If Harry was being honest with himself, he would probably, rather definitely be anywhere but here in the sewage dump of forgotten ancestors and giant chicken killing snakes.
Especially the giant snake that was slithering words in his head like a bad out of tune tele that he's heard his Uncle rage over. It was a weird thought to have when he had to fight said snake. Well, ok maybe it's not as weird a thought to have when you're a couple of hundred feet below a school full of magical people that have better experience than he has that would be better off then he is right now.
'In hindsight,' he thinks, laying in a puddle of his own blood, the basilisk's blood, what felt to be probably his own pain-panicked vomit, sweat, tears and venom, plus some other sewer unmentionables.
'I don't have very good eyesight at all.' the voice in his head sounded dry. He could agree with the dry voice in his head. Tough luck for poor Harry. Maybe all this sarcasm was getting to his brain. Like the venom. Probably. Maybe.
"— little more than a few minutes to live," it takes a few too many seconds for Harry to even register what the ghost— what Tom was even saying. That's fine, he really shouldn't listen to the voice of a sassy teenager. Though, was that the pot and the kettle? He's getting distracted, Focus, Harry. What were you supposed to do?
His attention expands, before focusing into a pinpoint, away from the pain, away from the thought of it. Just for a moment before the rush has him gasping to awareness. Focusing. Got it.
The basilisk was dead. That is good. So is Professor Dumbledore's Phoenix. That is not good. Tom Riddle, Voldemort— and here he gives a blurry look up, up at the floating teenager and he realises that time seemed too slow. Too fast. Focus, Harry.— was quickly turning 'alive' as the villain of the year says. The villain of every year in Hogwarts so far. Terrible luck for poor Harry.
His head rolls, staring to look at Ginny. Ginny who he barely knew, who would probably devastate Ron if she died, would devastate that whole family of Ron's. That sweater was still kept safely in his trunk, almost untouched but so full of love that he had cried when he first unwrapped it. That was a family full of love and that would be no good to lose Ginny like that.
Yes, it wouldn't.
Now, what can you do?
Sitting up would work. He does that, through the fever and nausea that can't go anywhere. The sword isn't here. But the dead snake is, still warm and cold next to him and full of so so much teeth. One of which had entered his arm.
Ah, right. He was dying.
Not the time, Harry. Grab the tooth. Ginny is right there, with a familiar book in her hands. The tooth feels warm, though maybe it's the venom and blood that's on its rough surface of cavities and brittle age underground. It almost slips from his hands, fumbling like his first potion class.
"You'll be back with your dear Mudblood mother soon, Harry…" there's blood on his hands and it burns, black sludge and blacker magic as he tugs the book out of her hands. He almost drops it in haste, a burning need to do something and not exactly sure what that something is.
"What? Trying to save her? That won't do anything, Harry." Tom Riddle still speaks; Voldemort still talks and his words dig into his brain, wrapping venom around his mind and confusing him further; would this even work? Or is Tom Riddle as invincible as the wraith that had passed through him a dreading promise to come back like every danger he's felt?
Harry doesn't know what to do, he can't breathe.
It's okay, Harry. Focus. You can do it.
"Funny, isn't it? The damage a silly little book can do…" the fang had broken off, brittle from years of disuse and solitary confinement within the dungeons of Hogwarts. The snap wasn't too clear and he had thought he broke a bone only for it to have been something far worse. He wavers, staring at the book, and then at the fang with its shining poison, acidic against human flesh.
He has to move. There's a pause, a sliver of thought and thinking.
The ghost narrows his eyes, mind a second too slow to realise just what he was doing. That's all Harry needed.
'You know what to do.'
Tom Riddle feels his future sins grab hold and strangle him.
With a lunge, the spirit, the piece of a shattered whole is too late to stop him.
And Harry? A savage grin, less made of happiness and more of determined spite is on his face as he stabs the tooth back into the book. The effect is immediate and the spirit falls to his knees with a screech.
Magic rings in Harry's ears, a cacophony unraveling old and dead magic clumsily used in the hands of a teenager. Once, twice, three times. The charm, the curse, the spell; his ears ring, almost bleeding as he watches Tom Riddle crumble apart, screaming, screaming, screaming. He's screaming back at him, as if it would subvert the pain in his head; in his soul.
(Ginny sleeps, slowly dying, slowly living unaware of the blood so close to her.)
It all ends too suddenly. A rush of air, a vacuum space that sucks back into his lungs like something fierce had hit a brick wall. The melted remains reach for Harry and through his blood blurred vision he thinks he sees fear before it burns away into nothingness.
Harry is alone. (He never is. It's a weird comfort.)
Silence is held back only by the ragged breathing of a child. The One Who Survived sits among corpses he caused. (The beating in his heart sounds too slow.)
…
…
What next?
His gaze drops to the bleeding book in his hands. The venom is quick to mix with the ink.
Oh, right. Harry was dying.
He couldn't even muster the energy to move anymore, slumping forward. There's nothing else to focus on. Ginny would be fine, right? She wouldn't mind if— if—
He was dying, dead, dead, dead. 'No.'
There's a half choked sob as he slides to the ground, tears hot against his face. The tooth clatters next to him.
He's dying.
(nonononONONONONO)
That's alright then.
Fates doors slide shut.
Harry dreams.
(Not Like This)
Once upon a time, a phoenix would arrive, scoring out the eyes of a basilisk. Crying out loud for justice and the safety of the child it was sent to protect. The phoenix did arrive and it would aid the child, crying for the child's wounds. Healing him of the venom that plagues his body.
Once upon a time, the child would survive and would live another day.
This is no fairytale, at least, in the way that ends well. This is no fairytale where good always win and yet.
Once upon a time, the phoenix does not survive.
The child does not live.
It's a flash of ash and fire, a tiny chick surfacing to a scene of a tragedy. A puddle of venom at its claws. The cries of sorrow are heard by no one but the dead and a little girl.
But. (It is story it is fake it is Real this is Real RealReal—)
Here's the thing about stories.
They never tell the whole truth. Not in a single perspective, anyways. What is written can always be read wrong; perceived differently. The wrong word can upset an entire thought, opinion, story. The right one can satisfy any curious mind. History is written by the Victors, and Hidden by the Lost.
It is not the truth that is needed.
It is Fact.
There are very few events, items, things, thoughts that could be considered Fact, however, so most people settle for a "Truth" instead, as ugly or as pretty as it could be.
It is here that I tell you the so-called "Truth".
Or perhaps, a Fact.
Once upon a time, the story is diverted, changed.
The phoenix chose to die.
The little girl chooses to wake up.
She wishes she didn't, to blood and a cold body. To a snake she had slithering in her mind well and truly dead. To a baby chick chirping in the ashes.
—She wishes she had woken up sooner.—
Now, let's bring it back to reality.
There's a heartbeat in her ears; the stone is wet beneath her hands, but the cold feels the same as her. It takes five heartbeats for her to scramble to her feet, every beat a struggle to follow her every step.
She finds no words, finds no energy but to fall again and crawl towards the silent body. She is living, she realises, with hands under her control and no blood to stain it. She can't help but get choked up at that, even with her mind in shambles.
She is alive.
Harry is, decidedly, not.
It's a gamble that only one knew, as it chirps and it catches her attention. Shaky hands scoop the bird from its grave, carried close and held out to Harry. To— well.
"Please," she whispers, fairytales of Phoenix's; life and death and rebirth ringing in her cracked mind. He is still her idol, a friend maybe and a soft feeling, a gentle fire urges her to ask. To help.
If she was any less exhausted down to her bones she would have noticed the magic in her core flutter. A fire that began to spark.
It takes a feather, some ashes; a touch of death. She doesn't know what she's doing but Fawkes does and dutifully through shaky hands paired with the smell of blood and water, she does what must be done.
A single tear is all that's left and Fawkes has that in spades.
When the professors finally get wind of what has happened, when they find their wayward students of Ron and a memory less coward, they find the story. They find a truth for themselves.
They find the crying girl on top of a living body and a tiny chick on top of Harry's forehead, hiding the slowly bleeding scar.
Past the room of moving doors in a dizzying display of magic, where, in another future it would be marked to navigate, through water tanks and whispering doorways; a crystal ball forms, silk to glass to ball, unnoticed, unseen. There is no one to see it happen. No one to note it down. Convenience has those that watch look away, distracted just long enough and there is a story built by no one but the reader. Magic takes care of itself after all.
In another place oceans away, a soft voice speaks to herself, orange flame at her fingertips and tears down her face. It flickers but never goes out as the shackles of a future crumbles away in her soul.
The Curse will be broken by the strength of the Sky.
The Dark soul inside shall linger and aid.
Where Magic will shackle, Flame shall prevail.
The Curse shall be broken by the strength of the Sky
When all unite and the Scar revealed
May the Sun guide, May the Mists protect
May the Rains roar, May the Clouds grow
May the Storm anger, May the Lightning strike
From Magic and Death to Flames and Life
When all unite and the Scar revealed
May the Sky Live
Consequently, in a room full of prophecies, and no one to witness it, does it ever come true?