When We Were Beasts

Experience

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"Granger?"

Hermione hadn't realized how far into herself she had fallen until his voice brought her back.

"Granger, wake up."

She was lost in the darkness. She couldn't find her way back, she didn't know where to go when the pieces that made her were so scattered-

"No. No please-"

I'm trying! Hermione tried to cry. I can't find my way back!

Distantly, she felt her physical body shift into warm, strong arms.

"Hold on, Granger." His voice had grown shaky. She didn't remember his voice ever sounding like that.

The wizard was casting a diagnostic charm, and whatever he saw made him curse.

His name evaded her, but his voice was familiar, comforting even. She wondered who he was, what he meant to her...

"Granger, are you with me?"

A hand on her cheek. Another curse as he muttered how cold she was.

Hermione wondered why he seemed to panic at this.

She felt herself float back down, down into the darkness. Where it was safe, and where she didn't feel pain.

"No!" His roar jolted her back from the edge of the abyss. "I'm not letting you give up. Not now, after everything!"

Vaguely, she felt her body swallow potion after potion. She heard rather than absorbed the spells he performed.

It seemed to do very little.

His grip on her tightened.

"Not like this," He pleaded, his voice nothing but a haunted whisper. "Please hang on. Hang on for me, Hermione. I'll take care of you, just hang on."

Hermione.

Yes, she was Hermione. Hermione Granger.

She was a fighter. A witch. A Gryffindor. A member of the golden trio. A member of the Order of the Phoenix. She was a survivor. A daughter. A player in the BackRooms-

Another piece of her soul fractured and fell away. She tried to reach the voice, the tether to hope, but she fell with that broken piece of her deeper, deeper until there was no voice at all, no memory of who she was, nothing but thick, syrupy darkness.

****

"You must save her."

Hermione's eyes stayed closed, but she could feel again.

It seemed like the last time she'd been in her own body was a long, long time ago. So long she had to think and concentrate on how to move her body.

Her fingers brushed against fur, and feather-soft pillows cupped her head. The air around her felt cool but comfortable.

Hermione didn't yet have the strength to open her eyes, but she could focus on the voice.

That voice. The last voice she heard before she went under.

Malfoy's voice.

"It will take time," another voice replied. Soft and sweet, like a babbling brook. "She is very weak, and the dementor broke much of her soul when he gave her the Kiss. When you brought her here, she was half-dead already."

"But she's not dead!" Malfoy yelled back. "And if you can't grant me my wish of freeing us from these fucking rooms, then at least answer my wish to heal her! You're a Wishing Well, hm? Isn't that the point of your existence?"