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Chapter 106 - Ballroom Shoot Out

Dimension: 1375 - Earth
Date: 31st October 2001 AD
Country: Britain - Scotland
Location: Hogwarts - Hogwarts Grounds
Time: Evening

In front of them was a host of Death Eaters with one tall figure at the head.

The mask of the foremost figure had been removed to display Lucius Malfoy's scarred face.

"You piece of FILTH, you would contaminated the name of Malfoy with her impure blood, how DARE you!!" the figure said approaching them menacingly.

Draco moved in front of Ginny, putting on his usual Malfoy sneer.

"Her blood," he growled out "Is as pure as yours is....Lucius." he literally spat the last word "You know that as well as I do and as for me being a disgrace to the name of wizard, I have just done what all Malfoy's have done and found myself a Pureblood mate who I someday intend to marry."

Ginny realised he was stalling for time, she just hoped someone would notice they were not at the Ball before they both got killed,

Hey!

Wait?

Did he say....MARRY?

Where in all of Merlin's beard did that come from?

"MARRY!!" Lucius roared, there were collective gasps from the Death Eaters, the son of Lucius Malfoy associating with and intending to marry a Weasley, some of them probably loved this; one of the most respected Death Eater had a son who far from following in his father's footsteps was choosing to ally himself with the enemy.

"I FORBID IT!!"

Draco burst out laughing, which was probably not the best thing to do when there were a large amount of Death Eaters in front of you, by this time Ginny had drawn her wand and was concealing it behind Draco's body.

"You forbid it, does it really look like that is going to stop me, you call me a disgrace to the name of Malfoy, the only sort of wizard you consider to be worth a knut is a Pureblood with a massive bank balance, lots of power and a tattoo on his arm, well guess what DADDY!" he said almost psychotically "Your dark lord doesn't fit in to any of those categories."

"SILENCE!!" Lucius roared.

"Let's start with the tattoo shall we, he ain't got one mate." Draco deliberately mispronounced the words to anger his father, knowing how he insisted on proper speech and manners at all times. Ginny could tell Draco was loving this, his voice wasn't just dripping with sarcasm, it was pouring.

"He just gives them to other stupid sods who are blind enough to follow him, secondly the fortune."

"SILENCE!!" he repeated

"He's an orphan and was left penniless, why do you think he siphons money of off you, thirdly the power,"

"I ORDER YOUR SILENCE!!"

"Your powerful lord is so powerful he has personally failed to destroy a single boy on no less than four occasions not including failed attempts by other incarnations of himself and his pathetic band of lap dogs."

There were growls from the Death Eaters and wands were levelled in their direction.

"Draco." Ginny whispered in warning.

"Oh yes and lastly your precious leader is a Mud-Blood....OH YEAH boys, didn't you know that, did your dictator fail to tell you that. He's not just a pathetic excuse for a wizard, he's a pathetic excuse for a HUMAN, when it comes to leaders I would rather follow a flubber worm."

That did it.

Curses erupted from wands.
________________________________________________________________________

Harry spun around at the fear in Dawn's eyes.

From the Main Hallway they could see dozens of black cloaks filling the near end of the Hall, Harry flicked his wand out of his holster, while Fleur withdrew her wand and Dawn withdrew a dagger from unknown places.

"Do I want to know where you were concealing those?" Harry asked.

Dawn wiggled an eyebrow while Fleur hinted "Maybe." before hoisting up their dresses and together running for the hall.

One of the Death Eaters turned; signalling to three others together they flicked their wands at the doors so that they slammed shut in front of the trio, the sounds of bolts and locks could be heard being activated from the far side.

Both Dawn and Harry slammed shoulder first into the door deciding that they could tackle it down.

This resulted in them both colliding with the door at high speed followed by two loud grunts of pain.

"ARGH....Ok....That was stupid." Harry commented rubbing his aching shoulder.

"Magically sealed door....very stupid." Agreed Dawn.

"Alohomora!!" Cast Fleur.

The door didn't even budge.

"Bombardare!!" a large cloud of dust erupted from the lock but the door didn't even budge.

Harry ignoring the lingering pain in his shoulder temporarily stowed his wand and began to spin fire between his hands before launching a large stream of it at the door.

It groaned loudly on its hinges, about the same as the previous spell did but again no significant affect.

Screams and shouts could be heard through the door.

"We have to get in there." Dawn shouted turning to the others "Think of a spell."

"I'm trying...." replied Fleur, Harry was busy centring himself, about to take another attempt at the door, this time using his currently secret Earth Elemental abilities, he had redrawn his wand so as to make it look like a spell "Do you know any Latin?"

Dawn turned to Fleur sceptically "Getting to know me is all well and good but this is not a time to be thinking about me academic knowledge."

"Spells are more powerful when put with words, mine and Harry's spells are strong but if we can work out the right word we can make a spell to get through the door more effectively."

"Oh, yes I do know some Latin."

"Think of a way of opening a door and the appropriate Latin words."

The sound of shattering wood was heard through the door.

"Quickly."
________________________________________________________________________

Utter chaos erupted, students started screaming, falling over each other in an attempt to get out of the way as the Death Eaters poured into the Great Hall through one of the side doors. Anne caught sight of the main doors slamming shut as Harry, Fleur and Dawn ran towards them from the other side.

She along with the rest of the teachers and Scoobies immediately turned business, drawing wands and a very odd collection of concealed pointy weapons, which made even the Death Eaters think twice.

The two dozen or so teachers and guests including a very annoyed looking Dumbledore and particular male MD teacher brandishing a five foot slightly translucent sword in a very threatening and skilful manner raised their weapons to fire the first volley, it helped that they were also backed up by a large majority of the senior students.

"STOP!!"

Much to the surprise of all the two groups did, mainly out of shock at being told to.

Stepping forward and leaning on his sword Adam started counting.

"Two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve, let's say around twenty of you against this assembled group. I don't think we are going to need everyone for this one Professor," he said turning briefly to Dumbledore "In fact I think four should be more than enough."

"Four!!" laughed a particularly bold Death Eater "Do you want to die."

Turning to him and replied:

"I wonder what you would say if I replied ‘yes'."

There was a moments silence as people stood uncertainly about, unsure how to follow the statement.

"Anyway where was I? Oh yes, I think around four, but before we start let's put on the right background music."

Turning his attention to the instruments he clicked his fingers, causing the drums to jump into action, starting a beat, causing several of the Scoobies and Muggle-Born's to smile as they recognised it what had just started playing.

Turning back to the Death Eaters Adam started the song.

"You ready Anne?"

"Aha."

"Spike?"

"Yeah."

"Buffy?"

"Ok."

"Alright fellas....Let's Gooooooo!!"

The trio and Adam leapt into action, literally in Adam's case. In a very Jedi like movement he jumped the five meters between the two groups in a single bound and landed on three Death Eaters instantly knocking them out while swinging his fists out incapacitating another two.

In between curses Anne (who had opted to use her wand and a knife) noticed Adams sword swing around and pass straight through the body of a Death Eater, the particles of the sword actually seemed to disperse like smoke on contact with the Death Eater and reform on his far side. The Death Eater collapsed to the floor presumably unconscious.

The Hall was utter chaos though it was mostly organised, which was also the difference between the two opposing sides, the Death Eaters did not seem to understand the concept of team work.

"Oh it's been getting so hard
Livin' with the things you do to me, aha"

As the invisible group started to sing, at the far end of the hall Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall were erecting shields around the students who had made it up and behind the teachers; the rest of the teachers were providing covering fire from behind hastily upturned tables which had been summoned to them from the wall where the refreshments had been by Professor Flitwick who was also charming the food and chairs to fly at the attacking Death Eaters (and as some of them would later testify it is very difficult to aim spells when your being pelted with pringles).

"Oh my dreams are getting so strange
I'd like to tell you everything I see"

Other than the teachers, also entering the fray were students (most of whom were DA members) including Colin, Hannah, Lavender and Neville who all looked very annoyed that their evening had been interrupted and wanted revenge for Dennis Creevey, Seamus Finnigan and Susan Bones deaths, the remainder of the older students were directed by and angry Dumbledore to hang back and protect the younger ones.

"Oh, I see a man at the back
As a matter of fact his eyes are red as the sun"

What made the DA group critical in this fight was that unlike the teachers they were not opposite the Death Eaters at the end of the hall but were in fact hiding behind a couple of tables which were half way down one side of the Hall so they were almost level with the Death Eaters creating a cross fire, between Professor Flitwick, the rest of the teachers and the DA members which was seriously affecting the Death Eaters chances of creating an affective attack against them, which was made all the more difficult for the Death Eaters as Lavender had followed Flitwick's example and was currently clobbering them over the heads with the base drum.

"And a girl in the corner let no one ignore her
'Cause she thinks she's the passionate one"

What made this even harder was the fact that Buffy, Spike, Anne and Adam were smashing their way through the Death Eater ranks. Willow, Tara, Hagrid and the rest of the Scoobies had assigned themselves the task of protecting said group and were distracting the Death Eaters that tried to use their weight in numbers against the close combat fighters by using the floating pumpkins as crude missiles, albeit extremely messy ones when thrown hard.

"Oh, yeah, it was like lightning, everybody was frightening
And the music was soothing, and they all started grooving
Yeah, Yeah, Yeah-Yeah-Yeah"

It was hard to tell which side was actually winning; there had only been around twenty Death Eaters to start with but reinforcements had entered through the side entrance (an entrance which had since been cut off by Dumbledore levitated several tables over the gap after sending several of the teachers down the passageway to guard it) bringing their numbers up to around forty.

"And the man in the back said everyone attack
And it turned into a ballroom blitz"

By this time the wounded were beginning to mount up on both sides, several students and teachers had been hit (none fatally) and had been pulled behind the shield at the end of the hall, the Death Eaters were suffering greater losses though as the melee group ducked and weaved in amongst them.

"And the girl in the corner said boy I want to warn you
It'll turn into a ballroom blitz"

Their presence was the main reason that superior numbers of the teachers, students and the Scoobies had not already resolved the fight as they were having to avoid hitting their own side, but the advantages were that less spells were being sent out from the group of Death Eaters as they were having to deal with the four fighters in amongst their number which usually resulted in friendly fire as the four of them were just that little bit too fast for them. Buffy and Anne were fighting as a pair, with Buffy sending knock out blows, while Anne hit them with lighter hits and shielded them both from attack, Spike had his demon face on (although he could not hit anyone) and was chasing those that ran away from him directly towards Adam whose seriously big sword was causing havoc amongst their numbers.

"It'll turn into a ballroom blitz
Ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz"

Hagrid was probably the most surprising of all those in the fight, his new dress robes that unlike his massive coat showed off his immense muscles (and bloody hell were they immense) easily explained why the most of the pumpkins thrown by him knocked their targets out cold upon impact. He also appeared to be immune to most spells, the others had noticed that not one curse had even seemed to slow him down, his thick skin had caused one hair raising moment when a bone shattering spell had flown between Xander and Giles, had bounced of Hagrid's stomach, narrowly missed Xander's skull on the way back and had impacted the unfortunate Death Eater who cast it in the first place, killing him instantly.
________________________________________________________________________

"Come on, come on, think of something!!"

"I'M TRYING!!" Dawn shouted back irritably before shutting her eyes trying to concentrate.

While Dawn had been wracking her brains Harry and Fleur had kept trying unsuccessfully to open the door which had only resulted in a lot of cracked stonework as the castle was built incredibly strongly.

"GOT IT!!" she said swinging round to face the door "Say...."
________________________________________________________________________

The scene in the Great Hall was truly spectacular; the Death Eater group were defeated.

"It's it's a ballroom blitz
Yeah, it's a ballroom blitz"

As the song ended Adam surveyed the battlefield, searching the hall for any remaining targets, Death Eaters were lying unconscious all over the hall with scatterings of students, teachers and guests interspersed among them.

"Well that was bracing." Buffy commented, before turning to Adam "Ballroom Blitz?"

"Can you think of a better song to have played during that?"

"No," she laughed "I was just wondering why."

"Why not." He replied turning to look up the hall "Any casualties?"

"None that we can see." replied Dumbledore "Several have serious wounds, but nothing that a night in Hospital Wing won't solve."

As Adam sheaved his sword, he saw a black cloak move out of the corner of his eye spinning towards the movement he was just in time to see a not so unconscious Death Eater raise its wand towards Dumbledore.

"Ava...." he began before getting cut off as Spike punched him in the face.

"Arr....Hey?" began Spike, clutching his hand to his head before realising that we was not in fact in pain, which got the attention of the rest of the Scoobies.

"Why aren't you in pain?" asked Anya as she attempted to reattach herself to Snape who was far more concerned with Spike.

"Of course." said Anne as it dawned on her "The chips electronic, electricity doesn't work inside Hogwarts."

"You mean he's no longer neutered?" asked Anya.

"I was never bloody neutered!!" Spike replied sharply, before anyone could say any more the main doors exploded, throwing shards of wood and dust into the hall.

When the dust cleared Harry, Fleur and Dawn could be seen in the doorway looking more than a little surprised.

Harry surveyed the scene before him.

"I think we missed the party."

"Just." commented Buffy as she and Anne ran to embrace a very shocked Dawn.

Walking towards them remains of the door Dumbledore surveying the damage.

"I think you overdid the magic a bit Harry."

"I have to disagree Headmaster," Harry replied in shock "Fleur and I have been throwing spells at that door since the Death Eaters sealed it....we only succeeded in damaging the stone work....It was Dawn who destroyed the door."

All eyes turned to Dawn who looked like she was scared to move and looking at the destruction around her was not surprising.

"It was very effective though." Harry commented to a now shaking Dawn.

"Dawn....it's ok." Buffy reassured her.

"She's right," Anne chuckled "It's perfectly normal round here."

Dawn grinned uncertainly, she'd always wanted to be able to do magic but this was just scary.

"Is everyone accounted for?" Adam asked while checking on the injured.

"The Heads of Houses are doing head counts as we speak." Dumbledore replied.

"Wait." Harry said looking around frantically "Where are Ron, Hermione, Draco and Ginny?"

The others all immediately began scanning the hall.

"Shit."
________________________________________________________________________

Ginny and Draco threw themselves to the ground as curses flew over their heads.

Draco rolled over covering Ginny while drawing his wand and turning to face the Death Eaters.

"You can't win boy."

"Maybe not, but I'm going to give it a dam good try." Draco sneered back, catching sight of the black shadow that rose out of the forest and began silently gliding towards them.

"Tell me boy, how do you plan on battling all of us at once?"

"Well....a good start would be a distraction."

A roar split the air as Sapphire dived over the heads of the Death Eaters, causing them to spin around and most to dive for cover before she disappeared up into the sky.

"And that will do nicely....INCENDIO!!"

Lucius being slightly smarter than the average Death Eater was ready for the attack and easily deflected it, but unfortunately Ginny's wasn't slow to react, she threw a ball of flame immediately after Draco's spell not giving him enough time to raise another shield.

Malfoy senior's robes ignited engulfing him in fire.

"PUT IT OUT, PUT IT OUT, PUT IT OUUUUUUTTTTTT!!"

The other Death Eaters scrambled to their feet, most pointing their wands skywards in case the dragon attacked again, only a couple were in any real rush to douse the flames leaving Malfoy seniors robes charred and very wet.

He spun round to face Draco and Ginny who were intelligent enough to take advantage of the diversion and had started running and were now half way across the lawn.

"GET THEM!!"

Curses flew across the grass aiming for the rapidly shrinking pair.

Draco and Ginny ducked as spells flew over the pair's heads.

"Thank Merlin Potter's Dragon showed up." Breathed Draco

"Thank Merlin we can run fast." Ginny returned.

"And thank Merlin these guys can't aim. Come on, only another two hundred meters."

"You would think someone would have noticed we'd have left by now."

"Yeah," Draco panted "Where's the bloody cavalry?"

"You mean other than the Dragon."

"It doesn't count."

"You mean she doesn't count."

"This is not the time to start debating what constitutes an ‘it' and what constitutes a ‘she' or ‘he'."

A lucky spell caught Draco's ankle, cracking the bones.

"AARRGGHH!!" he cried as his leg folded under his weight.

"Draco!" Ginny cried skidding to a halt.

"WHERE IS THE BLOODY CAVALRY!!"

"Not coming boy," Lucius sneered catching up with his downed son "You think they will ever care for you, you're the enemy....a Malfoy....a...."

"Good man." a voice spoke, exuding power with each letter; it seemed to emanate from all around them though the source was behind the Death Eaters.

The Death Eaters spun around wands drawn to face someone they would later much prefer not to have met.

And boy was Hermione pissed.