CHAPTER 8: NO LONGER A GOD'S BLESSING
Teddy ran behind a big trunk and hid himself there. He stood quietly, occasionally peeking his head out to check if Luna was still around seeking for him. She didn't seem all too happy. He pulled back his head, covering his giggling mouth with a hand, she obviously couldn't find him. He would win, he always won every time he played this game.
He then looked around, oh there was a bigger tree on that side. So he tiptoed running over there and enjoyed watching Luna fidgeting from afar.
"Teddy! Come out, please. It's dangerous to stray too far from the camp!" - Luna screamed.
What danger? He didn't see any. They were only camping and he had done that countless times with daddy and the Weasley. And everybody used to play hide and seek too. He thought, smiling at the memory. The boy lifted his head and looked up at the big branches high above his head, warm sunshine was making their way through the green leaves and creating small beautiful sparkling dots on his chubby palms. Luna's voice calling for him sounded more distant than ever but Teddy didn't feel bothered one bit. As soon as she admitted her defeat, he would jump out immediately. Teddy then continued watching the natural surroundings when he heard the chirping from somewhere up there. He looked around, there was a small bird's nest lying on a tree branch, which for some reasons seemed unbalanced and was about to fall down. There was no sight of mother bird…
Teddy stared at the scene then tried to lean and reached up...but his hands were so small...He wanted to look for Luna but she was no where in sight.
"Auntie Luna!" - Teddy called loudly.
There was no answer.
He tried two or three times more, the boy's cry echoed off the thick bushes and disappeared behind the tree line. No use. Teddy came closer to the tall tree trunk, trying to climb up but failed eventually. Again, he had never been fond of height. But he just couldn't let the birdies alone here either. Why wasn't anyone around to help him when he needed them most? Then all of a sudden, Teddy remembered that last time when his dad got down the kite stuck on a tree branch for him. Teddy decided to imitate what Harry once did so he raised his hands up and stared at the bird's nest for a while. But still… nothing happened.
"But daddy could do it!" - Teddy stamped down his foot.
And then he tried one more time. He stared at the bird's nest again, eyes widened... Suddenly, the nest lifted itself off the branch magically and flew down slowly from above. Seeing that scene, Teddy couldn't help jumping in joy. But the moment he did so, the nest fell down freely and was soon to hit the ground. Teddy was startled. Without any further thinking, he ran and caught the nest in his hands before both him and the birdies fell down onto the ground, hard. Teddy sat up, stunned for a few seconds. He rubbed his head as his eyes cast to the birdies who was chirping in panic, luckily none of them seemed to get hurt though.
Teddy stood up, brushed off his hands on his pants. He should head back to the camp and asked daddy to put the birdies back to their nest. Just as he was about to go, Teddy heard the rustling sound as if someone was stepping on dry leaves and coming closer to him.
"Auntie Luna..." - Teddy happily shouted.
No. Not Luna.
Three adults were walking towards him. They looked weird and ugly, so much like from the ones he had seen in town a few days ago. He was scared of them. Their clothes were town apart and there were blood on their hands and faces and bodies and feet...Some of them didn't even have eyes and their mouth seemed to be bleeding too. It must have been a long time since they last brushed their teeth…
Teddy was tremblingly backing away, his hands still held the bird's nest close to his chest.
Think! What did daddy tell me to do when in doubt? Teddy tried to remember.
"Run! And call for daddy!"
So he turned around and ran as fast as he could. But the footsteps behind him just wouldn't give up and he was panicking right now. They weren't going fast...but he wasn't running fast either. His feet wouldn't listen to him at all. So...Teddy burst into tears.
"Daddy...!" - He screamed out - "Daddy! Help me…!"
-o-
Harry stirred in bed, the warm feeling was embracing him, making him unable to open his eyes nor sit up either. He buried his face into the soft pillow with that sweet aromatic scent… such a familiar one that seemed to bring him back to the passionate memory of that moonless night…
Harry jerked up, eyes wide-opened. Oh no...he wasn't burying his face into a pillow. In fact, he was burying his face into a bushy brown hair and after a few seconds, his sleepy brain started to register what was going on and where that enchanting scent came from.
"Her...Hermione?!"
The brunette slowly opened her eyes, rubbing them, following a normal wake-up sequence until she saw...Harry.
"Harry?" - She sat up.
The two kept staring at each other, speechless for a few minutes until Harry made the first move and broke their gazes. He looked around, trying to determine who had been the one mistaking their tent. Soon he found the answer as Teddy's backpack revealed itself in front of his very eyes. Oh Merlin, Oh no...Disaster...Tragedy...and it was all due to his sleepiness. Not knowing how to face her straight on, Harry started showing sudden interest in his squirming hands and feet, never been in his life wishing he could vanish out of the tent that bad, wishing he wouldn't have to face his best friend right now. He didn't even dare look down at his body, since he knew all too well that he was in a state of...half naked… He had taken off his shirt earlier. He had always known that habit would get him in trouble one day, he just didn't expect this would be the day. Argh...it was killing him inside...what if someone showed up and caught this sight?
"You must have been really tired, Harry...?"
"H...huh?" - Hermione's voice pulled Harry back to the miserable reality.
"You must have been exhausted, Harry... so much that you mistook your tent and went to mine..." - her voice was full of concern and nothing like how he imagined she would have reacted.
"I..."
Harry's head was spinning around with thoughts, his eyes fixated on the sleepy face of Hermione. She looked to him a little bit too sweet, a little bit childish, a little bit confused too. Suddenly Harry didn't know how to react or what to tell her anymore. He blushed, his heart was pounding loudly in his chest.
Thump! Thump!
Harry was seriously believing that his chest would explode any minute now. His hand drifted towards his left chest…No...His heart was beating fast, that much was true but certainly not the 'thump' sound he had heard. It was the sound of running footsteps outside. He tilted his head towards the tent door when it got burst open, letting the sunlight spilled inside.
"Hermione, Teddy..." - Luna rushed in like a whirlwind, and for a few seconds there, the girl just froze on track at the sight in front of her.
"Luna...th-this...I - er - not...and...w-well...she not too - I mean…we...er..." - Harry stammered, feeling like an apocalypse had struck.
"Teddy went missing!"
His heart dropped out of his chest. Not 'like an apocalypse'...it was 'truly an apocalypse'."
-o-
"Daddy! Help me!"
His dad didn't hear him anymore. Teddy was panicking. He tripped over something for the second time today and was now rolling on the hard ground. The bird's nest got out of his hands. Teddy hastily got up but those people were coming close. The rotting stench was suffocating him, leaving him breathless. The moaning intimidating sound was also scaring him too.
One man suddenly grabbed his foot. Teddy struggled, kicking the man sending him flying over to a tree trunk...Wow...that was unexpected, he wiped his tears, didn't realize he was that strong. No...that wasn't him. Somebody had kicked that man away. His head jerked up. It was Draco and his uncle was piercing a sharp wooden stick to the man's head. Teddy was so-so-so-scared right now...He couldn't even stand up straight without trembling.
"Stand back, kiddo!" - Draco warned Teddy, not turning around.
Teddy didn't dare move an inch, he picked up the nest and stood aside as he watched in horror when two other people came up from behind Draco and tried to bite him. Draco pushed back one and stabbed her stomach, but that woman was still moving after that. Draco pulled back the stick, cursing loudly. Teddy was so afraid that he couldn't think of or do anything to help Draco. Right then, the other man grabbed Draco's back and words suddenly slipped out of Teddy's mouth as he shouted: "Watch out behind you!"
Draco turned back in time to dodge the attack and with the stick in his hand, he pierced it through the man's head. The earlier woman took that chance to use her dirty hands and grabbed Draco's face pressing it hard to a trunk nearby. Teddy saw blood flowing out and heard Draco's scream at the same time. His uncle grabbed the woman's hand, twisted it back as he pushed her head to a thorny tree, ending her life with one big thorn stuck out of the trunk and pierced through her skull. Draco held his face, dropped down onto the ground as he whined in pain. Teddy rushed towards him and was terrified when he found blood on all over Draco's fingers which were covering half of his face.
"Uncle...you okay?"
Draco didn't answer, he kept moaning while Teddy heard the familiar voices calling his name.
"Teddy! Teddy!"
His dad, auntie Hermione and auntie Luna rushed into the scene. They were quite pale to be honest. Teddy stood up, waving and jumping:
"Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! I'm here!"
-o-
Harry immediately pulled Teddy into his arms protectively.
"I got you! I got you!"
When he heard from Luna that Teddy had gone missing, he had almost lost his mind. Harry had lost too many loved ones already so he couldn't afford to lose Teddy too. Harry was searching for the boy with a strength much as he was searching for his own life force. What would he ever do if he was to lose Teddy?
"Are you okay, honey?" - Hermione knelt down beside Harry, nervously asking the boy while she checked his body for any injury.
"I'm good...but uncle Draco got hurt ..." - Teddy tremblingly pointing towards Draco.
Only then did Harry noticed Draco who was holding his bloody face with a hand and grumbling in pain. Luna walked slowly towards Draco and sat down next to him. Harry looked to Hermione, nodded before he left Teddy in Hermione's hands and walked over there as well.
"Scumbag, murderer, goddamn it..." - Draco mumbled.
"If you don't look up, we can't see your wound!" - Luna spoke calmly.
"Get away from me!" - He hissed back aggressively.
Harry was worried, not because of the wound though… Draco was still able to curse, so he wasn't in such a bad state. It was just that... the guy was bleeding.
"Malfoy...you...weren't bitten, were you?"
Draco jerked up, blood was oozing out on his face from a fairly deep wound starting from his brow to his left cheek. Harry suddenly realized the reason behind all this whining. It probably wasn't because he got hurt...but because he got hurt "on his face".
"Does it look like a bite to you, scarhead?" - He yelled at him.
"No. But looks like I'm not the only here got scar on my face anymore." - Harry retaliated with a sigh of relief. Draco wasn't bitten.
-o-
All that day, Draco had been whining nonstop about the fact that he didn't do anything to deserve such fate, that he had no responsibility to rescue Teddy and sacrificed his self proclaimed 'handsome face' in the process. Luna calmly assured him that nowadays nobody would care about appearance anymore...and as long as he looked better than the walkers, he was good. Because no one could mistakenly kill him with one of the undead. Pansy yelled at Luna for her nonsense assurance then gave Draco a look that was even more sorrowful and despaired than that of the victim or unwilling hero of the incident. And even though Draco kept pestering everyone to compensate for his loss, kept asking Harry to keep watch in his place, kept asking Luna to make meals for him, kept asking Hermione to check his wounds and ensure that there was no infection or whatsoever...even after all of that, Harry thought he still owe the guy a big thanks for saving his son.
Of course Harry didn't blame Luna either, he knew how good his son was at hide and seek game. Apart from Harry, no one had ever managed to find the boy when he went into hiding. He inherited the stealth trait from his mum and the quietness of wild animal - of course from his dad. It was Harry's fault for not warning him of the current situation...no where was safe now. Not anymore.
That night, Harry went into Hermione and Teddy's tent because the only two people the boy would ever listen to was Harry and his grandmother. And right now, Harry had only one thing to ask of Teddy: Never ever got out of adult's sight and stayed close to Harry as much as possible.
"But there was no one there. I promise..."
"Oh...how do you know for sure, honey?" - Hermione winced.
"He knew, Hermione ... if anyone comes near him, he'll know. His senses are extraordinary. Taking after Lupin, the werewolf of course. Lucky he didn't inherit the morphing ability." - Harry mused - "What were you doing at that time, son?"
"I wanted to get the bird's nest down..."
"Did you climb up there by yourself?"
"No, I couldn't. But I raised my hands up to get it. Like this, daddy...let me show you..." - The boy giggled.
Something flashed through Harry's mind with Teddy's answer. It brought back the memory of when he was trying to bring the boy down with magic that day. Yes, his senses might not be as good as Teddy but it wasn't that bad that he couldn't even feel a walker right behind his back. Plus, he was definitely sure there wasn't any of 'them' right there, as sure was Teddy that he didn't see anyone around in the woods this morning.
"Hermione, take Teddy outside and called up everyone in this camp save for the Muggles, I got something to tell them!" - Harry stood up, said all in one breath and then rushed out of the tent.
Teddy and Hermione looked at each other, confused.
...
In front of the flickering flame, human faces were half hidden in the shadow of darkness, looking utterly confused and lost. The anxiety and tension were building up among the magical group with Harry's decision to call for only wizards and not Muggles.
"What now, Scarhead? I need a break. I'm wounded!" - Draco grumbled, burying his bandaged face in his hands.
"Oh yes, you will want to listen if you don't want to wake up in your sleep with a bloody mouth baring their teeth at your face." - Harry growled dangerously.
"What's the matter Harry? Is there something important?" - Neville urged.
"Yes, the thing is...There are quite a few things happened that I can't help noticing. Say the other day when Hermione and I were trying to rescue Teddy from the rooftop, I used magic to get him down twice, and twice walkers showed up out of no where while I had previously checked both times and was sure that just a minute ago, there was no one there so the walkers couldn't just approach me that close without me not detecting anything unusual…"
"... 'cause you have a lame sense of danger..." - Draco interrupted.
Harry threw him a warning glance, hinting dare - you - try - to - sneak - and - attack - me, then he continued.
"At that time I didn't think too much of it until just a while ago Teddy told me that he didn't sense anyone near him when he was in the wood either. That is...until he tried using magic to get the bird's nest down. If you know who Teddy's dad is, you'd believe in his intuition. Erm...I mean...biological dad." - Harry hastily added as he saw Luna giggled and Hermione rolled her eyes.
"So what you're saying is... magic got something to do with walkers?" - Hermione asked warily.
Her question suddenly made everyone tense up. If using magic was dangerous, then what would be the way out for them, people who had been using magic their whole life.
"Maybe Harry's right." - Hermione continued, placing a hand under her chin - "We don't know the origin of this disease. But as far as I know, I'm sure it isn't like any disease that has ever been recorded in Muggle's history and the modern medicine. More likely it came from our magical world..."
"...If that's the case, it wouldn't be unusual if magic interacts with walkers...Unfortunately this interaction isn't to our benefit. It brings more harm than good. Magic seems to attract them…" - Harry continued Hermione's words.
"Now that reminds me, Harry..." - Neville winced - "Back in London, when I took my grandma on the run, there was a group of walkers chasing after us. In my panic, I performed some spells to stop them and didn't really have time to look back to count if I defeat any or not. Thinking back on this, the initial group seemed to get larger after a while and wasn't affected by my magic at all. If I hadn't found a car later, I'm sure we would have been doomed by now."
Neville finished, the atmosphere turned quiet and heavy consequently.
Harry took a deep breath, continued.
"So...in a way, there's a high possibility that magic has become our enemy right now. And I'd ask of you to refrain from using your magic before we could find the exact cause for this matter. Please...for the safety of yourself and everyone else."
"That was easier said than done. How can we live without magic? Maybe all the incidents up till now were just purely coincidence." - Pansy protested.
"Muggles don't use magic, and they do a good job living without it. If you still insist on no harm coming out of that, you're welcome to risk your life and prove whether that is just mere coincidence. Be my guest, go deep into the woods and use magic to morph dry leaves into butterflies. Let's see if walkers come after you and whether we care at all." - Hermione fired back a retort, clearly irritated with the girl's stubbornness.
Pansy opened her mouth, about to argue back but couldn't think of anything smart to say so she pursed her lips, and shut up, extremely dissatisfied with the outcome of their discussion.
-o-
The group went to bed with a new discovery, a new fear. Magic was their instinct. It was in their blood. Stop using them wasn't a thing that can be said and done overnight. Not to mention in some cases, magic just automatically flowed out when one was in danger. Wizards used to be proud of their heritage and claimed that magic was a special gift from gods. But all of a sudden...it now turned into a threatening burden to them all.
That night, it was Pansy and Neville's turn to keep watch.
Neville was sitting by the faint camp fire, his face hardened and eyes looked blankly into the quiet night. It seemed like he was thinking a lot, but also like he wasn't thinking at all.
Pansy sat curling up into a ball in front of her tent. One hand rested on her knees while the other clutched tightly at her wand even though Neville had warned her to better not use that. Pansy of course didn't believe in that crap. There was no reason for a strange disease to have that kind of interaction to magic, Potter was amazingly stupid too. He was just dramatizing the whole thing from his traumatic experience while the rest just blindly obeyed whatever he said 'cause he was an oh-so-damned-hero-of-the-world. Oddly, Draco wasn't with her this time. He didn't even back her up and objected that foolish idea.
Pansy angrily kicked away a small rock at her feet. What she didn't expect; however, was a centipede lying underneath the rock. Losing its hiding place, the centipede started crawling towards her.
"Oh no..." - Her face went pale. She quickly looked around to find a stick or a rock, but unfortunately for her, the only rock there was kicked away a few seconds ago.
"Oh no, no..." - Pansy stepped back. Since there was nothing she could use to kill that disgusting creature, Pansy pointed her wand at the centipede and muttered - "Exterminate!"
There was a 'poof ' and a small flash of light popped out from her wand tip. The centipede was perished in a blink. Pansy sighed looking around to check if there was any more of them before Neville's voice startled her.
"What did you do, Parkinson?" - His eyes widened.
"I just killed a centipede. Chill! No big deal!" - She yawned, clearly annoyed.
"Didn't we all agree not to use magic?! " - Neville hissed intimidatingly.
"Oh c'mon. It was just a simple spell. Look! There aren't any walker, are they?" - The girl retorted shrewdly.
Neville bit his lip, looking around worriedly. He threw a final warning glare at the stubborn girl before turning away. It was...really just a small spell...so hopefully there would be no serious consequence.
A dozen minutes passed by and Neville was still stretching his ears out to listen carefully to any sound or movement. Quiet. Just when he started to believe nothing would happen, a high pitch screeching of human voice pierced through his ears. It came from the Muggle tents. Colors started draining out of Pansy's face as Neville jumped up shouting:
"HARRY! MALFOY ! EVERYONE! WAKE UP!"
Neville rushed into the nearest tent and found two no... three walkers were pushing Mr. Bruman down and eating him alive. His wife and two sons were crying for help but none of them dared to fight back the monsters.
"Get out of the tent! Get out! Now! " - Neville ordered while pulling Mrs. Bruman and the boys away from the threat.
As the boys followed her mother out, everyone were awake and grabbed their weapons, ready to fight back. Harry was pretty much stunned when he realized they were attacked at midnight. Oh Merlin no... how could they have come here?
The two Muggle sisters were running out of their tent in panic too. Harry hastily stopped them by grabbing Mary's hand, the youngest one.
"Don't run! Everybody stay close together, stay close together, don't run off on your own…!"
But it was too late for the eldest sister, Julia had just run out of Harry's sight and not long after he heard a loud scream followed by the sound of a collapsed body, struggling and fighting with that thing. He bit his lips, one hand grabbed Mary's, the other clenched tightly at his machete. Staring into the dark night, he found four more walkers in the camp area, not counting the one devouring Julia. The girl wasn't dead yet, but she writhing in pain as her abdomen was torn apart with a lot of blood loss. They were quickly surrounded.
"Julia!" - Mary screamed.
"Don't Marry! She's dead. Run over there with them and make sure you don't leave the group." - Harry pulled Marry back in and pointed towards Hermione. Luna was beside her too, both were protecting Teddy and Augusta.
Harry cast his eyes to Hermione and met hers half way. He nodded before rushing out. There were too many people to protect, too many people to fail. He gritted his teeth, slashing his machete right straight at one of the walkers' heads who was coming after the girls. On the other side, Neville was dealing with a walker who had come out of the tent after the thing finished Mr. Bruman while protecting the mother and their two sons, Tim and Sean. The boys hadn't any experience in dealing with them so they just kept on hitting the walkers' body parts with their knives in panic. Harry heard Neville shouting angrily:
"You gotta hit the head! The head..."
"Arghhh..."
One boy got bitten and blood was oozing out of his throat. Mrs. Bruman screamed out her child's name as she broke out of Neville's grap and rushing by her boy's side, trying to free him off the monsters. Right then one sneaked behind her and bit her in the arm. Harry stopped, panting after he took down three more walkers and witnessed the tragedy with his own eyes. He then ran to Neville just in time and plunged his machete into the walker's head who was pressing Neville against the tree trunk. On the other side, Draco had taken down another walker and was pulling Tim, the other son of the Brumans, out of his mum and brother's corpses while muttering "fool!" to him. Pansy didn't leave Draco's side the whole time, looking more panicked than ever.
"HARRY!"
Hearing Hermione's scream made his heart jump frantically. He turned around, two more walkers were coming closer to them. Hermione was holding Teddy in one hand while the other pulled Augusta back. Harry ran forwards, slashing his machete at one walker, while Luna took care of the other by stabbing her small knife into its eye socket. Harry looked at her with surprise but the girl just simply shrugged while her dirty blonde hair was matted with blood.
"You're bitten..." - Draco's voice rang out.
Harry and others rushed to where Draco and Neville was. His friend was examining Tim's arm. Neville looked back at Harry, shaking his head. It was a pretty deep bite which probably pierced through the artery and blood was flowing out uncontrollably. Tim shakingly looked at them, then turned his eyes to his mother and brother's lifeless bodies. Nobody had made it out alive with such injuries. Tears were now falling all over his face.
"I-I'm gonna die, right?" - He whispered, fear spread out in his young eyes.
"No..." - Harry softly whispered back, didn't know what to do but knelled down and put a comforting hand on the boy's shoulders.
"I don't want to die..." - Tim 's voice broke down as he pleadingly looked at Harry - "... I still have a lot of things to do. God...I'm only sixteen ... I haven't even got a chance to graduate from high school and confess to Katie. Save me..." - The boy was begging Harry but he really didn't know how except mumbling a few broken comforting words.
"Let me treat his wound. Maybe we could save him..." - Hermione sank down beside Harry and opened her first aid kit.
"T-thank yo - "
Thud!
The cold cruel sound of the wooden stick plunged through human head ringing out as blood oozed out of Tim's face while he was still looking at Hermione with pleading eyes. She was horrified as she watched the boy's body plopped down onto the ground.
It was Draco, his eyes were as cold as ice.
"You bastard! What have you done? What have you done?" - Harry jumped up, grabbing a handful of Draco's collar and yelled at him.
"He got bitten and will soon 'turn'. What else was there to do but killing him?" - Draco glared back, hissing through his teeth.
"We don't kill the 'living'. The boy was still alive! Goddammit, he was still breathing."
"How much time do you think he could have left? Were that saving him or prolonging his suffering? Have you ever seen anyone you know died then rose up and wanted to take a bite out of you, fool?" - Every word and every sentence Draco spouted out was filled with merciless cruelty. But what upset him even more was that the ferret was somewhat right...
Harry remembered Muller. Then he remembered what Hermione had said about her mum. Memories started flashing in his mind as he let go of Draco and made a loud roar angrily and helplessly.
"Shhh...Harry..." - Hermione stepped forwards and grabbed Harry's hand. Draco's words clearly had an impact on her for her eyes now was all reddened.
Neville hugged Augusta then looked over his shoulders and peered at Pansy with plaintive eyes.
"Are you happy now?"
The girl was trembling at his intimidating voice.
"What is it?" - Harry asked.
"I just killed a centipede, it was crawling towards me. I couldn't find anything to - to…. so I...I swear…I didn't mean to..." - Pansy turned to Draco, stammering in her attempt to justify herself.
Everyone went silent. Harry looked to Marry. The bewildered girl just didn't understand what had happened and was happening. He silently wished that she would never ever understand that it was Pansy who brought upon her family's deaths.
"Can everyone help clean up this place, please?!" - Harry said tiredly.
To be continued ...
