Chapter 33
With a wave of his wand and a mental picture, Ziad was deposited back in the High Street of Hogsmeade. In the distance he could barely see the forms of Harry and Dumbledore speeding over the path on broomsticks. They quickly disappeared into the night.
"Who the bloody hell are you?" asked the woman who had been speaking to Potter and Dumbledore just a minute ago.
Ziad turned to her, moonlight glinting off the lenses of his goggles, which combined with the scarf and helmet completely obscured his face.
"Call me Ishmael."
Ziad faced the castle and began walking, mentally high-fiving himself for both the literary reference, the religious reference, and the fact that it sounded really badass.
He began running back to the castle.
Ziad had put on a fair amount of muscle in the past months, but even he had trouble carrying all those guns and bullets.
He dropped a couple of the guns and associated ammo, and kept running.
Finally, he reached the castle. The Dark Mark was above the astronomy tower.
"Goddamn," whispered Ziad as he remembered that was the highest of the towers.
With nothing else for it, Ziad began huffing and puffing his way up the stairs.
There were a lot of stairs.
At the bottom of the final ascent to the astronomy tower were a couple of big guys in dark cloaks and a general menacing air about them.
They saw Ziad and raised their wands.
Ziad was faster with his AKS-74 assault rifle.
The crack of gunfire was heard for the first time in the halls of Hogwarts.
"And call to mind, through this divine writ, Ishmael..." recited Ziad, as a few more cloaked men rounded a corner and cast curses towards him. Ziad dodged and returned fire.
"Behold, he was always true to his promise..."
Another man fell to Ziad's gunfire.
"And was an apostle..."
Bangbangbangbang!
"A prophet..."
PowPowPowPowPow!
"Who used to enjoin upon his people prayer and charity..."
Ziad was climbing the stairs now.
He reached the top of the tower just in time to see Snape push aside a kid Ziad thought looked like that little Malfoy twat and raise his wand...
"...and found favour in his Sustainer's sight!"
Snape stopped casting his spell and turned to face Ziad. The numerous other cloaked bad guys also faced Ziad, raising their wands.
Ziad dropped his empty rifle and pulled the two Makarov pistols from his vest.
"Allahu Akbar!"
Ziad emptied the two pistols into the Death Eaters.
Blood sprayed across the tower as Ziad shrieked his war cry praising Allah, pulling the triggers over and over until, at long last, the slides clicked open and the last bodies hit the floor.
Ziad flicked the magazine release catches, and the the two empty magazines fell to the stone floor of the tower, splashing in the fresh blood that now soaked into the spaces between the stones.
"Ishmael, Father of the Arabs, rises again."
Ziad slid fresh magazines into the two pistols and put two bullets through the head of each fallen Death Eater, to ensure that they had really met Death.
Snape had collapsed, a bullet in his gut. He gasped in pain. Ziad approached him and raised a gun.
"Do you deserve this as well? For now, I am God. I have the power of life and death over you. Now... Plead your case."
Snape coughed blood.
"Don't... Please..."
Ziad frowned. That was not Snape's voice. It was Dumbledore's, who was still alive. Somehow.
After all, it's generally pretty difficult to be alive when you've got a bullet in your chest.
Even harder when you've got two.
"Oops," whispered Ziad.
Ziad picked up Snape's wand, pointed it at Dumbledore, and said:
"Avada Kedavra!" Dumbledore didn't die, because Ziad didn't know how to cast the spell, but a faint green light did appear.
That should fool the "Priori Incantatem" mumbo-jumbo Ziad had heard about.
Dumbledore immediately died.
Ziad heard a guttural shouting noise followed by the feeling of sharp pain as he was thrown into the ground by an invisible shape.
"You bastard! You killed Dumbledore!"
Harry Potter appeared, completely out of nowhere, beating Ziad with his fists.
It didn't really hurt, as Ziad was wearing a fair amount of protection, but it was annoying.
"It was an accident, man! Chill out!"
Ziad shoved Harry off of him and pinned him to the floor. He stuck a pistol in Harry's mouth to shut him up.
"Now, here's how it works. Dumbledore got shot after Snape murdered him, okay? I saved your life from these other assholes. I almost saved Dumbledore but was tragically too late. Got it?"
Harry's eyes practically sparked in anger.
"Look, Dumbledore was gonna die either way. I mean, look at him. Good God, man. He was so weak that getting shot was practically a mercy."
Ziad took the opportunity to slide the gun from Harry's mouth and relieve him of his wand.
"Hate me if you like. I don't really care. I only came here to make sure Parvati is alive and well. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go make sure of that.
Ziad reloaded his remaining guns and dashed off down the stairs.
When he reached the bottom of the stairs and jumped over the bodies he had relieved of life, he saw that there were still more baddies to be massacred.
He slung a rifle from his back and went back to work.
The first target was a lumpy-looking man dueling Ginny Weasley.
Ziad ended that duel. That room became clear.
He moved through the hallways, ending fights with extreme prejudice. The wooden grips of his rifle soon became too hot to touch from the heat of constant firing. Ziad finally ran out of bullets for that rifle and grabbed the other he had brought and began shooting more Death Eaters.
Finally he came to an open area where the fight was already over.
Padma, Parvati, and some nameless students stood over the stunned body of a Death Eater.
Ziad walked over to the body and turned it into a corpse, then turned towards Parvati.
"Are you alright?"
Parvati stared at him.
"Who are you?"
Ziad had forgotten he was wearing clothes that completely obscured his face. He silently praised God for that.
He ran off into a secluded, empty classroom, stripped himself of all clothing identifying him as the guy who shot Dumbledore, and returned.
"What was all that shooting and noise I've been hearing?" he said, faking a panicked voice.
It wasn't very convincing, but fortunately everybody was too much in shock at all the pretty violence to notice.
Parvati approached him and collapsed into him, grabbing him into a hug and crying into his shoulder.
"There's been-" sob "- a horrible attack on the school!" Sob
Ziad awkwardly patted her on the back.
"Wow, who could imagine such a thing. Wow. Who shot all these people."
"Some guy wearing muggle military clothes and using a muggle weapon- a gonne, I think it's called," answered one of the nameless students Ziad didn't care about.
"What a surprise." said Ziad in a deadpan voice.
It was at that moment that Parvati realized she was hugging a guy wearing only boxer briefs and a t-shirt. She quickly disengaged herself and stepped away, averting her eyes.
"I'll go put on some actual clothes, if you'll excuse me..." said Ziad.
He returned to the Entrance Hall, where a large group of students were congregated and milling about in chaos.
He noticed Parvati and pushed his way through the crowd to her.
She stared at him.
Ziad had put on his custom-tailored Hugo-Boss suit, which, with the extra muscle he had put on over the past months, fit him very, very well.
The Ray-Bans sunglasses were rather unnecessary at this time of night, however.
But they did look pretty cool, so Ziad forgave himself.
"What's going on, now?" asked Ziad.
"Well it turns out Dumbledore died in the attack," said Parvati, in a remarkably neutral tone of voice.
"That's awful."
"I suppose."
They stood silently, watching the crowd.
"Who killed him?"
"Harry Potter is saying the guy with the guns did it. Nobody's really sure."
Parvati shrugged.
"I can't say I was a big fan of old Albus anyway. He and my father used to go on business trips together, often to South Africa or Russia or someplace. It always struck me as odd. He was a different person than he was when he's with the students here. Much less kind-old-man, and much more sinister. Funniest thing, though. My Dad once called him 'Number One' when I was eavesdropping on one of their conversations. He called my Dad 'Number Three.' Probably nothing, but I've never trusted him since. Or my Dad, for that matter."
Ziad's mouth dropped open.
"Oh my God..." he whispered.
"What is it?"
"Uh... Nothing. You want to know who killed Dumbledore and all those other Death Eaters?"
Parvati glanced at him.
"Obviously."
"Follow me."
Ziad led her through the crowded hallways to that secluded empty classroom, where the discarded military clothing and weapons lay.
"Me."
Ziad noticed that the look in Parvati's eyes was not horror or disgust, but instead a vague sense of admiration.
Hmm. Unexpected.
"Impressive," she whispered, "That was just like in those Rambo movies! I love those movies!"
"Uh, duh. Who doesn't?" said Ziad.
Parvati walked over to the classroom door and closed it. Then locked it.
Hmm... Interesting.
I'll let what happened next be described by these lyrics.
Drop her white pants wide open warm
Now she's slipping on her uniform
And every second would become so misdefined
Girlfriend's girlfriends never could be mine
Cutest girl asked for more
Unfortunately, someone's creeping on my floor
An empty glass, a topless babe, a knock on the door
Girlfriend's girlfriends never could be more
What can I do? What can I say?
Choose your weapon, time to pay
Forget about the second day
We could be friends with a kiss in flow
Choose your weapon, time to go
A military fashion show!
And if that's not clear enough for you, let me put it bluntly.
They banged. Good enough?
Author's Note:
Yeah, so my Parvati is different from the canon Parvati.
Deal with it.
Also, I've been feeling really crappy (ie- sick) lately so instead of moaning and generally making a nuisance of myself I've just sat in bed and caught up on schoolwork.
Haha, just kidding. I've written these last few chapters, watched way too many violent action movies, and listened to way too much German dark electro music. So that's probably why this chapter isn't nearly as "funny" as I try to usually accomplish. Although I suppose connoisseurs of dark humor might find it amusing.