AN: Alright, here's the next chapter. I'm definitely still new to this whole posting stories thing, and I can say that this story has made me wish I'd either finished it, or at least gotten much farther along before I started posting, but I thank you all for your patience and support while I navigate balancing work, life, and fanfiction. This one took me a while, but I hope you all enjoy it. Let me know what you think, and as always, thanks for your continued support.

Chapter 16

Harry stared in shock, looking at Becca, Maddy, and Marlene who were sobbing over Sirius's body. It couldn't be real. Losses were expected, and Harry was no stranger to them, but he'd desperately wanted to save this world without it resulting in the death of any of his doppleganger's family. He especially hadn't wanted Maddy and Becca to lose their father, just as things were starting to improve in this world.

"How?" Ginny muttered to Alicia and Jason, the latter of whom was looking exhausted, and was sitting on the floor, his face losing more color each minute.

"We ran into Crouch Jr, Riddle, and Regulus while we were protecting some Order members," Jason muttered. "Regulus killed Sirius."

Harry's eyes closed as he felt tears flow. Killed by his own brother . . . a brother that in Harry's world had died a hero, trying to bring about Voldemort's end.

They were currently at Potter Cottage, but the large group of people that had been transported there couldn't stay. The little Potter home wouldn't be able to support all the people they'd saved, especially since they'd lost all the tents that had been back at their underground Order base. The ones here at Potter Cottage were all the ones that Harry's family and friends had brought with them to stay in, and were thus all occupied. The two extra tents that Jason and Alicia had brought were both lost, so housing was really going to be an issue. However, details like that were trivial in the face of devastating losses.

"Harry, we need to pull it together and help figure out who's still alive, how they found us, where we'll house the survivors of the Order, what we're going to do next, and how we'll treat the wounded," Alicia said from where she was crouched next to Jason looking worried. "We'll mourn afterwards," she said softly, and Harry nodded.

"What spell did you use that put you in this condition?" Harry asked after a moment, very rarely having seen Jason look this exhausted.

"I used the time displacement ritual," Jason muttered, and Alicia shook her head at him with a scowl.

"You know how dangerous that ritual is!" she scolded. "The backlash if Riddle had interrupted the ritual would have killed you."

"I know, but I didn't really see many other options," Jason said quietly, his voice strained.

"What's the time displacement ritual?" Harry asked.

"A very dangerous and complex ritual that allows its user to shift spells or objects forward or backward in time space in order to re-materialize it elsewhere," a voice said, and Harry turned to see Grindelwald still standing there, looking at Jason curiously. "Few have ever even attempted that ritual, since using it in combat isn't usually possible for most people, and if it's interrupted, Time punishes the user by quickly aging them to death."

Harry and Ginny gaped before both glared at Jason.

"What the hell kind of gamble was that? If you used the clone technique to make that work, you should have been able to hold off Riddle, Crouch, and Regulus," Ginny scolded.

"There are no guarantees when fighting people of that caliber, and you damn well know that," Jason said back with a bit of heat, to Harry's surprise. "Yes, I'm a better duelist than Riddle, but he still knows an incredible amount of magic . . . more than me, and all it takes is one creative twist that I don't counter or even know how to counter and I die. Besides, Crouch and Black were no pushovers. Superb duelists, easily as good as the Lestranges, maybe better. With Riddle helping them, and me shielding people, I did what I thought I needed to do."

"We can yell at Jace later," Alicia said, breaking up the tension. "For now, we need to deal with the situation at hand. Harry, get with Albus and start coordinating homes for all the Order members. I'll set up a field hospital with Apollo and Artemis so we can start treating the wounded, or evacing them to the Australian hospital if needed. Ginny, find Lily or James and have them get in contact with Severus. After that, find Ron, Hermione, Neville, and mine and Jace's dads to start working on plans and scenarios."

Everybody nodded at their assigned duties and then started moving off to do what they could. Before Alicia went off to set up the field hospital, she leaned down and gave Jason a quick kiss, and then brushed her arm across his shoulder.

Jason managed to pull himself to his feet, and then he walked over to Marlene, Becca, and Maddy, who were still mourning Sirius's loss. Becca looked at him before flinging herself into his arms and he hugged her tight.

"I'm sorry," Jason whispered, knowing it did little to help the grief stricken girl.

**HP**

"83," Harry said, his voice dull. "That's how many Order members died today."

It had taken over four hours to coordinate where to send everyone, treat the injured so that none would die of their injuries, and gather accurate reports on who was dead, and who was still alive. Now, those who were able to push their grief to the side in order to have this meeting.

"Gods, over half of the Order died," Isabelle muttered, looking angry, especially now that all their plans to end the war had just gone down the drain.

"Would have been more if we didn't have Order members out doing scouting missions or out getting supplies," Katie said grimly. "Not counting those that just weren't at HQ at the time."

"I want to know how the hell they found us!" Ron exclaimed, a scowl on his face.

Around the table was nearly every person from the other dimension, save Isla, Alicia, Jamie, and Angelina. In addition to the dimension travelers were Dumbledore, McGonagall, Amelia Bones, Bill, Kingsley, and Barty Crouch. Of those, all but Crouch were showing signs of grief, since all of them had lost friends, and family in the ambush.

"I can answer that," a sneering voice answered, and they turned to see Snape walking in, his face very grim. "You got sloppy. The Dark Prince captured one of your group and killed three others who decided to try and conduct a raid on Cabbe's home. He pulled everything he wanted to know out of Rand's worthless mind before he killed him. Thankfully the Dark Prince was only looking for you all, and not me or I might not be here as well."

"That fool should have died!" Crouch growled.

"None of them should have been out there at all!" Ginny snapped.

"Well, you weren't moving fast enough!" Crouch snapped back. "We needed to strike!"

"You stupid, short-sighted assholes just cost us ending this war within the next few weeks!" Katie exclaimed. "How the fuck have you survived this long?"

"By striking first! By striking hard!" Crouch exclaimed, his eyes bulging with a hint of madness.

"Well because of your stupidity, we lost 67 of the newer recruits to the Order, and we lost 16 of the original Order members, many of whom were some of your strongest fighters," Harry said sternly.

"Who all died?" Hermione asked hollowly, glancing around the room at the grief-stricken people, knowing there would be some names that would shock her.

"They hit the medical wing killing Poppy, Andromeda, and Dorcas, so the Order lost all three of its healers," Harry said sadly, knowing that Tonks had now lost both of her parents. "Flitwick, Hestia, and Dedalus were all killed. Edgar and Ruby Bones, Proudfoot, and David Bell. Now we know that the Patil's, Rand, and Aran were killed before the ambush, and lastly Gideon Prewett . . . and Sirius," Harry finished quietly, glancing at Bill who's face showed barely repressed rage and sorrow at the loss of his uncle.

"They knew the risks," Crouch said with a scowl. "We killed a lot of Death Eaters today, and that's a good thing!"

"All in all, the Dark Lord lost 55 Death Eaters today," Snape said with a sneer. "I would hardly count that as a victory, Bartemius."

"We'd had the wands to actually engage Riddle's forces while we mounted an attack on Diagon Alley and Gringotts," Ron moaned. "Riddle could have been mortal this time next week if you'd just been patient!"

"Well, now the Dark Lord is preparing for battle in a way I haven't seen in over ten years," Snape said bluntly. "His multiple losses have made him realize he's a bit rusty in his dueling skills, and he's working hard to correct that. He will not underestimate you all again, that I can be sure. I can also be fairly sure that you will find it hard to recruit anyone, since the Dark Lord has started hanging the bodies of everyone killed today in places of prominence like Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade, in front of Hogwarts, and even at the Ministry."

"Great," Harry muttered, knowing that it was his and Jason's duels that had led to this outcome.

Harry sighed, thinking of what a colossal cluster fuck this had turned out to be, and all because some of the Order members got impatient . . . fifteen fucking years, but they couldn't wait another week or two.

"Alright, we have to adjust. We need to shake things up," Harry said, trying to think how to proceed. "We'll talk to our allies abroad and get some information on the war on their fronts, and see if they can spare people. After that, we'll have to plan how to salvage this war. Severus, any intel you can provide, will be helpful. Otherwise, everyone else, get back to your families and friends. Dismissed."

**HP**

"I thought my people were idiotas, but your . . . " Illeana couldn't even finish her sentence, she was looking so angry. "Your people were supposed to take care of Riddle! We've nearly wiped his troops off two continents, but you can't even take back your own country!"

"We know, Illeana," Alicia said tiredly.

It had been three days since the ambush that had claimed half the Order's lives. In that time, they'd had to do some serious planning and thinking to figure out how they were going to proceed. A lot of it depended on this meeting here.

For the first time since Voldemort had taken most of this world and the dissolution of the ICW, the world's resistance leaders were gathered to discuss how to end Voldemort and the Death Eaters once and for all. Nearly forty countries' representatives were in attendance. It was more when you considered that the SAA only sent five people to represent the many countries that comprised it.

"So what? Now you expect us to lend you some of our forces so that you can deliver on your promises to all of us," Kane said with a frown on his face, and a dark gleam in his eyes.

Jason didn't blame him. The Oceanic Alliance had done great things liberating many islands in the Pacific Southeast, but they'd also suffered heavy losses doing so, and it had started on the promise that the English would take care of Voldemort. He made eye contact with Alicia and she nodded slightly, obviously understanding what he was thinking. They weren't going to get any help from these people, at least not in the way they had hoped.

"No, we'll still deliver on our promise," Jason said wearily, knowing that they were going to have to do something he'd really hoped to avoid. "We just want help in stopping Riddle's forces from returning to England."

"What did you have in mind?" a deep voice asked, and Jason looked to see Langston Brown, the American Hitwizard, one of the most powerful wizards Jason had ever met.

"For those of you still fighting your own battles in your respective countries, we just want you to keep up the good work, but also maybe try and prioritize hitting portkey locations. For the rest of you, especially you American's, and the SAA, we were hoping you might be willing to take a page out of muggle history."

There were murmurs around the room at that pronouncement.

"What are you proposing?" Fernando Cortez, one of the SAA leadership asked.

"Back in World War II, the Americans, Canadians, English, and many others joined forces and invaded Europe through France in order to combat the Nazi Germans," Jason said. "We were hoping you might be willing to do the same thing."

"You want us to invade Europe?" Roger Carson, the American Minister asked in surprise.

"Yes," Jason said. "This will help prevent Riddle from pulling his forces back to England, help our allies that are working to retake their countries," he said nodding at the representatives from the French, Italian, Polish, German, Spanish, Portuguese, and Greek resistances, "and also be the next step in retaking this world."

Muttering started breaking out, and soon arguments were being held as people argued in favor or against Jason's proposition.

"Why must it be Europe? Our countries matter too!" one voice protested, and others started clamoring about agreeing or disagreeing.

"ENOUGH!" a voice said loudly and authoritatively, and everyone looked over to see the representative from the Japanese resistance: Eichi Kirigaya.

"The proposed plan is sound, and at no point was it said that forces couldn't be directed to other places to assist other resistances," he said calmly. "The Dark Lord must be killed if we have any hope of fully retaking our homes, and if the British need us to stop Death Eaters from returning to their lands in order to accomplish that, then that is what we must do."

"Kirigaya is correct," a heavily accented voice said, and Jason realized it was Yaroslav Patrova, the Russian delegate. "Ve must band together to defeat these dogs, and if that means some of us need to last a bit longer in our own territories, zen so be it," he finished with a scowl.

With those two speaking up, the meeting started to settle down as even some of the louder voices who wanted support for their areas immediately realized a shift in the atmosphere had occurred. It wasn't long before plans were being made for the largest alliances to start gathering their forces to prepare for invasions at several key locations, just like the muggles had done. It would be the largest coordinated effort the magical world had ever seen.

As things were wrapping up, Jason and Alicia started wandering out, prepared to return with both good and bad news when Ileana and Kane cut them off.

"Are you going to be able to deal with Riddle and the Death Eaters despite losing half of your forces?" Kane asked.

"Yes, but we're going to have to cross some lines that we'd avoided doing so till now, and it will cost us our spy's position," Jason said with a tired sigh.

"What lines?" Kane asked with a frown.

"We need aid, so we'll get it from the one force in opposition to the Death Eaters that wasn't present at this meeting," Alicia answered, and seeing the confusion on the other two's faces, she finished, "The werewolves."

Both Ileana and Kane showed surprise.

"Even we've heard of how bloodthirsty the werewolf packs in Europe are," Ileana said. "Are you sure that's wise?"

"We definitely can't trust them, but the enemy of our enemy and all that," Jason replied tiredly, and then glanced at Alicia who nodded. "We'll keep in touch, but it's time for us to get back if we're going to set this up correctly."

"Very well," Ileana said, and Kane nodded, and then turned to head back to their respective groups, and moments later, Alicia and Jason flame traveled away.

**HP**

"That's insane! We can't ally ourselves with those murderers!" Mad-Eye protested, as Harry explained the idea that they'd come to in case they weren't able to get assistance from abroad.

"We need to ally ourselves, even temporarily, with anyone who might help us kill Riddle," Ginny responded sharply. "We're not asking you to fight side by side with Greyback, but his group might be what we need in order to end this war. The United American Resistances will invade Europe in a month, and when they do, we need to deliver on our end of the bargain. We have just over one month to hit the enemy hard, which will lead to the end of this war. Severus will deliver on his end, but now that we have half the troops, if we want to successfully hit Gringotts, we're going to need more people."

The remaining senior members of the Order were nearly all present, many still showing signs of grieving their lost friends and family, but despite that, they all seemed to be agreeing with Mad-Eye's sentiment.

"How will a bunch of bloodthirsty werewolves even the playing field?" James asked. "No one's even sure how many people Greyback's got, and unless he's got even half of the people we've got, they won't be that useful."

"Oh, they've got plenty of people," Alicia said with a shrug. "I didn't get a full count, but I estimated they were roughly a hundred strong, possibly more if they had any of their people out in different areas. In fact, I would bet that they have quite a bit more that were out hunting or doing scouting runs."

"When did you make contact?" Bill demanded. "I thought this was a discussion about whether we would or not, but you just went off and did it!"

"Of course not," Katie responded with an unimpressed glare at Bill. "They tracked down the werewolves' locations just in case they needed them and then did a scouting fly by to get an estimation of their strength."

"How were you able to track them down?" Savage asked suspiciously. "Nobody knows where they are."

"Well, we had a rough idea of where the werewolves would probably set up shop," Jason admitted with a shrug, since he'd had dealings with several werewolf packs back in his own world. "Turns out we were right, and it was a simple matter of tracking the werewolves the rest of the way back to their hideout."

"Regardless of how we found them, the matter remains," Harry said. "A hundred strong or more is plenty to accomplish what we need to do. We can have them hit both of the reactionary forces that Riddle has, perhaps augmented with some of us dimension travelers to deal with the dementors. Meanwhile, the Order will split into two large forces, one of which will hit Hogsmeade, and the other will hit Diagon Alley. With two major locations being hit, and both reactionary forces under attack, Riddle's forces will be hard pressed to counter us in force, and that should give us time to get into Gringotts and get Hufflepuff's Cup. Prior to us conducting those attacks, Severus will kill Nagini and poison the Death Eaters' dinners that night. If we pull this off, we'll have gathered or destroyed all of Riddle's horcruxes, and we'll have dealt a decisive blow to his forces. From there, we should be able to call in some of our allies to lend us some wands in order to finish them off."

"But how can we trust that Greyback will keep up his side of the mission?" Amelia Bones asked. "It's a good plan, and it could really lead to the end of this at last, but it relies on trusting Greyback, and that is never a good idea."

"Greyback will keep his side of the bargain because it will be in his best interest," Neville answered, and all eyes focused on him. "The Death Eaters betrayed him, and they kill his kind on sight. The British Ministry, while certainly discriminatory, didn't kill werewolves. Perhaps arrested them without valid reasons, and made their lives unnecessarily hard, but didn't kill them. They stand to gain a lot by this working, plus if they're as bloodthirsty and ruthless towards Death Eaters as we've heard, then this will be something they'll enjoy. Besides, I would bet a great many of those werewolves follow Greyback out of need, not desire. They have to stick with the pack or they'll die. Take away that, and I bet many would branch off to go about their lives or form their own packs away from Greyback. Regardless, we need them, so we just have to hope that they hold up their end of the bargain, and be cautious in case they don't."

The various members of the Order started muttering among themselves, debating it over and over before it seemed they'd all decided it didn't matter what they did since the dimension travelers would probably do it anyway, and nearly all nodded their approval, though many of those nods were hesitant.

"We'll leave it to you to talk to the werewolves," Albus said after glancing around the room. "In the meantime, we'll start preparing everyone we do have. Dueling practice, making potions, gathering supplies, and we'll start gathering information on the locations, and planning the operations."

**HP**

Jason, Alicia, Harry, and Ginny appeared on the outskirts of Greyback's territory. Not liking what they were about to do whatsoever, but knowing it had to be done, they set off at a brisk pace towards where they knew the werewolves had set up their homes. It wouldn't take long before the scouting party noticed them. They could conceal themselves, but it wouldn't win them any favors to surprise Greyback and his horde, nor were they sure that the werewolves wouldn't just curse first rather than bother to ask questions.

They continued to move through the woods, staying on edge, prepared for an attack, but it never came. They knew that some of the pack was aware of them, so they assumed the reason that they had gone uncontested was because Greyback wanted to let them in. Granted, that was probably just so he could kill them himself or so that he could get Ginny and Alicia to himself, since they remembered him as a pig that preferred women's flesh.

Finally, just as they were getting close to the temporary village that they knew they would find, one werewolf revealed himself. He had a manic look in his eyes, and his face and body language told them that he would love nothing more than to tear them limb from limb, but a testament to Greyback's savagery and dominance, the werewolf merely snarled.

"We're here to talk to Greyback," Harry called out, eyeing the man in front of him.

The man cackled, eyeing them all. "I'm goin' to enjoy feastin' on your bodies after Greyback's done wit' you."

Those wonderful words spent, he turned around and guided them the rest of the way to the village. 'Village' was probably a bit much to describe the hovels that the large pack were living in, but with how many people there were in the pack, a village was an apt description.

"How nice, you brought me some delicious females to feast on," a voice growled, and the four travelers leveled glares at the most savage werewolf in history. "I do love how tender their flesh is," he said with a nauseating grin.

"We're here for your help," Harry said, ignoring Greyback's words, since they were meant to unnerve him, but his words just caused many of the werewolves that were around to either start laughing or growling dangerously.

"That's rich," Greyback said. "They want our help," he said with a grin. "Well, we're helpful, boys, aren't we?"

A cheer went up around the clearing they were in, as jeers and taunts were thrown their way.

"Riddle," Harry called out, bringing the clearing to silence. "You want him dead, and we can make it happen, but we need your help to do it."

"Well, I'll admit I'm intrigued, but I highly doubt a few morsels of meat like yourselves are capable of killing the dark lord," Greyback said.

"We've already beat him in a duel, twice," Harry retorted back. "Killing him is a problem, but it isn't the problem. The problem we need your help with is his supporters."

"You want us to be the grunts who die fighting the Dark Lord's supporters while you kill the Dark Lord, is that it?" Greyback asked, a dangerous glint in his eyes.

"Not quite," Harry replied, unfazed. "We're certainly going to help with the Death Eaters, but we need your numbers to augment ours if we have any chance of pulling this off."

"What's in it for us?" Greyback asked, but Harry could tell his interest had peaked. "What are you going to be contributing to our forces?"

"First, we'll provide the intel so that you can hurt the Death Eaters more with less risk on yourselves," Harry said. "We're going to teach any of you that can do a patronus the destruction variant so that you can kill dementors, but we'll also augment your group when you attack with our people so that you shouldn't have to deal with the dementors. Should we be successful, it will lead to the destruction of the Dark Lord's regime. I know the Ministry was never good to you, but it was better than the certain death under this one. I can also promise that members of the Order will try to get better rights for your kind. I won't make guarantees that I know I can't deliver on, but with your aid, the Death Eaters could fall, and it could usher in a more tolerant era," Harry said passionately.

"Well, you offer us quite a bit," Greyback said, "but I don't see why we can't just kill you all right here, and then attack the Death Eaters whenever we feel like it, without the risk of attacking a large force of them. In fact, we can."

Greyback snapped his fingers and members of his pack started moving towards where the travelers were standing.

"Leave me the two girls!" Greyback said.

A volley of stunners and cutting curses came flying at Ginny, Alicia, Harry, and Jason, but the four of them simply flicked their wands, turning themselves all transparent so that the spells flew through them and hit the ground around them harmlessly.

Jason shadow traveled and appeared right in front of Greyback, and his sword tip was at Greyback's throat. Greyback snarled at him, but he didn't move a muscle.

"Cute trick, you worthless brat, but I don't think you have the guts or the speed to run me through," Greyback growled out.

"Greyback, killing you will not affect my conscience whatsoever," Jason replied coldly. "I will sleep just fine after I've removed your head from your body. However, as much as I would like to kill you, we need your ruthlessness. We need your talent in murder. We need you to help us kill the bastards that hunt all of us down and murder us whenever they can. If you don't want to help us, well, I can certainly kill you right here, right now, and hope your successor is more reasonable, but I think you'd prefer to die ripping out your enemies throats."

Greyback leveled a stare and then started laughing.

"Alright, kid. Now you've got my attention. Let's hear what you brats have planned. . ."