Eight years prior:
"That is a sick, sick joke, Hopkiss," Hermione said, her eyes wide and her jaw practically reaching her chest.
"Oh, Granger. You know I have no sense of humor," he said in return, patting her shoulder sympathetically.
"There is no way...it's impossible. Malfoy? No. Never. Not in a century...not in three centuries. Not in any number of centuries!" She continued to ramble as her supervisor leaned against the wall and crossed his arms in a manner that simply expressed the fact that there was nothing she could do to possibly change his mind.
He cut right through her. "You are a Healer-in-Training, Granger, and a bloody good one at that. You have shown skill in both the operating room and behind the desk; you have promise, as does this Mr. Malfoy character. I fear that it is not within your control to change the circumstances of your advancement."
She frowned deeply before speaking. "I could quit."
Mr. Hopkiss barely restrained himself from laughing. "But you won't. You're not much of a quitter, Granger." Damn! He had a point.
"I refuse to intern with him, Hopkiss. Pair me with anyone, with a disaster, a complete and total fool who doesn't know a wand from a stick anyone besides him."
Her boss seemed thoughtful for a moment, giving her false hope. "What is it that you and this Mr. Malfoy have against one another?"
She paused, attempting to find the most adequate way to put it. "Personal differences."
He let out a snort of amusement. "Ah, the Gryffindor-Slytherin prejudices. I near forgot how pigheaded the two houses could be." Of course he didn't. He was a Hufflepuff and as such he'd been constantly stuck in the middle.
Her lips puckered in distaste. "It's not that alone, Hopkiss. Whether he was a Slytherin or a Ravenclaw Draco Malfoy is still an insufferable prat. If I were to tell you that we did not get along it would be a gross understatement, to say the least."
Mr. Hopkiss frowned. "I heard rumors of rivalries betwixt Mr. Malfoy and Potter, but I didn't read into them. The entire Dueling Club fiasco seemed too far-fetched for my tastes." He had been a sixth year at the time, four years Hermione's senior.
"Well, it's not 'far-fetched', I was there. Not even ten years ago when he gave me beaver-esque teeth could I possibly have worked with him! I cannot work with this man."
"Perhaps he's changed over the past three or so years, Granger."
Hermione shook her head furiously. "No, Malfoy never changes. I doubt it that he's bushy-tailed and eager to be working with me, either."
Hopkiss nodded fairly. "He isn't looking forward to it, per se, though he handled the news quite well."
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"NO! NEVER!" he roared, alarming people one hundred meters away.
"You don't have a choice, Mr. Malfoy. You two are at similar levels and are, in essence, the only possible candidates for the internship. I fear that this is inevitable." Hopkiss informed him.
Draco Malfoy looked dumbstruck. "NO, I say. Not never, not ever, I would prefer thirteen hours of the Cruciatus to suffering the pain of the poster child for know-it-all-ism," he said stubbornly in return.
"I don't believe that that is a word, Mr. Malfoy." Hopkiss said fairly. This did nothing to ease Draco's temper.
"By the end of the week one of us will be dead and I have little doubts that it will be me who suffers the pain of either unemployment of death-"
Hopkiss cut straight through him. "You should feel quite privileged to be working with Ms. Granger. She is quite the professional."
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"I don't want to!" she cried, her tone short of wailing, only a few steps short of throwing herself to the floor and throwing a full-blown temper-tantrum.
"It will only be a few months, Granger."
She rolled her eyes. "And then we'll be stuck in the same ward at St. Mungo's until we retire!"
"Or quit," he added sarcastically.
"Is there any possibility of leeway here, Russ?" she asked, for the first time forgetting to address him formally in her hope for a reprieve.
He blinked before shaking his head. "No possibility, Granger. You'll just have to get used to the disappointment of the workforce, perhaps it will be a good lesson."
She widened her eyes. "A lesson? I've learnt enough lessons to last me for several years. I believe that my lesson-insurance will run out when I hit let's see…forty-two!"
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"If you continue to insist on acting like a child I will impale you on this quill," Hopkiss threatened only half jokingly, wielding his writing implement as a weapon.
"If it would get me out of working with Granger, so be it," He muttered beneath his breath, his attitude not escaping Hopkiss' attention.
"I heard that, Mr. Malfoy," he said sharply, narrowing his eyes. "The two of you will get along well enough to work together if it kills you."
Weeeeeelllll...that's it for the second chapter, how'd u like it?