Disclaimer: Bless the instructors who taught us to fly, Sent us off solo and left us to die…
Thank Merlin for the MAF
It wasn't any kind of duel, resembling something more along the lines of a knife fight in a telephone booth rather than the formalized combat they'd learned in class. Minerva's arm hung limply, her broken wand lodged in the eye socket of her last opponent. Of the students, her soldiers, three remained. Of her opponents, Grindlewalds best, none.
"Make sure none of them are still alive," she instructed her remaining prefect, a sixth year Hufflepuff.
"Got it," the boy agreed. "Bet you never thought you'd have to do this when they made you Headgirl?"
"My mistake for thinking the bloody professors were worth a damn," she snorted. "Do we have wounded?"
"Jere's still breathing, not sure for how much longer."
"Do what you can," Minerva sighed. "We ever get a message off?"
"I'll see if the floo's up," one of the other students volunteered.
"You do that," the Headgirl agreed, hacking a blood filled ball of phlegm onto one of the corpses.
"Aurors say they'll be here in four minutes!"
"Tell the useless bastards that we need healers now!" Minerva called back. She collapsed onto a bench, one of the few objects that hadn't taken any significant damage. The Headboy, her partner was dead. As were the majority of her prefects save the one she had with her and hopefully the two she'd assigned to escort the little ones back to the castle. Her graduating class would be lucky to have enough members to fill a Quidditch team. The classes below it weren't much better.
The woman didn't feel sorrow, she felt rage. Lives had been taken, the lives of her friends, her partner, her subordinates.
Her highland blood sang for vengeance. Death, cold death, was the only thing that could cool her ire. She had planned to apprentice herself, to become a mistress of Transfiguration, to parley her natural talent into a career. After the day she'd had, after what she'd seen, after what she'd done, she decided a career could wait.
London, three years later . . .
Minerva's face was impassive as she listened to the ministry flunky lay down the new rules. No more oxygen masks, they were not to fly to altitudes which required the use of muggle equipment to survive. No more hitting bombers, they were there to protect magical sites only and were only to target bombs that threatened magical areas. No more-
"I was wrong, Mr. Riddle," she interrupted. "I apologize for that. We shall do things your way."
The ministry stooge didn't say a word, astonished that someone so insignificant would dare to interrupt him while he was speaking. He died with the same stupid look on his face, a few seconds later, when her second accelerated a handful of shrapnel through the man's lungs.
Minerva's gaze swept over her people. "Mr. Malfoy insisted on leading tonight's mission himself to show the effectiveness of the new rules, he died with honor and is a credit to the Ministry and his noble family. Understood?"
"Understood, ma'am," her people replied.
"Good. We do things as normal, forget everything this idiot said. Mr. Riddle!"
"I'll drop the idiot while we're gaining altitude."
"Good man." She raised her voice. "Check your buddies, make sure their warming charms are applied correctly. Cast bubbleheads, check oxygen pressure, mount up, and-" she waited a handful of heartbeats. "Lift!"
Five minutes later she was exchanging spellfire with one of Grindlewald's best, one of escorts he'd assigned to protect the bombers when she and her people had started to get a bit too effective. A burst of tracers from a friendly spitfire shredded the man a few seconds later, the pilot tipping an imaginary hat as he flew by on his way up to meet the hun. It was something none of them talked about with anyone on the ground, not her people or the pilots they shared the skies with. Statute would be paper bloody thin by the time the war ended, she thought to herself as the new severely reduced enemy escorts activated their escape portkeys.
"Form up on me!" Minerva ordered, the enchantments on her mask carrying her voice to the rest of the unit, "time to show the bastards that they have no place in British skies!"
With terrible grins, they pulled up on their brooms, setting an intercept course with the fat but speedier birds above. If they had the timing right it would be another chance to down one of the enemy aircraft. Wrong and they'd be forced to watch as yet another of their foes escaped.
They passed a downed aviator on their way up, friendly and possibly the one that had helped them a short time earlier. Hanging limp in his harness, it was evident the man was hurt if he still drew breath.
"Break off and see to him, Ms. Smythe," Minerva ordered. "Hover and prepare to catch friendlies after you stabilize him. The hun isn't going to just stand by and let us destroy their only way home."
"Yes, Captain!" the unit healer replied.
"We'll be concentrating on the number two plane on the right," she continued as they got into range. "Mr. Riddle, take five and do all you can to banish it into the one next to it. Foxworthy, five more on the engines. See if you can make things easier for Mr. Riddle. Harrison, five on shields. Rest of you with me, I want to concentrate on the cockpit. Things'll be a lot easier if the pilots are dead. In three . . . two . . . one . . ."
AN: Inspired by a couple scenes in Cal's 'Book of Dobby.'
Not terribly sure what I'd write next. No Voldemort war, he got bounced and drafted before graduation. Bounced to make him eligible for conscription on an imaginary, rather than real, crime pre chamber. Thinking proper purebloods became Aurors, the three year training period being a safe excuse to stay out of things and hope the mudbloods ground the other side down enough to allow the proper sort to go in for the kill and to get the credit for ending things.
Dumbledore in his ivory tower waiting for sanity to return for most of the story before giving up and finally going to the continent to do his duty. Minerva McGonagall, grizzled combat commander at the age of twenty one.