Written for the Final Round 2 of Season 2 of the QLFC as Beater 1 for the Falcons.
Prompts: (1) "We might be born the same, look the same, but we're two different people still." (2) examine
Must use: those words - he rejected their very essense
Word Count: ~2,500
Disclaimer + A/N: I don't own the characters or the setting. The title comes from the song End of the World by Streetlight Cadence (everyone should go check them out!) And the pranks. Well, they're modified versions of pranks pulled by real people that I have copied. I had to do extensive, excruciating research for this. Idea for this fic came from detectivesangelstardisandwands on tumblr, not that they know this though.
This is basically an AU where 1) Voldemort doesn't exist and 2) Harry is still famous. They're still at Hogwarts and all that.
I Forgot to Say I'm Sorry
(Will You Be My Friend Till the End of the World?)
Draco examined the package closely. He hadn't been expecting anything but the name on it was unmistakably his.
To: Draco Malfoy
From: Your Secret Admirer
Of course, it would make sense that someone secretly admired him. He was quite admirable.
Draco picked up the package and gave it a delicate shake. Nothing rattled, and he couldn't tell what was inside. But whoever it was must be nice, judging by how carefully they wrapped the package and how neatly they had written the label.
"What's that?" Pansy asked him, looking over from across the table.
Draco looked at her and shrugged.
"Haven't a clue," he said, giving the package another shake.
"Well, open it!" she said, impatiently.
Definitely wasn't from Pansy. Besides, she would never put "Secret Admirer" on it. Draco thought about opening it later in private, just to spite her, but…he was curious about what it might be, and was even more curious about who it might be from. Maybe there'd be a clue inside. And really, he'd never give up a chance to show off.
Smirking at Pansy, he glanced over at the Gryffindor table where Potter was, predictably, package-less—as if anyone would be Potter's secret admirer—before finding a seam in the wrapping and tearing the paper away.
The box was pretty and decorated with silver and green. It must be a Slytherin, then. That seemed quite logical.
Draco opened the box slowly. He wanted to peek inside before opening it for everyone to see. It might contain something horribly embarrassing...like some doll or…or pants.
As he lifted the top, something odd caught his eye and when he leaned in for a closer look, a pair of yellow eyes stared back at him. Basilisk eyes, he realised.
"AAAAAHHHHHHHHHRRGGHHH! MY EYES!" he shouted, tossing the box up in the air.
"Draco?" Pansy shouted, just as panicked as he was, but Draco ignored her in favour of more shouting.
"I'm going to die! I'm too young to die!"
Laughter erupted from somewhere, and Draco spun around to glare at the Gryffindor table where the Weasel clan and Potter (because he was sure Potter was involved somehow) was laughing.
As the situation sunk in, Draco realised three things. First, the entire Great Hall was staring at him. Second, he was most definitely still alive and had not turned into a ghost in any way, shape, or form. And third, the box he had thrown had flipped open and it definitely wasn't basilisk eyes staring back at him…or really any eyes at all. The "basilisk" was fake.
Slowly he looked back at the Gryffindor table and there, the two twin Weasels were still laughing and definitely smirking at him.
And that was definitely everyone else in the Great Hall joining in.
Draco swore right then and there that he was going to get them. Even if it had to be the very last thing he ever did, he was going to get his revenge.
.x.x.
It took him nearly two months to plan the perfect revenge, but he'd finally gotten it ready. He was going to get those damn twins, consequences be damned.
Getting the potions to the twins was the trickiest bit of the whole operation—brewing it and getting some bits of Potter had been easy. In the end he decided to slip it into their drinks the next Hogsmeade weekend they had. It meant waiting a bit longer, but Draco knew it was going to be worth it.
The plan was simple: slip a bit of love potion into their drinks, then sit back and enjoy. At first he was going to have them be infatuated with each other, but that probably wouldn't be at all funny since they were already inseparable anyway. So, he decided to have them fall for someone else, and who better than Harry Potter? Especially since Draco was sure Potter had something to do with that whole Great Hall fiasco, he just didn't have any proof.
Getting Potter's hair for the potion was surprisingly easy: he just walked up to him and yanked a few.
Now, the potion was ready and he just had to slip it to the twins.
Draco followed the twins to the Three Broomsticks and got a table near theirs. He waited until they got their drinks and had let their guard down before he set off the enlarged Exploding Snap he'd placed earlier at a corner close to the twin's table, and while they were distracted, slipped the potion into their drinks.
So far so good.
Draco made his way back to his table and watched.
It didn't take long. And it didn't disappoint. Especially with Potter sitting a few tables away.
"Oh, Harry!" one of the twins shouted! (Draco couldn't tell them apart.) He jumped up and threw himself at Potter's table
"I must declare my love for you!" shouted the other, following after his brother.
"No! Me!"
"Me!"
Draco sniggered. This was working out quite a lot better than he'd expected.
He watched as Potter jumped out of his seat and tried to back away from the advancing twins.
"What the bloody hell, Fred? George? What are you doing?" the Weasel shouted at his older brothers.
"I'm declaring my love for Harry," said one.
"No, I'm declaring my love for Harry," said the other.
"I'm declaring out of this conversation…and this prank, whatever it is," Potter said, turning towards the door.
"Wait, Harry!" shouted the twins together.
"This isn't—"
"—a prank!"
"Shut up, George!"
"You, shut up!"
"Fred! Geroge!" the Weasel shouted again, ready to jump in between his brothers. But Granger tugged on his robes.
"Ron, stop," she said pulling him out of the store after Potter.
It took the twins a full five minutes to realise the object of their affections was no longer there, and it took another five for them to finally stop fighting to go after him.
Once they've left, Draco stopped trying to hold back his laughter.
"Oh god! That was brilliant!" he gasped.
Blaise, he noticed, was laughing, too.
"God, did you do that, Draco? Remind me never to cross you," he said when the both of them finally stopped.
"You want to follow them?" Draco asked.
"Of course," Blaise said.
.x.x.
They found them at the little clearing by the Shrieking Shack. The Weasel and Granger were sitting off to the side watching and laughing.
"Harry, you'll just have to choose," one of them said.
"Yes, you obviously can't love both of us," said the other.
"We might be born the same, look the same—"
"—but we're two different people still."
"It pains us to say this, but—"
"—you can only choose one of us."
The expression of pain on Potter's face was worth all the trouble he'd gone through. He could feel Blaise shaking next to him.
"Obviously, that'll be me."
"No, me!"
"No—"
"Guys!" Potter shouted.
"Yes, Harry?" they said together, giving him their full attention.
Potter blinked at them, looking surprised, and stammered, "Uhh…stop?"
One of the twins (Draco still couldn't tell who), reached out and grabbed Potter's hand while the other said, "If that's what you want, Harry, we'll stop fighting."
"But you'll have to choose one of us eventually."
"We won't stop until you do."
"I'll do my best—"
"—to show you I'm the best choice."
"It's more than a little creepy how they're finishing each other's sentences even though they're declaring their individual affections," Blaise whispers next to him.
Draco had to agree.
It wasn't as funny, now, though, not with how seriously the twins were looking at Potter and holding his hand. It made him uncomfortable and oddly upset. But Draco wasn't going to analyze that.
"So it was your doing," someone said behind them.
Draco and Blaise both turned to see Granger standing over them with her hands on her hips.
"So what if it is?" Draco said, matching her glare with his own.
For a moment, that's all they do, glare at each other. Then Granger started laughing and walked away.
"What was that about?" Draco asked.
"No clue," Blaise answered.
When he looked back at the scene, one of the twins was trying to actually kiss Potter, and the other was trying to stop him. The Weasel just laughed, and as much as Draco wanted to join in the laughing, he couldn't.
Thank god the potion was supposed to only last a day.
.x.x.
Or so the potions book he'd gotten the recipe from had said. But the next morning, in the Great Hall, both of the twins were still obviously infatuated with Potter. They were carrying Potter's bag, getting his food, pouring his drink, wiping his seat, and, at one point, even trying to comb his hair. In the Great Hall. Blaise was laughing, but Draco wasn't. In fact, he might have just lost his appetite.
"I'm not hungry," Draco said, standing up.
Blaise gave him an odd look. "You all right?"
"Yeah, just not hungry," he said.
Draco left and tried very hard not to think about what it might mean.
"So it was you, was it?"
Draco spun around to see the twins smirking at him.
"Good one," said one of them.
"We'll make a prankster of you yet," said the other.
Draco frowned at them. "Aren't you still in love with Potter?" he asked bitterly.
"No—"
"—we just wanted to get back at you."
They laughed as they walked away.
That made Draco nervous. They couldn't possibly know. No one knew. Hell, he didn't know what it all meant.
.x.x.
Draco blinked and stared at the curtains separating him from the rest of his dorm mates. It was oddly bright behind the curtains even though they should be in the dungeons. He couldn't figure out what had woken him.
Then he heard it. The giggling. A lot of giggling.
Slowly, Draco sat up and pulled the curtains back.
He definitely didn't scream when he saw what was on the other side. He had more dignity than that. He definitely did.
Staring back at him was quite possibly the entire school, or so it felt like.
"Bloody FU—how the hell did you get in here?!" Draco shouted as he grabbed his sheets and pulled them up to cover himself.
No one needed to see his penguin pyjamas. And they definitely didn't need to see his…uh…Harry Potter voodoo doll. Draco looked around frantically for it but it wasn't on his bed or in his hand or anywhere he could see.
"This is an interesting piece of décor."
Draco could feel his heart sink and his cheeks burn up. Because of course it was the twins.
"It looks amazingly like him."
Draco turned and glared at the twins. They stood at the foot of his bed, grinning at him. In the hands of one them was his doll. And he was playing with it, the nerve of him.
Draco noticed, then, that he wasn't in the dungeons; he was in the Entrance Hall. With all his furnishings. His bed, his bedside table, his trunk—they were all there. Including the scrapbook he'd been working on the night before, right there on top his trunk.
And was that…was that Potter reaching for it?
Draco scrambled out of his bed—penguin pyjamas be damned—and snatched the album away from Potter before any damage could be done. No one—absolutely no one—needed to see what was in there.
Potter blinked, looked him up and down, and laughed. Draco was going to murder the twins after this. They weren't going to live after he was done with them.
"I like the penguins," Potter said.
Draco looked down at the hockey playing penguin print on his pyjamas."I like them, too," he said.
Someone coughed and Draco looked up to see one of the twins holding his…er…voodoo doll with one eyebrow raised.
Draco snatched that back, too. He cleared his throat and said, "It's to stick pins into."
Both twins started laughing and Draco swore he was going to murder them for this.
"I hope you're planning on moving all this shit back to my room," Draco said icily.
They gave him a considering look and said, "We'll think about it."
.x.x.
In the end, they did help Draco put his things back. They also thanked Blaise for letting them into the room, and Draco added "find better friends" to the list of things he had to do.
"Now, young Malfoy," one of them said, slinging his arm around Draco's shoulders, "we've a bit of business to discuss."
"But first," said the other twin, "what's with all these Harry Potter things?"
"What? What are you talking about?" Draco said nervously.
"You know, that Harry Potter doll—"
"—that scrapbook of Harry related news clippings—"
"—those secret photos of Harry under your bed—"
"—and that journal in your bedside—"
"THERE'S NO SUCH THING!" Draco interrupted.
Both twins snickered. "Are you sure?" they said together.
Draco glared at them. "I'm positive," he said.
"Really? We could have sworn you were—"
"—harbouring some secret crush on Harry."
Draco shuddered. Those words—he rejected their very essence. He couldn't possibly be, could he? He hated Potter with a passion. The twins were delusional. He told them as much.
Draco opened his mouth to say more, but they cut him off.
"None of that is important."
"You can deal with your teenage crush later."
"We have much more important things to talk about."
"Yes, let's talk business."
They both stared at him, and Draco narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "What business?" he asked.
"Good question, young Malfoy!"
"We thought you'd never ask!"
"We're here to propose—"
"—a partnership."
Draco stared at them. "Partnership?"
"Yep. Of the best pranksters—"
"—Hogwarts has ever known."
"It'll be perfect."
"No one will know what hit them."
Draco considered this for a moment. He couldn't tell if this was yet another elaborate practical joke or not. But the idea had its appeal.
"Tell me more," he said.
"Well, we were thinking…"