Title: Delusional Ballet
Author: Jon Clift
Rating: PG
Summary: Ron dreams about his worst fear. So why do they want him to tap-dance with them?
Warnings: Lack of plot; surreal dreamscapes… oh yes, and spiders…
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters, names, etc. are property of J.K. Rowling, all publishers concerned and Warner Brothers. The only things owned by the author are the plot and any names not featured in the official Harry Potter books or movies. No money is being made from this, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Word Count: 1061
Author's Notes: I had the idea for this after watching Prisoner of Azkaban for the second time. Though the part I was interested in wasn't in the books, the scene where Harry notices Peter Pettigrew's name on the Marauders Map caught my eye, and I wondered just what Ron's 'dream' about tap-dancing spiders was all about. Here's my idea of what caused him to wake…
P.S. If anyone can think of a better title to give this, please let me know in your review.
-Jon
---
It was night and, in Gryffindor Tower at Hogwarts, Ronald Weasley was settling down for sleep. Earlier on in the day he had encountered his worst fear, and inside he was still shaking. Thankfully it was only a boggart, and he'd been able to defeat it with the help of Professor Lupin and the rest of the class, but still, it was a frightening experience sure to cause him nightmares.
He wasn't sure what had first caused his fear. He didn't know when he'd first felt the icy clasp of it upon his heart. All he knew was that every time he saw one of those eight-legged creatures, his insides turned to jelly and he felt like he'd never be happy again.
The worst experience of his life had been meeting Hagrid's 'friend,' Aragog. The giant spider may have been old and as blind as Lockhart had been inept, but he was the size of a small-elephant, and that overcame his 'weaknesses' in Ron's mind. Being almost eaten by hundreds of Aragog's children had done nothing but increase his fear twelve-fold.
All of this was moot as Ron's head soon hit the pillow and a muffled snoring filled the dormitory. Everyone else, bar Harry, was already asleep and dreaming. No one noticed Ron's jerky movements or his quiet whimper.
There was a reason for his juddering and it had nothing to do with the fact that he had a trapped nerve in his shoulder.
---
Click… click… click…
'What the…'
Click… click… click…
'Why's everything black?'
Tap-tap… click… tap-tap… click-click…
'What's making that noise?'
Click… click… click… tap-tap… click… tap-tap… click-click… tap-tap click…
Ron opened his eyes and saw not the canopy of his four-poster bed but a ceiling that looked like a chessboard. From more or less everywhere came the sound he'd heard, but he couldn't tell what was making it. It sounded eerily familiar, somehow…
As he got to his feet he looked around himself and noted that the floor was just like the ceiling. His clothes were that of rich, crimson robes - such as he always wished to own - and his wand was in a holster of sorts.
Tap-tap… click… tap-tap… click-click…
'There it is again!'
He set off in the general direction of the noise. That is to say, he moved in a straight line exactly forwards, for he wasn't the type of person to walk backwards.
Upon reaching a door in the far wall of the room, he twisted the doorknob slightly, and slowly opened the door. Beyond was a courtyard, with a giant fountain in the centre. The gentle flow of the water cascading over the statue soothed his mind and prevented him from screaming. It was of a spider.
Sliding towards it across the cracked stone flooring, he gradually became aware of voices coming from another doorway, opposite the one he'd left. He could just make out a muffled conversation, but the words were lost to him.
Click… tap-click… tap-tap click… click… tap-click… click-click…
He knew where it was coming from, now - through that door, behind which the voices were also talking. Ron wasn't naturally the inquisitive or adventurous type like his best friends, but he hadn't been sorted into Gryffindor for nothing. He reached his destination in seconds (in part thanks to his long legs) and carefully went through to the next room…
"Harry! Hermione! What're you doing here? I was in bed and just about to fall asleep when I woke up in this place. D'you guys have any idea where we are, and what's the deal with the spider-fountain thing?"
Harry, Ron noticed, was wearing viridian robes, and had one hand at Hermione's waist. Hermione wasn't so much wearing a sparkling dress of midnight blue as becoming it. Ron thought he glimpsed a pink-ish pachyderm rush past out of the corner of his eye. He shook his head to clear the vision. When he turned back to his friends, something was wrong. They looked older… a few years or so at most, but definitely not thirteen anymore.
'Whoa…'
"What… what just happened?"
He knew it to be a nightmare when Hermione put her arms around Harry's neck, inclined her head upwards and closed her eyes. Harry removed his glasses in a flourish and turned with Hermione so that they appeared as they might at the end of a tango. He dipped his head and brushed his lips lightly against hers.
Then the spiders came… oh, yes, they came… in pairs, hop-skipping (awkwardly, it has to be said) here and there. Some even pirouetted (which is a feat not to be missed if you're particularly brave).
In the lead was a solitary spider that dwarfed all others. Its pincers couldn't have been less than six-feet in length, and its eyes were the size of soup plates. (Ron knew these to be eight-inches across, since he'd made it a point many years ago to find out what all those 'sayings' really meant).
It was a kind of solid black, with a white stripe running lengthways along its underside; the top hat completed the effect of an eight-legged muggle entertainer from the Twenties. His embracing friends forgotten in the mad rush of absolute panic, Ron melted into his boots.
"Form up, my friends. We must wait 'til the music begins. Ah, what's this, a new member to our troop?"
It was hard for Ron to hear the words to begin with, through his terror, but the fact that the spider clicked its pincers together with every word it spoke made it worse.
"!" Ron said.
"Right, then. You'll be dancing with young Arathog over there-don't be so worried; she doesn't bite newcomers. Now, what size shoe are you? We need to know because we're learning 'tap' today."
"Tap… tap-dancing spiders?"
The world swam and darkness closed in upon him…
---
"Spiders! Tap-dancing spiders! I don't want to tap-dance…"
Harry looked up from the Marauders Map, moving his wand so as not to blind himself.
"Yeah, you tell them, Ron."
"Yeah… yeah… I will…"
In little less than a second a loud snore broke loose from Ron, and Harry merely smiled, shaking his head. He had other things to think about, and Ron's dream was probably nothing important anyway. It wasn't as if his friend had the Sight and it was a Vision or anything…
- Finis -