Cyan: Hello again! Ferb, I know what we're gonna do today! :D

Magenta: Conquer the world? :D

Cyan: Not yet, woman! Write the next chapter of the fanfic!

Magenta: oh, well :( ... But aren't we warning our readers about...?

Cyan: No! Let them get surprised!

Magenta: But it's sooo sad T.T...

Cyan: Shut up! You'll ruin everything!

Chapter Ten – Lucid Dreaming

Space, vast and empty, began to swirl up around them. It dragged away the solid forms of the bedroom and instead replaced it with a dark vacuum of nothing, isolating the girls in the middle of a sea of blackness. Cyan and Scarlet exchanged worried glances, and Magenta, at last her attention gained by the strangeness of the situation and the disappearance of the chair she had been sat on, suddenly woke up. "What's happening?" she said, now fully alert and slightly panicked.

"The nothing space," Scarlet whispered, "Somewhere between the real world and the dreamscape. We're transitioning. Best hold on."

"Hold on for what?" Cyan asked, but a second later her question was answered as the void around them was filled with a storming rage of color. Figures and shapes sprang into life about them and they felt the ground shift and realign itself several times beneath their feet. An onslaught of sounds pummelled their ears, much similar to what they had experienced when travelling through time previously, and the girls realised that they were entering the violent chaos that was Bianca's dream.

A few seconds passed, and then steadily the scene around them began to calm down and settle into something more consistent. The three sisters looked about them, beginning to recognise the scene as someplace in Hogwarts, and the Scarlet spotted a girl standing nearby with dark hair streaked with viridian and jade green eyes. "It's her," she whispered to the others.

She was reading a potions book they all had used before, although that version had an older looking design on the cover and was covered in moving stickers of Shakespeare's characters, such as Mercutio or Benedick and Beatrice. "She doesn't seem to be very disturbed," said Magenta ."Are you sure we're in her dream and not some random memory?"

But, before the others could answer, a faint, frightened voice came from behind a column. "No! Por favor! huye ahora que puedes...!"

And then they came across a familiar sight: there was another Bianca curled into a ball in a corner, with her messy appearance and white hair, scratching her nails into her own skin and rocking feverishly back and forth. "Bianca!" Cyan grabbed her hands so she stopped hurting herself. "Stop it! It's just a dream!"

"Not a dream, Cyan," Scarlett looked at the dark haired student, who was now talking to another girl about homework. "A memory."

The former Jade raised her eyebrows, then sighed. "You want to copy my homework, don't you?" The other girl shamefully nodded. Jade opened her backpack and lent her the assignments, allowing the girls to spot the dark stoned ring on her finger. Magenta tried to grab it, but as her fingers passed through the whole figure became mist for a second before returning to its original form. She let out an exclamation of how this situation was 'too trippy', before going to help Cyan with Bianca while Scarlet kept watch over the former Jade and her surroundings.

The more familiar white haired form of Bianca was still muttering to herself in Spanish, seemingly oblivious to Cyan's attempts to calm her. "Bianca...Jade! You're only dreaming! We can get you out of here and back to Moody's house." But the albino girl didn't seem to notice. Then, one word broke through her ramblings that the other girls could clearly understand.

"Dumbledore!"

Puzzled, Cyan looked at her twin and then back to Bianca, whose eyes were wide with fright. Then Magenta spotted the white haired, bespectacled form of a younger Albus Dumbledore approaching them through the dream. He stopped by the forms of Jade and the other girl, who quickly tried to hide the assignment they were exchanging.

"Good morning Miss Enigma," he addressed Bianca, which the girls assumed must be the surname she was using at Hogwarts, "And Miss Sutton. How are you both?"

"Well, thank you," both girls replied, relieved that Dumbledore appeared to have not noticed the homework cheating, but instead he gave a small smile. "I'm glad to hear it. Now if I may, Miss Sutton, I should like to speak with Jade alone a moment."

"Of course, professor," the other girl muttered before hurrying off to class, leaving a somewhat nervous looking Jade standing beside Dumbledore.

"No!" Yelled Bianca "Aléjarte de él...!"

"What's up, professor?" asked Jade. "Is there anything wrong?"

"Oh, not at all," he answered, taking a lemon drop out of his pocket. "Just wanted to talk to a very brave student, who perhaps would care to share some candy with me?" He offered her the lemon drop, which Jade accepted and popped into her mouth.

They both smiled, but the principal's grin seemed sinister. There was something wrong with the lemon drops, and the girl had no clue. "My..." Scarlet could not believe her eyes, as Jade's face turned slightly blue for a second. She had read about that kind of potion once, but it had never been proven that it was actually possible to brew such a substance. "Are you seeing this?"

"Yes," answered Magenta "Our sister is really dumb...ouch!" Bianca, trying to escape, bit her hand.

"No, her face! The candy has Blue-face potion on it! It's the ultimate poison!" According to the books she had read, said mixture was odorless, tasteless, untraceable and so deadly it could kill a whale in two hours, victim of a cardiac arrest. But Jade seemed fine when she entered the classroom for her potions lesson, perhaps because of the horcrux ring she was wearing preventing it from taking effect. Dumbledore remained at the classroom's door with a grim look on his face. Scarlet could see that, when the girl was helping her classmates with their homework, he pointed his wand and whispered, "Accio ring"

The ring flew towards him, just in time for a giant vortex to open out of the cauldron in which she was working and, violently, started to suck in everything in sight. Dumbledore entered the room then, closing the vortex before it got too big...but Bianca had been swallowed. Scarlet saw him giving money to the kid that had dropped the extra ingredient, before waving his wand to convince everybody that Jade never existed. "That bastard!" yelled Scarlet. "I'm going to skin him alive!"

Bianca too was yelling in distress as the image of her former self vanished into the whirlpool of oblivion, and with it the world around them began to disintegrate now that Bianca's memory was no longer here to sustain it. The girls once again found themselves falling through the mists of time as their sister's dream dragged them into the confused chaos of the fourth dimension.

However, one figure remained constant: the image of Dumbledore standing as he had been in the dungeons when he wiped Bianca from existence. He was aging as the strange passage of time took effect; appearing older and more like the girls were familiar with. Scarlet snarled at him. "How could you? She trusted you! I trusted you! And it turns out you were even worse than Voldemort all along!"

She wasn't expecting an answer, knowing as she did that the Dumbledore figure was just Bianca's mental construct and this was only a manifestation of her subconscious fear, but to her surprise the elderly wizard turning his icy blue eyes to look at her. Staring straight at her, he focussed perfectly on all four girls, particularly Bianca who was hysterical with terror. Scarlet felt an icy chill as she sensed that somehow, they weren't the only people who had invaded Bianca's dream.

"How could I?" Dumbledore repeated back to her, seeming slightly amused. "I merely did what was necessary, Hermione dear, although it appears I wasn't quite as thorough as I ought to have been." He then fixed his gaze on Bianca with a cruel and determined stare. "So now I must finish the job."

Suddenly, a really strong wind began to blow and started to push them away from Dumbledore. The girls looked back, only to find a giant black hole right behind them, trying to pull them into the nothingness beyond its event horizon. As they fought against the currents of air and gravity, they could hear the principal's evil laugh as he disappeared.

"That idiot ran away!" yelled Scarlet furiously, deciding to go after him in her mad quest for revenge. She looked for her wand, but couldn't find it in her pocket. "My wand! It was here a moment ago!"

"We're in a dream, wands don't work here anyway!" The twins held Bianca, who was uncontrollably shaking, to prevent her from getting sucked into the black hole. She was yelling something about fear. "The real issue here is how to get back to Moody's..."

"No," Cyan interrupted. Her face was pale, although her voice had a neutral tone. "The real issue is to get rid of them".

From the depths of the fourth dimension, countless rotten bodies were coming closer, groaning and ready to slake their hunger. Judging by the remains of their clothing, most of them were Hogwarts students, although many more had antique robes which, at some point, may have been served as fine attires. "I do believe we're caught between a rock and a hard place," said Magenta. "Suggestions?"

"This is Bianca's dream," Cyan said desperately. "If she wakes up, all this disappears!"

"But we tried waking her up and it didn't work, remember?" Magenta snapped. "We need a plan B."

All three sane girls were desperately trying to think of one, but they were drawing up blanks. "What happens if you die in a dream?" Cyan whispered nervously, watching the pack of zombies draw increasingly closer. "You just wake up, right? ...right?"

"I shouldn't like to find out," Magenta replied. "Scarlet! You're the brainy one. Tell us about dream magic. What happens if they get to us or we fall through?"

Scarlet looked terrified, but still had the presence of mind to answer. "I'm not sure. We could just wake up, like Cyan said, or..." she trailed off in fear, but a panicked Magenta urged her to continue. "Or our minds could fall through into a level of unconsciousness from which we'll never awake. Given how unstable Bianca's subconscious already is, I'd say that's likely."

The girls were still fighting the pull of the singularity behind them, but the first of the zombies had reached them now and was trying to claw at Bianca's face. Cyan and Magenta fought it off with brute force, dragging it away from their terrified sister and shoving it towards the black hole, where it was overcome by gravity and sucked into nothingness.

The pull of the black hole seemed to be getting stronger, and Scarlet grabbed hold of her sisters' arms. "We need an anchor!" she shouted. "If we can hold onto something, it might stop us being sucked through but the zombies will be. We could get rid of them that way."

Bianca yelled as her eyes started to shine, causing the ground to move abruptly. Moments later, a giant iron anchor stuck out from the ground, ready to be held by the girls. Bianca fell to the floor, weakened, so the twins had to carry her. "A little too literal, but...okay," said Cyan, while trying to push back the inferis and keeping her albino sister from being sucked into the hole. "Scarlet! Help!"

"I have my own problems!" She answered. "The inferi are trying to unplug the anchor on this side!"

It was true. She kept hitting them, but they continued trying to pull it out, and her arms were too scratched and bruised to fight. "Take this!" Magenta gave her one of her boots, since she was using the other one to repel the undead. "Aim for the eyes!"

Scarlet gazed at her new weapon, confused. "With a shoe?"

"You see a knife anywhere, sweetie...?" Suddenly, one of the zombies punched her in the face, making her fall to the ground. Scarlet came to the rescue with the other boot, and managed to give themselves some space. Cyan, without letting go of Bianca or the anchor, pulled her twin next to her.

"Magenta! Are you okay?"

She nodded, noticing there was blood on her forehead. "Why isn't this black hole faster?!"

"Because Dumbledore is slowing it down, so we would be swallowed!" came the answer. Everybody turned back round to look at the unexpected speaker. It seemed that Bianca had regained sanity, but her serious expression was upsetting. "Let me go, Cyan."

Cyan did as instructed, while maintaining her own grip on the anchor. "So what do we do?"

"You don't do anything," Bianca answered. "This is my dream, and I'm the only one who can use it to fight Dumbledore off. If I can manipulate it in the right way then I can give you an exit." At that point she screwed her face up in concentration, and a moment later a flash of light appeared several yards away. The girls turned to see a door resembling a fire escape had materialised a short distance from the black hole, with a bright neon sign saying "exit" hanging over it.

Magenta raised an eyebrow at her. "You do take things very literally, don't you?"

"When manipulating dreams, it's best not to be abstract," Bianca replied. "It gives you more control. Now if you three can reach that door, you can all wake up and be beyond Dumbledore's reach."

Scarlet whacked another inferi with Magenta's shoe, the pointed heel making a nasty crack in its skull. "But what about you?" she said with worry, "Aren't you coming too?"

"I have to stay here and control the dream," replied Bianca. "I need to use my mind to weaken the black hole so you can reach the door, and somehow fight off these inferi..." A look of concentration crossed her face again, and then there was a rumbling sound as a crack in the floor appeared. Out of it, a giant purple tentacle suddenly reached up and wrapped itself around the inferi that was currently bothering Cyan. Then, it dragged the murderous zombie back down into the pit it had emerged from, before numerous other tentacles sprung up to do the same. The horde of inferi drastically slowed down as Bianca's mind weapon attacked them.

"Well, that's odd, but it works..." commented Cyan, "But we can't just leave you here!"

"You must," Bianca said determinedly. "It's vital that you three survive to fight Dumbledore, and this is the only chance we have. Now go!"

They suddenly felt themselves being pushed towards the door, as if someone invisible was dragging them towards it. The force was so strong and so fast that Cyan barely had time to yell, "Bianca, don't...!"

The girls were all falling now, through a multicolored tunnel of sounds and images flashing before their eyes. Before they knew it, everything was only lit by candles and they were on the floor, panting. Cyan, ignoring her wounds, got up quickly and went to see her sister, still laid on the bed. "Bianca...Jade...!"

It wasn't too late yet, as she was barely breathing. The girl got her wand out and did an awakening enchantment, but it didn't work. She kept trying with many different spells, but everything remained the same. "This isn't fair!" she yelled, crying. "You have to wake up, dammit!"

"Cyan," said a voice behind her. Scarlet, with a delicate movement, made her lower her wand. "It's useless"

The looked at each other. Scarlet's eyes were wet. "You can't be serious..."

Scarlet took away her wand. "But I am. The only way she could wake up from this situation is on her own, or by some miracle."

Cyan looked at Bianca, whose breathing was growing more and more shallow by the minute, and grabbed her hand. "Please, Jade...wake up, we need you"

The girl looked like a fallen angel, or a fairy tale princess waiting to be kissed by her true love, with her restored beautiful dark hair falling over her shoulders and contrasting her clear sporcelain skin. Her sisters stood by her side for what felt like eternal minutes, speechless with grief. It was unfair that, right when she was able to escape her prison and regain her sanity, her new life was now taken away.

Several more moments passed in which Bianca remained silent and unmoving, deathly pale and barely breathing. The girls waited still clinging onto some shred of hope, but she didn't wake up. Magenta crossed to her, shaking her shoulders and crying, "Bianca, please!" but got no response. Teary eyes, she backed away slowly. "It's no use, she's not there anymore."

With a cry of angish, Scarlet's hands clenched into fists. "No! It isn't fair! I'll kill that bastard Dumbledore for this!"

Cyan put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Yes, we will," she said softly, "We'll get revenge, I promise, but right now we need to get out of here and find some place safe. Dumbledore knows we're weakened without Bianca and he knows where we are. If we're going to have a chance of defeating him later we have to run now."

Scarlet looked at her with a pained expression, but knew she was right. "What about Bianca? We can't just leave her here, can we?"

"No," Magenta replied weakly, tears in her eyes. "We'll have to levitate her with us, but we'll have to move quickly. Get your things together because we have to leave now."

All three girls were crying as Magenta sat herself on the side of the bed and leant in to gently kiss Bianca on the forehead. "Goodnight, sweet prince," she muttered softly, knowing Bianca would have appreciated the quote from Hamlet, and then pulled away. Her tears fell onto the bed sheets as she did so. Then, turning back to the others, she gritted her teeth and said more determinedly, "Alright, let's go."

-.-.-.-.-. of Chapter 10-.-.-.-.-.-.

Magenta: Why did you have to do thiiis?! T.T I really like Bianca!

Cyan: It was your idea! ¬¬

Magenta: But I never thought you would actually do it! ToT

Cyan: Turns out I just did! AND NOBODY CAN STOP ME...!

(Bianca gets out of the computer, really angry)

Bianca: You bitch! (Curses her with her wand and runs off)

Cyan: (transformed into butter) This is...weird...

Magenta: Well, you locked her in the fourth dimension for sixteen years, made her insane, and now you put her in a coma. That's the least she could do :D

Cyan: ¬¬...look! Seemingly harmless man eating plant!

Magenta: Where?! I want to poke it! (leaves)

Cyan: See you next chapter :D