Chapter Four

Three days after Draco's incarceration, the nausea began. Stockell, who was still in charge of symptom management, administered a potion that prevented nausea and vomiting in thirty-three percent of Collier's patients.

Draco was not part of the thirty-three percent.

After two days, his vomiting was so severe that he abandoned what little comfort the hospital bed provided for the cold, smooth tile of the lavatory floor. He held onto the toilet as if it were a life preserver in a stormy sea. He hunched over it, hugged it, cursed it, considered letting go and drowning himself in it.

Before he could take the plunge, a jet of bile and mucous surged up his esophagus. His back arched as he retched, his throat and mouth burning from stomach acid. The taste was repulsive; the sight reminded him of the worst parts of war; the sound of its spatter into the toilet made him want to gouge his eardrums. But the smell – the hot-sour acid and half-digested food combined with the subtle odor of bleach that didn't quite mask the stench of his own shit and piss – was more than he could handle. He heaved again, the second wave no more productive than the first, but twice as painful.

Sweat dripped down his face and body, slicking his hair to his forehead and dampening his thin hospital robe. It stuck to his skin, cold and uncomfortable beneath his arms, along his chest, and at his lower back. He swiped for the lever, but his shaking, shivering body was clumsy. He missed it and pitched forward, nearly breaking his front teeth upon the toilet's porcelain rim. He glared weakly at the lever, then closed his eyes as he rested his head upon the tile floor.

This was as bad as it could get. This was as low as he could go. It had to be. All he wanted to do was flush his mess away, to distance himself from the sight and smell of his body falling apart from the inside. But he couldn't. Was physically unable to. His body no longer worked the way it should. His fingers were like lead weights attached to boneless arms. His thoughts were confused and unfocused. He was too dehydrated, hungry, and exhausted to fathom attempting to stand, much less crawl, to his bedside. He'd never be able to retrieve his wand from the nightstand, anyway, and if he did, he doubted he'd have the strength for even the simplest spell.

For a moment, he toyed with the idea of reinserting his intravenous line. Stockell had hooked him up to it hours ago, but a particularly violent heave had dislodged it mere minutes after he left. Draco cracked his eyes and saw it lying within an arm's length. Nourishing saline solution dripped from the tip of the needle, creating a small puddle upon the tile. He tried to calculate the odds of the tip having contacted the floor, tried to remember the compendium of microbes that could be found on a dirty floor and which of those could kill him, but the information lingered on the outskirts of his mind, just beyond where his consciousness would allow him to reach.

But the needle was within his reach. If he could grab it and find a vein…

Dying from sepsis would be better than this.

Anything would be better than this.

Tears dripped slowly from his eyes as he stretched his arm toward the needle. He was an inch away; it felt like a mile. Then his fingers brushed the plastic syringe, and he hissed as he gouged a finger on this sharp, beveled tip. He tried again and felt only relief this time as his hand closed around it. He rolled onto his back and clutched the needle to his chest, breathing heavily. He lifted his arm, which swam and undulated before him. He closed his eyes again. There was no way he'd be able to find a vein.

But that didn't matter, did it? The puncture itself would be enough. Blood would rush to the site, carrying platelets and white blood cells – everything a healthy body would need to heal a wound. But his body was not healthy. His white blood cells were unlikely to fight off even the slightest infection. It would spread throughout his body, working with the Collier's to kill him more effectively. To save him from this pain.

He rested the needle at a slant on his arm and took a deep breath. Just as he was about to slip it into his skin, he felt a presence in the room. Smelled something other than acid and ammonia.

Hermione.

Strength flew out of him. He dropped the needle, and then her hands were upon him, gentle and warm and soft on his clammy skin. She smoothed his hair back and pressed her palm against his forehead. He kept his eyes closed and relished the touch. It had been so long since someone had touched him like this, so long since someone had worried about his comfort over their own.

Slowly, she propped him up on her folded legs. His stomach churned at the change of position. Instinct instructed him to curl back up, but she stopped him, reapplying steady pressure to his forehead, cheeks, and chest. After a few minutes, the toilet flushed, and Draco urged his lips into a small smile.

She stroked his cheek and murmured to him words he knew but didn't understand. She held him for hours, and he counted the minutes by the beats of her heart.

Draco woke to the scratching of quill on parchment. He cracked his eyes open and saw Hermione perched upon a chair at his bedside, research notebook propped open against her knees. She wore a long white coat that fell open around her thighs, which were hidden in shapeless, pale blue scrubs. Her shoes were covered in disposable blue booties, and she wore the hairnet, glasses, and mask, all now de rigueur for those dealing with Collier's patients.

He would have given anything for the ability to freeze that moment. He wanted to watch her, to study her when she thought no one else was looking. He wanted her unguarded and vulnerable. He wanted to touch the bags beneath her eyes and smell her sour breath from being with him all night. He wanted to see her as wretchedly human as he had been, if not to make himself feel better, then to reassure himself that, yes, it could happen to her, too, and no, he was not alone.

But Hermione was ever vigilant of her surroundings. Even if she hadn't noticed his movement, the increasing pings of his heart rate monitor would have given him away. She set aside her notebook and picked up a plastic cup.

"Thirsty?"

He nodded and grabbed his wand, feeling stronger the longer he held the warm, familiar wood. He tapped the bed, adjusting himself so that he sat up comfortably. Hermione held the water to his lips. He took a small sip and leaned his head against the pillow, closing his eyes as his stomach churned. Once he was sure he wasn't going to vomit, he opened his eyes and motioned for another sip.

"How do you feel?" she asked.

"Like shite." He certainly sounded it: his voice was weak from exhaustion and hoarse from vomiting. He probably looked it, too. Dehydration would have sunken his eyes, tightened his skin, and chapped his lips. The sweat from days of fever would have made his hair lank and greasy. The constant vomiting would have given him facial petechiae – small, purple spots caused from burst capillaries – around his eyes and on his cheeks. He was never so happy to not have a mirror.

"What are you doing here?"

Hermione straightened. "Pending your consent, I will assume responsibility for your immediate medical care. Major decisions will still be made through Stockell, of course, and then your mother when… Rather, if –"

"When," he muttered. Hermione inhaled sharply, but Draco cut off whatever life-affirming rant she'd prepared. "How did this happen?"

"Well," Hermione cleared her throat, "Whyte and I had a… discussion."

Draco raised an eyebrow at her. "Oh?"

"Well, she was hesitant at first, but I explained that any competent Healer should be able to monitor your vitals and make sure you're fed and bathed. I'm more than qualified for that, as I've technically had three years of experience in a Muggle hospital."

"And that was it?" He reached for the water cup, which she handed over at once.

"More or less."

Draco narrowed his eyes at her. "Bullshite," he said, after taking a long sip.

She looked aghast. "Pardon?"

"You're lying."

"I'm not."

"You are," he repeated. "I can tell. And Whyte would never have caved so easily. She nearly hexed me when I came back."

Hermione's lips tightened, as if she, too, was feeling the urge. "Do you know that St Mungo's only started awarding research grants within the last twenty years?" she asked briskly.

Draco shook his head, wondering at the relevance of her remark. She did not give him time to ask.

"Within our lifetime, the most popular and well-respected wizarding hospital in England has only just begun pursuing research ventures. Amazing, isn't it?"

She paused, waiting for an answer. "I suppose," he replied carefully.

"It is," she affirmed with a sharp nod. "Do you know that Whyte started the initiative? In the next twenty years, she wants St Mungo's to break the top five Healing and research institutions in Europe."

He took another drink; she refilled his cup. "They've a long way to go."

"They do, but they would be a lot closer if you were allowed to continue the work you've done on Collier's."

Hermione shifted forward, revealing what her body had hidden. All of his equipment sat on the small table beneath the window. His ingredients, his cauldron, his heat source, his mortar and pestle, his knives, his distillation set, his notebook… The space was an almost perfect replica of his laboratory upstairs, down to the four raggedy quills and dented inkpot. It would have been exact if not for the strange Muggle equipment sitting beside it.

Another piece of the puzzle snapped into place, and Draco turned his gaze from the workspace to Hermione.

"Whyte has a vested interest in seeing my research succeed," he said in a monotone.

"She believes it has potential, yes."

"And you'll be reporting my every finding to her?"

"That is part of our arrangement."

"So when I die –"

"If!"

"She will take my work and give it to someone else, who will use it to vault St Mungo's from research obscurity to a premier institution."

Hermione looked as if she were about to speak, then closed her mouth, apparently deciding that he had understood everything. She looked at him expectantly, and he stared back. After a long moment of silence, he said, "No."

Her brow furrowed. "Come again?"

"You heard me."

"I'm not sure I did," she said with a nervous laugh. "You see, I thought I heard you turning down the chance to save your own life, but that doesn't make any sense."

"My potion killed a man, Hermione. Two men."

She bit her lip and looked away from him. "You didn't mean for that… You couldn't have known."

"And what else don't I know that I'll find out during treatment? Should I risk drowning in my own blood, Hermione?" he spat. "Or perhaps my cure will literally – literally – melt my organs. I'm already going to die. I'm not interested in making the experience any worse than it has to be."

Her eyes snapped back to him. "It doesn't have to be that way." Her tone was clipped.

"Yes, it does."

"No, it doesn't!" she yelled, shooting to her feet. "You have time, Draco! You have time! Collier's takes twenty-eight days to run through the body. You still have three weeks!"

"Two!" he countered waspishly. "Or did you forget that I'll be paralyzed for that final week?"

"Do you even realize the progress you could make in that time? You're an expert in Potions. You've already made incredible, unbelievable strides towards finding a cure. If you stop your work, it may never get finished, and not only will you have effectively killed yourself, but also everyone else who needs this cure. You have to keep going. You have to!"

She turned away from him and swiped at her cheeks, trying to hide her tears. But Draco had seen them. He was responsible for their creation, and the truth of it tasted bitter. He closed his eyes and leaned against the pillow once more, breathing deeply through his nose.

Six days ago, he had returned to St Mungo's thinking that he had changed. He had thought he was prepared, ready to face the consequences of his illness, but he'd been wrong. The past few days had been the worst of his life, due in no small way to his isolation from those he cared about. From Hermione.

Now she was here, offering him company and a renewed sense of purpose. Simply by being at his bedside, she had proven that the impossible could occur. She had also brought his equipment. And if a first-year resident could bully a Department Head and get her way, who was to say that he could not succeed at something equally insane, like brewing a cure for a fatal disease in two weeks?

He nearly laughed as tears slid from beneath his eyelids. He wiped them away clumsily, mindful of the IV line stuck into the back of his hand. It was insane, what he wanted to do. The type of situation that, when spoken of, made people roll their eyes and say something pithy. But hopelessness no longer felt like a justifiable response for his inaction, and waiting to die seemed like a monumentally foolish waste of two weeks. If he could extend the time he had, even by a little, it would be worth the effort. And what if, in that extended time, he found the cure?

Hermione took his hand; he could almost feel her warmth through her gloved hands. He laced his fingers with hers.

Her insistence that he continue his work was probably misguided. His participation in her venture was probably destructive to them both. But by her side, beneath her touch, he felt awakened, and when he opened his eyes, the world looked a little less grey.

She was here.

He had time.

But not much.

The following week, Draco slept only when necessary, ate sparsely, and cared about neither his exhaustion nor his hunger. He was lost in the zeal of discovery, enraptured by the infuriating cycle of trial and error, which inched him ever closer to a breakthrough, an elusive answer that tempted and teased and twisted away from him like a nymph in a forest.

Hermione was with him for almost all of it.

She worked quickly and spoke rarely. To Draco, it was perfect. They didn't need to communicate. Their partnership had transcended speech. If he wanted a flask, she set it next to his cauldron before he could think to ask for it. If she needed a knife, he handed it over without her having to look twice. They were in perfect rhythm, focused and excited by their own work yet totally aware of what the other was doing. It was unusual to establish this kind of synchronicity with a laboratory partner, and when it did happen, it was rarely so complete.

This gave Draco a strong feeling of vindication. He had been right about what they could be together. He had been right all along. Their collaboration was easy and natural and, though Hermione did not openly acknowledge it, Draco knew she felt it, too. She had to. It was simply too blatant to ignore.

He was content to hold onto this small victory, to keep quiet and revel in the feeling of superiority over her. But as the end of week three loomed, Draco's contentment faded, and with it, his research-fueled enthusiasm. Trial after trial completed with no change in the infected cells, changes too small to be practical, or the death of the cells themselves, which would therefore result in the patient's death. In his death.

It was difficult to stay optimistic in the face of failure, but he could have managed it better if he weren't also running out of ideas. He had tried so many combinations of ingredients, concentrations, brew times, stirring speeds, and distillation methods that he was sure he'd repeated some. After flipping through his notebook, he found that he had.

The discovery made him cold. It was far too late for him to go back to square one. He was nearly out of time.

Hermione's motivation never flagged, and Draco began to study her more often than his cauldron. Watching her work was at once beautiful and painful. Beautiful because she was beautiful, and brilliant, and passionate, and he basked in the light and life she emitted. Whether she was driven by preventing his death or advancing Whyte's research agenda, Draco couldn't exactly say, but neither did he care. Near the end of the week, it was enough for her to simply be there with him, enough to see and experience her at her absolute best before he died.

For death was certainly coming. Neither of them could ignore his worsening muscle aches. The stiffness began at his neck and worked its way down through his shoulders and back. Eventually, it descended into his abdomen, hips, and thighs. His typically confident, graceful gait became shuffling and hesitant, more reminiscent of a centenarian than a man in his mid-twenties. His uncertainty distracted Hermione from her work. She began to move more slowly, to orient herself around him, ready at a moment's notice to catch him should he fall.

A small, sad part of him didn't want her to catch him.

A small, sad part of him just wanted to crash.

And, with only nine days left to live, he did.

He had been moving toward his research notebook, a vial of yet another failed cure clutched in his hand, when his feet suddenly stopped. He lurched forward and caught himself on the table, barely stopping himself from falling outright and wiping out their combined workstation. The vial he had been holding slipped from between his fingers and shattered upon the floor. Bright yellow potion seeped onto the beige tile. It reminded him, strangely, of the day he became infected. Of vomit and orange water swirling down a brass drain. Of his life rushing away.

Hermione looked at him with wide eyes, her arms outstretched as if he were still falling.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"Fine," he answered tersely, unable to look away from the creeping potion. "Just lost my footing."

He reached for his wand blindly, but missed the table. He groped again and felt nothing, so he turned to look.

The room suddenly compressed.

His hand rested on his wand, but he felt nothing beneath his fingers. No warmth. No tingling. Nothing to indicate that the piece of wood and core was an extension of himself, or even there at all. He curled his fingers and watched with sinking horror as nothing happened.

Paralysis.

It was easier to accept than he thought. He'd known it was coming, after all. Ever since he'd received his diagnosis, he'd known, and he'd prepared himself for the day it happened. Actually seeing it was a shock: it made his gut cramp up and his blood run cold and his head spin just enough to make him vague and a little faint. But he'd expected it, and could therefore process it quickly and without unnecessary emotion.

Because he knew what came next, too. And he knew what had to be done to facilitate that next step of disease progression.

So, with a smooth, sweeping motion of the arm which actually worked, Draco cleared his workbench. Vials of untested potion, plates of inoculated cells, his cauldron, his heat source, his ingredients, and his tools crashed to the floor, shattering, denting, spilling, becoming as useless as the spilled potion and his damned left hand.

Hermione screamed in surprise and unnecessarily protected her research with a quick flick of her wand.

"What the hell are you doing?" she shrieked.

"Moving," he said, swinging his left arm off the table and picking up his wand with his right hand. "Might as well, while I still can."

"Draco…"

His name in her voice, usually so reassuring, grated on him. Draco closed his eyes in an effort to check his temper.

"Give it a rest, Hermione, please. You and I both know the progression of this disease. We know the symptoms. I'm right on track to die at twenty-eight days."

"We don't know that," she said calmly. "There's still time. There's still a chance."

"There's not," he snapped. "I'm out of time, and I have no chance of surviving this. We need to stop this. I need to stop."

"You don't –"

"No, you don't!"

Hermione straightened. Her eyes flashed dangerously, and Draco read her intentions in the lines of her face. She was going to bait him.

She did an admirable job of it, beginning with his tendency to take the path of least resistance and then moving onto his constant need for handholding and his infuriating reluctance to accept it. And though she yelled and pointed and blamed, her words felt hollow, like she was caught in a lie and perpetuating it instead of confessing. It was rare for her to lack conviction. Draco supposed he should have been happy that she could not bring herself to believe the bile she spewed about him.

He likewise was doing an admirable job of ignoring it, but something in him snapped when she accused him for lacking commitment. For giving up too easily.

In two steps, he towered over her, his mouth and chin mere inches away from her mask-covered nose. She stood her ground and glared up at him, her expression not at all diminished by her plastic safety glasses.

"I have been fighting for years, Hermione. Fighting for you. For your respect at Hippocrates' School, for your forgiveness after I said you wasted your time at that bloody Muggle hospital, and for one measly evening with you here at Mungo's. How many times did we fight? How badly have you jinxed me? How many times have you told me no? And how many times did I quit? How many times did I give up?

"None," he seethed, not allowing her the chance to answer. "Not once. I committed myself to you, and you? You strung me along. You never gave me an inch, and I realize now – too fucking late – that I never meant anything to you."

Her body shook and her eyes became glassy with tears. "That's not true," she said, her voice shaking.

"It is!" he said with a derisive laugh. "It is true! And you know how I know? Because this time, when I actually want to give up, you won't let me!"

"How does that prove anything? This is different from asking someone out to dinner, Draco! This is your life!"

"Exactly!" he snarled. "My life. Mine. To do with as I please. And if you cared one bit for me, you'd accept my decision – the inevitable! – and let me die how I want to."

"I can't let you do that!"

"And why not?"

"Because I love –"

He shoved her. Put his hands upon her shoulders and pushed, hard, until she stumbled backwards and caught herself on the closet doors, until she was as far away from him as she could be, and he was no longer assaulted by her body and her smell and her damnable eyes.

"Get. Out." He had never felt more dangerous.

"Draco, please." She trembled forward, reaching toward him with a small, gloved hand. "Please let me explain –"

"You do not have the right to explain," he said lowly.

"But –"

"No," he cut in. He saw her breaking, but it was too late to stop, even if he wanted to. This was their reckoning, and damned if he was going to let it pass without speaking the truth. "You are selfish and manipulative. You are the worst kind of witch, and why no one but me gets to see that side of you isn't my problem anymore."

"You don't understand. This week, this past month, I've –"

"I don't care what you think you've realized. I don't care what lie you've told yourself to alleviate your own regret."

"Draco, you must –"

"I revoke your rights as my Attending Healer," he said loudly, drowning her out. The words hit her like a blow, and the hospital's spell activated at once, herding her away from him and towards the door. Her hand clutched at her chest; she looked breathless and lost.

"Please…"

"I will have Stockell transport your equipment back to your lab."

"Please, don't do this."

"It's done. Now get out."

She was at the airlock, struggling against the spell as it pushed her into the chamber. She wrapped her hand around the door, gripping it tightly, giving herself just one more minute.

"What will I do?"

Draco straightened. "I don't care," he said softly, finally. "Just as long as I never have to see you again."

She gasped in pain, and Draco felt a surge of sick triumph as he watched her heart break. Her hand released the door, the airlock hissed, and then dispelled her into the hallway and out of his sight.

But not away. He heard her break down, felt each of her quiet sobs like a punch to the gut, and shared in the anguish that he had caused her. That she had caused them. With a final sneer, he flicked his wand at the door. A heavy silence replaced her sobs. It pressed down on him, pinning him in place as another rush of reality washed over him.

The triumph was gone. In its place was hollowness, an aching in the pit of his stomach. He felt numb, as if he had consciously destroyed something irreplaceable and beloved. He felt sick with it and staggered to his bed, where he collapsed.

At last, he began to grieve.

Three days later, Draco woke to his mother's touch.

She gripped his hand tightly with her own; he could not feel the temperature of her skin through the gloves. Her platinum hair was pulled away from her face and covered by a hairnet. A surgical mask obscured her mouth, and the skin around her bright, tear-filled blue eyes was tight, as if she were trying to smile but only managing a grimace. She looked older than he remembered, more fragile, and the sudden reality of leaving her brought a hard knot into his throat.

He tried to swallow, tried to buy time to find the words which could explain what had happened to him as well as what was going to, but he was too slow. A sob ripped through her, and Draco gathered her to him as best he could with his weakening limbs, forgetting his own grief to focus on hers.

"How did you find out?" he asked, his voice cracking.

"Ms Granger Floo'd me," she replied, prying herself from him. He braced himself for the inevitable question – why did he not tell her himself? – but she gave him only a wretched, reproachful look, which was much worse.

Compounding his misery was the fact that Hermione had been the one to break the news. His kneejerk reaction was to be furious at her meddling, but all he could manage was vague gratitude. He had trashed his research, confined himself to his bed, and was in the process of internalizing his death. The responsibility of breaking this news to his mother was one he had purposely ignored. She had even given him time to do it himself: Hermione could have gone to Narcissa the day of their argument, but she waited, and he had undoubtedly disappointed her with his delaying. It was a sobering thought.

"She mentioned a cure," Narcissa continued, a little stiffly. "She said that you were close, and that you chose –"

"To live out the remainder of my life how I want to," he cut in. "I want to live and die on my own terms. Not on hers, and certainly not on Mungo's."

"But she was working with you, was she not?" Narcissa's voice lilted up at the end, and Draco winced.

"Her research was never serious," he said in a monotone. "It was an experiment, started only because Mungo's was desperate and her methods were untried."

"Perhaps if she had more time, or more money –"

Draco shook his head. "It's no use, mother. She… She just can't."

Narcissa bit her lip and looked down at the floor, fighting tears. Draco didn't bother, letting them slip down his cheeks. He had hoped once, too, and the memory of it caused a dull ache somewhere behind his ribcage.

For a moment, he considered telling her everything. About how Hermione had confessed her love for him when it mattered least, when absolutely nothing could come of it but pain. How she manipulated him, how selfish she was, and how foolish he had been to fall for the worst kind of witch, a siren in Healer's robes.

But he didn't. He thought of their reckoning every day, and always he questioned whether her confession was simply a reaction to trauma, or the most poorly timed declaration in the history of humankind.

Maybe she did love him. Maybe he'd been the fool not for falling in love with her, but for denying her the chance to realize it. For denying himself the chance to feel it.

Narcissa would know the answer. She would delve to the heart of their troubles at once, and she would tell him the truth. Either version of the truth would hurt, and Draco didn't know how much more pain he could endure. He thought it might be easier, at this point, to leave it be. It may be better that her final memory of him was marred by violence and tears; it would allow her to heal more easily once he was gone. It may be better for him to die without knowing what, if anything, he meant to her; it would save him from needless suffering.

Yes, it may be better to die without ever seeing her again. He would die with regret, but she would have a life after grief. It was satisfying, in a way: though he may be unsure about her feelings for him, he knew what he felt for her. That kind of conviction in the face of an uncertain beyond was the most comforting notion he had.

The twenty-eighth day had finally arrived, and Draco could barely breathe. His limbs were numb, already dead, and the rest of his body was slowly catching up. He felt that much, at least. Each breath was a measure of life: each inhale was a little more difficult, each exhale a little more permanent.

The Welcome Witch's voice sounded over the hospital's tinny public address system, informing visitors that they had to leave. Narcissa gave him one last kiss and one final, lingering hug. She gaspingly assured him that she would be all right – that everything would be all right. She loved him, she was proud of him, she couldn't have asked for a better son, and then she was gone,

The room lights dimmed, and Draco was alone in the semi-darkness.

He closed his eyes to stop from watching the clock and closed his ears to the slowing ping of the heart rate monitor. He listened instead to his breathing and reflected upon his life one final time.

Just four weeks ago, he had known what he wanted: a career, a chance to pursue his passion, and the opportunity to spend time with the witch he loved.

None of those had happened. Draco had failed on all counts.

Coming to terms with that had not been simple. Prosperity and family were banners of accomplishment. As Draco had neither, his life could hardly be termed a success. However, it hadn't been a complete embarrassment either. He'd managed moderate success in school and had made some difference in the lives of those he treated while at St Mungo's. It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing, and Draco held on to the satisfaction those truths gave him.

If he had to die, he may as well try to die happily. And though he had no idea what came after death, he was not afraid.

The airlock whooshed open, and Draco wearily opened his eyes. The lights were still dimmed.

"Stockell?" His voice was weak and slurred. It was half a miracle that he was still able to speak. Some patients lost that ability, too.

"No," said Hermione. "It's me."

A rapid series of pings from the heart rate monitor betrayed him. Mercifully, Hermione silenced the noise with a flick of her wand. She stood over him and gently turned his head so that he faced her. Then she sat beside him. She kept one hand in her lap and took his hand with the other.

They were touching skin to skin.

In fact, she was wearing none of the required protective equipment he'd grown so used to seeing. Her hair was pulled back, but not forced into order, remaining curly and vivacious. There were still bags beneath her eyes – there normally were – but her clothes looked clean and wrinkle free. She smelled like citrus, like fresh Satsuma. Free from the medial garb, she looked more herself than she had in weeks. She looked beautiful; Draco drank in the sight of her, and his heart ached with lost opportunity.

But that did not change the facts. He tried to pull away. "You shouldn' be 'ere."

"I had to see you," she said, her grip on his hand remaining firm.

"You're going to get it. You're going to get… Sick."

"I won't," she said with a quiet, incredulous chuckle. "I won't get sick, because I've done it."

Draco grimaced as much as his paralyzed muscles would allow. "Done wha'?" he asked, though he knew the answer.

"Found a cure."

Draco stared at her for a moment, then shut his eyes, unable to face her.

"I used Muggle technology," she continued. "I learned in the genetics lab at Guy's and St Thomas'. I wanted to find biological differences between wizards and Muggles, but my mentors would've had me committed for that, so I lied and said I was interested in disease genetics. I worked with bacteria and viruses. Learned cell structures, modes of infection, symptoms, treatments. For the more famous diseases, like influenza, polio, and smallpox, I learned about vaccine development. Most of it was theoretical, but I was able to perform some hands-on techniques, like tissue culture, cloning, selective breeding, PCR, DNA sequencing…"

She paused and took a shaky breath. "I learned everything I needed to make a vaccine myself. I tried it with Collier's, used magic to accelerate growth and testing. And it worked." She laughed again, incredulous. "Draco, it worked."

Bitter tears slipped from his closed eyes. "I don' want it."

She took a shaky breath and shifted in her seat. "What?"

"I don't want it," he repeated firmly, opening his eyes and looking at her to make certain she understood. "I don't."

Emotion flitted over her features, but Draco did not have the strength to give them names. He shut his eyes again, tired. He did not have long.

"Why?"

Draco thought for a moment that spanned two labored breaths. How could he explain it to someone who wasn't dying? How could he explain that, somewhere over the past week, he had accepted his fate? He was going to die. Death was an integral part of life. Billions before him had done it, and billions more would follow. He was just one. One out of billions, insignificant and unimportant. On a global scale, his death would not even register.

But neither did he look for meaning globally. He looked at what he had done, the lives that he had influenced over his brief twenty-five years. He had loved and hated. He had been a good friend to some and a rotten friend to others. He had made mistakes, but he'd done some good, too. Maybe it was enough to go on to something better than this world. Maybe it wasn't, and he'd pass on to something worse. Or maybe this life was all he had, and he would go on to nothing at all.

Draco didn't know, and the answer didn't matter. There was no sense in planning for the unknown, no sense in worrying about it. He'd lived his life, made his decisions, and dealt with the consequences. He'd given his own life meaning. He was satisfied with what he'd done.

"I'm ready," was all he said. "I'm ready to die."

She removed her hand from his and was silent for several minutes. Draco opened his eyes and was surprised to find her staring at him calmly, without a single tear. It was the answer he needed and thought he would never get. It hurt to see her so detached and unemotional, but the pain was distant. Unimportant.

She was here. She was his friend. He got to see her one last time.

She took another shaky breath. "You may be ready to die," she said, her voice tremulous and soft, "but I'm not ready to lose you."

She moved quickly, drawing the syringe from her lap and uncapping its tip, and he felt nothing as she plunged it into the flesh of his arm. She depressed the plunger and yanked the needle out in one smooth motion. Draco could do little but stare at her bright eyes and heaving chest.

Sound returned to the heart rate monitor. His blood pounded through his veins more and more rapidly, turning the pings into one steady, sharp alarm as whatever she injected worked its way through his veins.

Draco gasped for air but couldn't get it. His vision grew fuzzy around the edges.

Her cure hadn't worked; he was dying.

Though his mind had accepted it, his body continued to fight, seizing but unmoving, trapped by the paralysis. His body had erupted, his organs were failing, and all Draco felt was agony.

The last thing he saw as the world faded to black was Hermione struggling against two guards, trying desperately to reach him.

The last thing he heard was her shouting his name.