The Fallout by EveryThursday (reposted)

Nineteen

Day: 1436; Hour: 15

"I don't think you understand. Or, at least, I'm hoping you don't understand, because I would hate to see someone that stupid in such a position of--"

"Hermione," Justin whispered, but she jerked her arm away from his touch and shoves another finger into the Auror's chest.

"You are out of line--" Auror whoever begins, but Hermione cuts him off with a fake laugh and another raw poke into his sternum.

"And you are insane if you think I'm going to leave you alone for a second before you do something about this!"

The man grabs her arm suddenly, his fingers digging so hard into her wrist she feels the bones might pop. "We still have people we're pulling out of the fucking mud, hospital rooms filled with injuries, and a full morgue. We have a--"

"You think I don't know that? Huh? I know that! My friends have died today, and throughout this entire fucking war! People I considered my family are in that morgue, so don't you dare preach to me about what we have lost!" Hermione screams this in a way that breaks her voice open, splinters the expression on her face, and she hates that she is crying.

"Sir," Justin tries, and Hermione lets him leave his hand on her shoulder now. "First, I suggest you drop her hand before we take this up with Lupin. Second, all we're asking from you is for you to organize all in good health to form a search team. Both of us are already volunteering for it."

The Auror clenched his fist after releasing her, face pulled into disgust. "All decisions on missions are handed down the chain of command. If you want a search team, go get in the line bending the hallways at Mungo's to talk to Lupin."

"Ron Weasley is a good man. He has sacrificed--" Hermione starts, her hands shaking.

"They are all good people. They have all sacrificed. There is a long list of people that are missing. Unless he's got the ability to come back and save us all, he's waiting to be saved with the rest of us."

Because he was not Harry Potter, and she was angry at the darkness in the way she thought it, but all she could feel was callousness.

Day: 1437; Hour: 7

The healer tells her that Lupin has demanded Harry doesn't know about Ron yet. Ron is the exception, the woman tells her, and he knows about the status of the others they have documented so far. Documented, and Hermione wonders if the healers have lost their emotions from the war that was so huge it also had the energy to rip through hospital corridors with all the ferocity of a lion.

Ron is at his home, healing, and should be in good health within two weeks. That is their story. That is what makes Hermione want to scream, and vomit, and stay perfectly still all at the same time.

Harry is in much better shape than she had expected. His left arm was in a sling, small scratches lining the right side of his face from temple to jaw, and four broken fingers. There was the tint of a healing balm peeking out from the collar of his hospital gown, and a soft orange glow across his ribs came from under the thin fabric. For some reason, she had thought of some horrible disfigured face and body with claw-locked hands, and then she realized that she had lived too long with her worst fears. Magic would have him healed in a day, perhaps two. It was the mental damage she was most scared of now.

He took her hand and didn't let it go for an hour, both sitting in silence save their breath and the noise outside the room. He stared at the ceiling and then at her, in her eyes, and for a good fifteen minutes she was afraid to blink. It was like she was scared that he might not find what he needed there if she did.