Agent Granger, CIA

CHAPTER V

"Casualty, Part II"

Now, people tell you that when you die, your life flashes before your very eyes.

Or at least the most important and precious moments do.

But you have to wonder...where do these crazy ideas come from? Has someone died and come back with the specific interest to tell us this tale? Perhaps in this story, we will find out. Perhaps with the aid of Miss Hermione Granger, we will see what truly happens when we die.

Now where did we leave off? Oh, yes.

She was fading into an oblivion, her mind froze as it did when a troll attacked during her first year at Hogwarts, and she was not aware of Death reaching its icy claw out for her.

She felt a superior force clutch her soul and then it pulled, as if trying to win a game of tug-of-war. That's when it happened. Flash! To her, it was but a fraction of a second in time, but let us slow it down and see what she saw...

*"Ron!" scolded Hermione as she flipped a page of her Arithmancy notes. "Honestly! Exams are in one week and you're busying yourself with those silly Wet Weasley Whackers!"

"Fred and George said they needed someone to test them," Ron said defensively, cracking Harry on the head (which triggered the twin's new invention to burst into a blast of water). Hermione frowned and again buried her nose into her notes.

Harry stood up, soaked down to his Chudley Cannons boxers, and sulked off to find a dry cloth. Ron sniggered as he watched his best friend slug his way up the stairs, leaving behind a trail of residue for anyone who wished to follow. Looking back at Hermione, he sighed deeply, she was like a study-elf, always studying, always all work and no play.

"Say, Hermione," said Ron, rather boldly, since everyone knew not to disturb the number one student in Hogwarts while she was studying. Hermione held her little booklet up, as if she thought Ron had not noticed it. Ron blinked and a mischievous grin came over him as he knocked the book out of her hands with a swift uppercut, sending it high up in the air, and then, for his own safety, of course, he ran nervously excited to the other side of the common room.

Hermione's eyes flashed dangerously as she recovered her baby from the floor, which if it had flew any further, would have become firewood. "Ronald Weasley...you..." she began hotly, her cheeks firing up like burning coal, but then Harry appeared by her side and snatched the journal out of her hand, tossing it over to Ron. Hermione frowned and glowered at him. "Harry! You're still wet! You better go dry off completely before you catch a cold."

"Yes, mummy," Harry replied sarcastically, jumping over tables and chairs to join Ron. The two boys stood on the other end, taunting her with her notebook. Hermione then grinned and picked up a pillow on the armchair and chucked it like a football, if she had ever thrown one before. Like two birds with one stone, Ron and Harry both got smacked on the head (Ron's right eye was twitching, while Harry's glasses went askew to the left). Hermione burst out into a victorious howl, pointing and deriding the boys. But it wasn't like Harry and Ron to just stand there after a brutal defeat; they wanted a rematch.

The night went on as Hermione fought the two boys bravely by herself, armed with pillows only. After all three of them were positively exhausted from all the screaming and throwing, they collapsed onto the floor like a straw of hay wanting to stand on its own.

Harry almost immediately fell asleep, something he had been quite accustomed to do before a Quidditch game. Ron, who should have followed suit, but never did, took this private moment with Hermione gratefully. For the past five years, the both of them had been dodging and denying their feelings for each other, but now things were a bit simpler, they've both plucked up a bit more courage; or maybe it was just that one time when Harry blew up at the two of them, saying that if they were going to argue so much they should just get a room and get it over with; yes, the latter sounds much more credible for how they broke the tense beginning of a relationship.

Ron interlaced his fingers with Hermione's and grinned over at her. She blushed, but made no attempt to pull away. And so, one could say, they had transformed from a quarreling married couple to simply happy, ordinary lovers (and make no mistake, the latter is much better).*

Hermione vaguely acknowledged her existence through this memory, and deciding that she wanted to live, if not only so she could preserve that moment of her life, she grabbed onto the invisible rope which Death had held its grip, and she pulled back, with all her might.

Sight came back to her, she saw a man towering over her body, his arms flung wide open, and his back against her. Then, Death tried once again to take her away; she felt another excruciating experience as another flash blinded her eyes.

*"Hermione, where's Ron?!" shouted Harry, looking bewilderedly around the battle field in search of his best friend. He saw Dumbledore fighting off hordes of Dementors from the castle; only those who chose to fight bravely beside Harry Potter were being tortured out on the once peaceful front lawn of Hogwarts, everyone else was cowering behind the school walls.

Then he saw Hagrid and Grawp fighting, badly outnumbered, with giants greater and scarier than themselves. Students were falling like flies everywhere, Death Eaters being the swatter. Harry felt like being sick, blood and screams scattered themselves through the night, but the worst, the absolute worst of the battle was the laughter. The laughter of Voldemort's men as they slowly killed the children who were not ready to go yet.

Harry clutched his wand tightly in his fist and scanned his eyes across another corner of the battlefield. There he saw Ron, fighting off two werewolves (the race which Voldemort had called to, forcing every single one of them to transform and fight on his side in the battle) with Fred by his side. The twins had come back, of course, to protect the world from its greatest evil; for it seemed like no other wizard that wasn't already involved in the war wanted to join.

Hermione followed Harry's eyes and located Ron too. "Harry! He needs help! More are heading his way!" she cried. Harry hesitated, but nodded his head, he couldn't prevent this forever; both he and Hermione knew. This was it. He was alone now. That meant Voldemort would be joining him soon. Hermione looked one last time into the brilliant green eyes of Harry Potter and gave him a confident nod, which seemed to tell him 'everything is going to be okay', and even though it was a lie, it kept him strong to the very end.

Hermione set out into the chaotic mass of wizards and witches, careful to dodge every spell that missed its original target. But when she reached Fred, he was alone. He had cast a shield around himself to keep the Werewolves' claws off of him. Hermione blast a burning spell on one of them, but Fred spun around and knocked her hand the other direction.

"Don't!" he cried. "I don't know which one he is!"

Hermione frowned. "What are you talking about?!" she screamed back, pretending that she didn't understand (more to comfort herself than anything); Fred's arm flew out of the shield and dragged her in.

"Ron, Hermione! Ron! I don't know which one he is!"

Shock overtook her for a second as he shattered the lie she just convinced herself, but she refused to let it control her. "A werewolf loses its identity, but the same fears and desires of the human beneath remain," she recited from one of the many books she's read.

"Fred, how much longer can you keep the shield up?" she shouted through the deafening war scene.

"A while longer! Just figure out which one Ron is so we can kill the rest!"

Lupin flashed quickly across Hermione's mind, but there was no time to identify him too; perhaps he had already been killed, how was she supposed to know? She forced herself to accept that he was going to be a casualty in this war. Using her wand, and her five and a half years of knowledge in the art of witchcraft, she summoned an arachnid large enough to catch the eyes of the werewolves. One of them seemed to spasm, then it ran away, howling like mad.

"Alright, he's out of here, put the shield down!" said Hermione to Fred, who was looking weaker by the second. Fred removed the shield and side-by-side, they miraculously fought off the four werewolves before them.*

Hermione didn't even know she had this memory locked inside her mind, and however horrid it might have been, she wished she could have kept it. She wished she had known all her life after the war that Ron had become a werewolf. Once again, she pulled back on the rope Death was using to steal her away, and sight came back to her.

Things seemed peaceful in the real world. There were no gunshots or shouting anymore. She saw a blonde head bob its way over to her, and involuntarily blacked out again with a flash.

*"We are gathered here today to pay our respects to Harry Potter..."

Wizards from all over the world swarmed in for the funeral of the boy-who-lived-once. Hermione felt angry that they all cried for him now, but where were they when he needed them? She wanted to curse every single one of those people who pretended to understand anything about the war and her friend.

Ron wrapped his arm around her shoulder, comforting her, the same thoughts running through his head. She looked up, her eyes drowned with unshed tears. He gently kissed her forehead. Then something caught his eye. A hooded man loomed in the far corner of the ceremony. Ron turned Hermione to look, but the man was gone.

"That...he looked like...Malfoy..." whispered Ron as if Harry had suddenly moved inside his casket. Hermione spun her head around, searching for the man Ron had described, but no one was there.

Harry's funeral was held on the last day of school of their sixth year at Hogwarts. Everyone had expected him to at least graduate, but as things had turned out, he didn't. Many students who fought gathered together and remained at Hogwarts for a short post-trauma session during the summer, where each person could try and move on by talking about it to each other. Ron and Hermione remained, they hadn't just lost Harry; they also lost the companionship of Neville, Cho, Seamus, Dean, and the list really could go on. It'd be easier to say who had lived. Professor McGonagall had pulled through, but barely, along with Snape, who had killed Lucius Malfoy. Luna Lovegood was spared her life, she fought bravely alongside everyone else. All the Weasleys had survived, but Arthur was in critical condition. Actually, now that she thought of it, Percy didn't show up at all. Ernie Macmillan and Hannah Abbot also lived, they tried to give their condolences to Hermione and Ron, but nothing in the world could have made things right for them again.

Draco Malfoy had lived, to Ron and Hermione's dismay. Crabbe and Goyle, big and small versions, all died. Narcissa Malfoy was one of the few Death Eaters to live, but she had been driven insane, a complete nut job.

The trio was broken, and no matter what, things would never be the same between the duo left. Matters complicated during the first full moon, which incidentally occurred the day after the battle. Ron insisted that Hermione let him alone, but she wouldn't. She did, of course, make him the potion to allow him to remain humane, but the fact was, Ron was ashamed of what he was now. Hermione would constantly look at him with pity while he was a werewolf. He kept thinking that she deserved more, and until he found a cure, he was not worthy of her.

He figured the best way to push her away was to become friends with their enemy, Draco Malfoy. Surprisingly, Draco accepted Ron; there was nothing left to be ashamed of. The Weasleys were now in the middle to high class families when it came to wealth; for Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes was a huge hit to all wizards of all ages. And Ron was pureblood, and though Draco cared about none of that anymore, it still consoled him a bit; it would remind him of happier times in his life.

Ron was amazed at first that Draco could have a softer side than his hateful tongue and everlasting sneer. He seemed to be lost -for him, he did really lose everyone--, and for the time being, he clung onto Ron as Ron did him; they served simply as each other's life raft until a friendship actually developed near the end of seventh year. They kept no secrets from each other, and Draco understood why he had left Hermione.

Ron asked him not to act differently around her, and to stay the same as he was before; although he knew something in Draco had definitely changed after the war. And so the seventh year went by. Hermione had a few friends, but none were ever as close as Harry and Ron; she mainly busied herself with books and cursing people who made her mad.

Some part of her hoped that if she had become as nasty as Malfoy, Ron would return to her, but that never happened. She never really expected it to happen either, she just wanted an excuse to be bitter. To be bitter about her life and what had happened to her. And though she planned on curing herself of this bitterness, she never did, it became a part of her. It made her reckless and less of a human being than she was before.*

This realization snapped her back into reality, she forced herself to live again. She wanted to live again. She wanted to reform, do things right this time around. And so, when the victim says no and holds on as firm as she, Death has no choice but to let go.

She gasped back to life and sat up. Draco, who was kneeled down beside her, jumped back at her sudden movement.

"Bloody hell, Granger!" he screamed, grabbing at his chest. Without another word, he drew out his wand and before she could speak, he sent her to sleep.

**

"Hermione. Come, Hermione," said a warm voice.

Hermione, although lightheaded, made an effort to open her eyes. The stinging light on the other side proved superior to her feeble attempts. "Ron?" she strained, thinking her eyes were deceiving her.

"It's me," the tall redhead confirmed. "I'm here now."

"Ron...what's happening?" she asked weakly.

"Everything's going to be okay," the man assured, stroking her gently.

"Where...where's Jordan?" she asked, unable to carry the burden of all her unanswered questions.

"Shhh...go back to sleep, Hermione."

Then, as if a spell was cast on her, she drifted off into pleasant dreams.

**

"Ron, what are you doing?" Draco hissed, grabbing his best friend by the arm and shoving him out the door. "Are you crazy?"

"Draco, why is it lately I've been smelling Hermione's scent all over you?" Ron asked, deliberately ignoring Draco's question, and putting him on the spot.

"Don't change the subject Ron," said Draco, rather annoyed, and equally determined to ignore the question placed before him. "What were you thinking back there?!"

Ron tilted his head, mildly amused at his friend's attempt to parent him. "I don't need you to baby-sit me Draco. I don't have to explain everything I do to you. I'll do what I want, for whatever reasons."

Anger boiled inside the blonde man's chest, so he asked rather roughly, "Does that include killing people, Ron?"

Turning his back on Draco, Ron casually replied, "Who said I killed anyone?"

"Ronald Weasley. I am talking to you. Turn your ass around and look me in the eye when you talk."

Ron rolled his big brown eyes and wheeled around, only to tell his friend, "Draco. I am serious. Our friendship is bordering the line right now. You don't and won't understand why I did what I did. Also, while I'm on a roll, stay away from Hermione, or I'm not going to take responsibility for my actions."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Draco sneered.

"You know what it means." Ron disapparated with a final glare at Malfoy.

Draco fumed angrily. Ron was getting to be uncontrollable, even for him, and he had to do something. Taking the risk, he apparated after Ron.

"Ron. I'm serious too. That stunt you pulled today was not amusing. Why did you do that? You could have killed Hermione!"

"How was I supposed to know she was sent on the job?!" Ron cried, grabbing two cold beers out of the fridge and unconsciously tossing one to Draco. "They're building an army against us, Draco. I'm not going to wait until they have lead bullets pointed at my head until I fight back."

"What the hell are you going on about?" said Draco, grabbing a fistful of his hair, wishing it would cure him of his frustration.

"The Muggles have been running an underground operation concerning the genocide of Wizards."

"Wh-Ron. You're crazy, you know that? You're so..." Draco took in a deep breath and sighed. "I think we should put the potion testing to a rest this month."

"WHAT?!" the other man exclaimed as if someone had just robbed him of everything dear.

"The side effects are getting more intense every time, Ron. You're acting unreasonably even when you're supposed to be normal. I--If you can't get yourself under control, then maybe you're right. Maybe our friendship should end."

Ron blinked blankly at Draco. "Fine. But when you're bleeding to death like Hermione's partner is now, don't expect me to show you any sympathy."

It was lucky that Ron disappeared again because Draco was ready to pounce on him. Returning to his duty, he took the seat next to Hermione's bed.

Hermione sat up, wide awake after the sleeping spell wore off.

"Where's Jordan?" she demanded.

"He's in the hospital right now," Draco replied with an exhausted sigh.

"Why?" whispered Hermione in disbelief, even though she had already guessed.

"He jumped in front of you after the first gun fired. A series of shots rang after that. Two of them hit him, one got him in the abdomen and the other...it missed his heart by one centimeter, but he's still bleeding too much for his own good."

Hermione closed her eyes, her head feeling the effects of a blender. "Where is he?"

"One of my friends is taking care of him; he's the most experienced Healer there is, but Jordan still might not make it through..."

Hermione put a hand over the wound in her right shoulder, feeling its unique texture. "What about the vest? I was wearing a bulletproof vest...and he should have too."

Draco bowed his head, understanding nothing about guns, let alone bulletproof vests. "Are you talking about that black thing?"

"YOU TOOK OFF MY SHIRT?!" Hermione gasped, hugging her body tightly.

Draco hid a smile and replied, "You were bleeding Granger, would you rather have me stand there and just watch?"

Hermione squinted her eyes suspiciously at Malfoy and put her arms down. Draco smiled. "What are you grinning at?" she asked in an upset tone.

"Nothing," replied the blonde man, who still looked like a McDonald's Happy Meal box. He pondered something for a bit, then told her, "The bullet that I pulled out of you earlier scraped the vest, but still hit your shoulder. The vest stopped three other bullets that hit your body; which coupled with the one that made direct contact had enough force to knock you out."

"Oh," was all that she said. The things she saw during her near death experience were starting to come back to her, but she wasn't sure whether Draco was the person she wanted to answer her questions. He looked at her, noticing that she was conflicted about something.

"Are you okay?" he asked uncertainly.

Hermione nodded. To keep her mind off the subject until she was thinking clearer, she decided to ask him other things. "What were you doing at the White House?"

Draco bit his bottom lip, and closed his eyes. "Hermione. Do you really want to know the truth?"

She nodded fervently. Draco sighed and buried his face inside his hands. "Alright. Sit back then, you're in for a long ride.--

"First things first. I have some confessions to make. I sent on the trail of the--"

"The Masochist, yes, I know," she finished for him.

"What?" Draco laughed. "How did you?"

"After I cast the truth spell on you, I figured it out. That memory about the war, it would have been erased if the Masochist had really done anything to you. But I really don't understand why you're playing these silly mind-games with me Malfoy."

Draco sighed. "That Masochist has been a big pain in our lives, Hermione. Whether you know it or not. I'm sure you'd figure it out by yourself in a couple of days, but I'll just tell you right now. During the post-trauma session after the war, he came to the school and began his business to cure people of the bad memories that they were trying to escape. I made friends with him, I don't know why; I just had a knack for hanging out with all the wrong people.

In seventh year, when Ron came to me, for reasons unknown, he explained his situation with you to me. He asked me if I knew anything that could possibly make you forget what he was, and I thought of the Masochist, and I said yes. I was feeling pretty down myself at that time; all the people that used to be around me had died in the war, so I took him in, since he practically begged me to anyway.

We devised a plan to keep you away from him until he found what he calls 'the right way' back to you. He's a werewolf, but I'm sure you know that by now.

He cast a sleeping spell on you one night so that the Masochist could do his thing. When you awoke, he played out the break up scene, and told you that I was a much better friend. Remember that? I think that's why you became so hostile ever since. In his mind, as long as if you thought he broke up with you because of you, you wouldn't want him back.

Then, seventh year passed, everything was going fine. Ron and I had become great friends, he was the first true friend I ever had. I think I have half a heart today because he cured me of some of my hatred after the war. I started seeing things his way, while he started seeing things my way, and we just sorta met in the middle. Basically, we ignored you as much as possible.

We started the experiments to find a cure for his disease after we graduated from Hogwarts. I sold my father's old treasures on the black market to make myself rich again, and it also connected me with some business partners I still deal with today. Here is part where you pick up that I am still an evil fiend."

Draco chuckled softly to himself and his shook his head. "Anyway, I recently found out that Ginny ran into dear old Chist and he was the one that 'accidentally' wiped out her memory. I was going to kill him, but I didn't, it just didn't seem so easy to kill anymore. Now Chist owed me big, and I cashed in on that favor to gain your trust and keep you away from Ron without you knowing it. Little did I know, you already figured me out. So really, Granger, you were playing me!"

Hermione cocked an eyebrow and smiled sideways, "Maybe."

Draco admired how she never actually told him anything, she just dodged the question and moved on. "Recent events have been confusing, even for myself. Ron has been reacting too much, for lack of a better way to put it, to the potions we have been testing. Ever since I told him that I ran into you, he's been absolutely obsessed with it. I think he might actually be taking potions even when he's not a werewolf. That just scares me."

Hermione frowned. "Well, can you tell him I want to see him?"

"He already saw you," he replied dully. "And now that he almost lost you, he's probably taking two doses at once," Draco joked. Hermione huffed at him and took in a sharp breath.

"So why were you at the White House?"

Draco looked down. "No matter what I tell you right now, know that Ron loves you, okay?"

Hermione narrowed her brows and for some reason wanted to laugh. "Okay..." she said.

"Ron thinks there's a anti-wizard operation going on in the government, and they want to take all of us out...and he was determined to take the Muggles out first. So he owled the President, and left a note on his desk telling him to call his plans off, but now I'm positively sure that he's going to carry it through with much more enthusiasm then before..."

Hermione tried hard to keep a straight face. "You're joking right?" she laughed.

Draco shook his head. "Sorry, afraid I'm not. Anyway, I went there to clean up his mess. He left this cryptic note on the breakfast table, but I found it easier just to trace his apparation line. And then I jumped in on a shootout...freaked some people out...froze the scene...modified one too many memories for my taste...and then apparated everyone out of there."

"What about the soldiers that were in there but left before the shoot out?" Hermione asked, panicked, since there was no way Draco could have known about that.

"Uh..." he stuttered. "Well, the truth is...just to be safe...I um...cleared the whole building..."

Hermione's eyes expanded to the size of tennis balls. "You what?" she said incredulously.

"Well...I saw cameramen and stuff, so first, I apparated out. Then, I cast an anti-electric force over the premises, and from there on...I modified everyone's memory..." Draco made a 'heh, heh' laugh and shrunk back into his chair.

Hermione blinked repeatedly. "Okay. I guess that could work for now..."

"Good. Then you get some sleep, and I'll check back on you later." Draco gave her a nod and left the room.

Hermione leaned back on her bed. Everything was going to be okay.

**

"Doctor! He's bleeding out!" a nurse cried to the next room. A man dressed in all green rushed in and looked at the patient. Blood was flowing much faster than he could control. The patient's heartbeat began to slow down...then, before they were able to hook up another bag of blood to him...it flat lined.

They made some desperate final attempts to save him, but couldn't. "Call it," the doctor said sadly.

"Alex Jordan. Time of death, 7:53 PM. Monday, February 3, 2006."