"I need a place to hide. I need a place to hide. I need a place to hide." Hermione mumbled as she passed in front of the wall three times. Would it work with her brain shouting the hundreds of different things that she needed at her? She forced another deep breath down into her lungs. They ached from the trek up to the seventh floor and it did not help that she had fought to keep her sobs subdued the whole way.

She exhaled in a sigh of relief as the door to the Room of Requirement popped into being. She quickly dashed over and placed her hand on the grooved wood before checking over her shoulder. The sensible part of her knew she should have scouted for anyone watching prior to summoning the room, but her edginess wouldn't allow her mind to think of important measures like that. As she scanned the darkness her hand slid down the door, working its way down to the cold metal of the doorknob.

At a snail's pace she inched the door open just enough for her body to pass through. With one final look around the deserted hallway, she slipped into the room and shut the door with a gentle click. Hermione leaned her forehead against the ancient wood. She did not turn around to check out her surroundings. Instead she relished in the fact that no one would be able to find her. Even if one of her friends grew worried and thought to check for her here they would need their own place to hide for the door to work for them.

Finally safe, she let her tears cascade down her face. She knew all of Ginny's hard work was in the metaphorical toilet but she couldn't muster up enough sympathy to care. Large tufts of her curls fell from her updo and the sweat on her brow was enough to tell her that the painstakingly applied makeup was a mess already. The fact that she could be vain enough to care how she looked caused her silent tears to switch to full-blown sobs. She was an idiot...

She turned around so she was facing the room but her eyes were too clouded with tears to take in anything about her environment. She leaned back against the door and slid herself down until she was sitting on the ground. Hermione pulled her knees up to her chest and allowed the anxiety to take hold. Her raspy breaths felt like fire scorching up and down her throat. Every muscle in her body felt like a violin string ready to snap. She continued to sob, letting her head fall forward and smack her knee with a hollow thud. The pain didn't register as her extremities went numb.

Slowly her body slumped to the right and her shoulder slammed into the ground at an awkward angle. A sharp pinch at her temple let her know she had hit her head. When her vision started to dim she knew it had to have been harder than one would expect at that short of a distance but her only thought as she rushed to unconsciousness was... "Thank you!"

-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-\/-

The first thing that Hermione noticed when she came to was a deep pounding in her head. It felt like a herd of Erumpents were charging around in there. The second was that she was cold. Little by little she started to piece together what had happened and where she was. She sighed painfully and pushed herself up into a sitting position.

She groaned at the sudden rush of blood back into her right arm caused the sharp feeling of thousands of needles prickling along the tender skin. She flexed the fingers and lifted her left hand up to her right temple checking for blood. When her fingers came away dry she was grateful, at least she didn't have to deal with an open wound. As her world started to right itself and her senses could take more in than simple self-evaluation she noticed that she wasn't in a small room like she had initially thought. Not even close…

In fact, she wasn't even sure if what she was in could be considered a room. It was more like a cavern. She couldn't even see the other three walls because it was filled to the brim with stuff. Everywhere her eyes could see there were stacks of random odds and ends. Books, quills, parchment, broken furniture, weapons, clothing of every variety, brooms, bookcases... The endless amount of things was overwhelming. Thousands of students must have found this room the same way she had... Needing a place to hide (or more than likely needing a place to hide something).

She slowly got to her feet. Her haggard body couldn't afford to take another spill. She stepped up to a table that bore signs of having barely survived a fire at one point, most notable being the blackened top. The massive amount of papers it held was staggering and she theorized that it must have been charmed at some point in time to withhold the substantial amount of weight. She reached down to the floor and plucked a sheet from a random pile. Her eyes scanned the contents and she smiled softly. It was a love note from 1779. She wondered if Matilda had ever found out about Wilcott's affections...

After gently setting the parchment down she continued forward. She didn't want to go too far into the hoard but her natural curiosity would not let her just walk away without exploring a little further… At most it took ten steps into the maze for the massive hoard to become overwhelming. Right in front of her was the physical evidence of how many student bodies had moved through Hogwarts since it had opened its doors. Each item had an owner, who in turn had their own stories of how they came to have a need for this unique room.

Hermione made her way through the mess, being mindful that some of the "walls" looked dodgy so it was better to keep to the middle of the aisles. After two rights (she figured it was easier to remember her path back if she only needed to take lefts) and a fair amount of walking she came upon a jewelry box. It was sitting haphazardly on top of the beheaded neck of a statue. The silver casing was tarnished to the point that it caused the metal to appear black with green and blue speckles. Alternating lines of pearls and opals started at the top and dropped down the sides before angling to meet around the locking mechanism. The largest jewels were the size of a knut and the closer the line got towards the keyhole the smaller they became. The smallest were the size of dots formed by the tip of a quill.

Transfixed, she stopped in her tracks. It was as if the box had called to her. Instantly she forgot the preventative measures to keep herself safe and took a step forward. And then another... And another until she was standing over the beautifully intricate creation. The world around her seemed to fade away. The only two things in existence were her and the jewelry box.

Touch me, it whispered in her ear. Vaguely her mind registered that she shouldn't touch anything she wasn't confident was harmless...

Touch me, it coaxed again. She lifted her hand but hesitated to close the distance.

JUST DO IT, it screamed in her head causing a vicious drum beat to start against her temple. She stopped her hand from moving any closer, her fingers twitched as they hovered so very close to brushing the top. Again the thought to pull away nagged at her from somewhere deep inside her mind. She couldn't recall the exact reason that it would be such a bad idea but knew it would be…

Please touch me, it begged her. The voice sounded as if she was a long-awaited oasis to a parched mouth. Her hand started to move of its own accord and fought with her sluggish brain for every single millimeter.

Hermione's stomach twisted as she remembered why she shouldn't be touching random objects found in the Super Secret Hidey Hole for a magical school... Curses and possession being the highest on the dire consequences list. Even as her brain accepted this and tried to win the struggle, her hand continued forward. There was hardly a few centimeters left between her pointer finger and one of the raised gems on the box's surface.

Yes, it hissed. It must have felt its impending success because the helpless inflection was gone. Her heart started to pound in time with the frantic rolls of panic from her stomach. Or was it the other way around? Her stomach rolled with every panic-stricken beat of her doomed heart?

With the last of her restraint, she tried one last time to snatch her hand away. A repressed sob escaped her lips as she realized who the victor in this battle of wills was going to be. She hoped it would be quick and she wouldn't languish with some hideous curse for years on end.

Or even worse... She had heard of people getting sucked into magical objects before. She could be stuck here forever. There would be no way anyone could find her. It had happened before... A student just disappearing, never to be heard from again. The last time had been over twenty-five years ago but it was just Hermione's luck to be next on the list... All because she had stupidly dropped her guard and let this thing get inside her head.

Come on. Just a little closer dear, it nudged at her mind unpleasantly. She could feel her fingers itch to push forward. It was so quiet she couldn't even hear her heart anymore. The one thing that always let her know she was alive was discouragingly gone. What if she was already dead? Could she have hit her head that hard back there and this was all some weird prelude to the afterlife? With that depressing thought Hermione lost what little resolve she had left. She closed her eyes and embraced whatever would happen. She deserved what fate had in store for her. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all.

Suddenly, as if from nowhere, her ears picked up on the sound of shoes clacking against stone. The new stimuli somehow severed through the connection and caused the spell to be broken.

She heard a ferocious, Nooooooo! screeched into her mind before she instantly had control over her body again. She could not move though… Hermione's mind refused to accept the fact that nothing had happened to her. The odds were so infinitesimal that someone had come along at exactly the right moment. But yet there she stood. So she stayed frozen in the position the damned box had left her in.

The clacking stopped and a voice rang out, "What the hell are you doing Granger?"