Title: More than Mrs. Potter

Author: Joy

A/N: Okay...longer chapter... I will do my best to give you Harry and Ginny fluff in each chapter after this one...at least in part. We still need to talk to Hermione and Ron, mend things with Draco and Ginny, mend things with Draco and Hope, contact dear old Tom, test the new dark mark...and of course the epilogue to this thing is long enough to stand on its own. You will have to read all the really sexy parts on my site but you didn't mind last time so you'll be fine this time.

10.The Malfoy situation

Draco woke up bleary eyed with a monster headache. He assumed it was a hangover from all the drinking he had done the night before not knowing that in fact it was from having Harry Potter take his passed out body out of his room, tied him to a column, and slammed his head into said column...It had been a bad night. Everything had gone completely wrong.

Once Draco realized that his plan did not go the way it was supposed to Draco had yelled, screamed, and promised retribution upon his pack. He then simmered and split off from his group. April had followed him blindly offering him more carnal pleasures to take his mind off things. He had given into the desire once more, but knew it couldn't continue, in particularly when he found himself ready to call out Hope's name.

For all her appearances as an idiot, April was actually quite smart. She gave Draco one last real kiss, "I understand, Draco. I'm glad for the time we were together...don't do to me what you're gonna do to everyone else and we're even." April got dressed, turned around and looked at the broken blond sex god lying naked on the floor and murmured, "I won't even go after Hope." With that she walked out of his life.

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Draco stayed away for a long time before he entered the Slytherin common room minus his entourage late the previous evening. If he had known what was waiting for him he would have not come back at all. Malfoy moved slowly to the door that led to his room only to find Hope waiting for him.

This was Hope's first attempt at speaking to him since she 'read' him a few weeks before. He had tried every manipulative way in the book to get Hope to confront him (cold shoulder, jealousy, rage) and nothing had worked. Logical people actually start conversations when they need to talk...not do heinous things to force the other party's hand...but hey this was Draco Malfoy. It's not like the kid ever heard of Freud.

"Hope...are you okay? What's wrong?" Draco asked ushering her into his room.

She refused to look at him for a moment then all the anger that her small body could possess came at him through her eyes before slapping him across the face. "What's wrong? What's wrong? That is all you have to say. You arrogant, self serving, bastard... I can't believe I ever thought there could be anything between us. You really are all the things they say you are... What was it all an act to gather information for the dark lord?" Hope screamed at him.

Draco was thankful for the permanent silence and locking charms he had on his door. "No...I... I wouldn't hurt you and Ginny like that," he pled.

Hope's eyes got large with shock then quickly moved on to exasperated. "Oh...so death is the only thing that can hurt us right? Not me having to watch you get a hand job from your girlfriend at dinner. Not Ginny having to see you harass and torture kids because of what their bloodline is. Not catch you looking at me with such pain that I couldn't keep your emotions out. Not actually poisoning Ginny...one of the two people you just mentioned. Oh no...You could never hurt us like that!" Hope yelled as she went to flee the room.

Everything in Draco crystallized in him at that moment. Hope was the only one that could ever remotely understand him so everything else be damned. He had to make her stay. "Hope, don't go," Draco called catching her wrist. This was a monumental mistake.

Hope looked him dead in the eye and altered the hold he had on her. Suddenly Draco was inundated with images and feelings of the pain he had caused Hope and then Ginny...including the two girls weeping together over the loss of their friendship with him. "Feel that Drake, that's what it feels like to actually lose someone you love. I'm sure it's unfamiliar...since you have never loved anything but yourself in this life!"

Draco tried to open himself to her so Hope would know exactly how he felt but there was a huge solid wall there between them. "Hope...please," he muttered.

Hope put her palm flat in the center of his chest before pushing every negative emotion she had felt in the last two months onto him. Draco crumbled to his knees with the raw grief he was inundated with. "Go to hell, Draco," she answered and left him alone in his room to drink himself silly.

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Harry sat staring at an unconscious Draco wondering how he was going to stop himself from killing the idiot in front of him. He had to smirk at the shock Draco was going to receive once he woke. The boy would probably scream then pee on himself. That thought made Harry smirk larger and more evil.

Harry was nothing if not sneaky. After consulting his mother, father and godfather about the situation James and Sirius were set to help in anyway they could...which meant passing on the knowledge of a glamour that was used by dark wizards in place of the polyjuice potion. It not only let you take the form of another but also their voice and mannerisms. It was nearly impossible to tell the difference between the individuals...as long as the one behind the glamour played the part well. Harry decided he was up for the acting job of his life. This was one time he was definitely going to take revenge...and not even his mother or Ginny would talk him out of it...not that either really was trying to stop him. They just wanted him to be careful. It of course helped that both his father and godfather had encouraged him to keep the Marauder dream alive by squashing his Slytherin opponent.

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Draco came back to himself still off kilter. He blinked a half dozen times before he realized he was in one of the towers without his cronies. However in front of his face was his mirror image. Suddenly he was in searing pain from having his nose broken by his double punching him in the face, which also caused his head to slam into the post behind him for a second time. "Wakey, Wakey Malfoy," his substitute said quietly.

"What the hell?" he groaned as he went to run his hand over his face it occurred to him he couldn't because his hands were tied behind his back.

The twin smirked, "No worries mate. I took care of everything for you today."

"You what?"

A punch came down incredibly fast against his cheek.

"Won't it be fun to find out what I have done with your life all day long…"

With the same speed and precision a punch landed on his other cheek.

Draco sat still while his twin receded into the darkness.

"You might want to avoid your lackeys for a while… after all, you just left them naked in Great Hall cause you promised punishment for their failure with Potter and Weasley."

Everything came into focus in a new way, remembering what Hope had said the previous night. "Gin...is she okay? Did something happen to her? Please...I don't care what you do to me, just tell me if Gin and Hope are alright?"

Draco's mirror image looked confused and a bit concerned before becoming very angry. "You." Punch. "Don't." Punch. "Get." Punch. "Worried!" Punch...so hard that Draco's teeth loosened.

Draco looked up pleadingly and spit the blood in his mouth to the side. "Please...Their the only friends I have...or had. Are they okay?"

The double grit his teeth and clenched his fists. Draco prepared for the next series of punches to be delivered, but they didn't come. "They're fine...no thanks to you. Ginny is still a bit loopy...not allowed to fly for a few days. Hope is emotionally walled off everyone at the moment. So while they are both mainly okay...they are each part broken too."

The blond Slytherin merely nodded as his doppelganger observed him.

Just as everything had crystallized in his mind the night before Draco suddenly knew, just as Ginny had her watershed moment a while back, this was his. He hung his head and murmured, "You had everything. You always had everything... I wanted everything with Hope...but I scared her off. She wouldn't touch me anymore and yet she would touch you...always coming into your arms for hugs. And then Ginny...you were going to take her from me entirely... I just wanted to make you know what it felt like to be as alone as I was."

"What?" his doppelganger muttered.

"You, Harry. Ginny and I were smashing until you got involved. We didn't really talk in public, just vented to each other away from behind the scenes through charmed notes and such. It was never like I thought we were going to get together...but the point is Ginny knew me without the pompous prick stuff. But I was your enemy so you 'banned' her from talking to me outside the group. And I mean she loves you so she doesn't want to lose you." He shrugged, "I was so hurt and pissed I just thought why not screw with you. I had lost my only real friends anyway and you weren't even going to try to understand. Your worst fear is loosing her so I made it happen. I guess I thought maybe she would come back to me when you were a jerk to her."

The other Draco took in the words being spoken. "I didn't ban her from anything Draco. I just asked that she not work alone with you...and not treat you like an emotional surrogate."

"I know...but it was easier to be mad at you than to be mad at Gin or Hope," he said with wisdom that on comes after copious amounts of alcohol or a spiritual epiphany.

Draco's double continued to gaze at him, "You could have hurt her, ya know? That potion she was slipped was really messed up. If Hermione and Ron hadn't found her in time Gin would be in a potion induced coma now."

Draco paled and genuine tears formed in his swollen eyes, "I would never hurt her intentionally. She's one of the only people that really know me. Believe me the person who screwed that up felt it."

"You're great at potions. Why didn't you do it?"

Malfoy breathed deep, "Because I could rationalize I didn't actually do anything to Ginny. I only screwed with you."

Harry passed his wand over his fake Draco body and started to turn back to himself. He faced his enemy before untying him and sitting beside him. "You've changed," the dark haired boy mumbled.

"I have. But not enough."

Harry observed Draco quietly. "You stopped picking on the Weasley's last year... You stayed away from Hermione... What happened? Why the change?"

Draco shrugged, "My father was cursed one too many times for my taste by that arrogant snake. I am too self-centered to follow some guy blindly. I didn't want to be a Deatheater... but I was going to die if I didn't become one. So I pulled a Snape and went to Dumbledore."

Harry's eyes went wide, "Do they know about him?"

Draco shook his head. "No...Snape knew something was wrong with me. He took the risk I wouldn't tell."

Harry looked at the other boy, "So..."

"So our assignment is to try to find a way to limit the Dark Mark's control and help find a way to reverse it."

Harry sat confused. "Why didn't I know this? Why wasn't I told?"

Draco looked at his 'arch nemesis' with a sad smile, "Because you're here to save the world. That's enough for anyone to deal with."

"But..."

"Look...Ginny needed a purpose, some way to feel like she mattered in the great scheme of things apart from you. Dumbledore did not want to run the risk of her resenting being Mrs. Harry Potter in the history books. She is far too independent for that fate. Once hearing my plight Dumbledore surmised that Ginny still had enough of Voldemort's magic inside her that she could potentially alter the mark its self without it being noticed by the bastard," Draco explained.

"Apparently Gin had come to Dumbledore on occasion about her past experience with Tom Riddle," he said carefully to alert Harry to his knowledge. "Ginny and I were in the same boat in a lot of ways. The war was going to kick into high gear and we would be swept along with the dark magic. We depended on each other last year and over the summer."

"The over the summer is the part I have a problem with," Harry announced.

"We only ever talked about the project or what we were dealing with on the 'dark' side, so to speak," Draco stated.

"And she wouldn't talk to me about it!"

The blond shook his head, "You have to face the bastard. Why would she advertise her fear that he was still in her? She got it together though."

"I know...I was there."

"So then, why worry about it?" Draco asked.

Harry looked at him like he was nuts, "This from the guy that poisoned my girlfriend so he could make me believe she cheated on me. Right. Why worry about it?"

"She loves you...not me."

TBC...

So was it enough physical violence? Did you like what I had Hope do to him? Did anybody guess what the trio was working on?

Come on...tell me...REVIEW.