Sometimes Bad is Good

Chapter Seven

Scream after agonized scream rang from the end of the darkening hall, swirling around in his stomach, stabbing, slicing and tearing with their sharp icy claws. He shuddered for the first time, all at once feeling the fear that emanated from the blood-spattered and spell damaged walls around him. Such fear, almost crushing in its weight.

He clutched at the bloody sword, aiming its sharp tip in the direction of the screams as if it could ward away the fear. He knew that Voldemort was waiting for him, he could feel it in his burning scar; the pleasure, the satisfaction, the anticipation, the want.

This was all a bad idea, he shouldn't have come here, he wasn't ready for this, he knew Voldemort's mind like the back of his hand; manipulation was key. But it hadn't stopped him, he couldn't risk anyone else dying for him, he was over all the death and destruction that all centered around him, all of that which Voldemort had put there. He needed to end this, once and for all.

He followed the trail of blood, his buzzing wand emitting a soft light in his left hand and his blood-covered sword standing guard as his protection in his right. He tried to ignore the devastation laying before and around him, but the light of his wand seemed to reach every dark corner. Exposing just how dark the man he was about to defeat, really was.

There were mangled corpses lying in bloody puddles strewn across the hallway floor, some had oddly large pieces of debris crushing their limbs, their arms or legs were sticking out in odd angles, mostly away from the body, while others were covered in wounds varying sizes, lacerations from the claws and teeth of werewolves or cutting spells. Some even had scorch marks still emitting wisps of smoke that curled in large coils and disappeared into the air, leaving behind only the foul smell of burnt flesh. The worst were the ones with blank faces, with dying wands still clutched tightly in their hands and their eyes staring unseeingly ahead of them.

It seemed that they had been the unlucky recipient of Voldemort's favorite curse, the one that had failed on him but succeeded on everyone else.

"Potter. So you finally join us here on this momentous occasion,” sneered a cold, high pitched voice in the room at the end of the hallway.

Harry entered the large dome room slowly, cautiously avoiding fallen bits of debris from the walls around him, all the while keeping his eyes on the snake-like face not fifty feet from him. He wouldn't – couldn't give Tom an opening, not again.

"You kept me waiting," said Voldemort, a cruel smile curling his ugly thin lips into waved lines that looked more like twisted wire. "I'm not a man of patience, Potter -"

"You're no man at all, Tom. You're a snake!" Harry hissed, moving until he was standing in front of a wall, to make sure that his back was covered. His forehead creased when he noticed the piles of dead bodies lining the walls and floor, most were fresh and still twitching. He saw a tense and shaking young woman by Voldemort's feet, she wore Ministry robes and looked to have been at least in her late twenties. She gasped raggedly and gave a choked sound, looking as if she was desperately trying to tell him something, but then fell limp against the ground, blood pooling from her twitching mouth in one long stream and her eyes quickly died and lost their spark.

She would be the last to fall before Voldemort's wand, Harry would make sure.

"A snake, you say?" asked Voldemort in Parseltongue, amusement and darkness in his voice as he ignored the dead girl to his right in favor of Harry. Harry had seen his eyes flash a brilliant red when he'd spoken his given name, but it was gone almost as soon as it came. "My, my, such a compliment, Potter. Unfortunately, flattery will get you nowhere, surely you know this by now? I was certain that seeing your mother and father pleading and begging for their pathetic little lives -"