Ascension

Chapter One: Dream

JokersAceInTheHole

I'm falling in the black

Slipping through the cracks

Falling to the depths can I ever go back

Dreaming of the way it used to be

-Falling Inside the Black, Skillet

Warnings for this chapter: Mentions of Rape/Mind-rape, gore

Blood dripped in front of anguished green eyes. Black hair blood-slicked against a bruised forehead. Chapped lips torn open and bleeding, releasing a tormented scream that bounced around stone walls painfully.

"I-I'll tell you I'll tell you!" He coughed out along side drops of crimson. The manic grin of his tormentor tapered off into a mockingly contemplative look.

"Giving in already half-blood? I thought your little friends meant more to you." Yeah, until Snake-face didn't kill me and drove me at least half insane in little under two months. A tantalizing grin slid over perfectly sculpted lips. "Does bawby Potter want to go back to his friends?"

"Yeah actually." The smack of flesh on flesh alerted him to his slip of the tongue and he couldn't help but wince- not from the pain but the stupidity.

"What was that?" The Frizzy hair of the head of Voldemort's T&I division obscured his vision as slate grey eyes lowered to his level. "Did you say something, filth?"

He didn't even have it in him to feel insulted that his whimper wasn't faked. Satisfaction flashed across her eyes and she stroked his blood-streaked cheek fondly, drawing another flinch. They may have stolen his glasses but a regiment of vision corrective potions let him see every gory detail of his torture.

"I didn't think so." Her hips swaying, she sauntered out of the room, leaving him lying face-down on the stone slab she had left him on breathing heavily.

Once she was out of sight he checked himself over mentally. Left wrist: rebroken. Scalp: bleeding, various burns. Right knee: multiple incisions. Left shin: fractured. He winced and felt out the rest of his bruises and burns, seeing his hand shaking made him hold back a curse. Just because they couldn't drive him to insanity didn't mean that he wasn't subjected to the cruciatius hourly. Without moving from his face-down position he clenched his fists angrily.

He was weak, he was traitorous, he was just a stupid boy who was playing hero and failing. Epically. He swallowed, or tried to and almost threw up at the taste of blood, he must have bit his tongue again- good thing he couldn't feel it. And lucky for him he hadn't bit it off.

His eyes flicked instinctively towards the door as it opened. No matter how tired he was it was important to know exactly what it was you were going to be subjected to so you could prepare. His tired eyes widened briefly. Snape? But he had been killed hadn't he? But no… he never came back to Order Headquarters… he could have survived… defect? Or prisoner?

Studiously ignoring his burning gaze the potions master rooted around a cabinet nearby pulling out four blue-tinted vials. He placed them on a table and turned towards the door. His hand hovering over the doorknob he stilled and cast one look over his shoulder. He turned before Harry could get a full read but he had seen pity, disgust, resignation and something else… perhaps self-pity, but why the self serving git thought he should pity himself was beyond him.

"Dream…" The whisper was so quiet Harry had to strain to make it out over his labored breathing. "Forget… for your sake."

And with that he swept out of the room. Harry swallowed; bile stinging at his raw throat. What was he telling him? That he… understood? Empathized? Painfully Harry shifted enough that his left arm, trapped under his stomach came loose enough to remove. Slowly he moved the arm into the range of his sight, flinching once more at the raw, burning dark mark branded into his skin.

Angrily he branded the sight into his mind, swearing to himself he would never forget. A flicker of Bellatrix's crucio shot up his spine and he twitched, lowering his arm to his side. Why hadn't she come back already? Was she just letting him stew in his regret, his pain- not that they had never done that.

His eyes flickered as his tormentor re-entered the room. "How did it feel Harry?" She twisted his name around her tongue seductively and he shivered and flinched, "seeing your beloved potions master again?" He flicked his eyes away. A wand rested in a deceptively contemplative position against Bellatrix's lips. "He never went back did he…" A feral grin warped her expression and she leaned down slightly and looked him in the face, "Couldn't have when the information was ripped from his head… could he?" The last was said in a gentle lilting voice that made Harry grit his teeth painfully and agitate his broken jaw.

Ripped from Snape's head? But he was the greatest Occulency master Harry had ever heard of… able to block both Dumbledore and Voldemort- well not anymore it seemed.

Bellatrix was talking again and he found his attention drawn back to her. "Pity about that isn't it… you see, there's a problem with tearing memories. The Fidelus makes them distorted to protect itself." Her eyes bored into his and he forced himself not to swallow fearfully, "So tell me," she purred, "Where is the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix located?"

Harry hesitated for all of two seconds before a crucio brought a scream from his lips. "Tut tut Harry I don't need to convince you again do I?"

Harry was morbidly tempted to spit in her face- not that he could draw up enough spit to do it even if he had the guts. Her eyes tightened around the corners and he drew back quickly in on himself, his back stretching and re-opening his heavily dispersed scabs as he curled into the fetal position, whimpering. "I'll tell…" His words were quiet but he knew she heard them clearly.

A delicate hand curled in his hair then tightened and pulled his head up so he was looking at her. "Where?"

"Th-the Burrow… O-Ottery St. Catchpole…" An insane laugh and the release of pressure on his head made it clear that the madwoman above him remembered exactly where the Order was located. He hurt so much- and not just from his wounds. He did it for him and now they would pay the price for his selfishne… wait but he was always selfless. Always doing things for their sake.

A resolve settled itself in his chest, easing away a bit of the pain. He barely noticed as Bellatrix all but skipped out of the room. He had every right to be selfish, every right to let them burn. They all knew where he was, they all knew that he was being interrogated daily but had there been a rescue party? No- because they would be sure to gloat over how many they had killed or wounded to crush him even more. Which meant that they didn't care that they were found- or they assumed he was too nice to give them up.

A sneer curled on his lips and he pulled even closer in on himself in the cold room. He was being selfish for once, because this gut-wrenching, nerve-searing pain wasn't worth it. There was always Grimuald place- he almost spat when he realized that he was the secret keeper there as well- for headquarters, and Lupin's place, and even Hogwarts if it came down to it. If they were smart they would escape with minimal casualties. He frowned when he realized another possibility- that they thought they were safe because they thought he would never give in. Which would mean that they would be as off guard as his parents had been that night.

No! He wasn't Wormtail!

"You should have died! Died rather than betray your friends- as they would have done for you!" Harry whimpered at the reminder of his godfather's words. Was he that Wormtail? They hadn't given him a chance to die- a chance to choose death, just this furious, relentless onslaught of pain and threats and cajoling and kindness- it was enough to make his head spin! Enough that even that vital piece of information was worth nothing.

He brought his shaking arms up quickly, not even having energy to hiss in pain. His trembling fingers closed around hair stiff with dry blood, drawing strength from his tightening hold. Nails scraped against a burned scalp and brought a choked yelp to his bloody lips. Stupid- that's what he was. Foolish, cruel, betrayer. What would Sirius have thought of him?

A vision of the madness clear on his godfather's face when Pettegrew was revealed flickered in his consciousness; a replay of his furious sneer and threats to kill and a sob built up in his throat. Funny, how giving up had hurt more than anything Bellatrix could ever come up with. He shivered and brought his arms around himself, clutching painfully to bloody and bruised shoulders. This was too much for anyone… much too much for him.

He flinched at the surfacing memory of a meaty hand tightening in his hair painfully. He turned his face against the cold stone slab beneath him, drawing a sickening sense of comfort from the reality of now. The Dursleys had been a popular torture subject with multiple grotesque mind-raping episodes courtesy of Rudolphus Lestrange. He twisted his mouth into a pained grimace and all but tried to bury his face in the stone.

The husband of Bellatrix Lestrange had a disturbing talent with distorting memories. Making people think things had happened to them that they knew with absolute certainty only seconds before had never happened. He could hear the slapping of flesh against flesh, could hear angry shouts and threats and sickly danger, could taste bitterness he had never known before on his tongue, could feel the burn of soreness in his lower back and hated it. Hated him with such fervor and passion that he found it hard to remember it had never happened. Made him cooperate with the madwoman before her husband could pervert his memories of his godfather, parents, friends; before he could make him hate them.

With another shiver and a silent sob Harry slowly slipped into unconsciousness. Subconsciously remembering Snape's words only half and hour or so before, Dream... Forget… For your sake.

Sneak peak into next chapter:

"It doesn't work Sam, there's no use."

"Oh come on Danny- why don't you just see what you can do. Wouldn't it be cool if we could get it to work?"