A/N: I love angst more than is good for me… :/ Pease read and review!

The darkness

Being alone scared Draco. Being alone with his thoughts; where the deathly silence that existed within him would begin to manifest ideas and memories, bad ones. The dark, defensive, and scared side of Draco would consume him when he was left idle. It was at these times where Draco was not distracted, and left to his own devious thoughts, that he formulated the plans to assassinate Dumbledore. The shadows lurking in the corners of his mind would lay in wait, like panthers would stalk a deer, they would wait until it was asleep, then they would pounce. The oppressive darkness would take center stage, each thought viciously clawing at the other to destroy, and conquer – consuming the discarded thought to form a better, stronger, and more disturbing idea, this continued until one thought triumphed over the rest. The thought dark enough to consume the other, weaker thoughts – it was the rat prepared to devour its own kind to survive. Once formed, the thought would posses him, spreading through his body, each vein would pulse with the lust and desire to carry out the destructive dead. At the time he would become impulsive, the dark thoughts controlling his movements, and speech. But it was the few good thoughts, trapped by the shadows that kept him aware and conscious of what he did. It was the good in him that hurt the most. The flickering candle of good imprisoned in his mind would continue to dim and fade into the dark mist, until the darkness achieved what it so desperately desired. When it was triumphant, the darkness would recede back into the corners it came from, waiting for the next moment to ambush. The candle would become stronger, and burn steadily, spitefully – a reminder of what he had done. His trapped conscience would be released to taunt him of his darkness, and the candle would flicker furiously, burning him, scolding him for being weak and easily manipulated. Slowly the candle would smolder his heart, only causing him to become weaker. For many days after, his heart would continue to ache, more so when he was alone. Late at night he would curl into a ball on his bed, holding himself tight, trying to convince himself that the pain wasn't real, that it was in his head, but his body would reject the persuasion, and continue to mourn his dark deeds, each throb of his heart, the pounding of a questioning finger 'Why did you do it?' 'What were you thinking?' 'How can you do this to people?' all questions that he couldn't answer. He would call out in the night "It's not my fault! Please! Forgive me. No! Why? Arghhhhhh! Stop! Please!" but none could hear him, and those that did would ignore him and pretend they didn't. He never slept, and every morning he would rise, trembling, exhausted, pale, cold, and drenched in his sweat. The confusion, anger and pain, slowly erasing his sanity, and with the fading sense, his heart fell to pieces, from exhaustion and inability to hold anymore pain within him. Instead of exploding he would simply fall. As though the whole time he had been walking backwards off of a cliff, finally reaching the limit. When he fell there was nothing he could do, only a sense of numbness, surrender and darkness filled his mind. The dark thoughts finally conquering his entire being. There was nothing left of him, and only a shell continued to exist. It was too late.