I've always found the Longbottoms gruesomely compelling, and certainly one of the saddest stories within the Harry Potter universe. I only hope this small fic does them justice. As always, please review.
CRUCIATE
(by elegans)
Alice could see a corner of the baby's crib through the open door, and that thin edge of wood and blankets somehow made it all the more painful.
"Famous aurors, are you?" said the woman's voice, sweet and cold and terrible. "Members of the Order of the Phoenix? The ones who've given us so much trouble?" Her voice took a dangerous turn on the last few words; an ugly anger came throbbing to the surface. "I don't believe it. In the end, you were weak, weren't you?" Alice could not answer, even if she wanted to, for her jawbone had cracked against the wooden floor in her last fit of spasms. Her chest felt tight, and she registered dimly that several of her ribs were probably broken. Each breath was pain.
"I asked you a question," said the woman, the horrible hood-eyed woman, in a low voice. "So answer. Weren't you?" Alice did not answer, nor did her husband, whose splayed, twisted elbow she could see from the corner of her eye. Frank was not moving, but she could hear his breathing, harsh and pained. The Death Eater continued, and now her voice was taunting and angry in equal parts. "Still no manners! I'll have to teach you, won't I? Crucio!" A giant's hands seized Alice's head and tore it apart; daggers pierced her neck, her chest, her stomach; fire razed her skin and melted it off. Someone far off was screaming, and Alice realized, as the curse began to lift, that it had been her. She stirred feebly on the floor, tasting blood in her mouth. Something must have ruptured, she thought distantly, during her writhings. Something inside.
"Frank," she said weakly, and she saw her husband's hand twitch.
"I…I love—" he breathed, but suddenly his voice gave way to screams of pain. She focused on the baby's crib, that small wooden corner, until they subsided.
"There'll be none of those confessions tonight, doll," said a man's voice, sounding heartily amused. "Certainly not..."
"So, Alice Longbottom?" said the woman. Alice could not see her, but the harsh voice seemed directly above her. "Are you ready to surrender to us? To acknowledge our power? If you recognize the Dark Lord"—the woman's voice had taken on a hungry tone, full of yearning and wonder—"perhaps we will spare you."
Alice shuddered, and said nothing.
"You do not recognize our Lord?" cried the woman. "So be it! Crucio! Crucio! Crucio!" And it was as if a thousand snakes had bitten her at once, as if she were being burned alive, as if she had been cut open with a rusty knife while her entrails spilled into her fingers. The pain did not fade, but only grew stronger, and faintly, as if from another world, the baby began to cry, and Frank's fingers left bloody streaks in the wood, and somewhere, amidst the pain, Alice Longbottom forgot her own name.