Hindsight

Waterloo

All was silent for several seconds as the two opposing forces eyed each other, forty or so metres of ground separating them. Harry tried to pull Hermione protectively behind him, out of the immediate line of sight of the Death Eaters, but she resisted, refusing to budge, remaining steadfastly at Harry's side.

The fireplaces whooshed again, and the sound seemed to break the lead Death Eater of the group out of his trance. He raised his wand, but Harry was ready. The Death Eater was not fast enough to win the duel that he had unknowingly just initiated.

'Sectumsempra!' Harry shouted, snapping his wand down in a diagonal line across his neck and upper torso. The Death Eater screamed in pain. A second later, he fell forward, his head hanging onto his neck by just a strip of flesh and skin.

The first blood jolted both the Ministry's forces and the rest of the Death Eaters into action. The Aurors and Hit-Wizards leapt into the centre of the Atrium and began attacking the Death Eaters with a shower of spells. The first group was ill-prepared for the concerted attack and was mowed down by the veritable wall of curses coming their way.

Harry pulled Hermione out of the way of the Aurors and Hit-Wizards. He would let them do battle, as Amelia had insisted that he do. He and Hermione shot a few Killing and Blasting Curses over the Ministry forces' heads at random, aiming in the general direction of the Floo grates. The sound of battle was too loud for Harry to hear if their spells had found their marks.

Harry and Hermione continued firing spells over the Ministry Forces' shoulders. The Death Eaters were constrained by the bottleneck that was the toilet-Floos. They could only send reinforcements in intervals of three to five seconds each, and only ten wizards at a time to boot. The Ministry had the superiority of both numbers and skill over these low-level Death Eaters. The Aurors and Hit-Wizards were having next to no trouble cutting down Voldemort's forces. The bodies of dead or otherwise incapacitated Death Eaters were beginning to pile up at the exits to the Floo grates.

But Harry could not see nor hear any trace of Voldemort. Even as the fourth or fifth wave of Death Eaters fell, Voldemort had yet to make an appearance.

'He's using them to soften us up,' Hermione noted in a whisper. 'Make the Aurors and Hit-Wizards tired before jumping in himself. Stop casting powerful curses.'

Harry nodded. It was the exact thing that he would expect Voldemort to do. Instead of Unforgivables or powerful dark curses, Harry instead switched to Stunning Spells and minor hexes and jinxes. They were nearly effortless to cast on his part, and they would do the job in dealing with the relatively weak Death Eaters that were streaming in.

Suddenly, there was a flash of blinding light that took Harry's vision for several seconds, followed by a loud blast and several screams. The moment Harry came to his senses once more, he jerked his head in the direction of the sound. An Auror and three Hit-Wizards were lying on the ground, either dead or wounded – Harry could not tell. In front of where they lay, the tiles of the floor were shattered or destroyed, and there was a small crater in its place.

Hermione grabbed Harry's hand and pulled him towards where the curse had hit. They looked out in the direction of the Floo grates. The bodies of the previously killed Death Eaters were thrown away from the exits. Death Eaters were now streaming out of the grates, taking advantage of the temporarily stunned Ministry forces. In the midst stood a tall, dark grey figure. Voldemort held his wand high in the air, raining green jets of light down upon the Aurors and Hit-Wizards over the heads and shoulders of his followers.

Several of Voldemort's curses hit their marks, and those who were caught in the way fell dead. Harry pointed his wand at the Death Eaters standing in front of Voldemort and pushed as much of his magic as he could into a Blasting Curse. Three Death Eaters were shredded on the spot, while two others fell to the floor, stunned by the explosion and hit by flying limbs. The Death Eaters closed ranks around the fallen, reforming the human shield in front of their master, not bothering to help or even check on their wounded.