Waking up from sleep, especially unnatural sleep, is a confusing process. Sometimes, it happens slowly, as if you were swimming up from some great depth, while others it happens instantly, as if you had simply blinked and time , I'm experience more of the former than the latter, with waking up a near-=constant struggle for me, but this time I got lucky. When I first opened my eyes after the Potions classroom seemingly exploded, it was to perfect clarity-and an unfamiliar white roof, albeit of a style I recognized.

"Huh, less than a week and I'm already in the infirmary." I mused quietly, That wasn't entirely surprising, but neither was in expected. I was distracted from that thought, however, when someone spoke up from beside me.

"Honestly, I'm more surprised you didn't manage it sooner." Draco's said, prompting me to sit up and look at him-or at least, try to sit up. My movement was arrested halfway through as something locked my wrists in place, twisting the arms above and forcing me to collapse back down onto the massive piles of pillows beneath my head with a noise of surprise. As I result, i ended up simply turning to look at my friend from an angle. The first thing I noticed was that he looked tired, with deep bags under his eyes and a frown across his lips. In his lap was an open book that I imagined he had been reading before I woke up.

"Hey Drake," I greeted with a slight smile, not surprised to see him there even as I glanced down to see what had stopped me from moving. There were not, as one might imagine, a pair of straps or braces to keep me mobile, but rather two orbs of bright blue light anchored to where my arms were suspended in midair, just big enough to cover half my forearm and the back half of my hands, with the front half hanging limply as I realized I couldn't feel anything below where the bubble started. More worrying, however, was what I could see through the radiance, namely a ring of space where my flesh was simply gone, all the way down to where pale bone showed through. I grimaced at the gruesome sight. "Ouch. That's new."

Draco, unperturbed by my seeming nonchalance, shook his head, leaning forward in the flimsy plastic chair he had been sitting in as he frowned even harder at me. "Ouch is right. Apparently you got caught between almost half a dozen devolving potions and they mixed to become some sort of acid that ate everything but the bone. If it weren't for your excessive paranoia, you would be dead right now." I blinked, then blinked again as his words processed. Paranoia? Ah, he must mean my usual protections. And here Draco had laughed when I first made my work robes as a separate pair from my usual ones. In fact, even these wounds were probably just a result of the space between my sleeves and gloves, which was unavoidable regardless.

"Ah," I said slowly, swallowing thickly. Death by acid would have been an excessively unpleasant way to go, yes, and as I was still unsure just how much leeway my free get-out-of jail card in that regard gave me, not something I wanted to test. But as I was not, in fact, dead, I easily pushed that thought away and turned back to look at Draco once more. "And the other students? Illya?' I asked. Draco's frown deepened even more, apparently unhappy that I had brushed off the experience so easily, but then he shook his head, leaning back and sighing.

"You got the worst of it," he confirmed, lips quirking upwards for just a moment. "A few others were hit, but without the full mix of potions, Madame Pomfrey fixed them up already. Einzbern was covered by your robes, so the worst she suffered was being covered for a few minutes until the teachers pulled you off her." Here, he paused, eyes narrowing. "She was very enthusiastic about thanking you. I had to chase her out more than once when she distracted Pomfrey." I quirked an eyebrow at that, but even the amusement such a mental image spawned was but a drop in the bucket compared to the relief that surged through me. At least nobody else had gotten severely hurt by this mess. I was used to it, my studies being much more dangerous than most, but normal first year students were likely not. Even as I thought that, I glanced down to where my wrists were still suspended, instinctively trying to gesture with them but only getting an awkward half shrug instead.

"How about these? I imagine Pomfrey thinks she can save them if she hasn't just cut my hands off already." Of course, that question just made Draco frown even more, and I suppressed a wince. He never liked it when I was nonchalant about injuries, I knew, but after having discovered how far magical healing could go in this world-through personal experience, I might add-I just found it difficult to worry too much when it came to most things. Sure, in my old life I would probably be worrying about suddenly being handless, but here? I had seen far worse be fixed with barely a few days of bed rest. Naturally, Draco was forced to agree just a few seconds later.

"There's a potion." He allowed, still looking grumpy. "It's expensive and rare though, so she had to order it specially made by Professor Snape. You're going to be stuck there for a few more days." Ah. Well, that sucked, but there wasn't much I could do for it. That did make me wonder though…

"How long have I been out for, anyway?" I asked, glancing around to see if I could find a clock or something. That was about the moment that I realized it was, in fact, after dark, and had merely missed it due to the soft glow of my restraints.

"About a day and a half, give or take a couple hours." Draco answered, shaking his head. "I should be in bed, but Professor Snape gave me special permission to visit since Pomfrey said you should be waking up tonight." I raised an eyebrow in surprise at that. How the hell did Draco manage to pull that off? I mean, Snape was his godfather, and I liked to think I had come of on better terms with the man than canon Harry, but seriously? There was, however, a more important question, in my mind.

"Why?" I asked, my other eyebrow rising to join its brother. "I mean, it's nice and all, but dude. You need your sleep. What was so important that you stayed up just to talk to me?" Here, Draco paused, blinking then he returned to glaring at me.

"Honestly?" He asked, before raising his hand. "It was so I could do this."and then he thwacked me across the forehead so hard I crashed all the way through the pillows to hit the cold, hard headboard beneath them.

"Ack!" I cried out, before the sound of surprise cut off and turned into a low, short groan. Of pain. Then, of course, there was the annoyance of me instinctively trying to raise my hands up to my head, which twisted my arms again when they caught on the magical restraint, and made me cry out again. It was a miracle Madame Pomfrey didn't come storming out that moment to see what the fuss was about-I had the impression she was nearly omnipresent in her Infirmary whenever a patient was in residence-but I had plenty of time to slowly but surely bite back the pain enough that I could look up and glare at Draco.

"Okay, what the hell was that one for? I mean, I probably earned it, but how?" Of course, Draco wasn't amused by my incredulous tone, simply crossing his arms and glaring so fiercely I probably should have burst into flames.

"That was for being a fucking idiot." the silver-haired boy growled, and shit he must be angry if he was actually cursing. "You told me that this year was going to be dangerous, and then told me that things were going off the rails, but this? What were you even doing that blew up a potions lab?" I blinked. Wait, what?

"Okay, never mind then. This wasn't my fault." I said, retracting my previous statement as I glared right back. "Look, I was just talking with Illya and she got excited, then bumped into the table harder than normal. Ingredients flew everywhere, and a few landed in other potions. It was an accident." Sadly, my explanation didn't mollify the other boy, as he just glared harder.

"Really? why were you talking with her anyways, I thought she scared the crap out of you." He shot back, making me frown.

"Well not her, technically speaking, but her family. And there wasn't anyone else to partner with. She asked me why I was afraid, and, well…" I trailed off as suddenly Draco's expression shifted from angry to understanding.

"Oh, so you went all bleeding heart on her. Is that why she got excited?" I paused, surprised.

"I'm sorry, bleeding heart? I'm not a bleeding heart." I protested, but it was too late. Draco was leaning back in his seat, a smug smile on his face he watched me struggle once again with my bindings. It was a shame they had removed my robes at some point and stuck me in hospital clothes, or I might have been able to break them... Which would be extremely stupid, of course, but worth it if I could smack him back.

"Says the bloke who gives galleons at street performers and made me more than a few tools just for my convenience." This time, it was me who was growling, although it intersected with a sigh as I crashed back down onto the bed and pile of pillows in frustration.

"I'm rich, Draco, a few galleons here and there won't hurt me any. And you're my friend anyways, so why shouldn't I help you?" Draco just laughed, his smugness growing with every second.

"And yet you're in Hufflepuff, despite that. Methinks you protest too much." I groaned, but didn't deign to respond. Damn him, but it's not like he was entirely wrong. I had been planning to avoid Illya like the plague until she started being all adorable and sad. It wasn't my fault I'd been conditioned by almost a decade of anime and a lack of real-life experience to build up my resistances. Eventually, however, Draco stopped his taunting and I paused, glancing at him to see that he had grown serious.

"Draco?" I asked, eyebrow raised in curiosity as he frowned slightly. "What's up?"

"It's just…" He started, before pausing and shaking his head. "Your new friends, Einzbern and Gremory. Were you planning on showing them the Armory?" I blinked in surprise, contemplating the question. That was… not something I had thought about, really. Rias was still a little distant at this point, with only a few real conversations between us, and I had only just offered to become Illya's friend when everything went wrong. On the other hand, I didn't doubt that the universe would be throwing us into some kind of mess soon enough. I didn't know for certain that Narrative Causality was an actual thing here in this universe, but it would be good to be prepared just in case.

"I guess." I answered slowly, eyes narrowing at my friend. "Why?"

"Wll, I thought I might give them the tour while you were bedridden." Draco answered, trying hard to make it sound nonchalant. I knew him, though, and I could easily catch the faint edge to his voice as he asked. Ah, I understood now.

"Sure, if they'll listen." I told him with a nod, smiling slightly when he let out the breath he had been holding. " Remember how to get to the workshop?"

"Seventh floor, across the tapestry with trolls dancing?" He asked, earning another nod.

"Close enough, yeah. I'm thinking level three, and keep it traditional. The rest will just confuse them." He nodded.

"And if they want to take something?"

"Let them," I answered easily, trying and failing to wave the question away. Then I paused meeting his eyes with my own. "I trust you, Draco. Remember that." Unsurprisingly, my best friend stiffened, but after a moment of locked gazes, he slumped, nodding in acceptance. Silence reigned for a long moment, until finally he stood.

"Guess I'll be going now. Get better soon, yeah?" He said, jerking his chin towards me with a smile. I smiled back, wiggling my shoulders since it was all I could do.

"I'll try. Oh, before you go, can you get Pomfrey to knock me out?" At my request Draco paused, already walking away. His eyebrow cocked as he turned to look at me curiously.

"Knock you out? Why?" He asked. I just snorted, rolling my eyes.

"Dude, I'm ADHD with a tactile Tourette's Disorder. Being stuck like this is going to drive me insane." His other eyebrow met the first, and a faint smile formed on his lips.

"You're already insane.

"More insane, Draco. It will drive me more insane." He laughed, bright and cheerful, and far too amused at the thought of my suffering.

"I'll see what I can do." And then the fucker just turned around, and started walking out the door. Oh, oh he didn't. I knew that tone of voice. That was the 'I'm totally going to enjoy watching you suffer' tone of voice. In that moment, I knew Draco was going to do jack-all to get me knocked out, little asshole that he was. Leaning back into my pillows, I groaned, even as the itches started to come now that I no longer had an active conversation to distract me. This was going to be a long night.

XXX

Well that ended up longer than I was expecting. Really thought I would get to the chapter I've been waiting pretty much this entire story for. Anyways, here it is. Draco and Harry have a very interesting relationship, you'll note. Draco is the more sensible of the two, usually, making sure Harry doesn't do stupid shit and actually takes care of himself while also giving direction, while Harry, although it wasn't shown much here, acts as the sort of moral anchor and realistic voice. Where Draco would decide something needs to be done, Harry usually comes up with the plans to actually manage it and without extraneous effort or going too far. The heart and the mind, as it were. I tell you this because their friendship is one of, if not THE major theme in this story. Also because next chapter will, in fact, be an interlude where Draco goes a bit into how their friendship works and describes Harry from his point of view, so understanding why he does so is important. Also, yes, Harry waking up in a sickbed with Draco there is not uncommon. He gets hurt a lot doing his specialty, which will finally be explained next chapter.