A/N: I'm taking a break from Seven Days to have my turn in an angsty, mystery type D/G.  I just recently got really tired of my other D/G's, even if some people haven't.  So I'm sorry, I don't know when I'll continue that one, but give this one a try!  You never know where the twists may take you.

A lot of questions are raised in this chapter that will be answered in future ones, so don't worry about that!

Disclaimer: I do not own anything except the plot.  Not the wizarding world.  Not Ginny.  Not Draco (*cries*).  Not nothin'! It's all J.K. Rowling's.

Trapped

Chapter 1: The Knight Bus

"The Burrow.  Ottery St. Catchpole," Ginny Weasley said clearly to the young man, not feeling an ounce of anxiety even though it had been one year since she had seen a single member of her family.

She was nineteen, just a year fresh out of Hogwarts. Ginny worked for the Daily Prophet, writing all kinds of articles, usually taking over pieces on Voldemort. She didn't have much faith in other journalists when it came to news concerning that. People always made cracks about 'where was The-Boy-Who-Lived when they needed him'.

Voldemort had gotten stronger, and the deaths were starting again.  A certain murder had hit home when Ginny's family received the letter that Bill, who had been going undercover as a death eater, was killed when Voldemort found out who's side he really was on.  It had been a year ago, and the fact that Ginny hadn't seen her family since was no coincidence.

She hated emotions, and struggled with dealing with them.  Her brother's death caused a hole in her heart and in her family that was never quite mended. When Ginny told her mother that she felt she was being a hassle and had to go look for a flat and work on her own, she promised she would call and would visit often.

Ginny knew then that it wasn't true.  Every time she looked at her family, she thought of Bill.  She would look over at the empty seat at the dinner table, knowing whose body should have been filling it.  Saw his pictures on the dresser, smiling at her as though he were still there.  But she couldn't get to him, she couldn't talk to him, she couldn't touch him. Couldn't smell his cologne, or hear his voice.

So Ginny settled with writing letters.  It made her feel better about the absence from her family's lives.  Ron had said he was off on a job and wouldn't be around for a while, Fred and George were busy with their joke shop, Charlie was still working with dragons in Romania, and Percy still wasn't speaking to his family.

Ginny didn't want to abandon her family like Percy had but months flew by and she hadn't even noticed that it was already a year until she received the letter from a desperate Molly telling her to come down to the Burrow for Christmas. 

Her mother had asked her not to try to apparate or go by floo because the recent attacks had caused her parents to block those means of transportation from the Burrow.

So that was what brought Ginny stepping up onto the Knight Bus after telling the overeager conductor where she was headed.

And with one look in the bus Ginny wanted to run right off it.

Of course, she thought bitterly. Of course Draco Malfoy would be the only other rider on the bus at 8:00 in the morning. Not daring to make eye contact with him, Ginny took a seat in the front by the boy who introduced himself as 'Stan', behind the driver 'Ernie'. 

She immediately knew why Malfoy was in the back of the first level of the bus. It was because no matter how uninterested she seemed to be, how tired she pretended she was, Stan would not shut up.

"Where'ya headed to?"

"Oh, my parent's house. Christmas." She said it almost in a tone that implied it was none of his business, but it rolled off his back.

"What'choo say your name woz?"

Ginny coughed to keep herself from saying that she never mentioned her name to begin with.  And for a reason. "Weasley.  Ginny Weasley."

"Weasley!" Stan looked like he was meeting a movie star, as he gaped at her. "I oughta known it woz! Wich your red 'air! 'Course ya'are!  Dincha know it, too Ern?"

"Ar," said Ernie.

"We get choo Weasley's from time to time. Don' we, Ern? Don' we?"

"Ar."

Ginny wondered how a man of so little words didn't think of killing himself when in the company of Stan.  She was considering it herself. "Yes, well we're a big family."

Ginny heard a derisive snort from the back of the bus, and turned to glare at an impassively innocent Draco Malfoy.  She turned back to Stan, who was saying something, but she didn't actually hear words coming out of his mouth.

She nodded numbly for a while, occasionally muttering 'sorry?' if he had appeared to ask a question, before eventually tuning him out completely.  She laid her head against the cool window. Her eyes drifted close...

Suddenly Ginny was eating happily with her family.  It was Christmas Eve dinner.  She was about to offer some mashed potatoes to Bill, and turned her head to ask him before realizing he wasn't there.  He wouldn't ever be there.  Very numbly she put the plate of potatoes back on the table, before snapping to attention as she heard a loud bang. Someone was at the door! It was Bill! He wasn't gone after all! She lurched ahead to hug him, her arms enveloping over nothing...she was falling forward, forward, forward...

THUD!

Ginny flew off her seat, waking up from her brief slumber.  She threw her hands out in front of her, squatting dog-like in the aisle.  She looked up at a very white-faced Stan, and back at Malfoy who was hanging on to the metal bar above his head for dear life. 

The bus was rocking like crazy, snow was falling steadily out of the windows and Ginny couldn't see anything.  Suddenly with a horrible jolt she felt something heavy push into her hip, realizing it was the bus itself.

The entire left side had caved in with a bang as they crashed into something in the area.  They were falling now.  Tumbling.  She lost sight of everything, and gave up the inevitable, letting her body fly with the bus.  At one point she heard Stan's screams, saw Ernie fall away from the wheel.

And in the next moment, everything went black.

***

"Ow! Oy, god, what? I'm up, I'm up!" Ginny's hands sunk into the snow as she hoisted herself into sitting position.  She glared at her surroundings, for a moment forgetting why she was here before remembering her horrible misfortune.  "My god, Malfoy. Though throwing a snowball at me from miles away was effective, I think simply shaking me out of my near coma would have been less painful."

Malfoy glared down at her, not miles but feet away.  He crossed his arms. "What a cute thing to think.  Me, putting a clean hand on filth."

Ginny snarled in response. 'Clean hand' was a small overstatement.  On the contrary, both of Malfoy's hands were cut up and streaked with dried blood.  She then inspected her own body, taking note of the bruises on each arm and the sharp pain that presented itself whenever she made a sudden twist of movement in her hip.  "Oh yes," she said sarcastically, gritting her teeth as she barely managed to heave herself into standing position with the help of her weak arms. "I forgot that all Weasley's have cooties."

Malfoy shrugged. "Bound to have some sort of disease."

Frustrated, Ginny kicked at the light layer of snow that stretched on for miles. "Where are we?"

"Oh, damn," Malfoy said in mock incredulity. "Can you believe I forgot my map?"

"Fine. Fine," Ginny muttered looking around idly. "It's just, there isn't a road for ages."

"Yes, well, the Knight Bus hardly cares about roads."  His eyes traveled to the beaten up bus lying on its side a few yards away.

"I know!" she snapped.

"That's a first."

"What did we crash into?"

Malfoy laughed aloud at her.  It was so cold she could see his breath. "I was a little pre-occupied with trying to literally hold on to my life."

Ginny vaguely remembered seeing him gripping the hand bar for dear life before she had blacked out. "But there's nothing out here! It's just flat lands and mountains way in the distance!" She outstretched her arms fully spinning around before looking at Malfoy again. "We're in the middle of nowhere."

"Well how the hell am I supposed to know?" He shoved his hands into the pockets of his heavy black cloak, desperately trying to keep warm. "Maybe we crashed a while back, and the fall brought us out here."

"Yeah," she laughed to herself. "Maybe."

"Look you can go crazy out here trying to figure out the mysteries of the world, but if you can stand life without me, I'll be leaving now."

"Huh?" Ginny mumbled dumbly.

The derision from Malfoy's voice was so thick that Ginny could practically feel it giving her a blow to the stomach. "Weasley, we're magic."

She hated him talking to her like she was an idiot.  She was one of the most respected columnists for the Daily Prophet! Who the hell was he? "So what are you going to do?  Try to summon your broom from your Manor to...Oh wait, we don't know where we are."

Malfoy blinked. "No, Weasley.  I'm going to do a little trick I learned around 7th year.  And no it's not the killing curse – because if I knew that I would have used it already."  Ginny wasn't sure if he meant using it on himself, or on her.  She decided she didn't want to know. "Apparate."

Of course! She was too proud of him for reminding her that that was an option to be mad.  She would simply apparate to Ottery St. Catchpole.  If she couldn't apparate directly into the Burrow because of the spells protecting it, she could at least be a lot closer to it than she was now.  Or least have some idea of where she even was. 

Ginny squeezed her eyes tight, her hands balled into fists at her side as she thought of the quaint little town where she used to live.  The cute houses.  The sight of her many leveled teetering home.  The way you could practically smell her mother's cooking from miles away...

Five minutes passed.

She squinted an eye open, and then the other only to meet the blistering cold, and gentle snow. Malfoy still stood in front of her. "Malfoy."

His eyes were closed.

"It's not working," she said faintly.

"Shut up, Weasley." He practically sing-songed it out in utter annoyance.

"Malfoy we can't apparate."

"I'm concentrating, Weasley."

"Malfoy!"

"Weasley!" he snapped loudly, eyes still shut. "I'm trying to pretend that when I open my eyes I will find myself in the comfort of my Manor.  Away from this place. Away from you.  Hearing your whiny voice is sort of ruining this fantasy for me."

"Ooh!" she squealed out in blatant irritation. 

Malfoy reluctantly opened his eyes meeting the sight of her face.  The last thing he wanted to see at that moment.  "You know what? It's protected." He laughed. "This fucking place is blocked from apparation!"

Ginny flinched at the curse word.  It reminded her of Ron, who always got in trouble for cursing at home.  She wished so badly at the moment that she hadn't taken a year to realize how much she missed her family.  "Great," she mumbled, fighting the urge to mention how suspicious this was.  She and Draco Malfoy were stranded because of a crash that can't be explained, into the middle of nowhere that just happens to be blocked from apparation.

"Well what are we going to do now?"

Malfoy shook his head. "Does it look like I know?  Maybe the Knight Bus still runs.  I can get myself the hell out of here..."

Ginny was about to note that he hadn't said get us the hell out of here, when she remembered something.  "Malfoy! Ernie and Stan!" She felt like the biggest creep in the world.  She had forgot about the driver and conductor.

Malfoy's eyes widened, suddenly glancing over at the Knight Bus.  "C'mon," he muttered, jogging over to it.

For a split second Ginny had the urge to whoop for joy at actually doing something right, but then realized that she shouldn't be caring what Malfoy thought of her anyway.

Ginny followed him, stopping at the tipped over bus.  She walked around it, hoping that the reason Ernie and Stan hadn't come out of the bus was because the door was now the ceiling and they couldn't reach it, rather than the fact that they might not be alive. "One of us is going to have to climb up there, and open the door to get them out." 

"Okay," said Malfoy. "I'll give you a boost."

"Why me!?"  Her voice came out shrill.

Malfoy shrugged. "Why not?" He smirked, almost daring her to tell him that it was because she was a girl and wasn't strong enough, physically or mentally.

Ginny would have rather eaten a flobberworm.

She grumbled in response, and stepped up onto the first wheel, which was flat on the ground.  She outstretched her arms, managing to grip onto the second wheel above her. She hung limply from the wheel for a moment, before mustering all her strength together, and hoisting herself inch by inch, up and then over.

With a groan, Ginny managed to end up standing atop the wheel, and carefully walked over to the door.

"Do you see them?" she heard Malfoy call.

Ginny looked down through the door. "They're in there..." she bit her lip, looking at the motionless bodies which were crumpled near the drivers seat. "I think they're...knocked out or something."  At least I hope so, she thought.

"Alohomora," she muttered, watching the door spring open, proud of herself for not complaining to Draco that the door was locked and having to have him remind her for the second time that she was a witch.

Ginny looked down sadly.  They looked so helpless.  She wished she hadn't been so mean to Stan.  Quickly brushing that out of her thoughts, she performed a levitation charm on them both, and made them float down to the ground.

"All right," she heard Malfoy say. "They're down."

Ginny nodded, even though he couldn't see her, and a little sloppily, hopped off the bus, landing on all fours.  Malfoy didn't even look at her, let alone offer to help her up.

Huffily, Ginny stood brushing snow off her beige pea coat, wondering why she ever bought the stupid thing since it barely was keeping her warm, and snow was seeping straight through it. 

Ginny walked over to Malfoy, and looked down at Ernie and Stan lying next to each other in the snow. 

Very suddenly she realized what was wrong with the picture.

"Malfoy..." the blood rushed from Ginny's face.  She felt lightheaded. "They're not moving."

"Well one hardly moves when knocked out or in a coma," he snarled.

Ginny was too scared to worry about him making fun of her. "I mean their stomachs. Their stomachs aren't moving.  They – They're not breathing."

She bent down to touch Stan's hand, and jolted back.  It was freezing cold. She was pretty sure it had nothing to do with the weather.

"What are you talking about?" he drawled.  He looked down apprehensively.  "They don't have a cut or a scratch on them," he snapped, bending down.

Ginny reached for Ernie's pulse, then Stan's. "They're not breathing," she repeated. Her voice was shaking now.

"Weasley, the bus didn't even get hit in the front! The blow was from the side!"

"I know that!" She was panicking now. Ginny swallowed hard.

"Malfoy, there's no pulse," she said faintly, locking her eyes with his. "They're dead."

A/N: Well, my little lambs, that's all for chapter one.  Bear with me on this, I know a lot of things don't make sense but trust me; it's all going to come together by the end.  And I admit, there are a few things even I'm not sure about right now, but I'll figure it out! Heh! For now, just enjoy!

I can't say when chapter 2 will be up, considering I'm a little hazy on exactly where I want this story to take me and because school's starting on Wednesday *cringes*, but I'll get it up A.S.A.P.

For now tell me what you thought, by reviewing!  I love and worship reviewers! :)