Inside and Under: A One-Shot

Again, it was for another challenge. I picked a number and my turn was to write about a Slytherin character during the Final Battle of Hogwarts. Please enjoy!


"I want to be a part of the action!"

"This isn't fair that we're stuck in here!"

"I'm scared, what am I going to do?"

"What if he's dead!?"

Those are only a few of the things Blaise Zabini could hear from the sobbing students around him.

BOOM!

"That makes the fourth explosion in thirty minutes!"

"He's dead! I know he is!"

Blaise Zabini was listening to every terrified, panicked, and distraught Slytherin student as they went on and on about the events just outside the Slytherin walls. They have been in the Dungeons for six hours now and the majority of the students took to sobbing and going hysterical. It was Professor McGonagall who had all of them, every sodding Slytherin student, sent to the Dungeons. There was an attempt for the first fifteen minutes of their lock-up to escape, but no one was able to find the spell that would get past the wall. Even when Pansy Parkinson (who is semi decent with spells) tried to explode the damned thing, it did not falter. Blaise stood there and watched it all happen with a stoney expression. He did not bother to help. He did not particularly want to, either. There was a war going on out there and he didn't want to take part on either side.

“Shouldn't you be out there with Malfoy?” Leah Jones, a rather attractive seventh year, asked coolly. Blaise and her had a thing once, back in their fifth year. She played it cool with the other students that she despised Mudbloods and blood traitors alike to fit in. With her looks and attitude, Blaise decided she was definitely a wonderful little thing to have along the side. She waited for four months before telling him her attitude was all an act. Apparently, she thought his was, too. He saw no more of Leah again unless he absolutely had to.

When Blaise didn't answer, he hoped she would go away, but she copied his current position and stood right next to him instead.

“Parkinson sure is trying to get to him,” Leah nodded her head toward Pansy. She was still trying to get passed the wall, but she was the only one. Apparently, the explosions, screaming, and overheard spells were enough to scare the others and stop them from further trying. “I thought the three of you were somewhat friends?”

It was true. Over Blaise's time at Hogwarts he, Draco, and Pansy had been seen together from time to time. He wouldn't necessarily call them friends by any means, but he definitely knew them well enough to talk to them every great once in a while. He didn't approve of Draco's decisions and Pansy was just an incredibly annoying little trollop. If Draco would stick to simply loathing Mudbloods and blood traitors like Blaise, then he would have no real problem with the other boy. Instead, Draco joined up with Voldemort and was out there in that war at this very moment.

“Blaise I–” she started, but seemed to hesitate at his steely expression.

“How do we know when it's over?” someone cried out within the common room.

“Whose side are you on?” Leah snapped, deciding his silence was no longer an option while she was there. A pair of sixth year girls on Blaise's left started crying as one of them tried comforting the other.

“Hush, Annie. Everything is going to be OK. I promise...” One of the girls, the brunette, said gently to the one who was crying the most, Annie.

“He didn't go to Hog's Head!” Annie cried, seemingly talking about someone else in another House. “Of course he wouldn't! He would want to stay and fight! I love him, Nicole! What if he dies?” Annie seemed to be close to collapsing to the ground as she proclaimed her love for some unknown man fighting out in that mess.

“He's an excellent dueler, Annie,” Nicole said comfortingly, rubbing Annie's shoulder. “Collin will make it.”

The whole common room resembled what Annie and Nicole were like. All of the girls were either crying, or sticking their noses up in the air and secretly hoping their Death Eater mothers and fathers would prevail. The boys were separated into two different groups for the most part. One of the groups was filled with the quiet boys, neither talking of their families fighting or expressing their wish to fight. They were just sitting there and hoping everything would pass by like Blaise was. The other group was filled with the boys who were clearly verbalising their thoughts on the whole matter.

“My father is Voldemort's number one Death Eater!” One of them claimed, his voice full of pride.

“Oh yeah? Well, Voldemort actually told my father he was the absolute best Death Eater he has ever had!” another boy countered.

They both disgusted Blaise. Evidently, they disgusted Leah, too, because she wrinkled up her face as if she were horrified at the things they were saying and looked up at Blaise, expecting her answer.

“Neither.”

Blaise's voice was so deep, and so forceful, Leah hardly realised it was him who answered. She looked up at him and noticed neither his expression or stance changed.
“What do you mean 'neither'? Blaise, you can't just stand there and tell me you don't want to fight in this war for either side!” Leah argued, stamping her foot and stepping in front of him so he could properly see her for the first time. “People are out there dying right now for you to make a choice! If Voldemort wins, I'd much rather die, but I know you'll be happy once all of us blood traitors and the Mudbloods are gone! It honestly sickens me that you would ever think like that, by the way. You're better than that, but you–”

“I am better than that,” Blaise cut in hotly. His fierce brown eyes flicked down on Leah for a second before he looked over her once more. He got what he wanted with his movement and Leah shut up for a moment. It was clear she wasn't exactly over Blaise (she wouldn't be here talking to him moments before they could be killed if she was) but, like she said, she didn't exactly approve of his views either.

“Of course I want to fight,” he continued, ignoring her still. “Not on Voldemort's side like you think, but I want to fight. What that snake is doing is wrong.”
“So you do care?” Leah smirked, but she wasn't able to conceal the complete admiration in her voice.

“Not particularly,” Blaise said, still not letting any real emotion come through like the girl talking to him. This comment upset Leah greatly, however, and she flushed a rather vivid shade of red (which still flattered her beauty).

“How can you mean that? I don't understand what you're going on about, Blaise, but you
have to care about something if you want to fight! You want to fight against Voldemort and you want to help everyone on Harry's side!”

“Let me set one thing straight, Jones. I do not want to fight alongside Potter,” his voice was hard and rather startling. “Voldemort is killing anyone who gets in his way. He hates Mudbloods and people just like you,” Leah winced at that, “and that isn't right. I may not be able to stand the sight of you right now as you stand before me, but that still doesn't mean you deserve to die. My mother brought me up on what is right, and going around killing people because they are inferior to me did not make that list of morals.”
Blaise's expression remained the same, but he was no longer avoiding Leah's presence. He stood before her with his fists clenched and it was admittedly hard for him to talk to someone like her, but he needed to set how he felt straight. He did not follow Draco and his baboon friends when they traipsed after their precious Dark Lord, and he most certainly did not follow Voldemort. If he were able to go out there and into that war, he would be fighting for himself most likely, but he would do it proudly. He would even waltz right up to Harry after it was all done and over with (assuming Voldemort failed) and tell him he did not do it for him.

Leah, who lost most of her strong-willed persona when Blaise snapped at her, decided looking at her shoes was a much more fascinating way of avoiding the goings on just outside of the wall rather than continuing her conversation with Blaise.

“My sister is out there!” a first year wailed.

“Come on, Blaise, some of them have families out there,” she said quietly once their silence allowed for more whining to get to them. “Maybe if we get the younger students out of here, like McGonagall allowed the others to do, then the older students would be free to fight!” Her courage was regaining once the idea in her head was developing. “You can fight for whatever you please as long as it is against Voldemort,” she added darkly.

Inwardly she was cursing McGonagall for being so damn prejudice. She could have at least let the younger students go to the Hog's Head for protection like she let the other Houses. There was no telling what the older students would do. Her fellow Housemates were mostly all talk anyway, so she doubted any of them would come back to fight. All McGonagall cared about was Harry's safety.

Well, she thought, I'm worried about these childrens' safety!

“You said those children have families out there?” Blaise asked her with the first sign of emotion on his face since the beginning of their conversation: a smirk. Leah nodded and went to say something, but he didn't allow her. “So you think it is wise to send these children out there? Sure, some of them may not fully understand that their precious mummies and daddies are fighting and killing some of their best mates, but they'll only come back around to help them. They know enough spells to come back, Jones. They will most definitely come back.

As for the older children, Blaise knew they would come back. They were too proud of their built up reputations and names that they would stupidly come back. Leah was looking at everything with her rose-coloured glasses on. Of course the younger children were scared, but the fifth, sixth, and seventh years would most likely come back to fight all right, but not on the side Leah hoped they would.

There was another explosion outside and a majority of the students jumped. The girls screamed and cried louder while even the strongest of the boys looked around them as if Hogwarts was going to fall righ on top of them. The whole castle shook and some rubble fell from above. Out of the entire seven hours they had been in the Dungeons now, it was the worst explosion yet. It was nice to see how many students that worked hard on working up a bad reputation were actually terrified. It made them human.

“We could be out there fighting right now!” One of the boys protested. The feeling that a giant, magical castle would possibly collapse on top of of every single person in the room seemed to be getting to him.

“Shut it!” Millicent Bulstrode snapped from another corner of the room. The boy listened immediately and sat down.

During the commotion, Blaise was able to hear a muffled Avada Kedavra from the other side of the wall. There was a thud on the wall opposite him. Besides the now unknown dead body, someone was close to them. He wasn't the only one who heard the encounter on the outside. Leah's eyes went wide and she turned to the spot where the noise came from.

“Someone's close!” she squeaked with excitement. Blaise growled and pulled her close to him, putting a hand over her mouth.

“Quiet before anyone hears you!” he said. No one noticed their strange behavior. Whoever was on the other side of the wall would surely let them out and they would be safe for the most part. That is, until the children would go out and get themselves killed for trying to to fight against Hogwarts. “You can start a commotion in this room now and get everyone riled up before they jump to their death, or we can wait to see if whoever comes in is going to be of any use to us.” Leah nodded in understanding and he let go. Both of them turned toward the wall silently to see if anyone could get the wall to open on the other side.

“Hey! It's stopped!” someone from behind shouted.

“There's no more explosions!”

“Do you think she survived?”

“I bet Voldemort won!”

“Hey, what's Zabini and Jones doing?”

Blaise and Leah were staring at the wall and Leah had her hand reaching out to touch it. Before she could, however, the wall was already shifting in a way that was extremely similar to the way the bricks at Diagon Alley moved. Leah's heart stopped and she couldn't breathe. Blaise's jaw shut tight and his whole body stiffened as he waited to see who was on the other side of the wall. It started out as a small hole they couldn't see through and then continued to get bigger so they could see a set of torn up, green robes on the other side. When the wall opened completely, they saw the tired, and seemingly older face of Professor McGonagall.

For the first time in seven hours, the entire common room was dead quiet. All eyes were on McGonagall. She first glanced upon Blaise and Leah as they stood right in front of her before she looked down at her feet and they saw a body clad in black robes and a mask on the floor. Then the rest of the room started to whisper quietly before it turned into a loud commotion.

Whose mother or father was it that was lying on the floor before them? Was it the parent to one of the children that Blaise heard cry and holler throughout the last seven hours? Did McGonagall kill the man or woman before them? How many lives did their professor take in the last seven hours? How many people all together, good or bad, loose their lives in the last seven hours? Who, in these last seven hours, ended up winning the war? Was the war even over?

Every single one of these questions and more were being asked by the frantic students behind him. Even he began to wonder if Harry succeeded to defeat Voldemort.

“Professor...” Leah wondered aloud, her voice drifting off just as the voices around her did as she spoke. They were attracting more attention than they thought they were.

“He has fallen,” McGonagall said, a cheerful, but weary smile plastered on her face. “Voldemort will return no more.”

Just like that, the words were spoken. There were no cheers, no clapping, no insistent questions about who survived and who died, and no one questioned the woman before them.

A quiet, gasping choke came from Blaise's left and he turned just in time to see Leah's hand shoot up to her mouth to hide her smile. A single tear ran down the side of her face he could see and her eyes shined brightly. Though she was still beautiful, the simple but wonderful realisation flowing through her were not enough to phase Blaise.

“I have to find Draco!” a voice he recognised as Pansy's shouted from the back. The fast paced footsteps behind him told him she was already making a run for it.

“I am afraid, Miss Parkinson, you will have to wait,” McGonagall said firmly. “There are many injured bodies up above, and I'm afraid there are just as many dead. I would advise for you to all stay down here until we are able to– identify the scattered bodies around the castle.” McGonagall's eyes glossed over as she looked down at the hooded figure beneath her. Blaise knew that body was the father (the body was big enough to be a man) of one of the children in this room.

“I want to see my father!” someone yelled, a voice he recognised from earlier.

“I need to know if he's alive! C-C-Collin! Is he alive?” Annie cried out.

“Let us out, old woman!”

“SHUT UP!”

The powerful voice of Blaise Zabini raised above all others as the students finally registered what was going on and the chatter picked up to a deafening outburst. Leah looked over at him admirably but he dismissed her gaze and turned to the other students. His face, just as before, was steely and his dark features made him look even more terrifying. Every voice in the room shut off immediately and they looked at him with the same fear that had been in their eyes for the last seven hours.

“Who gave Zabini the right to–”

“Shut it!” Millicent snapped at the same boy again. He obeyed once more and Blaise was thankful for the somewhat friendship he had with Millicent at that moment.

Leah stepped forward and Blaise could see there were tears on both sides of her face. She was smiling at them all and she didn't care.

“Listen,” she said just barely loud enough so everyone could hear her. “We are going to stay down here. It is just for a moment longer, I promise. You will be reconnected with your...” her voice faltered here, “loved ones soon enough. If you could wait just a little longer. Please.” There was nothing more to her speech. She turned to look at McGonagall to see if she did a good job. The Professor gave her a slight nod of the head and then made her way back up the stairs with the unidentified body levitating gracefully behind her.

Everyone gave up trying to argue back. They were honestly too tired from the countless hours of being terrified and worried to try and push past Blaise. Leah wasn't much of a threat, but she was right next to him and helping to guard the now open wall. A few other students (like Millicent and Nicole) came to join the two of them at the wall to help guard. Millicent was an excellent addition. Blaise was sure the only person Nicole could try to keep from going up was Annie, but he didn't find it necessary to voice his opinions on that thought. Most of the common room didn't find it necessary to talk for that matter. There were a few whispers here and there, but nothing Blaise could make out.
All of them, every single Slytherin student (minus Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle) sat there and waited for someone to give them the sign that meant they could go on up. Blaise smirked at the thought of Leah wanting to go up and fight the whole time while the wall was sealed shut. Now, with the wall wide open for anyone to go at, she was keeping them from going up. She was talking to Nicole and Annie (who came to join Nicole once she couldn't stand comforting herself anymore). The whole room, in a lack for better words, seemed peaceful.

Girls were still crying, but their sobs and wails were kept to silent weeping. The boys, though still in the same two separated groups as before, were both thinking quietly to themselves. Blaise didn't know which of them were thankful of the war being over and which were thinking about revenging Voldemort, but at this moment he didn't care. That was how the common room remained, too, for the next three hours before McGonagall returned to tell them they could come up.

“Ten hours.” Leah said thoughtfully. Even though Blaise wasn't startled, he had forgotten she was next to him the whole time. “We've been down here for ten hours, and in that time: the most evil wizard of all time has been defeated, families and friends have been torn apart, loved ones have been lost, and we did nothing to help it.” She sighed. She couldn't tell if she was elated or disappointed with herself.

“We kept them alive,” Blaise retorted quickly, jabbing a thumb at the Slytherins behind him as they ascended the stairs. They somehow managed to be leading the group toward the Great Hall. “The idiots who would have ran off and gotten themselves killed. They're still alive. The children you were so worried about. They're alive, too.”

“Only because it was their families up there,” Leah shot back. “If we were any other House trapped in our common room, we would have all been killed.”

“Our House was our advantage,” he said deeply. “There are other Houses with Death Eater parents.”

“Yeah but, not as many. Are you saying that if we went to Hog's Head we would have been killed?” Leah asked, stunned.

“That's what I've been saying this whole time.” He wasn't sure if the conversation would have continued after his comment if the sight before them didn't shock them so badly. Before them laid hundreds of the dead and injured. Those surrounded by staff and parents could only be assumed to be students or Harry's followers. The ones with little to no crowds around them, besides the staff running around and trying to heal the injured, were the assumed Death Eaters. It didn't take long for the crowd of students behind them to find their parents or loved ones.

Even more tears were added to the ones they walked into as a majority of the Slytherin students mourned over their dead or severely injured parents. None of them would be seeing their parents again most likely (even the ones who lived). Not after a heavy Azkaban trial. Blaise didn't have to worry about that. Neither did Leah, apparently. The sight was terrifyingly real to Blaise. There were so many dead and injured, and he knew exactly who the fallen were. Of course there were several pure-blooded and half-blooded witches and wizards scattered across the floor, but there were even more Mudbloods and blood traitors.

Voldemort, the man he hated with a fiery passion, was dead. Somehow, he didn't think that would be the case. As much as he didn't want him to, Blaise was sure that when he would walk out of the Slytherin common room, he would be walking into a new world completely where it would be ran by Voldemort. The possibility of him dying was never a thought that crossed his mind, and it was these people, the Mudbloods and blood traitors, who made this world possible. Many of them were dead. They wouldn't be going to Azkaban. They wouldn't hold grudges toward one another once everything was over. They wouldn't live in a world full of hate anymore because they fought against it.
Blaise didn't move. Instead, he just watched everyone around him. He had no one to mourn or anyone to check on. He just stood there with a thoughtful look on his face.

“C-C-Collin! NO!” he heard Annie cry. He looked over and saw her stooping low over a blond boy's limp body. He was dead.

“Natalie! I'm so glad you're alright!” the first year girl from earlier clung to her older sister.

A boy was wordlessly staring down at the dead body of who Blaise assumed was his father. He seemed to be going through a range of mixed emotions of right and wrong. Further down the hall, Blaise spotted Draco sitting with his family and looking lost. He may not have agreed with what Draco did, but he agreed with his values. He walked up to the family and left everyone else behind.

Different, but still deserves some lovein'! Feedback please!