The last Auror slumped into unconsciousness. Though his final words were barely a whisper, Glenn still caught them through his connection with the alchemical puppet. Deep satisfaction coursed through him.
The plan had succeeded. Every Auror responsible for escorting Peter Pettigrew had fallen into deep coma from Snape's specially brewed potion.
"Reverse operation."
Glenn raised his left hand and snapped his fingers. Instantly, the alchemical devices scattered throughout the forest stopped spewing their vaporized liquid. They immediately began drawing the external mist into their internal storage chambers with violent suction. The potion-laced fog slowly dissipated, and visibility crept back into the forest like dawn breaking through storm clouds.
By placing Snape's sleeping draught into Glenn's liquid vaporization alchemical devices, the weaponized mist had spread through the entire forest with ruthless efficiency, blending seamlessly with the natural fog that had shrouded these perpetually overcast days.
According to Glenn's precise specifications, Snape had brewed a colorless, odorless sleeping draught—a masterpiece of subtle lethality. Its onset was deliberately slow, accelerating based on the cumulative dose absorbed by each victim.
The initial symptoms were deceptively mild: mental numbness, sluggish thinking. By the time victims noticed their bodies betraying them, their dulled minds could no longer process the danger. Even if awareness flickered, their compromised cognition couldn't grasp complex thoughts—only the inexorable pull of drowsiness.
Like frogs in slowly boiling water, the Aurors had succumbed to the trap Glenn and Snape had woven around them before they could even recognize the threat.
But Glenn was too experienced to rely on a single strategy. His contingency plan had been elegant in its simplicity.
The alchemical puppet. Before abandoning this forest now saturated with vaporized death, Glenn had buried his creation beneath the Aurors' inevitable path.
Through his enhanced senses, the moment the Aurors' carriage wheels crushed the earth above his puppet, Glenn commanded it to emerge and cling to the vehicle's underside—a mechanical spider waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
His foresight proved invaluable. One sharp-eyed Auror had sensed something amiss and suggested they take stimulating potions to counteract their growing lethargy.
Such countermeasures couldn't completely neutralize Snape's masterwork, but they might have bought the Aurors precious time. Glenn couldn't allow even that small mercy.
The puppet moved with surgical precision, climbing silently into the mist-choked cabin. By then, the vaporized potion had transformed the interior into a death trap—visibility was nonexistent, and the Aurors had been breathing poison for miles. They never noticed the extra presence among them.
Before the alert Auror could retrieve his antidote, Glenn struck. The puppet's hand found the man's carotid sinus with anatomical precision, dropping him instantly. From a prepared bag, it produced concentrated, non-vaporized sleeping draught. Through speakers embedded in the puppet's frame, Glenn perfectly mimicked the unconscious Auror's voice, seamlessly completing his interrupted suggestion while distributing liquid death to his unsuspecting colleagues.
The final stroke was pure theater. As the puppet handed out the fatal doses, Glenn deliberately exposed the Dark Mark tattooed on its left forearm—just a glimpse, but enough to plant the seed of false evidence in their drowsy minds.
Perfect.
Without magical control, the carriage became a runaway missile, careening toward the treeline. Glenn extracted his puppet with mechanical efficiency, leaving no trace of his involvement as wood splintered and metal screamed against bark.
Blood seeped from the wreckage—casualties were inevitable. But Glenn felt no more concern for them than a chess master feels for captured pieces. The real game was just beginning.
His reversed alchemical devices devoured every wisp of mist—natural and artificial alike. In this cold, damp night, a sphere of crystal-clear air had materialized within the fog like a gladiatorial arena carved from the darkness itself.
The stage was set. Glenn stepped into the spotlight.
Above the wreckage, the Dementors drifted in confusion. Why had their mobile feast suddenly stopped moving? As they contemplated this puzzle and began eyeing the unconscious delicacies below, death moved among them.
A shadow—swift as striking lightning, silent as falling snow—carved through their ranks. When the surviving Dementors turned to investigate, they found empty air where their companions had been.
Devoured. Completely.
Panic rippled through their ranks like wildfire. They scattered in all directions, their movements stirring up hurricanes of supernatural cold. But terror couldn't save them from Glenn's Patronus Charm. His serpentine guardian materialized with predatory grace, its silver coils tearing through Dementor flesh like razors through silk.
After dozens of their kind had been consumed, the survivors finally identified their hunter. But primal revulsion and bone-deep fear prevented them from approaching the creature radiating concentrated malevolence.
Flight became their only option. Better to abandon this feast than join it.
One Dementor—history would never record which—broke first, fleeing toward the horizon. The rest followed in a stampede of supernatural terror, desperate to escape this cursed ground and the monster still feeding on their brethren.
"The Dementors are retreating, Professor Snape. The stage is yours."
Glenn stood amid the carnage, recalling his alchemical puppet while updating his partner. Then he underwent his magical transformation, his form shifting as power coursed through him. Maintaining his Patronus Charm, he launched skyward, commanding his silver serpent to herd the fleeing Dementors like a supernatural sheepdog driving its flock beyond the horizon.
Glenn and his quarry vanished into the night, leaving the forest wrapped in profound silence.
Then—CRACK.
Snape materialized beside the overturned carriage, his black robes billowing like wings of vengeance.
"That boy really is becoming quite the monster," he murmured with something approaching paternal pride.
Raising his wand, Snape blasted apart the wreckage with casual violence, flinging aside unconscious Aurors until he found his prize: Peter Pettigrew, trussed like a Christmas goose and bleeding from head wounds sustained in the crash.
A savage smile split Snape's pale features—the expression of a man about to collect a debt thirteen years in the making. But duty came before pleasure. He raised his wand toward the star-drunk sky.
"Morsmordre."
Emerald fire erupted from his wand tip, climbing toward the heavens before blossoming into the skull-and-serpent sigil that had once struck terror into wizarding hearts. The Dark Mark hung in the air like a malevolent constellation, casting its sickly glow over the scene of carefully orchestrated chaos below.
The trap was sprung. The game had begun.
~~~~❃❃~~~~~~~~❃❃~~~~
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