Important notes: This is set just after the events in the Department of Mysteries in Harry's fifth year and is likely to carry on throughout his sixth and perhaps seventh year. The only thing that isn't cannon in this story so far is the fact that Sirius is alive, because, as you know (if you follow my work ;]) I bloody love him and can't seem to let him die unless it's absolutely necessary. It's actually necessary that he stays alive for this story to work – because it's all his fault that any of this ever happened =D You can assume that he had a fair trial and got a full pardon by this point as well – I'm just going to throw you right in it for once.

This story is CO-AUTHORED with a dear friend of mine, You Have Been Warned (there's a link on my profile). She's awesome, just hasn't quite found her voice yet – I only just managed to get her on fanfiction. We'll probably write alternate chapters. This one's mine, because I already had it written as a starter before I asked her if she wanted to help. We'll mark at the top who wrote the chapter!

Chapter One: Life Starts Now

'I hate to see you fall down
I'll pick you up off of the ground
I've watched the weight of your world come down'

Life Starts Now – Three Days Grace

He was supposed to be in hiding. He was supposed to be too cautious to go out in public, too cautious to get into a situation where more people can see him. Right now there were rumours, whispers that he was back, that he was alive. That waiting was supposed to turn into fear, fear that would only strengthen with time, to the point where people would turn on one another and mistrust would breed in the barracks. Then he'd show himself to the public.

Only the assumption to be able to understand Lord Voldemort's way of thinking was what got people killed. People like Harry Potter.

The ground rumbled and tore apart at the seams as something drove up under the ground and into the air. Sirius Black grabbed his godsons' arm and pulled him down a nearby alleyway.

"That bastard!" He hissed between his teeth, breathless.

"Professor Dumbledore said -" started Harry.

"Exactly. He said Voldemort would lay low. He also said you'd be safe in muggle London. Look where that got us."

Hermione fell past the small chain-link fence that was hiding them from view and into Sirius' awaiting arms, soon followed by Remus Lupin. She had blood on her cheek and a cut that ran the length of her outer arm. She almost sobbed with relief when she saw Harry standing doubled over, catching his breath under the cover of the barely concealed alley. She launched herself out of Sirius' grip and over to her best friend.

"Harry! You're okay! I thought -"

"I know, don't worry about me, I'm fine." He said quickly, holding an arm out to stop her from hugging him.

She swallowed hard, not quite daring to let herself go to the point of relenting to the tears swimming in her eyes. "Ron and... they're..." she started disjointedly. "I lost sight of them! Harry he's here. V- him. He's – I never thought I'd ever..." Sirius squeezed her shoulders.

"Deep breaths, Hermione. It's just the shock. You didn't expect to end up in a fight today; much less one You-Know-Who decided to attend. You're going to be fine. I'll apparate you back and-"

Remus was shaking his head. "Anti-aparation field. They had it planned. We'll have to try to get to Diagon Alley."

Sirius raised his wand, getting ready to go back out into the street. "Did you see where the Weasley's went?"

"Arthur made Molly take Ron and run, Ginny's missing. I'm not so sure where he went after that. Fred and George have managed to get a message to the Ministry, and to Dumbledore. I told them to try to find their way to Diagon Alley but they refuse to leave until we've found Ginny."

Remus scanned the Alley behind them momentarily before pushing Hermione gently in Harry's direction. "You two need to run, go down there, and follow the back streets until you find a crowded area. You need to get to The Leaky Cauldron – you can floo to Grimmauld Place from there."

Harry was already shaking his head. "No… this is my fault, I can't leave. Ginny's out there – what if they killed her, what then?"

Sirius' face slowly paled. "Harry you can't stay here. I know you've seen a lot, and you've fought for your life far more than any 16 year old lad should have to – but this isn't what you're used to. This is warfare. There are 40 Death Eaters out there, and You-Know-Who himself. It was planned – you were supposed to die today Harry, and I'm sorry to say this, but you aren't ready to face that many people at once. You go out there and you will die, Harry."

Hermione held her breath, slowly reaching over to grab Harry's arm reassuringly. "Please, Harry. I know you want to help, but you can't fight this." She caught his eye and held his gaze for a moment as he breathed heavily, adrenaline already pumping through his veins in anticipation of a fight. "Please." She whispered, wide-eyed.

Before he could open his mouth, to relent or otherwise, a flash of red hair caught his eye across the street, through the fence. Two brutish looking Death Eaters had a hold on Ron as he struggled under their grip, blood trailing down from the corner of his mouth and a nasty looking gash marring his arm through his torn right sleeve. Without a seconds thought he had pulled himself out of Hermione's grip, dodged around Remus, away from Sirius' flailing arm and out of their hiding spot into the open.

Two stunners immediately came flying in his direction, followed by a nasty looking purple curse. By the time he had managed to get out of the way of them he had been hit by a slicing curse to the knee, and another to his right arm.

What Professor Dumbledore had told him a month prior, about the prophecy and his fate - his destiny in life, suddenly really hit home. He had to fight Voldemort. And he wasn't ready. He couldn't fight, not now, and not then. Certainly not someone as powerful as Voldemort. On his knees and suddenly surrounded by Aurors, Sirius' words began to ring in his mind.

You will die, Harry

Ron's pain filled cry shattered the thoughts of despair ricocheting through his mind – a new found strength filling him. If he was going down, he was going down protecting his friends. Pushing himself to his feet despite the burning pain in his right leg, he threw a blasting hex at the man to his best friends' right, knocking the other off his feet in the process. With both of them on the floor, he quickly stunned them and pulled Ron out of the way as the Death Eaters that had been on guard nearby came running over, spells flying in their wake.

"What the hell happened?" He managed to yell through the stream of spells he was trying to remember and pull off correctly in a sorry attempt to save his life.

He didn't reply for a few minutes as they finished off the last Death Eater, ducking out behind a wall. "They've got the place surrounded – Mum was trying to make me leave, but I didn't want to leave you lot behind, while I was trying to convince her I could fight, we were attacked by Lestrange. I got carted off over here for 'safe keeping', and mum ended up duelling her. I guess they thought that you'd come out from wherever you were hiding if your friends were in trouble. Have you seen Ginny?" He rattled off in a rush.

"Well, it bloody worked." He winced, not daring to look down at his leg. "I haven't, no. Remus said she was missing."

Ron's ears slowly flushed red as his face went pale. It wasn't until he saw Hermione edge by that he spoke again, pulling her back behind the wall with his hand over her mouth to stop her from screaming. She struggled for only a second before realising who it was that had her. He let go.

"Hermione! Have you seen Ginny?"

She shook her head sadly. "No, Ron, I'm sorry." She grabbed his arm as he made to run back out into the street. "Don't be stupid, he just did that to save your sorry backside, and look where that got him?" She glanced down at Harry's knee and pulled a face. "That looks painful."

He shook his head at her in response, running his hands through his hair desperately. "What are we going to do now?"

"Find the others." She said resolutely, straightening her back. "We need to stick together, follow me – I'll hold up a shield. Be on guard."

They walked out into chaos. In amongst the 25 Death Eaters fighting the ever so slightly outnumbered Aurors, there was a stunned and bound few being carted off out of the way, and what he hoped wasn't the dead body of Kingsley Shacklebott. Voldemort was nowhere to be seen.

Most were too preoccupied to take any notice of them as they ran towards the fallen Order member. Harry slid out from behind the shield momentarily to attempt to revive him with a simple enervate charm. Surprisingly, it worked.

He was on his feet in under ten seconds – bleeding heavily, but alive. A building came to the ground ahead of them in an earth shattering rumble, causing him to pull the three of them away towards a group of Aurors banded with holding the captured Death Eaters. "Harry! What are you still doing here?" He looked to Ron and Hermione with something akin to fear. "You need to leave."

He turned to a nearby Auror, who nodded and grabbed Harrys arm, getting ready to escort him off out of the way of danger, two more soon following with Ron and Hermione.

"This is no place for you three, you will die out there." He said in a grave tone.

Anger bubbled up in his chest, unwilling to just walk away. "They're fighting out there because of me! You can't seriously expect me to just-"

But he wasn't listening. "Get them out of here. Stun them if you have to, just keep them safe."

As he was getting dragged away against his will, for the second time in 20 minutes, a Weasley caught his attention in the crowd of fighting Aurors and he was taken by surprise. Ginny. A man twice her size had hold of both of her arms. Emboldened, she stomped on his foot and managed to twist her way out of his grip, kneeing him in the groin purposefully in the process. He waited for her to stun him, but the moment never came.

As he began to subconsciously struggle out of the Aurors grip, he heard Hermione's voice behind him. "Stun him, now, before I do – he won't give up, and I love him too much to see him die."

They hadn't seen it. Not yet. No one had. Why wasn't she using her wand? He saw her stumble back to where fire from a nearby building hand bled out into the street, catching her hand. The pain on her face was so incandescent that he could almost feel it. Before he even realised what he was doing he was by her side, saving the second Weasley of the day. He had stunned the Death Eater before he even got there, suddenly finding himself in a crowd of people throwing spells, opposite a girl so strong, that even in agony, she had a face of stone.

It rippled ever so slightly as he glanced at her bleeding hand, gasping and swallowing hard in an attempt not to cry with the pain of it. She was squeezing her wrist so tight her knuckles had gone white. "They took my wand." She said, so softly he barley heard it over the roaring noise around them, her voice shaking with repressed distress.

The tremor of fear that went through him as she said those words was doubled as his scar began to tingle. Only that tingle turned into an ache, and then into a severe pounding that drummed in time with his thundering heart as the inevitable closed down on them. Nearby Death Eaters had turned to cast spells to weaken him in the wake of their master finally coming out to play.

A particularly strong severing curse sliced across Harry's side, the tail catching Ginny's stomach as she tried to move out of the way. Her entire body froze in fear as she saw who he had been waiting for over his shoulder. He turned in time to see Voldemort pull a twisted smile, nodding to someone to his right. A sickly pink spell hit him in the chest before he could react, and for a moment – nothing happened.

Then his heart stopped for a second as what felt like a knife tore through his chest. Ginny was by his side, holding him up, keeping him strong, even through her fear. The moment Voldemort set his eyes on her, and that horrible glare fixed onto his face, Harry knew what was going to happen next.

"Avada Kedavra!"

He didn't even think twice about doing it, not really. Something about the pain in his chest told him he was going to die in the next few seconds of his life anyway. So he turned with what last little bit of physical strength he had and grabbed Ginny, holding her tightly and keeping his back to the curse as it struck him instead of her.

He didn't even feel it hit, only the pain in his chest intensifying and coming to a climax as everything went the darkest shade of black he'd ever seen.

You will die, Harry

'All this pain
Take this life and make it yours.
All this hate take your heart and let it love again.
You will survive it somehow'