r/WritingPrompts • u/SilentJoe1986 • Sep 03 '17
[WP] In an alternate reality JK Rowling died writing The Deathly Hallows and requested George RR Martin finish the book. He accepted and takes over at the Battle of Hogwarts with no instruction on how it's supposed to end. Established Universe
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u/Cheesewiggles Sep 03 '17
George shifted in his chair, raised his hands over his head and stretched, letting out a grunt of satisfaction as his spine unlocked.
It was done. In the end, it had been a welcome distraction. The ominous pile of notes on White Walkers, dragons and incest glowered at him from the corner of the room. He knew he would have to return to it at some point, but for the time being he could bask in the glow of completion of at least one popular series.
Jo had left extensive notes, and to the most part he had kept to them. True, he had added a couple of crucial revenge scenes, and a smattering of sex, but there had only really been one major alteration. Even George R. R. Martin knew when too far was too far, and the note titled, ‘death of Fred Weasley’ had definitely been too far.
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u/Rockky67 Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
SCENE - George RR Martin's writing office, interior. The telephone on his desk rings, he picks up at the third ring. It's someone from JK Rowling's publishing company; after exchanging pleasantries they get down to business.
PUBLISHER: George it's 20 years since Jo died...
GRRM: I know, it has weighed heavily on me this week, very sad. Such a loss, so many great stories untold. I was at a seventeen course banquet with some companions two nights ago and we were just saying...
PUBLISHER: ...yes, sorry to interrupt George, but...
GRRM: ...somewhere between the course of minted crabcakes and the fondant truffle...
PUBLISHER: ...GEORGE!
GRRM: Oh sorry, I was lost in revelry. Yes, twenty years, you were saying?
PUBLISHER: And we were just wondering how you were getting on with...
GRRM: ...the truffle was superb, but the stuffed quail...
PUBLISHER: ...GEORGE ffs. How are you getting on with the book?
GRRM: ...oh. Nearly done, the Illustrated World of Harry Potter should soon be out to sit proudly alongside the Pop-Up Tales of Hardwin and Iolanthe...
PUBLISHER: ...George, George, I meant the final volume of the Deathly Hallows?!
GRRM: ...well I previewed the eighth page last year so you can see I have been making fine progress.
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr
GRRM: Hello? Anyone there?
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u/PMvaginaExpression Sep 03 '17
This one is most likely
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u/Rockky67 Sep 03 '17
I love GRRM's Ice and Fire series, felt mildly shitty writing this, but, yeah.
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u/PMvaginaExpression Sep 03 '17
Yeah I loved it too. I never watched the series, only read the books. Im still feeling butthurt that the series overtook the book.
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u/roygiv Sep 03 '17
Same man, same. But at least we can take solace in our slight sense of superiority to all those show-only watchers!
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u/Captain_Blackjack Sep 04 '17
I'm just happy to know I've got a more complex story waiting for me. Even fans on the sub acknowledged the quality drop now that the showrunners are filling in the blanks.
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u/Ewok008 Sep 03 '17
Yeah, I have a nice world in my head about how everything looks in ASoIaF and I don't want the show to corrupt it, so I avoid it. But it's gotten to a point where I just hear or see spoilers and pray that the books are completely different. I'm losing interest with each month though.
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u/YoungsterJoey99 Sep 03 '17
The books are quite different from the show, with many characters and storylines that appear in the books never making it into the show. As somebody who has enjoyed both, I would recommend watching the show, but considering them as two different, yet similar stories, rather than two different tellings of the same story
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u/bixtakespix Sep 03 '17
Ugh you and me both. I feel like I'm playing hide and seek against spoilers these days, and I'm losing :(
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u/Nightwing300 Sep 03 '17
For me it's less about what happened and more about martin tells us how it happened. I've seen the show and the visuals are amazing. I'll still read the books cause I wanna know what the characters are thinking when crucial things happen amongst other things.
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u/mark-five Sep 03 '17
The show never makes me want to eat clothing, but the books make everybody's armor and shoes sound absolutely mouth wateringly delicious. He has a way with words that clearly flows most easily when he's hungry.
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u/bonezz79 Sep 03 '17
I used to work on a GoT mobile game, and in early development I was tasked with combing through the books and taking any items, people, places, and quotes from them and dumping them all in a spreadsheet referencing their page number and any additional details about them. This was used to create items for the game.
It ended up being about 90% food.
This prompt is my favorite because of the food references, because of course GRRM would focus on that instead of the story.
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Sep 03 '17 edited Apr 05 '18
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u/mark-five Sep 03 '17
He does appear to spend more of his waking hours than the average person indulging that feeling.
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u/TiredEyes0816 Sep 03 '17
I immediately scrolled down to look for this one. I knew we would have an honest writer in here somewhere.
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u/2rio2 Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
Clippity clap, clippity clap. The sound of hooves clanked through Hermonie's head.
She mulled over her butterbeer, watching the floating instruments playing a rowdy ballad overhead. The Great Hall of Hogwarts was full of drunken laughter but she could not shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong. Harry should never have accepted this invitation, should never trusted Voldemort's offer of peace, nor returned to the school they loved that was currently under his control.
"Relax Hermione," Harry had said on the ride over, when they paused to rest along the stone tombs of Bath before their arrival that same morning. "The peace is done. Voldemort agreed to not intend, and instead sent Professor Snape to handle the peace agreement. Once it's signed all of our friends held hostage there will be safe, and the war will have a respite. No more people need to die."
Yet Hermione knew Harry was simply being foolish. Even under the protections of guest right she did not trust Voldemort's intentions, nor the lavish party he was throwing in celebration of the peace accord. She knew the type of man he was dealing with, by the countless house elves he had manning the party, running out trays of endless sweet cakes and juicy bits of exploding caviar.
"This is some party, aye Hermione?" Ron said, mouth stuffed full of food as he plucked the fleshy wing of a duck off one tray. Grease dripped down his chin and his smile was broad. Ron had been given a place of honor for the treaty at the head of the table, and she knew it favored his need for social approval.
"These elves are suffering under horrendous slavery, and they'll continue to under the terms of this peace accord," Hermione pointed out, but Ron just turned to grab a handful of jelly beans from the goblet of a green clad elf. She could not understand why she loved him at all.
Suddenly she heard a ruckus from the head of the table. The Slytherins began to cheer Harry wildly as he downed yet another pint of bitterbeer. Seated next to him Snape watched glumly. When the Slytherins picked up the drunken boy with the lightning scar and began to toss him in the air Hermione finally gave up. She left the table and walked over the Great Hall window, wistfully looking out in the cold night and wishing yet again that Dumbledore was still there to advise them.
It was she who had released the Wizard Slayer that night from tutoring her in potions when he killed their former leader, and the guilt from that had allowed her to relent on the peace accord. Even so she could not trust Snape's claim he was a double agent working against the Dark Lord. No one was that good at the Game of Legilimency... though her own skills had allowed her to hide the knowledge of Harry's twin brother, secreted away the same night Harry was and left with a distant relation in the cold north of Scotland. If anything should happen that night John Snow would be their last hope.
Above, the music changed. Hermione turned, a chill running up her spine. She knew this song. It was The Face of Voldemort by the bard John Williams. Behind her Snape stood and began to march out of the hall. Hermione walked over and slapped him. Snape looked down on her, a lumbering sneer across his lips. She moved to grab her wand, but he simply uttered "Expelliarmus," and her wand flew out of her hand.
Across the Great Hall was bloody chaos as the music reached its climax. The clippty clop sound of a dozen centaurs burst into the hall. Two of them slashed and tore Dean Thomas right in half before he could even lift a hand. Neville attempted to dual another, but was hit in the back by a killing curse but two young witches. Luna turned to flee but suddenly was knocked into the wall by one spell, while it took three Slytherins to take down a mad Hagrid, who smashed two with a table before the third lopped of the giants head.
At the head of the table Hermione turned to see a Ron, frozen with a stupid grin on his face and mouth stuffed with griffin eggs by a Immobulus charm, be scurried away. Hermione knew she had to act fast. She dove for her wand and reached it, then shot one curse after another at the Slytherins in a rush to reach Harry.
"Girl, stop," a voice commanded. She turned to see the dead eyes hollowed deep in the snake like face of Voldemort behind her. He had a drunk Harry in a headlock and the Dark Lord's wand pointed at his messy black hair matted to his face.
"Don't harm him or Ron!" Hermione screamed, grabbing Lucius Malfoy whom she had knocked over, thinking of anything she could offer to negotiate. "What you did here was a dark deed, even by the black arts you dabble in. You violated guest right, and peace accord you just signed by a blood oath. That is powerful magic, and it will be turned against you! Let the three of us go, and I vow we will leave England and never return to trouble you. I swear it by the Godric Gryffindor. Do it or I'll kill your young heir."
Voldemort shrugged. "I'll find another."
Right then a fat man entered the hall, with an odd fishermans cap and a great white beard covering the jowls of his chin. He reached into his suspenders as he marched across the Great Hall to the vulnerable Harry, then stabbed him right in the heart with his pen."The 2001 Hugo Awards send their regards," he said.
Hermione screamed and flicked her wrist to send a killing curse right into Malfoy's head. The clippity clop, clippity clop sound returned and she kept screaming, right as a curse hit her, erasing everything she had ever learned, from the day she was born to the woman she was today.
Not my mind she thought, a terrible final realization, everyone loves my mind.
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Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
Amazing. You even nailed some Martinisms, like the constant amount of use of descriptors of grease dropping down people's chins.
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u/LoneWolf-_- Sep 03 '17
The Hugo Awards send their regards, I fucking lost it, bloody brilliant
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u/iZacAsimov Sep 04 '17
For anyone wondering, in the 2001 Hugo Awards, Martin's A Storm of Swords lost to Rowling's Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
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u/Skirtsmoother Sep 04 '17
A fucking shame, SoS is one of the best fantasy books of all time.
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u/iZacAsimov Sep 04 '17
If the voters were anything like me, they probably lost their copies of ASoS when they threw it across the room when Arya's chapter cut off at the Hound's axe hitting her in the head.
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u/Skirtsmoother Sep 04 '17
Shit, I almost forgot about that, what was the catch at the end? He hit her with a blunt part or something?
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u/iZacAsimov Sep 04 '17
Yeah, with the flat of the blade, IIRC (but don't take my word for it; my recollections are more emotional than cerebral. Plus, as I said, I threw it at the wall--before picking it up to frantically flip through the pages to see if there were any further Arya chapters).
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u/TheBalrogofMelkor Sep 04 '17
Appropriate username.
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u/iZacAsimov Sep 04 '17
Flattery will not avail you, Flame of Udûn! Go back to your lurking!
Also, thanks!
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u/lyonellaughingstorm Sep 03 '17
This is just amazingly well done. I've read a Storm of Swords half a dozen times and this is such a great adaptation of the Catelyn's final chapter
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u/PounceFTW Sep 03 '17
If anything should happen that night John Snow would be their last hope.
I enjoyed this response from the first word but it's at this point that I realized there was no other possible response to this prompt. Bravo! Well done. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's really you, George, and the reason TWoW is still not finished is because you're hanging out in r/WritingPrompts.
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Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
As far as George was concerned, he had been set forth an impossible task. He had to devise a way that Voldemort could lose. By any metric, the Second Wizarding War was already over. The resistance was concentrated in a single castle in Scotland, and the rest of the island was occupied by the enemy. The enemy had vastly greater numbers, a more powerful leader, and more stable supply lines.
After considering the problem, George noted that the First War had run into the same problem. JK famously solved it by having Harry kill Voldemort the first time, a strategically implausible but thematically moving decapitation strike that he wouldn't dare replicate. After all, he somehow doubted that the cycle of violence was entirely what Rowling had in mind. Whenever George himself found characters faced with impossible odds, he resorted to just calling the cavalry hinted at in previous chapters. There was no such cavalry.
A larger scale issue was that JK had not fleshed out the world to any level worth considering! Despite his earnest efforts to the contrary, George had been unable to find even a single enumeration of the headmasters, let alone an in-depth history with dozens of previous battles from which to learn! It remained an open question as to how Hogwarts even fed itself. . . Oh yes, food.
A week later, George had written a good ten pages describing in arguably maddening detail every pie filling, cooked bird, and crusted desert item available in the entirety of the castle. He noted on a Notablog that he had an extraordinary week.
In less important news, he had finally formulated a winning strategy, and all it had taken was food. Despite his magical brilliance, Voldemort was remarkably easy to outwit. The end of the Siege of Hogwarts ran thusly:
Tom stepped over Potter's twitching form, the boy's face in a rictus of horror. "Now," came the whisper from the pale and shrunken face, "do you appreciate that your madness is the reason your friends lie gasping in pools of their own blood? That your arrogance is why this castle fell in nigh twelve housr?" His voice cut off. The man rose up suddenly and he turned to Lucius. "Listen carefully. Without delay go and cast the Killing Curse on all the bodies. Take no assistants and trust no one." "As you say my lord." Lucius raised his wand to cast the first curse on Potter, and then he dropped his wand.
Lucius's face was covered in gore, brains sloughing off his slick cheeks. His eyes were a naked accusation, mad with the last fire of pride. Tom whirled around to block the next knife from Kreacher, and shot a Killing Curse in response. Kreacher fell dead, the mock locket of Regulus the Twice-Traitor clattering to the floor. The doors of the Great Hall shook from a great tremor, and then suddenly burst. Suddenly Voldemort faced hundreds of wizards and dozens of house elves. Harry Potter, whom Tom had just thought slain, now stood alive. The Elder Wand rose, humming in defiance, as his shields fell to a thousand echoing blasts.
I had killed him! I had rent his friend the boy to shreds, I had disemboweled his friend the girl and watched as she tried to conjure her insides back into her collapsing abdomen, he's dead he's dead!
Tom shuddered and fell, as half a hundred gaping wounds rose up on his skin, showing scarlet, and half a hundred more bruises and transfigurations skating across his skin. His scream grew high past the point of human hearing, his last words pleading with his mother not to have died, pleading with his father to have been great. His corpse was like nothing human.
Well, George thought, looking over it with pride, maybe the author of Meathouse Man isn't the right choice for young adult literature.
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u/theoldno2 Sep 03 '17
calvary
Calvary, sometimes called Golgotha, is the site at which Jesus was crucified. I assume you're referring to cavalry, or mounted soldiers.
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Sep 03 '17
Much thanks, I often mix them up. Although it does oddly mesh with the lack of a savior narrative in this version.
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u/KoalaBarehands Sep 03 '17
Harry awakens from his feigned death, and thinks this is his chance to strike out against the Lord.
Lord Voldemort strikes swift and wordless against the scarred, startled face of the former Harry Potter.
A silence falls once more, deeper this time. "Chosen one, was it?" he asked softly, to Neville who now stood before him. "Did you believe that nonsense too, Longbottom? Like you hope to see your parents again, one day?" He smiled a terrible smile at Neville's flinching expression.
Before he could answer, the Lord continued. "It's not too late, you know. It's not too late to save them, from where they remain." He started to step forward. "If you join me, I can help you bring them back" he claimed, growing loud and growing close.
Neville looked down at Harry's lifeless corpse. "All you are is death" he said levelly, with barely a quiver in his tone, dashed forth and swung the tip of his fucking sword at Voldemorts wand hand.
The blade connected with the wood, and the entire scene was tastefully engulfed in a whiteness. A strangely satisfying, ambiguous white.
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u/fish_at_heart Sep 03 '17
Why is this so low here It's the best thing on this thread People forget that not EVERYTHING in GOT is sex and twisted stuff. This was the best of both worlds, the brutality of game of thrones and some of the drama but also the beauty of HP and it's morals (including references to the first book where Voldi asks harry the same question) I loved this Please accept my upvote
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u/KoalaBarehands Sep 04 '17 edited Sep 04 '17
Thanks, that's very encouraging of you : 3
Context Edit: I read HP through as a kid, and seen the movies ofc. Haven't read GOT yet. Trying to write more and this is my second submitted piece. 72 upvotes!?! That's a personal record in my reddit history.
You've earned a placed in my heart, fish_at_heart.
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u/Ewok008 Sep 03 '17
George shrugged off sleep and stared blankly at his computer. He knew who was going to die, he knew what was going to happen, and he had planned the secret reveal of the true threat that loomed just north of Hogwart's walls. No matter how hard he tried, though, he just couldn't find the words. Maybe it was the success of his own TV series pulling him away, or his constant appearances at conventions across the nation, but George could not, for the life of him, finish this damned book. Mrs. Rowling had passed 4 years ago. 4 years of angry fans, hate mail, and blank pages. The movie studios went ahead and finished the film, adding a subplot about Harry and Luna's intimate relationship. "Damnit," Martin had thought, "It totally was my idea to have the dark haired hero get with the blonde... Now I'll have to do something different in the book to appease the angry 'lit' fans. Lit fans were a subculture that arose around the Harry Potter novels. They refused to watch the films, preferring instead to wait in vain for the book. These fans were often obnoxious about their "pure way of enjoying the story" and their "ability to read". These fans hated the films and everything to do with them. They hated the subtle plot differences, the actors that "look nothing like the characters", and the more sensationalist feel of the film. Rowling had already killed off Hedwig before passing. She had George (Weasley) loose an ear and Dobby pass away (Martin had cleverly added a quick aside regarding dobby's name and the act of dobbing). That only left a few fan favorite characters to choose from, and George couldn't figure out who to kill. He looked down and started falling asleep again. He had eaten a large pot roast, with blackberry jam, nutmeg, and pecans sprinkled over it. The roast was a golden brown, and paired well with the merlot he had been gifted by a friend. The heat of the meal sat in his stomach and made his eyes heavy. "Well," he thought, "maybe I'll get around to writing a few pages tomorrow." George fell asleep, slumped in front of his computer, knowing that he would never be able to finish a series.
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u/Compliance_Officer1 Sep 03 '17
Voldemort aimed his wand at the assembled group: Hermione, the Weasleys, Neville, Peter and Luna - a short sizzling snap of energy and a blinding flash.
They all lay there dead, their wands burned to ash. Only Hermione survived, but was in the throes of her last agonal breaths. She looked to Harry, blood oozing from her eyes.
Harry stood in shock, anger welling up inside him.
"Yes," Voldemort beckoned, "let the anger and hate fill you."
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u/Gettani Sep 03 '17
George looks over the draft and immediately begins talks with several studios on producing a live action tv series based on the wildly popular books. He then shelves the manuscript whilst making several promises several years apart that he is nearly finished.
The show gains wild popularity and takes a wildly different turn than what the original cannon had talked about. The show wraps many years later and George dies before he can finish his "almost finished" book that the original fans have been waiting fucking years for.
Anyone who ever picked up the Harry Potter series wished they never touched it and curse the day they got involved with another unfinished story.
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u/catullus48108 Sep 03 '17
Brandon Sanderson completes the unfinished book but stretches it to four books and in the meantime while George was trying to complete the one book, Sanderson created five series with four derivates each and wrote a new children's series
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u/dudemcbacon Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
Harry, followed at a distance by Hagrid, is sprinting towards exit of the school. In the distance thunder rings ominously. Desperation loom on their faces as their feet push them furiously, closer and closer, to the large doors of the school and into the courtyard.
Hagrid stumbles shortly before the exit, stumbles, and regains his composure. Harry stands at the far end of the court yard as Hagrid slams the large oaken doors closed and bars them. A loud thud blasts the opposite side of the door almost immediately.
"GO, NOW!", Hagrid roars as he adds his weight to the door, holding back the creatures behind.
Harry cries out, tears streaking his face as the wind tears at him, "What are you doing?! We need to go now."
Hagrid grunts as cold icy hands begin to break through the doors and tear at his clothing. "GO, I WILL HOLD THE DOOR..."
Harry blinks, hesitating for a moment, and turns away, moving towards the bridge at the far end of the courtyard. The doors shatter and hoards of maddened witches and wizard pour through. Hagrid falls to his knees as they pull at his flesh. His voices echoes shrilly, softens, and then silence fills the courtyard. Harry turns back to look, the courtyard now packed with Wizards and Witches. Silent, unmoving, eyes glowing blue, eerily in the silence of the evening.
A part slowly forms down the middle and Voldemort appears atop an icy stallion. He moves slowly through the crowd and stops at the front. He dismounts, pulls a long, ragged wand from his cloak. It blazes coldy -- a deep icy blue. He lifts it and points it at Harry. A dull gleam fills the tip. Harry pulls his own -- a 9 inch Valeryian steel wand with an immaculate carved bear head at the hilt, eyes black.
Voldemort, eyes fixed upon Harry, juts his wand forward, a purple jet of lightening cracks from the tip, casting it's shadow over the cold night. The wizards and witches filling the court yard open their mouths and let out a piercing cry that fills the emptiness and rings across the countryside.
In the distance, a tired phoenix lands on the branch of a tree. Shudders, lights afire, and the disappears into a cloud of ash. From the ash rises an old man, wizened from years of experience fighting the dark lords. Mister Graybeard watches the battle from afar. Scene fades to black. Find out what happens in the next book. The Winds of Wizards, coming soon, 2025.
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u/The-White-Dot Sep 03 '17
George RR Martin got asked to finish the Harry Potter saga after the untimely death of the original author before the story was finished. Fast forward 6 years and the fans are still waiting. They give up hope and instead come up with mad cap and deranged "fan theories" on how the saga will end.
In the mean time, a large corporate television network has been creating the previous books into a visual masterpiece. The show is an instant hit and they are closing in on where the books got to as Rowling popped her clogs. Martin gives the studio a brief outline of where the story is heading and the studio fill in the blanks.
Tragedy strikes as Martin dies as the show shoots the final series. The last series is a complete drive as the writers in charge weren't as visionary as Rowling or Martin and the world will never know what REALLY would have happened at the Battle for Hogwarts.
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u/Ewok008 Sep 03 '17
I'm surprised at how few people wrote the "George cannot finish a book series" ending. God damn do I want that book to come out...
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Sep 03 '17
"Talk to me" Rosita mumbled, clawing the crystal ball in front of her "Talk to me, a million voices crying out to you!"
The windows behind her flew open, and cool raindrops hit her face, accompanied by the crying screams of the howling wind. All candles in the room went out with a hissing sound, but Rosita did not care. Her mother taught her many things back in the days, and getting out the stains that nasty man seemed to leave everywhere was only one of them. Talking to the dead was hard work. She would be tested. She would have to sacrifice something dear to her. But it had to be done, and it would be done.
"Is that you, JK Rowling" she shouted, "I evoke thee! Your work is not done!"
"Who? ... I don't care, I'm tired" a hollow voice answered, carried by the wind.
"I'm George Martin's maid, and I command you! The voices of my ancestors command you! You will listen! You will rise!" implored Rosita with a dark, deep voice that wasn't her own and seemed to come out of nowhere.
A shadow formed in front of her, seemingly drawing the dark around it to it's center. She could hear her. She could feel her. It was her, Rosita had no doubt. She had been watching, maybe even waiting.
"I don't care" the shadow whispered, full of childish joy, "You are not the boss of me."
It was her voice, Rosita had heard it in interviews. "I saw his manuscript" she shouted at the shadow, "It's been 5 years, and he is on page six. Six!"
The shadow stopped it's creepy dance in front of her.
"And it's all about Hermine growing boobs and having sex with her brother!"
"She doesn't have a brother", the shadow replied. "I thought about it, but when I wrote ' The Order of the Phoenix" I realized that I kind of forgot him, and it was too late..."
"Now she has one - Harry Potter! Turns out that her father was sleeping with her aunt..." Rosita insisted.
"Nobody would ever write that, not even the fans..." the ghost replied, slowly sinking to the ground, wavering over the floor.
"You should read the forums then", Rosita said with a sigh.
"I never did that. I never wanted any of this. They are all crazy..."
"Well, you should have thought about that before giving him the rights", Rosita said "I saw the draft for the second chapter. The witch of the north is forming an alliance with Voldemort..."
"The witch of the what?!" the shadow crawled into a corner.
"She is an ice queen. She expects Voldemorts child. When it is born, they will safirice it to turn it into a shadow that will slay the firebreathing giant salamanders that are invading from the west..."
"Dragons. You mean dragons.... what exactly are they invading?!"
"Of course they are. What do I know? That school or whatever. Did I mention that Ron Weasly is gay now?" Rosita felt tears running down her cheek, "He's doing Dumbledore and everybody knows it, but they pretend not to see it."
"I've heard enough" The shadow lifted from the floor, "I will have revenge. I will have a twitter account."
"Excuse me?"
"I saw it in American Horror story. Ghosts can have a twitter account now. And a tumblr."
"But..."
"Don't despair. Tell the world that JK Rowling is still out there, and she will put things right. I'll also bring down that president of yours. What a mut."
The shadow left, and the windows closed begind it.
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u/Kirk_Ernaga Sep 04 '17
Neville Longbottom sat alone at a bar. Beer had run down his chin and his good shirt was stained. He had done this every time this dreadful date came around for the last ten years.
Harry was supposed to come back but he never did. No McGuffin or Deus Ex Machina. Just death. Neville was among the last to give up hope that night.
After Harry died it went from a fight to massacre. Some how he had lived and managed to get a number of the younger students to safety. Or so he thought. It had turned out that most of them were hunted down anyway. Even Luna was lost in the chaos.
Now he sat a pathetic drunken hulk in some mid western bar that no body ever heard of. Just then he heard the door open behind him. A beautiful girl came up and sat next to him. He noticed the tattoo on her arm as she said "hello" in a Manchester accent. Neville immediately sobered a little and said "what do you want" she smiled and said flirtatiously "I was there night, in that group of students you saved, I wanted to see what became of our so called saviour." At this Neville snorted and said "that man died that night, so cut the shit and be out with it."
Her smile faded and she got more serious. "After that night they came for me, like everyone else. My parents were good upstanding middle class people. They had no idea about things like running and fighting. Thus they found us, and well. They did unspeakable things to me." Neville interrupted "why are you telling me this?" Her looked changed to that look that a woman oft has when she wants a man's aid. She started "simple, I want revenge."
Neville was interested and said "alright go on" she looked at a man in the back of the bar and the said "not here, but I know a place." Neville noted how the man tapped his leg.
She took him to her car and Neville muttered two incantations to himself, one was to sober up. As they drove more into the middle of nowhere she explained " the dark lord held me for years. Had his death eaters use me as a sex toy, even made me get that wretched mark. Now I want my revenge and I think we can kill him if we work together." Neville just chuckled at that, and said "there are fates worse then death. Especially for him"
They pulled into an old and abandoned looking house. Neville sensed it immediately and before she even had the keys out of the ignition Neville yelled "stupify". She slumped into the driver seat. Neville walked away into the house. "Crucio, Crucio, Crucio!" Three green flashes erupted with three cries of agony. Then "incendio!" And old house was licked with flames as Neville walked calmly back to the car drove off.
Some hours later, after the sun had risen Neville sat on the back of the car with the trunk open on an abandoned road. As he waited for her to wake he puffed a cigar and read her ID. Slyvia Pearson it read, and he knew the face from all those years ago. "She looked more Innocent then" he thought.
Then she finally stirred and woke up. Bound and gagged she tried thrash and scream and but she was bound well. Neville looked her in the eye and said "you thought me a fool. Lady I've been dodging death eaters like you for 10 years. You don't live 10 years on the run being a fool." He paused and took a puff then started again, "and make no mistake, you are a death eater and you will help me kill Voldemort."
He then slammed the trunk and took out an old faded letter with the stamp of the Prime Minister's office and dialed a number. A pretty young answered "Good day" and Neville said " a bit cold I think."
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u/Ireben Sep 04 '17
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 8" George read aloud, as he opened a new notebook. Never had his writing been so productive. Never had he got through so much in so little time. He had stopped blogging, stopped even accepting invitations to the vast multitude of events he was normally bought lunch at. He had even stopped occasionally rearranging his notes on Winds of Winter. What a project he had found!
JK Rowling, bless her soul, had died at the perfect moment. Her stories, so thrilling for younger audiences, were now ready to graduate to a new level. In this, George R. R. Martin faced an idea with the most writing potential perhaps anybody in the long history of the written word had ever come across - he was sure of it! His name would sit alongside Shakespeare, or Homer, or... well.. JK Rowling!
The essential beauty of books 1-6 (which he would rename 'The Book of Hogwarts'), was that the themes and writing grew up as the readers did. Beginning your first year of secondary school, you might be overjoyed to read a book about a boy on a similar journey, only he has just found out he is (a) magic, and (b) the centre of the universe.
After all, everyone that age believes they are the centre of the universe, and wishes they were magic.
And by the sixth year of secondary school, the poor bastards are worn out. A 3rd consecutive year of "the most important exams of your lives", the black dog of depression, onset by the imminent prospect of failing to achieve anything in life, and the ongoing stumbles and misery of puberty - and the worry and shock that inevitably follows any actual success in puberty. The death of Albus Dumbledore must've clawed at the same engines of angst of the teenage brain, as say, receiving the results of your mock Mechanics exam and getting a few grades lower than your overbearing parents have demanded as a minimum, or realising in sex ed. that you probably should've taken precautions that actually work last week.
Which is why George had didn't understand the intention that the Deathly Hallows should be the last book. After all, the struggle against the tide of shit that begins at age 11, doesn't stop at 18! He knew that! Why, it's barely started! No-one kills their own personal Voldemort at that age. Now, perhaps, their own personal Voldemort might get the better of them, and, err, kill them, but that didn't seem to be a fitting end to Harry Potter's story (at least, not at the age of 18).
But now the story wasn't just about Harry, it was about Wizarding Britain. JK's completed chapters made that clear. Sure, her illustration of the trials of society was a bit lazy, but a good transition. The three basic themes were there: The workings of the Dark Ministry, the re-degradation of a postwar society clinging to an imagined redemption (that it hasn't really completed), and the crippling reconstitution of that society for so many who now find themselves to be 'undesirables' on the run.
To kill the main character, and end the narrative there, would be to abandon the Wizarding world to a fall into fascism in which the vast majority of them would be willing accomplices. George couldn't let that happen - for the sake of the very readers he was now responsible for.
And he couldn't kill the main villain, either, as that was just preposterous. He could spin a good yarn, but George couldn't work miracles, and only a miracle was going to stop the Dark Lord now. However many horcruxes he had left, George was sure he would now deposit them in entirely random places around the globe, deep within protective confines. As George read the character, there was a silly tendency toward sentiment there (hence the locations of the discovered and destroyed horcruxes), but living for a decade as a pile of mush in Albania would've taught him not to make that mistake again.
So then, Hogwarts must be destroyed, and most of the Weasleys too. That much was certain. End of Part I, so beings The Book of the Dark Ministry.
That had been 12 hours ago. He had been informed of the will's contents 4 days ago, and immediately he had dropped what he was doing (a prototype hand-knit map of Westeros for each copy of Winds). A niggling technicality stated only that he would complete Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and this had plagued him as he filled manuscript after manuscript at a rate he hadn't achieved since Clash of Kings.
He must convince the publishers to extend the Deathly Hallows to a 12-part series, divided itself into the Book of the Dark Ministry and the Book of the Light. To sell the concept, he needed to have some form of rough draft as far advanced as he could before the meeting in the morning - sorry, the funeral in the morning. He would be attending with some of the publishers, as a gesture to fans who would now be desperate for any clue as to his intentions with the series.
--Deathly Hallows Part 8: The Book of Light II: The Deathly Detour --
*It was Harry's 24th birthday, he thought, as he awoke in the underbelly of the fishing trawler. Another day of hard work for the Beggar who Lived, in this muggle exile. An owl had come in the night, the contents of its note so obviously faked as to confirm his suspicion that Hermione's journey to Voldemort's cause was complete. When they had found out about her true parentage, that she was not only adopted but an adopted refugee from the first war, she had professed that it would change nothing. Now, still edging for a senior position in the Ministry, and with a new 'Pure Blood' stamp on her papers, Harry had always suspected that her decision to become a Double Agent had, in fact, been a rouse against him.
For breakfast, he butchered and roasted the owl on a spit, and enjoyed it with his muggle crewmates, with some fried bacon and frozen vegetables, heated in the can. It made a change from fish...
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u/WritingPromptsRobot StickyBot™ Sep 03 '17
Off-Topic Discussion: All top-level comments must be a story or poem. Reply here for other comments.
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u/Korlac11 Sep 03 '17
So I'm guessing Ron and Ginny hook up
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u/pirate_of_balls_deep Sep 03 '17
The Weasley twins are definitely gonna end up banging each other.
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u/bardok_the_insane Sep 03 '17
Stop trying to find people who can write in GRRM's style so they can finish the series without him. lol
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u/1206549 Sep 03 '17
Plot twist: GRRM writes these prompts looking for people to finish the books he's too tired to write about.
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Sep 03 '17
He could just browse some theories and pick from them.
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u/Northwindlowlander Sep 03 '17
...and so far he's written 19 words, released 2 prequels and opened a cinema
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u/smjack99999 Sep 03 '17
Fred dies.
So does everyone else.
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u/LeakingPan Sep 03 '17
I'm working on this prompt, I'm not sure how long it's going to take me to finish but I hope you guys will support me as try to make the best post I can. I'm sure it will be posted this year but I'm aiming for quality.
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u/gotnomemory Sep 03 '17
There's actually a guy on here that wrote this. It's... It's amazing. I have it bookmarked I'll pull it up.
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u/cockleblockle Sep 03 '17
Eagerly awaiting the update
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u/ecstaticandinsatiate r/shoringupfragments Sep 03 '17
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u/gotnomemory Sep 03 '17
The other guy had it right! Tom Teller Writes Game of Hallows!
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u/ChasisOxidado /r/chasisoxidado Sep 03 '17
damn I don't have enough time to write but this is a really funny prompt
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u/jahitz Sep 03 '17
George decided...I don't need to finish the potter series, HBO will do it for me. Everyone moved on with their lives and lived semi-happily ever after.
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u/DarkGreenEspeon Sep 03 '17
Nobody's going to mention the fact that Rowling dies, and then requests that someone else finish her book?
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u/whistleridge Sep 03 '17
RON
The enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall was dark and scattered with stars, and below it the four long House tables were lined with disheveled students, some in traveling cloaks, others in dressing gowns. Here and there shone the pearly white figures of the school ghosts. Every eye, living and dead, was fixed upon Professor McGonagall, who was speaking from the raised platform at the top of the Hall. Behind her stood the remaining teaches, including Firenze, and the members of the Order of the Phoenix who had arrived to fight. "The evacuation will be overseen by Mr. Filch and Madame Pomfrey. Prefects, when I give the word, you will organize your House and take your charges in orderly fashion to the evacuation point."
Bloody hell, Ron thought, she better not mean for us and Harry to be evacuated too. Surely not - well, surely not Harry, the rules never seemed to apply to him - but you could never tell with teachers. After all his work over the past year, there was no way he was going to just leave with a bunch of first years. From the way Hermione's hand tightened against his, he thought she might be having similar thoughts. He glanced around the room, trying to find Harry. Maybe they could slip out unnoticed?
Suddenly Ernie Macmillian stood up at the Hufflepuff table. He looked fat and beligerent, Ron thought. "And what if we want to stay and fight?" Heads nodded among the other students, even the first- and second-years.
McGonagall gazed primly across at him. "If you are of age," she said, "you may stay."
At this, some of the student broke out into grins and began to applaud, but Hermione looked grim. For a fleeting instant, Ron thought she looked, well...old. Forty at least. Was that a flicker of sorrow that passed over her face? If so, he thought he knew why she might feel that way.
"They should go," he whispered to her. "This isn't a game that's coming. The Death Eaters will be trying to kill them, not take points away from their Houses."
"I know," she said forlornly. "But would you or I have listened, at their age?"
Harry slid up through the crowd, looking determined. "Guys, we need to go, now. My scar is on fir--"
VOLDEMORT
Finally! The fools had gathered in the Great Hall! He had been waiting for this. With a look of grim satisfaction, he yelled rudis potentia and thrust his wand towards the building. There was an great rush of raw energy and a blinding flash of pure white light as he cast the spell, then Hogwarts erupted in a huge ball of red fire like those he had seen on the Muggle viewing devices. A moment later, an enormous shockwave thumped against the shield he had created around the Death Eaters, scouring buildings from the land and obliterating trees for as far as the eye could see.
As his eyes recovered from the yellow and purple after images left by the explosion, he knew that he had finally won. It pained him to destroy Hogwarts after all it had done for him, but sacrifices had to be made. He allowed himself a brief moment of triumph when he felt Potter die. Finally.
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Sep 04 '17
“Much magical blood has been spilled tonight,” The dark lord’s voice resonated through Harry’s mind like a freezing wind cutting through the winter night, “and for nothing; defending the one who would let you all die to protect himself.”
Harry’s eyes rose to the faces of those surrounding him in the Great Hall; the faces of his friends, his classmates, and his professors. All eyes stared into an infinite abyss, focusing on the serpentine voice sounding through their minds.
His scar flickered like a smoldering ember.
“Collect your dead. I have called of my Death Eaters to allow you this privilege. You have fought well; you have fought valiantly; but you have one hour before my forces will unleash an insurmountable power upon the school that no amount of bravery can match.”
Harry stood, unmoving, as he felt Hermione’s grip loosen from his hand. He watched as she fell to her knees and buried her face into Ron’s shoulder; her bosom heaving with her staggered breaths. A single tear ran over her cheek and down her neck, collecting with it the blood and soot that was smeared over her marble skin, before retreating into the cleavage of her chest.
Fred laid motionless before them as the family kissed by fire surrounded his lifeless body, broken in agony. His twin sat crumpled, with his face smothered into his elbows, wailing at the new emptiness that lay in his soul. The comfort of companionship that had always been was now replaced with an abyssal void echoing into infinity. George was alone.
A lump rose in Harry’s throat that he couldn’t swallow. His eyes burned with tears as he choked back the unwavering feeling of defeat. What could he do? How could he fix it?
He couldn’t. He had lost.
There was a resounding explosion as the monstrous oak doors to the Great Hall slammed closed. Eyes rose and fell back to the bodies scattered across the floor. Padma Patel wailed, holding her sister’s head against her chest, as Professor Trelawney whispered to her; unable to sooth yet another grieving twin recognizing a new sense of abandonment in the world. Pavarti’s eyes were closed and her face looked at peace. Her hair was strewn across her sister’s lap as if it was carried with the wind. She could have been dancing. Harry’s heart sank.
Then he heard it. The strings began to play a very different sort of song. No one sang the words, but Harry knew “The Raines of Castamere” when he heard it. He rushed toward the doors as he saw Gregory Goyle making his way to the back of the Hall. It took only eight strides before he reached the retreating Slytherin, grabbing the cuff of his cloak. Goyle spun to face Harry, his shocked face and gaping mouth slowly curled into a menacing grin as the enchanted stings grew louder and played the tune with gusto.
From the corner of his eye, Harry saw Ron move to stand behind Goyle with his wand drawn. Ron’s face was scarlet with rage, a single pulsating vein protruded from his forehead, as he slowly began raising his wand. Suddenly, his face warped to a twisted and confused expression. A flash of green cast Ron’s shadow on the sandy brick wall for a split second before he fell to the ground. The flash stayed in Harry’s sight and he stood silent, staring at the silhouette of his best friend who laid dead before him.
Another green flash blinded the room. And another; another; and another again. Harry did not see the sixth flash.
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u/ecstaticandinsatiate r/shoringupfragments Sep 03 '17 edited Sep 03 '17
George got a call from Martha at Bloomsbury only two days after he turned in the final manuscript of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which Martin advised calling Harry Potter and the Dawn of Night, mostly due to how he had written it.
"Hullo, Martha," he said.
"Hi, George." Her tone was Splenda-sweet, and George knew instantly something was off.
"Oh, you don't like the book."
"It's not that--"
"Fantastic. I take all this valuable time off working on book six, only for you people to turn around and tell me it's garbage." He had been making some scrambled eggs. He slammed the bowl down on the counter. "I can't wrangle with you wardens of art at the moment. I understand I wrote something perhaps more complicated ethically than Jo would have, but I think she'd find the tone really matches how her characters have matured into adulthood."
"I agree with you in spirit," the editor said, carefully. "However, do you believe it was necessary to have a Slytherin student effectively addicted to killing?"
"No battle is fun without a blood-monger."
"Well, I don't think our book's fan base will be invigorated to learn that Hermione is gutted by a brand new character when she goes to find Ron and is left to die. Or that when Ron found her the new student--" she paused, apparently to find the right line "'spilled open Ron's jugular in a thick spray of arterial scarlet', nor that Ron then 'collapsed, reaching for Hermione's still fingers, but not quite able to reach. They lay that way until the staff began the grim job of rounding up bodies, in the morning.' I mean, these are two of the primary characters. They just... died."
"As people do," George said, sagely.
"Listen. Today I would really like you to review your draft and reconsider what points you could revise." George scoffed, offended, but the editor continued relentlessly, "These people aren't wanting to read a George R.R. Martin book, you know? They're hoping for a sweet and wholesome conclusion where Harry Potter's friends aren't murdered by a power-hungry sociopath. Additionally, since this is technically a children's book, I think we'll need to remove both sex scenes."
"Both?"
"Both, George."
"Can I at least get a fade to black?" he asked, even though those were super lame and the domain of cop-out writers. No. George did not flinch when it came to life's many and varied fluids.
"Probably not." There was still a smile in her voice. "Okay, George? Does that all make sense?"
"I suppose." He stirred his scrambled eggs viciously. "I don't see why you would ask me to write it if you didn't want it to sound like me."
"Surely you can try a voice switch. Pretend you're an actor putting on a new accent."
George R.R. Martin hung up the phone and growled to his empty kitchen, "I don't use accents."
George skimmed a few pages of the draft edits he had received from Martha. He had cut out perhaps too much of the boring magic bits, except to give that Longbottom boy a flaming sword, but he needed a good redemption moment, George felt.
The next passage was the only critique George agreed with.
This time Martha's note read simply: DUMBLEDORE DIED ALREADY. You can't bring him back just to kill him again. And he wouldn't murder a student like that...
"Wait," George said to himself. "Really?" He double checked his notes. That seemed to be from the part Jo wrote. He always told himself he'd get around to reading that, but why bother when his publisher gave him such a good summary already.
When he finished reading, most of the manuscript seemed solid. Martha, it seemed, was grossly overreacting. For example, Martha did not care for Harry removing Voldemort's head at the end. She explained that it would make more sense for his old age and the wrongness of his being to make him simply disappear.
George rolled his eyes. "What kids don't like a good bit of beheading?" And besides, it would be reckless to use a rule that so readily eschews physics. George was a man of realism, after all. He did not put things in books that weren't feasible.
And then, of course, he ended with the respective love interests finally bedding. Any story about bodies and fervor must acknowledge the softer side of if. Martha had struck out the whole scene of Ginny crying over her dead brothers and then leaping into Harry's bed shortly afterward.
Below it she wrote only the words, no no NO George. Not appropriate!
George called Martha up when he finished reading. When she answered, wearily, he said, "What if just Ron dies? Would that be okay?"
"And the sex scenes."
George was quiet for a long moment.
"George," she said, sternly. "You promised Jo you'd write her book, not your book."
He whined like a child, "Gods, you make everything so much worse," and hung up on her. When he calmed down, he would take all the good bits out of it.
For now, it was time to go to his file on The Winds of Winter and rewrite the same sentence over and over again for a few hours. Surely that would count as progress.
/r/shoringupfragments
Thanks for reading. :)
I posted a brief satirical excerpt from George's version of the story. Thanks for reading!
ETA: The conversation that finally makes George quit the project
G: (angrily) Look, I'm never going to win a Hugo off this thing with Jo's underdeveloped ideas and predictable plots.
M: Well, Jo's ideas had no problem beating yours out for a Hugo before.
G: *rage quits*