A/N: I'm sorry about the amazingly long delay. Between homework, class stress, and a horrible case of writer's block, it took a while to get back on track. I appreciate the encouragement, yelling, and general cursing of my name in the meantime.

Posted: 12/06/03

To answer some questions:

1. This story is general/humor and I'm a quirky person. The characters will get OOC every so often and events may become unbelievable. I apologize to anyone who will be driven crazy by this fact. I'll try to keep things kind of grounded.

2. In the last chapter Ginny was cursing the muggles in the dungeons.

3. I'm making the assumption that Slytherin has no muggleborn students because Salazar prevented the hat from allowing them in.

4. SMITEM has only 'rescued' students living in muggle families. That would include muggleborns and eventually Harry. Draco would believe that halfbloods living in a partially wizarding home would be safe (I'm assuming Draco hasn't taken Tom Riddle's situation into account.) This means halfblood students are still wandering around the wizarding world as if nothing has happened.

5. This probably won't get romantic in either the het or slash ways. This is my first fic, and I'm not a strong enough writer yet to work on a general plotline and character romances. I admit it, I can't chew gum and walk at the same time. However I am making the assumptions that Ron worries deeply about Hermione's safety, and that Ginny feels the same way about Harry's.

Thank you to everyone who has reviewed. Double chocolate cake is in the kitchen.

Wards and Wardrobing

It was a simple plan. In the next few days SMITEMs members would make excuses to their families, leaving them free to spend the summer at Malfoy Manor. Draco would keep the campers in line until they got back. As of 5:00am that next morning, it was going quite well, or it was until Ron stormed in, robes wrinkled, hair sticking up.

"Malfoy!"

Minutes later a half-awake, Draco Malfoy trudged into the foyer. "Weasley what time is it, and what are you doing here? " He yawned. "You're suppose to be giving your overly large family a valid excuse so you can stay here the summer... you shouldn't be back for days." Draco took in Ron's appearance.

"Did you sleep in those robes?" He frowned.

"It can't go on any longer!" Ron waved his watch in the air and began pacing. "I've been watching this all night and it never stops!"

"What are you on about?" Draco asked.

"First she was in Great Distress, then she was in Danger, then she was in the Muggle World... fine. But wait, then she spent hours doing Manual Labor…and then she was at the Manor! Actually I think I dosed off at that point, but what I trying to say is: I refuse to let her stay there any longer!"

"Who?"

Ron looked at Draco like he was slow. "Hermione. We have to get her out now!"

"You do remember that her house is warded right? No portkeys can be used, no spells fired, you couldn't even drag her out if you tried. You can't just storm in there and get her."

"Which is the only reason why I'm here instead of unconscious on her front yard." Ron's pacing became frantic, "but I've got it all planned out now though. It's going to work perfectly too." He stared at Draco."I need parchment, a quill, and your signature."

"You need sleep, a restraining order, and…my signature?"

"It's absolutely necessary, and it's not going to be bad or anything. It's just that she won't believe me if I say it and this will get her riled up enough to..." Ron continued on.

Draco's head was starting to hurt. Before Ron could finish, Draco yelled at a house elf for a quill and parchment, scribbled tiredly on it, then held it out to Ron. "Here Weasley, just take it, stop pacing, and…don't speak." Draco grumbled, before heading back to bed.

Ron grabbed the quill and parchment and headed for the manor's main library. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't be searching dusty tomes of ancient pureblood law and history, but desperate times called for desperate measures. This had to sound convincing for Hermione, that and he needed official family crest designs. Three hours later the research had paid off in the form of two pages of coercion some would call a letter. Ron looked over his work with pride and wondered what NEWTS one needed for a career in forgery. Spelling the Malfoy family crest on the back he headed for the owlery.

Ron was quite pleased with himself as he headed into breakfast that morning to give Draco the wonderful news. "It's sent, once she sees it she'll come running to..." He got his first good look at the tables of muggleborns.

"…oh dear god…"

Draco smiled. "Amazing isn't it. I left basic robes for them to change into this morning. They're cleaning up nicely so far. I figured I'd get the Natural Enchantment classes out of the way before everyone got back. Even with you suddenly appearing out of nowhere, I still plan to get a lot done. Today will be personal care and hair styling, and tomorrow will be dedicated to attire and fashion training."

Ron lowered himself into a chair, still taking in the kidnapped muggleborns. "They're all..." he said in shock, "how did they get lobster red?"

"I'm still deciding what to do with their hair. Whatever it is though, it starts with trimming charms all around. It's painfully obvious the muggle approach to split ends is both barbaric and primitive. Perhaps deep conditioning as well." Draco said thoughtfully.

"You do realize that their skin's lobster red, right?" Ron interrupted.

"It will wear of in an hour or so. I had the house elves give them proper baths this morning, you know extra heat, deep exfoliation spells to remove damaged skin. The average loss was four skin layers. The Ravenclaws lost more due to all the ink staining. Of course several campers reacted badly to the scouring phase near the end. Those are the ones that really stand out from the crowd… and it's not so much lobster red, as a bright scarlet really.

But don't worry, they'll adjust to proper baths in a few days. The elves will make sure the campers take one every morning while they're here. All the muggle pollution in their systems is taking years off their lives, doubt any of them would live to a one hundred at this rate. It truly has to be removed."

"Only one hundred?" Ron looked horrified. "Okay, so they're lobster red for health reasons." He turned back to Draco. "But that doesn't change the fact that so far you've tried to Oblivate them, feed them drugged candy, and will probably have maimed them by dinner."

"Weasley, I'm hurt." Draco said frowning. "Everything I've done has been purely for their own good. Besides, it's not like I'm planning to shackle them to the walls... that would be entirely impractical. They'll be fine. If you're so concerned about their safety, come and watch." Draco looked Ron over. "Actually, as president of this organization and someone who has to look at you on a daily basis, I'm ordering you to watch. If I can save one pureblood Gryffindor from looking like you do...especially right now, I'll have done my service to humanity."

"There's nothing wrong with me." Ron protested.

"Ignorance has never been an excuse." Draco shook his head and announced class starting in ten minutes.

Ron looked around as Draco led them all into the Natural Enchantments 'classroom'. Obviously Draco's idea of a classroom ran well into his idea of an expensive day spa. Draco paused to rotated an end table of fashion magazines and finger food six degrees to the left, and strided to the front.

"Welcome to the first day of Natural Enchantments, a course entirely for your benefit. We'll be dedicating today to resurfacing, rehydration, conditioning, hair styling, and getting you to understand the words 'daily maintenance regiment'. Tomorrow will be correcting your bad habits and misunderstandings, and then you'll head straight into wizarding fashion and tailoring. Take your seats."

Reddened, sensitive campers cautiously sunk into comfortable chairs and loveseats. "Good. Tonight you'll find new sleepwear in your rooms. The robes your wearing now will be standard until you've gained fashion training. You will never see what you were wearing before ever again. They were all incredibly tacky…" Draco smiled to himself, "and satisfyingly flammable."

As class began, Ron sat in the back with his arms crossed. He waited expectantly for Draco to put the students through something more scarring than two rounds of shampooing, a hot oil conditioning, mineral facemasks, and an in-depth introduction to clarifying potions. After the second round of eye cucumber treatments Ron started zoning out...until Draco hit him with several 'entirely unintentional, accidentally misfired' grooming spells. The redhead scowled at the Malfoy heir through his newly split-end free hair, trying to get the radiant glow off his more evenly-toned skin.

It went on like this after lunch when Draco proceeded to cut, sleak-eazy, and style the campers hair beyond all recognition. Just after the second hour, when Draco had the muggleborns painstakingly recording hair styling procedure, Ron threw up his hands and walked out in defeat. It took effort, but he accepted that Draco wasn't going to Imperious the muggleborns or actually exfoliate them to death.

The next morning after breakfast, Draco led the muggleborns away to class and Ron let him. Draco hadn't harmed them yesterday, and 'correcting misunderstandings' sounded like it would be all lecture anyway. During the previous night Ron had figured out a way to keep anymore enthusiastic SMITEM members, especially his sister, from hexing the imprisoned muggles in the dungeons. It was mostly the out of sight, out of mind approach, and he planned to take care of it as soon as he finished his toast.

"Pertificus Totalus … Wingardium Leviosa"

Ron floated the last of the frozen muggles into the largest holding cell in the dungeon. Sure that every one was accounted for, Ron spelled an illusionary wall in front of it, making the cell disappear from view.

"Good idea Weasley. They were starting to get mangy and there was no way I was going to feed or clean up after them. Was there room left for Potter's and Granger's muggles in there?"

"Maybe if we stacked them." Ron said absently before he fully registered who was behind him. "Malfoy? Why aren't you upstairs? You're suppose to be working through the muggleborns bad fashion habits." Ron said confused.

"Actually, I was only doing the first day of class: fixing what muggle life had done to them." He responded. "Day two: breaking old habits, fashion training, personal tailoring, that's up to their new instructor." Draco commented.

"Who's that?"

"Pansy."

The classroom door crashed shut to the threatening sound of complex locking mechanisms falling into place. The campers watched in confusion as Pansy Parkinson stalked to the front, still in her travel cloak, followed by a house elf carrying assorted texts and an oddly marked bowl. As the elf settled it's load on the front table, Pansy spun to face her audience.

"Welcome to your second day of Natural Enhancements. By the time I'm done with you, you'll be incapable of making any of the fashion mistakes you're obviously made in the past. The level of incompetence you've exhibited to this point can only mean you've been mislead since birth." She stared down the room. "I was unable to do anything about it before...what with the constant presence of teachers, parents, and ministry officials, but now I have the chance to fix it all." Her eyes flashed. "Breaking you will of course come first. Rebuilding you will come... much later."

"Malfoy's coming back in soon right… or Ron? Ron would be good."

"No Gryffindor can help you now Creevey." Pansy said darkly, snapping her head to the side. "Mitsy, cut the lights!"

Panic rose as the campers noticed their new inability to blink.

"Now, down to business. With some help from my personal pensieve, I've cataloged every mistake I've seen a muggleborn make since I started at Hogwarts. This morning we'll go through those six years of repressed memories until you begin to understand the pain you've caused me… as well as the damage you've done to yourselves." She pointed her wand at the pensieve on the table. "I've made sure you can't close your eyes to the horrors you're about to see. Also as a side note, any fidgeting, unnecessary interruptions, or attempting to remove your restraints, will be met with disciplinary action. Let's begin."

An image appeared on the front wall, showing a girl in muggle clothes heading for the Hogwarts Express.

"Now do you think what she's wearing matches?" Pansy said in a curious tone. When she heard no reply from her chain-bound students she continued. "Don't be afraid, I just want an honest answer."

"yes?" *ZAP* "……Ahh!"

"Hardly! Now let's try again...."

Ron had been trying to get through the classroom door for an hour. He'd tried pushing, pulling, knocking, swearing, kicking, hexing...begging. His latest attempt involved loudly insulting its heritage... the manor's fifteenth century handcarved oak door had responded badly. He was still checking for internal injuries when Pansy opened the door and brought her shaky, stumbling students into the hallway.

"Parkinson, undo whatever you did to them, right now!"

"Absolutely not, stopping their fashion training now would only cause more damage. There's no going back Weasley, the only way through is forward." She said with confidence. "Go ahead and console them if you feel you have to. Just remember to keep them away from garish patterns and mismatched colors, their minds haven't worked through the negative reinforcements yet," then left.

Halfway through lunch, Ron led the still shaky campers to their seats. Seeing they'd settled into their meal, he grabbed Pansy and Draco, and pulled them into the drawing room, locking the door behind him.

"Parkinson, you shouldn't even be here right now! Go back home, finish lying to your parents already!"

"My parents are traveling the world this summer Weasley. Even if they weren't, being at Malfoy manor has always been acceptable."

Ron started to look suspicious. "Traveling the world, just like Malfoy's parents? They're probably all at some big deatheater's ... "

"It's really nothing you should be concerned with," she said quickly. "After all their being away serves the greater good now doesn't it."

"Okay, whatever. The important thing is I talked to the muggleborns and Parkinson tried to kill them! She hexed them, threatened them, and made them answer questions while restrained!"

Pansy scoffed. "I prefer corrected them, encouraged them, and successfully held their attention."

"I have written testimonies!" Ron yelled, waving a clipboard. "You treated them for wizarding color blindness. You can't prove that outside of St. Mungos!" Ron mumbled through the list until, "You threatened to make them run something called 'the gauntlet of garments' this afternoon, which supposedly included fire and spiked pits. You do remember that gauntletry was made illegal in 1827!"

Draco walked up behind Ron, looking over his shoulder. "Well, they say personal discomfort is an excellent tool for knowledge retention."

"You're not helping Malfoy. They would have been maimed!"

"Really Weasley, I'd have healed the deeper wounds. I wouldn't have left them scarred for life."

"What were they going to learn this afternoon Malfoy?" Ron growled.

"The last part of the course: fashion and tailoring. You know giving them a sense of style, and then tailoring their robes to it."

"I'm taking that then." Ron announced

"You are not!" Pansy shrieked in horror. "You know nothing about fashion!"

"I know plenty about fashion... I just choose not to use any of it!"

"That explains how your mother gets you in those hideous jumpers." Pansy sneered.

"You leave my mother out of this! Besides I... I outrank you!" Ron shouted searching for a last ditch defense. "As vice president, I'm taking them away from you." He turned to glare at Draco. "And no one is stopping me!"

After several moments of silence Draco spoke up.

"Fine Weasley, take the class. But if they aren't wearing highly-tailored, respectable robes by dinner, Pansy gets them back…" Draco's eyes lit up, "… and she gets you too."

Ron looked at the Slytherins defiantly. "Done."

It was an interesting afternoon. After light psychological counseling and some trust exercises, Ron had calmed the campers down enough to talk about fashion.

"Okay, well there are a lot of different fabrics and cuts, and rules about wearing them. You're never suppose to wear dragon's hide on Wednesdays, or if your going to a wedding…well unless you train dragons and then only if it's on boots with silver clasps …"

Ron looked up at his utterly confused audience. "Or I could start at the beginning, that would be good too." He cleared his throat. "Okay, all of you stick out in the wizarding world like sore thumbs, even in school robes. It's mostly because you don't understand the five criteria of wizarding wear: lineage, birth order, age, magical ability, and career." He watched several Ravenclaws take down his words.

"Since you're muggleborns lineage won't count, but your birth order does, and it should be counted by your first magical sibling. The higher the birth order, the more decoration should be on your robes, none of the rules have really changed in centuries. Age will determine tailoring. The older you age, the more tailored your robes should be, at least till you reach a hundred and ten, then all the fashion rule go out the window. Magical ability will determine how intense the colors you wear are and how rich the fabrics. Lastly, the actual color and cut are determined by your future profession. This lets others know what you're going to be, and will help you find apprenticeships. This will only affect the six and seventh years as the rest of you haven't taken your OWLs yet. Your robes will just denote you as students."

Ron considered the room. "Seventh years, your robes will take the longest to tailor, so you guys come up first. Everyone else stay down and try not to make any sudden movements till you turns." Scissors, needles, measuring tape, and thread appeared out of thin air. "Weasley clothing charms are kind of enthusiastic… and aggressive."

Ron threw more hemming, fitting, patching, and dying charms that afternoon than his mother had in the last five years. It had gone surprisingly well though. Sure, there had been some minor incidents, like the Creevey brothers being mistaken for dishtowels by a laundering charm, and several Hufflepuffs losing a fight with a flock of out-of-control hemming scissors, but really it was nothing several strong healing spells couldn't fix.

That night Ron escorted the muggleborns into dinner to show his work to Draco and Pansy.

"Not bad." Draco looked entirely amazed. "I'm impressed Weasley. They don't look threadbaren, impoverish, or raised by farm animals. Who knew you had it in you."

"They'd all look much better if I'd used my family's tailoring spells." Pansy noted.

"And as much as I'd like to see them all arrested by Aurors the second they step foot in Diagon Alley Parkinson, this will have to do. They aren't dark wizards. They shouldn't look like them."

"Some may be. We really won't know for a few weeks yet." Draco added helpfully.

"I'm not letting you turn them into You-know-who worshiping, deatheater spawn that…" Ron was interrupted as a Malfoy owl landed in front of Draco holding a very neatly addressed, very muggle envelope. He grabbing it before Draco had the chance and skimmed its contents.

"Yes!" Ron shouted happily. "Hermione's on her way."