Disclaimer: I am merely playing with other people's creations, I don't own the game/book/anime/TV-show I am borrowing from, nor am I making any money with this. I am writing for fun and practice, as fan-fiction to be shared with others if I feel like it.

Chapter 01: Dead Hero

The twisting sensation of a portkey had struck both Harry and Cedric as soon as they touched the tri-wizard cup, but as soon as they landed Harry Potter was aware that he had been right. All year, he had been thinking that someone was setting him up to die, setting a trap for him. Now he had put Cedric in danger as well by having him grasp the trophy at the same time.

"Wands out?" Cedric asked for confirmation, looking around concerned, but Harry shook his head. "Summon the cup to yourself." Cedric looked a bit confused for a moment, but did so. "I doubt it is two-way-" And the pop of him vanishing relieved Harry of part of the guilt at least. Cedric was away, and safe. Now, it was only him left in the mist.

His fingers reached to his pocket, yanking out a familiar cloak he pulled over himself, and lay in wait hearing the approaching footsteps. Although he didn't put as much effort to his work in class, he excelled in practical tests. He was a smart young lad, but felt Ron's jealousy and Hermione's drive to be the best would have made them unhappy if he had shown he had a shot at being the top student of the year.

Still, his past experiences during the three years had taught him that discretion was a better part of valor at times, and the sorting had had wanted to sort him into the Slytherin. He could have prospered there, but he considered it highly distasteful because Malfoy would have been one of his roommates. These days, he wondered if that would have been a better deal compared to Ron Weasley though. Finding him at the bottom of the lake during the second task had almost made him want to leave the traitor there.

Yet he had pretended to forgive the jealous prat once more, because he could not afford to be distracted when someone was looking to kill him. Now, the steps approaching told him that the game was about to come to its conclusion. "I don't see anything my lord." The voice made him freeze.

"He must be here! If that moron made it a two-way portkey I'm going to rip the bones from his flesh one by one!" A small infant squealed out in a high-pitched whiny noise that could have been funny if not for the fact it was so damn ugly. Harry was trembling a bit beneath the cloak. Pettigrew and Voldemort. Narrowing his eyes, he felt the scar on his forehead hurting, but he fought the pain while lifting his wand and gritting his teeth. Sirius had taught him a bit, and the letters had been helpful too.

"Avada Kedavra." Hissing out the words he directed the wand at the small baby, the spell hitting the small figure causing a horrifying scream to erupt to the air before he felt the scar on his forehead shatter and bleed over one of his eyes. Seeing the panicked look on Pettigrew's face hexing around into the dark, he raised his wand again and hissed. "Avada Kedavra." The spell hit the traitor, giving him a far quicker death than he deserved, but Harry wasn't taking chances.

A moment later a sound of apparition caught him off-guard, but he was thankfully still covered by his cloak as a figure rushed over. Moody. "Master, I did it, the boy is-" He started, before standing stunned seeing the two dead. Harry grimaced, and turned his wand at this new traitor. "Stupefy. Petrificatus Totalis."

Watching the figure fall, he moved to pat the fake Moody's pockets and lift a flask he kept sipping from all year long. He knew the smell. Polyjuice. Grimacing in disgust, he considered the scene and what he had done. His rage against Pettigrew and Voldemort had lead him to kill them both. Tired of all the games Dumbledore kept throwing him in. Now he had the person that threw him into this mess, but the ministry would likely still try and get him into trouble for using the unforgivable curse. Yet in the matter of war, there was no question about it. There was those who lived, and those who died.

Checking Moody's pockets he found a few smaller vials of polyjuice, noticing the lack of hair in most of them. Smirking quietly, he pocketed the ones without a hair, while uncorking one of them and slipping a single hair from his head into it. That done, he looked the fake-Moody in the eyes once more.

"I do not know why you did this, or who you are, but if you are servant of Voldemort then you are a death eater and beyond any mercy. You are a piece of trash to be killed. Fortunately for you, I have use for you or I would have killed you already." He leaned in, and poured the contents of the vial to the man's mouth watching with a bit of fascination as Moody turned into a copy of Harry Potter. He briefly removed the eye, the peg leg, and the other possessions moving them further off behind where Pettigrew's cooling corpse lay, and then turned to regard his guest once more. Silently stripping off his own robe, leaving the oversized clothes his relatives gave him, he dressed the imposter in his Gryffindor robes and drew a long breath.

"Unfortunately for you, the only use I do have for you is to take my place in the wizarding world... as the dead savior." He saw the fear in those eyes even if most of the man was already petrified. Harry moved to Pettigrew's side and took his wand, testing it out in his hand and pointing it out at the still petrified look alike.

"Avada Kedavra."

==== Dead Hero ====

A few prank spells like changing one's hair color and making one's nose twice as big as usual were good at making him hard to recognize, even as he called for the Knight Bus. After hurriedly getting on board and paying for his travel, he made his way to the Diagon alley and hurried over to the bank. Time was of the essence, and he did not want to stay behind when Albus Dumbledore and the others found the scene.

Once he was before the bank he quickly used a bit of magic to vanish the changes he had done on himself, and walked in feeling self-conscious of the brief looks of scorn and disdain for his attire. Then again, he wasn't planning to stay about for long anyway, and they were hardly going to recognize him in this outfit, hair covering that blasted scar, and his glasses in his pocket. He had not left them with the dead man, figuring he needed them more.

Finding a teller who wasn't busy, Harry approached the goblin man carefully, reading the sign before him and raising his voice slightly, enough to be heard but not enough to be overheard by anyone else. "Excuse me sir, I would like to talk to my account manager about the Potter accounts, and I'm willing to pay extra for quick service."

The goblin raised his gaze slightly, looking at the young lad carefully before Harry lifted the bangs of hair on his face showing his scar. The goblin put his quill aside, speaking seriously. "Key, please." At this, Harry swallowed awkward. "I don't have it. Albus Dumbledore gave my key to Molly Weasley to do my shopping this year and I haven't gotten it back." This caused the goblin's eyes to widen and he seemed to snarl slightly.

"Then I am going to have to ask you to prick your finger on this knife and drop three drops of blood on this document to prove your identity." The goblin was obviously suspicious, but held the knife towards him in a manner that suggested it was not a request. Cutting his fingertip on it, Harry let the required amount of blood drops fall on the pergament before pulling his finger back. The goblin watched as his name appeared on the document a moment later, nodding satisfied.

"Right this way then." The goblin tapped the knife on a small metal ring which burst with a brief flame seeming to burn the blade's tip clean and sterile once more. Moving from his seat, the goblin turned to lead Harry to the depths of Gringotts, to meet with his account manager. He had to make sure everything was in order after all, before the Wizarding World would declare him dead.

Including setting up a will. A smirk showed on his face for a brief moment at the time, considering the matter as he trailed after the goblin. While Dumbledore might not believe in killing, Harry had dealt with this threat to his life in a fashion that made sure those that had attacked him before would not have a chance to do so again.

Having wiped away most of the blood on his forehead earlier, he was still unaware that his scar was starting to come apart and the spot on his forehead finally heal.

==== Dead Hero ====

The three schools had been in a state of confusion at the end of the tri-wizard tournament when mister Cedric Diggory arrived holding the cup but screaming that Harry was still out there, and shouting for aurors. The maze had vanished allowing for Fleur Delacour and Victor Krum to hear how things had gone as well, but the mystery of what happened to Harry Potter remained a topic of much gossip for the rest of the night, as the teachers rushed them back to the school, and sent for aurors.

Dumbledore had sought for his friend Alastor in confusion for a while, but Pomona Sprout was not one to rest on her laurels, summoning the aurors as soon as Cedric managed to explain to her what had happened. Cedric got to stay at the infirmary just in case, and to heal from the bashing he had taken during the tournament, so most of the castle residents weren't sure what to think about the abruptly ended tournament.

Then the owls began to arrive and the first students picked up their copies of Daily Prophet, many of them going still or gasping. More and more people began to gather around those holding a paper, the front page screaming a headline that made more than one person pale.

Boy-Who-Lived Died Killing Voldemort Again!

It is this reporter's sad duty to inform the wizarding world that the youngest Tri-Wizard champion, Harry Potter (14) was found dead at a graveyard in Little Hangleton. The Aurors on the scene checked the evidence and confirmed a few earlier statements they had received earlier that day from a respected professor, that Harry Potter and Cedric Diggory who had been leading the way on the third task of the famed tournament had grasped the Tri-Wizard cup only to find out it was a portkey leading to a sinister trap.

Upon arrival, Harry Potter told Cedric Diggory to summon the cup, which he did while asking for the reason only to find himself transported back to Hogwarts, in front of the cheering masses. Celebration was far from his mind though as he began to shout for help and aurors. When the portkey was finally traced, the aurors found a grim scene to see.

It appears that after heroically seeing to it that the Diggory heir would return safe and sound to his family, Harry Potter fought a battle with Peter Pettigrew, formerly believed dead but recently found to have been alive at least until facing off with Harry Potter, as well as a homunculus that appears to have served as a host to the most dreaded dark lord of recent history. The evidence suggests that a dread ritual was prepared nearby, to help resurrect the dark lord and that Harry was likely to be a sacrifice to fuel his enemy's return.

However, the boy who lived appears to have managed to best both Pettigrew and Voldemort, but at a dreadful price. The boy who lived lost his life in preventing the return of the dark lord, and thus the Tri-Wizard Tournament once more ends with a tragedy, but one that nobody but the dark lord can be blamed for. Nobody could have expected something like this to happen.

"Harry had found out the first task was Dragons, he didn't have to tell me but he warned me beforehand." Cedric Diggory had stated. "I called him a little boy in my anger when I first learned he was the fourth champion. This same boy saved my little sister from the bottom of the lake and fought the dark lord all alone. I cannot even begin to say how wrong I was."

With the evidence of Peter Pettigrew's survival, the call for Sirius Black's arrest has been removed, and the kiss-on-sight order has been torn apart. Mr. Black is still a person of interest to the department of magical law enforcement and we hope to hear from him to uncover the mystery about him and Pettigrew, but given that Pettigrew was found with the dark mark, this reporter dares ask one more question that is troubling his mind.

Was Sirius Black thrown in Azkaban an innocent man, and have we all been part of letting a dark lord lead our your hero to his doom while thinking he was a willing participant in this tournament?

End Chapter

A/N: So, this is more of a little slip onto a tiny little idea that kept bothering me. Consider this: Harry is willing to use dark magic if necessary to win, and by killing Voldemort with the curse that initially killed him, actually fulfills the prophecy, killing Voldemort for good. It doesn't really make much sense but then again neither did a lot of things in the books, and the prophecy just called for one to kill the other in the end.

Voldemort's soul piece in Harry, and Harry casting that curse, it could be counted a suicide in a macabre manner, Voldemort's soul piece offing another. The protection not meant to prevent him from killing himself if he chose that life was too much, this counts as a suicide to the magic and allows Harry to actually vanquish the dark wanker without having to hunt down every little piece of him.

Most of this idea would be dealing with the aftermath of "The Death of the House of Potter" and how Harry intends to survive from that point onwards.

This is meant as a scribble more than a 'true story', so I considered leaving it "as is" for anyone to follow from if they wanted, or alternatively I figured I could write 1-2 additional short pieces to offer a bit more of my personal view on how that might have gone on since then.

At the most, this will be 3 chapters long little tale of a short "what if".