Child of the Waves- It gets even darker, thanks for the nice review.
TwentyDollarBill- This isn't going to be a novel-length story in the conventional means, these are just going to be snapshots through the eyes of different characters, we've had Harry, Stephen and now we're going to have Voldemort.
I like Stephen too, I always thought the Weasleys were a bit too...perfect you know? A bit too puritan. It wouldn't surprise me if they were hiding a dark secret like young Stephen.
I own nothing but the plot.
Spilt Blood and Split Bone
Our lives run different ways
Through the rain I see you in the sun
Our star shines anyway
If you wish upon it we are one
Dog eat dog
Every day
On our fellow man we prey
Dog eat dog
To get by
Hope you like my genocide
-Genocide, Offspring.
Voldemort cursed, wiping flecks of blood out of his eyes. This last kill had been the messiest yet and the blood coated not only the Dark Lord's hands and face, but also the majority of the small room.
The body lay in a crumpled heap at Voldemort's feet, hacked to shreds until not even the man's wife could have recognized him.
So much for the latest leader of the Muggle forces.
The effort made to protect their latest leader had been puny, although he had to admit the dead-magic machinery had made this latest kill difficult.
The man (Voldemort hadn't bothered to learn his name) was the latest in a long line of Muggle commanders; all of which, Voldemort was proud to say, had died at the end of his wand.
It was a simple strategy to keep the Muggles from getting any kind of effective leadership.
When the Muggles started to show some kind of cohesion then the Death Eaters mounted a raid to the nearest outpost and captured the Muggle with the most gold braid in order to force him to give them the name of his new commander.
Then Voldemort just tracked down the Muggle and tore him apart, easy.
Only it hadn't been that easy this time, these new dead-magic machines were becoming a significant threat. He hadn't known, but he'd suspected that this commander would use one as protection. All the same, it had been a nasty shock when he'd spoken the killing curse and nothing happened.
The Muggle had laughed, at least until Voldemort pulled out a bladed falcion and dismembered him, this being the reason for most of the blood.
Ugly kill really, he hoped Snape and young Stephen would get a move on and find a potion or spell to counteract the effects of dead-magic. Find or invent, whatever, just as long as they got it before the Muggles found some way to drag the infernal thing into a battlefield, because then there'd be trouble.
An irritating ache in his right arm reminded Voldemort that he hadn't gotten out of the fight as unscathed as he'd have liked, one bullet had gone clean through, but two had lodged in the bone and would need to be dug out before any healing spell could be cast.
The most infuriating thing was that he'd known this would happen, he'd seen first-hand what Muggles thought of anyone different, he even had the scars to prove it.
Stupid, stupid, stupid Dumbledore and his Muggle loving idiocies, thinking that they were harmless! Hah!
He'd seen what they could do, he'd traveled to the blasted wastes that had once been Hiroshima, he'd seen the ruined aftermath of their wars, the quick annihilation of anyone not like them, the fear Muggles held for anyone and anything different.
And when he remembered that this was simply what they did to their own kind, the thought of what Muggles would do if they ever discovered the wizarding world made a young Lord Voldemort feel rather ill.
No, best that they be killed; quickly, quietly, cleanly and without malice or emotion, just two words and a flash of green light. A swift destruction, a Vol de Mort.
And then it was too late, they had discovered the Wizarding world themselves and Salazar Slytherin's warning came true in the most horrible of ways.
He would have liked to have been able to get the chance to rage at Albus Dumbledore but the old fool had died before realizing the magnitude of his folly.
Gods, but what he'd give to get his hands around the man's scrawny neck...
Or, preferably the mudblood idiot(s) who had revealed the Wizarding world in the first place.
Voldemort wondered what had happened to the rest of the Wizarding community.
Most of the Ministry Officials had died in the destruction of the Ministry of Magic of course, although Diagon Alley had been evacuated before the attack. Hogwarts was still standing, though empty and St Mungo's had been moved to Wales where it was filled with the various casualties of war. Many had joined Voldemort's forces while hundreds more fought an anonymous guerrilla war in the back alleys of cities.
As for the rest, either they were dead, or they were in hiding.
The Dark Lord wiped his blade clean on the muggle's shirt, still lost in thought. He wondered where the Aurors had vanished to, in the first few months of the war they had been on the front lines, since then they had all but disappeared. Some, such as Shacklebolt, had joined his forces in all but name. They were after all the only faction of the wizarding world showing any kind of cohesion, what with that idiot Fudge and Dumbledore dying in the destruction of the Ministry. Many Aurors had died in that attack. Other Aurors, the most famous, had realized (quite rightly) that the Death Eaters would attack them on sight and decided to hide somewhere until the war was over.
Voldemort smirked, showing off a gruesome set of serpent's teeth, much good that would do them. If the muggles won, they were all doomed, but if he won, then they were equally doomed.
Still, not his problem. He straightened up, stretching aches out of his muscles and bones. His problem was putting together a battle plan to wipe out the verminous race that were Muggles once and for all and consolidating power afterwards. If he could just keep the Death Eaters together and organized when the war was won (and he was quite certain it would be), then he would have the largest faction in the Wizarding World and no one would be able to oppose him.
Even Harry Potter.
He still wondered what had happened to that brat. His name was still in the list of 'Most Wanted Wizards' on the Muggle list (it was seventeenth on the list. Voldemort's name was first and he took a perverse bit of pleasure in this), so hadn't got him. His Death Eaters would have told him had they killed the boy in order to get a reward, so that was out. Unless the boy had perished in a back-alley attack, he was probably still in hiding somewhere.
Again, not his problem. Not even the most fervent Muggle-lover could oppose his his methods, not now. Not since the Muggles had sent so-called 'diplomats' into the Ministry with several hundred-weight of plastic explosives and succeded in blowing the whole place sky-high.
And what had began as genocide had finished in all-out war. The only good news was that they appeared to be winning. Since the Muggles had no good leader who lasted more than a week they sorely lacked co-ordination and discipline and were quickly splitting into different factions. Much easier for the Death Eaters to pick off.
Divide and conquer, after all.
It was at that exact moment the alarms went off, along with the fire sprinklers. Voldemort jumped, nearly deafened and was soaked to the bone as water started pouring in. He sent the sprinklers one completely incredulous look, then disapparated.
Skull Bearer