Title: Somebody Out There (7/15)
Author: silverphoenix
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Summary: In the middle of a war, there are going to be casualties. This is inevitable. When two people lose their friends, they come to realise that death is not the end of happiness.
SOMEBODY OUT THERE
Part Seven: Believing
Hermione keeps a diary. I was rather surprised when she told me, as I have always associated diaries with 'girly' girls, giggling over secrets and hiding notebooks under mattresses. When we were in our sixth year at Hogwarts, Pansy Parkinson nearly turned purple in the face when Millicent found her diary and read it.
Millicent is dead. Pansy is in Azkaban.
It is funny how things change.
After reading Hermione's - she told me to read it - I have been inspired to keep my own. Hermione intends for hers to be published, but I am not sure if that is the intention of mine. I always think of diaries as private possessions, and the idea of writing it to be read seems to contradict that in my mind.
It sounds foolish, but I would like to be a man who makes a difference in this War. I probably will not; I am just one soul in this dark world, but I try to make things right. We are given choices in this world and I, Blaise Zabini, am choosing to stand up and fight for what I believe in.
I am not a hero, nor will I become one. I will not have a day of celebration in my honour. I will not have a statue cast in my image. But I will be free. It seems so far out of reach at the moment, and I sometimes feel that my faith is constantly dripping away. I believe in myself.
The people who do not know him call Harry Potter a hero. They say that he will be the saviour of the wizarding community and the one who finally rids us of Voldemort. Those of us who are acquainted with the wizard know that he simply does what he has to do to survive. He is no more of a hero than anyone else is. For him, more than anyone else, it is a case of kill or be killed.
There was a time when I could not say Voldemort's name. Now I can. Things change.
As it stands, I wake up bent and broken from my Auror training and I wonder if this is my fate. Had there not been a war, had I not become friends with Hermione, I think that I would be happy to live off my inheritance. Even if that had happened, it would have been giving in. It was what everyone expected me to do. I could have fled the country by now - left this all behind me - but I did not. I chose to stay. I could not do that.
To flee would be to leave behind the people about whom I care. Hermione, for one. She would never leave England and I understand that. When the time comes, she will be at the front line, ready for whatever they throw at her.
When the time comes, I will be stood beside her, ready to give my life for hers.
