A/N: This work was inspired by the idea of All Quiet on the Western Front meets Harry Potter. As such, there will be violence, it will be bleak, and characters will die. Forewarning, this is not a feel-good fic, and there is not a happy ending. With that being said, I hope you enjoy reading it if you choose to do so. Current outline is around 10 chapters, but we'll see how things go.


The sky was covered in a thick blanket of grey, weighed down with the scent of rain and smoke. Ron and Harry marched side-by-side, their boots sinking ankle-deep into the sucking mud with each step. The organised chaos of war surrounded them; muggle and magical soldiers moved indistinguishably, clothed in a patchwork of colours that had lost all meaning in the civil war Britain had bathed itself in. The sound of artillery and tanks rumbled in the distance, mixing with the hum of magical energy.

Harry adjusted the collar of his worn-out cloak, his hands gripping the straps of his kit bag tightly. The countryside stretched out before them, a once idealistic landscape now littered with shell-holes, stumps, and the distant flicker of gun and spell-fire. This was nothing like they had imagined.

"I can't believe this," Ron said under his breath, barely audible over the near-constant background noise. His eyes were narrowed, scanning over the horizon. "It used to be about Voldemort. Just, stop him, beat the Death Eaters...this is something else."

Harry nodded numbly; his thoughts were still miles away, back at home with Daphne and their new-born son. "Voldemort was just the beginning," he said quietly. "Once magic got out, and the muggles got involved...well -" Harry shrugged, "- just look at what's happened."

"Merlin, we don't even know what happened to him," Ron said, shifting his pack to a more comfortable position. "He could be dead for all we know."

Harry's thoughts drifted back to his last confrontation with Voldemort, the Battle of Hogwarts. It was meant to be the end of the darkest era of wizarding history, instead it was the start of the darkest era of British history. Voldemort fled that night, no-one knew why, Harry had always thought that he had discovered the destruction of his horcruxes. Looking around, it didn't even matter any more.

"It was the muggles," Harry said after a long silence. "Once they found out about us, half of them wanted to kill us, the other half wanted to work with us. It just spiralled."

Ron snorted, "and look at us now, slogging through knee-deep mud alongside muggles. Fighting our own people." He glanced to his side at a muggle soldier in their unit, his rifle slung over his shoulder, exhaustion clung to him just like the mud.

Harry didn't respond, his eyes were fixed on the horizon. Even from this distance he could see the dance of light. A waltz of death and he was next in line.

Ron glanced back at Harry, "and now muggles are running the war. Witches and Wizards, taking orders like common foot soldiers."

Harry grimaced, "they have no idea what they're doing. They've seen magic and gone right back to the First World War, trenches and charges. How can you have mobile warfare if half of the enemy can rip your entrails from your body with only a word?"

Ron fell silent. This war wasn't about Voldemort, or Death Eaters, or right and wrong. It was about fear and power. The muggle and magical worlds had collided, and now everyone was fighting each other. No-one knew how this was going to end, or if it ever would.

"Do you think we could ever fix this?" Harry asked, barely audible. The weight of years of fighting, ever since he was a child, pressed down on him. He was watching the world fall apart in front of him because of a conflict he had been at the centre of since his birth.

'I don't know," Ron finally responded. "But we have to try, right?"


Their march slowed as they entered a village, or at least what had once been a village. Piles of rubble and ash filled the spaces were children once played, the scent of death hung incessantly in the air. What would have once been a small countryside home was now a mangled mess of crumbled walls and blackened stone.

Harry and Ron quietly moved through the destruction, their boots squelching as they sunk in the ocean of muck. Soldiers, both magical and muggle, lay huddled together against the remains of what were once walls. Their faces were pale and haunted, some had grievous injuries and lost limbs. Healers in long robes bustled alongside doctors with muggle medicines, trying to save as many as they could. The hum of residual magic was barely audible over the droning artillery fire and the moans of the maimed.

"Fucking hell," Ron's eyes were wide as he took it all in. "This is...so much worse than I thought it would be."

Harry was silent. He was looking at a soldier, propped up against a rock, his face covered in grime and his uniform soaked in mud, a crude tourniquet was tied around what remained of his right arm. The man's eyes were open, but they were empty, blankly staring miles ahead of him, uncomprehending. Harry had always known that war was ugly, he had been in a war for most of his life. But magical warfare was clean, taking place in small skirmishes before both parties apparated away. This...this was warfare on an industrial scale he didn't even know was possible.

They kept walking until they found a small shelter, barely hidden from the harsh weather. It wasn't much, but it was something. With the sun beginning to set and the front still miles away they dropped their packs and set up a small camp, using their cloaks as bedding. The cool air bit at their skin, settling into their bones.

Ron sat heavily next to Harry, "do you reckon we'll be here long?"

"Probably just the night, we'll get moving at dawn."

Ron nodded, his gaze wondering among the scattered men. Some were lying helpless on stretchers, their bodies mangled from the horrors; others sat in groups, murmuring softly to each other with hollow eyes. There was no laughter.

Harry reached for his pack and fumbled around for a quill and parchment. The biting cold had settled into his fingers and he could barely move them, but he needed to write to Daphne, let her know that he was alright. He found a half-empty ink pot and scratched out the first few words, trying to think of what he could say. How could he tell her the truth without tearing her heart out? How could he tell her that he didn't think he was making it home in one piece?

Dear Daphne,

Me and Ron are both fine. We're still miles from the front-lines, currently resting in some ruined village somewhere. Neither of us quite know where. We're still together, we'll do our best to stay that way.

I hope things are well at home, and that James is behaving himself. Remember, you can always call on Mrs. Weasley if you need a hand, and I'm sure Hermione would be delighted to help out.

I'll do my best to be home soon. I couldn't forgive myself if I missed James's first steps could I? I miss you.

Try not to worry too much, we'll be okay. We're doing our best, I promise.

I love you,

Harry

He stared at the letter, heart heavy. Despite his attempts to reassure her that everything would be alright his words felt hollow, empty. He knew he wouldn't be home for his son's first steps, but he couldn't bring himself to tell her that. He carefully folded the letter and placed it away to post in the morning.


The wind had picked up since Harry wrote his letter, carrying the bone-numbing chill of an encroaching storm. The distant sounds of battle were slowly drowned out by the howling wind, giving the men a moment of peace. Harry folded his collar up in a vain attempt to protect himself from the wind.

Ron sat on a broken stone, his arms huddled around his middle. "Do you ever think about how we ended up here?" he suddenly asked, absently digging his foot into the soil. "Hogwarts feels like a lifetime ago."

Harry looked up at him, "yeah, it does feel like a lifetime ago."

They fell silent, their distant memories of Hogwarts, of the hidden magical world, felt almost like a dream. Their memories of sunlit days on the castle grounds as teenagers belonged to someone else now.

"Remember the Yule Ball?" Harry asked, a faint smile on his lips. "I still can't believe I got Daphne to go with me."

Ron snorted quietly, "I thought you were mental mate. You'd barely spoken to her before then. Yet, you still pulled it off."

"She still doesn't know why she said yes. She just says it was 'the greatest bad decision I've ever made'."

"And now you're married, with a son to boot."

Harry shrugged, "I could say the same about you and Hermione. It took you two forever but you finally got there."

Ron looked down at his wedding ring, it had only been placed there a few weeks earlier. "Yeah, we did, didn't we?"

Harry sighed and dropped his head into his hands.

"We thought it was all simple back then," Ron's voice was barely audible over the wind. "Kill Voldemort, fulfil the prophecy, listen to Dumbledore. It was pretty clear."

Harry snorted softly, "I wonder what Dumbledore would think about the world now."

Ron shook his head softly, "I don't think he would have any idea what to think about it all now."

Harry ran his hand through his hair, "I don't even know what we're fighting for anymore Ron. What's the point of this? We're just following orders from some muggle to kill our own countrymen. Shit, I heard from Neville that he had seen Dean get killed just before he went missing. Two guys that grew up in the same dormitory, killing each other just because they're on opposite sides of whatever the hell this is."

Ron shrugged, "I wish I knew. I think we all wish we knew. Everything's so twisted, the Ministry barely even exists anymore, the muggle government is gone, even the monarchy is a complete wreck. It's hard to think we grew up in a world were magic was meant to be special, hidden. Now, -" he gestured to the landscape around them, "- now it's just this."

Harry nodded absently, "I miss Hogwarts. Everything was simple then, when we knew what we were doing this for."

"Yeah," Ron quietly agreed. "Me too."

Harry shifted and looked at the devastation around him once more. It was hard to think that there was even a future to be fighting for in the middle of all this. The war had touched everything, and it had barely even begun.

"Do you think things could ever go back to the way they were?" Ron suddenly asked.

Harry stared into the suffocating darkness, "I don't know Ron. I really don't know."

The night slowly settled in, bringing a stifling air of misery. Harry and Ron sat in silence together, the memories of the past haunting them while the reality of war pressed closer.