Fanfic Bootcamp

Entry Five - Commander: Harry Potter And The Earthquake-Induced Tsunami

Panic. There was nothing but panic in the Gryffindor bedroom where Harry Potter still lay fast asleep.

"Get up, Harry! Get up!" Ron grabbed Harry by his shoulders, his face struck with panic. He shook him, hard. With difficulty, he managed to wake up the tired boy.

"Wha- What's going on?" Harry blindly grabbed his glasses off of his bedside table. Only then he noticed how everything seemed to be shaking. Lights flickered on and off, the chandeliers swinging from the ceiling. Debree fell down, nearly hitting Neville. The clock on his table told him it was twenty past three.

"We have to go, there's an earthquake!" Ron shrieked. Harry didn't believe what he was hearing. An earthquake? Here, in the Highlands of Scotland? He didn't believe it, though the shaking did imply there was something going on.

Harry shoved his sheets off of him, grabbing his shoes.

"There's no time! Come on!" Ron yelled. Neville was the last to leave the boys bedroom, his screams echoing as he ran down. Instead of his shoes, he put on his slippers

Harry grabbed his wand and followed Ron down. They caught a glimpse of how the last students slipped through the door. Harry and Ron quickly followed.

"Come on!" Ron shouted as he rushed down the stairs. Harry's eye caught the walls, where only a few pictures remained. One picture was hanging on by a thread and fell when Harry was only down the first set of stairs. The person in the painting shrieked with pure horror. Harry couldn't hear it reach the ground due to the trembling walls. He swallowed and quickly followed Ron.

They easily caught up with the rest of Gryffindor, mixed with students from Ravenclaw, too. The ground stopped shaking after a while. Harry didn't dare to believe those were the last rumbles. 

"Ron! Harry!" A girl shouted. After scanning the running people, Ron caught a glimpse of wild hair. " Hermione!" he shouted. She waited for her friends to catch up, and grabbed both of their wrists and held them in a tight grasp.

 "We have to get out of here!" Hermione shouted and immediately dragged them down the stairs.

"Watch out!" Someone shouted, pointing upwards. Hermione looked, noticing a big chunk of stairs falling their way, lifted her wand and shouted, "Expulso!" A blast was heard,  and the stone turned into rubble as it fell down on them in tiny dust particles. Ron stared bewildered at Hermione, who didn't so much as flinch and continued their way down the stairs.

Teachers were pushing students towards the exit. They were about to be pushed into the same direction by Professor Sprout when Harry caught a quick glance of the lake. In early November, the lake wasn't frozen shut yet, and it revealed a muddy soil of what once was the bottom of the lake.

He stared at the way they were lead. "We have to go the other way!" He shouted and took his two classmates by his arm.

"No, Potter! The other way!" Professor Sprout shouted at the three young teenagers. "The lake!" Harry shouted over his shoulder, " It's withdrawing! The waves are going to hit Hogwarts!" 

With that, they ran ahead, avoiding falling concrete and rubble. They quickly found their way to the bridge, to which all three's surprise, was still intact. They stared at each other as they stopped dead at the beginning of the bridge. Their loud breathing was the only sound they could still hear.

"What are we waiting for? Let's go!" Harry shouted and started running again. Ron and Hermione followed immediately. They were only halfway when the ground started shaking again. This time, it was harder than the one before. 

"Don't stop, it might collapse!" Hermione shouted as she tried to stay straight. It was difficult to run when everything around them was shaking. The wooden structure groaned beneath their feet. Slates fell down of the roof above them, one hitting Harry's arm and leaving a big gash. Blood was dripping down his arm, but Harry didn't seem to notice. All he wanted is to get to higher grounds.

They managed to get off the bridge in time, as it collapsed right after Ron put his foot on the grassy soil. The sound was terrifying, as the wood finally gave in and fell hundreds of meters down. They stared in disbelief at the empty space where once was the bridge. They could only hope that there was no one on that bridge.

The ground beneath them was shaking, but slightly less than before. " We have to continue," Harry urged. "We have to go!" 

Instead of running down the hill, they ran along it. It was a rough pathway with a lot of loose soil, but it leads upwards to the back of the castle where they needed to be. " Harry, your arm!" Hermione exclaimed with worry sounding through her voice, " You're hurt!" 

"I'll look at it later," He shouted back. "We'll have to get to higher grounds first!" 

The cold November breeze cut right through Harry and Ron's thin flannel pajamas. In their hurry, they had forgotten to grab their robes. Hermione, clever as always, had hers on. Despite that, her teeth were rattling. Harry had lost one of his slippers halfway up, his sock soaking wet of the wet grass. Besides them, Hogwarts was slowly crumbling. What once was their tower, collapsed and fell into the deep valley that separated them and their former castle. " Oh no..." Ron mumbled, feeling sorry for the situation right next to him.

The ground stopped shaking again. Both three students felt as if they had been drinking too much butterbeer, the way they continued their climbing up the hill.

They soon reached the highest point, as high as what once was the astronomy tower. And they stared down. A gigantic wave was busy on its uprising. They couldn't see the students or the staff from here.

"Are we the only ones left?" Ron asked quietly while he was catching his breath. Neither Hermione or Harry answered that.

The wave was slowly building up, reaching it's highest point quickly as it steered towards Hogwarts. The sound of the wave crashing into Hogwarts was deafening.

Harry's breath caught in his throat as he stared in disbelief at the blunt force of nature crashing down upon his home. Hermione covered her mouth as the tears streamed down her face. A shriek of horror slipped through her lips. Ron just stared, his mouth slightly open, his eyes wide of pure horror.

The wave crashed through the castle, tearing down almost everything on its way. The wave came crashing down in the valley, where it crashed and made a new river. And with that, it was over.

Only a few walls and towers had remained, while the water seeped through the cracks. 

That was it. Hogwarts was gone.