Harry Potter and the Defiance of the Hero

Harry Potter and the Defiance of the Hero

Chapter 27 - And We Became Legends

Before the face of God we duelled,
and tore asunder the heavens. God
himself smiled and waved. A small
smile... as if He knew a secret
we did not.

~~Bryce

Round 1

It was an art, really, dancing with swords. There is one point in every wielder's life when the sword ceases to be a tool, and becomes a part of the man - as vital as an arm or a leg, with just as much use. When it is no longer a weapon, but an extension of the soul.

The wielder may hate his weapon with a passion and what he has... must... do with it, but, as with all things, experience increases skill.

Harry waded through waist deep rose petals under an azure washed sky, his hard eyes and mind dedicated to one task, and one task alone. Destroying the creature before him, and getting back to where it all began. Back to March 20^th, 1997... even those months of his life had been normal compared to this.

Anything was normal compared to this. He tried not to laugh, he really did, but his broken sanity betrayed him.

A circle of flame had surrounded Harry and Allarius, even as the snowstorm of rose petals began to thin. Around Harry surged ninety thousand demons, pushing onwards towards the remaining human soldiers who, despite it all, were still twenty thousand strong. Harry's magic had kept them alive, whilst his plans had killed them.

Glittering in the twilight the sword of Godric Gryffindor was an extension of his arm. He could wield it with grace and style, slicing away whatever stood in his path. He tried to remember in that moment who he had been when he kissed Ginny for the first time atop of the Astronomy Tower.

He had not been who he was now, and likely never would be again.

It was a sad thought that, even after all he'd done, it would never be over.

But maybe it wouldn't be that way, if he could find love again....

Allarius was still smiling as he hopped from one position to the next, as quickly as lightning or a snake. His blade didn't glitter in the light, but absorbed said light... emitting a pulsing dark cloud that blurred the air the demon swung its blade through. Decaying flesh marred the creature's body, but it was more powerful than anything Harry had yet faced.

"Look at us, Harry," Allarius suddenly cried, raising his arms towards the sky. "Look at what we've done together. Could you imagine an existence where your destiny did not bring you here?"

Harry growled and began to move in across the small clearing they stood upon, guarded at every compass point by thousands upon thousands of rotting demons.

"I'm here because I chose to be here," he whispered, and yet his voice bellowed across the clearing and Allarius raised his sword on guard. "Destiny had nothing to do with it."

Allarius laughed. "How right you are, Harry," it smiled. "Oh my, how right you are...."

"You've destroyed something beautiful of mine," he said, coming to a stop six feet away from the creature. His arms were bursting with power and the blade flared to life. "DEFEND YOURSELF!"

Swinging the sword one handed back over his head and down, Harry didn't expect to hit the creature - and he didn't. He didn't even blink but suddenly Allarius's blade was raised, faster than the eye could follow... faster than light. The two blades met and power surged in such levels that a dome of golden light burst forth from between the two duellers. It faded away just at the edge of the clearing.

"And there I was thinking things had just gotten boring," Allarius mused. "HA!" He flicked his wrist and cut Harry across the stomach - across his armour. The boy stumbled back a moment too late, his dark eyes narrowing further. He had understood... no armour and it would have been game over.

Harry twirled his sword hand over wrist in his right hand, whilst in his left a sphere of power grew to about the size of a baseball. He swung, petals swirling around his form, and threw the sphere at an uncanny speed.

Allarius cried, "BATTER UP!" and used his sword as a club, striking the sphere and deflecting Harry's blade in one deadly move. The sphere split and spiralled away across the plains, the two halves exploding and killing dozens of demons where they landed. "That's two strikes, Harry."

Light metal struck Dark metal as Harry fell into a series of stances and low cut swings that Dermas had taught him. They were second nature, impossible to forget - like flexing his fingers. Each was met with a quicker and deadlier strike. On the last blow he jumped back with a cry, as the very tip of Allarius' blade had nicked his neck. Pain flared but he ignored it.

"Have you been holding out on me, Allarius?" Harry asked, buying time until he could think of something. "You were never this fast in the past."

"You've been fortunate in the past, Potter. A luck that tripped me more than once... but fear not, today I am on form. A battle worthy of your impressive skill."

Harry tilted his head in mock acknowledgement. "You're all heart," he said dryly.

Cruel laughter rang out followed by a blurred series of strikes and blows, each one parried by both combatants - each one radiating power enough to send those nearby to the ground, burying them under a field of rose petals.

It was then that Harry noticed that Allarius's hands were glowing similar to his own, the only difference being that his arms were encased up to the shoulders, and that his magic was now scoldingly hot from being held so long.

He could not hold it much longer.

The ground shook and rose petals shot up like the white swash from a crashing wave as the two titans duelled amongst the dead and dying. Harry's blade was the deepest silver, reflecting the purple of the sky, and it contrasted severely against the hard cold black metal of Allarius's.

Nevertheless though, the two blades met and the ground shook, splintered, shattered. Nearby demons - nearby being over one thousand feet - felt the blows in their bones. Magic preserved Harry and Allarius from these concussions for the most part, but it still began to wear on the Boy Who Lived.

Every strike of the blade, every parry of the swords felt like a hammer blow to his chest. Sparks blazed like a waterfall and his hair burnt, the demon shrieked, it all hung in the balance once again.

It all hung on Harry Potter's shoulders once again. When hadn't it?

Minutes passed slowly... or it could have been seconds... hours... years even. Harry didn't know, his mind was blank, his hands a blur and his sword a shining beacon for the light - the tool, the part of him through which he now led this fight. Blows were traded and the power inside both hero and villain grew steadily, and yet sometimes jumped to astronomical levels.

Always rising, never falling.

More minutes passed, and more and more. Every move Harry knew he had duplicated in a hundred different circumstances. He was tired, sick, and could not give an inch even for a second. Allarius was trying his hardest as well, dashing at him through the sea of petals, bending around reality and blinking back and forth across the clearing.... but their speeds remained constant, if not identical.

Hundreds had died on the Endless Plains just from the surges of power ricocheting off of the swords and users. They were, for the most part, demons - so no harm was done.

The land, on the other hand, was seething in turmoil. Magic, raw and unfocused, seeped into the heaving cracks that were springing up in the earth. Torrents of superheated steam burst up through these cracks, and it was only the beginning.

Harry neither saw nor felt any of this, and neither did Allarius. Moving almost faster than the human eye could see, the two of them danced and traded blows so strong that it was doing nothing but destroying the ground upon which they fought.

Bleeding from a dozen or so nicks of the blade, Harry came to the conclusion that he was getting nowhere with the sword, and that it would soon come down to hand to hand - fist to fist... magic to magic.

Even in his enraged calm detached state, Harry shuddered to think of the effect of unleashing their full power on one another would have on this world... perhaps more than this world. It was an option, though.

Allarius had drawn the same conclusion as Harry, and his eyes bulged at the prospect. Finally he would see how powerful the boy was, what he was willing to do and how much more he could sacrifice. Entire worlds... could he survive watching Earth crumble into dust?

As one, equals, identical opposing forces, hero and villain stepped back, one panting the other smiling, and lowered their blades. In the same instant the swords disappeared, Harry's into his arm awaiting his call and Allarius's into a fold in reality.

"Great minds think alike," it mused, and made a show of cracking its decomposing neck and gathering its power. When the demon did crack its neck, it bent down to a right angle, before snapping back up with a deep hiss.

"To destroy you, demon," Harry growled. "To destroy you I'm willing to do anything."

Allarius laughed his usual laugh. "Fool! I cannot die for I do not live. How do you kill the undead, Harry?"

Harry smiled grimly. "You drive a stake through its heart."

Next... came the Power of Existence.

"Come, Darkslayer, prove your worth."

Harry had been holding onto his power to keep himself alive, struggling to maintain a grasp on the awesome, never before fully tapped, strength that lay within him. Deep reservoirs of his magical potential had never been tapped. Now... now though... none of the regular rules applied.

If the greatest thunderstorm ever blanketed the entire world and the oceans surged up and absorbed all of the land in a torrent of crashing waves and towering walls of water, it would not even approach a drop of the amount of power now swirling through Harry's veins, coursing with unique strength towards his palms.

That same power burst to life in Allarius, and anyone that looked upon them at that moment would have been blinded - even for an instant. They shone with such radiance that the twilight sky faded, and it was mid-morning again.

Harry screamed - or at least he thought he did. There was so much power... so much potential. He could do anything now, absolutely anything if he had the will. It clawed at him, bit into his flesh - into his soul - and he continued to scream, now in exhilaration. He felt as if at any moment he would explode - perhaps he would... such power had never before been used by a mortal.

It was a strength, mayhap, to match... the Creator.

"Such happy thoughts, Harry," Allarius cried, his voice sounding beyond joy. Even speaking caused waves of power so strong to blast forth from the demon, but they washed over Harry uselessly, and killed everything still alive within five hundred feet.

"If it has to be this way...." Harry whispered so sadly that the magic he held, the dam of pure power, seemed to cry out in anguish as it steadily increased.

He then threw himself at the demon, tearing forward and unleashing his power. He corkscrewed through the air, balling his hand into a fist, and that glowing fist smashed hard into the demon's cheek.

Allarius screamed in pain, stumbled and fell and was back up in less than a second. The earth sank fifty feet downwards, showers of dirt and rock and petals falling, falling, falling. Harry landed on his feet just in time to receive a similar blow from his enemy.

They were fighting on a whole new level now - anything was possible - and the blow that broke Harry's jaw was strong enough to pierce the earth's core... thankfully, this time, it didn't. His own magic shielding him somehow, the force in Allarius' hand was devastating, hurt beyond words, but the main power was deflected upwards and screamed hurtling into the sky, punching through the atmosphere and exploding in a dazzling fireball four hundred miles above the planet.

Four hundred miles... and the shockwave forced thousands upon the Endless Plains to their knees. Not Harry and Allarius though - never them.

And so, a new dance began. Harry's mind was filled with power and the one aim to destroy Allarius - these feelings were reflected in the demon's furnace-like eyes. Nothing else was noticed, and only vaguely Harry wondered where the power he was throwing landed - if Allarius deflected it.

Beneath his feet he felt the ground rumble, could hear a thousand stones shattering in his eardrums. It was beyond terrible, beyond real. Their power was increasing.

Harry and Allarius grappled with one another; at moments rolling around on the ground, fists dealing punches, eyes throwing power and hands stretching towards throats. Sweat lined both their faces, Allarius' was blood red, and still the magic came.

At one point Allarius screamed and made a move to kill. He linked his hands and pummelled Harry in the chest with enough force to level a mountain... and that is just what it did. His own magic still providing protection, the strength of Allarius' blows bounded off his chest and tore through the earth south for over fifty miles - back towards the mountains he had walked through a day ago.

The noise was deafening - it was the end of the world, it had to be - as thousands upon hundreds of thousands of tonnes of rock and dirt were hurled up into the sky, blanketing the sinking sun, raining down upon the land and the strewn contingents of humans and demons battling on the now pockmarked and not so flat Endless Plains.

A rift had appeared from the epicentre of the power - from where Harry and Allarius still stood, still trading blows - and it was over three miles wide. A devastating split in the earth. Where the mountains had stood for millennia at the end of this rift lay a scattered fan of rock and dirt.

Beyond terrible. The humans and demons scattered before this threat, those that still lived, turning tail and wisely running away - just away from the two who could wield such devastating power. No one should possess it, no one - not for any reason.

Harry didn't have time to care about the destruction, and threw his entire weight into the demon that wouldn't die. They rolled on the ground, a seething mess of muscle and power that destroyed anything it touched. Screaming, Harry pressed his blazing hands into the throat of the demon and, as if he were holding a ball of paper, roared and threw the monster up and into the air behind him.

Allarius flew, flew and laughed, high into the sky - flying through debris from the destruction, through rose petals and chunks of flesh. Two miles before he slowed down, the demon arced in the sky and smiled, seeing Potter's light on the ground below. A ground that was rippling and steaming, strewn with destruction. It was beautiful chaos.

Allarius spun and power spiralled around him until he became an invisible blur on the ash filled sky. Like a drill, he tore back down through the air faster than light and dove straight into Potter.

Harry's eyes widened a moment before it happened, but then he was driven a mile into the hard compact earth behind him, a corpse of Evil holding him down. Tonnes upon tonnes of rock and dirt started to fill the mile deep crater. Harry blinked, Apparated, and stood upon the field of petals again. A rain of boulders was still falling, but they burst into dust before the waves of power emanating from him.

Allarius was nowhere to be seen.

Bleeding, battered, bruised and his left eye swelled shut Harry scanned the plains and felt for the power of the demon - he couldn't feel it, anywhere.

"Did I kill him....?" he whispered, chaos falling around him.

The ground cried out and groaned from the strain, the sky was torn to shreds as a hundred different night skies, cloudy skies, and twilight skies from a hundred different worlds looked down upon this source of power.

Harry moved slowly, his senses heightened and eyes sharp. Power still pushed off him in waves and he walked through wasted bodies and unseen allies as he hunted for the demon.

"I couldn't have killed him...." he whispered again, and static crackled around his mouth.

Cyclonic gusts swirled around the field, picking up rose petals by the thousands which brushed passed Harry gently, stroking his bruised and painful face. He smiled, it hurt and the petals blinded him for a moment, and then power enough to destroy the earth erupted behind him.

Harry turned on his heel and saw a beam of pure dark oil surging through the petals towards him, Allarius on the other end. Acting fast, Harry fired a beam of his strength and the two met in the middle.

A ball of searing hot fire exploded from the beams and raced across their length. Harry Apparated to Allarius and punched the demon from his side, sending the foul creature down into a 'bowl' in the ground full of petals, just as the explosion died out - leaving behind smoky tendrils and charred remains.

Knuckles bleeding, Harry defended himself as Allarius sprung back up and threw his fists through the air. His forearms wanted to shatter under the assault, and after a moment when it almost became too much, Harry feinted to the left and ducked under the demon's arms to the right, delivering a devastating blow to the creatures stomach.

A large chunk of Allarius's flesh tore away under the power of Harry's fist and the demon stumbled back gasping. It glared and with a scream, new flesh knitted over the gushing hole and repaired the damage.

"Shit," Harry breathed, just as the healed creature leapt at him.

Harry linked his hands together and created one powerful fist, and as Allarius shot through the air towards him, he dropped his linked hands and they collided hard with the demon's upper back, driving it down into the ground for several hundred feet.

Not wasting a second, Harry screamed and fired raw power down into the hole after the demon. Dirt and stone were eaten away by the blast and the hole widened as more and more was disintegrated.

Behind him, Allarius silently approached having used his own power to Apparate out of the hole before Potter's magic reached him. He held no strength, masking his presence to the boy's heightened senses, and then struck.

In the blink of an eye power flowed into Allarius' scorched palms and he threw a soccer ball sized amount of energy at the boy's back. Harry turned faster than the blink of an eye though, swinging around his still blazing hands - which cut a rough track through the earth and then came up to intercept the sphere of energy.

Both fighters were forced to their knees from this explosion - a sure sign that they were tiring, and from where their two magics met, an explosion was sucked into a gaping hole that had torn open in the thin frayed fabric of reality.

Unable to prevent it as he was linked to his power, Harry's feet left the ground as the rip widened and sucked in his beam. He was thrown through the air and through the tear in space and into whatever new world he was about to destroy.

Allarius cried out in surprise and followed the boy through the hole, leaving behind him a wasteland that had once been lush green plains.

*~*~*~*

Round 2

Harry flew through the gap and let go of his beam a moment to late, the momentum carrying him further through the air until he smashed into something hard and metallic, his armour and magic absorbing most of the blow so he only winced.

When he struck whatever he struck, a loud whining sound filled the air and he heard many gasps and screams. Opening his eyes and blinking away pain and fatigue, Harry saw a weird jumble of letters and numbers before him,

2FCKNFST

A moment later he fell backwards, out of the metal object and onto hard concrete. It was then that his tired mind caught up with him and he saw the letters as the licence plate for a car. A very expensive looking car, of which he had just sent its engine hurtling up and through its windscreen.

Smiling though, as he got the joke in the licence plate, he managed to jump to his knees and take a quick look around. He was in a city, upon a main road filled with hundreds of people. Skyscrapers hundreds of feet high loomed overhead under an overcast grey sky, and normal people going about their lives stared at him in wonder.

Car horns blared, alarms rang out and people were shouting at him to get out of the road, was he alright, where had he appeared from. Most of these sounds faded away and were replaced by screams of the utmost terror.

Harry turned back the way he had come, just in time to see Allarius step through the gap in reality, leaving that last world, and the gap close behind him. As soon as it did Harry roared in pain as his scar link snapped and then burnt anew off and threw the nearest building - stretching north again.

Not worrying about that though, he gathered his strength and jumped at Allarius, just as dozens of cars on this busy four-lane street slammed on their brakes as people began running across the road without a care, wanting to get away from the breathing corpse and aura of fear that was Allarius.

Harry slammed into the beast and they grappled once again - upon an entirely new, more modern world. No matter, lives could end anywhere.

They went head over heels into the sidewalk which cracked as Allarius cackled and clawed at Harry. People were once again thrown to the ground as the waves of power burst from hero and villain. Lying above the demon, Harry pummelled its chest with punch after punch, driving them both down through the road and into the irrigation and sewerage systems beneath this metropolis.

Beneath the city the fight raged on as epic as ever. Harry fired spheres of light, which Allarius deflected up through the stone above his head and into the city. Above them, Harry could hear screams and screeches of metal on metal - of stone falling and breaking.

Wading in knee deep sewer water the Boy Who Lived could barely stand anymore. His left eye was swelled shut and bloated, his jaw sore and heavily bruised. Blood ran down his face... arms... legs... neck... and beneath his armour the force of the demon's blows had cracked a few ribs. He stood though, would always manage to stand.

"Another world, another crop of souls, Potter," Allarius whispered and his voice was darker than midnight - closer too. "You survived longer than any other..." And now he smiled. "Souls for the taking... catch me if you can."

Harry snarled and leapt forward, just as Allarius... thinned... blurred and turned into a bend in reality, shooting up through the pipe's roof and back out into the city. Harry scowled and Apparated up after him.

Blink.

He stood upon the street he had crashed into a moment ago. The car he had destroyed was still parked where he had left it, only now dozens of others had joined it. Bodies and stone, metal and glass, littered the street. Fire was consuming buildings and pedestrians alike, water mains had burst and were flooding the street. People ran back and forth, knocking one another down in their haste to survive.

Allarius was nowhere to be found.

Harry ran for a few feet passed upturned vehicles and smouldering buildings, more bodies and screaming innocents. He couldn't find the demon, it had once again let go of its power - masking its presence.

Where does our power come from? Harry wondered, still holding onto his - and for good reason. Should he let it go for a second, the poison in his veins would kill him as long as Allarius lived. What gave it to us... and why? We only destroy....

Adrenalin pumping through his veins alongside the lethal poison, Harry paused as he sensed a threat. Looking to his left as he rounded a crushed car - which was smoking and sparking - two men, wielding two guns took aim against him.

"FREEZE!" the one on the right shouted, a badge on his chest glinting in the sun. "POLICE! GET DOWN ON YOUR KNEES AND PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD!

Harry laughed, burst with laughter and his power shook the street.

"DO IT!" the other man yelled. "DO IT NOW!"

Unaware that he looked much like the walking dead himself, Harry spared them a quick, pitying glance and said, "Run. Run if you wish to li--"

Both blue shirted officers exploded, showering Harry with their blood and bone, their flesh and organs. He didn't even flinch, and as Allarius came into view as the blood fell and smiled, he grimaced as the demon disappeared with a swish of its cloak.

Harry really wished he knew how the demon travelled through bends in reality.

Trying to get his mind around it, he supposed it was something like slipping into a previous layer of the canvas that was this reality. Canvas was made up of threaded together layers, and it did seem possible that you could slip behind the first layer - the top layer, the one he stood in now - and step into an in between version of the world you stood upon. You couldn't be seen, but you could see everything else. You couldn't change anything, but you had surprise on you side.

Yes, it would be useful to know.

Trying to glance in every direction at once, not knowing when or where the next attack was coming from, Harry took deep breaths to calm himself and to help wash away the fatigue he was feeling.

The city street burned around him, roiled in the intense heat of the magical flames. It had become a crematorium.

Harry knew his magic had saved his life a hundred times over in this fight already. It had made him almost invincible to harm, save attacks from Allarius, and he felt exhilarated - slightly drunk on the power. It flowed in every single vein in his body, replacing blood even and cracking the concrete sidewalk beneath his feet.

He hoped and prayed that he could hold onto it for just a little bit longer, just as long as was necessary.

For the first time Harry noticed lightning crackling across the sky, and then realised it hadn't been there when he had first entered this world a quarter of an hour ago. He and Allarius had created it with their presence. Everything really was epic.

"Show yourself," Harry muttered, gritting his teeth against the swelling pain in his face. It had been reduced to a bloody mess and he couldn't see out of his left eye. "SHOW YOURSELF!"

Power flared to life behind him and Harry spun in the blink of an eye--

And received a hammer blow to the chest so hard that he was thrown backwards off his feet and through the side of the nearest skyscraper, tearing through concrete, plaster, wood and metal girders. He flew upwards through the building and ended up shooting out the other side in a shower of glass and debris on a new street completely unaffected by the destruction.

His magic absorbing the best of the blows, Harry fell hard down onto the road - crushing several cars and - of course - cracking the gravel road. A whole new wave of screams washed across these innocent people, who today witnessed the greatest battle in Existence.

Across all the worlds and all the planes of existence, through every universe to every creature - man or energy, alien or animal - to all the wars being fought for Harry or Allarius... nothing compared to the power in this one.

Harry rose with a scream of fury and unleashed his power back through the skyscraper he had been blasted through. Streaming white light, forty feet wide and twenty feet high burst and grew from his palms, cutting through the building and back to the parallel street he had stood upon mere seconds ago.

"DIE!" he screamed, and glass panes hundreds of feet above his head on either side of the road shattered and rained down as dozens of dangerous crystals.

The beam cut through the foundations of the building, destroying its support and, as Harry realised this, he heard Allarius laugh triumphantly.

Cursing himself and damning his soul even further, Harry Apparated away as the building, as high as the sky, began to crumble and fall upon the grid-like roads and smaller structures of the city.

The air was filled with screams, explosions, screeches... the air was filled with destruction.

Harry stood atop of a building half a mile away from the one he had just destroyed, and saw it topple and fall - obeying the law of gravity to the letter. A cloud of dust shot up high into the air, and lightning crackled around the fallen building. Hundreds died.

Once again, Allarius had masked his power.

The price of your game is high - too high.

Harry recalled Ethan's words clearly at that moment - as his nerve threatened to break. When did it become too much? "It has to be worth it...." he whispered. "It will be worth it."

High above the ground on this flat rooftop, Harry turned as he felt the demon step onto it behind him. Sure enough, Allarius - holding his sword again - appeared as if stepping out from behind an invisible wall. His burning eyes shone with amusement.

Harry clenched his fists and his knuckles cracked.

"They're all talking about us now, Harry. Watching us," Allarius cackled. "The Guardians, Good and Evil... we have become legends in the last hour. Can't you feel it? All life is watching us battle."

Harry spat a black bloody mess upon the roof at his feet. "You talk to much, demon," he stated. "Why can't I kill you?"

Allarius cackled, swinging his sword lazily through the air. Around him this city had become chaos. "Oh, Potter, you are simply not trying hard enough!"

See heaven in a wildflower.

Harry twitched and, remembering the old days perhaps, twitched his right wrist and his wand - strapped in the holster - flicked up and into his waiting hand.

"Vestic," he cried, and a blazing purple crescent blade of power burst from his seldom used wand, screaming through the air leaving turbulence in its wake to strike the demon on its disfigured chest.

The light hit home, Harry smiled and so did Allarius. Harry's smile faded as the light seeped into the demon, and it cackled.

"The Dark Arts," Allarius mused. "You know I was there when they were created... I am part of them, after all."

Harry swore - he had helped the demon, given him strength - he returned his wand to the holster.

"Right then," he said, calling back the sword of Gryffindor. "Let's try this again."

And they duelled.

All was crumbling away beneath them, light was being swallowed by dark - but putting up one hell of a fight before it died. Harry used the blade as if all the talent of all the blade masters in all the worlds had been given to him - his skill magnified a million fold by the amount of power he was still holding - always holding.

Allarius' smile slowly faded as the demon found itself on the defensive, edging closer and closer to the edge of the shaking building they fought upon. It's smile turned to a frown and then finally shrieks and hisses of frustration as it struggled to meet Harry's mythic sword with its own.

Harry's mind was a blur of stances and flurries, moves and counter moves he didn't remember knowing. His face hardened into determination as he pushed Allarius back, further back. He would win - he would win. He had to win.

Everything hung in the balance - beings of Light throughout Existence screamed him on, pushing him forward. He could almost hear them, living just out of sight in higher or lower plains... a fiant echo ringing in his ears. It was heartening to know that Light still existed.

Backed up almost to the crumbling edge, Allarius tried one final desperate move, attempting to hack and slice away one of Harry's exposed legs as he stepped forward into his most comfortable stance.

As quick as ever, Harry deflected the blow, lowering his own blade flat against his leg. Allarius' clanged against it so hard that it became notched at the hilt, and then Harry struck. Raising his blade in a sweeping arc, the Boy Who Lived came up underneath the demon's outstretched arm - still vibrating from the sword strike of a second ago - and cut viciously and mercilessly through the flesh in its armpit, hacking through the bone in one clean swipe and taking the arm clean off.

Allarius screamed - glass within a mile shattered if it hadn't already, stone split and water boiled - and Harry grinned in satisfaction, even as the arm fell away to the ground at his feet, sword still in hand, he struck again - and again.... and again.

Stepping back and spinning his sword expertly, Harry used the demon's shock and surprise - a precious few seconds - to deal another blow... straight across the demon's quivering neck.

"DIE!" Harry roared. "JUST DIE!"

The sword of Gryffindor sang as it sliced through terrible demon flesh, taking the head clean off Allarius' shoulders and cutting off its screams. A fountain of dark blood surged up from the gaping hole and ate its way through anything it touched. The body still standing and shaking, as the head fell somewhere nearby next to the arm, Harry did not stop his attack.

Slice.

It's other arm fell to the ground before Harry hacked his way through the demon's bloody torso. His screams blotted out his senses - eyes blinded by rage, ears filled with screams - and when finally the battle heat wore off, he stood before an unrecognisable strewn lump of demon flesh. A steaming pile of broken bones, bleeding stumps of what were once limbs.

Harry looked up towards the lightning sky and screamed in triumph, pointing his arm still grasping the sword up towards the dark clouds, defiance in his screams - daring them to send whatever else they had against him.

"Well...." he managed, after he had calmed somewhat, his voice croaking and weak. "What now?"

He looked around at this unfamiliar city that was falling apart in flames and chaos, felt a small pang of regret, and turned away. Where to now he did not know. He was alone in yet another universe that could be anywhere along the Stream, at different depths in it. Where to now?

His golden scar link stretched unerringly north, slicing through to another world somewhere up ahead. He nodded as if that made sense, which it did, and hid the sword back in his arm - just out of sight awaiting his call.

You did it, he told himself. There's no more dying... never again.

But then, nothing felt right yet. He could still feel the poison in his veins, throwing itself against the magical barrier around his heart. Shouldn't that have died with the demon?

Harry faltered and stopped walking, his hands clenching into fists. Muttering a small oath under his breath, he slowly turned back towards what was left of Allarius....

He turned, hope faded, and moaned just in time to see the demon fit its left arm back into its socket. Small pieces of hacked away flesh flew up from the ground and swirled around its healing form. Dim eyes ignited with the fury and hate of all Evil, and power exploded in the demon like a volcano erupting.

Harry sighed.

"What will it take....?" he asked himself - the fully healed and glaring Allarius heard.

"Nothing, Harry Potter," it said quietly, dangerously. "There is no power anywhere that can destroy me. I am the EMBODIMENT OF EVIL ITSELF!"

"You're an asshole," Harry responded, cracking his knuckles and preparing for yet another round with this undying monster. "Who won't stay dead."

Allarius didn't smile; its eyes were pitiless coals. It had ceased to be a game for it, now that Harry had proven his worth and - for all it seemed - defeated him a moment ago.

"An eternity in Hell awaits you, Potter," it whispered, the very air quivering in fear. "Your soul is damned - and I will claim it."

No power, Harry thought. No power in existence can destroy it... or perhaps....

Slowly, but surely, the beginnings of a plan began to form in Harry's mind. He saw a chance, he saw a way. It was small, ever so small, and not guaranteed to work at all... but after all that had happened it sort of made a poetic kind of sense. Over in his mind a single line of verse he had heard over eighteen months ago reeled constantly.

Despite the deepening darkness, Harry smiled.

But he shall have power the Dark Lord knows not....

To Harry right now, it didn't seem wrong that the crackpot Professor Trelawney may have Seen more of the future than anyone had guessed, or could have guessed, and that perhaps the Prophecy - everything came back to the Prophecy - perhaps it had meant more than what was obvious.

But then there was a very fundamental flaw in this plan... one that almost destroyed it entirely. After all that had happened, could he find a feeling strong enough to unleash this supposed power. It had taken Ginny to be within inches of death last March, and even then he wasn't sure what had actually happened.

Then again, he had a plan - a rough, next to impossible one, but it was a plan. It all hung on the edge of a knife suspended between Heaven and Hell, and Existence could fall either way depending on that.

It came down to one thing - did he have the strength... no... did Harry have the love needed to use the magic that nothing truly evil can understand. Time would tell on this one, oh yes, time would tell.

*~*~*~*

Round 3

Now, despite everything else, Harry did feel the eyes of other beings upon him, and he cast his mind back to that dream with Ginny, by the fire in the Burrow. It hadn't been Ginny, hadn't been a memory or a fantasy, it had been real - communication with something other than human.

Was that what he was feeling now?

Ginny laughed - it felt and sounded so real as she squirmed on his lap. "A life form," she replied. "One that has never taken interest in the mortal universes before... before you. You're drawing all attention towards you, Harry Potter. Wars are being fought on many plains of existence for and against you. Terrible battles and awesome forces are lining up behind you. Darkness and Light are preparing for the End. And it all revolves around you."

He remembered that from their conversation, and had sensed the thing's intent. It had wanted to use him - in its plans for Heaven knew what. He had not become her pawn though; he was a force unto himself.

Allarius could feel it as well, the sense of being watched, of silent cheers for both sides coursing throughout Existence. Potter stood before him, as defiant as ever, and Allarius struggled to believe that he had almost been defeated by this... by this mortal. It was shameful, laughable, it would not happen again. Potter was finished, tiring and almost through. Nothing and on one was coming to help him, he would die a thousand deaths before this was done.

"Follow me if you dare, Harry Potter," Allarius hissed, a blade of dark light swirling down his arm and culminating into a thin length of light stretching out from his closed fist.

Potter wanted a fight did he... Potter refused to die did he... It was time to take this battle to a whole new level, upon a familiar world within a familiar universe. Allarius cackled, swinging his arm through the air and cutting a hole between universes with his beam of dark light.

He stepped through and quickly jumped into a lower level of the canvas of this world, hiding in a bend of reality.

Harry scowled and walked across the crumbling tower building, forgetting the city wide chaos and stepped through the doorway in the air, lined with golden light. How he hated it, but Allarius would die.

Combing his memories - what remained of them - Harry recalled every one he could of being loved, of feeling love, of using love as power. They were few and far between, but they were still there - they had to be, or everything was doomed. He needed that power the Dark Lord knows not.

Ginny, he told himself. Concentrate on Ginny... who he killed...

Instead of finding love, anger enveloped him and the earth quaked beneath his feet. He bit down on it though, remembering what was important now - and recalled the good times, and that which had been true.

Ginny felt so fragile in his arms and Harry closed his eyes as she rested her head on his shoulder. It may have been minutes or hours but when Harry opened his eyes again he saw Ginny looking back up at him. She looked so beautiful in the failing light as a few beams of sunlight played with the loose strands of her hair. She laughed slightly and raised her lips again and Harry lowered his to meet hers--

That had been on the Astronomy Tower weeks before all of this had been set in motion. Christ, he had killed that beauty... no, find love... keep trying...

"I don't know....?" he shrugged matter of fact, his voice a distant whisper. "Love... it's all new to me...."

Ginny nearly reached out and hugged him then, but she was self conscious of the people still in the common room, at least of Ron and Hermione. Too many questions would be raised, and she knew Harry was trying to avoid that. "Why are you fighting it then?" she asked gently.

Harry thought deeply and agonisingly for a moment. "Because... I'd rather not have it, if it could get you killed."

"What if it's worth it, though?" questioned Ginny. "What if it is more important than life or death?"

So much was more important than that - and Ginny had known it from the beginning. Oh Christ, he had killed her.

For the first time since stepping through the tear in the air Harry looked around at the world he stood upon, and he nodded as it all made sense. Hogwarts castle, what remained of it, stood crumbling and broken on the horizon. Scorched earth and the burning remains of the Forbidden Forest lay beneath his feet. Gryffindor Tower still stood proudly though, if not a little scorched and crumbling itself.

A symbolic representation of his defiance.

Behind him the hole between universes closed with a snap, and he winced as his scar link was cut in two, before bursting from his forehead once again and off over the horizon, seeking a new path back... back to his own world.

Ah, he thought, this is not my world - not my Hogwarts. It couldn't be, not if his scar link sought a way out of this world. He was connected to Voldemort - his Voldemort - and the link stretched passed this world, he could feel that. Not his world, not his Hogwarts.

It still hurt to look upon his home in such a state though. Charred and broken bones littered the ground all the way up to the castle, and wands - weapons - stuck out of the earth at odd places. The lake had become nothing more than a dry dusty hole in the ground and above storm clouds gathered with an unnatural haste. Thunder and lightning crackled on the horizon.

Well, Harry thought wryly, at least no one here can die, seeing as how they already have....

It wasn't a comforting thought, and the few steps he took forward caused him to sink into knee deep ash.

"ALLARIUS!" he shouted. A harsh wind took away the scream before it had even left his lips.

Everything seemed tinged crimson - there was no hope, no love - nothing and no one could save Harry now.

"I can stop it, Gin," he whispered, holding her hand with his useable left arm and staring deep into her brown eyes. "But it means saying goodbye."

"Harry," Ginny said. "You better not be thinking what I know you're thinking."

Harry smiled sadly and brushed her hair back behind her ear. "I have to," he said strongly. "But I won't be gone long."

"You can't go through there, Harry," Ginny almost screamed, looking in fear at the growing darkness that was the tear in space in front of her. "You don't know where you'll end up."

"That doesn't matter,' he replied, shaking his head as a single tear fell from his eye. "Voldemort has been beaten back for awhile. I intend to be back before he is."

Ginny started to cry and she sniffed, looking at the ground and not at Harry. "I almost lost you a moment ago," she managed. "I don't want to lose you now."

Harry lifted her chin up until she was looking into his eyes and he back into hers. Then slowly, but gently, he kissed her deeply and wrapped his good arm around her. "I'll come back, Ginny," he whispered in her ear as she wrapped her own arms around him tightly. "I promise..."

Ginny sniffed into his shoulder as she realised fully the complete and utter hopelessness of the situation. "I know you will...." she managed.

Harry paused for a moment in deep reflection. How could I have left her? he asked himself, not for the first time. Why am I still alive?

Sunlight shone off something half-buried in the ash and dirt up ahead, closer to the ruins of Hogwarts. Harry knelt down and picked up the small object... it was a mirror. Tarnished and cracked, he beheld himself in the scratched glass - wincing at what he saw.

His hair was matted to his head in a dozen places, sticking up at odd angles in others. Slick with blood both his own and demon, it looked a mess. His face was a bloated bruised nightmare. He could barely see out of right eye as it had taken a battering and his left eye was completely fused shut. His jaw had swelled to twice its size.

Think happy thoughts, he told himself, constantly glancing around for the demon as he moved closer to Hogwarts - what remained of it. Hermione, Ron, and Ginny - Sirius, the good times.

At times as he walked and held so much power, Harry thought he could feel... a barrier... for use of a better word, against another well of power - different power, and was encouraged by his thoughts and progress... but it couldn't be that simple, nothing like this ever was.

"I can see you..." Allarius' voice hissed across the barren wasteland, echoing in every hollow and hole for miles around. The wind howled as it spoke, but Harry didn't flinch.

"COME OUT SO I CAN GO HOME!" Harry replied.

"You are home, Potter, you are home."

The air bulged before him and the demon burst forth in a rage that shook the world. Harry met him head on, fists and arms colliding in the middle as power once again warred between the two of them. Harry delivered powerful, but overall ineffective, blows to Allarius's stomach, and received a few to his face in return. Power built and they were both thrown backwards, rising again in an instant to repeat the process.

Love, Harry thought, I need love... to destroy.

Grasping the demon's arm, he turned on his heel and threw the monster hard into the ground, snapping something inside of its arm as he did. Allarius shrieked, spun in Harry's grasp, his arm rotating in its rotting socket, and kicked him hard in the kneecap. Harry went down as well, panting and wincing next to the demon.

Lightning forked across the crimson sky.

"Truly a battle for the ages," Allarius breathed. "Truly the greatest battle of any age. Never has so much rested on just two... albeit two of unmatched power."

Harry rolled to his left, pooling magic into his palms as he did and threw the spheres of raw power at the demon - as it rose. Allarius dipped and dived between them, and they flew for half a mile before hitting the ground near the remnants of the castle, exploding in a billowing cloud towards the sky.

Groaning, cursing, aching, Harry rose to his feet, struggling to find something - anything that would unlock his true power. Nothing... there was nothing.

Think of the cost if you fail, he told himself. Think of the madness, and end it. Nothing is beyond you - absolutely nothing. Never let anything tell you otherwise. Harry didn't think those last thoughts were his own, but he believed them.

Inside of him, it seemed for a moment that he felt something crumble, like a notch in a piece of wood. He was encouraged. They're all dead, but they didn't have to die - and they won't if you can unleash your power.

It only has to be once, just for an instant--

Allarius slammed into him hard, a writhing mass of power filled hate. The power drove them hard into the earth once again and it seemed for an instant that everything turned up on its head, a world of pain and insurmountable evil assaulted Harry's mind.

HE WOULD NOT BE BEATEN!

Crying out from exhaustion and dying life, Harry swung his fist up and hit the demon in the face, sending it head over heels backwards - buying a few more precious seconds.

She loved you, fool. Ginny loved you and died for it - don't let that be for nothing, don't let the trillions upon trillions of wars and deaths mean nothing. Or are you weak, Potter?

He laughed insanely as he berated and insulted himself into loving, into embracing the power he needed, but was so far out of reach.

"It shouldn't be as hard as all this...." he whispered. "But then again I suppose it makes it worth doing."

"You won't fail," Ginny smiled.

"Why not?" Harry asked her, his haunted eyes seeking her understanding.

"Because you're Harry," she replied simply. "Harry doesn't fail."

"Harry doesn't fail...." he moaned, his throat sore and rubbed raw - tears streaked his dirty and battered face. "Harry doesn't fail."

As if his tears had been the right answer to a question he hadn't known had been asked, another piece of the barrier inside of him fell away. He suddenly felt light, felt and saw light. Floating on a cloud, shining like the sun during the day. Darkness was there though, when could he honestly say it hadn't been?

"A fool waiting to die," Allarius mused, standing above him, his eyes on fire. "I had hoped to draw out your death slowly, but you have proven to be a greater annoyance than I thought possible."

Harry snorted, lying on his back in the ash and bones. "What'd you say we settle this with a pissing contest?" he asked, laughing insanely. "See who the stronger man is that way."

"Defiant to the last...." Allarius sighed. "You are truly unique in Existence, Potter."

"And you'd kill unique?"

Allarius radiated fear and hate, power and murder. "Without one more moment of hesitation."

Harry laughed and Apparated away just as the ground he was lying upon burst into flames thousands of degrees hot. He grasped the demon around the neck and twisted hard - he was rewarded with a more than satisfying crack, and the demon twitched in his grasp. He let it fall to the ground a wounded wreck.

"It's time for you to follow me," Harry growled, calling the sword of Gryffindor into existence he hacked away Allarius' legs and arms. He felt nothing - was a rock which nothing could touch or wash away. "When you pull yourself together, come and find me."

Screeching its hate, Allarius' shrieks trembled on the air. Harry smiled coldly, and Apparated away with a pop. It seemed that the anti-Apparation wards on the castle had fallen with it. Either that or he was simply way more powerful than that.

Nonetheless, he Apparated and in the blink of an eye stood in the ruined remains of Gryffindor tower, running the fingers of his hand against burnt and dirty cloth on one of the armchairs by the fire in the Gryffindor common room.

A great and gaping hole at least forty feet wide stood in the side of the common room, looking out on the barren and parched land that this world had become. Lightning played across the sky closer up here, but there were no clouds as the crimson sun burnt down mercilessly on this forgotten world.

Ash and flames had destroyed this tower, and the old wood creaked as Harry sat down in the chair by the broken fireplace, a beam of sunlight stretching across the chair and highlighting the roaring lion in the stone of the mantle. Shaking with it all, he held his head in his hands.

Love, he thought, using the precious few minutes he had bought himself in butchering the demon. He felt no remorse over what he had done - he only wished it were more permanent. Concentrate on love....

"We're your friends, Harry," Ron said. "Prophecy or no prophecy we'll stick by you."

It is always the little things that mattered, that overly influenced the monumental things. That said, Harry could never have imagined he would be fighting this battle upon a devastated world by the remnants of his home. To go even further, he could not have imagined thinking these thoughts whilst fighting that fight under a crimson-twilight sky.

"Don't shut us out," Hermione said softly. "Five years as friends can't be thrown away. We care for you, Harry."

Waves of awesome strength crashed against the barrier inside of him, battering away at its foundations. Soon, he would get to it soon and then... and then... hope for the living and for the dead.

"You won't fail, you don't know how."

He shook, absolutely trembled with power that all at once offered redemption and threatened to destroy him. The castle tower swayed and bricks - slabs of ancient stone - fell away, splintering wood and the foundations.

But Harry didn't notice - it wouldn't have killed him if the whole tower fell crashing down upon him. It was beyond that somehow. Beyond time, destiny, fate, and war. He was beyond it all in some place no longer understandable... and yet he found sense there, love.

I don't deserve it, he thought. Not when I've destroyed so much... sacrificed others without thought and pain...

Anguish wrapped itself around his tormented soul - anguish wrapped in madness, and he could feel the barrier building itself back up around his true power.

NO!

"Sirius loved you, Harry," Remus whispered. "He did."

The barrier held strong, out of reach and yet there on the edge of understanding. It had always been there, across all the years - but his mind had rejected it as foreign. Love was foreign.

"You may not trust yourself, Harry, but that doesn't mean that we don't trust you."

Dumbledore, the Headmaster. Dumbledore the manipulator, the old man, the closest person Harry knew who had made choices similar to his own. He loved Harry, and Harry did think he felt affection for the old man... but not love, or did he? He did not know.

All of this in turn helped and hindered him as he sat in the dying chair within the remains of the tower. One thought pulled at the back of his mind though, and the thought was that he was a warrior - not a lover - and that thinking about it wasn't going to be enough.... tears of pain and frustration lined his dirty bruised face. Something had to work....

Wind howling in through the hole in the tower sounded like shrieks of agony and a ticking time bomb. He was running out of time - had the demon pulled itself together yet? Was it behind him right now? He didn't even look, not caring if it's blade was descending upon his neck.

This is where it either stands or falls, he thought. This is where all becomes nothing - at Hogwarts.

But then... should it?

It wasn't fair, that it should all fail. Why did it have to be that way, when it could just as easily be the other? Why couldn't he just reach out and grasp his true power? What was stopping him?

And in one sweet moment of realisation Harry knew that nothing was stopping him but his own perceptions. He loved Ginny, she had loved him in return, and that was enough - God, it was enough.

He stood and laughed - long and true. Not a hint of insanity was in that laugh, and he was still laughing as Allarius appeared at his side, smiled once, and then hurled itself into the Boy Who Lived, propelling them both out of the massive hole in the side of the tower - a flurry of burnt furniture and old stone following them.

Harry laughed and fell with the demon forcing him down into the earth. Power, raw power, not his true power, pooled behind him to brace the fall, whilst Allarius' power worked to counter that.

As they fell through the sky towards the earth, Light and Dark battled again, riding on the waves of air.

The impact into the ground knocked the air from Harry's lungs and sent hundreds of tonnes of rock and dirt erupting into the sky, wiping away what remained of Hogwart's castle and hollowing out the barren valley.

Harry Potter wheezed, laughing and struggling for air as the enraged demon stood up before him, sword glinting in its hand and pure hate upon its disfigured face. Without a word Allarius shrieked and plunged his blade downwards towards Harry, who did nothing to stop him.

Harry screamed and still laughed, tormented and blissful, as the dark blade pierced his thigh high on the left leg, ripping through the muscle and flesh, skimming the bone and tearing out of the other side, pinning him to the earth. Blood seeped out of the wound and into the dirt around him.

"So it all ends here then," Allarius hissed, its arms igniting with power. "Upon the ground of Hogwarts, where it all began."

No it doesn't end for me, Harry laughed in his mind, feeling the power inside of him as he surrendered to it freely, willingly accepting love and what he now knew it was. But for you... death is not a fair punishment, but it will have to do.

So the battle was fought and worlds shaken and destroyed. Light lay before Dark, pinned to the ground with a sword of hate. Allarius' fists disappeared as two spheres of raw magic enveloped them. Joy and eagerness lit up that inhuman face and, now that it was all said and done, he threw them at Harry beneath him.

At that moment Harry ceased laughing and his face became a mask of serene calm, his eyes pitying and filled with something Allarius could not understand. All too late he saw his demise in Potter's eyes.

The demon's spheres of power impacted against something between himself and Potter that flared with a golden light, dissolving the magic and remaining in place over the supposedly beaten boy. Allarius screamed and screamed, throwing more and more magic - but the boy did not even blink.

And then phoenix song filled the air, coming from the boy. Allarius knew it and he despised it, wrenched his head right and left against it, stumbling back from Potter as the sound emanated from him.

"NO!" the demon cried. "WHAT IS THIS?"

Harry wept now and gazed at the azure sky fading into night, as it rained dirt and debris that was deflected around him. Despite it all he could feel love, his own and that of others - of Ginny. From wherever they were and wherever he was it was all connected, and that, more than anything else, caused the three golden spheres of light to rise from his chest.

They were beautiful, they were his... they were beyond comprehension.

Allarius staggered back in... in... fear. Evil retreated as the three spheres before the fallen form of Potter began to transform and take on a vaguely distinct shape. They were human, they were mortal, and they were his defeat.

Harry saw the light inside of him take form and he screamed defiance against anything that had dared try to defeat him and his true purpose - to reach the Ways of Twilight and set right the madness. Golden representations of his love hovered before him, taking on the forms of who he knew best.

Ron, Hermione, and Ginny stood before him - a part of him and what his power truly was. Surely, nothing could be greater than this.

The two golden figures of Ron and Hermione advanced on Allarius, who was slowly retreating in disbelief, whilst Ginny turned to look down on him with a smile that held worlds of understanding.

Her slender golden glowing hand tightened on the hilt of the sword embedded through his leg, and Harry bit his teeth against the pain as she was about to pull it out.

Only there was no pain - no tears... only love and phoenix song.

The blade was removed from his leg, the wound throbbing somewhere back in reality, but here and now it was forgotten as Harry gazed upon Ginny. She frowned and the blade blew away on the wind as dust, before kneeling down next to Harry and stroking his hair back out of his eyes, her touch cooling and soothing against his forehead.

"You've done well," she told him, and Harry nodded - accepting. "You have called upon the true power bestowed upon you by what will soon be called Destiny... your destiny, Darkslayer - Harry James Potter, the Boy Who Lived. You have called upon us, and we will do what now needs to be done."

"Thank you," Harry whispered, and she smiled.

"I knew His faith in a mortal human was not misplaced," Ginny mused to herself, care and tenderness in her eyes. "One day you will have need for us again, but it will be harder next time - the True Magic source has almost run dry since the Beginning, and the fall of the Creator - this has drained it further to almost nothing... it will be your task to replenish it when you are done with war. Do you understand?"

Harry nodded - he did understand. One day... it would be one day. After his enemies lay dead behind him. Voldemort....

"What do I do now?" he asked this glowing Ginny, his voice wrought with emotion, as she let his head rest gently on the ground and floated into a standing position.

She smiled, and it was that he would always remember. She smiled.

"You survive, Darkslayer," she whispered. "You survive. Dark times still lie ahead, darker for you... and victory is not guaranteed." Her smile faltered here for a moment but in the end it returned and was reassuring. "For now... just survive."

The phoenix song in the air reached a crescendo and it seemed it would be heard across forever, as Ginny moved to join Ron and Hermione above the cowering form of Allarius, who was backed up against a boulder - shouting and cursing, throwing magic at the apparitions before him.

Harry watched from the ground. His arms lying flat at his side he turned his head and watched Allarius' defeat with satisfaction. It was working, he had won. The three ghostly golden figures descended on Allarius as one, losing their forms and striking his chest as three golden spheres.

The demon's screams were lost to the intensity of the phoenix song, as magic it could never understand destroyed its very being, ripping away its hold on Existence and sending it back into the abyss defeated. Evil was being dealt a devastating blow, and the Darkslayer was responsible.

Harry Potter's victory was etched across the Halls of Eternity - where time only flowed in one direction.

The light disappeared and Allarius ceased screaming.... Harry blinked and when he opened his eyes again the phoenix song had died away, and his pain returned. He screamed as pain wracked his body from the awesome fight, and his leg ached from the wound he had received there.

The golden light was nowhere to be seen, but Harry felt a warmth in his chest that was good, and without thinking of the consequences he let go of the vast amount of raw magic he still held, had been holding for hours, and only then did he think of the poison in his veins.

He gasped, expecting death, looking down to his arm and expecting to see purple infected veins. He found only a slightly healed scar, and before his eyes a black ooze seeped from the wound and cleansed his body. He wept with relief. Survive he would.

Shaking - bruised, bleeding and almost at the end of his strength, Harry struggled to his feet and gazed around at the landscape before settling his gaze on the smoking corpse of Allarius, leaning slouched against the boulder it had died upon thirty feet away.

Limping as his left leg bled from the stab wound, Harry made his way over to the demon with a grim frown upon his face. He could still see the rise and fall of the agonised creature's chest.

Allarius was still alive.

But dying, Harry saw as he approached, coming to a stop a haggard figure before the demon. His eyes met the small fire that remained within the demon's own.

Allarius laughed his all too familiar laugh, and dark blood ran down his horrid flesh and chest. "That was... impossible," it managed, glaring at Harry beneath the setting sun.

Harry stood silent, accusing, for a moment. "Impossible or not..." he began, "you still lose."

Allarius laughed again, the fire in his eyes near extinguished. "Good show, Potter," it said. "But it was all for naught... you are being used by the Light." Allarius spat and cursed the name. "Drawn now into a battle that will crush you long before Existence can be saved."

"Die now," Harry said.

"Mark my words," the demon hissed finally. "It will never be over, not for you, Darkslayer. There can be no happy endings - not in this Existence."

Allarius died - truthfully and finally, but Harry frowned... he felt... Christ, he felt the demon's power growing.

Sure enough, the corpse of Allarius began to shine with a deep purple light - raw magic bursting out of its master without any control.

It wasn't over....

Allarius was dead, the demon defeated, but its strength was seeping out now - uncontrolled and unstable. It could not have been foreseen... not even by his true love magic, whatever that had honestly been.

"This world will be destroyed," Harry whispered, thinking fast. He had to get off it.

The air around him became superheated as the magic continued to grow as a glowing purple sludge that seeped from the consumed corpse of what had been Harry's most powerful enemy to date.

His skin on his arms blistered before he had a chance to step back, and when he finally did he knew his life was now measured in seconds. He had to escape to another universe before this one exploded away beneath him. He had to find a gap in the air, a tear in the fabric of the boundary - he had to...

"Follow the scar link," Harry whispered, looking up at the tainted beam that stretched unerringly north from his forehead. Off over the horizon and the destroyed and barren land. "But how? Hundreds of miles...."

The ground began to shake and catch fire as the purple liquid pooled and grew hotter - soon it would explode in a fiery rain of magic that would destroy everything.

"Survive she said," Harry grumbled, feeling pain in every bone he possessed. He dug deep into his pocket and pulled out the small, shrunken trunk. "This one is gonna be close...."

With a thought Harry enlarged the trunk and kicked it open. Digging quickly as he felt the heat of the magic on his back, he tossed aside clothes and books, some apples and rummaged through his rifles and pistols until he pulled out the WindStream broomstick, long forgotten and ill-used.

He smiled and closed the trunk, a few bits and pieces of its contents still lying on the ground as he shrunk it and returned it to his pocket. Yes, he smiled; this was going to be one hell of a race.

What remained of his leather pants and vest caught alight from the scorching heat of the magic bomb behind him, and Harry threw the broom before him where it hovered at waist height. Tired, hungry, bleeding and bruised over his entire body, Harry jumped forward and threw himself on the broom and shot off high into the sky as a blur.

"Okey dokey," he managed, his throat battered. He had just enough time to turn north along the scar link, two thousand feet off the ground, before the world ended beneath him, and Armageddon came earlier than expected.

Even in death, Allarius managed to deliver a parting blow.

Harry pushed the broom from nought to two hundred miles per hour within five seconds, urging it on with thought more than anything else as the demon's hateful magic exploded with the intensity of the Sun behind him, sending ahead of him a wave of hot air that threatened to kill him then and there.

But Harry survived - it was what he did - and came out of the hot cloud of air and dirt just ahead of a wall of fire hundreds of miles high and wide, spreading out in every direction from the epicentre where Allarius had died. It dug deep into the earth and rose high into the sky, spread across the continent and chased after Harry who struggled to stay ahead of the massive explosion.

Harry screamed and raced along his scar link, pushing the broom on faster and faster, using a drop of magic or two to increase its speed. Beneath him the ground was a blur, but he could still see it cracking and rumbling, rippling in waves as it was eaten and destroyed by the unleashed pure magic devouring it.

The oceans of this particular version of the earth were flash boiled in seconds when the ball of expanding fire reached it - the Irish Sea first - and the water evaporated in an instant. It was an empty, desolate planet though - having suffered the effects of the Boundary's destruction almost first hand, as it resembled a world close to Harry's.

The Boy Who lived felt the flames at his back as he covered miles in seconds, tearing through the air as if the fires of hell were behind him.

They were. It was insane, and he laughed. They were.

Above him the sky tore open as reality could not hold the canvas of this part of this universe together against such force. A black hole formed in the sky above Scotland, sucking in light and matter, revealing nothingness and the horror that lay in there. Harry flew, he flew with Hope tucked under his arm.

The noise was deafening, in fact he wouldn't be surprised if the ringing in his head lasted for years after this, but he could stand it - had to stand it. On over the horizon the golden scar link stretched as behind and below Harry the earth was consumed.

He was screaming, still screaming, but he could not hear it. Here he was, having defeated Evil itself, beaten back Allarius, and this was his reward. He wanted to rage at the unfairness of Existence, but then he could only rage at himself....

You've made a mess of things, Harry, he told himself. But don't give in now...

He was flying so fast through the air that his hands shook on the broom handle and the amount of drag he was producing was astronomical. If he turned sharply, travelling as fast as he was, gravity would crush his eyes back into his skull. The G force would be that great.

But magic sustained him, and he leaned down lower on the broom, streamlining the air and forcing it on as behind him everything was destroyed and before him everything was about to be.

Dizzy and tired, Harry nearly did not notice when his scar link began to bend downwards back towards the earth, towards the ground up ahead - probably about three dozen miles away, although distance was hard to tell. Whatever it was, he would be upon it in less than a minute.

Controlling his descent as best as he could at this speed, Harry glided downwards until he was flying along the ground, barely a hundred feet above it, and before him he could see where his link ended - cutting through to a safe, new world.

Once I get through it will close, he thought, knowing the destruction was right on his tail - mere seconds behind him. I'll have to aim it just right and fly through, and then keep flying.

And then he was upon it. The tear between worlds was only ten feet by teen feet - if that. Three metres would decide it all. Travelling upwards of six hundred miles per hour, Harry used every ounce of skill he possessed to aim it just right.

Wind howling in his ears as it was sucked up and into the terrible black hole in the sky, the explosion on his heels, Harry bit his lip and gasped, just as he flew through the gap closer to the right edge than he would have liked. He didn't make it clean through, even as the hole started to close now that he was in another world.

The tail on his broom had nicked the side of the doorway as he had travelled through, and had been sliced clean off - left in the destroyed world as the rest of the broom travelled through to a new one with Harry upon it.

In an instant he was through and the tear in the air closed with a long sucking sound, but his broom spiralled out of control - losing its aerodynamic design and power. Harry spun through the air, washing off speed and feeling the weight of his load triple from the forces of air acting upon him.

He hit the concrete beneath him of this new world at one hundred miles per hour, the broom snapping underneath him and absorbing the worst of the blow. Harry himself was thrown from it - still wearing his basilisk armour but no longer holding any power at all, and it was this that saved his life.

He hit the ground, and rolled and tumbled, scraping across it and leaving an amazing trail of sparks from the armour. He spun and tumbled across the ground and eventually hit a wall with still enough force to wind him again, and crack the wall. He cried out in pain, even as his fading eyes beheld the air where the gap had been bulge - as if the destructive magic in the other world was trying to burst through and claim him.

Gasping for air, Harry realised that that was exactly what it was doing. He prayed then, as he was out of other options, that the Boundary would hold the destruction back in that other world, and spare this one.

It was a populated world, he could see that as people rushed over to help him - those who had seen him hit the ground. And there were screeches of car horns, and tall buildings rose above him.

None of that mattered though, and Harry managed a final smile as the air stopped bulging outwards, as the Boundary held and he was, at long last, done with the fight.

"CALL AN AMBULANCE!" he heard someone cry, and felt hands grasping him. He couldn't hear anything else but a loud ringing noise after that cry, and before his eyes darkness had fallen.

One of Harry's last thoughts, before the darkness claimed him entirely and unconsciousness came, was that he had definitely earned this rest.

It was over; nothing more was to be said. Light and Dark had battled across the mortal universes, bringing death and destruction in their wake.

But it was over, he sighed. For now, at least, it was over, and...

....His final thought....

And we became legends.

*~*~*~*