Title: Strange Bedfellows: A Comedy of Assumptions
Author: Mad Maudlin
Email: mekamorph@yahoo.com
Catergory: Humor, and a little romance
Keywords: Ron Weasley, Draco Malfoy, Hermione Granger, Harry Potter, slash, 5th year
Rating: PG-13.
Spoilers: Teensy ones for Book Four, microscopic one for Book Two
Summary: Murder, mayhem, madness and Malfoy! Harry and Hermione face down an unexpected conspiracy, a possible nefarious plot, wild rumors and much, much worse to save their best friend from a terrible fate...right?

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

In other words, they're not mine; talk to the nice Scottish lady.

A/N: WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! This fic contains SLASH (male-on-male) SITUATIONS! Boys kiss boys! Boys do a lot more than kiss boys! It's SLASH! If this is the sort of thing that might offend you, do not read any further! I have a right to speak freely, but you have a right not to listen. So exercise your "Back" button! Bill put 'em there for something...

Strange Bedfellows:

A Comedy of Assumptions

by Mad Maudlin

3 / This Isn't What It Looks Like

Hermione was not entirely certain what they were going to do with their new knowledge. She didn't know why Draco Malfoy would choose now to develop some sort of neurosis, or how Ron exactly figured into it, but she wasn't going to let the little ferret do anything to harm him. At least, not until I get a chance with him, she thought, and then told herself off for doing so.

They entered the library and found Ron's bag easily enough; unfortunately, Ron was not in sight. "He probably just went off to the card catalog," Harry said. "He'll come back eventually."

"I think we should go look for him," Hermione said firmly. "I really think he needs to know about this."

"What's the rush?"

She sighed; Harry could be so thick sometimes. "Have you suddenly forgotten the past four hours? Malfoy's got some kind of fixation on Ron, he needs to be on his guard."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Hermione, look, take it from me: he's not going to appreciate having us swooping around trying to protect him from some kind of nebulous threat from Malfoy, when all we've got to go on are some comments from two people who are not, let's face it, the brightest crayons in the box."

"Harry," she said, trying to appeal to reason, "how would you feel if Malfoy kidnapped Ron and used him as a virgin sacrifice to Cthulhu?"

He made a face. "I'm not entirely sure that Ron's a virgin, Hermione."

"What?"

"But think of it this way," he said quickly, "how would you feel if Ron got all offended at us for over-reacting and never spoke to us again?"

"All right," she said sweetly, "how would you feel if I Transfigured Hedwig into a fruitfly and fed her to Trevor?"

"You wouldn't."

"Just try me."

Harry shook his head. "Fine. We'll go look for him. But you keep your wand away from my owl, got it?"

"Oh, Harry, I was only joking." She grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him into the stacks.

It only took a few moments to spot Ron, or more precisely, to spot Ron's hair. Operating on the assumption that the rest of him was attached, Hermione dragged Harry in that direction, until she spotted a flash of silver-blonde from around Ron's shoulder. Then she shoved Harry into the next aisle over, seized with panic. "Malfoy's already here!" she whispered. "We've got to do something!"

Harry seized her by the upper arms. "Hermione, calm down. Breathe deeply. They've already gotten into one vicious brawl today, I don't think either of them will be actively trying for a detention."

"You're right, you're right..." She looked down the aisle, and an idea occurred to her. "Harry, come here and give me a hand."

He looked are her warily. "What do you want to do?"

"I want to hear what they're saying. Come on." She grabbed the sleeve of his robes and pulled him forward.

He resisted. "You're suggesting we spy on them?"

"Well, I'm not going to leave it all up to Crabbe and Goyle. Who knows how many shiny objects there are in the Slytherin dormitories?" She paused when the sound of the two boy's voices became loudest: Ron's, a hoarse snarl, and Malfoy's, an acidic drawl. She tested the stability of the shelf, then looked at Harry. "Give me a leg up, will you?"

He looked up and down the aisle, then sighed. "Hermione, can I just say that I don't think this is a good idea?"

"Yes. Now get over here and help."

He bent over and cupped his hands together; she put her foot in them, then boosted herself up onto the shelf. Harry grunted. "What've you got in your pockets, bricks of lead?"

"Shh!" She strained, but still couldn't make out individual words. She put her other foot on Harry's shoulder and climbed higher.

"Ahhh! Who made me your stepstool?"

"Hush up!" She wobbled a bit as Harry squirmed, but managed to stay balanced. Now her head was just above the top shelf, and she could finally hear them clearly.

"...think you're playing at, Malfoy."

"Oh, need me to use simpler sentences?

"Quit putting words in my mouth!"

"I really should, there's so many other things I'd rather be putting there..."

Hermione tried to climb higher, to see over the edge of the shelf in case something violent happened. She put her original foot on Harry's head, but she slipped and nearly fell. "Yaa! Herm, those are my glasses! Were my glasses..."

"Shhhh!" She pressed her ear to the place where a book had been removed, trying to ignore how badly Harry was wobbling.

"...much more enjoyable, you know."

"Malfoy, that's sick. Really sick.'

"Oh, come on, Weasley, you can't say you've never thought about it..."

"Yes, I can, because I'm not evil."

"'Evil' is such a relative term..."

Her heart jumped into her throat. Was Malfoy trying to recruit Ron for You-Know-Who? She strained to hear more, but Harry's hand slipped and she nearly fell. "Hold still!" she hissed.

"I'm trying, you're the one who keeps moving around up there!"

In the next aisle, she heard Ron laugh. "You're pathetic, Malfoy," he said coldly.

It sounded as if Malfoy growled. "Watch it, Weasley," he said. "Just for that, I'm going to make you suffer. Oh, next time we meet, I'm going to make you scream."

"I'll enjoy seeing you try," Ron said contemptuously. She heard footsteps heading away, and she tried once more to get up and over to determine whose they were. She strained, heard Harry yell, and felt his hands sliding off her shoe. She tried to shift her weight to the other foot, but everything tilted wildly beneath her, and with a squawk she was pitched to the floor.

The back of her head cracked sharply against the shelf, and for a moment, she saw stars. She realized vaguely that she had landed on something rather softer than the hardwood library floor. She heard Harry moan from the vicinity of her knee, and was about to attempt getting up when she heard Ron's scandalized yelp from the other end of the aisle. "Hermione! What the hell? Is that Harry?"

She looked down. She could see her feet. She could see Harry's feet. In fact, she could see all of Harry up to about his shoulders, but no more, because his head was up her robes. She shrieked and kicked away, then scrambled to her feet and turned to face Ron. "That wasn't what it looked like! That wasn't anything! I don't know what it looked like to you, but it wasn't that! I was...we were...he was holding my ankles and we fell over! And I landed on him! Because I was standing on his shoulders! To get a book!"

Ron looked just slightly bug-eyed, then shook his head. "Fine. Sure. Whatever. Er, what happened to his glasses?" As if to punctuate this question, Harry moaned.

Five minutes, a lot more moaning, and one quick Mending Charm later, they were headed back to Gryffindor Tower. Harry kept shooting dirty looks at Hermione and wouldn't talk. "So, did you find what you were looking for?" Hermione asked brightly, once she had finished trying to apologize.

Ron blinked, then nodded. "Oh, yeah, I found it."

"What did you need it for, anyway?"

"Forget about it, it's not important."

Except it obviously was important, if it would prompt Ron to venture into the depths of the library. Hermione felt a surge of annoyance at being deliberately excluded from his life, then gave herself a long mental lecture about how they didn't need to do everything together because they were two...three discrete human beings capable of living separate and fulfilling lives, and Ron could have any secrets he wanted to, and she didn't care about his ruddy little book anyway, because it was more important right now to get Harry alone and tell him what she'd heard, and find out if he'd seen anything while his head was up her robes.