Chapter X
Strike One
Disclaimer: Once again no I don't own Harry Potter.
Harry felt himself gulp down the air that was stuck inside his mouth, he could also feel his hands begin to shake, glancing to Hermione who had her own gaze upon him awaiting for him to confirm her fears, he nodded and suddenly his best friend soon became a member of the pale white club, Harry turned back to the headmistress and with a simple nod the older women leapt into action,
"Students, you need to keep calm and quickly follow Professor Sprout here", unfortunately few of the students were cooperating as they didn't understand what was happening, one of the younger Ravenclaws asked the question many were wondering,
"Professor what's going on", silence was heard throughout the hall, McGonagall rubbed her temple trying to think on her feet with minimal time left she decided on the truth as it would hopeful get the students to see reason,
"Right now I have it on good authority that You know who and his Death Eaters are on course for Hogwarts and will be here within minutes", no sooner had she said this did chaos break out as young children began screaming and crying and the older students began trembling in fear, the noise began to give Harry a headache but before he snapped McGonagall came to his rescue and she whipped out her wand and used a noise charm causing a loud bang to be heard throughout the entire hall, the students were momentarily still as they turned to the head,
"Students, try and remain calm, please follow Professor Sprout, she will lead you to safety", Sprout stood and quickly began gathering the younger students and leading them into the room behind the teacher's table, Harry glanced around and realised that several of the older Slytherin students were refusing to move, he had been worrying that the Death eaters might have some of their children in Hogwarts, looking around he wasn't that surprised by the ones that were remaining, Nott, Bulstrode, Crabbe and Goyle and a few other's that Harry couldn't remember the name of,
The next sixty seconds felt like an eternity as Harry kept his eyes locked onto the map, there were many names that were all over lapping one another that Harry couldn't really make out any names apart from one that was slightly ahead of the rest with the name Tom Mavolo Riddle, Harry felt a lump in his chest and nearly jumped in surprise when a hand rested on his shoulder, he looked up to see Hermione looking at him with expressive eyes showing concern, he gulped and nodded to show he was okay,
The last few seconds ticked away, Harry glanced around and readied himself, many of the older students were still in the hall, whether or not they would be fighting for Hogwarts or otherwise was the only question, Harry noted that many of the DA from his fifth year were getting their wands at the ready, leaning into Hermione he whispered instructions into her ear,
"Pick one of the Slytherin students and have a hex ready, I think their going to betray the school" he stated, Hermione looked a little sceptical but nodded nonetheless,
Suddenly the Great Hall's doors swung open and the reaming students and teachers came face to face with Lord Voldemort standing there looking quite smug with a small army of his Death eaters right behind him, for a split second Harry saw a look of confusion on the dark lords face, no doubt he was wondering where all the students were at the moment, however he soon recovered and began to speak,
"Students of Hogwarts, I bid you a good morn..", he was soon cut off when Harry was given a boost of adrenaline from the hatred he held for this person, with a speed that even a firebolt couldn't match he had whipped out his wand and cast a stunner at the dark lord, to the amazement of Harry, Riddle and everyone else the red beam of light actually hit Riddle square in the chest and whilst it didn't knock him out did send him flying backwards and was only saved from falling over thanks to his death eaters,
The smugful look that Riddle had had when he first arrived at Hogwarts was now replaced by one of pure rage and hatred as he turned to the caster,
"POTTER!" he spat, there was no talk, no demands and no bell as curses were thrown, first by Bellatrix who wanted to make Potter pay for doing such a thing to her master, this was the perverbial opening of the floodgate as the battle started, Harry dashed and began using his speed to avoid any curses his way, thankfully both Riddle and his army had been so pissed at Harry that they had forgotten about most of the others,
Harry noticed unsurprisingly that the Slytherin students he had suspected began hurtling curses his way but to his surprise so had a couple of Ravenclaws, thankfully everyone else had now joined the battle, Hermione quickly took down Nott who she had had lined up for a hex since Harry had asked her too, the DA students began a volley of spells that forced the Death Eaters to split in their pursuit of Potter and their
desire to remain standing for much longer,
Riddle strode in amidst the chaos and was about to start throwing as many killing curses as he could until he saw a blue beam closing in on him, reacting just in time he produced a shield and glanced over to the tiny Professor Flitwick who was now showing his goblin half and the well known duellist,
"Move aside you half bred mongrel!" Riddle snarled, Flitwick however refused to get involved in name calling and began sending volley's of spells at the dark lord hoping to stop him in his tracks, Riddle realising that Flitwick wasn't about to back down, growled in frustration at having being temporarily blocked from his true target and produced another shield and waited until the tiny man had to take in breath before unleashing a killing curse which the charms professor jumped out of the way of which did in turn hit one of his death eaters, Riddle was in trouble of having an aneurysm from the anger he was feeling and suddenly began sending multiple spells at the professor and the fight was truly on.
Harry ducked another bone breaking curse that Nott senior was sending his way, Harry had managed to take down both father and son Goyle with no trouble but Nott was proving to be a lot more difficult, Harry had also seen a few downed Death eaters simply be revived, what was he suppose to do, he couldn't just keep knocking them out as they would simply be revived, for a split second Harry considered killing them, but he had been taught that that was wrong but taking a moment to look around he saw several bodies laying lifeless on the floor and unfortunately most of them were wearing Hogwarts uniforms, seeing another killing curse hurtled towards him, Harry jumped over the Hufflepuff table and the curse sailed safely towards the huge banners, Harry saw an opportunity from under the table and sent a cutting curse under the table and towards Nott's left leg,
Nott screamed in pain and dropped to the floor, he grabbed his left leg and saw his foot was barely there and was hanging on by little more than skin, the blood was freaking him out as well as he was unaccustomed to seeing his own, Harry noticed the man had also dropped his wand and it had rolled away from him only to be trampled on and snapped by one of his fellow Death Eaters who was momentarily distracted by the crack and looked down to see the broken wand and was then taken out by a stunner from out of no where,
Getting to his feat Harry once again rejoined the battle as he noticed that cracked brain women Bellatrix was moving around like the lunatic she was.
Ooo~ooO
Hermione winced as she felt someone fall backwards into her hitting her leg pretty badly, so far she had managed to take down the Theodore Nott who she noticed was once again up and back in the fight, looking around she didn't like their chances at the moment, she noticed that Flitwick was giving Voldemort a true challenge whilst McGonagall was backing up the charms professor and not giving Riddle much breathing room, Hermione quickly cast the 'Glacia' charm and turned a small patch of the floor to ice and watched as one of the Death Eaters slipped painfully on the floor, the mask came on and Hermione felt her eyes narrow as Draco Malfoy was uncovered,
The boy turning to see who had knocked him down locked eyes with Hermione,
"YOU, you stupid Mudblood bitch!" he cried as he sent a killing curse her way, Hermione managed to duck just in time and sent a stunner back but hadn't had time to line up the shot properly and missed Malfoy by a decent margine, Malfoy too this moment to hit her with a Crusiactus to which Hermione suddenly felt herself drop to her knees and began to whimper in pain but refused to allow herself to scream, Malfoy with a look of euphoria upon his face seemed to forget everything around him as he was finally given the opportunity to put the know it all in her place,
"Yes, hurts doesn't it mudblood", he calm tone laced with venom, he walked closer to it and put all his hate into the spell, trying desperately to make her scream,
"Down on you knees like the bitch you are!" he psychotically cried, Malfoy let the spell continue for as long as he could enjoying every moment of it, he was just thinking about ending the curse and finally killing her when suddenly a sharp pain entered his throat as blood burst from it, Malfoy dropped the spell and grasped at his now cut throat desperately trying to stop the blood flow, Draco fell to his side and desperately tried calling for help to no avail with little more than gasps escaping his mouth, looking up he saw his soon to be murderer walking towards him.
Ooo~ooO
Daphne Greengrass had always tried her best to remain her composure and even after six years in the snake den she had almost always succeeded but today her anger was getting the best of her, When the fighting started she knew by the looks on her fellow slytherin seventh years that they weren't to be trusted and quickly took down Bulstrode before being sneaky and diving under the table, she also watched Hermione take down Nott a few milliseconds after and began casting as many curses as she could from under the table without being spotted,
Her good luck soon dried up however when one of the Death Eaters who had fallen over in the chaos spotter her and soon she was pulled back in, Daphne was far from stupid and knew that whilst she had decent duelling skills, this wasn't one on one with rules and was more than a bit overwhelmed by the anarchy and wasn't fully using her knowledge and skills,
She was soon hit with a bone breaking curse that she blocked with her left hand sacrificing it so she could still use her wand hand, however was the pain shot through her and almost collapsed but saved herself by catching the table with her good hand, thankfully the Death Eater who cursed her was unlucky enough to get hit by a stray Avada Kedavra from Voldemort himself, Daphne took a moment to quickly strap her broken hand and was soon offering support as best she could,
Within moment she came across the sight of Hermione on her knees in pain with Draco smiling like a mad man and taunting her, suddenly images of Astoria in Hermione's place haunted Daphne's mind, the idea that her little sister might be married off to this scum was unthinkable, Daphne looked down at her wand, even if they didn't win today she could make sure her sister was safe from this thing, no one would ever know either, with the noise and fighting around her no one would ever know it was her, taking a deep breath she lifted her wand and took aim at her prey and sent a cutting curse at Draco Malfoy's neck,
She watched as he dropped the curse as he fell to the floor grasping at his throat in desperation, Daphne assumed the boy knew no healing curses and even if he did she doubted he could cast them non verbally anyway, she slowly walked towards both him and Hermione her eyes staying locked on the blonde haired boy, his eyes finally found hers and she saw his face coming to a realisation, his face was turning whiter with each passing second as the blood was cut off from his head, his eyes narrowed one last time as he mouthed the word 'bitch' at her and his head flopped to the floor as he finally died.
Ooo~ooO
Neville discovered that doing his own private traing over the last year had actually been quite good for him, he had taken down two Death Eaters so far and had managed to save Colin Creevey's life who had been hit with a spell that Neville wasn't familiar with but the boy had been bleeding excessively from the stomach, with a bit of quick thinking Neville hit the boy with a Totalas and then used a healing charm that he had learned from all the cuts he had received from working in a greenhouse with dangerous plants, problem was it was for minor cuts and Neville had had to cast several to close the wound, he wasn't sure if the younger Gryffindor would be alright but he had done his best for him,
Neville glanced over to his right to see Ron Weasley still past out on the floor, Just as the fight began Neville had seen Ron trip over the bench trying to get up and had gone flying sideways over it landing hard on the stone floor knocking him out right away, Neville could see he was still breathing and unless he was mistaken actually snoring, shaking his head he stood once again and was about to join the mix when he heard a familiar cackle not too far away and felt the blood in his system run cold, a cackle he hated with every fibre of his being, his cold blood suddenly turned as hot as lava as he turned to see Bellatrix casting a killing curse hitting a sixth year Hufflepuff, Neville was about to raise his wand to his the women with some of her own medicine when suddenly from his side a bright green light engulfed him and he fell to the floor lifeless.
Ooo~ooO
Harry felt his cheek begin to bleed as a cutting curse raced by him barely nipping him, he sent back a stunner and watched as the Death Eater crumbled to the floor, He also noticed many people had dropped during the battle and wasn't certain who was who and right now he couldn't afford to worry, suddenly he could hear Hagrid's booming voice,
"You good fer nuthin evil gits!", Harry turned to see his giant friend punch one of the Death Eaters who went sailing a good twenty feet or so whilst another had a killing curse halfway incanted, Harry quickly sent a stunner at the guys back who flopped to the floor unconscious, Hagrid looked to see Harry making his way towards him,
"Harry yer alright?" he asked, happy to see his young friend still breathing, Harry nodded,
"Been better Hagrid but still I'm still standing" he replied truthfully, he was about to ask if her had seen Hermione or any of the others when he heard a mad cackle behind him, he turned quickly and saw Bellatrix smiles insanely and cried "AVADA KEDAVRA!",
On his best day Harry might have been able to avoid the curse but he was feeling drained and hoped if he ducked it might sail past, his giant of a friend however had other plans a shielded Harry with his large anatomy, stunner's and hexes might not do much to giants or in Hagrid's case half-giants but a killing curse could kill anything, Harry watched as his oldest friend dropped in front of him to the floor,
Harry felt his heart stop beating as the lifeless body of Hagrid laid in front of his, memories of time spent with the gentle giant flashed in his mind, memories of being saved from the Dursley's Hagrid giving him Hedwig as his first birthday present and all the times he spent at the man's hut or helping him with his creatures or just going to the man for advice, all of it brought to an end with one simple curse, Harry lifted his head to see Bellatrix watching him with a gleeful look,
"Oh, what's the mater Potty, did I hurt your feeli.." Harry didn't allow her to finish as he sent a reducto curse at the women, had he being paying attention he would have realised he cast it non verbally and with thinking, Bellatrix had not seen it coming and hadn't had time to react and was thrown back towards the side wall of the Great Hall, Harry noticed the women's limbs were twisted in ways they shouldn't have been, Harry didn't even have time to register what he had done until another voice behind him slithered,
"Time to die Potter, Avada Kedavra!".
Ooo~ooO
Tom Mavolo Riddle better known as Lord Voldemort had not been this angry since his revival in the graveyard had not gone the way he had envisioned, similarly, today's antics had not gone the way he had envisioned either, he had believed that this would have been simple, he would have had the younger students killed to invoke fear and then kill any who would dare stand up to him, he had also heard word that Potter was on his way to Hogwarts but hadn't put too much stock in this since he believed that the boy would remove himself from the castle, Snape had also told him that Dumbledore had placed some sort of task on Potter's shoulders that would have him out of the school, However it seemed something was amiss as the hall had been practically empty and the students were already silent as he entered and seemed to be expecting him, this hadn't been what he had been expecting and was even more surprised when Potter hit him with a curse that as much as he hated to admit it had winded him a little and caught him off guard,
Riddle found himself even more pissed when his loyal minion Bellatrix tried to avenge him, Potter was his and only his, he paid little to no attention to the war around him and honed in on the boy, he was however driven from his path by the annoying half bred charms teacher,
Tom forgot that Flitwick was a duelling champion and was getting a first hand reminder of that fact, it had been quite a while since anyone had put up much of a fight besides as much as he hated to admit it, Albus Dumbledore, Riddle couldn't help but feel his rage rise even further when the tiny man continued to meet him spell for spell and refused to stay still, Voldemort was used to his victims staying in one place and making it easy for him,
The battle raged on for several minutes and Riddle had managed to subdue that cow McGonagal who was now looking rather winded, Riddle was beginning to feel embarrassment from the fact that so far apart from one of his own death eaters he hadn't managed a single kill yet,
He was also starting to get worried as he was on a bit of a clock, his plan had been to take the school by surprise and then kill anyone in the way and have Severus take over the headmaster mantle and change the wards before the aurors arrived, he had a few people still in the ministry who were tasked to keep the auror force distracted for a while but if he didn't raise the bar a little soon there would be no time to see the plan completed properly and he would be forced to fight the entire defence department, Riddle was not stupid and knew if that did happen he would likely lose a good number of his followers which he needed to avoid for the time being,
Flitwick sent a cutting curse his way that hit him in the shoulder Riddle seethed as the sharp pain registered in his mind,
"ENOUGH OF THIS!" He roared, this also distracted a couple of nearby death eaters who were then taken down by stunner's from a couple of students, Riddle however paid no attention as he turned his wand to the still winded McGonagall,
"Avada Kedavra!" he cried, Flitwick however didn't folly,
"Accio Minerva", the older women was pulled by an invisible force forward, however in the time to save his friend Voldemort had lined up another shot at Flitwick,
"Avada Kedavra!", the green light soared out of his wand and this time the charms teacher couldn't react fast enough and was engulfed by the curse, his body simply fell to the floor with no sign of life upon his face, McGonagal was clutching at her midsection but her face was contorted of both shock and grief,
"Fillius no!" she cried, she turned back towards her friend and colleague's killer and had plans to turn the bastard into a beetle and then stamp on him, however her reaction wasn't fast enough as Riddle hit her with a stunner knocking the women out cold,
Riddle silently let out a deep breath of tiredness he was unwilling to let anyone see, he surveyed the carnage around him and was surprised to see so many of the students still standing strong, he would take care of all these little mongrels later but first he wanted to find Potter,
Heading towards the back left of the hall near the windows he witnessed Bella kill that great oath Hagrid and watched with undisguised glee as Potter's face filled with despair, that moment was gone however when Potter actually took down Bella with what appeared to be a silent reducto, for a brief moment Riddle haltered, did Potter know how to silent cast, he doubted it considering Snape never gave Potter much of a glowing recommendation, as did neither the young Malfoy,
Riddle approached Harry who still seemed to be coming down from a rage high, raising his wand he spoke,
"Time to die Potter, Avada Kedavra!".
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Harry was given almost no time to react but did managed to jump out of the way, however he landed awkwardly and Harry felt his ankle twinge with pain he gasped and accidentally dropped his wand causing it to roll a few feet away and fell to his knees, he looked up toward Tom who was glancing at his with quiet rage,
"It ends now Potter, your teachers couldn't save you, that half bred oath couldn't save you, you should have realised it could only end this way boy", Riddle approached Harry with glee apparent on his face,
Harry felt a sense of deja vu from his nightmare as Riddle casually walked toward him paying no attention to dwindling battle, Harry felt a rush of adrenaline pass through him and would not show fear to Tom,
"If you don't mind could you kill me and then brag" Harry snapped, Riddle sneered before taking aim at Harry from point blank range,
"Say hello to your parents for me Potter, AVADA Keda...oof!", Harry felt his magic flare up as his hand pointed towards his wand and summoned the piece of wood, he also felt all his magic rush down his arm and into the wand causing it to make a loud bang sending a dark stream of colours right at Riddle's stomach,
The Dark Lord had been in the middle of the killing curse when he felt a great pain overwhelm his ability to speak, looking down at his stomach, Riddle saw a hole and blood gushing out of him at an alarming rate.
Ooo~ooO
The battle of the great Hall was momentarily stopped as the loud bang from Harry's wand was heard throughout, many turned to see Harry on his knees his wand aimed at the dark lords midsection, many could actually see Potter's wand by looking right through Riddle's stomach which now had a hole nearly as big as a bowling ball, everyone stood in shock as the Dark lord gasped in pain and began to stumble back,
"Pot...Potter, you..you can't!" he cried the pain overwhelming him, some of the death eaters began cries of "My Lord" to their master who now appeared to be standing on pure will alone, everyone continued to watch as Riddle tried to raise his wand to curse the boy who lived but failed miserably as he staggered towards the wall and clawed at it trying to remain upright,
Harry wasn't sure who said it but a voice boomed throught the now eerily quiet hall,
"Look the auror's are here!" Harry turned towards the window and could see several teams of auror's running towards the main entryway, less than a minute away, this ultimately started things up again as Riddle finally found a bit of strength,
"You IDIOTS, distract them, someone help me get up!" two death eaters went over to their lord and began to help him up, however the majority of the death eaters began to run with only a few willing to follow their lord instructions, Harry tried to get back to his feet as well to stop the few he could but his body was now too tired to even stand let alone fight, he did however see the remaining teachers and students continue to battle as best they could, a few even took a few shots at the Dark Lord who now appeared to be hanging on by a thread, however they were soon cut down by Riddle who had just enough energy left to see himself escape the hall,
Harry wasn't sure how Tom planned to escape but he was dragged from his musings as he heard the yells and stamping of feet coming from the entry hall, Harry finally succumbed to his tiredness and fell to the floor, his last sight was of the Auror team appearing at the Great Hall entryway before engaging the few reaming death eaters,
Harry's could almost feel himself shudder from guilt from his final thought before falling unconscious,
"Thank you Hagrid and...I'm sorry"
Ooo~ooO
Author's notes:
I apologise for my absence but if you check my profile page you will see I have been updating you there, if you haven't then I'll explain briefly, I've been ill, the English summer made me very badly especially the heat wave we had, I also ended up injuring my back and caused my sciatica to flare up again, my asthma is still pretty bad at the moment but as began to clear up, thank f##k autumn is nearly here.
Holy shit I did not like doing a big fight scene, seriously this is the first time I've ever attempted something this big in terms of a fight scene and I never want to write one again, though I'm probably going to have to eventually.
Yeah this chapter is meant to set up the rest of the story for the most part but I'm going to be giving you guys more indication on my representation of certain characters next chapter when we deal with the fallout from this one, also I'm thinking Ron and Ginny's downfall might be sometime soon,
Now to address something I'm sure will piss off a few people, the deaths, the characters I killed off simply didn't have much of a roll to play for the remainder of the story, I wanted Flitwick to have a big send off since as a duelling champion I thought he should have at least been on par with Riddle in terms of skill, not power just skill,
Hagrid, as much as I hated doing it, I just didn't have a plan for him and I felt his death could fuel Harry's anger,
Draco, I wanted him dead and I felt Daphne had due reason to kill him,
Neville was the only one I was in two minds about but I realised I couldn't really use him the way I originally wanted to because of the way that this story sets up the sequel and why certain things will happen, essentially Neville was more used to me dead than alive.
If you have any questions as always post them in a review or a PM, I'm not sure when the next chapter will be out but it won't take as long as this one.
Oh and yes I did rush this just a little, it's my birthday on the 20th and I know I'm going to be distracted for a while afterwards so I wanted to get this done before then, plus it's a little gift for your guys from me.
Until next time, bye.