Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping.

I don't know how long it's been that I haven't gotten more than a few hours sleep in a night.

Roughly kept awake by the captors that never leave me, I have fallen into a state of mindlessness. Mindlessness until today. Something has awoken within me. A fire that tells me that I must escape. I can't stay here any longer.

The more I look up, the more white masked faces I see, looming overhead, watching my every move. Their arms are trained against me, their faces are sinister.

I lie in a sort of sprawled ball, an oxymoron, I know, but that's how it is. I know there is a burning in my eyes that they will recognize if I lift my face and so I keep it trained to the floor. I am aware of a sharp pain along my left side, my exposed side. It aches with every breath I take and sharply stabs at me in the night.

A vision strikes me and I lurch forward on the floor, covering my head with my arms, pulling my knees to my chest. The Death Eaters surrounding me shift closer, some laughing, some pointing, others keep their well trained wands pointing at vital parts of my body. My head, my lungs, my neck which I can't seem to cover. If only Sirius were here. This could all go away. If only he could come and save me like I know he would. But they don't know where I am; their location is secure. Voldemort is wise enough not to practice strenuous dark magic in one place anymore, it is easily traced and I would be easily found.

My vision complete, I steal a heavy gasp of air and struggle to control my breathing. Foolishly, I lower a hand to my stomach, still curled on the floor, and try to easy the pain that pools there. My face exposed, I soon learn the price for not protecting myself; one sharp kick is all it takes. Covering my face again I once more learn the lesson of not protecting myself. Another round in the side. I try to make myself small, smaller than I already am and they laugh at my attempts and decide to leave me be. Curled tightly against the wall, my silent tears stream across the blood from my nose, leaving trails of flesh on my tired cheeks.

The dark wood floor echos in my ear and reverebates against my shoulder and hip, both dug painfully into the unforgiving floor. They are approaching.

No. Please, dear God, let them leave me be!

They are behind me now, kneeling on the floor overtop of me. I can see their shadow looming on the wall, bent over my practically non-existent frame.

Please God save me!

A hand reaches out from a cloak, aiming to grab my shoulder. I bury myself into the wall, rolling away from the touch, anything to stay away from the pain, but there is nowhere to go.

The fingers are against me now, and a hand grabs me roughly, shaking me hard and ripping me away from the wall. I cannot resist a cry of pain and fear as the white mask hovers over me. They are going to kill me now.

No, please don't.

'Open your eyes!' a voice commands me, but I only struggle beneath their grasp. 'Open your eyes!' they command again, this time grabbing my chin and forcing my head back. 'Harry!' and my eyes fly open, cold sweat dripping down my forehead. 'It's alright,' the mask says, but it's not a mask at all. The face is white, for sure, but only from the pale moonlight, a day away from full. 'Harry, it's okay. You're alright,' he tells me, 'You're home, you're safe.'

I realize the hand is not against my chin, but my forehead and I understand. He reaches around me to pull me up to sit where I cry into the shoulder of his robes, cry as I have done for the past four weeks. The cycle won't end. It has been never ceasing.

My ears feel hot as the arms hold me strongly and I wait for the pain to subside. The pain of memory and of hurts, long healed but ever reminiscing. He rubs my back until the tears relinquish, at last holding me at arms length.

'Are you okay?' he asks. He looks so ill, so ill and here he is taking care of me and my childish dreams. I nod with a quavering breath, wiping my face with the sleeves of my night robes. 'Here' he says, and hands me a tissue.

'I'm taking you in come morning,' he says with finality. "In" meaning the hospital. 'I can't stand to see you like this any longer,' he says sadly, and I nod in grim defeat. It was a deal we had made long ago. Should they last to the new moon, I was to be admitted without question. Four weeks was too long for a condition like mine.

'Do you want me to stay with you until the moon goes down?' he asks. I nod my head yes although my heart tells me to let him sleep and my tears begin anew. He can see my thoughts though, he reads them like books and pulls me into another embrace. 'I don't mind,' he tells me. 'Honestly, I don't. I sleep through it anyway. Don't you worry about me.'

He lets me go and I lie back down; he moves to sit in the desk chair before me. 'I'm always here, Harry, you'll always have me,' and he begins to tell me stories, anything to ease my mind. Stories of my father, of my mother, of myself when I was younger, and I fall asleep to the sound of his voice, starting the cycle one more time.

That's it… If you dig it, review it, and if you really dig it, maybe I'll continue it! Laters!

~Tini