Harry Potter: The End is just the Beginning

"I think... this is it."

Harry leaned his head to the side, staring with his one good eye at Ron. He coughed roughly, the dust in the air had accumulated in his lungs to a disturbing level. "You know... you may just be right."

The wounded red head dragged himself closer to his best friend, his legs in no condition to support him. "You think we got him?"

Harry shook his head. "Oh there is no way Tom survived that." He reached up to wipe some blood from his face, careful not do disturb whatever was left of his left eye after a Bombarda blew up the floor in front of him. A splinter slashed right through his eye and ripped his glasses off with it. He winced when he pulled at he wound. That wouldn't kill him, but collapsing veil just might.

Ron leaned against the fallen pillar he was sitting against with a loud groan. He must have broken a dozen ribs in all those explosions before the chamber got sealed. "What do you think... it will be like?" he asked Harry.

"Beyond the veil?" Harry asked, coughing once more. Ron nodded, so Harry answered, "I do not know. Sirius didn't return, and I'm sure he would have tried."

"So we... die, huh?" Ron asked, it sounded as if the words were quite foreign to his tongue, heavy as he had spoken them.

Harry looked up at the grey, vapor-like tear in their reality that hovered but a few inches above the solid stone platform it was perched on. The two pillars that had been responsible for containing the veil had been felled, one of them with it's powerful containment runes, had been used to forever bind Tom in it and was banished through the veil. He remembered how it had looked the last time he had been in here and it was now a far cry from it's former calm appearance. It rippled like the sea in a storm, its edges wavering, extending and pulling back in at uneven intervals. It also produced a distinct hissing noise and a lot of wind, Harry was sure that was also new.

"I guess," Harry answered after a long time.

This was the end. Harry hadn't imagined he'd die like this. He had actually thought that he would die fighting Tom in a duel or be killed by one of his damned Horcruxes. He didn't think he'd die not half an hour after it was all actually over. At least, everyone else was safe. Well, aside from Ron, who was breathing heavily in the dusty air. The rest had been banished out of the room by himself just as it sealed itself, Ron just had the misfortune of being on the other side of him.

"Hey... Ron?" he rasped, coughing again. Shit, did he taste blood?

"Yeah?" Ron slurred, sitting up to face him.

"Do you think... we could have avoided this?"

Ron's eyes returned the ever pulsing veil. "Maybe," he said, "But... I have no idea how else. I mean, could you have found another runestone as powerful as this one, with the right runes no less, then we could have done it differently." He laughed dryly. "But look at us, we didn't find one an now we're here."

It was true, Harry knew that, but it didn't make dying, or at least waiting for it, any easier.

"Will the others be ok?" Ron asked quietly.

Harry nodded tiredly. "Yeah, they're fine. This room seals itself completely. The whole thing could blow up and the outside wouldn't even shake."

"Hermione tell you that?"

Harry snorted. "Sure did."

Ron was quiet for a while. "I... loved her, you know?" he said, "I really did."

"I know, Ron." He coughed again, more blood. Dammit. "Everybody knew. I think even Hermione knew." He turned to see Ron stare at him in disbelief. "Really. She was, like you, too thick t admit it."

"Oh Merlin dammit...," Ron sighed heavily. "And I never even told her!"

"Oh she knew, it's fine." But it wasn't, Harry knew that this was not fine. Not at fucking all.

Ron groaned, but said nothing. He, too, was not fine with this, But what was there to do?

The veil shuddered visibly and the wind picked up, blowing up a lot more dust than it had been previously in the air. It caused Harry to cough harshly again, painfully too. The dull grey of the veil was picking up a deep green shimmer over time, a green that Harry couldn't place.

"Hey Ron?" he rasped.

"Yeah?"

"Are you scared?"Because he sure as hell was.

"I... I guess," Ron answered, "But it's uh... strange, more than its scary."

Harry nodded, wiping more blood from the left side of his face, wincing again as he eye burned in fresh pain. "Imagine... Imagine coming out of that and being... I mean... exiting where we sent Tom to and he's out."

Ron coughed. "Oh come one, Harry! I was just about to accept this!"

"We'd have to kick his ass again!" he laughed which turned into harsh coughing. "I swear, no rest even after we passed through the damn veil."

"That'd be classic," Ron agreed, chuckling. He stilled. "You think we could end up somewhere else?"

Harry shrugged, the motion pulled painfully at his left side. "They don't know what's on the other side, just that nothing ever returns." He coughed again, blood and other distasteful fluid flooding his mouth.

"So we set Voldy loose in some... some other world?" Ron asked incredulously.

Harry shook his head. "No, no, no... We sealed the snake tightly. No way he gets out... wherever." He was getting tired.

The air began to vibrate, the veil was visibly shaking. Their time was running out. "Ron...?" he croaked, his throat raw from all the coughing.

"Yes?" Ron coughed out.

"I... I don't know what happens after this but... you were my best friend," Harry said hoarsely, "My brother in all but blood. So... no matter what, I'll never forget you."

"Harry, I-"

But Ron didn't get to return the sentiment. The floor shook violently, the veil pulsed in an unholy green light that was at the same time unsettling and inviting in nature. The stone underneath them cracked loudly, an ear shattering noise, an it ore open between them. Harry lost all semblance of balance and was rolling of to the side, down the steep slope the moving floor had crated.

"Harry!" he heard Ron scream from the other side but he couldn't respond, the air was driven from his lungs as his back slammed hard into new even ground, the light of the veil now pulsing brightly above him. A sound like another explosion rang through the air and the ground underneath the veil broke away. Immediately the nebulous construct expanded in all direction.

It was fast approaching him, but Harry didn't have the strength left to try and avoid it. Where to would he? Would he meet Sirius on the other side? He heard Ron scream his name faintly one last time before the dark green light enveloped him and he knew no more and he passed through the veil.

A/N: I dunno why I wrote this, but I did. I intend to use this as the beginning for a cross over after I finished the first half of Jane's story.

Crossover Options:

The Witcher

Six of Crows

Lord of the Rings

One Piece

maybe even Naruto