Quicksilver

Quicksilver
(title subject to change)
story rating NC-17
pairing: DM/HG

Disclaimer: Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy, etc. are the sole property and copyright of the lovely J.K. Rowling. This story is for entertainment purposes only and is in no way affiliated with the original Harry Potter novel series or the Warner Bros. films.

This story contains minor violence, some adult language, and overt sexuality.

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Chapter 2
Take Me to the Other Side

It had been a rather uneventful day in Transfiguration. Ron had knocked over his ink with his wand instead of casting a spell and neither he nor Hermione could keep from laughing. Harry shook his
head with a smile, then went back to taking a few notes.

\"Ah, the young couple shares a special moment over an inkblot. How precious.\" The thickly drawled remark dripped with sarcasm...but that wasn\'t unusual when the source was considered. Draco Malfoy sneered haughtily at his own ill humor, then directed his attention back to his textbook.

Ron shot him a killer look while Hermione simply scoffed and went back to writing.

\"What\'s the matter, Granger? Books don\'t stand a chance for your loving attention when the Great and Powerful Weasel can cast spilling spells and awe the world, eh?\" Malfoy had spoken without even glancing his his time. Hermione rolled her eyes and Ron gripped his wand instinctively, trying to keep his notorious temper at bay.

Naturally, Crabbe and Goyle thought this was all quite hilarious and had added a unison background of moronic giggling to the situation. \"Look, his face is as red as his hair,\" Goyle said, pointing not quite subtly in Ron\'s direction.

Harry had been watching the relatively minor situation as it commenced. Lately, Malfoy\'s malice had been solely directed at only two of the Gryffindor Three, as if he sought to annoy Harry simply by antagonizing his friends.

\"That\'s right, Weasel. Blow your top so your pathetic girlfriend will wake up and defend you.\" Draco was certain he\'d get a more amusing reaction now out of one of them.

Harry sighed exasperately and dropped his quill. He took his wand and thought for a moment, scratching his scar idly with the hilt. Suddenly he remembered a spell trick that Hagrid had taught him. All it would do was send out a small show of sparks that sting the recipient only slightly, but nothing else...faking the target out into thinking he\'d charmed/cursed them and leaving them to ponder what was going to happen as a result of the phony spell.

Harry grinned with an air of mischief and looked around the classroom. Professor McGonagall was still out in the corridor speaking with Professor Flitwick. Perfect. He cleared his
throat so as to direct Malfoy\'s attention his way, then whispered the fakeout charm. Tiny blue sparks flew and Draco, horrified, braced himself for whatever it was that Potter had \"done\" to him. When nothing happened, he immediately fell into the paranoia trap that Harry had set for him.

Hermione looked on bemusedly, also quite curious as to Harry\'s revenge scheme. Expecting Malfoy to vomit slugs or turn colors, she was almost disappointed when nothing happened except for a very confused look which replaced the wizard\'s trademark sneer. She turned to give Harry a quizzical look, and he simply winked. Ron, satisfied that Malfoyld hld have nothing else to say for the rest of class, began to calm himself and refocus on his work.

Harry finished the paragraph he\'d been reading, looked at his quill and promptly changed it into a traditional muggle ballpoint pen. He grinned, blew on the tip of his wand as if to mock a smoking gun, then reversed his spell.

***

In the Great Hall that evening, Ron sat down in between Harry and Hermione after owling his mother to ask her to send more ink. Without preamble, he turned to his bespectacled friend and blurted, \"What in Merlin\'s name did you -do- to Malfoy? I think the fact that nothing happened weirded him out more than turning him into a Ferret did.\"

\"Yes, Harry!\" Hermione chimed in. \"I\'d nearly forgotten until Ron said something, but I\'d never seen a more priceless face on our favorite Slytherin wizard...\"

Harry smiled. \"I didn\'t really do anything. I faked Malfoy out. Hagrid taught me an incantation that makes one\'s wand react as if a real spell had been cast, resulting in only a tiny bit of stinging on the offender\'s face. It was all for show, just so that Malfoy would be eaten alive with paranoia.\" He took a big bite and giggled to himself.

\"Wicked!\" Ron grinned admiringly. \"I \'spose you can\'t get into trouble if you haven\'t done anything, plus it still served to shut Ferret Boy up. Well done.\"

\"I propose a toast,\" Hermione said with a smile. \"To Harry\'s benign yet brilliant war tactics and Malfoy\'s strangely silent defeaShe She raised her pumpkin juice and laughed.

\"Hear, hear!\" The two boys chimed in and did the same. Their goblets clinked and they all laughed once more at Draco Malfoy\'s expense. Hermione looked around to see if the snarky blonde had witnessed their toast, but he was strangely absent from the Slytherin table.

\"Too bad he wasn\'t here to see that,\" Hermione said in a slightly more sober manner. She had silently hoped he\'d seen her raise her glass to his folly, that arse
\"He
\"He\'s got a quidditch match today,\" Ron said with a mouth full of food. \"You know that weak, spoiled git doesn\'t eat before quidditch anymore. He\'s prone to motion sickness.\" Ron had emphasized that last bit with a mock sympathetic air, and made a \'poor baby\' face to go right along with it. This only served to give Harry and Hermione giggle fits once more.

\"So today\'s match is Slytherin versus...?\" Hermione asked.

\"Hufflepuff,\" Ron and Harry said immediately in unison.

\"Ah, too bad it isn\'t Gryffindor. I was hoping to see the two of you beat him into submission. That would be a great way to end today.\" Hermione paused to take a bite, then drifted off
into her own world as the two boys launched into a full scale quidditch strategy discussion.

***

Hermione rushed absentmindedly through the corridors, knowing that Crookshanks was probably waiting impatiently for his dinner. She turned a corner toward the main staircase and ran headfirstteraterally--into Draco Malfoy himself.

\"MALFOY! Look what you\'ve DONE!\" She kneeled to collect her scattered possessions, then looked up expecting a haughty annoyance. Those gray eyes betrayed nothing of the sort...in
fact, he seemed to be staring at her with an unidentifiable look in his unexpectedly softened gray eyes. He shook his head, as if to bring himself back to reality, and took on the typical sneer that he knew was expected of him. Hermione was confused--what had all that been about?

\"What I\'VE done? You ran into ME, you clumsy git!\" It didn\'t sound as convincing as it was intended. His lip was also bleeding. He had grown several inches over the years and
now stood nearly a head taller than she did. One of the pins in her hair must have caught hip. Sp. She looked up from his lips, expecting him to be staring menacingly at her but instead caught him looking down her blouse. She blushed profusely, and tried to think of something--ANYTHING--to kill the awkwardness threatening to take over the situation.

\"About that quidditch match...break a leglfoylfoy. Please do!\" It was the only thing she could think to say. Having gathered all that she\'d dropped in the collision, she ran off completely flustered, leaving him to stare at her back.

She practically choked out the password at the portrait hole and flopped herself down on one of the sofas in the Gryffindor common room. What had just passed between her and Ferret Boy? Why was it flustering instead of nauseating for her to catch him ogling her? And why on EARTH had he been doing that to begin with?

Hermione had indeed been \"involved\" with Viktor Krum, but what did that mean, anyway? She had barely let the poor lad hold her hand, let alone much else. She didn\'t want anything to interfere with school and hadn\'t really felt anything for him. Sometimes, she had
entertained a thought or two about Harry or Ron but had felt that neither would ever really reciprocate such ideahe ihe idea that a boy like Draco Malfoy would...

Would WHAT, Hermione? She interrogated herself mentally. He was just looking down your shirt for Merlin\'s sake! It\'s hormones. Bloody hell.

But does it mean anything that this same boy regarded her as a person lower than scum...a boy that had, during second year, wished her dead in the Chamber of Secrets?

Hermione buried her head under a throw pillow and let out a frustrated wail. She started to wonder why she should even care one way or the other.

She was lost in thought when Harry and Ron scared the wits out of her simply by approaching her curled form on the sofa. Ron giggled and implored, \"Dreaming about You-Know-Who are you? We\'re going to watch the match; are you coming?\"

At first she\'d nearly had a coronary attack caused by Ron\'s words...until she realized that \"You-Know-Who\" was referring to Lord Voldemort rather than Malfoy. Ron can\'t read your mind, silly girl! she scolded herself.

She agreed, hoping that seeing Malfoy again would erase the assinine thoughts that had been whirling through her mind. Everything would be just as it usually was and she could dismiss
the odd moment in the hallway.

***

Harry and Ron spent most of the opening moments of the match arguing about different things going on over the pitch. Hermione rolled her eyes. They were just like her father when it came to rugby. She\'d never quite understood the male obsession with sport, but here she was nonetheless. She concentrated on the sheer physics of it all, delighting more in the aerial display than in anything else.

She could spot the nearly white locks of the Slytherin seeker easily among the other green robed players. He was surveying the scene and watching keenly for the snitch. Hermione knew that sometimes it was hours before the little devil made an appearance, but she soon saw a Hufflepuff player shriek as something grazed her hair. Malfoy noticed, too, and Hermione could see the glittering object flying haphazardly once he began to chase it. It
was headed quite close to where she sat, and he was in hot pursuit, with the Hufflepuff seeker directly behind him.

At that moment, he looked up for somasonason and his eyes locked upon hers. She was entranced until Ron said \"Uh-oh.\" A bludger took the back end of Malfoy\'s broom and sent him spinning into the tower wall. Hermione, along with everyone else, stood straight up in horror and watched as he fell to the pitch, landing like a rag doll. Gasps could be heard all over.

\"Oh, bugger. That had to hurt,\" Harry said in a sober, shocked voice. \"I would say that I would know...after third year and all, but I don\'t, thank goodness.\"

\"Not that he didn\'t deserve it, but I almost wouldn\'t wish that sort of thing even on a bastard like him,\" Ron admitted in an equally serious tone.

Hermione couldn\'t move or speak. She just stared at the teachers mobbing around Malfoy\'s body, sprawled and motionless on the ground. She swallowed hard, wondering if he\'d have seen the bludger if they hadn\'t have been staring at one another. She felt almost guilty, as if her presence--which was simply to reassure herself of \"normalcy\"--caused that unbelievable
accident.

***

For five days, she\'d been riddled with guilt, hearing news that Malfoy wasn\'t recovering. He had sustained head injuries that had him feverish and unconscious. She knew that she should not feel bad, that there was nothing that she could have done to stop what had happened. Unless, of course, she hadn\'t have been at that match.

Hermione sighed. She just didn\'t have his resolve. She couldn\'t wish death or other ugly things on him nor anyone...except for He Who Must Not Be Named, of course, but He was barely human. She longed for Malfoy to walk through that door and tell her to sod off...anything. Anything but elude mediwitchcraft and conventional muggle medicine and continue to exist
nearly comatose.

She\'d stopped tryto cto convince herself that he wasn\'t worth her worry. Just because she didn\'t like him did not mean that he deserved any of what happened to him. It would be like her disappearing simply because he was fixated on pure family lineage. Two wrongs did not make a right. She just tried to not worry -too- much, as she was certain he wouldn\'t care either way.

She\'d been to a Prefect meeting and felt his absense like there was a wall missing from the room. His emptyt att at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall also stood out like an eyesore.

She was sitting in Potions class, pondering whether Snape missed his star student because he was picking on others more than usual, when the classroom door burst open. In a flourish of robes, an obviously wired Malfoy strode quickly into the room. Without warning, he drew his wand, pointing it straight at Harry Potter and yelled, \"You cursed my broom, didn\'t
you?? That\'s what that bloody spell was! I just spent five days in Dante\'s bloody Inferno for picking on your friends just because you\'re King of the World Harry Potter, the Boy who Lived! Is that it, Potter?!\" Malfoy\'s eyes were threatening and he appeared to be deadly serious.

Professor Snape shook himself from his shock and wordlessly strode over to Malfoy and took his wand. The blonde wizard continued to seethe and stare menacingly at his raven nemesis. Snape turned to Harry and asked, \"Is this true, Mr. Potter?\"

\"N-no, sir.did did pick on my friends and I cast a fake charm to stump him and draw his attention away from them. I didn\'t curse his broom...\" Harry was wide-eyed and obviously stunned by Malfoy\'s accusations.

\"That\'s what I thought,\" Snape remarked calmly. \"Because if anyone had indeed cursed my student\'s broom, I would have known about it in some form. I did when it happened to you, Mr. Potter. I just didn\'t know who was at fault, so I tried hard to stop it myself. Mr. Malfoy, if someone besides fate is to blame for your terrible mishap, I am not aware of it
and neither is Professor Dumbledore. The situation of your accident was discussed immediately and thoroughly, I can assure you. Now, we are all thrilled that you are well and out of the hospital wing and I would like you to sit down.\"

Hermione watched as Malfoy took a few deep breaths, then slowly sat down. The angry flush hadn\'t left his face yet, but that confused look from nearly a week before was back in his eyes. She had been excited to see him burst in, obviously quite healthy, and act in his normal ways. Now he\'d sort of dampened her happiness with the return of that look in his eyes...until he looked up from staring, directly into her own. She expected the anger to
take back over, as she\'d felt partially responsible for his quidditch injuries. Instead, that confusion deepened into some sort of inquiry.

She knew the question well...it had been haunting her. Why was everything suddenly different? But like him, she didn\'t know the answer. She only knew that nothing was going to be the
same again.

***

Author\'s Note: This chapter\'s title (referring to the same story told in Chapter 1, but from HG\'s perspective) is an allusion to the Aerosmith song \"Otherside\".

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