So! This is the special gift for Faint Hate! She was my fiftieth reviewer for Freesia op.2 so she gets this!
Hope you like it hun! I know it's not exactly what you wanted, but I just followed the flow of my fingers.
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and everything related to Harry Potter doesn't belong to me. It belongs to Goddess J.K.Rowling. Congrat's on the successful delivery of your baby girl, Mackenzie Jean Rowling Murray.
Warnings: Slash. Cursing. Violence. Insanity.
Inside by Aloh Dark
Madam Pomfrey had assured everyone that Ron had made a full recovery. But Ron knew she was lying. To everyone else he acted the same, but in his head he knew different. He could feel it there, inside his head, the remnants of thoughts left behind. It shot adrenaline through his heart and made him feel sick to his stomach. No one seemed to know the difference, though, so he kept the act up.
But now, two months later, he was back at Hogwarts for the start of his sixth year. It should be a joyous time, and it would be, had he not been trying so desperately to avoid someone all summer. The only person that noticed his change.
It was his luck, too, that got him prefect duty the first night back and in the dungeons. Ron tried to be as quiet and quick as possible. He only wanted to get some rest, to sleep his nerves away. No such luck, he realized, when his wand light came across familiar feet.
"Draco." Ron whispered into the darkness.
"You've been avoiding me." Draco said, stepping into the wand light.
"I answered all you letters." Ron replied evasively.
"I would hardly consider what you sent back to be answers." He said, an annoyed tilt to his tone.
The half-thoughts rise up in his mind and try to take over. It takes all his will to keep them at bay and left none to guise his voice. "I was busy." An obvious lie.
Draco's eyes narrowed. "Yes, busy putting my father and family friends in jail, I know. I helped, after all." He said. "That's not an excuse either."
He took a step forward.
Ron took a step back.
"What are you hiding from me?" Draco asked.
Ron gave a breathy 'eep' before shifting his eyes away. The half-thoughts were yelling in his head. He couldn't think around them. "Nothing!" He replied, his voice way too high.
Draco took another step and reached out his hand. "Like hell it's nothing! Ron, please, tell me!"
Ron looked at Draco's hand with mounting horror. His vision shifted between seeing Draco's hand, a comforting sight, and the vision of tentacles flying towards him, making him theirs.
He panicked and shoved Draco away. Tears were in his eyes. "I'm sorry!" He yelled before running off. The pain... The pain filling his lungs and bursting his heart.
Draco watched in stunned silence as Ron ran away. Determination hardened in his heart. He knew no one else noticed the change in Ron. It was up to him to show them that Ron needed help. And that he wasn't going to allow them to sit back and do nothing while Ron was in need.
It wasn't until after dinner a week later that his anger at everyone made him act drastically. He watched closely, and saw things. He noticed how neither Harry nor Hermione noticed the small changes in Ron's behavior at all. No one did. At first he thought he was just crazy, but in his heart he knew. No one noticed.
And Ron was avoiding him. And if they met in the halls, he was snappish and threatened physical harm. No one found it odd that Ron was acting that way, but Draco knew. He knew.
Which was why he made his way through the many corridors of Hogwarts to the hallway containing the portrait of the fat lady. Ron had let it slip once that she was the entrance to the Gryffindor dorms.
Draco walked right up to her, which startled her, and looked straight into her eyes. "Is Ronald Weasley in there?"
"Why young man, I don't know what you're talking about." The Fat Lady said.
"Horseshit!" Draco spit out. "Both you and I know this is the entrance to the Gryffindor dorms."
"Young man, how dare you!" She shrilly said back.
"Oh shut it, you old biddy!" Draco snapped. He walked up to the portrait and started banging on it. "RON! RON GET OUT HERE!" He screamed through the door.
"Stop It!" The Fat Lady yelled at him. "Get away you Brute!" She uselessly tried to hit him away.
Draco ignored her, and her yells. "RONALD WEASLEY! YOU GET YOUR ARSE OUT HERE AND FACE ME!"
Draco took steps back as the now empty portrait swung open. Nearly all of Gryffindor stood there, facing him. He looked straight at them. "Either bring Ron here, or I'm going in to fetch him." He told them.
"What do you want, Malfoy?" Harry demanded.
"I need to speak with Ron. This is between him and I." Draco said. "It's none of your business, Potter."
Harry was just about to say something back when a hand on his shoulder stopped him. Ron was looking at Draco, but spoke to Harry. "No, it's okay. Stop." He was pale and Harry could see him shaking.
Draco watched as Ron walked out of the portrait and to him. Draco said nothing, but grabbed his hand and pulled him away. He could feel the eyes on them as they walked away.
They went to the Room of Requirement, which was covered in pillows. Nothing that could hurt if thrown was in the room. They sat facing each other, backs to opposite walls.
"What!" Ron finally demanded, after getting tired of watching Draco watch him.
"I'm waiting for you to tell me what the hell is wrong." Draco said. "No one else has noticed it, that much I know. But you tell me what it is that's wrong."
Ron pulled his knees up into his chest. The thoughts were whispering again. "Nothing's wrong." He whispered.
Draco heard Ron's voice and it tried to break his heart. He could hear everything in those two words. All his anger shattered and all that were left were his concern and worry. He got up and moved next to Ron.
Draco put a gentle arm around Ron and pulled him against him. "Tell me, Ron." He said. "Please."
Ron began to cry. "I'm sorry." He whispered. "But you can't help me!"
Draco held on tighter. "Just tell me what's wrong and then we'll see if I can help you or not."
"The thoughts. They're in my head." Ron whispered. "I can't get them out. They're always there and they can't be controlled!"
He turned a tear stained face to Draco's. "Please, please help me. Please just make them stop."
Draco held him close and gently kissed his lips. "I'll find away, Ron, I promise you, I'll find a way."
They stayed there all night. Ron would randomly tell him more about the alien thoughts in his head, but mostly they just laid tangled together in silence. Dawn the next day they finally went back to their own dorms to get ready for the day of classes. Draco didn't want Ron to go, but Ron couldn't be convinced to stay with him in the Room of Requirements.
After that, none of the Gryffindor's would let Draco anywhere near Ron, and the rest of the school bugged them both to no end about what was so important that night.
Draco did all he could to find a way to help Ron, but found nothing. Not even Madam Pomfrey could help, she knew of nothing that could help. "Besides," she assured Draco. "Mr. Weasley made a full recovery." No stray thoughts should have been left.
But as weeks went by, Draco could see a more pronounced change in Ron. His behavior grew erratic, but no one else noticed. Sometimes when they were alone, he'd start to scream if Draco touched him. Other times Draco noticed long, freshly made scratches on Ron's arms. Ron always claimed he didn't know how he got them, but Draco didn't know how he couldn't notice. On further inspection, Draco realized that Ron was making them with his own nails.
It all finally crashed down around him at Christmas. Draco was on Prefect duty when, rushing by him went Madam Pomfrey. Then, minutes later, she was rushing back with McGonagald. Ron had taken a piece of glass and cut his own scalp with it.
When Draco later asked him why, he only said that he wanted the voices out.
They gave him a potion to take once a week, and they promised that would clear his mind. And again, Draco was the only one that noticed. Ron was faking it. His entire brain was numbed, but not enough. The thoughts were still there, but in flashes. As if the potion forced them to lay in wait until they had enough gather strength for one stray thought, and then they'd start all over again.
This time Ron didn't let Draco help. He wouldn't let him. And Draco was panicked.
Ron's behavior finally scared him into swallowing his pride. He talked to Hermione and Harry about Ron. Told them, warned them, all but begged them to help. They scoffed at him, laughed at him, called him a liar. They wouldn't believe anything was wrong with Ron, especially when it came from a Malfoy.
Draco couldn't help it, he told them about their relationship. Tried to get them to believe that so they'd believe him about Ron's behavior. They walked away after telling him he'd gone insane.
And then it happened. It was during dinner, and Harry, Hermione and Ron were no where to be found. Then, bursting through the doors was a tear strained Ron. He paused in the doorway for a moment before running to the Slytherin tables.
Draco couldn't care less about his reputation at that moment. Ron ran straight into him, grasping him tightly. "Draco, don't let them do this to me!" He begged.
Then he pushed them apart, grabbed Draco's hand and ran him out of the Great Hall. The entire room filled with a buzzing of voices and several professors ran after the boys.
They ran full speed together. Draco just let Ron pull him along, not knowing or caring where they were going. They finally stopped after they burst through the doors leading to the tower top that was used for Astronomy class.
"Now, Draco, now!" Ron said, his eyes manic. "We've gotta jump. They're coming!"
"What?" Draco asked, shocked.
"The thoughts. They've told me. They're coming! We've gotta jump! It's our only chance!" Ron said, walking in a circle, staring at Draco.
"No!" Draco said. "That's insane, Ron!"
Ron's face flooded with rage. Before Draco knew it he was on the ground after being backhanded by Ron.
"Not insane! Not insane!" Ron yelled. All the rage left his face and he was crying again. "Oh gods, Draco! What am I doing? Stop me! I don-" And Ron was standing again, his eyes blank.
Draco stood and put his hand on Ron's arm, trying to pull him back down into the castle.
"No, Draco!" Ron said, fighting. "Jump! It's our chance!"
Tears were in Draco's eyes as he let go. Ron watched him in horror as he pulled his wand on him. "I'm sorry." He whispered but Ron's screech of betrayal over powered it.
"You're one of them! You're one-" He screamed, falling to the ground unconscious before he finished.
Draco was cradling him, crying, by the time the professors got there. He looked at them confused. "I don't know." He just kept repeating.
The next day Draco watched as Ron was walked away from him. He was sedated up to his eyebrows and was being taken away. Draco watched, helpless. Ron shouldn't have been able to, but somehow he turned his head around and smiled at Draco before the doors shut between them.