In Too Deep

Disclaimer : Harry and friends obviously not mine. Also X Battle 1999 are not mine.

Thank you to Menoin714 and Richard Old for the Beta. They are such wonderful people. Without them this story would never be uploaded.

I beg any critics and reviews. Enjoy!!


Chapter 2 Diving

“Harry… Harry wake up they’re here…”

With bleary eyes he struggled to get up from the rough couch, where he had slept for the past couple of weeks that he’d been staying at St. Mungos. He managed to “pull some strings”, that means for some amount of Galleons, St. Mungos was able to accommodate the situation. The staff of the hospital happily provided him with a VIP room with its own private adjacent waiting room. He sat at the end of the couch when Ron handed him a glass of water. He drank a little and went to the nearest bathroom to wipe the sleep from his face. There were five other people in the Waiting Room when he return from the bathroom.

Remus Lupin who spotted him first came over to shake his hand. The other guests were Arthur Weasley, a St. Mungo Healer and an old man who was standing near the entrance door and eyeing him carefully. He was as old as Dumbledore with the same long, white beard and twinkling eyes but no glasses. Mr. Weasley sauntered over to give him handshake and two taps on his shoulder while the Healer only nodded his head at him. Then Tonks came over and gave him a crushing bear hug that nearly suffocated him. Honestly, she would make Molly Weasley proud. Remus watched them with amused expression. Finally he was released. Still breathless, he met Remus’s amused smirk. The weary werewolf motioned to Harry to follow him. He introduced the young wizard to Dumbledore resemblance who was standing by the door.

“Harry, I’d like you to meet Mr. Norman. He was a professor at Hogwarts a long time ago.”

“A very, very long time ago I’m afraid,” said Mr. Norman with the slightest smile on his lips.

Harry firmly shook the old man’s hand with admiration. Somehow, the information that this man was once a member of the Hogwarts staff put him at ease. The fact that he looked like Dumbledore brought back many memories for him.

“Mr. Norman is a medical practitioner in a small Wizarding village in Greenland. He is a great Healer who has saved many wizards and witches in the last hundred years. His specialty is the study of the effects of Jinxes, Hexes, and Curses on the human body. That is why we’ve asked him to help us now” Lupin said.

“Such a big word for an old man. I am afraid I will have a severe case of … bubble head.” Mr. Norman said with a smirk to Harry.

Quick introductions were made and they wasted no time in getting to what was necessary. Harry personally wanted this done as soon as possible. They needed a solution and couldn’t wait any longer. They, meaning he and Ron, had been waiting two bloody weeks with no useful information. The staff of St. Mungos started to give up hope. That was how they had come to this desperate point, to find any other way, by any means possible.

The old healer had used all his magic and examined her for hours. He had an Order of Merlin First Class in Medical department, yet he couldn’t give them any definite answers. Time was running out. Sometime soon, people from the ministry would come and bring her judgment.

All seven of them packed inside the smaller room, beside the Waiting Room. There was only one bed in that room and a low table. On that bed, Hermione Granger lay quietly and completely oblivious to her surroundings. Her blank vision showed no emotion at all. Even though her body was there, she wasn’t really present. No, she wasn’t dead … it was worse than death. She had been like this for the past three weeks and there was no guarantee that she would ever regain consciousness. She was in a catatonic state, lost in her own mind, in her own memory and her own world. She refused to come out or let anyone in.

This nightmare happened almost a month ago when suddenly Hermione insisted on seeing her parents in the middle of their voyage to search for the remaining Horcruxes. There was only one left to destroy and yet she insisted on checking on her parents. Harry and Ron had offered to accompany her but she told that she was always careful and they had nothing to worry about. Certainly she was able to protect herself and definitely did not need a babysitter.

A day before Hermione departed, Harry was restive. His worries abounded. He had found Sirius’s mirror in the master bedroom of Number 12 Grimmauld Place and gave it to her. He made her promise him to take it wherever she went.


********

“That’s ridiculous Harry!” She exclaimed

“Hermione I am serious!”

“Well, I can not very well bring it to the bathroom can I? You may call at the worst time and … and …” She trailed off. A sweet red rose to her cheek and she flustered a bit but Harry urged on.

“Of course you can” He stated firmly.

“What!?” Hermione’s eyes widened in mild shock, even Ron wore the same expression.

During the time, Ron had been standing against the wall, watching two of his best friends argue with a somewhat amused expression. Yes, he knew exactly what was going on here and he loved seeing the show. He and Hermione had tried to date right after they left Hogwarts; after Dumbledore’s funeral but it turned out bad. It was horrible, to say the least, because he and Hermione simply had different views of everything and their personalities clashed. It was awful to finally find out that there was no passion left after they settled their bickering arguments. It was as if the bickering was the only thing that fueled their passions and it was rather scary actually, cruel even. Many times Hermione had been hurt because of it, in the past and in the present. All of them were appalled. They could not stand to have more of that in the future.

Many had confused their witty banter and bickering; and of course Hermione had been one of them. Her arguments with Ron and Harry were different. She spent a good three months of the summer aftertheir sixth year analyzing this, because analysis was her most prominent talent. She had foughtwith both Ron and Harry. With Ron it was passionate bickering. She tried to best him at many levels, but Ron’s temper and stubbornness put her off and they ended up insulting each other in a very cruel way; that always left her crying afterwards.

Harry had practically the same temper and sometimes the same stubbornness as Ron’s, especially when he had Ron to back him up. But she often tried to see reason behind his argument and unconsciously or not she always tried to synchronize her thoughts with him to find a better solution, which never happened during her arguments with Ron. They also avoided insulting each other and whenever they unintentionally did, she always felt bad afterward. She could tell that Harry felt bad too because they always tried to make amends toward each other. She could never stay mad at Harry for long. She always thought Harry was a better friend and Ron would be a better lover but it did not look like that anymore. It was not suppose to be like that.

Now, she and Ron enjoyed their bickering as much as any best friend would. She was somewhat closer to Ron now as a dear brother she never had, an over-protective dear brother. Somehow this idea comforted her and she no longer felt awkward being near him anymore. Both of them knew that they loved each other and with Ron growing up; he started to notice things he had failed to notice before. He started to observe his two best friends closely as a spectator, he watched their attitudes towards each other, he noted visible flare ups of emotion, with much amusement. It was grand entertainment from his point of view.

While Hermione was struggling with her jumbled emotions at this time, Harry had come out with such a suggestion. Ron fought to hide his smirk.

“What?!” She shouted. Her cheek reddened with each passing second, which made her complexion turn a rather pretty shade. Harry knew every thing that made Hermione adorable and a flustered Hermione was one of them. It was one of his favorites actually.

“Of course you can find a way to bring the mirror to the bathroom without… revealing yourself.” Harry said “When I say every time, Hermione, it means EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.” Harry was determined.

Honestly, Ron had to admit that that was the most logical statement that Harry had produced that made even Hermione speechless. “Now, I won’t let you go until you promise me that!”

Hermione opened and closed her mouth like a fish out of water with nothing coming out of it. That Git! How could he even suggest such a thing with such a calm demeanor? And just to think of it, made her cheeks flush even more. ‘Oh Merlin, my heart! Damn you Harry!’

Since Harry was so determined, Hermione had no choice but to give him her word. Harry and Ron escorted her to her home and gave heranother lecture, cautioning her to be careful at all times. Surely they would have given Mad-Eye Moody a run for his money. They finally departed, when she started to get irritated. Finally she was home, safe and sound. There was no place like home Hermione thought. She felt safe and warm, here in her childhood home and surrounded by her parent’s love.

Both her parents were exhilarated to find their daughter was with them again. They were slightly disappointed with her decision to leave school to face this impending danger. They knew that Hermione was an adult and she was capable of making her own decisions, yet, still they wanted her to have a proper education or whatever that was needed to ensure her future. It was not until Hermione promised them to keep up with her studies. She assured them that she and the boys could still take the exams later, to be able to graduate from Hogwarts properly. With that promise her parents finally relented. Now, she was home and they were as happy as a family could be.

Aafter a night of restless sleep for Harry, what he feared actually happened. Harry checked up on Hermoine every hour as he promised. –Despite her frustrated assurances that she was fine- She even brought the mirror with her everywhere as she promised. On the sixth day there was an Order meeting and both of the boys were summoned to attend. The meeting’s primary discussion was on Remus’s report about a riot in the werewolf clans. Voldermort had master pieced a plan. No one seemed to know what the plan was or where and when it would be initiated so they made wild guesses at who would be the victim. When Harry mentioned his worries about Hermione his scar erupted with searing pain. He spent a full minute writhing on the floor of the Weasley’s dining room. His breath came in short gasps. The only word he could pronounce after the burning had subsided was …

“Hemione!” and with that he apparated, undoubtly to Hermione’s house. Ron followed a second later and the others, a few seconds after that; but it was too late.

Harry had seen Slughorn’s house at the beginning of last year’s term. Yet, what he saw at Hermione’s house made the damage at Slughorn’s a mere child’s prank. Surely Slughorn’s house was the perfect picture of a Death Eater-wrecked-house. What he saw at Hermione’s house was much more, it was a horror. Blood was all over the place. Fresh human blood, not animal blood, was all over the walls, on the floor, splattered on the broken furniture. Its stench filled his nostrils as soon as he apparated into their living room.

In reflex, he slapped his hand to his mouth, and resisted his urge to vomit. He looked around the disgusting scene before him, while he ignored the pounding of his heart, pumping cold blood through his body. Each beat sent hisblood; colder and colder until it chilled him to the bone. He began to shiver from the chill and the dreadful images unfolding before his eyes... Yet any images his brain produced were much less dreadful than the image before him. There were body parts, yes human body parts, scattered about, at odd places around the room.

Harry spotted a pair of human heads in one corner of the room with blood still dripping from their severed necks. He couldn’t make out whose heads were sitting there, as the sight was too revolting. His stomach was still flipping dangerously, ready to send bile out of his throat. Someone had taken great pleasure in making this living room into a slaughterhouse and freely killed these humans as if they were cattle. Off at one side of the living room, rather secluded from Harry’s point of view, sat Hermione Granger, frozen in front of a wall and dressed in red. The wall behind her was awash in red. Fresh blood was still dripping from its surface. Her feet were tucked beneath her body in a still, somewhat lifeless repose. Her right hand with her wand clutched loosely had fallen to her side. Fear and panic consumed Harry as he strode rapidly to her side.

He dropped gracelessly right in front of her. She looked horrible. Blood was all over her face and body. He called her name over and over and shook her limp body but Hermione made no reaction at all. She just kept starring straight through his head. It was as if she was off somewhere leaving her body behind, while her mind traveled elsewhere. He carefully wiped away the blood that covered her face and closely-examined her body for further injury. There was so much blood all over her that it drenched her hair and soaked her shirt. She also seemed to be sitting in a pool of blood. A loud crack filled the room and Ron’s voice burst out.

“Bloody Hell!” He cursed in whisper. His face aghast with disgust, he kept his left palm over his mouth to resist the urge he had to vomit again and he hurriedly ran across the room, as soon as he spotted Harry. He didn’t recognize the figure sitting in front of Harry at first because of their horrendous appearance.

“Harry is she ……” Harry didn’t understand the need to whisper but Ron insisted on keeping his voice low as if he was afraid things would get worse if he raised his voice louder. Harry didn’t answer; instead he held Hermione’s face with both hands and started to sob uncontrollably while resting his forehead on hers. This action put more horror on Ron’s already contorted face. Somewhere about this time the other members of the Order, with the exception of Remus; gathered inside the living room. Neither Ron nor Harry were aware of them.

--If I still make mistakes please blame me ... --