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Heafen

Part 1

September 2003

Arthur Lowe was the middle-aged, stubby, and balding senior writer of the lifestyle section of the Daily Prophet. In his younger days, he was a diligent journalist who would attend the Annual Wizarding London Toy Convention and visit every booth to discover exciting new games and toys to introduce to the general public. But 20 years of seeing almost exactly the same things—new versions of broomsticks that were just minutely better than last year's version, new versions of Wizard Chess with different character designs, playing cards with a variety of reactions to a player's wins or losses, and nightmarish magicked dolls or figures that interacted with children (Arthur had made it a rule to never write about those because he thought they were incredibly creepy)—he had long since given up hope to find anything truly innovative at the convention and attended it purely for the free booze and the fine looking show girls.

It was the pretty smile of a tall, shapely brunette in emerald green that first drew him to Booth 342 at the convention in September of 2003. "Welcome to the Armandian Entertainment Booth," the girl said to Arthur when he walked nearer.

It was only then he noticed the lack of any recognizable games at the booth that made him curious enough to ask: "What kind of games are you presenting?"

The girl gestured at the strange eyewear and earpiece that Arthur thought was part of her costume. "We present Heafen, a magic based virtual reality role playing game where you're the hero of a kingdom in peril. Would you like to give it a try?"

The terms "virtual reality" and "role playing game" were completely foreign terms and Arthur took a mental note to find out if those were one of those "young people" terms that he should know about. He hadn't planned to waste any time trying out any games at the convention floor that day, but the girl gave his arm a warm squeeze and another coy smile and he decided the free martinis at the convention VIP lounge could wait.

He put on the eyewear and earpiece.

"Are you ready, sir?"

He gave a small shrug. "Ready."

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the convention floor melted out of existence and when his surroundings stabilized again, he was suddenly standing in thick mud next to a medieval-looking gatehouse. The sign on the stone wall told him he was in Yolmaf, a village in the kingdom of Valencia.

When his ten minutes of game time was up, he had just finished killing a giant with a broad sword and a few extremely impressive fire magic spells that he would never be able cast in real life. It took him a few seconds before he readjusted to reality, and then the realization that he just had a taste of something truly extraordinary hit him. "What is this game called again?"

"Heafen, by Armandian Entertainment."

Arthur would spend the rest of his day telling people all about wonders of Heafen. The word of mouth grew, and by the end of the 3-day convention, everyone was talking about Heafen and Armandian Entertainment. Booth 342 would have a line that wrapped around the corner, and Heafen was voted Game of the Convention by a record-breaking margin.

The rest, as they say, is history.

There was a world before Heafen, and another after it.

—x—x—

March 2008

March 6th 2008 begun as a perfectly normal day.

Twenty-five-year-old Ginny Weasley rolled out of bed 20 minutes after her alarm sounded. She shrugged on a tank top and shorts, pulled on a light jacket, and left her flat on the edge of Diagon Alley for her daily jog. She felt upbeat and ready to take on the world. It was one of the rare sunny days in November, and she couldn't help but think, as she ran along the Thames toward the Tower of London, that the wind that had chased the dark clouds away had simultaneously driven away the shadows that had hung about her since her breakup with Harry six and a half months prior. She was excited to go on a date that night (not a rebound date, a real date with the handsome medic that treated her wrist sprain a week ago), and life—though not perfect—was good.

It was a perfectly normal day.

It was 8:52am and game day, but the game would not start until 3:00pm, so she took her time showering and changing, and treated herself to a full English breakfast complete with black pudding at Karl's Café downstairs. She picked up the dress robes she ordered for the Annual All-Stars Quidditch banquet from Madam Malkin's before heading to the Harpies' home pitch.

The pre-game routine went by especially smoothly that day. They were finished with their fly around the pitch and pre-game drills five minutes early. They were already in a good position in the league, so whether the Holyhead Harpies won or lost against Pride of Portree that day didn't really matter, but Ginny never played to lose. When the game started, she dodged and looped until the Harpies were so far ahead that even if Portree caught the snitch, the Harpies would still win.

It was a perfectly normal day.

Portree took a timeout 94 minutes into the game. Ginny landed twenty seconds later on the pitch surrounded by cheers. The sun was bright that day. She squinted toward the stands and waved to her fans. She turned around and waved to the fans on the other end.

And that was when she saw a blue flash at the corner of her eyes.

Followed by pain.

It started on her left leg before spreading outward until it enveloped her whole body. It felt like someone had lit a fire inside her body, burning and tearing her apart from the inside. The heat was so intense she could barely register the moment when her body hit earth. She could hear screaming, but whether it was from the crowd or from herself, she did not know.

Relief only came when her vision went dark.

—x—x—

When Ginny Weasley came to, she found herself attached to an assortment of magical contraptions. The familiar fog of pain potions kept her from feeling pain.

"Ginny!" Her mother hovered into her vision. Ginny instantly noticed the puffiness of her mother's eyes. She had been crying.

What happened?

There was shuffling of footsteps, then her father and all of her brothers all came into view. A full family reunion? They hadn't been crying, but she could see the bags under their eyes. They looked like they hadn't slept for at least two days. She strained her mind to piece together her memories. She was playing a game against…Portree? A Quidditch accident? She had never fallen off her broom from high up before, but Quidditch was a dangerous sport and, she supposed, it was only a matter of time.

They should have known better than to worry about her—broken bones, no matter how ugly, were nothing a bitter potion or two couldn't fix. She tried to let them know she was okay, but her throat was so dry her words came out as a bad cough.

Her mother instantly race to soothe her cough while her father brought her water. When she could finally speak, her voice was a raw whisper: "I'm okay."

She did not miss the nervous looks her brothers exchanged. Or the way her mother tightened her grip on her hand. Or how her father pressed his lips the way he always did when he was nervous. Dread raised her stomach as their reaction sank in.

"What happened?"

"You were attacked at the game," Charlie said, when no one else would.

"Attacked? By who?"

Ron spoke up, too quiet and too solemn. "Harry is on the case. He said it may be a Death Eater." He spat out that last word like he had tasted something vile.

Ginny nodded numbly as she took in the information. Death Eater. Death Eaters had always been more Harry's forte. She had resolved to think about Voldemort or his followers as little as possible after the war because she didn't believe in letting fear win over freedom. You're so paranoid, she used to say with a laugh whenever Harry fussed over her public safety around the anniversary of the war…

She changed topic because she couldn't handle the irony. "Did the Harpies win?"

"They did, thanks to you," Bill assured, but there was no smile on his lips. The room turned silent and the tension in the room built until it became completely unbearable. There was something else her family wasn't telling her. Something that was eating at them from the inside.

"What is it? What's wrong?" She asked, but no one would look her in her eyes. "Tell me." She grabbed onto her mother's hand and shook it until her mother had no choice but to look at her.

"The healers—" her mother's voice cracked and she broke into a sob.

Her father stepped forward, gave her mother a half hug, and finished the sentence for her. "They fear there may be permanent damage." He gestured helplessly at the end of her bed.

Ginny struggled to push herself up, she didn't want to know what he was alluding to, but she knew she had to know all the same. She forced herself to look. Something was wrong, but for a moment, her mind couldn't quite process what was off. Then, to her horror, it finally occurred to her:

She couldn't lift her left leg.

—x—x—

April 2008

She was released from St. Mungo's a month and a half after the attack.

She couldn't walk out of St. Mungo's without help, but at least the pain was manageable even without potions, and she could move her left leg a little. It was progress, and she couldn't help but be hopeful despite the healer's cautious warnings that full recovery was not guaranteed. Unlikely, even.

But she knew that she would prove them wrong. She would get better, she believed whole-heartedly. She had, after all, survived the war, survived Tom Riddle and the Chamber of Secrets. There was no way she would allow some dark wizard's spell destroy her life.

Harry would catch her attacker and she would fly with the Harpies again in no time.

—x—x—

May 2008

The healers told her parents she must refrain from physical activities, and her mother had taken their words to heart. She brought her back to her flat, but stayed during the day to cook, clean, and take care of her. She wouldn't let her do anything, not even to wash a dish.

"I'm bored," she complained to her brothers when George and Ron visited her a week after her discharge.

Ron smiled. "Good thing I got Geor—"

George elbowed Ron on his side.

"Ouch!" George gave Ron a pointed look. "We thought to bring you this," Ron quickly corrected as he rubbed his ribs dramatically.

George rolled his eyes and pulled out a shrunken box from his trousers pocket and unshrunk it. "Full set of Heafen gear made by Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes ready to be used, the best cure for boredom."

Ginny first heard of Heafen a little over two years ago, when she asked Victoire what she wanted for Christmas. Her niece wasted no time to tell her all about Heafen, the hottest game in her class, and the coveted Terrius 2, a peripheral that would not only allow her to touch Heafen with her own hands, but also make her the most popular girl in her class. Bill and Fleur refused to buy Victoire the over-priced magicked gloves because they didn't want to raise a spoiled daughter. But Ginny was Victoire's aunt, and there were no rules to stop her from spoiling her niece and solidifying her status as the best aunt in the world.

She heard a lot more about the game when George and Ron negotiated rights for Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes to make their own official Heafen peripherals half a year later. For a solid two months ideas for new features were all they could talk about. As much as she loved them, she learned to tune them out whenever they brought up Heafen, she had absolutely no interest in gaming in general.

The circumstances were different now. Interested or not, she had nothing to lose: anything would be better than sitting in her room and staring out of her windows for another minute.

George took out the box's contents. It included eyewear, an earpiece, and a pair of gloves. "Want to give it a whirl?"

She took the gear from his hands without hesitation. "Hit me."

"Ron and I will set you up in the original world, Valencia. Still our favorite, and it's a good place for beginners."

They activated the game and the Burrow swirled and shifted away. When her surroundings re-stabilized, she was standing in front of an old gatehouse. The castle in the distance looked like ones she had seen in Scotland, but the purple moon above it told her she was not on Earth. A tall light haired orc, probably part of the game, told her some evil enchantress called Amoriala had released a horde of demons into the land of Valencia and she was the only one in the village who could help.

As she killed her first Komother with a jumping kick that she could not do in real life with her injured leg, Ginny felt tears in her eyes and suddenly understood what the hype was all about.

—x—x—

July 2008

Gill Millers, the manager of Holyhead Harpies, sipped her tea. "What's the name of the plant you have in that planter?"

Ginny turned to follow Gill's gaze. She had absolutely no interest in gardening and it was only because her housekeeper wouldn't shut up about those new spring flowers she planted that she knew their name. "Lungworts."

Gill nodded thoughtfully. "Luke and I had been thinking about redoing our gardens, and I think those will be wonderful underneath the willow tree. I was thinking of foxgloves as well, what do you think?"

It'd been over 20 minutes since Gill had stepped into her home, and they had yet to talk about what Gill really had in mind. Gill had a tendency to meander in her conversations, but today she may be setting a new record. Ginny could barely contain her exasperated groan. She had always been a direct-to-the-point kind of girl. "That's wonderful Gill, but I am sure you didn't come all the way here to talk about flowers."

Gill visibly recoiled. Ginny, feeling a tad guilty, added her excuse: "I'm sorry, I'm just a little snappy. My leg is bothering me."

It wasn't exactly a lie: her leg was aching even if her mood was significantly better before Gill arrived.

Gill sighed and shook her head with a bland smile that Ginny did not like. "No, no, you're right. Let's get to the point." She pulled out a stack of paper and pushed it toward her.

Ginny skimmed the paper. There was a lot of legal speak, but she saw the words "contract termination" and the seven-digits number next to it, and she did not need her lawyers to know the Harpies were trying to pay her out of the eight years contract they had signed with her just over a year prior.

Ginny was aware that Gill was talking again, something about how the team really appreciated her services, and that this was a very painful decision for everyone involved, and that this was a generous offering from the team, but Ginny wasn't fully processing any of it. All she could think about was everything she had given up for the Harpies. She skipped taking the N.E.W.T. because of tryouts, she lost friends and got into arguments with her family by missing countless meetups, she neglected her relationship with Harry until there was nothing to be done—all in the name of becoming the best Chaser, becoming the youngest captain in the Harpies' history, becoming the first person to bring the Harpies to the Euro Cup…

She had given the last ten years of her life to her team, but now, her team was giving up on her.

—x—x—

October 2008

She felt like she could not breathe in the subtle tension that filled the room. Her family was talking and laughing but somehow everything felt so very forced and restrained. It was the beginning of another Quidditch season but no one mentioned a word about it. They were trying to protect her, she knew.

Just like how they stopped wearing their favorite teams' colours, or averted their eyes from her left leg, or brought up the fact it'd been nearly six months and no one was formally charged for what happened to her.

The ever-growing horde of children her brothers had created ran into her in their game of tag. She looked up sharply. The children took no notice. Percy's girl, Molly, stepped on her bad foot. It hurt, but not excruciatingly, but enough for her to grunt in pain.

The Burrow instantly quieted. She could feel everyone's concerned eyes on her.

She felt her blood rushing to her cheeks at the attention. "I'm—"

But her mother had already rushed to her side. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she told her, but she forced her to sit as her brothers swarmed around her. She felt a headache forming as they closed in. "Just a small—"

"What did I say about running, Molly?" Percy asked too sternly. Molly started to cry.

Her headache worsened into constant pounding throbs. She felt trapped. "it's fine, I'm fine, please."

But her words fell to deaf ears. Molly kept crying. Her family continued to fuss about her like she was made of glass, so fragile she would shatter at any moment. Breathing was hard. She was suffocating, drowning in the noise and commotion. She wanted, no, needed, to be alone.

She pulled out her wand before anyone could stop her and apparated home.

—x—x—

January 2009

The draw of Heafen was the promise of what one could not have in real life. For some, that was love and friendship; for others, it was magical talents and power; for Ginny Weasley, it was anonymity and a pair of perfectly functional legs.

In Heafen, Ginny is a perfectly ordinary mage class woodland elf named Wesvra. The only distinguished feature she had was a long flame-coloured hair customization that she purchased (she was—Heafen or not—still a Weasley after all). As Wesvra, Ginny traversed worlds without the not-entirely-subtle glances and the constant whispering of words like "tragic" or "sad" or "pity" that followed her wake in the real world. Wesvra could run, dodge, and attack with an ease Ginny never quite appreciated before, and kill increasingly powerful foes as she honed her skills. And when Wesvra teamed up with strangers for quests and hunts, she was an asset and not a liability.

In the real world, Ginny Weasley was an empty husk of her former self, but in Heafen, Ginny felt free and alive.

—x—x—

March 2009

"We will conduct a final test," said Healer Reed.

Ginny didn't quite remember how she had gotten to Healer Reed's office, but she knew whatever earlier tests she had done were good and she didn't really see why she shouldn't do a final test, so she nodded.

Healer Reed walked over to her desk and pulled out something from behind that she didn't notice before: a broom.

Ginny stared at the broom dumbly. She hadn't flown since the attack, and the last major milestone she had reached was over half a year ago when she was able to hobble without support, but she seemed to have reached a plateau. "I'm not sure…"

"You can," the healer said with an encouraging smile, holding out the broom to her. "You just have to trust me."

Ginny stood up to find her leg surprisingly solid beneath her. She took a hesitant step and found the familiar pain gone. She took another. How could she have forgotten she had gotten better? She laughed and took the broom in her hand. She laid the broom flat and then pulled one leg up and around the broom, and suddenly she felt the familiar weightlessness. "I'm flying!" she cried in excitement. She turned to Healer Reed, only to find her gone and replaced by Georgiana, her captain on the Harpies from when she first started her Quidditch career. Her presence didn't make any sense, but the fact didn't bother her as much as it probably should.

"Took you long enough," Georgiana said in her usual teasing way.

Her surroundings shifted while Georgiana spoke, but somehow everything still felt right. At the corner of her eye she saw a Quaffle zooming towards her. She reached out her arm reflexively and felt the ball land squarely in her hand. "Sorry to keep you waiting," Ginny said with a smirk, and flew toward the goal hoops.

She laughed as she felt wind flowing through her hair and past her body. She dodged a Bludger, and suddenly she was within scoring distance. She wound back her arm and—

She startled awake from the sound of a loud bang. She could hear wind and heavy rain from the window. She saw the flash of light from her closed eyelids, followed momentarily by another loud bang. A storm must have blown in while she slept. She must have been dreaming. She felt the burn of disappointment as reality sank in and she oriented herself: she hadn't been flying, the Harpies hadn't taken her back, and she was on her bed in her home…

She opened her eyes to darkness before another flash of lightning lit up the sky a moment later. She should close the window, she decided numbly, after feeling the dampness of the air. She pushed herself up and off the edge of her bed. The pain that shot up her left leg as she put weight onto it was so intense she grunted out loud. She let it settle, then took a step, and another. She managed five steps before she tripped on her desk chair and fell onto the floor.

She cried out in frustration and gave her desk chair a violent shove.

It's been a year. She was supposed to be all better by now. She was supposed to be…

Be patient, things will get better, her family said to her often. She wanted to believe them, but more and more, Ginny had trouble imagining better.

—x—x—

May 2009

"Ugh, these things just never stop coming, do they?" the short orc next to her asked rhetorically while swinging her axe and slicing off the skull of another skeleton. "Remind me why we are here again?"

Wesvra rolled her eyes and cleared a small radius with her fire spell. "You invited yourself, Lucaorl. I told you where I was planning to go."

Catacomb of the Tututi was infamous for its hordes of persistent undead skeletons that leveled up with a player's level. It was a great place to grind for level, but more importantly, it was a great place to go after a particularly bad day.

It was extremely cathartic to cut through hordes of mid-level skeletal undead in a crowded catacomb.

Swing, slash, dodge. Swing, slash, dodge. "Bad day? I had a bad day too, my prof gave me detention for being 3 minutes late."

Ginny was indeed having a bad day.

Rose told her she didn't want her to bring her to the museum because she walked too slow. It was an accurate observation, and perhaps she was overly sensitive, but the offhand comment wounded like a twist of a knife. It was ridiculous to be crushed by a four-year-old, but then again, she was coping by mindlessly killing undead in the hundreds in Heafen with a suspected thirteen-year-old boy she had never met in real life, so maybe that's just how laughably absurd her life had become. "That sounds awful, kid."

Lucaorl scrunched up his face. "I'm not a kid."

"Whatever you say." She kicked away the skeleton that was about to hit Lucaorl in the back and cast a chain lightning spell. It felt good to see the skeletons collapse in a pile around her.

—x—x—

August 2009

"I'm sorry, Miss Weasley," said Healer Reed after she read out the result of the latest test: no noticeable improvement since the last test two months ago.

Ginny couldn't keep her despair from her face. She didn't have high hopes, but to hear she had made no recovery in the last two months didn't just feel like a setback, it felt like crushing defeat. She could feel tears at the back of her eyelids and she took a deep breath to keep them at bay. She didn't want Healer Reed to feel even worse for being the bearer of bad news.

Ginny gave a wan smile and shook her head. "It is what it is." She glanced at the clock on her right and made her excuse, "I have a meeting with Harry in thirty minutes to talk about the investigation so I better get going. I'll see you in two months."

She was lying. She had met up with Harry before the appointment. She had hoped for news on her attacker but Harry would only tell her he was following a new lead. He wouldn't give her any details, not even to confirm or deny whether her attacker was really a dark wizard or witch. All he gave her was that damned apologetic smile.

She stood up and hobbled as quickly as she could out of Healer Reed's office and out of St. Mungo's.

She made it to the end of the corridor.

She heard quick steps, her only warning before a swirl of dark robes and blond hair made a sudden appearance from behind the corner and turned directly into her. Had this been before the attack, she would have been able to jump away to avoid collision, but as it was, she could only give a sharp yelp as they made contact and she fell backwards.

The man cursed, apologized, and managed to grab her arm before she made full contact with the ground. "Are you alright?" he asked as he pulled her up.

The fall still hurt, she would likely bruise, but she could tell there was no permanent damage so she nodded.

"I didn't mean—" he broke off abruptly and Ginny could feel his eyes focused on her. "Ginny Weasley?"

She gave an inward groan. He didn't quite sound like a fan and his voice did sound familiar. An old acquaintance perhaps?

She looked up and was instantly startled by what she saw: straight blond hair, cold grey eyes, and aristocratic high cheekbones. His face had sharpened from when he was younger, she had not seen him for years in person or in the news, but she had no doubt, the man who had ran into her was: "Malfoy."

The Ministry had acquitted his family's war crimes years ago, but words like "dark arts" and "Deatheater" still bubbled up in her mind. She couldn't help but notice the injustice: that someone like him could walk around unscathed after the war while she… And that, along with her disappointing meeting with Harry and the negative result from her checkup triggered a sudden burst of righteous anger.

She yanked her arm away from his grip. "Were you trying to finish the job your buddies failed at?"

Malfoy looked genuinely taken aback. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't act innocent, we all know you people did this to me," Ginny snapped, gesturing curtly at her leg.

Malfoy glanced down at her leg. It took him a moment to process what she said, but his eyes narrowed as he reached a realization. "You think I…" he broke off, his jaw clenched. "I had nothing to do with your attack."

Ginny felt a pang of satisfaction from his reaction and continued with a cruel smirk. "Perhaps not directly—"

"No. Directly or indirectly, I had no involvement in it," Malfoy cut in, his voice firm.

Ginny snorted dismissively. "Of course not. After all, you are only a Death Eater."

Malfoy sucked in a sharp breath. He looked away through gritted teeth and combed his fingers through his hair. Then, closing his eyes, he let out a deep sigh. "We can't change the past," he said quietly after a long pause. He glanced down at her leg, then looked back up right in her eyes. "I wasn't involved with the attack, Weasley, but I'm sorry about what happened to you."

His words sounded so surprisingly calm and sincere and Ginny wasn't sure how to react. Before she could think of what to say, Malfoy nodded a silent goodbye, and walked away.

—x—x—

There were few people in the Wizarding World who would not recognize the avatar of the creator of Heafen: Amaroc the Maker, a dark elf necromancer with black hair and grey eyes of unknown level and a crisp British accent. Amaroc was prolific in Heafen. He personally shut down user-made worlds that broke Heafen rules against bigotry, surprised unsuspecting fans by participating in quests, and routinely spoke in press conferences and interviews held in the Heafen city-world, Soltay.

Yet, despite all of his Heafen appearances, despite being named "Man of the Year" by The Prophet three years in a row, the real-life identity of the creator was one of Wizarding World's best kept secret. He never attended award ceremonies or public functions. He conducted business meetings with partners and investors strictly in Heafen. If he did attend Heafcon (the largest Heafen fan convention in the world) as rumoured, he never announced himself. The few C-suites like Blaise Zabini who must know who he really was wouldn't speak beyond acknowledging that the creator was an eccentric man.

The mystery spurred on all types of wild rumors. Some said he never made public appearances because he was horribly disfigured in real-life. Some said based on the hair colour of his avatar and his British accent that he could be none other than Harry Potter. Some said he may not be human at all but some sort of sentient magic being that could only interact with the world through Heafen.

When asked about the rumours in interviews, Amaroc the Maker would only shrug, neither confirming or discrediting any of the theories, and say with a tilted smile: "It's better this way."

A/N: Dear prompter, this story is probably a bit different than what you expected when you gave the prompt, but I hope you like it anyway.

Boogum's Prompt (1)

Basic premise: Ginny either joins or is coerced into joining some kind of "therapy group" (you can choose - whether it be an addiction recovery group, anger management, some kind of PTSD group - whatever). The point is that Draco is a member of the same group, much to her chagrin.

Must haves: Post-Hogwarts.

No-no's: Previous DG relationship. Character bashing. Excessive angst.

Rating range: Any

Bonus points: Some quirky or unexpected side characters (for the therapy group members). If Ginny and Draco are forced to draw crayon pictures (or something Draco would find equally ridiculous) as part of the therapy classes. Awkward flirting.