Admiration

Admiration

Whitefeather

*

"Finished, Alastor," Madame Poppy Pomfry mutters, backing away from me. "Completely fine, every last bit of you. Those spots you were worried about are actually a heat rash from being on the field--it should go away in an hour or so with this potion. Just don't do it again."

"Do what?" I ask gruffly. "Go out there? Don't have much choice. There aren't many of us around anymore willing to go head-on with the Death Eaters. Heat rash is a small price to pay for taking a few of them down. Each man down on their side is one less person to kill our children and innocents, or more importantly, my men."

She looks to the side, occupying herself with some potions on the table next to me. I sigh and stand up, tapping my wooden leg on the ground before moving to the door. "I know you don't like it, Poppy, but this is who I am. What I do. I'm sorry if that isn't what you want to hear, but I can't change for every person. Goodnight."

From behind me as I walk out, I hear a faint sob. I throw it aside in my mind and think about the mission tomorrow. There's no room in a commander's mind for the present, only the future.

*

The mission wasn't terrible. We lost three men, bringing the count of the light side army down to twenty-four. Twenty-four of us that are able to fight out there, against an army of well over twenty thousand Death Eaters on their front line and sixty thousand creatures of the dark; add to that his five hundred thousand troops either under the imperius or under the threats towards their families that aid him...

All in all, it's now fifty-seven of us holding up in Hogwarts. This includes twenty children and cripples that can't do a damned thing. The other thirteen are a mixture of six intelligence workers, six that manage life here--and Poppy Pomfrey. The only healer that we have anymore.

She's probably the one I admire most. I'll admit it readily. The Dark Lord offered all healers a place at his side with good pay, familial amnesty and a clean slate, no matter what they had done in the past. He sent her a letter personally offering her all these things in complete honesty; he didn't want us to have any help.

She turned it down. Never explained why. Everyone here was trying to convince her to go; there's no chance we're going to win here. Not when it's thirty versus five hundred and eighty thousand on the front line alone... even I told her to go. Never explained why she didn't take the job; I guess that she felt a loyalty to the memories to the people here.

I hate it.

"Any injuries I should be aware of?" She mutters, moving to the door. I shake my head and follow her.

"No. Finnigan, Creevy and Rotigan were killed with the curse, and the time that took let the rest of us get out of there. Took five of them down in the process."

She slows, looking towards the floor. "Five of how many thousand?"

I get angry. She isn't supposed to be despairing.

"Five men that could have killed anyone here, Poppy! Five men that killed five of ours each! Five men that killed my brothers out on the battlefield!"

She shakes her head. "I've seen it my whole life. I've seen people die and people suffer and people try to deny this all. The same things you see out there. The difference is that I see another side to all this. I also see those who make it out, who suddenly realize what a gift life is; how much each breath means and the true value of freedom that comes with a brush from death. You never get the chance to see that out there. You never get the chance to count your blessings and enjoy every bloody thing that is offered to us..."

I can't help it. I grab her shoulders and begin to scream.

"Every Goddamned time I walk out onto that battlefield my life flashes before my eyes. Every time I hear the killing curse, I think about what I have to lose. Every time someone else goes down I wish it were me but at the same time, I thank God it wasn't me because there are so many things left in my life. Do you understand the weight of all that? Of knowing that my life is dictated by this war, that nothing will ever be right, that not one thing in my life can be the way I want it to be because the next day, every day, I'll be back out there? That I prepare myself to die every morning and every night mourn everything that I lost, and everything that I will never have?"

She looks terrified, but somehow finds the strength to raise her hand. Expecting her to slap me across the face, I drop her shoulders and turn away.

Her hand touches my face.

"I didn't know you were capable of crying, Alastor," she whispers.

Half confused, I touch her wrist and turn it over in my hand. Her fingers glisten with a teardrop. I start to laugh. "I haven't cried in over fifty years on the battlefield, and now I'm crying over a pointless argument in an hour of peace. My world is ending."

Her head shakes a bit, as though she is fighting something. "You're allowed to cry. We're all going to die here, one by one. It's a scary thought. And worst of all, we're going to die alone. That is enough to make me cry every night."

She cries every night? Poppy Pomfrey, the strongest woman on this good Earth, cries?

"You're not alone," I blurt out, trying to say something. "We're all in this together, we're facing all of this together..."

"That's not what I meant, Alastor, and you know it."

We stand there for a moment, looking at one another awkwardly.

"I..."

A scream echoed suddenly down the corridor. Before I had a chance to move, Minerva was in the doorframe.

"There are around five hundred Death Eaters outside, Alastor, and they are prepared to fight to take this place down. We're having the last stand. Everyone's saying their goodbyes as quick as they can and then running down to meet them. I'll see you out there."

I watch her leave the room emotionlessly, knowing very well that that was the last time I would see Minerva McGonagall alive. Poppy was at my side breathing heavily, shaking like mad.

"It's time," I mutter, facing her quickly and giving her a nod. "Goodbye, Poppy. I'll say hello to everyone down in hell for you."

She doesn't say anything. Just stares at me with those wide eyes, still shaking.

I bite my lip and turn to the door, pulling out my wand.

"Alastor!"

Before I can fully turn, she's on top of me; sobbing and holding me as though I were life itself. I peel her gently back and stare at her.

"Alastor, if this is it then I'm going to say it. I've loved you for fifty years, and hell be if when I finally get the courage to tell you, I'm going to let you walk away."

I stare blankly at her, no quite sure what to say.

"Please... just give me one minute... one minute to do what I should have done all those years ago..."

She kissed me suddenly, desperately, as though I was air and she was drowning.

For the second time, I pull her off of me and stare down at her. She looks completely lost. "I have a war to go and finish, Poppy. Try and get out of here. Do what you can for yourself."

I'm halfway out the door before, without looking back I tell her, gruffly as ever, 'You've been amazing. Thank you, Poppy."

*

They say that when you die, your life flashes before you. My life flashed before me preceding every battle I entered into. What that means, I'll be damned. But when you're about to die, without a doubt, I guess you wonder about these things. Wonder about all the 'could have beens' and 'should haves'.

Poppy has been my best friend for fifty years. Since our third year in Hogwarts. She is the only healer I ever trusted with anything to do with myself--she is the only loophole in my paranoia. Why? I always wondered that.

Damn death. Damn it for making me wonder all these things that I will never know.

The least the Death Eaters could have done was kill me. Probably should, so I won't escape.

But then again, I can't run with no legs.

Damn my logical sense.

Damn death.

Damn these chemicals running through me that are demanding me to rewind and review my entire life before I can go to hell.

Back to the beginning. Poppy. She's the first thing I can remember after all those spells have had their toll. She's the first and last thing I remember.

The best thing, too. How she came to me after the Longbottom night, when I was completely broken inside. And outside. She saved my life then. Couldn't save my leg though. Or my eye. Blamed herself.

Damn. I am prioritizing my life at my deathbed. And damn again for someone being on top of that list.

Damn.

Damn.

Damn.

I won't get to see her again. She's going to heaven.

Damn.

Damn.

Damn.

Damn.

Da-

*

Apparently, you can do shit things in your life and end up in Heaven. Something about good intentions. Bullocks, I say, but why would I be stupid enough to complain?

It's funny. You-Know-Who (old habits die hard) now rules the Earth. Spends his time knocking off everyone who once stood in his way. Thinks they'll be fearful and dead and all that shit. They die. He laughs.

Then they come up here and stare incredulously around a room that looks as though a lunatic went ten steps more crazy and painted it. Dumbledore and Potter Senior take much pride in said looks, I might add.

And then, for each person, we celebrate. We look down at the poor immortal man and wonder how, at the world's end, he will take life. How long the immortality he searched for will lead him to insanity. And we drink to each person. This is our own personal Valhalla. A Valhalla for those who went to hell and back and now only want to sit in this psychedelic room with those we once knew and drink to every damned thing we know.

"To the color maroon!" James yells out, and it is echoed soon after by a band of fools. McGonagall shakes her head towards me as I take the customary swig. She isn't used to hearing me yell in drunkenness.

"To rings!"

"To Harry Potter!" (This one was followed with a particularly loud chorus and a drunken James falling out his chair)

"To muggles!"

"To wood!"

"To love!"

Everyone in the room, drunk or skeptic, gives a sudden yell. As soon as the cheer leaves, the room was divides into pairs--the married couples that had been evident in life as well as couples that had been formed after or towards the end--Dumbledore and McGonagall, Filch and Pince, Longbottom and Lovegood...

Sobriety washes over me. I swear gently under my breath and raise my glass. "To those still alive!"

No one echoes. There are only five people left alive that had been on our side--four of which were Potter, Granger and the two youngest Weasleys. With them come two couples, so there is no one to miss them in that way. They have each other and that is all they need.

Albus stares at me over Minerva's shoulder. His eyes are doing that damned twinkling thing that they have the tendency to do; and he is grinning.

I don't bother to look over my shoulder.

"Took you long enough."

Black grabs his glass, throws it into the air, and yells at the top of his lungs some incoherent words before collapsing into Marlene McKinnon's outstretched arms. Lupin shakes his head and raises his glass. "To our newest addition! To death and the absolute wonders it holds! To us, and more overly, to Poppy Pomfrey!"

The yell that follows is nothing to me. Nor is the hand on my shoulder.

"How are they," Albus asks suddenly.

Poppy moves from behind me, not taking her hand off of my shoulder. "They destroyed the final horcrux last night. Live or die when he faces him, the Dark Lord is mortal once more. Let him die of old age for all I care. He will eventually die. We've won."

More incoherent yells fill the room. Poppy smiles and lowers her head, turning. Still not looking directly at me, she places her head onto my chest and her arms around me.

"I never believed you before. I thought we had no chance. Thought you were a great fool for believing in life, in the light, in everything. I never had hope."

A shiver races down my spine. "Then why did you stay with us?"

She laughs gently. "I told you. I've been in love with you for fifty years, Alastor. I've dealt with you before battles, when your friends pass away, when you're injured to the point of no return... I've loved you through all of this. You think a small thing like the end of the world would end that?"

I don't push her away, for once, however uncomfortable it is. Everyone in the room stars at us, waiting for me to be my typical self.

"I never gave you anything back," I mutter. "I never could. Never would have let myself."

She nodded. "I never expected you to. I just wanted you to be you. I never expected love or compassion, simply you to just be there. You did everything I could have wished for. That's why I love you."

Not sure what to say or how to act, or how to react, or how to deny or accept, I do what she needs me to do.

I pull away slowly and nod to her before walking away to Albus to discuss the future.