The moment broke as Draco spoke, his voice even, yet commanding, like he had been in this situation many times before.

"Take his BP and O2 levels... my hands are occupied."

Hermione nodded and obeyed, relaying the stats to Draco as medi-witches and wizards rushed around them, one of them sedating the patient.

It was pandemonium, but as they made eye contact again, they both felt an odd sort of peace in the space between breaths.

"Get me gauze, lots of it. I have to pack it. I have to try something, so you're going to have to lower the gurney height and reserve judgement for later."

Hermione nodded and obeyed, lowering the gurney and rummaging frantically through the cabinets for the gauze, eventually just using a summoning spell for it.

"How much do you weigh?" Draco asked, casually as if he was asking for the time of day.

"I beg your pardon!" She gasped, appalled.

"Answer the question, Granger!" he barked, rolling his eyes.

"58 kilograms!" she shouted back.

"127 pounds…Perfect. Get on the gurney and use your knee to put all your weight on the distal abdominal artery." he said, pointing with his free hand to the space where the artery would be.

"What?" Hermione sputtered.

"Just do it!" Draco commanded, "Applying a 120-pound weight to the abdominal artery can cut off blood flow to the femoral artery. You're a little more than that, but it'll work."

Hermione obeyed, and she started seeing the exposed tissues blanching as she applied her weight on the artery.

"Good. Hand me the gauze. I'm going to remove my finger now and start packing it as tightly as I can. You are not going to move a muscle off that artery or I'm going to have to pronounce time of death. Got it?"

Hermione nodded and Draco nodded back.

"Good. Ready?"

Another nod.

Draco began packing the wound with laser-like focus, clearly having done this before.

She took that time to look him over.

Dr. Draco Malfoy, MD, FACS, FCCM was written across the breast pocket of his lab coat.

"Oh, so he is a doctor? And a fellow of critical care medicine as well? Oh, shit. He's the new chief of critical care." she thought to herself.

"I'm going to loosen the tourniquet. Grab your wand and start performing stability charms. Don't move off that artery." Draco said quietly as his wand circled the packed wound, driving the gauze in deeper and deeper, another bandage coming out of the end of his wand and wrapping around the wound, carefully avoiding the femur.

Hermione nodded and obeyed, whispering the charms as he worked to loosen the tourniquet.

The wound was stabilized in a few minutes and Draco looked up at Hermione.

Hermione found her voice.

"Raise the leg. It's been almost ten minutes. I'll begin letting up on the pressure."

Draco nodded and obeyed in return.

Hermione held her breath and removed her knee from the patient's abdomen.

"He's in stable condition for now… I suppose the only thing we can do now is call the orthopedic surgeon and hope they have a competent one here… he's going to need to have that femur fixed ASAP and I pity the doctor that has to fix it, because it seems to be shattered by the looks of it. My guess is that he fell from a broom." Draco said as he stood back and took in his bloodied appearance.

Hermione sighed and looked down at the arterial spray that covered her scrub top.

"That would be me..." she replied, shrugging slightly, shucking off her gloves and washing her hands, "I'm the orthopedic surgeon here."

Draco's eyebrows raised and he let out a low chuckle before pointing his wand at her.

She sprang into a defensive position out of habit; her wand at the ready.

"Relax, Granger…I'm just giving you a hand…" he said, holding up his hands defensively, "Scourgify."

The blood disappeared from her scrubs and skin.

"Fair's fair." she replied, pointing her wand at him and repeating the incantation.

"Thanks." he said, and Hermione was taken aback.

That was the first time he had ever thanked her.

She was about to ask him about his training while he washed his hands when Frederick Norrington ran into the ER and came across the two of them.

He was a stout older wizard with greying hair and a constantly flustered appearance.

"There you are! I came as soon as I heard.", he began, panting as though he had run a marathon and not from one end of the department to the other.

"Apparently, not soon enough…" Draco thought to himself.

"Do you have a proper OR for Dr. Granger to begin treating this in? I'll assist her as this also falls into my area of expertise." Draco spoke.

"No…how long would it take for one to be set up?" Norrington asked.

Draco rolled his eyes and scoffed.

He would have to take back the things he said about Norrington. Clearly, the man was good and had his shit together on paper, but in reality, he was just a blustery mess of a wizard.

No wonder people didn't want to come here anymore.

"Merlin, you really have no clue." Hermione muttered.

"What do you usually do in cases like this?" Draco asked, folding his arms across his chest, his voice beginning to turn to ice, the same way it did when he had trained new residents who thought they were big shots because they got to be at Shock-Trauma. This icy tone was meant to take them down a peg, for them to learn some humility before they screwed up in surgery and killed a patient.

Norrington sputtered.

"Well, uh, we usually just Episkey it back together and stitch it up… g-granted patients with injuries this severe usually die before we can stabilize them…"

"So, you basically let them die is what you're saying?" Draco replied, arching an eyebrow accusatorily, "Because I saw how well you were prepared… none of these nurses know techniques to immediately stop trauma bleeds, every single one of them was running around like a chicken with its head cut off, only one of them had the good sense to sedate the patient. Dr. Granger had to summon the gauze to her, for Merlin's sake!"

"I had to take the vital signs because nobody was reading them out and monitoring them like they should in an emergency situation." Hermione added.

Norrington went red in the face as he opened and closed his mouth uselessly.

"By the way, a fully functioning OR is a completely sterile room, blocked off from the rest of the hospital, it is kept cold to prevent germs and bacteria from growing, it has a prep room joined to it, as well as an area for the surgeons and other personnel to scrub in. There are also machines there to sterilize tools and instruments." Draco replied, "The table in there should be equipped with ortho accessories so that Granger can use traction techniques during orthopedic surgery, a kidney bridge, and stirrups. Your nephrology and OB-GYN doctors and nurses will thank you for it. Lucky for us, they should be easy enough to transfigure."

Draco glanced to Hermione, motioning for her to make additions.

Hermione nodded minutely and continued where Draco left off.

"In order for me to fix this," she said, gesturing to the busted femur, "we'll need an anesthesiologist, a few x-rays of the break, although I'd prefer MRIs to assess and rule out any hip joint damage, someone to monitor vitals, proper lighting, sterile instruments, plenty of surgical nurses, and at least one tech that can hand me my tools as I need them. I'll need my Stryker Ortho drills from my equipment locker at The Royal London Hospital. I'll need them sterilized and I'll have to find a power source for them. This femur isn't going back into place with a single spell, it's going to take some screws and pins and I'm not hand drilling anything."

Hermione tried to think back to her training in emergency medicine as she continued.

"There also has to be a crash cart with a defibrillator on standby in case the patient begins to go into cardiac arrest. We'll also need several pints of blood, O negative is preferable, for transfusions, someone to intubate the patient, and someone on hand to open at least one large-bore IV line, should we need it."

Norrington listened to all of their words.

"We don't have anything like that here." he stated lamely once they had finished speaking.

"Well, then I suppose it's a good thing you have us here." Hermione sighed and Draco glanced at her.

"What are you on about?" he asked.

"We both got near perfect marks in transfiguration, if memory serves me." she replied.

He nodded.

She did have a point.

Norrington groaned.

"I can find a spare room nearby that can be transfigured into a proper operating room…" he said, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket and patting away the sweat that was beading up on his brow.

Clearly, he had underestimated just how lengthy this undertaking would be.

"Good, then we'll be off." Draco said, "I have to track down some competent nurses in this place and Granger needs her tools. Send us a Patronus when you've located space for our operating room."

He spun on his heel and walked off to the receptionist's desk to retrieve the directory of employees, tapping the book with his wand to narrow his choices.

Hermione glanced at Norrington before following Malfoy.

"Excuse me, but I believe I should have a say in who I allow to be in the OR during my procedure." she said, approaching the white-blonde man who was flipping angrily through the directory.

"Our procedure, Granger, and your concern is noted, however, I'm used to selecting special teams for surgery, so if you could leave me to it, I'd appreciate it greatly." he replied, not looking at her.

Hermione placed a hand on the book, stopping his progress.

"What is your problem?" he asked, unable to keep the old sneer out of his voice.

Granger bristled at him. She supposed that now that the adrenaline rush from their earlier teamwork had worn off and they were no longer focused on saving a patient, they were slipping into their old, bad habits.

"My problem is that the last time I saw you, your best mate almost burned us alive. Now you expect us to be immaculate professionals, but I think I deserve an explanation as to why you're here."

"I'm here because I was needed here. I suppose you're here for the same reason?" Malfoy replied.

"I am. I am also qualified to make these decisions." she replied, trying to keep the haughty tone out of her voice and failing miserably.

"So am I." he replied coolly, turning his focus back onto the directory.

Hermione refused to be ignored, an irritating trait that she had retained from being brought up as an only child.

"Oh really? What hospital were you working in before this?"

"The R. Adams Cowley Shock-Trauma center in Baltimore, Maryland, I did my fellowship there… you mentioned keeping your tools at The Royal London Hospital, I assume that's where you usually do your surgeries?"

"Yes." Hermione replied, trying to keep the shock from showing on her face.

She was not going to admit that he had more experience than she did.

"Well, they're both good hospitals. I did my residency at Johns Hopkins, I assume you did yours at the Royal London, that seems about right, especially if you studied at Cambridge like most orthopedic surgeons do?" He replied, glancing at her, his silver-grey eyes softening slightly as he spoke, "Anyhow, I think we should choose these nurses together, after all, we'll have to be working with them, might as well make sure they aren't total idiots before asking them to sign on as surgical staff." He continued.

His response was more mature than she had expected from him.

Well, he wasn't the slimy little git she had punched in third year anymore…

No, he had grown into himself.

It was then that she gave herself the chance to look him over for the first time in twelve years.

He was tall and slender, but she could tell that his lab coat and dress shirt hid lean muscle. His white-blonde hair was pulled back into a messy bun at the back of his head. His jawline was still strong, but not as pointy as it had been when he was sixteen. He had long fingers that were tapered, he didn't wear a wedding ring, and he had steady hands, which was a job requirement for surgeons in general, but she recalled how he held his wand during school, and he had never been unsteady, except that fateful day when they were captured and taken to his manor…

The day his crazy Aunt Bellatrix had tortured her right in front of him, carving the word "Mudblood" into her arm.

She recalled staring dead-eyed in his direction, in shock from the pain, bracing for the next Cruciatus curse.

She could see his hands shaking in her mind's eye, as vividly as if it were happening right in front of her.

Hermione quickly glanced away and placed a hand over her left forearm, feeling the slight rise of the scars through her long-sleeved shirt and lab coat.

"You're right. Better make sure those nurses know what to do and are competent enough to be trained to do it…" she muttered.

Draco glanced at Hermione then, his eyes taking her in.

She had grown into a rather lovely woman, and he wasn't lying. Her hair was still frizzy, but it was braided back and neat. She was curvier than he recalled, and still just as tall as she had been in their sixth year.

She didn't wear a ring, so, as far as he could tell, she wasn't married, like so many of their classmates were. Then again, most women in medicine didn't wear their rings to work, especially not if they worked in a hospital.

She rubbed her left inner forearm absentmindedly, and a memory of her at age seventeen came rushing back to him, rising up unbidden and horrible before his mind's eye.

She was lying on the floor of the drawing room at the manor, writhing in agony and screaming as Bellatrix tortured her with the Cruciatus and interrogated her about a bloody sword, of all things.

He remembers being frozen where he stood as his aunt had pressed her knife to her throat, drawing small droplets of blood as she whimpered, then he remembered shaking as she faced him and screamed, her eyes wide and bloodshot as Bellatrix carved that ugly word into her flesh.

"Come on, Granger, lets find an office somewhere and go through this book. It'll go faster if we split the work." he said, clearing his throat, "The less time we spend on this, the more time we'll have creating a proper operating room."

Hermione nodded.

"I thing the board room is probably free." she supplied.

"Good idea." He stated, lifting the directory and carrying it as they walked back to the emergency department.

If only Ron and Harry could see her now, fraternizing with the enemy.

But Malfoy wasn't their enemy anymore, for all she could tell, he had grown into a very well-adjusted adult.

Her concept of good and bad had always included shades of grey between the light and dark, and she wasn't as golden as all the wizarding world thought she was.

If they only knew the type of things she had done in the war. She had killed, but she had been on the right side, so there had been no hearing for her.

Malfoy had been coerced and threatened into being a Death Eater, he had been used by Voldemort, who had intended upon disposing of him once he had killed Dumbledore, just to get the Elder Wand.

He had been forced to watch in silence as terrible things happened, helpless to stop them.

She knew what a strong motivator fear could be.

She had been there herself.

He had nearly been sent to Azkaban for being a victim himself, an unwilling participant who had to either act the part or die.

It wasn't fair how he had treated her in school, but he didn't deserve prison for his stupid childhood actions either.

Shades of gray.

That's all it was.

They walked through the emergency department and had almost reached the male patient with the shattered femur when they heard someone say "Episkey!" and blood sprayed onto the curtain surrounding the patient's bed.

Draco dropped the directory, and Hermione gasped as he swore loudly and they both sprinted to the patient's bed.

A junior Healer stood over the patient, repeating incantations to stop the hemorrhaging, but to no avail. He was shaking like mad and Draco pulled out his wand.

"VULNERA SANENTUR!" he roared, scaring the junior Healer as Hermione drew her own wand and shouted, "BRACKIUM EMENDO!"

The bleeding didn't stop, dark blood still gushing from the wound and turning the white dressing and bed covers bright red, but the femur did pop back into place with a sickening crunch.

Hermione jumped back onto the gurney and went to kneel on the abdominal artery again, but it was too late, the patient had lost too much blood, and had passed.

"Time of death, 9:37 am."

"Time of death, oh-nine-thirty-seven hours."

Hermione and Draco met each other's gaze once more as they both called time of death at the same time, hers in standard, his in military, the way they did it at Shock-Trauma.

They both held their silence a moment, Hermione bowing her head and moving off of the gurney, before rounding on the junior Healer.

"Who put you up to that task?" Draco said harshly.

"Because of your lack of judgement, this man is dead!" Hermione shouted, gesturing to the body as she backed away from the gurney and waved her wand, a sheet appearing and fluttering down gently over the deceased.

"I'm sorry, I didn't think-" the junior Healer began, shaking where he stood.

"No, you didn't think. I ought to throw you out of here for that." Draco commanded, his eyes flashing dangerously.

"You can't!" cried the young Healer, "Not for one mistake! I-I don't even know who you are! Norrington is in charge of staff!"

Draco, who had clearly had enough of the young man's stammering, said, "Come on, we're taking this elsewhere out of respect for others." and grabbed him by his upper arm and pulled him into the nearest, empty private room, Hermione walking quickly after them, closing the door behind them and casting a Silencing charm so that nobody could overhear what was said.

Draco released the young man once they were there.

He took a deep breath as the junior Healer continued stuttering out excuses, finally cutting him off when he started repeating that Norrington was the only one who could fire staff at St. Mungo's.

"While Norrington is the only one who can terminate your employment here, for the time being, I am the chief of critical care, which means that this emergency department, this trauma bay, is my territory." Draco replied, calmer this time as he jabbed his thumb towards the door.

"This patient's death happened on my watch at the hands of one of my employees, which is you, so while you were at fault, I will be the one that has to tell his family that he has died." he continued.

"But-" the young man began, and Draco held up his hand.

"No. You listen now. You'll have your chance to speak, but I want you to listen to what I have to say first. Tell me, have you ever had to take a family into the quiet room and tell them that their loved one is dead? Because I have. Where I come from, people get shot in the streets like animals, people get thrown from cars, run over, impaled on trees, you name it, I've seen it. It never gets easier the more times you have to tell people that someone they love has died. I've said my part, now I want you to tell me who gave you permission to perform a spell that you should know is only for minor breaks, sprains, and abrasions?" Draco asked.

"I did it on my own. Nobody authorized me…" the young Healer replied.

"There were no senior Healers around to advise against this?" Hermione asked, finally speaking up.

"No Nurse…"

"Doctor. You'll address her as Dr. Granger or ma'am, as she sees fit. You'll address me as Dr. Malfoy or sir. Now apologize at once, she worked hard for that title, as did I." Draco said.

"Sorry, Dr. Granger… nobody authorized me."

"What is your name and your position here?" Hermione asked.

"Alex Swan… Junior Healer, ma'am…" he replied.

Swan looked between them carefully, a look of realization finally dawning on him.

"Merlin… I recognize you two now…You're Draco Malfoy, the Death Eater that got exiled twelve years ago, and you're Hermione Granger, the Golden Trio girl!" he gasped.

Hermione rolled her eyes as Draco groaned and scrubbed a hand over his face, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Alright then, Junior Healer Swan, enough of the fawning, yes we were in the War, so were a lot of people, we're straying too far from the topic at hand… how long have you been licensed to work here?" Draco said.

"I've been here for two years now…"

"Then you have had training on proper wound care, especially in cases of trauma bleeding?"

"No, Dr. Malfoy… the patients usually don't live that long if they're bleeding out, unless it's a splinching accident, then that's relatively easy to fix with some spells and some essence of dittany."

Draco looked at Hermione and muttered, "I feel like I've been thrown back to the dark ages."

"So, the golden hour of trauma care means nothing to you? You've never had to attend a Stop the Bleed seminar?" Draco asked, "How are you even remotely allowed to work in an emergency department without basic knowledge like that? Do you even know how to perform CPR?"

"I usually don't work in the emergency department." Swan replied.

"Then where do you usually work?" Hermione asked, becoming fed up herself with the answers he was giving them.

"I usually work in the potions lab, but we're so short-staffed here that I had to get my certification rather quickly. I've been a licensed potions understudy for three and a half years now, I started that once I graduated from Hogwarts…they made me double with Healing arts, and I had to split my time between both studies…"

"So, you didn't even start at Hogwarts until a few years after the battle happened…" Hermione stated, earning a nod from Swan.

"Let me guess, you didn't like full-on Healing, so you only paid enough attention in those lessons to scrape by with a barely passing grade?" Draco asked rhetorically.

Another nod.

The silence in the room was almost deafening until Draco spoke again.

"Well then, how many other junior Healers are there here that don't want to be Healers at all?"

Swan shrugged.

"Probably more than anyone would care to admit."

"So, do you want to be a Healer or not?" Hermione asked.

Swan nodded.

"I do, but only if I get trained to do so properly. There's a lot of things that we should have learned at the academy, but the academy was destroyed in the War and most of the professors were killed for their blood status or went abroad and never came back." Swan stated, "A lot of textbooks on the Healing Arts were destroyed as well, some of them at the hands of Death Eaters, most of them at the hands of professors who didn't want their life's work to be abused."

"How did you learn?" Draco asked.

"Basic lectures, reading the books that weren't destroyed, mostly by experience. You see, once the War was over, a lot of the old Healers came out of retirement, and we're talking the really old ones, some of whom still remember the time when you had to be half-blood or purer to become a Healer. Most of those lot are dead now, but you also had a lot of junior Healers and medi-witches and wizards that were promoted almost overnight, so you also had less experienced people holding positions that should have gone to those with more experience."

"I remember that." Hermione said, glancing at Draco as he raised his eyebrows at her, "Most of the graduates from Hogwarts who did decide to go into medicine went to muggle universities and colleges."

"Ah, I see…" Draco acknowledged as Swan nodded.

"If you were graduating and had decent NEWTs in Charms, Transfiguration, and Potions, you were immediately sat down with a St. Mungo's rep and they tried to get you to join the hospital. Most of the pureblooded students who were offered jobs here signed up, myself included. Nearly all the muggle born and half-blood students who Mungo's tried to recruit declined the offer and went to muggle school instead."

"It seems our work is cut out for us then, Dr. Granger, wouldn't you agree?" Draco sighed as he crossed his arms and looked at Hermione.

She nodded in response.

"So it would seem, Dr. Malfoy."

Swan glanced between them.

"What work was cut out for us?" he asked.

"The work that was cut out for us," Hermione gestured between herself and Draco, "is that we have to practically rebuild this place from the foundation up. A lot of doctors were supposed to meet today to discuss how we would take on this task of reinvigorating St. Mungo's, but we've been preoccupied by your blunder and the death of a patient, so we've missed that meeting."

"Anyway, we've seen enough, or at least I've seen enough, to know what has to happen here." Draco added, "All of you need to be retrained, taught how to practice both muggle medicine and the healing arts, that way we can preserve the traditions and hopefully make strides towards increasing the population and health of the magical community as a whole."

He looked at Hermione, pausing so she could add to his words, but she nodded in agreement, and, even though they had never been on the same page or even close per se, he understood that he had summed up everything succinctly enough for her to be satisfied.

"So, I'm not in trouble?" Swan asked tentatively.

Draco laughed, a short, sarcastic bark of a sound, and shook his head.

"Hell no, Swan, aside from being written up, you're going to learn the first part of being a CNA, or certified nursing assistant, we're talking cleaning up after patients, and no magic. The muggles don't get to use magic in their training or their practice and neither did I when I was trained. Look how I turned out. You'll learn the hard way and be all the better for it."

Swan's face fell.

Hermione bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing at the young man's facial expression.

"B-But I'm a pureblood…I can't do this job without magic…" Swan stuttered.

Draco laughed then, truly laughed.

Hermione was shocked and her eyebrows rocketed towards her hairline at the odd sound of his laughter.

There was no malice or sarcasm in the laugh, just a pure and simple response to a humorous and weak comeback.

"So am I, but I managed. Muggles are making a surprising go at it, and doing a better job at healing their people than we are!" He replied, "So, with that said, you're going to go home and research all you can about CNAs and the important work they do, you're dismissed for the day… if Norrington asks, I'll tell him what happened, you have Dr. Granger here as my witness. She wouldn't lie to save my skin, so you can put your trust in her, even if you can't trust me for being a former Death Eater."

Swan nodded and left the room, leaving only Hermione and Draco in there.

Draco uncrossed his arms and leaned forward.

"Well, we haven't received Norrington's Patronus yet, so shall we get to work?" Draco asked.

Hermione nodded.

"I don't see why not, although I would be quite interested to hear more about your, erm, exile." She replied.

Draco sighed and transfigured the empty bed in the room into a desk with two chairs and motioned for Hermione to sit.

"Well, I suppose I might as well. I have a feeling you won't ever completely trust me as a person, and rightly so, but I'm hoping that if I satisfy your curiosity, you'll stop asking about the past twelve years?"

Hermione shook her head.

"I trust you as a professional. We both have the same goals in mind. I do have to wonder why you chose to be a doctor." She replied, still shocked at his civility.

"Probably the most cliched answer ever, but I wanted to help people. I wanted to help them and save the lives that I couldn't save during the war…" he glanced up from his folded hands, his grey eyes boring into her, looking right into her soul, "Are you satisfied?"

"I'll probably never be fully satisfied, but my curiosity has been fulfilled for the time being." She replied.

"Never thought I'd hear you admit that you were unsatisfied." Draco said, "Mind if I ask you a question now?"

"It's only fair, I suppose."

"Are you married and do you have children?" He asked.

Hermione felt her face grow hot as a blush rushed into her cheeks.

"No. Why do you ask?"

That was a surprise.

He expected her to be married to Weasley with a litter of red-headed rug rats.

"Oh? Well, I was just wondering how many other school mates of mine were married and had children…apparently Pansy and Blaise have a couple kids and so do Potter and Ginny. I was also trying to determine whether or not I should have a secondary ortho surgeon on standby just in case you were a mum and had to attend a family emergency." He replied, raising his hands in defense, "I didn't mean to be rude, I apologize if I came across that way."

Hermione was stunned by his reasoning and didn't reply.

Draco felt the tense silence and spoke up, "In my defense, I'd be asking the same questions if you were a male, just so you know I don't mean anything sexist by my line of inquiry."

Hermione shook her head then.

"No, its fine, I just wasn't expecting that question in particular… Uh, are you married and do you have children as well?" Hermione asked, "Twelve years is a long time, I wouldn't be surprised if you did."

Draco shook his head.

"I'm not married and I don't have children. My mum was hinting at wanting some grandchildren though, but I'm not in any rush to settle down, so that's that."

"How is Narcissa, anyway? Harry is Teddy's godfather, so he goes over to have dinner with Andromeda and Narcissa every Thursday evening, but I haven't spoken to Harry in a bit… He and Ginny have been busy with moving into a new house and Harry's been made a senior Auror, Ginny's been trying to get back into her Quidditch training, you know she's a chaser for the Holyhead Harpies, right? They're making a good run at the World Cup this season…" Hermione rambled.

"Uh, mum is good, definitely thriving now my dad's in prison, I'm quite proud of her for embracing more muggle ways of life…" Draco replied, surprised at how easily talking to Hermione was.

Draco felt a stab of guilt for bullying Hermione mercilessly when they were younger, she really didn't deserve that, not when they could have very well been friends, had Lucius not so deeply engrained his hatred and blood prejudice into him as a small child.

Hermione nodded and pushed her hands into the pockets of her lab coat, absentmindedly rubbing her right calf with the top of her left Dansko clog.

"Yeah, we've all changed over the years for the better… I guess time does heal, huh? Now, what were your ideas for hybrid medicine?" She said, making eye contact with Draco.

He nodded and went into a lecture on how his training in trauma medicine could be applied to magical healing arts, but how he still preferred a non-magical approach to healing, simply because the statistics supported muggle medicine.

The two doctors spent the next half hour bouncing ideas off of each other until they were interrupted by a glowing white anteater lumbering into the room and speaking in Norrington's voice.

"The operating theatre is ready. Follow my Patronus there."

Draco and Hermione shared a glance and closed the directory, folded up their notes, and followed the anteater from the room and into a hallway off the emergency department.

They followed the creature into a room that was horrifyingly like an old 19th century operating theatre, save for the fact that it had been cleaned up somewhat and was filled with other people chatting idly amongst themselves in the raised seating around the dais.

Norrington saw them arrive and clapped his hands together, bringing the room to attention.

"So sorry to delay our meeting, but our final two members have arrived, may I present our new Chief of Orthopedics, Dr. Hermione Granger and our new Chief of Critical Care and Trauma medicine, Dr. Draco Malfoy." Norrington spoke.

As soon as he said Draco's name, whispers broke out among the gathered professionals.

They had all heard of his involvement in the War, and apparently, his infamous name was more interesting to talk about than Granger's Golden Trio status.

This would be quite interesting indeed.

Draco squared his shoulders, an act that didn't go unnoticed by Hermione.

He was still dealing with the prejudice that surrounded his name, but he had no choice but to face it headfirst, which is what he was doing.

"I'm glad I won't have to be working with him…" muttered one dark-skinned female doctor, pushing some of her box braids over her shoulder with a haughty sniff, "His lot deserve to rot in Azkaban, in my opinion."

Hermione saw Draco rub his hand absentmindedly over his left inner forearm, pressing the fabric of his sleeve into the spot where the Dark Mark was still branded into his flesh. She saw him swallow, saw a muscle clench in his jaw.

"Hey," She spoke, before she consciously made the choice to do so, directing her words at the dark-skinned witch, "what's your name and what field are you in charge of?"

"Dr. Alicia Bennet, Dermatology…" she replied.

"Well, Dr. Bennet, nice to meet you, and I hate to burst your bubble, but if we get a burn victim brought into the ER, guess who's going to be assisting you in primary treatment?" Hermione said, jabbing her thumb towards Draco, "He will. I suggest you all get over your prejudices, because Dr. Malfoy happens to know what he's doing."

Draco inhaled sharply at her defensive words, not expecting Hermione Granger, of all people, to come to his defense.

There was fire in her eyes, her glare daring another doctor or professional to say something about his presence there, that Gryffindor bravery shielding her like armor.

Dr. Bennet inclined her head in acquiescence.

"My apologies, it's just hard for some of us to forgive as easily as you have, Dr. Granger." She replied, her colleagues nodding and murmuring in agreement.

"If you want to see my work history, I'll email you my resume, cover letter, and letters of recommendation. As for prior convictions, I don't have any, my only one was overturned twelve years ago, as you all know. If you want someone to vouch for my behavior in the US, I'll send you the contact information for my MACUSA case worker." Draco replied, "If you have any problems with me that have to do with my performance as a medical professional here, I suggest you speak to me in private or send me an email or an owl at your earliest convenience. I will not be entertaining any inquiries into my upbringing or my actions during the War, as we have far too much to focus on here at St. Mungo's."

Hermione nodded in agreement.

Norrington looked like he was about to pass out.

Clearly, he had bitten off more than he could chew in terms of the types of professionals he had just hired to revamp St. Mungo's.

"Without any further ado, I suggest we begin the meeting… I apologize for the delay, there was an emergency which Dr. Malfoy and Dr. Granger had to attend to… how is that patient faring, anyway?" Norrington asked.

"He's dead." Hermione bit out.

"Junior Healer Swan has also been sent home for the day, and he has been tasked with learning about the job of a CNA, as that will be his new position until he proves that he can do that job well without needing magic to do it. There is also going to be a write-up in his personnel file on his actions here today." Draco replied.

"Don't you think that's a bit harsh?" Came a voice from the assembled professionals.

"No, I do not." Draco replied, "And may I have your name?"

"Dr. Damien Mortimer… I'm just one of the new GPs here and the chief of General Medicine, but I am interested to hear about what sort of actions we'll be taking to retrain the medi-witches and medi-wizards and how we'll go about implementing hybrid care into daily practices. No offense to you, Dr. Malfoy, but Dr. Fatima Abdullah and I both know that if we just randomly switch from potions to injections, we'll have a lot of people freaking out."

"Before you ask, I'm Dr. Abdullah, and I'm the chief of Pediatric Primary Medicine." Came the voice of a middle aged woman of middle eastern descent who was wearing a deep blue hijab, "I've been in this field for almost twenty years now, and I can say with confidence that magical children are very likely to be terrified of modern medical practices, no matter how non-invasive they may be, and this is usually a direct result of their parents and elders telling them horror stories of muggle doctors cutting people up for fun, as I'm sure many of us heard when we were young…"

"What do you suggest we do about this, Dr. Abdullah?" Draco asked, "I have some experience with pediatric trauma care, but I am interested in hearing your input."

Dr. Abdullah sighed.

"Inshallah, I hope that we can start to bridge the gap with the help of the Ministry as well as hopefully having some doctors and nurses visit Hogwarts and the other magic schools and academies to lecture them on the importance of modern medicine and to host Q and A sessions to help assuage student's fears and apprehensions regarding modern techniques. Sometimes, we have to change the minds of the young to move the hearts of the old." She replied.

The assembled doctors and professionals nodded and murmured in their agreement.

"I like that idea, Dr. Abdullah, if you would like to help lead the charge on this topic, I'll have my secretary start drafting ideas for a series of pamphlets to be distributed by the Ministry's Department of Health. Each branch of medicine should convene and brainstorm ideas on what to include in the pamphlet series." Norrington added, "As for retraining our medi-witches and wizards, we should form mandatory classes to retrain all of them, and I will see to it that our junior and senior staff has these classes as well."

"This will be a massive undertaking, there will be a lot of work to do and we'll face a lot of pushback and resistance, but in the end, we'll be much better off for doing this." Draco spoke up, "But our community needs us now, more than ever. We all took the same oath, and it is our duty to uphold it to the best of our ability."

And as the operating theater was filled with applause and the murmurings of new ideas and concepts, Hermione met Draco's eyes and a moment of stillness fell between them.

For the first time in a long time, Hermione felt at ease with herself, knowing that there was someone else whose ambitious drive matched her own, knowing that, no matter their shared past, they would be able to work together to achieve what had been thought impossible.

She knew that they would disagree, but they had already proven themselves as successful colleagues, and surely would again, so that chance of disagreement didn't bother her.

Draco didn't pretend to know the future, for he had seen lives change in a series of split seconds and had saved them just as quickly, but something in him just knew that a partnership with Granger would be in his best interest.

Neither of them knew that the hardest test of all was yet to come.

Abbreviations:

BP: Blood Pressure

O2: Oxygen

OR: Operating Room

MRI: Magnetic Resonance Imaging

CNA: Certified Nursing Assistant