Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter franchise nor anything affiliated with it.
Draco's POV
Draco's POV
We are lined up at the airport in the group check-in line, waiting for the staff to open up the counter. I'm pretty tired so my thoughts start to drift back to this morning.
This morning started off pretty rotten. I had another nightmare last night, and they haven't been going away. I've been getting very little sleep as of late, and it's never restful. Overall I probably only sleep about 4 hours every night, and it's quite light. My insomnia has come back just like it was in sixth year. Every night since that day on the astronomy tower, I've had nightmares constantly. It wasn't so bad after my mother died, but that must have started it. Anyway, I must have fallen asleep after I got changed and I went to get my phone from under my pillow. I was woken up for the second time, but this was by Hermione banging on my door. My first thought was 'why is she knocking on my door this early?'. I assumed that my alarm hadn't gone off yet, and that it must have been 5 something. Then she asked why I wasn't down yet and I saw that it was almost 8. I was two hours late!
I had panicked and splashed some water on my face before realizing just how terrible I looked. I had ridiculously pale skin, even for me, and my eyes had huge purple tinted bags. My eyes themselves were red and my hair looked really messy. I then quickly placed a glamour charm on myself to look less dead on the outside. After that I straightened out my shirt and stuffed my binder in my bag before running down to meet Hermione. We put our shoes on before walking, at a faster pace than usual, down to breakfast.
Class started off like usual and my mind had started to wander. Sometimes when teachers talk I find it very hard to concentrate. It's not their fault it's just that I know that they will be talking about school work, and that it will probably boring, so there is no need for me to pay attention. I'm pretty good at picking up what we're doing anyway so it hasn't been a problem yet. The other reason I lose focus is that when I'm really tired I have a hard time keeping my thoughts organized like usual. They just don't fit together and I lose each thought amongst a weird static feeling in my head.
This morning I was lost in thought about a song I was listening to last night. I was trying to remember how it went when I heard the teacher say something about an 'airplane'. I lifted my head up and tried to figure out what was going on. Hermione picked up on me daydreaming and not paying attention, so like usual, she passed me a small paper with a brief summary of what's happened so far. As I read it I started to feel kind of confused because I didn't know what most of the terminology meant. All I knew was that we were going on some sort of field trip to an 'airport' and then coming back.
I looked at her with a confused expression but she didn't notice so I quietly pulled out my textbook and tried to find out what these things were using the index. I quickly skimmed the text there and found out that airplanes are sort of like big metal birds that can hold a large amount of people and keep them in the air so they can travel, with the help of large engines. You can fly in one by purchasing a ticket and going to an airport. It didn't make complete sense, but I wasn't as confused as I was previously.
Professor Carrington then said something about 'passports' and I was passed a small burgundy book that said 'European Union - United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland Passport' and had a crest in the middle. I looked inside it and saw a photo of myself as well as details about me like my full name, date of birth, sex, nationality, date issued, and the expiry date of the passport. The page with all of those details was kind of hard and shiny, but the following pages were like regular blank paper.
All of a sudden everyone was getting up to leave and I felt really lost. Hermione seemed really excited so she left very quickly and darted out the door. I quickly scrambled to gather my stuff before sprinting out after her seeing as how I didn't know what was going on. I soon found her on our usual route to get to our dorms.
We finally got up to our room and she just ran up to her room and slammed the door shut. I heard her rustling around in there quite a bit, so I just walked into my room and sat down for a bit. Based on the note Hermione gave me, the passport, what I remembered from Professor Carrington's little speech, and what I read in the textbook, I gathered that we were going on some sort of trip. I highly doubted that we would be going for more than a day, so we probably just needed to bring a couple of small items. I realize that she probably had said a list, but I didn't catch that.
I was about to step out of my room and ask Hermione if she could tell me what I missed, when she knocked on my door. I walked over from my desk and opened it to see her standing at my door in more muggle looking clothes and her hair in a smarter ponytail as supposed to her usual bushy madness. I asked if she could come in and she did. She stared at my room for a little and almost seemed to be in awe. Eventually I got her attention again by asking what I was supposed to pack.
"You need to bring something to occupy yourself with, something to take notes in, your passport, ideally a water bottle that you can empty before security and then fill up again later, I recommend bringing some muggle cash as well, and put it all in a relatively small bag that can fit any other small objects. A smaller bag will make security easier to get through."
As she spoke, I had gathered my stuff and put it all in my messenger bag after pulling my binder out and placing it on my shelf. I double checked that I had everything and closed it up. After I finished that we walked into the halls and headed to our class again. On the way while Hermione walked in front of me, I decided to transfigure my clothes into more muggle looking attire seeing as how I knew we would be going to a muggle place.
I'm pulled back to the present when the line starts moving again. I'm standing next to Hermione in line and decide to look at the architecture of the area. There are windows everywhere including the ceiling and as a result, the area seems extremely bright. The whole place is so white and clean. There's a funny smell in here, like it's too clean. It has a synthetic smell that just reeks hospital and sickness to me. I try to take my mind off of that by observing the planes outside, in the opposite direction from where we came. They look so huge, and I find myself skeptical of the fact that they can actually make it off the ground, with people inside it as well.
As I think about all these things we move further through the line till we make it to the front and finally to the desk. The lady at the desk asks for all our passports to check with our faces and we all get through without a hitch. Once we are done we walk out to go down the main hallway by the entrance to go around to the main gates that will lead us to security. We are near the front doors that we walked through to get inside from the bus when all of a sudden there is a huge explosion outside.
The bus we were just in about 20 minutes ago, the bus that hadn't left after it dropped us off, was engulfed in an orange fireball as shrapnel flew everywhere. The surrounding cars also exploded and so did another couple of buses further down the terminal stretch. Security around us was thrown into a frenzy and people started yelling and screaming in panic. Half of our group started panicking or just had a glazed expression on their faces and I knew exactly why.
It wasn't because a bomb had just gone off, though that was one of the causes. It reminded them of the war. All the screams and panic were trying to pull me back there as well but I slammed those thoughts to the back of my mind as fast as possible. I tried to focus on my responsibilities, reminding myself that I had a job to protect my classmates and get us out of here alive.
Professor Carrington turned to Hermione and I with a look of fear as well as one of fierce determination.
"Hermione, Draco, remember what I said earlier. Take care of the students. I need to figure out what's going on and see if I can help. You guys can't help the way that I can, your wands will be too obvious and I don't want you all being investigated by security when they have so much to deal with. Now go and take care of them."
Hermione and I nod and hurriedly guide our fellow classmates to a back corner from where our check-in desk was. As we guide them there there is another explosion right where our professor ran off to, and a couple of other spots in the terminal itself. The heat of the blasts is so much more intense when we're right next to it. I cast a quick shield charm at the same time as Hermione to protect us and our classmates from debris. I have to fight back a cry of frustration and anger at possibly losing another person that I knew in such a violent way. I turn to Hermione and see my hurt and frustration mirrored in her eyes. With unspoken communication we turn back to our class with the goal of protecting all of them from this.
We get our classmates to the corner as quickly as possible before they can ask any questions. Working quickly together, we cast a disillusionment charm our classmates and set up some wards around them. We get the students to stay in there and cast a muffliato so they can't hear what's going on. Then we leave them with a portkey that will take them to Hogwarts in 1 minute, so that they'll get back there as soon as possible without the need for apparating or the floo network, with Neville in charge.
We are both thinking the same thing as we do all this. That we have to help everyone around us since we can, but we also have to protect our classmates. As we leave them and run back there is suddenly another wave of explosions. I grab Hermione and pull her down, using myself to shield her under me as pieces of glass rain down on us. I wait for the impact of the debris but nothing falls. I look up and see that Hermione's put up a shield charm. I thank her through my eyes and quickly help her up. We keep running and try to put out the fires as we go by them or at least prevent them from spreading by transfiguring the glass into sand to dampen the flames.
As we run I notice a couple of black robes and white masks and I start to slow down and freeze. No, not now. Not here. I start to feel panic rising inside of me but suddenly I feel a sharp sting on my cheek. I look around to see where it came from and see Hermione looking at me with a concerned expression as well as her hand raised from slapping me. I notice the small tendrils of fear creeping in her eyes and I'm sure that the same is true for my eyes as well.
"I'm sorry I slapped you, but we don't have time for either of us to panic right now. Before you say anything, I saw them too. You aren't crazy, there are Death Eaters here. They're probably responsible for this whole mess."
Her words shake me a bit when all of a sudden I hear a laugh coming from behind me, joined soon by another. The laughs of two people who have been in Azkaban and have gone crazy because of it. The laughs of two people who used to love torturing students. The laughs that used to haunt my dreams as well as my everyday life back in seventh year.
Hermione's words may have scared me, but those laughs chill me to the core and I feel my panic start to seep into my bones.
"Aw, how cute. Draco Malfoy associating and being comforted by a mudblood, even better, one of Harry Potter's accomplices. A member of the Golden Trio and the Order of the Phoenix!"
"I guess the rumours were true after all Amycus! The Malfoy's have gotten soft and have become blood traitors."
I snap my head around to see the ghastly grins of Alecto and Amycus Carrow.
Author's Note: I hope y'all are okay with the turn I've taken with this bit. I just wanted to put in a bit more action before my next bit, also I really enjoyed writing this kind of stuff. Thanks for all your support, but please review. I would love to have some feedback or critisism, you can't get through life without it. Have a great week all of you, till next time!