Another Evil Grandfather (Percy Goes To Hogwarts)

Chapter 32: Not Dead After All

"Percy,"

"Percy, wake up."

"Huh?"

"Percy, what happened?"

"Wait what?"

"Percy, there is a very messed up body next to you, one I'm reaally trying not to think about right now. Or look at. Or smell. You need to get up."

I blinked. There were two girls standing over me. They looked familiar. I studied the one on the left. Wait....that's Hermione! I turned my blurred gaze over to the one on my right.Wait, that can't be right. She's Hermione. Hold up, there can't be two Hermiones. Wait, that could be her twin! I didn't know Hermione had a twin! Why didn't she mention that to me? People these days!

I blinked again. Hermione and her twin converged on one another. I was about to tell them to be nice when I realized something important: there was actually only one Hermione. Oops.

Suddenly it all came back. But then, isn't Hermione supposed to be dead? She's standing right in front of me, so I'm going to guess not.

I sorted through my memories: I found the body. That was definitely real. I searched the body too, that was real. But when when I closed its eyes, that's when everything started to get blurry — the body had had Hermione's face. And then when Ron had found me, I ran.

"How are you alive?"

"I — wait what?"

Groaning, I looked around me. Everything was the same. Except for teensy tiny fact that where the bodies eyes were there was only pitch black sockets. My head began to hurt.

I looked away, squeezing my eyes shut for a minute before opening them again.

I looked back at Hermione. Everything was becoming clearer now, my head loosing more and more of the fuzziness that had been clouding everything.

"Help me up, would you?"

"Sure,"

Grabbing my outstretched arm, she tried to pull me up. She didn't actually move me an inch, but it gave me the little extra push I needed to get up.

"We need to get help," Hermione muttered.

"No, not yet. Give me time to think."

I stumbled over to a nearby blood splattered wall, leaning on it for support while I thought things over. Hermione was just watching me in an attempt to figure out what was going on. I think she had cast some smell repellent spell or something because she wasn't plugging her nose anymore.

Maybe it was a blackout caused by my PTSD? The body, or at least what's left of it, looks exactly the same as when I had examined it except that it's face isn't Hermione's, so maybe seeing another violent death triggered some fear-induced dream? But even though I care about Hermione, wouldn't I see Annabeth because she is who I worry about most?

Wait... what if whatever killed this person left some kind of residue that caused some hallucination? Based on the deep dark creepy pits of despair that are the corpse's eyes, I'm going to assume that the magic was contained in its eyes, and that's why I was fine until I looked at them. But still, why Hermione?

Hermione's nervous chatter cut off my thoughts.

"Percy, come on, we have to go get help. I literally just found you lying unconscious on the floor next to a horribly mutilated corpse, and now you're just leaning there on the wall oh so calmly. We need to go."

Just then, there was an audible thump outside of the door.

What the heck is going on with these wizards? Why do they like fainting so much?

"Okay Hermione, lets go. I'll carry Ron to wherever it is that you take people to when they get hurt. You can explain. Then we'll take some time and figure out what exactly happened."

Hahahaha. Got you all!
Just to clarify: Hermione isn't dead.