Chapter Two
If I'm Living in
Beside her, Hermione saw that Draco's body had went stiff, and his eyes
glazed over, then he collapsed into a heap on the floor, out cold. But on the
other side of the hall the students had divided into two groups, a small group
mostly containing girls had taken refuge under the Gryffindor table; but the
remaining had gotten their wands out as soon as they heard the manic laughter;
and a large group of Slytherins had not so mysteriously disappeared, no doubt
to join the Death Eaters.
She spotted Harry and Ron leading the crowd in the fight along with the
teachers, and made her way to them; her wand out and ready by her side. When
she reached the two boys she turned to them and asked, "How on earth did
they get in here? Don't they know they weren't invited?"
All they could do was shrug in reply as an onslaught of masked figures
stormed their way. The war had begun and; if Dumbledore had any say in it;
would end, here in the Great Hall.
It was what happened in the midst of all the chaos that Hermione
remembered most vividly; it was getting late into the evening and there was no
sign of either side giving up, when Neville, with his wand at his side came and
stood beside her, right at the front of the combat zone. He gave her a look of
pure bravery, one which surprised her, because he didn't seem like the
outwardly brave type, and raised his wand into a duelling stance. A death eater
had seen him do so and taken up the challenge, but the fight didn't last long.
Neville hadn't stood a chance, so Hermione was forced to watch as the death
curse hit her clumsy friend direct in the chest, the look of terror and
disbelief crossing his face as he fell to the floor.
That was too much for Hermione, who had never watched a person die until
now; she turned to the death eater that had thrown the hex and hit him with the
most powerful, and painful spell she knew; it hit him square between the eyes
causing him to yell out in pain. The spell she had preformed was one that took
away all your senses; sound, speech, sight, touch, and smell, it also came
along with a nasty headache.
Then there was a sudden ringing and she looked all around the now
bloodstained hall trying to find the origin of it, but when it became apparent
that it wasn't coming from the hall she woke up.
*~*~*~*
Hermione hadn't even noticed that she had fallen asleep, and as she
looked at her alarm clock she found that it was
But her plan was derailed when a raggedy, old bum ran up to her and
began shouting, "It's real, it's all real, I've seen it with my own
eyes!!"
Hermione's first reaction was to push him away and keep on walking, but
her curiosity got the best of her and she asked to man what he had seen, his
reply was," Magic of course! It's all real, they have wands and they can
do all sorts of things to a man if he doesn't stand his guard!!" He waved
his hands in the air to demonstrate his point before running off in the
opposite direction.
Now as she turned to walked away from the man, who she previously
thought was crazy, she wondered if her old world was so bad off that the muggles
were beginning to catch on; because obviously this man had seen something that
had knocked the sense out of him.
*`*`*`*`*Three hours later*`*`*`*`*
At the hospital Hermione felt more at home, in her white overcoat; where
she had something occupying her mind to keep it from straying into the past.
But there was one thing her mind wouldn't put at rest; the girl who had come in
last night, who was she, and who had attacked her.
So she went to the front desk and approached Donna, the receptionist,
"Donna, do you know where the girl from E.R. last night is being
kept?"
Donna, a high school kid looked at Hermione like she was crazy, for
Donna was new, and they had never met before, "and you are?"
"Dr. Granger, I was the one of the doctors on her case, Hermione
said patiently.
"Ah, well, there were three female E.R. patients that came in last night;
can you be a little more specific? A name maybe?"
"Um…She didn't have any identification, so she's probably listed as
a Jane Doe," Hermione was taking a shot in the dark, she wasn't sure who
the girl was, she hadn't stuck around long enough to find out, but if she was a
witch she wouldn't have any identification.
"Oh yeah; the freak; she's in intensive care, room 517, Monica says
she's a real nut case," Donna then snapped her gum and nodded as Hermione
walked off.
It took Hermione no time to find the room, she glanced at her
information sheet; it read:
Unidentified
young female,
check in time: 2105h
Diagnosis: Unknown
So she knocked, and a voice on the other side of the door told her to
come in.
Inside, the miniscule hospital room was just like the rest of the
building; clean, sterilized, and white, the only difference was the young woman
sitting under the starched sheets.
At first all Hermione saw was a girl with sickly pale skin, a raggedy
head of red hair, and a dark purple bruise on her cheek, but after a second
glance, and then a third, it hit her.
"Ginny?!?" Hermione exclaimed stepping further into the room,
"What on Earth are you doing here?"
Ginny smiled a sad, but triumphant smile, "I found you. Everyone
thought you had been killed, but I found you, I did it."
"Why?" Hermione was confused about why friends would think she
was dead, "What happened?"
"Oh Herm, it's terrible, He's gone completely insane, and no one
knows what He's going to do next. Even his most trusted Death Eaters have
abandoned him in fear of their lives," Ginny shook her head in disbelief;
"It shouldn't be this way."
"But wouldn't that be a good thing, all his Death Eaters leaving?
Now he has no assistance, and more people against him, he shouldn't be as
powerful," She looked at Ginny, knowing who she was talking about,
"Right?"
"That's what everyone thought, but it was like the exact opposite
that happened," She sighed, "He has power beyond magic, no one
understands it, and no one can fight it, people have dropped dead in the street
when he felt like someone should die, he doesn't even have to be there."
"Do you know when you get out of here?" Hermione asked her
friend, "This isn't a good place to be talking about this, it's too
risky."
"Yeah, this afternoon, unless I have
another attack."
So that was how it went, Hermione went back to work, running through
everything Ginny had told her, again and again, trying to make sense of it, to
find out what power he had resorted to. But more than once her mind would drift
off to Harry, Ron, or her other old friends from Hogwarts, the school she had
loved so much, but now feared it wouldn't even be standing. So at the end of
the day, she was eager to find Ginny and get back to her apartment, she needed
to know all that had happened since she left.
She found Ginny gathering the few things she had come in with. She was
looking better than she had that morning, but still rather rough, her clothes
were muggle, a pair of baggy jeans and a large white t-shirt, you could see her
wand sticking out of her pocket; her robes that she had come in with were in a
small bag. When she saw Hermione in the doorway, she smiled, but it wasn't like
Hermione remembered. Ginny's smile would always make her face light up, it was
a contagious type of smile, but now her smile was worn out, and didn't reach
her eyes.
"Come on, lets go," Hermione motioned to the door.
In the car on the way to her apartment Hermione remembered that she had
no groceries, and if Ginny was going to be staying with her she'd need
something to eat, "I have to get groceries, is that okay?"
Ginny just nodded. So Hermione pulled into a food store and they got
out. In the store Hermione took a cart and randomly began putting things that
she thought Ginny would like, Ginny just followed her blankly. When they pulled
up to a till, the cashier, one of Hermione's neighbours, noticed that Ginny was
a little out of it.
"Is she going to be okay?" He asked Herm.
Hermione was about to reply when Ginny interrupted, "I'll be fine,
thank you, can we go now?" So they left.
*******
At Hermione's place, while they were putting away what they had bought,
Ginny began to cry, it had started as a few tears then became an all out bawl,
Hermione ran over to her and lead her to the couch, "What's wrong
Gin?"
"Nothing," Then she gave another loud sob, "Who am I
kidding, everything is wrong!!!"
"Shhh....It's all right," She handed Ginny a tissue,
"Here. Now tell me what is really wrong?"
And there they sat, all night long, talking and crying.
"Well, it's just that life has been so hard, and then I come here,
and you are living your life, no one's bothering you. You don't have to look
around every corner to make sure that there's not someone who's going to come
out and kill you," Ginny explained.
"But Ginny, I want to come back, I want to help, I feel so guilty
for leaving, then when I try to come back, I'm scared that there won't be
anything left, I feel so helpless here" She admitted.
"But it's horrible, if you see what I've seen, you would cherish
your life right now, instead of regretting it. So many people have died.
Sometimes you just want to wish you were dead too, but you're scared that someone
will come and grant that wish."
Hermione gave her a look of surprise, "Surely it can't be as bad as
you say; you must be overreacting."
"I wish I was, but unfortunately, I'm not. I'm surprised I even
made it here alive. To me it was like a miracle."
"But you almost didn't, you were under a curse when they found you.
What was that, and more so, who did
it to you?"
Ginny didn't answer right away, first she sighed, then she wiped the
tears from her eyes, then she sighed again, "Well you see, it's kind of
hard to explain. I was caught awhile back, trying to get out of
"I guess so, but still you shouldn't have even tried, you said
yourself that everyone thought I was dead." Then she asked out of curiosity.
"If everyone thought I was dead, why didn't you?"
"I don't know," Hermione nodded for her to continue, "It
was a trap, you know. When he killed your parents, it was a trap to get you.
You were so close to finding out how to kill him, that he needed you out of the
picture...permanently. Does this mean he didn't attack you?"
"When I got the message that my parents had been murdered I came
here, because they were visiting family here, and when there was nothing, the
bodies were laying all over the place, the house was completely lifeless and
there was an air of magic in the air, so I knew that he had destroyed them, but
he wasn't waiting for me, no one was. So I stayed there for a few days thinking
maybe he would come back. And when he didn't, I found I didn't have the courage
to come back, so I stayed, started a new life, and tried to forget about
magic." That was the story of her life, she was afraid. And now she was
needed, but would she be able to help?