Second Place - Comedy

The first day of sixth year was rather amusing.

Of course, Zacharias pretty much thought most days were either amusing or annoying, and they were quite often both.

Hermione Granger, the girl who thought any grade below Outstanding was an invention of the Dark Lord, and Ron Weasley, whose violently coloured hair distracted Zacharias from any personality he might possess, spent a lot of time looking anxiously out of their compartment so that Harry Potter would be left alone. Apparently the boy was still moping about something.

Ernie grabbed Zacharias as he was wandering past the compartment.

"Ssssh!" he whispered, and hauled him into total darkness.

"I can't see," Zacharias said dryly after a minute.

"It's so people will think that the compartment is empty," Hannah explained anxiously. "It was Ernie's idea."

"People will come in, wonder who pulled down the curtains, trip over one of us and think the compartment is empty?"

"Don't make things difficult, Zacharias," Ernie snapped. "Give us the password!"

"What?"

"We've decided that the password we give for going into our rooms should be given every time we meet. To establish who's a loyal Hufflepuff, and can be told our secrets," Ernie said conspiratorially.

"Couldn't we use a different system? Like, say, you could recognise me. If you didn't have the curtains drawn." Zacharias paused. "Also, we don't know the password yet."

There was a brief spate of deeply conspiratorial whispering.

"He's right, you know," said Susan.

"You always spoil things, Zacharias!" Ernie wailed. "Don't you realise that we're in a very dangerous situation?"

"Of course I do, I just tripped over Susan."

"He means that the Dark Lord has risen!" Susan said sharply. She seemed a bit annoyed about Zacharias tripping over her.

Vaguely, Zacharias wondered whose hand was on his ass.

"Yeah... Didn't Dumbledore tell us that in fourth year? Susan, you came with me to join Dumbledore's Army last year..."

"Yes," said Susan, "but now it's official. The Minister of Magic drew out a paper saying that the Dark Lord has returned. My aunt signed it."

"Oh."

"And he's targeted the Hufflepuffs!" Ernie exclaimed.

"I thought he was targeting Harry Potter," Susan pointed out.

Zacharias certainly hoped so. There was no other excuse for that careworn, slightly self-important expression Harry was always wearing.

"That's a smokescreen," Ernie argued earnestly. "I mean, let's face it, he killed Cedric and he didn't kill Harry, did he? He wants to exterminate us!"

Zacharias remembered Cedric. That had been a bloody shame. Hufflepuff had no chance at the Quidditch Cup without him.

Also, his parents had probably been upset, or something.

"Anyway, I think Harry might be an evil mastermind out to exterminate us too," Ernie continued. "All that stuff in the papers - no smoke without fire, eh? And he gave me a funny look, not two minutes ago."

Hannah squeaked in consternation.

"What's clear is that the Hufflepuffs are being hunted by dark mysterious forces which mortal man should not wot of," Ernie declared with a sort of morbid satisfaction.

"Have I told you that I was once Petrified by a basilisk?" Justin asked from behind Zacharias. "That was terrible. I was the first victim."

Ah. That explained that.

Zacharias sighed. "Justin, get your hand off my ass."

"Yes, Justin, honestly, we've discussed this," Susan said sternly.

"Well, I'm sorry, it's dark in here, I didn't know, did I?" Justin demanded.

"Justin, your hand is still on my ass."

"It's still dark in here." Justin sighed in a martyred way. "Oh, all right," he said grudgingly. "But everybody does it in Eton. Anyway, you should have some consideration for a victim. Have I ever told you that I was Petrified by a basilisk? First victim."

"You see, it's proof," Ernie informed them all. "The Hufflepuffs are being closed in on! We're first in line for the slaughter!"

"I seem to remember the first victim was a cat," Zacharias put in.

"All right," Ernie conceded. "So first the Dark Lords will destroy the cats in an orgy of feline blood, and then the Hufflepuffs will be crushed! Fiendish cunning!"

"I heard Mandy Brocklehurst say she wanted to give Mrs Norris a right kick," Hannah offered.

"Aha!" said Ernie. "Clearly code. We'd better keep an eye on Mandy. She could be Harry Potter's dark, salacious consort, plotting evil deeds with him and satisfying his terrible, wanton-"

Zacharias levered up the blind an inch.

"His eyes are bulging again," he observed.

Hannah got out the paper bag. "Just take this and breathe into it, Ernie," she said kindly. "Put your head between your knees. You'll feel better in a bit."

"It's... poison," Ernie gasped. "Brothers and sisters in Hufflepuff... avenge my death..."

Justin looked introspective. "I think," he said, "we should loosen his clothes."

"Oh, really, Justin!" Susan snapped.

"Don't judge me!" Justin snapped back. "Everyone does it in Eton! It's not like I'm a bloody homosexual!"

"Wait," Susan said, struck by a sudden thought. "Have we wandered off the subject of the Dark Lord?"

Zacharias shrugged.

Then Harry Potter called a meeting of Dumbledore's Army right after the welcome-back dinner.

"Maybe he's trying to give us all indigestion," Susan whispered.

Zacharias patted her hand. "Susan. You've been spending too much time with Ernie."

"Harry," Michael Corner said plaintively, "can't we go to bed?"

"Maybe you wouldn't be so eager to sleep if Voldemort haunted your dreams," Harry snapped.

Zacharias thought that Harry was doing the grim thing awfully well, actually, and it was a shame his trousers were so big he had to keep hitching them up. Going all gaunt with misery while wearing an obese person's hand me downs had been a bad mistake.

"Ginny here is going to show us how to make bat wings erupt from people's faces," Harry went on. "We have to learn every spell we can in order to face down Voldemort."

Zacharias put his hand up. "Are you saying Voldemort every time you speak to show off?"

"No, Zacharias, I'm not!"

Zacharias shrugged. "Okay."

Ginny stood in front of them and began demonstrating her curse. Lots of people wondered why Ginny had suddenly started being so much more outgoing and popular last year.

Zacharias thought it might have something to do with the fact that she had cut her robes practically down to her navel. Her freckled cleavage bobbed, on alluring display, as she gestured. Harry Potter did not notice.

"Breast her little heart," Zacharias murmured, "she tries so hard."

"Ginny used this on Malfoy last year," Harry said with a wolfish smile.

Zacharias put up his hand. "Is Malfoy evil, then?"

"Er... yeah," Harry nodded.

"Oh. Why?"

"Well... he's in Slytherin," Harry said.

"Are they all evil, then?" Zacharias asked. "Like, even the first years?"

Harry frowned. "Well, I mean, his family is evil."

Hermione Granger stood and went over to him and whispered something that sounded like 'wsst wsst wsst Sirius.' Zacharias did not think now was the time for an urgent discussion of constellations, but Hermione could be like that.

"That's different," Harry snapped. He gave Zacharias a narrow-eyed glare. "Look, Malfoy is a git, all right?"

Zacharias thought about it. "Is that the same thing as evil, though?"

"Look, Malfoy is evil because I say so! God, Zacharias, I'm trying to have a meeting here! We have to defeat evil!"

"I just thought it might be helpful to know who was evil first," Zacharias shrugged. "Whatever."

Harry could get really ratty when people questioned him. He was generally all right, but Zacharias thought that people doubting his moral attitude gave him a migraine or something. He tried to do it often because it was funny when Harry winced, and also it stopped the grim speeches. Frankly, Zacharias found the grim bits a little dull.

Harry stared at his wand a bit too often, apparently sunk in dark thought.

"Does he remind you a bit of Ernie?" Zacharias asked Susan in a low voice.

"It's not paranoia when the Dark Lord really is out to get you."

"Huh. So Harry is Ernie in a world where Ernie is always right." Zacharias shook his head. "I love this world. It makes so little sense."

"I think the world's supposed to make sense, Zacharias."

"Ha," said Zacharias. "Where have you been?"

"Do you mind?" Harry frowned. "Stop talking. This is serious, you know."

Zacharias shrugged.

The day ended on the same amusing note when Zacharias went in to go to bed, and found himself attacked and bound.

"Surrender, spawn of darkness!"

Zacharias spat out a mouthful of blanket. "It's me, Ernie. Justin, stop trying to cop a feel."

People killed him.

The next morning, Zacharias ambled neutrally by the Slytherin table. Gryffindors tended to get eggs thrown at them, the Ravenclaws were tripped up while they were reading, but Hufflepuffs could slip under the radar. There were advantages to being beneath contempt.

"Shhh," someone was drawling, "I'm listening."

Zacharias was pretty sure that was Draco Malfoy drawling, because nobody else in Slytherin was really allowed to drawl, though no-one had got around to informing Professor Snape yet. Once he caught sight of the white-blond head he was sure, because everybody else had been specifically forbidden to use bleach.

Occasionally Zacharias suspected Draco Malfoy was power mad, but he might just have a thing about his hair.

"I can't believe you enchanted Harry Potter's egg cup," Blaise Zabini was saying. "This is new levels of dedication."

Draco Malfoy's voice was dark. "He put my father in prison."

Zacharias admitted that this might possibly irritate some people. After all, if Mr Malfoy was in prison, who was giving Draco his pocket money?

On the whole, he sympathised.

Harry's voice suddenly sounded from the egg cup. Draco held it up to his ear and waggled the egg cup around to improve the reception. He looked a little bit insane.

"I'm on page eight of the paper," Harry said in a puzzled voice.

"Oooh, poor me, I'm only on page eight of the national paper," Draco exclaimed. He stood up. "That's it. I'm killing him."

"No, Draco, you mustn't kill him," Pansy Parkinson said. "The teachers are here. Think of the house points."

"It's all right, Harry," Hermione told him, her voice crackling dimly from the egg cup. "Think of something cheerful. Like - you can have Quidditch practise again now!"

Harry laughed his tired, bitter and slightly overdone laugh. "Like I need to practise to beat Malfoy."

"Crabbe, get his legs," Pansy said in a resigned tone.

Half of Slytherin table had to sit on Draco Malfoy, who was foaming at the mouth and clawing at the tablecloth.

"I'll kill him," he said in muffled tones. "Don't stop me, he has to die! I... mmmmph, Crabbe, be careful. Those trousers were expensive."

"Calm down, Draco," Pansy counselled desperately.

"But his every word fills me with dire loathing," Draco muttered rebelliously.

Zacharias supposed Harry could be a little grating. He peered down at Draco Malfoy, crushed under thirty other Slytherins, with his blond hair all messed up and still clutching the egg cup with determination. He thought all his impotent fury was kind of amusing.

"Aren't you a Hufflepuff?" grunted something alarmingly Neanderthal-looking next to Zacharias.

"Who're you?" Zacharias asked.

"Me Goyle!" said the Thing. "Slytherins superior."

"In what way, precisely?" inquired Zacharias, edging away.

Goyle's brow furrowed in obviously arduous thought. "I pound you now."

"Actually," said Zacharias. "I'm a Slytherin. I just stole some Hufflepuff's robes. Haha."

"You look like Hufflepuff. Name Smith," Goyle grunted.

"Ah, you see, I stole his face too," Zacharias said.

"Oh." Goyle laughed. "Good one! Show them. Haha. Who're you really?"

"Ah, Millicent Bulstrode."

"But you boy," Goyle pointed out.

Zacharias shrugged.

Zacharias considered the matter of the amusing Draco Malfoy for a while, and then approached him. He was standing looking up at the Gryffindors practising, and he was making some notes about their practise that were quite clever, and would probably have come in useful if he hadn't missed out some crucial parts making faces at Harry Potter.

Zacharias sidled discreetly over to him, and came up with the perfect opening line.

"Harry Potter is a bit of a twit," he observed calmly.

Draco laughed. "Oh, at last a soulmate," he responded, and then turned around and jumped back. "Ew, a Hufflepuff," he said faintly. "You're not allowed to talk to me, are you?"

"It's not in the school rules," Zacharias pointed out.

"I knew I should have gone to Durmstrang," Draco muttered. "All right, go away or get beaten to a pulp. Minions!" he called imperiously. "Minions, where are my... oh for God's sake, they went off for their second brunch, didn't they?" He looked pensive. "It's so hard to find good minions."

"If I was rich," Zacharias remarked, hoping that he wasn't giving him ideas, "I'd hire assassins."

The suggestion seemed to appeal to Draco, who tilted his head in his direction in a manner that suggested he could one day accept that Zacharias was not taking up air that could be more usefully conserved for Slytherins.

"My mother has all kinds of absurd rules," he answered. "No contract killers until you're eighteen, Draco. Honestly!" Zacharias laughed, and Draco appeared to give him further consideration. "What's your name, then?" he snapped.

"Zacharias Smith."

"Smith. Yeah, right." Draco rolled his eyes. "Every Hufflepuff I meet tells me his name is Smith. Do they think I have a little black book where I put down names?"

"I don't know, do you?" Zacharias asked.

"Actually, I do. But I don't put Hufflepuffs' names down in it." Draco sneered. "What's your actual name?"

"It really is Zacharias Smith."

"There's actually a Smith in Hufflepuff?" Draco frowned. "Your housemates must not like you very much."

Zacharias shrugged.

"I'm-"

"Draco, yes I know."

"Malfoy," Draco corrected, displeased.

"I'm not calling you Malfoy," Zacharias said flatly. "It's far too English public boys' school. It's like Eton."

He thought of Justin, and made a face.

"I don't know what an Eton is," Draco told him, in tones indicating that Eton did not deserve this honour. "But we are in an English public school."

"Actually, this is Scotland," Zacharias corrected.

"Scotland!" Draco looked perfectly horrified. "No wonder they don't let us out of the school grounds. The natives wear kilts."

"So what? You wear robes."

"It's a question of decorum," Draco informed him. "You cannot see my knees."

Shame, thought Zacharias, and then wondered briefly if Justin might be rubbing off on him.

"And they have weapons called bagpipes. And red hair," Draco continued. "Savage, Muggle Weasleys."

"The hair's a bit disconcerting," Zacharias admitted.

"Your hair is all right," Draco said graciously.

"Thank you," said Zacharias, aware that this was the ultimate seal of Malfoy Approval.

"Excuse me," Draco said suddenly.

The Gryffindor Quidditch team had landed, and Draco apparently just had to stroll over to them. Zacharias saw his lips move a few times, and then Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Angelina Johnson leaped on him and began to pummel him.

Gryffindors always were a bit touchy.

Zacharias bit his lip as Draco went down. Ouch. That had to hurt.

"You want to help out your disgusting little friend?" someone yelled in his direction.

Zacharias shrugged.

Harry Potter cornered him after lunch.

"Well," he said, "I hope that you see what a bastard Malfoy is now."

"Not really," said Zacharias, wondering where this compulsive urge to be agreed with came from. People who didn't agree with Zacharias simply amused him with their stupidity.

Harry frowned. "He called - my mother a Mudblood," he said in quiet, intense tones.

Zacharias frowned back. "Yeah, but... he called names and three of you jumped on him and blacked his eye and broke two of his fingers."

"I think you're missing the point, Zacharias," Harry snapped, storming off.

Zacharias shrugged.

Later on, he was slightly surprised to see Harry going up to Draco in the corridor.

"Hey," he said. "Um. I don't forgive you for what you said about my mother, but - I'm, um, sorry we hit you. It was wrong."

Zacharias' point had been that it had been a bit irrational, but however.

"Nothing you haven't done before," sneered Draco, after a beat.

"Oh, Christ, Malfoy, stop pissing me off!" yelled Harry the volatile. "I have enough on my plate without you. My godfather-"

"Yeah, well, my father, you bastard!" shouted back Draco, who definitely had anger management problems himself.

"That's different!"

"Not from where I'm standing!" Draco, having made a good point, then went on to ruin it entirely by adding, "And your mother was a-"

Zacharias coughed urgently.

"Oh look, Professor McGonagall," he said, grabbing Draco's elbow and dragging him away.

It pained him to see someone ruining a nice piece of logic. Logic was rare in this world.

"Hey, these robes are designer," Draco sniffed. "And I'm sure Hufflepuffs aren't allowed to touch me."

"Let it go, Draco," Zacharias said.

"Well," Draco conceded. "Why'd you drag me away? I was just about to-"

"Get hexed by a horde of Gryffindors," Zacharias said. "As you'd know if you weren't currently experiencing a rush of blood to the head. That's what always happens."

"Not always," Draco grumbled. "Sometimes teachers show up and turn me into animals or the Dark Lord appears and terrorises me. Everybody's on Harry Potter's side."

He stopped, and raised his eyebrows at Zacharias.

"I was being pounded on by those Gryffindors and you didn't come to help," he observed.

Zacharias shrugged. "Why should I go to get pounded as well?"

Draco sucked in one side of his lip. "That's very sensible," he remarked, and then smiled.

Zacharias thought that, when not completely out of his head with fury, Draco Malfoy might end up being a bit of a kindred spirit.

"What d'you think I should do to get back at Harry Potter?"

"Try not to get so angry," Zacharias advised, not terribly interested.

"But he makes me angry," Draco said, his eyes narrowing.

"That makes you something less than cunning," Zacharias said diplomatically.

"I suppose you have a point," Draco said, grudgingly. Zacharias thought the boy seemed intelligent, and the fact he was now agreeing with Zacharias proved it. "I am a Slytherin, after all," Draco concluded. He flashed another smile at Zacharias, this one somewhat brighter. Apparently he could be quite taking when he wanted, which was probably the case with most brats. "You're not so bad," he said loftily.

"I like to think so," Zacharias agreed amiably. "We could probably be friends after a while."

Draco frowned. "Friends?"

"A little bit like minions, Draco," Zacharias explained.

Draco rolled his eyes at him. "Maybe we could. I'm not making any promises, though. Anyway - why d'you suddenly want to be friends?"

Zacharias deeply approved of this mild suspicion about the motives of the rest of the world, and thought about admitting something like, I think you could be interesting. But he wasn't going to go crazy with this.

Zacharias shrugged.

The ranks of Dumbledore's Army swelled and swelled over a few months. People said things to Dumbledore like 'bunch of righteous little vigilantes' and 'encouraging rifts between students,' but Dumbledore just beamed his benign smile at Professor Snape and let it carry on.

Zacharias was a big admirer of Dumbledore. He thought it took a special kind of mind to walk the line between 'ancient wisdom' and 'big-headed, stubborn, school-wrecking senility.'

It made Draco foam at the mouth a bit, too, which also amused Zacharias considerably.

Zacharias suggested that the original members of Dumbledore's Army should get special privileges like first dibs at the cake, but Harry Potter was very firm about everybody being equal.

"Except for evil people," Zacharias pointed out.

"Yes," said Harry with the look of someone who suspects he is being mocked (the boy really was more intelligent than Zacharias had thought), "but there are no evil people in the Army."

"That's what you want us to think," muttered Ernie. "We're onto you, Potter."

"What?" said Harry blankly.

Thankfully, at that point Hermione brought in the Butterbeer. After about four, even Harry Potter unwound a bit and stopped looking quite so dreary. Parvati Patil giggled and suggested a game of Spin the Bottle.

"That's a very triv-triv-trivial thought," said Ernie. "We are in dark-dark-dark times."

Butterbeer always gave Ernie the hiccups.

"Let's play the Gay Game," Parvati said.

Justin spat out his Butterbeer. "I'm not!" he said. "Who told you? It's normal at Eton!"

"No," Parvati said patiently. "Say you had to sleep with someone of the same sex. Who would it be?"

"Oh, theoretically," Terry Boot said with a certain amount of relief.

Ravenclaws liked theory. You could probably get them to approve of the Theory of Ravenclaw Extermination. Theoretically.

"Ah, well, if I was a pansy boy," said Justin, "which obviously I'm not, since I practically went to Eton, Zacharias."

Zacharias unobtrusively moved his chair further away from Justin's.

"I'd have Millicent Bulstrode," Parvati said. "She's so manly."

Zacharias was interested and a little appalled by the ready way Parvati spoke up.

"I think I'd have Padma Patil," Hermione put in shyly. "I saw her reading Hogwarts: A History once."

"My sister?" Parvati said, looking offended. "But we're exactly alike! What does she have that I don't?"

"Er, well, you don't read much," Hermione said. "And I'm not so into your butterfly clasp - Parvati, where are you going? Parvati, don't be like that!"

Ginny leaned back, crossing her legs. She had clearly made slits in her robe, as well.

"I'd take Cho Chang," she said in a throaty voice. Harry looked unmoved.

Zacharias thought this was easy enough. "I'd take Draco Malfoy," he said casually.

Harry Potter looked like he was going to choke on his own tongue. "What? That evil - Why?"

Zacharias hoped that Harry Potter didn't have a secret crush on him. He was sure that he wouldn't be able to kiss in a virtuous enough way for Harry.

"I like the way his nose scrunches up when he throws one of those murderous temper tantrums," Zacharias observed neutrally. "I think it's cute."

"Cute? Malfoy?" Harry yelped.

Terry Boot looked convinced. "I'll take Draco Malfoy as well," he nodded.

Harry looked as if the bottom had fallen out of his world. "But you can't really fancy Malfoy," he said.

"This is theoretical," Terry said hastily.

Zacharias shrugged.

Professor Snape asked for volunteers to organise his Potions closet. He did so with a look of fiendish glee, suggesting how happy he would be when nobody volunteered and he could punish everyone for doing so.

He was a strange, bitter little man. Zacharias was rather amused by him.

"Young Malfoy has volunteered already. He is the only one in this entire year who is not entirely worthless and should not be fed to rabid crocodiles."

Zacharias put up his hand and volunteered, before Terry Boot could.

Professor Snape looked disappointed.

"All right, then," he said grudgingly. "But you'd better do it right - or there will be punishment."

"All right," said Zacharias, in the placid knowledge that he was quite ready to throw Harry Potter to the wolves to save himself. You didn't need an excuse to punish Harry if you were Professor Snape.

"Punishment," murmured Professor Snape, and then added something that sounded a bit like, "I'll show you underwear."

"Please don't," Zacharias said mildly.

"Eh?" said Professor Snape. "Er - I wasn't talking to you. Now, run off, lad, or there will be-"

"I get the picture," said Zacharias, and went to find Draco.

That evening they found themselves sitting in a closet with a pile of jars around them. Justin had rather urgently tried to come along when he found out how small the closet was.

"Draco Malfoy will be there too," Zacharias had said. "And please, Justin, don't touch me like that."

"I don't mind. I think Malfoy has a certain something," Justin had answered with a terrible eagerness.

Zacharias had callously left him behind, though, with a parting bleat of 'Did I ever tell you about the basilisk?' ringing in his ears.

"Oh my God, it's dusty in here," Draco wailed, pushing his hair back.

There were now grey marks in the blond strands, but Zacharias prudently did not mention it. There was no point in inducing hysterics.

"I like the jars," he said instead. "They remind me of Hufflepuffs."

"Uh, Zacharias, they're full of mould." Draco mulled this over. "Well, I suppose you might have something there."

"I meant they have no labels on them," Zacharias corrected him calmly. "The Sorting Hat once said we were the leftovers from the other choices."

"You're the mouldy leftovers?"

Zacharias flashed him a quick smile. "I mean we aren't chosen for specific qualities. So we're an unknown quantity - and we can choose almost anything. We're not committed to anything, bad or good, honest or cunning. We can be Switzerland."

Draco looked discontent, clearly feeling that another house having good qualities was a direct insult to his own.

"I could be Switzerland," he said crossly. "If I wanted to, I could be Switzerland." He sulked. "But I don't even like cuckoo clocks."

"I meant the neutrality-"

"I know what you meant," Draco snapped. "Jesus, what kind of imbeciles are you used to talking to?"

"Ernie and Justin are simply a little different," Zacharias said calmly.

"Yeah," Draco said. "Crabbe and Goyle need to go to a special school in the summer."

Draco and Zacharias exchanged discreet smiles, basking in the glow of their own superior intelligence.

"Personally, I like labels," said Draco, labelling something 'mugwort.' "Since all the things I can be labelled are, like, gorgeous and charming and wonderful and rich and great."

"And amoral and petty and constantly enraged."

Draco raised his eyebrows. "What's your point?"

"No point," Zacharias said, labelling in a peaceful fashion.

"Anyway, I could still be Switzerland," Draco said in a sullen voice. "I... met the Dark Lord this summer, you know. Just for a few minutes."

"Oh," said Zacharias. "Was he keeping well?"

"He was terrifying and revolting, is what he was. My dad said he was charismatic and alluring and stunningly handsome," Draco informed Zacharias in a cheated voice. "And he's bald and he's got red eyes and he smells funny and his manners are appalling. I'm beginning to wonder about my father's taste in men."

"He's psychotic, too," Zacharias put in.

"Yes, yes," said Draco irritably. "But I thought it might be in a kind of, you know, cool way. But I have to tell you, I don't think I want to join. He laughs in a very alarming manner." He frowns. "Of course, Dumbledore isn't any kind of poster boy either, he looks like a prune. The whole thing is a public relations disaster."

"Practically speaking," Zacharias noted, "the followers of someone psychotic tend to get hurt too. I'm not at all keen on grovelling under Cruciatus to anyone myself. That's why I joined Dumbledore's Army."

Draco looked vexed. "God, it would be such a come-down to crawl over to stupid Harry Potter's side. I suppose Cruciatus would be worse, though." He looked unconvinced. "And my father will kill me."

"Your father's in prison," Zacharias reminded him.

Draco looked thoughtful. "That's true. I mean - that's the terrible, terrible truth. But since he is, I suppose I have a certain leeway. And it's almost my duty to go over to the Ministry's side and campaign for his release."

"He's a politician, isn't he?" Zacharias asked. "I'm sure he doesn't have any real loyalties to anyone."

"It's the Malfoy way," Draco agreed. "And there was a very strange man in the Dark Lord's cave who asked if I wanted to see his shiny bits." He shuddered, fastidiously. "I don't really have a choice, do I?"

Zacharias shrugged.

There was a bit of a fuss when Draco joined Dumbledore's Army.

There was the problem where Draco made badges that said 'Dumbledore's Army, Only Not Really, Because I Don't Like Him, and Definitely Not Affiliated with Harry Potter in Any Way' and Zacharias had to explain to him that the lettering was too small and the badge was totally illegible. Draco pitched a fit.

There was the sharp volley about racism from Hermione Granger. Draco explained that he had been thinking it over and killing the Muggleborn was just awful. Unfortunately, then he added that this was because it seemed such a waste when they could simply be the purebloods' slaves instead. Zacharias was amused when Draco got bitch-slapped around the room.

Draco stayed rather quiet after that, until the final problem, which was of course the inevitable screaming match with Harry Potter, while people hung around both their necks and kept them sitting down.

"You can't join because you're evil!" Harry shouted, completely losing it. "The whole point of this club is that you're not supposed to be evil!"

"I'm not evil!" Draco screamed back. "I'm morally challenged, you righteous little prat! There's a sodding difference!"

"You're evil!" Harry bellowed. "You do evil things to me! You say evil things to me!"

"That's not because I'm evil!" Draco yelled. "That's because I HATE YOU, you nasty, bespectacled, rotten glory hound! You drive me up the wall! You're driving me insane this second, and I HATE YOU, let me go so I can strangle him Zacharias, don't try to talk me out of it, he has to pay..."

"You see, he is evil!" Harry said triumphantly.

"Gah!" Draco howled.

"Maybe they're both evil," Ernie suggested.

"Ernie," said Zacharias, "don't make this any worse."

Eventually, things settled down to a comfortable state of seething hostility. Personally Zacharias thought that Draco added a certain something to the Army.

He did a very good imitation of Mundungus Fletcher, after Fletcher came to visit them. Even Harry looked tempted to laugh.

"The whole world's crazy anyway. We might as well laugh," Zacharias said philosophically. "I mean, has anybody noticed that our sole spy for the dark side is Professor Snape, a man who apparently can't tell shampoo and olive oil apart?"

"I like Professor Snape," Draco said ominously.

"Draco, you're so good at being nasty," Zacharias said. "Why waste that on only the people you dislike?"

Draco tilted his head, absorbing this notion.

"So you're saying I should be nasty to everyone?"

"Why not? The world's not particularly impressive."

"I like the way you think, Hufflepuff," Draco said, and leaned against Zacharias' knee as he imitated Professor Flitwick.

Zacharias particularly liked the way he squeaked out 'Face me or die!'

He didn't know that he particularly cared for the way Harry Potter had been scowling at him but, there you had it.

Zacharias shrugged.

Draco in Dumbledore's Army worked quite well. It banished, once and forever, the idea that it was a place for do-gooders. Moreover, Harry Potter's private, fierce concentration on a couple of people in the world alienated all the others. Draco's universal, open-handed nastiness somehow made people feel more included.

Zacharias liked having someone who occasionally thought like he did at the meetings.

"So, what would you do if it looked like the Dark Lord was definitely going to win?" he asked Draco once, after a long night up with the curse books.

"I'd go abroad," Draco answered instantly, and Zacharias smiled.

"Already got a bank account set up?"

Draco grinned. "In Switzerland. You want to come with?"

Zacharias thought about shrugging, but nodded instead.

"We're off, Potter," Draco added, hauling his bag over his shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah," Harry snapped. "I love to watch you leave."

Draco's eyebrows shot up. "Why, Potter," he drawled. "I had no idea."

Harry's ears went suddenly incandescent. "That's not what I meant! Hermione!"

Zacharias and Draco both laughed in Harry's direction, and Zacharias casually linked elbows with Draco and they went on.

The next day, Harry was telling people darkly of some of the things that had happened to him. Zacharias privately thought he should just write some books about them and let the royalties roll in.

"Shut up, Potter," Draco finally exploded. "God, you annoy me. You annoy me so much-" he looked at the wand in his hand, snapped finally, "that I've forgotten all the spells I know," and hit Harry on the side of the head with his wand.

"Ow! Malfoy, you big freak!" said Harry.

That was when Zacharias began to think that their constant use of each others' last names might be a bit Etonian.

He thought that even more when Dumbledore's Army was training by the side of the Forbidden Forest, in which a squad of Death Eaters daringly Apparated.

Daringly being another word for 'really, suicidally stupidly' in Zacharias' vocabulary.

Hermione set off running for Dumbledore. Zacharias and Draco stayed prudently to the back of the Army, and fired off some well thought-out spells, but then Draco got over-enthused, as he did, and rushed forward.

Unfortunately, one of the Death Eaters got in a curse at the spot to which Draco ran. Zacharias calculated the distance, and decided that it was too bad, but he would get seriously hurt if he tried to rescue Draco.

Harry, with his usual bravery and what could be kindly described as dumb luck, lunged and somehow got himself and Draco to safety, and then Dumbledore and the other teachers arrived and the Death Eaters decided they were keen on a bit of a nature walk.

"Why'd you do that?" Draco asked in a shaken sort of tone. Zacharias was proud to see that his suspicious nature was in place.

"I-" Harry frowned. "I would've done it for anyone," he said shortly, and walked off.

Draco sneered at his back. Zacharias helped him up.

Afterwards, Zacharias realised he was neither amused nor annoyed by this occurrence. He frowned in the middle of the Hufflepuff common room as he realised he felt like... like he cared about something, or something.

"I don't," Zacharias muttered. "I'm not like that. I'm Switzerland."

A light appeared in Ernie's eyes. He sidled over to Zacharias.

"You know the code language, brother?" he said under his breath. "The purple spotted hippopotamus lurks in the leafy bowers on Thursday."

Zacharias stared. "I don't have the faintest idea what you're talking about, Ernie."

"That's right, brother. Don't let the others know. Very clever." Ernie tapped his nose, knowingly. "Keep nocking that old fiddle, eh?"

Zacharias shrugged.

Everyone stayed for the Christmas holidays, saying that it was because they wanted to hone their skills to face down the Dark Lord.

Zacharias thought they might be motivated by the fact that Dumbledore had promised to roast a pig on the Quidditch pitch. The fire was large, and students wandered around it. Neville Longbottom had an apple magically stuck in his mouth.

"Very amusing, Draco," Zacharias observed neutrally.

Draco cackled. Zacharias had given him a pair of jeans for Christmas, because Zacharias did not believe in giving presents that did not benefit him personally. Draco was wearing them now with a dark jumper, and Zacharias had added to the list of things he rather liked about Draco. It now read, occasional wit, flashes of good sense, nose, hair, dark outlook on the world and body.

It was the most complimentary list he had about anybody.

Zacharias was wearing black jeans and a jumper too, and they had their elbows linked again. Justin was giving them unhappy looks as Hermione described some showdown with Professor Umbridge over the fire.

"Did I ever tell you that I was attacked by a basilisk?" he asked plaintively. "That was very traumatic, you know."

"And it spelled doom," Ernie said in a sepulchral tone. "Doom to the Hufflepuffs!"

"We can only hope," Harry told him exasperatedly, getting up and walking away from the fire.

"Thus speaks a guilty conscience," Ernie told them all.

"D'you want to roast marshmallows?" Susan asked.

"Did you like your present?" Draco inquired as they went to get their marshmallows.

Zacharias took the mirror out of his pocket, and peered into it. It called out, "Look at you, you sexy thing. Dance for me, tiger. Yeah! Yeah! You're working it!"

"It's lovely," he said.

Draco beamed. "I have one just like it. It always cheers me up."

Draco became occupied with trying to steal all the marshmallows and keep them for himself. Zacharias veered away from that side of the fire because Justin kept trying to sidle in his direction.

Mindful of the fact that at any moment Justin might descend into outright pursuit, Zacharias decided to remove temptation from him and go on a little stroll around the Quidditch pitch.

Watching Justin watch his jeans, he climbed the Quidditch bleachers for a little extra distance, and slipped between them. Zacharias believed in discreet retreat before any aggressive moves were made, if this was an option.

Then he saw Harry Potter sitting in a brooding, disgruntled heap behind the bleachers, and backed up.

Harry looked up. "Wait," he said. "Please. I was - hoping to get a chance to talk to you."

Zacharias paused warily. Harry Potter might be the saviour of the world and all that, but Zacharias did not think he was a particularly sparkling conversationalist.

Still, Ernie lowered your standards after a while. Zacharias would have been all right with listening to Harry, if Harry had actually spoken to him. He just seemed to stare at the ground and mumble a bit.

"Sorry?" Zacharias asked with a hint of a sneer. Draco rubbed off on you, eventually.

Harry looked up, in the usual direct way he did when he was about to do something really stupid. Zacharias wondered if there were any Death Eaters around. Seemed a pity to curb the boy's impulses.

"You're confusing me," Harry burst out. "You were supposed to be - different! And if you were different, you were supposed to be different in a different way! You're doing it on purpose to annoy me."

Zacharias squinted. Maybe someone had spiked the marshmallows.

"I've had a terrible time," Harry told him, angrily, and stood up. "And you keep confusing me, with your bloody being morally challenged and laughing at me and having a cute nose!"

He was advancing on Zacharias with the kind of purposeful look that he had when he espied evil that needed a good vanquishing.

Zacharias couldn't think of anything he'd done recently which had been particularly evil, and then he realised that he was standing against the firelight, and thus was simply a blond silhouette in dark jeans. Who had just sneered.

Panic exploded in Zacharias' chest.

"You can't really like that cold bastard Zacharias," said Harry in his very determined way, and grabbed hold of Zacharias' neck, shut his own eyes and pressed his mouth very firmly to his.

Zacharias made a frantic effort to get away, but Harry was significantly stronger than Justin. He also seemed to be expecting an effort to get away, and pushed closer because of it.

This was the only time in his life that Zacharias would not have been amused by the discovery that Harry Potter had a bit of a kink.

Harry opened his lips, mouth hot on Zacharias'. Zacharias panicked and finally found the strength to shove him away.

"You've got the wrong nose!" he shouted.

He was throwing a fit. He'd never done anything like this before in his life. But, well, saliva of Harry Potter!

"Don't you examine people before you kiss them?" he demanded. "Gah!"

Harry Potter stared at him, breath coming in short gasps. "Zacharias?"

"Yes," Zacharias said. "You could have checked! Oh my God, your saliva doesn't transfer anything weird, does it? Like Parseltongue?"

He realised he was having a complete spaz attack, and sounded like Draco. He tried to calm down.

"No," Harry said absently. His ears were going violent, Weasley red. "Oh my God, I don't believe this. Oh my God, I am so embarrassed."

Harry's wretched shame was making Zacharias much happier.

"I am such an idiot," said Harry, who was not getting any arguments from Zacharias. "I... Zacharias." His voice held a note of appeal. "You're not going to tell anybody, are you?"

Zacharias realised all this was actually very amusing.

Harry's voice was strangled. "You're not going to tell Malfoy?"

Zacharias shrugged.

Amusing as Harry Potter's total humiliation was, Zacharias also realised that the time had come to act. He left Harry in agony behind the bleachers and walked quickly back to the fire, where Draco was nursing his stolen stash of marshmallows.

"Draco," he said, "I need to have this cleared up. Are you straight?"

Draco, his mouth full of sticky goo, made a sound that Zacharias thought was pretty much the vocal version of "!!!"

"Do you like girls?" he pursued.

Draco swallowed. "Like girls?" he snapped. "Don't be disgusting!"

That was the first hurdle, and it had gone splendidly. "Good. So you like boys then," Zacharias said calmly.

"Don't insult me," said Draco.

Zacharias had never had quite so many shocks in one night.

"I hate sweeping generalisations like that," Draco told him irritably. "I mean, liking boys? That could include liking Crabbe. Liking girls could include liking Millicent Bulstrode. Are you mad? Obviously, being gay or straight involves a whole lot of potential for liking people unworthy of a Malfoy. The only sensible thing is to compile a select number of names who might be worthy of the supreme honour of allowing myself to be attracted to them. I'm private-list-sexual."

Zacharias considered this. "You're very strange and twisted, Draco," he told him in a businesslike tone. "And you have rage issues. Also, your nose is too pointed."

Draco made the "!!!" noise again.

"But most of the rest of the world isn't even worth my time," Zacharias continued. "And you, like your nose, have a bizarre appeal. I want to go out with you. Do I get on your list or not?"

Draco lounged on the grass, mulling this over. Zacharias had to admit he lounged well, too. There was roast marshmallow fluff on his lower and extremely pouty lip.

"Weeell," Draco said doubtfully, "you are a Hufflepuff, you know. But I suppose I rather admire your attitude of total unconcern about the fate of most people in the world. And we might end up going to Switzerland together." He peered up at Zacharias through his silvery eyelashes, and Zacharias was amused to note that amid his many other terrible qualities, Draco Malfoy was a tease. "I suppose you might do," Draco concluded.

Zacharias reached over, and pulled Draco's sticky mouth to his. Draco's lips curved in either a smile or a sneer, and Zacharias curled his back.

Their mouths opened. Zacharias put his hands in Draco's hair, amused by Draco's small sound of protest. Draco was angular and difficult to please under his hands, and Zacharias liked it.

"You know, three chaps often go at it together at Eton," Justin said hopefully.

"Be careful, brother," called out Ernie. "He could have poisoned the marshmallow fluff on his mouth. Yes, that's it! Draco Malfoy is a killer! Get him, Hufflepuffs!"

Draco opened his eyes, and blinked down at him. "You taste of Chocolate Frogs," he remarked, a little breathlessly. "You don't even like Chocolate Frogs."

Zacharias shrugged.

The Badger Series - Chapter 2

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