Disclaimer: Harry Potter, his friends, enemies and all respective items and characters (beasts or beings) from the novels and novellas of J. K. Rowling are hers by moral right and legal copyright. All new creations are my own fictions by moral right.
They are all dead, Harry, Ron, Hermoine and Draco. So why are they still arguing.
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All Dead
\\What the hell is going on?\\ Draco thought to himself.
One moment he was in his bed, the aches in his scarred and battered body, like old friends, keeping him on the edge of sleep. Then a most curious feeling, a lightness seemed to descend upon him and he was suddenly here.
\\What the hell is going on?\\
Draco realised he was standing. Another surprise! It's been almost a year since he was able to stand by myself.
\\What the hell is going on?\\
He absent-mindedly brushed the hair out of his eyes. Hair? It had been decades since he had hair.
\\What the hell is going on?\\
His hands. Not the wrinkled and scared hands of an old man. They were the young, graceful hands of a youth. Draco felt his face. Smooth skin, and the hair seemed real enough, long and blond from what he could tell from the strands that reached past his eyes. He was young again!
\\What the hell is going on?\\
\\ I died! \\ the realisation hit him like a sledgehammer.
Draco looked at his surroundings for the first time. If he was dead, then this should be hell but it didn't seem too bad. Bit misty perhaps.
\\ A Corridor! \\ the thought was so clear, it was as if someone else had thought it for him. He was in-between Heaven and Hell. Turn one-way, and there was paradise, turn the other way and there was damnation.
\\ Oh well! \\ Draco sighed, turning the way he knew he must go.
"Draco, is that you? What are you doing here?" came the voice Draco had not heard in years. Lifting his head, Draco looked straight into a face that had haunted his entire life.
"Potter, do you mind not bugging me anymore. I mean it was bad enough while I was alive but now I'm dead, I expect a little peace and quiet." Draco told the young boy, with the scar on his forehead, standing before him.
"Dead? Your dead? But what am I doing… Oh! I think I'm dead too! Strange, I was just showing some of my grandchildren the Wronski Feint and next thing I'm here. Damn, Cho is going to be pissed."
"Gryffindors! Typical! Always no regard to the risks." Draco sneered back at Harry.
"God I've missed those contemptuous comebacks of yours. How are you Draco?" Harry laughed back at his old nemesis.
"Dead, Potter, I'm dead, remember!" Draco replied disdainfully.
"Yeah, but besides that, how are you?" Harry responded brightly.
"Harry, Is that you?" a figure emerging from the mists called out.
"Ron!" Harry called excitedly.
"Weasley, I might have guessed you would show up. Always at Potters side, as usually. People thought you two were joined at the hip." Draco said to his new companion.
"Draco! Why Draco, how are you?" Ron asked.
"Dead! I'm dead OK!" Draco, now at screaming point, shouted.
"Dead? Dead. We're dead? Really?" Ron said surprised.
"Seems so, Ron." Harry replied.
"I just hope…" Draco began but was cut short.
"Ron? Harry is that you." A forth figure emerged from the swirling mists.
"Too late!" Draco sighed.
"Hermoine!" Harry exclaimed.
"Darling" Ron said to the girl that was always in his heart of hearts.
"Ron, Harry! Oh Draco! How are you?" Hermoine asked as she joined the group.
"AAARGH!" Draco cried out.
"He's dead, Hermoine. Seems that we all are." Harry told her.
"Dead, We're all dead? Oh!" Hermoine replied.
"Not too bad though, is it?" Ron said. "Haven't felt this good in years and Harry you look exactly like you did that first day at school."
"You too, Ron, Hermoine. Even Draco here, looks eleven years old." Harry laughed.
"So now what?" Hermoine asked.
"I don't know" Harry replied.
"Its simple, you lot go that way to heaven and I go this way. Hopefully, I'll get a little peace in hell." Draco responded, strangely reluctant now to part from these three people who had been so much a part of his life.
"What do you mean, your not going to hell surely?" Harry, now with a concerned tone, asked.
"Look it's simple, goodie-goodies that way, death eaters this way" Draco stated, turning to go.
"Oh no you don't!" Harry said, grabbing Draco from behind. "Ron, you get his feet."
"Let go of me. You can't do this." Draco protested.
"Just watch us" Ron laughed, as they carried the struggling Draco the opposite way he had intended to go.
Suddenly, they all were at a set brightly shining Pearly Gates, beside which an old man stood reading a gigantic book upon a stand.
The old man looked up from his book. He reminded Harry of Dumbledore, with his flowing white hair and beard.
"I think you can put your friend down now." the old man said kindly.
"St Peter?" Harry exclaimed, releasing the struggling Draco.
"I am, in your perception of this place at least. Bit traditional for a wizard isn't it?" the old man replied.
"Must be all those Sunday Schools the Dursley's sent me too when I was young." Harry replied.
"So if you would just give me your names, I'll look up your lives and you can be on your way." The old man said in a more officious tone. "Ladies first."
"Hermoine Weasley, I mean Grainger. I mean Grainger was my maiden name." Hermoine told the old man nervously.
"Hmmm, Grainger-Weasley, Hermoine. Yes, here we are. Hmmm, loyal friend, good wife and mother. Eight children! Smart without arrogance, soldier for the light. Ever true and loyal. Yes that seems all in order. When your ready, in you go!" the old man said, consulting the large book before him.
Hermoine looked at her friends and with a nervous smile turned and walked up to the gates that were now opened, although all that was visible beyond was a bright glow. As she stepped across the threshold, she disappeared from sight.
"Next" the old man said.
Ron spoke up "Weasley, Ron Weasley". He looked like he was about to sit his potions final.
"Weasley, Bill, Charlie, Percy, George, Fred, Ah here we are, Ron. Good husband and father, soldier of the light, steadfast companion. Yes that's all in order, in you go!" the old man smiled at Ron, much to his relief. Ron smiled at his companions and turning disappeared across the gates glowing threshold.
The old man looked down at Harry and asked "Name?"
"Harry Potter" Harry said.
"Potter, Harry, 'Boy who lived', well not anymore eh, true and loyal friend, husband and father, enemy of Voldemort, leader of the forces of the light, guardian of the innocent, and so on and so forth. No problem there. In you go." the old man told Harry.
Harry smiled at Draco before he turned and followed the others into that glow at the gates edge.
"Name?" the old man asked once more.
"There's been a mistake, I'm not suppose to be here. They carried me here against my will, I'll go!" Draco stuttered out.
"Name?" the old man asked more forcefully.
"Draco Malfoy" Draco said "but there's no need to…"
"Ah here we are, Malfoy, Draco… Death eater! My My My." The old man leaned closer to study the great book.
"I'll go!" Draco said turning.
"Why?" the old man asked.
"What?" Draco replied.
"Why? Why go?" the old man asked.
"Well you said it. I was a death eater. I belong in the other place." Draco replied.
"Says here you turned your back on all that and fought for the light. So why do you think you belong in hell?"
"But the things I did at first, as a death eater. I can never make up for that, can I? It must say that in your book. That I am damned to hell for all eternity."
"The book only lists the facts about a person's life. Whether they are damned or not is up to the person to decide. God condemns no one to hell. They do that, themselves." The old man told Draco.
"But the things I did…" Draco told the old man.
"It says here, you have spent the last sixty years striving to make up for your mistakes. You saved countless lives by turning spy for the forces of the light. You choose to do what was right even though it was against everything you had been raised to believe. And when you were discovered, you suffered greatly, almost died."
"Even after the war was over, you continued to help those in need. Spent your entire family fortune helping those who suffered the most as a result of the war, the orphans of both sides. Even turned your own mansion into an orphanage. And every night just before falling asleep, you begged for forgiveness. Why don't you think you belong inside with your friends?"
Draco stared at the old man, lost for words. Dare he hope?
"In you go, lad." The old man said kindly.
Draco moved up to the gate. But turned back to the old man and said "No, there must be some mistake. I don't deserve…"
A hand shot out of the glowing gate and seized him by the front of his robe. Harry's voice came through too. "Come on Draco, my parents are waiting to meet you!" and Draco was pulled through the gate.
The old man smiled. "Some people just can't accept the good things in life or in death without a little help from their friends."