He Who Walks Between Worlds

Dark for Death Business

Beginning Notes

All characters belong to J. K. Rowling 

This is a long one. Enjoy!

Ginny

By two days after Halloween, Ginny was fed up. Hermione was hanging out with Harry and Ron again, Nico was sick, her quidditch friends were too afraid of tempting Umbridge's wrath to hang out, and Michael was avoiding her for some unknown reason. So when she saw Luna slipping off with a cup of tea after dinner, she followed her. Luna always drank juice or water, but Michael liked tea.

Luna led Ginny to the library, and then to a space hidden away at the very back of the voluminous room. The space was a mess. It was a forest of books blanketed in a snow of paper. In the midst of half a dozen open books, scribbling furiously, sat Michael. He was a mess. His fingers were smudged with ink. His eyes were shadowed with lack of sleep--or was it just ink smudges?

Luna handed Michael the cup of tea. He took it, pulled another book towards him, took a gulp of tea, then set the cup down next to another, empty cup. Luna sat cross-legged nearby and began drawing on a blank sheet of paper.

"Michael?" Ginny said. He looked up. "Ginny?"

"What are you doing?" Ginny asked.

"The temperatures are too low," Michael said, pointing at two long rolls of paper. "The thermometers aren't broken."

Ginny pause, trying to make sense of what he had said. "Have you eaten or slept recently?"

"Not since Halloween," Michael admitted. This made Ginny feel slightly better. If Michael was too absorbed in whatever he was doing to eat or sleep, of course he would be too busy for Ginny. She was still annoyed and frustrated. She had thought Luna was the crazy one! 

"You need to eat and sleep," Ginny chided crossly, helping him up. She made to let go, but he swayed on his feet. Luna quickly took his arm and steadied him.

"I need to figure it out," he objected, but he had little strength to protest as they led him away from his books and notes and towards the door of the library. Ginny's frustration was quickly giving way to curiosity about what had possessed Michael so. Only the knowledge that Michael likely would not be able to explain in an intelligible manner in this state, and also that it might make him refuse to leave stopped her.

"My thermometers!" Michael exclaimed.

"I'll get them," Ginny said. To Luna she said: "Can you take him to Ravenclaw Tower?"

"I'm fine; I can walk by myself," Michael said. His steps were steady as he walked to the door. Nonetheless, Luna still held his hand in hers, and he did not pull away.

Ginny smiled. They were so cute together! She went back to find the thermometers. She found them quickly. On top of a case labelled 'Body Temperature Records' were four long rolls of paper slowly scrolling while four quills remained fixed in place, drawing long lines as the paper moved. Floating above the papers and next to the quills were four mercury thermometers with their ends encased in blobs of metal. Peering closer, she saw labels on each of the thermometers: 'Hermione', 'Nico', 'Michael', 'Ginny' and 'Luna'.

Ginny was wary of touching Michael's apparatus. She pondered for a moment, then -- "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The quill and the mercury for the thermometer labelled "Ginny" began moving to the left. Ginny froze, worried she had messed it up. Michael would be so mad. Then it stalled and began creeping slowly back to the right. Before anything else could happen, she floated it out of the library, and to the Ravenclaw Tower.