AN: We're in the final stretch ladies and gents… Enjoy

Disclaimer: they just ain't mine more's the pity.

Dawn came far too soon for anyone involved in the events that would follow. Hermione shifted softly eyeing the new visitor to her room. She was unconcerned at the moment with her toiletries but upon recognizing tonks, she had a good feeling where this was headed. Tonks smiled softly at her before speaking, "Yeah they sent me to assist you if you needed to get ready you know." Hermione had not spoken for a very long time just how long she did not know nor did she care. She still did not break her silence but merely nodded.

About an hour later she was leaning heavily upon tonks to re-enter the deliciously grey room. She seated herself on the bed atop the covers lying relaxed. Tonks disappeared out of the room only to return bearing a tray of food. How she had managed the distance without dropping it intrigued Hermione she had a strong suspicion that it had been charmed to refuse to be dropped. Even feet away the delicious aroma of soup wafted towards Hermione reminding her for the first time in ages just how hungry she really was. The tray was placed on her bed across her lap. The tray magically conformed to seat itself above her lap so as she would not bear any of its weight upon her frail body.

She smiled softly at Tonks as she disappeared once more from the room leaving Hermione with her thoughts. The tray bore a thick looking clam chowder and a rather large chunk of her favorite bread. It was completed by a very customary glass of pumpkin juice. She ate in the hush the room bestowed upon her willingly. Her mind wandered to the preparations she had made months ago. It seemed so long ago that she had first begun to write her last letters. Dumbledore had swore to her they would be delivered to all she had written to if it was at all possible. She recorded her thoughts in an inventive way she had conjured up herself. It was something like a cross between a pensive and diary.

She reflected calmly with a slight smirk the very first one she had done. It was in a fit of anger towards Ron towards it all. She recalled in vividly her exact words…

I was always the sure one you know. I knew where I was headed, who I was. I was ever so certain who I wanted to be of what I wanted to be. I knew the intricate ways the world in which I lived and yet I knew nothing. I had read of dickens and his Tale of Two cities became so literal to me in the later months. The opening page seemed to capture the essence of where I now stood. You were now the sure one. You were ever so certain of where you stood. You knew what you wanted. I in some secret part of my soul despised you for it. You knew you hated me. I can still see the rage burning in your eyes every time ours meet. Forgiveness was something you were always terrible but Hell, so was I. You were certain and I was not something I'll never grow used to, never. I shouldn't be this way, it shouldn't be this way but it is. I still remember you telling me far too often for my taste that if it shouldn't supposed to be this way if it wasn't supposed to be this way then it wouldn't. The world had always been so simple to you. You saw things so black and white, I prayed you always would.

I knew nothing and I fully blamed you. I blamed you in some small part of me. In the part of me so broken by what you've done, of you've become. In the part of me you have shattered, I feel these things. Although they do not dominate me by any means, they rarely do ever, they still exist. I opened all I had to you and yet you doubted such a fundamental part of me, of who I was. I was left so unsure of the things before me.

My heart, my mind could barely comprehend the things you would do to get even. Your anger frightens me for if ever I should find forgiveness within you I fear for what would be. Would I fall again in your esteem, would my fall from grace be so final this time? Would it be the end just like that, I know the answer and I have never been sorrier to know something in all my days.

I broke and shattered into a billion more pieces than I thought it was possible to break. But somehow in the darkness I was finding the answers I had so sought. Your forgiveness became a thing of the past. You couldn't, no you wouldn't with every fiber of your being. I had lost you to some imaginary foe that you had brought into existence. Perhaps I share some blame but in comparison to you it is minimal. I know now and I knew then I had done nothing wrong. I pity you for all you lost to something only you could see. I take that back your sister saw the same monster. She saw it in me and for that I am so sorry. She destroyed her greatest chance of happiness in much the same way you did. Hell, the ways were identical except for the aftermath. She retreated you came out roaring in bitter defense. Perhaps the ways in which you act is some genetic trait I have yet to encounter. I have no siblings and neither does he.

There is no reconciliation for us perhaps there never was. Perhaps you lied about how you felt about me from that apology in first year on. I know better though and I believe you are better than that. I hope one day you find all the things you've so desperately searched for. I'm dying it's the truth no smokescreens no anything. It's the thing you always accused me of loving so dearly, cold hard facts.

I've a role to play I barely understand but from that night on it's been that way. I shudder to think of where we would all be if you had chosen what you did when you did. Dumbledore tells me that through some sacrifice we will when, he says it has to do with the power of love. I have never doubted that power if you must know. Seems odd, no, that after everything I would believe, believe in the things you taught me. When you met me I didn't believe a damn thing like that. You brought that into existence with me for that I shall always be grateful to you. I don't regret a single thing we have done in the months that have followed, nor will I in the years that follow numbered as they may be.

Don't mistake me though I am so incredibly sorry for the way things are ending but it's just how things are. It's far too late for me to fix things. In the greatest part of my soul I wouldn't if I could. I genuinely believe its better this way. This way I'll die without a fuss. If you loved me it would be harder. Harder to leave you behind without me, living that kind of life, a life I never wanted for you. Now you'll be with another she will stand with you where I can't. You won't try to save me for even I see that it is far too late for such heroics. My choice is made and perhaps it was made that very night. If you suddenly forgave me, I would want out of it. I wouldn't want to give myself over to save a world for which I would not live to see.

I'm dying alone, it's pitiful but I don't begrudge you an inch. I know now what I want. If anything I like others before me have found the epiphany at the end. Strange to think as the world goes dark for me a bright light will shine at the end of it. I want for you a happiness I never had the pleasure of finding. I want you to be the man that I saw in you. I know what I want for myself twisted as it is. I want to die; I want to be done with this. I'm not suicidal don't get that impression please.

I'm just ready, ready for the choices to be made; Ready for the battle to rage. I'm so tired I can barely stand anymore, I want to sleep. I know better now than ever before it's my time, no matter how corny that sounds it's true.

I just wanted to say that I loved you more perhaps than you'll ever truly know. I'm not sorry for who I am, I never will be again not for any man. I don't begrudge you; things are the way they are. Goodbye for the last time my lionheart.

Harry awoke with a heaviness he couldn't shake. He knew Voldemort was closer ever so closer. He was coming, he was coming for Harry. He was coming to end things once and for all. He could feel in his bones in his core some preternatural sixth sense. He let Ron sleep as he sat in the window sill stroking Hedwig softly. She seemed to understand the finality of this last visit. In her own animalistic way she savored the last moments of peace just as Harry did.

In the later hours of the morning nearly eight Ron finally awoke. Harry wasn't bothering with class today it would be absolutely useless. He could no longer pretend that the battle wasn't coming; that the last steps to the end weren't arriving at his doorstep. He knew Voldemort would be here. He knew he would come before the day was over.

Ron took one look into Harry's eyes and knew the truth. It needed no explanation. They made their way done to breakfast with the heavy knowledge this was in all likely hood their last meal together. In some twisted sense of fate the house elves had served their favorite breakfast. They each feasted deciding to spend the last vestiges of time talking. They didn't want to fill their last moments with meaningless jokes, with a heavy silence or an absolute anger at the events unfolding before their eyes.

They headed back up the common room each with different purposes. Ron settled down with ink and quill to write a long letter to his parents. He didn't know if he would survive this coming battle and he didn't want to die with words unspoken. Harry was consciously going back over everything every memory. He was reliving his entire life without the benefit of a pensive. The two seemed to trade purposes in the mid morning. Harry settled himself down in a corner of the common room watching for a moment the stillness and emptiness that so filled it. He spoke the words in those last letters that he would never be able to utter in life. He doubted they would ever be read and a part of him profoundly wished they wouldn't be read. He said all the things he needed to say and he was better for it.

Hermione wanted to fiddle with the muggle clothes she wore beneath the black witches robes. It was a pale auburn dress. The thin straps and silken material clung to her. It was her favorite dress it was what she wanted to die fighting in. She brought herself to her feet with a great force and shuffled across the blue-grey carpet to the drapes.

She forced them open looking into the bittersweet tangerine sky spike with crimson. She could almost feel the cool wind dancing upon her skin. She turned at the sounds of the door being eased open. It was Dumbledore dressed in those familiar midnight blue robes of his. He beckoned to her without saying a thing. There was nothing else to say , nothing else to do but face the fight. To face the death before her, her own death. To face the choices she had made. It was simply time for all of them.

This is the next to last chapter so I just wanted to say it's been a blast!