Author's Note: I am not and have never been J.K. Rowling. I can only attempt to embellish the world that she has already skillfully created. I hope that what I have built upon her foundation is amusing or otherwise entertaining. I apologise in advance if I make any factual inaccuracies and I hope that you, dear reader, will review this story to let me know if and when I do so that I can correct my errors! Last, but not least - Thank you for reading!

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"AVADA KEDAVRA!"

Everything was silent. For one complete moment the noise and the chaos was suspended. It was as if, for an instant, the world had stopped spinning.

Then, suddenly - an explosion hit her body with full force and knocked her off her feet. She felt the blistering heat wash over her, felt the sting of glass and shrapnel burrowing into her skin. The blinding light burned orange through her eyelids and seared through her. It was only moments between the stillness, and the instant fire that descended upon her relentlessly, suffocating her.

She tried to call his name - tried to scream. Her throat burned and lungs ached for the air that she couldn't seem to find. Blind and deaf from the explosion, she screamed silently, clawing at the rubble around her to find something, but here was only glass - glass and blood.

The year was 1998. The Dark Lord was once again in power, and the wizarding world lived in fear.
Life had become static. The world as it had been known for centuries had, seemingly overnight, ceased to exist. Cobblestone streets once bustling with community were now decaying; skeletons of war. The schools once teeming with bright young witches and wizards sat empty. Society crumbled to a fragment of what it once had been.

It was shortly after midnight on the second of May when the battle of Hogwarts commenced.
Harry Potter, the boy who lived, faced Lord Voldemort in a final duel to determine the fate of the world.

When the irrevocable words were at long last uttered, thousands of spectators stopped and turned to witness their fate.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!"

A blinding green light spat out from the wand of the Dark Lord and streaked across the sky to land triumphantly on the chest of Harry James Potter.
Bodies were flung backwards in the heat of the explosion that followed. Brick, glass, and shrapnel flew in every direction, tearing apart bodies and spraying the landscape with the smell of death.
For a moment, nothing happened and no one moved - No one but an inconsequential grey tabby cat darting through the rubble to reach a small crumpled heap that fell closest to the explosion. The heap lurched up - It was a girl, or at least the shadow of what once was.

Her eyes opened, unfocused, as her blackened fingers wildly searching through the broken glass and ash on the ground, reaching for someone - anyone.

The tabby cat shuddered and expanded, it's dishevelled fur molting to make room for a dark velvet cloak. Moments later a woman was kneeling in it's place, her grey hair flying in several directions. Ash and dirt were collecting in the creases of her tearstained face. She looked worriedly ahead of her towards the flaming wreckage, and then back at the young witch in front of her who was sputtering and gasping, her open-mouth screams only as loud as a whisper in the mayhem.

The older witch reached out to grasp the young girl, who lurched back at the feeling of her velvet cloak. The weakened teenager shivered and shook under her grasp as the shock set in, but there wasn't enough time for the woman to be concerned with that. The older witch whipped out her wand and with a swish of her wrist, Minerva McGonagall and Ginny Weasley disapparated from the rubble where Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry once stood.

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Author's Note: That's it for now! It was a short first chapter, but I can assure you that the rest will be longer. Please consider reviewing to let me know what you think. All constructive feedback is welcomed and appreciated!