« the pain »

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FRANK! I CAN'T KEEP HOLD
IT HURTS MORE THAN EVER
I'VE BEEN HIT BEFORE BUT –
FRANK YOU'RE SCREAMING
FRANK!
WHERE HAVE YOU GONE!
FRANK, PLEASE STOP.
FRANK, I LOVE YOU
FRANK FRANK!
PLEASE GRAB
MY HAND –
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It all happens very suddenly.

One moment, the three Longbottoms are having their breakfast, and in the next, a deafening crash echoes through the air, causing the walls to tremble and the windows to rattle. They sit stunned in their places, unable to move, but when a mad, shrieking laughter – a horrifying cackle – reaches them, Alice and Frank both leap to their feet, drawing out their wands. They exchange fearful glances, knowing very well who the laughter belongs to, but their Auror instincts kick in, and they are quick to hide their emotions.

Alice's mind, however, whips upstairs, where Neville is asleep. She glances at Frank, who is already halfway out to meet the intruders, and then she looks at Augusta, whose eyes are wide with fear. Alice pushes her roughly to bring her to her senses and forces her to stand up.

"Augusta, take Neville and get away from here!" she urges, shoving her in the direction of the stairs. "Get out through the back door and disapparate to the Weasleys."

"What about you two?" Augusta seems to have gathered her senses, for a light burns in her eyes, and her voice is as steady as it could get.

"We'll fight them. Go, please."

A scream tears through the air, which finally pushes Augusta to run for the stairs. Alice whips around and bolts to the entrance hall, wishing, hoping, that it wasn't Frank who had screamed. She pushes thoughts of Neville to the back of her mind, fully trusting Augusta to take him to safety.

Frank is on the ground.

She sees him first, doubled over on the floor, a look of excruciating pain very prominent on his face. Then she sees Bellatrix Lestrange. Clad in black robes, towering over him, a crazy menacing laughter erupting from her mouth as she kicks him on the ribs and sends him to the floor.

"Frank!" Alice shrieks involuntarily. She raises her wand to curse Bellatrix, but all of a sudden, something heavy crashes on her side, and she collapses to the ground, a piercing pain shooting through her arm as he drops on her elbow. Another death eater pins her down to the ground, making her unable to move. She slides her hand around the cold stone surface to search for her wand, but realises that she has been disarmed.

"Crucio!" The death eater above her screams, and suddenly, the world goes blurred. The walls, the windows, the house spin around, and she feels like she is drowning in a pool of boiling water, while numerous red hot needles pierce through her skin, through every organ in her body. Her lungs seems to shrink, and she finds herself unable to breath. She is screaming, but she cannot hear herself. She cannot see, she cannot feel, she cannot breath.

All she knows is that death is a far better alternative.

And just like that, it's gone.

She inhales a deep breath as the curse is lifted off her, but it feels like the air is poisoned. Each breath hurts her lungs, each puff of air she takes in tears through the soft tissues of her trachea, each teardrop that falls from her eyes burns her cheeks, and Alice wishes desperately for Death to take her away. But Death isn't so merciful.

Bellatrix saunters over to her, grinning happily as though she is looking at a large Christmas pudding rather than a human in pain. She tuts softly.

"Not so fast, Barty," she drawls, voice barely above a whisper, and yet reaching every corner of the room as if it has been magically amplified. Alice continues to take large, rattling breaths. "Let her see her husband suffer, let her hear him scream."

"No, let him go," she manages to utter, and her tone is pleading, pitiful. Her lungs sting with each syllable she breathes out, but she speaks. "Please. Don't hurt him."

"Crucio!" Bellatrix's curse hits him right on the chest, and a earsplitting shriek echoes through the air, reverberating off the walls and drumming mercilessly against Alice's ears. Tears break through her eyes and she thrashes around under the death eater's hold, screaming her head off, no longer caring about the pain that tears her apart. But a body bind curse is put on her and she falls completely still.

"Frank!" she screams, and she hates herself for not being more careful, for not being able to help him. She hopes Augusta has already left with Neville. She doesn't want them to hear his agony.

Eons pass, but Bellatrix's ecstasy doesn't falter. Frank has become less mobile, and for a moment Alice thinks that he is dead, until he lets out a low groan. She lies on the ground, weeping and begging, but her pleas fall on deaf years. There are two more death eaters, she notices, but they merely stand by and laugh as Bellatrix continues with her maniac work. She closes her eyes, unable to take it any longer. She is going die soon. She begs Death to come.

The body bind curse is lifted off her. Alice crawls her way to her husband, but the death eaters don't stop her. "Frank?" she whispers, peering into his sweat soaked face. He whimpers and opens his eyes minutely, and she sees how fearful they look. His brown eyes she has loved so deeply are now covered with nothing but terror; he looks like a child facing the monster that has been hiding under his bed, and that has finally come out to haunt him. "Frank, I love you."

When he lifts a hand – his face contorts with agony as he does so – and touches the side of her face lovingly, caressing her cheeks, Alice feels her heart shattering into a million splinters that cut through her skin and every other organ in her body. He is crying, and so is she. The end is as clear as the sky, as inevitable as how the sun rises every morning and sets every evening. There is no denying it.

They are going to die. She will never see her son again.

Alice lowers herself to kiss Frank, but before her lips can touch his cheek, an agonising pain crumbles her insides as one of the death eaters kicks her in the stomach and sends her sliding halfway across the room. She comes to a halt at the feet of Barty Crouch Junior, who sends her a sarcastically tragic look.

"Crucio!"

She is drowning.

There is water all around her – viscous, black water that grabs at her limbs and pulls her down to its depths. It enters her lungs and suffocates her. Sharp, stinging nettles that crawl out from under the waves, pierce through her and rip her skin apart. She waves her arms around frantically, desperate to stay afloat, but the water is alive, and it keeps dragging her beneath its surface. The sky is dark, she cannot see anything. She hears screaming, and sees a blurry silhouette which she recognises as belonging to Frank a few metres away from her, thrashing around like herself. She cannot take it anymore.

And once again, it's all gone.

She is in her house again, lying on the ground with Frank, their fingers intertwined. The death eaters' laughter can be heard, and she senses them revolving around the two of them, but she cannot see them. Her eyes are tired, and she only sees a blurred and twisted version of reality. There are no windows, nor any doors, in the room, though she is fairly certain that there have been a few moments back – or was it a few hours? It could be a few decades, for all she can remember.

Perhaps Frank isn't here either. Perhaps he has already died, and she hopes that this is so. She doesn't want him to take anymore pain.

"Frank, Frank, Frank. . ."

Alice continues to breath his name, holding onto the syllables desperately in an attempt to keep herself from drowning. She can already feel her soul ebbing away, and she is falling down into an abyss of darkness. . .

She is in the water again.

The ferocious waves grasp at her and pull her under, the water wraps around her like a snake twisting around its victim, and she cannot breathe. Excruciating pain flows through her whole body, sails through her blood vessels and reaches every nook and cranny it can get to. There is simply no way out.

Except –

"Frank, Frank, Frank. . ."

Through the sound of the water waves roaring against each other, the words reach her ears, and she is filled with a blissful moment of serenity. She holds herself above the surface of the water and opens her eyes. Just near the horizon, there is land. Covered in trees. And on the other side, there is light. A tiny ball of sun is visible. She knows she has to get there.

With agony ripping her apart, she swims. Alice looks around for Frank, but he is nowhere to be seen. She hopes that he is on his way to the land too, and wills herself to get there.

Each movement makes her whole body scream and protest. She is exhausted, she cannot go any further. But then she remembers Frank, Neville, and she knows she has to get there. Something tells her that once she is on land, she will be reunited with her family, and all sufferings will be gone.

She doesn't know how right she is.

Hours pass, maybe days too, and her body begins to fail. But she clings on to the tiniest bit of hope desperately and tells herself that she has to reach land. She has to. She has to.

She does.

The water stops swiping at her as soon as she lays her hands on the ground. The pain begins to fade away, and for the first time she is able to breathe without burning her lungs. She stays in that position for a long time and allows herself to recover. Then she slowly climbs onto the ground.

A large meadow is laid out before her. Green and purple and red. Millions of colourful flowers wink at her and greet her kindly. A breeze blows and she inhales the air deeply, taking in the fresh smell of the air, the soil and the flowers. She smiles and takes a few steps forward, the soft grass bending below her feet.

A sound reaches her ears with the breeze.

"Frank, Frank, Frank –"

She frowns and looks around confusedly. Where is this coming from? She doesn't know. But something tells her that it is something important. That she should know. She racks her brain to remember, but slowly the words disperse into the air and all she can hear is the soft whistling of the wind as it rushes by her ears, and the rustling of the flowers as the wind brushes by them.

Alice shakes her head dismissively, deciding not to worry about such a trivial matter. She looks here and there for a minute, trying to decide which way to go, but everywhere is the same, everywhere she looks, she sees miles of land covered in bushes and flowers.

Smiling pleasantly, she begins to hop around like a child, chasing a butterfly that has appeared out of nowhere.

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