Drarry One Shots

Bad Enough For You?

A/N: This is a relatively short and intensive one shot that's come about from two requests. One from @Red_1216 who asked for a one-shot based on the above artwork by @Sirene312, and a second request from @AiyenQuaine1828 based on the song "Bad Enough for you" by All Time Low (link below). All lyrics from the song are in italics. Thanks for the prompts!

***

He is love. I am hate.

He is calm. I am anger.

He is noble. I am deceit.

He is safety. I am danger.

Only...

Only, maybe that's not true...

Maybe it's the reverse that is true.

A story circulates that Severus gave Harry his memories just before he died. Apparently, Harry viewed them in a Pensieve during those vital minutes before he walked into the Forbidden Forest. And those memories were pivotal. They changed everything. The gossip ripples quietly and people talk in hushed voices about Albus Dumbledore telling Severus that he'd known all along that Harry had to die. That Harry mustn't know he had to be kept alive just so he could die at the right time, for the 'Greater Good'...

People whisper that Harry had already realised he had to die but it confirmed that knowledge. And the memories provided the foundations of his singular purpose in life that was decided upon by others around him. 

Perhaps it's a side of the story that's never told too loudly because it would taint the 'good' side. Because honestly, what is 'good' about raising someone to die at the right moment? What is 'good' about putting them through all those trials without telling them the whole truth? What is 'good' about such an ultimate deceit?

He was a sacrifice. He was always to be the sacrifice. The sacrificial playing piece in a chess game played by others.

And he wasn't supposed to survive.

What does one do with that knowledge? How does one live after that?

So Harry Potter is a modern Prometheus; created by the very gods who built him up to improve human existence and then those same gods sought to punish him for overreaching by reminding him of his own mortality. Apart from he broke the rules and defeated Death with barely a scratch on his existence. Well, that last bit's not true but allow me a touch of poetic license to prove a point.

And now...? Now what?

Now, he deceives the world as he pretends that he loves this new way of life. He pretends that he's not fed up by an existence that is dictated by a new set of gods. He hides that he is bored with it all. Bored and frustrated by all that is projected onto him as 'our Hero', 'our Saviour'. Those titles don't belong to him, they belong to us. His life belongs to us. And that angers him too. I see that. I see it simmering below the surface. I know him too well not to recognise its presence begging for release. It is never voiced. But he desires life. He desires adventure. He desires fire. He desires choice.

It is no small wonder Harry is frustrated, even if his volatile temper of fifth year is quashed, buried deep, locked away.

There is a danger that Albus Dumbledore has created a new monster. Imagine a wizard more powerful than Lord Voldemort carrying a whole world of suppressed boredom and frustration within his mind. Then stir in some unresolved anger. And then add to that the knowledge that this wizard is the true master of the Elder Wand... that this wizard is the master of all three Deathly Hallows... that this wizard is the Master of Death... and he seeks a new adventure in a world that is at his mercy...

I can't deny it; that excites me.

He fascinates me.

But then again, he always has. Mostly because I loved how he hated being equally drawn to me too. I love how he hated the chase. Or rather, he loved the chase but hated that it was me.