Vonne: Hello again! I promised a fair amount of you that I wouldn't forget about 'Orchard'; so, finally, here it is- chapter four! Please, please please be kind and leave me a review!

Orchard Omniscient
Haunt

In hindsight, Harry probably shouldn't have gone back to St. Mungo's. He does, though, nevertheless.

Hands deep in his pockets and eyes half-lidded behind the sheen of crooked, plain spectacles, he reaches the door marked 253, summons up all the courage of battling mermaids, facing giants, and vanquishing Dark Lords, and turns the metal knob as if the lot of horrors were waiting there behind it. With a soft click, the door re-locks itself behind him and once inside, Harry meets shaded, rainy gray, a dripping, faulty tap, and a well-confined square of monotony at the center. The only sign of Malfoy is the pale, blond tuft sticking ruggedly from the sheets; and Harry has to admit, "Okay, maybe this is partly my fault," before deciding, for the most part, its actually his fault entirely.

It's not exactly guilt that washes over him, but the sick wave of semi-pity unsettles him all the same. "Malfoy!" he whispers.

The figure on the mattress doesn't move, though. Instead it rests suitably- a small, pale presence within the chaos of far too much white. It's just as if Malfoy were made to be insane; and it almost assuages the sympathy Harry feels for the whole 'committed patient' aspect of the prat's whole ordeal. Almost, of course- but not quite.

"Malfoy," he repeats, still standing barely a foot from the doorway, "Oy! Malfoy!" There's something chilling about the hollow breaths that emit from the spot before him. Lethargic, the spent sounds of Malfoy's exhaustion fade off into uncharacteristically small sighs that sound strangely helpless; and, for a second, Harry thinks about the zoo-kept serpent behind the glass at Dudley's birthday. "Goddammit, Malfoy," he swears on purpose, simply to cancel out any sort of godliness associated with the fact that he had been the underlying cause of this entire mess. "Wake up."

He doesn't, the bastard, but instead a sleepy groan floats out from the blankets and Harry thinks, unconscious or not, Malfoy only makes the nose in order to further torment his inner conscience.

Yet, despite everything, he can't help but consider the fact that perhaps he really isdisrupting the peace. Every slide of his foot makes squeaks against the tile; and the infiltration seems almost unforgivable, like a sin. Malfoy, in the meantime, doesn't even fidget. Staring holes into the sheets, Harry thinks the Slytherin-sized mound looks more pathetic than actually human and he reaches the edge of the white hospital bed contemplating removing the layer of blankets or simply leaving him hidden there beneath them.

For good measure, he tries again. And this time he finds that the covers responsively shift.

"Bugger off, Crabbe," says a sloppy voice. The fluffy blond head retracts back into the white and then, as if on accident, reveals itself against the pillow. In sleep, Draco Malfoy looks piss-faced drunk. The purple circles around his eyes make them hollow, and the unending faucet of his nose makes sticky puddles against cotton. "You're such a pest," Malfoy mumbles incoherently, and instead of waking up, he squeezes his eyes shut tightly and buries his pointed, red-tipped nose into the cushions.

"Potter."

Malfoy predictably doesn't budge, but Harry jerks around so fast that he almost gracelessly loses his balance on the tile. However, notably prepared, he whips out his wand and stands subconsciously between Draco and the bed, glasses slanted unthreateningly at the bridge of his nose. The unspoken hex on the tip of his tongue, however, falls flat at the face of a stern, yet surprisingly shocked-looking, Kingsley Shacklebolt. "Ahem," coughs the Minister of Magic, "Good evening to you, too, I suppose."

"Minister," breathes Harry. Why he's speaking in hushed, whispered tones is beyond him, but the soft sighs of Malfoy at his back sends shivers up his spine; and for some reason, not doing so seems somehow disrespectful. "I-"

"Snuck into a hospital in the early hours of the morning?" finishes Kingsley. His deep purple robes look vibrant in the moonlight, but the raised brows on his face are daunting enough to spread a fast blush on to Harry's otherwise drained face. After a few short moments, however, Kingsley manages to pull his expression into a far lighter one. With a smile, he says, "If I didn't know any better, Mr. Potter, I'd say you were still back in your school days," and Harry laughs nervously in response.

"I couldn't help but feel responsible," he says out loud, explaining himself.

For a second, Kingsley studies Harry with a stoney expression. He lets his large brown eyes wander to the blond mess of hair protruding from the bed sheets and shifts his weight studiously. He doesn't speak in quiet tones, but the intensity of his voice is not unkind. "Mr. Potter," he says finally, breaking the awkward silence, "Mr. Malfoy is here on his own accord. Brining him to St. Mungo's was only part of the job you were assigned to do. If anything you saved his life."

Harry, however, remains unconvinced. He considers the conditions of Malfoy's situation with a heavy heart, still uneasy about the idea of having to have him transfered from hospital to hospital. Sure, he detested the spoilt brat with every bone in his body, but the war was supposed to be over. People weren't supposed to be living like this.

He says, "Malfoy certainly doesn't see it that way," and Kinglsey quirks his brow curiously.

"Yes, well, be that as it may, the Ministry certainly does."

On the small bed, Draco Malfoy moans softly. It's the first sound of distress he's made in the presence of the Minister, but only Harry flinches. Kingsley, on the other hand, takes several steps forward and strides past Harry swiftly. Lifting a large, dark hand, he pulls back the covers strewn across Malfoy and peers down at the pale, pointed face, twisted with the stress of an unkind nightmare. Silently, Harry wonders why the Healers had opted not to give him any Dreamless Sleep. Then, quickly, he considers the fact that perhaps Malfoy had been doped up on enough drugs already.

Nonetheless, its Kingsley who draws out his wand. Wordlessly, he places the tip of it at the side of Malfoy's perspiring temples; and, awestruck, Harry watches the lines smooth on the front of Malfoy's face. His brows relax themselves gently, and the deep frown evens out into a simple, sleepy line. Whereas before the blond had looked ill and horrified, the childlike expression of innocence on his face almost catches Harry off guard. Draco burrows his nose deeper into the cushions, letting out a small, infant-like whimper; and Kingsley drapes the covers back over his face, hiding him completely.

"Mr. Potter," says the Minister, turning back around, "Why are you here?"

"I'm not exactly sure," replies Harry, honestly. Sure, he'd said he had felt responsible before, but the act of sneaking in to Draco Malfoy's hospital room had, admittedly, been a bit out of character. Running a hand through his messy black hair, Harry lets out a long, exhausted breath and scans the white lump of Malfoy all over again. Perhaps he'd only come for reasons that were selfish and not entirely respectful in the first place. Perhaps, for that matter, he'd only come so that he could finally sleep well at night. "I guess I just thought I could make things better."

"Draco Malfoy is in professional hands," Kingsley assures him, and his body blocks the image of Malfoy entirely.

"But-"

"Harry," interrupts the Minister, "go home."

So he does.

o O o O o O o O o O o O o

Or, at least, he'd intended to.

Instead, Harry walks down the too-white hallway and just as he passes the slightly open door to Bostworth's office, he comes face-to-face with the stressed-looking Healer himself. "Harry!" exclaims the man, "just the lad I wanted to see!" and, like that, he is dragged into the room and strung along his couch.

The Healer looks at him with a nervously wide smile and his fingers twitch strangely around the steaming hot cup of tea that he's holding. "Err-" starts Harry, looking apprehensively from the door to the doctor, "how have you been, Mr. Bostworth?" He thinks it's perhaps the most polite thing to ask, but Bostworth flinches at the question, the corners of his mouth almost itching to relax properly again.

"Oh, Harry, not good," breathes the man, "not good at all, in fact. It's actually your latest case that's been keeping me up! The Ministry wants the transfer papers for the Malfoy case in by the morning and they're pushing for Whittingham." Bostworth lets out a long, haggard breath and smoothes his hands over the top of his unflattering head of semi-hair. He eyes Harry quickly, takes a jittery sip of his tea, and shuffles back to his desk, moving around papers with shaking hands. "It's your signature that I need, you know. Once you've acknowledged the move, they'll be off my back."

He's talking a mile a minute, but Harry studies his jerky movements. The anxiety within them makes Harry anxious as well and, for a second, he only stares back, taking it all in. After a long while, however, he manages to ask, "Whittingham?" and Bostworth's head snaps back up. He wears a curious expression on his old, gloomy face.

"Unfortunately so," he says, morosely.

Something about his frown makes Harry uneasy. There's a slight shimmer of pity in the man's eyes, and he stops filing through the papers to pause timidly, glasses twinkling in the dim light of his office. "Sorry," says Harry slowly, mainly in timid apprehension for the bad news that he can practically sense coming. "I'm not familiar with Whittingham Hospital."

"Ah." Almost as if he can't hold it up any longer, Bostworth's expression droops. Against the shag of the carpet, he shifts his weight awkwardly and sets the papers back down on the top of his desk. For a second he stares out the slight opening of his office door and, waving his wand, he spells it softly shut, leaving the two of them in a rather uncomfortable display of darkness. "Tea?" he asks in a small, yet serious voice.

And this time, Harry decides that perhaps tea would be the best idea. "Sure," he says, and he watches Bostworth fill a spare mug up with water. "Thank you."

"Not at all."

For a moment, neither of the two say a word; and, uncertainly, Harry sips from his mug and shifts against the soft cushions. He wishes he could be anywhere else in the world right now- for the distressed expression on Bostworth's face makes him wish he'd have never asked about the hospital at all. And yet, peculiar as though the silence may be, the man takes one step forward, leans his back against the front of his desk, and sets his own mug down on a stack of important-looking files. He says, "Ugly business, Mr. Potter, ugly business" and this time, Harry really really wishes he'd stayed back home and left Draco Malfoy to rot.

It's not as if they were ever friends.

"U-Ugly?" asks Harry, in spite of himself.

Bostworth nods once. "Quite," he says. "It seems the Ministry has decided to place Mr. Malfoy under the watch of the most professional wizards in the business. As the terms of the protection program, Draco was supposed to refrain from harming anyone- himself included- in the times after the end of the war. And yet, as you know, Mr. Malfoy..." Bostworth's voice fades off into an uncomfortable trickle of a sound. Despite his profession, it seems as if he doesn't even want to say it.

So Harry supplies the rest of the sentence for him. "- Tried to off himself."

"Yes," says Bostworth. "That." He lets out a quick breath, regains his composure, and adjusts his stance just a bit. "Well, for... 'trying to off himself' Mr. Malfoy has broken the rules. And that means that the Ministry is permitted to take responsive action."

"So they've decided to send him to a different hospital?"

Bostworth freezes slightly. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose just a bit and reaches back down for his tea. "Err... well, in a sense. Mr. Potter, Whittingham is not exactly a hospital as it is an institution. Under the terms of Mr. Malfoy's program, as I'm sure you're well aware of from the basis of his trial, Mr. Malfoy is to be committed."

Committed.

Harry's not exactly sure that he's heard him right, but the word echoes around the room like an annoying little fly that just won't leave him be. It takes the mickey out of him instantly and, though he'd have once killed for a time when Draco Malfoy could be hauled away to some institution, the nauseous ache in Harry's belly comes as almost an unpleasant surprise. Really, he doesn't know what to think, but the strange feeling of bile that rises up in his throat is something new and, for some reason or another, the thought alone makes him dizzy.

Committed. Like a mad man, Draco Malfoy is going to be dragged off to some goddamn institution.

"For how long?" is the only thing that comes out of his mouth; and Harry is only vaguely aware of himself speaking when he asks it.

"Unfortunately, that is still up to the Ministry to decide."

It takes a long while for Harry to garner up the mindset to say anything else. Rather, he almost forgets the steaming hot tea in his hands and the cushions of the couch beneath him. Instead, the only thought that runs through his mind is that of Malfoy, clad in white, strapped down to a stretcher of un-exquisite material, drooling disgustingly down the front of his pale, pointed chin. He says over and over in his drug-induced state, "All your fault, Potter." And only a little part of Harry thinks that he deserves it.

Somewhere in the back of the hallway, though, Albus Dumbledore reminds him, "Not a killer."

"No." It's out before Harry has much time to stop it. Granted, he's not exactly sure why he's standing up for the well being of Malfoy, but he is, and he flicks his eyes up to Bostworth with the heavy expression of not going down without a fight.

"No?" asks Bostworth.

"No Whittingham," explains Harry. "Healer Bostworth, I'm not going to sign those papers. There has to be another option."

The deep flush of red that overtakes Bostworth's face spreads quickly. His eyes, however concealed behind the sheen of his spectacles, glisten wildly, and he almost looses his composure against the end of his desk. All the stress that he had shown previously returns at once, and again he touches the pathetic ingrown strands of hair that stick out unflatteringly from the perspiring crown of his head "Mr. Potter," he says, almost pleadingly, "I can assure there's nothing! The Ministry must keep an eye on him. Whittingham is perhaps the only hospital that will take him, and, as the Auror in charge of his case, you are the only one that can issue it!"

And a thousand things run through Harry's mind at once. He thinks of all the people that died in the war and how he'd always hoped their sacrifice would have made the surviving world better. He thinks that life was never supposed to end up like this, how the out of control and unfair aspects of the world were never supposed to live on. And the numbness of the night creeps up on him slowly, rising in his legs and spreading in his ears; and he almost can't even hear Bostworth rambling on and on around him, stammering over explaining the details of the unjust Ministry regulations.

Ex-Death Eater, says Bostworth.

Danger to the society, says Bostworth.

The Healer breathes loudly, anxiously, and he holds the unsigned files out in front of him, a bobbing, airborne quill just inches from the curled-up edges. Sure, Harry considers dropping the matter entirely and giving in. He considers reaching over, grasping the quill, and drawing his name, short and sweet, along the shimmering gold line. It'd be easy, so easy. And he almost does it, too. "... Have to sign the papers," says Bostworth.

"And if I don't?" says Harry.

o O o O o O o O o O o O o

Draco Malfoy breathes in slow. He lets the sterile air of hospital medication and overly cleansed countertops fill his nose and squeezes his eyes shut to the unbearable headache in his temples. It doesn't help that his wrists are strapped down to the metal sides of the bed, or that his uncovered feet are almost blue with the nippiness of cold, but when he peels his eyelids open and finds himself face-to-face with a tall, redheaded blur, he all but passes out all over again.

"You're quite ugly when you sleep, has anyone ever told you that?" says Fred Weasley, hands on his knees and head cocked to the side smugly.

Draco jumps as much as the bindings will allow him. He screams a silent and sore sort of scream, and slams his eyes back down to hide the freckle-faced image of the certainly dead, yet certainly happy-looking, Weasley twin.

"What's a matter, Malfoy?" continues the apparition amusedly. Even with his eyes closed, Draco can still hear him. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Malfoy doesn't say another word, but instead busies himself with drumming his fingers on the chilly side of the bed bars. Madly, he hums a tune to himself and ignores the soft giggles, still persistently sounding off around him. They've given him too much medication, drugged him up beyond reasonable repair. All the morphine in his system has made him barmy, of course; and that alone is responsible for the hallucinations.

"Not a hallucination," inerjects Fred.

"Shut up shut up shut up," demands Draco.

A soft creak, as if the ghost were actually taking a seat, meets Malfoy's ears. It's silent for a second, and Draco almost sicks up at the thought of going permanently mad. He clenches his fists, trying to break free of his bonds, but cries out unsuccessfully at the tightness against his wrists.

"You know," says Fred over the whimpering sound of Draco's protest, "I know you're a prat and all, but you really have no reason to be so rude, Malfoy. It's disrespectful. And I'm dead. And you shouldn't be disrespectful to the dead or the dead will haunt you, and you don't want that, do you?"

All things considered, Draco thinks the dead have already started to haunt him.

"Oh," agrees Fred, "right."

When Draco opens his eyes, Fred Weasley is sitting perched on the edge of his mattress. There's a kind, gentle look in his eyes, but there is also no mistaking the mischief there, either. In death, it seems, the boyishness had never really left him.

"Boo," says Fred appropriately, and Draco screams before fainting accordingly.

o O o O o O o O o O o O o

Draco doesn't dream this time because this time they wake him up and pump him with calming sedatives before unstrapping his arms and directing him down the hall.

The large, muscular men holding him upright jolt him into a staggering sort of balance and they don't even bother wiping the spit from his cheeks or the tears from his eyes. Instead, Draco clamors down the corridors and blinks by the blinding lights and peering eyes of the other hundred madmen standing watch. Some of them shout, "DEATH EATER SCUM!" but when Draco opens his mouth to retort, a fountain-full of saliva dribbles from the opening of his lips instead of anything sufficient enough.

He feels strange, but then again, normalcy seems too foreign a concept anyway.

"Rot in Hell," instructs someone from the back of him. Malfoy sees the shapeless blur bend over and whisk off a slipper before it hits him square in the jaw and fumbles to the ground by his feet.

"No throwing," dismisses the men at his side.

A couple of spare Healers rush off to the offending tosser, but Draco isn't given the satisfaction of watching them inject him with punishment of his own. Instead, they steer him around the corner and past the ogling eyes, into a whole different room. And this time, the whole cooped up place is almost frighteningly too dark.

"Patient DM25300," they say.

Though watery lashes, Draco peers around the room. Faceless, formless figures stand in clumps all around him; and it's almost too glaringly white to make out much of anything else. "Mr. Harry James Potter," says a calm voice somewhere else.

Draco doesn't see him, but the bright, un-ignorable image of two green eyes meet him half way through all the chaos. There's something sympathetically pitying about them, and they glisten intensely behind the annoying sheen of ugly spectacles. Huh. For a minute, Draco wants to reach out and touch him, but the twitching jerk in his fingers is involuntary and the fact alone makes his cheeks flush. Stupid Potter. The boy who lived and lived and lived and just wouldn't die already.

"Malfoy." The green eyes look at him funny. Chilly air signifies the movement of his hand, and Draco flinches when Potter touches him; the warmth of his fingers makes him uneasy, off-balance, and the strange question of, "Are you alright?" arrives slowly, barely processing in the fuzziness of Draco's head.

He thinks, "Am I alright?" and then someone lifts up his hand and shoves it forcefully into the heated confines of Potter's. Draco's hand just lies there, limply compliant within it. For a second, however, he simply stands across from him. Supported by the two strong hospital men at his side, Draco lets his eyes flutter shut and breaths in slowly through his nose. Each inhale feels like ice to his lungs. Every exhale makes the voices all around him fade a little bit faster.

"Malfoy?" Potter asks him, tightening his grip ever so lightly. The concern in his voice is strange, but Draco opts to ignore him partly because moving his mouth feels too tiring and partly because, despite everything, he still hates his guts. "Malfoy... can you hear me?"

Several footsteps creak around the room. With his eyes closed, Draco can only feel the presence of another being, but the tip of something pointed and long at the center of his fist is most certainly that of a wand. "Do you, Mr. Potter, agree to monitor the actions of one Draco Lucius Malfoy for the currently undisclosed time of enrollment in the Ministry's watch program?"

Potter is stalling. Within their unusual union, his hand slightly loosens. "I..." he starts. "Is he alright?" However, despite the inquiry, no one in the room bothers answering. Rather, they repeat the original question in a daunting, forceful voice and Potter swallows hard before saying that, yes, he does.

"And, therefore, you acknowledge the fact that he is hereby your responsibility to maintain and overlook?"

Draco feels sick. There's something not right about all of this, but it feels better to lean against the men's convenient grips instead of speaking out anyway. Potter, however, does all the speaking for him. His voice says, "... Yes," and at that very moment, Draco gets nauseous.

Nevertheless, Potter's hand pulls away from his and the men at Draco's side let go. For what feels like hours, no one says a word; but Draco's legs feel limp and useless and he sways just inches from Potter, threatening to loose his balance completely.

However, only after the bile actually escapes his throat and lands with a thick, slimy thud, on Potter's shiny leather shoes, does Malfoy feel the slightest bit of accomplishment.

It's short-lived, of course, but brilliantly enough, its the first feeling of elation Draco Malfoy feels before passing out all over again and this time leaving the Golden Boy graciously to the madness.

Vonne: Motivate me to continue? Pleaseeeee!