Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to the Harry Potter world, all of the characters, places and ideas come from J.K. Rowling. I know Remus and Tonks were killed by Dolohov and Bellatrix but I changed that a little bit.
War is loud. The sound of fear and anger press against their ears as friends and adversaries fall to their demise. How could anyone survive this?
Tired and worn, Remus blinks the dust away from his eyes as he tries to see what is in front of him. Tonks is clutching his arm in desperation.
"What happened?" his tired voice croaks.
She looks around them with a look of dejection across her face. Her breath is labored and she seems to be injured. She points to the pile of rubble around them, "I pulled you out from under this pillar. It collapsed on both of us."
He glances down at the wound on my side. Focusing on it only makes the pain expand. He sees that she too is far more injured than he had initially thought.
He reaches his hand out to stroke her face, "Dora."
Tears begin to fall from her eyes. The strong, independent metamorphmagus begins to sob.
"I tried to pull you out, but I can't get us out of this area."
Remus tries to smile, "It's okay Dora, you did fine." He tries to sooth her like a professor would a forlorn student. But how can he sooth her when their world was just blown apart?
They're quiet for a moment, holding onto what remains of each other.
"I think we should paint our house blue," Remus whispers.
Startled, Tonks looks up at him, "What?"
"We should paint our house blue. You like the color blue. We can move out to the country, far away from everything and grow our little family."
"Remus," she whispers.
"You can help Teddy develop his metamorphic abilities."
"And you can teach him to read all of your books."
Their breaths became more shallow.
"I thought we would have more time," Tonks whispers.
Remus holds onto her tighter, "We don't need more time, Dora. Not in this world. These short years together have been filled with more love than I had ever hoped to experience."
Tonks sobs again.
"Sweetheart," he whispers as he forces her to look at him, "I want you to know, that even though I resisted for so long and fought against us so strongly, these past two years with you have been the best years of my life."
Tonks nods and tries to blink away her tears, "I know." She struggles to speak, "I love you so much, Remus."
He smiles, "I love you too, Dora."
"I hope Teddy grows up to be like you."
Teddy, their beautiful son, would now grow up in world broken from war. What would happen to him?
As if following her train of thought Remus replies, "He'll be a beacon of light against all of this darkness."
"He won't have us."
Remus shook his head slightly, "No, but they will take care of him, they will tell him of us and he will never be without love."
This is what they hope for. Yet, the terrible truth was that there lay the possibility that they would lose. If Harry fell and Voldemort won the world left behind for their son would be unbearable and it would probably be a world that he would not survive in. In a way they were fortunate to be out of time, because the time ahead, regardless of who won, would be something very painful to bear. It will be an era stapled to a list of casualties where the living will have to survive their survival.
Fatigue lay heavily on them as they leaned against each other. As young students screamed in terror, as families lost children, and as fear was beginning to win, the hearts of Remus and Tonks silenced. The sound of war is loud, but the sound of death is quiet.
One day Remus and Nymphadora will be names distributed in history books which will talk about their sacrifice for an important cause. Their authors won't write about the son who was left behind parentless nor will they mention the pain and the worry they felt when time ran out. They will talk about perseverance and their resilience to fight. There will be no mention of a blue house in the country side that sits away from the rest of the world.
