Author's Note:

Whoa! Loooooooooong chappie! Six pages! Don't get too used to it, upcoming chapters are shorter.

THE FINAL BATTLE AGAINST VOLDEMORT!

(All the cool stuff comes in chapter five or so. Until then, more neutral things and explanations what had happened in the wizarding world and stuff…)

Ginzogirl: Hello there! New chapter!

Jessicameansseethelight: Thanks for your review!

As usual: This in an independent fic; this has nothing to do with my two others fics. NOTHING!

BUT! Those who actually read 'Angelic Layer': This fic contains a couple of cookies and a couple of hints of becoming things in Angelic Layer.

Designation of Doom

Instead of beautiful weather and new life, spring brought death and misery. The Death Eaters started finally their killing sprees. The first mass murdering had stared in Diagon Alley. There had been a demonstration against the ministry and Fudge. Suddenly over thirty Death Eaters had streamed in from everywhere, casting the killing curse on everyone who wasn't a 'respectable' pure-blood.

On almost three hundred witches and wizards just a handful survived. The attack had been so brutal, so quick, no one had even time to react. Most people had died with their eyes wide open, wonder and horror written on their faces. That spring day was forever to be remembered as the first day of the 'Death Wave'. In the space of two weeks, fourteen attacks had wiped out lives of dozen thousands of people.

Death Eaters didn't use only wands to kill. They had apparently discovered the joys of the muggle weapons, and had developed a series of Kalashnikovs containing bullets smeared with deadly poisons, that took less than one minute to kill anyone hit by the bullets.

This new techniques confused everyone: Death Eaters weren't supposed to use new techniques: they were cheating. The Order, still in the old pattern of the past war, weren't ready for this and all their old techniques and schemes were useless.

The Death Eaters claimed that many members Order of the Phoenix had dressed up as civilians to try and escape Voldemort's aggression (which was in a way true- they worked undercover, just as the Death Eaters). They used this as their excuse to go around killing whomever they wanted to kill. The Purebloods committed these acts because they had the mentality that they could get away with anything, and because they knew that their side was capable of bullying the weaker rest of the wizarding world, should a rebellion on the Light side have occurred. After a couple days of killing, the brutality became routine, and the fact that hundreds were dying every day was no longer so horrifying to most Members of the Phoenix. The worst maybe was that even the public got used to it. .

The Death Eaters' attacks were irrational. They had just the one goal: kill as much as possible. It was a good way to create confusion, panic and irrational actions. The Order was bound to make at some point a mistake. Severus Snape was in hiding: in the middle of the trio's sixth year, Voldemort had found out about his spying. Ever since, the Order had been quite powerless to do anything.

England was in a state of chaos. People fled, people panicked, people locked themselves in to their houses. Children too young for Hogwarts were sent there, others were taken away. Those who had lived through the first war left for America, Asia or somewhere far, far away. The problem was however, that this time Death Eaters were everywhere. Those who escaped England were often killed in punishment of their cowardice in America. Life was harsh.

March had killed more people than the first six months had killed during the first war. The numbers were alarming. Yet no one could react against it all. The order needed inside information, and quickly so.

Harry had been given intense legimancy lections by Snape, yet Harry couldn't sneak his way to Voldemort's brain without being noticed. The only thing he could was to catch a couple of words of which they tried to make sense.

Sometimes it had been successful: Harry had given them a whole sentence, and in this sentence were information about when and where the attack would happen. This set to an end the 'Death Wave', yet it exhausted Harry to no end. He couldn't continue on his Auror training for days after his mental contortions to get into the puzzling mind of Voldemort.

His friends had stayed with him then, enveloping him in a warm cocoon of secure feelings. He never told them what he saw in Voldemort's mind, but Ron and Hermione didn't care. They were there for him. Comforted by his friend's presence, Harry dared to go more and more in Voldemort's mind. The information he brought was little, yet crucial. Slowly the Order was able to see a pattern immerge from the attacks. Harry brought information that completed the bribes the Order managed to get out from the few Death Eaters they managed to capture (alive).

Meanwhile, Hermione and Ron did more than just live together. Hermione, encouraged by the Weaslys, had implored her parents to move away somewhere safe. They had accepted to do it, but only for their daughter's sake. It had been a teary and tragic departure, to see the Granger's leave. They moved to Holland, where Missis Granger had some relatives living. They insisted always on Hermione coming to them, yet Hermione couldn't leave. She just couldn't. The idea had crossed her mind, and she knew that they would understand if she would leave. Yet she simply couldn't. She knew that even if she'd leave, she still would be in London.

Spring went by slowly, bringing in more and more dead folks. The lists of deceased people were growing with each hour passing. Now the Death Eaters just killed the first person they saw, just like that, on a whim. The Order had captured a good twenty Death Eaters, yet they knew there was at least six times more somewhere. Voldemort was also somewhere lurking in England.

After a while, the Order saw the pattern chosen by the Death Eaters: it was simple yet very ingenious. The death Eaters killed in different places in order to confuse everyone. Yet it wasn't the same death eaters operating all the time: The United Kingdom was split in fifty parts, and each part had one Death eater leader. The Death Eaters were placed in strong strategic locations.

Hermione was the one who had the idea of starting to compare the culprit of the Death Eaters to different military strategies used during muggle World War II. They all got extremely scared as they noticed the culprit of the Death eater attack was exactly the same as the Japanese had used in Nan king.

They were circling Hogwarts. All the territories even capable of brining help were destroyed. They concentrated their attacks around the areas near Hogsmade and Hogwarts. They knew that if they managed to take over Hogwarts, the victory of Voldemort was assured.

Finally seeing this, the Order prepared the biggest counter-attack ever made in the History of Magic. The battle seemed to be prepared yet it wasn't as much as people believed it was: the Order counted much on luck and on Harry. If this attack would fail, the Order would be destroyed.

Operation 'Golden Lion' was carried out in three phases: first force the Death eaters to join one single spot, and lurk Voldemort there; phase two was to encircle the Death Eaters in a tight circle, place anti-appartion points all around and mine up the earth with bombs who would explode if exposed to dark magic; phase three: attack of the Order 'Lion' and cleaning of the area so Harry could face Voldemort unscarred (he was going to be accompanied by his two friends, thus received the surname 'Golden'). All three had one secret weapon on them. They had decided to keep them secret until the battle.

Eventually, the Order carried on the plan. It was over-all a success, for each fallen member of the Order, three Death Eaters had died. Yet there had been pointless losses. The first mistake had been to start the operation too early. A fifth of the Death Eaters were missing as the operation begun. The second error had been to mine the place with bombs. The bombs should have been charmed just to explode under the pressure the contact of Death Eaters. The third mistake had been to underestimate the Death Eaters protections. Another mistake had been for the Order of taking only experienced Aurors with them. They had plenty of perfectly capable members they had refused to take with them. It was good of course in the way that young people didn't die; yet more people could have made the escape of dozens of Death eaters impossible.

The 'Golden Trio' had been surrounded by Aurors and other people with strong powers. This had prevented them to be directly hit by any spell. It had worked well until they walked directly into a trap that maimed Hermione's arm so badly it almost fell off. She closed her eyes and continued on walking, pretending it wasn't anything bad. In the heart of action no one really realized how badly she was hurt. A Death Eater had used a thin metal wire lasso to try decapitating Harry, yet Hermione's arm got strangled by it instead. Her arm was crushed, and only her skin held her arm to her body.

Ron got shot in the face, yet he managed to dodge somehow the shot by bending backwards, getting only brushed by the bullet. The poison however started to creep it way into his body, and his only chance of survival was to burn the wound with a fire that ate up a part of his face. There would be a scar forever in his face.

They presented a quite queer picture when they faced Voldemort and his closest Death Eaters. Harry robes slightly burnt, yet still totally healthy and unscarred. Hermione, her hair a halo around her head, her arm hanging limply at her side, tears of pain in her eyes, a wand in each hand, an odd lump on her chest. Ron had his face on fire, his hair burnt partly away, a gun his left hand, a wand in the other. Around his neck, he wore a thick collar. That collar was a shield that protected from old curses (he had nicked it from his work).

Everything went very quickly. Lucius Malfoy was shot in his hands by Ron, Hermione knocked out Bellatrix (and quite surly decapitated her) by levitating blocks of stones on her head. Dolohov received a cheering Charm, a stunning spell and an amnesia spell all at once, letting him fall down on the floor, giggling helplessly whilst watching the scene around him with empty eyes. Now there was still three Death Eaters and Voldemort to go.

Hermione had the incapacity of killing anyone, yet it wasn't a problem for Ron. He cast a complicated curse on Rudolf, which would kill him. Each gasp of air he took tightened the spell around his ribcage; it was a manner of minutes before he fell on the ground, chocking. Harry had taken out his surprise-secret weapon and pierced Lucius Malfoy's chest with it and had made Macnair fall on his knees. It was Godric Gryffindor's sword.

So far Voldemort had done very little. There still was a Death eater next to him, wearing the infamous white mask, so no one knew who it was. After have killed, maimed and defeated the Death eaters in the room, they walked towards the little throne Voldemort was sitting on. They walked carefully, eyes darting around the room, waiting for a surprise attack.

There was no extra attack- but there was a surprise. The Death Eater next to Voldemort was no actual Death Eater. It was Dumbledore. Hogwarts Headmaster. He was the one standing next to Voldemort, his face cold and impassive, his eyes filled with tears and a slightly sad smile on his face.

It was quite a shock. Hermione was the one who reacted first. She cast a stunning spell whilst yelling apologies. Voldemort took this opportunity to cast the killing on Harry. Ron pushed Harry away, and dodged the deadly spell in time. Meanwhile, Hermione was bracing herself and trying to fix her broken arm. She noticed at the last moment Mcnair's killing curse. The turned around to face him, and received the spell right in her chest.

She fell motionless on the floor; Ron killed cold-bloodily Mcnair with the same curse that had chocked Rudolf Lestrange. Harry, not quite believing what he saw, dropped his sword on the ground.

Then the oddest of things happened. Ron yelled and screamed at Hermione's motionless body. Harry just stared at Hermione with his eyes blank. Then, at the precise moment he understood what had happened, his brain shattered and flooded his and Voldemort's mind with the memories of Hermione.

Voldemort couldn't comprehend what was happening. The love and friendship Harry felt towards Hermione burnt Voldemort's brain. Nothing could stop it. The more Ron screamed, the more the feelings intensified, burning Voldemort from the inside. He screamed and whined, trying to get off Harry from his brain. He tried blocking Harry out, but he couldn't. The pain was unbearable for both of them. Slowly, Voldemort started to transform. Everything that had been evil burnt from the inside. Voldemort's ugly, pointy, white face turned rounder and fuller, more handsome. The eyes turned cooler and calmer, hair started to grow at a tremendous rate. Voldemort was becoming Tom Riddle again.

Tom Riddle accepted the feelings inside of himself, soaking them in. Harry grew weaker by moments passing. Finally his eyes turned white, and he bucked backwards, falling on the floor, shrinking rapidly. Harry was becoming younger and younger. Tom Riddle ate up Harry's life.

Under Ron's surprised eyes, Hermione sat slowly up, grimacing and crying in pain. She took her wand and pointed it at their teacher, muttering the counter curse. Dumbledore was freed some the spell.

Dumbledore walked towards Tom Riddle, who was now looking like a handsome middle-aged man. The only one to notice what was going on was Dumbledore and the few Death Eaters still alive. Tom Riddle turned from a middle-aged man into a late teenager, from a late-teenager to an old child, from an old child to a baby and from a baby to nothing. As finally Dumbledore bent down to se what had happened to Voldemort, there was nothing more than a foetus. Harry had disappeared as well.

Ron helped Hermione slowly up from the floor. He could barely believe what he saw. Hermione had received a death curse right on her chest and she still lived! He slightly wondered if she was going to become 'Hermione: The-Girl-Who-Lived'. Hermione was crying whilst walking up, and Ron jumped in surprise as he saw the odd lump that had been on Hermione's chest fall on the floor: it was Crookshanks. Her faithful cat had been her weapon; he had been her shield.

They held each other, oblivious to anything else and there, they cried. They cried and cried and cried, tears streaming down their eyes, wetting their faces. It was all over. They stood there, surrounded by dead bodies of Death eaters and Dumbledore holding the cloths that had been Harry's and Voldemort's.

They realized that Harry was dead. Their cries broke the taboo of not talking about the dead. They didn't say a word, just cried. And with the abolition of taboos, they lips met, touching for the first time. They kissed. Where death had taken from them friendship, love had taken place.

They were both alone now. The trio was now a duet. And they knew they couldn't ever leave each other. They became one, a person, and whilst they kissed, their bodies melt into one form, and it was impossible to say where he began and she stopped.