Disclaimers: Yeah, I know. JKR would have done better with books 6 and 7 if she had followed our fanfiction ideas more closely... But, it's you all's fault because you did not let her know she could borrow from you- like I did!

Chapter 5: UH-OH

Our story picks up at: It has been three days since the boys disappeared down into the dungeons. They have not been seen since. So in order to appease the panicking masses, Lucius Malfoy has gallantly volunteered to go check up on them.

The first thing Lucius noticed was that the doors were very heavily warded and soundproofed. Ah, well, what are a few spells to a fully trained, determined Death Eater? The first spell left him looking like he was wearing a pink furry suit, the second made his hair stand on end and the third spell had him screaming like a girl because he suddenly realized that he was now a life-sized version of the pink panther after finishing the fluff cycle of the dryer. (Insert the Pink Panther theme tune now if you know it. If not take a commercial break and go watch Pink Panther cartoon.)

Like any real sane man he ran screaming back up the steps to find his wife. It was his belief that Narcissa could fix anything that went wrong- and his appearance was definitely wrong.

Lucky for him, Narcissa was standing in the Great Hall casting SCOURGIFY spells because she was of the opinion that the Hogwarts house elves were not up to par with the cleaning. She took one look at her frizzy husband and shook her head. "Why, in the name of all that is magic, do you insist on wearing those stupid Halloween costumes that Severus owns?"

"Cissy," he wailed. "I swear I wasn't dressing up! I went down to see what the boys were doing and they hexed the door."

She rolled her eyes. "FINITE INCANTUM," she muttered. Her husband was back to being his usual beautiful self. "I don't know why you can't learn that spell yourself. It must be some stupid man thing!" Her chastisement too loved to be of serious consequence

He grabbed her and swung her up into his arms. "Sod finding out what the boys are doing. Why don't you and I find a nice quiet spot and ruin the ambiance?"

"I knew there was a reason I married you." They did not manage to take more than two steps before they lost track of where they were, in favor of what they could be doing. They definitely managed to delay dinner by several hours because no one wanted to interrupt the amorous couple. (Personally, for us jealous types- we'd call it oversexed. But, who are we to complain?)

The boys finally emerged from their self-imposed isolation. Mainly because Mad-Eye Moody saw what was happening and wanted in on the action. They had found a computer game called M & M's: The Lost Formula and modified it to work at Hogwarts. They had called in a technical expert, a muggle who operated under the hacker name of Ratty Baggins (Self-insertia here- all the facts are correct. Disclaimer: Ratty does not qualify as a Mary Sue and does not have his own action figure-yet.) He was showing them how to get through the game. Moody became enthralled with the little M&M guy falling in the chocolate and yelling UH-OH just before he vanished. He also decimated the boy's stash of marshmallow peeps. (American Muggle Easter candy- back in the 1990's they come in three colors: pink, yellow and blue.) Moody, being a manly-man, had no sense of shame as he ate his way through whatever was there-color be damned.

Draco was the first to give up after trying to dislodge his great- grandfather from the computer. It was impossible though, the old man was adamant in regards to playing, eating and hexing anyone trying to get him away from the computer. And he was doing all three very nicely, thank you. (Fragonknight02 at this moment had a vision of Master Snape doing an Irish Jig while wearing a kilt. Must have been an IMPERIOUS. We would appreciate a gust of wind right about now.)

The other two followed shortly thereafter. They went upstairs and eventually interrupted the affectionate part-veela couple in order to eat dinner at the table. Narcissa giggled helplessly as Severus Snape held her husband at wand-point and made him SCOURGIFY the entire hall.

(How he managed this feat is unknown, but congratulations to him. Drinks all around!)

Never mind that, they were back to being friends within hours. Lucius did eventually admit that the hall needed a good going over, and had the audacity to smirk at his glowing little wife as he said it.

That same wife was heard murmuring to Harry later that she hoped he would keep up with his lessons and not forget anything she had taught him so far. Harry just giggled and patted Draco on the knee. She took that to mean that he would indeed stay in practice.

Draco did not bother to tell his mother that the two of them were far too busy to waste oodles of time on sexual exploits. They had a whole castle full of people to terrorize, Quidditch to practice, food to eat, potions to brew and any number of more useful pursuits. (Let's face it- someone overloaded the heroes social calendars again.)

Dinner had finished around nine and no one really wanted to go to bed yet. Lucius was feeling pleasantly tired from his successful afternoon and wanted to stay in and unwind. Narcissa wanted to go out so she rounded up the girls and they all went down to Hogsmeade to go pub crawling. That is why, a bit later, when Albus went looking for his two favorite spies from the war he found them in Severus's private rooms. Severus and Lucius are lounging around in the dungeon, relaxing and catching up on the good old days.

"Things really have calmed down a bit since the death of the Dark Lord hasn't it, Severus?" Lucius brushed a few strands of hair back from his face before squinting slightly and very carefully placing the needle into the little hole of his counted cross stitch.

Severus looked up from the jumper he was knitting and grinned at his friend. "Actually I don't miss the robe-kissing, thinking up outrageous lies, and malicious hexes that the sodding old snake used to subject us to. I suppose it would be nice to have a decent dual with a few aurors, but I think we could just have Dumbledore hold a dueling tournament for us."

Lucius sighed and held the sampler he was doing. "I think I am going to miss some of the muggle technology though. I mean, wizards don't usually do counted cross stitch. I would never have known how much fun this is if we had not gone on that last raid."

Severus nodded but kept counting his purl stitches. He looked up at Lucius and snickered. "You mean you are going to miss him miscalculating where to apparate. Seeing the confused look on his face when we landed in that craft shop was priceless."

"Well, we did end up in some pretty strange places. The Hippodrome was fun as hell-who'd have thought gay night was such a riot? I think the highlight of his incompetence though was ending up in the hardware store." Lucius sighed and readjusted the throw rug tucked around his feet, trying to keep the cold draft from the dungeon floor away. He finally gave up and curled his feet underneath him on the chair.

Severus almost fell out of his chair as he howled with laughter. "Yeah! I had forgot about that. That was the time McNair picked up that big axe he carries around wasn't it? I can still see Voldies face as McNair started cursing him and swinging that damn thing around."

The two of them had finally settled back down and were working in a companionable silence when the fire blazed up and Albus Dumbledore's head appeared. He looked around before calling to Severus. "Severus, my boy, I have been looking everywhere for you."

Severus's face turned red and he tried to jam his knitting down in the side of the chair. He glared at Albus for a minute then snarled, "I thought I told you never to fire call me on Wednesday nights."

Albus scratched his chin thoughtfully and nodded a few times (dotty old wizards tend to do that). "Yes, my boy, I do recall you mentioning that before now that you mention it again."

Lucius just glared at him and went back to work on his sampler. He was determined to finish it in time to present it to Narcissa on the occasion of their anniversary. He just knew that she would love the picture: doves holding a twisted ribbon, wedding rings entwined, with their names and bonding date stitched on- just as the picture showed. After that he had to get Draco's birth sampler done.

(Face it, he was over-booked too. He was going to need every moment if he intended to get all this done.

Fragonknight03: Who the hell keeps doing these bookings anyway?

Fragonknight02: Ease up!

Fragonknight01: They are only wizards! All they have to do is borrow someone's time turner. It's not like they don't have all year-all year.)

Severus continued to glare. Albus telling him to continue with his knitting did not do anything for his temper. He refused to wait the old man out and snapped, "Well, what did you want? Or, were you worried that the Death Eaters were sacrificing little children in the dungeons trying to resurrect the Dark Lord?"

Lucius snickered at this and said, "Well if they want virgin sacrifices that leaves out all the Slytherins. Except maybe a few first years, but that should be taken care of by summer vacation."

Severus hid his head in mock shame, "Oh the shame of it. And I keep telling them to be so discreet. I simply can not figure out how the school governors found out."

"Severus, Severus! I merely wanted to tell you that Harry and Draco were found down in the kitchens acting slightly disoriented. When I finally got to speak to them I found that they had been dueling or some such nonsense."

Lucius perked up at the mention of dueling. "Did they have fun? Any good hexes? Did Draco finally get to try out that cutting hex I taught him for filleting salmon? I never did use that one on anyone and I'd like to see what happens."

Severus shook his head and hissed, "TMI! I did not need to know that."

Albus merely chuckled. "I removed an OBLITERATE from both of them. They both became quite ill as they told me what happened. I re-obliterated them so that they would not suffer any undue trauma."

Lucius sat his cross stitch aside. "You have my undivided attention, old man. Please tell me what happened to my heir that was so traumatizing."

Albus asked, "Severus, may I come through?"

"You may. I want to hear what has happened to Harry this time. It is amazing that the boy has managed to stay sane."

Albus came through and conjured himself a chair to sit in front of the fire also. The sight of his knitting needles flashing through some banana berry wool (featured by Red Heart)tm was a calming sight as he thought of where to pick up his tale regarding the boys.

Harry and Draco had made their way out to Greenhouse #4 to get some fresh clipping for a potion that Draco was teaching Harry how to brew. They had managed to get in the greenhouse, find the plant, collect the clippings, and were on their way back out when they heard a noise coming from Professor Sprout's office.

The boys had gone to investigate the noise since it was dinner time and Professor Sprout almost always ate dinner in the Great Hall. They were worried that someone was trying to vandalize her office. Albus twinkled merrily as he said, "They found Professor Sprout and Professor Flintwick in a compromising position.

What little color stained Severus Snape's face faded. He literally shrieked, "Vandalized Hell! Those poor little boys have been VIOLATED!" Turning his evil Death Eater glare on Albus he hissed, "You probably broke the obliviate on them because you are a nasty old perv!"

"Severus! That was not nice and you know it!" The demonic glare did not leave Severus face. "Nice, you want NICE? If you really want nice GO LIVE IN AN ORPHANAGE!" Glaring at Dumbledore did not help any so he threw down his knitting and heaved a frustrated sigh. Looking over at Lucius he asked, "I don't suppose you would like to play jump rope would you?"

Dumbledore chirped, "You would not happen to need a third person to help turn the rope would you? It has been several days since I got to play jump rope and it is ever so invigorating."

The younger wizards were still in a huff but they let him join in.

After they finished jumping rope Lucius could be heard asking, "Sev, do you sitll have those halloween costumes you and Lily used to make?"