4:00 AM
"Hermione…"
The skies were clouding up. The battlefields were packed with corpses, silent wounded and those still dueling with any person of the other side they laid their eyes on. This was it for both of them.
She stopped in her tracks, looking left to right for the voice that called her name. She heard him, at least. A look of slight panic was etched on her face. Her hazel eyes searched for a sign of life in her range as she said, "Who is there?"
Draco Malfoy stepped out of the shadows, from behind a filthy, almost moss covered brick wall. He unclasped the required Eater's mask from his waxen pallor face and let the hood resting atop his head fall to his shoulders. He stood smack in front of the although she did not seem to recognize him, for she just stood there, immobile. His hands trembled slightly under his cloak.
It seemed as if Hermione sent a message to Draco, just through looking at him. She seemed to say 'What are you doing, Draco?' just with the quaint smile she was sporting.
His heart began racing, just like it did when she first called him Draco to his face, and he did not even retort. He assumed it was because he didn't mind.
"I-I…" Draco's mouth jolted shut. He ran out of things to say for a few seconds. Hermione raised a brow. His eyes flickered on her and finally he managed to say, "What are you doing? Retreating? Accepting defeat?" How stupid it was that these words seemed to slither out of Draco's mouth like a hot knife through butter.
"Accepting life, really. In a time of war like now." Hermione's hand pointed out to the fields where not so many hours before, was occupied by legions of wizards and es. Now it was all… waste.
Draco scoffed, rolling his eyes casually. " At a time like this, eh? You're seriously telling me that now? Sort yourself out for once." In all honesty, Draco knew his Slytherin vibes were kicking in automatically. "If I know Potter, Weasley and all you other Gryffindor vermin friends, you'd be asked to spark a few on that ground over there. And I do know those ingrates."
Hermione took two steps forward. He could spot dried tearstains on her cheeks - she had been crying.
"Talk is cheap, Draco, and if it were cheaper, I could pay for the entire world. You yourself know that you still have much to learn and realize. How can you be so assured you know my friends? You tell me when you are a hundred sure…" Hermione took another step forward.
Without so much as a warning, she pulled him into a deep kiss. He felt the need to resist, he knew he had to, but no muscle in his body seemed to want to resist. Abruptly, Hermione let Draco go. Her facial expression looked strained as if the kiss was a curse.
A twist in his stomach gave Draco the idea that he knew why. Feeling pressured to kill time, he said, " If I could, I would, Hermione. Believe me. " Taking out a pocket watch and checking the time, which at that moment was 3: 38 AM, he prayed that things would turn out as planned.
Hermione, seeing Draco glance quite nervously at a pocket watch, quickly assumed he was up to something, waiting for it to arrive. Or someone.
"Just what are you doing for Merlin's sake, Draco? Are you waiting for an apocalyptic message to tell you just what the hell to do with yourself?" Hermione, having no idea why, and frankly, not caring for it at that moment, had tears beginning to fall once from her hazel eyes. They fell like tiny sparkling diamonds from her skin to the earth.
"I LOVE YOU, YOU Y MORON! And you reject it to serve someone who would rip your skin off if you do so much as say 'no', kill innocent people and remain a gullible fool hiding in a black cloak and mask to shield his hatred for himself from the world! IS THAT WHAT YOU REJECT LOVE FOR? Look at what you've done, Draco! Get a load of you!" She ended with a sarcastic tone her voice. That changed when she suddenly flopped to her knees, and started sobbing, covering her face shamefully. Draco couldn't even pluck up the courage to do anything about it.
After all the people he'd cursed and killed, he couldn't do anything for Hermione. His first instinct was to take his wand out and use the killing curse on the . That was until he realized it was not his own instinct, but his father's or another Eater's. His real first instinct was to apologize for his idiocy. But he couldn't do that – because he was too much of a b l o o d y moron.
Draco glanced back at his pocket watch. 3: 51 AM. "How are you so sure that those people were i n n o c e n t ?" He mused suddenly.
"What?" Hermione looked up, confused.
"You heard right!" Draco's voice began to shake and tremble. "How can you be so sure that I'm all you just said?"
Hermione froze, staring through Draco. He, however, was too preoccupied to notice. (A/N: No surprise there)
"How are you so sure that I even love you?" Draco, with a menacing glare, spat at Hermione.
"Because you're with us, right, Draco, my son?"
Lucius Malfoy stood, along with four Eaters beside him, and the Dark Lord himself a step ahead of him. "Move aside to let his lordship pass, Draco" Lucius said lazily. The son did as his father asked him, putting the required Eater's mask back on, not forgetting to let the hood rest on his sleek head again.
Voldemort took Hermione's face in his hand and turned it from left to right, as if he were examining it. "You have done well, Draco. A Mudblood – my favorite kind to…dispose of." A cackle meant to be a sinister laugh escaped from him. He looked at Draco. "I knew you'd obey my orders well."
Hermione's eyes hot wide open when she realized Draco had been deceiving her. And all the more – letting her die, most probably. And he couldn't do anything but pretend he couldn't care.
"I am afraid I am being called on to other matters, not matter how much I would love to speculate the mudblood's..eh, you know what it is. Wouldn't want to ruin anything. I leave it up to you, Draco." Lord Voldemort turned on his heel and walked away, followed by the Eaters, most of them snickering.
Still kneeling on the muddy earth, Hermione forced herself to look Draco straight in the eye. Tears were forming in her eyes, no matter how hard she desperately tried to put them back.
Have you ever seen a rose so beautiful, so fragile that you cannot help, out of curiosity to hold it with your own hands? And nevertheless, out of your juvenile idiocy, you get ed sharply on the finger by one of its thorns? This was the surge that Draco felt with every fiber in his body, every cell in his veins.
Raising his wand to her forehead, Draco knelt on the ground before her. His hand was clearly shaking. He hoped, just by the look in his pleading eyes, that Hermione would find it in Draco to see that he still loved her either way. He prayed and hoped to eternity that she would on a little bit tighter….
They just bore into each other's face, wondering who would go on and speak first between the two. Eventually, Draco's hand wavered and slowly, his wand was lowered.
Hermione thrust herself into Draco's arms, holding onto him as if letting go would poison her.
"L-let me go," Draco whispered, trying to break free of her grasp. "Please just let me g-go…"
"Sshh… I'll never let you go…"
"…avada kedavra…"
Draco held his breath as Hermione went lifeless. For what seemed like a million years, he stared at her, cursing himself.
The time was 4:00 am and he was now alone.
--PAV'06—
I'm totally open to constructive criticism, believe me, people, so click that review button! I don't think good, and I have a feeling its getting so 'The OC', but you decide 'kay? I'm a drama freak. Heheh. Blame my mommy. Now, this isn't a songfic or anything, but I just got really moved, I guess by the Lostprophets' (get their new album!) 4 AM single, so I did this. Here are the lyrics, and give a listen to the song itself, it's no time wasted. I thought about using the Rasmus' In The Shadows but whatever. Not feeling it. Spread the peace and love for indie music, too!
Yesterday I lost my closest friend
Yesterday I wanted time to end
I wonder if my heart will ever mend
I just let you slip away
4 AM forever
Maybe I'll never see you smile again
Maybe you thought that it was all pretend;
All these words that I could never say
I just let them slip away
4 AM forever
Why don't you hear me when I'm calling out to you (to you)
Why don't you listen when I try to make it through (to you)
Goodbye, goodbye
Goodbye, you never know
Hold a little tighter
4 AM forever
Maybe one day when I can move along
Maybe someday when you can hear this sing
You won't let it slip away
4 AM forever
And I'd wish the sun would never come
It's 4 AM and you are gone
I hope you know you're letting go
It's 4 AM and I'm alone
Why don't you hear me when I'm calling out to you (to you)
Why don't you listen when I try to make it through (to you)
Goodbye, goodbye
Goodbye, you never know
Hold a little tighter
Why don't you hear me when I'm calling out to you (to you)
Why don't you listen when I try to make it through (to you)
Goodbye, goodbye
SGoodbye, you never know
Hold a little tighter
4 AM forever...