Nocturn Core (Abridged)

I was walking along some train tracks. I was some sort of duck… Joining me in my travels were a chicken and a cat. We heard a train coming, but we didn’t know which way to look until it zoomed out of a nearby tunnel and nearly flattened us! We waited for it to go back through the tunnel in the other direction – the tracks were set in a loop behind us – before walking through it. On the other side of the tunnel was the Dragon Ridge. The mountains were jagged and unforgiving, and some of them looked as though recent rock slides had buried sections of vegetation. The other animals turned into Nicole (the cat that was not a cat) and Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander (the chicken that was not a chicken). Nicole pointed out a heart-shaped rock high above us. It lay on the summit of a smaller mountain. We had to be close to Naven, she said. We climbed over a hill of loose rocks; they were so finely grained that Zedd got his feet stuck in them like quicksand. On the other side of the hill, we found a lone cottage. When we entered the building, I knew immediately that evil had made this place its home. The interior was an exact replica of my grandparents’ house. I sat down in the dining room with a sign that read “Yeah!” in bold, red letters. Before long, Voldemort entered the house. I was fortunate this time… He went straight to the back door and exited onto the patio. He came back in through the front door almost immediately after, went to the back door again, and… This time, he turned around. Our eyes met. He glided across the dining room with his black cloak billowing as though a violent storm was stirring up inside the building. His hand clasped the wand sitting on the table. Immediately, he fired a volley of spells at me. I repeated his words, tossing the same spells back.

“Expelliarmus!” My wand popped out of my hand. Crap. “Crucio!” I fell to the ground, effectively paralyzed. I didn’t feel any pain, though. Voldemort put a foot on my leg and stood over me with his wand pointed at my heart. He smiled. Slowly, he pronounced the name of the killing curse. “Avada… kedavra…” A green bolt of energy shot out of his wand and bounced off my body. Voldemort’s face contorted. “What?! Why can’t I ever kill you?!”

“Because love is forever, stupid,” I said. I shot him with the same spell several times in succession before he finally died. I was glad I was able to protect Zedd and Nicole from harm.