The Family That Lived

²⁷|ᴅᴇᴀᴛʜ ɪꜱ ᴀɴ ᴏʟᴅ ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅ

There it was once again, his mother's wisdom and his father's calming presence. No doubt his mind had conjured them to help show him his way back.

With that he opened the door, facing the same blackness that had greeted him a couple of moments ago.

_________________________________________

"Is he dead?" Bellatrix questioned, only to be glared by her leader.

Narcissa moved forward, her heart just as heavy as the steps. She did not want this to happen, Potter clearly meant a lot to her son and her son meant the world to her. She had been late to realise it and not the best in showing it but Draco was the only reason for her existence.

She bent down next to the body of the young boy, his face was dusty and it carried a huge part of maturity. There was no part of boyishness left, nobody would know that he was in his teens. Life definitely had not treated him fair.

She took his hand and there she found the opportunity to repay the unspoken one-sided debt she felt like she owed the boy and his entire family.

"Dead" she announced.

Her sister let out a laugh followed by many others which covered up the saddened howls from Hagrid.

The next step was to proceed to Hogwarts, show them the dead body of their supposed saviour. Voldemort kept his back straight as he led the group of people who did not dare to match step with their leader.

All staying behind as Hagrid who was still chained carried the boy he had adored since he was born.

He held him high, almost high enough that nobody could see his face.

It came crashing down when Voldemort reached the gates. Both sides came rolling out to the perfectly preserved entrance of the school.

To say the least, Voldemort was more than satisfied to detect the despair, the disappointment and the worn out faces of his rivals.

Lily was leaning on to James. Fred and George were behind their siblings and the group along with Molly and Arthur were in a group latching on to each other, some with fear and others with grief.

Sirius hid his face in Remus' neck, his sobs evident with the way his body was shaking. Hermione and Draco stood together, years of fighting made them get into alert upon the mere sight of the dark lord. The terrible slowing of time stretched around them both like a strangling rope.

Amidst the silence and the agonizing glares, Voldemort raised his hand. Of course, all the glares went towards the direction in which his ivory fingers. There stood Hagrid, who had managed to go undetected by now.

Before anybody could start guessing about the limp body in his embrace, the man in the middle announced: "Harry Potter is dead."

"No!" came a scream from Lily who could not find any means of composing herself. The woman couldn't move. Could barely breathe. She could hear her own heart beating, hear the scrape of her breathing in her dry throat. Her husband was holding her back and she gave up fighting, giving in to the embrace of the man who also lost a son right now.

"Now you all put your faith in me," the evil wizard said. Words rolling off his tongue as easily as he expected the others to accept them.

However, this was not the case as Draco stepped forward and said "no! You must be insane to think that we would give up now when we are so close to freedom."

"It is true that Harry fought with us but our fight doesn't end with him," Neville said stepping forward.

Ron continued, "Doesn't matter that Harry's gone. People die every day-friends..family. Yeah, we lost Harry tonight. But he's still with us...in here." The redhead boy pointed towards his heart.

And that is when Hermione stepped in, "the boy you killed, the one you have been trying to kill for years is the love of my life and at this moment I know that he wouldn't want me to give up." She stared at Harry, motionless in Hagrid's arms. His eyes were closed, his face still; if it weren't for the limp hands and legs, she could have told herself he was asleep.

Now very much against her will, she thought of the way Harry had looked at her then, the blaze of faith in his emerald eyes, his belief in her. He had always thought she was strong. He had showed it in everything he did, in every look and every touch.

Hermione closed her eyes. Remembering the way Harry had looked at her the night of the Yule ball confessing how much she meant to him, she couldn't help but imagine the way he'd look at her now if he saw her trying to give up and cry, waiting to be killed beside him the way she so wanted to.

He wouldn't be touched, wouldn't think it was a beautiful gesture. He'd be angry at her for giving up. He'd be so-disappointed.

With that thought in her mind, she found her voice and continued "I will not stop fighting you, none of us will. I will make sure that he did not die in vain even if I die doing so. You cannot pull me over to the dark side because I will resist you till my last breath."

Agreement aroused in the crowd and then Lily screamed "my boy was strong, determined and kind, everything that you are not. This fight does not end with him, the same way it did not start with him. Your followers would stop fighting the moment we defeat you, but we all have something to fight for and that does not stop with the death of my son. In fact, that motivates us to take revenge for taking a beautiful soul, another beautiful soul away from us."

"So assholes, come and get us" James yelled and suddenly Harry was rolling out of Hagrid's arms.

Gratitude, relief, anger, irritation and all other kinds of emotions were rising in everybody. Although, the only thing that was in Harry's mind was rage and vengeance.

"Potter!" Draco screamed. Harry looked over and raised his hand to catch the wand coming towards him.

Everything broke loose, some death eaters escaped by turning into black smoke while others stayed back and fought.

A/N: So I changed the mid-life-and-death limbo scene a little, mainly because I think that Dumbledore was there because of his guiding role in Harry's life and this au includes his parents as a support system.
I am not sure about the accuracy, but it an alternate universe.

Also, I had to thank you guys for reading this story and we are over 10k reads.

xx