Chapter Three: The Part with the Heartless Bastard, AKA Draco Malfoy or the Tin Man:
Draco wasn't very familiar with the movie, 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'. He had seen it only once, very recently. After all, it was an old Muggle movie, so why would he be familiar with it? He had also read the book, also only once, also rather recently, but once was enough for him to form the opinion that the author, a chap by the name of Frank L Baum, was a warped, twisted, sick man. In other words, he felt the man was a kindred spirit.
One thing he knew was that Hermione Granger knew the story very well. Just two weeks ago, right before her beast of a cat bit his finger, he was at the Ministry and he overheard her telling a coworker that it was one of her favourite movies, and that she had also enjoyed the book as a child. She said that she often thought of people in her life as resembling characters from both.
When the witch she was talking with asked her to elaborate, she said, "Well, I've always thought of Harry as the scarecrow, smart as can be, but not confident that he is. Of course, Ron would be the cowardly lion,'" to which the other witch laughed, having Hermione add, "But of course." Draco didn't know what that meant at the time, even when the laughter ended and she said, "I thought that back when we were searching for the Horcruxes and he left Harry and me." Draco watched the movie right after that and immediately knew what she meant. She meant Ron Weasley was chicken shite.
Then, that fateful day, she said something that really shocked him, though he was in the dark as to what she meant about the next statement until he watched the movie days later. She said, "And of course, Draco Malfoy always reminded me of the tin man. He's not evil, per se, he just has no heart. He's cold and hard on the outside, for all intents and purposes, but I swear, somewhere, down deep, somewhere in that puffed out chest, there has to be a heart. I only wish I could prove it."
The other witch asked Hermione why it mattered if Draco had a heart or not. Draco waited patiently for the answer to that question as well. She was silent for a moment and then said, "Because I'd hate to think that I've wasted ten years of my life having a crush on a man who doesn't even have the capacity to love."
Both witches laughed and walked on. Draco stood behind the door where he was hiding in utter and total shock. She had a crush on him? For ten years? Well hell, he'd had a crush on her for twelve, so take that, Hermione Granger.
He immediately rented the Muggle movie, read the book, and then concluded one thing: Hermione Granger was a nutcase, but by golly, she was a nutcase that had a crush on him, so he was going to steal her away from her cowardly boyfriend, if for no other reason than the fact that he wanted to do so. Oh, and that he liked her back.
That was when he came up with his plan regarding her cat. He certainly didn't plan on the beast biting his finger…no, the mangy beast did that all on its own. Afterwards, though, he saw the parallel to the movie, and he thought he would play a sort of trick on her, only she took everything so seriously. What started as a way for him to infiltrate her heart, turned into a war of sorts, as she began to pour over law books, and ancient tomes, and consulting solicitors. Of course he had to play along, so he had to file a true complaint against her and the ugly old beast. Still, he had no intention of actually destroying the stupid thing.
Then everything snowballed out of control. That morning, when he found her in the archives of the Ministry, and he had come with the basket to collect the cat, he never intended to really take it. What he had intended to do was to draw her attention to the parallels between their 'real life' and 'his favourite Muggle Movie' as a way to show her that they had a lot in common, and to open a line of communication. Then he would have a change of heart, tell her she could keep her cat, if she would go out with him, and all would undoubtedly be well.
But then he met Potter in the lifts, and Potter began to call Draco all sorts of foul names, and began to threaten him for daring to threaten his best friend's cat, and merely because of his hatred for Potter, he decided to really take the cat.
He informed Potter that it was Potter's job to uphold the law. He informed Potter that he was on his way down to get the cat as they spoke, and he could either help him, or arrest his best friend, one or the other. Then, to make matters even worse, that stupid Weaslebee entered the lifts, making more threats.
By that time, Malfoy had, had enough of both of them. He told them both to go to hell. He left them out in the hall, entered the old archival room, and told Granger to give him the cat. He was scared shiteless. He didn't know what to do with the cat once he had it. He could tell she hated him at that moment. He tried to act nonchalant about it all, even though it was tearing him up inside. He knew he was ruining everything but he didn't know how to stop it.
Then, to top it all off, Potter and Weasley joined the fray, and told her she would be arrested if she didn't hand over the cat, the stupid morons, which made her cry. He hated to see her cry. He really did. The silly creature cried, then chased after her beast of a cat, then the bookshelf she was on began to wobble.
Potter made a strangled sort of noise, and Weasley swore an oath and stepped back, (can anyone spell 'chicken shite'?) but only Draco reached out for her. He ran forward, yelled, "Watch out, Granger!" and grabbed the edge of her skirt just as the whole shelf toppled over.
The next thing he knew, he was waking up here in "Dreamland" and he had a hell of a headache. He saw that she was unconscious. He tried to revive her, and had only just begun, when the oddest thing occurred. All these little people began to run around them. He had to admit, they frightened him a bit. There was just so much ginger hair a man could abide!
He ran and hid, and watched as she finally came to her senses. He also watched as she dealt with them and with a Looney Lovegood look-a-like with her usual aplomb. Hell, she even threatened to drop a bookshelf on a mirror image of Umbridge! He almost laughed out loud at that!
Even though he had only watched the movie once, he knew, just as well as she did, that some things were slightly off in this alternative universe. The brick road was the wrong colour, her shoes were the wrong colour, and heaven help them all, but Potter was there as the scarecrow, just as Hermione told her friend a few weeks before.
Draco didn't know if this was a spell, or a mass delirium, but he knew that the only ones who seemed to know it wasn't real was Hermione and he, and even she didn't know that he knew, so he was at an advantage. Didn't she say that he reminded her of the tin man…no heart, in deed?
He ran to find the woodsman cottage, knowing that was the next part in the movie. He expected to find the orchard beside the cottage empty, but another tin man was taking his place, and it looked a lot like that stupid Quidditch player, Oliver Wood. Well, no matter. Draco had his wand, and could only assume magic worked here. He popped the other tin man into the cottage, transfigured his own usual black attire into a solid silver suit made of rusted tin, and very uncomfortable at that, and he popped a stupid funnel on his head and waited, in a stiff and unnatural pose for Granger to come along. If she thought he had no heart, he would just have to prove her otherwise.
Hermione and Harry continued walking until they came upon a dense little wooded area, an orchard. Hermione said, "I could use a snack. Would you like an apple, Harry?"
The scarecrow smiled at her and said, "Let me get them for us." He walked to a low lying branch and plucked a red, round, beautiful apple from the stem. He presented it to Hermione.
She smiled and said, "Thank you." He reached up to pick another one for himself when something hit him on the side of the head.
"Ouch!" Harry rubbed the side of his sawdust, stuffed head and said, "I think that tree just threw an apple at me."
"For goodness sakes, of course it did, I forgot this stupid part," Hermione said. She walked up to the tree and said, "You stop it this instant or I'll hex all your leaves off, give you a bad case of wood rot, and fill all your apples with worms. I have a wand, I'm angry, and I'll do it!"
Draco turned his head slightly and grinned at her tenacity. She reached up to the nasty tree and plucked another apple. She handed it to Harry and said, "Here you go, Harry." She started to walk away when the tree threw an apple right at her, hitting her hard on the bum.
"HEY!" she shouted, rubbing the spot the apple hit. She picked up the apple from the ground, and threw it back at the tree. Soon, that tree, as well as others, started throwing apples at her and Harry. They were sorely outnumbered, so they ran down the path, picking up the thrown apples, and putting them into her basket until it was filled.
She reached for one that rolled off the path, when she spied a tin shoe. Just as in the movie, she knocked on the shoe. She was almost afraid to look up. She stood slowly, letting her eyes travel just as slowly up the body of the tin man. When she got to the face she was in shock.
She dropped her basket, grabbed the shoulders of the tin man, stared right in its eyes and then screamed as loudly as she could.
"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"
Great, now Draco Malfoy was deaf as well as frozen solid.
Harry ran toward the pair, just as she was backing away from the tin man. "What's wrong, Hermione?"
She pointed at the tin man and said, "NO! NO! NO! NO!!" She closed her eyes tightly and yelled once more, "NO! Please, let me open my eyes, and have someone else be here, please!" She opened her eyes, saw a frozen Draco Malfoy in front of her still and promptly screamed again. "AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!"
She turned to the scarecrow, threw her arms around him and said, "Take me away from this terrible, terrible place, okay?"
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Nothing, you know what, we need to get back on the road, or we'll be late for something, I don't know what, but something." She picked up her cat in one arm, her basket in the other, and stomped off.
Harry remained by the tin man, who was trying to communicate to him. Hermione turned back around and said, "Oh, Harry, don't try to talk to it. It's evil! It might warp your mind!"
"But I think he's rusted," Harry said. "There's an oil can here. Perhaps we could loosen him up a bit." He bent down and picked up an oil can right next to the tin man's feet.
She dropped her cat and basket, ran up to Harry, and slapped his hand away from the oil can, and said, "Oh, you don't have a brain, so what do you know about it? Do you even know what rusted means? Frankly, tin men love rust. They thrive on it. It's their whole goal in life, to be rusted. He's achieved his goal…do you want to ruin it for him?" She grabbed the scarecrow's hand and began to pull him away from the tin man.
Then she heard it, softly, but clearly, "Oil can."
She dropped Harry's hand and turned back to the tin man. She walked up to him, looked him in the eyes and said, "Please, I hope to goodness you didn't just say, 'oil can'."
"Oil can," he managed to squeak out the second time, barely moving his mouth. She dropped her head onto his tin chest, and banged it against it three times in utter defeat. Bang, bang, bang…it sounded completely hollow. She looked up again and said, "I swear, tin man, if you end up acting like Draco Malfoy in any way, shape or form, if you call me mudblood even once, or if you try to take my cat, I'll throw the bucket of water on you, instead of the witch, which will rust you back up in a heartbeat, not that you know what a heartbeat is. Do you understand?"
He knew he wasn't meant to answer. He remained quiet, actually quite amused by her antics. She held out her hand and said, "Hand me the oil can, Harry." He did, and she began to place oil along the seams of the tin suit, and across hands and feet, leaving his jaw and mouth for last.
She stood back and watched him as he began to move. She handed the oil can back to Harry, who placed it in her basket. She waited for the tin man to say 'thank you'.
Instead he said, "It's about bloody time, woman. Did you want me to stay rusted there forever? My stars, to think, everyone thinks I'm the heartless one, when apparently, you're more heartless than me!"
She turned to Harry and said, "I knew it. He's evil and he doesn't have a heart."
Harry smiled and said, "Well, maybe he can come with us to see the Wizard, and he can get him a heart, while he gets me a brain, and helps you find a way home, Hermione."
Draco threw his arm around her shoulders and said, "I think that's a capital idea, Hermione. Well, what are we waiting for? Let's get your arse in gear, sweetheart. We don't have all day."
She frowned, and then groaned. This daydream just turned into the nightmare from hell.
