Chapter Text
BREAKING NEWS: QUIDDITCH HEARTTHROB LANDO NORRIS TAKES A TUMBLE MID-AIR!
Disaster strikes at the Quidditch League semi-finals as McLaren Seeker Lando Norris plummets from his broom during a high-speed dive! The 25-year-old prodigy — known for his gravity-defying moves and headline-making charm — crashed in the 73rd minute of Sunday’s match against the Red Bulls.
Spectators report a sudden lurch, followed by a terrifying fall from over 60 feet. Medical wizards rushed to the pitch within seconds. Sources close to the team call it “a freak accident,” but fans are already whispering: was it sabotage?
More details to come.
The headline pulses across the enchanted glass of the Daily Prophet Live broadcast, looping endlessly in its charmed corner slot above the staff sink. Below it, the footage plays again for the seventh time that hour: a maroon blur against grey skies, the glint of enchanted hoops high above a roaring stadium, and then a stutter. A lurch. A streak of movement no one expects — downward.
A body drops.
Maroon and gold robes flailing, broomstick spiraling. The crowd inhales as one, a massive collective breath sucked through teeth, and then the feed slows on the figure mid-air. Suspended. Caught by the camera mid-plummet. Curled like a leaf. Dark curls visible even from this distance, blown back by the fall.
Oscar doesn’t move.
He stands by the tea counter, one hand resting on the edge of a chipped porcelain cup, waiting for it to fill itself from the perpetually bubbling kettle. The staff break room at St. Mungo’s is always too bright. Everything is a shade of pale: pale green walls, pale yellow tiles, pale, twitching fluorescent charms in the ceiling. Even the air feels scrubbed raw, like it’s been filtered too many times through too many spells.
Behind him, the room murmurs with low conversation. Nurses and mediwizards shift in and out, tired voices buzzing like flies. Someone rustles a bag of crisps. Someone else coughs. The broadcast volume is charmed low, but it still bleeds into the atmosphere. There’s no escape from it. The repetition, the looping of the footage, the subtle urgency behind the calmly spoken words.
“He just… dropped,” someone says from the couch near the window. Their voice is hoarse. “Right off the broom.”
“Altitude destabilisation?” another offers. “Or a muscle lock? You hear of that case last season with the Racing Bulls—”
“Or nerves,” someone else mutters. “Pressure finally got to him.”
Oscar glances down at the tea swirling into his mug. Clear amber. Perfectly brewed. He doesn’t want it anymore.
“It was probably his ego,” he says quietly, almost to himself, but not quite. “Got too heavy mid-air.”
There’s a brief silence behind him. Not awkward. Not tense. Just… muted. Like no one really wants to engage. A few feet shuffle. The broadcast flickers again.
—Golden boy Lando Norris is said to be receiving top-level care at St. Mungo's, where Healers are—
The kettle hums into silence. Oscar picks up his mug.
He doesn’t turn to look at the screen again. He already knows the angles. The image is fixed in his memory, burnt into the inside of his skull like an afterimage from staring at a spell too long. The shot of Lando mid-fall — not graceful, not golden, just human. Loose-limbed and falling too fast.
Oscar doesn’t feel anything about it. Not really.
It’s a name he recognises. A face from old corridors, late-night common room chatter, the echo of Quidditch commentary during exams. It lands in his brain the way a dropped file does. Just another note in the backlog. Lando Norris, former schoolmate. Fell during a match. Is probably going to be fine. Probably.
Oscar lifts the mug, takes a sip, finds it too hot. He sets it down again, harder than necessary. The clink echoes too loud in the whitewashed room.
Someone mentions St. Mungo's again. Mentions a full recovery. A spokesperson. A quote about “unforeseen circumstances.”
Oscar doesn’t comment. He doesn’t even roll his eyes.
He just picks up the folder someone left on the counter and flicks it open, scanning the first page with professional ease. A burn case. Third-degree spell damage. Clean margins, manageable scarring. He moves on to the second page.
Behind him, the broadcast loops again. Maroon robes. Grey sky. Dark curls. Falling.
He doesn’t look.
He doesn’t need to.
He already knows how it ends.
St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
Second Floor — Spell Damage Wing, Room 2C
Oscar Piastri reviews the scan twice before knocking lightly on the doorframe.
“Morning, Mrs O’Dell,” he says, stepping in.
The older witch sits upright on the exam bed, arms folded over her floral shawl, lips pursed as if the idea of being here personally offends her. A thin stream of blue smoke curls lazily from one of her ears.
“I told them it’s residual from the misfire,” she says, before Oscar can open her file. “Happened when I tried to silence the kettle.”
Oscar nods, flipping through the parchment anyway. “Spell caught your eardrum. Still inflamed. Let’s check if it’s receded.”
She frowns, watching his hands move with clinical precision. “Are you the one who was at Hogwarts with that Norris boy?”
Oscar doesn’t look up. “Yes.”
“You must’ve heard, then. The whole thing’s all over the Prophet. Tragic. Such a talented flyer. McLaren’s never had someone like him.”
He nods again, expression flat. “Please tilt your head to the left.”
She does. More smoke escapes, now tinged faintly green.
“Do you know how he’s doing?” she asks, eyes narrowing. “You work in the hospital he's in, yes?”
Oscar lowers his wand. “Tilt to the right.”
She complies, but not before adding, “They say it might’ve been a curse. Or sabotage. Imagine—sabotage, in a game.”
“I haven’t been updated,” Oscar says, voice still even. “Open your mouth, please.”
“But you must’ve seen him around,” she insists. “He’s so recognisable. You two were in the same House, weren’t you? Or was it just classes?”
Oscar doesn’t answer. He taps her temple once, gently, and mutters a charm under his breath. The smoke twists, then vanishes with a soft pop.
“There,” he says, stepping back. “Residual charm’s cleared. You’ll have a mild headache this evening, but nothing lasting. Use a cooling compress and avoid loud spells for forty-eight hours.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” she says, still peering at him. “And you’re sure he’s all right? I mean—your generation produced so many stars, didn’t it? That Norris boy, especially. Always seemed a bit too perfect for his own good.”
Oscar smiles, thin and unreadable. “Your discharge form is at the front desk.”
The next consult goes much the same.
A warlock in his thirties with post-duelling wrist damage. Bone still stiff, even after regrowth. Oscar reviews the original reconstruction spell, tweaks it slightly, conjures a stabilisation brace.
“Have you heard what happened to Lando Norris?” the man asks, rotating his arm with cautious delight. “Poor kid. Never saw it coming. You know him, right?”
“I used to,” Oscar says.
“Bet it’s madness in here with him upstairs. The press must be circling like Hippogriffs.”
Oscar nods. The man doesn’t seem to notice that Oscar hasn’t made eye contact for several minutes.
“Honestly,” the man continues, “he was always pushing the limits. The way he dives—like he thinks he’s immortal.”
Oscar’s grip tightens on the roll of bandage. “Please flex your wrist.”
“Do you know if he’s awake yet?”
“I don’t know,” Oscar says, clipped this time. “Let’s focus on your healing response.”
It doesn’t stop.
Every patient that morning, from a teenage Beater with fractured ribs to an elderly wizard who accidentally hexed himself invisible from the waist down — they all find a way to bring it up. Lando Norris. The Fall. McLaren’s Golden Boy. Half of them assume Oscar’s on the case. The other half ask if they were friends. As if the entire history of his medical training has been reduced to whether or not he knows the fallen Quidditch star personally.
By the time the last patient leaves — a seven-year-old girl who giggles while asking if Oscar can get Lando’s autograph for her mum — Oscar is clenching his jaw so hard it hurts.
He mutters a cleansing charm, letting it settle over his shoulders like cold mist. The room resets. Charts file themselves. Surfaces shine. His breath evens out.
But somewhere under it all: a flicker.
Not anger, exactly. Not sadness either.
Just that familiar, hollow tightness in his chest — the one that started as far back as Hogwarts. A strange pressure that settles like dust. He never asks it to stay. It just does.
The knock comes just as Oscar finishes scribbling a prescription charm across the final page of a follow-up file. His handwriting, as always, is precise, almost mechanical. He doesn’t look up.
“If this is about Lando Norris again,” he says, tone flat, “I swear to Merlin I will request a permanent transfer to Spell Containment.”
“Not quite,” comes the reply — clipped, faintly amused. “Well. Depends how you define ‘about.’”
Oscar finally glances up.
Dr. George Russell leans against the doorframe, sleeves pushed halfway to his elbows, the ever-present patient folder tucked under one arm. His hair is slightly askew, like he’s been running from wing to wing again, and behind him stands Alex Albon, chewing absently on the cap of a quill like it’s the only thing tethering him to reality. Both of them wear their white coats open — unbothered, too casual.
Oscar narrows his eyes. “I’m finishing up rounds. I’ve still got half a file stack to get through.”
George ignores that. “Head office wants you.”
“Head office can wait,” Oscar mutters, reaching for the next folder.
“They can’t. Or rather, they won’t.”
Alex steps forward, quill now held like a pointer. “Before you say no, hear us out.”
“I’m not saying no,” Oscar says coolly. “I’m saying I’m busy.”
“You’ll want to see the file,” George says. “It’s unusual.”
“Everything is unusual around here. That’s the job.”
“This one’s different.”
Oscar sighs audibly — not dramatic, just exhausted. “Is someone going to die if I don’t look at this right now?”
“Possibly,” George says. “Just not in the way you’re thinking.”
That earns a pause.
George takes advantage of it and steps further into the room, holding the file out without fanfare. “Lando Norris. Brought in late last night. Level Seven, private wing. No media or leaks about his condition. Someone called in favours. We don’t know from where.”
Oscar doesn’t move to take the file. “And this involves me because…?”
“You’re the best with magical neural entanglement in the department.”
“I’m not a Mind Healer,” Oscar says automatically. He’s said this enough times it might as well be tattooed on his name badge.
“No, you’re not,” George agrees. “But you’ve seen more spell-induced loop cases in the last two years than anyone else here. And you don’t get squeamish.”
Oscar still doesn’t take the file.
Alex shrugs. “We already tried the obvious. Cleansings. Nulls. Spells. Nothing stuck. He’s not cursed, not hexed, not potion-compromised. His vitals are textbook. The only anomaly is his neural patterning.”
Oscar folds his arms. “Looping?”
George nods. “Exactly. Not just replaying a memory — it’s structured. Layered. Like an engineered trap.”
There’s a long silence.
Eventually, Oscar reaches out and takes the file, flipping it open with the air of someone checking the weather — necessary, not interesting.
The chart is clean. Disturbingly clean. As if Lando’s body has no idea it’s unresponsive. All systems functioning. Heart rate steady. No arcane residue, no spell flare. Just that one line, buried in the diagnostics summary:
Neurological activity: active loop signature.
Type: unidentified.
“Who made the initial call?” Oscar asks, eyes still on the file.
“Manager. Didn’t come through official channels,” George replies. “It got routed up. Admin didn’t even realise who the patient was until he was already in containment.”
Oscar turns a page. A photograph is clipped inside. It’s Lando, just a few hours after the fall — still as marble, mouth slightly parted, hair damp with residual spellwater. Oscar stares at it for a long moment.
He looks awful.
Gaunt. Shadowed. There’s a pallor that magic can’t disguise. And something about the position of his hands — loose and uneven — suggests a body that didn’t choose to rest.
Oscar closes the file.
“I’m not a publicist,” he says, voice low. “If they want someone to parade around and look concerned on telly, get someone else.”
“No one’s asking you to smile for a camera,” George replies calmly. “We’re asking you to look at a patient.”
“Not just any patient,” Oscar says. There’s no heat in it. Just weight.
George meets his eyes. “No. But you’re the only one I trust to handle this without getting distracted by all the headlines.”
Oscar exhales slowly through his nose.
His hand tightens around the file. His shoulders don’t move.
Alex watches him for a beat. “You okay?”
Oscar shoots him a look. “Fine.”
Another beat.
Then: “Do I have a choice?”
George just shakes his head once.
Level Seven – Private Spell Damage Wing
The room is silent in that way only high-security spell wards can be — as if even sound has been filtered out. The walls gleam with recent sanitisation charms. The air smells faintly of antiseptic, old linens, and the static sharpness of layered protective enchantments. Clinical. Intentionally impersonal.
Oscar steps inside without comment.
He doesn’t know what he expected.
Something messier, maybe — chaotic vitals, alarms, residual energy etched into the corners of the ward. The aftermath of a cursed object, maybe, or trauma from a half-botched obliviation. Instead: quiet. Cold. Too clean.
Lando lies in the centre of the room.
Unmoving.
Not in the loose-limbed, uneven way people sleep — but arranged. Arms resting precisely by his sides, head tilted slightly toward the ceiling, expression neutral to the point of unnatural. There’s no tension, no breath catch, no micro-adjustments of a restless body. Just stillness.
Oscar walks forward, boots clicking softly against the tile.
A containment field shimmers faintly around the bed — low-level, stable. Diagnostic sigils float in a patient grid above Lando’s chest, pulsing at uniform intervals. One of the monitors tracks brainwave activity. The output pattern is… strange. Predictable in its unpredictability. Like a circle drawn too many times.
He stops at the foot of the bed. Folds his hands behind his back. Observes.
Lando looks—
Unwell, obviously. But not in a way most people would notice. The difference is subtle. A slight sunkenness to the cheeks, the pale crescent of a healing scar just at his temple, the way his fingers curl inward as if reacting to something unseen. There’s no glamour here, no post-match bravado. Just a body. Suspended.
Oscar keeps his distance.
He catalogues what he sees: elevated aetheric latency. Magical tension in the muscular reflex channels. Signs of long-term looping activity in the synaptic grid. He runs through the diagnostic framework automatically, the way you might recite ingredients for a routine salve.
Eventually, his gaze settles on Lando’s face again.
His hair’s longer than it used to be. Less controlled. It fans out across the pillow, sweat-damp and matted. There’s a faint line at the edge of his brow — stress, maybe. Or impact.
Oscar doesn’t sigh.
But something behind his ribs shifts — quiet and inward, like a drawer closing.
“This is excessive,” he murmurs to no one. His tone is dry. Functional. “You’d think with all the attention they’d have at least found something.”
Still, he steps closer.
His fingers hover over Lando’s wrist, just above the monitoring charm embedded in the skin. He doesn’t touch it. Doesn’t touch him. But for a second, he thinks — maybe. Maybe there’ll be a flicker. Some reflex. A catch in the breath.
There isn’t.
He retracts his hand without reacting.
The numbers on the charm don’t change.
He doesn’t say you look worse than I thought. He doesn’t say I haven’t seen you in years. He doesn’t say I figured if anyone made it out clean, it’d be you.
Instead, he turns back.
George stands just inside the doorway, arms folded, unreadable.
Oscar nods once. His voice is even.
“What do you need me to do?”
The room doesn’t invite conversation.
It’s built to contain. Neutral-toned walls, temperature-held at a clinical constant. Silence layered between faint magical frequencies: diagnostic hums, monitoring glyphs, containment wards. All precise. All necessary.
Oscar stands near the examination table. His coat is still on. His hands are still.
A file lies open under a sterile light. Pages slightly curled at the edges from heat exposure — or magical interference. Hard to say. He reads in silence, eyes flicking from line to line, absorbing patterns, not meaning. Not yet.
The pages are dense. Brainwave tracings. Magical contamination scans. Healer notations. Pattern diagnostics. All recorded meticulously, almost obsessively. But none of them say anything useful.
Across the room, George waits, arms folded. Watching, but not speaking. He knows better than to interrupt.
Oscar turns another page. The brain activity is stable — that’s the first thing. No erratic spikes. No sudden troughs. No neurological collapse. But the rhythm is wrong. It loops. Repeats. Identical frequency, identical waveform. As if frozen in motion.
He tilts his head, expression unreadable. Notes the complete absence of external trauma. No residual curse shock. No unravelled counterspell debris.
But something is there. It’s just… too clean.
“Modified memory-binding,” he says, voice flat. “Possibly something derivative of a Mindlock hex, but deeper. Slower. It’s not meant to immobilize — it’s meant to trap.”
He flips to George's log. The entries are technical, impersonal.
Spell cleansing ineffective. Nullifiers bypassed. Mindvault intrusion attempt triggered harmonic backlash. Healer in charge sustained brief auditory dissociation.
Oscar’s mouth tightens slightly. The terminology doesn’t matter. The outcome is consistent: failure.
He turns the page again. Another scan. Magical residue: trace levels of structured mind enchantment. Refined. Unfamiliar.
“This isn’t standard mind magic,” he says quietly. “Someone built this deliberately. Layered, reinforced. And not to break the subject — to preserve them. Keep them confined in something inert.”
George shifts. “So it’s not an accident. Or fallout.”
“No,” Oscar replies. “It’s active. Intentional. And extremely sophisticated.”
He leans over the chart, fingertip hovering just above a glowing node on the magical scan. The frequency loop isn’t degrading. It’s holding. Sustainment spells must be embedded somewhere deeper in the mind’s architecture — latent enchantments feeding on ambient magic. Possibly drawing energy from the subject directly.
Oscar’s mind clicks through options. Break the loop? Too dangerous without isolating the core enchantment. Sever the sustainment spells? Requires identification first. Enter the mindscape? Risk of recursive entrapment.
“We need to destabilize the loop first,” he says. “Disorient the feedback long enough to access the internal structure.”
He pulls a scroll from his coat pocket, flicks it open. It unfurls over the table with the precision of intent — blueprints of potion matrices, experimental and fringe. Not yet sanctioned. The kind of thing brewed in silence, in labs with no names.
“Valerian compound for cerebral slackening,” he murmurs. “Nightshade to fog the reinforcement layer. Essence of mooncalf — not for sedation, but to induce temporal dissonance. Let the loop lose its grip.”
George steps closer. “You’re going to try that?”
Oscar nods once. “There’s no precedent. But precedent doesn’t help us here.”
His tone is devoid of hope or urgency. This is process. Procedure. Calculation.
He checks the time. Calculates the brewing duration, the necessary cooldown, the method of administration. Oral ingestion would fail — the patient’s passive wards would reject the potion before it reached systemic absorption.
“Intravenous only,” he says. “Direct line past the magical threshold. I’ll prep the dosage. You’ll need to isolate the ward. No visitors. No healers.”
George’s response is clipped. “I’ll lock it down.”
Oscar nods again. Brief. Dismissive. Already elsewhere.
He closes the file. The snap of the cover breaks the silence. Just for a moment.
Then: “Notify the lower lab. I want the distillation tanks warmed and the stabilizers calibrated. No errors.”
George is already moving.
And Oscar — he’s already reaching for the thin gloves in his coat. Not out of concern, but control.
The work ahead is precise. The risk is structural. The subject is not awake, not reachable, not present. But still—something inside is resisting extraction.
Not by accident. Not by nature.
By design.
Level Six — Potion's Lab
The lab is silent.
Not empty — but stripped of sound. Everything that moves, moves precisely. Every surface gleams. No clutter. No deviation. Only clean lines, cool air, and the low ambient thrum of magically reinforced containment wards that keep the rest of the hospital out.
Oscar doesn’t speak. Doesn’t sit. Doesn’t pause.
He moves through his workspace like a system running on code. Tools align under his hands. Glass clinks. Liquid measures itself into calibrated vials. Incantations murmur low in the background — voice-triggered wards maintaining stability, temperature, balance. They obey. They always do.
The potion is already forming.
A cerebral disruptor, retooled and refined. Originally built for trauma-bound magical fractures. Now repurposed — not to heal, but to intrude. To break something open that refuses to be touched.
He grinds valerian root by hand. Slow, even pressure. The fine powder settles into the air like dust in static. No excess. No wastage.
Nightshade next — not for sedation, but for dissonance. Enough to slip between reinforcement spells without collapsing the entire structure. Too much, and the mind might shut down. He calculates the dose again. Adjusts downward. Then proceeds.
The mooncalf essence hovers in its vial, faintly luminescent. It doesn’t behave like other liquids — light bends around it, refracting in odd, elastic patterns. He doesn’t watch it. He pours with precision.
Timing matters. Lunar interference is peaking — a rare alignment of arcane fields, logged in advance. The infusion synchronizes to that rhythm. No rituals. No fanfare. Just math. Just application.
He doesn’t wear gloves. He doesn’t need to.
His hands are steady.
He binds the mixture with a low chant, the syllables exact, almost inaudible. Stabilizing the reaction. Locking in the potency. No flare of light. No reaction. Only the soft pulse of the potion turning over in the cauldron — slow, deliberate, like a heartbeat filtered through glass.
He checks the temperature again.
Then the infusion path. Intravenous delivery. No other method will work — Lando’s passive wards will reject oral absorption, maybe even spellcasting. But not this. This will slip through. This will enter.
Oscar records nothing. He doesn’t need to.
It’s already memorized.
He draws the final dose with clinical care. The potion has turned — no longer liquid, not quite vapor. Something in between. It glows faintly, like memory trapped in glass. Like moonlight spilled into shadow.
He seals it. Labels it. Sets it aside.
Then stands motionless for exactly three seconds.
Not to reflect. Not to hesitate.
Only to confirm.
The air in the workshop remains unchanged — cool, sterile, humming with the dull energy of anticipation. The moment does not feel significant. Only quiet. Tense. Waiting.
This isn’t healing.
It’s entry.
Not into consciousness. Not into dreaming.
But into containment. Engineered. Inflicted.
Oscar’s expression never shifts.
He turns toward the exit. The vial is steady in his hand. There is no announcement. No final thought.
Just the silent, calculated movement of someone who has built a key and intends to use it.
The air was thick with antiseptic and the faint, unyielding hum of magical wards.
Level Seven was a fortress of silence — walls sealed with layers of enchantments, containment spells pulsing faintly in rhythmic beats like a slow, mechanical heartbeat.
Oscar moved deliberately through the room, eyes sharp and hands steady. He traced the outlines of the protective charms woven into the walls, floor, and ceiling, fingers hovering over sigils glowing faintly blue.
Each ward was a barrier not only against external interference but against uncontrolled magical feedback — a thin line between safety and catastrophe.
He muttered the incantations under his breath, testing the strength of each ward, his voice clinical and steady.
“Containment spells are stable,” George’s voice cut through the quiet, low and sure, standing near the entrance with arms crossed.
Oscar didn’t look up. “Reinforcement matrix on the north wall—sustained at ninety-two percent. That should hold.”
George nodded. “No one gets in. No one gets out without our say.”
Oscar’s gaze flicked to the floor, where an intricate network of runes shimmered faintly beneath the tiles. “Passive wards are calibrated to nullify any mental intrusion below Level Six. It’s the best barrier we have.”
A nurse stepped into the periphery, clipboard in hand. “We’ve cleared the schedule. No visits. Minimal staff rotations. No distractions.”
Oscar gave a curt nod. “Good. This isn’t routine.” His voice dropped to something almost unreadable. “We’re pushing boundaries.”
George’s eyes met his. “I’m ready on my end. Backup protocols in place. If anything goes sideways, I shut this down immediately.”
Oscar finally looked up, expression unreadable. “Let’s keep it that way.”
He moved to a central panel, fingers dancing over controls that monitored every magical layer in the ward. His eyes scanned the readings — wards stable, containment fields active, ambient magic low and steady.
He sighed softly, almost imperceptibly. “We’ve isolated the target. Now we wait.”
George’s silhouette stayed firm in the doorway. “When you’re ready.”
Oscar’s lips pressed into a thin line. “Soon.”
He stepped away from the panel and pulled a thin, silvery cord from his coat pocket.
It was faintly luminous, delicate but unyielding — a tether charm designed to anchor him back to the waking world.
His fingers moved with deliberate precision, weaving the cord through a series of small, precise gestures.
The tether hummed softly as it anchored itself to his palm, then extended to a rune inscribed on the ward’s control console.
He tested the connection with a low incantation — a pulse that traveled along the cord, feeding back in a steady loop.
If I lose myself, he thought clinically, this tether will pull me back.
He turned to George, who watched silently.
“No margin for error,” Oscar said flatly. “This link is the only thing between extraction and… permanent loss.”
George nodded. “I’ll monitor it from here. Signal if anything changes.”
Oscar gave a brief nod, securing the tether coil at his wrist like a surgeon fastening a tourniquet.
The room held its breath — sterile, still, expectant.
Oscar’s breath slowed. Each inhale—controlled, deliberate—not calm, but exact. Like the slow, steady cut before the first incision.
His fingers flexed once, then stilled, steady as stone.
Across the room, George stood silent, eyes fixed on the monitor—pulse, brainwaves, magical flux—traced in faint, trembling lines of blue light.
The ward held its breath. No sound but the mechanical hum, steady and low, the pulse of containment wards holding all at bay.
Oscar lifted the vial, cool glass warming in his palm. He uncapped the syringe—smooth, practiced—drew the liquid with no pause, no tremor.
He moved to the bedside.
Lando’s arm, bare and warded, waited.
Oscar pressed the needle in—no hesitation, no ceremony—just the sharp, clean act of purpose.
The potion slipped into the bloodstream—a quiet ripple in the still air, the hum of magic shifting, realigning around the unseen tide.
George’s voice cut the silence, sharp:
“Fifteen seconds.”
Oscar nodded once. Not acknowledgment. Confirmation.
Time—precious, fleeting. The potion’s veil would thin, fail, and wards would roar back. He must enter before the gates slammed shut.
He looked down at runes glowing softly beneath his hands—ancient glyphs alive with silent magic, pulsing in response.
He placed both hands gently at Lando’s temples.
No words. No flourish.
Only contact.
“Legilimens.”
The word fell like a blade in still water.
The room did not shift—but his sight did—folding inward, edges blurring, sound muffling as if underwater.
Not pain. Not movement. Only displacement.
The threshold trembled beneath him.
And then—
He fell.
Not down, not out—
But deep, inward—
Past wards, past skin—
Into the endless loop.
Oscar’s eyes fluttered open — slow, distant, like surfacing from a deep well.
The distant roar of a train echoed, growing louder, vibrating through the haze.
A sharp metallic screech, the rush of wheels on rails.
Then, darkness pulled him under again