Chapter 26: Raid on Princeton

A/N: My attempts at getting this done by its year anniversary is going well. I'm not sure how many chapters there will be after this - probably only two or three. We're almost there, guys! Thank you for all of the support and love so far. :)

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or House MD, but if Hugh Laurie is up for grabs, I will most certainly take him.

Regulus reacted quicker than he expected himself to. The fact was, he had been Robert Chase - a seemingly powerless Muggle doctor - for a decade and a half. When you act like something long enough, eventually, your skin grows over the mask. You become what you pretend to be.

He was Robert Chase, the Australian intensivist who had worked under the greatest doctor in the world for three years, and he was a surgeon who saved lives on a daily basis. He'd be damned before he let himself be murdered by the shell of a man in front of him.

So, taking all that into consideration, he forewent Lucius' wand and kicked the greatest dark wizard of all time in between the legs. Voldemort let out a hiss of breath and dropped his wand for a split second, just long enough for him to bring up his wand and send Voldemort flying backwards into the check-in desk, barreling over it with a crash and a bang.

He'd just gotten the upper hand on the Dark Lord. Very nice. He could only hope that his luck would continue. A second later, Voldemort was back on his feet, enraged, and firing a blast of emerald flames at him. He narrowly dodged out of the way, rolling as the fire scorched the wall where he had been standing.

"Incinerandum!" he shouted, sending a blazing fireball towards Voldemort. It was high time he started fighting fire with fire. It had been a long time since he'd said a spell out loud, and Lucius' wand produced a much larger fireball than he predicted. It flew towards Voldemort, but the dark wizard deflected it with a flick of his wand before sending a bolt of electricity his way.

"Protego!" he shouted, diverting the lightning bolt just before it would have hit him straight in the chest. The strength from the magic was absorbed by the shield, but it was so powerful that it continued to arc up his arms, sending him back against the wall with a groan. He was fighting a wizard that was several dozen times stronger than he was by himself, and he realized at that moment how lucky he was that he was still breathing.

He just needed his luck to hold out until he figured out how the hell he was going to get himself out of this. He put as much energy as he could into his shield, and it managed to hold off the next several attacks before shattering under another emerald fireball. He felt the searing heat wash over him. Thinking hard, he Apparated directly behind Voldemort and out of the fire, though he could feel that his eyebrows and the hair on his arms had been singed.

"Lacerivosa Tissio!" He slashed Lucius' wand in an uppercut motion, and Voldemort hadn't had the chance to turn around before the sleeve of his robe was ripped open and a splash of blood splattered across the reception desk.

"Insolent fool!" Voldemort screamed, enraged, before sending him flying backwards with a gesture of his wand. His head hit the wall hard, and he saw stars in his eyes as he fell to the ground in a heap. Voldemort was encroaching on him quickly. He struggled up and quickly scooped up Lucius' wand, which had flown out of his grip. He brought it up just as Voldemort raised his own wand.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" he bellowed at the top of his lungs.

A moment passed.

Nothing happened.

"Mad-Eye Moody," Greyback growled, having just tackled him to the floor. He had tried to head off the remaining Death Eaters that were making their way to House's office. There had been ten of them, and he had managed to take out four of them before he took a binding curse that had his arms and legs frozen, he was on the ground, and at the mercy of Fenrir Greyback. "The Auror that stuck half of us in Azkaban after the Dark Lord fell. Oh, I'm going to relish this."

"Eating when it's not the full moon now?" Moody asked, refusing to be intimidated by the werewolf. A feral grin formed on Greyback's face before he motioned for the remaining Death Eaters to continue on.

"Find out where Potter is, then kill them all. Except the Muggle girl... I want her for a late night snack," he ordered them. They all nodded in unison before departing down the hallway.

"You seem to have forgotten something," Moody said, voice low and threatening. Greyback looked back down at him, and he could feel his moist and fetid breath on his face.

"Oh? And what's that, Mad-Eye?"

"Almost all binding curses break when the caster moves out of a fifteen foot radius of the victim," he explained. "Including the one your lackey just threw at me." With that, he punched Greyback hard across the face, sending him reeling backwards. He managed to reverse their situation, and he had Greyback pinned to the ground. He felt Greyback's claw-like fingernails rake across his face, but it didn't stop him from getting his wand to the werewolf's throat.

"It's high time you get put down, Greyback," he said in a deadly whisper. No, the Order did not kill indiscriminately, but Greyback was one of Azkaban's most wanted, and he had taken so many lives and ruined so many more, including Remus', that he deserved worse than death. Unfortunately, death was all he could give him. "One werewolf's life for another... Remus was worth a thousand of you, you sick bastard." With that, he drew his wand sharply across the exposed skin of his throat as he thrashed underneath him.

His blood drained quickly. Barely a minute later, Fenrir Greyback was at his feet, pale and unmoving. Good, Moody thought murderously. Now it was time to head off the Death Eater's that were no doubt continuing on to House's office. Thankfully they hadn't seemed to have figured out where Harry's ICU room was. The room had been warded so thoroughly that he doubted they would be able to get through the door, anyway.

Just as he turned the corner to head towards the elevator, he heard a cataclysmic crash from the floor above, the third floor, and the entire building shook.

House sat at the differential room table, brooding as he heard explosions and shouts echoing from other parts of the hospital, and he smelled the pungent scent of smoke wafting from somewhere. He was not liking sitting on the sidelines. What if the explosions were coming from Harry's ICU room? What if Wilson and Thirteen were being burned alive at this very moment?

He wasn't usually one for concern, but this was definitely a situation where it was warranted. "So what," he said, drawing George, Cameron, and Hermione's attention to him. The young witch had been hovering nervously by the door with George at her side, and Cameron was still sitting in the chair next to him at the glass table. She'd been looking increasingly uneasy for the past fifteen minutes. "We just wait here and hope the Death Eaters don't level the place? It sounds like World War Three out there."

George shrugged, less cheerful than usual. "Hopefully Moody's handling it. Not much else we can do but wait."

"We can fight... there's got to be a way to fight..." House muttered, more to himself than anyone. He'd be damned if he was just going to sit here and let his hospital get burned to ashes. Okay, well, technically it was Cuddy's hospital, but still.

"House, not that your cane throw back there wasn't impressive, but that was a fluke. They've got magic on their side. We don't," Cameron told him, frowning slightly.

"Foreman, Kutner and I managed to fight them off back in London," House argued. "Was that a fluke? Considering that I'm still breathing, I'd say no. We did have a black guy on our side then, but nonetheless I think we can get by without him."

"I do hate to be the one to point this out, mate, but they got captured, didn't they?" George cut in, and House glared at him.

"Shut it. I-" House was interrupted by the sounds of yelling from farther down the hallway.

"Bollocks," George cursed. "We've got company." As if on cue, five Death Eaters became visible in front of the glass, wands all raised and pointed directly at them. "Let's hope for all our sakes that you knew what you were doing with those wards, Hermione."

"They'll hold for-" Five bright spells of varying colors all crashed against the glass. There was a momentary silver glimmer, and the shield seemed to hold. "They'll hold for a short time, but against five dark wizards it'll only buy us a few minutes, if that. There's got to be some way we can get out of here. The balcony, perhaps? We can levitate the four of us to the grounds and Apparate somewhere safe," she proposed, but George shook his head.

"We can't just leave Mad-Eye and the others," George said. "We're just going to have to fight them off." A bright flash of navy blue crashed against the wall, and the entire room shook from the aftershock.

"But House and Cameron-" Hermione began to protest, but House stopped her with a hand. He gestured with his cane towards the door to the balcony.

"You can climb over a divider and get onto the section of the balcony that's outside Wilson's office. We can go through there, circle around back. If we flank them, we have a much better chance," he offered, rising from his seat. Cameron did the same.

"Not liking the 'we' part, but it sounds like the best chance we've got," George said, looking to Hermione for confirmation. Before she could respond, however, the glass of the differential room wall and the wall between House's office and the exterior hallway were blown to smithereens, showering the four of them in a torrent of shattered glass. The blast also propelled George and Hermione, who had been standing closer, back against the opposite wall. The shocks sent House and Cameron to their knees.

Oh, shit.

Thinking quickly, House grabbed the edge of the differential table and flipped it so he and Cameron were behind it, and it made a sort of makeshift cover for the two of them. Out of the corner of his field of vision, he could see that Hermione was slumped over and unmoving against the wall. George was scrambling to his feet, shouting "Protego!" over and over again as if his life depended on it, which, in retrospect, it probably did. He could only guess that it was some kind of shielding spell, as the projectiles sent by the wands of the Death Eaters were bouncing off of it.

George turned his head to the side, blue eyes bright with fear. "TAKE HERMIONE AND GO, I'LL COVER YOU!" he shouted, just as he dodged to the side, narrowly missing a green jet of light that House identified as the Killing Curse. House, deciding that if there was ever a time to run, it was now, grabbed Cameron by the shoulder and pulled her roughly with him as he rose to a standing position. His leg screamed in protest at the sudden movement, but he did his best to ignore it.

A ball of dark red sparks almost grazed his ear, and he bent down, hoping beyond hope that his luck would hold out long enough not to be hit. He unceremoniously shoved Cameron towards the sliding door that led to the balcony, and she seemed to get the idea, scrambling forward to escape. She was saved the trouble of having to open the door, as a wayward spell obliterated the glass.

"WHO THE HELL THOUGHT IT WAS A GOOD IDEA TO MAKE EVERYTHING IN THIS OFFICE OUT OF GLASS!?" House burst out angrily as Cameron stepped through the now empty doorway.

He heard a shout of agony, and he quickly looked back to make sure it wasn't Fred, but saw with a feeling of relief that the twin had managed to take out one of the Death Eaters. He dived towards Hermione, scooping up the small girl in his arms. Thank God she was young and fairly petite. Struggling with the agony eating away at his thigh muscle, he followed after Cameron. As he stepped out into the mid-afternoon sunlight, he felt a sharp pressure in his back, and then the sensation of electricity arcing its way painfully up his shoulders. He'd been hit.

He stumbled, his leg and back combing to send him down. He gripped Hermione tightly, making sure not to drop her. Damn it, I can't get back up fast enough, this is it, I'm going to die, I'm finally going to die.

He struggled to his feet, expecting the green jet of light that would mean his death to come any second. Instead, however, he heard a resounding crack that seemed to echo through the entire hospital. He looked back, just long enough to see the four remaining Death Eaters surrounding George look upward. The Weasley twin had his wand pointed at the ceiling.

Before House even had a chance to register what George had done, the entire ceiling collapsed, a shower of plaster and concrete tumbling down in a cacophony of screams and crashes. The next thing he knew, a slender hand was wrapped around the sleeve of his jacket and was pulling him towards the divider between his balcony and Wilson's. Cameron motioned for him to pass Hermione to her. Cameron held the unconscious witch up by her armpits while House eased his crippled extremity over the divider, which was followed by the rest of his body.

He grabbed Hermione's feet, and together, the two of them made their way to the door to Wilson's office, which House opened with his elbow. Once they were inside and the door was shut behind them, both of them breathed an enormous sigh of relief. They deposited Hermione on the couch. He turned his eyes to his former employee. Cameron's dyed blonde hair was a flyaway mess, her lips were pursed in barely controlled fear, and a corner of her blouse sleeve was singed off, an angry red blotch on the skin it revealed. She wasn't in good shape, that much was obvious.

"We should probably check and make sure that she's alright," Cameron said, gesturing down at Hermione. House nodded dimly, making his way towards Wilson's desk. He easily picked the lock, and a second later, he had his best friend's backup penlight in his hand. He limped slowly back over to the couch, instantly regretting his choice to abandon his cane in the differential room. Brushing past Cameron, he peeled back Hermione's shut eyelids one eye at a time, flashing the light in front of them.

"Pupils are equal and reactive. She's just unconscious, no concussion. She should wake up in a few minutes," he said, sliding the penlight into his pocket. He limped behind Wilson's desk and collapsed in his chair, sliding back slightly. Cameron followed him, sitting on the edge of Wilson's desk, facing House. Their knees were brushing.

He could still hear the sounds of destruction in the distance, and the hospital shook occasionally, but they weren't as close as they were before. However, stepping out of Wilson's office and into the halls of PPTH sounded like a suicide plan, and he really preferred living.

He looked at Cameron. She was shaking slightly, and she was paler than usual. She was terrified, even though she was clearly trying to hide it.

"Well, this isn't how I imagined going out. Being chased by dark wizards, cowering behind Wilson's desk." Just to ease the tension, he sniffed the air in an exaggerated way. "Ugh, he must spray Eu de Oncologist on this place on a daily basis."

"House?" Cameron said his name suddenly, pale blue eyes looking into his own in a desperate kind of way.

"What?"

"Can you please lie to me?" she asked quietly.

House shrugged. "Depends on what you want me to lie to you about. Even I have standards, you know."

"Just tell me that we'll make it through this," she pleaded with him. "Tell me that we're not going to die here. Please, please tell me we're not going to die here."

House just stared at her, contemplating her words. The fact was, he couldn't tell her that, because he was fairly sure that before the day was out, they would be killed. They had no idea about the whereabouts of Moody, they didn't even know whether Sirius and Regulus had survived their trip to Malfoy Manor, they didn't know whether Wilson, Thirteen, Fred, Ron, and Harry were alright, and on top of that, George was quite possibly dead.

Things were not looking good, and in spite of the fact that everybody did indeed lie, he didn't feel like now was the time for him to look Cameron in the eye and tell her that everything was going to be peachy, because it wasn't. Instead, he put his hand around the back of her neck. Her eyes widened slightly in confusion. He brought her head down so that their faces were only an inch away from each other. Throwing all caution to the wind, he pressed his lips against hers. They were warm.

It was tender, he supposed, as kisses went. It wasn't a promise. He wasn't even sure if it was a sign of affection. Maybe it was just his way of saying, "Yeah, we're probably going to die."

After a long moment, Cameron pulled back, breathless. "What was that?"

He traced a circle on the back of her neck with his thumb. "The best I can give you."