𝒜𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓂𝒶𝓉𝒽 | 𝒟.𝑀.

72 | ﴾ Immanent Termination ﴿

In the center of the stadium, a large black and purple vortex of fire began to spread outwards from where Ascelin was commanding Madeleine's actions. The panicked response to the terrorist attack amongst the audience members was staggering; the entire elliptical structure was suddenly overwhelmed by thousands of bodies jumping up, disapparating, and running frantically.

Hermione thought on her feet, "Everyone grab onto each other, we need to disapparate. Running is no good." She stiffly grabbed onto both Harry and Ron's sleeves, and Draco gripped Blaise's shoulder who had latched onto Hilda and Hermione. Seamus struggled to get out of his seat where the hotdog suit had wedged itself tensely in the bent apparatus, and Draco stretched his arm painfully to reach for Seamus' hand as the heat from the dangerous incendiary cyclone began to blister the air around them.

He just barely got ahold of the small boy's sweaty fingers when Hermione warped the group through time and space. They reappeared out in the field, surrounded by the now abandoned tents of festival goers. People were fleeing in every direction, tripping on tight tent wires and blundering into each other as the stadium was engulfed in the background in a demonic bonfire several dozen stories high.

Draco dropped to his knees in the dirt, agonizingly mesmerized by the horror before him. He was in such a state of shock that his ears had stopped working properly; sounds were warbling in and out of reality and function. He hardly acknowledged Harry's hand on his shoulder, shaking him on the spot where he was being smashed into by running fans in the lane beside him. Seamus was on Draco's other side, still fighting to remove himself from the stadium chair that had come along for the ride. Ron stepped forward and popped the plastic hot dog with his wand, finally relieving the drama in Draco's immediate peripherals.

His eyes slid to his peers, feeling as though everything was moving in slow motion, his body threatening to pass out from the sheer volume of traumatization. Hilda had her face buried in Blaise's dress shirt, bawling into the fine textiles comprising his suit. 

Hermione was also crying and shaking her head, her dark eyes brightened by the reflection of the flames in her tears as she took in the monstrous blaze that had just claimed the lives of hundreds of people at a minimum. Goyle was missing entirely as he had not been agile enough to grab onto the group, and Draco had no way of determining if the dull boy had thought quickly enough to dissapparate on his own.

Minutes crawled by, perhaps as long as half an hour, before the flames started to reduce. The superstructure made of weak metals and wood caved in on itself with metallic groaning and large gutteral booms. Above them in the sky, the taunting blood moon stared down at them with red intensity like Satan's ugly eyeball. 

Draco had spent most of that time silently crying and staring down into his lap, mortified and paralyzed. Tears slid down his cheeks as he blinked at his cracked military watch which had somehow been shattered in the harried escape. She was lost to her Creator; time was up.

Hermione paced in the now nearly abandoned camping area that they had all been recovering independently in. She ran her trembling fingers up into her wispy hair, pulling it away from her face and choking on her words which were addressed to no one in particular, "I don't...I don't understand, it's not even close to midnight. What happened?"

Draco coughed, speaking barely audibly over the sound of distant screaming and the consumption of the World Cup arena, "It was never about midnight. Asclin had us all conned from the beginning. The cuffs weren't doing anything the whole time, we're fucking pathetic fools."

The group was silent, staring at him forlornly and at a loss with what to do next. Harry rubbed at his face, "How can you be certain?" 

"I've seen her in my room wearing the cuffs, hours before midnight, plaguing me with nightmares in my sleep. She played along so we wouldn't see this coming while she was...digesting Madeleine," Draco lifted his puffy eyes to the witches and wizards watching him seriously.