FicWad

DISCLAIMER: See Ch. 1.

A/N: Ah, the chapter I'm sure a good deal of you have been waiting for: Harry reams out his "friends"...

NOTE: This chapter has been edited since the first time it was posted.

Also, this chapter is dedicated to Khadon, for sending me all his saved files of "The Heir of Gryffindor" months ago during a major crisis for me! Quoth his review from chapter 1 of this story (or at least the original time it was posted on my old account): "I love Harry goes to Azkaban ficks cause I'm a big fan of Harry yelling at everyone who screwed him over." Well, Khadon (and everyone else reading and enjoying this fic), your wish has been granted...

Respects and thanks go out to one of my favorite writers, TheVelvetGhost, since I got the idea of Harry's genealogy from her, which you will see in this chapter...

BTW, like last chapter, this was somewhat inspired by one of Harry's few but lethal rants from "Redemption," by krtshadow. You have to hand it to her, she's quite good at writing rants. Well, so am I, in my own unique way, of course... ;)

Chapter 6: What Goes Around, Comes Around

Dumbledore had told Harry a year before that indifference and neglect often do more damage than outright dislike. Harry considered walking out on them right then and there, not even acknowledging those he once considered to be his friends. But Percy's foolish remark only tossed more fuel on the fire. Now, those who betrayed Harry would really get put in their places.

Percy, just for being himself (and, more importantly, for claiming that he never meant to hurt Harry), was the first to get his ass served to him on a platter. "Percy, you're an absolute asshole. You only care about yourself and never for your family or your friends... if you even have any friends! And what do you mean, you never meant to hurt me/? You wanted me out of your life to make it easier for you ever since the beginning of my fifth year, after Voldemort returned! If someone killed me, you probably would have been dancing on your desktop! This whole miscarriage of justice was because of you! Even if you felt the Imperius and Cruciatus Curses, you should consider yourself /extremely lucky that you weren't killed or subjected to those same curses again/! I've gone through much more than you can possibly imagine, and do you see me complaining like that? How you ever got sorted into Gryffindor, I'll never know, not when you call yourself brave and noble yet raise a stink when you get so much as a paper cut! You were still smarting over the Ministry's disgrace after its denial of Voldemort's return, and you saw this as the perfect way to get me out of the picture! Why your family even puts up with you - no, why they even came together like that to imprison me /because of you - is absolutely beyond me! Anyone else would have disowned you by now! You're just like Fudge: Greedy, two-faced, lying, immoral, and absolutely corrupt!"

Percy went exceedingly pale and just hung his head in shame, his pompous and authoritive-sounding words failing him for the first time in his life.

Tonks tried to pacify Harry, but that only ended up adding fuel to the fire. "Look, Harry, Percy made a mistake. Okay, he rather blew it out of proportion, but -"

Harry's burning gaze immediately locked onto Tonks, and after feeling invigorated by having put Percy in his place, he went after her. He was delayed, however, by someone tugging at him.

Whipping around, he saw Colin Creevey, whose pitiful face clearly said /please forgive me/. "Harry, please, we're all sorry, don't -"

"Get the hell off of me, you obsessive little celebrity stalker!" Harry growled, wrenching Colin loose.

"Please!" Colin begged. "I need to apologize -"

"You need psychoanalysis!" Harry retorted, getting away from him and moving onto Tonks. Swooping at her, Harry continued his maelstrom of fury.

"For an Auror, Tonks, your detective skills /suck/! What was it you said as I got dragged off to Azkaban nearly a year ago? Oh yeah, something about Sirius being disappointed in me. No, he'd be disappointed in /you/, /Nymphadora/! If he were here right now, he'd either drag you by your hair or rip out your throat, you clumsy fool!"

Leaving her a tearful wreck with dreary gray hair, Harry moved onto Lupin, who looked close to breaking down himself. "For someone who was loyal to my parents, Lupin, you certainly don't act it! I'd have thought that after Sirius was proven innocent, you'd be unlikely to make the same mistake again and put an innocent man in prison! Even Peter Pettigrew, Wormtail/, the man who betrayed me and my parents to Voldemort and helped Voldemort arise a few years ago, helped more than you did! The last true Marauder? Ha! Your loyalty is as questionable as his was, if not /less/! /I shamed my parents and godfather? Oh no, you stained their names, you hypocrite! I'm warning you, Lupin, if you ever try that again, I won't hesitate to throw a Silver Dart Curse at you!"

There were a few gasps as Lupin's eyes widened at the threat. Harry obviously must have hated his former mentor if he took a jab like that at his lycanthropy, a fact which the younger wizard never meticulously took into account like most of the wizarding world.

Hagrid, being a half-giant and having faced some similar discrimination in the past, came to Lupin's aid. "That was a terrible thing to do, Harry -"

The tables were immediately turned back on Hagrid as Harry focused on him, his green eyes with a mean glint in them. "No/, Hagrid, /I'll tell you what's a terrible thing to do. How about sending an innocent student to Azkaban, knowing full well what it's like? Even before Sirius was unjustly thrown in there, you went through that same hell! Given what this society's so-called 'justice system' is like, chances are you weren't the first person ever to be put unfairly in Azkaban either! How could you think so little of me, Hagrid? After all the times I've helped you, covered up for you, and even took the fall for you? How about dealing with your giant three-headed dog, helping care and then smuggling out your illegally bred dragon, or nearly getting eaten by your acromantula 'friends' in order to prove you weren't responsible for the Chamber of Secrets incident more than fifty years ago? If you could care more for your pet monstrosities than for your friends who would probably die for you, then let that be a testament to your loyalty! I wouldn't trust you as far as I could throw you!"

Leaving a shameful Hagrid with his face in his giant hands, Harry moved on to take a potshot at Ginny. Fred and George, however, instinctively moved forward to protect and defend their younger sister. Undaunted, Harry merely overcame this by grabbing each of their heads and banging them together. As both twins moved apart, rubbing their foreheads, Harry decided to go at both of them in the meantime. "You are undoubtedly two of the most ungrateful traitors I've ever met! I give you the thousand Galleons from the Triwizard Tournament to cover your losses after you were stupid enough to gamble with Ludo Bagman, and this is how you repay me? By trying to throw me in jail as quickly as possible? If it wasn't for me, you two clowns would probably be garbage men in Diagon Alley right now!"

Both of them looked down shamefully while Mrs. Weasley moved in, hoping her maternal instincts and abilities could soothe the young man she often thought of as her surrogate son. "Harry, please, we're all eternally grateful for what you've done for us, you're like family to us -"

Harry faced her, and she had to stifle a shudder as she looked into those burning green eyes of his. "Like family? I actually have a revelation for you and your entire family, which I only remembered just now." Taking out his wand, he conjured a rectangular cloud of mist that looked more like some heavenly tablet. Then he chanted the words, "Revela meam hereditatem, propter sum Harry James Potter."

For all to see, a family tree suddenly appeared, showing the name "Harry Potter" underneath "James Potter" and "Lily Evans Potter." The genealogical chart then shifted towards the Evans family. Above the names of Harry's mother and aunt were the names of their parents. The chart then greatly expanded to show unexpected results.

Harry's maternal grandfather, Albert Evans, was a relative of the Weasleys. More specifically, Albert Evans was Molly Weasley's second cousin. Gasps resounded throughout the courtroom, and the entire Weasley family present looked on, eyes wide and mouths wider.

"I remember when I met your youngest son that day on the Hogwarts Express, he said you had a second cousin who was an accountant or something, whom you didn't talk about much," Harry elaborated, waving the chart aside and causing it to vanish into mist. "I would have never guessed I was related to you. In the few weeks before I was arrested for supposedly murdering Percy, I spent lots of time in the library researching spells I felt I would need to learn so I could defend myself. One day I came across a book of wizarding genealogies of Britain's pureblooded families. As Sirius told me once, all the pureblood families are interrelated, so I thought it would be a good idea to see which wizards might be among Voldemort's ranks. As the old saying goes, 'know thy enemy'. I was looking at your family's chart when I saw the name of a second cousin by the name of Evans, and the branch ended there. I know Evans is a fairly common last name, but something just kept telling me that maybe, maybe it wasn't just a coincidence between his last name and my mother's. I sent a letter to whatever department of the Ministry manages birth records and that sort of thing. Of course, the Ministry being what it is, it took longer than it should have, and I got arrested and thrown into Azkaban before I could see the records. That would make you and your husband an aunt and uncle, and your children third cousins, once removed."

Mrs. Weasley was at a loss for words as tears welled in her eyes. "Harry..."

His anger swelling in his heart again after having finished the explanation, Harry finished it off by saying, "I never thought I could ever have relatives I'd hate more than the Dursleys, if I even had any other living relatives to begin with. Well, I'd say you and the rest of your clan could give them a run for their money. Even they never did anything this horrendous to me, as detestable as they are."

Forcing herself not to break down and not to think of herself as being in the same bracket as the wretched Dursleys, Mrs. Weasley reached out for Harry, pleading, "Please/, Harry, I would /never say or do anything -"

"To hurt me?" Harry coldly finished for her as he withdrew from her reach. "Then what about when you said I always got your kids hurt just for being around them? That certainly didn't help matters, now did it? Well, let me ask you this/: What if I /hadn't been around to save their lives on more than one occasion? They'd be dead then, that's what!" Disgust written all over his face, he finished, "A year or so ago, I would have been ecstatic to know I was actually related to the one family who unconditionally accepted me as one of their own... now, I couldn't be more /revolted/, knowing that I was foolishly betrayed by that same family, who I was actually related to this whole time!"

That finally made Mrs. Weasley break down sobbing. Her husband automatically moved forward, hoping to soothe his wife and reason with Harry. "Now Harry, I know this whole incident is regrettable and could have been avoided, but please, you have to give us another chance..."

"Oh no I don't," Harry retorted. "If you think for a moment that I'll just find it in my heart to wave aside this whole outrage, then you've got another thing coming. Like I'll really trust your stupid, bloodthirsty, hotheaded, greedy, ungrateful, treacherous, cheating, short-tempered foolish family ever again. And as far as I'm concerned, I'm not part of your family anymore - biological, surrogate, or otherwise! You're no better than Malfoys!"

There were some more gasps, and Mr. Weasley's eyes bulged as though he'd been punched in the gut.

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry could see a tearful Ginny approaching him, ready to plead and beg for forgiveness. Cutting her off, he said coldly, "No, Ginny, don't delude yourself into thinking I'd ever forgive you, either! I thought at least you and your father would be reasonable enough to listen to me and hear me out after your idiot brother Percy accused me of using Unforgivables on him, seeing as I've saved both your lives, him from a poisonous snake and you from Voldemort's old diary. But no, instead, I get 'I hope you die, and I hope that day comes soon!' I almost did die because of you, Gin, you and your foolishness! I save you from an evil diary and a basilisk that Petrified other students and even managed to bite me, and you can't even save me from your corrupt brother and his evil bosses, you pathetic girl! The next time you nearly get yourself killed, don't expect me to pull your ass out of the fire again!"

As Ginny broke down crying ('There go her chances of ever getting a date,' Harry thought rather malevolently), he turned his attention to Hermione, who looked close to weeping herself. Seizing this opportunity to make her suffer greatly, Harry went at it. "You're one of the biggest hypocrites I've had the horrible misfortune of meeting, Granger! You claim to be constantly concerned over my well-being, and the moment I'm accused for attacking, torturing and nearly murdering someone, what do you do? You abandon me if favor of your jackass of a boyfriend, because you think with your hormones instead of your brains! You even convolute everything I've done to come up with a damning testimony guaranteed to put me in prison faster! In case you've forgotten already, Hermione, it's called perjury in the Muggle world, and you could get thrown in jail for it there for lying under oath! You and Ron took advantage of that, knowing that here, wizards care less about actually punishing the right person and more about merely finding someone to blame! You actually had the gall to say that I defied Umbridge by forming that Defense group and luring her into the forest? No, Granger, that was all your doing! How could you possibly defend her after what she did to me and tried to do to me? I'll tell you why; because you're just like her!"

"What!?" protested Hermione. "I'm nothing like her!"

"Oh really? Let's see... You're sneaky and manipulative, you use books and 'intelligence' as fronts, you silence and blackmail people, you find underhanded and painful ways to brand words and messages onto those who speak out, you use the press to your advantage to discredit your enemies, you set creatures on those enemies... if it hadn't been for me and your dear boyfriend, you probably would have ended up like that awful /cow/! I can't believe I stuck with you for five years. You make me /sick/."

Hermione instantly collapsed into a hysterically crying heap.

Ron instantly rushed forward. "How could you, Harry? We're your /friends/!"

It was only after those words left his mouth that Ron knew and realized he'd gone too far. Grabbing Ron by the scruff of his robes, Harry towered over the normally taller boy, who was now cringing in fear. "Oh, I'm Harry again now, am I? A year ago, it was Potter this and Potter that as you tried to get me put in jail as quickly as possible! You knew me for five years, and why, of all the times for you to not believe me, was it when Voldemort tried to get me out of the picture! For all your loyalty and bravery, Ron, you're as jealous as hell! How could you possibly be jealous of me? I lost my parents and my godfather to Voldemort! I was treated like a slave by the family I was left with! You have a family that cares for you and managed to get through the war together; I lost everyone! Sometimes I wonder if you would even be willing to sacrifice a family member if it meant being famous; if Percy had been murdered before Dumbledore could intervene, would you truly have been upset, or would you have used that as an excuse to help imprison The-Boy-Who-Lived-to-Betray and get famous off of it? And what with your bullshit testimony which you cooked up with Granger, that was the final nail on the coffin, and you know it/! What if the situation had been reversed, Ron, and you were accused of torturing and almost murdering someone close to me; would I have jumped to conclusions and have gotten rid of you just to find someone to blame? What do you did was so low it was only worthy Draco Malfoy! And you have the /nerve to claim you're my friend/? No, Weasley, I'm not your friend; you've made that /abundantly clear! And I certainly don't want or need to be around someone whose head is as empty as his family vault!"

With that, Ron fell to the floor in an undignified heap as Harry let go of him because he couldn't stand right. A few tears even leaked out of his eyes as he tried to get up.

Harry then passed Snape, who was smirking without end, in order to get to the biggest fish of them all: Dumbledore.

"As for you/, you crazy old hypocrite, you're the worst of them all! You talk so much about indifference and neglect, and yet you leave me with those god-awful relatives! Surely you knew how they treated me! I can still remember that first letter from Hogwarts: 'Mr. H. Potter, /The Cupboard Under the Stairs/!' You couldn't have done a /little more research to see if maybe I had other relatives out there?" Here he gestured to the shame-faced Weasleys.

Dumbledore, as calm as ever, apologetically replied, "Don't doubt for a moment, Harry, that I researched your genealogy on both sides of your family. The records you mentioned just now, the ones connecting you to the Weasleys, I was never able to find, sorry to say. And I mean this: There really was no other choice for who to place you with."

"I'm doubting that more and more by the minute," Harry said acidly. "Now, I can't help but wonder if you deliberately let Sirius be put in Azkaban just to make sure I'd be placed with the Dursleys, all for the sake of that damned blood protection, you manipulative old coot! All for the sake of your precious plan! There were probably plenty of other alternatives then to have let me grow up with those miserable excuses for human beings! It was obvious you cared more about molding your precious weapon then making sure of my own well-being! And why/, pray tell, would you have me put away in Azkaban when you knew I was the /only one who could kill Voldemort? Do you realize how many people died because of your mistake?"

The crowd bristled as all this was being said, not exactly accustomed to seeing their idolized Albus Dumbledore being reamed out by the great Harry Potter. They also bristled more as they tried to comprehend what was said about being the only one able to kill Voldemort.

"I still remembered the prophecy full well. I had to hope you would become repentant enough one day in order to defeat Riddle," Dumbledore said calmly in his defense, although Harry could detect a slight undertone of uneasiness in his voice, which only motivated the teenager even more.

"And the whole thing with finding me guilty: You/, of all people, should know about Voldemort's deception! How is it you can talk so calmly of how cunning and devious he is, and yet he's managed to find some way into Hogwarts nearly every year I've been there, and yet you fall for his tricks /every single time/?" When Dumbledore didn't answer this, Harry pressed further, "And how is it you didn't stop Riddle from even turning into Voldemort to begin with? You're just as responsible as he was! You could have stopped all these deaths from /both wars from ever happening!"

That was the straw which finally broke the camel's back. Dumbledore's reputation was now hanging by a thread. As calmly as he could muster, Dumbledore explained, "I had no solid evidence to prove his was responsible for the crimes he committed while he was still at Hogwarts. Besides, he was considered such a model student that if a brought any accusations against him, based on only the suspicions I had, no good would have been done."

"Strange how you can be manipulative, sneaky and prying enough to find false information to imprison innocent students and yet to you can't find enough to imprison those who are actually guilty," Harry responded in a tone which said I-don't-believe-you/. "I almost wish you actually /were a Death Eater... at least then I'd have a valid reason to blast you away right here and now!"

More gasps from the audience, while Dumbledore remained seemingly unaffected, although Harry looked close enough to see the old man's eyes widen ever so slightly.

Having gotten all that out of the way, Harry ground out, "Well, at least now you can go back to your job of pretending to be concerned for your students' welfare, Dumbledore; just don't expect me back there, because I'm /through/."

"I'm afraid I can't allow that, Harry."

Feeling his anger rise up again, Harry disguised it as he raised an eyebrow. "Oh, /really/?"

"Yes. You see, for one thing, you're still a minor. You are indeed an extraordinary and powerful young wizard, but you're still a minor nonetheless. For another thing, I don't think your parents would want their son to have an incomplete education."

That did it. Dumbledore's use of Harry's parents as an excuse for his own ulterior motives was the final straw.

Now, while he was at the Founder's Temple, Godric Gryffindor's spirit taught him a certain code of morality. This code included things like not instigating fights, never using physical violence it was necessary out of self-defense, and not sinking down to the levels of other bad people, regardless of whatever they may have done. There were also several minor rules, such as never using profanity, and other things which were part of etiquette for society and interacting with others.

Harry's rage boiled at the mention of his parents like that. Oh, how he wanted to ream Dumbledore out for that one...

'Oh well,' he thought, 'I'm sure Godric will forgive me on this one.'

At the top of his lungs, Harry roared, "DON'T YOU DARE BRING THEM INTO THIS, BECAUSE THEY CERTAINLY WOULDN'T HAVE WANTED YOU TO BETRAY ME, YOU -"

Harry finished that off with every last swearword, obscenity and profanity he could remember or even think of (he unintentionally learned quite a few while in Azkaban), ones which called into doubt Dumbledore's loyalty, sanity, intelligence, heritage, and a myriad of other things. By the time Harry was done, Dumbledore had actually turned a rather peculiar shade of red, and everyone else in the room merely stared open-eyed at his choice of words (with the sole exceptions of Snape, who looked to be beside himself with glee, and Luna, who merely quirked an eyebrow).

Breathing heavily, Harry now dropped his voice so low that everyone had to pay close attention to hear him. "You're certainly not going to use me as part of your plans anymore, Dumbledore. As for you and everyone else who betrayed me -" here he looked around at them all, causing them all to flinch as his gaze swept over them "- you can all jump off a tower at Hogwarts, drown yourself in its lake, or hang yourselves in a broom closet for all I care, because you're all dead to me anyway." They couldn't help but flinch again after he said that.

In a last-ditch effort to have Harry return to their ranks peacefully, Dumbledore said in his wisest voice, "I know you've been through a lot, which I accept responsibility for -"

'Why must every idiot in this room use that argument when it's not even true?' Harry thought bitterly. Slowly taking out his wand, he mocked them, "You know what I've been through/?" Speeding things up, a bright silver light formed at the end of his wand as he shouted, "You will now!"/

The silver light shot up towards the ceiling in a pillar of light before branching off and coming back down in a gigantic wave that engulfed everyone in the room (minus Snape, Neville, Luna, and Madam Bones, which took some effort on Harry's part). Once they were all connected to his own mind through this spell, Harry took all of his memories from Azkaban and dumped it into everyone else's minds. He originally considered only showing a few of the less violent atrocities he witnessed from his cell in Azkaban, but this whole ordeal with having to put up with his betrayers had made him a lot less merciful. In the end, he forced them to live through every atrocity he witnessed and could bring forth... every murder, destruction, rape, mutilation, torture...

What seemed like an eternity later (which in reality was just under ten minutes), he let the spell loose, by then, everyone was crying or vomiting (a few people were even doing both).

Satisfied that everyone now knew the truth and could no longer deny it to even themselves, Harry decided to forgo his original plan for a dramatic exit through the courtroom door, and with his wand, he used long-forgotten ancient magic to disappear in a fiery mist.

"Reap what you sow," Harry muttered as he vanished along with the mist.

As Snape made his way through the crowd with the timid Neville and quirky Luna behind him, he couldn't stop feeling as though this was somehow one of the best days of his life. 'Damn, Potter,' he thought to himself, 'I always knew you'd cause a world full of trouble someday... I just never expected it to be for everyone other than me.'

(End of Chapter 6.)

A/N: Well, this was fun to write... once I just sat down and did it...

Note about the whole genealogy thing: How much of a kicker was this? (Also, the spell Harry uses is a slightly different version of the genealogy spell from chapter 31 of "The Heir of Gryffindor." The Latin incantation he said translates into "Show my heritage, because I am Harry James Potter.")

Note about the Hermione/Umbridge comparison: Was that too unfair to Hermione? I'm sorry, but I can be quite the pessimist sometimes.

NEXT CHAPTER is where Harry finds a way to thank Snape, Neville, and Luna for their faith him before severing ties with the world which betrayed him...



/EXTRA MATERIAL!!!/ If Snape, Neville and Luna hadn't been so loyal to Harry, his rants towards them might have brought up the following material:

Snape: Harry doubts his skills as a spy, and while he's at it, asks Snape how he's heard of thousands of Potions ingredients yet doesn't know about shampoo.

Neville: Harry calls him a stupid crybaby who's as retarded as his parents. (Cruel, but hey...)

Luna: Harry questions her intelligence; then again, there might have been little feedback from her, given all the teasing she's gotten at school, plus her immunity to offensiveness from other people.