The Fallout by EveryThursday (reposted)

Three

Day: 416; Hour: 12

"You know what I think about? While I have sex?"

"Oh, Merlin." Ernie groans.

"I don't think we even want to know." Lavender laughs.

"This night just got scary, is what I think." Dean flips a card on the table between him and Ernie, and grins over his shoulder at Roger Davies.

Roger gives him a glare. "No, no... Listen. How many people in the world, do you think, are having sex right now? You know? No! No... Look. When I'm having sex, I can't help but think... how many people in the world are currently doing the same exact thing, and feeling the same exact way? It's like an orgy. Like a mind--"

"I've never been in an orgy, but I can guarantee it's not like--"

"Sure, sure, Lav." Ginny laughs and the rest follow, despite the affronted look on Lavender's face.

"So, it's like a cheap orgy," Roger tried. "It just makes it better. Sex is always better with more people."

The room laughs or bursts into agreement, and Hermione blushes and shakes her head at her knees.

Day: 422; Hour: 6

She vomits.

There isn't much to give up, but her body heaves and pushes until all that's left of the liquids and soup she's had in the past three days is on the ground. Her snot is running all down her face, and she sucks it back up, hacks it out. The feel of it along her tongue sends her gagging, and it's green bile that splashes down across her hands.

"God," she whispers pathetically.

She does not have the stomach for war, or blood, or death. She is not made for it.

She does not know his name, and she feels horrible about it now. She isn't sure why she does, but she does. His name is important, and his life was too, and this was a human being with a family. He is dead now. Dead, dead, dead, and he deserves to have her remember his name of all things.

She runs a spell, checking for a pulse, but he is pale blue. "Okay. Alright."

She wipes her hand, puke and saliva, on her jeans, and reaches up to shut his eyes. She mutters a prayer to a God he probably doesn't believe in, and flicks the blood-caked hair away from his swollen face. She moves on, because there is time to count the dead later (maybe), and absolutely no time for it now.

The figure she has just Stupefied is now back up, but she has caught on by now, and throws another one at him. It will wear off in five seconds, she knows, and so she is quick to bind him with another spell, wrapping him in rope. He moves and she stuns him again, advancing to try and find his wand. Her hands shake from the Crucio she took (twice) before realizing that they were somehow throwing off her stunning spells.

She has to stun him seven more times, all close calls to him attacking her physically, before she is able to find his wand. She runs backwards, breaking the thick length of wood and tossing it to the ground. He is back in motion against the confines of the rope, and then struggling to his feet with a roar when he finds his wand gone. Hermione is at a loss on how to handle the situation, her eyes darting the area for a way to keep him away from her without having to stun him every few seconds or-- She raises her wand and casts a Dancing charm at him, trying to force her mind to remember something useful. She cries out in frustration because it feels as if her mind has broken down on her, and failed her at a pivotal moment. All that knowledge, now suddenly blanked.

She whacks the heel of her palm against her temple and clenches her teeth, groaning and impatient as she tries to think of something useful. The Death Eater currently dancing a jig several paces away yells out then, and she looks up in time to see a flash of green strike him between the eyes.