Chapter 2: Better Versions
The moment they were safely out of sight, Draco yanked his arm from not-Granger's grip, glaring at her.
"Are you fucking insane?" he demanded. "Do you have any idea what you've signed up to do?"
"Of course I do," she said, with the same swotty certainty his own version of Granger (the one he was familiar with, that is) often employed. "I understand everything," she informed him, and then, directly undermining her irresponsible claim to cognizance, she shrugged. "So I have to steal a wand. Big deal."
"Big deal?" Draco echoed, flailing in his disbelief. "You don't even have magic!"
"No, I don't," not-Granger agreed, and to his dismay, she spun, suddenly pressing him back against the corridor wall with her knife held deftly to his chest. "But I'm pretty handy without it," she murmured, eyes flicking with amusement over his face. "And besides," she added, releasing him to continue striding down the hall, "nobody ever expects the Spanish Inquisition."
"What?" Draco asked dazedly, abruptly regaining his senses and jogging after her. "What does that have to do with—"
"Never mind," not-Granger said flippantly, shrugging. "Just a little muggle joke."
"Oh," Draco said, waiting for a moment of revulsion that, much to his confusion, didn't come. If he had to guess, though, he figured things were far too odd for a single muggle reference to upset his unerring sensibilities. "Still," he pressed, and took a few more lengthy strides to cut her off, stepping directly in front of her. "Why the fuck are you trusting him?"
"What?" not-Granger asked, pausing abruptly.
"Why do you trust him?" Draco repeated. "He's obviously arrogant, and underhanded, and completely self-interested—"
"Huh," not-Granger snorted, arching a brow. "Interesting assertion, seeing as he's you—"
"He's some other version of me," Draco corrected her stiffly. "A version that doesn't really seem to understand consequences, for one thing, and who doesn't seem to care much about you other than how he can use you, so—"
"I don't trust him," not-Granger informed him, unblinking, with the very heavy implication Draco had somehow been the stupid one for thinking so. "I'm not an idiot," she added, cementing the overtones with a scoff. "I fully intend to kill him once I have the wand."
"You fully intend to—" Draco stared at her. "What?"
"I'm going to kill him," she repeated, shrugging. "I'm almost certainly going to have to, since I doubt very much that he plans to stick to his end of the bargain."
"What?" Draco repeated, and then, frantically, "What?!"
Not-Granger seemed to find his dismay unconcerning, or possibly even exhausting. She looked distinctly tired out.
"Look," she sighed, "he's not without his uses. For one thing, he's given me the means to steal a wand. An unbeatable wand, and a portkey that travels between universes. Ergo," she mused, once again prompting the sensation that she was speaking to an imbecile (which Draco supposed she may have been, considering nothing she said or did was making sense to him), "I obviously need him right now, but I won't for much longer."
"But," Draco attempted hoarsely, "but you—you don't know how to use magic, and—"
"I'm going to have an unbeatable wand," she reminded him, waving away his concern. "I'm sure I'll figure it out. I'm sort of a genius." She said it like she'd been commenting on something as inarguable as her hair color, or the fact that he'd barely managed a breath this entire conversation. "I was going to start early at Oxford until Malfoy found me—and anyway, I can definitely make things happen on occasion. Nothing I can control, of course," she admitted under her breath, "but I know I have magic. I know I have it."
She looked lost for a moment, and dazed, and there was a flash of innocence on her face; a hint of longing, and at the sight of it, Draco felt a pull of something in his chest he very much wanted to violently smother.
"You don't seem to understand how difficult this will be," Draco pointed out, growling it in his frustration. "The man—the wizard—that this version of me wants you to steal from is no ordinary target. This isn't going to be easy, and you might very well die, and—"
"That word you called me," she interrupted, and he grimaced, realizing with lofty displeasure that she hadn't remotely been listening to him. "Mudblood." She frowned up at him, tilting her head. "What does it mean?"
"I—" Draco faltered, finding himself suddenly rather unwilling to define it. "It," he attempted, fidgeting, "it means someone who—who isn't… a pureblood."
"Like you," not-Granger guessed, frowning. "You're a pureblood?"
"Yes," Draco confirmed, half-relieved. It may have been a day of uncertainty, but at least he'd always been sure enough of that much. "I'm a pureblood, and you're—"
"Mudblood," she repeated, and frowned, abruptly combatant. "Why?" she demanded. "Because my parents are… what's it called. Muggles?"
Draco shifted uneasily. "Well," he began, and immediately faltered. "I mean, it's common knowledge that—"
"But you saw her blood," not-Granger objected, staring at him with apparent disbelief. "You saw her bleed. Are you really going to tell me yours looks different?"
"I—well, it's hardly literal," Draco said hastily, "I only—"
"Because we can find out," not-Granger interrupted, suddenly using the entirety of her surprising strength to shove him against the wall, the knife in her hand once again finding a home against the hollow of his throat. "Shall we?" she whispered, and he inhaled shakily, alarmed. He didn't quite believe she was capable of killing him, true, but he also wasn't convinced she wasn't. "Shall we find out what pure magical blood looks like, then?"
"Granger," he choked out. "Please—"
She glared at him, her eyes flashing gold, and then grabbed his palm. She sliced it open with her knife, a helpless whimper ripping from his throat in the same motion, and then she stared up in triumph as blood began to seep from the wound, oozing up in a viscous, too-real scarlet.
"Fuck," Draco whispered, and with a rapid flick of her wrist she did the same to her own hand, brandishing it in his face.
"Blood is blood," she said through gritted teeth. "Blood means nothing." She stopped, eyeing her own wound; flexed her palm, swallowing hard, and watched that same troubling crimson trickle down her wrist. "Blood means nothing," she said again, half to herself, as his gaze followed the narrow trail of it, a single darkened tear that traversed the blue-green channels of her veins. "Magic means everything. Power means everything."
She glanced up at him, defiant. "I want magic," she said flatly, curling her injured hand into a fist as longing turned to frustration, and then to abject fury. "It isn't fair that I'm the same as you," she snarled at him, "and yet I have to do without."
He swallowed, unable to take his eyes from the thin trickle of blood that slid down to the bone of her wrist.
"No," he admitted, not sure what possessed him to say it. "No, it isn't fair."
It took a moment—a considerable effort, in fact, that clawed its way from an uncomfortable, inexplicable numbness—and then, before he quite processed what he was doing, Draco reached into his back pocket, pulling out his wand.
"Here," he murmured, taking her hand and unclenching her fingers one by one, easing them into openness, submission. "When you have a wand. The spell for this is Tergeo," he said, waving his wand and cleaning the wound. Then he paused, taking stock of her withheld breath, before doing the same to his palm.
She breathed out sharply, her gaze alighting on his with something he couldn't quite put a finger on before she suddenly nodded once, seeming to have determined something for herself.
"The wand," she said. "This Dumbledore guy—"
Draco swallowed uncomfortably, glancing away. "Yes?"
"He's dead here, too," she assured him quickly. "Or so Malfoy says. But anyway, Malfoy told me that you disarmed Dumbledore in your universe, so even after that Tom Riddle person took the wand, you're the rightful owner. It will obey you—and only you," she clarified, "and that's why he needed me to convince you to be the one to steal it."
"Why doesn't he just try to win it in this universe?" Draco asked, frowning. "Surely that would be less effort, wouldn't it?"
"I don't think so," not-Granger said, shaking her head slowly. "He'd have to rightfully win it, which is apparently some sort of wandlore I'm not familiar with. But the way he tells it, this"—she held up the pocket watch—"is just some family heirloom he came across by accident. All you'd have to do to get your version of the wand was to rightfully possess it, which is hardly any effort for him at all."
"But then—" Draco swallowed, connecting the very troubling dots. "But even if I could possess it, he'd still have to take it from me, wouldn't he?"
She glanced slyly at him, a delicate smirk finding a home on her lips. "He'll have to take it from me first," she reminded him softly, and Draco forced another swallow, wondering once again what the utter fuck he'd gotten himself into.
"Ah, you're back," not-Malfoy said, his cunning smile flashing again as the real Malfoy reentered the room with her counterpart.
Upon entry, Hermione watched herself walk; eyed the presence she had, and marveled. This version of her was brash, unconcerned with others, and she was… bigger, somehow. Not physically, but she carried herself differently; wore her spine straighter, held her chin higher. Hermione recalled herself as she had been in the muggle world (read: friendless and alone) and wondered if perhaps this version of herself had never made friends. She might have never needed them, perhaps, or had possibly never even wanted them.
Hermione wondered, then, if this version of her wasn't somehow much more dangerous.
"Yes, we're back," not-Hermione confirmed smoothly, sauntering into the room with Malfoy at her heels. "You were in a hurry, weren't you?" she asked, dropping her gaze pointedly to Hermione. "Have you thought of a plan?"
"I… no," she admitted, glancing warily up at the real Malfoy. "I don't know the house very well."
"Potter and Weasley would be in the cellar," Malfoy supplied, grimacing. "With—" he paused. "With a couple of other people," he confessed, visibly deflating.
To Hermione's dismay, her attention snagged on not-Malfoy beside her, noting against her will that his pale brow had risen in apparent amusement.
"Interesting," he murmured in her ear, opting to address her privately. "This is the version of me you prefer? The kind who takes prisoners?"
"I hate all versions of you," she whispered back. He smiled, indifferent, and Malfoy seemed to catch the interaction, his brow furrowing suspiciously.
"Maybe we should talk," he suggested to her, though he looked distinctly uncomfortable at the thought. "Go over the plan? The house, I mean."
"Go ahead," not-Malfoy permitted, stretching languidly. "I'll get you a wand to use for the time being," he added, leaning towards Hermione. "You'll need it for when we go back."
"We?" Malfoy echoed sharply, and not-Malfoy turned, offering him an oddly graceful tip of his head.
"Yes," he said. "You really think I'd let you do it alone?"
Malfoy blanched and his alter ego laughed, somewhat alarmingly. He rose gracefully and without hesitation—even sparing Hermione a courteous bow—before he turned to exit the room, not-Hermione slowly falling in step beside him and frowning in thought as she turned the corner in his wake.
"So," Malfoy ventured when they were alone, staring uncomfortably at her. "Are you okay?"
Hermione grimaced. "No," she muttered, and she wasn't, but she very much preferred not to get into it with him, of all people. "But we should really talk about this," she pressed, dropping her voice as she changed the subject. "We can't let him get the Elder Wand."
"No, we can't. And we can't let her get it, either," he muttered, gesturing to where her other version had been. "It can't be good in either of their hands."
Hermione nodded, fidgeting. "Paradoxes really aren't meant to converge like this," she said, glancing at him as he grimaced in agreement. "Entropy and all that—we really shouldn't disrupt anything, or be seen with them. Who knows what an event in one universe could cause in the other?" she added, suddenly apprehensive. "Those two don't belong in our universe, and the Elder Wand in ours certainly doesn't belong in theirs—"
"Oh, so you believe in paradoxes now?" Malfoy joked drily, and Hermione flashed him her most impatient glare; the kind she usually saved for Harry and Ron.
"We have to destroy that portkey," she said, pointedly not mentioning how he scarcely deserved the right to mock her, particularly given the position they were both in. "We can get the wand from him—we should get the wand, really, it's not exactly safe in You-Know-Who's hands—but we should… I don't know. Destroy it." She shuddered. "Nobody should be in possession of an unbeatable wand."
"Given the circumstances, we might have to," Malfoy agreed, much to her surprise. She looked up, catching the grim line of his mouth. "We might need to use it to send them back," he pointed out. "And then we can destroy the portkey."
"So you agree, then," Hermione exhaled, relieved. "We have to get the wand, and then get them through the portkey—"
"Take them back here," Malfoy confirmed, nodding. "And then steal the portkey and go back through—"
"And destroy it in our universe," she breathed out conclusively. She glanced up at him, treading carefully. "Which means we'll have to work together. Can you stomach conspiring with a mudblood?" she asked him, unable to keep the bitterness from her voice.
His grey eyes dropped inexplicably to his palm as he flexed it, toying with something on his tongue.
"Yeah," he eventually muttered, and did not elaborate.
It was surprisingly easy work; transference into Draco's version of the Manor was almost worryingly unobstructed as they traveled from not-Draco's bedroom into his own, landing with a soft thud in the corner of the room.
"Listen," Granger said, nodding her head towards the door. "He's not here yet," she ruled, listening to Bellatrix shriek frantically at Lucius and Narcissa. "Seems like they haven't called him. Maybe they still haven't decided what to do?"
"Do we wait, then?" not-Granger asked, frowning at Draco. "Will he be back later?"
"He will," Draco confirmed slowly, "but—" He paused, shifting uncomfortably. "I could also call him."
He touched his right thumb to his left wrist, and immediately, both versions of Granger looked uneasy. Draco could tell, instinctively, that even if the alternate version of Granger didn't fully understand what the gesture meant, she still had some general perception that his ability to do so was no flattering connection.
His other self, however, wasn't so easily distracted. "Do it," not-Draco instructed crisply. "Once we've restrained everyone else—"
"What?" Draco cut in, balking. "Restrained?"
"Yes," he said impatiently, as though this should have been intensely obvious. "Obviously we don't want to chance someone else getting in the way—like your father, for example," he offered pointedly, "or Aunt Bellatrix—"
"Right," Draco said, feeling less and less confident in his choice of company.
He changed his mind, though, upon realizing what an asset their paradoxical selves were; not-Granger was nearly as good with a blade as Granger was with a wand, and his oddly confident clone was certainly a force to be reckoned with—not to mention that it was an easy enough trap for both Lucius and Narcissa, considering neither of them had time to realize it wasn't him before he'd stunned them from elsewhere in the room.
Within ten minutes, every Death Eater and Snatcher in the house had been meticulously apprehended, paralyzed or bound to something they could not easily escape, with their memories suitably modified where necessary. Granger had left the door to the cellar open after stunning Potter and Weasley, and returned Weasley's wand with a fragile, reverential sort of care—treading, in fact, with a mournful guilt that Draco was pleased to see not-Granger observed from afar with impatience; "Is that really who she's dating?" she asked, making a face—and then, within minutes, they were alone in the ballroom with Draco's wand pressed to his Mark, his hand shaking as he summoned the Dark Lord.
"Draco," Lord Voldemort said, apparating in with a subtle crack and a burdened frown that gave Draco more than a moment's breath of pause. "I presume," he began silkily, "that if you've called, that must mean you have—"
There was a thud, a crash, and then Lord Voldemort promptly collapsed, sinking to the floor with an oddly graceless impact. Draco frowned, stunned, and then Not-Granger stepped forward, gripping the handle of a sizable antique vase that had shattered upon slamming into the back of the Dark Lord's head.
"Got it," she declared loudly, tearing the wand from the Dark Lord's fingers and then appearing breathlessly at Draco's side.
"Did you kill him?" Granger asked, eyes wide. "You can't, you know, there's horc-" She broke off, swallowing. "I mean, there's… things to consider. For one thing, we have no idea what that could do to your universe, much less to ours—"
"Relax," not-Granger said, cutting her off with a wry twitch of her lips. "It's just a flesh wound. You're not the only one who mistrusts paradoxes, you know."
It was all so rapid and nonsensical that Draco could scarcely process the series of events, much less what they were talking about; he stared at Granger, reaching helplessly for clarity, and she gave a limp approximation of a shrug, seeming a certain degree of unsettled herself.
Not-Draco, meanwhile, was as collected as always. He held out a hand to the other version of Granger, beckoning for her. "Give it to me," he said, stepping towards her, and immediately, her eyes narrowed.
"It's his," she reminded him, slowly holding it out to Draco. "Remember?"
There was an uneasy pause, leaving Draco and Granger to exchange apprehensive glances.
"Ah, yes," not-Draco confirmed, his eyes flashing briefly with what even Draco could see was anger before it quickly cooled, the spark of silver soothing back into the grey. "Right. Of course."
Draco took the wand from not-Granger, barely breathing as his fingers closed around it. Was it really everything they said it was? It was impossible to tell, though a rush of something unknowable flooded through his bloodstream almost at once, jolting him slightly as he made contact with the wood.
Still, whether the wand was unbeatable or not was hardly the primary issue. He had the wand for now, but how soon before his paradoxical self took it—either by force or by theft—if he refused? Whether he came for it sooner or later, what could Draco really do to stop him? The portkey between universes was more than a small problem, particularly if not-Draco continued to use it to travel however he wished.
"How about a trade," Draco offered to his other self, hoping his voice did not betray his sudden rapid influx of scattered thoughts. "What if I loan you the wand," he suggested, more firmly this time, "temporarily. You came with us, after all," he added, gesturing between himself and Granger. "You helped us. What if we help you with Grindelwald?"
Granger frowned for a moment, concern flicking over her face; but then she nodded, seeming to grasp his intent. "Yes," she said quickly. "Yes, of course. You helped us. It's only fair."
Not-Draco stared between them for a moment, and then promptly burst out laughing.
"You can't seriously think I believe you," he said, struggling through his apparent mirth. "You really think I'd let you just—"
"You can have the wand afterwards," Draco offered quickly. "I'll even give it to you to hold on to, as a sign of good faith. But I want it back."
Not-Draco frowned at that, taken aback. "What?"
"There's a war here," Granger contributed, leaping seamlessly to Draco's aid. "We could end it with that wand," she added, pointing to it, "whereas you only need it to disarm Grindelwald once, and then you can take his Elder Wand."
Not-Draco's mouth twitched; a smile, though an unsettling one.
"Disarm," he murmured, winking at her. "Right."
She bristled, and not-Granger flashed her other self a look of something Draco suspected was skepticism, or else pity. Such naivety, he imagined her saying disdainfully, and realized that part of him wanted to laugh at the thought.
"Well, fine," not-Draco ruled, shrugging. "Give me the wand, and then we'll all go back to our universe. We'll get Grindelwald's wand by disarming him," he clarified, smirking, "and then return this one to you, and then you can be on your merry way to win your little war with Riddle." He leveled his gaze at Draco, holding out a hand for him to shake. "Deal?"
He was lying. He was so, so clearly lying.
"Portkey first," Draco suggested slowly. "Then I hand you the wand—"
Not-Draco waved a hand. "Logistics," he ruled, dismissive. "Not a problem. Do we have a deal?"
"Deal," Draco confirmed, consenting to give his own hand (but not) a brief squeeze before leaning over to murmur in Granger's ear.
"Get the wand from him," he whispered to her.
She nodded, not looking at him.
"Get the portkey from her," she breathed back, her lips carefully unmoving.
a/n: Chapter 3 will post later this week to help get us to the meat of the plot sooner. This chapter dedicated to gaeleria, who prompted the initial one-shot: prejudiced!Draco forced to confront his bigotry. Thank you to everyone for reading!
