"Hermione…Hermione, the train is there."
Hermione woke up from her thoughts. She looked up to see Harry staring at her worriedly. The past few days haven't been easy for her, Harry and the Weasleys. Ever since Ron's outburst, he was gone, just disappeared. Hermione was shocked by his outburst. She had known that Ron sometimes felt that way, but she didn't thought that it was that intensively. After Ron went away, she tried to follow him. She was overwhelmed with guilt after his outburst and it only got stronger after he disappeared. They had searched for him everywhere, but he was just gone.
"Oh, yeah, train. Well, let's say goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley." she said tiredly. She couldn't sleep anymore during this past weeks. Every time she had to think that Ron may be dead and it was all her fault, because she was such a bad friend. She had cried her into sleep a lot in the past few days. Ron, her best friend was gone. The one who provoked her, who insulted her, who annoyed her, but also the one, who was caring, who lightened up her mood and who always balanced her out.
Also Hermione began to notice the changes in Ron. He was now a lot more mature than he was during their forth year and also his body became more physically attractive. Hermione blushed at the thought.
"Hermione, are you alright?" Harry asked her worriedly.
Hermione smiled at him. At least she still had Harry, but it he didn't replaced Ron. It didn't compensate the hurt of Ron's disappearance.
"I'm fine. Just thought about Ron." she replied sadly.
She noticed how Harry flinched. She smiled at him sadly. She knew how hard it was for Harry, that his best friend was gone. He was the one who brought Harry back to life, when he was depressed or deepened in thought about You-Know-Who. He was the one who made Harry feel normal.
"Hey, he will be okay. He's a fighter." Harry tried to comfort her.
Tears were welling up in Hermione's eyes. She just didn't wanted to know what she would do if Ron really died.
"But, if something happens, Harry? He is just a student! He could be in the hands of the Death Eaters for all we know!" he cried. A few tears were now falling down Hermione's cheek. She felt so helpless as she said that. Ron was there somewhere missing and there was nothing they could do.
Harry laid a hand on her shoulder. "Just believe me Hermione. I'm sure he is alright. He is tougher than he looks like." Harry reassured her, but didn't looked very convincing while saying this.
Hermione just nodded numbly. She didn't had the strength to argue with Harry. She wanted to believe him, but she knew that there was not always a happy end in the real life.
"Let's go. The others are already waiting." she said pointing at the Weasleys.
They went to the place where the Weasleys were standing. Fred and George were teasing Ginny, while Mrs. and Mr. Wasley were talking to each other. It seemed to be like always, but Hermione knew that they were broken. First Percy and now Ron. Hermione couldn't imagine the pain the Weasleys were not feeling.
Mrs. Weasley turned around and spotted the. She smiled at them. "Oh, Harry and Hermione, dears. I hope you are alright?" she asked motherly.
Hermione smiled at the older woman. She was like a second mother to her with hr warm attitude. "We are alright, Mrs. Weasley. We were just talking about something." she looked at Harry to warn him not to say anything about Ron.
He rubbed his neck nervously. "Yeah…yeah we were."
Mrs. Weasley smiled at them. "Oh, goodbye my dears. I wished, our parting would have happened under better circumstances." she said sadly as she hugged the two of them.
Hermione smiled sadly at Mrs. Weasley. She couldn't imagine how broken she was now. She always admired her for raising all her children. She was sure that she would never have managed it.
They said goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and walked towards the train.
In the train they met up with Ginny.
"Hey, guys." she said to them giving them a small smile.
"Hey, Ginny." Harry greeted back. "You are okay?"
Ginny shrugged. "I've been better, but it's okay I guess." she said smiling, but Hermione knew that this was just a mask to hide her sadness. After Ron had disappeared, Ginny had cried for nights always saying that it was her fault that he went away. It was terrible and Hermione's heart broke at the scene. The two siblings always were close to each other, despite all their squarrels.
"Guys, I have to go to the prefect meeting. I will catch you guys up later, alright?" she said. The two of them nodded. With that Hermione walked towards the prefect compartment.
She just wanted to enter when she saw Pansy Parkinson standing in front of the door.
She was smirking at her. "Well, well, if that isn't the mudblood Granger." she said.
Hermione gave her a death glare. The last thing she needed was a bitchy cow talking to her. "What do you want, Parkinson?" she asked.
She was still smirking at her. "Well, for starters. I'm here, because I became a prefect." she said pointing at her badge.
Hermione stared at her incredulously. How did a troll like her became a prefect? "What! How did you became a prefect? You are dumber than a troll!" she cried.
Parkinson gave her a death glare. "I would shut up, if I were you Granger. Anyway, I'm also here because I wanted to say sorry for what happened to Weasley." she said.
Hermione stared at her bewildered. Pansy Parkinson just said to her sorry for Ron's disappearance! What was going on?
"What are you playing at?" Hermione asked suspiciously.
Parkinson rolled her eyes. "Don't be so paranoid, Granger. It isn't that hard to believe that I can be nice. I do have a heart too, you know. But to answer your question, you are not the only one who lost his best friend. Draco has gone missing for one week."
Hermione stared at her in shock. Draco Malfoy was missing. That was definitely news to her. Was that a coincidence or planned. What if Malfoy was the one who had kidnapped Ron. Did Parkinson knew about this plan? But if, why would she tell her that he was missing. She decided to ask her that later. "I'm sorry about that." she said simply without expressions.
To her surprise Parkinson didn't smirked. She really looked hurt. "Yeah, thanks, well how about we go into the prefect room. I think the others are already waiting for us, Granger."
Hermione stared at her for a moment as if she was an alien, then she nodded. "You are probably right. Let's go." And with that she followed Parkinson to the prefect room. Things couldn't get weirder now.
"Here is a compartment free. There is just Loony Lovegood sitting there." Ginny said.
He, Ginny and Neville who had joined them walked into the compartment where a blond haired girl with a strange glasses was sitting there wand reading a newspaper. She was reading it the wrong way round.
The three of them sat down. Harry on Luna's side.
"Hey, Harry guess what my grandmother has given me!" Neville said to him.
Harry shrugged. He was not in the mood to talk about Neville's strange presents. "What?"
Neville grinned and pulled out a plant. "This is the Mimbulus Mimbeltonia." he claimed prodly.
Harry examined the plant. It looked pretty pathetic. "Cool." Harry said with a fake smile. He was still thinking about Ron's disappearance. His best friend was now gone. Couldn't his life be normal at once?
"It also got a really cool self-defense mechanism, want to see it?"
Harry snapped out of his thoughts. "Yeah, sure." he said.
Bad idea, because when Neville poked the plant it literally exploded with green goo spreading around the room and hitting the four teenagers. Ginny could only just raise her hands like a shield and protect her face from becoming a green glibber monster. She now had a green glibber hat instead. Luna was mostly saved because of her newspaper and Neville and him were drenched in green goo.
Neville blushed or at least Harry thought he blushed under the green goo. "Sorry, Harry. I didn't thought that it would end up in that mess." he apologized.
Harry just wanted to reply something when the ccompartment door opened. It was Cho. "Hi Harry…am I interrupting something."
Harry just wanted to curl up and die. Here there was his crush standing in the compartment door looking at him drenched in green glibber. Ever since the last year Harry had a huge crush on the Asian Ravenclaw.
"Oh, hi." Harry said toneless.
"Oh well…I just wanted to say hello…well bye." she said awkwardly blushing a little bit. The she went away.
Harry groaned. Why couldn't he had sit with some cool people and joked around with them. Instead he was sitting with Neville and Luna Lovegood, drenched in green glibber. If Malfoy would have seen that, he would probably invented a new nickname for him. Probably Glibber Boy or something else.
"Don't worry." Ginny said expressionless. "We can easily get rid of that. Scourgify." she said. The glibber was gone.
Just now Luna looked up from her newspaper. "You are Harry Potter aren't you?" she asked.
Harry rubbed his neck nervously unsure what to answer. "Yes, I am."
Luna nodded then turned to Neville." And I don't know who you are?" she asked.
"I'm nobody." he said quickly.
"No, your not." Ginny said quietly.
Now all heads turned to her. She looked tired like as if she hadn't slept for days. Harry smiled at her sadly. He couldn't imagine how hard Ron's disappearance was for her.
"Luna, this is Neville Longbottom. Neville, meet Luna Lovegood, my classmate and friend." she said expressionless.
She was sitting there motionless, her eyes looking like they would close any second now. She gave them a small smile, but Harry knew that deeply inside Ginny was heartbroken. Harry wanted to comfort her, when suddenly Luna said something.
"I heard about your brother. I'm sorry Ginny." she said.
Ginny didn't respond. Instead she looked like she wanted to burst into tears. "Please…can we not talk about that?" she asked shakily.
Luna gave her a small smile, but then nodded and continued to read her newspaper.
Neville stared at Ginny in shock. "What has happened to Ron?" he whispered into Harry's ear.
"He's gone." Harry simply said.
Neville looked terrified. "Go…Gone? You mean dead?" he asked.
Harry shook his head. "No, just disappeared for a week. But he could be dead to for all we know."
Neville looked at him flabbergasted. He looked like he wanted to find the right words.
"I'm sorry Harry. It must be really hard for you. I know…"
"Don't tell me you know how I feel!" Harry snapped at him. Suddenly all heads turned to him. Harry looked at Neville's shocked face and suddenly felt guilty.
"Look Neville. I'm sorry for snapping at you, but I'm not in the mood to talk about things right now." he said.
Neville just nodded probably scared that Harry might have another outburst any minute. Suddenly the compartment door went open. Harry almost expected it to be Malfoy who wanted to sneer at him about how Ron was a pathetic Weasley and how it was about time he was finally gone and how the Weasley population was now slowly sinking on a normal level, but it was just Hermione.
"Hi, everyone." she said as she sat down.
"Hey, Hermione. How was the prefect meeting?" Harry asked.
Hermione shrugged. "Normal, I guess. My prefect partner is Seamus."
Harry looked at her in surprise. "What, Seamus?!" He couldn't believe that out of all he was chosen to be a prefect. Sure Seamus was a good friend and a funny guy, but he wasn't exactly what Harry would call the prefect type.
"Yeah, I was a little bit surprised too. But it's Dumbledore's decision, so I guess he had a reason." she simply said.
Harry nodded. Normally he would probably felt a little jealous and questioned why he didn't became a prefect, but the last few days were just too exhausting for him.
"Who else became prefect?"
"Anthony Goldstein and Padma Patil for Rawenclaw, Ernie Macmillan and Hannah Aboot for Hufflepuff and Blaze Zabini and Pansy Parkinson for Slytherin." Hermione told him.
Harry raised his eyebrows. "Zabini? Not, Malfoy?!"
Hermione bit her lip. It was obviously she a big new to tell Harry. "About that, Harry. Malfoy is gone too."
Harry looked at her in complete shock. "Malfoy is gone! What?!"
Hermione smiled at him sympathetically. "I know, I was shocked too. Parkinson had told me it. Apparently he has been gone around the time when Ron disappeared. Parkinson even said she was sorry that Ron was gone, because she knew what it was like to lose her best friend."
Her words just made Harry's mind explode. Malfoy was gone too? And Parkinson was being nice? What was wrong now? "That means Malfoy was responsible for Ron's disappearance!" he shouted.
Suddenly all heads spun around to him. On Ginny's face there was a mix of hope where here brother could be and anger about Malfoy.
Hermione shook her head. "You forget that Malfoy is just a student like me and you. I don't think he would be capable of doing this."
"But…but." Harry stuttered.
Suddenly Ginny began to speak. "He's right, Hermione. What if he really did this? What if he has my brother?" she asked her lips moving fast as if she was bibbering.
Hermione shook her head. "We already searched everywhere for Ron. Even in the Malfoy Manor. And if Malfoy did kidnapped, Ron, why isn't he here? Wouldn't that be suspicious? As much as I despite Malfoy, he isn't that dumb."
Ginny looked like as if she wanted to argue, but kept her mouth shut.
Harry wanted to say something, when he noticed the headline on Luna's article. Ron Weasley disappeared! Death Eaters or fudge's fire spirit army? It stood on the cover.
"May I?" he asked Luna as he stretched his hand for the newspaper.
Luna nodded and handed him the newspaper.
He looked at it. There were a lot of badly drawn caricatures, which showed his best friend Ron. If he didn't knew that this was about his best friend he would have never recognized him.
He looked at the article in front of him.
Ronald Weasley disappeared! Death Eaters or fudge's fire spirit army?
A few days ago, on the 24th August, the student Ronald Weasley has gone missing. His family was hysterical when they heard about their son's disappearance and many assume that he had just ran away. Some suspicious people say that he was kidnapped by Death Eaters who had survived the First Wizard War and were released as a prisoner.
BUT IS THIS REALLY THE TRUTH?
In our last edition we analyzed how our Minister of Magic had built of an army of Heliopaths. Those are fire spirits that can transform into any kind of creature and use their fire abilities to defend themselves mostly. But Fudge is using them for his own use. Indeed, there were hints of a fight between someone and a Heliopath near that place where Ronald Weasley was seen last.
"There was fire flying through the air. Someone was defending himself from it, as if he was attacked by a fire ghost." said Brigitte Vingrad who had observed the supposed fight between th missing Hogwarts student and the Heliopath. Also, aurors have found burned grass near the place where Ronald Weasley went missing. But what is Fudge aiming with that. Some say that he wants to use someone as a test person for his new cloning method so he could create a new clone army, others say he is just searching for a son.
"Deeply inside, the Minister has a soft side for children and teenagers." the auror Michael Held told us. As heartwarming that may sound it doesn't erase the fact that Fudge has kidnapped an innocent young student. We from The Quibbler demand: release the student Fudge and resign!
Harry stooped reading the article. As much he didn't liked Fudge, he couldn't think of him as a kidnapper or a creator of a fire spirit army.
Hermione huffed. "Everyone know that the Quibbler is rubbish." Hermione said. Suddenly Luna glared at Hermione with a dark expression.
"Excuse me, but my daddy is the chef editor of this rubbish what you call." she said angrily.
Hermione blushed at that. "Well…I didn't."
Luna just stared at her coldly which was odd for her. "I'll take that back." she said and snapped the newspaper out of Harry's hand.
Harry didn't say anything. Those days were just too exhausting for every one of them. Harry looked back to Ginny who was still sitting there motionless.
Harry reached forward and laid a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, it will be alright." Ron will be fine, you'll see." he tried to comfort her.
She just nodded not looking at him.
Harry was hoping that his words will be true, because he wasn't sure. He didn't know anything and that was what scared him so much. Not knowing about Ron's health status. After a while the train arrived at Hogwarts. The five of them went out of the compartment. A new school year has started again, just this time without Ron.
Bam, finally finished the chapter. I decided to write in Harry's and Hermione's POV. Many Ron bashers write that if Ron would die or something like that Harry and Hermione would make a party or something like that. That is bull**** (sorry for that). He is their best friend. They would be broken without him, just as Ron would be broken if Harry or Hermione would have died. The golden trio needs all his members. You can't just let one die and think the other two won't need him. Everyone of the trio has a important role. Harry's the leader, Hermione the smart one and Ron is the one who brings both of them back to reality and back to being a normal teenager. Well, that was it. I hope you liked it (and my article, because I suck in writing articles :p). Please review it. Next chapter will be posted soon.