Work Text:
He should not, he thinks, be able to count his breaths by the way the blood bubbles out of his chest, but he can and he is. The raid had gone wrong from the get-go, even before they set out from the office really. Several of the Aurors slotted for taking part in the raid had not shown up – sick children, sick themselves, even a few non-work related injuries not quickly healed at St. Mungo’s – but despite being heavily short-handed the Head Auror had demanded the raid go through.
When he’d tried to speak up, tried to do something that would see all of them coming home alive at the end of the shift, all he’d gotten was a derisive ‘What, Malfoy, haven’t had time to warn your murdering buddies yet?’. It had stung, it really had, but considering that his partner had looked murderous enough to leave Head Auror Callins as a pile of ashes had he met her eyes, it hadn’t cut as deep as it would have when he was a Junior Auror.
He had protested again as they lay in wait outside a building that, according to good intel, housed the headquarters of an international smuggling ring specialised in heavily addictive potions, but again no one listened to him – not even when his partner tried.
She was the Woman-Who-Conquered, she’d muttered sotto voice to him a short while later, one would think they’d listen to her. They should listen to both of them, considering their case closure rate, but no, one was a former coerced Death Eater and the other was just a silly little girl.
When Callins called the start of the raid, Draco could still see her muttering to herself, lips moving and suppressed gestures galore. She was nevertheless only half a step behind him, the position she always took when they were on raids – she considered herself his ace up his sleeve because behind his comparably bulky frame her tiny one was nigh-on invisible.
They advanced on the building, every Auror covered by a disillusionment charm keyed to let the Auror department see through it. The place looked empty, but appearances can be deceiving, and this smuggling ring was frightfully clever about everything they did.
No one would ever be sure of who cast the first curse, nor where it came from, but three minutes and twenty-seven seconds after the Auror raid had started, a bone breaker curse was thrown into the midst of the Auror contingent – and no one knew if it came from within or from the outside.
Susan Bones was the first to go down, a Reducto to the shoulder caving half her chest in before she managed to trigger her emergency portkey. At Draco’s side, Heather Potter fought like a woman possessed, pale wand flashing in the dim moonlight. Draco, in turn, shielded both her and the others best he could, taking potshots at where he thought the curses were coming from in-between Protegos and conjured brick walls.
Zack Smith went down next, a piercing curse to the throat an ignoble end that not even he deserved, Draco felt.
They were two Aurors down, several minor injuries among the ones left at the site, but they weren’t getting overwhelmed. It seemed like the smugglers didn’t know how to fight when they didn’t have the upper hand of surprise guiding them along, especially not when they were up against Heather. She was a powerhouse in her own right, and with Draco there to shield her she didn’t have to waste power on that but could concentrate on cursing them back and trying to overcome their shields in turn.
That’s when someone threw a curse Draco didn’t recognise by sight, and he hadn’t heard the incantation either – in reflex he threw up another brick wall between the spell and themselves. He regretted that choice badly when the brick wall exploded. As he went down, already choking on his own blood, Heather went supernova.
He couldn’t trigger his portkey either, so all he could do was lay beneath the rubble of his exploded brick wall, count his breaths by the way his blood bubbled out of his chest, and hope against hope that maybe, he’d survive this as well.
“Draco!” Heather gasped when she returned from the building, a hideout now overrun by Aurors, the mastermind behind attacking the raiding party incapacitated. Draco wasn’t certain what had happened to him, but he knew Heather had been the first to find him – and while Heather was unfailingly kind, she did not know the meaning of mercy.
“Hey,” he started, blood bubbling out between his lips at the slight exertion. He was about to continue when what little air he had left in him was forced out in a violent coughing fit, his entire body straining against the pain.
“Shh, shh, don’t try to speak,” she shushed him, smoothing his hair out of his face in a gesture so achingly kind it almost hurt as much as the coughing, if in a different way. She leant back slightly to look around the battle site, scanning every moving person as quickly as she could. “Where is the bloody healer?!”
“Heh,” Draco gasped out in reply, voice barely more than a whisper, blood staining his every word. “I don’t think… they’ll come… in time, Heather love.”
“Oh, you don’t get to do that to me!” Heather said, laying one hand on his cheek. She looked incredibly fond beneath the worry, and Draco – for all that he was gravely injured – rejoiced. “Don’t confess your love to me like this! I expect flowers and dinner, you know.”
Heather was interrupted by her own sobs, one hand coming up to try and dry her tears. Draco desperately tried to lift his hand too, but couldn’t find the strength to manage it.
“Kiss me?” he managed to mumble, words barely recognisable. He was so very cold.
She sobbed harder, shaking her head in denial, and he thought he could almost hear his heart physically break.
“I love you,” she said, however, leaning down to kiss him. His eyes had lit up when she told him, and suddenly she was incredibly hopeful – if he had the energy to request kisses, of course he’d pull through this as well.
Beneath her lips, Draco’s softly smiling ones went slack.