CHAPTER 28:

THE END OF MILLENNIUM

A Dhampir, a priest, and a catboy enter a zeppelin. If it were a bar, it would sound like the beginning of a joke. But given that London was being attacked, it would be one in appalling taste.

Yet oddly enough, before they could start searching for the one they wanted, the zeppelin in question actually pretty much landed on the rooftop, or rather, hovered over it, its ramp open and welcoming to them. "Won't you walk into my parlour, said the spider to the fly?" Anderson remarked.

"How should we do this?" Harry asked.

"Both the Major and the Doctor are on that zeppelin," Schrödinger said grimly. "At least as far as I know. They also have a cache of items they took from Holocaust victims, ranging from valuables to teeth with gold or silver fillings. Given that the Major intended a death or glory attack, he saw no reason to leave the resources behind."

Anderson harrumphed. "And the Doctor…he was the one who created the artificial vampires Millennium fielded?" As Schrödinger nodded, Anderson said, "Well, I've got my plan of attack. You two can go find the Major. Apparently the chubby little bastard has no fighting ability whatsoever, how he managed to get so high in the SS is beyond me. Just be careful of the fanatics he throws at you."

"And what about you?"

"Me? Little old me is gonna go see the Doctor and discuss religion with him. Just like I did with that paedophile priest a wee while back. It's going to be something of a rigorous discussion."

"…Since when did religious discussion end in bloodshed?" Harry asked.

Anderson shot him a smirk. "Harry, you've never been out drinking in certain pubs in Dublin, have you?"

Once they entered the zeppelin, they heard the Major's voice come over the tannoy. "Ah, Wilkommen, my dear guests. I was watching your battle with Voldemort. Wunderbar! True, I was kind of hoping that Schrödinger would finally do his duty and sacrifice himself to ensure Alucard was erased from existence, but alas, it's a tenet of war that not everything goes your way."

Anderson flung bayonets at a bunch of soldiers that appeared, spearing them through the throat or heart expertly. "This isn't war, you imbecile. This is just you committing suicide and taking as many people as you can with you. Suicide's already a mortal sin, and adding mass murder to it is just compounding it."

"And how many sins have the Vatican committed in their own proselytization?" the Major taunted.

"Don't lecture me about sin, you bucket of nuts and bolts," Anderson retorted. "I'm well aware of the hypocrisy. Hell, we of Iscariot are steeped in it. I'm going to Hell when I die, I'm under no illusions. But if it's for the sake of the Church, then I'm content. Ha, even the kid there is better than I am, and he's a bloody Protestant and a Dhampir, with Dracula himself as his grandsire. So stop throwing your mooks at us. You and I both know how this ends."

"Indeed I do, but allow me to have my fun." As they came up to the intersection, the Major said, "So, you have a choice. Schrödinger can confirm it, but if you wish to take out your frustrations on me, take the right-hand path. Of course, maybe one of you, Schrödinger perhaps? Wishes to discuss matters with the Doctor. He's down the left-hand path. He's also hoping to desert and set up shop elsewhere."

Anderson and Harry looked to Schrödinger, who nodded. "He's not lying." He then said, "Harry…can I leave the Major to you?"

Harry nodded. "Be careful, Schrödinger."

The catboy chuckled, waving off any concerns, and he and Anderson headed down the corridor towards the Doctor. Meanwhile, Harry began storming up the corridor towards the Major. It was past time he ended this…

"…So, what exactly did you do to the paedophile priest?" Schrödinger asked as he and Anderson walked up the corridor, picking off Millennium's goons as they did so.

"It was a long and protracted process," Anderson said, even as he stabbed one vampire, while Schrödinger opened up the throat of another, and then stabbed his neck, severing the spine. "Honestly, I'd say it'd give you nightmares, but you've seen some shit, boy, so I'll just say it'll take too long to explain. If we've got time, I will demonstrate on the Doctor. Ugh, that bastard's going to ruin my memories of Doctor Who."

"Eh, what're the odds that some other crazed psychotic would call himself the Doctor, anyway?"

"You'd be surprised…"

Across worlds and dimensions, in the world of Teyvat, a man with blue hair and crimson eyes, wearing a variety of different masks on a variety of different bodies, sneezed. In all his iterations, in all his different bodies, the Fatui Harbinger known as Il Dottore paused, and wondered why that had happened. After a moment's thought, his various selves collectively shrugged, and got back to their work, of cruelty in the name of science…

Harry soon found himself in the control room of the zeppelin, the walls lined with many video screens, most of which held a map of London. He whistled, impressed despite himself, even as he noticed the Major sitting on a chair, and even as he kept an eye out for any traps. "Wow. I have to admit, I'm impressed. This is like something out of a Bond film. Now all you need is a cat to stroke."

"I did, until you took him from me. I loved ruffling Schrödinger's hair," the Major said.

"…Okay, that just sounds wrong," Harry said flatly. "Then again, there's so much of this that is just wrong. You're doing this, all to go out in a blaze of glory? I honestly don't know whether that is better or worse than what Voldemort wanted."

"Oh, I am better than Voldemort," the Major said cheerfully. "At least I admit I am the worst kind of human being."

"You're not even that," Harry said, pulling out his wand. He finally noticed the reflection of light in front of the Major. A screen of bulletproof glass standing between him and the monster who caused this. "Schrödinger told us you turned yourself into a cyborg, all to supposedly retain your humanity so that you'd be able to triumph over Alucard. That's not humanity. All you did was exchange one form of being a monster for another. You were a monster long before you turned yourself into part of a machine."

"Well, we'll have to agree to disagree," the Major said. "Do you intend to use that wand?"

After a moment, Harry got an idea. He wondered if certain spells would make it through a bulletproof screen? "Yes. Accio."

The Summoning Charm tried to latch onto the Major, but it latched onto the screen instead. Then, Harry decided to try Bombarda, rapid-fire. The explosive spells only scratched the glass, but cracks began to appear. He began to feel the strain, even as his vampiric heritage boosted his magic. The Major was peering at him, curiously, like a man on safari, watching a lion paw at his vehicle, wondering whether anything would happen…

Anderson and Schrödinger found the Doctor in his lab, rummaging through his things, packing them away. By way of a greeting, Anderson threw a bayonet, impaling the bag he was hurriedly filling with papers. As the Doctor whirled to face them, Anderson waved. "Good day. I was in the area, and thought I might discuss religion."

The phoropter-wearing madman was snarling. "Of course…the failure and the hypocrite…how dare you come here?"

"How dare we?" Anderson glared at the man. "Says the Nazi. At least the Major was willing to die, but you? You're a rat fleeing a sinking ship."

"And you took Mina Harker's remains and used them to turn people into vampires," Schrödinger sneered.

"Halt de Klappe, Göre!" the Doctor snapped. "I created you, and this is the thanks I get?"

"Oh, Doctor, have you never read books?" Anderson said, shaking his head. "I doubt a Nazi would have read much about the Golem of Prague, given that it's about Jews fighting back against their killers, but surely you've read Frankenstein? It's the prerogative of monsters to turn on their creators. In any case, allow us to give you a foretaste of what awaits you in Hell, Doctor. Besides, I'm curious to know whether that machine body of yours feels any pain."

"Of course it does! One needs to simulate the entire neural system to give context to…GAAAH!"

The scream came about because Anderson had impaled his palm even as he reached for something. "Contextually speaking, how fucked are you(1)?" Anderson asked casually, even as he and Schrödinger advanced. "The correct answer is…a lot…"

To Harry's astonishment, along with the Major's, the bullet-proof glass shield was crazing and cracking. His very blood felt like it was on fire with the sheer amount of magic he was using, but he didn't care. He needed to stop this monster, now.

"Yesss…" the Major hissed in excitement. "Come on! Show me what you're made of, Boy Who Lived!"

Harry wanted to snarl at him to shut up, but he didn't. He instead concentrated, baring his fangs in a snarl if fury. This monster needed to die.

And then, finally, it broke, glass showering down, leaving a large hole. The Major cackled, only for Harry to fire off another Summoning Charm. "GET OVER HERE!" he roared, his vampiric blood imparting a demonic reverb to his voice. The Major was pulled through the hole with a squawk of surprise.

The Major whipped out a pistol from his coat, but Harry was faster, grabbing the man's gun, and in a fit of adrenaline and anger-fuelled strength, crushed the vintage handgun. "That was my favourite…" the Major began, only for Harry to punch the man in the gut. And despite being a cyborg, the man began choking and gasping.

"Don't care," Harry said. "You don't get to have a glorious last shootout with me or anything like that. This is just me putting you down like the rabid dog you are."

The Major coughed up a black oily substance that could have been his blood as he collapsed onto his back. "…I seem to have touched a nerve."

Harry stomped on the man's chest. "Yes, you have. You're just like Voldemort in your own way. Nazis and Death Eaters…you're both racist monsters. And no matter how much you deny it, you are a monster, and that's all history will remember you as. So fucking die already!"

With that, he pushed down with his foot as hard as he could, feeling it crunch through the Major's body. The cyborg spasmed, choking up more of that oily shit, before grinning at him. "…So are…you…Harry Potter…" he rasped, his voice now sounding electronic, crackling like it came from an old radio.

With a sudden burst of rage, Harry yanked his foot out of the man's chest, before he stomped down on his head with vampiric strength, causing it to burst like a piñata filled with offal and machinery. He stomped down again and again, snarling with rage as he did so. He didn't stop until well after he had obliterated the face, especially that smug grin. And then, he spat on the mangled corpse for good measure.

"Fuck you!" he snarled. "Whatever kind of monster I am, I'm still human where it counts, unlike you! I care about people, I care about life! But you didn't! So go to Hell, Major, and burn there! Hope Voldemort's keeping a place warm for you…"

It took him several minutes to calm down. Afterwards, he was looking at the control panel, looking for something like a self-destruct sequence, when Anderson and Schrödinger arrived. The catboy looked a bit freaked out, staring somewhat, while Anderson looked nonchalant, covered in the same black shit that had come out of the Major. "How did it go?" Harry asked.

"The Doctor's wishing he was dead," Anderson said. "He's alive, barely. Cyborgs are surprisingly resilient, you know? But he's more 'armless than a snail, more legless than the patrons at a pub, and he's literally wearing his guts for garters. Had to cut it short because we need to destroy this damned thing, though, so he won't be alive for long. So…you dealt with the fat fucker?"

"Yeah," Harry said.

"…Good."

"Don't celebrate yet, my little intruders," the Major's voice came from the screens, his rotund, grinning visage appearing. "Now, this is a recording, to be set off in case of my demise. I should tell you that, unless I activated a failsafe, once my mechanical body stops working, a self-destruct sequence will be activated. Once this recording finishes, you should have…about a minute to get off this airship, before it emulates the Hindenburg. True, there is no hydrogen, but there are plenty of incendiary bombs ready! Have fun! Auf wiedersehen!"

"Ach, he always liked to get the last laugh!" Schrödinger snarled quietly. "We'd better get off, now!"

"Can we make it?!" Harry asked as they followed the catboy through the corridors of the zeppelin.

"Oh, I certainly could! I know this place like the back of my hand! Come on!"

They barely reached the airlock in time, before the airship burst into flames. Thankfully, they were still on the ground, but it meant they had to run like hell away from the exploding airship. And the shockwave scattered debris far and wide, setting the surrounding buildings on fire.

Harry turned back to look at the burning airship. A funeral pyre for Millennium, and for the Death Eaters too, and, if the remains of Mina Murray were on that ship, a funeral pyre for her too, albeit a more solemn one. Or at least he could hope.

A shame it took so many lives for that final end to happen. But neither Millennium nor the Death Eaters intended to go quietly into the night. The Death Eaters intended to take over Britain if not the world, while Millennium intended to die making as big a mark on the world as they could. They had been stopped…but at a cost.

He just hoped it was worth it…

CHAPTER 28 ANNOTATIONS:

So…there it is. The final fight. All that's left is the epilogue.

Anyway, it's been a long time. Four years, actually. Four years I have let this story lie fallow, and I'm sure many of you thought that was how it was going to end. But it seems I was able to drag up some last motivation to finish this story. I've been trying to finish at least one of my bigger stories per year lately, and while I was worried I wouldn't make it for this year…well, here we are.

BTW, did anyone like the Genshin Impact reference? I get the feeling that if Il Dottore and Herr Doktor ever met, the world would be fucked.

1. The Doctor and Anderson are quoting Dr Gero and Piccolo's dialogue in Episode 37 of Dragonball Z Abridged.