Loss

by Breninblack

Disclaimer: All belongs to the ever-wonderful JKR.

Chapter Notes: Let's end it on this/give me one more kiss/let's end it on this. This is it, folks. The last chapter. There will be an epilogue that will hopefully be up this week, but I make no promises. However, after that I will be finished writing this (not so) little fic. I would appreciate it if, when you're finished with the chapter, you made sure to read the author's note at the end (if you don't already do it, anyway). Enjoy the chapter!

Chapter Seventeen: The Long Day Is Over

Harry landed with a thud in a crowded room. He held Draco as he looked around wildly, trying to discern where he was. There were people everywhere around him, some chatting amicably with each other, but most looking utterly confused. There was a gap in the crowd and Harry spotted a familiar bed. With a sudden jolt of realization, he knew that they were in the Room of Requirement and the crowds of people were all the people they had released from the veil.

Thank God. We're home, he thought.

He looked down at Draco and all the relief he had felt at being home quickly faded. Draco was still convulsing in his arms and sweating as if it were a hundred degrees in the room. He needed help and fast. Harry wasn't sure how much longer he'd last.

'If everyone would just be quiet for a moment, I've got an announcement to make,' came a voice over the crowd that Harry recognized as Hermione's. 'I'd like you to sign your names on this sheet. No one's leaving this room until everyone has signed in.'

Pinned on the ground by Draco's dead weight, Harry tried frantically to get Hermione's attention. He shouted for her, but his voice was lost over the din of the crowd. Finally he tugged on the emerald green robes of a man standing closest to him and urged him to get her attention.

'Uh, Miss? There's a young boy here who'd like your attention,' the man called out politely.

'Harry!' Hermione shouted as soon as she saw him. She ran up to him and gave him a hug. 'Thank God you're back! You won't believe what's going on!'

'We haven't got time, Hermione. Something's wrong with Draco.'

Hermione looked down at Draco, who had turned a very pallid shade of white. 'Oh my god, Harry. What happened?'

'I don't know. One minute he was fine and the next he was unresponsive and his eyes were rolling back in his head. This little pudgy man said he thought it was Dark Magic, but I haven't a clue beyond that. We've got to get him to the hospital wing as soon as possible.'

'I'll send Dumbledore an urgent owl,' she said. She began to get up, but Harry yanked her back down.

'We don't have time for a bloody owl. We've got to get him up to the infirmary as soon as possible!'

'We can't, Harry. I'm under strict orders to keep everyone in this room.'

'This is Draco's life we're talking about here. I don't care if you don't like him. I love him and I refuse to let him lie here and die! The rules have never stopped you before, so why should they now?'

'It's not the rules I'm worried about Harry. I wouldn't let Malfoy out of the room even if there weren't any orders.' Harry didn't understand, so Hermione continued. 'Lucius Malfoy showed up a couple of hours ago. He's hell bent on finding his son. He was raving about some kind of dark magic he's got on Draco. He wanted to have some of his house elves patrol the halls, but Dumbledore wouldn't allow it. He managed to get Lucius in his office before he tried anything else, but we've been ordered not to let anyone leave the room until Dumbledore sends word.'

'Fuck. If we don't get Draco some help soon, he's going to die!'

'I have an idea.' Before Harry could ask, Hermione rose and pushed her way through the crowd. When she returned, she was accompanied by a very familiar figure.

Seeing him in the spirit world was one thing, but seeing his Godfather in the flesh - the real, tangible flesh - was another entirely. He wanted to hug him and feel him with his own hands, not with ghostly spirit hands. Unfortunately, there was no time for that now. Reunions would have to wait until later.

'Let's get him onto the bed before we do anything else,' Hermione said. Enlisting the help of some of the people around them, Sirius and two other men gingerly lifted Draco's twitching body over to the bed. As they set him down, a man in stately burgundy robes approached them and spoke:

'I'm a healer from St. Mungo's,' he said. 'I work on the fourth floor - spell damage - and I think I could help, if that was alright with you.'

Harry nodded vigorously. 'Anything you can do for him would be a God sent.'

The healer took his wand out and began checking Draco with a series of spells. As he worked, Sirius, Hermione and Harry decided what to do.

'We can send Sirius out,' Hermione said, speaking barely above a whisper, so as not to be over heard, 'as Snuggles. He can alert Dumbledore of the situation with discretion while we wait. Dumbledore will know what to do.'

Sirius nodded solemnly. It was apparent that he too wanted to reunite with his godson, but he was also aware that there were more pressing matters at hand. Hermione lifted the wards for him and with one last glance at Harry, he left the room.

Sirius Black prowled in the shadows until he was sure there was no one watching. Within seconds, he was no longer a scraggly looking man, but a scraggly looking dog. Taking a back passage he knew from his school days, he quietly crept out of the castle unnoticed.

Once outside, he ventured around to a modest tower near the front of the school. He knew the tower well; the marauders had played tricks on it's occupants many a times. He barked twice and waited in the bushes until he saw a head appear out of the window. Poking his head out of the bushes, he looked up right into the face of Albus Dumbledore.

A smile flourished on Dumbledore's face as Sirius barked again, this time more urgently.

'It's quite nice of you to stop by, Fang,' Dumbledore said with a wink. 'But I'm afraid I'm otherwise engaged at the moment. You might want to watch out on your way back to Hagrid's. I hear you got hold of Severus' slippers again. He will not be happy when you see him about them. I imagine he'll even come visit me about them.'

Sirius barked again and ran off around the side of the castle. Going in the way he came out, Sirius reentered the castle and made his way down to the dungeons. He scratched on the door of Snape's office and hoped to God that he didn't have a class full of Slytherins. The last thing they needed right now was a bunch of moffaty first years writing home to their Death Eater parents telling them of a big, shaggy black dog that came to their class that day.

The door opened and Snape appeared, looking quite annoyed. 'My office hours are clearly posted and I have made it clear I have no time for disruptions,' he said before even looking to see who was at the door. He looked around for a moment, irritated, before he thought to look down at Sirius.

'Christ. I thought we got rid of you for good,' he said disdainfully. Sirius bared his teeth and pushed his way through the door. Snape look disgustedly at the dog hair that had clung to his pristine black robes and then to Sirius. 'Do tell why you have decided to grace me with your presence.'

'Dumbledore sent me,' Sirius said, with a long suffering sigh.

'Ah, but of course. I risk my life day in and day out teaching these invidious little brats, yet he still insists on raising my blood pressure by sending me...mangy animals.'

Sirius glowered at Snape. 'Feel free to drop dead at any moment. Believe me, I'm not going to stand in you way. In fact, if there's anything I can do to speed up the process, do let me know. I would be beside myself to help.'

Snape scoffed disgustedly and rolled his eyes. 'What do you want, Black?'

'One of your house members is dying and his father is on a rampage to kill him faster.'

'And he needs me why?'

'How the bloody hell should I know? Maybe he wants you to gas Malfoy to death with the horrible smell you've got about you.'

'At least I don't have fleas,' Snape said sharply.

'At least I wash my hair more than once every twenty years,' Sirius retorted.

'At least I wasn't fucking a werewolf!'

'At least he loved me! You could never say the same for Lily. She detested you and you still followed her around like she was fucking Morgana herself.'

Snape had his wand out faster than Sirius could blink. With a swift movement, Sirius was suspended in the air as if an invisible hand was clasped around his throat, holding him there.

'Don't go there, Black.'

'Look at you, Severus,' Sirius said in short gasps. 'She's been dead for over 15 years and you've still got a sore spot for her. Have you been saving yourself all these years? Cause I've got news for you: they're not coming back.'

Snape slammed Sirius against the wall, knocking his head on the stone. 'If I recall correctly,' Snape began, 'you weren't the only one with unrequited love. You seemed to have the hots for Potter.'

'And he had the hots for Lily. It wasn't meant to work. Unlike you, I moved on.'

'And settled for second best, eh? I bet he's not even that good,' Snape said maliciously.

'Don't you fucking talk about Remus,' Sirius managed to growl.

'I hear his dick's all shriveled,' Snape continued. 'I hope you didn't come back for him. He won't be able to get it up for you anymore. A side effect of the Wolfsbane, you know. It won't matter anymore anyway. He's done with you. First with losing you to Azkaban, then to the veil. Did you really think he'd wait that long?'

Sirius stopped struggling and Snape's hex faltered. Sirius fell to the floor with a thud, but slowly picked himself up off the floor.

'Dumbledore wants to see you in his office. You'd do best to hurry,' he said, before he slammed the door behind himself.

€€€€€

In the Room of Requirement, Draco's condition was worsening. For a few minutes, he came to and was able to speak, albeit incoherently. Harry thought he might have heard the words 'hark' and 'fly,' but he couldn't be sure.

Hermione had taken charge and begun to try to make some order of the 44 people who were stranded in the room. She had just taken roll when Remus showed up.

'Oh my,' he said when he entered the crowded room. 'I would have come sooner if I had known you had your hands full. Have Harry and Draco returned?'

Hermione gestured to the bed.

Remus went over to the bed immediately. Harry was lying next to Draco's comatose body, stroking his boyfriend's hair.

'How is he, Harry?' Remus asked quietly.

Harry's eyes were red and swollen when he looked up. 'He's in a coma and that his vitals are dangerously low. If they sink any lower, he'll die.'

'I'm so sorry, Harry. Do you know why?'

'There's a healer from St. Mungo's who says it's extremely advanced dark magic, but beyond that no one knows.'

'Excuse me, do you mind if I take his vitals?' asked the man in burgundy robes.

'Sure, Mathais,' Harry said.

'Why don't we go talk?' Remus said. Harry agreed and they searched the room for a quiet corner. There were none, as Hermione had been conjuring chairs and couches up the wazoo and every place had become occupied. Remus pointed to the kitchenette and they both sat down on the floor.

Neither of the men said anything for a while. Harry closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the cupboards.

'I saw my mum and dad,' Harry said with his eyes still closed.

'What?' Remus asked, looking sharply at his young friend. With the Malfoy boy needing to be sent to St. Mungo's, the last thing they needed was to check a bed for Harry, too.

'The orb sent us to heaven first. We were waiting for this woman to take us to the VEST--'

'VEST?'

'Veil Ejection and Storage Tank is what the sign said.'

'Right. Keep going.'

'Well, this lady -- her name was Gloria -- was off doing something and they were just standing there, talking. I couldn't believe it. The only thing I've ever really wanted and then she stopped me. She led me away and that was it. I suppose you don't believe me, do you?'

Remus chose his words carefully: 'I believe you really want to see your parents. And I believe that Lily and James are in heaven. But are you sure you were actually there?'

'Yes.' Harry didn't argue as vehemently as he might have if his boyfriend wasn't lying near death across the room. But something in the way he spoke made Remus think it wasn't just a product of his tired and grief-addled brain.

'I could have stayed. I almost did. But Draco wouldn't let me.'

'You did a good thing, Harry, giving these people their lives back. It takes a lot of courage to do a selfless thing like that.'

'They seemed sad to see me,' Harry stated, almost as a question.

'Lily and James sacrificed their lives for you. They wouldn't want to see you waste what they died to protect just to see you.'

Suddenly, there was a loud commotion from across the room. Harry and Remus popped their heads over the kitchenette counter to see what all the bother was about. A tall blonde man was struggling to get out of the grasp of two men who were holding him back. Standing not far behind him was an shorter elderly man who was attempting to calm him down.

'I'll kill that bastard. I'll fucking kill him!' the young blonde man was shouting. Harry jumped up from behind the counter and ran to the blonde man.

'Søren! Søren! Stop!' Harry yelled. 'What are you doing?'

'My father did this! I know he did!'

'Søren, calm down.'

'The boy's not going to listen,' said the elderly man behind them. 'He's just as stubborn as you.'

'There's nothing we can do!'

'Yes, there is! I can go out there and rip him to shreds!'

'How do you plan to do that?' Harry asked. 'He's twice your size and you have no wand. How long do you think it would take him to obliterate you? Next to nothing. He almost did it before, but something tells me he'd be a hell of a lot more careful this time around.'

Søren stopped struggling and sank down into the nearest chair. 'He's a monster. He's killing his own son with that exact intention. He's the one who should be killed.'

'If you go kill him,' said the elderly man, 'you become just as bad as him.'

'Gus is right,' Harry added.

'I feel so useless just sitting here, doing nothing.'

'You think I don't?' Harry asked incredulously. 'He means just as much to me as he does to you, just in different ways. The only thing we can do for Draco is to lie low and wait until we hear from Dumbledore.'

'Speaking of whom...' Remus trailed off, looking toward the entrance to the room.

'Harry, my boy. It's good to see that you have returned to us. And you've completed your mission as well. I'm proud of you.'

Dumbledore turned to Søren and extended his hand. 'It's been far too long. I see the years have had no effect on you, though I daresay they have not been so kind to me.'

Søren shook the headmaster's hand. 'Sir, my brother's sick. He needs help.'

'It has all been sorted out. A team of healers from St. Mungo's will arrive any moment. I can assure that they will take the best care of your brother.'

'But my father...healer's won't help if he's still cursing Draco.'

'I am happy to make the announcement that Lucius Malfoy has been arrested and placed in Azkaban for an unknown duration until he can be tried and his fate determined.'

Harry was not sure there could have been better news. If only Draco could hear this. 'How?'

'In his rage, he broke a rememberall I had received as a gift some years back. I called the ministry on property damage,' Dumbledore said with a smirk. 'It gave the Aurors a chance to search the Malfoy Manor, whereupon they found a number of incriminating articles and have found legitimate reasons to put him away for what I hope is forever.

'Pending the stripping of his wand, all curses in place should be ineffective and annulled. Young Master Malfoy will return to his normal self in no time.'

'What about us?' called someone from the back of the room.

'I have called a full meeting for the Order of the Phoenix, to start in an hours time in my office. If you'd like, you can all follow me up there for tea and biscuits.'

The general population of the room rose and followed Dumbledore out of the room, leaving Søren, Remus, Harry and Hermione.

'I'll be going, I think,' Hermione said, starting toward the door. 'Ron will want to be updated.'

'Will you and Ron come by later? There's something I need to tell you guys,' Harry said, giving Hermione a hug. As they embraced he whispered in her ear: 'I don't know what I'd do without you, Mione. Thank you.'

'Anything for my best friend, regardless of who he's kissing on dark fields,' she whispered back, before slipping out the door.

'What the bloody hell are you all doing just standing over there?' came a gravely voice from the bed. Harry, Søren and Remus turned around to see Draco trying to sit up by himself. 'Get your sorry, weepy arses over here and help me up!'

Harry grinned. He wasn't sure he'd ever been this happy.

€€€€€

Remus slipped out of the room and walked right into someone. He began to mutter his apologies when he smelled something he had not smelled in almost a year.

It was a smell of ginger and motorbike oil.

Remus gripped the shirt of the person he had run into and almost beat him. 'Don't you ever fucking do that to me again, Sirius Black. I would never be able to forgive you.'

Sirius looked at Remus closely as if he wasn't sure what was happening.

'Aren't you going to hug me? Kiss me maybe?' Remus asked, looking into Sirius' eyes.

'Oh, Moony...I thought...Snape said...' Sirius embraced Remus and kissed him so hard that he literally took the other man's breath away.

'When are you going to learn that everything Severus Snape will ever say to you is an attempt to rile you up ?' Remus asked after they parted lips, gasping for breath.

'Never,' Sirius said with a proud grin.

'Good. I wouldn't have it any other way.'

A/N: Being this the last chapter, I'd like to say a few things. I would like to profusely thank the wonderful people who have stuck by me through the shitty beginning chapters, all the way to chapter 17! It means the world to me and I hope that you all will continue to read my work in the future.

Speaking of future work...There (most likely) will not be a sequel to this fic, but the odds of me writing more H/D are relatively high. I have started two new longer fics (a marauders era one and a post-war HP/DM one) and have ideas for a few more. However, only one will make the cut. I would love to hear your input on what you might be interested in reading!

Thanks again for sticking by my humble little story and I! I really appreciate that you appreciate it.

(The title of this chapter is a Norah Jones song).

Say goodbye on a night like this if it's the last thing you ever do:
fifespice: I was very tempted to let Harry just stay in heaven and end the story there, but that wouldn't have been very nice, huh? Good thing I didn't. Draco wouldn't have made it either if he had stayed.
volleypickle16: thanks for the review!
Suicidal Bunnies: No more waiting on the edge of your seat for you! Here is another chapter! Hooray! Sadly, it's the last one (if you don't count the epilogue). But I'll be writing more stories, so be sure to watch for them! (P.S. - I love your name!)
PrOnGs Da GrEaT: Hey, glad you decided to read my fic! I'm happy that yet another person enjoys it! It just warms my heart (and my toes...they've been cold lately .).
caltha: I agree that the Pearly Gates require much exclamation points and question marks. I had that kind of moment when I was writing. All of the sudden there they were in front of those gates and I was like 'omg! how did they get THERE!' Thanks for the review!
Silvermane1: THANKS
suishoku-ketsurui: Sorry it took me so long to update this chapter, but I hope you enjoyed it. I'm super glad you loved the last one, though!
Nio Rein: you make me laugh! I 'luff' Sirius, too. When I read OotP and got to that fateful chapter, I literally slammed the book shut and stopped reading. I was so close to the end, but I couldn't do it because I was so mad at JKR. I've forgiven her, but only because Ilove her too much. I still think she should bring him back. Maybe she will. I shouldn't get my hopes up, though, should I?

Next Chapter: The Epilogue (read: how everything turns out).