Chapter Nine: The Amazing… Thing
"It's amazing how much trouble you get me in, Potter. If it wasn't for you, I would be peacefully sleeping out there. This is your fault."
Silence.
"Did you hear me?!" Draco stomped his foot. "I said this is YOUR FAULT!" His fluffy tail twitched irritatedly and his ears snapped up like a hound on the scent of a rabbit. The spell Potter had cast was supposedly going to remain on him for at least the next three days. He nudged the dark haired boy in front of him with his toe. "I hate you."
Potter half turned and smiled horribly. "I love cleaning the floor of the Potions room. Do you mean to say that you don't?"
Draco howled wolvishly.
"Hey… Malfoy…. Look at this."
"NO."
"Come on- it's one of those experimental spells. Some Ravenclaw must have dropped it when they were here." Potter shifted until he was sitting on the stone floor and leaned up against the cupboards. After musing on the poor handwriting for a few minutes, he spoke up again. "It's for switching bodies."
Despite his irritation, Draco lifted a brow. To switch bodies with Potter… it would be disturbing, but quite possibly good material for blackmail. He thought for a moment and then said, "Switching bodies for how long?"
"Well, however long you like, I guess." Harry wrinkled his brow.
Gah! There it is again! I thought of him as Harry... Draco sobbed inwardly, but outwardly exuded his usual level of snobbish serenity. "I don't want to be you for more than five minutes, got that?"
Potter looked up, surprised. "I… wasn't planning on switching bodies with you," he said cautiously, his eyes unreadable behind round glasses. "In fact, I wasn't even thinking of trying it at all. It's pretty risky. After all, this was trash."
Draco was stuck. "Aa… ah… Ahem. I knew that. You're not exactly the epitome of Gryffindor are you, Potter? No bravery… Besides, who else would you trade bodies with if you did get up the courage to try it?" He stood back, not exactly satisfied with his disjointed speech, but assured that the other boy got his meaning.
"You need to learn to speak English, Malfoy," the other boy said, and then quickly stood up. "But I'll do it. Only for a few minutes, though." Potter pushed his hair back out of his eyes and his tail twitched. "We need our wands for this."
Both of the boys pulled out their wands. For a moment, Draco thought about his own wand. It had been made just days after his fourteenth birthday from the heartstrings of a young dragon and yew. So far, he felt that this was the wand that worked best for him. He had already had six others, and yet this was the one that seemed to resonate with his magic.
"Now I have to read this first…" Potter mused, looking at the page in his hand. "Then, you say that… and then we both touch the tips of our wands and shout that last word… resario." He glanced at Draco. "You ready, Malfoy?"
The blond smirked. "Any time you are."
The first words of the spell sounded wrong. Draco should have said something, but instead he held his tongue, figuring that experimental spells probably did sound different than established ones. Potter didn't seem to notice, and kept reading for the next few seconds. Then, silently, he passed the paper to Draco. The blond took it and began to read the words. Again, he had a pervading feeling of wrong.
When he had finished, he saw that Potter already had his wand raised and that a faint blue glow surrounded the tip. Draco raised his in response, and was not surprised to see a white glow around his own wand. The two of them didn't step closer, but felt their wands being drawn closer as if they each contained a magnet. Draco felt his ears begin to ring. By the way Potter was shaking his head, it looked like he was experiencing the same thing. The ringing grew louder as their wands drew together.
The tips of the wands touched, and then the shrieking began. At first, the two boys couldn't hear it due to the ringing in their ears. As it grew louder, however, Draco began to panic. It felt as though the shriek was drawing his very essence from his body. As any being struggling to survive, he tried to stop himself, but it didn't work. Instead, he was swallowed by an intense blaze of light and then things went grey.
Shit, what are you… OW! Get out! Stop that!
What is going on?
Hell if I know.
Where am I?
Technically, it's not… you.
Who… oh… Harry.
"Aren't you going to punish them, sir?" That was Madam Pomphrey. "After all, that wasn't the safest thing to do, and they both know it."
A chuckle. That was Dumbledore. The cracked old man. "No, I think they are being punished enough. Oh dear, this is turning out much better than I thought." Great. Not only was he cracked, he was a cracked sadist. "This will be good for both of them. It will be difficult, but for the time being, there's little I can do for them except create a mental room. But before I do that, one or more of them has to be awake."
Something must have gone wrong. Draco tried to open his eyes, but when he did, he found that everything around him was blurred.
"Ah, I see you are awake, Mr. Potter." A blurry grey thing obstructed Draco's vision.
"I'm not…"
"Please excuse me. I meant Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy."
Draco's brow wrinkled and he blinked hard, trying to clear his vision. He hoped that nothing had gone wrong during the spell to affect his eyes. Wearing glasses for the rest of his life would really downplay his wonderful appearance. "What do you mean?" he asked rudely, raising a hand and rubbing his eyes. Then, suddenly, he stopped. The hand was not his own.
Of course! He had successfully completed the body switch! He felt a smirk twist itself over his face. Ah… now if only he could find out the size of Harry's-
"Is only one of you awake?"
"What are you talking about?" Draco was starting to get irritated. Not being able to see added to the irritation. Where were Potter's glasses? "Where are Potter's glasses?"
"Mr. Malfoy, there has been a complication in the spell that the two of you attempted to perform." Dumbledore pressed something cold and oval into his hands and, upon drawing it close to his eyes, Draco found that it was a glasses case. He opened the case and drew out the glasses, putting them on at once.
"What happened? What has Potter done with my body?" Draco had a sudden horrible vision of his gorgeous self being covered in griffin shit, or worse- being turned into griffin shit!
"It's not what Mr. Potter has done to your body. It is far more serious than that." Dumbledore was sitting on a stool beside the bed. "The spell that you performed was not only unfinished and therefore very dangerous, but you didn't even complete the spell."
For a moment, Draco was confused, but then he realized with a sudden shock that neither of them had said resario when their wands touched. He frowned again. "If it didn't work, what am I doing in Potter's body?"
Dumbledore's mouth was serious, but a light played across his eyes. "Well, Mr. Malfoy, it appears that both you and Mr. Potter are stuck in the same body."
For a long time, Draco couldn't speak. In fact, he could barely think. After a while, he asked softly, "Then where is he? I can't… where is he?"
"He's probably still sleeping inside your body." Dumbledore gave him a slip of a smile. "I do have a solution for this. However, it will take a minimum of three days for Professor McGonagall and I to complete the preparations for separating you two."
"Where is my body?" Draco asked sharply. "Where is it?"
"Right over there." The Headmaster gestured to a curtained off area. "It is just as you left it. Complete with the tail and dog ears."
Draco rolled his eyes. His eyes- they weren't his, really.
"Before the three days are up, I assume the both of you will experience considerable difficulties in trying to control the same body. So I have devised a little plan. I could have easily merged your consciences into one, but since you two are not as compatible as, say, Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley, I am going to try something different. What I am going to do is create a boundary between your consciences so that you will be able to talk to him inside your head and he will be able to do the same. The only real problem I expect you to have is directly when Mr. Potter wakes up."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, things might be a little difficult to explain to him, and to convince him to share his body." Dumbledore sat forward on the stool. "I am going to perform the spell now, while you are awake, and then you will have a chance to explore what it will be like before Mr. Potter wakes up."
All Draco could do was blink. This was all coming too fast for him. Of course his sharp mind had caught the gist of things, but he had no idea what this was going to be like. Sharing a body with Harry Potter? Sharing a mind with him? "Will I be able to read his thoughts?" Will he be able to read mine?
"You will be able to sense his feelings, yes, but you could not directly read what he was thinking unless he directed it towards you."
Draco was silent. And then he nodded. It wasn't the best solution, but it was the only one at the moment. Of course, he could have owled his parents in distress and seen if there was any black magic to take care of their current predicament, but he was still angry at them for leaving him at Hogwarts while they went Sloording.
"I'm glad you agree with me." Dumbledore's face spread into a full-fledged smile. "Right then." He drew out his wand. With a swish and a quick, three word spell, it was done. Draco could feel himself being separated from what he assumed was Potter's consciousness. It was a strange hollow feeling that he didn't enjoy. Grumpily, he thought //Wake up, already, Potter!//
//Hm..? What… hey, what's going on?//
To be continued…
Notes: I am rapidly losing interest in fanfiction writing, as I'm working on original stuff at the moment. This story WILL be finished, but don't expect it to come very quickly. I'm sorry for the delays… Thanks for all the sweet reviews!