Author: SportsNightLover

Summary: Post HBP. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and others search for the horcruxes. They skip their last year at Hogwarts, so that they can find and destroy all of Voldemort's horcruxes. PLEASE R&R!

Disclaimer: The characters are not, and were never, mine.

A/N: There is a little switching of whose POV it is in this chapter.

Lord Voldemort lifted his wand, looked into Harry's eyes, and saw very little fear, but mostly the deepest loathing there could be. The little fear that Harry had, Voldemort knew, was purely for his little girlfriend, whose fate was already sealed.

Voldemort laughed inside, "I love this part." He thought to himself, smiling before he could stop himself. "Wait, I don't need to stop myself, I'm Voldemort, the most powerful wizard in the world." And with that, he let out a short laugh.

"What's so funny?" Harry asked, obviously delaying for time.

"You wouldn't understand," Voldemort said truthfully, not caring how much he told Harry, considering he was about to die.

Voldemort abruptly stopped laughing. "This is the time," he thought, "the moment I've been waiting for. It's been more than sixteen years since this little brat escaped me, and now he shall pay."

Voldemort had already raised his wand to Harry's eye level, and was preparing to kill him. "This is the time that he would be saved," Voldemort continued in his mind, looking around. "There's no one here, so my plans must have been perfect. His stupid little friends must have all been wiped out by my Death Eaters, and the Order is too afraid to help. Nice to know." he thought. Again, Voldemort laughed out loud.

"Avada Kedavra!" he shouted, while a red light shone around the room, and a thud was clearly audible.

"Wait a minute, the killing curse is green, not red," Voldemort thought so loud that he almost said it.

He looked around to see that the Death Eater closest to him had been stunned and fell to the ground, causing the thud. He saw the rest of his Death Eaters aim shots out the windows, and pitifully miss. He then realized his killing curse must have been dodged.

"Must I do everything myself?" he asked, this time out loud, pointing his wand at the red-haired boy shooting spells at his guards, and the brown-haired girl at his side. His spells were deadly accurate, and the boy and girl flew into the air, and fell feet away.

"RON!" Harry yelled after shooting his spells at the Death Eaters while they were distracted. "HERMIONE!"

"Expelliarmus," Lucius Malfoy said, as if nothing happened.
Harry's wand flew back into the kitchen, and he couldn't get it because half the Death Eaters remembered what their job was. The other half was still engaged in fierce battle.

"Damn it," Voldemort thought to himself, realizing that Harry's friends actually beat his well-trained Death Eaters. Granted he sent his worse, but still, he sent a number of them.

Voldemort looked to see how much Harry was smirking, but was surprised to see that he was wide-eyed and counting on his fingers.

"Twenty, twenty-one, plus Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and me, that makes only twenty-five. Where are the other five?" Harry said, not caring who heard.

"I got five of them, that's great," thought Voldemort, and then the other side rallied back. "Five lousy teenagers is it. With all of my Death Eaters, it should have been all thirty."

"That's true. And, they didn't leave the fight to just join another, so they must have won. And, they wouldn't have been happy unless they had saved their homes from every one of my Death Eaters. So I could count on twenty-five less Death Eaters, maybe a few more. It depends on how many fled this time," his first side agreed. He finally snapped back to attention, and looked around him.

There were ten Death Eaters lying face first on the floor, "Why didn't they win?" Again, his other side argued.

It doesn't matter right now, they will be dealt with.

That's right, and the others have filled their places.

How many of the others?

All of them. Why?

Even the one that held the little girl, and none of them are making sure Potter doesn't escape?

You're right, they're all fighting, and the girl is gone, but Harry isn't.

Really?

Yeah, he got his wand back, and he is now joining the fight from inside.

Don't you think you should stop him?

That would be a good idea.

Hurry, he saw you grab your wand.

It doesn't matter, I'll catch up.

True.

With his internal argument now subsiding, he leapt off the throne-like chair he was sitting on, and began to walk outside. He was met by no one, but saw that his guards from before were on the ground, obviously stunned. He laughed, knowing that Harry did this, and thought that if he only stunned them, he would be no match for Voldemort. He continued around the house. The fresh morning air was full of shouts as spells were yelled and lights as they erupted from the wands. And then, everything went silent.

"What happened?" Voldemort thought. "Based on their performances from a minute ago, my Death Eaters wouldn't have won yet."

"Go find out," Voldemort heard the voice in his head say.

As he rounded the building, he saw that all of his enemies looked happy, and were picking up their wounded as if they had won. Voldemort noticed that the girl was leaning against Harry for support, and before he could get a spell off, the whole army disappeared with a few cracks and pops, breaking the new silent air.

"How could he get away again?" Voldemort asked to no one, as he went to check on how badly his Death Eater's lost.

He went inside to see that every one of his Death Eaters had been hit by a spell. They were elementary spells and could be fixed, but why weren't they good enough to be blocked and why were his Death Eaters the ones who lost, not the other side?

"Who's injured, and how many are there?" Harry asked the second he got back from the graveyard.

"There are a lot this time, Harry," Neville was the first to answer, looking like he wasn't even in the fight, because he was completely unscathed and was smiling.

"How many?"

"Seven," Luna answered this time.

"Seven?" Harry almost shouted. Then he sighed. "That's too many. Who are they?"

"Dennis Creevey was hit by something, and he still hasn't gotten up, but there's a pulse," Neville said, "Some Ravenclaw girl, who was knocked off her feet, but she doesn't look too bad. McLaggen was hit by a stunning spell, because he was too busy shouting out orders. It hit him in the arm, and there it's oozing. Zacharias Smith was hit by some spell, and he has a broken leg."

"Serves him right," Luna said. Harry looked at her questioningly, curious what he did to her.

"A Hufflepuff, who was fine, but a little dizzy, and Ron and Hermione were also hit by something that we can't figure out, but they seem to be fine. Everyone else cured themselves," Neville continued.

"Where are they?" Harry asked immediately.

"Who?" Luna asked.

"Ron and Hermione."

"Right in here," Fred said, emerging from one of the rooms, and pointing through a door opposite him.

Harry walked in to find his two best friends lying on beds, eyes closed, but fear still in their faces. George was sitting near Ron, and rose when Harry walked in the room.

"What happened? You where in there when it happened, right?" George asked quickly.

"Yeah, I was," Harry said, staring down into the faces of Ron and Hermione. He thought to himself, 'Why couldn't you just stay here? Why couldn't you just stick to the Death Eaters? Why did you have to try and save me?'

"Well, who shot it?"

"I'm not sure, I was trying to shoot the Death Eaters from up close, but I think it was Voldemort." George gasped, obviously thinking the same thing Harry was, that if Voldemort shot it, it must have been dangerous.

In a shaky voice, George asked, "How many did we get?"
"I'm not sure, but last I saw, there was about fifteen on the floor, then Voldemort went after me, and I went back to you guys."

After seeing if he could recognize the curse, which he couldn't, he left to check on the others. Dennis Creevey wasn't hit by anything major, it was simple to apply the counter curse, and heal him quickly. The Ravenclaw was just stunned, and was fine in a matter of minutes. McLaggen was oozing fast, but could be healed in an instant, and was harshly yelled at by Harry for giving directions to his army. Neville was right, and the Hufflepuff had nothing medically wrong. Zacharias Smith's broken leg wasn't really broken, just slightly fractured. He made a bigger deal out of it than he should have, and barely thanked Harry when he put it back to normal. Harry then ran back to Ron and Hermione to see how they were doing. Since he was gone, they had awoken, and they were now sitting up, and seemed to be perfectly fine.

"Hey, Harry," Hermione said, the second he entered the room.

"How are you guys?" Harry asked.

"We're fine," Ron answered for Hermione.

"Good, because I think that curse, or whatever it is, came directly from Voldemort."

"So?" Ron said, seeming more afraid of Harry saying the name, than Voldemort himself.

"So, he is the most powerful of any of them, and wouldn't care about using dangerous spells. Whatever it is, you guys aren't allowed to help us for a few weeks, just in case."

Ron and Hermione made to protest but Harry just left. He wouldn't have stopped them from helping, if he weren't afraid of them getting hurt again. Hermione was supposed to be one of the best, and if she could get hurt, what about the rest of them? He walked into the room that Fred had left before, because he now knew that was where Ginny was.

"Ginny, how are you?" Harry asked, searching her for any signs of missed injury.

"I'm fine, thanks to you," she replied, smiling.

"How did he find out? How could he have known?"

"I don't know, but we're all safe, right?"

"For now, but he might just go after you again. And now he knows where we are staying, we will have to move."
"Come on, let's go to the cave, everyone is waiting for us. Don't worry, I'll protect you," she said, fighting back laughter. Harry however, did laugh.

When they got to the cave, Harry first asked what happened while he was gone. Hermione answered, telling him that she had heard the Death Eaters apparate, and immediately woke the others. Once everyone was up, they attacked the Death Eaters, of which there were twenty. His army outnumbered them, and surrounded them. They shot curses from out in the open, in hiding, from behind, and even right in front. The Death Eaters were uncoordinated and just tripped over each other. They beat them easily.

"Why did you come help me? And how did you know where I was?" Harry asked.

"We thought you needed help, and we found your letter," Ron replied.

"I thought I ripped that up."

"And we put it back together," Fred said from behind Neville.

Harry then told them most of what went on when he was alone. They seemed in awe that he managed to stay alive that long, and save Ginny. He then put them to the task of finding a new place to stay, considering that the place would be swarming with Death Eaters soon. They went to bed thinking about it.