A/N: Okay, for those of you who like Ron and/or Draco you will be happy ducks in this chapter. Also, I'm over half way through the first book with this story, and I've been wondering if you want me to continue this story. I can finish this book, or the whole story arch if there's interest, but if not, I might try to get some friends or something. The future of this story is in your hands. Keep going, or just leave it? The fate of this story lies in your hands.

Enjoy.

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November brought cold weather to Scotland, and more work to Harry Potter. Harry spent his days in classes, and his nights either playing the professor with Hermione, helping her to learn all of the spells he thought they would need, or hanging around the common room with Ron, Neville, Seamus and Dean.

Ron and Hermione still weren't on good terms, and Harry began to try to remember when it was that they became friends. He really wished that he had some sort of written record of these things, because he was nearly positive that by the middle of November they had formed the "Golden Trio" as all the future history books called them. He put it on his list of things to do.

There was something even more puzzling to Harry, though. Something he would have never seem coming, his strange friendship (if you could even call it that) with Draco Malfoy. It started with sitting next to him in Defense Against the Dark Arts, and making small talk, to Draco inviting Harry to sit with him at the Slytherin table at dinner (which Harry politely declined).

As strange as it was, once you got past the pureblood mania, Draco wasn't that bad of a guy. He liked Quidditch, both "The Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle" and "Loony Nonby v.s. Cornish Pixie", wizard's chess, Honeyduke's candy and all the things that every other eleven year old wizard seemed to like. It seemed as though he was just a normal boy, who go brought up in a bad home, and Harry ended up feeling bad for him more than anything. Harry even went as far as going to hang out with him, Crabbe and Goyle, which was weird, but not wholly terrible.

Hermione hated that Harry talked to Draco, though, and he couldn't really blame her. Malfoy's animosity towards Hermione rivaled that of Ron, and no matter how much Harry tried to convince them that she really wasn't that bad, they didn't want to listen.

At least there was Neville. Neville seemed to like Hermione, and he would sit next to her often at dinner, and the two of them would discuss all the plants and herbs and fungi that Harry really had no patience to remember.

All around Harry was not having an unpleasant time. It was different, but not in a particularly bad way.

Then came the morning of the first Quidditch match of the season. It was the first Gryffindor match that Harry had been to, where he hasn't playing, and he couldn't help but feeling sullen about it.

"Why are you so sulky this morning?" Ron asked that morning at breakfast, his mouth full of cereal.

"I don't know," Harry lied as he poured himself some orange juice.

"Well cheer up, mate, today's the first match of the season," Ron said.

"It'll be good. I hear we have a real good team this year," Seamus said.

Ron was in his element, "I hear the seeker they got is brilliant."

This piqued Harry's interest.

"Who is the new seeker?" he asked.

"A fifth year girl named Tracie Everson," Ron said excitedly.

Harry's mood, needless to say, didn't improve with this news. She was fifth year. That meant that she could be on the team for another two years after the current one. They wouldn't need a new seeker until Harry's fourth year, and then there would be the Triwizard Tournament, and he wouldn't be able to play anyway. So he would have to wait until fifth year, which was a long way away.

As the school made its way down to the field, Harry was surrounded by excited chatter, which seemed to worsen his already less than sunny disposition.

The match was a success for Gryffindor, who won by nearly two hundred points. Harry had to admit the seeker was a good flyer, and she did catch the snitch within an hour of the start of the match.

He remembered the first time he was at this particular match, and how he had nearly been thrown off his broom, and began to feel worried. The last time Quirrell had tried to kill him, what was to say that he wouldn't do it again? He knew that if he was killed it would destroy the horcrux in his forehead, and maybe he could come back to life again, like he had last time, but he would rather not waste his one chance at resurrection in his first year, he knew that he would need that later. This left him worried about when and where Quirrell would strike.

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That answer came only a week later. It was Wednesday night, and the first year Gryffindors had Astronomy. They were mapping Taurus, Orion, and the seven sisters. Harry was leaning on the ledge on the southern side of the tower, trying to get the spacing between Taurus and Orion right, when suddenly the section of ledge he was leaning on disappeared, causing Harry to lose his balance, and fall off the side of the astronomy tower.

His wand was in his pocket, and he was trying to draw it as quickly as he could, but the ground was approaching quicker. He began to panic, his hand fumbling to grab his wand. Twenty feet, fifteen, ten. Oh god, he was going to hit the ground. He braced, and was hit, but not by the ground, but by a spell that stopped him in midair, only inched from the ground.

It had hit him hard enough to wind him, but he was otherwise intact. As he was lowered the last few inches to the ground, he saw a shadowy figure dash into the woods with its hood drawn. It had to have been Quirrell.

"Stay there Potter!" Harry heard Professor Sinistra call out from atop the tower.

He lied on the ground trying to remember how to breath, and then trying to stop his heart from feeling as though it was about to explode. He had just nearly plunged to his death. Had Professor Sinistra not been so quick on her feet, he would be dead.

Slowly he sat up, feeling slightly queasy.

Professor Sinistra, Ron and Hermione all came running over, followed by the nervously whispering first years that were in his class.

The Professor kneeled down beside him, "Are you alright? Is anything broken?"

"No," Harry said, "I'm just a bit shaky."

"You would be a lot worse than shaky if Malfoy hadn't saved you," Hermione said. She looked as pale as Harry felt.

"Malfoy?" Harry said. He looked around at the people crowding around him, Malfoy wasn't there.

"Oh yes, he did a damn good job," she looked around, and also noticed he wasn't there, "fifty points to Slytherin, even though Malfoy seems to have run off."

She looked at Harry, and then to Ron and Hermione, "Can you two make sure he gets to the hospital wing. Just to be safe, and the rest of you go back to your common rooms, class is dismissed. I need to speak to the head master."

She stood up and walked back into the castle.

Hermione and Ron helped him up, and through the crowd of whispering people, who all wanted to ask him about what happened. As they were walking Harry turned to Hermione, "It was Quirrell, I know it."

"You think Quirrell tried to kill you?" Ron sounded utterly shocked.

"Yeah, he's trying to steal the philosopher's stone, which is hidden in the castle," Harry said.

"What?" Ron looked totally lost.

"The philosopher's stone is used to produce the Elixir of Life, which makes the drinker immortal. It's hidden here, because Voldemort is trying to steal it, so that he can be brought back to life, because now he is just sort of a soul." Hermione said, sounding impatient, "Oh, and Quirrell is working for Voldemort."

Ron looked at them, "How do you two know all this?"

"Well, we found the three-headed dog on the third floor, and noticed there was a trap door under its feet. Hagrid ended up giving away that the dog was guarding something secret involving Nicolas Flamel. We did a bit of research, and found out who that was, and we learned the stone had been in that Gringott's vault that was robbed a few months ago. So obviously someone was trying to get it, right? But who would want to live forever more than someone who at the moment wasn't really alive, so the clear choice is Voldemort." Harry said. He didn't really want Ron knowing about his time traveling, because he didn't really want Ron to get hurt. Hermione understood how messy time was, but Ron most likely wouldn't handle the situation as well.

Ron's eyebrows furrowed, "But how do you know it's Quirrell?"

"On Halloween he let the troll in. It was a rouse to lure all the teachers away so he could sneak up to the third floor, but Snape went to stop him." Harry said, "That's why he had that wound on his leg the next day."

"But how did you know that the troll was a rouse?" Ron seemed somewhere between scarred and impressed. Harry and Hermione looked at each other, trying to figure out how they knew this.

"Well, um…" Harry said.

"We weren't at the Halloween feast, remember? We were trying to figure out who it was that was trying to get the stone when we saw Quirrell sneaking off, followed by Snape. Later that night we heard about the troll, and naturally put two and two together," Hermione said, saving the day, yet again.

Ron thought about that for a moment.

"Well, why does he want to kill you though?"

"Because he probably sees me as a threat, I mean, I stopped him once before, what if I do it again?" Harry said as they turned down the hall that led to the hospital wing.

"So are you going to try to stop Quirrell?" Ron asked, looking at Harry with a mix of concern and awe.

"I'm going to have to, if he gets the stone Voldemort might come back," Harry said.

They got to the doors of the hospital wing, and Harry walked inside where he was greeted by a very tired looking Madam Pomfrey, who gave him some strange green potion to 'help with his nerves' and sent him off to bed.

.

The next day Harry spotted Malfoy on his way to breakfast.

"Malfoy!" he called.

The blond boy turned, to see who it was, "Morning Potter."

"Morning," Harry said, "I just wanted to say thank you. For saving me last night, Hermione told me it was you."

Draco did something that almost looked like a smile, "I think you're pretty damn lucky I was there."

At any other point in Harry's life that would have had an entirely different meaning.

"I was pretty damn lucky," Harry admitted, "What spell did you use?"

"Aresto Momentum. The one you used to save Longbottom," Malfoy said proudly.

"It was brilliant." Harry said.

"I know," Malfoy actually smiled this time, and Harry couldn't help but join him.

As they walked into the Great Hall together, Harry realized the absurdity of the situation. He was becoming friends with Draco Malfoy.

.

That evening Harry encountered a very normal situation which, given the context of the situation, was absurd.

He was sitting in the common room with Ron and Neville, trying to help them with their potions essay when Hermione Granger came over and sat down net to them, and offered to help. Now, that on its own would have been an obscure occurrence, but what propelled it to the level of outright bizarre was that Ron not only took the help, but thanked her for coming and offering in the first place.

Neville and Harry looked at each other for a moment, hoping that the other one would know what was going on, before shrugging and realizing it was better not to question.

It seemed as though there were certain instances in life which brought people infinitely closer, and it seemed as though having to defeat Voldemort was just one of those instances.