AN: because as Ultima-Owner pointed out last chapter, when it rains it pours. I still own nothing, you guys will be the first to know if things change. Not that I expect them to, of course.
CHAPTER 40 – Crescendo of war
"Minerva!" called Chandra rushing towards the older woman, Liliana close behind her.
Having received Snape's message they had been making haste to reach the front gates, hoping to catch a professor who could hopefully give them a lift: planeswalking out of a plane and back in was exhausting enough without the prospect of the battle to follow.
"Chandra, miss Vess," greeted the scotswoman without slowing "I expected to see the two of you already at the Ministry."
"The students have kidnapped Featherbright, we're kind of in need of a way there," sheepishly explained the redhead "We were about to go get them under control when that ghost doe appeared."
"Should some of us stay back?"
"If this Voldemort character is as powerful as you all make him out to be we'll be needing every one of us, especially since Dumbledore is out of the picture," said Liliana shaking her head "Maybe let the other teachers know if you can spare the energy. A few students are hardly our most pressing concern."
A distant explosion resonated somewhere in the dungeons, as if to defy the necromancer's statement.
"I fear you're right," admitted the older-looking woman casting a glance in the descending stairs direction "Filius and Pomona will have to deal with this. Let us make haste."
Apparating into the Ministry main hall, it immediately became apparent to the trio that they had landed into a warzone: most exposed surfaces sported signs of spellfire, and what Chandra guessed had been a large golden fountain laid in pieces scattered all around. A single body was propped against what remained of a desk of some kind. Judging by the scarlet robes, he had been a night guard.
Ignoring the fallen man –or in Liliana's case, swiftly animating him– they made their way after Minerva towards some kind of golden cage that turned out to be an elevator.
"Arthur should be down in the Department of Misteries. I'll go help him, you two should head for the auror headquarters. If there's resistance, it's probably centred there."
Seeing no reason to disagree, the two planeswalkers bid the professor good luck and took a different elevator to the suggested level, hoping to find something other than scores of Death Eaters. Not that putting some of them out of commission wouldn't be a good thing, it was just that Chandra would have much preferred saving some lives.
"My minion first, you cover him, I cover you?" asked Liliana tapping her right index finger on her thigh.
The pyromancer sincerely doubted the necromancer to be nervous, it was more likely that the ride was boring her as much as it was Chandra herself.
The pyromancer agreed and donned her goggles. The red lenses wouldn't do any good in the dark –Voldemort's forces must have had a way to bypass the problem or they wouldn't have snuffed out the lights– but the discomfort was worth not getting cinder in her eyes.
The elevator reached a floor –second level according to the disembodied voice that preannounced them stopping by scant seconds– and the golden bars opened to reveal two panting aurors, a man and a teen girl slightly older than Chandra. The man was leaning on his colleague's shoulder, obviously favouring his left leg.
"Friends!" exclaimed the pyromancer seeing both the man raising his wand and Liliana's servant tensing to charge "We're all friends here! Reinforcements from Hogwarts."
"A bit late girlie," commented the man eyeing the animated corpse with distrust "The Ministry's fallen, or is as good as."
"Shove it Proudfoot, it's a miracle they're even here," said the girl, her black hair turning an impressive shade of red, before cycling to a pale cyan "With them here we have a chance of getting the boss and the other guys out!"
"Where are they?" asked Liliana stepping back to let the two lawmages in "We were directed towards the third level."
"The boss should be on the fifth, defending the Minister's office with most of the boys," explained the girl while she helped her colleague in the elevator "There should be others on various levels like us, left behind to act as a distraction."
Agreeing that they had no time to go through every level hoping to find someone still alive, the five men team ascended towards the fifth floor. Proudfoot opted to stay back and cover the way out since he was wounded, while Tonks was more than willing to join the planeswalkers.
Hearing the female auror's name, Chandra realized that she was the same shapeshifter the pyromancer had met in the summer at the Order meetings. It was no wonder then that she had readily accepted their help.
Nobody had called the elevator on either the third or the fourth floor, so they reached the fifth shortly. As soon as the doors clanked open, the signs of the battle that had been fought there were visible to anyone with a working eye: broken furniture, debris, burnt marks on most surfaces, and three corpses. Somewhere down the hall sounds of a spellfire exchange could be heard.
"No time to rest dears," called Liliana as her runes flashed purple.
"I'd be only a dead weight," protested Proudfoot, who had leaned against the wall in order not to aggravate his injury.
"She wasn't talking with you," snorted Chandra gesturing to the corpses who had started to clumsily rise to their feet.
"Normally I should arrest you Lady, but I'm hardly in any position to," chuckled the wounded auror "Give them Hell for me too, will you?"
The four undead took point, forming a wall in front of Chandra and Tonks, who walked ahead of the necromancer.
They soon came upon the fight they could hear: almost ten Death Eaters were huddled around a bend and behind some furniture, while at least two red robed aurors defended a barred up room, casting from behind the chipped doors.
"Give no quarters dears," ordered Liliana gesturing with her right hand "There will be plenty of them to mop up in the lower floors later."
Chandra waited until the shambling quartet was almost upon the masked wizards before throwing a fireball in their midst, setting one of them on fire. Tonks followed suit with a hail of coloured projectiles. The Death Eaters, who were led by the blonde man Voldemort had called Lucius, fired back a salvo of bright green spells mixed with what the redhead believed to be exploding curses, which made short work of Liliana's minions. The necromancer tsked in annoyance and overloaded the spell animating the corpses, causing them to explode amid their opponents' ranks.
"What did I even come for?" wondered Chandra picking a piece of undead from her pauldron and flicking it away "You could have cleaned house alone!"
"Flatterer," replied Liliana kneeling next to a retching Tonks –her hair a sickly pale green– and massaging her back with one hand "You ok dear? If this makes you queasy maybe you should rethink your career choice..."
"I'd be more worried if she didn't puke after seeing that," commented the pyromancer checking if there were any Death Eaters still alive "I know I did the first time. Hey, this guy's mostly ok!"
And indeed she had found a masked individual that looked to be more or less unscathed, if stunned by the explosion. She took his mask off, punched him unconscious, and then broke his arms for good measure. Unfortunately, all of the dawned assailants disappeared moments later looking almost like they had been sucked into themselves. It was inconvenient, but it explained why they had found only dead aurors laying around.
"A healer, yeah right," commented one of the entrenched aurors revealing herself to be madam Bones "If we weren't almost overrun..."
"I'll have you know that I did indeed study as a healer under one of the greatest mistresses of the art that Dominaria has ever seen," said the necromancer in a badly faked offended tone "I never said that I actually practice the profession."
"I'm glad they came when they did," said the other auror, a brown haired man with no distinctive features whatsoever "Saved our bacon they did."
"On that we agree Dawlish," assented the woman "Unfortunately, you all didn't make it in time to save the Minister."
The fight wasn't going as planned, Ron considered. It wasn't nice to admit, but it was the truth. While Dean had sent a message via the charmed coins stating that Ravenclaw was secured, the Slytherins were still resisting –entrenched in their rooms after the initial assault had downed some of their bolder members– and he had yet to hear from his brothers, meaning that Umbridge hadn't been taken down either.
The plan had been intended as a shock tactic, relying heavily on the surprise element. The truth was there still was a fight to be fought only because they had managed to keep the Snakes separated in small groups, a state of things he wasn't exactly confident they could keep. When his forces tired out completely –not if but when, he was pretty sure it was just a matter of time– the Slytherins would surely push back and, with numbers on their side, they would squash the rebels.
Sure, Dean was en-route with the reinforcements, but he had to cross the whole castle, and if Ron's group capitulated first it would mean nothing: the Squad would easily overwhelm the rebels in the castle, leaving only the ten or so that still were in the Chamber.
Ron could already see their whole attack was going to end badly for the rebellion. Results couldn't be disputed. It had been a sort of mantra of his since the beginning of the operation, and the result was that his tactically sound plan hadn't been enough to let them retake the school. The result was that the whole rebellion would fall for his pride.
Unless he did something about it, of course.
"Fall back!" he ordered out loud while scrambling for his coin to extend the order to the other groups "Scramble and meet back at the entry point!"
Aborting the attack was the only logical choice. If results couldn't be disputed, at least he would assure all his comrades got back to safety. This way he had the meagre consolation that he would only have to face Chandra's wrath rather than whatever torture Umbridge could to cook up.