When Hermione Granger was a little girl, she was afraid of the dark. Now that she was an adult, that fear seemed small, out of reach. Like a book that had been put away and forgotten about. After the incident, it seemed as if she had rediscovered that book. It was old and dusty but familiar all the same.

There was a divide in her mind. A line between now and before. Before was flawed and trying. Back then she was fierce and determined. It was hard to think about before. The memories seemed murky like she was swimming in dirty water. Now things were different. Now she felt like she was suffocating. She was no longer fierce. No longer determined. She did not feel the need to fight for anything anymore. She felt like there was something wrong with her, something broken inside. But as hard as she tried, she could not fix it. Eventually, she stopped trying.

She had friends once, before the incident. Harry, she remembered, was her best friend. She remembered having a friend named Ron as well. She couldn't remember where she had met them.

When she tried to remember more all she saw was the dark. It hurt her head, and as time went on, she thought of them less and less. Hermione thought that perhaps she had once remembered more, before the incident. Perhaps that had all changed. Perhaps her memories had been fading, one by one sinking her further and further into the dark. The dark scared her. She could hear whispers sometimes. And yet she knew she was alone.

She had been for days, months maybe years. Hermione paused, wondering how long she had been in her cell. Could it have been years? Her memories were unreliable and when she thought too hard her head would hurt. She remembered hearing laughter. Had she laughed, before the incident? Hermione didn't think she had ever laughed, she certainly didn't remember the feeling. She remembered being more than she had become.

The knowledge that she was trapped, fragile and broken and endlessly alone suffocated her. She knew she was a shell of who she used to be.

Hermione sighed, her thoughts swirling. What had her reality become? What had it once been?

She put her hand against the wall, one of four that she had been a prisoner in since the incident.

Hermione opened her eyes, then closed them again. Her head ached. She felt as if she had been crying for days. Maybe she had been, maybe she'd been crying for months. Had she been crying? Had she-

Her thoughts were cut off by a voice

"Lookin a little peaky, aren't you love?"

Hermione turned her face towards the wall, covering her ears with her hands. She didn't want to talk today. She knew talking was pointless. As pointless as remembering. There was no one there. Just her. Left alone with her thoughts.

Hermione curled up and fell asleep.

She was woken by the sound of her food being shoved through the slat in the door. She blinked at the light. Then it was gone. She ignored the food. She was hungry, but then, she was always hungry. At some point, she had gotten used to the feeling of her stomach being empty. She was fed on a schedule, of that she was sure. But Hermione no longer had a solid grasp on time. She would reach for it and it would fall through her fingers like water. She thought she might be fed once a day or once every other day, or maybe once every two days? Most of her day was spent curled up asleep.

Hermione wished, for what she thought was surely the millionth time, that there was a window in her cell. So that she would have some grasp on reality. She sighed and stood up and was immediately hit by a wave of dizziness. She leaned on the wall as she waited for her head to stop spinning.

When it finally settled she walked towards where she knew her food would be in a tray on the ground. She sat cross-legged and felt along the tray until she found the roll. She brought it to her nose and sniffed deeply. It wasn't fresh, but it was the only thing they served that smelled like food. She put it aside to save for last and felt along the tray until she found the spoon. She felt for the bowl and sighed.

Another meal spent in this cell. Alone. She ate slowly, knowing she couldn't be sure when her next meal would be. It tasted like gruel. There was no other word for it.

When she was done she picked up the roll and the spoon and carried them back towards her corner. She always tried to save the spoons. They were plastic and had no other use than eating. Hermione had tried to break them to attempt an escape before she realized the door had a deadbolt and could not be picked. And once they were broken, they turned to dust. Now she saved them as a measure of counting time. She had had 60 at one point until one of the guards figured out what she was doing and took them away. Since then the highest she had gotten to was 24.

Hermione closed her eyes and leaned her head against the wall. She was suffocating. She was drowning. She was gasping for breath, screaming for help. No one could hear her. When was the last time she had spoken, she wondered?

Sometimes she would speak to the voices that she heard. She needed to speak needed to talk, needed to- needed to not be alone.

Hermione opened her eyes and stood up.

She needed to move.

She started walking the corners of her cell, pacing. Slowly, she increased her pace until she was jogging. She did this until she felt she couldn't anymore and then did some jumping jacks. Then some push-ups. Then some sit-ups. On it went until she had exhausted herself. She had to move her body when her mind stalled. When her mind felt like it was about to burst, she had to spend herself, had to put that energy somewhere.

Hermione sat back down in her corner, breathing heavy. Her body was tired, her mind was beyond exhausted. She fell asleep.