Whose Universe Are We In?

18

The scene the next morning in the headmaster’s office was far from tranquil.

Albus allowed Lucius free from his Incarcerous to pace about as his ‘son’ told his tale, with his werewolf lover at his side and his friends in attendance, who, by the way, happened not to be the saviour and his grumpy lover but these bloody muggles, and how had this happened and how had Lucius Malfoy, the most connected man in Britain, not heard of this....this abomination that, according to said muggles had killed the two main protagonists as well as ensnaring his own son to live a life of muggle hell before he could be retrieved and all in the name of safety? He didn’t trust these two interlopers an inch and said so, volubly,

He stormed towards them to be met with a united front that knocked him on his arse: two wands pointing at him with two wizards’ hands on them. Lucius Malfoy thought to be alarmed before blackness took over and saved him the trouble.

He came round spluttering waving away the hand from which the familiar scent of smelling salts emanated, deeply embarrassed at his faint but quite unable to rise yet. A field of blond, pale as his own swung into his view and he was hefted non too delicately to his feet and deposited in a chair by this....this man not his son.

He felt a cold glass pressed into his hand and he brought it to his mouth automatically and just as automatically, he paused and sniffed at the golden liquid first before, seemingly satisfied, he downed it in one, never mind that it was barely past breakfast time. He held out the hand with the glass in it and it was re-filled, by whom, he neither knew nor cared. The second disappeared as quickly as the first but the third he savoured hugging the glass to his chest and staring into the cold flames with over-bright eyes.

“So you think Draco’s safe?”, he eventually said, his voice sounding rusty and unused to his own ears. Dan shook his head, “I hope so. We don’t know for sure”. Tom ventured, “My parents are loving people, they’ll look after him even if he seems a bit strange to them. We can try and get him back after this is all over”. Lucius turned red eyes on this stranger, “Why not now? What are you? Who are you to presume that your part here is more.....vital....more important than my son’s?” Albus intervened, “I think that at least with young Tom here, we can be sure of his loyalties, Lucius, but with Draco back here and the two of you re-united, well, perhaps not yet”.

Lucius fumed and looked about to say something but subsided instead, muttering to himself then said, “I suppose that you are right but if it is at all possible, then I want my son back. I need my family around me, or as much of it’s tattered remains as still remain to me. Surely you can understand that, Albus?” The old man nodded, “At least be thankful, Lucius, that your son is spared this dreadful war”, and this served to silence the haughty blond for now.

Walking away from the headmaster’s office later, Tom enquired, “What will become of him now?” Remus tucked his arm around his lover, “Albus will call the Aurors in of course, he will be dowsed for evil spells and Legilimised for evil intent before extensive questioning under Veritaserum – Severus’ own special blend made and saved specifically for captured Death-Eaters, who, for the most part, have developed resistances to the original formula”.

Dan blew out a breath, “Wow, that sounds pretty harsh”. Remus frowned, “It has to be. These people are bloody dangerous, Dan, and have found all sorts of ways to circumvent Ministry probings into their heads or their motives”. Dan sighed, “And I thought the muggle police were intrusive. Don’t wizards have a basic concept of human rights? Or are the thought police sort of everywhere?”

Remus grinned, “No, they’re not, Dan. Such techniques are only used on suspected criminals. I expect, that for all the muggle talk of human rights and dignity, that the muggle police forces would kill to have the skills wizards have for penetrating the minds of their criminals. Such techniques might, for example, make sure that a persistent child-rapist stays behind bars, if the law enforcement chaps knew he would re-offend the moment he’s out of jail”. Remus’ casual acceptance of such intrusion made Dan gasp even while he saw the point behind Remus’ speech.

Alan slipped his arm around Dan. The gesture was comforting rather than erotic. Alan murmured, “Welcome to another of the uncomfortable ways in which this world differs from our own”, and Dan smiled ruefully before letting himself curl shamelessly into Alan’s side as they walked through the now-silent halls.

There were still a few students around, mainly the DA that had requested to stay on for an extra week or two until Voldemort’s attacks died down again and a few of the younger ones whose parents usually collected them personally. For the most part the students had gone that morning an a laughing jostling crowd to catch the morning Express back to London. The corridors still seemed to echo with their departed voices.

Now, Dan realised with a small smile, everyone remaining, bar a few juniors, knew him as Dan and that thought strangely comforted him as did the weight of Alan’s arm around his shoulders. He snuck his around Alan’s waist and squeezed gently and the four parted for the rest of the day.

As they started most days, after their food had gone down a bit they locked and warded their quarters before going into the basement space and opening their secret bunker, then Dan transfigured the stone into the swimming pool for the early part of their workout.

As it took shape he mused, “You know this could be a training resource for us all now the rest of the school has gone. It seems sort of selfish to keep this all to ourselves. I mean...”, he grinned then blushed, “we’d have to do something with the bedroom, it’s not even ours, but after that I think others should be able to train here”.

Alan knotted his brows, he quite liked to have these private training facilities all to themselves, thanks all the same and didn’t like the idea of sharing at all, then pulled himself up short, that was very....Snape-ish but then smiled slowly; not at all, he’d had his own private make-up area for years, hating to be in the midst of the hubbub when having his brows dyed and this was no different. He made to complain but winced at his own voice,

“All right,”, it said, “But only a select few and you do not show them how to get in here – and, yes, do something with the bedroom area by all means” Dan nodded, “Yeah, the rest have the Room of Requirement but I’d like the crack troops down here on their own, it’ll ease the crowds in the Room, after all it can only expand so far, apparently”.

Alan countered, “I appreciate that space is tight but if we have all and sundry down here then this space will become equally cramped. Did not Dumbledore intimate that there are other spaces such as this around the castle?” Dan frowned, “Yeah, he did. But if he can’t find them after all this time and his experience then who are we to....?”

Alan silenced him with a sudden kiss then drew away slowly, “That infernal map of Harry’s”, he purred, making Dan blink and his dick hard all in one fell swoop. He shook his head, “What about it?”, he quizzed, intrigued. Alan shrugged, “Has he ever required to see additions to it in a Room of requirement?” Dan looked hard at his lover then, “Okay, it’s an idea. Let me go and get it. Gimme a sec”. Shaking his head, Alan tightened his hold on Dan, “Summon it”, he whispered, his cheek close to Dan’s.

So Dan did, in the smallest of whispers, mouthed it really without sound. “Accio Marauders’ Map” and seconds later it hit Alan in the back of the head. Dan tried and failed to keep the smirk off his face as he bent to retrieve it from the floor. He partly unfolded it and tapped it with his right index finger, “I solemnly swear I am up to no good”, he intoned and the map sprang to life.

“Dan, when was the last time you used your wand for spell-work other than training?”, Alan’s tone was full of curiosity. Dan looked at his right hand as if the palm had suddenly sprouted fur, “Um, dunno. Why?” Alan smiled, “Because that’s not the first wandless magic I’ve seen you do. Dan Radcliffe, I think that you are possibly a more powerful wizard than Harry Potter ever was”.

The guilty look that Dan gave Alan confirmed for the older man the fact that Dan had at least considered this. Dan sighed, “Well we had to be chosen for some reason I suppose. Look. I mean....say what you like about those two being cowards or whatever as the general public is bound to think especially if they ever saw that flippant note but I don’t think it was that at all.

Those two had responsibility bred into them; forced upon them, okay? Bear with me, this does have a point. So. Suppose, just suppose that they realised that after all the training all the anguish and all the fighting, even the falling in love but failing to conceive a bond, that, whatever they did just wasn’t going to be good enough”.

Dan let his words hang in the air before admitting, “Though why they’d choose us as their replacements is anyone’s guess”. Alan faced him square on, “Dan, apart from the fact that you look astonishingly alike and the fact that the magic you have seems to have matured along with your extra years, I’d say you were a good choice”. Dan threw his hands in the air in exasperation, “But I had no magic when I acted, when I was in that world”.

Alan sniggered at this, “Oh no? You don’t think so? You didn’t have something that entrances millions of people at the box office? And before you say it”, Alan held up his hand, forestalling any protest Dan was about to make, “It isn’t just the stories that keep people coming back to see these movies, Dan, it was yourself as the lead, make no mistake about that. Granted, I had my own fan club, mainly consistent of young ladies with a fondness for black lipstick and nail polish”, at this Dan sniggered, “but, Dan, we weave a magic all our own. Perhaps we were witnessed during our scenes together, who knows the criteria by which we were selected”.

Dan grew gloomy, he still had to read the bloody diary, didn’t he? He wasn’t going to get away with it, was he? He sighed. He knew what he would be doing this afternoon, but right now, there was an inviting pool before him, the blue-tinged water still and beckoning, begging him to fracture the image of the lane-markers on the bottom of the pool by diving in and thus spoiling that perfect stillness.

He stepped to the edge, he raised his arms, he breathed in deep, he bent slightly forwards at the waist then the effect was totally shattered as Alan took a perfect header beside him, spoiling all that pristine water and Dan glowered, slipped and fell in, spluttering and swearing as his head breached the surface. Alan came over to see that he was all right before setting off with his customary long strokes interspersed with equally long glides that made a knife of his lean body as it cut through the water at high speeds.

Dan watched from the side of the pool, fingering his cock lazily with the wake that his lover’s passing caused washing over his taut nipples. Alan was a magnificent swimmer, barely making a ripple, a delight to watch, so watch Dan did, now tugging faster and faster at his swollen cock.

Alan watched from the far end of the pool surreptitiously as Dan’s head tipped back and his eyes closed before quietly swimming up to him and startling his younger lover with a very wet kiss that pinned his squirming head to the edge of the pool as his mouth was mined with hot tongue. As he pulled slowly away, Alan murmured, “Weren’t you going to try something witty and original with the Map?” But all practical thoughts were scattered from Dan’s mind as he pulled Alan closer and wrapped himself up in wet flesh, pressing his hard dick against a wet, hairy belly, and he thrust, once, twice and came with embarrassing haste, splattering all that lush belly hair with come.

Parting them slightly, Alan hefted his rigid cock in his hands, starting to seriously wank himself over Dan’s sticky stomach and as his eyes closed, Dan slipped down in the water and took the tip of Alan’s cock in his mouth to hear a low groan from his lover whose hand still slid up and down the thick shaft while Dan sucked and licked the bulbous head. It was when Danny’s fingers sneaked behind Alan’s big bollocks and pressed upwards that Alan shrieked out in a sort of gritted-teeth way and came on Dan’s tongue. When they got their breath back, they rinsed off in the water, kissed and fooled around a little then climbed out exchanging pool for dojo.

As it changed, Dan dried himself off and went back to the Map, laying it on a dry patch of floor and flopping down, still naked beside it. He smiled as he felt Alan lie out behind him and kiss his hunched shoulder. A long hand appeared on his hip. His lover was feeling affectionate and Dan smiled, rolling away from the map onto his back to be gathered into Alan’s arms and kissed. When they parted, Alan murmured, “You see, we cannot do this and be like this while half of Hogwarts is down here, can we?”

Dan sighed, he loved these sessions with Alan, and he totally agreed, this was one place where they could be themselves even while they refined the roles of ‘Harry’ and ‘Severus’, and Dan could see that Alan was loath to give up their privacy – this part of the school was accessible to no others save themselves.

Leaning up to give Alan another kiss, Dan rolled back to the Map, “Well then, you’d better let me set about finding us all somewhere bigger to practice, though now the weather’s nice, I don’t see why we can’t use the Great Hall or even the quidditch pitch. It’s not as if the school is overlooked at all, we’re in the middle of nowhere here”.

Slapping Dan’s cute rump and jiggling the cheek in his hand, Alan growled and bit Dan’s shoulder at the junction with his neck, “Then find somewhere, I don’t want Uncle Tom Cobbley and all down here. This space is for you and I”. Dan wriggled and squirmed under the attentions of his randy lover and laughed, “We aren’t the only ones that know of this space, you know – SHE has written of it”.

Alan made Dan squirm some more by licking his ear, “Ah, yes”, he rumbled against Danny’s neck, “But to her this space is a figment of her imagination”. Dan shrugged and pored over the Map, “All very well, but she describes it to a ‘t’, doesn’t she? And the space above here?”

Alan paused a moment to think about this then chuckled into Dan’s shoulder, “In that case, maybe you need to get onto her again, ask her to write in another Room of Requirement somewhere, perhaps under the Astronomy tower, that would be an ideal place. Are there basements beneath the tower?”

Dan pushed his glasses up his nose and they both peered at it, their heads close together. There was nothing Dan could see immediately until Alan purred, “Tap it again, make it show us the basements”, so, nothing loath, Dan did just that and the general view faded from sight to be replaced by various large empty spaces devoid of all humanity save one, labelled ‘kitchen stores’ that had a number of figures milling about within all bearing single word names like ‘Tiggy’ and ‘Morby’, that they both presumed to be house-elves about their regular tasks.

Gradually words appeared in the empty spaces. There was a ‘magical implements’ store, who knew what that was! Then Alan spotted a ‘caretaker’s sitting room’ that was currently occupied by Argus Filch according to his little flag – there was even one for Mrs Norris, though her label read ‘Mrs Norris 111’, so Dan had to assume that Filch called all his cats Mrs Norris and was up to the third.

Frowning and concentrating his magic, he placed a finger plumb in the centre of the parchment and said clearly, “Room, show other Rooms of Requirement on this Map”. Nothing happened for a long while. The diagrammatic representation of the basements faded slowly and the parchment was almost blank for a while before lines started drawing themselves once more in completely different shapes from previously.

They were dotted lines rather than solid as if the Map itself knew that these spaces were hypothetical. The first one it drew in was the one on the top floor. Here were a number of name flags present and it didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to deduce that the DA was in session and practicing hard.

The second was a thin line delineating the space beneath Snape’s rooms, the very space they were in, in fact. It showed the orientation of the room and Dan knew now that it lay north-south roughly pointing at it’s far end at the lake and that it ran under the walls and outside.

Another space appeared, much larger than the Room they knew up on the top floor and the one they were in, and was made up of what looked like a large hall with several smaller spaces off it. Dan exclaimed, “Wow, this looks like the place to be. I wonder how we get into it”. He tapped his finger on the Map again and asked it to overlay the school schematic.

Ah! That explained things! They watched as lines filled above the space and Dan peered in closely, “Look, Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom above it. This is the Chamber of Secrets. I bet Harry never thought to do this with his Map in a Room of Require.....bloody hell, what’s this?”

Alan leaned in closer as Dan pushed his glasses up his nose. Another vague space was taking shape, dotted lines drawing themselves under several solid lines. Dan Banished the main schematic for now and sat and watched the lines resolve themselves to a rectangular shape. Here looked to be yet another Room and this one was unknown by all, possibly even Dumbledore. It seemed perfect.

Dan made a circle with his fingertip around the area of the castle in which the Room had appeared and said, “Enlarge”. The lines all faded then began to redraw themselves in the centre of the parchment and yes, the schematic was larger but not much more detailed. Dan gasped as first a small round room was drawn in solid lines, then came the larger dotted-lined room, bigger, rectangular, pushed out into the spaces around the room below as if squashing it.

Harry mumbled, “I wonder if this room is drawn this big ‘cos it’s a wizard’s space and can be enlarged”. Beside him Alan just shrugged. They both watched the diagram grow layer by layer until Dan giggled, “Well I’ll be a monkey’s fuckin’ uncle”, he exclaimed softly and Alan turned to him, frowning.

The Map finished redrawing itself into the enlarged portion and Dan could quite clearly see the balcony at the top of.....the astronomy tower....and this Room was beneath it. “Bloody hell-fire”, he breathed then tapped his finger on it again and said, “Zoom out. Twice the normal scale”, and once again the Map’s lines faded.

He was right. And that was what Harry and Severus were doing in that particular corner of the castle....maybe. Alan shook his head and peered at the Map, “Seems like a good spot for the magically unusual. Do you think they were searching for it when they....crossed?” Dan whipped his head around, “I don’t know but it could explain why they were in that spot”.

Turning back to the Map, Dan waved his hand over it and incanted in a voice too low to hear removing layer after layer of the drawing carefully to see beneath. Alan was fascinated and stayed silent. He loved to watch Dan do magic; he had picked up so much since he’d been here, though Alan suspected that Dan had ‘inherited’ more than he had when they crossed.

He looked up when Dan made an impatient noise and prodded at the Map, “Show entrance”, he said, firmly, but the Map stayed resolutely silent on the matter. Dan breathed out noisily, “Damn, it either won’t or can’t show us the way in. We’ll have to go and check it out ourselves”. He made to rise but was stilled by Alan’s hand on his arm. “Let’s not go rushing in. After all, was this not the reason why Snape and Harry disappeared?” Dan shook his head, “No. They either crossed themselves over or it was done for them but as we know from the paperwork in the trunk that was a separate issue. Actually, as the new Room showed itself so readily, I suspect that Harry and Severus knew about it, then, and that you were right. Yeah, we need to approach with caution”.

Alan murmured, “You know, it occurs to me that Remus may be able to effect more subtle additions to the Map. After all, was he not one of it’s makers?” Dan smiled lopsidedly, “Yeah, he was but if we show him this, then he’ll suss out our space here, won’t he, and want in? I know him, he’s a nosey bugger and reports back to Dumbledore”.

Musing over the problem, Alan said, “You seem to be pretty good with this Map, even using it in ways that it hasn’t been used before, perhaps you could hide this bit from prying eyes. As Harry, you are the heir to the Map aren’t you?” Dan snorted, “Yeah. As ‘Harry’, but I’m not him”, his voice grew faint, “Although I start to think I feel like him more and more each day as this Battle approaches”.

Sitting up at this juncture, Alan took Dan into his arms and rocked him, “Dan, we knew we would have to be them ere this was all over, didn’t we?” He felt the movement of Dan’s hair against his chin as Dan nodded. He stayed silent a moment then added, “Then I think we need to actually be them again for a while. Names and everything. We’ve acted them, now I think it’s time to ‘do’ them for real”, he sank his lips into Dan’s hair and kissed his scalp, terrified as to what Dan’s reaction might be.

Dan pushed Alan slightly away until he could look at him without going cross-eyed but still held him, “I think you’re right but it feels really wrong somehow. I mean, these people....these kids are still grieving the loss of their anchor and here we are....mere interlopers. Oh, I dunno”, and he folded back against Alan’s chest.

Alan held on tight. “I know, Danny, I know. Don’t think I don’t. We have people to miss after all, but this is a War, Danny, a fucking War, and we have to be the goddamned saviours. I think that out there on the battlefield and even while we prepare, it would behoove us to be Harry and Severus, others’ sensibilities or no. I think we at least ought to put it to the next Order meeting and that of the DA”. He felt Dan nod against his chest as well as the waves of horror and regret pouring off the boy.

He hefted the now-shivering form hard against him, pulling Dan’s legs across his own so he could get his arms all the way around his lover and hold him extra-tight, rocking him to feel Dan start to warm up in his arms. Alan closed his eyes, feeling so protective of this mere lad he rocked but damnit, he loved him, really loved him and he wanted to make all Dan’s problems disappear but he couldn’t. He could simply hold on and love, so this is what he did until Dan started to respond shyly, shifting in Alan’s arms until he had his own around Alan’s neck and they could kiss; gently, slowly, full of love rather than passion.

At last they parted and shared a smile but the anguish was soon back on Dan’s face. Alan held him tight and murmured, kissing his hair again, “I’ll be with you, my Dan. I’ll be with you, so we can joint cast, whatever you want, love, but I will be there. We go as a team, all right?” He felt Dan snort out a laugh and nod against his chest then they got back to the Map again.

Dan murmured “Save” to it before mumbling “Mischief managed” and watched as the parchment became blank once again. He folded it carefully and laid it aside.

His kata was feral that day. He punched, whirled, kicked, chopped, flipped, leapt, turned, attacked, parried, using feet, hands, his whole body. He was exhausted as he bowed over his hands at the end of his session and slumped down a wall in the dojo. He glanced over to see Alan in a full lotus looking beautiful and calm. Dan longed to wander over and disturb him but he knew not to. He sat back instead with a required bottle of water and watched Alan go through the rest of his yoga routine, stretching one leg behind his head, then the other. Dan smirked, he’d have to try this yoga malarkey for himself – it kept his older man flexible after all!

Tired out after their long session, the sex and the exercise and the magic, they stumbled back to their own quarters for lunch and a nap.

Dan was the first to awake, not sure what had stirred him. He raised his head and listened. There it was again, a diffident knock on Snape’s door. Kissing Alan’s sweaty, sleepy brow, Dan slipped from their bed and wrapped himself in his gown before answering the knock, to see Hermione half-way down the hallway. He called her back softly and when she turned, apologised, “Sorry, Alan and I were crashed out. Busy morning training. Come in”.

He sat her down. She perched on the edge of her seat as if in denial that she was here in the dungeon belonging to her most feared teacher. Her eyes were round as she took in the room. Dan Summoned a house-elf and ordered refreshments while he watched her reaction to being in Snape’s quarters by herself.

She seemed to suddenly remember her manners and sat up straight, apologising and going red, “Sorry, it’s still a novelty to come down here, so I can’t help my eyes a-wandering”. Dan grinned, “I’d read of Snape, of course, in the writer’s books but he’s ever so much more complicated than she made him out, isn’t he?”

Hermione blushed, “Erm, yes. I have to keep reminding myself that she was writing for children and a real War is nothing to do with children”. Dan covered their awkwardness by pouring tea and offering pastries. Hermione continued, “Have you and Alan started taking contraceptives yet?”, and Dan nearly choked on his first sip of too-hot tea. She smiled then and reached out to him, touching his forearm, “I think you’re going to need them. I’ve done some research....”, her voice faded.

Frowning, Dan said, “I did look up in the library about the possibility of male pregnancy but we drew a complete blank, didn’t find any reference anywhere. Are you sure about the pregnancy thing, um, for guys?” She nodded, “Of course, I did my researches, found quite a few books for Harry....never got them back, mind you, but, yes, bonded males can get pregnant. Here”, she fished in her pockets withdrawing a largish clear bottle about 250ml size or the size of a stubby beer bottle and handed it to him along with a folded sheet of parchment, “We developed this potion just in case...you know....that they did have a bond. I, erm, only did Harry a potion because Severus was....well....um...”

Dan smiled at her red face and took the proffered items, “You mean Severus was the ‘top’ so he wouldn’t need it?” She nodded and looked down, “Yeah, that’s right. So, um, three drops under your tongue every night before you sleep”. Dan was grinning now, “Will this work for Alan, too?” Swallowing hard, she looked at him with wide eyes, “Yes. Yes, it’ll work for all males. It, erm, makes your sperm less motile and prevents the internal....ah....arrangements....from occurring. Gosh, I’d better make more if you are both going to need it. I take it, then, that you both, um, take turns topping?”

Dan was tempted to tell her to mind her own business but she’d done this for them and had been discreet coming down here on her own, so he nodded instead, “Yes, Alan and I have a very equal relationship. Okay, I’ll admit it, he tops more than I do but we still take turns and he loves it when I fuck him”, he was delighted to see her blushes darken still further and she held a hand up, “Whoa, I suppose I asked for that”, she mumbled and Dan laughed aloud. “Sorry, didn’t mean to embarrass you or anything. Tell me, since you know so much about mine and Alan’s affairs, are you and Ron both gay?”

She smiled then, “I am but I don’t think Ron’s made up his mind yet. Sorry and all that, but I’m just not keen on boys’ dangly bits. I’m with Susie Bones and have been since last year. After all this is over, we plan on getting a flat together in London but as for Ron, I think he’s still experimenting, bless him. Does that answer your question?”

Nodding, Dan said, “It was something in Harry’s diary that made me ask, that’s all. If you like, when I’ve finished scanning it all you can read it”. She whipped her head round, “Really? I’d like that. Is it very....er....graphic?”

“A bit”, he replied, “Mainly, though, it records the crush he had and their eventually getting together. I haven’t found much yet on the ‘experiment’, as Harry called it, but it has been mentioned a time or two but I haven’t read it all myself yet, the writing style is pretty awful but then you’re hardly composing one of the great works of literature when you’re writing a diary, are you?”

She nodded grimly, “Yes, he gave it to me just after last Christmas and I suppose that they did most of the work on the ‘experiment’ after that, between then and when they disappeared. Have you found much on that yet?” Dan shook his head, “No, but we’re still looking. I know he felt completely inadequate for the task in front of him, though, and he wrote a lot of his doubts down. I actually sort of don’t blame him and Snape for running away now, if that makes sense”. Hermione nodded ruefully, “He never mentioned this to us at all, you know, but I knew something was eating at him, really bothering him. He was always saying that he wished he could grow up really fast, he was desperate to become mature, so if he and Snape really did have a bond then it’d start to ‘take’, or something, though I’m not sure if that’s how they really work”.

Dan’s hand closed over hers, “I think that too, that’s why it had to be Alan and I. It’s something to do with the fact that we are older than our characters. I’m nearly twenty-one to Harry’s barely eighteen and Alan is sixty-two to Snape’s thirty nine. It was sort of pointed out to me earlier that our ages might have something to do with it all, though I’m buggered if I know what”.

This was when Hermione smiled, “I think it’s ‘cos Harry’s magic wasn’t....mature enough or something. He just wasn’t ready, so he swapped with you two, well, him and Severus, but then they went and died”, by this point, her breath was hitching and Dan slid over to her, sitting so stiffly on the edge of the sofa and took her into his arms. She gradually collapsed into them as sobbing took her over.

After a long cry, she suddenly seemed to remember where she was and made to sit up awkwardly. Dan hushed her and continued to hold her until she relaxed against him. She sniffed loudly and finally said, “You’re still nicer than Harry. He wouldn’t have done this”, she waved vaguely at the two of them holding each other, “he was a bit selfish like that”, she said by way of explanation.

Dan continued to stroke her back, “I dunno”, he murmured, “I always read Harry as severely abused. I don’t wonder that he didn’t get into hugs and the like. I always acted him as coming from an abusive family, not just violent, you know? But sexually abusive. Harry in many ways seemed so needy. For love. For affection. For any sign that anyone loves him at all. Was he really like that?”

There was no sign from his companion for such a long time but then she nodded and spoke softly, “We knew about the abuse. He told Ron and I in our lower sixth year. He told Dumbledore too, I know he did, he told us afterwards. God, you should have seen how broken up he was after all that and knowing he was still to be sent back to these people, whose blood-magic was strong enough to keep him protected even while he was still suffering but in a different way. I was surprised he could even think about love but when I found out who he was in love with, somehow I wasn’t that surprised after all, do you know what I mean?”

Dan smiled, “Aye, Snape, a difficult man at the best of times”, and he felt the girl relax a little more against him. He felt the smile against his collar-bone, “Yes. Difficult doesn’t even come close to describing him but Harry and he had something. Something bloody real. It shone out of them in their unguarded moments that were few and far between. I mean, Snape made Harry glow in the fucking dark. We all knew that this was the one for Harry. I know, I know, we all hoped against hope that this would lead to a real bond. A wizarding bond, fuck knows they were strong enough wizards, but it didn’t. Dammit it didn’t”. She curled forwards in Dan’s arms and wept for her dead friend and the lover who wasn’t quite enough.

Dan waited until the storm had passed and muttered, “But I’m pretty sure that we did, and, um, I don’t think we’ve got the squib type either”, and this brought Hermione’s head up sharp enough to almost butt him under the jaw but with his quick reflexes he got out of the way. “WHAT?!”, she exploded, a fine mist of spray hitting Dan’s face. He turned away, relinquished her, judged her trajectory level and got beyond it, “I told you at the party but you were a bit pissed. I think Alan and I have bonded. You told me then about the possibility of us getting up the duff”, he said, simply.

That made her really sit up and take notice. She homed in on him, her eyes narrowed and her lips pinched, “How much do you, of all people, know about bonds?”, she hissed. Dan gulped, “Erm, there’s books all over the place in a room not far from here, a sort of secret room that’s only available to either Snape or Potter, or, ahem, us, and it’s sort of packed to the rafters with all kinds of books”, then he saw her expression and held his hands out. “Sorry. Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I know what a tart you are for books, but anyway there’s loads down there on bonds. It seems as if Snape and Harry were keen to make one and it didn’t happen. According to Harry’s diary, they tried shared spell-casting and failed. Alan and I can do this and have practiced, severally”. He watched as her mouth gaped.

He smiled at her and gave her the time to snap back to herself and smile back. She cocked her bushy head to one side, “I’m really sorry to have lost Harry, you know, but at the same time, I’m glad you two are here. I actually think that we might have a chance now”. Dan shook his head, “Oh, I wouldn’t get too previous if I were you. We are only substitutes after all, and pretty poor muggle ones at that...”, but Hermione held her hand up.

“Shut up”. She ordered and Dan obeyed. He breathed fast until she cast a breath-regularising charm over him and he took air in at more or less the normal rate. She waited for him to sort himself out before she spoke.

“So, Harry and Severus planned to disappear on us like this” Dan barely nodded but a nod it was. She breathed hard, “Okay, so they picked you and Alan as stand-ins, yes?” Another nod. Her tone was quite bright when she said, “And they had a reason for choosing you, yes?” Dan nodded again, feeling like a nodding dog ornament on the back shelf of a car, but he let Hermione reach her own conclusions.

Eventually, she stroked Dan’s face lightly. “Shit! You two really are stronger than Snape and Harry. Like, loads stronger. It is starting to look more and more like a real wizards’ magical bond. I’d love to see more of your shared stuff some day. That’s a skill you really need to develop. It is, as the prophecy says, ‘A magic that he knows not’. Can you two speak to each other telepathically?”

Dan grinned, “We’ve sort of ‘sent’ and ‘received’ a couple of things but we haven’t had the time to explore it yet. So far, it’s sort of been by accident”. He was surprised to see Hermione biting her lip and her eyes suspiciously wet. She sniffed and said, “Have you any idea how fucking rare this is? I mean real bonded wizards?” Dan shrugged, “Look, there’s loads of stuff scattered around on the subject but we haven’t got around to reading it yet. We’ve got a Dark Lord to kill first”.

Hermione stuffed the backs of her fingers into her mouth to stop herself from screaming. This was the one, the man of the prophecy, the man with the ‘magic that he knew not’, and all of a sudden she felt a kind of peace suffuse her. Harry might be gone but everything was going to be all right after all.

This wasn’t just Harry. This was Uber-Harry. Bigger-than-Harry. The one that was prophesied to appear. In their hour of need. Like bloody Merlin rising and calling his knights from whatever hill they were supposed to rest beneath, waiting for their call.

Here was Uber-Harry stepping up and taking on the bad guys. Hell, he even had Malfoy senior switching sides or so the rumour mill was running, and this man wasn’t Harry. Hermione gazed earnestly into Dan’s eyes. “Who the fuck are you?”, she asked before breaking the gaze.

Seeing her downcast look, Dan smiled, cupped her face in his palm and lifted it. She let her eyes meet his. He said, “I’m Dan Radcliffe, I’m almost twenty-one and I’m an actor. I have played the part of Harry Potter since I was ten but I am not him. I am not him”, Dan let his voice trail away.

Hermione looked boldly into the man’s eyes, “All very well”, she commented drily, “but you’ll have to be him come the endgame. After all, it was Harry that was prophesied to do him in”. Dan retreated a moment to regroup. He came back with, “Alan and I need to be in our parts to do this. We need to be Severus and Harry. If we are to do this then we need to be in character....and that means names and everything. I know it’s going to be hard for everyone...”, he said but Hermione hushed him.

“I know, okay? I know it should be Harry. So does everyone else. But you two are what we’ve got. We have two actors, muggle actors, who are stronger wizards than either Harry or Severus, who are let into every ward Harry or Severus ever set up. Come on, me and the girls were laying bets as to who would be eaten by the wards first! But that never happened which means Harry and Severus had to have chosen you, and the chief reason for that, as far as I can see, is because both of you are significantly older that they were and therefore your magic, when you experienced it passing from Harry and Severus to yourselves, is more effective, and somehow this age difference is significant”.

Dan breathed out, “Yeah, I’m twenty-one just a week before Harry turns eighteen”. Hermione turned frightened eyes on Dan, “That’s when he’ll attack! He’s always attacked before Harry’s birthday!”. Dan smiled lazily, “I know, I’ve read the books, made the movies, remember? I’ve been him since I was ten”.

She nodded and kept her head down, “I’m sorry, I forget what an insight you must have into him, having played him for so long. I forget, to you, he’s just a fictional character, a role to inhabit, whereas to me he is a person, a living, breathing person, who was crushed under a lump of rock, lest we forget”, and she sniffled significantly, on the edge of tears again. Dan sighed, “No, it’s me should be sorry. To me he was lines on a page, a script. He was your friend”. They sat in silence until the sound of the bedroom door opening made them both look up.

Alan was sleep-mussed and hesitant in the doorway, seeing the comforting arm and the girl’s wet face, “I’m sorry, is this a bad time, Hermione? I’ll quite happily leave you and Dan to talk...”. She smiled through her tears and sniffed, rummaging in her cardigan sleeve for her hanky, “Gosh, no. Please. I was getting miles too maudlin anyway”. Alan threw Dan a significant look, “Perhaps we may cheer you with a little news, the results of our morning’s endeavours”.

With a what-the-fuck shrug, Dan unhanded Hermione and went to fetch the Map from the bedroom, stopping to kiss Alan awake as they passed. Alan kissed back, they shared a light touch then parted again. Hermione watched this little scenario and bit her lip, letting her breathing deepen then she looked away as Alan sank into the chair and the moment was gone. Dan wondered at it though as he looked on his bedside table. Damn, the thing was still in the conjured space.

Running back into the lounge, he mumbled, “I’ll need a bit longer to recall where I’ve left it. Order tea, love, while I look”, then shut the connecting door and opened up the passage, darting down the stairs, closing the secret door to behind him and Summoning a witch-light to guide him down the steep black stairs.

He yanked open the desk drawer, hissed at the snake and pattered swiftly down the winding stair, into the cave and had to wait a moment or two until everything shivered into view again. There it was, near the ‘pool’ area. He snatched it up and ran back the way he’d come, feeling the rumble of the rock closing behind him.

He’d just slammed the desk drawer and turned when he wasn’t sure who screamed the loudest but he was face-to-face with a stunned Hermione Granger. He glared at her, “How the fuck did you get down here?”, he snapped. She reeled back from his wrath. “I-I-I’m sorry, I just saw the door ajar and I was looking for the bathroom...” Dan shook his head, “Fuck off, you were being nosy, just like all the others wanting in here to see what Snape had here. Lupin’s been angling for an invite for ages and Albus keeps asking about these quarters so don’t tell me that you never heard anything about mysterious rooms beneath Hogwarts?” She shrank back at this outburst and started to stammer an apology but Dan cut her short, “Say a word about this, and I’ll fucking Obliviate you, okay? I don’t think Snape wanted these rooms known about”.

Ever the Gryffindor, Hermione shot back, “So what about that desk drawer I just saw you climb out of? And, no, I won’t tell a soul, not even Ron. We aren’t joined at the hip”. Dan’s brow rose, “Oh, I thought you were, sorry, no matter. Anyway, as to the desk drawer, just forget about that okay, it’s just an empty drawer, and don’t say a word but I’ll show you something else that’s really interesting instead. It’s why I went to get the Map. Come on, let’s get out of here”.

He hated to have to do it but as he climbed the stairs behind her he was saying the spell over and over in his head, setting the spell to the requisite number of seconds of memory loss to obliterate, then as he banged into the back of her by ‘accident’ in the hallway at the same time as he closed the door, he mouthed the spell and she shook her head, laughing, “Where did you say the loo was again?” Dan let out a held breath, clutching the Map to his chest and pointed out the way.

It was while the Map was re-drawing the enlarged section showing the Room under the astronomy tower that Hermione shouted, “Pause”, and it did. Dan was surprised she could influence it and said so. She shrugged, “The Weasley twins had it for ages, it’s not that exclusive to Harry but I bet there were things he could do with it that I never could, it was given to him after all. Now, what’s this? The astronomy tower, yes? What’s this enormous room, right at the base?”

Dan lifted his shoulders, “No idea. There’s never been anyone in it. There’s loads of basement space under this castle but this is what popped up later”, but she stilled his arm and peered at the drawing in wonder, “No. Don’t adjust it yet. Harry could never make it see this deep into the castle. You see, you have to have actually visited these places in order for them to come alive in this Map, or that’s what I was told, and everyone that’s had it has added their bits as they’ve gone along. So, you’ve been here? This is one of the Foundation Stone rooms”.

Curious, Alan came over with coffee for everyone and sat cross-legged and now dressed before the small table. The fib he told was one of omission, “Last time we were in the Room of Requirement, I instructed Dan to require his map to show us other spaces akin to it as Albus has hinted that there are more such spaces here. Dan did this and this is what you are about to see. We think”.

Dan added, “No, we’ve never been to these places. Perhaps Harry did, or perhaps Snape. He’s always wanted to get his hands on it”. Hermione chuckled, “Somehow, that does not surprise me”. She waved her hand at the Map, “Sorry, go on, show me what you were going to”, and Dan tapped the parchment for it to begin again and the huge room appeared with it’s dotted lines and bafflingly absent entrance. He heard her gasp.

He paused it then after the Room had finished and he smirked at her. “Bloody hell, it’s enormous”, she breathed. This made Dan smile fully, “And we think it’s what Harry and Snape were after finding that’s why they were in such an odd spot”. Alan yawned, “Hardly, they were on the spot where we were found, the exact spot where my trailer was; where the rock crushed us. They probably had to be in the same spot as us for the transference to take place. Perhaps they threw too much magic at it, though and that’s why we now have electricity and other appurtenances from our own world as well as a ripping force strong enough to dislodge a piece of the tower wall”.

Hermione chewed on a nail thoughtfully, “That bit was weak, you know, it was cracked for years, probably decades. I bet they didn’t even think about it or take it into account”. Dan murmured, “Probably not” Hermione brightened then, “Shall we go and look for it then? The entrance to this Room?” Dan grinned, “Not today but we will go and look in the near future, take a couple of the Order with us or something”. Hermione looked quite put out that ‘Harry’ wasn’t immediately asking her and Ron but, as she still had to remind herself, this wasn’t her Harry. She wasn’t sure that she wanted to be left out of something quite this momentous either. Well, sod that, she could make a few discreet explorations of her own. She was thoughtful still as they let her out a short time later.

****

Over the next few days, Hermione and Ron tried in vain to find the entrance to the unknown Room but all their explorations drew a blank though Ron was inducted more fully into the ranks of the addicted when he was introduced to computer games, courtesy of his best friend and her laptop and marvelled at the wonders of muggle electricity even while he startled at the trilling of the phone but they both ignored it. As they left the Astronomy tower much later that night, Hermione thought to divert to the Owlery and send a short missive to inform Dan that his phone had been ringing though they hadn’t answered it, and that she would happily chip in to the costs of the phone line and the dial-up costs.

****

Phone ringing? Who could it possibly have been? Dan mused over the parchment and read it again then sighed, probably some Indian call centre trying to flog him something.

It was only later that night that the thought came to haunt him again as he lay, sleepless, on his back, Alan on his side beside him. Dan had to get up for a piss at any rate, he might as well throw on some clothes and have a stroll over to the tower. He knew he wasn’t going to get any more sleep until he had satisfied his curiosity.

Slipping into clothes and trainers, Dan exited the dungeons on quiet feet. He was glad of the relative emptiness of the castle and didn’t have to creep around so much; even the ghosts seemed to quiet down at this time of the year and even the deepest places in the ancient stone building seemed to finally warm so the journey to the astronomy tower was pleasant though dark.

As he entered his room, he could see the smudgy grey starting to light the horizon through the easterly facing window and saw something else much closer to him that caused him to rush across the room. During his shopping spree in London, as an afterthought, he had thrown on the pile of purchases a simple answering machine and it was this machine that was activated. A small red light flashed: he had a message.

He went to press ‘play’ and paused, letting his hand retract from the little row of buttons. He berated himself: ‘come on, Dan, it’s as you thought, just someone after selling you something’. But, as if he was having a conversation with himself, another voice chimed in, “Yes, all very well, but folk like that don’t always leave messages”. Damn.

The first voice was back, “Just listen to the damned message. Could be from the writer. Remember you left your landline number as part of the feedback to her last set of chapters”. Double fuck!

What if it was? He’d been making increasingly desperate entreaties to her and had even fed back the results of hints in earlier chapters where things had been slightly anomalous. He supposed he was trying to convince her he was real and not some sort of sick stalkerazzi type but he had been quite insistent and actually leaving this number eventually in desperation.

That did it. He pressed ‘play’, sat back on his heels and listened.

“Hi, I’m sort of starting to believe you and it’s scaring me. Either you are watching my every word and reading too much into it – it’s a story, dumbo, or else something really weird is happening and you are for real, or at least you think you are, and by that, I have to admit I’m intrigued. I’ve instructed ‘1471’ to not note this phone number, that’d be too weird but you can, if you like, write to me direct on....” and the voice gave out an email address that Dan memorised as he booted up his laptop and opened his Internet browser.

As the machine came to life, he listened a couple more times to the message, then it hit him with the force of a bludger to the head.....he knew that voice!!!.

Knowing this now, he listened again. She was English, so not someone he’d met in America, then. No. This voice he knew well; a friend from school perhaps? He cursed the way phone lines messed up the voice and when the message ended again, replayed it. There. Shit! That was it! The ‘dumbo’.

His skin went cold all over and he shivered. It was a name he’d been called many a time in the past, when he did or said something exceptionally stupid. It had always made him feel like the younger one in their relationship even though she was four years his junior. Into the still air of the room, he breathed out a single name: “Chrissie”.