Thanks to all the people who reviewed the last chapter. Your various permutations of the general `` What the F*** ! ? ! Update now ! '' Were most appreciated. I feel kind of bad for jumping a twist like that on you after 40 chapters. variety of deceitful. safe to live the majority of the great unwashed appreciated it.



"Harry ?"Padma said quietly, standing at the end of the hospital bed. Harry seemed to be sleeping, his chest of drawers rising and falling weakly. His eyes were red, like he'd been crying. Perhaps the pain in the ass was spoilt than he let on. She felt bad for needing to wake him."Harry wake up."She reached out and tapped his leg. He jerked fitfully, but his middle flickered open. He didn't speak though, didn't acknowledge her. He just stared off into space. What had Dumbledore said to him ?

"Harry I ‘ ve been talking to the therapist. They ‘ ve run some more tests."She licked her mouth."aspect, it looks like a few calendar month was actually optimistic. There ‘ s damage deep down, lots of damage. You need to let them help you now or ... or you ‘ ll die. In a few weeks."

Harry said goose egg, he didn't even seem to have heard her.

"You won ‘ t be able to fight down Voldemort."Padma tried a dissimilar tack."I ‘ m not saying you ‘ ll have hebdomad like you ‘ ve been going all class. You ‘ ll have weeks in this hospital bed, not able to strike, eventually you won ‘ t even be able to blab out. You won ‘ t be able to shoot down Voldemort. You won ‘ t be able to be the chosen one."

Harry flinched, pain running across his wear out face.

"You see Harry, you ‘ ve got to let them avail you."Padma stepped up to put her hired hand on Harry's."Please ?"

"You do what you have to do."Harry pulled his handwriting away. He still hadn't looked at her.

"You ‘ ll let them serve you ?"Padma tried not to be put off."You ‘ ll take off the vicious eye and let them work on you ?"

"Yes, why not."Harry rolled over so he was facing away from her. His breathing stuttered, he sounded like he was holding back tears. Padma backed away, she had got what she came for. The healers would fix Harry's body. What had happened to his judgement ? That might take a petty longer.

What had Dumbledore said to him ...
*


The boy who was once called Harry faded in his head as the healers entered his room. Bustling around and speaking comforting, empty quarrel. They cleaned him up, washing his arms and chest. They asked him to remove the pick-me-up. He did, letting it return to the storey with a brazen clatter. The healers shied away from the mark on his arm. Fearful. Why should he care.

They did something that was supposed to numb him. He couldn't tell the difference. Everything was dulled already. He watched, unable and unwilling to care, as they cut his peel open. His blood seeped out, quickly staunched by a healer. He wished they wouldn't bother.

A low temperature gel was swabbed onto his sunk mitt. Ruined for what ? For the sake of what ? All useless. He wished they wouldn't bother.
*


genus Draco slapped the sore skin of his arm to try and stay put awake. It had been burnt in the battle, but it was mulct now. Just enough remainder rubor and pain to assist him stay alert. He swung his weary eyes around the waiting elbow room, all of the marauders were here. Most of them had finally succumbed to slumber, Draco didn't blame them. It was hard to imagine that the pestilent midnight assault on the beast ship had been just terminal Nox. They had been worn out, worn down. Draco pinched his arm again. He wondered if there was anywhere he could find some tea. The tea shop was closed but surely the therapist had a staff elbow room or something. Maybe he could ask one.

Or maybe he could just fall asleep.

Draco shook his head. Some of them had to be awake when the therapist finally stopped working on Harry. He shuddered, they had already been at it for hours. How many ... add-on .... had Harry made ? He glanced around the elbow room again. Everyone seemed to be numb. Even Ginny, who seemed to suffer nodded off in the act of pinching herself. They had all been there all night, no one had collected them. He supposed it was only a matter of fourth dimension before a instructor or an order of magnitude fellow member came to wrangle them up and drag them back to Hogwarts, where they would no doubtfulness stay. Chained to post like dogs so they couldn't run off again.

Draco got wearily to his feet, maybe he could walk some of his tiredness off. He stepped carefully around the prone piranha and stepped up to the door to the Mrs. Humphrey Ward. Harry's bed was obscured by drapery but the tail of the healers were still moving against the open. As he watched one of them detached and stepped towards the doorway. genus Draco stepped away to let him out, hope and dread uprising in his stomach.

"Is there any news ?"Dragon asked.

"Yes, there is."The healer looked around the room."Is his family here ?"

"Yes."Draco said definitely, looking over the vulture."time lag a moment ... HEY !"The marauders jerked to aliveness, hands flying to baton before they realized where they were. Draco turned back to the healer."They ‘ re up. What is the news ?"

"well we ... we removed various detail from the body of your friend."The hapless therapist swallowed nervously."We found a drop-gem embedded in his sternum. There was also something in the wall of his stomach. We think it may have been designed to negate poisonous substance but it seems to suffer had the opposite outcome. It was the source of his illness. We also found-"

"What about his eye ?"Draco broke in."Have you fixed his eye ?"

"His ... his eye."The therapist paused."His eye had been removed too long ago, there is a large sight of scarring. Unfortunately we were ineffective to restore it. We are currently looking into whether the installation he has is high quality enough to result there."

"Installation ..."Draco stared at the man coldly."You ‘ re talking about his eye."

"Yes, I know."The healer shook his heading and turned back towards the door."We ‘ ll try to keep you informed."He pushed back through the door and hurried back towards the curtained bed.

Draco looked back over the marauders. Through their sand-filled, droopy eyes he could see their sadness. Harry had fought so hard and got cipher in comeback but accusations of murder and a permanent wave disfigurement. And a dark stigma, they could not forget that.

"Harry might say it was Worth it."Padma said softly."For driving Voldemort to ground."

"Of course he ‘ d say that. Doesn ‘ t make it true."Ron pulled his knees up to his chest."I mean you heard him in there. He ‘ d think last was Worth it."

"Is he wrong ?"Dragon muttered darkly. Perhaps they didn't hear him. Perhaps it was just as well. They were all startled as another room access was pushed open, revealing professor McGonagall. She didn't need to say anything, they knew why she was there. They were going back. And they might never leave.
*


"Are you sure ?"Natalie asked ? Her articulation admirably free of shaking."You could get a bracer like Harry ‘ s. Or perhaps there are less invasive mean of removal."

"There are not, it was not made to be removed."Snape tightened the strap around his arm."And I would prefer to not be dependent on an token of illegal jewelry. Just please do it, it is already beginning to burn."

Thankfully she did not argue, but instead bent down and touched her wand to the tegument on Snape's arm. The slicing pain was distant, dulled by potions. There were bottles by his arm, some empty, some waiting to mature the peel back after the sign was gone. He was in his apartments at Hogwarts, the only place he could have gained those potions without doubtfulness was from his own provision. The searing began and Snape looked away, watching his own arm butchered was not what disturbed him, not after everything he'd seen. But it reminded him of what Harry was going through. Of the dark God Almighty as well. What would he do next ? What would his next motion be ...

"He may go into hiding."Natalie answered his unrequited query, still intent on his arm."Like he did fifteen years ago."

"He will not."Snape shook his head."He was forced to hide then, he had no great power. Now he does, it is lessened certainly, but he still has some."

"Bellatrix, Rookwood and Forneus."She traced easily around the edge of the skull."That is who he has left. What would he do with them ?"

"It will be savage, I am sure of that."Snape felt the cutting stop and watched as Natalie picked the little fluttering of pelt up and calmly incinerated it. It was done, he was devoid. Strange that he should palpate so footling. Perhaps because he knew he was not truly free until Voldemort was beat. Perhaps because he knew that, without the ability to spy, he was next to useless.

"Don ‘ t think that."Natalie's eyes flickered up to his as she daubed his arm with a potion soaked bandage.

"But I am."Snape shook his head."Perhaps not useless but ... if I had not acted on instinct we would now know exactly what Voldemort was planning. We would be able to counter him instead of stumbling around in the darkness."

"You had to."Was all she said.

"Perhaps."Snape let his head drop back, perhaps.

"You know them better than anyone."Natalie continued."You can work out what he will do next."

"I have been trying."Snape replied tetchily."But I can not retrieve of anything he would care to do that he has the manpower to accomplish. Unless he has some plan I am unaware of. Which he almost certainly has. I always got the gumption that he had something brewing."

"The ministry ? The section of enigma ? The prophecy ?"

"He covets that no incertitude. But I can see no way he could obtain it with three death eaters."

"Four."Natalie corrected."Barty Crouch is still out there somewhere."

"And if he is not beat then he is doing Merlin knows what."Snape shook his principal."It could be anything."

"Severus,"Natalie took his brass in her script and tilted it up to conform to her optic."Not so low now. We won today. It may not feel like it, but we won a victory. Victories have been few and far between this past tense year, we need to cherish them, not worry about what will happen next."Snape was once again amazed by the way she could break off through to him, whatever his mood. He smiled,

"I believe I have some wine."
*


The boy who carried the gens Harry felt himself enter the familiar aspiration. He felt floorboards under his back, scratchy through the thin hospital robe. He knew where he would be when he opened his oculus. And finally, he even knew why.

He pushed himself off the floor, leaning his well-worn soma against the paries. The wall painted with bears and snitches over a pale blue sky full of fluffy cloud. Harry felt like spitting but he couldn't muster the Department of Energy. He ignored the crib in the center of the room, it's shining Mobile spinning idly in the dream-wind. He shoved the room access open and descended the stair. The revulsion he always felt was still there, but he could barely bring himself to care. He knew what this property was now.

No one-year-old remembers their firm. No one-year-old could retrieve every pic, or the pattern on the wallpaper. This place was a lie, a parasitic memory that had been burnt into his creative thinker. The creeping sickness in his cutis was his mind's way of telling him that it wasn't real, that it didn't belong.

He stepped up to the front door and stepped outside. There were street signs in the memory. No one-year-old would commemorate street foretoken, they couldn't even read them. He should hold known, should feature realized somehow.

He couldn't feel the orchard nearby. God knows what that represented. Some metaphor for safety his mind was projecting out maybe. Who knew. The river ? Some other part of his mind ... it didn't matter. Harry let himself go down to the solid ground on the grass, it was all pointless. It wasn't worth fighting this anymore, it was burnt onto the back of his scull. He could never escape.

His eyes flickered open in the hospital Barbara Ward. He could feel the sore new ontogeny in his hand. It was pink, new skin, and small than the early. Harry dropped it back onto the cover. Other parts of his body hurt too, piffling scars and injuries. They had fixed him up. He wished they hadn't bothered.

The dreaming was still swirling in his head, biting at him. It was too voiceless. He saw his thing piled neatly against the wall, even his clothes. Suddenly he knew he had to depart. This place ... he just had to go out. He quietly pushed out of bed, ignoring the creak in every muscle and drew his bag over. He dressed quickly and disillusioned himself before slipping out the door.

The vulture were sleeping there, lying across benches or curled up on the floor. He didn't wake them. He didn't want to talk to anyone right now. Couldn't talk, he had no idea how he would even set off. He hurried away and down the stairs. He didn't hitch until he was out of the edifice and a few streets away. A small street, not busy. Breathing hard he shoved his scepter out into the street. He found that he could barely go along his arm up for the few seconds it took for the knight bus to confuse out of nowhere and screech to a stop in movement of him.

"Ere are you Harry Potter ?"The pimply director squinted at him, his voice full phase of the moon of amazement.

"No."The word of honor was hollow in his chest.

"Right, right, incognito."The man tapped his nose."I never believed any of that clobber about ya. torpedo that ‘ s what I say."

"Right."Hero ... that cut to the core like a tongue."Take me to Godrics Hollow."He had no melodic theme where the idea had come from, but as soon as he said it he knew he needed to go. It was as unattackable a motive to go to it as there had been to leave in the dream.

"Godrics Hollow ?"The pustulate guy swallowed."Right, I see."

The bus moved off and the unnamed boy sagged down in a chair. Why was he doing this ? Did he even have a reason ? He didn't seem to accept ground's anymore. He remembered being full of fervency and motive, burning passion for the fight. But now he just felt hole, like he'd been scooped out. He didn't want anything anymore. Except perhaps to die. Why was he going to Godrics Hollow ? Why not. It wasn't like he had anywhere else to go.

The bus screeched to a freeze and he got out without speaking. The bus disappeared with a swoosh, a purple blur in the air. Harry looked up and down the street, it looked like any early village. It was empty this clip of day, like a trace Town. Suited his climate perfectly. He looked forward, an derelict house, burnt and with the top floor blown off.

But he knew what had stood there. He had seen it in his dream. This was where it had happened. It just hadn't happened to him.

He stepped send on his hand stretched out, then shied away. This theatre was just Sir Thomas More prevarication. The feelings in his headway, grief, loss, fear. They weren't his, they weren't his loss. only strangers had died here, two strangers. hoi polloi who had nothing to do with him. The grief was another trick, just another level of lie.

He spun away and stalked down the street, not looking back. He had never lived there, it meant nothing to him. Or should mean nothing. His foundation brought him to the second power and he lent tiredly on the war commemoration. He should never make come here, it was not what he needed. He raked his mitt through his hair.

Not his hand.

Not his hair.

He spun and punched the gemstone, hissing out rage through his teeth. The lie poisoned everything. Even his genuine memory were tainted. He didn't even look like this for Deliverer's sake ! His whole body was a mask !

The stone shifted under his fingers. He looked up just as the memorial seemed to melt, morphing into, a statue underneath. Harry stumbled back. No ... no no no. Under the memorial there were two figures, a man and a womanhood. The womanhood cradled something in her hands. The man ... the man looked just like him.

No he doesn't. I don't even look like me. The boy trembled with rage as he looked on the felicitous ceramicist family. The testament in Stone to the life story he had never really had. His fingers went to his wand.

"Reducto !"The wand flickered out, even through the rage the spell flew true. It struck the header of the Father statue, shattering it into splinter. Some of them cut the boy's flesh. He didn't care.

"Reducto ! !"Lilly potter's chief snapped off and crunched onto the tarmacadam. Rolling to a full stop in a storm drain.

"Reducto ! !"The last shooting was the strongest, striking out in a blinding bolt of visible light, obliterating the bundled baby. Blowing the little boy-who-lived to smithereens. flame flickered across the statue before they died out. Flickered across the washed-up stumps of head word and died to nothing.

The unnamed boy stepped back, breathing like he'd run a marathon. His apparel wet with fret. He dropped his wand back into his pocket and turned his binding on the statue, his breathing time still coming in infuriated fit. He couldn't think, couldn't breathing spell. He walked off down the street, not trusting himself to look on the statue again. It made it all too real.

His optic found a graveyard. Both eyes, real and magical. He shuddered, he'd got used to the shining overlay over his visual modality, the x-ray sight of the world. Now it was just a constant reminder. A reminder of what he'd sacrificed for the lie. He pushed the graveyard gate afford and let the eye roam, in a consequence it had angled in on the Potter grave. He walked hesitantly to it, his wand safely away in his pocket. He pushed a musical composition of ivy off the Harlan Fisk Stone and read the inscription.
The last opposition that shall be destroyed is Death


Well that was bollocks. Being dead meant you had at least one early foeman left, namely the one that killed you. His eye whirled in it's socket, looking straight down. The two coffins, English to side in the flat coat, stared back at him. But ... there was a shadow. Like a vacant area. He drew his wand and muttered a revealing magic spell. Faint whiffs of delusion drew out of the reason to get together him. He waved his wand again, cutting the foggy waifs away. He worked ... he didn't get it on how foresightful. Probably minutes, maybe minute. At some compass point the gray sky gave way to rain and the graveyard weed turned sly. Harry ignored it, concentrating on the enchantment. It was respectable. It was a mystifier, breaking the magic. It stopped him from thinking.

Finally he was done. aught different showed on the aerofoil, but down underground ... Harry stood and stepped back, his heart hammering in his chest. There was a third coffin on top of the early two, arranged like a pyramid. Inside ... inside was a smaller body, a fry. It's bantam blazonry crossed over it's chest.

The unknown boy fell to his knees. There it was, the final proof. The final demonstrable tick. That hapless wasted body in there was Harry Potter. He could even see a flyspeck scratch on the bone of his scull, above his eye, in the shape of a lightning bolt. The real scar had cut all the way to the bone, his was barely more than constitution. That was all he was in fact ... makeup for a puppet. A god-damn doll.

He raised his wand to the stone, but said nothing. The ire in him was gone. He had seen the eubstance of the genuine Potters, lying together. It was surd to feel anger, but he wished he did. The ira at to the lowest degree filled him up, filled the vacancy with flames. But now the fire was gone and he felt even vacuous for it. He found himself resting the point of his wand against the rough, wet stone.

It wasn't even his wand. He stared at it, idea skittering over the asleep shopping mall of his mind. It was a wand gained from killing, killing and fighting in a war he was never supposed to be persona of. This wand was his killing wand. He had done frightful things for the sake of this war ... to others ... to himself. He found himself pressing down harder on the wood. He had pickled his psyche in profligate and what had it got him ? He added his other arm and pushed harder. He had fought, and he'd been broken. The wand splintered with a tacky scissure, the springy Ellen Price Wood bending almost double before it twisted into ribbons. A little red fluff was visible through the good luck. It had had a genus Phoenix feathering marrow, he never knew.

"Well that makes thinks easier."

The voice had come from behind him. He turned slowly but his magic eye had already whizzed around to obtain the interloper. The black robes told him everything he needed to have intercourse. Harry knew he should palpate affright, or dread, fearfulness perhaps, at least surprise. But he was damned if he felt anything.

"You would be Rookwood."His voice sounded dead in his ears.

"Yes I am August Rookwood."The man sketched a sarcastic bow, his wand in his bridge player."Thank pigeon hawk I still have a watch on the minor magic detector. You ‘ ve amount a long way just to slip one's mind now. A foresightful yearn way ..."

"Felt like further."The empty boy dropped the remains of his baton onto the potter grave. Perhaps some gull wizard would find it and construct up some story about it. He turned back to the death eater and asked,"Are you going to vote out me ?"He was surprised that his voice did not vocalise eager.

"Eventually Mr thrower, no doubt."Rookwood held out his wand."But first you ‘ re going to guarantee something for me."

"What ?"

"The dark noble ‘ s undying favor."Rookwood tilted his drumhead up arrogantly."I will be raised above the others, above even that whoreson Crouch."Rookwood paused, obviously expecting the weary figure before him to say something. `` Well ? Nothing to add ? No witticisms ? ``

"No."The boy who had been Harry stepped forward."Do whatever you like to me. I don ‘ t tending anymore."

"Is this some kind of trick ?"Rookwood raised his wand threateningly."You are alone here I know that ... well, to be sure. Stubefy !"

He closed his eyes before the spell hit. The darkness was welcome.
*


A crashing noise woke him. Flashing light burned through his eyelids as he groaned. The noise went on and on, familiar ... very familiar. His computer storage twinged, his real ones.

"I ‘ m in the underground."His centre flickered open just as the electron tube train flashed out of muckle, leaving the burrow in shadow. He felt the cord binding his hands together, his fingers danced along them trying to find a knot. There was none. They were loaded though, biting into his peel, wizardly no doubt. He didn't have to feel to get laid that his stage were similarly bound. He didn't fuss to try to stand.

"You are indeed Mr Potter."Rookwood stood over him, his wand outstretched."The London Underground."

The unidentified boy twisted and looked around him, one of the walls was been broken through and a dark, earthy tunnel stretched away. Now that the train was gone he could listen something in the shadow all around, a scratching slinking sound.

"We ‘ re not alone."Harry breathed.

"Oh, so you noticed."Rookwood held up his wand and lit it, smiling. The darkness rolled back, but not far. A grey wall stopped the luminosity, a writhing passel of cloth and rot.

"What ... what are they ?"He looked on the dark hooded human body. As he watched one of them turned its shrouded point towards him. It let out a decease rattle.

"Those are Dementors."Rookwood smiled."Had you forgotten that they too served the dark Maker ? Slipped your thinker ?"

"Dementors ..."The boy looked into the swirling mass. Wasn't he supposed to be feeling some sort of coldness, despair ? Wasn't that what Dementors were supposed to do when you were ending to them ? He shook his head, they couldn't touch him, a person could only sense so much despair and he was already at his limitation. And as for making him relive his worst memories ? Ha ! His dingy moment was still newly in his mind.

"The dementors like it down here."Rookwood continued."They ‘ ve been breeding down here similar flies. There are hundreds of them."

"Dementors don ‘ t dig."Harry glanced back at the tunnel."What else do you have down there ? I thought I killed everyone you had."

"You did."Rookwood sneered."But that doesn ‘ t topic. In fact, none of that matters. Now be quiet."Rookwood flicked his sceptre, making a silencing magical spell. A second film levitated him off the level. Rookwood reached into his pocket and pulled out a long silvery length of material, easily recognizable. An invisibility cloak. He just hung there in the air as the cloak was thrown over him. He really couldn't have done anything else. Rookwood turned and walked up the tunnel, his black horseshoe slipping on the wet dirt.

The one who used to be Harry was dragged along afterwards, floating in the air. He couldn't move ... speak ... he was a ghost. Right now his situation fit him like a glove. He hung weakly as Rookwood moved further towards the scratching, digging sound. The dementors followed after, filling the burrow with low temperature. Up ahead there was a turning. As Rookwood walked calmly around the bend chassis came into persuasion. One wickedness cloaked figure standing tall, the rest ragged and torn and scrabbling at the dirt mindlessly. No, it wasn't just their clothes that were ragged. It was their flesh.

Inferi, or automaton. Who could distinguish the remainder ? The pattern in front of them turned as Rookwood approached. wickedness farsighted hairsbreadth spun out as Bellatrix stepped towards Rookwood.

"You are tardy Augustus."The female death feeder was not as pretty as she had been. It seemed like a brand toed iron boot with the force of a falling teenager behind it did More damage than expected. The leftfield incline of her face was crushed in, a flock of scrape and bulging skin. When she spoke she slurred, only the redress side of her mouth moving. Her eye was a raw socket, nada left.

She had lost her eye. How wonderful. How very poignant. Under the cloak the invisible prisoner felt his vacuum filled with a tiny spark of satisfaction.

"hello Bella."Rookwood stopped, his hired man flickering to his verge."Shouldn ‘ t you be in your own burrow ? That was the architectural plan was it not ? Forneus in one, myself-"

"I know the plan."Bellatrix snapped."Do you Augustus ? It seems to me that you are the one who doesn't know the plan. I came here to see why you were late. Why were you late ?"

"I was delayed momentarily, nix to concern you."Rookwood waved his deal away."You should go to your own burrow. Without someone there the row them the dementors may be getting restless."

"I want the Sojourner Truth of this."Bellatrix held out an accusing finger.

"You will not get it."Rookwood dropped his crisp behavior and snapped at her."Get to your own tunnel. We take down the ministry tonight, there can be no misapprehension because one of us is trying to separate themselves out from the crowd."

"There is no gang anymore."Bellatrix sneered through her ruined face."There are three of us. There will be more than enough nimbus to go around."Bellatrix turned and dissaperated into thin air.

"fabrication bitch."Rookwood grated."We all want to be the gloomy lord ‘ s right bridge player. halt dig you freaks !"He directed the stopping point one to the animate being burrowing in the shite. They stopped moving and stood, their vacant center rotting in their skulls. Rookwood raised his sceptre and the dirt began flying away faster. In a short here and now the dirt became a brick wall, old and faded. The wall of the ministry.

"Are you set Mr ceramicist ?"Rookwood grinned up at the invisible prisoner hanging above him."Here we go."He turned to the bulwark and raised his verge. There was a smashing flack and the wall caved in. Behind it a man at a desk jumped to his feet his bridge player tangling in his robes. A green flashing of light struck him in the head, he dropped onto the desk, scattering papers.

"Go."Rookwood pointed. The dememtors flew past him, the inferi lumbering along between them. There were a few moments of quiet, then the belly laugh started.
*


"Dumbledore !"Helen Wills yelled as he thumped down the corridor at Hogwarts, moving his old bones as fast as they could."Dumbledore get your senile arse down here !"

"Moody ?"Albus appeared around the recession, his case a masquerade of business organization."You were on safety device duty. What are you doing here ?"

"Didn ‘ t you listen to me ?"Moody threw his hired hand back the way he'd semen."The ministry ‘ s falling ! Enough dementors to paint the sky black !"

"Why didn ‘ t you send a patronus ?"

"Didn ‘ t you hear what I just said ! Every column inch of that place is to the full of the soul sucking monster ! No patronus could cut through that !"

"My god, we must help them !"

"Oh really ? You think so ?"Moody saw his spit fly.

"We must go now."Dumbledore pushed past him, dashing to the door."We can take back the ministry, all of us can."

"But there could be a lying in wait !"Moody tried to keep up, his breath catching in his chest."You can ‘ t go in there blind you can ‘ t just ... we don ‘ t even have intercourse where Voldemort is !"Dumbledore was speeding away."We need a plan ! Do you get a programme you old bast-"But Dumbledore was gone, already around the corner. Moody doubled over, he was old, too old. But gods he wasn't done yet, he wasn't ... done. What the the pits was Dumbledore thinking ? He could get them all killed ! The intact order. The entire bloody fiat in one fell swoop, and what the hell could he do to intercept it ? He felt so old ...

But not yet done.

He straightened and staggered down the hall. Faster. Faster. He found the room access he wanted and threw it open.

"Severus !"Helen Wills Moody shouted towards the startled professor."The order needs your assistance !"

"The rescript ?"Snape stood, his manpower categorical on the tabular array. Zhao was beside him in a mo."I am not a member of the order any-"

"The ministry is compromised !"Moody saw his words cut Snape."Dementors in more numbers than ever before."

"And you want all the assist you can get ?"Snape sneered."The order had done me no favour lately."

"Severus,"Natalie Zhao spoke calmly, despite the situation."Look at him, something else is going on."

"Smart girl."Moody shook his head."Dumbledore is heading for the ministry, by now he ‘ s trailing half the order. He ‘ s going in without any middle, without anything. It is a trap, or could be. Even if it ‘ s not he ‘ s still going to lose half the parliamentary procedure. He ‘ s ... he ‘ s reckless. He ‘ s stuck in the old war. He ‘ s everything you said he was. But if we let this happen ..."

"I know."Snape's eyes flickered with panic."We need to help them. We need to serve the order."

"That ‘ s why I ‘ m here Snape."Moody was gritting his teeth. Every consequence was wasted."But I don ‘ t know what ... there are only three of us."

"Four."Snape muttered under his breathing time."There are four of us. Natalie, would you get Albert Michelson. sports meeting us at the ministry back entrance."

"Even four can ‘ t blanket this."Moody growled as the dreadful dashed from the room."You know that."

"I know. I know well ..."Snape pulled a robe off the cover of a president."We need an army."

"Do you fuck where to happen one ?"

"I do."Snape closed his eyes,"I do."
*


Rookwood stepped over a torso. It's optic were still open, it's backtalk moving vacantly. The dementor's kiss, it left them living, but they were bodies nonetheless. Rookwood paid them no mind.

"Welcome Mr Potter, to the Department of Mysteries."Rookwood pulled the cloak off his floating captive. Harry potter. His prisoner was just hanging there dumbly. Well ... he couldn't really do any unlike. Rookwood let Harry down to the floor and canceled the silencing charm."Well Mr ceramist ? You have anything to say ?"

"What are you doing with me ?"Potter's voice was a lilliputian cavalry from the long secretiveness."You ‘ re trying to earn points with your Maker, isn ‘ t capturing me enough ?"

"More than sufficiency Harry. more than than enough."Rookwood tweaked his sceptre and the bonds on Harry's legs snapped off. Another click and Harry stumbled forward."But I am after the icing on the cake. If I am to surpass Crouch in terms of merit to the master ... I must attempt the icing."

"That ‘ s the unintelligent affair I ‘ ve ever heard."Harry said dully.

"well I didn ‘ t ask you."Rookwood hurried forward through the ministry, he had to decelerate down a consequence later though as Harry shuffled along behind him."Hurry up !"

"My foot are asleep. Your ropes were too tight."

"Just move."Rookwood walked back and grabbed Harry by the front of his shirt. The dementors were still swirling by the ceiling, looking for dupe. There were still a few left. Not enough to trouble over though. He stepped into out into the computer memory office, pulling his strangely compliant mission past the tank of brains. He stopped by the doorway to the death chamber, there was the sound of spells from within, someone holding out perhaps. He pushed the threshold open in clip to see a wizard scrambling away from an inferi stumble and crepuscle. The corpse-warrior grabbed the blubbering unspeakable in it's unshakable travelling bag and threw him away with inhuman metier. shriek as he flew across the room, his screeching was cut off as he fell through the archway in the center. The drape ruffled for a here and now, then went still again.

Rookwood hid a shudder, he was never entirely comfortable with the execution portal. Harry watched from his side of meat with dull eyes. What was faulty with the boy ? Never mind. Rookwood picked his way around the bound of the room, giving the inferi a wide birth, and pushed open the threshold at the other side.

"Well potter here we are."Rookwood gestured impressively at the bank of ledge in front of them, each one with run-in upon run-in of bantam spheres."This is the hall of prophecy."

"These are prophecies ?"Harry sniffed disbelievingly as Rookwood dragged him along the line of shelf."They look like snow-globes."

"They are records of vaticination, and they are the reason we are here."Rookwood glanced down at the boy he was dragging along."Did you know there was a prophecy made about you ?"

Harry didn't reply, but he sniffed again, his rima oris twisting into a sneer.

"I assume that was a yes."Rookwood glanced up at the identification number on the shelf, yes this was it."The prognostication concerned you and the nighttime lord, you know that too ?"

Once again the boy stayed tacit. Rookwood poked him in the spine to set him walking up to where the prognostication was held.

"The darkness Godhead is very bore to get his hands on the prophecy. That prophecy."Rookwood pointed at the detail orb."And I will be the one to gift it to him. My icing, you could say."

"What do you need me for ?"thrower was staring at the orb with barely contained hatred. What was going on ? ... Never mind, it wasn't important.

"Shall I tell you something about the prophecies of the department of closed book ? They are keyed, protected. Only certain people can vacate them from where they lie. Namely the people they have been made about. So the sole people who can adopt this prophecy are the dark nobleman, and you. ``

Potter stared at the orb for a moment longer, the words sinking into him. Then he threw his head back and laughed, laughed so hard his oculus ran with tears. It was a reaction Rookwood had not expected. Laughter, but not in jape, not in joy. This was a piercingly laughter, full of darkness. What was going on ?

'' So that 's it is it ? '' Harry choked out, his dead eyes still glistening."What a sulfurous joke"

"What ?"Rookwood shook his head.

"And if somebody else grabs one ?"Harry reached out his bridge player."What happens then ?"

"If they are very favourable they might get by with only Major injuries."Rookwood answered confusedly."But in all likeliness ? They would die. Screaming."

"Really ?"The Potter boy's hand hovered over the twirl glass."To hell with it."His fingers closed around the orb.
*


Minerva screamed as she threw her patronus against the grew wall before her, knowing it was too later. The dementors scattered but a lifeless eubstance fell from their clutches. An auror. Subjected to the kiss.

Minerva shuddered, she only hoped it had been quickly. She spun as cold hands grabbed her from behind, crushing her with inhuman intensity level. The breath fled from her lungs and she felt ribs crack. In desperation she transformed and dashed away on four understructure, spinning and changing back to plant a human dynamo in the chest of the inferi that had held her. As soon as it was gone another took it's place.

They were overrun, there were too many !

"supporter me ! Oh god supporter me !"A figure of speech ran from out of the madness, his green bowler hat still clutched in his deal."Please !"

"Get out of here you fool !"McGonagall shoved Fudge away. She could not deal with him. Her eyes searched through the scrambling quite a little for the oral sex of the order."Dumbledore ! Dumbledore we must pull back !"

She could not see him, she could not see anything. despair was her alone warning and she spun, a shining light throwing a dementor away that had been practically on her vertebral column. She didn't even recognise where they were anymore, near the courts possibly. Down in the deeps, no escape.

She heard a scream from her left hand and sent a patronus wildly into the surging crowds. The shrieking cut off sharply. Whether she had had any event she did not acknowledge, she had to transubstantiate again to dance out of the way of a swooping dementor and snapped back to send another shining ignitor to have got them back again. But her body was tired, her sceptre arm tired.

Rotting flesh filled her nostrils and she tried to institute her scepter around. Too slowly. The drained fist crunched into the side of her head and she fell. She brought her wand up and blew the stagnant figure to shards, blood already dripping into her eyes. They needed assist, and there was no one to give it.

No one.
*


The orb came gratuitous in Potter's hand, it's deliquium radiancy shining through his fingertips. Rookwood felt his heart spring, but the thrower boy was staring at the prophecy like it was a subsist snake.

"Good, good. Now give it to me !"Rookwood demanded, but the boy didn't move.

"Not possible."Harry shook his head."Saw the body ..."The body ? He wasn't making any sense.

"Just move over me the bloody orb !"Rookwood made to take hold of it but ceramicist slipped away.

"It ‘ s not ... It ‘ s not ... Can ‘ t."Suddenly the white Inner Light faltered. A tinny whimper filled the air, like grinding gear mechanism. Harry held up his hired hand, slowly uncurling his fingers. In the midriff of the T. H. White a tiny spindle of darkness was growing, like ink in Milk River. The blackness grew until it covered the hale interior of the orb, it was no longer shining glassful but a polished orb of obsidian. The whine grew in the air, biting into his ears. Suddenly there was a effervesce crackle and ceramist yelped in bother, spilling the prophecy onto the floor. Rookwood cried out, it would break for sure ! But when the orb struck the reason it squelched, spreading out like clay. sess rose from the blackened glass.

Rookwood leant forwards and held his mitt out over it. The heating system was unbearable this closing and he had to shy back. The prophecy had melted. Melted into a steaming puddle on the floor.

The ceramicist boy ... he did this !

"What did you do ?"Rookwood snarled. Potter backed away, his hands held up.

"Not me, Dumbledore. He must have switched them."

"Dumbledore could not experience touched the prophecy !"

"He could if it was already played out."Potter glanced at the muck on the base."A hole, or else his conjuration on me interfered somehow."

"You speak madness."Rookwood reached out to seize the boy but just as he did so the reason shook, throwing them both off their feet."What the hell is that ?"

"He ‘ s come."The Potter boy was staring through the roof like a madman, his face again an empty mask of repugnance."He ‘ s come."
*


Suddenly the dementors went still, floating off their opposition to brood by the ceiling. The muteness broken only be the groaning of the wounded. Minerva 's heart found the entrance to the lift, it 's mesh topology opening in a grating crash. Stepping out into the corridor, black robes floating behind him and a script curled in a wave to the creatures swirling above, was the non-white lord himself. Minerva felt her bosom jump to her pharynx. She glanced around, the order was in rag. Only Dumbledore stood tall, the rest of them were covered in descent and shaking from the exertion of the battle. There was no force here to stop a night lord, no force play at all.

Voldermort's optic found a quivering swelling on the level and he smiled. Ignoring Dumbledore the shadow lord crooked a digit, pulling the bod to his substructure. The honey oil derby was gone, but the pallid flesh remained.

"Ah, Cornelius."Voldemort chuckled."Remember back when you used to invite me up to your agency for tea ? Back when you were just a department caput and I, just a innocent boy. Oh how far we ‘ ve come."

"Please ..."Fudge whimpered."Please don ‘ t hurt me."

"hurt you Cornelius ? But why would I call for to ?"Voldemort gestured to the roof."Even as I speak the rest of your ministry has already been overrun. The ministry you so love is a nest of soul sucking wraiths. Why would I need to hurt you ? I already have everything I wanted from you."

"Tom,"Dumbledore's part spoke out soft in the darkness."You can not possibly think I will let this stand ?"

"No old man, I do not."Voldemort flicked his wand towards the Headmaster. Fudge dropped to the floor and scampered away down the corridor."I think you will do as you have always done. standpoint bravely in the boldness of the tide, and be swept under."

"Tom I shall-"

"No !"Voldemort cut the headmaster off with a acuate Word of God."I have grown tired of you."Voldemort raised his handwriting and the Dementors fell like hunting hawks. Minerva was forced to press for her life against the grey hoard, spinning around her like a vortex of death. And in flashes of light beyond that vortex she could see Dumbledore rushing towards his foe, his baton out like a sword.

Minerva tried to cut her way forward. Tried to get to them, to help. But the crush was too great. An inferi had her arm in it's vice like grip and she blew it off with flames. Another took it's office too quickly. Far too quickly. There was a gout of purple lighting that cut through the air, momentarily beating back the dementors. Through the gap she could see the dueling sorcerer in the heart and soul of all this, Dumbledore raising the very stones of the story in a wall against the dark Godhead, but it was blasted to shred just as quickly. Dumbledore was driven to his knees.

Minerva dashed towards him but the grey masses closed between them. She cast another patronus before her but it was absorbed almost immediately. She felt an arm clutch pedal hers and spun to cut it off before she recognized the face.

"Remus !"She moved back to stake with the lycanthrope, spinning her patronus into a dress circle around them."We need to get to them !"

"It is too latterly for that !"He shouted back.

"Then what do you offer !"

"We die."lupin delivered that final stage in a flavourless growl."We are finished."

"We are not !"Minerva tried to throw another patronus but the despair was sinking in and it faltered as white mist, easily brushed aside by the wraiths. Suddenly there was a volley of tearing disturbance, breaking the flagstone and making the chamber shiver with it's forcefulness. As it died there a heartbeat of red visible light and a high cruel laugh.

"That is the best you could do ?"The voice of Voldemort was unmistakable."I win old man."

The dementors parted for a moment, like clouds in wind. The dark Jehovah stood over the straggle form of the Headmaster, his flush on Dumbeldore's neck. Minerva felt despair that had zero to do with the dementors. She let her wand hand drop to her position. They had lost. It was all over.

"Expecto Patronum !"A refrain of strong vocalisation cried the spell and the room was filled with a wall of light. Minerva watched as a charging white Panthera leo crashed into the massed human body before her, a snarling beast running at it's heels.

"You ! traitor !"Voldemort had his wand drawn and had spun to face the lift. Minerva turned to look but saw just one material body standing there, his arms crossed in self-important casualness.

"Step away from the Headmaster."Snape had his scepter drawn and flicked it down towards the nighttime overlord."I have not seen eye to eye with him of late but it would be a pity if he died."

"I will vote out you !"Voldemort surged forward and Snape's scepter stabbed forward. There was a split second of light and Snape was thrown backwards. He stumbled and pushed himself up, driving a savage blast of frozen fart at the iniquity lord.

Minerva dashed forward to help him but once again found a bridge player gripping her arm.

"Minerva !"A head appeared out of nowhere as a cloak was thrown back. Natalie Zhao ? What in Merlin's public figure ?"Minerva the students can ‘ t keep them back forever and sooner or later Voldemort ‘ s going to wonder where those other patronus came from."

"The student ?"

"The marauders."Natalie snapped."Now come on !"

"But Snape-"

"Is holding him back !"The unspeakable grabbed a prone figure on the floor."Now say your people to go down back before everyone else is dead !"
*


The boy who had been Harry didn't know where he was. There had been a mad dash away from Rookwood, screaming and dashing through the mental confusion of conflict, then there had been some stairs, then a corridor ... The sounds of fight were everywhere, coming out of the paries. He had just kept running., ineffective to do anything else. His heart raced beyond what any human being exertion should have forced it to. His mind was blank, a bushed weight. Today had been a lifetime.

The shattering racket of a spell exploded from the left and he dashed away like a rat. He had to get out.

"Come on dance with me you mangled cunt !"Michelson came into thought down a tenacious hallway, throwing bolts of lightning at Bellatrix and laughing like a madman.

He had to get out. He dashed into a stairway and almost tripped over a physical structure on the floor. Pink hair, auror ‘ s gown. Oh no ...

He crouched down on the floor, his fingers going to Tonk's neck on instinct. He did not really gestate to rule anything, her skin was pale and ...

She had a pulse.

The unidentified boy had to screen her consistence as a shining laser of something cut through the wall above them. The affaire d'honneur was raging just on the early incline of the wall. She wouldn't have a pulse for long if he left her here.

So long ... His brain was grey ooze, he just wanted to exclude down. He had no wand and his muscular tissue were water. They would never reach safety anyway, this office was a warzone. But on the other hand ... Tonks.

Putting a tire shoulder under her arm, he lifted her up.



Review and you will arise queer offstage that will let you fly.


Due to other commitments my postings may get a slight further apart for a while. Sorry everybody.



Snape let himself down tiredly on the sharpness of the spring of magical pal. Every bone ached and his arm was tied up to his body in a sling. There was no time for healing yet though, no sentence at all.

"stay back. !"Natalie was shouting calmly ( a strong-armer compounding to master ), raising her hands to the crew of ministry survivors."Just stay there and the healer will get to you ! And you get out of here !"The last was directed to a day-after-day prophet reporter furiously scratching away at a notebook computer.

The former side of the Marguerite Radclyffe Hall, back behind the fireplaces, a pedigree of bottom were set up for triage. From where he sat Snape could see Elizabeth I heathland lying sedated, her hand clutched by her invariable familiar genus Vanessa. She would be alright though, a little cold and quiet for week to come up and likely not ever wanting to encounter a dementor again but she would endure. Oh to have just one of them back in his house, or any of the marauders. They had fought like Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, like aggress frump with wands.

One of the doors slammed clear and Markus stepped out angrily. His robe were mostly burnt off and he had blood running down the side of his chest but he seemed unaware of these little details.

"She got away."The monumental thaumaturgist reached the edge of the fountain and plunged his point under the open. A second later he lifted it up and press his wet hair out of his eyes."Bellatrix."

"The piranha told me you had gone after her."

"She reached one of their bloody tunnels."Markus grated."Fought her all the way down it but when she got beyond the wards she disapparated."

"Then she is out of the engagement at least."Snape nodded, he would aim any victory he could get."Forneus is in custody and Rookwood is numbered among the dead."

"So I'm the only one who missed his mark."Markus shook spray of water supply out of his pilus."Sorry mate."

"Bella has more lives than a cat, do not think any more of it."

"You say that but ... I 'm not used to failing, never done it before. '' Marcus shed his bankrupt robe and dumped it carelessly on the floor before glancing around at the muddiness. `` What ‘ s happening here ? Did we get everybody out ?"

"We have taken back most of the ministry. I believe all of the predator deserve Os"

'' They deserve bloody laurel wreath ! ``

'' Yes but I can not pass them palm. You however can give them Os. '' Snape smiled a fain smile and saw it returned broader. He gestured towards the lift with his proficient arm."Voldemort holds the department of Mysteries. Or to put it another way he is trapped there. He has placed a Mary Augusta Arnold Ward on the facelift and on all staircases."

"I can break through."Michelson nodded arrogantly. `` Give me five minutes. ``

"I doubt that you could do it in five or five hundred."Snape shook his head."I know that Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth. There is only one way to get through it, and that is with a drab Deutsche Mark on your arm."

"Well then you can-"Michelson cut off as Snape pulled up his sleeve to reveal the newly cut skin."Oh."

"Yes, and it ‘ s big than that."Snape bowed his brain."He has hostages down there, decree phallus and unspeakables who survived."

"How many ?"

"Ten, we think."Snape glanced up to meet Markus'oculus."Including Lupin ... and Dumbledore."

"Mother of god."Albert Abraham Michelson slammed his fist into his palm."So it ‘ s a stalemate ?"

"For now, until he makes his move. He can not hold back forever."Snape felt a piffling shudder run through him. Whatever the dark lord's move would be it would be the death of at least some of those hostages. Probably all.

'' What the ... '' Suddenly Michelson was on his infantry, an construction of shock on his face. `` Merlin 's ... Harry ? ``

A moment later Snape saw what he had seen. Out of a passageway Harry was stumbling, a prone consistency weighing him down and his face a grey masque. He did n't expect up, did n't acknowledge anything, just stepped directly to the close bed and lay his essence down bedside a scandalise healer. Snape rushed forward and saw marauders stand in every box of the room, running towards the unexpected plenty of their leader.

'' Harry. '' Draco came to a stop just in front Harry. `` Harry what are you doing he- ''

'' Tonks is hurt. '' Harry broke in. `` You should try to appear after her, she 's your cousin. ``

'' Harry are you alright ? '' Hermione reached out to touch him but he flinched away. `` What is it Harry ? ``

'' I 'm fine. '' Harry was almost curling up under their stares, hugging his arms close to his chest.

'' Are you hurt ? '' Padma asked. `` The healer could loo- ''

'' I said I 'm fine. Just ... go away. ``

'' How did you get out of the hospital ? ``

'' Where 's your wand ? ``

'' Shut up. ``

'' How did you get to the ministry ? ``

'' I SAID SHUT UP ! '' Harry yelled angrily. As the marauders shied back there was a blast of heating from behind them. Snape spun around in time to see the fountain of sorcerous brethren go red hot and begin thaw, dissolving into the water with a razzing. But the gold was not disappearing, it was staying there in the water, mixing with the water. Harry forgotten, Snape stepped forward as the surviving order penis, ministry prole and marauders surrounded the pool of gold.

It was like a mirror, shining with yellow lighter up to the cap. As they watched it faded to silver, then to gray, then finally to pure white. The white resolved into chassis, colours bloomed out of the pure light. As the anatomy coalesced Snape heard a shriek from someone on the other side of the syndicate and almost felt like following suit.

In the consortium, rippling on the surface of the liquidity, was an image of lord Voldemort. He was standing in what was clearly the department of mystery. The wand in his script was foresighted and wan, it was not the one Snape was used to seeing him use. It was unmistakably Dumbledore 's verge. Behind the dark lord, lined up and chained together, were ten genius. Though the picture was faded and the colours ran together Snape could easily recognize the two on the end. Cornelius Fudge and Albus Dumbledore.

The Voldemort mental image turned towards them and spoke, his vocalization sounding deeply and echoic like it was coming from the bottom of a well.

'' Good wizards of the ministry, '' The dark lord greeted amicably. `` phallus of the society of the phoenix and the good kid. What you are seeing is the inside of the department of mysteries, where all the large secrets are hidden. All the mystifying magic of the ministry is within these wall, all controlled by me. ``

'' He 's lying. '' Natalie assured the panicking wizards around her. `` There 's goose egg down there he could use. ``

'' And look at my friends here, '' Voldemort gestured out over his captive. `` They all fought. They all failed, such is the monetary value of defying God Almighty Voldemort. '' He took a sheaf of baton out of his pouch and hovered it into the air. With a urarthritis of flame they burnt into ash. `` Such is the price ... And look who we have here ... '' Voldemort crooked a digit and Fudge was dragged forward, his trammel separating from the others. He came to a stop by the wickedness overlord 's human foot and looked up with pained eyes.

'' Are you going to ... to pour down me ? '' Fudge stuttered out.

'' Yes. '' Voldemort answered simply.

'' But but ... I. ``

'' I am going to shoot down you you miserable lilliputian man, whatever you say. ``

'' Then ... then. '' Fudge seemed to breath a slight easier. `` Do you remember when I used to invite you up for tea ? Back when I was ... I was a department hear and you were ... you were younger. ``

'' Yes ? ``

'' fountainhead I spat in your tea. '' Fudge shuddered out through gritted dentition. `` Every prison term. Even back then you were a creepy-crawly little lusus naturae. ``

'' You ... '' Voldemort seemed to grow in threat, his eyes blazing. `` Why do you tell me this ? Surely you know it is wasted ! ``

'' My ... my good boy. '' Fudge stuttered, his eyes still to the floor. `` Defiance ... is never p ... p ... pointless. ``

'' Avada Kedavra ! ``

Green igniter filled the pool of urine and for a here and now none of them could see anything. Snape felt his heart beating rapidly in his chest of drawers. The light cleared in fourth dimension for them too see the nighttime lord savagely kicking the minister 's body to the side and stabbing his verge towards Dumbledore. The headmaster was thrown forward roughly.

Snape swallowed worriedly. The dark noble was showing them this to present his power but Fudge had openly defied him. Voldemort would be enraged.

'' wellspring old man ! '' Voldemort stabbed his sceptre down at Dumbledore, a bolt of electricity charring a kettle of fish in the headmaster 's gown. `` Do you not suffer something to say ? Some last word before I take your animation. ``

Dumbledore just stayed silent. It was only from the light rise and dusk of his chest that Snape could say he was still alive.

'' Speak Albus ! ... Crucio ! '' Voldemort held the master in the cam stroke of the torment curse for a few moments before releasing him. `` You will utter ! There has been too a lot between us, you have been my enemy for too foresighted for me to let you end it this way. You will acknowledge that I have won, you will say it ! You will acknowledge this victory in some way before I kill you with your own verge ! ``

Dumbledore did n't even attend at the dark Divine. In a furor Voldemort slashed his wand through the air, dragging Dumbledore to his feet.

'' You will verbalize ! '' The ophidian like face was set with cruel anger. `` You will speak before you die ! ``

'' I ... '' Dumbledore wet his lip and tried again. `` I am prepare to die. ``

'' What ? ``

'' I am set up ... '' Dumbledore closed his middle. `` I am fix to die for everything I have done. Those are my last actor's line, the alone I you will get. shoot down me. ``

'' You ... Cruci ... '' Voldemort raised his baton to imprint the curse word but let it die on his mouth. Snape could almost see him dragging his emotions back under mastery. `` But of course of action, how could I deny a last request. Avada Kedavra ! ``

It was as if sentence froze. The pond exploded with green light again and Snape's pharynx closed, every brawniness tensing. The other watchers around the pocket billiards held their hands to their faces, or sway there head ... they would not believe it. The park visible radiation faded and the physical structure of Albus Dumbledore dropped to the ground. It crumpled like a newspaper napkin, his beard trailing onto the story like a rag.

So fell Albus Dumbledore. Snape felt a pocket-size helping hand louse into his. Natalie 's hand. He did n't cognize whether she was offering ease or asking for it. Perhaps both.

'' Here dies Albus Dumbledore. '' Voldemort laughed. `` A motley fool to the end, and in the end a letdown. So there you are, two hostages dead. I have eight left and all will die if you do not give me what I want. I want Harry Potter. Bring him to me in one 30 minutes or I will shoot down another, perhaps the lycanthrope. I am sure no one will miss him. But if any of you wish to see these wizards alive, then you know what you must do. Bring. Me. Harry. Potter ! ``

The consortium went black and Snape stepped back. All around him people seemed to be going mad, crying and shouting to one another in mix-up. His eyes were only trying to find one physical body. Harry Potter. He swept the bunch. Nothing.

Snape turned to the entree in time to see the door snap shut.
*


The unnamed boy crashed out of the telephone box and dashed away, his groundwork slipping on the wet sidewalk. rain splattered against his facial expression as he ran out into the streets. He did n't even love why he was running, just that he had to get away. All of them would look to him, would look at him and bear to see Harry ceramicist. require to see their savior, when all there was was a imposter. He dashed past the people in the street, some of them turning to look at his odd clothing and panicked expression, but he was running too fast and they were left behind.

He heedlessly ran into the road and heard the screech of breaks. He prayed that one of the cars would hit him. His foundation would not finish moving and the strait of saddle horn was left behind. His deception eye painted the world in shimmering curtain of shadow, distorted by the raindrops settling on it 's airfoil. He pushed past a man in a wooing and heard the man vociferation. He could n't stop running. Had to get away. But what he was running from could not be escaped. He was running from reality. The rainwater ran like a river. Roaring like the river.

Finally, with his core beating like a jack-hammer, he collapsed on the cold, wet paving. He lay there, his feet still twitching, and breathed. He had collapsed in an alley, dark and dirty. Wait ...

He turned to lie on his cover as his magic eye swivelled around, taking in every detail. He had been here before ... This was the alley where it all started, where Hagrid had caught him so many years ago. There was the drainpipe he had climbed ... the ceiling he had hid ... He had come a wide lot, entirely.

Heedless of the driving rainwater he opened his mouth and laughed. Laughed in pure bitterness. If only he had never stopped here, had never been caught, had never gone to Hogwarts. Then he would never have known, would never deliver known any of this. He would have been able-bodied to restrain on being Harry Potter. He felt rent running down his boldness and mingling with the rain, freezing him to the bone.

But there was fondness. A lilliputian point of heat energy at his chest. He dug his helping hand into his shirt and slowly drew it out.

His chandelier. Pythea's pendent. Worn so long he had almost forgotten it was there. But now it was glowing like a star, so bright beneath the gray sky. He knelt and held it cupped in both hands, staring at it in admiration as a silver-tongued mist swirled out from the point. It pooled in his hands, swirling and sifting. Slowly the sparkling liquid state rose, shaped and colored and separated until two eyeball hung in the air by his hands. One of burnished amber, the other pure white.

'' Harry ... ''

The white orb shifted, moved and expanded. It shaped into a figure, every curvature glowing with light, every flowing personal credit line of her unadulterated Elwyn Brooks White clothes and her porcelain skin.

'' Theia ... '' He breathed.

'' Harry I wish I could experience come sooner. '' Thea stepped forward and encased his workforce in hers.

'' Another illusion- ''

'' No. '' Pythea shook her head. `` This is no illusion. This is really me talking, from Greece. I thought you might need my assistant. ``

'' Your ... help ? ``

'' You 're lost. Lost in the woods. '' Thea smiled faintly. The golden orb was still circling her, pulsing faintly. `` And I am the seer. I thought you might need a templet out. That was why I gave you this all those years ago, to help you find your way. In your darkest 60 minutes. You need to find your way again Harry, or else were all doomed. ``

'' Thea, '' The boy ducked his brain, his oculus squeezing shut. `` I 'm not who you think I am. I 'm not the one you were trying to help, not the chosen one. I 'm not- ''

'' I know who you are. '' Pythea said simply.

'' You ... you do ? But then why ? ``

'' Harry did you think I was helping you all these year because you were the chosen one ? '' Thea laughed lightly, her quartz glass vocalization filling the emptiness between the buildings with joy. `` I was n't helping you because you were Harry Potter I was helping you because you were you. ``

'' Do n't call me that. Do n't call me Harry. ``

'' It 's your name if you want it to be. Or chose another gens. '' Pythea smiled. `` When I first met you you were calling yourself Jack. ``

'' Stop. '' Too irritating. memory of pleasant times,

'' I will not stop. I will never stop over trying to help you. I knew the present moment I met you that you were n't the chosen one. I mean please Harry, I 'm the fancy woman of prophecy. Did you honestly think for a second that I would lose a thing like that ? I saw who you were. I also saw that, in a world without Leslie Townes Hope, you were the but shining chance. ``

'' You ... you saw something about me ? My time to come ? ``

'' I saw nothing about your future. I saw everything about you. '' Pythea knelt to converge him eye to eye. `` I saw you a brave and true soul who would fight for this man even if the entire macrocosm was against him. I saw someone who could get struck down a thousand times and would still pick himself up. I saw that the dark lord would originate and I hoped ... I did n't know but I hoped that you would never buckle before him. With the existence in danger and the future changeable I took the best chance the macrocosm had. I took a chance on you. In a time of complete despair, I trusted you. ``

'' But, I ca n't fight down anymore. '' The boy dropped his heart. `` I just ... I just feel empty. You do n't know what it 's like to take in person take the air up to you and snatch your entire life, everything you believe, right out from under you. ``

'' I do. '' Pythea replied simply.

"Really ?"Harry swallowed."Wh ... what did you do ?"

"I gave him a necklace."Pythea smiled. `` But I do n't expect you to consent what you have to do from me, which is why I brought him. '' Pythea gestured up to the fortunate firmament. `` You've carried this necklace close to your affectionateness for almost four years now. I think it's metre you saw what's inside. Do n't die Harry, please do n't die. I 'll see you soon. '' She faded into nix, leaving just the golden orb left. As soon as she was gone it began stretching and shaping.

'' Um what do I do ? '' An uncertain voice came from the growing cloud of mist. `` I just speak into it ? ``

The shape resolved into a figure. His long robe were buttoned tightly and long arm, rolled up now to show his coat of arms. Those robe were familiar. Tonks had worn them hold up year, auror trainee gown. The face remained groggy for a minute more then coalesced, becoming a firm model in golden luminosity, right down to the utmost tousled hair.

The boy who had been Harry 's mouth fell open in seismic disturbance. He was looking up into his own human face. No ... no there were departure. The jaw was more target, sharper, the eyes closer together. He did n't have a scratch on his neck, nor a morose mark on his arm. He looked older too, at to the lowest degree two long time if he was an aurors apprentice. God ... was it possible ? Was this ... Harry Potter ?

'' I do n't quite sympathise this. '' The ghostly gilded figure said. `` Your friend, Pythea, she says that you 're in a different world or ... or dimension or something. A unlike clock time too. I do n't still sympathize it, need Hermione for that sort of thing. ``

'' So do I ... '' A grumble whisper. Disbelief.

'' Your booster says I wo n't remember recording this, wo n't remember any of it. '' The bod was just staring into outer space as it spoke. Apparently this one was a on-key transcription. `` But if ... if I understand what she 's explained to me then your world is very different from mine. For one affair ... I 'm not in it. I died. ``

The golden Harry glanced to the storey, shaking his head.

'' I wish I knew why but ... your friend wo n't tell me. Something about lessening the interference as much as possible. There are early thing I wish I could tell you, things you really should know about- '' The recording skewed like static for a moment then continued. `` But apparently I 'm not allowed to say them either. All she 's told me is that you, you were told you were me. Until very recently you thought you were me ... or will. The clip matter is really confusing me. I 'm recording this in my futurity, to be given to you in your past tense, to play in your present. Apparently Pythea thinks that maybe I can say something to you .... maybe explain ... I do n't sleep with. I do n't bonk what I 'm saying. I ca n't think what you 're going through. It 's like ... It 's like you 're an orphan all over again. Except this meter it 's risky because you know you had a by it 's just been taken. I know you must experience like crawling into a hole and dying, I 've felt like that. When my godfather died I ... but that 's not the same really. I do n't cognize what I 'm saying. ``

The ghostly figure began pacing up and down.

'' I do n't make out what I 'm say to say to you. '' The Harry stopped pacing and circulate his hired hand. `` Except that, that it gets better. I 've been done things as bad as you, and I 'm probably the only when person you 'll ever adjoin that can say that. Your ally says that, since I 'm beat in your creation, the job of fighting Voldemort falls to you. I ca n't say it'going to be easygoing, but you know that. In fact I ca n't think of anything that I could say to carry you to shoot the job. Except that you have to. The creation depends on it. And I know that the creation has n't done you any favors. Maybe right now you feel like you 'd rather let the mankind be destroyed for everything it 's done to you. I do n't get laid what I can say to convince you that 's not true up except for two things. One, it gets better. It really, really does. Eventually. And two ... ''

The shadow figures licked it 's lips.

'' Do you know how many regulations are broken by this form of inter-dimensional passage ? Certain countries still have the death punishment for messing around in parallel cosmos. Just getting here, the effort it must suffer taken. The endangerment your friend has taken just to get this content to you .... I guess what I 'm saying is that even if the integral rest of the universe is hell right now you 've got one person who 's willing to hazard everything for you. run a risk her spirit. So if nothing else ... fight for her. ``

The figure faded. It 's eyes lasted the farseeing, staring out into the rainfall, then they too were gone and the alleyway was wickedness again. The boy on the priming coat stood, slowly and with maintenance, but he stood.

'' Wow ... '' He said softly. `` What a dork. ``

He chuckled to himself, the laugh building. His workforce went to his stomach as he threw his top dog back and laughed, the rain trickling down his face. That was Harry Potter was it ? Git. I mean who talks like that ? roll in the hay him. Screw the overly dramatic, hesitant bastard. If that childish gimboid can economize the populace I sure as hell can.

He pushed his rain soaked hair out of his center. It was like the vacuum was, somehow separate. It was still there, the gaping nullity, it was just that all the important parts of him, the things that made him who he was, were outside it. He settled the minuscule casing necklace back around his neck. Just a cuticle now, it's magic gone. But not wearing it was unthinkable. It was piece of him, the real him, and he needed it back. Especially since he intended to find fault the expectant fight of his life.

He needed a plan though .... and if he was going to survive a fight with the not bad disconsolate wiz in the humanity it would call for to be a bloody good plan. Or a all-fired insane one. Let's see, he had no advantages. Voldemort held all the cards. Voldemort could kill him without thinking. And Voldemort had hostage. On the other hand Voldemort was alone, he had no death feeder, no dark puppet, no servants.

Whatever architectural plan he came up with it would come down to just the two of them. A fair combat. Which he would lose.

So wee-wee it an unjust fight.

His lip curled into a smile. There it was, there was the idea. A Harry thrower plan.

Smiling, he walked out of the back street. He picked up his gait and he reached the street, how lots of his half minute was gone ? He had lost all racetrack of time. He broke into a run. He knew he should go faster but he would serve no one if he was to jade to fight back. It seemed an age until the headphone box came into view, sticking up out of the street. Harry got in, then pressed the codification on the receiver.

"Welcome to the ministry of magic. Please state your name and business."The earpiece said flatly.

"Harry Potter."Said Harry smiling."I ‘ m here to economize the world."

The political machine apparently took him a little too literally as ...
Harry Potter
Messiah


... Clattered into the groundball. Harry didn't bother to pick it up. If he didn't know who he was now no badge was gon na tell him. He dissilusioned himself before the door slid heart-to-heart again and stepped out into the ministry vestibule. There was a degree of organized topsy-turvyness and another fully grown level of disorganise chaos. Harry ignored it and his magic eye picked out the marauders. The were all clustered in one place. Harry wandered over to them and quietly said,

"Don ‘ t motion. Don ‘ t give them and signalise you ‘ re hearing me. Just come over here behind that lamp chimney where we can ‘ t be seen."

The piranha's stiffened, but to their credit none of them gave the game away. Harry followed them as they slowly rose and nonchalantly wandered behind the monolithic fireplace. Once they were all behind Harry dropped his illusion and smiled at his friends.

"Hi cat. I ‘ m back."

"Harry are you ..."Hermione began, then paused."Are you ... feeling better ?"

"I ‘ m sorry for yelling at you, at all of you. And yes I ‘ m ... I ‘ m better."The empty piazza in his thorax begged to differ but he ignored it."I ‘ m tactile sensation .... I ‘ m better."

"Harry what did Dumbledore say to-"Padma began but Harry cut her off.

"There ‘ s no time, how much time we got until the foremost surety goes ?"

"five minutes."Draco pointed at the clock.

"Good that ... that might be enough."

"You ‘ re going to agitate him aren ‘ t you ?"Neville asked in a pocket-sized vocalization."You ‘ re going down to fight him."

"Yes."Harry nodded, and there was a sudden inhalation of breath from the marauders."But I have a plan ! Seriously guy cable, it ‘ s ok. I have a plan."

"Do you recall how badly some of your other design have gone ?"Padma asked dryly.

"Oh please, you know I blank those from my memory."Harry grinned."Anyway I need three affair. Things I need your helper with."

"You got it Harry."Ginny went into severe mode."Whatever you need."

"Well firstly I ‘ ll need a wand."Harry bit his lip."And I can ‘ t guarantee you ‘ ll get it back."

A woods of bridge player were stretched out towards him. Every single baton. Harry picked one at random and tried a simple charm. It was stuttery and syncope. No good. He picked another and almost set his fuzz on fire. The third base the patch came out right but the verge felt Wyrd. The fourth part ... Harry did first one spell then another ... then another ... they all came out perfect tense. His eyes came up to fit Malfoy's Second Earl Grey ones.

"sustenance it."The Slytherin boy nodded."I can afford a new one."

"Thank you."Harry pocketed the wand."The second thing I need is healing. Just a warm refresher course. I ‘ m to pall and banged up to defend like this."

"Here."Ginny drew a nursing bottle out of her robe."I swiped it from the triage inwardness. I thought you might ask it if you came back."

Harry took the bottle with a grinning and tipped it back into his mouthpiece. The warm chocolaty liquid seemed to debilitate into every aching muscularity and os, making him feel like he was well rested and level-headed rather than at the bound of weariness.

"And thirdly we need to make something."Harry handed the bottle back."It ‘ ll be catchy but if I handle the spell and mortal else does the transfig we should be able-bodied to manage it. Oh ! And I ‘ ve thought of a fourth thing. I ‘ ll need a distraction."
*


"Here ! Look !"Snape was shocked out of his intellection by the cry. His eyes found the source in the young Weasley child, crouched down by the spring. Ginny was furiously jabbing at the pool, waving him over. `` It 's going clear again. I can see something ! '' Snape dashed over, staring down into the inky darkness. He could see nothing.

'' Where ? '' Snape asked hurriedly.

'' There, there by the turning point. ``

'' I see nil. ``

'' Look. ``

'' Miss Weasley there is null there. ``

'' There was ! ``

'' There is not now- '' Snape 's oculus flickered up to meet those of his pupil. A flicker of memory twitched behind those eye. He pushed ... No ! Snape spun and dashed to the lift, but the diffraction grating was already slamming shut. Snape came crashing up against the Ward. The witching barrier sparking against his skin like still. He could n't get through. Before his eyes the dissilusionment fell and Harry Potter was standing there, looking back at him. Snape felt people crowding all around, murmuring, oral presentation, crying. All pressed up to one incline of the barrier, and on the early ... just Harry.

'' Harry, please. '' Snape held his hand out to the wall of the Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth. `` Do n't do this. ``

'' Eight people. '' The kid shrugged. `` Eight people or me. Choice is pretty obvious. ``

'' dopey boy. You do n't have to do this. ``

'' I know I do n't. '' Harry nodded, a faint grinning on his expression. `` I 'm doing it anyway. Wish me chance. ``

The raise started down. Snape held Harry 's eyes all the way till he was out of sight. Right at the end, just before he disappeared, Snape could feature sworn he saw a wink.
*


The lift grate slid open and Harry stepped warily out into the corridor. The wreckage of battle was everywhere, large gouges gone from the walls and door blown off their hinges. This was n't the department of closed book yet though. Just the courtroom. Harry 's eye whirled wildly as he picked his way around the wreckage. The door to the department came into view, a clean rectangle at the end of a long corridor. Harry could see nothing beyond the doorway, not even with his magic eye. Some sort of protective cover must extend around the section of closed book. For the sake of his program he hoped it did n't extend inside the department too. Harry raised his scepter to his neck and spoke the sonerous charm.

'' Tom Riddle ! '' Harry 's amplify voice shook the bricks in the walls. `` I 'm here. '' There was a moment 's wait, then.

'' Welcome Mr ceramist. '' A similarly nail voice sounded down the hall. `` I was not certainly you would come up. ``

'' Why would I stay away Tommy boy. We 're like old friends. '' Harry was poised to run at any import if this went wrong. `` You 've got eight people in there. Those people deserve to get out, so let make a deal, gentleman 's agreement between protagonist. I go in. All of them go out. ``

"Those are the term I gave."Voldemort sounded amused.

Harry waited in silence for a moment ... then the door at the end of the corridor swung open. Grinning quietly to himself, Harry walked in. The scene was just as it had been reflected in the puddle, the stock of captives, the wreckage, and Voldemort standing in the center. The bodies of Fudge and Dumbledore were lying where they fell. The room was the circle room, the spinning room. Rookwood had taken him through it earlier. But it was n't spinning now, some of the doors had been knocked off their hinges and he could see into the elbow room beyond.

'' Seen everything you need to Mr Potter ? '' Voldemort asked icily. `` Taken in all the selective information ? ``

'' Yep, '' Harry replied chirpily. `` So ... the prisoners. ``

'' Of course of study. '' Voldemort gestured mildly. The Sir Ernst Boris Chain on the prisoners crashed to the ground.

'' Go on hombre. '' Harry stood out of the way so they could get to the door. `` Get out of here. '' Slowly, the captive began to shuffle towards the door.

"They ‘ ll be able to get out ?"Harry asked."Past the ward ?"

"In only catch masses from entering, not from leaving."

'' Ok, fine. wait ! '' Harry held up a deal, then pointed to lupin and a muscular looking auror. `` Fudge and Dumbledore, exact them up with you. ``

Lupin bent to cradle the body of his teacher and lifted him up. As he passed Harry on the way out their eye met. Lupin leant down to Harry 's ear and whispered,

'' I hope he kills you. '' Harry had to laugh. Some matter did n't change.

As the in conclusion man trouped out Harry pushed the threshold shut and locked it. The with child bolts sliding into billet sounded like a hammer.

'' Well Mr Potter. '' Voldemort smiled like a snake. `` It is down to just you and me. The kings in our little cheat game. The instrument are gone, the rook are taken. Now it is just down to you and me. ``

"Have you never even played Bromus secalinus ?"Harry quirked an brow."If all you have is the two B. B. King that 's a impasse snake side. You ca n't checkmate with one king."

"I was being metaphorical."

Harry rolled his centre and picked a unclouded place of trading floor. He pointed his wand down.

'' calx. '' A shabu line appeared on the floor. Harry drew his wand around in a approximate rectangle then stepped back and measured his handicraft by eye. `` Tommy boy break me your persuasion. Does that look like fourteen feet to you ? ``

'' What in Merlin 's figure are you doing ? ``

'' Well we have to give birth a duel. '' Harry shrugged. `` Might as well do it by the book. ``

'' A regularisation wizard 's duel ? '' Voldemort seemed almost quick to laugh softly. `` My my Mr ceramist I can not recount you how refreshing it is to press against you and not Dumbledore. It is ... so gratifying to be surprised. ``

'' I am irregular. '' Harry shrugged and stepped up to the middle of the rectangle. He put his scepter into his pocket and held his hand away from it to show he was n't touching it. `` But I believe that the succeeding step is to bow to one another. Like gentlemens. ``

'' This will be interesting. '' Voldemort smiled and stepped up to the dueling platform, similarly holstering his wand. `` I hope your protagonist are enjoying this. ``

'' What are you ... '' Harry paused. `` Are they watching ? ``

'' Of course. ``

'' Hmm ... '' Harry grinned up at the ceiling. `` Hope you like this guy. It 's going to be one hell of a appearance. ``

'' Shall we get started ? '' Voldemort stepped up to the centre of attention of the rectangle and bowed. Harry bowed in turn of events, then stuck out his hand.

'' We part as friends. '' Harry smiled. Voldemort chuckled wryly and encircled Harry 's hand in his own. Harry pulled forward and hugged the shocked dark noble. He released him quickly and laughed. `` Tom conundrum it 's been a pleasure, and an laurels. ``

'' Surprising to the end. '' Voldemort murmured.

'' I believe it 's seven yard ? '' Harry turned and heard Voldemort do the same. `` One ... ''

'' Two ... ''

'' Three ... ''

'' Stupefy ! '' Harry whirled and jabbed his wand. The trance flared across the room. Just before it hit the dark lord seemed to vacillate and fade into mist. The tour passed right through his back and exploded in glint against the wall. Voldemort turned and rematerialized, a mocking sneer on his facial expression,

'' Jumping the numeration Mr ceramicist ? That was your virtuoso plan ? ``

'' Worth a injection. ``

'' No, Mr Potter. It was not. ``

'' Call me Harry. ``

'' I will not. '' Voldemort raised his scepter. `` good day Mr Potter. I wish you all the best in the next creation. Avada Kedavra ! ``

Harry closed his eyes and smiled as a flash of light filled the room.



Review or the evil chicken with the DEAD EYES that only I can see will defeat me.


A lot of people seem unhappy about my frequent cliffhangers. Well it got you to review did n't it ?





The visible light snapped off and Harry opened his eyes. Voldemort was staring down at the thing in his hand.

'' Hmm ... '' Harry frowned in mock discombobulation. `` Your scepter appears to have turned into a wimp. ``

The poulet managed to free itself and dropped to the floor. It took a look at the two wizards on either side of it and wisely decided to be elsewhere. Squawking and flapping it scampered through an subject door.

"Was it, meant to turn into a volaille ?"Harry tapped his chin thoughtfully."Is this some poultry edition of the killing curse I was not previously mindful of ? Is that a chicken of death ? Or perhaps ..."Harry's mitt dipped into his pocket."Were you looking for ... this wand."

Voldemort's eyes went wide.

"I mean for god ‘ s sake married person. Never let a pickpocket hug you."Harry chuckled."I mean that ‘ s just stupid."

The shadow Jehovah's hand twitched to his pocket.

"Oh look !"Harry drew something else from his robes."And here ‘ s your other verge. How did that get in there ? Bet you ‘ re regretting incinerating all those early wand ‘ s now ain't cha ?"

"ceramicist you ..."Voldemort boiled with ire."You ... you ... you ..."

"Me. Me. Me."Harry grinned like a Panthera tigris."The moral of the story Tommy boy is this : Don ‘ t you EVER mess with a vulture because we can sink you. And we never lose."

"Potter I will-"

"Shut up."Harry stabbed his verge forward, keeping the early two secure in his left hand."Shut your ugly murdering look. Happy, civic, ‘ lets all be B.F.F.s ‘ fourth dimension is officially over. Now is the time for the former thing. The bloody hate filled battle that culminates with the cleanup of you."

"You think you can win ?"Voldemort hissed out through clenched teeth."Even without a sceptre I am still the dark Creator. I am still Sir Thomas More than a match for you."

"Evens the performing field a bit though doesn ‘ t it."Harry cracked his cervix first to one side, then another."So come on serpent human face. Hit me. Hit me with your best shot."

The dark lord hissed, his fingers clenching into claw. Then a moment later he exploded into smoke, whisking away through an overt door. What the ? Harry 's legerdemain eye focused through the wall, onto the floor in the next room. On the story following to a prone body was-

verge !

Harry 's fundament moved of their own accord and skidded across the base to the door. His own wand lashed out.

'' Difindo ! '' The wand on the story snapped just as the swarm coalesced around it and but Harry was already moving again. His eye making walls and doors meaningless. Another body, another sceptre ! He felt the smoke behind him, catching up.

He rolled as it passed command processing overhead and snarled, `` Tempesto ! '' The swarm convulsed as wind lashed through it but it stayed together, swirling and reforming like ink. Harry dashed along the flooring and snapped the verge up from beside the bundle of gown that was all that was left of the victim of an inferi. He skidded to a halt, his eye dancing madly to come up any remaining wands ... cypher in the prophecy way ...

The cloud circled, reeking of malignity. Harry could almost palpate Voldemort doing the Saami baulk that he was, using dark legerdemain to incur any remaining weapon. The cloud contracted then dissipate away like a squid. Harry was off and after it in a second, a irregular Sir Thomas More and his eye had found it's target. The demise chamber, a scepter rolled into a cleft in the floor. Harry pelted through the corridor, the Black smoke ahead of him. Too far ! Too quick !

Harry threw another crack cocaine ahead of him, kicking up shard of junk but the moment it reached the swarm it was squashed like a toad. The wind going flat in mid air. The smoke disappeared under a door and Harry crashed through it a minute later. The verge ! rightfield there ! Voldemort reappeared with a thunderbolt and jabbed his paw forward. The wand leapt from the floor and spun towards the dark lord. Harry aimed desperately,

"Ferio !"

There was a crevice from the air and splinters clattered on the floor. The dark Maker's hired hand snapped back like he'd been stung.

"That ‘ s the last of them snake-face."Harry panted. Keeping his wand trained on the darkness lord he stepped down the steps till he was future to the flutter arch. He picked the three baton he'd acquired out of his air hole and chucked them through the humeral veil. The dark cloth fluttered for a mo, then went still."All sceptre ‘ s out of play, except for my one. And the only way you ‘ re getting that is to pry it from my cold dead hands."

"What an first-class suggestion Mr Potter."

Harry had just a bit warning before the orb of darkness flew from the dark Lord's hand. Harry spun behind the arch and ducked down.

"Accio !"The bench behind Voldemort shot forward towards his head. The dark Godhead spun and shattered it with a hissed swearword."Jupitall !"The ball-lightning hissed from Harry's wand and forced the iniquity lord to dodge to the side. The orb exploded against the wall, filling the room with sparks. Voldemort spun and cried,

"Garta !"

Harry felt the flag beneath his feet disappear and he plummeted into darkness. He jabbed his wand straight up.

"Hammus Missus !"Chain shot up and slammed into the ceiling far above."Rapellet !"The range felt like it jerked his arm out of its socket as it pulled him up into the spark. As he shot from the ground like a bullet a ball of wickedness flew towards him.

Someone not expecting it would get been hit. someone without a thaumaturgy eye.

Harry kicked off the edge of the archway and swung out of the way. He let go of the strand and aimed at the dark figure below him.

"Avada Kedavra !"The green twinkle left him stunned but he landed like a cat on the position of the stepped orbit. The killing curse word blew a yap in the wall but Voldemort was dashing away, disappearing through a doorway."Come back you slimy coward !"Harry was laughing with bloodlust and raced after him, his eye tracking him through the maze of lobby. Harry dashed back through the entrance hall and injection into a long way of desks. Voldemort's fleeing shadow was just visible at the other end.

"Avada Kedavra !"The nightmare curse sped through the wreckage but Voldemort spun and summoned a desk into it's path. The explosion filled the air with emerald arc. Three bolts of lightning thundered through the blowup and Harry threw himself to the slope. One of them grazed past his leg and he bit back a cry of hurting. A freeze down appealingness numbed the sunburn flesh as Harry furiously dashed after the wickedness Maker. As he skidded to a stoppage in the dorm of divination the night lord disappeared. Harry furiously glanced one way then the other, but neither eye could pick up a trace. A wisp of rundle curled around one of the ledge, only to disappear a moment later. Harry cursed, the eye wasn't so good for immaterial things. He slowly turned, letting his eyes sweep through the disruption between the shelf. Voldemort was in here somewhere. Harry closed the room access and whispered a vicious trap on anyone who tried to get through it. Voldemort wouldn't be able-bodied to break it, some affair required a wand.

Harry walked slowly out into the prophecy manse. The glass welkin had not escaped the carnage of the battle, many were left in glittering fragment on the marble trading floor. The little crack of glass cracked under his boots. Was that smoke ? Harry 's heart hammered in his breast. Was that a-

FIREBALL ! Harry spun and yelled,

'' Ferio ! '' The hex blasted into a spinning orb of flame, exploding it in the air and throwing Harry backwards into a shelf. The wood buckled and Harry fell through backwards in a pot of burning splinters. There was an ominous creaking auditory sensation and Harry had to clamber to get out of the way of the collapsing ledge. Orbs of shining grass bounced off his articulatio humeri and shattered on the floor, their white heater spilling out and going inky blackened like swirls of midnight.

Harry 's eye swirled and he just caught a glimpse of the dark robed figure before he dissolved again. Harry picked himself up and held himself at readiness. This was like a bloody shootout, it was all about who was quicker to the draw play. Unfortunately Voldemort did n't actually have to force ... The air moved, Harry moved faster.

'' Symplegades ! '' Voldemort appeared out of nowhere but Harry had already cast his spell. The shelves crashed together as if drawn by magnets. The morose Jehovah 's wraithlike bod was trapped between them. Before Harry could stray another trance the ledge exploded outwards, Voldemort stepping out wreathed in flames. He raised his deal, about to become weed again. Harry stabbed his sceptre out again.

'' Tartrate ! '' It was a wild stab in the wickedness. The charm was used to make liquidness into jelly. Voldemort stumbled, his soma blurring a moment but not turning to smoke. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

The wickedness lord threw his paw forward and a slab of the marble level was thrown into the air to catch the torment. Voldemort hissed and the ardor behind him jump off up into a chromatography column of flame, curling and splitting into a glow red snaked pass. The serpent roared and bit forward, it 's teeth dripping with molten venom.

'' Excalabus ! '' Harry slashed through the burning apparition but his shining steel slipped through it like body of water, leaving not a shekels. The snake shine forward like a viper and Harry dropped to the story, his eyebrows charring off his expression. `` Ardor-Algidus ! '' Harry yelled the flame freezing charm and leapt up into the hellfire monster. He stabbed his wand at the vestige beyond the inferno and yelled the killing cuss again. The redness flashed to green and Harry could see the dark God Almighty 's shocked expression as he had to fudge a spell from within his own creation.

Harry did n't give him an in, he threw himself forward, pellet another curse at his off balance enemy and found a cloud of black knives flying in his face. He dropped to the floor and learn them brattle behind him. He threw himself to the side but the knives jerked to follow him. He grabbed a plank of shelf from the floor and spun it in front of him, hearing the sullen thunk of the vane impacting the wood. Harry spun to face the nighttime lord and banished the knives towards him. Voldemort waved his deal distastefully and the knives melted into smoke.

The shadow lord was panting, breath hiss in and out through his lipless mouth.

'' You can not win. '' He hissed, choler and high-handedness battling for prominence in his voice. `` You must earn that YOU CAN NOT WIN ! ``

'' Shut. Up. Wanker. '' Harry gasped through sonorous breaths.

'' You are just extending your woe ! ``

'' Is n't that what lifetime is all about ? '' Harry drew himself up, grinning. `` And besides- Ferio ! '' The spell caught the dark lord by surprise, smacking into his articulatio humeri with a bone splintering cranny. Voldemort roared and Harry felt the base under his pes warp and grumbling. He flipped backwards as the flat coat where he had been standing became a swirling quicksand pit, prepare to puff him down into it 's depths. Harry danced backwards as gem upon Harlan F. Stone became draw Death. His feet hit a ledge and he clambered up like a spider. The shelf lurched as it began to sink into the stone. Harry spun, holding on with one hand and leapt to another towering shelf just before the one he had been standing on was obliterated in a swarm of dark lightning.

It was n't dependable up here. Harry clambered to the top and dashed along the slanting wood. Being up here made him too much of a target. Harry 's eye spun to find the dark lord and he almost fell off in jolt as he found Voldemort hovering up from the ground with murder in his centre. The SOB could fly !

'' Tempesto ! '' Harry 's crack sprung out of nowhere, drawing sand from the base and filling the air with yellow-white grain. Harry called another tornado, and another. The wickedness master disappeared in the sandstorm. Disappeared to normal center that is. `` Avada Kedavra ! '' Harry shot through the murk at the dark in the air and dashed away along the top of his shelf, he leapt across to the next one just before a lightning deadbolt flashed through the air behind him. The nighttime lord could not see him in all this but he could see where his spells were coming from. Only a fool attacked and stayed in the Same place ... unless ...

'' Acerbus cuspis ! '' Harry called the pain in the ass fizgig, flashing out in their decelerate fan. He twisted them in the air like a snake to strike the night lord from both slope. He was rewarded with a howling of pain as one of the shining thunderbolt struck home. Harry cast again but the iniquity lord summoned a eloquent shield. `` Motus ! '' Harry did n't even have to think. He just struck out and made the dread orb vibrate with unbearable randomness. He twisted to obtain the ringing but Voldemort was slyer than Albert Michelson and cancelled the orb. Harry turned to run but the night Divine was quicker and lightning caught his arm, burning like nether region. Harry lost his foothold and dropped off the incline of the teetering shelf.

Harry spun his twister and blew himself up into the air again, shooting like a rag-doll through the sandstorm until his digit caught the edge of a shelf and he held on for dearest life. He pulled himself up and tried to stand, his eye spinning to notice the dark Maker. There he was, but what-

'' Ulkaa Avaskanda ! '' The shrill cold vocalization of the wickedness lord shouted out of the tempest, then. `` Finite Syrtis ! ``

The sand vanished like mist but Harry had bigger problem. He leapt into the air as rocks the size of cars obliterated the ledge behind him. His feet hit another shelf but it was already shattering and falling. Harry 's wand whipped out and a come-on impacted into the roof. Harry swung out over the expanse of wind. A boulder came hurtling out of nowhere but Harry still had his storm.

The wind pulled him out of the path of the meteor with a whisk of his scepter and he let go of the chemical chain, catapulting himself onto a standing ledge. He leapt again and saw two Boulder hurtling towards him. His wand flashed out again and one rock veered into the path of the other, shattering them both to fragments. Harry felt the Grant Wood beneath him wobble again and this time let it sway him down a moment before leaping off and dropping to another collapsing shelf, his eye found fast footing and he jumped again as the last ledge collapsed into splinters.

Harry dropped to the top of a pile of wreckage. A jam three prison term as tall as he was and full of part wood, tattered drinking glass and the smouldering remains of spent bowlder. Harry waited while the last of the crashing and clattering stopped, then folded his arms.

Voldemort was hovering in the air level with Harry. The darkness overlord slowly floated down to the floor ( which Harry idly noted was back to being marble ) and settled back down onto his feet. Harry watched with a crooked eyebrow. Voldemort 's teeth clenched in craze as he stared up at Harry standing on his base of ruin.

'' What are you ? '' Voldemort sneered through his dentition. `` You should not be animated ! No human should be alive ! ``

'' What makes you think I 'm homo snake face ? '' Harry smiled evilly. `` Are n't you the one who 's always saying we 're better than mere individual ? ``

'' DO NOT MOCK ME ! ``

'' But you make it so easy ! '' Harry put his paw on his hips. `` Anyway, it 's hard not to mock you when I 'm winning ! ``

'' YOU ARE NOT WINNING ! ``

'' I 'm not loosing. '' Harry grinned. The dark lord 's fists clenched but he said nothing. Harry smiled. `` Of course, you could surrender. ``

'' capitulation ? '' Voldemort spat the word. `` Surrender to you ! ? ``

'' Hey mate, you 're the one that wants to exist forever. '' Harry cracked his knuckles. `` You wo n't live forever if you surrender but I can secure you 'll survive farsighted than if you keep fighting. Not much foresighted but still ... ''

'' I ask again Mr thrower ! '' Voldemort raised an accusing digit. `` What are you ? ``

'' Me ? I 'm the moon curser of the roofs at night. '' Harry laughed. `` The hero of the blood war. The only subsister of the torrent of geezerhood and the Hogwarts triwizard champion. ``

'' But- ''

'' I 'm the mirror-blade, '' Harry spread his weapons system blanket. `` serpent 's bane and wolf-slayer. I 'm the buccaneer of the Spirit of Njordr."

"You-"

"And, to my distress, I am Dumbledore 's little changeling child."

"What-"

"But that does n't matter because I 'm also a marauder ! invincible cutthroat bastard and badass extraordinaire ! I. Am. Harry. thrower ! The choosing one ! '' Harry trained his wand on the night lord, his face set in stiff firmness of purpose. `` That is why you should give up. Right now. Or I swear on this pile of vaticination that I will combust you from this world. ``

Voldemort took an involuntary step backwards, faltering before Harry 's stare.

'' Last hazard. '' Harry snarled. Voldemort straightened up, his eyes burning red.

'' Never. '' The darkness Divine hands clenched to fist. `` I will never surrender to a half blood boy like you. ``

'' Whatever, '' Harry grinned. `` In that display case ... suck it bitch ! Depulso ! '' Harry jammed his wand straight down and the pile of wreckage exploded out in all counsel, the wood becoming deadly sliver and the rock singing out in razor sharp shards. The dark Jehovah threw up a smooth-spoken carapace but Harry was already on the ground. With a pic of his verge the shield screeched and Voldemort threw it away from him as if it was red hot. Harry rolled to the side to dodge a nebulizer of black eyeball and threw his verge up. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

The darkness Divine fled through a threshold and Harry rushed to follow, casting end scourge before him. Harry vaulted a desk and skidded through a doorway only to receive his body rising into the air. A lightning bolt grazed his shoulder and Harry was spun around like a top. Planets were floating in this room ! There must be some spell screwing with gravity !

Harry shot a crotchet at Saturn and pulled himself out of the way just before another lightning bolt flashed through the air. Harry jabbed his wand at the sun and yelled,

'' Confringo ! '' The clump of plasma exploded but Harry cast another flame-freezing spell and pushed off Saturn directly into the inferno. From behind the cover of flame Harry shot a killing curse at the dark Divine but had to twist in the air to stop his head being taken off by a disconsolate brand flickering through the air. He had used the flame-cover deception one too many sentence. well lets try another.

'' Esurio Esurio ! '' Harry aimed at the spinning red planet next to Voldemort. It grew a gaping oral fissure and snapped angrily at the dark Godhead, who blew it into fragments but Harry had already trained his baton back on the dark God Almighty. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

Voldemort swung a chunk of planet into the track of the spell and fled, pushing open a door Harry had n't even seen. He pushed off the wall and floated weightlessly after him. As soon as he reached the room access he dropped to the level again and raced through, skidding to a point when he saw where he was.

In total contrast to the residue of the department this room was a sort of zoo. Cages full of tool filled the room up to the ceiling and were stacked in a pile in the middle. Some looked normal, some ... not so much. Harry shuddered as his eye flickered over a mutated blob of soma with what he sincerely hoped was not a human arm coming out of it. His illusion eye swirled in it 's socket, trying to get a fix on Voldemort but all the life and drift in the way made it tricky.

Harry tried to describe out the room. Long, not so wide ... The door at the other end was closed. That meant that Voldemort was either at the wall behind one of the John Cage at the side or crouched down behind one of the one in the middle. Harry grinned,

'' Alohomora ! '' He pointed his wand at the pile of coop in the center and all their legal community sprung surface. creature scattered in every direction. Something that looked like a mutation wolf made a starved leap at the cages to the left field and was thrown back by a tour. There ! Harry 's wand was trained there in a moment. `` Confringo ! '' The hex blasted the cage out of the way, revealing Voldemort 's Zane Grey tegument. `` Avada K- '' Harry had to discontinue off the swearword to duck behind a desk as more orb of darkness rained through the air. Harry heard a door jibe spread and leapt up from where he was crouched. He dashed to the door and swung through, his wand out.

The destruction sleeping accommodation ! Back here ! Harry saw Voldemort just reaching the door at the former face of the dimly lit way and aimed his wand.

'' Colloportus ! '' The door squelched and glowed red. Harry spun and locked the former doors too. In a moment he had his wand trained back on the dark Divine. Voldemort was just staring at him from the other side of the Brobdingnagian room, his lips contoured into a sneer. He clearly knew he could discontinue the poxy lockup spell, but doing so would give Harry the moment he needed to vote out him. Harry tried to continue his hint even as he spoke, `` Got you. No more running play. ``

'' Then you have signed your own death endorsement. '' Voldemort slowly stepped down the face of the chamber.

'' I doubt that. '' Harry mirrored the dark Divine and slowly walked down the steps. `` I rarely signed things. ``

'' I will be sick you through the caul myself. ``

'' What ... ever. '' Harry shrugged. `` I 've had enough of your ego significant terror. Time for the showdown. Let 's end this. ``

'' Nothing would please me Sir Thomas More Mr thrower ! '' Voldemort reached the fundament of the room. Harry was just a step behind him. They stared at each other from opposite incline of the plinth that held the arch of the humeral veil. Voldemort 's lip curled up in a leer. `` If I had my wand you would have died long ago. ``

'' That would be why I nicked it. '' Harry chuckled. `` And anyway ... Lumos ! '' Harry jammed his sceptre towards Voldemort and the ray cut through the faintness like a public eye. Voldemort threw his hands up to protect his eyes."Avada Kedavra ! ``

The dark Creator dropped to the level, letting the spell pass over his headway and jabbed his arm up at the ceiling. The shadows above them became live, a writhing caldron of swarthiness. Harry dodged wildly as a tentacle of Nox shot down and tried to wrap itself around him. Harry felt another grab his leg.

'' Excalabus ! '' The tentacle was sheered off but Harry had been thrown to the floor and had to wrap as bolts of thunder slammed into the flagstones where he had been lying. A ball of lightlessness caught the side of his leg, simply obliterating chassis and skin. Harry screamed and pulled himself to his feet, jumping out of the way of another tentacle. He had to get rid of that thing ! He could n't fight back it and the dark Lord at the same clip ! But how to defeat something like that ... How else ? Harry jabbed his wand at the cap. `` Avada Kedavra ! '' The commons spell impacted the glum creature and it wailed in pain in the neck, it 's tentacles going limp.

Harry spun back to facial expression Voldemort just in fourth dimension for an black orb to take a chunk out of his shoulder joint. He was bleeding too much. Had to end this ! The dark overlord raised his hand for another bolt of lightning. Harry tore two flagstones from the ground and hurled them in the path of the trance, one after the other. The number 1 was blown to splinters but the sec, hidden by the swarm of rubble, frivol away through like a marble discus and crashed with a hideous compaction into Voldemort 's ribcage.

The dark Maker was thrown back, his arm coming up to cradle his bruise chest. Harry pressed his advantage and Voldemort was driven back by spell after enchantment. The dark lord was pushed onto to the measure and stumbled back, lying prone against the Isidor Feinstein Stone. He seemed exhausted.

'' Avada Ke- ''

"Fulgar Fletch !"The wickedness Creator 's hired hand swung up ! It had been a caper ! Harry saw a cloud of shameful steel erupt out of zip and sail towards him. He had no protection ! He could not circumvent ! There was just one chance ...

'' Protego ! '' Harry called out desperately and was driven back as the knife clattered against his infirm shield. Harry let it go and stepped forward, only to feature his stifle buckle and drop him on the floor. What the ? Harry tried to tolerate but his legs would n't act. Was this some sort of execration ? Harry looked down and saw the reason.

There was a knife embedded to the hilt in his stomach. Two more than in his leg. Draining blood line down his thigh and pooling on the floor.

'' Bloody shield .... '' Harry 's branch dropped down, suddenly too infirm. His wand rolled away on the dark stone. He had n't felt the knife go in, adrenalin perhaps, but he felt it now. Pain and fire raging out from the hole in his stomach. `` Bloody ... Shield .... And I was doing so well ... ''

'' Yes Mr potter you were. '' The darkness lord picked himself up from the steps and dusted his robe off. Now that he had won the friendly, almost fatherly, tone was back. `` I applaud you. ``

'' I could have beaten you ya know. '' Harry coughed weakly and saw droplets of line of descent spray from his backtalk. `` The very first go I threw. Back when I jumped the reckoning. Back when you had the bastard wand. If you 'd have just tried to screen like any rule ace ... I could have won on the first patch. That was ... that was the plan. ``

'' It was a full programme. '' Voldemort must have seen no reason to be furious now that he had won. `` Against a normal star it would have no dubiety worked. ``

'' Damn it. '' Harry raised his bridge player to spread his fingers around the knife blade in his stomach, but he could n't stop the lineage. His life story was draining out onto the trading floor. The ones in his leg would maim him. The one in his tum meant he was dead.

'' Do you get any hold out password my beloved foe ? '' Voldemort asked calmly. `` I did not hear any satisfactory single from Dumbledore. Anything ? ``

'' Ca n't think of anything ... '' Dark dots swam before Harry 's heart. He had failed. `` Are my ally still watching ? ``

'' Oh yes. '' Voldemort nodded. `` I would not sustain the wizarding populace fille this event. ``

'' Then my last wrangle are ... keep on fighting. '' Harry raised his middle to meet Voldemort 's. `` Keep fighting him. ``

'' Not very original. '' The wickedness lord shrugged. `` But best than Dumbledore 's. ``

'' And ... '' line was pooling beneath Harry 's legs. `` And tell Thea I tried. ``

'' An admirable sentiment. ``

'' That 's ... '' Darkness was closing in on Harry. `` That 's all I got. ``

'' Very well. '' Voldemort raised his bridge player. `` I shall miss you. My ... interesting antagonist. '' Voldemort opened his mouth to talk the last words Harry would ever hear.

'' postponement. '' Harry whispered, he had no strength to address normally. `` I 've thought of some amend terminal dustup. ``

'' Really ? '' Voldemort asked, amused. `` And ? ``

'' The one with the power to beat out the dark lord will be born as the one-seventh month dice. '' Harry 's whispered actor's line rang out in the quiet room. `` Max Born to those who ... those who ... ''

'' Have thrice defied him. '' Voldemort prompted, his eyes suddenly desperate. `` Yes ? Yes ? ``

'' Thrice defied him. '' Harry licked his lips, his vocalization was barely coming out now. `` And the nighttime lord will commemorate ... will mark him ... ''

'' Yes ? What then ? '' Voldemort leant tight in to listen.

'' Mark him as his match ... '' Harry 's backtalk were barely moving, his quarrel just disturbances in the air. `` But the dark ... the wickedness ... ''

'' Yes ... '' Voldemort put his mitt on Harry 's shoulders, steadying him. `` Please finish it ! ``

'' The dark God Almighty, shall never ... '' Harry 's eyes were closed. `` Shall never learn. ``

'' What ? '' Voldemort 's eyes narrowed to slits.

'' The dark lord ... shall never watch. ``

'' What did you say ? ``

'' I said you never bloody hear ! '' Harry 's middle flicked open. `` Do you ? ``

Powered by the last pant of dying madness Harry pulled the knife from his flesh and push it into Voldemort 's neck. Harry fell backwards as blood fountained from his tummy and his eyes clouded black. As he slipped away and his heart and soul stopped beating all he could hear was the rustle of the veil.




Cliff. Hanging. Again. I know. Sorry. reappraisal anyway.


Sorry this took a while to post. I did n't signify to intentionally leave you hanging at a cliffhanger but first-class honours degree I posted it then realised I had to change something so that sent it to the back of the waiting line, then it got rejected ... anyways it 's up now.

Reviews seem to be mixed as to whether people think Harry 's really numb or not and whether the series is over or not. It 's nice to take created such take issue views. : )




The beginning thing Harry sensed was the smell of orchard apple tree prime. It was a olfaction he knew very well. His eyes flickered undetermined and looked up onto the familiar mottled leaves of the grove in his dreams. It was exactly as it had always been, green and full phase of the moon of life.

Harry was lying on the storey. How had he got there ? He lifted his sleeve up and realized that his descent soaked and fight frighten garments were gone, replaced by a simple Theodore Harold White gown. That was n't all that was missing either. Harry 's digit went up to his eye, poking it lightly.

'' Ow ! '' shape, not glass. Harry shook his heading, realizing what must have happened. Eye 's did not mature back, orchards did not spring out of nothing. `` I 'm dead. I died. ``

Harry breathed out, a long sigh of lugubriousness. He had done his trump, his very, very best. He had tried to go. He had tried to not leave the Earth of the life, had tried not to leave his friends.

There are people that will meet if you die, even if you take Voldemort with you

'' I tried Thea. '' Harry felt a glob in his pharynx. `` Oh god I tried. But he was better than me. He was ... he was better. I mean I knew he was, really. I just hoped I could skew the betting odds enough to let me win. Let me live. I guess I was incorrect. ``

Harry looked up at the trees, bearing blossoms and fruit all at once in an insufferable, but beautiful, tableau. He was sword lily he had ended up here, not back at Godrics Hollow.

'' I did shoot him with me though. '' Harry spoke the bitter words. `` I got him good. ``

The wind rustled lightly through the trees. He thought he could almost, just almost, hear children laughing. Harry sat down and set his back against a tree and closed his eyes. If this was the afterlife then he knew one affair for sure enough. Before he met any pearly door guard or had his sins weighed against a feather or whatever he was sitting right here and having a rest. The horde of Hades could not act him from that spot.

The wind whistled through the trees and for a moment Harry though he could hear voices.

"Stop her ! Don ‘ t let her get to the soundbox !"

"She ‘ s got a portkey !"

The voices faded. Harry shrugged, that kind of matter probably happened all the time when you were dead.

Harry 's script wormed it 's way along the ground and found an orchard apple tree. It was nice and surd, fallen recently. He brought it up to his sassing and bit into it, letting the juices run down his cheek. It tasted a little bitter, just a little.

Harry heard the grass in front of him disturbed by footfalls. individual was there. He opened his eyes slowly, and arched his eyebrows when he saw who it was.

'' Did n't await to see you here. '' Harry commented dryly. `` Though I suppose I should have. ``

'' May I sit down ? '' Dumbledore asked, his voice bearing a placidity it had not held in life.

'' Why not ? '' Harry shrugged. `` I mean were all dead here are n't we. Maybe Zen and Merlin will unite us next. ``

'' I doubt that Harry, Elvis is n't idle. '' Dumbledore frowned suddenly. `` I apologize, you asked me not to phone you- ''

'' You can call me Harry. '' Harry smiled. `` Do n't worry about it. ``

'' But I do worry. '' Dumbledore shook his psyche. `` I can never apologize to you enough for what I did to you. No give-and-take could ever suffice. I ... I am only glad that I got this one last probability to severalize you how good-for-naught I am. My crime was inexcusable. ``

'' Apparently it was n't seeing as you 're here and not in a big fiery station with fortune of pitchforks. '' Harry chuckled and rested his arms behind his head.

'' You seem, '' Dumbledore was picking his row carefully. `` You seem at peace with what I did. to a greater extent than the last time I saw you at least. ``

'' Mate, I can never forgive you, so do n't ask me to. '' Harry sighed and shook his head. `` I do n't consider I can ever forgive you but at the like time ... I get why you did it. You were in a bad topographic point, everything was riding on your articulatio humeri. I mean look at me, today I cast an unforgivable curse ten ... maybe twenty times. And before that, over the course of this year I 've killed ... people. Several people. We all do what we think we have to do. You did what ... what you thought you had to do, at the prison term. I ca n't forgive you for it. You playing with my head. Making me your Frankenstein's monster 's devil. Your changeling child. You ... took me and changed me. Changed who I am, put memories in my caput. You said you put your computer storage of James ceramist in my head. I can feel them in there now ... How much of it is me ? Is any of this me ? Or am I just a poor people written matter of Harry ... Or worse a pitiable copy of James thrower. Am I ? reply me truthfully. Please. ``

'' I ... '' Dumbledore dropped his eyes to the floor. `` I do not know how much of your original personality survived. Integrating memories is never fully successful, not from one soul to another, but there is no way to tell how much mix there has been. There is a chance that the remembering settled harmlessly into your subconscious, but then again ... ''

'' There 's a chance they did n't. ``

'' Yes. ``

"Why did n't you severalise me this earlier ?"Harry sighed,"I mean before I went and cut out my eye and everything."

"I ... There were many reasons."Dumbledore looked away into the aloofness."You see it was very gentle to ... to not remember what I had done. To not think of it. I mean there you were, looking like Harry, acting like James II. It was easy to accrue into the ambush of thinking you were ... that you were ..."

"real ?"

"That you were not the bread and butter proof of my sins."Dumbledore shook his head."At least that was the cause at first. I simple did not want to acknowledge what I had done. Then, later on, after you had defeated the basilisk, after you had come back from the waterspout of ages, I began to think perhaps I would not make to. You had proved yourself a submarine sandwich so I though ... perhaps no one would ever have to know. Perhaps I could let you fill up Harry 's place and never tell you. I thought I could let you carry the encumbrance. I am not proud of that. I should ingest known the prophecy could not be so easily avoided."

"Is it possible I still can require his position ?"Harry pointed at his radiocarpal joint."I mean, the night lord did marking me."

"Harry he did not mark you as his equal he marked you as his servant."Dumbledore shook his head."And besides, I can bet on my fingers the people who have thrice defied Voldemort. I would give birth known if one of them had been with child."

Harry sighed. As he did the wind seemed to murmur, carrying to him aloof vocalism. He strained his spike to take heed,

'' Help him ! For pigeon hawk 's sake helper him ! '' Was that ... Hermione ?

'' Shut up and let me by. '' Snape 's vocalisation cut across her.

'' His heart 's not stick ! ``

'' Of trend It 's not beating he does n't birth any blood line left you hysterical idiot. Each of you, cave in me your hands. It's a full thing Harry acquired so many tagalong, one of you has to be his blood type. ``

The voices faded into the breeze. Harry's forehead furrowed.

"Did you hear that ?"He asked Dumbledore.

"No, but then I ‘ m a little more beat than you are."Dumbledore smiled.

"So I ‘ m ... I ‘ m not dead ?"Harry felt hope wage hike in his heart.

"You are dead, technically. Your pith is not beating."Dumbledore's eyes twinkled."But I believe that, with time and a generous donation of good red blood, you may be pulled back into the man of the living."

"So ... Is this actually you then ?"Harry scratched his head."Is this actually the afterlife or just another dream ?"

"This is the afterlife."Dumbledore nodded."And I am, more or less, who I appear to be."

"How ?"

"The fact that you are near death coupled with the fact that you died mere m from the veil."Dumbledore shrugged."I am just glad I got a net luck to speak to you."

"fountainhead I assume we ‘ ll sports meeting again ... eventually."Harry cracked a grin."When I ‘ m old and hoary and die in a bed surrounded by beautiful women."

The old whiz and the young laughed. A thought struck Harry and the hilarity dimmed.

"So, while I have you here, can I ask you something ?"

"Of course of action Harry, anything."

"What is my name ?"

"I ... I do not know."Dumbledore hung his foreland."I am sorry Harry. I erased the memory from my own mind so I would never foretell you it. Never slip up ... But I can tell you the orphanage where I found you. It is called the Malyn orphanage, or was nine years ago, January twentieth. It stands about ten miles south of capital of Northern Ireland. If records exist then, well then you might be able to find them there."

"Malyn orphanhood. January twentieth ..."Harry whispered. Then,"So I ‘ m Irish ?"

"Yes Harry. You ‘ re Irish."Dumbledore cracked a whimsical smile.

"Interesting."Harry, who had lived his life with a London idiom thick enough to float bricks on, chuckled."So, do you retrieve there might even be book of my parents ?"

"I do not think so."Dumbledore looked away, not meeting Harry's heart. He seemed to be picking his Christian Bible carefully."I do not think that you will find records of them there."

"What aren ‘ t you telling me ?"Harry felt the emptiness grow."Were they wizards ? Were they death eater ?"

"No Harry zippo like that."Dumbledore shook his headland."In fact I believe we can safely arrogate both your parents were muggles. Let me excuse, when I took you from the orphanhood they told me a small about you. About how you had come to be there. Apparently you were not given to them in the rule style, you were ... found. Found by an older couple walking along the Lagan river. The river was bursting it ‘ s camber a little after a storm and they saw a little megabucks washed up in the mud. When they unwrapped you they thought you were abruptly, I was told that you were blue angel all over from the cold and dampness, but so weak you weren ‘ t even shivering. You had been in the water for a yearn time."

Crashing John Rock. Raging white urine. Harry's mind shied away from the wink of threat in his mind and he felt his breath quicken. The raging violent stream in his intellect banishing all though was real, a storage so scaring even Dumbledore had been unable to erase. His only veridical memory was a phobia. Another sulphurous joke. He licked his lips, had to say something, anything to assume his mind off it.

"How old was I ?"

"About six calendar month old, throw or take."Dumbledore answered."The couple gave you to the authorities and of course an investigation was made. Unfortunately nothing was ever found. And, inevitably, you ended up in the mitt of the child avail. The story after that is, well, rather as you might guess it."

"It could get been an accident."Harry spoke, not daring to go for."You make it sound like my parents tried to kill me but it didn't have to happen that way. Maybe I was swept away from my family. You said there were floods."

"I ... I do not suppose that was the case Harry."A tear rolled down Dumbledore's cheek."You see, I have something the muggle authorities did not. I have my map. That was the understanding lupin knew. I needed him to incur it and establish me how to use it, or it could hold revealed the truth."

"The map- Or course !"Harry smiled, his eyes lighting up."It should picture my real number name ! That ‘ s why you kept it obscure and everything ! What does it say ?"

"Harry the map does not express your name."Dumbledore brushed the pluck away."Do you know how the map works ?"

"No."

"It works by making use of an ancient type of legerdemain, the legerdemain of names."Dumbledore's part took on a lecturing shade, but Harry could still hear the lump in his throat."There is an old thaumaturgist superstitious notion. An old wives tale, if you will, that a wizard's name is tied to their destiny. That the name first given to a wizard somehow sets his path. There was once a great fad for concealing one ‘ s reliable name so that opposition could not gain power over you. stupidity really, in those twenty-four hours someone ‘ s admittedly public figure was easy enough to divine. That is what the map does in any case. It works by the legerdemain of names."

"Yeah,"Harry motioned the late Headmaster to continue."And ?"

"And for you it displays nix Harry."Dumbledore closed his middle sadly."On the map your name is blank. Just a set of footprints and an discharge scroll."

"Oh ..."Harry let the silence grow between them. He couldn't really think of anything to fill it.

"Do you understand what that means Harry ? It means-"

"I know what it means."Harry said quietly."It means my parents never named me before they threw me away."

"Harry ..."

"I was six calendar month old. Six months they had me and didn ‘ t even care enough to ..."Harry slammed his clenched fist into the primer coat."I guess I ‘ m better off without them."

"Is his sum beating ? I can barely-"

"Is that a pulse ... it was there I swear it was there."

Harry let the voices on the wind die away. He sighed, looking up into the calming dappled sunlight.

"Harry are you alright ?"Dumbledore asked."I realize that this is a bang-up deal to take in on top of-"

"I ‘ m alright."Harry swallowed painfully."I mean I ‘ m not alright, really. But I ‘ ll be very well. I can already tell. I ‘ ll be aright. I mean after all the other thunderbolt this doesn ‘ t really tip the shell that much does it. Like a molehill beside a smoking volcano."

"I ‘ m just sorry that I was once again the carrier of bad news."Dumbledore squinted at Harry, his optic narrowing."You are fading. Not long before you can no longer touch this office. Is there anyone else here you would wish to address to ?"

"I ... I don ‘ t know."Harry scratched his mind."Most of my friend are still alive."

"A blessing."

"So I can call anyone then ?"Harry asked slyly."Anyone beat and they have to make out ?"

"Yes, anyone dead."

"Tom Marvolo Riddle."Harry said the dread name loudly into the Mrs. Henry Wood, only faint reverberation came back."He ‘ s not absolutely then."Harry's hands clenched into fists.

"No,"Dumbledore shook his head."I believe you have Bella to thank for that again. She snuck in when the Mary Augusta Arnold Ward came down and spirited his torso away right hand under your ally'noses using an parking brake portkey. Rather careless of them. Alastor is probably beating himself up right now."

"I though I got him."Harry gritted his teeth."I thought I got-"

"He will be severely weakened."Dumbledore stepped forward and laid a helping hand on Harry's berm."Perhaps as badly as he was xv years ago. This is a victory Harry, it will be years, possibly 10 before he can rise again. And if we can view him while he is weak and complete him off, so much the better."

"I guess."Harry tried to see the unspoilt position. It wasn't easy."fountainhead let ‘ s try ... Barty Crouch Jr."Again the wood remained empty but for the two of them. Harry grimaced, he hadn't really hoped that the slimy bastard was dead. But it would take been a receive surprise.

"Is there not anyone you actually wish to speak to Harry ?"Dumbledore asked, fading a little as he did so."No one in this creation ? Perhaps the real Harry Potter ?"

"I ‘ ve already met him. Twice actually now that I think about it."

"How could you possibly ..."

"Well once was years ago when I traveled through time and met him before he died."Harry checked that off on his finger's breadth."And the 2d metre me sent a message here from another dimension."At Dumbledore's shocked manifestation Harry grinned."I lead a very weird life."

"But interesting."

"Oh yes, very interesting."Harry smiled."All in all I think I ‘ ll let him and his parents rest in heartsease. After what I did to their statue I don ‘ t think I could face them. Anyways, goodbye old man. I'll see you again in a retentive recollective while."

"I hope so Harry."

"This is weird."Harry chuckled and looked around."Why does it feel like we 're having this entirely conversation two record book early ?"

"simpleton Harry,"Dumbledore smiled."Until now you have been walking someone else 's path. From this point on, you 'll have to make your own."

"Good."Harry nodded."I 'm ready."

"I know you are Harry."Dumbledore continued to melt."I know you are. Oh time lag, may I ask you something before I go ?"

"Shoot."

"What became of my wand ?"

"Your wand ..."Harry thought back."Oh ... I threw it through the veil along with Voldemort ‘ s. Sorry did you want to be buried with it or something ?"

"No no Harry."Dumbledore smiled broadly, a orphic twinkle in his fading eye."Just curious."And with that the old wizard faded into nothing, and was gone. Harry chuckled.

"You had to have the last Good Book didn ‘ t you. Git."

The air seemed to change texture. Harry breathed out softly, he was animated again. He could feel his heartbeat in his chest. Weak, but there. Harry glanced around at the orchard. It was exactly the Lapp as before but it felt different. He was dreaming now, just a fixture dreaming. Harry let his heart close slowly. He would wake up in good clip, but until then ? He was fine here. For now.
*


Snape reached his flat in Hogwarts and barely got the door shut before falling into a chair. There was a bed in the next elbow room, but it suddenly seemed very far away. Truth be told he could have fallen asleep in the middle of the great residence hall, on the flooring. He would possess been the laughing livestock of every student though. Even worse he probably wouldn't have woken up when they started laughing at him, even when they started poking him.

Snape raised his wand shakily and levitated the blank out bottle of wine off his mesa. It had been left candid, no matter. He poured himself a glass.

He had stood in the waiting room in St Mungos for longer than he could remember while incompetent healer told him they had no information. When they had finally told him that Harry was out of the woods all his uneasy muscularity had leeched out and it had taken all of his genial strength to stop himself sagging to the floor right there. He had managed to fool well-nigh of them. He had not fooled Natalie.

She had apparated him back to Hogwarts and made him swear to catch some Z's as soon as he got to his room. Who was she to ordination him around like that ? Why could she ? Snape's lips curled into a smile. Because she was interesting enough to get away with it and was the sole one who could pull it off. Which just added to the interest of course of instruction. Snape smiled as the wine-coloured curled down the back of his throat. He was very lucky in many respects. lucky than he deserved.

"Severus are you in there ?"There was a belt on the door. Not Natalie. Snape flicked his wand and the doorway creaked afford. Minerva stood on the other side, looking as tired as he felt.

"Minerva."Snape tried to sit a little less like he was falling asleep."It is beneficial to see you safe, in all the confusion in the ministry I lost track. cum in. Would you wish some wine-colored ?"

"No thank you."Minerva stepped inside. Now that she was closer he could see that the bound of her eyes held telltale signs of crying. She had tried to obliterate it, but to the trained eye it was quite obvious."I heard you were back in the palace and came down to see you."

"Anything in particular bothering you ?"Snape asked, perhaps more caustically than was necessary."I am rather tired you see."

"Yes, there is something."Minerva pulled a hard plump for chair over and sat down stiffly."When you went off to St Mungos I called the remaining order together, there was much to discuss."

"I can imagine that there would be."Snape yawned theatrically. He did not take in to bullshit it."I can not ideate how that would concern me however, I am no longer a member."

"That is partially what we were discussing."Minerva cocked her head to one face."Voldemort is weakened but not numb. The order's labor is far from done and we could more than use your expertise. Your primary feather reason for leaving was Albus. I will not presume to ask the particular of that disagreement, it was between the two of you. But do you not think that now he is ... gone, that you might be persuaded to hail back to us ?"

"That would reckon on who replaced him."Snape said levelly."For example if it were yourself leading the ordering, I would have got no objection."

"I will not be leading the order."McGonagall shook her heading."I will throw quite enough to do here at Hogwarts. The job of headmistress is enough for me. It has been hard enough to persuade parents to direct their baby to Hogwarts this class. I imagine future class may be a little well-heeled but I am surely I will still have my hands full. And besides, I will need to line up a new transfiguration teacher."

"Shacklebolt then."Snape waved a hand vaguely."He has always been very capable."

"Kingsley Shacklebolt may very well be the only thing currently keeping the ministry from falling apart."Minerva smiled faintly."He was the most senior auror to survive this debacle so I believe he will be ever more busy than I myself will be."

"There are former candidates."Snape was fully qui vive now. He could feel where this was going."Alastor Moody."

"Too paranoid."

"Chester Alan Arthur Weasley."

"Has no combat or strategic experience."

"Natalie. Natalie Zhao. She is-"

"Very new to the order."

"Remus lupin then, he has been with the order since-"

"Remus has grown irregular recently. Especially where Harry is concerned."Minerva fixed Snape with a level stare."I believe we can check that whoever should head the lodge should be someone Harry trusts. soul like you."

"No."

"Someone who knows how the night Lord thinks."

"No."

"Severus listen to me."Minerva leant near to him."Do you not intend we discussed all these things in amongst ourselves in the Holy Order ?"

"If I had been there I would have had a few affair to say !"

"Severus please."Minerva's centre dropped to the floor."This past year Albus ... well you yourself saw. I do not verbalize ill of the utterly but he had become ... tired. He was not the Dumbledore we all knew. He was not acting at his best."

Snape stayed silent. Not at his best was a horrific understatement if ever he heard one but there was no indigence to say so.

"In any case he was faltering. We all saw it, everyone in the order. But no one did anything about it. Except you."Minerva shook her head."Perhaps we were all, how did you put it ? ‘ Trapped in the past.'Except you."

"I ... I can not extend the order."Snape tried to realize his vocalization not go like that of a rat at bay."I was a death eater, I fell into dark magic. A farseeing time ago yes but some marks do not fare out."

"Yours has."

"That is not what I meant !"Snape took a mysterious draught of wine."I am ... tainted. Undeserving."

"Albus always said he did not deserve the jut he was given."

"Do not compare me to-"Snape bit back the end of that angry judgment of conviction. There was no to take out his ira on the messenger."I merely meant that I do not call back it is secure to move over me this form of power."

"Albus also said that those who seek power are those least suited to wield it."Minerva held his eyes."The corollary of that is that those who are suited to exert baron are those who reject it."

"Do not quote at me."

"Severus, there is no one else who can do the job as well as you. No one else."

"No one else."Snape felt like chuckling."That is what it always comes down to doesn ‘ t it ? We all do what we must."

"I always have."Minerva stood."So you will take the chore ?"

"Do I have a pick ?"

"You do, but I already screw how you will choose."

"You knew before you stepped through that door."Snape sneered."I am trapped like a rabbit."

"Only by your own traps Severus."Minerva smiled and turned to the door.

"You know that I will do thing differently than Dumbledore."Snape said suddenly."There will be changes."

"I know, I look forward to them."McGonagall nodded, and left the room.

Snape rubbed his forehead. He should begin planning, there was much to do. No, he should not. Right now he had a promise to proceed. Shedding his robe tiredly, he walked towards his bed.
*


'' Harry ... Harry open your eyes. ``

Harry woke from late dream, the sparkling silver vocalisation in his ears.

'' I 'm awake, '' Harry murmured, his middle closed. `` But I 'm still in my orchard. I can smell the heyday. ``

'' You are still departed, in St Mungos. '' Water rippling over shining endocarp. `` I wanted to talk to you but you 're on a keen spate of medication. It was simpler for me to just come to you. ``

'' And where are you ? '' Harry 's lips twitched up into a smile.

'' Sitting beside your bed. ``

Harry chuckled, and opened his eyes.

'' Hello Thea. ``

'' Hello Harry. '' The Pres Young vaticinator was sitting cross legged under a tree in front of him, looking like the human image of serenity. Instead of her usual white-hot robe she was wearing a simple dark-brown dress, she seemed almost office of the wood. She looked ... different, somehow different. It was not her face, she was still the same beautiful girl he had always known, or her eyes, mismatched as they were. Her silver whisker was caught up into a hanker tail down her back, tied with dismal ribbon. She looked exactly the Saami but there was something missing. Gone was the mother wit of ancientness, the feeling that the piffling person in front of him had outlasted Empire. She seemed ... immature, the same age as him give or take a year. Harry supposed she always had been. It did not contract lots to guess the reason for the change.

'' You 're not the oracle anymore. '' Harry guessed, guiltily.

'' No, I 'm not. '' Pythea smiled. `` I was sacked. ``

'' I 'm sorry. '' Harry hung his head. `` It was because you were helping me, was n't it ? ``

'' Yes, they finally caught on. '' Pythea reached forward and tilted Harry 's Chin up. `` Do n't feel guilty, not even for a moment. I was abject there, almost a prisoner. I 'm glad to be gone. ``

'' You do n't get to distinguish me that just to- ''

'' It is the truth. ``

'' But it was your rest home. '' Harry sighed. `` I 'm going to feel shamed whatever you say, you ca n't blockade me. ``

'' Stubborn. ``

'' holy terror. ``

'' I am not. '' Pythea smiled warmly. `` Do you have any idea what you will do now ? After you are released from hospital I mean. ``

'' I ... I have somewhere I want to go. ``

'' The orphanhood ? ``

'' Hey, you reading my creative thinker again ? '' Harry smiled mysteriously. `` Do n't I get any closed book ? ``

'' I can not register minds anymore Harry. '' Thea shook her head word. `` That came with being the oracle remember. I just know you. ``

'' But you 're still a oracle, right ? '' Harry hesitated to ask.

'' Oh yes, there are some things they can not take away. '' Pythea nodded. `` I am still a seer, and a very powerful one. ``

'' Can you ... can you tell apart me my hereafter ? '' Harry asked suddenly.

'' No. I ca n't. '' Pythea smiled and stood. `` Do you want to go to the orphanage now ? ``

'' Now ? '' Harry scratched his top dog. `` Are n't I in hospital ? ``

'' A short pass will not inconvenience a mighty hero sandwich like you too a lot. '' Pythea crooked an supercilium mockingly.

'' A short walk ? We have to get to Ireland ya know. ``

'' Then it is lucky that another matter they can not require away is my outside phantom permit. '' Pythea held out her mitt. `` Just tell apart me where Harry. And we can go. ``

Harry reached out and took her hand.
*


'' Ow. '' Harry 's hand went to his stomach as annoyance flared there through the hospital sheets. `` That really hurts. ``

'' I told you it would. '' Pythea was sitting exactly where she said she was, at the side of his bed. `` The knife was made with dark magic so the wound ca n't be magically healed. You 'll sustain to let it knit together the old fashioned way. Is it too much ? Do you like to wait money box tomorrow ? ``

'' No no. It just surprised me is all. '' Harry slowly lowered his feet to the storey and gingerly stood. He had to hunch just a piddling to stop the skin of his stomach stretching painfully, but he could walk. No he could n't. His leg was mangled too. Maybe he could hop ... `` Do you take my wearing apparel somewhere ? Oh waiting my bag 's rightfield here. Can you grow so I can- ''

Pythea cut him off with a Wave of her hand. His hospital gown changed into a elementary egg white T-shirt and trouser. Muggle enough to be getting on with. With another wafture a carved wooden cane appeared in his hand. Obviously she did not call back he was as good for you as said he was. red cent her for being right.

'' Thank you. '' Harry smiled and picked up his bag from beside the bed. `` Shall we go then ? ``

Pythea stepped up to him and wrapped her arms around his stamp middle. This close Harry could smell her hair, like honey oil grass and the sea. He was breathing faster, probably because of all the potions they had him on.

'' Are you ready ? '' She asked.

'' Yes. '' Harry shut his eyes and waited. And waited ... He opened them again and cocked his principal to one English. `` Is there a trouble ? ``

'' You still have n't told me where we 're going. '' Pythea clicked her tongue irritably. `` Not being able to read mass opinion is going to hire some getting used to. ``

'' I 'm grim. I really am. '' Harry apologized again, earning him a layer stare from the minuscule seer, and told her their destination.

For the commencement time in his life history Harry enjoyed an apparition. The walls of the void pressed him into Pythea, forcing them closer together. He could feel her breath on his buttock. He was almost disappointed when they dropped onto a small route in the countryside.

Harry stepped back and glanced around. There was no mistaking the orphanage, it was the only building there. At the sum of it was a stately-home case of thing. He could n't put a date to it, old was the best he could do. That was clearly the center of the complex but at some point the owners had felt a penury to expand. The two blocks to either side of the main building took after the put-some-rectangular-concrete-blocks-in-a-vaguely-building-shape style of computer architecture. Around the completely place there was a senior high school wall with burry conducting wire looped at the top.

Harry tried not to think that made it look like a prison. All school day had that these days.

With a deliberate bridge player on his abdomen Harry walked up to the main reception. Pythea stopped there and sat down quietly on a bench.

'' You 're not coming in ? '' Harry asked.

'' You go on ahead. '' Thea looked out over the countryside. `` You should probably do this yourself. ``

'' I can still do it myself with you there. ``

'' Go inside Harry. ``

Harry grinned and turned towards the room access. He took a oceanic abyss breath, then winced at what that did to his abdomen. He tried to quiet the raging butterfly inside but could n't. The only when thing that gave him the will to promote give the door was marauder rules. Follow through. No fear.

As he stepped into the wearisome entrance hall a secretary looked up from her desk, eying him quizzically.

'' Is there a records department ? '' Harry asked uncertainly.

'' Up the step first door on the left. '' The secretary looked back down at her papers.

Up the stair. Of course. Harry labored up the steps, having to stay More than once before he reached the top. Out the window he could see the resort area, to the full of children running about wildly. From inside the bulwark the place looked a lot nicer. All around the edge of the wall there were a series of children 's house painting. Long running mural and vortex of color. It was almost pleasant, it looked like a normal school.

Harry managed to hit the first floor and took a few tire out breaths. She wanted to let me to this by myself. Probably just did n't want to carry me up the bloody steps. Harry then realized that hunching over and breathing heavily in a building full of children could possibly be misinterpreted. He stood and walked forward towards the number 1 room access, his walking stick clattering against the base. He knocked, politely.

'' Come in. ``

Harry pushed the door loose to see an elderly lady sitting in figurehead of a computing device, looking at him questioningly over her glasses.

"Hi, I used to live on here. At the orphans' asylum I mean."Harry stepped inside.

"Oh,"The woman smiled."Please have a seat."Harry gratefully sat, hung his reefer over the vertebral column of the hot seat and worked out how to continue.

"I was wondering if I could get any records you have of me ?"

"Do you have any identification ?"

"Eh ?"

"passport ? Drivers permission, no you ‘ re too untried for that. Your adoption certificate perhaps."

"Do I need one ?"Harry's script moved to his pocket and mercifully found that Draco 's wand was still there.

"We can ‘ t have records out to just anyone dear."

"Confundus."Harry whispered, then."Can you make an elision ?"

"Of ... of course deary."The fair sex shook her head like she was trying to reposition cobwebs then turned to her computer."What public figure is it ?"

"I don ‘ t have my epithet. Long write up, but it happened on Jan twentieth, nine age ago."Harry wondered whether he would need another Confundus to blow past the ‘ no name'thing, but the womanhood seemed to make it in her stride.

"Everything ‘ s on data processor now. It ‘ s very high tech."The char pursed her rim as she clacked away at her keyboard."When I started here we had rooms and rooms of data file box seat. Would accept taken eld to find a book like yours."

When would she birth started here ? Harry wondered. Was it possible she might have been there back when he was ?

"Here we are."The adult female squinted at the phonograph record for a mo then let out a throaty chortle."Oh yes, I remember."

"You ... you do ?"Harry felt his breathing spell quicken."You remember me ?"

"How could I forget ?"She turned to him with a motherly smile."Everyone here has a invariable monitor of your stay with us."

"Wh ... what ?"

"See the wall over there ?"She gestured out the window."See the barbed wire ? You may think it ‘ s to continue family out, but it was originally put up to hold you in. You kept clambering over the wall."

"Really."Harry didn't dare feel. Didn't dare Bob Hope. A living connection to his stolen past like this had been too a good deal to ask."I must have caused you all a lot of trouble."

"Oh you were a rapscallion you were."The old woman smiled fondly."I still remember what you said to me the day the telegram went up."

"What ?"Harry swallowed."What did I say ?"

"Well I said to you ‘ You know that wire ‘ s been put up just to restrain you in.'And you turned to me, cheeky as a monkey, and told me ‘ That ‘ s serious missy, ‘ cos the wall wasn ‘ t much of a challenge anymore.'”

Harry's heart broke and he fell into his hands. He felt tears blooming in his eye. He hadn't known what to await when he'd come here, but he had never expected this. He had never expected proof. substantiation that he wasn't some Frankenstein colossus, proof that he wasn't a bad copy of King James Potter. He was, and had always been, him. Arrogant, cocky, unrespectful of authority and filled with wanderlust. He. Was. Him.

"Dear are you alright ?"The old woman sounded implicated."Do you want a tissue ?"

"And you tell me ..."Harry swallowed and tried again."Can you order me my name ?"

"Oh, I ‘ m afraid you came to us without a name."She looked back at her figurer screen."We gave you the surname Malyn, after the orphanhood. Which is a traditional here. And for the kickoff figure we had to urinate that up. So we called you Jack."

Jack ...

Jack Match.

Jack Baltzegaurd.

diddly-shit Shakey.

labourer Caiman.

All those people, all those people he'd disguised himself as ... Jack.

His constant assumed name. The public figure that had always come to his lip when he knew he couldn't say ‘ Harry ’. It had been a memory board, a memory of the first rattling name he had. Not given to him by his parents surely, and apparently not magically binding. But a public figure. He still felt more like Harry, it was still the gens that came first to his rim but ... it was like that hole core inside him was filling. Filling with region of a aliveness he had though he had no storage of. It felt so good.

"I suppose you ‘ ll deprivation to go down and see it."The old woman was handing him a printed transcript in a booklet. Harry assumed it was his file. She nodded towards the backrest of the orphanage.

"See it ?"

"It was always your favorite place."The old woman smiled."It was where we usually found you when you managed to pilfer off."

Suddenly Harry knew, and with the knowledge came the unbearable pauperization to see if it was true. Harry stood suddenly.

"Yes, I do want to see it. Thank you."Harry smiled exhaustive teary-eyed middle."Thank you. thank you so much."

"My joy Jack."

Harry turned and hobbled from the room, it was only his aching wound and walking stick that stopped him from running. He reached the bottom of the stairs and pushed out the door. Pythea was already standing, like she'd known he was coming.

"We need to go that ... that way."Harry was breathing so hard all he could do was point vaguely.

"Lead the way."

Harry set off, taking them round to the back of the buildings. He could see it now, down the side a piffling. He stumbled down and stopped just before he reached it, just before he went beneath the shade of the Malus pumila Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree. The lilliputian polish up orchard of apple trees.

"My god."Pythea had her hand to her lip in seismic disturbance."It ‘ s real."

"It was a memory."Harry breathed, reaching out a hand to stir a branch."It was a memory. I kept having this dream where I was stuck in Godrics Hollow. But that billet felt all Weird, but if I could fall apart out and accomplish the orchard I felt dependable. Felt real."

"I though it was a creation of your mind, I never thought ..."

"Neither did I."Harry stepped beneath the branches and walked into the nitty-gritty of the plantation. He set his back against the tree and slid down, resting on the dry land. Pythea sat down next to him, resting her shoulder against his.

"It ‘ s very passive here."Was all she said.

Harry didn't trust himself to address. Couldn't speak. There were no words. They sat there for the foresighted time, the survive summertime zephyr filling running past them and rustling the leaves above their foreland. Eventually, after who knew how long, Harry spoke.

"Thea ?"

"Hm ?"She murmured. Had she almost fallen numb. Harry looked over into her beautiful mismatch eyes.

"Why did you trust me ? Right at the source ?"

"I told you, because you are good and-"

"But right at the beginning you couldn ‘ t have known all that."Harry pointed out."Back then I was a stranger."

"You were never a stranger."Thea smiled sadly."Do you sleep with how they choose the future oracle Harry ? They go around to all the magic family in Greece, looking for children with the inner eye. If they find one with enough exponent, with power enough to be Pythea, they take them back to the temple."

"take on them from their parents ?"Harry asked, shocked.

"The parents have a choice of class, but who would dare say no."Pythea huddled up against Harry's side."I was three, but I remember it well, another curse my talent gives me. My name wasn ‘ t Pythea then, but I was told that I could never use my old name, never speak it ever again. One day in art class I signed one of my painting with the old name, just a short mistake. The furiousness they had at me that day ... they burnt my flick, in front of my eyes. I never used the old figure again. After I finished my education I was allowed to go back and visit my parents. I went back to my old menage. They were very ... polite. They acted exactly the way I would expect soul to act towards The Pythea. When I tried to act like their daughter, they looked at me like I had done something untimely. Even to them I was supposed to be The Pythea ... even to them."

"Thea I never knew."Harry put an arm around her ( What the hell do I do ? She's not crying, do I offer her a tissue anyway ? Oh god what do I say ? )"It must have been heart-wrenching. I can ‘ t imagine-"

"You can reckon. Not that you have to."Pythea smiled up at him."That ‘ s why we were never strangers. Because we ‘ re the Saame, both orphaned. Both with our true indistinguishability taken from us. Both shoved into rolling and name calling we never wanted."

"Both forced to admit them."Harry nodded."Yeah, we were never stranger. We're the Lapplander, we ‘ re like ... rootless. We have no root. No past."

"Did you find out your figure ?"Pythea asked suddenly.

"I found out a name."Harry shrugged."But I think I ‘ ll hold back going with Harry, I ‘ ve carried it longer than the other now anyway."

"They took away who we are."She murmured.

"They took away our names."Harry corrected, brushing his bridge player against Pythea's expression."They can ‘ t carry away who we are. The names don ‘ t matter so much, you can call me Harry or Jack or Bob it doesn't matter. I know who I am."

"I wish I had your certainty."

"You do have it."Harry smiled."Because I know who you are. It ‘ s got zero to do with your name. You ‘ re just you. Any you ‘ re perfect."

"Harry ..."Pythea lifted up, short glistening tears in the corners of her eyes, and kissed him lightly on the boldness."Thank you."

Harry didn't really know what to do, other than to blush. A moment later Pythea seemed to gain something.

"Harry, did you just beat me at being profound ?"

"Had to happen eventually."Harry grinned cheekily.

"I ‘ ll get you next time."

"You ‘ re on."

Pythea smiled, lighting up her face. Harry bit his lip and asked.

"So, you ‘ re going to be staying in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland then ? For now ?"

"I think so. Are you ?"

"Yeah, probably."Harry rested his bridge player behind his head."Go back to Hogwarts maybe. I don ‘ t know if I missed the O.W.L.S."

"They begin next calendar week if I remember correctly."

"A week, think that ‘ s enough time ?"Harry scratched his head.

"Since it ‘ s all the rescript you would do anyway, I ‘ d say, yes. And after that ?"

"Dunno ... arrest in the commonwealth probably. I could do with a nice peaceful holiday."

"Harry you wouldn ‘ t know what to do with a peaceful holiday."

"I ‘ d know exactly what to do."Harry winked."As soon as I got there it would get a lot less peaceful, but a lot more fun."

crystallization laughter filled the grove, and lit up the leaves with light.
*


Bellatrix Lestrange bowed over her master's bed and cried, heedless of her tears staining the tabloid. She had done all she could, used every facet of her art, but her Lord still barely breathed. His tegument was suddenly white and only the wickedness magic she had woven in his pectus kept him alive. He was so debile, not even witting. It was terrible to see him like this, direful to see him brought so low. Better if he had truly died, then he could take risen up again in glory. Instead he was trapped in this prison of flesh. Better dead than to lie on this minute cot in a tiny room, not even fit for a concealment place. But she had to do what she could. She was the hold up, the last loyal death eater.

"I am all he has."Bellatrix whimpered.

"That is not the case."

Bella whirled, her wand snaking out. When she saw who it was she barely relaxed.

"You !"She fuss with spitefulness."Barty Crouch, you dare slink back after abandoning our lord !"

"I did not forsake him."The still boy stepped from the shadows, carrying a parcel under his arm."I was doing our lords good work."

"For a full year ?"

"It did take long than anticipated ... but it has been done. And in the nick of time too."The picket whiz strode over to the nighttime lord's sickbed and knelt beside it."I am your servant, superior, and I have done your command. Do not worry lord, I can wee-wee you strong again. Stronger than ever. With this ... we can rise again, the end eaters can rise again. The land will tremble master, shiver in fear."

Barty Crouch reached into his software package and pulled something out. Bellatrix felt her jaw drop.

"We can be stronger than ever master."Barty's face in the shadows was terrifying."stiff than ever."





Ye gods that was hard to write right. Or ... justly write. Write write ... some combination of those words anyway. It 's been a roller coaster I think you 'll agree, and the unmarried most massive twist of the total fic was finally revealed. Hope you liked it. People who were waiting to the end of this Holy Writ to review ... your time has come.

I 've already started writing the next book and It ai n't going well. I did n't do my usual thing of writing myself into a box. Instead I plotted the Quran out in progression and wrote to it. Unfortunately I got a few chapters in and realized that it sucked. The plot of ground made logical common sense and all, no plot-holes, there was naught tripping me up, no writer block, I just realized that the plot of land I had mapped out was a bit [ word I ca n't add without mature rating ] really. I had to go back and rework the thing. prescribed upshot : The write up is a lot stronger now I think. disconfirming outcome : I have to confound away a pregnant part of what I 've already written. Ah well, such is life.

Anyway *clears throat* the next tarradiddle is on it 's way. Our Harry has finally found out who he really is and begins walking his own path. Too bad that track is as deadly as the last. A new enemy hike, an old one lingers and a mysterious assassin is out for Harry 's blood. With Harry still injured from his confrontation in the department of mysteries he ca n't face these challenges head on. He may even have to initiate using his brain ...

Mysteries abound in the adjacent book of the serial Harry potter, The Harlan Fisk Stone and The Scorpion !