Chapter 41

Hermione reached for him to Apparate and instead, Draco grabbed her hand, yanking her towards him playfully. She yelped as she stumbled into him and he pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her to hold her tightly against his chest. She looked up at him with a twinkle in her hazel eyes, beaming.

Between the feel of her body against his and the promise of a day alone together with sunny weather, without war or death, all memories of Alecto, torture and the threat to his parents were vanished from his mind now.

She Apparated them close to a tree and thankfully they were out of sight, but Hermione had taken a chance that Muggles would have seen them. She glanced around, flustered, and then up at him brushing a few errant curls out of her face.

"Where are we?" he asked, curious.

"Leicester," she replied, as if that explained everything.

Draco scanned his surroundings to see a series of buildings dispersed amongst a grassy lawn with sidewalk pathways. Lots of people were strolling the grounds, enjoying the unusually warm weather. Parents held hands with children. Some were out walking dogs. One of the buildings had a design he'd never seen before and he focused his gaze, trying to figure out what it might be.

"What's with the gigantic silver beehive?"

Hermione's turned to face him with one of the happiest smiles he had ever seen. On anyone. Her excitement was contagious, and he felt himself smiling too, despite the horror of the morning. Without answering, she grabbed his hand and pulled him towards the oddest looking building he'd ever seen. They passed a sign that read "National Space Centre" and he stopped dead in his tracks. Hermione didn't notice he had halted and almost fell into him after being suddenly pulled back.

"Are you showing me spaceships?" Draco asked her in disbelief. "Is this a Muggle astronomy museum?"

"Well not exactly spaceships," Hermione turned to him, hazel eyes twinkling with delight. "The silver beehive building has two rocket nozzles and inside the museum they have one of the three Soyuz caps–"

He cut off her explanation by pulling her into a searing kiss. He bent over towards her, cupping her jaw, cradling the back of her head and plundering her mouth with as much passion as he could. Briefly he recalled Alecto's mouth on his just this morning but the touch and taste of Hermione chased those thoughts away. With each swipe of his tongue and each movement of his lips, Draco tried to tell Hermione what she meant to him.

She didn't have to explain to him why she wasn't inferior or why her parents weren't inferior. Or teach him the Patronus charm. She didn't have to take him to see a movie that she had clearly seen many times before. She didn't have to stay awake all night while he healed from the implant extraction. She didn't have to show him Muggle art and entertain his bigoted ideas, or care for him while he puked his drunken guts out and listen to his horrific confessions, and she certainly didn't have to take him to see a field of development completely foreign to the Wizarding world.

She didn't have to do any of this.

And yet she did. She accepted him as he was, with all of his struggles, and she did all of those things for him.

Happily.

Hermione made little whimpering noises and he swallowed every single one of them, hungrily kissing her mouth, devouring her. Those small, delicate – deadly – hands fisted his hair, slid around his neck, and then wrapped around his torso.

Draco snaked his hand down her back and around her waist to press her body against his. She was soft, petite and moving against him in the most delicious way.

Fuck.

She smelled warm and feminine and tasted even better.

Draco wanted her now.

Slowly, before the kiss became too heated for public, he broke away from her with a low growl and opened his eyes. Hermione's eyes were darker, and hooded. Her lips were swollen, her face was flushed and she was breathing heavily with a dizzy, lusty smile on her mouth. Draco wanted to do that to her again. He wanted to feel her body against his and to hear the sounds she made. He leaned forward but her smile faltered slightly.

Hermione was going to say something about objectivity and being his handler and he didn't want it to ruin the day. Instead, he gave her a devilish grin, and before she knew what was happening, he picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, walking with long strides across the grassy field towards the entrance to purchase tickets.

"Draco!" she squealed, hanging upside down, bouncing lightly against his back.

He had never heard her squeal before. He couldn't have imagined a sound like that ever leaving the mouth of Hermione Granger, and he grinned.

A few people walking across the grounds looked at them, but he didn't care. She giggled. Giggled. And dug her fingers into his ribs.

"Yaaaaaah," he cried out, stumbling as she tickled him mercilessly from her upside-down position.

He tried unsuccessfully to guard his rib cage with his arms. Giving in, he slid her down his front and down to the ground. She was still laughing, face beet red and hair coming out of her braid. Both of them were grinning ridiculously and gasping for breath. After a few seconds of panting laughter, they took each other's hands and continued to stroll towards the entrance of the building to wait in line.

Draco couldn't keep the smile off his face. It had been such a long time since he felt this happy, and he didn't remember when the last time was.

His smiled widened. Yes, he did.

Walking around the National Gallery.

"No tickling." He pointed his index finger in her face. That only made her laugh harder. She grabbed his finger with her hand and pulled it away.

A saucy grin played at her lips. "I'll make no promises not to exploit your weaknesses."

They continued on to purchase tickets. "Retribution, Granger." Draco towered over her and lowered his voice threateningly. "You won't know when, you won't know how, but it's coming for you."

Unfazed by their height differential, Hermione's eyes sparkled up at him with a naughty gleam. "Promise?"

He couldn't take this anymore.

oooooooooooooo

"And this is how Muggles get up into space?"

"You sound underwhelmed."

"I was expecting something like the Millennium Falcon, or a Star Destroyer."

"Well, this is how it's actually done. One of the ways anyway. It's not a movie. We're all a tad bit constrained by the laws of physics here."

"But it's so tiny! You could fit that in the Slytherin Common room."

"The Americans built space shuttles, those are much larger. The Russian Soyuz only seats three. At least, this version does."

"Three? In that thing? Not even Aunt Bella is that evil."

"It has to be small, so the rockets blasting it out of the atmosphere won't need as much fuel."

"Rockets? Didn't you say there were rockets here, Hermione? Wait, where are you going?"

ooooooooooooooo

"So these suits protect from the vacuum of space?"

"Also extreme heat and extreme cold. It's actually quite a remarkable feat of engineering. Being able to protect something as fragile as the human body so it can withstand such harsh conditions. And still retain the ability to move and communicate."

"That's all well and good, but is there enough room for my cock? Ow! You violent bitch."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

ooooooooooooo

"And the scientists will live up there for months? In a fancy metal cage?"

"Metal, plastic, ceramic, but yes. It's a collaborative project between NASA, the European Space Agency, Japan, Russia and Canada. This November they'll launch it into orbit. We could watch it on the telly together if you like."

"What if it fails?"

"There have been failures before. The Russians had many, the Americans had some too. They don't stop trying though."

"What's it for?"

"I think some experiments are done to see what happens when gravity is removed."

"So this multi-million – no – multi-billion Galleon international space station project is all just to simulate an anti-gravity charm?"

"Well, no, that's not all. Muggles also go up there to prove that they can. And to see how humans live in space for extended periods of time. How does humanity know what they're capable of if they don't push their limits?"

"Doing for the sake of doing?"

"Doing for the sake of pushing. But also to explore. Don't you want to see what else is out there? Who else is out there?"

"Aliens?"

"Maybe. And we have to leave Earth at some point."

"Why?"

"The sun will get larger as it ages and swallow the Earth up."

…..

"What."

"In five billion years. Don't worry about it."

"Fucking hell! Granger. You can't just say stuff like that out of the blue."

"It's common knowledge amongst Muggles. There was even a Doctor Who episode about it."

"Bloody fucking hell."

…..

"So Muggles are going to save the world?"

"Ironic, isn't it?"

oooooooooooo

"What kind of Cineplex is this?"

"It's called an IMAX."

"This one's larger than what you have in your town."

"They're expensive, and the films are made with special cameras in order to cover your peripheral vision. Usually, you only see these theaters in science museums."

"And everything we'll see in this movie is real, not with special effects like in Star Wars?"

"Yes. You'll see what the astronauts see when they leave the Earth's atmosphere and go into orbit."

"Hermione?"

"Mmm?"

"Thank you."

ooooooooooooo

They stood side by side, heads tilted back, staring openmouthed up at the nozzles of the Blue Streak and PGM-17 Thor rockets.

"This is definitely my favorite thing today," Draco said, his voice lifting slightly, completely entranced.

"Of course it is," Hermione snorted. "It's a gigantic phallus."

ooooooooooooooooo

Hermione dipped her French fry in ketchup and glanced to Draco sitting next to her. He was staring at nothing in particular, leaning on the table with his head propped up with his hand. His legs were sprawled on bench, and the hot dog resting in his hand was still half eaten in its wrapper. She wondered if he was still bothered by whatever had happened this morning with Alecto. She didn't want to ask because he said he wanted to forget. She had hoped their excursion to the National Space Centre had done the job but now she worried it was all coming back to haunt him.

She wasn't sure what she should do and felt at a loss at how to help him. Should she offer comfort again? Another distraction to help him forget? Talk it out with him?

Draco sighed. "It all seems so pointless, doesn't it?"

Oh.

He felt how meaningless everything was in the face of the incomprehensible, unending universe. Completely understandable. That was something she could deal with.

Hermione popped the French fry in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully, watching the slight breeze ruffle his hair. Coming to grips with the vastness of space had this effect on her too. It was his first time confronting the reality that something as large as their solar system was an insignificant spec in an infinite universe.

"What seems pointless?" she asked with a half grin. "Yourself? Humanity? The war? Earth?"

"Yes," he said, turning to her, eyes slightly glazed over. "All of that. And magic. Who cares about magic? Does it even matter? We're fighting over miniscule slivers on a tiny blue dot."

Hermione swirled the ketchup with her fry. "Size doesn't matter."

Her eyes snapped up to Draco's.

Oops.

The fire returned to his eyes and leaned into her on the bench, taking the bait with relish. "Once you've experienced something larger than Gryffindor cock, you'll understand that it does."

She let her head drop on the table. "Can you just–"

"I'm truly sorry that Scarhead and Weasel have disappointed you so..." he paused for effect and lowered his voice, "deeply."

"For the love of–"

He kept going.

"Obviously you need someone else to…" he paused again, "erect your piss-poor standards."

She lifted her head, he was still grinning. "Are you done yet?"

"I think so. No, wait…" He pointed at her, eyes teasing. "If your boy-toys told you it's only how you use it that counts, then you should know that it's both size and skill."

"Okay, then–"

"And they obviously lack both."

Hermione stared at him, exasperated. Draco stifled a laugh.

"And I suppose you have both?" she countered.

"Clearly," he said, popping a French fry in his mouth and licking the salt off his fingers. Unable to help herself, she watched the movement of his tongue. Noticing her distraction, he sent her a heated gaze and continued in a sensual tone, "I'd completely ruin you for anyone else."

A blush crept up from her neck to enflame her cheeks. She remembered the warm coil of desire in her belly when he had kissed her, his hard body atop hers, his length pressed against her thigh, so hot it felt like it was burning a hole through her clothing.

Draco continued with a smile at her reaction. "Certainly you'll be ruined for anyone else in Gryffindor. And Hufflepuff." He paused, considering her. "Ravenclaws are too clinical. You won't ever be satisfied with less than Slytherin."

The way he said 'Slytherin' made her cunt clench.

How did he do that?

"You're all talk," her voice came out as a throaty whisper and she cleared her throat.

His smile widened predatorily as he exposed his teeth.

"You were saying, Hermione?"

"What?"

They were talking about something before sex. She couldn't remember what it was though.

Draco closed his lips, watching her with amusement. "About size."

Size. Size of penises. Slytherin penises. Draco Malfoy's penis.

She returned his stare, positively clueless.

"Size of the tiny blue dot in the tail of the spiral of the Milky Way Galaxy in a small, infinitesimal part of the universe and how nothing matters," he spoke smugly. "Not even magic."

"Oh. Right." She blinked, and cleared her throat again, trying to remove all thoughts of Draco's body. Merlin. "I meant that it doesn't matter how large the universe is. The people we love are more important than anything else. Big or small."

Draco's grey eyes studied her face, serious now, and then he reached across the bench to take her hand. She laced her fingers through his, enjoying the warm tingling of his touch.

The conversation had a double meaning. He knew she understood his ethical quandaries in weighing the lives of those he loved in the short term versus the larger picture and helping the Order in the long term. She hoped she wouldn't ever have to be in that position with him. It was awful watching him go through it.

"Those we love aren't important in the grand scheme of things," Hermione continued. "They mean nothing when viewed from the perspective of the entire universe, but they are important to me. And to you. In the end, that's what matters."

He rubbed the ridges of her knuckles with his thumb and gazed down, following the pattern he made on her hand.

Draco spoke, his voice contemplative. "Wizards would make space exploration easier. Humanity would get on further by using magic and science together."

Hermione thought back to how he had called her a Mudblood in second year and her throat constricted with that same sense of pride and wonder she felt at the National Gallery. He'd come so far since their school days.

"I agree."

His eyes flicked up to hers at her choked tone. "Do you think we ever will?"

"I do." She swallowed, and stared down at his thumb, rubbing across her knuckles. Sometimes it was hard to hold his gaze when it was so intently focused on her. "It's difficult to see that now because we're in the middle of a war. But not just twenty years ago the Russians and Americans never would have worked together on the space station. They were competing."

Draco's lips lifted into a smile. "You're an optimist? I never pegged you as one."

Hermione shook her head. "No, I'm being realistic. Things change. Sixty years ago, you'd never see France and Germany work together on anything let alone a space station. Two hundred years ago France, England and Spain were fighting over lands that don't even belong to them anymore. And now the European Space Agency represents them all."

"So you're saying time heals?"

She met his gaze again. "It does. People forget what they've fought about. They realize working together has more benefits than fighting against one another."

This time, she rubbed her thumb lightly over his knuckles. Draco turned his hand over so she had more access to touch him. And she did, exploring the contours of his palm and the tendons of the underside of his wrist.

"You don't think Muggles will kill all of us first?"

Hermione looked up at him again. "You've read 'Hiroshima'?"

He nodded. "Atomic bombs are terrifying. There's nothing in the Wizarding world that comes close. No one should have that much power."

"I agree." Hermione remembered what Remus had told her after the Paddington safe house raid. "But sometimes it has to get worse before it gets better. No one has used nuclear weapons since World War II, despite all the wars that have been fought since then."

Draco watched two children throwing a Frisbee on the grass and then shifted his gaze back to her.

"And which stage do you think we're at now?"

He sounded apprehensive. Draco wasn't talking about space exploration anymore. He had just been sexually assaulted by Alecto Carrow, he was tortured at the whim of Voldemort, and made to torture and kill innocent people to keep his family alive. She couldn't imagine what his world would look like if it were getting worse.

"I don't know, Draco." She squeezed his hand tighter. "Do you want to go back?"

He released her hand, stood up from the park bench and stretched. Hermione watched his long limbs tremble as he reached to the sky and then scratched his stomach. The black fabric of his Star Wars T-shirt lifted slightly, exposing his abdominal muscles between the slit of his shirt and jeans.

Draco looked around, pensive. It was late in the afternoon; she didn't know what time constraints he had. He returned his gaze to her, grey eyes bright and wistful.

"Not yet."

She picked up the remains of their food, holding out his half eaten hot dog. He shook his head and she threw everything in the trash, brushing the crumbs off her hands.

"It's a university town, let's walk around the downtown a bit."

They ambled around the streets of Leicester, holding hands, fingers interlaced. Hermione sensed the tension between them mounting as the evening approached. Walking down the sidewalk, Draco placed his hand slightly lower on her waist, fingers splayed with his pinky pressed experimentally into her jean clad rear. She guided him forward through a doorway to a shop, her hand on his mid-riff, gingerly fingering those abdominal muscles she had ogled all night when Mary extracted his implant. She wondered if her touches would make him feel uncomfortable, given what had happened to him this morning. But he didn't seem to mind. Even more so, he appeared to enjoy her increasingly sexual affection.

Waiting for their lattes to be prepared, he placed a hand on the nape of her neck, and his thumb rubbed slow circles underneath the back collar of her shirt. They sat down to sip their lattes, and she traced patterns on his knee and up his thigh, feeling his muscles flex under the fabric of the jeans. Draco licked the froth from his upper lip and grinned at her devilishly.

In another store, Hermione bent over to look at some hand painted scarves. He stood behind her, not touching, but just close enough that she could feel his heat all up and down her back side. Right before she stood up he lightly gripped her hip and she remembered his words from when he tested her Occlumency.

How about I bend you over your bed, rip your pants down and pound into you while you scream?

His fingers twitched.

Later, she stood behind him in a book shop, watching him flip through a science fiction novel by Ursula Le Guin. Hermione couldn't tell if she was the one pressing her breast into the back of his arm, or if Draco was the one rubbing over her nipple every time he flipped the page. All she knew was that she had a dull, pleasant ache between her legs that wouldn't go away.

Feeling bold, she slipped her hand into the back pocket of his jeans and gave a gentle squeeze to his arse. She had done the same thing with Ron and hadn't received much of a reaction. With Draco, she watched with satisfaction as his pelvis gave a slight reflexive jerk forward. He slipped the book into its place on the shelf and spoke without looking at her.

"Let's go back."

Wordlessly, she removed her hand from his pocket and laced her fingers in with his, leading him out the store and into a side alley.

She turned around, heart pounding in her chest, to see his eyes darker and hooded, staring down at her through his fringe.

"Won't they take you from me?" Draco murmured.

"Not anymore."

Hermione felt a thrill at the possessive way he spoke to her.

He closed in on her, pressing her against the brick wall of the neighboring building, hand on either side of her head. He smelled like the warmth and sun of the outdoors and his lips lowered to hers. "What changed?"

She glanced at his lips and then up into his grey eyes. So hungry for her. She had wondered if whatever happened with Alecto had put him off of any further sexual activity but it hadn't.

Hermione swallowed nervously and her stomach twisted into knots. It was going to happen. Right now. She felt like she was burning up.

God. Was she ready? He was rearing to pounce and she could barely breathe. She was scared. She wanted this. But she was scared.

"The tiara," her vocal chords were hardly functioning. "The cup. Only Ron and Harry know about them. They can't send someone else now."

She wanted him so badly.

Draco closed the remaining millimeters between their mouths and paused, his lips ghosting across hers. Her heart was pounding in her chest. It would break her rib cage. Anticipation and desire were scorching her skin and she could feel herself getting tighter and tighter between her legs. She was going to snap.

"So it's just you and me then?" he whispered.

Hermione closed her eyes and reached up, threading her fingers into his hair. Smooth. Soft. Hers.

"Just you and me."

Chapter end notes:

160K words. I don't know who I'm more proud of: myself, for writing this much without smut, or all of you for reading it and sticking with me!

Next chapter is THE chapter. ;)

National Space Centre including the rocket nozzles, the Soyuz capsule and the gigantic silver beehive.

Hiroshima by John Hersey details firsthand accounts of six survivors of the atomic bomb blast. It's available for free on line if you're interested.