Chapter Nine

It took them another ten of Harry's sleep cycles to find the first sign of civilization they had seen since arriving here. By that point Harry was barely able to use his magic, so much of it was devoted to keeping his body running. This was made even worse because of the debilitating heat and the scorching sun above them. That made going harder, but thankfully the end of their journey seemed to be at hand.

Harry was now hiding behind the large outcropping of rocks staring down from his position at what was obviously a small metal door set into the side of the mountain over what was probably a cave or a tunnel of some kind.

"We have to get in there." Lily said worriedly, standing out in the open since no one could see her ghostly body. "I can feel it in the air, something is changing, some kind of storm or other."

Since coming to this world both Harry and his mother had begun to feel things like that. Lily put it down to the fact that the magic on this world or in this star system wherever they were was so much more powerful than back on Earth. It was a strange phenomenon, especially to Lily. She had lived in Hogwarts, one of the five most magically charged areas on Earth, but here, the entire planet had more magic than there. She couldn't describe it better than that, but it had been helpful several times in avoiding danger.

This was particularly true since coming into the sun-ward area of the planet. It'd helped them avoid one of the most dangerous creatures that Harry or Lily had ever seen, a fifty foot tall monster with six spear footed feet, long whip-like tentacles and massive jaws. Whatever that creature was, it was obviously the alpha predator of this area of the planet, and neither of them had any desire to see if Harry's growing skills with magic would stand up to it.

The magic also had two more surprising features. After a few days Lily was able to actually solidify parts of her body for a few seconds allowing her to touch Harry however briefly. She still couldn't interact with the rest of the environment, but even that little bit was enough for them to be thankful for.

They both also felt that the magical aura of the planet was also the only reason why Harry was still alive. Even given his own magical strength Harry could not have lived for this long on his own magic, but the magic of the environment kept on filling him up second by second, allowing him to keep going.

But even that had its limits, and looking down at him now Lily knew those limits were close. Harry's face was thin and parched, his skin burned red, his eyes despite being covered, and his arms evening when covered by his makeshift jacket was thin and unhealthy looking.

"I know." Harry replied, his voice weaken and parched. "But we can't just try to break in. That door's probably that heavy to keep out those monsters. Whoever is in there, we can't just let them in."

"I know but…" Lily bit her lip then floated down to kiss Harry on the cheek. "Wait here Harry, I'll be right back."With that she zoomed off, not stopping when she met the metal door, simply floating through it and the rocks around it. The door was heavy, but not exactly large.

On the other side it was obvious to that this was some kind of protective cover over an air vent, which was closed at present. When Lily looked closely she noticed it was disused, bits and pieces of it here and there rusted, possibly making it immovable without a lot of there was no one around, and the small air shaft kept going deeper into the mountain.

She looked around using a mental trick she had learned during her marriage to James to memorize the layout of the area, hoping that her desperate plan worked. Harry wouldn't survive more than another few days out there if that and she refused to let him die. No, no way, we haven't come this far just for my son to join me in the afterlife!

With grim determination she continued her mental exercise until she was certain she knew every square inch of the area around her, then phased back out the door. She stopped however with her head out the doorway, staring at her son. "Harry, I thought I said…"

Harry shook his head quickly, pointing back up the mountain slope at the sky. Lily turned and stared up into the sky aghast. It was like a heat haze was gathering directly above them. And now that she was out of the cavern even she could feel it, the magical aura of the planet warning them of danger.

Extreme danger. Even as she stared up into the sky she began to see a pattern beginning to form up there. And the wind though Lily couldn't feel it began to pick up, causing Harry's hair to ruffle and then nearly blow him off his feet forcing Harry to hold onto a small bit of metal outside the door.

"I need to get in there now!" Harry said, and for once his voice sounding small and scared. The force of nature going on above them was doing that where none of the other dangers they had faced since arriving wherever they were had. Not even that first creature had made him so frightened for his life.

Lily forced her hands into solidity, gritting her teeth in concentration to solidify so much skin, holding his head in her hands. "Harry," she said calmly, "look at me. I have a plan, but you need to be calm and able to concentrate, can you do that?"

Harry stared into his mother's eyes through the thin strip of cloth covering his own, took a deep breath and exhaled slowly as he began to calm his mind. He entered a sort of semi-meditation frame of mind for a moment as his mother had taught him over the past few weeks, the first step in learning how to do Occlumency, the art of organizing and protecting the mind. After a moment Harry nodded and Lily let her hands fall away from his face with relief. Keeping her hands solid like that had been exhausting beyond anything Lily could remember from when she was alive.

"All right Harry, I am going to ask you to close your eyes while I tell you about what we're going to do. You're going to have to visualize this exactly, and when we're done, you're going to try to apparate yourself to the other side of the hatch."

Harry blinked, frowning for a moment before he nodded. Concentrating for a moment he decided he was strong enough to try this, if only just. Though that wasn't the only problem.

They'd talked about apparition based on the notes Harry had taken on teleportation, and his mother had filled him in on it what had happened when he lost his memory. The two of them had debated what the old man who she recognized as Albus could've been up to, but haven't come up with any satisfying answer. Lily was somewhat reluctant to call him an ally or an enemy for his actions that day, while Harry was unwilling to see him as anything but an enemy.

That was neither here nor there right now. The idea of splinching himself again, as his mother put it, was the thought that was dominating his mind at the moment. But if it was either that or standing here and facing that storm…

Resolutely Harry nodded. "I trust you." he said firmly, then closed his eyes not seeing the bright smile his mother's face. After a second however she got down to business, describing the inside of the tunnel as well as she could, including the height of it and everything else she had seen. When she was done Harry recited it all back to her, with Lily correcting him quickly but calmly, her own eyes staring up into the growing storm above them. The heat was also rising exponentially, and Harry was beginning to sweat profusely despite the cooling charm his mother had taught him, wincing despite his covering at the wind and the impact of the heat on him.

After a moment they were ready and Lily said. "All right Harry now focus on that image and then slowly superimpose yourself into it. Concentrate on it until you have your entire body perfectly then merge the two images. Wait until you have it exactly right, with your body perfectly aligned into the new image, then pour your magic into it and make it happen."

Lily repeated her instructions several times as Harry went through the mental process, then after a moment he nodded, sweating now from more than the rising heat, even though that was becoming so much his skin was blistering despite his clothes. "All right now!" With a loud pop Harry disappeared from where he had step stood, and Lily frantically looked around, breathing a sigh of relief as she noticed that he hadn't left anything behind.

With that thought she turned, phasing through the doorway just as the storm hit behind her. Behind her the heat storm hit, cyclone level winds blasting the landscape as the heat rose beyond 300°C, baking and burning, killing anything living in its path.

Inside the tunnel Harry was on his knees, gasping as the magical exhaustion hit him. Apparating like that had really, really drained him, but Lily looking down at him and then back at the door knew they couldn't stay here. "Harry," she said urgently reaching down and gently running her ghostlike hands through his hair. "We need to go, we need to get further away from the surface of that heat storm, it's going to eventually start sending heat through the door, you can't be here when it does, even a little bit of that will kill you!"

Harry looked over his shoulder at her, pulling off the cloth around his face then wearily summoning up a small very dim little ball of light in one hand. "Lead the way."

As he walked, Harry pulled off bits of clothing, wringing them out over his mouth and sucking hungrily at the sweat, as he had been doing for days, it being the only source of water on the light side of this planet. That would be the first priority Lily knew. It amazed her that Harry's magic had been able to keep him alive so long, but water and food would be a definite priority.

An interminable amount of time later they were far enough away from the surface for Lily to let Harry rest, which he did so slumping against one of the walls of the small tunnel, falling asleep almost immediately. Lily bit her lips again looking down at her son, knowing how close he was to just burning out, whatever his own inherent magic or the magic of the world around them could do.

With that in mind Lily left him there, heading further down the tunnel, trying to discover everything she could about this place. Eventually she began to hear sounds ahead of her, including, and this made her smile happily when she realized it, noises that were obviously voices.

The end of the tunnel she was in was blocked off by a heavy boulder, causing her to wince realizing that Harry would have to try to apparate through it again. The other side of it was at the back of what, Lily figured out quickly was some kind of small hovel or poor area. There were several dozen alien creatures around, all of them living in small makeshift huts set haphazardly against the side of a far larger tunnel than the small air shaft Harry had been trooping through.

The aliens were somewhat human looking, two arms, two feet what were obviously mouths, ears and eyes and all that. But they didn't seem to have any hair on their heads, instead having two long tentacle-like things coming out of the back of their skulls and draped down their backs. A few of them had what were obviously tattoos of some kind scattered across their bodies, and one or two of them were exchanging words in a language that she could not understand.

Judging by the breasts two of the group had, they were females, but the rest were all males of various ages. One of the females was youngish, the other wrinkled and old looking, like one of the men in the area.

All of the aliens wore rags further indicating that this group wasn't exactly well-to-do. Though there were bits and pieces here and there that hinted at the fact that maybe there were richer groups around, and some of the tools she saw being used to cook or to mend clothing looked strangely high-tech. What was also interesting to Lily was the fact that their teeth were obviously that of omnivores, which was a good sign and led into the most important thing.

That important thing was they also had some food with them. Some kind of soup was bubbling away over a fire along with strips of what looked like meat and what looked like an oddly green and white spotted bread of some kind was being cut into slices nearby. There were even four of what were obviously meat animals of some sort kept in a small walled off area. None of the aliens looked well fed, but they certainly looked better than Harry did at the moment. And honestly, with her son so close to death, Lily would not have cared overmuch if they looked like they were starving unless they were children.

Her attention was diverted from the food when there was a sort of whispered shout from further down the tunnel. She watched in puzzlement as the young female quickly hid herself in one of the huts, the entrance to which was quickly boarded up by one of the males.

A moment later another group of the same type of aliens entered the small area. This gang wore more clothing and seemed much better fed than the first group, all whom sat very still as the newcomers swaggered of them walked straight up to one of the other aliens, a heavy hand slapping into the other ones chest and sending him to the ground.

The downed alien didn't make a protest, save whimpering a little and trying to say something trying to make himself smaller. The newcomer continued to growl at him, before reaching out with a proprietary hand, grabbing up the largest piece of meat on the fire.

For all the magic that the wizards and witches of Earth ever developed, why did no one ever try to figure out a way up to create a translation spell? Hell, why didn't I? Lily thought shaking her head. This was obviously some kind of gang or other, and the squatters couldn't fight them, so obviously gave into their demands.

Thankfully after a moment the group of thugs seemed satisfied and moved back off down the tunnel. Lily watched as the squatters breathed sighs of relief, including the young woman who stuck her head out from her hiding place.

She watched as the guard who had obviously warned the others of the gangsters arrival walked up. He said something to the young woman who nodded back, reaching out to stroke one of his tentacle-things lightly, which caused him to smile slightly, it's tip winding around her hand for a moment. Then he turned back, moving further down the corridor while she hurried over to remove the soup she had been tending from over the fire.

Lily followed the guard, coming to a small unobtrusive and well-hidden barricade at the end of the tunnel, where he stood hidden in the dark of the tunnel staring out into the first fully lit tunnel Lily had seen so far, which this one intersected. From here she could hear some sounds in the distance in both directions, though it was noticeably noisier in one direction than the other.

She decided to head in the direction of the least noise for now, quickly coming out into what was obviously some kind of underground factory or other which is obviously seen better times. A lot of the machinery she could see, whose purpose she couldn't understand, looked ancient, rusting in places and obviously worn down. There was also a harsh tang of rust in the air, further hinting at the age of the place.

So, squatters living on the edge of a rundown area, understandable I suppose if not exactly a good sign for Harry and I. She refused to think about the fact that it was just Harry that really needed food and water to survive since she was a ghost. Worse, Lily could possibly continue on if Harry died even if he didn't immediately join her. That was a horrifying thought on many levels, and she refused to do well on it.

She spent a few moments zooming through the ancient looking factory, finally understanding what they were building here. It looked as if they were building small batteries and small handheld devices of some kind, though not quickly, and not in very large numbers. Though Lily decided to put the low output down to simply the age of the machines rather than the workers themselves, who seemed to go about their jobs efficiently At least from her perspective which admittedly wasn't worth much.

Possibly this place could be gang-owned I suppose, but nothing we can do about it, not right away at least. Lily had a firm grasp of right and wrong, and about law and justice and she detested bullies. That had been one of the many reasons why she'd kept on turning James away for so long until he finally changed his tune during their senior year and become a man rather than a little boy.

She turned, making her way back down the corridor quickly, moving towards the other end of it. After several smaller areas each with other groups of squatters or gangsters, she finally broke out into an area that looked well-to-do, with far better lighting, better-looking housing, and better looking clothing on the people all around.

The men she saw around now wore full-body clothing of decent design if rather drab in color and more than half of them seemed to go around armed, which Lily wondered was a defensive reaction or a societal thing. If those monsters we saw outside can get in here sometimes she shuddered at the very idea of what one of those beasts could do in close confines like this.

And it was close, even here in the better areas the cavern was only about two or three stories tall and about 600 feet across. She estimated this would be the equivalent of a mid-range suburb or so, and she hoped that the higher she got into the interior of the mountain the better it would look. But even that thought was set aside due to the main issue she was seeing as she looked around.

Many of the women around her wore skimpy clothing of the kind that she knew would cause her son issues, which rather amused her frankly. But what didn't was the fact that it might not be their own choice. More than half of the women Lily saw around her wore collars, or possibly other things over the tentacles on their heads, signifying what could be slave status. That isn't good she thought grimly. Not good at all.