Title: This is My Kingdom Come
Rating: T
Paring: Fred/Hermione
Summary: Lights were surrounding Fred. Everything around him was too bright. Fred was dying, and nothing could save him now. He sucked in a breath and closed his eyes. "Please, god… Let me live." He whispered. He let Fred Weasley survive, living is going to be up to Fred. And it's going to be a lot harder when all Fred can think about is returning to the lights.

Fred kind of really needed to scratch his nose. It was itchy, but now didn't seem like a good time. Potentially life threatening and all that jazz. If he took a moment to scratch the itch on his nose, well, it'd probably be the last thing Fred would ever do and that would suck as an obituary. 'Fred Weasley. Died from scratching his nose during an explosion.'

Because, you know, Fred Weasely was in the middle of a battle. Dumbledore's Army was fighting to keep You-Know-Who out of Hogwarts, again, and it wasn't going so well.

And wow, battles were messier than Fred had remembered. He'd fought in two battles now, and several skirmishes, but he'd forgotten about the general chaos. It was basically impossible to keep track of anything, or anyone. It was all just heat and noise and motion.

Fred twitched his nose before firing off another spell in an attempt to relieve the irritation. It didn't work. It seemed to get worse, actually.

He thought it might be harder to keep track of who was on which side. Thankfully it wasn't too hard. The Hogwart students and what was left of the Order had shed their robes and wearing their plain clothes instead. The Death Eaters were still wearing their robes. Still, Fred was glad he was stuck with the job of protecting the secret tunnels. It also helped that the Death Eaters had masks on. It made it easier to pick out who he needed to hit. If you had a weird white face, you were getting hit by a spell.

Maybe if he rubbed his nose against his shoulder he could get rid of the itch before anyone could hit him.

Percy was on Fred's left, and Fred was fairly certain that Hannah Abbot was somewhere behind him. He thought he had seen Harry and Ron, but he was probably imagining it. His mind was wandering and it was not a good time to have drifting thoughts.

If his bloody nose would stop itching he could focus a bit more.

"I'm resigning!" Fred only caught the tail end of Percy's words, but they warmed his heart and made him laugh in glee. His brother-the one he thought had betrayed him and would never come back-was fighting by his side against the Minister himself! And he was joking, how could Fred not laugh and love him?

Constant vigilance!

Moody's words came flooding back to Fred the moment he turned towards Percy. His mouth was moving, laughing and talking without his consent.

"You're joking, Perce!" He knew he needed to keep his attention on what was going on behind him, around him. There was a battle underway and being distracted by a joke was not a good idea. Especially when it sounded like they had a giant in the tunnel beside him. Which really didn't make too much sense because logistically it was impossible to fit a giant in the tunnels.

Not to mention, if Fred was going to get distracted from firing spells, it needed to be because he was scratching his extremely annoying, and irritated, nose.

The moment you're not paying attention, your enemy will be!

Moody's warning hammered through Fred's head with the force of a blast. He could feel it drumming through his entire body. A flash of light in his peripheral vision caught his attention and he spun his head to the left to see what it was. There wasn't anything there. He'd been hallucinating.

"I haven't heard you joke-" Another light, a figure this time. It was burly and looked like it had a cane. An oddly familiar form. Fred couldn't focus on it before it was gone. "Since-" something was very, very off. Time wasn't right anymore. Percy was moving too slowly. In fact, he wasn't moving at all. Nobody was.

Fred forgot about his nose. He forgot about the fact that he was supposed to be keeping 'constant vigilance!' And that this was probably just a trap. Fred was freaked. He spun around, and realized that nothing around him was moving. Everything was frozen. He blinked and noticed something in his peripheral. He spun to his right and the figure of light was back. It was more solid now.

Fred blinked again, and gasped when he opened his eyes.

Lights, lights were everywhere, completely surrounding him. Figures, he almost recognized them. They were so familiar. Friendly faces he knew.

They were warning him. Fred had no idea how he knew that, but he did. The lights- the figures- were warning him about something. He tried to ask, tried to open his mouth, but he couldn't.

Then, as quickly as they appeared, they were gone and time was moving again. Percy's face, which had just been spread in a joyful smile, was now drawn in utter terror. His mouth was opening up, he was shouting something. What was he trying to say? Fred had no idea, he just knew in his gut that it was a warning.

It was a little too late. A warm blast came from Fred's right, and then it was surrounding him. Stones flew through the air, and hit Fred. Pain instantly flourished throughout his body, and he heard distinct cracking sounds echo in his ears. He was fairly certain those were his bones.

Help! Fred couldn't even speak the word as he fell to the floor in a crumbled heap. He'd never felt so much pain before. It was already consuming him, already making his heart stop. It was alarming but there wasn't time to think it through. His brain wouldn't stop gathering information about every single part of his body that was breaking long enough for him to accept the pain.

Please, God. Let me live. He had no doubt in his racing mind that was what was happening to him. Fred Weasley knew he was dying, and it scared him senseless.

He was barely able to feel the pain as the back of his head cracked against the floor. That was the nice thing about the human body. It could only record pain in so many places at once. Between his crushed legs, his slashed arms, his cracked ribs, and the rest of his slowly burning body, his head probably thought it was a bad time to complain. Which was wrong on his head's part. Fred would welcome the pain in his head as a distraction from the rest of his screaming body.

Something very weird was going on with Fred's breathing. Or rather, not going on with it. He was sucking in air for all he was worth, but his lungs weren't responding. They weren't taking the air in, or pushing it out. They were stagnate. It was almost like the signals his brain was sending were getting lost in route.

This was what terror felt like. His entire body was throbbing with it. Every sense was saturated with the absolutely horrible feeling. The all-consuming fear was robbing him of thought, and his failing body couldn't fight the fear off.

Something in his leg shifted, cracked, and he realized, with a fresh jolt of pain, that someone was trying to get to him through the mess of boulders. He couldn't see, well, no, that wasn't quite right. His eyes were open and they were passing images onto his brain, and his brain was receiving those images, it just wasn't doing anything with that information. Fred couldn't make sense of what he was seeing.

It was an utterly bizarre feeling, and one he really, really hated.

Fred needed his twin. Where was George? He'd been assigned to a different tunnel... He wouldn't be there to see Fred. That was good, Fred didn't want George to see him die, even though he wanted the comfort of his twin's presences. He wouldn't be that selfish. He didn't want George to blame himself for not saving Fred. He'd hate to have to watch George die. He'd rather die alone than hurt George in that way.

He couldn't hear either. Actually, now that he thought about it, the only sense that was working was feel. That sense was working brilliantly. Unfortunately, because Fred still felt a hell of a lot of pain. His skull kind of felt like it was on fire, engulfing his head and burning him up from the inside out. He tried to cry out and couldn't. So his vocal chords were on the no-go list as well.

And suddenly, on the next attempted inhale, there wasn't so much pain. His vision kicked back in, but it wasn't quite right. Everything around him was too bright. It reminded Fred of when his mum would throw the curtains back to wake George and him up. Everything was just light. There were odd shapes in the light as well. Fred blinked and couldn't help but wonder if he'd died and just woke up in heaven. He would have laughed at the thought if he could get air in his lungs. Fred had never believed in Heaven. He really should have though, all things considered, because they'd spent the last few years in Hell. And, if Hell existed, then Heaven probably did.

But no, Fred didn't believe in heaven, so what was going on?

One of the forms came nearer and got a bit clearer. Fred could finally make out that it was a man. He'd guess the man was a little older than himself. He had fiery red hair that stuck out in all directions. His brown eyes were extremely familiar, and his smile was comforting, oddly so. Fred knew this man, he was sure of it, but he couldn't place him.

A warm breeze blew over Fred and made him shudder. It warmed his chilled body and, strangely, cleared his. Fred groaned, it seemed the thing to do. After all, he had just been dying. Groaning was the only way to express the pain he had been in. There wasn't currently any pain, but Fred was wary of its return.

Oh god, he was going to go insane. He was going to go mad and then he was going to die.

"Fred..." A deep voice vibrated through the air. It seemed to completely envelope Fred. "My dear Fred."

Yep, he was going mad. At least he wasn't in pain anymore. And the lights were beautiful. Fred didn't mind going mad if it was like this.

"Fred, you've grown so." The figure drew nearer, his brown eyes filled with love. "You're so close to the end. You're very nearly there."

So, the person knew him then… Who was he? Why did he look so utterly familiar? He wasn't the same figure that had tried to warn him earlier either. That one had been carrying a cane or something.

Fred tried to open his mouth and talk, but he just made a croaking noise. Please, God. Let me live! He thought again, a bit more desperately as he started struggling to move, to breathe, to do anything at all. The red-head knelt beside him and brought a bright hand to his face. He cupped Fred's cheek and smiled softly, his brown eyes twinkling. A strange peace filled Fred at the light touch and he wanted nothing more than to close his eyes and bask in the wonderful feeling. It was contentment and belonging and pain-free. It was utter euphoria. He could stay in it forever. It was pure bliss, the likes of which Fred had never experienced before.

"Don't worry, Fred. I'm your guard." The man whispered, his eyes holding Fred's. "I won't hurt you." He leaned in closer and smiled like he was about to tell Fred a big secret. "It's not your time to go."

That didn't make any sense to Fred, but he couldn't find the will to care. He just wanted to close his eyes. He figured if he was going mad, he might as well enjoy it.

"I'm sorry, Fred, but I can't let you do that. You need to wake up." The figures voice started to change with those words, growing higher, shrill almost. He knew the voice instantly. Percy.

The light disappeared and Fred sucked in a breath with a horrible rush of nausea. The pain was back with a vengeance, but he could see now. And breathe. Which, all things considered, was a bit of a relief.

Percy was bent over Fred's head, his face uncomfortably close. His blue eyes were wide, tear filled, and unblinking. He had a gash on his right cheek that was really deep, Fred could almost see bone. It would have made him sick a few years ago, but he'd seen much worse injuries since he'd left Hogwarts.

Another figure tipped forward and Fred recognized him as Ron. He looked even worse than Percy, but Fred couldn't focus on his baby brother before Harry and Hermione were filling his vision. They were all pulling at him. Pushing rubble off his body and trying to get him away as other figures shot at the creatures emerging from the hole in the wall.

Fred gasped for air, his entire body convulsing in shock or pain. Fred didn't know which. He didn't know anything. Well, no, that wasn't true. He did know one thing.

He was alive.

A/N: My cousin asked me to do this. I think she might have started the story, but decided it wouldn't be her style. Because she took such good care of me during my last year, I'm going to write this for her. If anyone out there has a story they'd like me to write, send me the summary/prompt, and I'll see about writing it :)

Also, to everyone who reviewed Part of the Pack... I'm utterly speechless. I've never read such sweet comments. I actually had to stop reading and just cry from the sheer number of feelings you all managed to raise in me. And I don't honestly cry easily. So, thank you. It really means more to me than I can ever say. I've actually considered trying to convert that story (part of the pack) into an actual novel. It was really near and dear to my heart and I think it could change fairly nicely... What are all your thoughts?

Ps. This will be a bit more angsty of a story, but happy endings will happen. I can't write un happy endings. Real life has enough of those for my taste.