Happenstance

Chapter 25: Hands of Time

Just as promised, Narcissa brought the item her son had requested night before over to his house. She'd made it a point to come by Draco's house early that Monday morning since she knew that both Luna and her son had to get ready for work. She'd been quite surprised when she'd stood outside knocking for nearly fifteen minutes and no one answered. Finally she'd just let down the wards Draco had put up, which luckily were the exact same wards his father had set up at Malfoy Manor; 'like father like son,' Narcissa thought, as she stepped into her son's home. She knew that they weren't up yet, since the entire lower level was still pitch black, thanks to it being just before five-fifteen. Lighting her wand, Narcissa carefully and quietly tiptoed upstairs towards Draco's room. The closer she got to the room the more obvious it became that they were up they just weren't 'up' yet; their moans being a dead give away. If the trinket her son was after hadn't been so rare and expensive, Narcissa would have just left it along with a note, and let herself out of the house, so as not to disturb their alone time; but unfortunately these things were so hard to come by that she just wasn't willing to do that. Begrudgingly, Narcissa tapped at the bedroom door. When no one answered her knocking, Narcissa tapped harder and called out to them softly.

"Draco, Luna," she said. "It's me. I've got the ti..." before she even had a chance to finish her statement, Draco came barreling out of the room with his bed sheet clenched tightly around his hips.

"Hi, Mum," Draco said, sounding out of breath and looking quite disheveled as he shut the door behind him. "Can we keep this whole thing quiet. I don't want Luna to know about it."

"Sure, Love," she said, untucking her handkerchief from the hem of her sleeve and wiping a few stray beads of sweat from his forehead. Never in her wildest dreams did she ever think that she'd be standing in front of her son wiping away the sweat he'd developed while shagging the mother of his child; it was surreal really. "What exactly are you planning on doing with this anyway?"

"I'd like to keep it a secret for now," Draco said, not wanting to upset his Mum after she'd gone through the trouble of helping him out. "I haven't exactly ironed out all of the details yet."

"Well, promise me that before you start messing around with this thing, you'll iron out all of the details first," Narcissa asked. "The last thing I need is for you to get in trouble for causing irreparable damage. Keep in mind, the tiniest of details can completely alter the way things have turned out, and you of all people, have a great deal lose."

"So you're basically saying not to fuck it up," Draco summized.

"More or less," Narcissa agreed. "And watch your language."

"Thanks Mum," Draco said, as his mother headed down the stairs and he headed back inside the room. Before rejoining Luna in bed, Draco quickly headed over to the jacket he had out to wear to work that morning, and dropped his newest acquisition into the pocket, without Luna being any the wiser.

"What did your Mum need?" Luna asked, lifting up the covers and inviting Draco in.

"She left her shawl here last night and just wanted to come and get it before we left for work," he lied. Luna nodded and let the subject rest, more than ready to pick up where they'd left off.

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Luckily for Draco, Luna's mind had bee elsewhere that morning. Otherwise, she never would have believed that his mother had left her shawl at their house the night before. Luna had been meticulous while cleaning up after their guests and she'd never noticed his mother's shawl lying anywhere. If Luna hadn't bought his excuse for why his mother had come over so early, Draco didn't know what he would have done. The plan he had running through his head had been nagging him for weeks and he was pretty sure that it would prove successful, so the last thing he wanted to do was ruin the surprise. The only downside to what he was doing was that he was having to lie a great deal more than he would have liked, but being the Malfoy that he was, Draco was more than just good at it, provided he had enough time to think his lies through. When it came to lying on the spot, he was down right terrible at it.

Just like that morning when he'd had to lie, Draco told Luna that he was heading to the office when in reality he was actually meeting Blaise and Goyle at a nearby coffee house. As soon as he had a chance last night, which coincidentally was after Luna had fallen asleep, Draco owled two of his oldest friends and asked them to meet him the following morning; he had something he needed them to help him with. Try as they might, Blaise and Goyle tried to get Draco to tell them what all of this was about ahead of time, but he remained tight lipped, promising them that it would be a blast. Begrudgingly, the pair agreed to meet him.

"Merlin," Draco groaned, cradling his gloved hands around the warm coffee cup as he sat outside of the coffee house waiting for his friends. He'd made it quite clear that they were to meet him at seven-thirty sharp, but it was already five till eight and neither had shown up yet. Wishing he had sat inside, Draco cursed his best mates under his breath.

"Watch your language, Malfoy," the familiar sound of Blaise's voice called out, as the young Italian wizard approached. "Sorry, but Quidditch practice ran late," Blaise explained. After graduating from Hogwarts, the former Slytherin had applied for a spot on his favorite team and had immediately been accepted. Even during off season, he was required to spend his mornings attending grueling practice sessions with the rest of his team. "Where's Greg?"

"Late," the disgruntled blond mumbled. "As always."

"I'm not always late," Goyle interrupted, quietly approaching his friends. Unlike Blaise, Goyle had surprised everyone and had accepted a job in the Ministry, working in the Department of Magical Safety. It was no secret that Goyle was all brawn, and the Ministry wasn't willing to let so physically powerful a wizard slip through there fingers. This meant that Greg Goyle spent his days investigating claims and suspicions of abuse of magical powers. Needless to say, if you saw Goyle approaching, you'd better be worried; he looked ready to break knee caps, and not even his finely tailored suits could soften his threatening persona. "Just sometimes."

"Well, nice of you both to finally show up," Draco replied, snidely. Both Goyle and Blaise knew that their friend was only messing with them, so they didn't take his words to heart.

"So, what's this little pow-wow about?" Goyle asked, pulling out a chair and straddling it, before signaling for the waitress to bring him a menu. "Thanks sweetie," he said, winking at the pretty waitress.

"Can you focus?" Draco said, smacking him on the back of the head lightly.

"Not when a pretty face is around," Goyle answered.

"Pretty?" Draco scoffed, rolling his eyes. "She's awfully plain..."

"So, what are we doing here?" Blaise interjected, not wanting to listen to Draco and Goyle get into a discussion about whether or not the waitress was attractive enough to merit a second glance.

"Someone's grouchy this morning," Goyle joked, playfully grabbing onto Blaise's shoulder and shaking him a bit. "What? Did you wake up on the wrong side of the bed?"

"No," Blaise replied. "I woke up in the center of my bed, surrounded by two very beautiful blond witches..."

"Bullshit," Draco laughed, before taking a long sip of his warm coffee. "Like you'd be able to find one witch who'd shag you, let alone two of them. That would be nothing short of a miracle."

"What's a miracle is that you're shagging Luna Lovegood," Goyle said, shaking his head in disbelief. "She turned into a hottie, didn't she?"

"Uh huh," Blaise agreed. "I didn't see that one coming. Did you see the article in the Prophet a few weeks back that listed her as one of the hottest unwed witches. That picture of her was pretty fantastic."

"I didn't see that," Draco said, not quite sure of what his friend was talking about.

"Just before your Dad had Skeeter fired, she did her annual list of the top ten hottest unwed witches and wizards. You placed number one on the wizards list... as always, and Looney was...

"Her name is Luna and I'm not telling you again," Draco warned.

"Luna," Blaise corrected, rolling his eyes at Draco's defensive behavior, "placed number two on the witches list."

"Who'd they put above her?" Draco snapped, unable to believe that someone could have been considered more attractive than his Luna; but then again, he was partial.

"Granger," Goyle answered. All three wizards had disgusted looks on their faces. "I know, gross isn't it."

"Yeah. It just proves that even the ugliest witch can be beautiful if she's best friends with the savior of the Wizarding World," Blaise sighed.

"She's not nearly as ugly as she used to be, but she doesn't hold a candle to Luna," Draco argued. "Potter must have used his swag to get her on the top of the list. You'd think he would have made sure that his girlfriend had been put in the top spot, not Granger."

"Rumor has it," Goyle said, sounding all too pleased. "Weasley and Potter called it quits a few weeks back, but neither is willing to admit it because they don't want to deal with all of the questions."

"Really," Draco said, getting a great deal of satisfaction out of the failure of Potter's relationship; especially since his own personal life was going so well. "Weaselette and Potter are done?"

"Don't know for sure, but since she's been shacking up with Dean Thomas, I'd say so," Goyle laughed. "Thomas said that she wasn't much of a shag at first. So, I don't think Potter was able to juggle being a Saint and teaching his girl the ins and outs of bedroom etiquette, if you know what I mean."

"I think everyone knows what you mean," Draco said, laughing.

"Not to change the subject, but why are we here?" Blaise asked again.

"Right," Draco said, having been so caught up reveling in Potter's misery that he'd almost forgotten that he'd asked them to meet him there for a reason. "I've got this idea on how to get Luna's research back."

"Snape burned it," Goyle reminded his lovesick friend. "Unless you collected all of the ashes and created a spell to regenerate them, I'd say you're shit out of luck."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Draco laughed, tossing a small piece of croissant at Goyle's head. "My mother had a time turner," Draco withdrew the small golden trinket from his breast pocket and flashed it at his friends before tucking it safely back in its place. "I want to go back and replace the portfolio Luna gave Snape with a decoy that looks exactly like it, and save the other one from the fire." Blaise and Goyle stared at their ambitious friend, dumbfounded. The reason why the Ministry had placed such tight restrictions on time turners was for reasons like this; people who didn't have the expertise necessary to modify time without completely screwing up the future, going back to try to correct previous wrongs.

"You're not licensed to have a time turner," Goyle said, after several long moments of silence.

"How do you know?" Draco asked, not knowing just how restricted these devices were.

"Because no one outside of the Ministry is," Goyle sighed. "Fuck, Draco, you're really putting me in a shitty position. It's my job to make sure that no one's abusing magic and here you are in possession of a time turner."

"Look," Draco said, realizing that he really was taking advantage of their close friendship when he hadn't intended on doing so. "Sorry man, but that research meant the world to Luna and she hasn't quite been the same since Snape destroyed it. She means everything to me and I've got to get it back for her. I'm not going to mess up the future. I'll make sure that no one sees us..."

"Us!" Blaise and Goyle shouted in unison. Neither had realized that their friend had planned on including them in on his little escapade. They'd honestly just thought that he was bragging.

"Yes," Draco said, sternly. "Us. I need someone to run lookout. I can't do this on my own. I need your help... please." For nearly ten minutes all three wizards were silent, Draco simply allow his friends to ponder their decision. He knew it was asking a lot, especially with the possible repercussions they were all facing, but he really wanted to do this for Luna.

"I'm in," Goyle said, offering his friend a mischievous smile. "It's been a while since I've done anything I knew I shouldn't."

"Me too," Blaise said, sounding a great deal less sure of himself than Goyle was.

"You sure?" Draco asked, wanting to make sure they wouldn't back out. Both boys nodded. "Alright. I've done all of the calculations, and in order for us to get back to the day it happened, we'll need fourteen and three-quarter turns backward. The only problem is that once we've replaced the real portfolio with the fake, we'll have to hide out in that time frame until Luna storms out of Snape's classroom after finding out that he ruined her research. That's the earliest time I can calculate our return point from. Once we see her leave the room, it'll be fourteen turns exactly for us to return to the time when we went back. Worst case scenario, we have to shadow our present selves for a few minutes to make sure that we reappear at the exact time we left." Goyle stared at Draco, confused.

"I'm going to have to take your word for it," Goyle laughed, shaking his head as if it hurt.

"I'm one-hundred percent confident in my calculations," Draco assured his friends. "The only possible problem is that we may get caught. It's so important that we remain out of sight of not only our old selves, but others. The slightest mishap can completely screw up the future, and I'll be really pissed if it affects my relationship with Luna and Landon."

"How is Lanny?" Blaise asked, not really meaning to change the subject but curiosity getting the best of him.

"Oh, he's doing great," Draco said, his short attention span making an appearance. "He's smiling a lot more now, and it's really cute cause he doesn't have any teeth yet. We play this game called peek-a-boo all the time and he gets so excited. You guys have to come by and see him soon, he's getting so big."

"Aww," a voice interrupted. "Isn't that cute. Daddy Draco's waxing poetic about his little bundle of joy." Turning, ready to strike, the trio came face to face with none other than Harry Potter and Ron Weasley. "Fatherhoods turned you soft, Ferret," Ron said, smirking at his nemesis. Before Ron was able to continue, his girlfriend, Hermione Granger approached, instantly silencing any further taunts with a stern glare.

"Hello Malfoy," she greeted, uneasily. "How's Luna?"

"Better now that she's gotten rid of some of the... garbage from her life," Draco replied.

"So, she finally dumped your lousy ass?" Harry asked, him and Ron high-fiving each other.

"No," Draco assured him. "We're very much still together... better than ever actually. How's Ginny? Oh wait, maybe I should ask Dean Thomas." Blaise and Goyle erupted in laughter. Draco's quick wit was one of the reason's they'd always enjoyed being close friends with him; it certainly proved to be amusing. The smirk on Harry's face instantly faded and was replaced by an angry glare.

"Well at least I didn't knock her up," Potter said, hoping to get one over on the blond wizard.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I did," Draco agreed. "And I've got a wonderful family to show for it. Not to mention a fantastic job, enormous fortune and all the power that comes with it. How's your job, Potter?" Draco knew he was hitting a bit of a sore spot. Ever since graduating for Hogwarts, Harry's performance had been sub-par. Not only did he only make a decent Auror, but there had been a bit of a scandal a few months back because Harry and Ron had let a fugitive supporter of Voldemort slip through their fingers because they'd been so hungover after a long night of partying.

"Let's go," Hermione ordered, pulling Ron and Harry away by the arm. She wasn't dumb enough to let her boys get into a fit with three of the most magically, politically and monetarily powerful wizards in their world. It was social, and maybe even literal, suicide. "Now," she ground out when the boys tried to resist.

"That's right, boys," Blaise laughed. "Listen to Mommy; tuck you tails between your legs and skitter away like the pathetic twat's you know you are." A witch who was walking past them at that moment with her very young son, slapped Blaise quite hard on the arm and sent a very unhappy look his way. "Sorry ma'am," Blaise apologized, winking at her while looking her up and down appraisingly. Granted, she was a common middle-aged witch, whom Blaise certainly didn't find attractive, his pretend flirting proved to instantly soften her angry look.

"I didn't know you liked your witches so well... aged," Draco said, laughing. Normally, he wouldn't have made fun of his friends in front of their enemies, but it was too good an opportunity to pass up.

"I like my witches, like I like my wine," Blaise joked. "Well aged and with a plate of cheese."

"What the fuck?" Goyle asked, unable to believe what his friend had just equated his taste in women to. Draco was too busy laughing to say much of anything.

"Laugh now," Potter hissed, snapping the former Slytherin's out of their friendly banter. "But in the end, just as we always do, we'll be the one's laughing."

"Oh," Goyle retorted, stepping in front of Malfoy so that his face was barely an inch from Harry's. "We're petrified."

"Do us a favor," Draco interjected, haughtily. "Don't bother trying to talk the talk, if you can't back it up. Now, if you'll excuse us, we were in the middle of something; besides I'm sure there's a bottle of Firewhiskey that you two drunkards need to get back to." Turning on their heels, the three wizards walked away from the other two very pissed off boys.

"Draco!" They heard Hermione call out. "Can you please tell Luna that I'm sorry for what I said and that she has a very handsome son!" Part of Draco wanted to say something snide like, 'she already knows that her son is handsome; she doesn't need the likes of you to tell her that,' but the look on Hermione's face was one of remorse and guilt, so he went against his gut and nodded. "Thank you," she said, dragging Harry and Ron away from the coffee house.

"Weird," Blaise muttered, shaking his head. "What's she sorry for?"

"The same day that Luna found out that Snape destroyed her portfolio, she overheard the Golden Trio making fun of her. I mean they laid into her like you wouldn't believe. Apparently, Granger feels bad for being such a stuck up, self-righteous little bitch."

"Tell us how you really feel," Goyle joked.

"Yeah well, if you heard what they'd said, you'd be pissed too," Draco said, in defense of his harsh words. "We were mean and sometimes even cruel to Luna, but at least we never pretended to be her friend."

"Good point," Blaise said. "Not that its much better, mind you."

"I'm not saying that it is, it's just not the same as what Potty and his lap dog's did," Draco argued.

"So, when are we going to get her portfolio back?" Goyle asked, glancing down at his watch. He really needed to go, otherwise he'd be excessively late for work.

"I based my calculations on our heading back, Friday night at ten o'clock," Draco said. "Are you guys free?"

"It's Monday now, so I'll just go ahead and reschedule the date I had for Friday. She wasn't that cute anyway," Goyle said, assuring Draco that he'd be free that night.

"I'll be there," Blaise said, as he and Draco did their trademark handshake.

"Thanks a million guys," Draco said, never having doubted that they would be there for him, just like they always were; even after Vincents death, they'd still managed to remain inseparable. "I owe you."

"You bet your ass you do," Blaise agreed, just before apparating away.

"I'll see you Friday night," Goyle said, him and Draco also doing their handshake before both apparating to work.

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