Fallen Warrior

"Hagrid?" Harry struggled to raise himself out of the debris of metal and leather that surrounded him; his hands sank into inches of muddy water as he tried to stand. He could not understand where Voldemort

Many of the occupants flinched and winced at the name.

"What do you mean, You Know Who?" Roared Dolores Umbridge for the first time. She strangely quite during the introductions.

"It mean that he is alive, Professor Umbridge" Said Harry, now standing up.

"It would do you no well to argue Umbridge. After all I swore on my magic that all the contents in the book are real?" Said Teddy.

Pink tints appeared on her face but she thankfully kept quite.

had gone and expected him to swoop out of the darkness at any moment. Something hot and wet was trickling down his chin and from his forehead.

"Blood" Hermione gasped

He crawled out of the pond and stumbled toward the great dark mass on the ground that was Hagrid. "Hagrid? Hagrid, talk to me –" But the dark mass did not stir.

"Oh no!" gasped McGonagall. Dumbledore looked solemn, Snape no reaction, The Golden Trio Sad, and the Slytherins had cruel smile on their faces.

"Who's there? Is it Potter? Are you Harry Potter?" Harry did not recognize the man's voice. Then a woman shouted. "They've crashed. Ted! Crashed in the garden!"

"That's MY dad" Said Nymphadora (ahem…Tonks! Jeez Sorry!)

Harry's head was swimming. "Hagrid," he repeated stupidly, and his knees buckled. The next thing he knew, he was lying on his back on what felt like cushions, with a burning sensation in his ribs and right arm. His missing tooth had been regrown. The scar on his forehead was still throbbing.

"What is it with the scar?" asked someone aloud.

"Hagrid?" He opened his eyes and saw that he was lying on a sofa in an unfamiliar, lamplit sitting room. His rucksack lay on the floor a short distance away, wet and muddy. A fairhaired, big-bellied man was watching Harry anxiously. "Hagrid's fine, son," said the man, "the wife's seeing to him now. How are you feeling? Anything else broken? I've fixed your ribs, your tooth, and your arm. I'm Ted, by the way, Ted Tonks – Dora's father."

"Ha ha. Told ya!"

"Nobody contradicted you."

Harry sat up too quickly. Lights popped in front of his eyes and he felt sick and giddy. "Voldemort –" "Easy, now," said Ted Tonks, placing a hand on Harry's shoulder and pushing him back against the cushions. "That was a nasty crash you just had. What happened, anyway? Something go wrong with the bike? Arthur Weasley overstretch himself again, him and his Muggle contraptions?"

"Arthur?" Roared Mrs. Weasley. Her eyes were flashing dangerously.

"Sorry Molly." He answered meekly.

"No," said Harry, as his scar pulsed like an open wound. "Death Eaters, loads of them – we were chased –" "Death Eaters?" said Ted sharply. "What d'you mean, Death Eaters? I thought they didn't know you were being moved tonight, I thought –"

"Moved? Why?" asked Harry.

To his dissapointment nobody answered.

"They knew," said Harry. Ted Tonks looked up at the ceiling as though he could see through it to the sky above. "Well, we know our protective charms hold, then, don't we? They shouldn't be able to get within a hundred yards of the place in any direction."

"Wards, quite nice one at that." Mused Dumbledore.

Now Harry understood why Voldemort had vanished; it had been at the point when the motorbike crossed the barrier of the Order's charms. He only hoped they would continue to work: He imagined Voldemort, a hundred yards above them as they spoke, looking for a way to penetrate what Harry visualized as a great transparent bubble.

Almost everyone rolled their eyes.

"Your imagination Harry?" groaned Hermione.

He swung his legs off the sofa; he needed to see Hagrid with his own eyes before he would believe that he was alive.

Harry prayed with all his heart for him to be alive.

He had barely stood up, however, when a door opened and Hagrid squeezed through it, his face covered in mud and blood, limping a little but miraculously alive. "Harry!" Knocking over two delicate tables and an aspidistra, he covered the floor between them in two strides and pulled Harry into a hug that nearly cracked his newly repaired ribs.

"Hagrid!" said McGonagall chidingly.

"Blimey, Harry, how did yeh get out o' that? I thought we were both goners." "Yeah, me too. I can't believe –" Harry broke off. He had just noticed the woman who had entered the room behind Hagrid. "You!" he shouted,

"Harry, I know she looks a lot like her but she isn't her." said Tonks confusing Harry.

Snuffles wagged his tail and barked at the mention of his sister, the favourite one at that.

and he thrust his hand into his pocket, but it was empty. "Your wand's here, son," said Ted, tapping it on Harry's arm. "It fell right beside you, I picked it up…And that's my wife you're shouting at." "Oh, I'm – I'm sorry." As she moved forward into the room, Mrs. Tonks's resemblance to her sister Bellatrix became much less pronounced: Her hair was a light's oft brown and her eyes were wider and kinder. Nevertheless, she looked a little haughty after Harry's exclamation.

"Of course she would, you basically insulted her, Harry." Said Ginny rolling her eyes.

What happened to our daughter?" she asked. "Hagrid said you were ambushed; where is Nymphadora?" "I don't know," said Harry. "We don't know what happened to anyone else." She and Ted exchanged looks. A mixture of fear and guilt gripped Harry at the sight of their expressions, if any of the others had died, it was his fault, all his fault.

"It isn't." groaned Hermione.

He had consented to the plan, given them his hair . . . "The Portkey," he said, remembering all of a sudden. "We've got to get back to the Burrow and find out – then we'll be able to send you word, or – or Tonks will, once she's –"

"Oh Harry, Thank you for caring so much!" said Tonks" And it's not your fault, we consented to drink the polyjuice and to this plan so if anything it's ours."

Harry looked up and smiled weakly.

"Dora'll be ok, 'Dromeda," said Ted. "She knows her stuff, she's been in plenty of tight spots with the Aurors. The Portkey's through here," he added to Harry. "It's supposed to leave in three minutes, if you want to take it." "Yeah, we do," said Harry. He seized his rucksack, swung it onto his shoulders. "I –" He looked at Mrs. Tonks, wanting to apologize for the state of fear in which he left her and for which he felt so terribly responsible, but no words occurred to him that he did not seem hollow and insincere.

"I'm SO Sorry." Muttered Harry quietly. He didn't want anyone to listen but they did.

"It's ok, Mr. Potter. I understand the dilemma you're under." Said Andromeda Black.

"Yeah Harry, please don't blame yourself." Said Hermione incredulously.

"I'll tell Tonks – Dora – to send word, when she . . . Thanks for patching us up, thanks for everything, I –" He was glad to leave the room and follow Ted Tonks along a short hallway and into a bedroom. Hagrid came after them, bending low to avoid hitting his head on the door lintel. "There you go, son. That's the Portkey." Mr. Tonks was pointing to a small, silver-backed hairbrush lying on the dressing table. "Thanks," said Harry, reaching out to place a finger on it, ready to leave. "Wait a moment," said Hagrid, looking around. "Harry, where's Hedwig?"

"Oh no, this won't go good." Said Ginny.

"Look, mate, You know what, spend as much time you can now with Hed so that you won't regret it later. You ok mate?" Ron added when he saw Harry looking at him with wide eyes.

"Ronnie-kins is such a softie I didn't know Gred"

"Right you are Forge"

"I'm not dreaming, am I?" Ginny asked Harry while clutching her head.

"That was deep Ron."Said Hermione impressed.

Meanwhile Ron was a spectacular shade of red which matched his hair.

"She . . . she got hit," said Harry. The realization crashed over him: He felt ashamed of himself as the tears stung his eyes. The owl had been his companion, his one great link with the magical world whenever he had been forced to return to the Dursleys.

Hermione hugged him and Ron patted him on the back.

"Mr. Potter were the Dursleys bad towards you?" Said Dumbledore, the twinkles absent from his eyes.

Hagrid reached out a great hand and patted him painfully on the shoulder. "Never mind," he said gruffly, "Never mind. She had a great old life –" "Hagrid!" said Ted Tonks warningly, as the hairbrush glowed bright blue, and Hagrid only just got his forefinger to it in time.

The Golden Trio burst out laughing while shaking their head fondly.

With a jerk behind the navel as though an invisible hook and line had dragged him forward, Harry was pulled into nothingness, spinning uncontrollably, his finger glued to the Portkey as he and Hagrid hurtled away from Mr. Tonks. Second later, Harry's feet slammed onto hard ground and he fell onto his hands and knees in the yard of the Burrow. He heard screams.

"What happened now? Is it a Death Eater attack?" said Mrs. Weasley hysterically.

Throwing aside the no longer glowing hairbrush, Harry stood up, swaying slightly, and saw Mrs. Weasley and Ginny running down the steps by the back door as Hagrid, who had also collapsed on landing, clambered laboriously to his feet. "Harry? You are the real Harry? What happened? Where are the others?" cried Mrs. Weasley. "What d'you mean? Isn't anyone else back?" Harry panted.

"Please, keep them safe." Ginny and Mrs. Weasley were chanting under their breath.

The answer was clearly etched in Mrs. Weasley's pale face. "The Death Eaters were waiting for us," Harry told her, "We were surrounded the moment we took off – they knew it was tonight – I don't know what happened to anyone else, four of them chased us, it was all we could do to get away, and then Voldemort caught up with us –" He could hear the self-justifying note in his voice, the plea for her to understand why he did not know what had happened to her sons, but –

Mrs. Weasley got up sharply, seeing this Hermione trailed off at the end. She marched up to Harry and crushed into the biggest bear hug of the world. Harry for the first time was feeling the love of a mother.

"You are also my son, Harry. Never say anything different. Not by blood, but I love you as a son Harry and so I care about your safety too." She said.

Harry, to his horror felt his eyes get hot and let tears falling down his cheeks.

Mrs. Weasley released him, kissed him on the forehead and went back to Arthur.

"Thank goodness you're all right," she said, pulling him into a hug he did not feel he deserved. "Haven't go' any brandy, have yeh, Molly?" asked Hagrid a little shakily, "Fer medicinal purposes?"

"For medicinal purposes, my a-"

Mrs. Weasley looked at him warningly.

"art book?" it came out more of a question.

She could have summoned it by magic, but as she hurried back toward the crooked house, Harry knew that she wanted to hide her face. He turned to Ginny and she answered his unspoken plea for information at once. "Ron and Tonks should have been back first, but they missed their Portkey, it came back without them," she said, pointing at a rusty oil can lying on the ground nearby. "And that one," she pointed at an ancient sneaker, "should have been Dad and Fred's, they were supposed to be second. You and Hagrid were third and," she checked her watch, "if they made it, George and Lupin ought to be back in about a minute." Mrs. Weasley reappeared carrying a bottle of brandy, which she handed to Hagrid. He uncorked it and drank it straight down in one. "Mum!" shouted Ginny pointing to a spot several feet away. A blue light had appeared in the darkness: It grew larger and brighter, and Lupin and George appeared, spinning and then falling.

"Are you ok George?" Mrs. Weasley asked fussing over him.

"Mom-" Fred said.

"-we are-" George said.

"-fine, plus-" Fred.

"-this happens-" George.

"-in the future,-" Fred.

"-Dear Mommy." They finished.

Everybody looked at them as if a tennis match was going on and felt headaches coming.

Dumbledre just smiled serenly.

A clock somewhere hooted twelvw times. Dumbledore stood up but before he could say anything, Teddy stood up and addresed the student body.

"Listen everyone, it's 12 O'clock and you all have classes to attend. So, it would be better if we stop here today and continue tomorrow sometime. Is that fine?"

"Well said Mr. Theodore." Dumbledore gave him a smile. Said person just grimaced at the use of his full name.

"I hate that name. What was mom thinking? Just because she got a hell of a name douen't mean she's got to make me suffer too?" he muttered. Fortunately or unfortunately nobody heard him except Tonks.

"All the visitors along with Snuffles and Mr. Theodore will come with me. I'll show you the guest chamber where you all will be sleeping." said Dumbledore walking towards them.

There was sounds of chairs scraping as everyone got up and left the hall towards their common room and to get ready for the next day.