Ugh. It had to be him, Hermione Granger thought to herself. She was currently in Potions class( Gryffindor and Slytherin) sitting next to her best friend Harry Potter and infront of her other best friend and ex-boyfriend, Ron Weasley.
I guess I should fill you guys in at this point.
The war had ended a year and a few months ago and Hogwarts was rebuilt and reopened. Students who were in the their sixth and seventh year had been invited to properly finish their education. A surprising number of students returned.
Two months after the war, Hermione and Ron broke up. They decided it was best if they just remained friends (which probably isn't the full story. They're totally hiding something.)
The death eaters who had not died during the war were given fair trials. Most of them ended up in Azkaban while a few were sentenced to home arrest and probation for a few months. Among those lucky few were Draco and Narcissa Malfoy, Theodore Nott Jr., Pansy Parkinson and other Slytherin death eater spawns that weren't active during the war.
And the final and most shocking news of all, Dumbledore and Snape were alive. They had somehow managed to fake their deaths but refused to say how. Snape had been welcomed back as a hero, for the first few weeks, after Harry and Dumbledore had managed to convince everyone not to kill him. Now they just treat him like a greasy haired git again and he seems totally fine with, so long as he gets to be regular old Snape again.
Now back to the story…
"I will divide the class into pairs. Each pair is going to brew polyjuice potion,which as you all know, allows the user to turn into his/her desired person for one hour. You will not be making the usual version, which usually takes a few months to brew. Instead you will make the new version that was recently created by none other than myself." said Snape, obviously very proud of himself.
"You will find the instructions on the board after I divide the class. It shall be tested so you had better get it right". Snape said in his usual Snape-like drawl.
"You will have no say in the choice of your partners. AndI will pair you as I deem it fit. The groups are as follows;
Ronald Weasley and Lavender Brown.
Harry Potter and Parvati Patil Neville Longbottom and Pansy Parkinson Seamus Finnigan and Blaise Zabini Theodore Nott and Astoria Greengrass" And he drawled on, and on, and on, until…
" Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger. The instructions are on page 194 of your textbook. Your time starts now."
Everyone looked at Snape incredulously, as though he'd just sprouted three extra heads.
No one, repeat, no one in their right minds would put Draco and Hermione together to do anything. Sure, Draco had changed after the war. And sure, the golden trio had vouched for him and his mother at their hearings. But they had to hate each other occasionally at least, because that's just how it works. Try to change that and you could easily tear a hole into the space-time continuum.
Everybody waited for either Draco or Hermione to complain but none of that happened. Instead, Hermione calmly walked over to his bench and put on her best poker face.
Some sighed with relief thinking that this meant a good things. Others kept watching them, fearing that the worst was yet to come.
I guess the latter set was right because little did they know that today Hogwarts would experience a new turning point. Today, a new height of madness would be discovered. The events following that followed would surely go down in Hogwarts history.
"Ok. Let's get started then." Hermione said as she placed her cauldron on the table. " Malfoy, do you mind getting the ingredients?"
He looked like he was about to say something but then he quickly shut his mouth, shrugged and stalked off towards the cabinet of ingredients.
Everybody had already started their potion. So far, so good, no accidents had occured. But with their luck, the Fates were probably just saving the worst for last.
And so it began…
They (by they, I mean Hermione) had been brewing the potion for the last twenty minutes, yet it wasn't giving them- Hermione- the desired effect so Hermione asked Draco to get some more ingredients for the potion, naturally.
"Shredded skin of a boomslang. Check. Powdered horn of a bicorn. Check. Other ingredients that aren't half as important and aren't even in the original version. Check, check and check." Malfoy said under his breath.
He was so busy making sure he had all the ingredients that he didn't even bother to look where he was going. He was almost at his table when he bumped into Neville, who bumped into Pansy (whom was two benches behind Hermione.), who accidently poured too many lacewing flies into the potion. And the potion also got knocked over by Pansy.
Pansy managed to regain her balance and not topple into the potion. The potion, on the other hand, was not as lucky. The student in front of Pansy, Theodore Nott Jr., wisely moved away as soon as he noticed the cauldron hurtling towards him. So instead of hitting Theo, the cauldron's contents flew straight into Theo's cauldron causing the mixed contents to pop and sizzle until it started bubbling. Then Pansy's cauldron hit the side of Theo's cauldron with such a force that it sent Theo's cauldron flying, sort of. The poor cauldron was about to meet an unlucky fate and so was Hermione, seeing as she was directly in front of the potion and had somehow not noticed all that was going on.
Time stood still, as though Titan Lord Kronos decided to grace them with his presence. The cauldron sorta flew through the air but the poor cauldron was not strong enough to handle two incomplete and terrible from the start potions, therefore, causing the bottom of the cauldron to give way.
Unfortunately, the time at which it decided to do that was when it was directly above Hermione. Poor Hermione. The bubbling contents spilled all over her and the cauldron landed right on top of her but seeing as its bottom had been melted, the cauldron placed itself at her middle section with Hermione's hands in there too. This threw Hermione off balance causing her to tip forward. Right into her own incomplete almost correct potion.
"Aaarrrrggghhhh!" The scream was loud and shrill enough to make a banshee jealous. Hermione's scream filled the classroom.
Oh, sorry. I meant, Draco's scream filled the classroom. It couldn't have been Hermione because she had already just slumped unto the floor with her own cauldron on her head like a seriously oversized hat.
All eyes were on him now.
"What happened to you, Drakie poo?" cooed Pansy.
"My hair. My beautiful hair." he half-wailed, half-sobbed. He was desperately trying to cover his head but it didn't work.
"I'm- I-I'm" "Go on, Draco." Pansy said encouragingly.
" I'm bald." he wailed and dropped his hands.
Gasps filled the classroom. In all the chaos, no one , except Draco and Neville, had seen how in his panic, Neville had cast a spell that made Draco bald. The damage was minor when compared to Hermione's but it was still terrible.
Even the Gryffindors found it hard to laugh at the moment. Pansy put her hand on Draco's shoulder as a sign of sympathy.
"Who did this to you?" Pansy asked shaking with anger. No one took away her Drakie poo's hair. Draco pointed at Neville like a shy child telling his parents the exact student who had bullied him.
"You!" Pansy shrieked accusingly.
"It was just a reflex, honest." Neville replied nervously.
"Who on earth uses a spell like that as something for self-defense?!"
"He was supposed to turn into a vulture."
"WHAT?"
It was up to Harry to cause this to turn into a serious fight.
"Hey, guys, what about Hermione?" Harry asked "Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley. Take her to the Hospital Wing. Everyone else, back to work." Snape said suddenly remembering that he was supposed to be in charge.
Unfortunately, no one was intent on following any of those orders.
"Aren't you going to deduct any points from a certain house." said Dean Thomas, another Gryffindor in Harry's year.
"Thank you for reminding me. 10 points to Gryffindor for that." said Snape. The Gryffindor were starting to think this was the day that their points wouldn't be deducted in potions. But then again, this was Snape they were talking about.
"30 points from Gryffindor." he said gleefully.
What the heck?!
Ron, who was planning on carrying Hermione to the Hospital Wing while Harry was busy glaring daggers at Snape, dropped Hermione and started yelling.
"But it was that git, Malfoy, that bumped into Neville." he argued.
"Do you have any proof ?" asked Snape.
"No. But-" "No buts. Now you and Potter had better take Miss Granger to the Hospital Wing before it's too late."
That seemed to get to them because they hastily picked Hermione and ran out of the classroom. The class went back to its former chaos.
"Ron's right. It's Malfoy's fault." shouted a random Gryffindor.
"No. It's Longbottom's fault." Malfoy half-shouted, half-sobbed. "Plus, he made me bald. Gryffindor deserves to get points docked off."
And it went on and on. Much like a game of monopoly, you would never no when it ended, if it ever did. Neville decided to leave the classroom. He seriously doubted the class would continue.
He ran out of the class while Snape was threatening a Gryffindor.
'And I'm supposed to be the dumb one. At least I have enough sense to know when to exit a classroom with an angry Snape in it'. he thought.
Snape, on the other hand, decided to leave the class and go to his office. He was quite tired of dealing with the students.
He entered his office, went to his cupboard and pulled out some wine. He didn't realise that by leaving the classroom he had made the biggest mistake ever. A mistake worse than Voldemort himself.