lil' note: Sorry if the writing's a little odd and unconnected, your darling author mostly listens to Eminem while writing fics, and while 'Stan' is pretty fine, 'Steve Berman' and 'My Dad's Gone Crazy' appears to have their weird effects. Mind you, they include spelling errors, so pardon me for the weird spellings I didn't manage to spot.

CHAPTER 2-

*****
The two boys tiptoed downstairs to the Dursley's electric fire, Harry holding his invisibility cloak in one hand, and Malfoy holding his container of floo powder in his. When they reached the fire, Harry removed the boards, revealing a bunch of fake glowing coals and flames. Malfoy uncapped the container and held it out to Harry. "Ladies first," he said, and grinned at his own bad joke. Harry rolled his eyes, then took off his glasses and stuffed them into his pocket. He was still holding the invisibility cloak, so he used his free hand to get a pinch of floo powder.

As the powder scattered over the fake fire, a real, blazing green flame suddenly shot up from the fireplace. Harry stepped into it, enjoying the immediate warmth, and shouted "Knockturn Alley!" The Dursley's living room started to spin...

Harry fell face first out onto a hard, stone floor. He was in the same place he had arrived in during his first encounter with floo powder. He got to his feet and stared around, beginning to get the feeling that this was the wrong place to be. Before anything else could happen, something kicked him hard in the back of the leg and landed heavily on top of him. He yelled out of fright and someone furiously clamped a hand to his mouth. As Harry struggled, trying to free himself, he rembered something: Malfoy was supposed to be after him. He stopped moving and Malfoy hastily got off and brushed some soot off his muggle clothes.

"You could at least move out of the way!" he whispered, "and try to be more quiet." Harry shook his head, dusted soot off himself, and put on his glasses. "Now what?" he asked, trying to control the increasing heat that was radiating from his cheeks. Malfoy didn't answer, but grabbed Harry's wrist and dragged him past many strange locked boxes, preserved magical creatures, and a cage full of screeching things, and out of the shop. "There's this really cool something that I've been dying to try," Malfoy said excitedly, releasing Harry's wrist and gesturing down the narrow, dimly lit street.

Harry followed Malfoy to a shop called "Dangerous Muggle Artefacts" and rooted his feet to the ground right outside the doorway. No way was he messing around with 'Dangerous Artefacts', even if they were from the world he had once lived in and believed it to be all he had. Muggles. Malfoy skipped right up to what he was looking for and read the sign on it again.

'Ouija Board. It is your own risk, messing with spirits from the muggle world.' Malfoy shuddered with excitement tinged with a tiny bit of fear. Right after he had read the last word, lightning suddenly streaked across the sky outside, followed by a loud crash of thunder. He jumped a little, thinking that perhaps he should leave this muggle device thing alone till a nice, sunny day when nothing could go wrong.

"You git! let's go back! It's about to rain!"

Harry was waving his arms madly outside the shop, trying to get Malfoy's attention. Another flash of lightning and an even louder clap of thunder made Malfoy run out of the shop to join Harry back on the street. "Another day, another day," he announced his thoughts out loud. Harry was already running back towards Borgin and Burkes, not even bothering to inform Malfoy that he didn't want to be found in, or even near Knockturn Alley for a long, long time.

Before the pair had even made it very far, it had started to rain. Not a drizzle, but large, bullet-sized raindrops. Borgin and Burkes was just nearby, but the rain was so thick that both of them were soaked by the time they made it into the shop. It was only now that Harry realized all the shops were left open even though the owners weren't around. He took it that all the items on sale were cursed or had protective spells on them. He thought it was a little odd too, that Knockturn Alley wasn't bustling with illegal wizarding activities. On the contrary, it was as silent as a grave. (Author: Boo.)

"You first now," Harry pointed a shaky hand at Malfoy before suddenly letting out the explosive sneeze he had been stifling. Malfoy took a pinch of floo powder, scattered it into the fire and handed his container back to Harry. The moment Malfoy disappeared into the floo network, Harry prepared to return to the Dursleys. A large slimy tentacle shot out from the dark corners of the room and curled round his leg.

*****

After waiting by the Dursley's electric fire for a little longer than 3 minutes, Malfoy got impatient. The floo network wasn't exactly reliable, but as long as you got the words of the location right, you would end up exactly where you wanted. He yawned and seated himself on the squashy couch. His wet clothes made a dark patch on the cushion. After 5 more minutes had passed, Harry wasn't back yet. Malfoy was beginning to get worried about his friend. //Ha ha. Friend. For once I have a friend who can actually manage 11 words without having to take a bite of some food or another.// He certainly didn't miss Crabbe and Goyle.

Something was up. Malfoy dashed back to their room as quietly as he could manage, then threw open his trunk with surprising silence. He snatched up the small box containing the rest of his floo powder, and after a second thought, his wand. He clattered down the stairs without thinking, and practically shouted 'Knockturn Alley' while standing in the fireplace. The wet floors could be handled later.

*****

When Malfoy arrived in Borgin and Burkes, the first thing that he saw when he stumbled out of the fireplace was Harry's invisibility cloak. He swore under his breath. He felt a little spooked by the dark corners, and thought he heard something moving in the shadows. He tried not to let anything at all scare him, meanwhile deciding to risk a 'lumos'. When the tip of his wand illuminated, he was relieved that what his father said before was true.

Knockturn Alley was so filled with dishonesty and lies, and cheats, and what would be considered evil to most people, that it had developed a sort of shield, so that it became a world on it's own. Nothing could be detected by the Ministry of Magic, because the shield had been formed naturally, after all the hexes and curses used had been interwoven into the atmosphere. (Author: Sorry, corny explanation but it's necessary -_o)

Malfoy wouldn't have realized it, but he could have performed an 'Avada Kedavra' without getting an owl from Hogwarts, informing him that he had been expelled. All the times he had been in Knockturn Alley with his father, he had never bothered to test if this was true. The Ministry had tried hard to keep this fact a secret, but those who knew about it had definately made a point to take advantage of it.

With the end of his wand casting a faint beam of light in front of him, he started slowly towards the retreating shadows. Almost immediately after that, the shadows started to slowly advance towards him. He squinted, and took a glance at the many flickering candles at the other corner of the shop. He took a small cautious step forward, wand-light making the shadows retreat again, only to be swallowed up at the other end by something hiding there. Malfoy frowned, sighed, and told himself to be a man, although he still had about 3 more years of being a teenager. He half-heartedly aimed a reductor curse at the darkness, and blasted a table, and something else out of his way.

A sudden brainwave hitting him, he fired red sparks into the air, and trapped by the room, they emitted an eerie glow. Malfoy was slightly disorientated by the rest of the room being revealed so suddenly, but had no time to look around, as he had something to keep him busy. A disgusting, fat slob of a creature was waiting to destroy him, and sure as hell a creature which looked like that wouldn't give him time to look for Harry, especially as Malfoy had just blasted it out of the way like an abandoned portkey. It opened it's mouth and let out an ear-splitting screech, almost causing Malfoy to drop his wand.

A jagged streak of what looked like neon lightning hit the creature, and ice began to form on it's slime-covered skin. Tentacles flailed, and the thin layer of ice at the bottom broke, leaving the creature looking like a monster pop with an octopus' bottom. As the ice began to thicken some more, Malfoy darted behind a shelf and waded through an ankle-deep mess of weird stringy herbs, broken and unidentified things, and monster slime. Someone had already made a mess of the place after he had left, and before he arrived again. Behind him, the creature was bumping about, tentacles free, but having increasing difficulties supporting a body encased in a large block of ice.

Malfoy was now shouting Harry's name repeatedly. Getting desparate wasn't a good way to handle matters, but worrying would probably kill him anyway. He used the reductor curse to blast more objects out of the way, ignoring the black marks they made on the floor. He blasted his way around the room, keeping an eye on the tentacle-thing all the while. He made his way to the back of the thrashing creature to the other side of the shop. Amongst the mess there, he spotted a tuft of black hair sticking out behind a table. Harry must have been under or behind it when Malfoy blasted it away.

Harry's glasses were missing, and probably broken. Malfoy already knew that Harry would be uncounscious when he finally found him, or he would have somehow escaped back to the Dursley's, or came out to help Malfoy. However, he didn't expect to find Harry tied up. Unless the creature had extremely skillful tentacles, then someone, a human, was behind this. Deciding not to ponder upon why that someone had not actually kidnapped Harry, Malfoy stuck his wand into his pocket and used both hands to drag Harry towards the fireplace.

There was a loud crashing sound, as the stupid slime creature finally realized that smashing it's body against the hard wall would crack the ice and make large chunks of it break off. Malfoy's were almost as round as Dudley's belly, as he allowed himself just a second to be wasted on staring. It took just a short while to drag Harry to the fireplace, as he wasn't very heavy, given the way the Dursley's had fed him before their third year at Hogwarts. With Harry slumped in front of him, Malfoy hurridly got out the floo powder and threw a pinch into the fire.

Then he allowed himself to wonder how was he going to get himself and an uncounscious Harry back to the Dursley's. He wasn't going to literally risk his head, by dumping Harry into the fire and shouting 'Number 4 Privet Drive' up the chimney for him...

The green flames started to go down, which meant some floo powder wasted. An extra loud crack and an especially ear-splitting screech anounced that the tentacle creature was ice-free, and ready to get it's tentacles on whatever it wanted. Malfoy dropped the container and held his wand in front of him, not exactly ready but forced to face whatever came next.

* * * * *
TO BE CONTINUED...

Well, ya see, the plot isn't that simple, but whatever it is that may lead to something else darker, will just be part of the sequel to this fic. :P And don't need to tell me you hate this chapter. I hate it too. -.- Well, the next chapter is going to be silly, and gets slightly slashy now, so watch out!