Catalyst

Chapter 9: Camouflage

"You can't keep a dragon, Hagrid!" Hermione exclaimed. "You live in a wood hut!"

"Ah, little Norby wouldn't hurt a fly. Isn't that right?" the hybrid said, holding the infant dragon up to his face, where it was doing its best to set his eyebrows on fire. Abathur watched, transfixed. He could practically feel the essence in the creature, and it was all he could do to suppress the automatic reaction of the salivary glands. The ability of flight despite the obvious unsuitability for it, the seemingly endless supply of psionic infused fire, the armor, the strength, the power he could feel flowing off its every cell, everything about it screamed to Abathur to collect the dragons strands. If the giant-human hybrid turned his back for just a minute...

"My brother Charlie works at a dragon reserve. Maybe we could give the dragon to him," Ron suggested. An unacceptable outcome. The dragon essence belonged to Abathur, even if the terrans and the dragon didn't know it yet. Unfortunately, the others seemed to like that idea quite a bit. Perhaps redirection was in order?

"Alternate proposal. Dragon flesh, known to be beneficial to consume, very tasty. Rare opportunity. Consumption, leaves little trace. Solves all problems," Abathur said, looking directly at Ron. The terran had been observed to have a large appetite, critical in convincing the group. It certainly wasn't ideal, sharing the essence, but some was better than none, and he could probably get the skeleton too. An elegant solution. It didn't explain why all the others were staring at him, though.

In the end, the dragon was ferried away to the reserve, without Abathur ever getting a taste.

(Transition)

Abathur was almost ashamed that he had never been to the corridor that promised certain death earlier. Anything that would doom terrans was more likely to be very interesting to Abathur than actually deadly, it really should have been a high priority much earlier. To be fair, he only learned that it had promised certain death when his camouflage mentioned it during tea at the hybrid's house. Perhaps he should listen more to the terrans when they had those long speeches.

Regardless, Abathur was on his way now to take a look through it, when his camouflage quite literally ran into him. Ron, to be more precise, rounded a corner too quickly and rammed into Abathur, knocking them both to the ground. Both quickly got to their feet, Abathur coming up first with his wand in his wand, Ron a few seconds behind, Harry and Hermione standing behind. There were a few tense seconds where both participants were ready to fight each other, before recognition kicked in.

"Abathur? What are you doing here?" Ron asked, confused. Abathur was about to respond when Ron interrupted. "You know what, doesn't matter. Come on, we need your help! Snape's going to go after the Stone tonight!" Ron said, an excited expression on his face. Abathur had very little idea what he was talking about, so he did his best to mimic the expression while he racked his memory for the phrase. He had found that to be very effective when he didn't have any idea what humans were talking about. Still, he really should start paying more attention.

"I know, right?" Ron said, observing his expression. "Come on, we have to go quick!" The group resumed their frenzied rush, with the addition of Abathur. Abathur himself was just following along, not entirely sure what was going on, but certain that it was likely going to be interesting. Soon enough, the group arrived in front of the corridor that Abathur himself had wanted to explore, a happy coincidence. Right outside the door, the terrans stopped seemingly nervous, wands in hand.

"You have the flute, right, Harry?" asked Hermione.

"Yeah," Harry replied. Still, he seemed reluctant to enter. So, Abathur opened it for them, and looked inside. The only thing in there was a giant three-headed canine, loosely chained to the wall. Hardly interesting. In all honesty, the room was something of a disappointment. Of course, it could still represent a threat, showed by the three heads growling at him, before leaning back on his hind legs, preparing to jump. In response, Abathur pulled out his wand, evaluating the creature. The muscles were lackluster, showing a lack of exercise. The heads were poorly placed, they would get in each others way, reducing the efficiency of each. The mass was more of a detriment than a boon, making the heart work harder to power the already weak muscles, and providing too much weight on a creature designed for running. It was ridiculous, as if someone had thought you could just make something bigger and add more appendages to make it more dangerous, then lock it in one area and have it ready to fight at any time. Abathur could see a dozen ways to make it better.