Harry watched from a window as four people from the Ministry approached. There was a brief commotion at the gate but then those people were let in. He went to the conference room. He wasn't sure if the others wanted him there but nobody dared to say anything.
The meeting started. The diplomat and his three associates in many meaningless words told them that the best thing for them to do is to let the things be. McGonagall and Kingsley reacted to it diplomatically but Harry didn't. McGonagall discreetly hushed and reprimanded him a few times for that.
Then one time, when she was doing so, the diplomat said, "If you would allow, I think Mr. Potter can speak for himself and that he is entitled to his opinions."
McGonagall turned to him with venom in her eyes but he continued, "In fact, I hoped that we could get a moment alone with Mr. Potter."
Kingsley broke his diplomatic decorum for the first time and exclaimed, "The hell you could! Do you think we are idiots?"
One of the associates replied on that, "We would like to know what he has to say when he is out of your hearing range. The Ministry believes that Mr. Potter is currently being manipulated by you, as he was manipulated by Dumbledore before..."
Harry laughed and then said, "At first you said that I had killed him, now you say that he manipulated with me, what's next?"
Harry drew Draco's wand and said, "Would you excuse us for a moment?" and casted a privacy charm. Then he turned to Kingsley and the others, "Did you search them?"
"We wanted to, but they refused. They didn't even surrender their wands. But we let them because it's only a diplomatic gesture from their side, they can't do anything with all of us here. And we have casted detection spells on them and they didn't have any portkeys or anything else that could be dangerous. Of course, it's still unthinkable for you to be alone with them."
Harry thought for a while and then said, "No, let's do it. It's possible that they really believe it and this could solidify our position in their eyes."
Before Kingsley could stop him, Harry lifted the charm and told the diplomat, "I accept. Let's go in the next room."
McGonagall stood up and voiced her objections but Harry was already leaving with the people from the Ministry. Disapproval of everybody even raised when they realized that Harry wanted to speak with all four of them alone and that they are keeping their wands. But somehow, Harry managed to keep them at bay and closed the door behind him.
"So, what do you want to talk about?" said Harry broadly when they were alone.
"We just want to ask you a couple of questions." said the diplomat.
Then they talked for a while. The people from the Ministry asked him questions about his last year and slightly hinted that he could be prosecuted for some things he did.
Finally, the diplomat asked, "We've also heard that you are in possession of items that we believe are pieces of advanced magical technology."
"Oh yeah, you think the cloak, the wand and the stone?"
"Yes." Said the diplomat with a smile.
"Well, I chucked the stone away. I don't know where it is. At the time, I didn't think I would ever return and tried to find it. As to the wand, I snapped it. Kingsley and the others saw the shards, you can ask them. And the cloak? That's a precious family heirloom. I've got it from my father and he from his father and so on. So I'm really not going to give it to you."
The others were disconcerted by his words but Harry continued, "But don't be disaponted. The first two items had no practical usage and the cloak was already examined by experts. The result are contemporary cloaks of invisibility I think."
The diplomat spluttered a bit and then said, "Potter, I don't know if what you said is true but if it is than it was really stupid from you!"
And then the diplomat tried to uncover Harry's lie by legilimency. He wasn't very good at it and the circumstances weren't ideal for him but that played no role. He had delved into several minds before. Some had been just a bunch of information and all he had had to do had been to reach and look at the right one. Other minds had been more organized - up to the point where he, with his feeble attempts couldn't achieve anything. But in Harry's head he found nothing else then inhumanly neat structure. He didn't recognize anything that resembled occlumency defenses but yet he couldn't find a single crevice. It was unsettling.
"What do you really want?" asked Harry.
Because the diplomat was silent, one of his companions said, "To find truth. We need information! Where are those three items, what really happened here, what are your plans and so on."
"You already know what happened." said Harry with a grin.
"Do you think we believe that bunch of fairytales about miracles? What you keep telling us is in conflict with the laws of magic. It simply can't be true because there is no such thing as miracle! We always knew you were Dumbledore's puppet and now Kingsley and the others are pulling at your strings!"
At that moment, Harry was reminded of his uncle and his "There is no such thing as magic!" He said, "Well, I wanted to find information as well and predict the plans of the Ministry. But I see that this is leading nowhere."
Harry swished with a wand behind his back and the room became acoustically insulated. Another swish and the door was locked.
"What are you doing?" asked one of the others in the room but Harry just assumed a combat stance. The others took out their wands. And then Harry attacked. At first, he held himself back and only stunned one of his opponents. He let two of them to occupy him and the third to revive the stunned one. But then he came down upon them in earnest.
His opponents weren't good duelers so he would take them all down by himself even before his death. But now, it was a child's play. The world went gray and colourfull at the same time (or maybe it was that way always). He had a feeling that he can sense every buildup in his enemies' wands and every movement of their muscles. Or maybe he dreamt it.
After a few seconds, the first one yelled in pain. His belly was bleeding and he fell to the floor, clutching at his guts. Then second and third followed. Harry left the largest one for the end. He closed the distance between them and from a point-blank range casted a spell.
Kingsley and the others quickly found out that something was wrong. In fact, they were waiting by the door for something like that with their wands prepared. They broke in. They were startled by what they saw. Five bodies lay on the floor and blood was everywhere. They ran to Harry who was slumped by the wall. When they touched him, he immediately moved and gripped Kingsley's neck. He opened his eyes, saw who it was and released his grip.
"That's you. Sorry." he said and stood up. He rubbed his head.
"What happened?" asked Kingsley.
"Well, they were assassins. They attacked me some time after we came in here. I wanted to stun them at first but they just used a reviving spell. So I had to use something more lethal. Then it all happened really fast. I wanted to capture the last one alive but he tried to attack me physically. I used a blasting hex but he was already at me by that time. Well, and as you see..." Harry lifted Draco's wand which was snapped in half.
"It seems that I am changing wands like socks. But since I defeated them then one of their wands should do." continued Harry and took one of the wands from the floor.
"They are all dead." said McGonagall.
"Are they total idiots?" exclaimed Kingsley. "This move of theirs makes no sense!"
"Well, they believed that I'm really only a puppet so they thought that they would succeed." replied Harry. "But otherwise you are right. How could they expect to kill me and then to escape out of here? It's like somebody made them forget about that."
Everybody fell silent. Harry looked at them and then asked, "What? You did check them on psychical spells, did you?"
The others looked at each other and then Kingsley said, "Well, it seems that nobody thought about that. I didn't think that the Ministry would try something like that. And there are ways how to achieve such thing even without lingering magical effect."
"Well, I didn't think about it either." said Harry.
When they returned to the conference room, Harry said, "Well I think that the intentions of the Ministry are now clear. The fight is inevitable."
The others murmured.
"So, it's the Daily Prophet them?" asked Harry and looked expectantly at the others.
Kingsley stared in a wall and then he said, "With our options, it will require a perfect planning..."
Harry grinned.
It was evening and the new issue of the Daily Prophet was almost prepared for the next morning. Redactors and reporters were finishing their job and some of them were preparing to go home. What was unusual (at least before the war) were the guards who were present in the building. They paced through the redaction and oversaw the work.
One of the redactors sipped from his coffee. Suddenly he started vomiting in his trash bin. A few people looked in his direction. When he wasn't stopping, more and more people turned their attention to him.
"Oh come on! That's disgusting!" shouted one of the guards.
When everybody was distracted, two stunners soared and hit their targets. More followed and before anybody could do anything, all the guards were down. The staff looked wildly around, with their wands drawn. Kingsley and Harry took off their cloaks and revealed themselves.
"Good evening." said Kingsley with a broad smile. "As you might already know, I am Kingsley Shacklebolt, your new minister. And this young gentleman here is Harry Potter, your saviour."
As he was speaking, a few order members came in. Kingsley wanted to continue but one of the redactors swished his wand and shot a curse at him. There was a brief skirmish but everybody who opposed them was soon stunned or disarmed.
Then Kingsley again addressed the employees of the Daily Prophet, "As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, we represent the new government which was established when Voldemort's regime failed."
People flinched at his name but Kinglsey continued, "You represent what's left of that regime."
Cries of disapproval filled the redaction but Kingsley silenced them, "Those of you who are responsible for the crimes of this institution will be dealt with later. Right now, we have work for you."
The building was secured and the work began. They had only several hours and a lot of editing to do. Some of the content remained as it was, some needed to be changed and some articles were removed. And several new ones were added. Apart from a brief rehash of things that people should already know (from Potterwatch or their friends), they also reported the recent development, including the assassination attempt on Harry. They also reminded readers that it was Umbridge's second(/third?) attempt to kill him. All the articles referred to the ministry in London as to "remnants of Voldemort's regime" and the group around Kingsley was pictured as an official government. They also hinted that Voldemort's followers might take over the Daily Prophet and continue with lie-spreading. Harry proposed that they could move the Daily Prophet away but when he saw all the equipment needed for running it, he gave up on that idea.
They finished their work in time and waited for the morning. Some time before sunrise, hundreds of owls took their packages and flew away.
Dolores Umbridge woke up. She was at the Ministry in London since she wasn't sleeping at home since the war ended. Her first thought was that she must find out if their envoys returned from Hogwarts already. She went to her office and looked at the new number of Daily Prophet. She already knew what was going to be there but she wanted to look at non-political articles.
She spitted her coffee out. The headline on the front page was: "Voldemort is dead!" and bellow that was a subtitle: "As are his Death Eaters but the war continues."
A number of wizards approached the building of the Daily Prophet. They were trying to be discrete since there were muggles around them. They were composed mainly of muggleborn-hunters but there were two aurors with them as well.
They rushed in. Without resistance they got inside. When they saw nobody they stopped and looked around. Suddenly fireworks went off and created a diversion. Then the attackers were ambushed. They realized that they fell into a trap but it was too late. Before too long, they were all stunned and some of them even died.
Kingsley scanned the bodies and frowned when he saw the dead. He wanted to avoid causalities.
"Okay, that's it. Now what?" asked Kingsley when he, Harry and a few others met later.
"Well, they'll try it again obviously." meant one of his comrades.
"We might have time to release one more issue but it's a risk." said Harry. "I certainly wouldn't be here when they come."
They began to work. They wrote about anything new and repeated in more detail what they didn't manage in the previous issue. They released their new issue a bit prematuraly and packed up. A few sentries with cloaks were left at the watchout.
After some time, a new wave of attackers came. They slowly crept in the building, careful not to fall in a trap. Suddenly a wail of police sirens reached the area. Sentries placed there by Kingsley were startled when they heard them and a few moments after that, the attackers inside the building were as well. The only one who wasn't surprised was Harry. He wasn't supposed to be there but yet he was. He walked away from a phone booth, hidden under his cloak. He found an empty alley and apparated away.
The police cars stopped in front of the building of the Daily Prophet and cops jumped out. They weren't ordinary cops, they were armed. The wizards inside couldn't apparate because of the wards. The cops rushed in and found the wizards who started to cast spells. The cops panicked and opened fire. The skirmish turned quite bloody in few seconds.
"How could that happen?" asked Kingsley at Hogwarts.
"Well somebody saw the attackers, found them suspicious and called police." proposed Mr. Weasley. "But that doesn't explain why armed cops arrived and opened fire."
"Maybe the caller thought they are from IRA?" remarked Harry.
Kingsley rubbed his brow and the said, "Well, now I need to go to the prime minister and explain everything to him in detail. I think I should have done that already since the Ministry might do the same."
"Phe! They are too arrogant to do that." disagreed Harry.
"Yeah." agreed Kingsley. "But we are still lucky that he knows me. I'll go soon."
"Wait." said Harry. "Should you really go alone? I think that I and maybe few others should go as well. And somebody should watch our back, the prime minister might be watched."
Kingsley agreed. One hour later, he, Harry and professor McGonagall visited the prime minister. A few order members were in the area on a lookout. Kingsley introduced his two companions and then they told him about everything that happened in the past year. The minister was both relieved and worried at the same time. They also discussed the possible actions. After a few hours, they left.
Later that day, Harry firmly decided to talk with Ginny. He knew that he should have done that sooner but various reasons had delayed him. After exerting some effort, he managed to corner her. She didn't look very happy, she was almost annoyed. Harry took it as a bad sign since he didn't know that she reacted like that to everybody.
"Gin. At first, I want to tell you that I'm sorry." said Harry to her.
"Yeah. Everybody says that nowadays. 'Sorry for your brother little one.' I'm starting to be sick of it." reacted Ginny rather too much harshly.
"No, no. I mean yes, I miss Fred too, but that's not what I wanted to talk to you about."
"Well, go on then."
Harry took a breath and after a bit of thinking he told her, "Ginny. I know that I wasn't treating you well in the past years. I could have been a better friend to you. And that's what am I sorry for."
Ginny sighed. She didn't know why he was bringing this up now when there was so much more important things to take care of. She said, "If you expect me to say 'That's OK.' then you are deeply mistaken! My life wasn't very good since you appeared and Ron started to hang out with you and Hermione. Everything started to turn around you. Before you came I never felt so alone. In my fourth year, I thought that things might turn better, that we might be even friends one day. But my fifth year took my illusions away. And this year? This year..."
"No!" interrupted her Harry. "That's not how it was!" He meant that he let her be because of her brothers.
"Oh yes it was!" shouted Ginny. "And there's a news flash for you and everybody else: while you were out there saving the world, I was stuck up in this shitty school! Do you have any idea what was it like in here? Do you think that those fucking muggle relatives of yours are bad? Then you think wrong! We were tortured on daily basis. One day I met a bunch of slytherins. When they realized I was alone, they attacked me. After one minute I was down on the floor and they were standing around me, casting curses at me and shouting at me. I was so afraid. Luckily Flitwick appeared and chased them away from me."
Harry stared at her. Her story totally dispelled any anger that had built up in him when he heard her accusations. Then he said, "Ginny, I'm really sorry for what you have been through. I don't want to detract what you've experienced in here. But I didn't come to argue with you. There is something I must tell you."
Ginny calmed down a bit. She was a bit sorry for what she said but she wasn't going to show it. She told him, "Okay. Out with it, I'm listening."
"Ginny, I... I... Ginny. What I wanted to tell for the past few days is that I love you."
Ginny stared at him. She blinked a few times and dumbly chuckled. Then she said, "Excuse me Harry? I think I didn't hear it correctly."
"I love you Ginny."
She again stared at him. Her brain refused to accept his words as anything else then a bad joke. And her heart? That was quite indifferent. "Are you serious?" she asked.
"Deadly serious Gin."
"Look, I don't know what do you expect me to say. Do you expect me to jump in joy? Well, I see no reason why I should. Maybe five years ago, but today? Frankly I don't understand why are you telling me this at all. Especially now! Couldn't it wait for a better time?"
"Ginny." interrupted her Harry. "I have loved you for a long time. Years actually."
Ginny had again some difficulties with comprehending of Harry's words. After a while she asked, "What? Are you sure? Because, you know, if it was true then I would surely notice, don't you think?"
"It's true! I loved you for years. I wanted to tell you in the summer before my sixth year."
"Yes? Then why you didn't?"
"Trust me. There were strong outer reasons."
"Yeah, I know, I know." said Ginny and meant Voldemort.
Harry was bewildered. She had known? But she had would say something if it was true. Before he could attempt to clarify this misunderstanding, a voice called from the door, "Ginny! There you are. Mum's searching for you." It was Bill. Without a word, Ginny turned to leave.
"No! Wait! He is doing it on purpose!" shouted Harry.
"Not now Harry." replied Ginny.
Ginny left and Bill entered the room. He was glaring at Harry for a moment and then he said, "Some people are incorrigible."
At those words, Charlie, Percy and Ron entered as well.
"We told you to stay away from her." continued Bill. "But you knew better. And what's the result? You've only upset her."
"You bastards!" roared Harry. "That's because of you! If I told her that summer, everything would be OK. You ruined everything!"
"Don't you dare to blame us!" yelled Charlie. "You are such a hypocrite! You tried to ruin Ron's relationship with Hermione. And she is not even related to you! And now you have an audacity to accuse us!"
Then Ron added, "I saw this coming for a long time. I'm telling you: stay away from my sister and stay away from me and Hermione. Or I'll tell her that you wanted to mess with her life."
Harry was enraged. They were the people he loved like his own family. They were the people he had died for! He took out his wand and cried, "You are going to regret this!"
The others took their wands as well and Bill said, "Come on, don't be stupid. Put it back at once."
Harry responded by a powerful stunning curse. Bill managed to conjure a shield but he staggered back anyway. Harry would get him by another spell but the other three boys attacked him with full force. It was probably his most intense duel since his death. He again noted how different everything was. The world was a blur of a gray background and of coloured pieces of information important for the fight. His brain was processing them calmly end effectively. Where his opponents used instincts, he used cool tactic. Maybe his vision was a matter of interpretation (after all, everybody's eyesight is an image created by their brains) but he was sure that he also saw things that he did not before his death. Bill, Percy and Charlie weren't using incantations but it made them no good. Harry saw every spell before it left a wand. It was even stronger than when he fought the "assassins". Harry's opponents started to loose their strength while Harry showed no wear. Ron was stunned. Percy wanted to revive him but Bill and Charlie were unable to give him a cover.
Suddenly Mrs. Weasley came and saw what was happening. She froze in the doorway and then shouted, "Stop it!" but nobody listened to her. And then she saw something she couldn't believe. Percy, who was trying to revive Ron, was hit by Harry's spell and it made a deep gash in his shoulder. Percy yelled and clutched his wound. Molly immediately shot a petrifying curse on Harry. Harry's senses detected it and because he didn't know who was attacking him, he conducted a counterreaction: a pirouette aside, light shield and a covering blasting curse. Molly barely managed to cover behind the doorframe. She was shocked and hurt by Harry's action.
"What are you doing?" she shrieked. Her feelings were evident from her voice. Harry finally heard her and froze. Bill's and Charlie's curses were absorbed by his shield. Then Molly casted another petrifying curse and scored a direct hit. Harry fell on the floor. Molly entered the room and barked, "What does it mean?"
Charlie caught his breath. He was hardboiled by years of making plausible excuses to his mother. He told her, "We heard Harry and Ginny arguing. We came here to see what was that about. Ginny angrily left and when we asked Harry what happened he was enraged and attacked us."
Molly raised seven kids so she was no greenie in handling kids' argues. Normally, she wouldn't immediately believe such a story. Normally, she would pull everybody concerned by their ears. But this time, with this Harry... She had enough. She went to Percy and healed him. Then she revived Ron. Finally she took Harry's wand and aimed it at him. She told him, "We saw this coming and we did nothing. We should have talk to you, Arthur and me, but we did not. You are like on a rampage!"
Then she released him and continued, "I shall keep you wand for now. And you will go to your dormitory to think about yourself. Do you have anything to say?"
"Yes." snarled Harry angrily. "Go to hell! All of you!"
"Now listen to me young men...!"
"I trusted you!" interrupted her Harry. "I opened my heart to you and you stabbed me in it. You hurt me more than Dursleys ever could!"
Harry pushed past Molly and ran away. She angrily called after him but to no avail. When nobody was around him, Harry threw his cloak on and drew the Elder Wand. He went out and headed towards the forest. When he reached it, he started to run. The rage was burning his insides.
"Don't worry, everything will be alright soon." whispered the voice of the two hallows he had. "Soon, we shall be togather. And then, you will be no longer forced to carry the burden of other people's expectations. No longer will you have to suffer their envy and malice. No longer will you be manipulated by them and used as a puppet. Togather, we shall be stronger than either of us could ever dream of."
Harry found the place where he threw the stone away and with a little guidance from the voice, he found the third hallow. He calmed down and said, "I should have heed your advice since the beginning."