Cedric lands in the cemetery to someone shoving him down on wet earth. Pain flashes up his elbows, head tilted just enough catch sight of a familiar green stream shoot across where he once stood.
The air turns bright with toxic glow of curses.
"They knew!" the robed man's voice shakes Cedric's shock out of him. "Mad Eye's been compromised!"
A dark figure slip into view and he glances over to see Snape of all people positioned over him. Phantom shield bright and loudly thudding against curses.
The man hauls him up roughly by the elbow, snapping, "Move you silly boy!"
Reflexively, Cedric does as told.
Dashing across the cemetery and flinging himself behind a large angel bodied headstone for cover from the concealed attackers. A spell he doesn't recognize blasts the angel's wing off closest to him. Cedric tries not to think that could have been him.
Back pressed against stone, Cedric madly runs over what he could have changed for things to end this way.
"Mad Eye's been compromised."
Dumbledore trusted the wrong person.
"Shit," he mutters, risking a peek to the battlefield and scans his first sight of Death Eaters.
They were every bit as terrifying his parents made them out to be.
Garbed in heavy dark robes and disturbingly accurate skull masks, about a dozen of them surround Dumbledore and his people. Shouting remarks that make his insides curdle.
A woman who had stood next to him is hit. She doubles over, eyes wide in knowing horror.
Every part of herself drenches in fire like a lit matchstick.
Cedric looks away, squeezing his wand and listens to her piercing screams draw out.
Useless.
This must have snapped something inside Dumbeldore because suddenly the cemetery is struck with a curtain of vicious fire. Burnt earth stings Cedric's nostrils and he squishes himself into a tight ball as flames roar past the headstone. Painfully heating his back and sides.
The woman's scream is met by a half a dozen more and furious shouts.
Through watering eyes Cedric notices meters beyond him Mad Eye hobbling towards a small tomb dragging something red and black behind him. The picture takes a second to make sense in his mind and without much thought; he's already carrying himself past the range of fire. Feet pedalling across damp earth frantically towards Harry.
"Stupefy!"
Mad Eye whirls, casually knocking his spell away and muttering something explicit.
Cedric dodges return fire, recalling past DADA lessons and shouts "Epelliarmus!"
The blue light hits a shield and realising he's only a few feet away, Cedric takes the Belgium tactic.
He dives under the shield and slams into the bewildered man's legs. Nocking gravity right out under him.
It's a lot more painful than Krum made it out to be but it does the job and he quickly snatches Mad Eye's wand. Tossing it aside and stunning him.
Cedric drags himself to his feet, utterly breathless and staggers over to Harry crumpled near the tomb's pillar.
A nasty gash on his hairline had bled out over half his face and Cedric wouldn't have recognised him had it not been for those awful bottle glasses of his and red uniform.
"Merlin," he breathes and bends down with a finger to feel if he was still breathing. He was.
Thank you.
Looping a lax arm over his shoulders Cedric staggers them inside the tomb's rank chamber. Figuring this was the closest to safe they'd get to being cut down by Death Eaters.
Two coffins were laid inside and he gently drops Harry against the closest one. Straightening, Cedric just now realises that the torches inside were already lit.
Away from the overwhelming chaos outside, Cedric recalls not seeing Pettigrew among the Death Eaters.
"Crucio!"
.
Cedric can't pinpoint when he died after that. Only in a blink he's waking up in his bed with a scream ghosting his lips and death cooling his heart.
...Again?
.
Dying and waking up for the third time had stripped away the layer of horror to reveal an inability to shake the feeling that this meant much more than what Dumbledore labelled as being "an extraordinary magical phenomenon".
Walking sedately this time through the Common Room, unease rolls his stomach.
"Good luck out there, Cedric!"
Cedric braces in alert at the shout, head snapping over to a group of first year students sitting near the fire, playing chess.
Expressions wide eyed.
Without any memory of it happening, Cedric had reflexively marked his wand on them.
"Sorry," he forces down the action.
Disgusted at himself.
Voice coming out cheerful he smiles a short, "Thank you!" and with quick strides rushes out the door towards Dumbledore's office. Having remembered the password Professor Sprout used yesterday's today.
This time he had dutifully remembered to wear his slippers, so instead of the cold slap against his feet it was a more unbalanced shuffle.
He still got the bewildered stare from morning people he meets in the hallways.
.
"Compromised? Are you certain you heard correctly, Mr Diggory?" Dumbledore's eyes are bright with an intensity that verges on cataclysmic.
For Mad Eye.
"The man shot a curse at me, Headmaster," Cedric gives a wan smile. "'m pretty certain."
Dumbledore goes silent. Thoughts visibly swirling before getting up and pacing.
"This confirms a suspicion I've had for some time now, thank you Mr Diggory for confirming it for me. I'm sure I've already warned you about the dangers of changing anything until the Trial, yes? "
"You have, Professor."
"Then leave this matter to me, if you will," just as last time, Cedric watches in awe as Dumbledore produces the map to the maze. He hands it over and Cedric quickly pockets it. "Mr Diggory, I must tell you to not give way to your suspicions about the individual portraying themselves as Professor Moody. The all-seeing-eye can pick up the most minute of details in a person's body language and alert the user to their intentions. Stay mindful of yourself, my boy."
Joy.
Still, he can't help but ask.
Feeling tugged and pulled at odd angles, Cedric's mind has begun stumbling over itself trying to organize the series of events.
"So…Professor Moody isn't actually Professor Moody… He's an imposter?"
Dumbledore nods.
For the entire year a Death Eater's been assigning him homework.
"…Blimey."
"Certainly," the old man concurs. "It's a startling truth."
Startling isn't exactly the word he'd use.
It's a bloody bad joke.
Dumbledore smiles in assurance, "Try not to think about it too much, my boy. You'll only run yourself haggard in useless worries. For now do as done as before." He indicates with a hand for Cedric to let himself out, but Cedric had still something on his mind to ask.
"Professor," he says. Dry swallowing. "How am I still alive?"
The question sobers Dumbledore even more so than the moment he had walked into his office and started regaling him on this sod awful story.
"My boy, I can only give you my suspicions. Of which I'm certain you've already heard."
"But Professor, it's different," he presses. "This is the third time. Too much to be a mere coincidence, it's got to…me dying over and over again must mean something."
It's got to.
"I've never once claimed to understand magic," Dumbledore says, looking at Cedric as though staring right through him. "But perhaps, you are right. And if so," he begins thinking aloud, "this grander meaning could be sending a message of war ahead of time. You are here to stop Voldemort from reaching full power. To save millions."
Magic must really not like You Know Who.
He says as much and Dumbledore can only shrug.
"Who knows?"
.