A/N: Not much to say this time. A big thank you to my Beta and a big thanks to Jimbocous, who is currently helping me fix the first couple of chapters.

That way people can stop being bothered by the hint in the summary and stop telling me to fix my mistakes so people can stop being bothered by them.

Humankind has a weird kind of logic at times... ;-)

Now on with the story...

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, apart from the plot and a character.

MoD2: Harry Potter, Keeper of Life

Chapter 6: No! This can't be happening!

While Sirius, with Xeno's help, was feverishly working to recreate the map, John and Harry were hard at work setting up the destruction of the Horcruxes. Both knew that it would be awfully dangerous. If they could not destroy the freed up pieces of soul, who knew what, or whom, they might latch onto.

Preparations were made to send the other inhabitants of the house away, while they would stay and perform the ritual. John was hard at work carving ritalistic words and runes into the walls of his basement room. They were part of erecting wards to keep all of the soul fragment inside. Harry had found them inside Death's Book and now laid them out for his father.

The goblins had offered their help and given them an assortment of objects they believed could destroy the vile objects and the souls attached. Just in case they failed at cleansing the items.

Harry had taken to reading in Death's tome every night, trying to find the right spells and rituals that would allow them to tear the souls from their housing and send them to Death's plane.

He had even asked him directly, but Death had told him that he would find the answer inside a book. Seemingly highly amused by their struggle, he had henceforth refused to answer Harry anymore.

It actually took him the better part of a week to find what he was looking for. It was Abraham Potter's book and his mother's journal that seemingly gave the answer. With all the death related rituals that he had read about over the last couple of days, he had seen the connection after a couple of moments.

Both the shield his mother had invoked, as well as his ancestors shield spell, required a sacrifice to work. The energy to make them work stemmed from the passing of a soul over yonder. They didn't need any specific ritual to make the connection to Death, any ritual that required a sacrifice would.

It would probably break, since his entire soul would have to pass for the ritual to take effect. There was a slight chance this would happen, but neither of them wanted to believe it would be that simple.

What they now needed was a ritual that would produce as little as possible backlash to the caster. Something that would gobble up the sacrifice and then collapse in a controlled manner. John spent hours over Abraham's book, which had a section on safeguards, and wrote out equations.

Close to Christmas they were ready. They had sent the others to a Potter property in Italy and promised to join them as soon as their task was completed.

John and Harry stood in a corner of the basement. They had spent the past hour filling the carvings on the walls with their blood. A dull red sheen came from them now. On the ground they had painted a giant circle, intricate markings and complex runes lining the inside. The coppery smell of blood was overpowering.

In each of the corners, a goblin made object stood. One blade that had tasted basilisk venom, a staff that according to Ragnok contained Hellfire. There was a mace that was so ancient that the Goblins couldn't define the metal it was made of, but a Battlemage had told them that it was holy and would smite the vile things if needed.

Last but not least, Ragnok had given them a piece of his own collection, a family heirloom. It was a gauntlet that supposedly had belonged to the greatest leader of their nation and had been blessed by a dragon many thousand of years ago.

Taking one last deep breath, John took the Horcruxes from their container and placed them inside the ritual circle. Freeing the soul pieces was the easy part as far as he was concerned. He just had to break the fragile connection the fragments had to their physical containers. When you're able to command magic in the most direct sense possible, it wasn't too hard to do, especially with the sloppy job Riddle had done on them.

It would have been easier to just destroy the Horcruxes, but they would have destroyed the artifacts as well. The ritual would remove the taint and leave them with the enchanted relicts. Plus it guaranteed that Riddles soul would go to Death and a mishap, like Harry's scar had been, could be avoided.

Preparing these highly magical objects to be the containers for your soul was bound to be hard, since they would actively resist your efforts. He would have probably made better containers out of everyday stuff he had found in the trash. Add to that the ridiculous notion of splitting your soul this often...well it wasn't the best of ideas.

With his mind, John 'snapped' the connection on each of the objects and immediately noticed two problems. With two of the Horcruxes, he had obviously underestimated the amount of forethought that had been put in.

The locket had its piece of soul trapped on the inside. Worse still, the diary, it refused to give up its piece entirely. It shook violently, ink started to flow from the center and the pages reabsorbed it.

The ink, John surmised, must carry the soul. If that was the case, their plan would not work on it. Slowly specters of Voldemort rose from the items on the ground. It was time to think quickly.

"Harry! Tell the locket to open in parseltongue!"

John was shouting over the deafening roar that took hold in the room. He sprinted over to where the mace stood. Harry spoke the needed command and the locket sprung open, it's fragment joining the rest in the room. John raised the mace over his head and had the medieval weapon crash down on the small book.

With an explosion of light, the diary disintegrated. The other fragments in the room started to wail loudly, the volume rising ever higher. Giving Harry the sign to go ahead, the younger Potter started chanting. The fragments floating around the room, trying to find purchase anywhere, trying to escape through the walls. Luckily their barriers, carved into all surfaces of the room, stopped them.

Harry had reached the middle of the ritual, the point where the life-death barrier would open for their sacrifice to cross. The specters were now trying to attack them. They tried to float through them, which was painful, but did little else. Harry now made the required cut on his hand, bleeding on the rune before him, John mirrored him on the opposite side of the room.

Suddenly, like there was a small vortex in the room, the specters started to spiral and converge in the center of the room. The deafening noise that had been filling the room stopped for a couple of seconds, before the soul pieces started screaming with terror. Their screeching and moaning, begging even, clued the Potters in on one thing. Voldemort's greatest fear was his own mortality.

In Little Hangleton a snake and a rat made their way across a graveyard. They were trying to get to the abandoned manor house overlooking it. They had made it about halfway across when the snake suddenly started to convulse. The rat, as was its instinct, quickly considered abandoning the snake and simply running into the undergrowth.

In the end Peter stayed put until the tantrum had subsided. The snake, which Voldemort possessed, started to slowly move again. After a couple of feet, its speed quickened. It locked eyes with him and Peter heard the dreaded voice inside his head.

"Faster Wormtail, we need to hurry my plan."

With this they finally made their way across and up the hill.

Finally, after what seemed like an hour of screaming soul pieces circling around them, the last bit of the fragments disappeared. In the sudden silence the build up energy exploded outward as the ritual failed as planned. With a low sound, they more felt than heard, it pushed them outward until they hit the walls.

As the force had subsided, both breathed a sigh of relief. A couple of bruised ribs were a small price to pay for their goal and finally the bulk of the Horcruxes were gone. Before them now lay Hufflepuff's cup and Slytherin's locket.

Both were highly magical artifacts and granted the user benefits. Then there was the book. It started it's life as a book, a simple diary and yet had held onto the soul far better than anything else so far.

After they were able to hear again, John cleared his throat.

"These three, plus you, that's four down. One more, which we know of…" He trailed off.

Harry scrunched up his forehead in confusion. "Dad? What's wrong?" He healed the cut in his hand and still John hadn't answered him.

He just stood there, one moment, two moments. Then he turned on his heel, almost kicked down the door and ran up the stairs. In the living room he started shoving their research papers out of the way. Clearly searching for something.

It was only a moment later, when he pulled a wrinkled up piece of paper from the mount. Harry looked at the paper and immediately understood. It was the map the Xeno and John had made for the Horcrux hunt. They had gotten so much help from their friends from the goblin nation and the one Death had inadvertently destroyed, that they had completely forgotten about it.

Swiping the table with one arm, John placed the map on it. There was a single glowing dot on it. The location of their remaining Horcrux.

"Recon?" Harry asked.

Nodding, John sat on the couch.

"It would be best if we destroy the last Horcrux. There is no faster way to get rid of it. Plus, we don't know how much of him is already in her."

"Will this get rid of him completely?" Harry asked skeptically.

"As long as he's not fully anchored, yes it will. If he is however…" Silence finished the sentence for John. As getting a soul out of a living being wasn't so easy, it usually meant killing the soul and the host.

"There are other ways though. We have read over the rituals necessary to drag a soul from a body." Harry interjected.

John pinched the bridge of his nose. "True, but most of them require you to prepare ahead, some even a couple of months. There is only one I'm aware of that can be done instantly and that has equal chances of saving the girl, as it does killing her. It's only useful as a desperate last measure, when all we could do otherwise is level a killing curse at her."

Harry was pensive. Something was lingering in the back of his mind, but he couldn't quite grasp it. Something he read about during the last week, but he couldn't put his finger on it. There was a different way, he would have to reread the books, not something he was accustomed to doing.

In the meantime, John studied the map. He moved his head between the map and a dossier he held in his other hand. Turning to his son, he placed the folder in front of Harry. The younger Potter studied the picture on top of the page. It was of a pretty looking asian girl, the same he had seen on the train. "Maybe recon won't be as hard as we thought. She lives at the horcruxes location. The other girl, Marietta, lives in London."

"Cho Chang." He read her name out loud and looked at his father, who was still busy massaging the bridge of his nose. John nodded once without opening his eyes. Harry rubbed his face once before continuing. "Well then we better tell the others that the holiday is over."

Once they had arrived in Italy, Harry and John were greeted enthusiastically. Hermione and Luna ran at Harry and enveloped him in their arms, and in Luna's case, even her legs. Harry, not expecting this, fell backwards and landed on the fluffy rug of the living room floor. Luna landed right on top of him and managed to drag down Hermione with her. Together they ended up pinning Harry's arms down on either side of him.

Quite red faced, Harry and Hermione untangled quickly, but Luna seemed unfazed as usual and got up slowly, giving Harry ample time to look up her skirt. While she had clean and ordinary panties on her, it didn't stop Harry reacting to it. He turned his head so quickly, he nearly gave himself whiplash.

After all entanglements were cleared up and all of their friends were brought up to speed, John brought up the remaining Horcrux.

No one interjected while he told them about it, but as soon as he was done nearly everyone wanted to talk at once.

Holding up his hand, they all quieted down and going around clockwise, he gave Sirius the first chance to talk.

"This girl is possessed by Voldemort right? Should we try to sedate her using special potions? There are some to make you fall asleep, whilst suppressing your magical core. It's usually used during medical treatment, if somehow you destabilized your core. I remember James having to take them for a week after one of Lily's spells failed in 7th year."

John nodded. "It's worth considering. After all, if we do sedate her, it's probable that Voldemort will try to assert control over her body. Without magic, he at least won't be as much of a pain in the butt as usual. Let's just hope that the potion will knock him out as well."

Next came the Grangers, Dan voicing the concern that they both held.

"What about that poor girl? Is there even a chance to save her? Will she survive it, if you take this piece of him down?"

Considering everything for a moment, John gave his opinion.

"She has a chance, but it gets slimmer the longer we wait. If his soul becomes intertwined with hers, it might not be possible without some desperate last measures. If we wait too long, there is a high chance that she might die."

Next he nodded at Wang, who chose to stay quiet. Then he motioned Xeno to speak.

"Will I be in charge of the snacks?"

This elicited a chuckle from the tired bunch. John nodded.

"If you want to my friend."

Looking about them, they noticed that the sun had set in the meantime. John and Harry had spent so much time in a closed off room, they hadn't noticed the passing of time. John quickly teleported back to their house to clean up the basement. While Harry offered to go with him, John declined, rather having him spend time with his friends.

It had been a long week for them leading up to this and he didn't want Harry to miss out on his childhood. But their current predicament had him consider the opposite. They had put their entire plan into jeopardy, just because he wanted Harry to live a normal, happy life. Normal, that was never in the books for him, and if they had just hurried and gotten it over with, then happiness would have been easier to find.

Now, it was time to hurry up and get done with that Voldemort business, so Harry could go back to being a child again.

The very next day, a letter was delivered to Mr. Chang in his office. It wasn't the raven that brought it, nor the quality of the paper that shocked him as much as the seal on the front. He hurriedly opened it and was shocked by the content.

That day as he returned to their home, he told Mrs. Chang that he had to meet an important potential business partner and that he wanted her to accompany him. She agreed and got ready, as her husband told their daughter that they would be gone for the evening and return later that night.

They had just left their home and disapparated into London, when Mr. Chang let out a breath he hadn't noticed he'd been holding. His Wife also noticed and gave him a concerned look. They turned into a street and went into the specified restaurant.

The maître d' took their coats and greeted them with their names, he had clearly been told to expect them.

Except for them the entire restaurant was empty. They were led to their table, which was raised on a dias in the middle of the main room. Three people were already seated. A boy, a man and an ancient wizard. The boy and man they recognized as Harry and John Potter from the newspapers. The ancient chinese wizard however, Mr. Chang only knew from the seal and from legends.

Bowing deep, his wife following suite, Chang spoke in their native tongue.

"Master Wang, it is such an honor to be in your presence. Thank you."

Wang waved them to take a seat, while Harry turned to John.

"Should we tell them that we understand every word?"

John chuckled.

"I think you just did."

Before they could continue however, the waiter came and offered them wine and water.

After they all had settled down with their beverages, Wang took the luduan horn from his pocket and placed it in the middle of the table.

"Do you recognize what this is?" He asked the Chang's, who both nodded.

"Very well, then you know what we will say is the truth."

John took over from him.

"Mr. and Mrs. Chang, as we specified in the letter we send you, this is about your daughter. We are afraid to inform you, that your daughter is in grave danger. It is quite possible that she might die, right now we don't know enough to be sure."

Mrs. Chang was shocked, it reflected in her voice as she asked about their daughters condition.

"Please tell us, what is wrong with Cho? Is she sick? Can't we get her treated?"

With dread in the pit of his stomach, John answered.

"I'm afraid it's not that simple. This matter is far more serious and dangerous than any of us is comfortable with."

He paused, cleared his throat and continued.

"We have known for a while now, that the dark wizard Voldemort hasn't been dead for the past 11 years, but rather is in a state of disembodiment. He has created anchors. So called Horcruxes."

He was met with blank stares, so he elaborated further.

"Soul containers. To create them, one has to apply special preparations to the chosen container. These are horrible in their own right and then the wizard or witch has to commit an atrocity so vile, that their soul splits apart. This soul piece is then transferred to the container. In this way he tried to gain immortality. Sadly, we are certain that Cho found one of these containers."

Mrs. Chang was livid.

"Where would she find such an item?"

Harry felt physically sick as he answered.

"It was hidden somewhere inside of Hogwarts. We have been searching and destroying these Horcruxes for some time now and the one Cho has found is the last one remaining. It… we… weren't able to find it, somehow she must have stumbled upon its hiding place. I'm so very sorry."

Harry's voice broke at the end and a stray tear made its way down his face.

They wanted to be mad, they wanted to scream at the Potter's and free themselves from the dread by getting angry. But they couldn't. The broken boy before them, he spoke the truth if the soft glow of the horn on the table was anything to go by.

Mrs. Chang, out of options, grabbed John's arm.

"Please, you must help our daughter! With your wealth, some kind of way has to be found. You must save Cho! Please! I'll do anything... anything at all... to save my daughter!"

The break down of Mrs. Chang, didn't make it easier for John to answer.

"I'm afraid it's not a matter of money at this point, else we would gladly pay for it. This is a matter of time and we're not sure if we still have enough of that."

It was Mr. Chang who asked the only remaining question.

"Then, what can we do?"

Cho was smiling as she came down the stairs. She had felt tired the past month, but today she was bursting with energy. Entering the kitchen, she greeted her dad with a hug and a kiss.

"Where is mom?" She wondered out loud.

"She's in London. There is a new store for chinese herbs in the city she wanted to check before you get up. Seems she wasn't fast enough. There is some hot chocolate with a warming spell on the counter."

She wasn't sure if her father told the truth there, but didn't put it past her mother that she had to pick up a present for her. Thinking nothing of it, she took the cup and began sipping it while looking out at the snow.

After finishing the cup, Cho suddenly felt tired and weak.

"Daddy… I don't feel so good." She managed to get out, before she collapsed. The potion had done its work. Mr. Chang just managed to keep her from falling to the ground.

John Potter came down the stairs, holding a diadem.

"Pick her up, I'll transport you to our safe location."

Then he teleported them to the Potter's basement. Mrs. Chang was already waiting there, as was Harry.

"Place her in the middle of the circle. Next to this."

John held the diadem up and placed it down.

"Now I'd rather have you leave the room, but I know you want to be here for her. One of you can stay and you will have to remain in one of the corners no matter what happens."

Nodding, Mrs. Chang placed herself in the corner. Mr. Chang took one last long look at his daughter and then left the room. No doubt he would wait at the top of the stairs together with Xeno and the girls. Wang was in his room, praying for Cho.

After closing the door, John addressed the concerned mother again. "We will try to cleanse the soul of Voldemort from both the diadem and you daughter. Hopefully there is still enough of a connection to the container to start the process."

Harry once more began the ritual, but they didn't get the response that they had the last time. Rather Cho started to convulse, much like the diary had. The soul of Riddle was locked inside of the girl and he refused to let go.

That was about the time that Cho opened her eyes. Instead of black however, they were red. Voldemort's voice came from the petite girls mouth.

"You will never defeat me. I'm now inside of her. To kill me, you'll have to kill the girl."

John began to doubt the validity of their plan.

"Don't listen to him, he's lying. Harry take the sword and destroy the Horcrux."

Harry picked up the poisoned goblin blade. He spun to strike the diadem on the ground. Turning 180 degrees, he came face to face with Cho.

"Ahh, young Mr. Potter, Harry, the one who didn't die. You could be a great asset to me. We could be equals and rule the world together."

Cho blinked, one of her eyes turning black once more.

"He's... not lying. Destroying the diadem... will get you nowhere."

Her voice came in gasps, her face contorted in pain.

"Kill me, please, end this and end this monster."

Harry stood there, the sword still poised to strike, extended in front of him.

"I can't, I could never do that."

Cho screamed, the pain evident in it. Before she defiantly took a step forward.

"He knows that! This bastard knows that!"

Another scream tore from her throat.

"I'LL END YOU!"

With the last of her strength, Cho walked right into the sword, impaling herself on it.

With this, Voldemort's soul piece was sucked out of Cho's body. Harry looked at her mother. John was holding her back, so she wouldn't enter the ritual circle. He looked down at his own trembling hands. The blood from the impaled girl running down the length of the blade and over his fingers.

Looking up, he wondered why the screaming didn't stop after the soul piece had been consumed, until he noticed that he himself was screaming.

He barely heard John's shout over his own voice.

"Close it, Harry. Close it."

Shocked, Harry released the hilt of the sword and Cho fell to the ground.

'I'm sorry.' He thought.

Kneeling in front of the circle, he drew a line through two of the symbols. The field collapsed and he fell to the ground. With blurry eyes he looked over to where Mrs. Chang was cradling the dying body of her daughter.

He could hear Cho speak with a garbled voice, the sword had pierced a lung. At least he had closed the circle, before she had been taken as a sacrifice for the ritual. Harry was barely conscious, his sight drifting in and out of focus. He saw Cho close her eyes, and Mrs. Chang turn on John. He saw Mr. Chang kick down the door, Xeno trying to restrain him. He let the man go after seeing the corpse of the girl in her mother's arms.

John did nothing, not while they screamed at him, nor while Mr. Chang started hitting him.

Getting up on wobbly knees, Harry made his way over to Cho's body. He pulled the sword from her torso and knelt beside her. He knew what he would do, he'd get her back. Death would have to listen to him.

Pulling his knife from its sheath, Harry made a deep cut in his palm. His blood mingled with Cho's, but he paid it no mind. Next he cut open Cho's blouse and exposed her mangled chest. Dipping his index finger into the small pool of blood inside his hand, he started drawing symbols on her, starting by the wound.

Xeno was shocked. "Harry what are you doing?"

This made John notice what his son was up to. With a hand gesture he shoved the angry parents out of his way and made his way over to the fallen girl.

"I'm bringing her back. I've read over the required ritual. I can do it."

Harry's reply was feverish. His hands were still trembling, his body still trying to cope with the shock.

"Stop Harry. You might bring back her body, but you can't bring back her soul." John reached out to pull his son away from the dead girl.

"I can, he has to give her back. He has to answer me!"

Taking Harry by the wrists, John pulled him gently toward Xeno. On the way he vanished the blood in his hand and healed the cut.

"He will do no such thing, you can ask him for a favor, but you can't order him around. He told you that the first time we met him."

John switched his attention to Xeno.

"Take him to get washed up and sit him with the girls upstairs. Have them talk to him after you explain what has happened."

Xeno took one last look at the prone figure on the floor and nodded.

With a sigh, John turned to the Chang's that were still held under his spell. With a wave of his hand he set them free.

Xeno had helped Harry get into the shower, where he just sat for ten minutes, letting the water run over him. He didn't even get up when the water had turned from hot to cold and simply allowed to run over him further. He sat there with his knees drawn up to his chin until Xeno returned. He helped him dry off and get dressed. Then he took Harry to the living room where the girls were waiting for them.

Both Hermione and Luna got up, wanting to hug Harry, wanting to make him feel better. They had barely stepped in his direction when he started shouting at them.

"Stay back, stay away from me! You'll die if you get closer! I know it, nobody will die because of me ever again! Never!"

Sitting on the floor, he hugged his knees to his chest and rocked back and forth.

The girls looked helplessly at each other and finally hugged each other just to draw some comfort from the embrace.

Xeno had sunken into a arm chair.

It was into this scene that John entered half an hour later. His nose was bleeding and his right eye was swollen shut. He saw Bob the Bunny laying in the corner beside the couch, knowing Harry rejected any comfort they were trying to offer him.

He cleared his throat, but still his voice was hoarse and scratchy.

"The Chang's are getting counseling and Amelia is taking care of the legal side of things. There will be no repercussions. The Chang's are grieving hard, but in the end didn't hold us accountable for what happened."

Pausing, John wiped some blood from his nose with his sleeve.

"Mrs. Chang even testified seeing her daughter impale herself on the sword. We don't know if Voldemort was somehow involved in the act. Knowing of his fear of death however, I don't think so. Meaning that Cho was a very brave young woman, who sacrificed herself, knowing there was no other way to stop the Horcrux and the madman it belonged to."

"There WAS!" Harry screamed at the man he considered his father.

With a sigh, John turned to the others.

"Xeno, girls, would you please give us a moment?"

Hermione and Luna left the room uncharacteristically fast, with Xeno in tow.

Pulling Harry out of his corner, John took him in his arms. The boy struggled against him, all the way over to the armchair. He tried shoving and hitting John, who just held him tighter. Finally, Harry relaxed into the embrace and started sobbing into John's chest. After the first tears had escaped him, the younger Potter let out a scream like a wounded animal. All of the frustration, sorrow and pain flowed out of him all at once in what seemed like a never ending stream of agony.

After half an hour of crying, Harry had fallen asleep. John looked at the boy in his arms and was involuntarily reminded of the day he had gotten Harry from the Dursleys.

The young boy was extremely fit for a twelve year old. But looking at him after the ordeal he had been through today, he felt just as light and frail in his arms as he did that day.

He carried Harry to the stairs and encountered Hermione and Luna waiting for them anxiously.

"Let him rest. You can talk to him tomorrow."

With his mind, he levitated the stuffed bunny from the living room and dropped it in the shared embrace of the girls. John saw that they had been crying as well.

After putting Harry beneath the covers, John went to his own room and entered the bath. He flinched a bit as he saw his own face in the mirror. Reaching up, he straightened out his nose. It would heal, with time. Using magic to instantly remedy the situation just seemed unfair to him.

He just wiped away the blood from his face and put some disinfectant on the cut over his eyebrow. Sighing, he laid down in bed, knowing that sleep wouldn't come.

Harry awoke with a start, a small scream escaping him. He was breathing heavily, his mind replaying the horrors of his nightmare to him.

He had seen the things he should have done, seen the steps that would have gotten Voldemort out of Cho. He had remembered, in the second she had impaled on the sword he had been holding. After it had been too late, he had finally remembered the procedure to to cleanse a human from this taint. Too late. He usually remembered everything, couldn't even forget if he wanted to, but this one thing that could have saved a young innocent girl's life, had slipped his mind.

Then he had seen her die again. John stopping him from doing the ritual that would reanimate her. Seen her mother scream in agony, her father lose his composure and crying while hitting John.

Pulling up his knees to his chest, Harry cried. He heard his door open and looking up, saw Luna come in with Hermione in tow. They sat on either side of him and tentatively hugged him, still remembering how he had rejected them the day before. He let it happen this time, but didn't return the embrace.

"We could have saved her, I knew how. Then she impaled herself. She killed herself, but she didn't have to die. Why did she do that?"

Neither Hermione, nor Luna, knew how to answer. After a long moment, Harry spoke again.

"It was my fault. I knew the steps we had to take, but they slipped my mind. Normally I can't forget something, but this one crucial detail I couldn't remember."

Hermione took his head in her hands and forced him to look at her.

"Harry, you are not responsible for this, or for the life of every person on this planet. You didn't make these vile things, or hide them in a school full of children."

Turning his head away from her, he replied.

"No, but I could have searched for it. I could have tried harder and maybe found it. I could have done so much more, but was to busy being a fucking school child."

Luna now copied Hermione, taking his head in her hands and forced him to look at her.

"Maybe, maybe you could have. That's in the past Harry and lingering on it will not change a thing. Stay with us Harry, stay in the present. I need you."

With this, Luna pressed a chaste kiss on his lips. It was innocent and short, nothing more than a peck, but expressed everything Luna had to say.

Now Hermione turned his head back to her.

"We need you."

She corrected and copied Luna. She put everything she wanted to say, but lacked words for, in the kiss.

After a second of stupor, Harry cried even harder.

"I don't deserve this, I'm a killer, I murdered her. I don't deserve your kindness. You should stay away from me, before you get hurt as well. I couldn't bear to lose either of you."

Now all three were crying hard, while holding on to each other for dear life. Without either of them knowing, Harry had done a vital step towards healing that night. With the girls holding him, he finally felt safe enough to fall asleep again.

A couple of rooms down the hall, John wiped the tears from his eye and finally found some rest as well.

Harry woke up and simply wanted to stay were he was for the entire rest of his life. Sandwiched in the warmth of two bodies, he didn't feel like getting up and facing the harsh reality of yesterday.

Cracking one eye open to look at the clock, he saw John standing in his doorway.

"Come with me." And with that he left the room.

Harry peeled himself out of the bed without waking Hermione and Luna up. Stepping out in the hall, John held Death's book out to him.

"No." Harry refused the tome in a dead voice.

"Yes, read up on what you tried to do yesterday." Was the answer.

Taking the offered book like it was a pestilent rat, Harry opened it and was instantly greeted with the required page. He read through the ritual quickly and turned green. It would have turned Cho's body into a puppet, a being without a soul. Like someone who had received a Dementor's Kiss.

"I had to stop you. It would have taken away the Chang's sorrow, only to plunge them into a living hell."

Harry nodded. John clamped his hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze.

They went down the stairs and came face to face with a pale Xeno. He looked like he hadn't slept at all last night.

"I have very, very bad news."

This put the Potter's on edge.

"Look at the map in the kitchen."

John walked by the man and woke the entire house.

"NOO!"

His scream tearing everyone out of their beds. Harry quickly went to look what had John scream like this.

On the map in the middle of the table, which should show no Horcruxes left after the last night, a single glowing dot rested a hundred and some miles away from them.

"Impossible!" Harry exclaimed. "No, not after all we had to do. Not after yesterday! Please NO!"

The girls were storming down the stairs, as were the Grangers, who had come over late last night with Sirius' help.

"What's the matter Harry?" Emma asked him, clearly concerned.

"He made another one…" The boy in question whispered.

"Who made what?" Dan asked.

"Voldemort! He made another Horcrux last night!"

John rubbed his face.

"This means he somehow has managed to gain a body for himself. Else he wouldn't have been able to perform the necessary procedure."

"She died and as she did it should have been over!" Harry couldn't calm himself. "Let's end this now. Let's go there and finish him off, once and for all!"

The night before in Little Hangleton, Riddle Manor…

Voldemort looked at the frail little body he was currently occupying. A frail homunculus, Wormtail had been able to procure alchemically with his tutoring.

At the same time he had guided him through the brew he needed to regain a full body.

He had used Nagini's venom and blood for the homunculus, so his new body would be more serpentine and tough. Nagini had been his host for the past few weeks and showed remarkable strength. He would keep her around.

They had to hurry of course, he had felt his anchors fail. Those that had destroyed them would suffer, once he had managed to regain his former power.

Now, there were more pressing matters at hand, of course.

Looking over into the corner, he saw panic. The eyes of the woman were wide. She was just an ordinary witch, born to Muggles of course. It wouldn't do to kill a purebred witch after all.

"Take her blood, Wormtail."

Seconds later, the servant returned with a vial full of the red liquid. It went into the bubbling cauldron, followed by the bones of his father and finally wormtail's own hand. It was kind of poetic really.

After the potion was done, he, inside his homunculus form, was dropped into the brew. It was a painful process, a terrible process, but he had endured worse before. Then it was over, the potion had gone and all that was left was his new body. He stood, naked and noticed that his privates had returned.

In exchange for eternal youth he had sacrificed them once and never missed them, but now he considered doing a test run. He shook the thought from his mind, there were more important things to be done first. He thought of Bella, she wouldn't mind taking care of his newfound bodily needs, once she had suffered for disappointing him.

Wormtail brought him robes and the wand of the person in front of him. He knew that simply killing someone wasn't enough to split his soul anymore. It would take a bit more work to do so.

Voldemort looked down at the mangled corpse in front of him. Not much hinted at the fact that this had been a human before, much less a woman. With a smile he felt Nagini slither past him. The piece of his soul imbuing the snake with power and, quite possibly, immortality.

He turned to Wormtail, who was still on the ground sniffling and groaning because of his hand. It would be easy to replace, but he still considered killing the fool. He would call for his followers first. Depending on the response he might kill him, or use him as a positive example.

"Wormtail, give me your arm."

With a smile, the groveling man extended the bleeding stump to him.

"No, the other one."

He relished as he saw the hope crushed in the kneeling man's eyes. This was what made life fun.

Pushing on the dark mark on Wormtail's arm, he began counting in his head.