Chapter 11
kateydidnt: OMG! I love you so much! Thanks for pointing that all out! Now that you mention it, you are so right. Now...*looks mysterious* I think I have an answer for those problems…
K.D. Toling: As always, thanks for the review. I'm very glad you don't know how a suicidal person thinks! *thinks about it a bit* That is kind of…icky… about him thinking about what he would be thinking. Yep, you are definitely right.
Corvus-corax: *thinks about it awhile* Wow, you are right about Neville. *huggles you for pointing that out and reviewing* It was really nice of you to review too! Thanks about it being realistic, I try! I'm also trying to write fast...but it's hard. And, nope, Percy's not crazy, although it would have made for a very interesting story.
Percy let himself go and began to fall. For a second his mind was blank, occupied by the feeling of falling and knowing soon he would hit the sidewalk and it all would be over. Everything began to rush faster and faster until it all became a blur, the building whizzing by him so fast and the ground coming closer and closer at an impossible rate. He couldn't even tell which way the sky was and which way was the ground. His mind screamed in panic, "I don't want to die! Don't let me die I take it back!" But it was too late. His last thought before his body slammed into the pavement began with: "Mother, I'm sorry…"
Percy woke up sweating, sheets tangled and everything disarrayed. He just lay there for a moment, eyes wide and breathing ragged. Looking around blankly, he discovered he had absolutely no clue where he was. It was a rather odd looking room, rather old and a bit too formal, and the bed he was lying in could have been owned by the Queen herself.
"Percy Weasely," someone said gravely, "I'm sorry if you are not quite sure where you are or why you are here. This will be explained in time. It appears your dreams have also been…bothersome." Albus Dumbledore peered at him seriously, then popped a yellow candy into his mouth.
"Why am I here? How did I get here?! Why am I here with you?!" Percy shook his head and looked confused. His head hurt and he couldn't think right, but other then that he felt marvelously good, almost blank. The last thing he thought he had done was get a new project from Mr. Eavert. For some reason he didn't feel as great about Mr. Eavert as before. How extremely odd, Mr. Eavert was such a great man.
"You are here for protection against a certain Death Eater named Eavert who placed you under an imperious curse and caused you to…" Dumbledore paused and said delicately, "…do something you wouldn't have normally done. You have just recently escaped from a Mental Institution and have nearly succeeded in an attempt of leaping off a business building in London."
Dumbledore sounded completely sincere but Percy sat there and blinked a few times, then gave a hesitant laugh. "Uh, what really happened? Seriously?"
"I'm not pulling your leg, Mr. Weasley. I'm quite serious." Dumbledore ate another piece of yellow candy thoughtfully.
"Your crazy," Percy said shortly, voice tinted with annoyance, "I'm going home! I have to go to work, what time is it? How did you get me here?! What right do you have to cart me off here and tell me ridicules lies? The Ministry is undoubtedly right about you, and I really wouldn't want to be found in your presence." Percy began getting out of bed. Looking around, he snapped, "Where is my wand?"
Dumbledore ignored Percy's obvious rudeness. "Mr. Weasley. You have been in my school for seven years. Do you really think I would kidnap you, lie to you, then try to keep you here against your will?"
Percy blushed then muttered, "Probably not. But you must admit, what you said just happened to me is completely ludicrous."
"Yes, that is true," the headmaster said mildly, "but…would I really tell you such an obvious impossibility if it wasn't true?"
"Mr. Eavert isn't a Death Eater!" Said Percy, scandalized, "And I'm not crazy, I am in good control of my senses, thank you very much."
"Your memory is more damaged then I thought." Dumbledore looked concerned, "And did I ever say you were insane?"
"You implied it," Percy said childishly.
Dumbledore shook his head. This time a clear smile was on his face, "I merely mentioned you were placed in a Mental Institution. I did not say you were insane."
"What would I be doing in an Institution if I wasn't insane?" Percy glared at Dumbledore, then looked down and realized he was wearing bright purple pajamas spotted with green and blushed a deep red.
"You were being kept immobile and thus not a threat to some extremely sinister Death Eater plans. Oh, by the way, those were the only ones that fit you. I'm dreadfully sorry; you came to us in rather bizarre attire. Candy?" Dumbledore handed him a candy.
Percy shook his head and pushed the candy aside, "Why, if all of this happened to me, do I somehow fail to remember everything?"
"Do you remember Gildory Lockhart? He taught Defense Against the Dark Arts during what I believe was your seventh year."
Percy coughed and said a bit blandly, "The man would be hard to forget."
Dumbledore's lips twitched slightly, "Gildory happened to have saved your life. He is very good at memory modifying. When you were about to—rather foolishly, I might add—jump off one of the tallest buildings in London, Gildory recovered part of his memory. To prevent you from having an untimely death, he used a certain Neville Longbottom's wand to modify your memory and make you forget you were depressed. Unfortunately, it also made you forget quite a bit more then that so you wouldn't have the slightest desire to leave this world, at least not yet."
"How can you prove all this?" Percy said suspiciously, looking at Dumbledore in a slightly befuddled and worried fashion.
"Simply by the fact that almost a 3/4ths of month has gone by from the time you last remember anything, that I can show you several papers with rather modified versions of the true story in them, and that your family remembers visiting you in the mental institution." Dumbledore reached into one of his cavernous star-covered pockets, that seemed to be full of lemon drops, and pulled out a paper with large headlines that read, "TWO INSANE PATIENTS ESCAPE, ONE ARMED WITH WAND, DANGEROUS."
Percy stared at the paper. A picture of him looking very official and stiff at a board meeting blinked tiredly up at him. "Oh…" he said, sounding faint, "Oh."
Dumbledore coughed but allowed him to stare in silence for awhile. Finally, he said, "There are several issues, however, that could change the fate of how we proceed. The first problem is you are the only one who can willingly tell us what we need to know. The second? You don't remember a single thing that happened and are probably in considerable shock." Dumbledore's face became extremely grave and ran his fingers through his beard like he was helpless to do anything else. "It appears, Mr. Weasley, that we have several other problems as well."