Saturday, April 11
All the triumph over Dumbledore's death in Susan's eyes died as Harry hurriedly related Timmy's message.
She didn't cry though, she looked terrified, but brave.
Harry appreciated her for that.
"What do we do?" Susan whispered.
"We go get them," Harry said.
"How?"
Harry actually had no idea.
And, historically, Harry was very bad at planning. Especially when his nerves were all on edge and it felt as if someone had poured a fizzy potion directly in his body, causing all his blood to fizz and tingle.
It would be fuckin brill to just go snag Snape and make him help rescue everyone.
"We need to know for sure who all's there," Harry murmured, ignoring his own slightly desperate idea to get Snape. Harry and Susan stepped in to an empty classroom that Harry quickly locked and silenced against intruders.
"Fingers crossed," Susan said once she saw Harry pulling his mirror out.
Fingers crossed for sure because if Timmy had Fred then Harry might just have Susan kill him then and there so someone could kill Timmy.
…except there were two more damn horcruxes so Timmy was currently unkillable.
Damnit.
"Fred Weasley," Harry said to the mirrors surface.
It was possibly the longest moment of Harry's life waiting to see if Fred could answer.
When he did, Harry's legs almost collapsed beneath him.
"Hey, darlin," Fred grinned. "Are you done with your super secret mission?"
"What was our hotel room number over the summer?" Harry asked quickly.
Fred screwed his eyes up for a split second as he thought about it. "1004?" he said slowly. "The bookworms were in 1003, Trent in 1002, and Sirius and Remus in 1001."
Susan was just on edge as Harry was because she jammed her face in front of the mirror as well. "What did I tell you the night of the Slytherin party last year when you brought Lavender?"
Fred grinned again. "'I don't like you, but Harry does. Don't give up on him, you utter swine tit.'"
Harry glanced at Susan and she nodded.
"Who all came to Hogsmeade with you?" Harry demanded while Susan whipped open the Marauders Map. "It's important, so don't be wrong."
"Tonks-"
Fuck.
Snape was probably going to be really upset if she died.
"Ron, Draco, Blaise, Neville, Trent, Sapphire, Luna, Theo, and Hermione."
Susan shook her head out of Fred's line of sight.
All of them. They were all missing.
Timmy had all of them.
"Are you at home?" Harry asked Fred.
"Yup."
"Good, stay there," Harry said firmly. "Don't fuckin leave unless Snape or Susan tell you to."
"And make sure it's us," Susan told Fred.
"What's going—"
"Love you," Harry said before disconnecting the mirror.
"How the fuck do ten students get kidnapped by fucking Timmy and nobody notices?!" Harry snarled quietly after he pocketed the mirror. "This school is such bullshit, isn't it?"
Susan bit her lip and rolled the map up. "We eat in the dorms all the time," she said, sounding as pained by their own decisions as Harry suddenly was. "It wouldn't be weird for us to still be in up in the dorms, or the kitchens, or even in Hogsmeade still."
Harry closed his eyes and nodded. She was right.
If ten students were going to disappear, Harry's ten people were the ones that would take the longest to notice.
"What now?" Susan whispered
"Do you trust me?" Harry asked her.
Susan's faith in him was unwavering. "I do."
Good. Because he didn't trust himself. Not with this many lives on the line.
"Where are we going?" Susan asked as they ducked beneath the cloak and ran for the front doors.
"Home," Harry said. "We need backup."
"From Fred and Lucius?" Susan raised a brow.
Harry smirked and shook his head. "Don't be stupid, we're not bringing him more hostages, Sue. We're getting the elves."
Susan didn't look like she understood, but she would.
If Harry didn't get her killed in the meantime.
***
"Mavis is not liking this," Mavis said with a tug of his left ear. "Mavis is not wanting Master Harry to be getting involved with the nasty snake man."
Harry checked his watch. It had been twenty minutes. He had less than forty to get his friends before Timmy went crazy and started killing them. He honestly did not have time to argue with Mavis.
"Oh for fucks sake," Susan sighed. She pushed Harry over and glared down at Mavis. "We need your help. Our friends need your help."
Mavis looked around at Draco's four elves and they all shared similarly unhappy looks.
"That's it." Harry couldn't keep wasting time. He frowned at Mavis, genuinely unhappy with what he would have to do. "Mavis, I'm so fucking sorry, but I order you to help me and I order you to do what I say, when I say it, and to not find any way to get out of helping me. D'you understand?"
Mavis narrowed his eyes at Harry, silently communicating how pissed he was and how shitty summer was going to be.
"Mavis understands," Mavis said through clenched teeth. "Mavis will be helping his sneaky Master Harry, since he is ordering him to."
Susan grabbed Harry's hand and squeezed it in a reassuring way.
"We's will be helping too," one of the female elves (Roo, maybe?) told Harry with wide eyes. "Mistress Malfoy is saying to be doing anything the Mister Harry Potter is telling us."
Harry nodded as he tried to piece together a plan on the fly. He inhaled slowly, counted to five, and blew the air back out just as slow.
"Alright. Roo-"
Oops. Guess Roo was the other female elf.
"-after we leave, wait five minutes, then you go to Hogwarts and get Professor Snape and tell him to get home immediately."
"Shouldn't we send everyone to the hospital wing?" Susan murmured.
Harry shook his head and put his lips right beside her ear. "We killed the Headmaster," Harry whispered very quietly. "Hogwarts isn't as safe as this place is."
Susan nodded and Harry turned back to Roo.
"I also need you to tell him it's fucking important, not tell him what I'm doing, and he should grab his medicinal potions kit just in case, yeah?"
"Yeah." Roo nodded eagerly. "Roo will be telling him that and Roo will not be taking no for an answer."
"Good." Harry eyed Blippy carefully. "If I tell you to come when Susan calls you and do what she says, will you?"
Blippy nodded solemnly. "Blippy will."
"Brill." Harry gave all the elves an appreciative look. "This can't get fucked up. There are important lives on the line, d'you understand?"
The elves nodded back, even though Mavis still looked unhappy with him.
Harry and Susan reconvened in the broom shed, neither wanting to be accidentally discovered by Fred or the Malfoy's. Susan pulled out two galleons and quickly explained to Harry how a charm Hermione put on them worked.
"Tap your finger on it, and think about whose name you want to send me," Susan said. "Mine will heat up and I'll know you have them."
They tested it quickly, making sure both could send little one word messages on there, and Harry thought it was brilliant.
"We have to get Hermione first," Harry said. "I'll find Trent and Luna, but you have to find Hermione. 'Mudblood', he called her."
"The baby," Susan gasped. "I'll find her first, I swear."
"Kill anyone who tries to stop you," Harry said.
Susan nodded with a grim expression.
"Wait. What happens to a vault at Gringotts if both owners are dead?" Harry asked Susan before he apparated blindly in to what seemed to be a rather well thought out and elaborate trap.
Susan scrunched her brows at the seemingly random question. "I think it's auctioned off after a time, but I'm not really sure, why?"
"Then don't kill a death eater by the name of Lestrange," Harry said quickly. "It's important, trust me."
Snape said the horcrux-cup was in Bellatrix and Rabastan Lestrange's vault. And Bellatrix was already dead. Harry couldn't risk that cup being moved.
***
Harry stayed entirely silent after apparating in Macnair Manor's back garden. He felt the wards on the property trip the moment he arrived, but they couldn't find him or Susan while they were under the cloak.
They could look though, and it would give Harry and Susan the chance to kill every single person that stood between them and their friends.
The two of them paused in the backyard, keenly listening and looking for any swarms of impending death eaters.
Harry also mentally scoffed as he looked over the two story brick house. 'Manor' was a bit of a stretch, but then again, so was pretending to be a pureblood when your father was a muggle.
So clearly if Harry breeds psychopaths then Timmy breeds delusional-paths, or whatever.
Delusional or not, there was no indication of anyone running out to try apprehending them.
"If you see a death eater, kill them if it isn't the one," Harry said as quietly as possible to Susan. "I'll keep you out of prison and I'll buy you a new wand."
Susan rolled her eyes while she held up her wand; she'd probably already been planning on killing anyone she could.
Because she had no idea how shitty Azkaban was, but Harry would never let her find out either.
"Point me Hermione Granger," Susan murmured. She laid her wand flat on her palm and bared her teeth in a silent snarl as it pointed directly to the back door.
"When we split up, you take the cloak," Harry said as they approached the house. "We aren't fighting, we're getting them the fuck out. Timmy won't kill me, but he will you."
The two of them paused outside the back door. Harry took his last heavy breath, reminded himself that this was unfortunately real, and squeezed Susan's hand one last time before dropping it.
"Wait." Susan grabbed Harry's wrist as he reached for the doorknob. "Look."
Harry followed her line of sight and saw a small window at the bottom of the house, probably no bigger than a large textbook, sending a small amount of yellow light across the grass.
"Let's go in through there," Susan whispered. "I feel lucky about it."
Far be it from Harry to stop Felix from finally fucking helping them out on the unluckiest day of Harry's life.
The two of them went over to the window and Harry grimaced at its size.
"I'll fit, but…" Harry hesitated as he tried to find a polite way to point out that Susan might struggle.
"But I've got a large arse," Susan said with the smallest hint of a grin. "I'll fit too. Let's just go."
Harry ducked down to reach the window.
Break it.
Harry cringed at the loud tinkling noise of the shattered glass hitting what sounded like a stone floor. Harry took his cloak off and wrapped it around his hand to carefully clear away the jagged pieces still in the frame. He'd made the mistake of not doing that once, when he'd been much younger and stupider, and wound up slipping inside the basement of an abandoned house and cutting the hell out of his back.
Once the glass was all the way cleared, Harry gave Susan the invisibility cloak and then slipped his legs in to the opening.
Here goes nothing.
It was a short drop. Ron, who was about a foot taller than Harry, might not even have had to drop really. Harry landed in what looked to be a pantry of sorts, there were shelves covered in canned goods, giant bags of flour, and other various household goods.
Well… Harry didn't see any reason for a bunch of death eaters to have so much food.
Harry took one of his dwindling minutes to go around and send all the food to Moon Lodge while Susan struggled to wiggle her way through the window.
He liked the irony of the bigoted death eater's supplies going to a house full of werewolves.
As soon as Susan finally twisted her way in to the room and she secured the cloak over herself, Harry flicked his dagger to his hand and moved towards the door. He checked his wrist watch one more time before grimacing.
Ten minutes before Timmy joined the fight.
Harry silenced both of their feet before nodding in the direction he was sure Susan stood. He turned the doorknob slowly and inched the door open, wincing slightly at the creak that echoed down the long dark passageway.
Harry had no real idea how basements worked, but he hoped following the passage would eventually lead to some sort of staircase or something. He kept his magic drawn up in his hand, causing the warmth to flood his fingertips and occasionally shoot off tiny tingles across his palms. He also kept his dagger held tight in his right hand as he crept quietly towards the next doorway.
He didn't feel lucky, exactly, but he did feel a bit of a bubbly calm presence in his mind that made him think maybe he was headed the right direction. He paused when he came to a divide in the corridor; there was a heavy steel door to his left, and a short set of stairs that led to a dark brown wooden door on his right.
"Point me Hermione Granger," Susan murmured.
Harry waited while he wand was probably spinning in her palm before Susan whispered for him to go left.
Further in the creepy dark basement it was.
The steel door was locked and Harry undid it quickly. The second he opened it though, a horrifying alarm began squealing- it was so loud and obnoxiously high pitched that Harry nearly put his hands over his ears. Instead, he waited until he felt Susan brush beside him and he closed the door and put up the ward that Snape once taught him to keep anyone with a dark mark from crossing the doorway.
It wouldn't keep Timmy himself out, and any death eaters already within the room couldn't leave now, but Harry had to hope that the small impulse that led him to do it was luck driven.
"SPLIT UP," Harry yelled at Susan over the alarm when they immediately reached a T. "Find them!"
Harry went left, Susan went right.
And it only took roughly ten long steps for Harry to realize that he was somehow both incredibly lucky and also terribly unlucky—
Maybe Slughorn misbrewed that potion?
—because Harry found Ron almost immediately on his right hand side.
In a mother fucking cell. Complete with iron bars and everything.
"HARRY!" Ron yelled over the ringing alarm and the now distant shouts coming from above them. Ron didn't look hurt, just a little dirty and a little messy. He also looked so painful relieved that it was heartening to know someone believed in Harry so wholeheartedly.
But Ron was terrible at shutting the fuck up.
Harry shook his head quickly and held his fingers to his lips. Ron nodded and pointed at a portion of the bars on his cell (Harry would kill every person that put his friends in fucking prison cells right before melting the entire 'manor' with his bare hands and rage) that had a carving on them. Harry hesitated for a brief moment before deciding 'what's the worst that can happen?' and grabbed the bars right on top of the carving.
Fucking pain. That was the worst that could happen. Harry's hands suddenly felt like they were burning, but he held on tight and forced his magic through them as he concentrated on opening the cell, remove the bars, open the cell.
It took about thirty seconds of time Harry didn't have, he could hear loud yells coming from the entrance he blocked now, but the bars finally sizzled and burst open.
Harry wasted no time in calling for Mavis.
"Straight home," Harry told him as he popped out the galleon to let Susan know he had Ron.
"No, Harry, let me help you," Ron said earnestly. "C'mon, I think Blaise might be hurt."
Harry glanced at Ron's burnt and empty hands- he'd obviously been disarmed and tried to open the cell the same way Harry had.
"I'll get them, I swear," Harry told him. "You go home, you're no help right now."
Mavis narrowed his eyes hatefully at Harry before quietly popping away with Ron.
One down—
Oh.
Harry glanced at the coin that was now pulsing with heat in his hand.
Thank God.
Susan found Hermione.
Two down, eight to go.
Harry sent a slightly panicked look behind him toward the doorway as he ran to the next cell—
Who put a prison in their basement?
Was this already here or did Timmy install it?
… And did Harry want one at his house?
Neville was in the next one with his face jammed against the bars, despite the searing heat that had left bright red marks on his cheeks.
"BLAISE!!" Neville screamed. "FIND BLAISE!!"
Harry spun around and took in all the cells that lined the corridor. He ran towards the door at the end of the corridor at random, praying to the God's he didn't believe in that he wasn't just running at random.
Unlock it, Harry commanded his magic as he grabbed a handle.
Felix Felicis apparently decided to finally do something for him, because Harry opened the door and he found Blaise.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Harry whispered. He knelt down on the floor in the puddle of blood surrounding his friend and flipped Blaise on his side.
It was only Harry's long-standing ability to not let blood affect him that kept him from blowing chunks all over Blaise's body.
It looked as if someone had torn an entire chunk out of Blaise's neck, leaving a gaping hole and slash marks that went clear to his eye socket.
And it was a mad thought to have, but Harry knew Blaise would be miserable if he was alive because Blaise loved his face so much.
"Blaise?" Harry carefully ran his hand down the side of Blaise's neck that wasn't torn to ribbons. He didn't know how to check for a pulse, but it didn't seem like it should be that difficult to find.
Except it was.
"BLAISE ZABINI, WAKE UP RIGHT FUCKING NOW!" Harry desperately yelled. He put his other hand over the chunk of exposed bone and muscle where the blood was sluggishly dripping.
Heal it.
When Harry moved his hand, the skin was knitting itself together, leaving behind silver scars from Blaise's eye to his shoulder. Silver scars like...
Like Lupin wore.
"Oh, I'm going to fucking kill him," Harry snarled.
"I told him you would."
Blaise's lips barely moved, but Harry heard him.
He heard him.
"Thank God," Harry breathed. "MAVIS!"
Pop!
"Straight to Snape," Harry instructed Mavis curtly. "Do not bring Snape back, do not tell him where I am. You go straight to Snape, make sure it is him, then come back the second I call for you."
"Mavis will be back then," Mavis squeaked quickly before grabbing Blaise's wrist and leaving immediately.
Three down, seven more to go.
No…
Harry checked his coin and saw that Susan had freed Tonks as well.
Four down, six to go.
How the hell was Susan opening the cells so fucking quickly?
Harry dipped back out of the room that had Blaise in it and realized he ran past more of his friends, aside from Neville, as he had went. He also realized the alarm had stopped ringing, though the angry shouts hadn't lessened at all.
Harry was panting slightly as he got back to Neville's cell as he looked at the coin again and saw that Susan had freed Draco too.
Even with Harry's splitting headache from blocking out Timmy, there was no reason that Susan should be opening the cells quicker than he was. Yeah Susan had her wicked strong arm, but Harry had wandless magic.
Harry had barely grabbed the bars of Neville's cell before Neville cleared his throat a little and pointed out how Susan was moving so much quicker than he was.
"Er… Harry?"
"'M trying to concentrate."
"Right, right… it's just that… that Mavis could just pop on my side of the bars here, mate."
Harry let go of the searing bars and felt his face heat up as hot as the palms of his hands were.
"Mavis."
Mavis popped up immediately and Harry pointed at Neville.
"Take him home," Harry said, ignoring Neville's protests that he wanted to stay and help. How could he? Neville didn't even have a fuckin wand.
Was that six now? Who was still missing?
Harry jogged away as Mavis and Neville disappeared.
Trent, Theo, Sapphire, and…
"Lue." Harry pulled up short in front of the cell next to Neville's and quirked his head to the side. Luna was doing some sort of ballet within the cell while she hummed her own music.
Harry grabbed his coin and forced it to flash with Neville and Luna's names.
"You wanna go home or are you staying here?" Harry grinned as Luna continued her little leaps and twirls.
"Home, please, if I can't stay with you," Luna said. She came to a halt on the other side of Harry and gave him a misty eyed smile. "I thought maybe I'd die here and I didn't want them to think they broke me beforehand."
Harry nodded in understanding. "Fuck them," he said. "But you can't stay with me, I'm not staying either, I swear. Mavis!"
Pop!
Mavis was muttering a lot of rude insults as Harry merely pointed at Luna and told him to take her home, but that was seven down.
Nope.
Harry looked at the coin in his hand and grinned to see Theo's name flashing.
Eight down.
Only Trent and Sapphire left.
Harry jogged slowly down the corridor, his head twisting left and right, before conceding that neither kid was on his side and he began running much quicker towards Susan.
They nearly collided as they met in front of the door that the death eaters still couldn't open, and Timmy didn't seem to feel the need to storm down yet.
"Who's left?" Susan tore the cloak off and was panting, bent over at the waist with her hands on her knees.
"Trent and Sapphire," Harry said. "Anyone hurt on your side?"
"Dray didn't look so hot," Susan said. "And Tonks was out cold, but Mione seemed fine."
Thank God.
Harry would melt the fucking skin off Timmy's ugly snake face if his godson had been hurt in any way.
"You?" Susan asked.
"Blaise is fucked up bad," Harry ground out, his jaw clenching as he thought of the damage down to Blaise. "If we see a werewolf, dibs on killing him. 'M not going to do it so nicely."
Susan let out a quiet moan as she closed her eyes, no doubt picturing how badly a werewolf could hurt their friend.
"Did you look in all the doors and rooms?" Harry asked as he glanced over Susan's shoulder. "Why wouldn't the other two be down here?"
"Dunno. Trade me, check my work and I'll check yours."
Harry nodded and raced past Susan, carefully looking up and down her side of the corridor before accepting defeat and moving back to the doorway in the middle.
"Give me a minute," Harry murmured once Susan came back and shook her head at him.
Harry closed his eyes and concentrated hard, focusing solely on Timmy's side of their connection; intruding his mind rather than letting Timmy intrude his.
Knock, knock.
Hello, Little Horcrux. Are you busy liberating your followers?
Harry imagined himself smirking and twirling a knife between his fingers, forcing Timmy to see it.
Nah, didn't take me long, did it?
That's because you are mine, hence your increased level of cleverness. I'm curious, how are my followers unable to enter their own dungeon?
Super secret spell. But I'm curious, where's the rest of my friends?
Now it was Timmy's turn to force an image in Harry's head, one he had no way of knowing if it was true or not, but he suspected that it was.
These followers? Timmy asked innocently, highlighting the image of Trent and Sapphire bound and gagged on the floor by Timmy's feet. Sorry, darling Harry, I heard you arrive and thought perhaps it would be prudent to keep a reason for you to come visit me within my line of sight. You can't leave without your godbrother, can you? Your paramour is home safe though, I presume?
Harry snarled, opening his eyes and punching his thigh in anger.
"Timmy has them?" Susan asked, her voice flat and furious.
"Seems like," Harry groaned. He rubbed a fist against his eyes, forcing himself to think.
As soon as he opened that door, death eaters would be firing at them.
He had to kill Greyback.
He couldn't kill Lestrange.
Susan couldn't get hurt.
And he had to get upstairs, get Trent and Sapphire, and get everyone the hell out.
Apparently Felix Felicis didn't care at all to help him.
"Cloak on," Harry told Susan quietly. "Back up. When I open the door, stun or crucio anyone you can. Do not kill, do not use Sectumsempra."
"And then what?" Susan whispered.
Harry grimaced. "And then we try and get Trent and Sapphire without having any fuckin casualties, yeah?"
Susan whipped the hood of the cloak back on. "Yeah," she said, her voice steady and supportive. "If we die tonight, I love you Harry James."
Harry raised both his empty left hand and his dagger in the right.
"I love you Susan," he said. "Open the door."
The door flew open at Harry's command, the slight yellow mist still filling the doorway, but…
But the dozen masked witches and wizards on the other side of the doorway merely had their wands raised defensively.
Their blank white masks stared at Harry, their shouts eerily silent now.
Harry blinked at them.
… maybe Dumbledore killed Harry and this was a dream?
Harry clenched his left hand in to a fist and let the nails cut in to the blisters on his palm, sending a hot wave of pain down his arm.
Not a dream then.
Harry kept the dagger held high as he tilted his head to the side curiously. "Any of you outstanding citizens named Greyback?" he drawled.
None answered him, but Harry swore he saw someone's head twitch to the side slightly.
"Don't suppose you'd get the fuck out of my way, would you?" Harry asked with a sharp smile now. "'M a bit busy, and don't feel like killing you all right now, but I can if you'd rather."
They just… they just stepped aside, silently.
Harry's friends were his friends, but damn if he wasn't a bit jealous at how well-trained Timmy's followers were.
Step One: Get a dungeon prison.
Step Two: Get actual followers.
Step Three: …prosper?
Harry waited until the pathway from his doorway to the doorway with the stairs was cleared before grinning.
Make them all sleep.
The magic practically flew from Harry's fingertips, so quick and eager to do his bidding. The death eaters began toppling on top of each other, falling asleep quickly and easily.
"Oh." Susan pulled the hood off the cloak and grinned. "And here I thought maybe we'd die."
"Nah." Harry grinned and called for Mavis again.
"Here's the plan," Harry said, making it up entirely as he went. "Mavis, get under the cloak with Susan. We're going to find Timmy. As soon as we find Trent and Sapphire, I want you guys to get to their side and take them home. Then come back for me."
Mavis and Susan both blinked balefully at Harry.
"You can apparate," Susan said drily. "How about Mavis takes the kids home and you side-along me?"
"Can't," Harry shrugged and kicked at the stone floor that felt like it carried an electric current across it. "Can't you feel the magic, Sue? I get the feeling it's anti-apparation. We can come in, but we can't go that way."
In fact, Harry spun on the spot to test the theory and only managed to make himself a bit dizzy.
"Master should be going home and Mavis will be getting the other children," Mavis said.
"Yeaaah, no," Harry scowled. "Mavis, I swear to God, I'm going to find a way to make it up to you, but I order you to get under that cloak and help Susan get Trent and Sapphire home before coming back for me, no matter what."
"Mavis is never making your mini tarts again," Mavis hissed acerbically as he slipped beneath the folds of the cloak with Susan. "Master will be eating normal sized tarts."
"The horror," Susan giggled.
It was actually.
Mini tarts just had a better ratio of custard to crust; Mavis was being evil.
"Don't speak," Harry said as he turned toward the corridor and squared his shoulders. "Get to Trent and Sapphire, get them home. That's the mission."
It seemed like a simple mission, foolproof really.
But Harry forgot that Gryffindor's were occasionally impulsive and brash and idiotic (aka all the things Snape said they were), as opposed to chivalrous and brave (as Neville and Fred both were).
Harry led the way across the corridor, up the stairs, through the wooden doorway. He let his intuition lead him through the kitchen he stepped in (also normal sized, what a tiny 'manor'). Harry walked warily and quickly through another doorway with double sided glass doors in to a dining room that definitely had to be magically expanded to hold the long table and chair set beneath a shining silver chandelier.
And, through another set of double sided glass doors, Harry could see Timmy.
Timmy sat in an obnoxiously decorated golden chair, a slightly less obnoxious silver one beside him. And, at his feet, just as he'd said, were Trent and Sapphire. Even from where Harry stood, he could see the ropes on their wrists and the cloth tucked in their mouths.
… to be fair, there were a few occasions where Harry would also like to silence his little chatty godbrother with a scarf. But Timmy sure as hell wasn't allowed to do so.
Harry smirked, since he could see Timmy's creepy red eyes trained directly on him, and he casually strolled around the table. He cleared his mind easily before throwing the glass doors open with a dramatic flourish, and stepped right in to the center of the room, leaving Mavis and Susan plenty of room to get around him.
"Harry, what an unexpected surprise," Timmy said with a smirk. "How was your day?"
Harry was surprised enough by the startling sanity in Timmy's dry jest that he grinned a little. "Same old, same old, really," he said. He twirled his knife between his fingers, the same knife that Pettigrew once used to cut Harry open to bring Timmy back to life. "How about yours?"
"I'm truly surrounded by the most mediocrely competent followers," Timmy said. He glanced towards Trent and Sapphire, both of whose eyes were bugging out of their heads as they stared at Harry. "Perhaps I'll be more mentally stimulated when we combine followers, Harry."
"Afraid I don't have much use for yours," Harry shrugged, taking a small step away from Trent and Sapphire, leading Timmy's eyes where he moved. "Bunch of sleepyheads. Oh! Where's Greyback? I'd like to kill him before I leave."
"Greyback?" Timmy tilted his head curiously as his eyes bore in to Harry's. "What would you want with a nasty creature like him?"
"Just told you," Harry smirked, "murder. Try and keep up, Timmy."
Timmy's lips curled in to an angry sneer. "Lord Voldemort, if it's all the same to you, Little Horcrux," he hissed.
"I like Timmy, it rolls off the tongue easier," Harry taunted him. "Plus—"
Pop!
Timmy's head turned towards where Susan, Mavis, Trent, and Sapphire just disappeared before turning back to Harry. There was anger in his eyes, but not as much as Harry expected.
"Clever," he murmured as he got to his feet. "Nobody's ever accused you of being unintelligent, have they boy?"
"Nobody who lived to tell the tale," Harry said with a wide smile.
Harry- One Timmy- Zero
Timmy also smiled, but damn it was super creepy. "Those muggles didn't seem to find you very intelligent," he said. "A wonderful obliviate you put on them, it took a bit of power to break through it."
"Muggles?" Harry's taunts died in his throat. "What muggles?"
Timmy gave Harry a confused tilt of his head now. "The disgusting oaf and his horse-faced wife. Did you not receive my gift, darling?"
Harry blinked. "Did you- did you kill the Dursley's to be nice?"
Timmy's confusion seemed to increase. "Did you think I did it to hurt you?"
"Yeah." Harry squinted at him, trying to decide if he'd actually died today and didn't know it. "You put me in Azkaban?"
"I meant to break you out," Timmy said smoothly.
"You had Crabbe and Goyle stab Ginny and Finnigan?"
"I don't know those names," Timmy said carelessly with a twirl of his wand as he took a step towards Harry. "I merely told them to attack students you didn't like. I did plan on having them kill the red-headed girl you hate."
"I don't-" Harry shook his head. "What the fuck d'you want from me?"
"You," Timmy said softly, stepping towards Harry. "Join me, Little Horcrux. Together we can reshape the world. I have heard your dreams of becoming Minister, with my help, you can be the youngest minister yet."
Harry felt a brief pang of fierce joy at the image of himself as minister, then he remembered who he was speaking with and narrowed his eyes in both anger and focus.
"You killed my parents, you killed Barty, you tried to kill Snape, you stole my fuckin friends, AND YOU PUT ME IN AZKABAN!" Harry yelled, his chest heaving with his anger. "And now you want to BE FRIENDS?!"
"Partners," Timmy said calmly. "You are mine, and I want you back."
Harry laughed. "Go fuck your—,"
Pop!
Harry and Timmy both looked to the side as Mavis and fucking Sapphire popped in to the room and Sapphire immediately shouted, "Stupefy!" at Timmy.
There was nobody in the world more stupid than Sapphire Herron.
Timmy blocked her stunner with less than a careless flick of his wand and had her petrified on the floor almost as quick.
Son of a bitch.
Harry looked between Sapphire and Timmy quickly as Mavis gave Harry an apologetic frown before popping away.
How did his entire plan fall apart so quickly?
"Join me or she dies," Timmy hissed with his wand pointed at Sapphire's frozen body.
"Kill her and you'll wish death was all I had planned for you," Harry hissed right back with his hand raised and his mind whirling.
He wasn't Snape. He couldn't come up with crazy plans on the fly like Snape did.
"Bow with me to our partnership and I will let her live."
They seemed to be at a stalemate-
Timmy with his wand pointed at Sapphire.
Harry with his magic drawn up and waiting for his command in his fingertips.
Neither moved. Neither blinked.
Harry couldn't think how to escape the fucking mess he was in.
He wouldn't bow- not ever. Not as a jest, not as a feint.
Probably not even to save Sapphire's life. Sapphire was a nice girl, but she was also brash and impulsive and got him in this fucking situation to start with.
But he couldn't kill Timmy, not with two horcruxes out in the world and one in his head.
And there was nothing stopping Timmy from killing Sapphire.
Until...
Pop!
"Fuck you!"
BANG!
Pop!
"AVADA KEDAVRA!"
In a matter of seconds—
Harry's heart shattered and his world ended right before his very eyes.