All I Ever Wanted

DISCLAIMER: Warning! I make no claim to any property of J.K. Rowling's, and am in no way profiting by this. I do offer her my sincerest thanks for allowing us this garden of the mind in which we play. Further Warning! This story...and likely any I ever write…are dominated by gay themes and characters. That's how it is, if this in any way makes you uncomfortable...do not read further.


All I Ever Wanted…chap. 52 'The Final Battle (part 1)


The world tumbled back into view for Harry and Draco. They were located in the back room of a shop in Hogsmeade, Hermione and Ron already waiting at the alley door, wands out and at the ready. Draco grabbed the satchel of medical supplies and potions, and began spreading them out in the back corner of the room. Harry steeled himself for battle, pulling magic from the air around him, and paused before leaving, intending to make a proper goodbye to Draco.

Draco was having none of it. “Harry! Just go. I can’t…not…fuck it! Just go, love. I’ll be here when it’s over.” His voice was cracking a little, and if it hadn’t been urgent, Harry could never have left while hearing Draco so distraught.

Gryffindor’s Golden Trio stepped out the alley way door without a single word between them. Draco watched them leave with eyes that burned and blurred with tears. As they marched out in battle order, Draco whispered, “I love you, Harry,” but it was too late for anyone to have heard it.

Prague, Berlin, Rome, Istanbul, Dublin, Shanghai, Delhi. The talisman rattled off attack sites while Draco waited in nervous silence. Around the globe, Death Eaters and their minions were striking at wizarding and Muggle communities alike. It was a single, enormous, seamless program, aimed at crushing all resistance at the same time. And everywhere the attacks had come, the Order, and the wizarding world, were fighting back.

Draco could hear noises in the streets of Hogsmeade. Screams, the roar of flames, and the shudder of curse strikes against buildings. It was distant, but somehow more horrifying because he could not be a part of it. It was his part, his role, to wait and heal his team. The wait was driving him insane.

Draco Malfoy was poorly suited for sitting still with no information. Contrary to popular belief, Slytherin was not the house of cowardice, but of caution. Now was the time for action, swift and merciless, and Draco, who was swifter and more merciless than any Slytherin in Hogwarts, was stuck in a dusty storeroom, with nothing to do but count the minutes.

Ron’s limp and unconscious body tumbled into the room by Portkey. Draco threw himself into his work, identifying injuries and hexes alike. Slashing Curse to the leg, and a concussion from the fall. One potion and two Healing spells later, Draco wrapped an enchanted bandage around the leg and tucked a blanket beneath Ron’s head for support. With a little luck, Ron would come to in a few minutes and he could get a battle report.

A few brutally slow minutes later, Hermione Granger appeared, Portkeying in on her hands and knees, gasping for breath, bloody foam at the corner of her mouth. Draco went back to work. Crushing Hex, right to the chest, with broken ribs and a punctured lung as the result. The hard part was getting Granger to stop talking while he worked. She was out of the fight for the duration. That lung wouldn’t be right for hours, no matter how many Healing Spells he cast. Ron was still out cold. HARRY WAS ALONE!

He’d been too busy to think of it, just doing what he’d trained to do, but now the sudden realization that Harry was out there, unguarded, spurred his adrenals and he knew what he had to do. Prophecy be damned, Voldemort be damned, duty and orders be damned. The last Malfoy would not be remembered as a coward hunkering in a dingy shop while his lover was in danger! He fumbled with Ron’s supplies and equipped himself.

Hermione, half conscious from potions and pain, saw what he was up to. “Mal-Malfoy. Draco. Don’t! He needs…needs you here. His dream…can’t happen….with you here. Safe.” The words were hellishly hard to get out, but they had no impact on a stony faced Draco Malfoy.

“Granger. ENERVATE! That’s a girl! Got your wind back. I wouldn’t have done that, but you'll need your wits about you. Drink the Pepper Up Potion when you start to flag. You’re in charge here, now. I’m taking Ron’s wand, and I’m going after Harry. I’m not leaving him alone out there.”

Hermione gasped as the spell hit her, flooding her body with energy that cleared away the fog of potions and painkillers. “GOD DAMN IT! Malfoy! Don’t do this! You belong here, not there, and you know it! He can take of himself better than anyone alive, he always has!”

Draco bit his lip for a moment, then broke. He kneeled by Hermione and looked her in the eyes. “I can’t. I’m not strong enough, Hermione. I can’t sit and wait for him to come home. I have to go. Forgive me. I love him, and I can’t not be there for him. If something…something happens, I might as well be there, because I won’t make it without him. Do you understand?”

Something about hearing brutal honesty from the lips of Draco Malfoy made Hermione crack. “Bugger. Go to him, love. Do what you have to. From the alley, take a right and head for the center of town. They’re everywhere, but they’re dead obvious. When you find Harry, just guard his back, let him handle the head on stuff. Now go.”

“One thing before I go, ‘Mione. Take this.” He shoved a bundle into her hand. “You may have breathing trouble later on. This works whether you can speak a spell or not. I brought it from my father’s room when I heard the Auror’s were leaving town. Use it if you have to.”

Hermione opened the bundle of cloth. It was an antique revolver, still clean as new, with six bullets loaded into the cylinder. “I’ve…I…never…”

“If someone comes through that door wearing black robes, point this at them and keep pulling the trigger until they fall down. Most protective spells aren’t geared to stop Muggle weapons. Purebloods are stupid that way…sometimes. I gotta run. See you when it’s all over, love.”

Draco Malfoy kissed the top of her head, grinned a wicked grin, and was out the door and gone. Then it was Hermione’s turn to wait, listening to the sounds of destruction from outside. Perhaps ten minutes later, the sound of crashing glass close by told her that the front of the shop they were in had been cursed. She readied her wand, but it was getting hard to breathe again. There were footsteps in the glass beyond the door, crunching noisily. Panic slipped in, and Hermione held her breath the best she could.

“REDUCTO!” The door to the front of the shop blasted inward, scattering dust and debris around the room. Hermione tried to aim her wand but the dust inspired a cough that stabbed at her insides like a hot knife.

“EXPELLIARMUS!” The wand flew from her hand. The black robed man stepped into the room, pulling his mask back and taking in the situation. Rudolphus LeStrange smiled when he surveyed his handiwork.

“Oh, I’ve been told of you. The little Mudblood that runs about with Potter and that blood traitor boy of the Weasleys. How sweet, that I should be the one to find you. I will enjoy this, and not just for the rewards I’ll receive for finishing you off. I mean to make this last!” He move closer and aimed his wand again. Hermione steeled herself, trying not to give away the hidden item in her left hand, obscured by rubble.

“Stupefy!” Nothing happened. LeStrange frowned. “Stupefy!” Still nothing. What the hell was going on? “Impedimentia! Immobilus! Crucio! AVADA KEDAVRA! DAMNATION! What is this madness!”

Hermione didn’t know either, but she wasn’t waiting to find out. She drew the pistol with a calculating slowness, and aimed it perfectly.

“And just what do you think you’re…OH FU-” With a loud report, and a puff of smoke, the twisted mind that was Rudolphus Lestrange was spattered across most of the storeroom’s back wall.

“Was it good for you, too? Fucker!” Hermione laid the pistol down in her lap, then leaned back to rest on Ron’s shoulder and tried to catch her breath, hoping that Harry and Draco were still alive and well.

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Neville Longbottom was stationed at the other end of town, with a satchel full of potions, bandages and antidotes. No one from his team had come back yet, and he was feeling as helpless and useless as he’d ever felt in his life. Somehow, Potions class was looking like a fond memory next to this.

Then all three of Neville’s team Portkeyed in, wounded, cursed and half unconscious. After that, there was nothing to think of but Healing Spells, and at least one of them was conscious enough to help. Neville managed to spill two potions, and accidentally sat on one of the antidote bottles, but at least he managed to get them bandaged up and comfortable. Two of them were out cold a few minutes later, recovering from shock, but the third went right to the door and back out into the fight.

Neville was nattering over his two patients like a mother hen, when the curse explosion hit the building. Dust and debris went everywhere. Glass was breaking, bricks and mortar were crumbling…and somewhere he could smell smoke. Timbers were creaking dangerously, and Neville knew he had no choice, it was safer outside.

He grabbed his first unconscious charge beneath the arms, and dragged him to the door, which was now leaning on its hinges. Neville kicked backwards, knocking the door open, and pulled his comrade to the far wall of the alley beyond. Then he ran back inside for the other. None too soon, either, since chunks of debris were falling faster, and a hole in the ceiling the size of his head allowed him to see licks of flame in the room above them!

Neville bent down and grabbed his other teammate by the arms, and a chunk of mortar came tumbling down and crashed into his own head. It hurt like blazes, but there was nothing to be done for it, so Neville carried on, pulling the weight of his unconscious charge behind him.

He paused in the alleyway when his task was complete, gasping for breath. Blood was running down his scalp and into his eyes. The medicine satchel! He’d left it behind! He dashed back into the building one last time, stumbling over chunks of brick and timber, until he had the precious satchel in hand.

The building itself seemed to groan…the walls looked like they were swaying! Neville made a dash for it, and slid out of the door, tumbling into the alley with the satchel clutched tight to his chest, just as a considerable portion of the upper floor made up its mind and quickly redecorated the lower one with three feet of stone and smoldering wood.

Neville couldn’t believe he did it! He was lucky just to be alive! AND he had just saved his teammates! Neville Longbottom, a hero! His heart was leaping in chest…and then he noticed the slender ankle in front of him. It was a lovely ankle, but the woman it was attached to was even more lovely. Only the icy cruelty of her face revealed her as an enemy.

“The irony is just delicious, don’t you agree? All that time in Azkaban for torturing the Longbottoms, and I get to be the one who finishes the job! How utterly perfect.” Her voice was a sickening coo. Bellatrix. One of the maddest and most vicious of Voldemort’s Death Eaters. The woman who killed for pleasure, not duty.

Neville’s heart sank. He’d lost his wand in the rush to get everyone out of the building, his head hurt like hell, and he was exhausted. Now the fiend that had tortured his parents into St. Mungo’s had him at wand point. He’d failed. He was going to die, and then she’d kill the others, and the Longbottom name would be nothing but a sad memory. It was all his fault. He hung his head and waited for the inevitable.

“How should we begin? I think I’ll leave you the use of your limbs, as I do so love to watch them thrash when Crucio takes its toll! Then perhaps Imperius, so I can watch you cut the throats of your own friends. Apropos? I thought so. So my last, darling little Longbottom, let us pass the time. You should worry, it won’t be brief!” Bellatrix aimed her wand and smiled.

“Crucio!” Nothing. “CRUCIO!” Still nothing. Hope flickered to life in Neville’s chest! Bellatrix was muttering curses and looking incredulously at her wand. Neville stood up with a roar, grabbing the nearest object, a fallen trash bin, and swung it over his head, smashing a stunned Bellatrix LeStrange to the ground and knocking her out cold!

When Bellatrix came to consciousness again, she was aware of a heavy pressure on her spine. She was face down in the alley, and Longbottom’s knee was in her back. He had one her wrists pinned to the ground in front of her, fingers splayed out widely.

She struggled a bit, then blinding pain claimed her when his free hand bounced her skull off the pavement. She was sinking into blissful unconsciousness again, when the white hot fire of agony tore through her brain.

She heard a sickening crunch when the brick in Longbottom’s hand smashed her index finger nearly to a pulp. She screamed and writhed, but the weight on her was too much to fight through the pain. A few seconds later, Neville Longbottom’s voice made it through the fog of her mind.

“Sorry about that. Bit clumsy, I am. No worries, though. I’ll get the hang of it yet, don’t you worry! After all, I’ve got NINE MORE TO GO! BITCH! This next one, it’s for Mum!”

Right about then, and for the first time ever, Bellatrix considered the possibility that Azkaban hadn’t been all that bad of a place after all.

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Mad-Eye Moody was fighting for his life. It hadn’t been pretty before, but it was getting really dicey now. He and Nymphadora Tonks had been pinned down by heavy curse fire. He managed to bring one of the bastards down, and Tonks had finally pegged another, but then the big one had laid her our completely with some searing curse that had blasted her backwards into the alley.

At some point, their wands quit working, and Moody had wound up fighting hand to hand with his enemy. It turned out to be that rat bastard MacNair when the mask came off, and Moody was still physically outmatched, despite a lifetime of fighting dirty against the Dark Arts.

One enormous paw was half clamped around his windpipe. MacNair had ripped off his magic eye, which had quit working anyway, and Moody kept trying get in rib shots with his free hand, while his left struggled to keep its grip on MacNair’s other wrist, keeping the sharp knife in that huge hand out of play.

“Yeh fuckin’ rat bastard! I knew ya for an unrepentant, murderin’ dog when I first saw ya! Shoulda dumped your carcass in Azkaban and left ya there,” croaked Moody. His breath was running out, and so was his strength. The man on top of him was just too heavy, too young, and too damn strong. Ah, well, at least he went out fighting to the last.

MacNair grinned hideously. “Keep talking, you old codger! I wanna hear your tune change when I open up your guts and play with them!” He yanked his knife hand back, and free of Moody’s grip, made ready for the final stroke.

CRACK! The grip on Moody’s throat slackened, and MacNair’s eyes crossed comically as he slumped to the side and fell over. In the gloom, Moody made out the shape of Nymphadora Tonks, wielding a large plank of wood, half her scalp burned and smoking in the night air. Moody gasped for breath, thanking all the gods that he’d see a little more of the world before he left it. Then he watched Tonks go to work.

She raised the plank again. “DO NOT…” CRACK!

“FUCK…” CRACK!

“WITH…” CRUNCH!

“MY HAIR!” The last sound of the plank striking MacNair was sickening, and heralded the certain end of the man’s life. Nymphadora stood over the body of the fallen Death Eater, panting and wild-eyed. She turned to Moody. She pointed the blood and gore drenched end of her improvised club at him.

“Does anybody else here…have ANYTHING to say…about my fucking hair?!”

“Darling, wear it anyway you like, you’re still the prettiest sight this old eye has ever seen!”

“Right then. Let’s get cracking, we’ve still got a war to win!” Moody took the offered hand and clambered up. Once he had his wand, his eye, and MacNair’s knife, they were off and running, looking for the next melee.

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To Be Continued in The Final Battle (part 2)