The now familiar sensation of travelling over the Floo network gripped him. Once again he was spinning and rushing forward with fireplaces all around when suddenly he felt a jerk. He was now traveling in a very different direction, clearly his route had been tampered with. Before he could do anything about it, not that he really thought there was anything he could do about it, he was hurtling through a fireplace. He fell on the ground, not having been expecting such an abrupt shift. He heard a crash as he hit the ground. His glasses were thankfully intact. The ground was cold, hard stone, the room was dark and it felt damp, like a cave despite the fire burning right behind him. Harry was fairly sure this wasn't the Burrow, still he looked up, hoping to see a flash of red hair and four smiling faces looking down at him. Six masked, cloaked figures looked down on him, snickering.
"We almost believed you had thought better than to go to your friend's house, we've been waiting for quite a while now." Said one, casually pointing a wand at him.
Harry pushed himself to his feet, the wand gave a twisting motion and Harry was blasted backwards off his feet. His head rebounded sharply off the hard stone of the mantle. Stars exploded behind his eyes . He vaguely heard shouting somewhere in the distance. He felt as if he were floating momentarily and then suddenly he was on his back and he felt something warm and sticky rolling off the back of his head. One of the dark figures appeared over Harry.
"He's not even unconcious."
There was a short silence before another figure appeared above Harry. This one laughed with a short, feminine laugh before removing it's mask.
"You!" Harry cried out when he realized who it was. He leapt to his feet and lunged at her throat with speed borne of Quiddich training and strength born of pure rage. Belatrix Lestrange looked suprised as Harry's hands closed around her throat. Before he could get a good throttleing going he heard a muttered "Crucio" to his left and before he knew it every nerve in his body carried an urgent message of pain to his brain. His knees buckled and once again he fell ungracefully to the floor. He didn't have time to struggle to his feet again before he felt the tip of a wand prodding him in the back of the neck. A now distinctly feminine voice called out "Crucio"
If his first taste of the Crutacious curse was painful, this redefined his idea of what the word pain means. Pain flowed out from the spot where the wand was touching his skin in waves. Every muscle in Harry's body siezed up, causing him to thrash about violently on the floor. It was almost a full minute before the wand was let up and the echoing pain started to die down.
"I am in control here, if you try to lay a single dirty mudblood finger on me again you will find a world of pain before you die." as if to emphasize her point she jabbed him in midback with her wand and again performed the Crutatious curse. With the wand in this position it no longer issued waves of pain at predictable intervals, it caused a line of pain up and down his spine, each time it got to his brain the world lit up with the fires of agony. At the third iteration of this method he finally cried out in pain as it got to his brain once again. At this point Belatrix withdrew her wand and began to laugh.
"I had nearly forgotten how lovely these screams of anguish are. As you can probably tell I am one of the chief experts in the wizarding world in causing pain. Of course we've had quite an opportunity for a lot of practice. I believe you've met Mr. and Mrs. Longbottom." Belatrix laughed, "Do you know how long it took my husband and I to destroy their minds?" She asked in a cruel, falsely sweet voice. Harry didn't answer.
"Come now, take a guess." Belatrix said, almost teasingly. Harry still did not answer.
"The Longbottoms were quite as reticent as you while still sane, now that they are mad they will probably never say anything again." Belatrix continued.
"If you want to share their fate, by all means keep your lips sealed. But before you are completely mad, where is the base for the Order?"
The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix is located at number twelve Gimmauld place, London
Flashed through Harry's mind, he had to avoid telling them that if it cost him his life. A wand touched the back of his shoulder. The pain had begun again, this time it was a sort of dull pain, and he wondered why she was doing such low impact spots of pain if she was a master of causing pain as she claimed. He found out when she dragged the wand down his arm. The feeling was as if a knife was slicing him open all the way to the bone all the way along the path she traced with her wand. When she got to his elbow she gave the wand a slight twist, causing the muscles there to sieze painfully as if he had just sprained his arm at the elbow. He kept a leash on his cries of pain as much as he could, knowing that it was this that the horrible woman was looking for. After several more passes up and down his arm, after which Harry was certain his arm was cut to ribbons, she let up. Harry sighed with relief when he touched his arm to find unbroken skin.
"Now, I will ask again, and you had better answer this time. Where is the Headquarters of the Order?" Harry once again refused to answer. And so it went, that Belatrix would torture him, then ask him the same question and he would not answer, again and again and again. Soon, her husband joined in, and two wands were an order of magnitude more painful than one. Eventually he could no longer retain his screams, but he could always keep himself from saying what they wanted him to.
He was never allowed a real break, but there were times when his two torturers would converse with the rest of his captors. They would talk about how they would enjoy killing all those he held dear. Ron would apparently be torn limb from limb, then beheaded. Hermione would be drowned in mud, then run through multiple times, so she would become a true mudblood. Mr. and Mrs Weasley would get their necks broken, then their skulls bashed in, but not before they had their 'fun' with Mrs. Weasley in front of her husband. Ginny's fate was the strangest, they would hang her upside down, with her wrists slit, over an open cauldron. They would force her to drink blood-replenishing potions until the cauldron was full. They would then drop her in and boil her in her own blood. Fred and George would get their tongues cut out and be tortured while they bled to death. Dumbledore would be crucified over the course of several weeks, not allowed to die to end his pain for that whole time.
Harry had rolled onto his back while they had been talking back and forth over this, he was breathing hard from all the torture he had been put through, but he focused on the anger he felt at their casual talk of hurting his friends and loved ones. Belatrix came back to his side, no longer really expecting him to answer she simply smiled at him and bent down to place her wand on his side. Harry lashed out, catching her in the face with the toe of his shoe. Using his momentum to roll backwards onto his feet he whipped out his wand which had laid undiscovered the whole of the time he had been in this dark, dank room. The four Death Eaters seated around a table stood and pointed wands at him. Harry shouted, "Protego" at the top of his lungs. Though it came out hoarse because of all the screaming he had done so recently, it was the best shield charm he had ever done. The four stunning curses fired at him bounced away at random angles after hitting an invisible barrier in front of him. The confusion as the Death Eaters scattered to avoid their own stunning spells gave Harry a window of opportunity. He dared not use the fireplace and Floo powder as that was they way he was captured in the first place, he saw only one door and was sure it was locked better than a simple Allohomora spell could penetrate. This left one option, a slight discoloration in the black stone walls made Harry aware of a small window painted black to keep out the sun. He pointed his wand at it and said, "Diffindo" The glass split in two, then shattered.
Harry made a mad dash for the window, spells flying to halt his retreat. He ducked his head just in time to avoid one, just as another grazed his shoulder. He didn't know what spell it was, but the way it sliced open his arm and splattered his blood against the far wall he knew it must have been powerful. And he was at the window. He threw himself out at full tilt. The ground stretched out under him, the room he was in had been on the fourth floor of a building. He was looking down at the street so very far below, and began to fall.
Harry had played Quiddich and knew that from time to time people would fall off their broomsticks, he knew also that when that happened the referee would use a spell to slow their decent to the ground. He knew it existed and knew he had heard it somewhere, if only he could remember...
"Arresto Momentum" He cried
Suddenly Harry felt a jolt, he was no longer falling at a breakneck pace, but was floating down like a feather. His feet hit the ground and he felt the lightness leave him suddenly. He looked back up at the building he had fallen out of. A masked face was looking down on him when suddenly it disappeared. The base of the building now sported all six Death Eaters, Belatrix with her mask back on. Harry suddenly remembered the Death Eaters all had the ability to Apparate, and he didn't. They raised their wands against him and he ran down the street as fast as he could go, spells shattering cobblestone and shopfront alike. He realized he was on Knockturn alley, or someplace exactly like it. This gave him hope, if he could get to Diagon alley they wouldn't dare follow him, and if they did, he could alert Fred and George, who could Apparate to the Order and raise the alarm.
Three masked figures were now in front of him, ducking their near simultaneous Impedimia curses he ran down a small alley between a dingy appartment building and a seedy looking bar. He knew that was a bad idea as soon as he had done it, the cramped quarters in the alley would make it impossible to dodge a barrage of spells issued from the mouth. Harry groaned when he saw the other end of the alleyway, a solid brick wall. He looked back to the mouth of the alleyway. The six Death Eaters were assembled there. He looked back to the end of the alleyway, there was one possible escape. The fire escape ladder was down, leading up to a second floor door leading into the appartment building. He ran to the ladder and began his climb.
He realized this was another bad idea as soon as he had done it. Climbing was umbelievably slow, and he was an easy target for any of his persuers. He shouted once again "Protego" but was sure they would shatter the shield quickly enough. He climbed up the Ladder as quickly as he could manage. Harry felt as much as heard the CRACK of his feeble shield failing, the spell that had managed it hit him in the spine, He had been more focused on the task of climbing the ladder so he didn't hear the incantation, but he could swear it was the Crutatious curse from how much it hurt. His legs suddenly flopped uselessly beneath him. Holding his wand in his teeth he grasped the top rung of the ladder with both hands and desperately pulled himself up. His legs still would not work, so he crawled to the door. As he finally achieved temporary covor inside the appartment building a terrible thought occured to him. He prodded his leg sharply with the tip of his wand. He sighed with relief when he felt the slight pain it caused.
He guessed the jynx he had been hit by was the jelly legs curse, kind of silly for Death Eaters to use, but whatever worked, Harry muttered the counter-curse and stood up. He heard the pop of Apparation and in front of him was a Death Eater. Harry needed a way to remove him from the fight entirely, Stupify would wear off, Petrificus Totalus could be undone by his allies, then he thought of it. His wand. The Death Eater brought his wand to bear on the standing Harry just as Harry threw himself back to the ground. The spell prepared for him sailed over the target, Harry pointed his wand up at the extended wand of his foe. A well placed "Diffindo" sliced the wand cleanly in two.
The Death Eater looked from the short stick which used to be his wand to Harry, who, while laying on the ground, still had his wand. The Death Eater turned tail and ran. It was an oddly humorous sight, seeing the fearsome figure running away. The Death Eaters seemed almost inhuman while in their cloaks and masks, veritable incarnations of fear. It was sometimes hard to remember that they were still human under it all.
Harry picked himself up again, he was doing that quite often today, and sped off down the corridor. There was a series of loud cracks as the rest of the Death Eaters Apparated up behind him. A spell hit him from behind, almost causing him to collapse. It must have been the same one that grazed his shoulder from earlier, because it hit him in the side and felt like it ripped a hole straight through. He didn't dare look though, afraid he'd see his entrails leaking out behind him as he continued to run.
A Death Eater was now in front of him, down the hall, it was too sudden, Harry couldn't bring his wand up in time. He moved his wand to his left hand and threw himself against the door to his right, hoping the frame would give him a little bit of cover. He was suprised when the door gave way before him. He stumbled a few steps into a dark appartment, his unchecked momentum took him over a countertop and onto a grimy tile floor. Harry noted with a rising level of panic that it was much harder to get up this time than it had been the last dozen or so times today. As soon as he got to his feet he heard a crack of Apparation to his left. Standing there, of course, was one of the Death Eaters. Harry found himself flinging something he found in his right hand at the Death Eater. He realized as soon as he had done that that it had been a mistake, it was a kitchen knife, picked up by reflex as he had tumbled over the countertop. He wished with all his might that he might grab it back. Alas, despite his intention the knife sailed end over end through the air. Probably not understanding his impending doom the Death Eater raised his wand at Harry.
"Avada..." but he was cut off there as the knife sank into his throat. Harry looked on in horror as the Death Eater issued forth gurgling noises, trying to breathe past the blade and the rushing blood. He dropped his wand and fell to his knees, clutching at his ruined throat. Harry saw his eyes through the holes in his mask wide with terror, before rolling up into the back of his head. The horror of what he had just done settled in over Harry. Even the sharp cracks of more Death Eaters Apparating in didn't bring him back to reality. When he heard Belatrix's voice, for once not cold and cruel, but soft and horrified say, "No... Rodolphus.... NO!" he came back to his senses. She ran to the side of the fallen figure clad in black. She knelt over his body, gently shaking him, asking him to wake up, that it was all a dream, that this couldn't happen. Harry wondered idly what she was talking about and then suddenly he remembered. Belatrix and Rodolphus... Lestrange. He had just murdered her husband. He suddenly didn't feel much like running anywhere.
Belatrix looked up at him, no longer with just hatred of his kind, of him and people like him, not with just cruelty she felt toward everyone save a few. She looked at him with distilled loathing, the hatred for Harry Potter, the individual who had killed her husband filled her very being, till there was little remaining besides the hate. Harry looked at her with sympathy in his eyes, knowing what it was to lose a loved one, never mind that it was her that caused him to lose Sirius, he knew her pain and felt sorry for her for having to feel it as well as he did.
"I'm sorry." Harry said truthfully, wishing he had not thrown that knife. Belatrix stood up suddenly, pure rage boiling off her in waves. She didn't even have words to express how she felt, so she simply slammed him into the wall as fast and as hard as her magic was capable. When Harry hit the solid wall and felt something give, he wasn't sure at first if it was the wall or himself. When he found himself outside once again, blown all the way through, he thought it was probably both. Harry couldn't muster the willpower or the energy to duplicate the spell that had saved him from falling to his death before. Rather than shatter his skull on hard pavement Harry found the surface he landed on to be soft enough to mitigate some of the impact of falling. He realized he had fallen into a dumpster in an alleyway between two buildings on the next street over from the one he had been before.
The mouth of the alley revealed people crossing back and forth... people wearing normal colored robes, with faces exposed... laughing. Where ever he was it was not Knockturn Alley. He stumbled down the alley, he was near his limits, a human body can only take so much punishment, and his had. People stared as he came out of the alleyway, covered in blood and garbage and dust. He spotted Gringott's on the corner. It was assuredly Diagon Alley. He stopped one of the passersby, "Where is Weasley's Wizarding Wheazes?" The older lady he had stopped pointed in a direction and Harry started off, thanking the lady first.
Luck alone saved his life. He stumbled and fell just as a green flash of light issued from behind him. The rushing sound that accompanied the Killing Curse came closer and closer, and then passed over Harry, carrying on into the chest of a very suprised middle aged man. Harry cursed as he crawled down the road, knowing he would never escape if he couldn't get to his feet, and he couldn't get to his feet. Belatrix was behind him, as were the remaining three Death Eaters.
"I see you've gotten yourself into a heap of trouble again." Someone said up ahead of him. "Almost worthy of one of us." Said another voice very much like the first. Harry lifted his head. Fred and George, hands casually on their wands in mirrored stances stood in the middle of the newly cleared road, Lee Jordan behind them and to their left, looking a little scared. Angelina Johnson looking very brave stood next to him, wand out.
"Seems like odds were a touch long... four against one?" Fred inquired
"Those sound like Bagman odds.." George nodded
"Or Weasley odds." Fred said, grinning
"It was six against one, but he... he..." Belatrix shouted
"Good show Harry, give em back better than you take." George said cheerily
"He... he killed my husband." Belatrix said, voice shaking with malice. This wiped the grins off the faces of the twins, who looked down at Harry, looks of disbelief on their faces. He wanted to sink into the ground, beyond the sight of people who could look at him and see the murderer he was. Why couldn't he have been murdered instead? how could he live with what he had done? Taken another's life... it was unthinkable.
"I guess that'll teach you to try to, err, teach you to harm Harry." George said, his grin back.
"Play with fire and get burned as they say." Fred completed the thought. Belatrix looked more annoyed and enraged than ever before, Fred and George could have that effect on people sometimes.
"I tire of this, it's time for the lot of you to die." As soon as she completed this sentance the curses started flying over Harry's head. He tried to roll over, to point his wand at the Death Eaters and assist his saviors. He heaved, but fell back to the ground, his limbs felt weak and the rest of him felt heavy as lead. It was getting dark, Harry let his eyes slide closed and knew no more.
He was on his back, facing a white celing that intersected almost seamlessly with the identically colored walls. He lay in a white bed and wore a set of clean white hospital robes. It didn't look much like how he remembered St. Mungo's. He tried to move and found it very difficult, his muscles responded slowly and felt very weak. His skin had reknit and his broken ribs had been reset. Still, in the way magic could heal people, he still felt the injuries, felt the weakness and the pain.
Despite the pain of it, he slid out of bed, wondering how long he had been out if no one was waiting for him. He wondered whether it was late at night and the Weasleys had to go home. He found the blinds and pulled them open to see a bright, sunny day. It must have not been two hours past noon, so unless he was out of it for an entire 28 hours it was only hours later on the same day. He stopped for a moment, it wasn't too unbelievable to him to be unconcious for so long. Perhaps it was a day or more later, he would have to ask when a doctor would come in to see him.
As if summoned by his thoughts, an older man wearing white robes and small framed glasses stepped through the doorway, a suprised look on his face as he noticed Harry.
"You shouldn't be awake yet, much less walking about, you should get back in bed."
"I'm tougher than I look, what happened after I fainted?" Harry responded shortly, remaining on his feet. The healer hesitated, obviously debating whether to tell Harry or not.
"Alright, I'll tell you, but you'll want to sit down for it." the healer sighed in defeat when Harry stubbornly remained standing.
"Very well, after you fainted the Death Eaters immediately gained the upper hand, stunning Mr. Jordan and... otherwise incapacitating Ms. Johnson. The Weasley twins, well, four Death Eaters are more than can be expected for any wizard to take on. Even so, they fought bravely, and even forced the Death Eaters to withdraw, but not before they managed to use the killing curse on George Weasley." The healer explained as gently as he could. Harry felt dizzy. He realized the doctor was right, that he should have taken a seat, because he found it extraordinarily difficult to remain on his feet after he was finished with the retelling.
"So, George is gone?" Harry asked weakly, the healer nodded. Harry felt like he was going to be sick. He killed a person with his own hand, his blind scraping to conserve his own life had robbed an innocent bystander of their life, and the day had culminated in a situation that caused someone to give their life to protect his own. Three people had died this day because he didn't like living with his Aunt and Uncle. Harry thought he was a horrible person before for causing his Godfather's death by his pride, now he thought he'd be better off dead. He sank to the floor and cried.
AN: You know, this was supposed to be light-hearted and fun, not really starting until he got to the Burrow but something went wrong and suddenly Harry killed some guy and brought about George's death. Seems like it's gonna continue (albeit slowly) and get darker and darker. I've already got plans to ruin the lives of pretty much every major character in the series... I seriously don't think the survivors will number in the teens. I have a feeling that many people will like the way I plan on ending this. If you chose to review please tell me what you thought of the magic-fight scenes, I'm trying to make them exciting and I want to write more in the future. For those of you who searched Harry and Ginny romance I ask you bide your time, as that's about to become the focus. It's gonna be hard since I'm having neither of them start out loving the other, I never like stories where they start out in love and all they have to do is admit it to each other. I warn any of you who read and liked this, I take forever to update, so you might want to wait until it's finished, or resign yourself to the slow and sporatic writing. I must apologise for the formatting, this chapter is too long for Notepad, and I don't have any of that fancy shmancy MS Word, and Wordpad has never agreed with Fanfiction.net, so I had to break chapter one into two sections, I have a feeling that's the way it's gonna be in other chapters as well.
"We almost believed you had thought better than to go to your friend's house, we've been waiting for quite a while now." Said one, casually pointing a wand at him.
Harry pushed himself to his feet, the wand gave a twisting motion and Harry was blasted backwards off his feet. His head rebounded sharply off the hard stone of the mantle. Stars exploded behind his eyes . He vaguely heard shouting somewhere in the distance. He felt as if he were floating momentarily and then suddenly he was on his back and he felt something warm and sticky rolling off the back of his head. One of the dark figures appeared over Harry.
"He's not even unconcious."
There was a short silence before another figure appeared above Harry. This one laughed with a short, feminine laugh before removing it's mask.
"You!" Harry cried out when he realized who it was. He leapt to his feet and lunged at her throat with speed borne of Quiddich training and strength born of pure rage. Belatrix Lestrange looked suprised as Harry's hands closed around her throat. Before he could get a good throttleing going he heard a muttered "Crucio" to his left and before he knew it every nerve in his body carried an urgent message of pain to his brain. His knees buckled and once again he fell ungracefully to the floor. He didn't have time to struggle to his feet again before he felt the tip of a wand prodding him in the back of the neck. A now distinctly feminine voice called out "Crucio"
If his first taste of the Crutacious curse was painful, this redefined his idea of what the word pain means. Pain flowed out from the spot where the wand was touching his skin in waves. Every muscle in Harry's body siezed up, causing him to thrash about violently on the floor. It was almost a full minute before the wand was let up and the echoing pain started to die down.
"I am in control here, if you try to lay a single dirty mudblood finger on me again you will find a world of pain before you die." as if to emphasize her point she jabbed him in midback with her wand and again performed the Crutatious curse. With the wand in this position it no longer issued waves of pain at predictable intervals, it caused a line of pain up and down his spine, each time it got to his brain the world lit up with the fires of agony. At the third iteration of this method he finally cried out in pain as it got to his brain once again. At this point Belatrix withdrew her wand and began to laugh.
"I had nearly forgotten how lovely these screams of anguish are. As you can probably tell I am one of the chief experts in the wizarding world in causing pain. Of course we've had quite an opportunity for a lot of practice. I believe you've met Mr. and Mrs. Longbottom." Belatrix laughed, "Do you know how long it took my husband and I to destroy their minds?" She asked in a cruel, falsely sweet voice. Harry didn't answer.
"Come now, take a guess." Belatrix said, almost teasingly. Harry still did not answer.
"The Longbottoms were quite as reticent as you while still sane, now that they are mad they will probably never say anything again." Belatrix continued.
"If you want to share their fate, by all means keep your lips sealed. But before you are completely mad, where is the base for the Order?"
The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix is located at number twelve Gimmauld place, London
Flashed through Harry's mind, he had to avoid telling them that if it cost him his life. A wand touched the back of his shoulder. The pain had begun again, this time it was a sort of dull pain, and he wondered why she was doing such low impact spots of pain if she was a master of causing pain as she claimed. He found out when she dragged the wand down his arm. The feeling was as if a knife was slicing him open all the way to the bone all the way along the path she traced with her wand. When she got to his elbow she gave the wand a slight twist, causing the muscles there to sieze painfully as if he had just sprained his arm at the elbow. He kept a leash on his cries of pain as much as he could, knowing that it was this that the horrible woman was looking for. After several more passes up and down his arm, after which Harry was certain his arm was cut to ribbons, she let up. Harry sighed with relief when he touched his arm to find unbroken skin.
"Now, I will ask again, and you had better answer this time. Where is the Headquarters of the Order?" Harry once again refused to answer. And so it went, that Belatrix would torture him, then ask him the same question and he would not answer, again and again and again. Soon, her husband joined in, and two wands were an order of magnitude more painful than one. Eventually he could no longer retain his screams, but he could always keep himself from saying what they wanted him to.
He was never allowed a real break, but there were times when his two torturers would converse with the rest of his captors. They would talk about how they would enjoy killing all those he held dear. Ron would apparently be torn limb from limb, then beheaded. Hermione would be drowned in mud, then run through multiple times, so she would become a true mudblood. Mr. and Mrs Weasley would get their necks broken, then their skulls bashed in, but not before they had their 'fun' with Mrs. Weasley in front of her husband. Ginny's fate was the strangest, they would hang her upside down, with her wrists slit, over an open cauldron. They would force her to drink blood-replenishing potions until the cauldron was full. They would then drop her in and boil her in her own blood. Fred and George would get their tongues cut out and be tortured while they bled to death. Dumbledore would be crucified over the course of several weeks, not allowed to die to end his pain for that whole time.
Harry had rolled onto his back while they had been talking back and forth over this, he was breathing hard from all the torture he had been put through, but he focused on the anger he felt at their casual talk of hurting his friends and loved ones. Belatrix came back to his side, no longer really expecting him to answer she simply smiled at him and bent down to place her wand on his side. Harry lashed out, catching her in the face with the toe of his shoe. Using his momentum to roll backwards onto his feet he whipped out his wand which had laid undiscovered the whole of the time he had been in this dark, dank room. The four Death Eaters seated around a table stood and pointed wands at him. Harry shouted, "Protego" at the top of his lungs. Though it came out hoarse because of all the screaming he had done so recently, it was the best shield charm he had ever done. The four stunning curses fired at him bounced away at random angles after hitting an invisible barrier in front of him. The confusion as the Death Eaters scattered to avoid their own stunning spells gave Harry a window of opportunity. He dared not use the fireplace and Floo powder as that was they way he was captured in the first place, he saw only one door and was sure it was locked better than a simple Allohomora spell could penetrate. This left one option, a slight discoloration in the black stone walls made Harry aware of a small window painted black to keep out the sun. He pointed his wand at it and said, "Diffindo" The glass split in two, then shattered.
Harry made a mad dash for the window, spells flying to halt his retreat. He ducked his head just in time to avoid one, just as another grazed his shoulder. He didn't know what spell it was, but the way it sliced open his arm and splattered his blood against the far wall he knew it must have been powerful. And he was at the window. He threw himself out at full tilt. The ground stretched out under him, the room he was in had been on the fourth floor of a building. He was looking down at the street so very far below, and began to fall.
Harry had played Quiddich and knew that from time to time people would fall off their broomsticks, he knew also that when that happened the referee would use a spell to slow their decent to the ground. He knew it existed and knew he had heard it somewhere, if only he could remember...
"Arresto Momentum" He cried
Suddenly Harry felt a jolt, he was no longer falling at a breakneck pace, but was floating down like a feather. His feet hit the ground and he felt the lightness leave him suddenly. He looked back up at the building he had fallen out of. A masked face was looking down on him when suddenly it disappeared. The base of the building now sported all six Death Eaters, Belatrix with her mask back on. Harry suddenly remembered the Death Eaters all had the ability to Apparate, and he didn't. They raised their wands against him and he ran down the street as fast as he could go, spells shattering cobblestone and shopfront alike. He realized he was on Knockturn alley, or someplace exactly like it. This gave him hope, if he could get to Diagon alley they wouldn't dare follow him, and if they did, he could alert Fred and George, who could Apparate to the Order and raise the alarm.
Three masked figures were now in front of him, ducking their near simultaneous Impedimia curses he ran down a small alley between a dingy appartment building and a seedy looking bar. He knew that was a bad idea as soon as he had done it, the cramped quarters in the alley would make it impossible to dodge a barrage of spells issued from the mouth. Harry groaned when he saw the other end of the alleyway, a solid brick wall. He looked back to the mouth of the alleyway. The six Death Eaters were assembled there. He looked back to the end of the alleyway, there was one possible escape. The fire escape ladder was down, leading up to a second floor door leading into the appartment building. He ran to the ladder and began his climb.
He realized this was another bad idea as soon as he had done it. Climbing was umbelievably slow, and he was an easy target for any of his persuers. He shouted once again "Protego" but was sure they would shatter the shield quickly enough. He climbed up the Ladder as quickly as he could manage. Harry felt as much as heard the CRACK of his feeble shield failing, the spell that had managed it hit him in the spine, He had been more focused on the task of climbing the ladder so he didn't hear the incantation, but he could swear it was the Crutatious curse from how much it hurt. His legs suddenly flopped uselessly beneath him. Holding his wand in his teeth he grasped the top rung of the ladder with both hands and desperately pulled himself up. His legs still would not work, so he crawled to the door. As he finally achieved temporary covor inside the appartment building a terrible thought occured to him. He prodded his leg sharply with the tip of his wand. He sighed with relief when he felt the slight pain it caused.
He guessed the jynx he had been hit by was the jelly legs curse, kind of silly for Death Eaters to use, but whatever worked, Harry muttered the counter-curse and stood up. He heard the pop of Apparation and in front of him was a Death Eater. Harry needed a way to remove him from the fight entirely, Stupify would wear off, Petrificus Totalus could be undone by his allies, then he thought of it. His wand. The Death Eater brought his wand to bear on the standing Harry just as Harry threw himself back to the ground. The spell prepared for him sailed over the target, Harry pointed his wand up at the extended wand of his foe. A well placed "Diffindo" sliced the wand cleanly in two.
The Death Eater looked from the short stick which used to be his wand to Harry, who, while laying on the ground, still had his wand. The Death Eater turned tail and ran. It was an oddly humorous sight, seeing the fearsome figure running away. The Death Eaters seemed almost inhuman while in their cloaks and masks, veritable incarnations of fear. It was sometimes hard to remember that they were still human under it all.
Harry picked himself up again, he was doing that quite often today, and sped off down the corridor. There was a series of loud cracks as the rest of the Death Eaters Apparated up behind him. A spell hit him from behind, almost causing him to collapse. It must have been the same one that grazed his shoulder from earlier, because it hit him in the side and felt like it ripped a hole straight through. He didn't dare look though, afraid he'd see his entrails leaking out behind him as he continued to run.
A Death Eater was now in front of him, down the hall, it was too sudden, Harry couldn't bring his wand up in time. He moved his wand to his left hand and threw himself against the door to his right, hoping the frame would give him a little bit of cover. He was suprised when the door gave way before him. He stumbled a few steps into a dark appartment, his unchecked momentum took him over a countertop and onto a grimy tile floor. Harry noted with a rising level of panic that it was much harder to get up this time than it had been the last dozen or so times today. As soon as he got to his feet he heard a crack of Apparation to his left. Standing there, of course, was one of the Death Eaters. Harry found himself flinging something he found in his right hand at the Death Eater. He realized as soon as he had done that that it had been a mistake, it was a kitchen knife, picked up by reflex as he had tumbled over the countertop. He wished with all his might that he might grab it back. Alas, despite his intention the knife sailed end over end through the air. Probably not understanding his impending doom the Death Eater raised his wand at Harry.
"Avada..." but he was cut off there as the knife sank into his throat. Harry looked on in horror as the Death Eater issued forth gurgling noises, trying to breathe past the blade and the rushing blood. He dropped his wand and fell to his knees, clutching at his ruined throat. Harry saw his eyes through the holes in his mask wide with terror, before rolling up into the back of his head. The horror of what he had just done settled in over Harry. Even the sharp cracks of more Death Eaters Apparating in didn't bring him back to reality. When he heard Belatrix's voice, for once not cold and cruel, but soft and horrified say, "No... Rodolphus.... NO!" he came back to his senses. She ran to the side of the fallen figure clad in black. She knelt over his body, gently shaking him, asking him to wake up, that it was all a dream, that this couldn't happen. Harry wondered idly what she was talking about and then suddenly he remembered. Belatrix and Rodolphus... Lestrange. He had just murdered her husband. He suddenly didn't feel much like running anywhere.
Belatrix looked up at him, no longer with just hatred of his kind, of him and people like him, not with just cruelty she felt toward everyone save a few. She looked at him with distilled loathing, the hatred for Harry Potter, the individual who had killed her husband filled her very being, till there was little remaining besides the hate. Harry looked at her with sympathy in his eyes, knowing what it was to lose a loved one, never mind that it was her that caused him to lose Sirius, he knew her pain and felt sorry for her for having to feel it as well as he did.
"I'm sorry." Harry said truthfully, wishing he had not thrown that knife. Belatrix stood up suddenly, pure rage boiling off her in waves. She didn't even have words to express how she felt, so she simply slammed him into the wall as fast and as hard as her magic was capable. When Harry hit the solid wall and felt something give, he wasn't sure at first if it was the wall or himself. When he found himself outside once again, blown all the way through, he thought it was probably both. Harry couldn't muster the willpower or the energy to duplicate the spell that had saved him from falling to his death before. Rather than shatter his skull on hard pavement Harry found the surface he landed on to be soft enough to mitigate some of the impact of falling. He realized he had fallen into a dumpster in an alleyway between two buildings on the next street over from the one he had been before.
The mouth of the alley revealed people crossing back and forth... people wearing normal colored robes, with faces exposed... laughing. Where ever he was it was not Knockturn Alley. He stumbled down the alley, he was near his limits, a human body can only take so much punishment, and his had. People stared as he came out of the alleyway, covered in blood and garbage and dust. He spotted Gringott's on the corner. It was assuredly Diagon Alley. He stopped one of the passersby, "Where is Weasley's Wizarding Wheazes?" The older lady he had stopped pointed in a direction and Harry started off, thanking the lady first.
Luck alone saved his life. He stumbled and fell just as a green flash of light issued from behind him. The rushing sound that accompanied the Killing Curse came closer and closer, and then passed over Harry, carrying on into the chest of a very suprised middle aged man. Harry cursed as he crawled down the road, knowing he would never escape if he couldn't get to his feet, and he couldn't get to his feet. Belatrix was behind him, as were the remaining three Death Eaters.
"I see you've gotten yourself into a heap of trouble again." Someone said up ahead of him. "Almost worthy of one of us." Said another voice very much like the first. Harry lifted his head. Fred and George, hands casually on their wands in mirrored stances stood in the middle of the newly cleared road, Lee Jordan behind them and to their left, looking a little scared. Angelina Johnson looking very brave stood next to him, wand out.
"Seems like odds were a touch long... four against one?" Fred inquired
"Those sound like Bagman odds.." George nodded
"Or Weasley odds." Fred said, grinning
"It was six against one, but he... he..." Belatrix shouted
"Good show Harry, give em back better than you take." George said cheerily
"He... he killed my husband." Belatrix said, voice shaking with malice. This wiped the grins off the faces of the twins, who looked down at Harry, looks of disbelief on their faces. He wanted to sink into the ground, beyond the sight of people who could look at him and see the murderer he was. Why couldn't he have been murdered instead? how could he live with what he had done? Taken another's life... it was unthinkable.
"I guess that'll teach you to try to, err, teach you to harm Harry." George said, his grin back.
"Play with fire and get burned as they say." Fred completed the thought. Belatrix looked more annoyed and enraged than ever before, Fred and George could have that effect on people sometimes.
"I tire of this, it's time for the lot of you to die." As soon as she completed this sentance the curses started flying over Harry's head. He tried to roll over, to point his wand at the Death Eaters and assist his saviors. He heaved, but fell back to the ground, his limbs felt weak and the rest of him felt heavy as lead. It was getting dark, Harry let his eyes slide closed and knew no more.
He was on his back, facing a white celing that intersected almost seamlessly with the identically colored walls. He lay in a white bed and wore a set of clean white hospital robes. It didn't look much like how he remembered St. Mungo's. He tried to move and found it very difficult, his muscles responded slowly and felt very weak. His skin had reknit and his broken ribs had been reset. Still, in the way magic could heal people, he still felt the injuries, felt the weakness and the pain.
Despite the pain of it, he slid out of bed, wondering how long he had been out if no one was waiting for him. He wondered whether it was late at night and the Weasleys had to go home. He found the blinds and pulled them open to see a bright, sunny day. It must have not been two hours past noon, so unless he was out of it for an entire 28 hours it was only hours later on the same day. He stopped for a moment, it wasn't too unbelievable to him to be unconcious for so long. Perhaps it was a day or more later, he would have to ask when a doctor would come in to see him.
As if summoned by his thoughts, an older man wearing white robes and small framed glasses stepped through the doorway, a suprised look on his face as he noticed Harry.
"You shouldn't be awake yet, much less walking about, you should get back in bed."
"I'm tougher than I look, what happened after I fainted?" Harry responded shortly, remaining on his feet. The healer hesitated, obviously debating whether to tell Harry or not.
"Alright, I'll tell you, but you'll want to sit down for it." the healer sighed in defeat when Harry stubbornly remained standing.
"Very well, after you fainted the Death Eaters immediately gained the upper hand, stunning Mr. Jordan and... otherwise incapacitating Ms. Johnson. The Weasley twins, well, four Death Eaters are more than can be expected for any wizard to take on. Even so, they fought bravely, and even forced the Death Eaters to withdraw, but not before they managed to use the killing curse on George Weasley." The healer explained as gently as he could. Harry felt dizzy. He realized the doctor was right, that he should have taken a seat, because he found it extraordinarily difficult to remain on his feet after he was finished with the retelling.
"So, George is gone?" Harry asked weakly, the healer nodded. Harry felt like he was going to be sick. He killed a person with his own hand, his blind scraping to conserve his own life had robbed an innocent bystander of their life, and the day had culminated in a situation that caused someone to give their life to protect his own. Three people had died this day because he didn't like living with his Aunt and Uncle. Harry thought he was a horrible person before for causing his Godfather's death by his pride, now he thought he'd be better off dead. He sank to the floor and cried.
AN: You know, this was supposed to be light-hearted and fun, not really starting until he got to the Burrow but something went wrong and suddenly Harry killed some guy and brought about George's death. Seems like it's gonna continue (albeit slowly) and get darker and darker. I've already got plans to ruin the lives of pretty much every major character in the series... I seriously don't think the survivors will number in the teens. I have a feeling that many people will like the way I plan on ending this. If you chose to review please tell me what you thought of the magic-fight scenes, I'm trying to make them exciting and I want to write more in the future. For those of you who searched Harry and Ginny romance I ask you bide your time, as that's about to become the focus. It's gonna be hard since I'm having neither of them start out loving the other, I never like stories where they start out in love and all they have to do is admit it to each other. I warn any of you who read and liked this, I take forever to update, so you might want to wait until it's finished, or resign yourself to the slow and sporatic writing. I must apologise for the formatting, this chapter is too long for Notepad, and I don't have any of that fancy shmancy MS Word, and Wordpad has never agreed with Fanfiction.net, so I had to break chapter one into two sections, I have a feeling that's the way it's gonna be in other chapters as well.