Chapter 49: Welcome to Atlantis
Hyacinth POV
The wormhole folded in on itself with a soft whoosh and the Gate went still. The ring on Dad's hand started to lose it's glow the longer it sat inactive. For a breath, nobody moved as the silence settled around us, it wasn't the uncomfortable kind of silence though. It felt... like Atlantis and us were listening, almost like we were all waiting for something big to happen.
We'd made it.
The Gate Room was bigger than any hall at Hogwarts, but not empty the way big rooms usually feel. Stone and metal interlaced cleanly, with lines of pale blue running like veins through the walls and floor. Every surface was precise and clean with no traces of dust or cobwebs. Just the low hum of old power and something else. It gave me the same feeling as Hogwarts but the presence here felt weak almost like it was trying to wake up after a long sleep. Which now that I think about it, that makes sense considering how long Atlantis has been asleep.
I shifted my weight and the floor lit up beneath my feet, one rune after another, as if the city itself were answering my steps. The glow ran ahead like it was laying a path. Beside me, Draco sucked in a breath. I didn't blame him or make a teasing comment because I was too busy trying not to gape at the phenomena myself.
Dad stepped up beside me and squeezed my shoulder. "We're here, Princess," he murmured. His voice carried farther than I thought possible. It was almost like the city was allowing the words to carry farther than necessary for it's own reassurance that we had returned.
That's when something brushed my Occlumency shields. It felt warm, almost careful, and a little unsure, then it settled against them like an old friend putting a hand to a window in an attempt to get my attention.
The touch deepened, it was steady but soft like water flowing over my palm, and then came a clear thought:
Welcome, High Chancellor.
My throat went tight. I didn't answer out loud. I didn't need to. The acknowledgment rolled outward anyway. Runes along the grand staircase began blinking to life one by one, like the city was nodding its head.
Gran Augusta felt it too, I could tell. She straightened her spine and pretended to fix her hat, with her eyes shining in a way she'd never admit to. The goblins exchanged a few quick words in their Gobbledygook and went still. You could see their respect for the ancient city in the way they set their feet and straightened their spines. The house elves simply bowed their heads without being told.
Beside me, Hermione slid her hand into her father's. Neville tucked his precious pot closer to his chest like it would tip over in the onslaught, even though it was charmed not to spill. Fred and George stopped grinning long enough to look reverent. That alone said we weren't imagining things.
The knowledge hit then, not like the blow of the repository, this was more like remembering something I'd always known but had put in the wrong drawer. Directions unfurled in my head. The route to the Potentia chamber. The order of the first systems to bring online. The way the lifts responded to genetic keys, the failsafes, the warnings, all of it slotted neatly where my mind knew to keep it.
Across the group, little flinches and nods said I wasn't the only one to get the new upload. Uncle Lucius tilted his head, eyes going distant for a heartbeat and then very sharp. Uncle Remus let out a soft "Right," under his breath like he'd just finished reading a manual and agreed with it. Professor Flitwick murmured, "So that's how they stabilized reclaimers with harmonic wards," and looked delighted as a first-year with a new wand.
I drew in a breath, steadied myself and spoke before my nerves got the better of me.
"Professor Flitwick, could you coordinate with the goblin captain and his team? We need three Potentia in the core to stabilize conduits and to power the shields that are keeping the water out. Aunt Narcissa, Professor Sprout, I need you to check air and water filtration systems. Confirm filtration saturation and circulation, magical and mechanical."
Aunt Narcissa inclined her head once, her face looking as calm as a winter pond. Professor Sprout had already produced a notebook and a charcoal stick from nowhere and started a list.
"Gran Augusta, I need the sleeping quarters on this level cleared out and made ready for us. Can you organize the house elves into getting that done? Also, I need you to keep everyone here until we confirm the shields integrity and internal security. Use the north and west galleries if needed, there's access to sanitary modules that will come online with the first power push."
Gran Augusta rapped her cane once on the floor. "You heard the Chancellor. Let's get moving."
"Dad, Uncle Remus, Uncle Lucius," I said, and my voice evened out, it didn't feel like it echoed anymore, the room to adjust to it. "I need you all to form defense teams. Check and patrol all the choke points. If anything here can bite, I want it mapped and muzzled before nightfall."
Professor Snape was just behind them, a tall dark wall, his arms were folded, and his eyes were flat, almost thoughtful. I didn't need to ask what he was thinking though because he stepped forward of his own accord.
"I'll take the east and the lower labs," he said. "I don't trust rooms with too many sinks especially after being under water for millennia."
Dad's mouth twitched. "That's my girl's favorite potions corridor you're insulting."
"It can still be her favorite... when it's safe," Snape said mildly, and turned away with Uncle Lucius without wasting another word.
I didn't realize I'd switched languages until Draco had pointed it out, all of us had. Atlantean felt natural in my mouth, and it seemed like the city settled down a bit at the sound of it. I could've kept going like that for an hour, but time mattered. Our air supply mattered and our power output to input ratio mattered most of all.
"Uncle Newt," I called, turning, and he was already there, with his satchel still slung over his shoulder. "Walk with us?"
Uncle Newt's smile cause the skin around his eyes to wrinkle at the corners like paper. "Always."
We took the broad corridor out of the Gate Room, runes blooming to life beneath our feet in calm waves. The goblin captain was about as tall as my shoulder in height but armored like a wall. He paced at Professor Flitwick's side with a slate-sized reader that hummed faintly in time with the veins in the wall.
The lift didn't look like a lift back on earth. It was more streamlined and gave a sense of security that I never got from one of the death traps the muggles insisted were safe. I placed my palm on the console plate. It warmed in recognition, and lowered us in a soft spiral. When it opened, the air was cooler and the sound was more muted. The Potentia chamber waited like the heart of a beast that trusted us.
It was beautiful. Not in a flashy cluster of blinking lights that you would see in Sci-fi movies. The room was a circle with clean lines, a suspended central array, and three luminous sockets that glowed with the diminishing light of the failing potentia. Each of them were trimmed in a ring of etched characters I could read now without needing to think.
"First and third," I said quietly. "Then second. Give the grid room to re-balance between cycles."
Flitwick nodded, already half in trance. "I'll ride the stabilizers and ward the housings as they go in. Goblin captain?"
"We'll lock them from tampering," the captain said. His voice had an added weight to it. "We'll stabilize the cores with our craft work so that no one else can tamper with them."
Uncle Newt stood at my shoulder and took everything in like he was encountering a creature no one else had ever seen alive. "Steady as we go," he murmured to the room. "We wouldn't want to spook the ol' girl."
The first Potentia came out of its case like a sunset you could hold. The goblins carried it like it was a prince and a bomb all rolled into one. Flitwick guided them to the cradle and tapped three points with his wand, sigils falling into place like stitches. I touched the housing ring with my left hand and pressed the rune that meant accept.
The module clicked home and the floor under our feet answered us. It was a sound you felt more in bones than your ears. Lines across the walls brightened, low to mid-level power waking all the way down to the lowest drains. I didn't realize I was holding my breath until my lungs decided to catch up.
Second in sequence next would've been natural, but that wasn't how we were going to do things. We could optimize Atlantis's start up by doing odds first. This would allow all necessary systems to come on in the most efficient way possible. The city herself had nudged that bit of information into my mind: Allow the first to feed. Anchor the opposite pole.
"Third," I said, and the goblins were already moving. This time I sensed the city anticipating it. When it sealed itself into place, the hum deepened, and the chamber's light shifted in tone. The soft blue went warmer at the edges, while the air pressure changed just enough to pop my ears.
"Pause," Flitwick breathed. "Let her catch her breath."
We did just that, allowing the power readings to stabilize on the output monitor.
The second Potentia went in just as cleanly. The room lit softly and then everywhere at once, there wasn't a big flare, or any drama to it. The steady pulse that followed wasn't loud, but it was definitely there she was awake.
The city... our city... Atlantis wasn't starving anymore.
I swayed a little due to the overwhelming feelings that rushed through me. Uncle Newt's hand hovered at my elbow ready to catch me. "You alright Cinthy?"
"She's... happy," I said, and it sounded ridiculous but it was true Atlantis was happy. "And yes I'm fine, it was just overwhelming for a moment."
The energy rippled outward in concentric circles. You couldn't see it with regular sight, but I could feel it pick up corridors like beads on a string. Somewhere far above us, the shield woke fully and locked itself around us with a quiet, stubborn click.
Dad's voice came through the small speaker plate set into the wall near the lift, amused and pleased. "The shields just flared and pushed the sea back off of the already half drowned city. We're in a bubble at the bottom of the ocean and everything's holding."
"Let's keep it that way," I said back, and heard Uncle Remus chuckle in the background.
On the way back up, I pulled the little portrait out of my pocket. Mum's eyes were bright. Dad James had gone soft-eyed in a way that made me smile in return.
"You did well," Mum said. "Don't look at me like that. You know you did."
Dad James grinned at me. "Try not to let your old man take credit for your first day on the job."
When the lift opened into the Gate Room again, it wasn't the same room we'd left. The blue in the walls had settled into a bright but soft glow. The great staircase led up to the mezzanine on either side, both galleries lit and steady, the right-side consoles awake and waiting. The space felt occupied now, not just by bodies but by intention.
Gran Augusta had a dozen cots already transfigured into neat lines along the west wall, blankets folded exactly the same at the foot of each. Aunt Narcissa had house elves directing crates toward a temporary stores area. Professor Sprout had two assistants charming two barrels to work as water stations, and the sound of a working kitchen drifted up from an open trunk that apparently someone had thought ahead and brought with us.
Dad, Uncle Remus, and Uncle Lucius came in from the east with their reports. Dad tossed his down on a crate and came straight to me. "North galleries clear up to three junctions. One sealed lab we'll leave alone until we've got a better handle on what's in it."
"Pressure seals?" I asked.
"Holding," Uncle Remus said. "Better than holding. The new power evened them out. It felt hinky when we crossed the first threshold before but not now."
Uncle Lucius's gaze flicked to the stair runes, to the consoles, and then to me. "You did in twenty minutes what the Ministry couldn't have done in twenty years." He didn't have a smile on his face, but his voice had what I'm going to assume is admiration in it.
"It was a team effort," I said. "Gran's already won the war on bedding by the way."
Gran Augusta sniffed like I'd only just noticed.
"Let's get everyone settled before we do anything clever," I said. "We'll keep everyone on this level until we map the nearest three corridors and fix the damage being underwater caused the systems. Same with the kitchen. Tomorrow we can start assigning quarters and work rotations."
Dad raised one eyebrow like he couldn't help it. "Listen to her, Remus. We haven't even been here a day and she's already replaced me as leader. I might as well be a layabout."
"You were always a layabout," Uncle Remus said, with a mischievous glint to his eyes.
I climbed the first flight of stairs and the lines beneath my feet flared gently, guiding me. I didn't have to think about the console; my hand knew where to go. The right-side panels opened under my touch, revealing controls that were both intuitive and nothing like I had seen before, but still knew how to work thanks to the information upload.
I set the internal shield lattice to full. I brought the environmental wards up to their recommended baseline. I tagged the Gate Room and three adjoining corridors as "safe zones," and the city answered by shedding a thin veil over them like a blanket over a sleeping child.
The voice returned:
Designation confirmed. High Chancellor Hyacinth Potter-Black, acknowledged. Council formation pending. Restoration protocols engaged. Pressure shields at optimum. External cloak intact. City status: submerged and secure.
My hand was steady on the console. "Thank you," I whispered.
The acknowledgment came as a warm hum up my arm and into my chest.
I looked down at our people. There were witches and wizards talking with goblins in polished armor. Elves carrying blankets and bowls with the air of a well-run regiment, while Professor Sprout scolded Fred and George for trying to charm a cot to pogo. Draco was cataloging something in a small ledger because of course he was. Theo was sitting on a crate like he was still learning the shape of breathing freely. Luna humming to the lights and Hermione was with her parents, showing them how to open a storage trunk they'd never seen before. While Neville was talking to a plant like it was a person, and the plant was actively listening.
That's when it hit me, all at once. It wasn't fear, or even relief, exactly. It was just a quiet certainty.
We'd done the impossible thing. Not the flashy, dragon-slaying kind of impossible. The heavy, real kind of impossible that means people sleep peacefully, wake up safe, and get to eat all they want. All while working towards something that is real and means something more than just surviving.
I came down the stairs and moved through the room, touching shoulders, giving quick instructions, stealing a roll off a tray and getting caught by Aunt Narcissa's raised eyebrow, but laughing anyway. It felt... normal already. Maybe that was the strangest part.
When I reached Dad, he leaned in so no one else had to hear. "How's she treating you?"
"Like she's known me my whole life," I said. "I think she's been waiting."
"Same," he said, gaze going to the ceiling like he could see the ocean pressing down, the weight of it all, the shield and the cold being kept out by a ring of light. "She's stubborn in the best way. Reminds me of someone."
"Gran Augusta?" I asked, deadpan.
He wheezed a laugh and let his forehead bump mine for a second. "Don't let her hear you say that."
Uncle Newt drifted over, "The water from the taps tastes clean," he reported happily. "The air reads good. There is one curious species in an upper cistern we'll identify later. It was rather polite though. I asked it not to chew the wires. It blinked at me and moved along."
"Of course it did," I said.
Aunt Narcissa approached with her precise calm. "Sleeping assignments are in order. The children will be to the west. Adults to the east. We'll rotate watch with defense until all wings are secured."
"Perfect," I said. "Thank you."
She gave me the smallest smile. My chest warmed at her approval.
Professor Snape reappeared with Uncle Lucius, both a little damp from a corridor. "There doesn't seem to be anything hostile near the Gate Room," Snape said. "There are however a few sealed labs with interesting signage. We'll keep the children away from those until I have a better understanding about what the labels mean exactly."
"What about the others?" I asked.
"The stairwells are now lit all the way to the third ring," Uncle Lucius said. "The shields are solid. If we plan to remain submerged, we can, indefinitely."
"We do," I said. "For now."
Dad ran his thumb over the ring on his pointer finger once, and the soft glow ran around its edge like a cat being stroked. "Alright, High Chancellor," he said, only half teasing. "What's next?"
"Food," I said. "Then sleep. Tomorrow we start building."
He saluted with two fingers, the irreverent kind that always made Gran sniff, and turned to shout toward the makeshift kitchen that the Chancellor decreed we would not starve.
I dug out the little portrait one more time. Mum and Dad James watched the room with the same look people get when they see something they missed for the first time in years. Mum's smile went soft while Dad James tapped the edge of the frame.
"Go on then," Mum said. "Make it yours."
I tucked them away carefully and lifted my eyes.
Atlantis hummed around us with her shields steady, lights low and warm, and rooms waiting to be opened. She was under the ocean where she belonged, wrapped in the safest skin she had, power fed and rising, listening to the footsteps of her people as if each one was a promise.
We'd come home, and we were going to make it a good one.