I don't own them.

"Fred...oh, Fred..."

Ron knelt next to his brother. The moment the door had closed the chains that had bound him and Harry to the wall had realeased them. "Fred?" he touched his brother's head, sweeping the sweaty hair back. Ron glanced at Harry, who was kneeling next to George, then screamed with a sudden rage, "She could have killed them!"

Harry ran his hands over George's back. Nearly all the skin had been cleared away and white bones were shining through, just barely visible in the dim light left by the torches. Harry hoped his spine hadn't broken under the stress. He pressed his fingers to George's neck. "He's not breathing right Ron. Ron?"

Ron was kneeling over Fred, who had re-awoken with a start and a cry of pain. Fred's eyes were glazed as he glanced up, first at his younger brother, then at Harry and George. "You guys..." he shuddered, biting his lip and arching his back as a wave of pain washed over him. "Okay?" he finished his sentance with a small squeek that made Harry even more angry at Umbridge, if it was possible.

"Yeah, we're fine." Ron's hands were moving over Fred's body, checking his hands and feet and his back, which had been cut up even worse than George's. "You aren't, though."

George still hadn't opened his eyes. When Harry put a hand to his neck, he found that the heartbeat was still eratic. "Ron, go find Madam Ponfrey." He knew that they couldn't move the twins like this. Even now his jeans were soaked with their blood.

"She's probably watching the hospital wing." Ron didn't have to explain who 'she' was. He didn't seem able to wrench his eyes from his brothers and Harry saw the fire in his eyes. He wanted Umbridge. He wanted to get her back for this.

Harry tried to keep his voice calm as he instructed his friend. "Ron, we need somebody. Now." He didn't like the cold sweat that coated George's neck, or the way Fred's eyes remained unfocused. He barely registered the door opening and closing and he searched fruitlessly for a wand. If he could only get these bindings off he'd be able to examine the boys more closely.

Fred seemed to be trying to get up. With a last worred glance at George, Harry knelt next to Fred. "Stay down." he commanded him, seeing his freckled face turn white witht eh strain of pulling himself up. Fred coughed out a great spout of blood and collapsed back to the ground, his broken wrist dangling uselessly from the chian. "Don't worry." he said to Harry's expression. "Bit my tongue." his voice was barely a whisper and it seemed to Harry that he was passing back into unconsciousness. He shook him to keep him awake.

A moment passed in which the two boys locked eyes, then Fred muttered, "George?" Harry wanted to look away, wanted to lie and say everything was alright with his twin. Instead he shook his head slightly, "He's not...he's not doing very well."

Fred's working hand clenched into a fist, his foggy blue eyes brimming with tears as he looked past Harry to his brother. Harry sat in silence as he watched Fred take in his brother's unmoving form, saw him open his eyes to say something...

Bang.

The door burst open with such a fury that Harry lept to his feet, his hand going instictively to his now wand-less pocket. But it wasn't Umbridge or Filch who raced through the door, as Harry had expected. It was Ron, followed closely by Professor McGonagal, who was wearing a dressing gown, her hair loose about her face.

"Professor!" Harry's relief showed through and his voice cracked over the word. Surely Professor McGonagal would know what to do.

The teacher glanced quickly over Harry and lingered on the still unmoving form of George and the hunched, bleeding figure that was Fred. "What happened here?" she asked, her voice holding both anger and resentment. Harry suspected that she already knew what had happened, but told her anyway.

"We got detention with Umbridge." he said, his words tripping out of his mouth in an effort to explain. "Fred and George...she beat them, Professor. And George." he glanced behind him, seeing a puddle of blood surrounding the boy and choked on his own words.

"George got the Crutiartus Curse." Ron finished quietly, his voice uneven as he shook in his rage. "He hasn't woken up since."

Professor McGonagal nodded, barely registering the words as she dropped in the space between the two boys. The space that was now rapidly filling with luminous crimson blood. Already she was making a catalouge in her head of the various spells and potions needed. Her hands passed over the back of the boy who was awake. She had never learned to tell them apart. She breathed out a hiss as she saw white protruding through. Skelo-Grow would be needed, and more potions besides if the nerves had been damaged.

She turned to the still-unconscious one, marvelling at the fact that he was alive at all. She remembered that barely a week before he'd fallen nearly a hundred feet, and now with that Curse and the loss of so much blood, blood-replenishing potion for both, of course, well, youth was a blessing. An older wizard would surely have died.

"Potter, Weasley, you should return to your Common Room. Your wands are there, I think." she undid the shackles that bound the boys to the floor, a wave of fury washing over her. So this is what Doloris's detentions ahd turned into! She would have a word with the 'headmistress' about this. No other student would be hurt like this while she still taught in this school!

Ron's emotions finally broke out. "But my brothers, Professor!" he watched as she conjured two stretchers and carefully put the boys on it. Both were unconscious now.

"Will be fine, Weasley. Upstairs." Professor McGonagal noticed the shaking of her wordsm though she doubt the boys did. Potter pulled his friend out of the room, muttering to him something about the DA. Those brave boys. She turned back to her charges, lifting her wand from them for just enough time to shoot a jet of silver at the door. The cat ran through it. Poppy would need to be warned. She would have to work all night if these boys were to survive any longer.


Harry and Ron entered Gryffendor Common Room to find Hermione, Dean, Seamus, Katie Bell, Angelina, and Neville all waiting for them. "What happened? Are you alright? Where are Fred and George?" The two answered the questions as best they could. Both their heads were spinning from what they'd just seen.

"How could she?" Hermione summed up everyone's thoughts with the three words. They all gazed open-mouthed at Harry, who was struggling himself. He was already guilty. He kenw that. It was his fault...all his fault that Fred and George were hurt, that they would possible die, right now, tonight. He had talked them into revenge on Umbridge. Trying to orginize his thoughts, he looked around at the group again. Ron asked the question that was on his mind.

"Where's Lee?"

Katie answered, her voice shaking with tears. "He got called by Umbridge about twently minutes ago. She saw him running down the hall, you see."

This was too much for Harry. He slid into a chair and tried to take his brain away. He shouldn't be doing this. He was getting all these people into trouble. Nothing was worth this. The price was too high.

And eventually, everyone left, and Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat in the Common Room all night, waiting, perhaps, for two red-headed boys to come through the portrait hole.

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