Just Harry

Once upon a time in a land closer than you think, there was an evil dark wizard who threatened to take over the world…

“I’m just Harry. Just Harry. I’m me.”

It’s all that saved him from merging with the void of dark power that swirled about him, calling him into its depths.

"Power, greatness, magic fusing through your veins the way it was meant to. You were meant for greatness, you are meant to stand above all others…"

The darkness whispers into his mind, calling to the deep parts of his soul, which he had locked away, dark secrets and longings. It seduced him, and part of his mind could see this all happening, and it was screaming.

Let go of me! I am not you! I am not evil! I…

I’m Harry Potter, just a boy…

"Just a boy who can do magic? Who can have anything he so desires? You can have them all back: James, Lily….Sirius."

He didn’t know any longer whether it was the voice –him- talking, or just a repressed part of himself.

And somewhere, over the deafening roar of the void, he heard other voices. Familiar voices, that may or may not have been memories, or maybe Ron and Hermione were actually there.

“We’re always here, Harry,” said Hermione almost clearly, but the wind that swept through the voice stole the words from the trembling boy. And there were other words, as if he was drowning in the ocean in a storm and his friends where on the shore, shouting...

“Remember…light! I…Har…mem…phoenix…light!”

The wind swept the words away, but not before Harry could grasp some of them; the voices in his head filled in the rest:

“Remember the Light from which you came, and to which you shall return!”

But there was no light here. Only him, just Harry, alone with a darkness that threatened to smolder or devour him. And it was cold; he never remembered anything being so cold. Had the sun never shown its face to Voldemort?

“The sun despises me. It tricks…it’s a hypocrite!”

Had it never shown on Tom Riddle?

“I am not Tom Riddle. I am better than that boy; I am a man with no fears! Just as ou will become when you cast aside foolish wishes.”

But Harry knew something Voldemort didn’t. Don’t think about it!

“Don’t think about what?!”

Don’t think about it!

Think about light! Think about sunshine! Think of the Phoenix, coming to save you in second year, the bright red plumage casting a light of it’s own in that dark chamber.

A light began to glow, around Harry, or what he thought was himself; a mass of green and gold light, a mind of tangled thoughts that began to weave together as the light shone brighter. Infused, he continued just to remember…

The light across the lake as the sun set, and how he always knew it come up again; it was a given. Feeling the sun on his face and the wind in his hair, playing Quidditch, or just flying because he could, and he loved it. Watching the sunlight dance across her hair, sending it into a flaming mass of bursting sunlight…

The darkness was speaking again, but the sunlight stopped the false words, and Harry could feel himself again. He had legs that moved. He got up and stretched himself.

When had he become so tall? Was he a man now?

“Almost, Harry,” said a voice in his memories, with a rakish smile he could almost see. “I wish I could-”

He had something to do. The thing that only he could do.

One cannot exist while the other lives. One would have to kill the other.

But was he enough? Was this light around him enough to kill that dark, soulless thing?

“He’ll just come back,” Severus Snape said, out loud in his dark chamber in the dungeons. Darkness surronded him, but his mind was silver: rusted and unpolished, but silver nonetheless. “There are countless ways, and he’ll use them all before we’re rid of him.”

Dark eyes looked up, and Harry could swear that they could see him right there. “Don’t just kill him.”

And the vision was gone. Swept away by a torrent of cold water, the ocean crashing upon helpless rocks. Harry was trust to the side, the water enveloping the light.

Don’t kill Voldemort, what does Snape mean?

“…light!…fire!…courage!”

Right, I have to be strong. This is the moment Harry. If you can’t kill him, what can you do to him?

Think, Harry. Take a step back, why do you want to kill him?

TheprophecysaysIhaveto.hesevil.hekilledmyparents.hekilledSirius.hekilledsomany….I don’t want him to hurt anyone, ever again.

“It’s a start,” said a voice that sounded startlingly like Mad-Eye Moody.

“How?” said someone, a mentor, a deep smooth, kindly voice.

I’vegottokillhim.

“There’s sometimes more than one answer!” Had Ron said that to Hermione once?

Another answer, Harry. Maybe you don’t have to kill him, just stop him. Completely. But how?

He’s got me trapped here, but it’s taking up all of his energy to do it. If I could trap him, instead...

And before he could think and calculate, Harry felt himself, his magical being, burst and stretch and spread.

The darkness was manifesting as fog that became more and more solid, and smaller. Harry used his own self to wrap around it completely –distantly he could hear Dumbledore’s hoarse voice: “light!”

I can’t do this forever! Harry realized. I’m already, so weak…

“You’re the strongest, bravest person I know,” said a voice he knew very well. A dazzling smile and a mane of bright hair triggered his feelings…if only he had had the courage to tell her before…

And he could see her face, a real vision this time: “I know, Harry, I know. And…I love you, too.”

The vision and his elation fueled the cage; but it would only be for a time…

He needed some indispensable source of energy…but he couldn’t concentrate, always the roar of the darkness inside him and always the distant yells and memories tearing at him.

“S..light! Har…sun…!” They created a rythmic beat in his ears, and he closed his eyes...

He was falling asleep! On the day that would determine whether he lived, or the world turned to darkness, he was falling asleep. But he wouldn’t let go of the darkness. No, he wouldn’t let out Voldemort for all the rest and peacefulness in the world. He would just sleep for a while. He’ll wake up and this will have all been a dream. He wasn’t really a wizard, he was just an orphaned boy, hungry for love, with an overactive imagination; he was just Harry.

“HARRY!” It was her voice. Harry smiled lazily, and then…

He jolted awake, and tightened the reins around that slippery, slimly mass of Voldemort. Shame filled him: He had almost let Voldemort go!

He needed to do…something. The voices pounded him, something about light…

What’s light, though?

Something that blinds, and warms, and burns, that streams in rays from a relentless sun…

Time stopped (or hadn’t it already?).

Voldemort tried to slip away again, and Harry let him, just a few inches…

And bam, they were on the sun, and the flames engulfed Harry, and he made them engulf Voldemort as well.

As the dark mass tried to slip away, Harry thought, Oh no you don’t. I’m not going to give up my life just so you can get away again.

And Harry burned Voldemort’s soul (or…whatever it was) into a cage of flaming sunlight, where they both screamed until the end of time.

Once upon a time there was a brave boy, who became a hero when he gave up everything to keep us safe. And he called himself Harry, just Harry.