Author's Note
Aaaand we're done, holy shit. My mindset when writing this was 'let's just cram a ton of stuff into a short timeframe, not develop any of it and be done with the whole thing in like five days', so imagine my surprise when it took almost a month and ended up being over 30k words. Oh well, it was worth it.

Thanks for reading and reviewing, (hopefully) until next time!

"I'm going to need a pensieve," Luna stated, taking a small bottle from her pocket. "Showing you my memories of the vision will be easiest."

"No problem," Ron said, producing a pensieve from his storage compartment. "As always, I'm equipped for everything!"

Luna opened the bottle and handed it to Ron.

"Thanks mate," he replied, instinctively chugging it.

Luna blinked, started raising her right hand, opened her mouth, closed it again and let the hand fall back down, looking unusually stumped while Ron convulsed on the floor, tripping balls.

"Well," she finally said, pouring her memories directly into the pensieve, "I guess it's a good thing I made copies instead of a full extraction."

The group minus Ron collectively dunked their heads into the stone basin, which somehow had room enough for all of them, and took a trip to the past...

"I don't want to kill you, Gellert, but I will if I have to!" Albus Dumbledore threatened, standing on top of a mountain of debris and collateral casualties. "If you surrender as peacefully as you still can, this will defiantly be easier for everyone involved."

"Friss mein Ding Dong Nudel, Albus," Grindelwald ripostated definitely, preparing to fire his next volley of spells. He was bleeding from multiple cuts and missing three fingers and half an ear, while Dumbledore didn't have a single scratch.

"Not today," Dumbledore replied. "You've gone too far."

"I guess I'll just have to up my game then," Grindelwald spat, transfiguring a nearby house into an active volcano and sending the lava at Dumbledore.

"So be it," Dumbledore said, sending the volcano snot right back at his ex in the form of a giant burning spear.

He followed it up by firing a massive stream of undefined magick in its rawest form at Grindelwald. The air crackled and sizzled around them as Dumbledore's special Light Lord technique caused a temporary distortion in the fabric of reality.

"You're not ready for my final gambit!" Grindelwald shouted, "EXPLODO SANITAS!"

"NOOOOO, you madman!" Dumbledore cried as Grindelwald's spell flew straight into his cloud of undiluted magick. "Do you want to end the world?!"

"It's a better option than losing to you!" Grindelwald yelled.

Dumbledore's magical cloud fused with Grindelwald's spell and caused an explosive tornado that destroyed the area in a radius of at least one kilometre. Tendrils of magic struck the two wizards right into their heads, knocking them out. The storm raged on for about five more minutes, before dissipating. An entire town and every single lifeform in it, destroyed by one duel...

"Ooooh, I feel strange," Grindelwald groaned as the both of them woke up. "Where am I? What are you doing here, Albus? What happened?"

"I can't seem to remember, Gellert," Dumbledore answered perplexedly, stroking his beard.

"I don't like it here," Grindelwald said, looking at the newly-created wasteland around them. "Let's go visit Aunt Bathilda, I could do with some tea."

"Did you get any of Auntie's explanations?" Grindelwald asked later that day, as they were sitting in Dumbledore's living room.

The latter scrunched up his face.

"Nope."

"Well, I got that you were being a mean bully because I'm better at playing dark lord than you, so you went and destroyed everything I'd built up over the years," Grindelwald grumbled. "Dammit, I don't want to start from scratch, it was sooo tedious!"

"I'm so sorry, my love," Dumbledore cried, "I don't know what got into me! But worry not, I already thought of a convoluted plan that will keep us from getting bored ever again!"

Dumbledore started explaining, and soon, the house was filled with the gleeful giggles of amorous sixty year old men...

"Ha, this is your end, Dumbledore!" Voldemort declared, victoriously brandishing Dumbledore's wand. "I don't know what you were trying to achieve by luring me into the Room of Death, but it sure makes it easier to get rid of you once and for all! How nice of you to stand with your back to the Veil, now I'll just-"

His monologue was interrupted forever as a disillusioned Grindelwald summoned him through the Veil from the other side, with Dumbledore skillfully dodging at the last moment.

"Haha, you were right Albus," Grindelwald laughed, "this guy was a total amateur. I can't believe he fell for our trap!"

"I didn't even need my real wand to fight him long enough to be believable," Dumbledore snickered. "Now we'll just take advantage of the fact that we're obscenely powerful and brew some permanent Polyjuice Potion. Then, you'll be Voldemort and I'll be your arch-nemesis! Goodbye boredom!"

An obnoxious amount of mad laughter rang through the hall for many minutes after that.

"Gellert," a much older Dumbledore said, "we need to shake things up. We're both getting tired of Britain, and the populace is starting to get suspicious of my eccentricity."

"What do you have in mind?" Grindelmort asked.

"Well, I faked a prophecy about a child that will have a downright grotesque amount of power if my arithmantic calculations are correct. This child will be your new nemesis and end up killing you. Twice! We'll have to sacrify some of your horcruxes to make it extra convincing. Once you're dead for the second time, I'll arrange for Severus to kill me for reasons I still need to think of."

"You think he'll do it?" Grindelmort asked curiously.

"Oh, he'll do more than that," Dumbledore said machiavellistically, "he'll do our resurrection rituals too! I already have a scheme in mind to ensnare him in several unbreakable vows. Once that is done, we'll be able to start anew somewhere else, preferably on the other side of the planet."

"Excellent," Grindelmort said. "The adventurer in me longs for new horizons! And no one will ever suspect our new identities' joined horcrux to be hidden in the Hogwarts Sorting Hat!"

"Oh my god," Hermione said once they'd left the pensieve, "you mean, all this time, Dumbledore was just insane because both he and Grindelwald got hit by the latter's Permanent Batshit Insanity Curse?! That's horrible!"

"No shit," Neville said, "I feel kinda bad for him now."

"Indeed," Harry said, dramatically closing his eyes like a man who knew what he had to do and was determined to do it, but didn't like it, "this is quite the depressing situation, since this particular curse is utterly irreversible. Not to mention the fact that his insanity has led Dumbledore to commit many flat out impardonable crimes. I see no other solution than putting him out of his misery."

They all spent a minute in silence in honour of Dumbledore's former greatness.

"You know," Tom said, "I want to be angry at those bastards for killing my other self, but in the end, this is actually the best thing that could have happened to me. I just got promoted to master soul status!"

Everyone stared at him. Tom looked at Harry.

"...let me guess, you didn't tell them anything," he said.

"Not yet," Harry said. "Guys, this is the teenage version of the real Voldemort, he was in Ginny's diary. Tom, you already know who they are."

"Oh come on," Tom said, noticing the alarmed looks he got, "like I already told Harry, it was just a harmless hobby! Yes I wanted to be the most powerful wizard in Britain, but the only person I ever wanted to kill was Dumbledore, to take his place! And he was already insane at the time so I was totally in the right. I never had plans to take over the world or to cause the deaths of hundreds purely for entertainment!"

"I don't know if I can trust a guy who named himself Voldemort," Neville said, "it just sounds so... evil."

"Pah, you're just scared of the name because you're associating it with that imposter and his crimes! It's just a silly name I came up with back at the orphanage, when we had alphabet soup that one time..."

"Didn't you make horcruxes?" Hermione asked suspiciously.

Tom started fidgeting a bit.

"One horcrux!" he corrected. "And that one was an accident. How should I have known the stupid basilisk hadn't been told by Slytherin not to look at students? It's important to know that I always had a pretty unstable soul because of something my mother did back when she conceived me or something, according to my research, so when Myrtle died and I felt my soul splitter, I was like, 'come on man, how could I not?' I'd have been a fool to waste an opportunity like that."

"Anyway, this does explain why everything was so convenient," Harry mused. "In the end, I was just playing my part in their entertainment."

"Hm, our side had some majorly convenient events fall into our lap too, though," Hermione said, visibly grinding her mind's gears. "Luna's visions, for example..."

Harry was suddenly overcome by suspicion.

"Oh hell, I think I know who might be behind this. After all, there's only one wizard in the world who's more powerful than I am. Luna, was the Great Snorkack humanoid per chance?"

"He sure was," Luna confirmed. "I just assumed he'd hidden his horns because he was ashamed of their crumpliness."

"Did he look and sound like an older and wiser version of me?" Harry continued his questioning. "Did he wear an ominous looking ring and wield an ominous looking wand?"

"He did," Luna replied. "That's impressive, Harry! Did you open your Third Eye, too?"

"I think I actually did," Harry replied, "but I didn't even need it for this. I knew it! It just makes too much sense."

"Harry, what the hell are you talking about?" Ginny inquired.

"Probably about me," someone said from behind them, dropping their invisibility cloak.

It was... The Uncle.

"I guess it's time to come clean," The Uncle said, "for the final showdown seems to be approaching rapidly. Harry... I am you from another reality."

"You're what from what?"

"You heard me," The Uncle said. "I kind of died in my original world, but I got better. Dispensing knowledge is the only way I'm allowed to interfere with other realities though, that's why I had to train you to be the best there ever was."

"Why this particular version of me, though?" Harry wondered.

"Because this continuum's Dumbledore is an insult to Dumbledores everywhere," The Uncle replied darkly.

"How in the world does one get to become a dimension traveller after dying?" Hermione inquired.

"No time to answer that," The Uncle said, "as usual, the enemy is acting fast."

He pointed out the window. Harry had a look and gasped. He'd anticipated the final battle to be difficult, but this easily exceeded his expectations. Grindelmort had gathered a massive army of followers, there were hundreds upon hundreds of them marching up the hill. Not all of them were Death Eaters either, quite a few of them looked like new recruits from the mainland. A group of former Grindelwald followers were marching at the back, drunkenly waving german flags, and the massive lumbering shapes of several giants could be seen approaching from the forest. A swarm of dementors came flying from above, and the approaching warcries of countless vampire pirates could be heard from the ocean.

"ONWARD, TO GLORYYYYYYY!" Ginny screamed, grabbing a broom and flying out the window. "INCENDIO, INCENDIO!"

"Have you gone completely fucking nuts?!" Hermione called after her.

"Welp, I'll go watch from the sidelines since I'm not allowed to do anything," The Uncle said, flying after Ginny without bothering with a broom.

He was followed by Neville, who was carried by his flying venomous tentacula.

"Time to test my new powers," Luna said, warping away through her halo of black holes.

"They've all gone crazy," Hermione lamented.

"Where the fuck did Tom go?" Harry asked. He was distracted by a groan from his right.

"Ugh, Harry's balls, what the hell was that?" Ron asked, recovering from his memory poisoning.

"What do you mean, my balls?" Harry asked indignantly.

"Well, since you're the next Merlin and all, I figured it was about time someone started swearing on your body parts," Ron said. "Don't bother explaining everything; apparently, drinking the memories has the same results as watching them, it's just... more intense."

"I hope you two aren't planning to charge straight into battle like the rest of these maniacs," Hermione huffed, "someone needs to get rid of the horcrux in the Hat after all. Now would be the best time, Dumbledore seems to be distracted."

She pointed out the window. Harry had another look and indeed, the entire Hogwarts staff appeared to have gathered in front of the castle, with the Dumblegoat already merrily galloping around among the Death Eaters, firing reductors from his horns and twinkles from his eyes.

"Alright, let's waste no time," Harry decided. "To the Headmaster's office!"

"Accio Sorting Hat!" Harry shouted after having blasted his way into Dumbledore's lair of depravity. An infernal cacophony came from upstairs as the Hat was ripped straight through the Headmaster's candy cupboard and came tumbling down into the office on a tidal wave of lemon drops.

"Kiss me Potter, I'm a princess!" the Hat called.

Harry obligingly changed into his dementor form and proceeded to have a souldestroyingly voracious makeout session with the Hat, who transformed into a lady in white.

"Hark, my saviour," she said, "thou hast conquered the heart of Lady Hogwarts."

"Uuuh, well," Harry said, taking a step back, "this is awkward. You see, we may not have demonstrated any of our affection on-screen, but I actually kind of started dating this bookworm over there not too long ago."

"Damn," Lady Hogwarts said, reverting to her hat form. "It was worth a try. Oh well, guess I'll go back to sort children in my grumpy old man voice. Thanks for getting rid of the parasite, my oaths of secrecy kept me from telling anyone."

"What the unholy fuck, this is the most disorganised mess I've ever laid orbs upon," Harry said after he'd made his way onto the battlefield. Somehow, the battle of Hogwarts had turned into a giant free-for-all. People and creatures of varying degrees of sapience and sentience were running, flying and getting exploded all over the place in a massive salad of chaos.

To his right, Professor Lupin was rushing at Grindelmort's soldiers, swinging his fists and yelling "Stupefy" with each punch, although they seemed to be rather more lethal than a simple stunner.

"That's thirty-one, Longbottom!" The crazy werewolf yelled over the battle sounds, "you're falling behind!"

Neville swung his shovel, cleanly bisecting three Death Eaters in one fell swoop.

"Thirty-two!" He shouted. "You're gonna need to do better than that to impress me, old man!"

To Harry's left, Luna was busy distorting space and possibly other parts of reality around a group of trolls, producing a demonic laugh that would have made Santa Claus jealous.

"From this day onward, you may refer to me as Luna Lovecraft!" she told the terrified creatures.

"Ugh, whatever, I guess I'll just go with the flow," Hermione sighed, conjuring her trademark battle axe and charging at the crowd.

"Is that Ginny?!" Ron exclaimed, pointing towards the ocean.

Harry looked over at the Sea of Hogwarts and saw that indeed, Ginny was currently fending off a fleet of Rotfang vampires, producing a neverending wave of fire from her wand while one of the squid's tentacles swung her around like a flamethrower.

"Looks like fun!" Ron said, running towards the squid. "It's time for the famous Fiery Weasley Temperament to shine! INCENDIOOOOOO!"

Harry started fighting his way through the crowd, looking for Grindelmort. Soon, he was completely lost, and the fact that someone had freed Neville's fanged carrot prototype didn't make things easier, as the pesky buggers weren't yet at the stage where they could distinguish between friend and foe.

Wait, I'm a fucking idiot, Harry thought, I have a dragon!

"Hey, assholes, give me some space!" he yelled, "my dragon needs to land!"

"Coming right up," McGonagalls voice answered from somewhere. Seconds later, the enemy fighters around Harry were transfigured into fish and started suffocating.

"YARRR, MATEYS," Captain Hagrid roared, shoving a handful of them into his mouth,"TONIGHT WE DINE ON TROUT!"

Harry's dragon landed next to him and the glorious Wizard of Destiny took to the air, flying in an outward spiral pattern and scanning the crowd for Grindelmort with his expert Seeker's Eye.

He spotted him near the ocean, leading a group of Death Eaters towards the vampire pirate ships on a conjured wooden bridge.

"Yarrr, me fellow purebloods," the mad Dark Lord yelled in a bad imitation of Hagrid's pirate accent. It be time to take to the seas, our undead allies requested a magical flying upgrade for their ships, arrrr!"

Harry was about to fire a piercing curse at Grindelmort, when the latter suddenly unshrunk a broom, took to the air, vanished the bridge and transformed into a laughing pink-haired witch while flying away. The unfortunate Death Eaters fell into the ocean, where Viktor Krum's shark form made short work of them.

"'Arry, what are you doing out 'ere?" someone said next to him. It was Fleur, in full bird form, her newly hatched pet dragon buzzing around her.

"Oh hey Fleur," Harry greeted her, dodging a stream of fire from the squid, who was now wielding two Weasley flamethrowers. "Just looking for Voldemort. Where's the rest of your dragons?"

Fleur blushed.

"Well, I got really 'ungry that one time..." she mumbled.

Harry decided now was not the time to comment on veela feeding habits, as not even his fabled Allure Immunity™ would save him from that one. Looking back towards the castle, he scanned the crowd for anything particularly eyecatching. He spotted Neville, holding on to a tuft of a giant's hair and emptying a barrel full of his potato grenades into the beast's ears. Then he saw it, in the background: Grindelmort himself was riding up the hill, sitting in a massive, soup-filled cauldron on wheels pulled by six cockatrices and a still imperiused Vernon Dursley riding an enchanted jackhammer.

"Soup of the evening, beautiful souuuup," Harry could hear him sing.

Peter was riding a horse next to his Lord, banging his spoon hand against a frying pan like a gong of war. Harry started making his way towards them, but was intercepted by a new wave of Grindelmort's soldiers.

"How many of them are there?!" he cried. "It never ends!"

"More fodder for my Glory Machine!" Sirius yelled, driving his motorcycle through the enemy forces in a wave of gore.

What a total madman, Harry thought with amusement, he actually installed the woodchipper upgrade he was talking about.

"Don't worry, I've called reinforcements!" Hermione called from beside him. "Our species has a millennia old history of fighting dark lords."

Harry saw she was accompanied by two older bookworms, both swinging battle axes of their own.

"Harry, these are my parents, Watson Granger and Radcliffe Granger," Hermione introduced them. "Mum, dad, this is Harry, the boy I mentioned in my letters."

"Pleasure to finally meet you," Mr Granger said, "I've eaten several books about you over the years. Unfortunately, it seems now is not the time for smalltalk."

He raised his axe into the air just as a Death Eater was sent flying in his direction, cleanly cutting the unfortunate man in half.

"Let us bathe in the blood of our enemies, for the glory of the Goblin Nation!" a voice roared in the distance. It was King Ragnok, accompanied by his squad of elite fighters.

"For the Goblin Nation!" they chorused. "And Harry Potter, the Saviour of Goblinkind!"

"I too have called reinforcements!" Luna said, pointing at a fissure that was opening in the ground. A shirtless young man swinging a wooden trident rode out of it on a flock of rabid sheep.

"Behold," he bellowed, sending earthquakes at the enemy with his trident, "the dawn of Ragnarolf looms upon us!"

The chasm in the floor had the additional benefit of exposing the Hogwarts sewer system, allowing Tom to make his way to the surface on the back of the basilisk, who was wearing sunglasses.

"Make way for the true Heir of Slytherin!" he screamed.

A massive chorus of NOOOOOs rang through the Forces of the Light. Harry whirled around just in time to see a cat with suspicious markings around its eyes get hit by a killing curse.

"Naughty little blood traitors get sent to hell!" Bellatrix screeched, before focusing her attention on her next opponent. Thus, she was caught completely unaware when the dead cat transformed into a very alive transfiguration teacher and permanently dealt with her by transfiguring her into an explosion, which she then walked away from without looking back.

"Nine lives, bitch," McGonagall stated coldly.

"Guess who didn't dispell his clones yet!" Harry said, deciding it was time to call reinforcements of his own.

He summoned his two clones and began double-fiendfyring Grindelmort's cauldron with one of them, while the other one set up a giant floating screen replaying Luna's memories about Dumbledore.

"What is this sorcery?!" the Dumblegoat called, unsuccessfully shooting reductors at the screen.

Meanwhile, Grindelmort was just as unimpressed by Harry's double Fiendfyre.

"You foolish child," he cackled, "my body is indestructible! It's pointless to try and boil me, as this soup is already souperheated! Also, it's actually sulfuric acid, supplying me with power!"

Harry and his clone switched to reductors and blew up the cauldron, causing Peter and Uncle Vernon to get dissolved in a flood of acid.

"Curse you, Potteeeeerrrr!" Vernon cried, vainly firing his magical drill into the air.

Next, Harry attempted to get rid of Nagini, who had been draped over Grindelmort's shoulders during all this time. However, no matter how hard he tried, the Dark Lord's aura kept his dementor form at bay like a magnet repulses a similarly poled fellow magnet.

Harry was accosted by a redheaded man with glasses.

"Hello Harry," Arthur Weasley said, "I know we've never met before, but please accept this magically enhanced vacuum cleaner!"

"You have my thanks, that's just what I needed," Harry said, putting the bulky part of the machine in his magical core, transforming into his dementor form once more and sucking the soul right out of Nagini from a distance.

"Argh! No one destroys my property and gets away with it!" Grindelmort fumed.

He broomlessly shot up into the sky and started glowing.

"Oh crap, he's charging up his lightning attack again," Harry said, flying after him on his dragon.

Taking advantage of Grindelmort's charge up time, Harry started firing every dark curse he knew at the madman, to no avail. It seemed his body was really as indestructible as he'd claimed.

"HAHAHAHA, YOU PATHETIC WORM," Grindelmort eructed, frying Harry with thousands of lightning bolts, his aura radiating the madness of the terminally deranged, "ELECTRICITY TRUMPS EVERYTHING."

Harry's dragon began sizzling and its wings cramped up, causing it to plummet towards the battlefield below.

"Noooo, Hedwig!" Harry cried, still hovering in the air.

Grindelmort used his distraction to pull his final masterstroke of deviousness on the panicking Potter: he stopped levitating and, while dropping down, transfigured himself into a pool of localised hypergravity centered on Harry, who got ripped from the sky and slammed into the ground, breaking the sound barrier on the way down. While he was still regathering himself, Grindelmort unleashed a relentless barrage of Cruciatus Curses on him.

"I'll give the expression 'to be in a world of pain' an entirely new meaning, Potter!" the Dark Lord proclaimed.

Indeed, Harry had never been in that much pain before, not even during his time with the Dursleys. He started hallucinating and saw himself in a literal world of pain, with pain sheep grazing on pain grass, surrounded by a pain forest. Pain clouds were floating in the sky and little pain gnomes pulled Harry's nails off, made papercuts on his eyeballs and punched him in the dick.

"Oh god what's happening to me?!" Harry screamed, feeling like his brain was about to pop out through his ears. Both of his magical cores shorted out and he felt his magic exploding, causing a poisonous black cloud to cover the entire school grounds and temporarily knock out anyone still alive.

"WHO DARES THREATEN THE HEIR OF THE LAST TRUE VAMPIRE CLAN OF BRITAIN?" a magically amplified voice boomed.

The smoke lifted and Harry gasped as he saw the figure standing in the middle of the battlefield. It was... Lily Potter.

"What the hell?" Harry asked. "Mum? I'm a vampire? I don't get anything anymore, please tell me I'm still hallucinating."

"Harry, my son," Lily said as pompously as you'd expect from an ancient immortal being, "it seems my slumber has lasted longer than anticipated. You're all grown up..."

"Yeah well, you were kind of dead, actually," Harry said, adjusting his glasses and trying to reassemble his balance.

"I wasn't," his mother corrected him. "Voldemort's killing curse just put me in a coma, from which I could only wake up if my loved ones were in mortal danger. Perks of being a True Vampire."

"Nothing like the vampires I learned about," Harry said.

"Yes well, I could go on a detailed tangent about the different levels of vampirism," Lily said, "the low level vampires, the hybrids, the wild vampires, the demon vampires etc etc, but now doesn't seem to be the time. How in the world you never realised your nature is beyond me, your magical core should have clued you in. Humans don't have one after all."

"What?" Harry exclaimed. "But no one seemed to think anything about mine was unusual except for the size!"

"Ugh," Lily said, rolling her eyes, "that ridiculous belief in human magical cores clearly got worse while I was asleep. Anyway, the power he knew not was the power of being an explosive vampire, the end. Oh look, here's the police."

Harry turned his gaze to the gates of Hogwarts. Dozens of aurors were marching up the hill, accompanied by three dementors who hadn't defected to Grindelmort.

They quickly arrested the two Dark Lords, who were just waking up from unconsciousness and thus completely unprepared, and that was that.

"Show's over guys, time to go home," Harry told the disappointed Death Eaters. "I'm as surprised as you are."

"Albus Dumbledore and Gellert Grindelwald," Amelia Bones declared in her Serious Business Voice, "for war crimes too numerous to count and multiple centuple murders, the supreme Wizarding Court sentences you to death by drapery. The execution is to be carried out right on the spot, as transporting you two anywhere would be too dangerous."

One of the Ministry dementors pulled a veil made of nonspace from its cloak and brandished it like a demented toreador from hell.

"Whatever," Grindelmort said, jumping onto the Dumblegoat's back. "I'm too old for this shit anyway, and no one has ever fooled all of you for as long as we have. I'll welcome Death like an old friend, for my work here is done!"

"Indeed," the Dumblegoat said. "Go on, my trusty whatever the reverse of a steed is, it's time for our next great adventure!"

"Hoppe hoppe Reiter, wenn er fällt dann schreit er!" Grindelwald sang, missing every note and riding through the Veil on Dumbledore's back to raucous cheering from the Forces of the Light.

Harry had to wipe a few tears from his face.

"I can't believe I'm going to miss those crazy old fucks," he sighed, "they were the worthiest opponents I ever had... Although I really wish I could see their faces once they arrive on the other side and realise I got rid of their horcrux."

"Don't worry, I'll send you a picture," The Uncle said.

"So you're telling me I've been dating a vampire without realising it?" Hermione asked. "Me, a bookworm? Do you know how many books about dark creatures I've eaten?"

"Yes well, the Evans Clan are True Vampires, which are a special case not much has been written about," Lily explained. "We didn't originate from bite wounds, but got our powers thousands of years ago from magic itself. Sometimes, a True Vampire will be born powerless, just like magical humans occasionally spawn squibs. You may know such creatures as hags."

"Oh hell," Harry said, smacking his forehead, "that's why Aunt Petunia always was such a huge bitch to me! She must have been frustrated because she wasn't allowed to eat me."

"You grew up with Petunia?!" Lily shrieked.

"Uh, yeah," Harry said, covertly trying to maximise the distance between him and his mother, "but it was Dumbledore's fault and he's dead, so don't worry about it."

Their discussion was interrupted by Professor McGonagall.

"Excellent work, Potter," Hogwarts' newest Headmistress said, "I'll award Gryffindor fifty points for defeating the worst duo of Dark Lords Magical Britain has ever been cursed with. Unfortunately, being the embodiment of fairness that I am, I can't give you more than that, so you'll have to buckle down if you don't want the Hufflepuffs to win the cup. They're still leading. And don't think this will dispense you from having to participate in the Third Task, either."

With that, she left them again. Harry swept his gaze over the friends, girlfriends and mothers he'd somehow amassed in the last few months.

"You know," he said, "after all is said and done, I don't think my first year at Hogwarts could have started in a better way."

THE END