A/N. This is shorter than usual. One of you hoped that I would post before the fall and I felt compelled to grant the requestJ
Happy Easter everyone.
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Chapter 70 - Flight of the Phoenix
James grabbed the invisibility cloak and pulled it off. It was Hugo he had crashed into and had pinned down.
"Get off me!" Hugo squirmed under his weight.
He was bigger than his kid brother and more fit. There was no way the latter could overpower him.
"Get off me! I have to go! They'll die if I don't!"
James tried to talk some sense into him, "You've gone mad! If you think you can do what they can't...!
"I don't! But if something happens to them I would never be able to live with myself if I don't try!"
He was somewhat stunned; he had never heard anything so desperate in his entire life. James had to back off to give him space.
His brother picked himself up, gathered the invisibility cloak and shoved it into a small pouch strapped closely against his chest. As Hugo did that James saw other things in it; an old book and some sort of Muggle medic drug.
"What are you going to do?" he asked with concern.
"I don't know yet."
From what James just saw that wasn't entirely true. Hugo was up to something.
"You can't go by yourself."
"I have no choice."
"Of course you do."
"Malvado said to come alone."
"He's going to kill you."
"Do you think so?" Hugo was being sarcastic as he walked past James and headed straight for the Atrium fireplaces.
James had to do something. He couldn't just let Hugo walk to his death.
"Wait!" James called out.
Hugo turned to face him.
"Petrificus totalus!"
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The collapse of the dungeon slowed her human pursuers down but the Dementors kept coming nonetheless, draining her as they got close.
Hermione conjured her Patronus. It wrestled with one but got overrun by the others. There were too many and she knew it would be near impossible to fight them all off.
They were gaining on her. Surrounded by earth she accelerated and continued to tunnel through, her momentum catapulting her through the surface. She crawled away, but too slowly to elude them. She could only think of doing one thing. It wouldn't work but she had to try.
Hermione turned on her back to face them and tried to raise her wands but her arms stayed limp on her side. Not one part of her body obeyed her ask to keep moving away. A Dementor was floating right above her, literally drawing life out of her.
Dark clouds approached her from every angle, engulfing her within seconds. Too tired …too cold…too hopeless…
The screaming started; her own. Decades old emotions were drudged up…the intense loss…the gut wrenching sorrow…the deep regret…
She was at a mass funeral. Rows upon rows of coffins, all belonging to people she knew, each one dying right before her very eyes from the most painful death imaginable, over and over again. Her Mum...Rosie...Hugo...Harry...her family. And all of it her fault because she couldn't prevent it from happening.
Hermione was screaming yet she couldn't breathe...she couldn't breathe…
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Moments earlier, Al snapped out of Gates' Superius spell just as the Canadian said he would. He looked at the group of six blood-thirsty wizards and witches with the fifty or so ruthless followers surrounding them. They were poised to fight.
Thankfully not against him.
While he was in no position to judge and be picky, Gates told him the unsavoury lot was the best attack crew to bring into a suicide mission against Malvado. Each entity had come up against Malvado in the past and lost. They all had motive to get rid of the Dark wizard, all of them for personal gain. There was one catch; their willingness to fight was highly dependent on being summoned by the son of Death's Mistress. They believed in the prophecy and would only challenge Malvado if he, well Hugo, led them into battle.
Gates admitted that he took advantage of the Polyjuice incident because he needed to spur Malvado's enemies into action. Al didn't buy the hogwash and suspected that the local boys' idea to Polyjuice him was one of Gates' suggestive spells. Gates needed Hugo, or someone who could pass as his brother. And Gates obviously preferred someone other than Hugo to do this.
Free from Gates' influence, he supposed he could leave. He could find a way to contact his Dad. But Aunt Hermione was a prisoner in the camp and he was in a position to help her. It was a no brainer. Much like after he regained control at Pag-asa, something within him was telling him to stay, play the part and see this through.
And besides, revealing himself to this barbaric crowd was a sure invitation to get killed.
One of the thugs came up to him and said impatiently, "We're ready. When do we attack?"
Al swallowed the lump in his throat. It was much easier to be brave under the Superius curse.
"Get into position."
They moved stealthily under the cover of darkness and got to the spot Gates told them to be at. Across their hiding place in the middle of an open field was the entrance to the underground dungeon where Aunt Hermione was being held. Wizards and Muggles stood guard outside and several Dementors hovered about.
Their instructions were to wait for a signal. He wasn't told exactly what that signal was other than it would be obvious and hard to miss.
Five minutes went by, then ten. The eerie silence made him anxious and the gravity of the moment hit him hard. He felt like throwing up.
There was movement. Someone was at the entrance. He was allowed in with a food tray. Moments later he came out followed shortly by the guards who went in with him. Not a minute after, the Dementors become restless. Flashing lights came on, alarms went off, stirring humans and non-humans into a frenzy. He motioned the men to hold steady.
Then the ground shook.
They all felt it and looked at each other, puzzled. Earthquake?
It shook again. This time the earth kept moving and with it came a loud, escalating rumbling sound. Close to the dungeon entrance the ground swelled and exploded outward.
If that wasn't the signal nothing else would be.
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Moments earlier, Ron followed the IMP Maria through dark underground tunnels, bringing them closer into the heart of Malvado's camp. Several others were behind them, some with dimly lit wands, moving single file through the narrow pathway as quietly as they could. By his estimation they were grossly outnumbered and he wanted to avoid running into Malvado's men for as long as they could.
Harry, being a man of few words, omitted telling him where the meeting would take place. However they made a decision to head for Malvado's prison dungeon, where Hermione would be held captive if she were still alive. Since leaving London he had been fighting off the dreadful thought that they were too late.
Ron wondered where Harry was right now. Harry knew of the tunnel; Maria told him about it. However, there was no indication that someone had been through here recently. Ron's gut told him that Harry, if he were already in Malvado's camp, chose a different route. That or the rendezvous was nowhere near where they were headed.
Up ahead Ron could see that the tunnel was coming to an end. There was light pouring in through a thick curtain of thick leafy plants hanging from above. Maria stopped at the opening and held one hand up to them to do the same. They waited.
Ron joined Maria at the entrance and saw what they were faced with. The tunnel opening was on the side of a hill overlooking an open field, at the centre of which was a heavily guarded area. Ron could barely make out the opening on the ground but it was there.
He assessed the enemy. Aside from the armed wizard and Muggle guards, several Dementors hovered about. He had not fought a Dementor since he was a teenager and something about them always brought out intense irrational fear that he felt in childhood.
"How's your Patronus?" Maria asked.
"Rusty, haven't had the need to conjure a protective one since Auror training," he replied, "Yours?"
"The dark half of me has never let me execute one," she admitted, then figured about the rest of their team, "We might not have enough."
Dovalov weighed in, "We plan smart and make do."
They had a few Aurors, former Aurors, IMPs and former IMPs of various abilities, then there were Seamus and Neville. After a head count of Patronus capable witches and wizards they judged they had enough but just barely. And it was possible that there were other Dementors in the area. There were also Malvado's armed men to contend with.
The odds were against them. Both Dovalov and Maria were thinking the same thing but they all knew there was no backing out.
"Something's going on," Maria announced, her sights trained at the dungeon entrance.
"Is that a food tray?"
Ron wanted confirmation before getting his hopes up. Food tray meant live prisoner.
Maria's mood perked up, "Yes, steak and asparagus."
"You can tell from here?" Ron was impressed.
"They've done this before," she was referring to Hermione and Gates, "It's not the first time one of them has been in this kind of trouble. Get ready."
Just as the guards alighted from the dungeon entrance the Dementors went crazy. The sirens went off.
Then Ron felt a tremor. He looked in the direction of the peak of the mountain and thought he saw something fiery shoot out of it. He must have imagined it.
It happened again, this time the origin was, without a doubt, closer. A loud reverberating echo was approaching. In the open field close to the dungeon entrance, the surface began to mound up with the escalating rumble, culminating in an explosive burst of dark, heavy earth.
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Harry recognized the golden locket dangling from a thin chain around the woman's neck and the restraints on her wrists and ankles were hard to miss. The magical scanner confirmed Hermione's signature but with a Biomorph involved (and Merlin only knew what else) that meant nothing. Harry needed to get closer and to talk to her to verify it was indeed her.
He expected games and treachery and it was exactly what he was getting. He took the Elder wand out, tightened his grip on it and kept it at the ready, his senses heightened to react to just about anything.
Harry called out, "This isn't complicated. You get the wand, I get Hermione, then we try to kill each other. Why are you afraid of me anyway? Aren't you supposed to be invincible?"
Malvado laughed, his voice echoing from several places around the crater, "I am not a fool, Potter. You have a reputation for doing the impossible. Although I like my followers to think otherwise, appearances, aside I respect your abilities way too much. I will not give you the opportunity to add my defeat to your long list of accomplishments."
The sudden modesty was clearly a smoke screen.
"Never figured you for a kiss ass."
"Put the wand down."
"Come and get it."
A vibrating tremor coupled with a loud rumbling sound percolated from somewhere beneath them. He stepped back against the rocky mountain wall just as a sprinkling of red, hot rocks, gas and ash sprung up from the opening below.
One of the stones the size of a fist narrowly missed him. Then the sound of a spell being conjured caught his ear. He looked up expecting a curse, ready to deflect.
But nothing came. Instead, across the crater, the rocky ledge Hermione was on shattered and collapsed from under her feet. She was freefalling into the volcano.
Without hesitation, Harry leapt into the opening after her, summoning his broom as he did. He caught the stick with his left and mounted it just as another cone of smoldering projectiles shot up. He maneuvered around the obstacle and headed full speed towards her.
He was right. In the surrounding darkness he could clearly see the reddish reflection coming off the lake of molten rock at the bottom of the crater. He fought off the noxious smell of gas seeping from between the crevices in the walls surrounding them. He got to Hermione about twenty feet above it and reached out to grab her outstretched arm.
"Hang on!" he yelled, pulling her up with his left hand.
He tugged, she looked up. Harry swore to himself.
Before Harry could shake him off Malvado gripped his arm with brute force. Several sharp metal objects extended from Malvado's fingers and pierced through him, causing an instantaneous bone crushing pain that almost made him pass out. The restraints disappeared and in its place, a weapon.
Harry didn't wait for Malvado's complete transformation. He fired.
His foe countered and muffled his attack. They skirmished in close quarters, him pounding Malvado curse after curse to get his opponent to fall even at the expense of his arm, and Malvado, trying his best to contain his curses to hang on.
Then Harry heard it. A rumble. Malvado heard it too and knew it was coming. They pointed their wands are each other and fired, the same instant a plume of molten lava bubbled up from the surface like a geyser.
Harry braced himself. It was headed straight at them.
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Hugo appeared at the mouth of the volcano, dropped the portkey at his feet as he watched his father mount a broom midair and dive into the crater at break neck speed. Someone else had fallen in and it looked like his father was trying to save them.
He peered in from the edge to see who it was but had to step back as the volcano spit out gas and something hot and hard. A rock. He dismissed the burn on his arm to quickly orient himself. His Mum was not here. Malvado was not here. Nobody else was here.
But there was definite wand fire from deep within the volcano. He looked down into the hole again, more cautiously this time. It was too dark and his father was too far in it. More curses were fired. Hugo felt an urgent need to be there, to help his father out, to do something other than wait for the outcome.
He didn't have a broom but he didn't need one. What he needed was a boost. His pulse was racing but not fast enough. It seemed like only fear for his own life could get him that excited. Hugo took the medic pen out of the pouch secured around his neck, found a prominent vein on his arm as Isa suggested and stabbed himself with the drug.
It hit him unexpectedly. Adrenaline gushed through his heart and his arteries. He clutched his chest as it tightened so much he was choking. The pen fell from his hand and rolled into the pit as the drug sent every part of him into a chaotic reaction. His head pounded, his ears rang, his entire body shook and his heart felt like it would spontaneously burst into flames.
Hugo could no longer take the powerful rush. He jumped into the volcano, arms stretched out. He had done this before, it had to happen again.
And it did. Very quickly he changed and unlike before he felt every part of his transformation. Human to avian, normal to freak, everything on him somehow seamlessly molding into some part of what he transformed into. He was flying.
Wings with red and golden feathers flapped at his sides. He scanned for his Mum but couldn't find her. Then his hearing picked up the sound of two powerful curses clashing against each other. He trained his sights at the source and his hyperacute vision tracked his father's figure as the blast tossed the older Potter off the broom.
One arm all mangled and bloody, his father had lost consciousness. A scream…a wall of lava swallowed Malvado up and it was about to do the same to his father.
Hugo swooped down and grabbed his father by the collar with his powerful talons. He swerved and took them both to safety, out of the mouth of the volcano. Far from danger and his strength waning somewhat, he had to find a good place to land. A few feet down the slope of the mountain there was a flat surface. It would do.
He set his father down gently and knelt beside him. Already Hugo was back in his human form, which, like his phoenix transformation, he had no way of controlling. He looked at his father, pale from the blood loss, left arm half gone, not breathing.
Panic came to him.
"No, you can't die now," he heard himself say.
He put one hand on top of the other at the center of his father's chest and began pushing hard against it. This was how the Muggle doctors did it, how their medics taught him. This was the only way he knew how to get his father's heart to work again.
One…two…three…four…
Don't die…please don't die…
…five…six…seven…eight…
I don't hate you…I promise, I don't hate you…
…nine…ten… eleven
I just didn't want you to hate me…
…twelve…thirteen…
I just wanted to be your normal son…but I could never be that…you know…normal…
…fourteen…fifteen…sixteen…
And now I know it's okay…I'm fine with it because you don't care about that…you don't care that I'm different…and I know you want me to be your son…I want you to be my Dad…
…seventeen…eighteen…
Please don't die…don't die…not now…
Hugo stopped counting. He pushed hard again and again and again and again. It wasn't working. His heart wasn't beating. He wasn't moving.
After some time, when he couldn't anymore, Hugo stopped. He sobbed as he remembered how great he felt the one time he let his father hug him.
I'm so sorry…
Hugo wrapped his arms around his father's neck and cried some more.
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Hermione couldn't breathe for the longest time, then she could.
Ocean air filled her lungs and she felt sand under her feet. She was back in Perth at her favorite spot at the beach where her Mum and Dad used to live.
Someone took her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. It was Harry, a much younger version of him, the one who loved her before Death made him forget. She was younger too.
Harry looked into her eyes and said to her, "Spend the rest of your life with me."
He was a picture of pure happiness, peaceful contentment bursting from within him. She felt the same.
Hermione smiled and replied, "I'd have it no other way."
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Malvado was fuming. He hated being burned.
He climbed out of the crater and allowed his damaged body to recover, surveying the vicinity as he did.
A few feet away he saw them. Potter was dead and Granger's son was next.
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