Copy Cat

A/N: ^^; Uh.... I fail. Epically. I am sooo busy. Like all the time. So, I'm sorry!! But I found time to write another bit for y'all. Cuz I love my readers!

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Remus paced in front of the wall where he knew the Room of Requirement would appear. He just kept thinking of a place large enough to stash a couple hundred Harry Potter’s. Eventually, the door appeared. Sighing with relief, he opened it, Sirius immediately stepping inside to examine the surroundings.

It was spacious, for one thing. Sirius guessed its size to be about equivalent to that of the Great Hall. He frowned when he realized that Remus had not thought about seating for the replicas. Immediately, four large tables, like in the Great Hall, appeared with benches. Satisfied, Sirius nodded his approval of the room, warmly decorated with Gryffindor colors.

“This will do for now, I suppose.” Sirius said. Remus entered the room and shrugged.

“It’s better than keeping them in the hallway.” He admitted. He was already feeling taxed about this whole situation. He just kept thinking about what would happen if their Harry – the real Harry – got taken by someone other than his destined mate, even if that mate did appear to be Draco Malfoy. At least Lucius was keeping him detained for now.

Within minutes, Harry’s started filing into the room. Some were still trying to pick fights with others in regard to who was the real Harry. As it turned out, the real Harry was number 65 in line. He was wondering how on earth all these things always happened to him. Part of him decided that he should never help Neville again, as it seemed that whenever he did, something strange occurred. But, on the other hand, Neville was one of his friends, and you just didn’t turn your back on a friend, no matter how much trouble they caused you.

As soon as the last Harry and Severus with Ron and Hermione were in the room, Remus shut the door. He waited for them all to be seated. He considered himself fortunate that Harry was well behaved enough, even in large numbers, to wait for further instructions. Well, that is until the Harry’s caught sight of Ron and Hermione. Many of them began calling to the two, eager to have them come and sit with him. Ron and Hermione shifted uncomfortably. They had only tagged along in order to find out what was going to happen to Harry, whichever one he might be.

“All right! Quiet down!” Remus said. Immediately, all eyes were on him. He idly wondered how Dumbledore put up with this at every meal. “Now then, we’re going to need to keep you here until we know what to do with you all. First, in order to keep track of you all, you’re going to be given a number. This number can be considered your new, very temporary, name.”

Sirius and Severus began counting. A red number appeared above each Harry’s head, identifying which one it was. The real Harry, due to how seating had ended up working out, was no longer 65. Instead, he was 74. He was number 74 out of 207 total. That was quite a daunting number. And, if he had done the math right, the school’s population was only 280 students regularly. This was based on the fact that in Gryffindor House, his first year, there had been, say, 10 first years. Assuming the same pattern for the other Houses for each year, that meant that there were 40 students of each year, so 40 multiplied by 7… 280. They had practically doubled the school population with Harry Potter’s. That was almost enough for every student to have their own personal Harry.

Harry didn’t know how much he liked that idea, especially with the knowledge that there were Slytherins out there who would just love to have their own personal Harry, not to mention that Romilda Vane girl who was determined to get him one way or another. On the other hand, having so many Harry’s might not be such a bad idea, especially if Voldemort showed up any time soon…Still, he supposed that so many of himself running around would get tiresome. He was bound to get hexed, even if it was just a replica instead of his actual person. And yet, he felt a sense of smug satisfaction at the thought that Draco Malfoy, who had long considered Harry to be an attention seeker, would finally see just how much attention Harry received without purposely looking for it.

And that brought up another question…

“Why wasn’t Malfoy in Potions?”

Draco stormed around his father’s quarters, throwing everything that came into sight. He was supposed to be in Potions right now. But he wasn’t allowed to go to classes until he calmed down. Calmed down! As if he needed to calm down. He was perfectly calm and rational, thank you very much! And he said so.

“Really, father, I feel fine. I don’t need to be contained here.” Draco said, his grip on a pillow so tight that his nails, which were presently claws, punctured the silk covering.

“You’ve gone into manic mode twice in the last twenty-four hours. You’re staying in here where I can keep an eye on you.” Lucius, in fact, had his newspaper and was presently reading it whilst sipping from a mug of steaming coffee.

“But if I go to Potions, Severus can keep an eye on me.” Draco tried the logic card, hoping to prey on his father’s strange sense of parenting, which often involved handing his son off to someone for a few hours at a time. He was unaware of the fact that the silk was now tearing as he hands pulled away from each other, shifting his grip on the pillow.

“You’re shredding one of your mother’s favorite pillows, you know.” Lucius said without looking past his paper.

Draco screamed and threw the pillow. “I don’t need to be watched! I’m not a child anymore. Besides, how do you expect me to beat Pott…” Draco stopped, the memory from the train where he had whimpered… actually whimpered…after Potter coming back to him. “Oh Merlin.”

“For the record, I don’t expect you to beat Potter. I never have, really. You seem to have misconstrued my simple desire to see you excel as being equal to finding some way of throwing your rejected offer of friendship back in Potter’s face.” Lucius pointed out. He was, by now, peeking just above the edge of the paper, though an observer would hardly be able to tell.

“Stop talking about Potter!” Draco yelled. “I don’t want to hear about the stupid speccy git!”

“Oh, silly me. And here I thought that you were trying to sneak off to Gryffindor territory last night after you’d seen him…” Lucius got little delight from his life that didn’t involve embarrassing or tormenting his son. After all, that was what parents were put on earth to do.

“I was not trying to sneak… I was… I am Head Boy, and I have… Shut up!” Draco shouted, his face flushing pink with the exertion of his anger and the embarrassment of the truth. He went off on another tirade about how Potter was everywhere and just couldn’t leave him alone.

Lucius tuned him out, returning to the paper when he heard a coughing from the fireplace. Glancing up to see that Draco was presently taking down every portrait whose occupants had black hair, he went to answer the call.

“Yes? Do try to hurry. My son is being ‘thoughtful’ again.”

“Is he?” Dumbledore’s head strained to see around Lucius. “What’s he doing now?”

“He seems to think that portraits containing persons with black hair are unsuitable.” Lucius said with a small smile. He had had a talk early that morning with Dumbledore about the apparent situation of Potter being Draco’s mate. Dumbledore smiled in understanding.

“Well, I suppose that you best keep what I tell you next to yourself and Narcissa. Where is your lovely wife today, Lucius?”

“She did have a class scheduled early this morning.” Lucius said, baring his teeth at the headmaster in silent reminder that Narcissa was his mate and not the barmy coot’s.

“Of course.” Dumbledore nodded.

“Well? What did you have to say to me?” Lucius said, satisfied that Dumbledore had remembered his place.

Unnoticed by both participants in the conversation, Draco had seen that his father was no longer in his chair, and pulled by curiosity, had sought out where the older Ryuugon had gone. Draco loved when Lucius had to answer firecalls. It involved the man kneeling on the ground in a most ungraceful manner. Ready to tease his father sufficiently about his place on the floor, the words died in his throat when Dumbledore spoke again.

“There was a potions mishap a few minutes ago.”

“I assume that means that Potter was involved, otherwise you wouldn’t be telling me to keep it secret from Draco.”

Draco held his breath, the Ryuugon fury at the prospect of his mate being hurt in any manner already bubbling to the surface.

“Severus, Sirius, and Remus seem to have the situation under control.” Dumbledore said evasively, having noticed the shadow of two huge wings crossing over Lucius.

Lucius frowned, but took in the smaller amount of light around him. Well, damn. There went that hope. He slowly turned, knowing that he would see his son in manic mode. Again. Merlin, couldn’t the boy control himself at all anymore?! What the hell was Potter to get Draco so riled up that all training was practically useless?

“Where?” Draco asked in a growl.

“The headmaster didn’t say, Draco.” Lucius said, standing up. Draco backed up a few steps.

“I’ll find him myself.”

Lucius was surprised by the amount of lucidity that Draco was presently displaying. It was almost as if the human part of his son had finally just given up on the fact that he couldn’t control his fate and might as well embrace it. All the same, it meant that the creature part was simply using its human parts to get what it wanted, and that was worse than Draco synchronizing with himself. A synchronized creature was always in control and could execute the same amount of power without having to transform. He shook off the worry and maneuvered himself in front of the door.

“Move.”

“Potions mishaps happen all the time. Severus knows how to fix them.” Lucius said.

“I. Want. Out.”

“I can’t let you out.”

Draco howled in frustration and began tearing the room apart. Again.

“I try and embrace this stupid creature and you won’t let me go find my stupid mate and I can’t win, can I? I’m not in control, I’m not synchronized, and I bloody feel like the Knight Bus has run over me. And you’re keeping me in this stupid room and I just want to go to my stupid classes and get my stupid grades and beat that stupid Potter! Argh! Potter! Why him?! I hate him! I hate that idiot. He’s always rushing off into trouble, always getting all the attention, always just… there. And he never even notices me…” Draco was making progress. It seemed that tearing things apart helped him regain control over himself. Lucius turned toward the sound of a house elf popping in. He brightened at the prospect of more coffee. But he never got to hear what the house elf was there for. Draco, in his path of destruction, happened upon the house elf and threw it across the room.

Lucius ran after the flying creature, still wanting his coffee. He caught it and was about to set it down when Draco paced his way again. “… And why should I be mates with someone I hate and who doesn’t even care about me? I mean, he treats that Weasel better than he treats me, and I smell infinitely better. Thank you, father.” Draco took the elf from Lucius and threw it again before continuing his rant. Lucius sighed. So much for more coffee…
Lucius sat down at the table that he had brought in for the purpose of having somewhere to serve tea. He drummed his fingers against its surface, waiting for when Draco would finally get tired enough of his complaining about his mate to focus on synchronizing and no longer needing these destructive fits. The house elf, surprisingly still intact, appeared before him, looking somewhat dizzy.

“Dobby?” He asked, genuinely surprised.

“Dobby greets Master Lucius most affectionately.” Dobby said, trying to adjust his hat. “Is there anything Master Lucius is needing?”

“I…” Lucius looked at Dobby and sighed. It didn’t feel right making the elf go back to the kitchens in such a state and bring him coffee as well. Besides, the elf was likely to spill it everywhere. “Not at the moment. Would you like to take a seat?” Lucius pushed out the chair across from him with his foot.

“Master Lucius is too kind.” Dobby squeaked, hopping onto the chair and resting his head on the table. “Arranging for Harry Potter to free Dobby was clever, sirs, even if it still brings Dobby troubles.”

“Mm. Well, the Dark Lord was getting suspicious about how it seemed that this flawless plan kept being thwarted, waifish ghost that he was at the time.” Lucius continued to drum his fingers, watching as Draco gradually calmed down, his wings folding and eventually pulling into his back again, claws returning to plain fingernails, etc.

“And… and…. What was I saying?” Draco asked, out of breath.

“I haven’t the foggiest.” Lucius said with a wry smirk. “Hungry?”

Draco’s stomach growled noisily. “Yeah…. Hey, Dobby.”

Dobby nodded in greeting. “Master Draco is looking well.”

Draco shrugged. Lucius continued to be amused. Until Dobby got a thoughtful look on his face.

“Master Draco is knowing who his mate is, yes?”

Lucius tried to get the elf to stop talking, to not mention the ‘m’ word again… But it was too late. Draco bristled and kicked the table over.

“Merlin-damned, shit-eating, hug-giving, danger-seeking, attention-getting POTTER!” Draco was up on his feet and
storming about the room. Then he stopped, abruptly.

Lucius wondered what could have possibly made him quirk his head in that way…. As a precaution, “Dobby… Warn Severus that Draco might be about to do something incredibly stupid.”

Dobby nodded and disappeared with a pop.

Draco turned, halfway into manic mode. “Father.” He purred. “Potter’s been involved in a Potions mishap. As his mate, I do believe it is within my rights to see to his health and safety.”

“It is. But I’m seeing a problem in letting you go out.”

Draco snarled. “Why?”

“If you don’t know, then I’m not going to tell you. But you’re failing him as a mate.” Lucius chose his words carefully, knowing that any sign of weakness as a mate would trigger the Ryuugon to seek to rid itself of that weakness.

Draco growled and settled down in a crouch, chewing at a claw. He was thinking about what he was doing wrong. A good sign, to be sure.

“Until you can tell me what you’re lacking, you are not permitted to see or approach your mate. Understand?”

Draco snapped his head up and nodded, already accepting the challenge, both as Ryuugon and as his own self.
Perhaps the goal to get out of the room would unite the two factions of Draco’s self and allow people to get a bit of rest for once.

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There! ^_^

Unfortunately, I was in such a rush to get this out, I didn't have time to do a proper Reviewers' Address, but I love all of you who review and who give me the feedback you do. Please stay with me!