That night, when Ron climbed into bed, he was shivering madly with fear and discomfort. The Room of Requirement battle had scared Ron into desperation and mad shivers. He wanted his friends with him at every given point in time. He didn't want to be alone. He was scared, scared they'd come back. It was petty and foolish, yes, but Ron was still scared. He looked over the edge of his bed to see Hermione, still unconscious, breathing rapidly. The welts on his arms from the brain's tendrils stung painfully, and they limited the ways he lie down to on his stomach and his back. Resting touchily on his back, he looked over at Harry, on his left side, and Hermione again, on his right. He had long forgotten the small kisses they had shared in Ron's dormitory last year, and he looked at her with a sort of desperate longing.

Desperate for her to wake up.

Desperate for her to be okay.

Desperate for her to recognize him. To need him.

He ignored the stinging pain in his arms as he lifted himself up and kneeled by her bed.

"Hermione?" he asked. "I know you can't hear me, but I miss you. I want you to wake up. Please. I need you." He watched her for a moment, her breathing steady and raspy. Then he went back to his own bed, watching her sleep for a while longer before nodding off.

Little did he know, Hermione was very much awake.

Ron was on his way down the long corridor with the rows and jars of brains and body parts. He flung his way into the main door hall, where Harry, Hermione and Neville were in fierce combat. Ginny was lying on the floor with a sickened face, clutching her ankle very hard. Ron's attention snapped back to Hermione, who was battling two Death Eaters with a look of fierce determination etched upon her face. Ron leapt in beside her, throwing a 'Stupefy' that missed by barely inches. Ron ducked a well-placed 'Crucio!' and shot a silent spell –Jelly-Legs- behind his back. That hit, and the Death Eater reeled around the room, wobbling hither and thither until his comrade hit him with a 'Finite Incantatem!' and he stood, wobbling a little, shooting horrid spells all around. Hermione's attacker flicked his wrist up, and yelled a spell that Ron didn't recognise. A flickering purple flame shot across the whole of her torso and she shrieked.

To Ron, she fell in slow-motion, her eyes closing slowly, her body falling with her hair billowing all over her face like a pleasant wind was blowing it.

And Ron just stood there. He watched her fall with a terrified expression on his face. He looked around him, terror growing, and watched Harry and Neville battling, not noticing that Hermione was dying next to him. Ron sat on the ground next to her, eyeing her face with a look of terrified worry, fearing she was dead.

Wake up!" he yelled at her. And then a spell shot him in the back. Dead-on target. Ron fell next to Hermione, face screwed up as a burning pain spread through him. He watched Hermione's face with a feeling of dread and longing.

"Wake up!" he yelled again, this time through his gritted teeth as the pain reached his arms and legs, immobilising him, burning him, killing him...

And then something that made the pain recede and dulled it down to a pointless murmur in the back of his head.

Hermione's eyes had flickered open.

They were dull. Bland. Like there was no life left in her.

"Hermione?" Ron asked cautiously. Hermione's eyes slowly focused on him.

"Ron?" she whispered. "It hurts." She whimpered.

"I know." He said. "But you have to fight it. Please."

"I can't." She whined pitifully. "Ron, I can't, it hurts so much."

Ron sat up with all his might and looked around. The Death Eaters they had been fighting seemed to think they were dead and were fighting Harry and Neville; one was even covering Ginny, who was yelling curses though gritted teeth. He felt guilty for a second, but the feeling quickly dulled as he looked back at Hermione's limp form. She was blubbering incessantly. Ron touched her shoulder.

"Please, Hermione, you have to fight, you have to push through the pain, I can't live without you." Ron said sullenly. She was so feeble and pale that he felt an urge to shake her and yell, 'Please, for the love of Merlin, wake up, I need you!'

But he didn't. And he solely wished he had.

"You can. You don't need me." She paled as all of her effort went into putting her and on his knee. He held it.

"Yes, I do." Ron pleaded. "Please, stay awake, I lo-" he stopped as her eyes softened with interest.

"You what?" she asked, squeezing his hand.

He bent his head and whispered,

"Hermione. I need you to stay awake because... because I love you."

There. He'd said it. After a spell of four years, He'd told her how he felt about her. She smiled.

"I have ...some... something to tell you." Her breaths were coming faster now. Ron realized with a jolt that she'd been dying all this time. "Come... closer."

He leaned into her, and she captured his lips in hers. He put one arm across the other side of her body, bending lower and deeper into the kiss. This was what he wanted. Not for her to die. If she died, he'd never get this again. He pulled back quickly.

"Hermione. You can't let go now! Not now that you know-"

"Sh. Ron, I –ow- I know I can't stay here. I just wanted to know, what you wanted."

"I want you!" Ron pleaded, watching her slip away right in front of him, and he was powerless. He didn't know what she'd been hit with, he couldn't help her. So he leaned down and kissed her again. It was his only hope of giving her a will to live. But he felt a breath escape her lips, warming his own.

And he knew she was gone.

Ron's eyes opened. Remembering his other dreams, compared with them this one wasn't bad at all. But hearing Hermione say she didn't want to live, and knowing that his love wasn't enough to keep her awake. He looked over at her. She was resting sweetly in her bed. He knew that he loved her. He knew. But he couldn't tell her.

Not yet.

A/N: This chapter was crappy! C-R-A-P-P-Y! In apology, I'll upload the next chapter today! Woohoo! Because that really sucked. It wasn't a nightmare, it was a bad dream. I just can't find anything else in OOTP that would scar Ron for life. Ugh. I'm disgusted with myself. Don't look at me. Go. Just go.