Chapter 2: Genesis
Draco led Potter out of the conference room. Shacklebolt looked up from his desk.
"I was beginning to grow concerned when things went quiet," he said. "What's the prognosis?"
"I can fetch Weasley," Draco answered. "Potter—apparently—is coming with me. Theta's fine with it so long as you agree to Obliviate him once we're finished. Also, somebody is going to come by to transport that Cabinet to my office."
"All right." Shacklebolt stood. "Take a seat, Harry."
With a flick of Shacklebolt's wand, the chair Potter had been sitting in when Draco first arrived spun in its place so that it faced the office. Potter dropped into it.
"This is just to stop you from becoming disoriented," Shacklebolt said, standing in front of Potter. "We'll Obliviate you seated in this same position. This will be the last thing you remember before everything that happens between now and then is gone. Understand?"
"Yep." Potter looked over at Draco. "Well?"
"Come along, then." Draco gestured at the fireplace, then reached into his waistcoat pocket for his pouch of Floo powder. He held it open to Potter. "'Draco's office' ought to get you where you need to go."
Potter left in a flash of cerulean. Draco gave him a few seconds to get through and make room, half-expecting Shacklebolt to say something while it was just the two of them there. When Draco looked at him, they ended up just exchanging nods.
By the time Draco stepped out onto the hearth rug, Potter had meandered toward the left.
He pointed with his jaw toward the opposite wall. "You're one of those people, are you?"
Draco frowned. "What do you mean?"
Using a finger this time, Potter indicated the blackboard Draco had covered with maths from his current project.
"I don't follow," Draco said. "One of those people who bothers to learn non-magical maths higher than algebra? I took Arithmancy at Hogwarts."
"Not the NEWT," Potter replied, then stilted. "Or did you?"
"Eventually." Draco folded his arms. "I didn't need to, but I suppose I wanted to prove that I understood the subject matter to that point as well as I'd impressed myself to believe."
"I get that."
Potter kept on in his slow circle, which made Draco antsy. He very rarely had other people here. Those others had all been Unspeakables, and were so indulged in their own work that they couldn't be arsed to care what sorts of instruments dusted every surface. They never glanced at the books on Draco's shelves to discern the Muggle from wizarding volumes. They certainly didn't care about the few shelves dedicated to Draco's filled journals. Those visiting Unspeakables wanted to share whatever expertise they could offer Draco in consult, and then be off. Draco would know, because he behaved the exact same way in their workspaces.
"You know," Potter said suddenly, "I was actually kind of disappointed you didn't go back to Hogwarts for an eighth year."
"Why bother?" Draco shrugged. "I did the seventh-year coursework as far as Easter. I just missed the last term, plus exams. They wouldn't let me write my NEWTs in Azkaban, if you'd believe the audacity."
He jested, but that didn't seem to land with Potter.
"It's not as if anyone wanted me at Hogwarts," Draco added, growing uncomfortable anew under Potter's shrewd gaze. "I didn't belong there. I lost that chance. Besides, I was already here by the time term started." He paused. "Why were you disappointed? Don't tell me you actually wanted to see me. Well, to watch me take my turn at suffering, perhaps. . ."
"Nothing like that," Potter replied. "I was dreading that, actually. The war was over, and I was ready to move on. It didn't suit us all to just flip the situation like an hourglass or something, and let all that vitriol flow the other way. I was disappointed because I didn't want to see you go to waste."
"Go to waste," Draco repeated with a blink.
"You got a second chance. I might have hoped it for you and did my part to pull it, but I honestly didn't really expect it," Potter said. "I wanted to see you take advantage of it. You disappeared, though. I figured you went to the Continent like all your friends."
"No." Draco fell quieter. "Just here."
"That's part of why I was so pissed off with everything to do with Nice." Potter stopped walking. "We'd gotten word about Yaxley being spotted. Then we tracked down where he was staying. Lo and behold, the house was registered to you. I couldn't believe you'd fallen right back into all that rubbish."
Annoyance flickered in Draco's stomach. "Well, I didn't."
"No. You didn't."
"Do you think I owed it to you?" Draco couldn't help the sneer that crept into his tone. "That because maybe you had something to do with me not staying in Azkaban after my trial, I was obligated—"
"You weren't obligated to do anything," Potter cut him off, tone stern in a way Draco loathed to hear from someone his own age. "I just wanted you to succeed. I knew you weren't thick by any means. I wondered what you could do if given the opportunity to flourish."
Potter looked around Draco's office again, slower this time—really taking it in. A strange anxiety curdled in Draco's stomach. Being talked to the way Potter did made him feel like a stupid teenager again. Draco resented to also discover that that old yearning to somehow impress Potter hadn't fully abated. Looking at his own office—at the accumulation of over a dozen years of work—Draco had to admit that it was impressive. He'd done a lot. He'd accomplished a lot, even if only a handful of people in the world really knew about it.
"Wow," Potter quietly said. He'd reached the blackboard, covered in differential geometry equations and some arithmantic derivatives that Draco had half cooked for his own purposes. "So what exactly do you do? What is all this?"
"Well, that's incomplete." Draco joined Potter where he stood. He felt a little embarrassed that his work-in-progress be scrutinized, even if Potter couldn't read it. "It's just my current project. It's a model. Care to see while we wait on the Cabinet?"
Potter studied Draco, gradually turning wary. "Depends. What's it going to do to me?"
"Get off it, Potter." Draco nudged him with his elbow. "Don't you know me better than that? Come."
Potter let out a sardonic laugh. "It was never a good sign before if you were enthusiastic about something. That'll take some trust building."
"What a perfect exercise, then."
Draco led Potter to the only door leading out of his office. It had twelve runes on it, placed in a three-by-four grid. He tapped them in a series with his wand. After the sixth one illuminated, all went dim and a rush of magic pushed back on Draco like a breeze. When he opened the door, it was to complete darkness. Draco lit the tip of his wand and jerked his head with a glance at Potter to follow. Potter looked even less certain as Draco stepped inside.
The door closed behind them with a decisive click. Potter lit his wand too, even if the spell did little else but illuminate their faces and torsos. The floor reflected nothing. Their footsteps didn't even echo.
"What is this place?" Potter asked.
"My lab," Draco replied. "This particular iteration, anyway. Large, dark, and empty."
It was cold too. Draco's exhales were visible, and he thought he heard the slight chatter of teeth beside him.
"Where are we going?" Potter spoke again.
"The centre. It's not much further."
They only had to walk about a minute before a podium came into sight. Atop it sat a plain, black box.
"You grew up with Muggles, yes?" Draco asked.
"Mhm," Potter replied, deadpan.
"Did they ever take you to church?"
"Er, no. The Dursleys weren't into that. I think they were Anglican, though. Why?"
Draco opened the box with a wave of his wand. A ball of dim light about the size of a gobstone floated up out of it. Like the rest of the room, the podium and box disappeared into darkness.
"Did you ever read the Bible?" Draco asked.
His placid smile edged toward a grin at the look Potter was giving him.
"No," Potter said.
Draco hummed. "You can't by chance quote the third line of Genesis off the top of your head?"
Potter blinked, then looked down at the floating ball.
"Let there be light?" he guessed.
Draco did grin then as he waved his wand at the ball. It glowed brighter, about matching the amount put off by Potter's wand.
"Let there be light," Draco confirmed. "It's best you stand still for a moment."
Just as Potter looked back at the singularity, it exploded. Raw magic barraged them like a gale of wind as simulated matter propelled outward in every direction. Draco clenched his eyes shut until the worst of it passed. He became aware of a painfully tight grip just above his elbow.
Potter had grabbed him. Now that the dust from the explosion surrounded them in hot, colourful clouds, the room had warmed up substantially. A bead of sweat formed at one of Draco's temples.
"Little more warning would be nice," Potter grunted.
"Where's the fun in that?" Draco smirked. "It wouldn't hurt you to be prepared to see a few strange things at a split-second's notice. Once that Cabinet makes its way to my office and I can sort out the exit coordinates, we'll be leaving our universe behind. You might as well start wrapping your mind around the idea."
"Right." Potter looked around at the clouds, then hastily released Draco's arm. "Er, so the Big Bang, I take it?"
"Ours, specifically," Draco confirmed.
As the simulated matter of it expanded, the whistle reminiscent of a muffled kettle gradually deepened. Potter moved a hand through the clouds nearest to them. Like a rip tide, matter tangled around itself in the wake. Small-scale explosions occurred as the swirling matter coalesced into newborn stars. Other clouds started to look stringy as they followed suit. They thinned. Within a few minutes, strings of stars more resembled veins. They began to swirl in places, forming primordial galaxies.
Potter had fallen quiet. When Draco looked at him to see what he might be thinking, a nearby supernova explosion reflected off Potter's glasses. His eyes widened behind the lenses as a nebula bloomed in its place.
"Enjoy it while it lasts," Draco said with a wistful sigh. "In accordance to our multiverse's natural laws, stars are barely here for a blink of all time. We are so very lucky to live when we actually have stars in the night sky."
"Because they move too far away to see, or. . .?"
"They eventually die as well, and nothing that we can see with the naked eye takes their place," Draco replied. "You recall what I said about balancing values of one and negative-one? That toggles its way back toward true zero. Space itself is torn apart. Time stops, or at least becomes irrelevant due to lack of entropy. True, true death. Complete decay."
Potter idly nodded, lightly grimacing.
"We could get out of here now," Draco suggested. "We ought to, actually, before stellar mass black holes become prevalent. They smart if they hit you."
Potter snorted. "All right."
Draco figured the exit's direction with a quick spell, and they headed off toward it. All the matter they disturbed along the way sorted itself out behind them. Galaxies broke apart, stellar nurseries scattered, and nebulae dispersed. When Potter noticed, he started doing it on purpose.
He flinched hard suddenly, and gasped. "Fuck!"
Draco broke into abrupt laughter. "What was the point of warning you if you didn't listen?"
"Fuck off, Malfoy. Where's the exit?"
That Potter also laughed made it hard for Draco to believe he was actually angry. "Not much further—bloody fuck, ow!"
One of the black holes had gotten Draco in the hip. Reflexively batting it away caused another sharp pain on the back of Draco's hand. It caught Potter in the shoulder. Draco broke into a run for the door, and Potter's heavy footsteps caught up rather quickly. The two of them stumbled back into the office.
"Look at that!" Potter exclaimed when he pulled the collar of his shirt far enough to expose a welt. "Hit like a bloody wasp, don't they?"
"Oh, yes." Draco took a step toward his desk, intent on the salve he kept in one of the drawers. He slowed briefly when he noticed that the Vanishing Cabinet had made it. "Would you like something to take the sting away? Then it looks as though we can get started."
"It's fine," Potter replied. "I'll take care of it."
He had his wand out. While he used some sort of non-verbal healing spell, Draco debated whether or not he ought to tend to the welt currently smarting on his hip. It would require removing his waistcoat and untucking his shirt. Since Potter was preoccupied, Draco made a quick decision that it would be stranger to be strange about it. He draped his waistcoat over the back of his chair and just turned so that anything exposed would be out of Potter's view.
"You know," Potter broke the silence, "I can't recall that you and I have ever had a civil conversation before today."
Draco glanced over at him. "It's quite incredible what we can accomplish when you show me the barest modicum of respect, isn't it?"
"Likewise."
"Ha, ha," Draco said.
"Are you all right?"
"Just fine." Draco finished applying salve to where he'd been hit. He became incredibly interested in neatly tucking his shirt back in to avoid the fact he was in any state of undress before Potter. "Bugger put a hole in my shirt. And my favourite waistcoat."
"Don't you spend all day in there?" Potter asked. "Shield Charms probably come in handy."
"Quite." With a tap of his wand, Draco mended the small hole burned into his shirt. "And yes, I suppose I spend entire days in there on occasion. I use this simulation mostly to toy with variables in natural law, to see what other sorts of multiverses exist outside our own. It's a glimpse into the omniverse—that is, the fields of branes beyond."
"Do you really do a lot though, or is most of the job just thinking?" Potter had started walking again in that slow way, arms folded as he looked at the book titles on the shelf.
"Thinking is doing, in this line of work," Draco replied while buttoning his waistcoat back up. "Although, apparently I split my time evenly between here and aiding Death Eaters in France."
Draco couldn't see it, but he had a strong feeling that Potter had rolled his eyes. He smirked.
"You think they're living in the Muggle world, then?" Draco asked.
"It's the best way to fully vanish as a wizard." Potter's shoulders rose and fell on a quiet sigh. "That's especially true if they don't use dark magic, since it's a lot more traceable. It's easy to impersonate Muggles with things like Polyjuice Potion, or just to implant false memories on one. 'I've always lived in your house, remember? It's not strange at all that I'm here in your spare room. Just go about your business, and I'm going to help myself to your fridge and shower until I'm ready to move on.' Things like that."
"I have to say, I'm having a very hard time imagining my father living in the Muggle world," Draco said. "You don't have any idea at all where he is? Last known sightings, anything like that?"
"He'll be a contender now for who's been impersonating you," Potter replied. "Other than that, no. I never liked the theory the absconded Death Eaters slipped away into the Muggle world. Like I said, it goes against their principles. Then again, maybe it doesn't seem like such a bad deal when Azkaban is the alternative."
"I don't think about it very often." Draco took a seat at his desk. "I don't like to think about it."
"Don't blame you. Honestly, when the war was still on, I thought the one thing your dad had going for him was you and your mum's safety being his priority. So much for that, huh?"
"Yeah." An old emotional pit digging itself anew within Draco took the volume out of his voice. "So much for that."
There was more to it, which Potter had to know if he was close enough to it all to be this involved. Father had tried to convince Draco and Mum to go with him, to run before the authorities showed up in force and the inevitable happened. Draco hadn't thought that Father would run regardless. The current rawness in Draco's chest went to show he hadn't yet forgotten what realizing he'd been abandoned felt like.
"Sorry." Potter turned awkward. "I didn't have much respect for your dad to begin with."
"Clearly." Even if there was nothing worth defending, Draco still bristled. "Care to get a move on here, Potter? Or would you rather insult my family for a little while longer?"
"What're we doing, then?" Potter approached the front of the desk. "This is your field of expertise, and it's not really my place to tell you to get on with it."
"Just find somewhere to sit down and be quiet for a while."
Draco pulled his current work journal out from an inside pocket of his waistcoat. It grew back to normal size with a tap of his wand. Draco's shoulders tensed as he waited for Potter's next comment, which he wagered would be something about his use of Muggle biros. He could definitely feel Potter's gaze. In silence, he'd gone right back to studying Draco like an animal in the bloody zoo.
"There's nowhere to sit," Potter eventually said.
"Do you not know how to conjure a chair?" The headache that had threatened Draco back in Shacklebolt's office returned as a subtle jab in his temple. "Sit and be quiet, so I can concentrate."
"You're only writing."
"Writing out the situation helps me to focus my thoughts."
"Is it all right for me to do the same thing about my investigation?" Potter asked. "I'd rather not start over fresh after I'm Obliviated."
"Do whatever you want."
"Where's the line on what needs to stay confidential?"
"It doesn't matter. If you keep a journal, it'll be scrubbed of anything sensitive as part of the process."
"Can I borrow a biro?"
Draco held out the one he'd been using without meeting Potter's eye. While he opened his desk drawer to fetch another, Potter conjured himself a comfortable looking armchair in the middle of the office floor.
Draco glanced at Potter, then dropped his gaze to his journal when he realized that—again—Potter was studying him. So much for preoccupying himself with his own work. Rather mindlessly, Draco began penning down all the details so far of the situation. He knew without a doubt that he would be shortly interrupted again.
Sure enough: "You live in the Muggle world, don't you?"
Draco ignored him.
"Most wizards that do prefer biros to quills," Potter carried on after a moment. "You still live in Britain. I've been waiting since you first showed up in Kingsley's office for your accent to break, but it hasn't. It's as pretentious as ever. So you live somewhere pretentious, and that's why I've never seen you in Diagon Alley, or even just around the Ministry. You didn't disagree with me when I said living in the Muggle world is the best way to disappear as a wizard. It's what you did, isn't it? Other than coming to work here. The Department of Mysteries is a pretty close contender for that."
"I thought we had established," Draco said, not looking up from his work, "that I live in Nice and moonlight as the owner of a Death Eater safehouse."
"Shut up, Malfoy. No you don't."
"Oh, but I speak fluent French. Un, deux, ménage à trois, and such."
Potter snorted. As much as Draco tried to resist, he smirked.
"In all seriousness," Potter said. Draco still refused to look at him, but he could hear the grin Potter wore. "Where do you live now? Not London."
"That's classified."
"I have clearance."
Draco chuckled mirthlessly. "Not for my personal life, you don't."
"What personal life?" Potter replied. "You work alone. You live alone. I'm getting a very strong sense that you have no close friends."
"With my winning personality? Nonsense. There are plenty of gluttons for punishment in this world. Me included, I'm finding, based on this conversation."
"What would you give me if I guessed correctly?" Potter asked.
"A pop of the fist on the cheek," Draco evenly replied.
"In that case, I'm going to guess. . ." Potter paused, giving Draco the chance to roll his eyes. "Oxford."
Draco's biro slowed. He looked over at Potter, who held up the biro Draco had lent him. It had University of Oxford stencilled onto it.
"Not a bad choice, in that case," Potter kept on when Draco said nothing. "I mean, it must help with your work to hang out around there. Is that how you learned all the non-magical maths?"
"Is this how you coerce confessions out of people you've arrested?" Draco countered. "Talk their ear off until they'll agree to Azkaban, just to get away from you?"
"You're deflecting."
"Fuck off."
"You also have a rubber duck on your desk." Potter ignored the request. "Arthur told me all about what they're used for at Sunday dinner forever ago. Muggle programmers—like the people that write computer codes—use them to talk through their work."
"And here I thought it was just modern chic decor."
Potter seemed ready then, maybe, to finally back off. He fell quiet for a while, although Draco didn't hear him writing.
"Malfoy?" Potter said in a cautious tone.
"What?" Draco snapped.
"It's not the rubber duck you were arguing with yesterday, was it?"
Draco hit his limit. He pulled his arm back and flung his biro directly at Potter's head.
And Potter caught it. With his left hand, no less.
"You disgust me," Draco said, unsure what other combination of words could better convey the defensiveness that boiled in his stomach like an unsupervised cauldron.
"Not a bad throw," Potter commented.
Draco sighed and rubbed his eyes, not stopping until the stars that erupted in his darkened vision had.
"What exactly is your goal here?" Draco asked. "What are you trying to do?"
Potter furrowed his brow.
"Why are you asking me all these questions?" Draco reframed it. "I'm trying to work, and it's not like you just wandered in here. The longer you put me off, the longer it's going to take to get Weasley back. I would have thought you'd be doing all in your power to make sure I go as fast as possible."
Potter had turned to sit sideways in his conjured armchair. His right leg dangled over the armrest. While he pondered Draco's question, his foot jiggled his leg into an idle swing.
"You said time wasn't of the essence," Potter eventually said. "And you inferred we'd have Ron back by the end of the week. We're leaving this universe. What I'm hearing you say is that once we do, time isn't going to pass here until we're back."
"It won't, no," Draco confirmed. "It's all going to feel the same to us, though."
"So?"
"So you really want to drag this out, Potter?"
"It's not for nothing." Potter tossed Draco his biro. "You and I aren't going to be done just because we got Ron and Yaxley back."
Draco raised an eyebrow.
"Unless you have no actual interest in finding out who's impersonating you in Nice." Potter resettled in his chair, slouching down further. "Because I do."
"What's the point of all this, then? Besides annoying me to the point I might just leave you wherever Weasley and Yaxley are."
"I'd like to see you go up against Hermione if you did."
"You're missing the point. I'm asking why you're intentionally stretching out the amount of time we're going to be spending together. And why you're taking it upon yourself to make it as miserable an experience for me as possible."
Potter quietly scoffed. "That's rich."
"What is?" Draco snapped.
"That you're miserable with the situation." A beard might have nearly hidden the quirk in Potter's cheek, but a glint in his eye made up for it.
"Wow," Draco said under his breath. "What gave me away?"
To his surprise, Potter didn't have a smartarse remark in response to that. Draco took his chance to put biro back to paper. Soon, two of them scratched along. While Draco made a clear and petty note that Potter was extremely irritating, he had to fight his facial muscles against following their familiar path toward a smirk.
"There it is," Potter spoke up. "You're loving this."
"Shut up, Potter." Draco pushed his fist into his cheek, as if that might convince his face to cooperate. "Or I'll throw my biro at you again. And this time, I'll aim to kill."