DEATH TO VOLDIE
or, Tea Time with Harry
"McGonagall was suddenly hit with the curious image of Harry temporarily flummoxing Voldemort by producing a tray of tea things at the height of battle, and then cursed herself for being frivolous." ---Unthinkable Thoughts, by Aidan Lynch
It was the Last Battle of the Great War. Voldemort and Harry Potter were locked in a battle of Titans, wands out and curses spilling forth. They dodged, they ducked, they blasted; red and green and blue light blasted away a tree, left a black scorch mark on the earth, and singed Harry's hair.
In one particularly gruesome death grip that Harry slipped away, smiled, pointed his wand - not at Voldemort, but about a yard away - and conjured a table, two chairs, and a sterling silver teaset.
If anyone else other than Harry and Voldemort had been in that particular area of the battle, they might have fainted dead away; as is, Voldemort could only stare, utterly dumbfounded, as Harry conjured a tablecloth (that slipped effortlessly under the teaset already there), a plate of scones and a small basket of peanuts and pecans. Another wave of his wand, and there was a stick of butter, melting slowly on a china plate, underneath a glass vase full of flowers.
Voldemort blinked his snake-like eyes slowly.
"I was thinking," Harry said brightly, transfiguring a stick into a napkin and tucking the corner of it in his collar, "we've been dueling here an awfully long time. It's time for tea, and I thought perhaps we could take a break."
Voldemort could only continue to stare dumbly.
Harry poured himself some Earl Grey. "Mmm. Smells good, eh, Tom?"
Somehow, Voldemort managed to collapse into the other empty chair. He continued to gaze at Harry in morbid fascination as he went from pouring tea for the both of them, to buttering scones. Voldemort took his proffered tea and scone, drinking and eating mechanically. Dimly, he thought this would be a good time to attack, except for the fact Harry still had his wand.
"Isn't this nice? More battles should break for tea-time," Harry was still speaking in a sickeningly cheery voice.
Voldemort nodded, not quite sure what to make of the situation. He'd finished his scone, and found himself buttering another. Perhaps the boy makes sense. In a very, very strange way. I am hungry. Killing Muggles and Aurors and dueling with boy heroes does that to you.
They ate and drank, while Harry chatted on enthusiastically about Quidditch. Voldemort found himself realizing it had been a good thirty years since he'd last played or watched a Quidditch game.
The scones were all gone, and Harry poured Voldemort the last of the tea.
"Peanuts?" Harry asked, holding out the bowl to the Dark Lord. Shrugging, he grabbed a handful of peanuts. Harry continued to chat on, though by now Voldemort had tuned him out. Until -
- "...and then Dumbledore happened to mention that, why, James wasn't my father at all, but that you were my f - "
At that moment, Voldemort did something very undignified for a Lord of the Dark Arts.
He choked, and got a peanut lodged in his throat. Quite soon, he was turning purple; he could dimly hear Harry, voice far too loud and laced with a saccrinated concern, "Oh, dear...Tom? Whatever is the matter - ?"
Voldemort hacked, and coughed, while Harry prattled on about rushing to go get help, or call St. Mungo's, or find a Muggle who knew the Heimlich maneuver. If Voldemort weren't quite so busy choking to death on a peanut, he would have noticed that, for all his talk, Harry didn't seem to be moving.
The last thing Voldemort heard before everything went black was Harry saying was a horrible thing to happen, right when they were having such a good time, drinking tea and eating scones.
-----
Harry stared down at the still body, prodding it with his toe, wrinkling his nose in disgust. With the wave of his wand, the table, chairs, and tea things disappeared. He muttered a soft, "Mobillicorpus," on Voldemort, and carried him off to the main part of the battle. Casting a quick protection charm around himself and the body, he strode right out into the middle of hundreds of wizards and Death Eaters, battling it out with wands and curses and hexes and jinxes.
A hush slowly fell over them as they all caught sight of Harry Potter, levitating Voldemort's corpse. Then, in one sudden movement, all the Death Eaters started to run in the opposite direction of the wall of Aurors, witches, and wizards; they didn't make it very far, and soon, all the Death Eaters were rounded up and being Apparated to the Ministry and Azkaban, whilst the remaining wizards crowded around Harry, shouting and calling, eager looks on their tired faces.
Ron elbowed his way through the crowd, smile a mile wide. "Harry! You did it - you actually killed V-Voldemort!"
Hermione was next, throwing her arms around Harry and squealing. "Oh, Harry! However did you manage to do it?"
Last came Draco; he'd turned away from the Dark Arts years ago, and had since become a rather good friend. Hermione finally disengaged herself so that they could all circle around Harry, who, grinning ruefully, said, "Well, it's all to do with Neville, really."
As one, Ron, Hermione and Draco went, "Neville?"
Harry nodded, holding up his wrist to show them the watch Neville had gotten him the previous Christmas. "I looked at it, and saw it was tea-time. So, I, um...started having tea and scones."
It went dead quiet.
Draco finally asked, "You stopped dueling with Voldemort to have tea and scones?"
"And peanuts," Harry elaborated. "The peanuts were very important."
"The peanuts were important." Ron said, flatly. Harry nodded, turning earnest eyes on friends and fellow followers of the Light and members of the Order. "Yeah. I waited until we'd finished the tea and scones, and then I offered him a peanut. Then I made up this crap about him being my father, to startle him, and he started choking and turning purple."
Remus had managed to get to the front of the tight circle of witches and wizards around Harry, and when Harry said this, his eyes started twinkling. Hermione and Draco's mouths twitched.
"...and I just kept talking while he, uh, choked...on a peanut."
Draco was looking decidedly bemused now. "Harry," he said, turning to look him in the face. "Are you saying you defeated Voldemort - Dark Lord and poster boy for all things evil - by having him choke on a peanut?"
Looking rather sheepish, Harry nodded.
It was silent for a few moments again, before a great cheer went up, followed by laughter, followed by Ron's, "Bloody brilliant, Harry!"
After that, it was pandemonium as several of the stronger, more muscular wizards hoisted Harry on their backs, while everyone else danced around, laughing and singing. A few other wizards Disapparated, taking the body of Voldemort with him. Ron, Hermione, and Draco followed in the wake of the crowd, all smiling and chuckling.
"You do realize we can never let him live this down," Draco said. Hermione's grin widened, and Ron smirked devilishly. "Too right, Malfoy. Too right."
------
Which is how Harry Potter, once the Boy Who Lived but now the Man Who Defeated Voldemort (By Having Him Choke On Peanuts), spent many, many years to come having Hermione, Ron and Draco always serving Earl Grey, scones with butter, and a basket of peanuts and pecans at tea-time. And how a new brand of Anti-Voldie peanuts came out on the market, and how the conjuring of tea-things came to be a very important lesson in Defense Against the Dark Arts, and, most importantly, how the reign of Voldemort finally came to an...
...END