A/N: A strange little oneshot that wouldn't leave me alone. I don't own Harry Potter.
No one has ever survived the killing curse.
Harry has faced it twice. Once, in a cozy house in Godric's Hollow, surrounded by the corpses of his family before he was old enough to speak. Twice, in a clearing in a dark forest that reeks of death and terror and a quiet, unassuming acceptance.
He expected to die this time. When he was confronted by whiteness and the visage of his old mentor, he was confused. He expected darkness and coolness and calm, a vivid vision that stemmed from an unidentifiable place. Instead, he gets cryptic words and an unceremonious awakening on the hard, uncomfortable ground. There is something missing, he thinks as his body flops bonelessly, unaffected by the Cruciatus curse. His scar is hurting though, a vicious, searing pain that makes it difficult for him to think. He remembers his friends and his family and his mission, but deep inside his breast, a yearning for an infinite blackness thumps in time with his heart and grows larger with each passing minute.
The following events pass in a blur, obscured by the pounding in his head and in his chest that grows worse and worse. Somehow, he finds himself, wand in hand, facing the man that has walked in his nightmares and haunted his steps. The skeletal man raises his wand and Harry is unable to stifle his bitter, terrible laughter because in that moment, he finally understands. The connection to Voldemort, the pounding in his head, his imperviousness to Imperius and Cruciatus, the strange draw of the Veil…. The stick of elder sings a mournful tune; doesn't Voldemort realize? A glance at the man's angered face shows that he doesn't. Harry, still in the throes of laughter, because it makes so much sense, barely fires off a spell in time to intercept Voldemort's killing curse. The curse ricochets back towards Voldemort. It doesn't really matter. No one has ever survived the killing curse.
Malfoy's wand, of hawthorn and unicorn hair, drops to the ground, straight through Harry's hand, which is becoming transparent and hazy. Harry isn't an expert on spellcraft or magic theory, but he thinks he understands. The horcrux and his blood, anchoring himself and Voldemort to earth until one of them died. A quick switch seventeen years ago swapped a baby's soul for the fragment of a madman's, but the truth remains.
A breeze causes the dust to swirl into the air as the throngs of people stare in disbelief at the scene before them, the lack of Harry and Voldemort, gone like they never existed in the first place.
No one has ever survived the killing curse. Not even Harry Potter.
