Harry Potter - Series Fan Fiction ❯ The End Shall Come, And We Will Dance Forever ❯ Prologue - The Beginning of the End is Just a Dream ( Prologue )

Title: The End Shall Come and We Will Dance Forever
Author: Makoto Sagara
Series: Harry Potter
Archive: fanfiction.net, afallenangel.net/makotosagara/, mediaminer.org, Foreverfandom.net, makochanupdates.livejournal.com; anywhere else, please ask
Category: Angst, Drama
Pairings: Unknown
Warnings: Angst, language, OOC, 7th year timeline based upon OotP

Disclaimers: Harry Potter is owned by J.K. Rowling, Scholastic Publishing, and Warner Bros. I make nothing from this. In fact, I lose money to write this, so… no suing, `kay?

Summary: 7th year, based off of OotP, ignoring HBP and DH. When Harry is faced with his greatest enemy, will he have enough to kill? Or will it be the end of The Boy Who Lived? And how will his relationships change before the final confrontation?

A/N: What part of `I need a break from writing fanfiction before I go insane' is so hard for a muse to understand? It must be the insane part. My three certainly are insane as it is. Okay, the first paragraph for this piece came from a girl off of the gw-fan mailing list. I don't know why my brain processed this as a Harry Potter fic, but I don't really care. The girl was giving it away for usage, and my muses thought it would be wonderful to use. Hence my doing of this… I think I really am insane. (Sigh.)

Prologue - The Beginning of the End is Not A Dream

He hurt. Oh Merlin, he hurt. Pain radiated through his body, blending with the ache of a stomach that has been empty for too long. He couldn't remember the last time he ate or even slept as he pushed himself to keep going, placing one foot in front of the other to escape the slaughter and senseless violence that had surrounded him and tried to pull him under. Barely healed cuts and gashes were rubbed by blood-soaked clothing as he moved, adding to the pain in his body. Stumbling, he barely caught himself before he fell, and forced his weary body onward. If he fell, he wasn't going to be moving for a long time, and he wasn't safe yet. He could still hear the sounds of fighting, yelling, and dying, but he wasn't sure if it was all part of his exhausted mind. Until he knew he was safe from the carnage, he had to keep moving.

If only he knew where Dumbledore was, then he knew he'd be able to collapse like he so yearned. If only his Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia hadn't been so adamant that he leave. If only... If only... If only he'd been able to grow up as a normal child, with parents who loved him, with brothers and sisters, with love... If only a billion things had been different... But they weren't.

He was the great and wonderful, or horrid and a large impediment, depending on whom you asked, Harry Potter. Saviour of the Wizarding world. The proverbial thorn in Voldemort's side. A seventeen-year-old man so full of hatred, rage, and sorrow that he barely kept it in check. And he'd never asked for any of it.

All he had ever wanted was a way to get away from his horrid aunt and uncle and his unbearable cousin Dudley. He never wanted to know that his birth had marked a change in the balance of power between good and evil. He never wanted the responsibility, the burden, the never-ending dread. He just wanted to be a normal teenager, to find someone who he loved and loved him, and to be happy.

A sudden flash, followed by screams of agony and peals of maniacal laughter, had Harry more alert than he'd been moments before. His wand was out and ready for use as his eyes raked over his surroundings wearily. The shrieks of small children and their parents mingled with the bursts of hysterical pleasures all around him, until that was the only thing that seemed real. And he knew that that was the greatest irony of all.

To think that Hermione, Ron, Neville, Ginny, Fred, George, Bill, and Charlie were all too far away for him to see made his chest and throat tighten, but he knew that this was no time to start crying, and still he trudged forward. There would never be a time where he could shed tears. Not until Voldemort was dead, and even then he knew there was no guarantee that he would live through that. How he longed for someone else to share at least a sliver of the anguish that was his life.

He realized that his thoughts were going around in circles and he couldn't help but give a bitter smile. He knew that he was not alone and that this was the last time he'd face this opponent. “This will be my graveyard, won't it, Voldemort?” Harry asked, firing his only chance at living, the ultimate unforgivable curse, Adava Kedavra.