~*Pieces*~
Chapter One: Years Gone By
A/N: Hey guys, it's been a long time since I've written...I know, I'm sorry. I hate it when I can't write but lately it's been REALLY hard. Teachers are really cruel, loading me with homework and major projects, plus sports which make just doing the homework really hard. But luckily a lot of those sports are ending for the year and I can get to writing, instead of running myself ragged. I will continue my Draco/Hermione fic,'Coming Together', I don't know when though, I have a terrible case of writers block because when I began writing that story I didn't plan it out enough, I just did it on a whim...and so now I have to figure out where the plot is going. I have a few ideas so I will TRY to get a new chapter posted. This fic I have planned out in my mind and there will be some twists and turns...as always there will be some...well a lot of romance in later chapters...but I'm gonna try to make it not so fluffy as my other fics. I'm really trying to improve and mature my writing skills and I'm going to try really hard to do it through this fic and later chapters of my other fanfiction. I have chapter two already written and done, but it won't be out until around Monday or Tuesday (hopefully! Depends on my beta and because I print it out and edit it with a bright pink pen. I find if I print my stuff out, a recent discovery of mine, I can find things I don't like about it! lol) and read it over I can make my fanfics so much better! I'm gonna work extra hard and this fic and keep it going...with at least a chapter a month (but I can't make any promises) So please review and tell me what you think! I love your comments and it just makes me want to write so much more! This chapter is dedicated to Jessie Manning for being a great, friend, editor, and funny Pabik lover!
You could be my sea
You know that I'll protect you from all of the obscene
I wonder what you're doing
Imagine where you are
There's oceans in between us
But that's not very far
~Puddle of Mudd, 'Blurry'
Hermione Granger sighed as she pushed her reading glasses atop her head, and massaged her temples. At 23, she felt about 60, with all of the paper work the ministry was giving her, on top of her training to be an Auror. She had begun her training right out of Hogwarts, but soon found she needed a way to make money, and became a part-time assistant to the head of the Improper Use of Magic office. Her training would be over in a month, and she would become a full fledged Auror, and she honestly couldn't wait to drop her job as an assistant. Hermione stared out the window at the inky black sky, and couldn't help but think of her old friends.
Ron. Ron was working as the head of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts office, and quite enjoying it. He, of course, had inherited his father's passion, and interest for muggle artifacts, and was in contact with muggles and their things on a daily basis. She still spoke to Ron, usually once or twice a week by owl, or she would apparate into the Burrow, if she had spare time, but that was rare.
And Harry...Harry was...well, no one really knew. She hadn't seen him six and a half years. He had disappeared shortly after his last fight with Voldemort, when he was 17. The ministry had recruited Harry during the summer going into his sixth year at Hogwarts, in order to begin training as an Auror. She knew for a fact that he was alive, and had left on his own free will, because she had been there. She had seen him defeat the Dark Lord, and she saw him leave too...
Hermione shook her head, no reason to dwell on the past, she told herself time and time again. Her dark brown eyes darted to the little clock on her desktop. 9:57. A small sigh escaped her lips, as she took her glasses off of the top of her head and placed them on the desk. Hermione took a sip of her water, and coughed suddenly, she took a double take, glancing at the clock.
"9:57?? Oh no, oh no..." Hermione had been scheduled to have dinner with her boyfriend of a year, Russell Rhodes, two hours prior. Still in her black work robes, she apparated to the restaurant they were supposed to have had dinner in. She hadn't expected him to still be there, and she was right, he wasn't. After apparating to his place and finding it empty, she went back to her own flat, feeling down and guilty.
Flinging her coat over a chair, she mumbled a charm and the lights in the flat came on.
"Hey," a voice to her left caused Hermione to gasp, and jump. Her eyes darted to where the voice had come from, and she exhaled.
"R-Russell you scared me to death." Russell ignored her comment and stared at her intently.
"Forget about our date?" he asked coolly.
"Oh, Russell...I'm so, so sorry about that. I got tied up at work and I it just completely-"
"Slipped your mind." he finished for her. She looked away. "Hermione, that's what you said the last time. And the time before that."
"I know, and I'm really sorry it's just--"
"Hermione." he interrupted her, "This isn't working. I think you know that. With your job and my job we just don't have time for each other," he paused, looking at her. "I think we've stretched our time together as far as it'll go."
"You're breaking up with me?" she asked in a small voice.
"Well...why don't we just call it mutual?" he smiled wryly. "I'm sorry Hermione, but I think you know this is the right thing." Russell got up, kissed her cheek, and apparated out of her flat.
"Damnit Hermione...there you go botching something else up." she said running her hands through her long, curly brown hair.
"Rise and shine." said a voice from above her. Hermione could hear the curtains being opened and the small bit of light that was outside during the early morning hours was shining in. She moaned and rolled over, covering her face with her pillow.
"Come on, Hermione, get up." said the person, shaking her. Hermione tried to keep her pillow over her face, but the person pulled it away and she glared up at the, her vision still blurry from sleep.
"Draco, go away." Draco Malfoy stood, looking down at her, and she could sense slight irritation in his gaze. Draco had grown up since their days at Hogwarts, he was now close to 6'1 and was more muscular that scrawny, but the mischievous spark in his gray eyes was still there. He had changed in other ways, though. He didn't hate her anymore for one. After Hogwarts had ended he surprised everyone by becoming a spy for the ministry, although he had already become a Death Eater, after Voldemort killed his father, he realized being a Death Eater wasn't all it was cracked up to be. He had been training with Hermione to become an Auror, and they had actually grown quite close. The two of them shared a kind of brother-sister relationship....but not the kind who got along, oh no, more like the kind of brother and sister who were always bickering and couldn't agree on anything.
"No can do. We're going out on a training mission with some of the Aurors that have been teaching us. We need to be there in an hour. Now get up." he said literally pulling her out of bed. Draco looked her over and shook his head. "Slept in your clothes again? Fall asleep working?"
"No," she said slowly. "Russell broke up with me." she said looking down.
"Good, I never liked him any way." Hermione stood up and looked at him.
"What? Why? He was a great guy!" she protested, as she grabbed her clothes out of her closet. Draco shrugged.
"He was always checking himself out in mirrors. His motto was probably 'who needs a girlfriend when you have your reflection.' And there was this one time in the locker room at Marshall's Wizarding spa, he did this...glance at me if you catch my drift." He said as she began walking to the bathroom for a quick shower.
"Glance?"
"Glance."
"Are you saying you think he's gay?" she asked, incredulously.
"Well...if you want to say it bluntly." Hermione rolled her eyes.
"Draco, if it were between you and him, you would be the one people would say was gay, hands down."
"You're biased."
"Ugh..." Hermione walked into her bathroom, closed the door, and turned on the shower.
"All right, all right, settle down." he said, the light chatter dieing. today three of you will each be assigned to a trained Auror. You will go out to examine a dark magic 'hot spot' where we believe some wizards and witches may be hiding out. But, don't be keen on finding anyone, these are only possibilities." he looked around at them all, his brown eyes sparkling from the light. "Ok, now to business..." he began announcing the names of students and assigning them to Aurors. "Malfoy, Lawrence, Granger...you're with Martin Crowell." A young man about 25, stepped forward, he was Draco's height, maybe an inch shorter, with dark brown hair and dark brown eyes.
"Alright you three, today we're apparating to a cave on the border of Ireland. I believe you three may have heard about it recently, there is some strange activity over there and we need to find out what's going on. So, you ready?" they nodded. "Good, let's go." With that, all three of them apparated out with a small 'pop'.
Crowell led the way as they walked around the skinny trail to the cave. The trail got wider, until it led straight into the dark, damp cave. Halfway through it, the trail of the cave split off two ways.
"All right, Lawrence you come with me, Malfoy, Granger, you go to the left and if you find something, send out red sparks, they'll come through the cave to me, got it?"
"Yes, sir." they replied simultaneously. Hermione and Draco walked off the left, their wands aglow. In a moments time Hermione realized how big the cave was, when one side dropped off into a deep pit.
"We're not going to find anything." Draco said, sounding bored.
"Belt it, Draco." Hermione said out of habit. Draco sighed.
"Maybe, you should, you know, walk behind me in case something pops out and surprises you." Hermione rolled her eyes.
"Maybe you should stay behind me because anything that pops out I can handle ten times better than you." Behind her she heard Draco stumble and she whipped around, pulling him back away from the edge. "Smooth move. Can you try to be more careful?"
"Hey, it's dark."
"That's what you have a wand for, smart one."
"Oh, that hurts Hermione, it really does." He said sarcastically, placing his hand over his hear melodramatically. And their conversation lapsed off.
They had been walking for over 10 minutes in complete silence, Hermione was getting a little jumpy do the fact, she couldn't see too much even with her wand lit.
"See? You should've listened to me when you had the chance," Draco said, sensing Hermione's uneasiness. She glared at him.
"I should've let you fall into that pit when I had the chance." Draco didn't take her bait instead he was pushing her forward. "What?" Hermione asked.
"Something's moving up ahead over there." he said pointing a few meters in front of them. To Hermione's surprise there really *was* something moving. Draco instictively moved in front of Hermione, on the offense. "Who's there?" He shouted holding up his wand, and shining the light toward the movement. Hermione saw, what looked like a person scuttle down a passage, trying to flee them. Draco hurried ahead, and Hermione followed turning down the smaller passage. "You're in a dead end. Show yourself. Hermione stepped to Draco's side, and shone the light coming from her wand at the end of the tunnel. A man was at the end, cloak drawn over his head.
"Who are you?" Hermione asked. "Explain yourself." she aimed her wand at the man. The man, looked up at them, the hood of his cloak falling from his face, which was almost black with dirt, but what stood out were his eyes. They were a brilliant green. Hermione gasped, her blood running cold, as she backed away. "H-Harry??"
A/N: Hehehe...I emailed to this chapter to a friend of mine earlier and she said that I was terribly cruel for leaving it at that...but oh well. Thanks to my beta, Emily! I have chapter two done and I hope to have it posted by Monday, I dunno though. I really hope you guys like this one!