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Chapter 21: Walking Small Part One:

“Hailey, you are making too much noise, you are giving me advanced warning of your attack,” lectured Harry a couple of days after Christmas as he helped his sister off the ground. “Any moment of indecision could be the difference between life and death.”

“Well, it doesn’t help that you keep ducking,” muttered Hailey darkly under her breath.

“Do you think a potential enemy will stand there and let you attack them without attempting to duck them?” asked Harry coolly. “I think that’s enough for today. You’ve done fairly decent for someone who’s only been at this for six months but there is obviously a lot of room for improvement.”

Hailey nodded coolly before she walked towards her room. She still had a Potions Essay that she unfortunately had to complete for her second least favorite teacher, Snape.

Harry sank into the chair, rubbing his forehead in frustration. His sister showed flashes of being talented in the field of ninjitsu but her focus left a lot to be desired. Harry wouldn’t say she had the potential to be as good as him but at least Hailey didn’t have the potential to be utterly hopeless.

If Hailey ever got herself in a situation where she couldn’t use magic for whatever reason and no one could save her, Harry feared for her ability to save herself at this point in time.

A tapping sound on his window brought Harry out of his thoughts. Springing up to his feet, Harry saw an owl drop a folded piece of parchment outside the front door. A puzzled expression appeared on Harry’s face; he didn’t know who possibally could send him any messages by owl. Most of his close friends and family contacted him through his two way mirror if they had anything to say to him at all.

Cautiously pushing open the front door, Harry looked down at the folded piece of parchment. There seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary with it but Harry wasn’t taking any chances that one of Voldemort’s Death Eaters sent him a cursed piece of parchment, even through all the security around the United States border. Carefully, Harry levitated the parchment over to a table in the living room, careful not to touch any inch of it on the off chance that it was cursed. Harry released the levitation charm on the paper, dropping it down on the table.

Waving his wand in a vertical motion, Harry found that the parchment didn’t glow, so there weren’t any magical enchantments of any type of it. Unfolding the parchment in a slightly cautious way, Harry saw the following cryptic message which stated

One seventh is located at a place where a Riddle was once enchanted.

Harry blinked a couple of times, expecting there would be more than this cryptic one liner on the paper. He scanned the paper, but found nothing to elaborate on what he just had read.

Harry briefly wondered if someone was attempting to play a joke on him but he was struck by a sudden thought that he should hang onto this message, as it could very well come in handy later on. Maybe Harry could actually figure out what it meant eventually.

At the headquarters of the American Wizarding Government, the Chief Executive Officer of Magical America Alexandra Morgan was busy filing some last minute paperwork. The British Ministry of Magic had once again requested that she would have the United States join up with the International Confederation of Wizards. The Ministry had maintained that it would do some good for the stability of the Magical World but Alexandra was certain that the British Ministry wanted to have some control over American policy. They weren’t apparently too happy about their low rate of dark magic activity as it made the British Ministry look horrible by comparison. Also, through her spies in the Ministry, Alexandra found out that the people in the higher levels of power weren’t too happy about the wards around the country that instantly killed anyone with a Dark Mark who had entered the country. She highly suspected that the reason for this was that the people complaining about this were people who had cried “Imperius” when Voldemort had became a bodiless spirit.

At any rate, the American Wizarding Government in a whole weren’t going to intervene against Voldemort until the moment they knew exactly what they were up against. They had restrained to doing so during Voldemort’s first reign because of lack of information.

Alexandra was brought out her thoughts by a buzzing sound on the magically modified intercom in her office.

“Yes,” said Alexandra coolly, waiting for the person on the other end of the intercom to respond.

“Madam President, your guests have arrived,” said the voice on the other end.

“Send them in,” said Alexandra as she pointed her wand to the door, clicking open the lock with a silent Alohomora charm. A moment later, two figures with their faces obscured by the hoods of a cloak entered the office, followed by a large black dog entered the office. Looking up, Alexandra locked her door and quickly put a silencing charm around the room, before disabling her intercom. “Okay, Sirius, Remus, Lily, no one’s going to bother us now.”

Remus and Lily pulled off their cloaks, as Sirius lost his Animagus form. The three sat in chairs in front of Alexandra’s desk.

“I received some very interesting information straight from the Ministry of Magic just last night, I doubt even this has leaked to the Daily Prophet yet,” informed Alexandra as she reached under her desk, before pulling out a folder. Opening it, Alexandra pushed the contents on the desk for Lily, Sirius, and Remus to see.

“A list of five people who have a pretty good chance of becoming Minister of Magic,” muttered Sirius looking scanning the contents of the folder. “Rufus Scrimgeour, Allan Tallens, Amelia Bones, Amos Diggory, and….oh Merlin you have got to be kidding me, this can’t be right.”

Sirius looked as if he was going to be sick as he looked at the paper.

“What is it Sirius?” asked Remus as he leaned over at the paper. “This could cause some difficulties.”

“Difficulties, that’s putting it mildly,” said Sirius in an agitated voice. “If he becomes Minister of Magic, we might as well just sign the Ministry of Magic over to Voldemort and be done with it.”

“Alexandra, please tell me that this information is faulty,” said Lily in a disbelieving voice. “The Ministry could fold in a couple of months if he became interim Minister.”

“I’m afraid not, this is one hundred percent factual, as I double checked it through a couple of different sources,” said Alexandra grimly. “The fact remains that Lucius Malfoy has thrown his name in as a potential candidate to be interim Minister of Magic.”

“Unfortunately he has the best connected of the five candidates,” said Remus darkly.

“Only because of all the bribes he’s thrown out!” declared Sirius angrily. “We have to do something to make sure Malfoy doesn’t become interim Minister.”

Lily paused for a second, an insane idea formulating in her head. Her idea had seemed crazy as it had occurred in her mind but what if it would work?

“Alexandra, what does someone have to do to become a candidate for interim Minister?” asked Lily.

“Go to the Wizengamot and…..” started Alexandra before she trailed off. “Lily, you aren’t wanting to do what I think you’re suggesting are you.”

“Maybe I am, if you’re thinking that I’m going to try and become interim Minister of Magic myself,” said Lily with a smirk.

“Lily, you hate politics,” said Alexandra in a surprised voice.

“I’m quite aware what I like and dislike but this has to be done. There is no way Lucius Malfoy can become Minister of Magic,” said Lily in a definite voice before looking towards Sirius and Remus. “Unless you can think of a better idea.”

“No, actually I think this idea is brilliant,” said Sirius. “That would really piss off a lot of pureblood supremacists, as to my knowledge there has never been a muggleborn Minister of Magic.”

“You’d be right Sirius about that,” commented Remus knowledgably. “Of course, no muggleborn has ever tried due to fear of retaliation from the fanatical old pureblood families.”

“Well, Voldemort already does want to kill me, so I don’t think I have to worry about having anyone more dangerous than him after my blood,” remarked Lily.

“The Wizengamot will select the interim Minister of Magic in late January and they can accept potential choices up until January 7th,” said Alexandra. “Still, Lily, you’ll have an uphill battle attempting to get the pureblood dominated Wizengamot to vote you in and there are a few people who were accused of being Death Eaters at one time on that court.”

“Yes but they are also blinded to an extent by how the public sees the Ministry as a whole,” said Lily. “There is a pretty good chance that people want to see something different as the same old pureblood ideals are not cutting it. That fact could sway the Wizengamot’s votes slightly.”

At that instant, Lily’s two way mirror began humming. She reached into her pocket and pulled it out, to see her son’s slightly discouraged face on the other end.

“Mum, I wouldn’t normally bother you but I received a cryptic message that has been plaguing me all afternoon,” said Harry in a discouraged voice.

“What is it Harry?” asked Lily curiously as Alexandra, Sirius, and Remus edged close to the mirror so they could hear what Harry was going to say.

“One seventh is located at a place where a Riddle was once enchanted,” recited Harry. “That’s all that the note said, however.”

“One seventh, one seventh, one seventh,” muttered Lily before a sudden burst of realization. “Harry, I think the one seventh may refer to one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes.”

Harry could have smacked himself. Why didn’t he think of that? He had been working way too hard lately if a simple solution didn’t come to him straight away.”

“Yes but what about the other part of the message?” asked Sirius, breaking the silence.

“It could refer to where the Horcrux is hidden but I’m not exactly sure how,” said Lily, as she frowned deep in thought. “I haven’t really got the foggiest idea of what an enchanted Riddle could refer to. Maybe one of Voldemort’s Muggle ancestors but that’s a shot in the dark.”

“Okay, this just leads to even more questions,” muttered Harry. “I need to go take a walk or something to clear my head.”

“Okay Harry, bye,” said Lily.

“Bye, Mum” said Harry absentmindedly as he put his mirror away and headed towards the front door, before he opened the door up and stepped outside.

Harry took a few steps forward before he heard the smashing sound of a broken window. He knew it wasn’t any of his business but something told him to investigate. Harry walked forward a few steps before seeing the source of the noise. Someone had broken into headquarters of the Clearwater Scientific Corporation. Rushing forward with his wand in one hand and weapon in the other, Harry pushed the door open, seeing a trio of thugs looting the place.

“The boss wants that positronic dematerializer and we have to get back to the hideout with it,” said one of the thugs in gruff voice.

“I don’t think you’ll be leaving with any positronic dematerializers tonight, gentlemen,” said Harry coolly as the thugs spun around and started shooting their guns at Harry. Thankfully, Harry had the pressence of mind to throw himself behind a table, causing the bullets to miss entirely.

Peaking over the table, Harry threw his double edged sword over the table, causing the vandals to turn around allowing Harry enough time to quickly wandlessly vanish the bullets in their guns.

“Damn, I’m out of ammo,” muttered one of the thugs.

“Me too,” declared the second thug.

In a flash, Harry leapt up, knocking one of the thugs back with a vicious kick to the chest. A second thug charged Harry but Harry grabbed him by the arm and flipped him over to the ground. The leader of the group backed off for a second causing Harry to grab him by the shirt and slam him against the wall.

“Tell me, what would a couple of two bit thugs be after an experimental scientific invention like a positronic dematerializer!” snapped Harry dangerously.

“I’ll never tell you anything,” spat the lead thug definitely.

Harry pulled a dagger out of his pocket and held it to thug’s throat causing him to wilt.

“Fine, fine, the boss wants it,” said the thug desperately

“And who is your boss?” asked Harry in a chilling voice.

“I’ll never tell you, boy,” said the thug which caused Harry to angrily toss the thug to the ground. Harry straightened up, as he heard police sirens blaring outside. He pulled out his Portus Amulet and disappeared. He decided to let the cops take it from here.

Besides, Harry didn’t want the police to suspect that he was looting the lab himself.

Moments later at an abandoned warehouse at the edge of town, Luther Malfoy sat in a chair, tapping his fancy cane on the floor in an impatient matter. His two top henchmen Mugsy and Boris, who were recently got out of a jail, watched their boss with a bit of a nervous air in their expressions

“Tell me, how hard it is to get one insignificant positronic dematerializer?” asked Malfoy coolly. “I must have that device so I can hold this entire city in the palm of my hand for ransom in exchange for the American Wizarding Government finding some way to convert me from a squib to a full fledged wizard.”

“We watched boss, that Harry Potter sabotaged the efforts of our fellow gang members to swipe the device from Clearwater Labs,” said Boris in a nervous voice.

“Potter!” yelled Malfoy as he angrily swung his cane towards an antique vase, smashing it to bits. “I have the funds that I need to gain my revenge on my dear brother Lucius for what my accursed parents did to me but I don’t have the magical ability to carry it out. I must have all the pieces of the puzzle before I can proceed with my plan. “

Luther Malfoy rose to his feet, his eyes narrowing dangerously.

“Tonight we go back to that lab and we will walk out with that Positronic Dematerilizer no matter who gets in our way,” said Luther in a cool voice. “Mugsy, you and Boris round up a dozen my other gang members. This time I’m going to steal the device personally to make sure there are no slipups.”

“Right boss,” said Mugsy in an obedient voice as he walked off to carry out Malfoy’s orders.

Deep in the sewers, Harry paced around as Raph, Mikey, Don, and Leo looked at him nervously. Harry turned his attention to his brothers and took a deep breath.

“Just a short while ago, I encountered a few street thugs after a Positronic Dematerializer that was being stored at the Clearwater Scientific Corporation,” said Harry coolly. “I didn’t get any other information out of them before the cops had shown up however.”

“Okay, one question,” declared Mikey coolly. “What exactly is this Positronic Whatmacallit thingy?”

“A Positronic Dematerializer an experimental device that makes stuff shrink,” explained Don in knowledgably.

“That’s a rather stupid idea for an invention!” declared Raph angrily. “You’re just asking for every nut job in town and some out of town to come after it for their own gains.”

“Raph, I agree,” said Leo. “And I don’t see whomever is after this device would give up going after it so easily.”

Leo paused before pacing around the room.

“There is a pretty good chance that whoever is after it, they could come back for it later tonight,” said Leo.

“Leo might be on to something,” said Don calmly. “We could beat the person who is trying to steal this to the punch and stop them in their tracks. It could be serious.”

“No I very much doubt Harry’s godfather is behind this,” said Mikey cheekily which earned him a slap to the back of the head from Raph. “What was that for?”

“For using such a lame joke,” grumbled Raph moodily, before a thought can to mind. “Through it could be the Foot. They’ve been all too quiet lately.”

Harry nodded, Shredder did have a variety of various street thugs at his resource and he wouldn’t mind risking a few to steal a very powerful scientific device, even if it was only experimental.

“So, it’s settled, we stake out that lab tonight, just in case someone shows up,” ordered Leo.

A short time later, Harry pushed away the grating a basement sewer entrance to the Clearwater Scientific Corporation. He looked around, to see if the coast was clear. There wasn’t a creature in sight, not even a mouse.

“Okay, guys, you can come up now,” muttered Harry as Raph, Mikey, Leo, and Don followed Harry into the basement. The five crept in the shadows cautiously before slowly moving their way up the stairs into the main lab.

Using a wordless Alohomora charm, the door clicked open and Harry crept out, slinking in the shadows. The Turtles slowly followed their human brother up before waiting in the shadows.

“All we have to do is wait and watch for someone to show up,” whispered Leo to the others.

“Then we knock them around,” muttered Raph.

For hours upon end, Harry and the Turtles waited in the darkness but the only sound they heard was the wind blowing back and forth outside.

“Well this is a bust, no one’s coming,” muttered Raph, sounding rather disappointed.

“Yeah, I could have been at home, playing video games or something,” whined Mikey but he stopped at the sound of the entrance pushing open.

“Wait a minute, spoke too soon guys,” whispered Don as he saw a group of shadowed figures.

“Here they come, here comes…” muttered Harry before the lights flickered on revealing the thieves. “Luther Malfoy and his gang?”

“Great, we spend all this time here and it’s not the Foot,” said Mikey which drew Luther Malfoy’s attention over to their position.

“The Turtles!” exclaimed Luther Malfoy in a shocked voice before turning to his henchmen. “Take them all out boys while I swipe the device.”

Without further warning, Malfoy’s henchmen began firing stolen Federation laser blasters at Harry and the Turtles, who threw themselves on the ground to avoid the barrage of laser fire.

“You know, come to think of it, Shredder might have been better,” muttered Harry as he rolled from behind the table. Seconds later, Harry was airborne, taking out two of Malfoy’s gang members with a vicious split kick. They fell to the ground with a thud.

Don sprang up using his Bo staff, propelling himself over two of the gang members. He threw his weapon in a spiral motion, disarming two of the henchmen. Mikey sprung up, cracking his nunchucks over the head of one of the henchmen. Without hesitation, Mikey grabbed the second henchmen by the arm and flung him into the wall.

Raph tossed his Sai into the hand of one of the henchmen, tossing him into a wall. Mugsy rushed Raph, attempting to wipe out the Turtle with a punch but Raph ducked down and kicked Mugsy in the leg. Mugsy crumpled down, allowing Raph to kick him right in the face, sending him flying backwards.

“Anyone else want to take a shot,” muttered Raph but he got blasted from behind by one of the lasers, causing him to crumple to his knees, stunned.

“Raph!” yelled Leo as he sprung up, breaking the laser blaster to pieces with a well placed swipe with his katana. Raph pulled himself up and ran full force into his attacker, knocking him backwards. “You okay.”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” said Raph dismissively as Boris attempted to club Raph’s head in with a pipe but Raph blocked the pipe with his Sai allowing Don to spring up and knock Boris into the wall. Boris was slumped into the wall and Mikey sprang up, whacking him right flush in the face with the nunchucks, knocking him out.

Luther Malfoy broke up the case containing the Positronic Dematerializer with his cane before taking the device, a circular disk shaped object.

“Yes, I have it! The Positronic Dematerializer is finally mine!” yelled Malfoy triumphantly but his triumph was short lived as Harry spiraled into action, grabbing onto the end of the Positronic Dematerializer. “Give me that Potter! Give it to me. Now!”

Harry didn’t say a word as he struggled against Luther for the device. After a moment’s struggle, the Positronic Dematerilizer flew right out of the hands of both Malfoy and Harry. The device connected with the wall and fired a jet of blue light without warning. Malfoy managed to duck out of the way in time but the blue light engulfed Harry causing him to vanish from sight!

The device clattered to the floor, before rolling into a crack between the wall and the floor, completely vanishing from view.

“Harry!” yelled the Turtles in unison in a quartet of horrified voices as Luther Malfoy looked around and motioned for his henchmen to follow him out of the exit. He would come back to the device at a later date.

Raph, Mikey, Leo, and Don felt despaired that Malfoy and his henchmen managed to escape but they had other pressing matters on their hands. Harry had vanished completely from sight and they frantically looked around but they could not see him.

Harry’s eyes flickered up, as he rubbed his forehead in pain. He had hit his head pretty hard and didn’t remember anything after beginning to fight with Luther Malfoy’s gang members. He rolled over; this room didn’t seem to be so large before. Pulling himself up, Harry saw a cloud of dust that he could have sworn as large as a small house. At least that’s how large it seemed from Harry’s vantage point.

“Don, Leo, Raph, Mikey!” called Harry in a futile attempt as he walked down the endless floor. “Anyone, can anyone hear me?”

Raph, Leo, Don, and Mikey continued to frantically search for Harry throughout the laboratory.

“We have to find Harry because first he’s our brother and b, how in the hell are we going to explain this to Lily?” asked Raph in a frustrated voice.

“Oh yes, that will be a real charming conversation,” declared Mikey in a sarcastic tone of voice. “Hey, Lily, your son just vanished before our very eyes. I’m sure that won’t get us cursed into oblivion or anything.”

“Guys, focus, Harry has to be here someone, I just know it,” said Don desperately.

“How do you know Don?” asked Leo.

“Well he got blasted by the Positronic Dematerializer and that only shrinks things,” said Don. “So Harry is still somewhere in this room.”

Don decided that it would be unwise to enlighten his brothers that the developers of the invention had no idea what the effects of the device would be on living people.

Harry raised his head before his eardrums felt if they were about to shatter at the loud sound of the voices. He looked up and saw what looked to be enlarged versions of his brothers. Harry’s heart sank, before his memories started to come back to him. Before he had hit his head, he had been zapped by a spontaneous burst of light from the Positronic Dematerializer.

Harry threw himself out of the way at the last minute, as he was nearly stepped on by the foot of one of his brothers.

“Hey, I’m down here!” screamed Harry as loud as his shrunken lungs would allow him. He pulled out his wand, attempting to send jet of sparks to gain his brothers attention but it appeared that the magical power of the wand had shrunk as well and no visible light sprang up in the air.

The Turtles continued to search but the sound of police sirens caused them to become paralyzed in fear. The sound of car doors closing and footsteps coming towards the entrance increased their anxiety.

“Damn, it’s the cops!” swore Raph.

“We have to get out of here, we can’t stick around and let the cops see us,” said Don in a sad, logical tone of voice.

“What about Harry?” asked Mikey.

“Can’t be helped Mikey, hopefully he’ll find his way out of this mess,” said Leo in a sullen tone of voice as he lead Raph, Mikey, and Don towards the basement to the sewer exit.

Harry collapsed to the floor, exhausted. He wasn’t event a centimeter tall thanks to that accursed device; a jaunt across the room might have been walking across the country.

Outside of the Potter residence in New York at Five O’ Clock in the morning, Raph, Mikey, Don, and Leo walked up the driveway with a little bit of a nervous air.

“Well, we should knock on the door,” prompted Leo.

“Well go ahead, fearless leader,” declared Raph.

“Don, maybe you should do it,” suggested Leo.

“Me? Mikey’s the closest!” exclaimed Don, as he pushed Mikey in front of the door.

“Here goes nothing,” muttered Mikey as he raised his hand and knocked on the door. The door opened a second later, revealing a very sleepy looking Lily Potter.

“I suppose this has something to do why Harry didn’t come home last night,” remarked Lily calmly. “Do come in.”

Wondering how Lily could have known why they were here, the Turtles cautiously walked in to see that breakfast had already been set on the table. Sirius and Remus were up as well and looking rather curious at their guests.

“Sit,” ordered Lily as the Turtles sat down. “Explain.”

Sirius looked amused that the four accomplished ninjas looked like him and James normally did we they had to report to McGonagall during their time at Hogwarts.

“Harry joined us in trying to find who wanted to steal a Positronic Dematerializer, we found out it was Luther Malfoy, we got into a tumble, Harry got zapped, vanished into thin air, we can’t find, the cops came, we couldn’t look anyone, please don’t kill us ma’am!” said Mikey quickly all in one breath.

“Harry was zapped with a what?” asked Sirius looking confused.

“A device that shrinks things,” said Don in a bored tone of voice. “It’s quite disheartening how no one bothers to read anymore.”

“Surely Muggles aren’t that dense to have something like that,” said Sirius. “Having a moronic invention that shrinks things is inviting every nutter in town to come after it, along with some just visiting town.”

Remus nodded in agreement but Lily looked rather frantic.

“I’ve read about that device, and it’s unstable when used on humans!” declared Lily in a horrified tone of voice. “Please tell me you actually have the device so I can find somewhere to reverse its effects when you can find where the shrunken version of my son is.”

“Um…no,” responded Leo in a horrified voice.

“It’s imperative that you find that device, you four,” said Lily in a serious voice. “You go back for the device and I’ll try and find Harry. I just hope that tracking charm on his mirror is still functional even when shrunk.”

“Oh you mean this mirror,” said Hailey who had just joined everyone, holding Harry’s two way mirror in her hand. “Harry accidentally dropped it when he left the house.”

Lily’s face fell, finding her son was going to be about a hundred times more difficult.

“We need to find Harry and the device as soon as possible,” said Lily grimly.

“And if we don’t?” asked Raph.

“If my theory is correct, after a certain portion of time, Harry will end up shrinking into oblivion,” said Lily causing everyone to gasp in horror, the seriousness of the situation gripping them by the throat.

Back on the dusty floor of the Clearwater Scientific Corporation, Harry sat, attempting to find his way towards the exit.

He looked up to a whistling sound. The janitor had arrived for his morning cleaning round.

“What a mess, another robbery, after I work so hard in cleaning this place up, I should get a raise for this rubbish” muttered the janitor in an irritated voice as he swept the floor. To his horror, Harry felt himself swept in a large pile of dust.

Despite his struggles, Harry found himself entangled in the dust and rubbish on the floor. He rolled into a dustpan.

“Well this can’t get much worse,” muttered Harry to himself before he saw the janitor bend down and pick up the dust pan and walk it over to the garbage can. “Oh silly me, this is my life, of course it can get worse.”

Harry managed to detangle himself from the dust before he got dumped into the trash can. He hung onto the edge of the can before the janitor inadvertently backed into the can. Harry was propelled through a small crack in the wall and fell what seemed like hundreds of stories but was only a matter of eighteen inches. Harry landed firmly on his feet in a small patch of ground that didn’t have any snow on it.

Harry took a deep breath, before collapsing. He felt more diminished if that was even possible but at least he escaped being thrown out with the trash. Surveying his surroundings, Harry found himself to be in an alleyway right beside the lab.

A hissing sound brought Harry out of his thoughts and the horrifying realization that a plump black alley cat was eying Harry with a hungry expression. The cat slowly walked forward, as if toying with Harry.

“Great, it looks like its breakfast time,” muttered the miniaturized wizard sarcastically as he saw the cat give him a predatory expression as if Harry was a deformed looking mouse. “And I seem to be the main course on the menu.”