart. Same sense of humor and all."

Harry smacked himself on the forehead. It was rather obvious. "Mutant" werewolf always hanging around Lily and James Potter?

"So now there are two children of prophecy in my world for me to deal with." Voldemort said. "And to think I had concluded it was a dud. You killed me in your world, didn't you?"

"Well, I mean, I had help. But yeah, you didn't give me much of a choice." Harry said. "And the you in my world was much less... likeable."

"Really? How different was I?" Voldemort asked.

"You spent thirteen years as a disembodied wraith parasiting off of wild animals." Harry said. "Trapped as a fraction of a spirit by your Horcruxes. It was enough to drive anyone insane and when you gained a new body you were monstrous."

Voldemort neither needed nor wanted to know any more than that. He had spent two months in this place and was already questioning his sanity, thirteen years of a similar experience of sleep, food and sensory deprivation sounded like hell.

"So it was a mercy killing?" Voldemort concluded.

"Honestly? Yeah. That's what it felt like. Or more like putting down a rabid animal. There was nothing human about you anymore. In appearance or behavior." Harry warned him.

Voldemort nodded solemnly.

"Well, the Horcruxes are no more. Thank you kindly for not destroying them before I could reincorporate them." Voldemort said.

"Not for lack of trying, but I couldn't find any of the damn things. Two weren't where I knew them to be. The cave and shack I wasn't going to go anywhere near without Dumbledore to help me, and I thought I had time to worm into his and Lucius' good graces. Alas, that didn't work out." Harry said.

Wow. He really did have a lot of half-correct information. Still, he was more formiddable in Voldemort's eyes than ever before.

He had battled a more monstrous version of him and won. Survived all three unforgiveables by his hand, including the killing curse. He wielded powers Voldemort knew not. And now he was his wizarding worlds only hope.

"You came to my world on accident, not to kill me. I did notice your interference was peaceful." Voldemort said. "You never intended to kill me in the first place. Hat was your end goal?"

Harry shrugged.

"I just wanted to help everyone. I never had a full plan in motion, as I was still figuring things out. But you? I was just undoing the damage you did. I was going to take everything you ruined, from the Malfoys to the ministry, and fix them up. After that was done I didn't care what happened to you. You would be beaten without a single spell being fired. That was my general plan. And it was working."

Voldemort gaped at him. He wasn't kidding. It had been working, to the point Voldemort was happy with the results. He'd had half the mind to name Hadrian his successor and just fuck off, but was still trying to figure the man's loyalties out. He was disappointed by this turn of events because it now consolidate him as a true enemy, through and through.

Both Morpheuses remained quiet during this conversation of theirs until Harry turned on them.

"How is little me any ways?" He asked

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Romulus sat at his desk staring off into space, sweating.

He had just let out his sixth year students and he was positive he couldn't take another day of this.

Since when were Hogwarts students allowed to wear skirts that short? And why did so many of the girls talk so breathy to him, especially Luna and Ginny. And then there was the way so many of the girls stared. With such talkative eyes. He didn't need legilimacy to know that behind those smoky stares, porn scenes were playing out in some of their minds.

He imagined if he were in their position and a sixteen year old girl was his teacher he'd have similar fantasies.

Hell, ever since he'd let the students convince him to reincorporate desks he was getting flashed – accidentally and seemingly deliberately – by half of his class. Snape had warned him. He had said the girls were going to see him like chum in the water, and he was right.

The love letters. The love potion filled snacks that kept appearing in his quarters or on his plate. The really lame flirtation and a few outright proposals.

And here he was with a legally binding contract, an army of minders watching his every move, burning hormones and a girlfriend he couldn't go see to burn off all of this frustration with because his mum was being a cockblocker.

Thank god Christmas break was nearly here, he couldn't stand to see another pair of candy-cane striped thigh highs and matching panties, unless they came attached to Hermione and they were both anywhere but at Hogwarts.

He banged his head on his desk again.

"Please me. Please come back so-oo-oon." He whined into his desk.

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