12. HADRIAN'S DREAM
Under a blue sky stretching like a vast mantle over a beach of golden sand, Hadrian Percival laughed with his friends. Hermione, Ron, Neville, Luna, and Ginny.
In the distance stood a small wooden cabin—simple, rustic, with smoke curling lazily from its chimney.
The girls wore shorts and swimwear, and the boys wore only trunks, their light footsteps marking the damp sand as they played an energetic game of handball. Hadrian was happy, they all were, and there was not a single problem in the world.
And how could there be, when everything was perfect? From the salty wind that cradled their laughter to the sunlight warming the sand beneath their feet—everything was perfect.
Sirius Black was happy as well; shirt unbuttoned, expression relaxed, he had joined in the game, earning a few admiring sighs from Ginny with his bold maneuvers. Everything breathed harmony—the shimmering sun, the dancing waves. Peace surrounded them.
But like the breath of a curse, the horizon suddenly darkened. Dense purple clouds swallowed the light, and a glacial silence replaced the laughter. Before Hadrian could react, black lightning ripped across the sky, striking the bodies around him.
One by one, his friends dissolved into spirals of silver smoke as the bolts struck, leaving behind only the echo of screams lost in the void.
Neville reached out in desperation. Luna offered him one last serene look. Ginny tried to run into his arms but vanished like mist as the lightning touched her.
Hermione called his name before dissipating, and Hadrian tried to gather the drifting pieces of smoke with his hands, but it was useless.
A voice shouted for him—Sirius, still standing on the sand now turned to ash.
"Hadrian!" cried his godfather, his voice hoarse with panic as luminous cracks began splitting through his body. "Help me, please, don't—"
A thunderclap silenced him, reducing him to a veil of ashes that fell onto the beach.
Hadrian remained frozen.
But then, from the swirling dust, a tall figure rose, wrapped in shadows fluid as water. Its eyes shone like red beacons, and it fixed them on the raging clouds. With a casual motion of its hand—as if soothing a feral beast—the storm, once colossal as a black hole devouring stars and planetary bodies, shrank and folded into the size of a melon through sheer tyrannical will, strong enough to bend mountains and pull down the sky itself.
The figure hurled it toward the cabin. The wooden doors slammed shut like hungry jaws, swallowing the storm, which roared from inside like an imprisoned beast.
The once-churning sea smoothed into glass. The sun timidly broke through the clouds again. Even the air seemed to sigh in relief.
Hadrian knelt on the sand, ashes slipping between his fingers.
The figure approached, leaning down to observe him. When it spoke, its voice was both merciless and mocking.
"— Are you going to stay there? Trembling because of a bargain-bin nightmare?"
The red eyes blinked, cracking with disappointment.
"Honestly, I expected more from me… I mean, from you."
Hadrian slowly lifted his face, meeting the distorted reflection of himself.
"I couldn't save them."
The Other rolled its eyes dramatically.
"You are unbearably tragic, Hadrian. It's as if Shakespeare decided to write a soap opera."
"You don't understand."
"I do—and it's time to wake up from this pathetic little play."
"Wake up?"
Without warning, a hand pierced Hadrian's chest and tore out his heart. He saw it beating in the Other's grasp before he could even process it.
A pull dragged him into the void, and the last sounds assaulting his ears were screams—perhaps his own—mixing with the distant ticking of a clock.
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