After a while, Draco was starting to feel restless. Since Theo had told him to stop helping him, Draco felt like he'd disappointed him, like he'd failed, like he would continue to fail. For a couple days, Draco caught himself scheming in his head, brainstorming impossible ideas until he'd remind himself that he was just in class and his help wasn't asked for. It was like he'd shovelled himself a grave. One filled with wet concrete. His feet got stuck in the wet cement when he'd tried to jump into it and there was no getting out.

Not that any of what Theo said would stop him from at least TRYING to get them all out of this mess but the day the answer letter from the Weasley twins arrived, Draco already knew it was pointless. In a surprisingly neat font, it read:

To our dearest ferret,
Harry says 'no'.

Sincerely,

Forge and Gred Weasley

Draco didn't know HOW they found out it was him who had written the letter but this was a definite 'no' to the polyjuice potion. And suddenly the concrete was no longer wet but full on solid. Draco could no longer move, his options thinned out and all plans had completely evaporated. Draco was stuck, once and for all and it was both a weight off of his shoulders, and felt like the walls were closing in. More specifically, the walls of the manor that had made him feel exactly like this. The only difference was that he knew, for once, that the screaming voices he heard at night weren't real.

Draco was back at the beginning of this adventure with the realisation that there was no going back and no moving forward. There were no choices he could make, and no plans he could follow. Draco balled his hands to fists. He needed to do something. No matter what, he'd be fine with anything at this point. He could just fling himself out a window and pretend he'd died, maybe then he could infiltrate the manor again. Maybe he could still find a way to open the door to the storage room in the dungeons. Snape would notice and absolutely hate him for it, but Draco needed to-

"What are you doing?!"

Neville. Draco's eyes widened as he took in the sight of the confused teen. Draco hadn't seen Neville while he had been pacing in the empty dorm room. He seemed to notice people less and less. Draco didn't know whether that was a good or a bad thing. Not letting his inner conflict show, Draco suddenly noticed Neville's tired expression. In fact, Neville had shadows under his eyes that matched Draco's own and now that he thought about it, Neville seemed to wake even earlier than Draco these days.
It took Draco a moment to process the question. "Nothing." Draco answered maybe a tad bit too late because Neville frowned and stepped closer towards him.

"This isn't about you and Harry coming out as a couple, is it?" With 'this', Neville gestured to Draco's nervous fidgeting.

"Eh... yes. I'm just -" Draco stopped himself. Was he just about to lie? Hadn't he promised NOT to lie?

Neville seemed to have noticed, because he suddenly stood before Draco and wordlessly motioned him to sit. "I think we should talk."

Why did Draco have the feeling that Neville knew far more than he let on?

"Talk about what?" Draco was beginning to sweat.

Neville sat down heavily on the opposite bed, weight dipping the mattress slightly. "Do you remember the beginning of last year when you asked me to help you? For moral guidance and stuff?"

Draco blinked. "Of course I do -"

"You haven't been doing that. Ever since you returned from the manor, you've been exhausted, depressed, and all riled up. Like, all the time. I would have expected you to ask for help more often, instead it's become less." Neville let the words sit between them for a while. They sank in like a heavy stone. There was a question there - an almost obvious question, really.

Draco's adled brain just didn't want to register it. Quietly, Draco stared at his folded hands. "I don't think I need the help anymore."

Neville raised a brow. "After you killed people." It wasn't a question. It wasn't an accusation either. The words were laced with concern and under-woven with a sense of 'the fuck are you trying to fool'. "And now you're planning something else. Going from one suicidal plan that you didn't discuss with anyone to the next, no doubt just as reckless, plan."

Draco almost laughed. "You make me sound like a Gryffindor."

Neville shook his head, frowning slightly. "Draco, I know what you're doing and I don't like this. And I think you're in way over your head. You need to slow down."

Draco gritted his teeth. Neville knew. Neville knew far more than what Draco had wanted him to know. And there Draco had been trying to keep him out of it. He couldn't risk sending Neville out there, letting the teenager face the horrible snake. There was no guarantee that Neville would survive this and Draco wanted nothing more than to keep him save. He wanted to keep everyone save. He couldn't do that when they all knew what he was doing. That said, maybe he could still deter Neville, could make him feel involved. "I do have a plan. It's not the best one but it's my only one." He hesitated for a moment but took a deep breath as Neville gestured at him to elaborate. "I have this whole plan about Theo pretending to be Aberforth, the barkeeper of the - "

"I know him."

"Right." Draco cleared his throat. "Anyways, Theo was meant to impersonate him and let some of the Death Eaters into the room of requirements, where I would be waiting for them..."

"And kill them," Neville concluded the thought without changing his expression in the slightest.

Draco could only nod, a little shocked how Neville had managed to guess that detail. "Then, I would assume one of their identities while Theo would take another, and then we'd invade the manor and kill the snake." This was half a truth. Draco had planned to impersonate Theo and make sure that his friend remained in Hogwarts. Draco pressed his lips into a thin line. "Depending on how many Death Eaters we'd face, we'd have their corpses modified to look like us as some form of trophy and -"

"Okay, Draco, I'm going to stop you right there." Nevill raised a hand, face pale despite the monotonous expression. "I didn't think I needed to tell you this, but murder is never okay."

Draco opened his mouth to say something, when Neville simply shook his head. "Harry may be lenient with you because he loves you and I understand why you had to do it, but killing muggles and ministers isn't something you can just do whenever it seems like the easiest option. I'm not saying I don't understand it, I know what you did was incredibly brave and necessary for your survival... But Draco, the circumstances are different now. You can't actually believe this is a good plan."

Draco stared at him, the words hitting closer to home than he would dare to admit. He stared at his own hands, finding them shaking a bit. "How do I kill Voldemort without murder?!"

Neville's face softened a little. "Why do you think you have to be the one to do it?"

Draco looked up, an amused smile playing at his lips. "Because someone has to do it and I've already killed people. If I don't do it, then someone else will and I can't ask someone else to do it for me. I need -"

"No." Neville shook his head. His calmness was strangely unnerving. "What you need, Draco, is to sort out your own mind. Since I met you at St. Mungo's, you've been non stop running ahead. You can't keep doing that. I know you haven't told Harry of this plan and I know you weren't planning on telling him either. This will put a strain on your relationship because it will kill something inside you that you didn't know could still die. What you did at the manor was self defence, it was a survival tactic. What you're doing now is different."

Draco let his head hang. He was wrong. It hadn't been self defence, couldn't have been, because Draco had never planned to survive. "Is that so?"

Neville nodded slowly, then sighed deeply. "Did you really think you could defeat who knows how many Death Eaters who'll make it into the school? On your own?"

"I can't afford-"

"Friends? Help? People who are fighting the same fight as you are? Last year you were so determined to keep your distance from the DA because you were afraid they wouldn't fight in the coming war. That it would need every single one of them. Since when have you been so narcissistic to think you could do it all on your own?" This time, something close to vitriol slipped into Neville's voice and Draco found something inside him cringing.

"I just don't want anyone to die." Draco winced at himself, not quite sure anymore what he was trying to defend. He'd started this. There was no turning back, only pushing through. This was the sole purpose of his existence, why he'd been sent back in time, why he'd survived the war to begin with!

"Well, last time we made it without you, didn't we? And this time, you already took care of half the fight."

"I can't sit here and do NOTHING!" Draco gritted out, finding that this was closest to the truth. He'd even jumped up without himself noticing. Before he could sit back down, he began to pace in the room once more, anxiously awaiting the answer.

Neville exhaled a deep breath. "Draco, there are other things to be done than find the Horkruxes. If you want to help, you could also think of ways to protect people from the Death Eaters. How were they found, what refuge can you offer? What has changed since last time, can you convince more people to stand with us, can you help strengthen the castle defences? What do we need to destroy Horkruxes? Where are THOSE things?
Remember who you are! You told me you were a therapist. Do THAT. Help the people in the castle who need guidance! Strengthen the people from the inside!
You told me yourself that the magical community doesn't care about therapy and that this was a giant flaw. Prove it! Make us stronger from within!" Neville took a small break in which he stared Draco down who was suddenly standing stock still, mind blown. "You can be of help without self destructing, Draco. Leave Voldemort to Harry and the Horkruxes to me. The snake was mine to begin with, wasn't it?"

The smile Draco found Neville wearing was full of determination and reassurance and Draco exhaled a breath he'd never known he'd been holding. For a long moment Draco stood stock still trying to process the words. Once more, a second time in his life, Neville Longbottom shocked Draco to the core. This was not the Neville Longbottom from their first run through, not the one who'd lead the DA when Potter was gone hunting Horkruxes. This Neville was another person entirely. This Neville wouldn't wait for Harry Potter's death to take charge. He'd already done it. This Neville had a plan. Draco could see it shining from his eyes. This Neville wasn't a hero from his past, he was a hero of the future. This future.

Neville was by no means the only person who'd told Draco what to do. Aberforth had called him insane, the hat had told him to seek wisdom from the other houses instead of getting lost within his own, Dumbledore had told him to focus on his studies, Harry had tried calming him down by attending feasts and distracting him with long walks at the lake. Theo had rejected his offer to help entirely. Every single one of them had told him to slow down, warned him who he'd lose, reminded him that he was about to run against a wall. And it were the Slytherins who'd picked him up, reminded him he wasn't alone and that he needed to stop. Snape and the Weasleys put hurdles in his way. All of them wanted him to give it up. To rest. To back down and not to move. It felt like they were all surrounding him and blocking him from moving, the very thing that Draco could not allow himself to do.

But Neville's words hit differently.
How telling was it that Draco found his eyes water, just because what Neville was doing wasn't to tell him to stop. Neville knew that Draco couldn't. Out of all the people Neville knew best that stopping him would put Draco back in the hospital, that holding him back would only frustrate him and make him break down, make him want to run faster. He knew that not moving put him back inside that room in the manor where he'd hear people screaming for his help, where he'd been stuck and where his decisions didn't matter. Because he'd been told not to move.

Draco didn't need to stop, he was just running in the wrong direction.

Draco took a deep shuddering breath, closed his eyes and let a small tear drop into his uniform. "Thank you." It fell from his lips like a prayer. Draco realized then and there that he wasn't done fighting. That he wasn't useless if he didn't fix it all. There was still something he could do, he still had a purpose, he could still make up for his mistakes! He could still help, even if he didn't kill himself immediately.

Neville's expression finally twitched in surprise. "Draco?"

"I really needed to hear that." Draco wiped off the tear and tried to compose himself once more, finding it close to impossible. "You have no idea how much I needed to hear that."

--------------------------------

After his discussion with Neville, Draco decided to refocus. And he did that by first focusing on his own relationship. After hours of contemplation what he needed to do first, Draco came to the surprising conclusion that he needed a stable, functioning relationship before he could truly help others. In fact, he needed his relationship to be stable to be able to win the war! Potter needed to kill Voldemort. How could Potter do that if he was distracted by Draco's problems and insecurities? Surely this was the reason why Potter hadn't dated Ginny Weasley during his hunt for the Horkruxes! And surely it was the reason why Potter didn't insist on finding the snake now.

While Draco still wasn't quite sure what to make of his and Harry's relationship, the reality of it all, the fact that Potter's feelings, his love for Draco, seemed to be huge factor in this war, surprised him. Although it shouldn't really. If Draco had allowed himself to look around for just one second, he would have seen it sooner. Now it seemed totally obvious. And that seemed to be the crux of it! Draco's problems stopped Harry Potter from winning this war. So, Draco shouldn't be trying to win this war for him, he should fix himself so he didn't stand in Potter's way.

These thoughts plagued Draco's still disoriented brain - disoriented because his plans had suddenly changed so drastically - when he stood in front of the DADA room that next Friday for Sirius' queer club. It was the first time Draco attended one of these, for Potter's sake more than his own although that wasn't mutually exclusive anymore, and found himself surprised to find Rita Skeeter cornering Potter in the hallway. A second later, he found out that their relationship would be publicised in the daily porphet by the morrow.

"What's it like dating Draco Malfoy? Would you say the Death Eater experience puts a level of excitement into your relationship that you can't experience elsewhere?" The questions were highly suggestive and absolutely non journalistic. Shabby work, -11/100 stars, Draco would have her fired if his father wasn't currently in Azkaban and all the connections he'd had left a bunch of murderous Death Eaters who quite literally wanted him dead.

Harry shrank back just a little, clearly uncomfortable, his eyes neither confirming nor denying anything. "No comment." His answer was firm though.

"I'm sure it must be thrilling-"

"Could you please stop harassing my boyfriend, Mrs. Skeeter?" Draco stepped into her line of sight, pushing up his sleeves as he watched her eyebrows raising in surprise. Draco would deny it, obviously, but he felt incredibly anxious. Just saying the word put him on edge and he realized in another startled moment that it was the first time he'd used it in front of other people. Without another word, he grabbed Harry's wrist, startling him in the process, revealed mark purposely showing. The glance he sent her was icy and on the mild side of threatening. "If you cannot keep your feather in your purse, I'll snap it in half on a good day, is that clear?"

"Are you threatening me?" Skeeter narrowed her eyes. "Do you think you can scare me?"

Draco tilted his head, ignoring the way Harry nervously flushed under his grip. "What, you think I can kill Fudge but hesitate at your dumb ass? Leave us alone." With that, Draco pulled Harry inside the room, ignoring how Harry stumbled after him even more in tatters than usual.

For reasons unknown to Draco, Skeeter did not immediately follow them into the DADA room. That was suspicious as hell because Draco didn't know if she would remain outside to lurk for other unsuspecting students, turn into a bug to spy on them or plan something else entirely.

"Draco?" Harry was blushing when he pulled Draco back around to make him look at him. "You just told Skeeter-"

"I know." Draco managed a weak smile in return. It was strange how simple it was to look at him this time. Perhaps it was because Draco was no longer actively trying to ruin their relationship by disappearing and lying and maybe killing people which would make Potter hate him beyond belief- He had decided on trying to make it work. As terrifying as it was, it made breathing a little easier.

Harry's smile twitched a bit higher, his face reddened a bit more, a hope burning in his eyes so bright that Draco nearly punched him in the nose.

"Oh, don't be so pleased, I didn't do it for you." Draco rolled his eyes and averted his gaze. Of course he had. Of bloody course he had!

"I didn't know you would be so possessive." Harry laughed and leaned forward to press a kiss to Draco's cheek.

Draco tried very hard not to react as he felt the lips faintly brushing his skin, but he knew that his usual pale face was actually bursting into flames. Truth be told, he hadn't even known that his face could do that. "I'm not possessive," he muttered anyway. Protective, maybe, but possessive? Draco had spent quite literally decades of his life watching Potter be married to someone else. (Not that he was thinking of marrying him, of course.)

Harry grinned his typical Potter grin and Draco felt the urge to shatter it. "Either way, where is everyone else?"

"They'll be here soon enough. I told you an earlier time because I thought it would be easier for you when everyone's just dropping in one by one, rather than be faced with a wall of people. In the meantime, you can help me decorate the place." Harry was already moving towards Sirius' desk and pulled out several drawers in search for something, as if he hadn't just said the most emotionally devastating line ever. "I swear that man puts them somewhere else every time!," he muttered, as if Draco knew exactly what he was searching for.

"What exactly are we searching for?" Draco asked because it was easier than address the fact that Potter was being considerate again. Draco felt a bit nervous being all alone with Harry as well. Of course only until the door opened and Rita Skeeter slipped into last row of the room. "Is she supposed to be here?" And why had she waited so long before coming in?

Harry didn't even pay her attention, as if she'd done this before. As if she'd been allowed inside. "Sirius warned everyone else that she'd be here to write about the queer club, so it's technically fine. No one is going to be here who doesn't want to show their support. I'm searching for the pride flags. AH!" Harry suddenly stopped. "There it is!"

What Harry pulled out of the drawer was a monstrosity of a pride flag, although it was the progressive one. Even including the intersex circle. "Isn't that a bit ahead of its time?"

Potter shrugged. "Perhaps, but Hogwarts has been behind on this for so long, I didn't think it would hurt to be progressive for once." Harry seemed thoughtful as he stretched the fabric over both his arms. "Would you hang it up for me? I'll get the snacks and pronoun badges."

"Okay." Draco blinked twice, then pulled out his wand. Draco paused only for a second, remembering rather suddenly what that wand in Potter's hand could do, and then shook off the thought. He'd managed just fine with it over the past year, he wouldn't freak out on it. "I'm still not sure if having her in the room is such a good idea. Don't you remember what she wrote about Dumbledore?" Draco casted a spell on the flag and watched as it found it's rightful place underneath the ceiling. It seemed to merge into it, breaking the light just so that the flag reflected into every corner and on every surface. Draco thought it was ironic and perhaps poetic that he stood between the black and green stripe.

"I remember it very well, thank you." Harry's wand summoned a couple of bowls with fruit punches, several bottles of butterbeer and plates with cheese, sausages, and some with candy. The pronoun badges were placed on a small plate and held a default 'Me' signature. "She also wrote about me, remember? Several times. Before and after the war, and she did write some nasty things about you as well."

Draco raised one of the pronoun badges to his eye level to inspect it. As soon as it touched his fingers, it changed to he/him pronouns. "These are cool." He didn't even have to say anything, they seemed to just... know.

Harry looked up. "Oh yeah. Luna helped make them. They react to the way you identify."

Draco nodded. "That makes sense. Luna always had an eye for things that go beyond what we can perceive. It's like a sixth sense or something."

"I wouldn't be too sure about that," Harry paused. "She keeps calling Timothy Barnes -," he caught Draco's confusion, "a fifth year Ravenclaw- Anyway, she calls him 'mam' from time to time."

Draco raised a brow. "Really?" Then, Draco noticed Skeeter taking some notes. "Do you think Luna is wrong or that there is something up with this kid whose name we shouldn't be mentioning in front of Skeeter?"

Harry paused for a moment, as if only now noticing her presence. "Oh." He looked panicked.

Draco blinked, then he turned to Rita Skeeter. "You're not writing that down, are you?"

Rita Skeeter looked up from her glasses, blond locks sitting perfectly as if she'd used a spell to keep it right. "Of course I'm writing that down, Darling." She hummed. Draco got the feeling that the woman was trying to get revenge for last year when Draco hadn't helped her out when he'd learned that Granger had kept her in a jar for a year. "My readers deserve to know the truth."

"You're aware that I know your little secret about being an animagus, right?" Draco's voice lowered dangerously in warning.

Skeeter rolled her eyes only put down her feather for a second. "Perhaps you should be careful of what you speak. Dumbledore might be protecting you, but after your little stunt during the summer, you and your little friends lost a lot of credibilty and trust me - the ministry is too busy to deal with small fry like me." She laughed. "I mean, all this talk about war and murder and you switching sides on a whim... And this is what you do with your time?" She gestured at the flags. "Setting up little meetcutes and talking about your gay panicking." She paused. "Don't get me wrong, I support you, of course. The magical community doesn't address sexuality enough. I just mean, it must be so hard as the son of one of the sacred 28 whose dating the Harry Potter." Her smirk seemed almost condescending. Then Rita Skeeter strolled the room and pointed at the pronoun badges. "And I mean, what's the point of these anyway?"

Suddenly, Draco felt ridiculous. This whole thing felt ridiculous. One some small degree, Draco even agreed with her. It was a waste of time. They shouldn't have to have these meetings, they shouldn't have to come out, one by one by one, and each one fearing for their lives and rights for a slightly different reason. Each and everyone of the people under the rainbow existed, whether Skeeter agreed or not. Whether it made sense or not. It should be enough that it made sense to them. The world didn't make sense. The world is vast and wide and incomprehensible and people like Skeeter were just mad that they failed to grasp it. "What I meant-," Draco began coldly, feeling a rage for Skeeter that felt strangely justified, "-is that I've gotten away with literal murder, Skeeter. I don't think people will bat an eye when I squash a bug."

Skeeter's long, painted nails flinched away from the pronoun badges that Potter had put in the bowl on a table.

Other than Draco, Potter had far more patience. "No murder at the queer meeting, Draco!," he scolded him. "Mrs. Skeeter, the pronoun badges are here so we address each other correctly. It's a sign of respect and support. And it's for the comfort of each individual. For example, there are some people in this school who are transgender. We want them to feel save here."

"Trans." Skeeter said, brows furrowing.

"The literal translation is 'the other side of'. It basically means that someone identifies with the opposite gender than the sex they were born as." Harry said this was such a bright expression that Draco wanted to punch him for his naivety. "Cis means 'the same side as'. Basically, I was born male and identify as make, so I'm cis."

Skeeter's frown deepened. "That's ridiculous. You're either a man or a woman."

Potter seemed irritated for a moment. "No, actually, there are a lot of scientific explanations that prove that this is real. Some are biological, like when your chromosomes aren't what you'd expect, stages of pregnancy that influence how the body produces hormones and stuff, but also psychological. It can be influenced by how you're raised, what society expects of you and even through bullying-"

"So it's based on trauma."

"What?" Potter blinked at her. "I mean- I'm sure it can be in some cases... But that just means that there is a reason for who you turned out to be. You're never who you might have been, you are who you are."

"This is ridiculous." Skeeter said again, looking very cross with Harry all of a sudden. "This just confuses people."

"Not really." Harry said, his irritation growing by the second. "It's not my job to understand it all. I just know that some people prefer to be referred to differently than what I might expect them to, so I try to be respectful and follow their lead. They know best who they are, who am I to question that?"

"You're setting up this meeting-" Skeeter said, putting her arms out to point at the flag and the pronoun badges and the rainbow colored food, "- to confuse people! And where does this lead? You're gonna allow men in women's bathrooms next?"

Harry frowned. "What?"

"There is only men and women!" Skeeter said as if it were a fact and not words that people made up to be able to describe their differences. "You can't just suddenly change that!"

"It's hardly sudden. History is full of stories about-" Draco muttered to himself but was interrupted before he could finish.

"You're putting these ideas into children's minds!"

"What?" Harry seemed distraught at this point. "I didn't put this idea into anyone's head! They told me about how they felt and I -"

"Nonsense." Skeeter bristled. "You put this in their heads!"

To Draco's utter horror, this was the moment that the door to the DADA room opened and Cho Chang entered the room. Before they knew it, Rita Skeeter was grabbing her by the shoulders. "Don't listen to them!," she said in a loud volume making Chang shriek at the sudden attack. "You're not a man! You're a woman!"

"Erm-," said Chang, eyes wide and blinking, her black hair tied to a knot at the back of her head. "Okay?"

Draco bit his hand before he burst into laughter. 'We can always tell.' Draco had heard that take a couple times but he'd never thought someone could be so blatantly and confidentally wrong. It was dramatic too, the way Rita Skeeter glared at her, daring her to say any different. Draco didn't even know people did that in real life, wasn't this normally just internet bullying?

Slowly, it seemed to dawn on Chang what was going on because she stuck out her chin defiantly. "I'm a trans woman, actually." Her own eyes widened a little and it occurred to Draco then that this might be the first time she'd actually said this out loud. And to Skeeter no less. Skeeter let go as if she'd been burned. "My parents thought I were a boy but I wasn't," she clarified bravely. "When I showed first signs of magic, my hair grew out longer than my parents allowed it to be and it kept keeping me from growing too tall when puberty hit."

Skeeter stared at her speechlessly.

Draco couldn't help himself. "Want her to use the men's bathroom now, Mrs. Skeeter?," he whispered at her, making her fume in her rage.

Skeeter shook her head, then, followed by her angrily scribbling feather, left the room.

Draco remained behind, amazed and intrigued by what he'd just been witness to. Chang walked up to them both, fumbling with her hands. "She's going to put that in the prophet, isn't she?" Cho put on a pronoun badge, it read she/her as immediately as Draco's had read the opposite. Helpless eyes found Harry's. "You guys don't think this is just in my head, do you?"

Before Draco could console her, Harry had already put a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Of course it is happening inside your head, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?"

Draco stared at Harry. "Where do you have that from?"

"Dumbledore." Harry said and smirked at him.

A dread filled Draco's mind. "When did he say that?"

There was a glint in Potter's eyes that basically screamed that the man was hiding something from him. "When I was dead."

Draco opened his mouth, then closed it. "What do you mean." Irritated, Draco tried to picture Dumbledore, as he'd rushed to Potter's corpse in the ministry, whispering those oddly ominous words to him. In what context did that even make sense?

"When I died." Harry said and sent him a smile. "It was a whole thing with the afterlife that for some reason looks like King's cross to me. It's supposed to take the form of the one thing you associate with drastic change in your life. Like a crossroad, or well... Something of the sort."

Gaping, Draco kept staring at him, feeling as if he saw Harry for the very first time in years. He'd never stopped to think that Potter might have seen things when he'd been dead. Had never thought about there being a threshhold to the other side, or that Potter might have been stuck there for a while. Harry had already turned around to busy himself with the snacks when Draco found his voice again. "Where you there when you died at the ministry?"

"No." Harry said, his head tilting slightly. "And yes." He paused, thinking deeply. "The me who passed out in the future didn't die. It was just my 15 year old self who did. And my memories overlappe, so I suppose there was a moment when I was there again but I'm not sure which one of my selves was. It's all a bit fuzzy."

"Oh. Okay." What was he supposed to say to that? Draco averted his gaze only to find Chang watch him with curiosity. Suddenly tense, Draco squared his shoulders and folded his arms. "Can I help?"

Chang tensed. "Er- no. Sorry. It's just- we haven't talked in a while."

"Right." Suddenly, Draco wished he wasn't here at all. "I can imagine how you must be feeling after... everything." After the murder and deception in the ministry.

For a moment, the atmosphere between them seemed to worsen by the second. "Have you met my mother?" She suddenly blurted out.

Startled, Draco unfolded his arms. "Your mother? When was I supposed to have met my mother?"

Chang stepped forward. "Harry told me that you infiltrated the ministry to fool You Know Who! You were there, helping them enslave the employees and killing them. My mother works there! Last year she forbid me from challenging Umbridge because it would have cost her her job and maybe, if people knew about me, she wouldn't have gotten another, and maybe she's being controlled by you know who now! I can't tell from her letters and I don't know if she's involved! Please, you have to know something!"

Before Draco could answer her that no, he didn't know anything because he'd only been sent on assassination missions, that he hadn't been allowed with the actual planning, Potter stepped between them. "Hey, Cho. Maybe give him a moment, yeah?" He put a hand on her shoulder.

Tears welling up in her eyes, she nodded and looked down. "Sorry." She said and looked so impossibly small. Then she met Draco's eyes again. "I'm sorry that I doubted you," she said out of nowhere. "Neville told us what you had to do, how it affected you, it just-" Draco hadn't even noticed that she'd been doubting him. He'd simply assumed it because it had been such a justified reaction to him literally killing people. But what actually distracted Draco was the idea that Neville had told her. Or them. Who were them? The DA? Draco hadn't been aware that they were still meeting up... He certainly hadn't been invited. "Can you forgive me?" Chang met his gaze, a mix between demand and pleading.

Draco nodded. "I was never mad." He told her. "But I can't help you with your mother." Suddenly, he felt the violent urge to do just that. To find out what had happened to her mother, if she were save or not... then he reminded himself that he was far away from getting any kind of information from anywhere within Voldemort's close peripheral.

Chang hissed in a deep breath but nodded eventually. "Of course. Thank you anyways."

She was saved, then, when the doors opened once more and more people flooded into the room.

Draco paled slightly and found himself skidding closer to Potter's side. It had already been a lot of input to have Chang and Skeeter in here, all of who seemed to want something from him. Now the gates opened to let in a couple dozen students, all of who were pointing and whispering at him. There were an unproportional amount of Gryffindors, of course, they were the couragous ones after all, then Ravenclaws and finally Hufflepuffs. Draco remained the only Slytherin and that was reason enough for people to stare at him. Potter reached out his hand to hold his and Draco tensed, unsure if that didn't make it worse somehow. Then, finally, Sirius stepped in, his pronoun badge glowing and quite literally blinding people. He/they the badge said, surprising Draco only slightly. Truth be told, it would have surprised him more had Sirius not used the opportunity to do something unexpected. Sirius raised his wand and made it rain confetti.

"Ladies, Gents and otherwise engaged-," he began his speech but was interrupted once more when the gates smalled open one last time.

In the door stood Ronald Weasley (he/him), Hermione Granger (She/Her), Luna Lovegood (Any) and behind them, much to Draco's shock, Pansy Parkinson. "You sure this thing isn't broken?" Pansy asked as she squinted at her own pronoun badge. (She/they).

"It's working perfectly." Granger said and smiled at them.

"I mean, I'm an ally." Said Pansy. "I'm not- What would that even make me?"

Before Draco could stop himself, he nearly ran at his oldest friend. "Pansy!" He huffed out when he'd reached her, finally ignoring the stares directed at them. "How are you here?"

"Granger invited me." Pansy said as if that were the most normal explanation a Slytherin could utter. Pansy looked around and grimaced at all the eyes nearly buldging out of their sockets when she'd entered. For once, Draco was one of them. "She said allies were welcome."

"Yeah." Draco said, blinking rapidly. Today so wasn't going the way he'd expected it to, at all. "I just- I didn't think-"

Pansy straightened her back, not reaching out to him like Potter would have, Slytherins didn't do hugs, at least rarely and never in public, they shook hands. So, Draco found himself shaking hands with his oldest friend, in the DADA classroom feeling like a lunatic. "I'm obviously here for you, idiot." She smiled painfully. "Blaise thinks this is stupid, so he stayed in the dungeons. And Theo- I think you can imagine what would happen to him if he showed up."

Draco nodded. "It's good to see you."

"It's good to see you too...," she paused. "At least you don't look like you're going to faint any second." She grinned.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Green, twinkling eyes made Draco feel very, very small.

After that, voices kept interrupting each other and Draco barely figured out what they were actually doing here except for socializing, getting drinks and snacks and finally, talking about how to organize the Queer Ball for Christmas. It was so much input at once that Draco felt dizzy with the new information that Luna had apparently decided to make clothes for everyone which she needed help for, Sirius was organizing a band made of volunteering students and Cho organized a dance class. Draco kept alternating bickering with Potter about who would be leading the dance and gawking at Pansy who had volunteered as lead singer for the band, at Ronald who apparently had a gift for sewing with muggle instruments, or learning that Hermione Granger played the drums. Since fucking when?

"I used to!" Granger rolled her eyes. "I was so anxious when I was a kid that my parents thought it would help me focus! Of course, my anxiety was a mix of me wanting to learn and my magic acting up but still- I stopped when we went to Hogwarts because I didn't want to disrupt everyone from learning. I do play during summer break, though."

It was a lot more fun than Draco had expected it to be. And it distracted him enough to not notice who was missing from the room.

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PoV: Neville Longbottom

A heat burned itself in his leg. In the beginning, it had made him wince. Granger had given it a sharper pain than Neville was strictly comfortable with but he understood the necessity of it. Taking a look around the dorm room, Neville pulled out the Galleon that they'd used for the DA meetings last year and that they were using again this year, albeit for different reasons. There were tiny inscriptions on every Galleon, the one's on the enchanted Galleons changed whenever one of them would alter the writing. It had taken Neville weeks of training and pointers via Hermione Granger to get the hang of it.

'Everything's going according to plan. Proceed.'

Unfortunately, Neville didn't know who had written the note but he assumed it was Granger. Draco had finally appeared at the meeting then where Harry had his eyes on him. Neville jumped to his feet and grabbed the Marauder's map from Harry's nightstand where Potter had left it for him. Then, he grabbed the invisibility cloak and took a deep breath. It was high time to act.

Neville descended the stairs from the dorm room, afterwards he fought to avoid all the trick steps he kept forgetting about but that the map now warned him off.

From the moment Neville had talked to Draco that one time, when they'd semi come up with a plan to defeat Voldemort once and for all, he could see in Draco's eyes that the man was keeping something from him. Last year, he wouldn't have been that translucent. But now, Neville knew Draco. Knew his struggles and problems and he could simply tell that something was off. Bit by bit, letter by letter, following him at night or in early mornings when Draco was too tired to notice, Neville had begun to piece together in what way Draco was about to self destruct. It wasn't even a bad plan, not in its entirety. But Draco wasn't in a position to fight. Not right now. He needed his friends to stop him and someone had to take over. So, Neville had decided to call on the other DA members who he had feared had thrown away their Galleons after Umbridge had left. But Draco had mentioned that Neville had been a leading figure in the future fight. Him, leading the DA. Neville had had an inkling that they'd kept the Galleons and he'd been right. Even the Weasley twins had answered him and told him about a random order for polyjuice potion. They had been confused as to why Potter would order some and for what purpose and why he wouldn't ask Granger of all people to make some. With Neville's suspicions, and Potter's overly worried denial at sending the letter, they'd figured out what was really going on.

Not knowing what else to do, Neville had turned to Dumbledore. And Dumbledore had informed Neville of Draco's attack on Aberforth.

By now, Neville knew about the plan and the place where Draco had intended to put it into action. And in his attempts to stop Draco, Neville had called for backup.

That backup was the very reason why Neville now stumbled down the stairs to the dungeons. Anxiety spiking, as it always did when Neville was forced to go there, Neville walked past the snake decorations in the walls, the greenish flickering torches and black, forboding doors. Neville didn't know where the Slytherin dorm room was and he didn't need to know. The place he was headed was far more terrifying.

Gathering all his courage, Neville pulled off the cloak and put away the map and then knocked on a door just as light sucking as the others. Except that there was silver lettering glittering in the dark, cursive and painterly in a lazy mimicry of someone else's writing. And of course Neville would know the hand that had painted this, as it was the same he'd failed to properly read for over five years whenever he sat in the potion's classroom on the verge of tears.

-Professor Severus Snape's office-

Neville swallowed. He'd never gone here before. And previously, he would never have thought of volunteering to go here. He could hear voices behind the door before the silky, albeit condescending voice called out and a spell opened the door for him.

"Come in, Mr. Longbottom."

Terror spiked in Neville's bones, goosebumbs made him freeze on the spot. He felt like a cornered animal, just hearing that voice, how on earth was he supposed to face him? Neville took one moment before he steadied himself and walked inside. His eyes automatically trailed to Snape who stood at the desk of his office, straight and unmoving like a statue. He had something of a bat, Neville had always thought, although his eyes had something of a shark. Sitting on uncomfortable looking chairs sat Theodore Nott and his friend Blaise Zibini. While Theo looked like he'd just been scolded, Blaise lazily leaned back in his chair, arms crossed and annoyance written all over his face.

"Sit." Snape wasped keeping eye contact.

"No." Neville said despite the cold sweat gathering in his neck. "I'd rather stand, professor." He quickly added to his disobedience. Neville feared that if he sat down now, he'd be tied to the chair and only his bones would be released in the morning.

"Well then." Snape said and moved slowly towards him. Then, threateningly, almost, he reached into his pocket. "Dumbledore instructed me to give you this." Almost as if it was dirt, Snape pulled out an old ragged piece of cloth from his mantle and handed it to Neville by the tips of two fingers. "Although it eludes me what this could be of use for."

Neville relaxed slightly as he took a good look at the talking hat. And then, in a pure act of instinct, Neville reached inside the hat. His hand wrapped around the shiny handle of what he knew was the sword of Gryffindor. Neville's heart beat spiked. He didn't know if it needed context to pull out the sword. If it needed fear and courage alike to be considered a true Gryffindor, but Neville was currently facing his greatest fear, his very boggart when he'd knocked on Snape's door. Neville relaxed and pulled out the sword in one swift motion.

Zabini straightened in his seat, Theo gaped, Snape didn't move a muscle. "I see." Snape said as if he'd just been given the answer to a boring riddle. "Anything else I can help you with?" He sounded bored, although appalled as well.

Neville let the sword down and faced Snape head on. "Actually yes." Neville said, gathering his courage once more. "We're preparing for the fight against Voldemort. And we could need your help." Bravely, Neville met Snape's cold eyes.

"My help."

"Voldemort knows you were a double agent, although I have no idea why. And I don't care. Dumbledore, Draco and Harry trust you, so will I. We can need every person in this war. The more the better and we want to include the Slytherins."

Snape met his gaze for a couple of seconds longer than Neville felt comfortable with. "You're recruiting members for your army, then?"

"Yes." Neville said, ignoring how fitting Snape's comment was.

"Interesting." Snape said surly. "And here I thought that the great Potter would be your leader. But you, Mr. Longbottom? I might as well follow an army of cockroaches-"

"You already did." Neville had no idea where that had come from but it actually made Snape pause. Heart beating wildly, both in fear and defiance, Neville stepped closer to his teacher. "You followed Voldemort."

Snape's eyes grew colder. "In light of recent events, I think we both know that I didn't. Not really."

"I don't care about the reason why you followed them. It doesn't matter." Neville said, feeling slightly braver with a massive blade at his hip. "What matters is that we defeat them."

Snape's mouth twitched in displeasure. "When Dumbledore told me you would come to ask for my help, I already told him that I do not owe him anything anymore. I will no longer risk my life in this ridiculous war. Not for him and definitely not for Draco who is the very reason why I even am in this position. It's over. I've done my part."

Suddenly, Neville felt another urge to defy him. He stepped closer, listening, for once, to his instinct. "But you owe me."

Snape's expression shifted, strangely. "Do I?"

Neville swallowed. "Five years of my life, you've been pestering me, making fun of me in front of every other class member. You made a fool of me and you made me afraid of the very subject you were supposed to teach me."

Snape's twirled a smile. "I owe you for hurting your feelings?"

Neville was only glad that Snape was no longer his teacher, since his own potion grades had only been an E last year. "You isolated me. You're the reason why other students avoided me. I was terrified of you and I still am." Neville admitted out loud. "You owe me compensation."

"By risking my life?"

"By aiding this war." Neville agreed. Sweating with nerves, he reached out his hand. "You're going to help me prepare my classmates for this war. Not because you care about Draco or because you made an oath, not because Dumbledore told you to but because I did." Even as Neville said this, even as he reached out his hand, he'd never, ever believed, not in a million years, that Snape would accept his demand. He'd done it on a whim, on the mere hope that facing his fear would be enough. And for that one moment he thought that he saw something almost like intrigue in Snape's eyes.

Hesitantly and his face still marbled stone, Snape grabbed Neville's hand. He squeazed so tightly that Neville feared his hand would fall off any second but he bit back any comments he may have had. "Didn't think I'd see the day you'd grow a spine, Longbottom."

Neville rubbed his hand as soon as he got it back, then he turned to Nott and Zabini. "Now you two." He said, relieved that this had gone over as well as it had. "I need a layout of the manor and what else there is that you know. If we invade, we need to be prepared."

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PoV: Narzissa Malfoy

Malfoy manor was one thing above all others in Narzissa's mind. Her home. That's what it had been since the day she'd married Lucius Abraxas Malfoy. She'd met him in her first year in school. He had been older, had been a pureblood like Narzissa's parents had always dreamed for her, and he'd been blond. It had been a striking change, especially for a Black. Bella had always been proud of her wild mane, their mother had had the same and their father had even gone so far as to make his own just a tad bit darker to fit the theme. Platinum. Wealth, security and most of all- safety. Narzissa had come to associate platinum with freedom. That's why she'd colored her own hair to match his. And now, black roots grew out of her head, almost devouring her freedom entirely.

Lucius Malfoy had always been proud, had held his head high and sprouted fantastic ideas for the future, a future under the guidance of Lord Voldemort. He'd always been a good match and she'd never before regretted meeting him, or Merlin beware, marry him. Lucius was many things, cruel was not one of them. At least not to her. He'd treated her like an equal, cared about her opinion and had even pleaded with the Dark Lord that Narzissa would not be disfigured by the Mark, although he would have never used those words. He'd been good with Draco as well. Maybe a bit too overprotective, too strict in some ways, but he'd always been there. He'd loved him, her, their family.

And one day, out of nowhere, her son had changed.

Narzissa did not understand what had happened. She'd never before seen Draco look so haunted and terrified. She'd never seen him so afraid as the day he'd broken down in the garden. And bit by bit, she'd discovered how broken her son had truly been. How he'd hated his parents, how easy it was for him to turn his back on them. He'd put Lucius into Azkaban and left Narzissa behind at the manor. What kind of future was it that he'd spoken of? What had he been through that he'd disown them?

But there was something else. Next to the terror, Narzissa had noticed Draco's mask growing and festering in front of the Dark Lord. She'd seen his hatred for Bella, the craving for death when he'd looked out the window, thinking she didn't see. And she'd seen how her own son hadn't managed to look her in the eyes, except for that one day when he'd gone to betray Voldemort. He'd pleaded for her to keep quiet with that one glance alone. Pleaded that she'd stay out of it. Draco hated them but he loved them as well. And she had to witness as Voldemort himself tried to hurt him and failed before he took him away, far, far away, returning with the words that he'd died.

Narzissa's long, broken nails dug deep into the flesh of her thights. She had her arms wrapped around them as she sat against the cold moldy walls of the cellar. Sometimes Wormtail would come and give her some food, but his visits were sparse, short and irregular, depending on how often someone upstairs remembered to bring her anything. Her clothes were ripped in parts where Bellatrix punished her for her son's betrayal, dry blood glueing the pieces together. Bella was disgusted with Narzissa for reasons she herself couldn't fathom. It was the only reason why she was brought up at all and Narzissa was fairly certain that Bella was just bored. It almost reminded her of their childhood. Almost.

Screams echoed through the cellar, and Narzissa closed her eyes. The Nott's weren't better off, naturally. Narzissa could already imagine how things would have been had Draco not suddenly changed so much. If Lucius had been so stupid to try and save their family reputation, she might even be worse of than them. Her son would have been facing the same impossible task that Theodore was now facing, Narzissa's husband humiliated and herself still stuck here, in her own home, chained to the wall.

But her son was dead. Narzissa had not cried. She had too much dignity to cry in front of the Dark Lord. Draco's pleading eyes begged her to stay save, so she tried her best not to look like she was grieving. She trained her grey eyes on the bars that kept her from escaping the cellar instead, nails dugging deeper. She knew one thing for sure. Draco had invaded the manor for a reason. And that reason was not to support Voldemort, it was to fight him. If she would get the chance, she knew, she would fight him too. She'd always been quiet but that didn't mean she couldn't be just as dangerous as Bellatrix. But while Bellatrix was simply manic and loved to murder, Narzissa's danger stemmed from her love for her family. It was a love that Voldemort had never understood and been too stupid to fear. It was the kind that she would use for her revenge. She would be patient. She would wait while her naked feet froze and became one with the floor, while she hungered in her isolation. Narzissa wasn't stuck here. She'd been born from concrete, she would know when to break it. She would know. And she would not hold any mercy.

People got one thing wrong about Dementors, she thought as she watched the two guardians of her cell pacing around her, making her freeze even more and the air in front of her mouth fogging. They sucked away your happiness, but there were some emotions they could never take away. And they could never take away the rage of a scorned mother.