Into the Truth

Chapter One

A Strange Beginning

"You don't remember me

But I remember you.

I lie awake and try so hard

Not to think of you.

But who can decide what they dream?

And dream I do…

I believe in you.

I'll give up everything just to find you.

I have to be with you

To live,

To breathe,

You're taking over me.

Have you forgotten all I know?

And all we had?

You saw me mourning my love for you

And touched my hand.

I knew you loved me then."

Evanescence - Taking Over Me

Part One-The First Dream

It was right after Professor Binn's class and the topic had been another Goblin War. During the class he had actually started to keep track of how many different goblin wars there had been. He was right now on 237. How could one race have caused so many wars and still have enough members of the populace left to support twenty large branches of Gringott's bank and continue their wars on the side? He was puzzling over this as he left the room but was brought out of his stupor by the crash of thunder outside. He looked out the window and confirmed his initial theory. The rain had not stopped. In fact, if anything, it had increased.

The day outside was bleak. The usually cloudless and happy days of Hogwart's fall were over now in place of the drab, dull days of winter. But it was still too warm for snow, so outside the rain poured relentlessly down. It had been going for days now, without a stop and people were starting to worry. It was dragging down morale throughout the school and posing serious disciplinary problems. As you know, when children can't play outside they get a bit antsy and that is exactly what had been happening here at Hogwart's for the last week or so.

He had become a prefect yet again this year, so it was one of his responsibilities to keep the order. And while he pointedly ignored certain crimes, such as the Slytherin that just used the Impedimentia curse on a Gryffindor, his job was still a bit busier than it should have been.

Fights, thefts and other petty little crimes were being committed around the clock, it seemed, and he hadn't had any rest in days. It blurred his judgment and left him asleep in classes that he very well shouldn't be sleeping through. Like potions. And transfiguration.

He shuddered at the thought of Transfiguration class, which was next on his list of classes for the day. Right after lunch. He sighed and another peal of thunder let loose partially hiding a female voice calling his name. He knew the owner of this voice. Or at least he thought he did. But he just couldn't place it. It was followed by a very irritated plea for his attention and hurried footsteps. He planned his motions perfectly and swiveled around just in time to catch an angry hand headed for him. He looked at the owner with some surprise and a thought crossed his mind a split second before the bells began. The thought was, strangely enough, that he loved her. Loved her with all of his being.

And as the thought passed, he knew it couldn't be. There was no way. He knew the truth and the truth did not involve Virginia Weasley, the fiery red head who currently stood in his grip and was staring at him like he was heaven on earth. She opened her mouth to say something, and then the school bells began to chime. So loud he couldn't make out what she was saying. He opened his mouth to tell her….

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Playground school bells ring again.

Rain clouds come to play again.

Has no one told you she's not breathing?

Hello.

I'm your mind giving you

Someone to talk to.

Hello.

If I smile and don't believe

Soon I know I'll wake from this dream.

Don't try to fix me I'm not broken.

Hello.

I'm the lie living for you so you can hide.

Don't cry…

Evanescence – Hello

Part 2 –The Second Dream

The stupid bells! She couldn't hear him because of those stupid bells!

"I can't hear you!" he called out, and gasped, waking up in a cold sweat. Class had just ended. It had been another of Professor Binn's stupid Goblin War lectures. How could one race have been through so many wars and still have enough populace left to support twenty large braches of Gringott's and still continue their wars? This thought was abruptly ended by a peal of thunder outside.

He gazed out the window in the corridor. Still gloomy, he thought, heading toward the Great Hall for lunch. He was a prefect this year. And since the main job of a prefect was to keep the peace, he was very sleep deprived. It had been raining for a week and the resident's of Hogwart's had become more and more antsy. The crime rate was up considerably. Small time criminals were popping up everywhere, at all hours of the night.

He silently cursed the rain and began listening for tell tale signs of a crime waiting to happen. But instead of little criminals planning their next little career move, he heard quiet murmurings everywhere, like the entire student body was planning something.

What is going on? He thought. I don't understand. Usually the halls are in an uproar during passing time.
He considered going up to a group of Slytherins and inquiring them what was going on. He walked up to them and tried to ask them what was going on, but they just ignored him. Like he didn't even exist.

And something even more curious was happening. His feet were carrying him, not in the direction of the Great Hall, but in the direction of the infirmary. What could possibly be so important in there? He wondered. He tried to stop, but found he no longer had any control over his legs.

Inside the infirmary he went, and as he did, a nurse came bustling past him, completely ignoring him. I would have thought she would stop me, he thought and tried to call out to her, but still she ignored him. Like she couldn't hear him.

Maybe she couldn't. The thought crossed his mind and left him cold inside. Why wouldn't I be visible? He pondered. Completely ridiculous.

His legs stopped him right beside a bed whose curtain's had been drawn. And icy pang of panic drove itself into his heart. Only one thing could cause the curtain0s of a bed to be drawn, and the thought of seeing what lay behind that particular curtain sent more icy shards of panic driving into his chest.

But still, he had no control of his actions. He walked forward, carefully parting the curtains and heard the last vestiges of a muffled conversation.
"I can't believe no one told you," said the voice of Madame Pomphrey.

The other part voiced a muffled sob.

Draco felt like he was going to die. Or maybe be swallowed by some large scary monster.

"She stopped breathing almost immediately after you brought her to us. Everyone else knows. I can't imagine why no one told you. To find out like this..,"

Madame Pomphrey's voice trailed off as the curtains parted. And there he saw Ronald Weasley, Virginia Weasley's brother, weeping bitterly in a corner. Standing next to him, huddled over him trying to console him was Madame Pomphrey. And on the bed….

On the bed….

These stupid bells! He thought, their sound filling his head, causing his teeth to shake and his vision to blur.

Who was it on the table?

He tried to see but the sound of the bells….

And his vision was so blurry.

And then, and immense pain entered his head and put him out of his misery.

And as everything faded slowly to black, he saw whom it was and his breath was taken away and tears were brought to his eyes.

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"Look here she comes now.

Bow down and stare in wonder.

Oh how we love you!

No flaws when she's pretending.

But now I know she never was and never will be…"

Evanescence – Everybody's Fool

Part 3- The Third Dream

"NO!" he screamed into the dark. He sat up drenched in sweat awakened not by his screaming alarm clock but by the loud peal of thunder outside. Raining again? He thought. His back ran chill with goose bump from the sudden feeling of déjà vu. But what was it from? His dream? Highly probable.

He knew whom his dream was about. In fact, he had had several other dreams on her behalf. God bless Virginia Weasley, the fiery redhead who was his worst enemy and yet best friend at Hogwart's. She was perfect in everyway it seemed. Her skin unblemished and her hair never out of place. The way she spoke and moved as if everything she did had been pre-rehearsed so she wouldn't screw it up. But so totally agreeable. A good politician to the core. She had been Draco's only competition since she got here five years ago.

But what exactly it had been about? He couldn't quite remember. Scowling at the alarm clock that was still loudly announcing it's existence to the world, he threw it at the wall. It made a few more sad attempts at it's screaming cry and then fell silent.

His father being one of the school's Governors had earned him his own room. His room was decorated in the furnishings of the rich. A King sized four-poster bed with lace canopy stood as the centerpiece of the room. Off to the right was a solid oak desktop with a ridiculously expensive computer sitting on it. To the left was his bureau and only window right above. Which someone had left open, he thought irritated. He rose to close it, but by the time he had gotten half way there, he was so cold he was shivering.

The fact that it was abnormally cold for the season didn't seem to register at all. The only thing that mattered to him was getting to the window. Something important lies there, a small voice in his head repeated itself, over and over like a scratched record. When he reached it and fought through the thick curtains to the actual window he saw perfect little Ginny Weasley on the lawn of the school.

What is she up to? He thought, blessing the fact that his intuition had been right. Can anyone say blackmail?

But out on the lawn, Hogwart's princess had noticed the barmy little silver hair prat staring out at her. Realizing her chances of accomplishing anything here were now over, she slowly faded away.

Alarm registered in Draco's mind and an idea came to him that he had to be going completely insane. First things first, you couldn't apparate off of Hogwart's grounds. He knew that by bad experience and read knowledge both. Secondly, he didn't know anyone named Virginia Weasley. No one by that name here at Hogwarts. He had never even heard the name! So where did this information come from? All of this background history and knowledge? How could she be so closely tied to him when he didn't even know who she was?

Suddenly he felt weak. Something wasn't right here. The thought came but registered slowly and an idea began to form. But before the thought could take hold, gravity did. In his haste to get a closer look at what was going on, he had leaned precariously out of his window. And when she had just disappeared like that, he had pushed himself over the edge of his balance. He fell out of his window with an odd sort of grace and before he hit the ground, the alarm clock began to scream again, voicing it's shrill cry and he, too, slowly faded away, hearing the sound not as an alarm clock but as a school bell ringing so loudly it threatened to drive him insane.

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Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping

Hello

I'm still here

All that left of yesterday…


Evanescence – Hello

Part 4 – Waking From The Dream

He woke up in the cold dungeon, bathed in sweat and breathing hard. What a weird dream, he thought. He looked outside at the storm that was raging.
What a warm welcome back to Hogwart's it had been. He frowned thinking about it. First off, missing the train and having to be escorted here by his father and enduring the almost constant tongue-lashing he got the entire way there. It ranged anywhere from him being irresponsible, to lazy, to stupid, to inept and most of it revolving around the fact that he hadn't gotten prefect this year, or the year before, or the year before that. And Malfoy's had always, always been prefects.

Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, after getting here after the sorting ceremony, receiving his first verbal reprimand of the year from Professor Snape.
And just to top things off, he ran into that blasted Potter and his nasty little friends in the halls. And they had laughed. All of them. At him. Like they had the right to be so nasty to him. Especially Potter.

He sneered at the thought of his most hated enemy. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter went together almost as well as flies and spiders. They just didn't. No reason why other than it was the way things were meant to be.

But one of Harry's little entourage he hated even more than Harry himself, and he couldn't put his finger on why. Virginia Weasley. Also known as Ginny Weasley. Oh how he hated her.

Every time they passed in the halls, his flesh would tingle and his normally perfect hair would stand up on end. He would bare his teeth and practically snarl at her out of dislike. And she rivaled him in the looks competition. Her fiery red curls and chocolate brown eyes were a stark contrast to his platinum blonde hair and storm gray eyes. But said named hair and eyes earned him a lot of second looks, blushing girls and secretive winks in the hallways.

She too, however, earned her fair share of such admiration. Not blushing girls and such, but she had no end to the number of males following her around like helpless little puppies bending to her every whim.

And this made him jealous. He was jealous because she was beautiful. He was jealous because she shared his spotlight. A spotlight meant only for him. This was his show and she had somehow worked her way seamlessly into it. And he hated her for it. As much as he hated Potter. And maybe more.

But the middle of the night was not the time to dwell on such things and he fell back into the cacophony of dreams that plagued him nightly, not remembering anything but a vague sense of sadness and loss of something precious to him.