By Spooky Mulder
He had been walking down the hall with Hermione, who was once again rambling on about scrolls that were due and study groups and reference books, when out of nowhere, Malfoy ran past and snatched her bag right off her shoulder. Harry gave chase.
“Catch me if you can, Potter!” Draco laughed, “Or am I too fast for you?”
Malfoy turned a corner, Harry followed. Draco ran so fast and for so long that Harry lost track of lefts and rights and he could no longer see Hermione, trying to keep up. They had lost her, but that was alright. As long as he recovered her bag, Harry thought, he could return it to her in the common room.
Harry rounded a corner just in time to see a flash of light. He was knocked off his feet, rolled, cradled his knee and winced. Draco laughed and when Harry looked up there he was with Hermione’s bag in one hand and his wand in the other. Harry drew his wand, his anger boiling, and Draco took off again.
The castle no longer looked familiar, though Harry wasn’t paying much attention. His focus was on keeping up with Malfoy, who could run like the thief he was. “You’ll pay for this, Malfoy!” Harry shouted as Draco turned yet another corner. “Drop that bag!”
“What’s the matter, Potter?” Draco called over his shoulder, “Getting tired already?”
Harry’s answer was a dueling blast that missed and took a small chunk out of the wall. Malfoy ducked into a room and slammed the door. “Aha!” Harry thought, “Dead end!” The room Draco had entered was on the inside of the castle, so of course there were no windows or doors to the outside. He tried the handle and found it locked. Draco laughed on the other side.
“Let’s see!” he called out, his voice muffled by the thick wood, “What filthy little mudbloods like to carry around!”
Harry heard Malfoy dump the contents of Hermione’s bag onto the floor. “Malfoy that’s PERSONAL PROPERTY!”
“Hey Potter!” Draco laughed, “Did you know Granger carries around a picture of you?” Draco bellowed laughter, “It’s in a heart shaped frame!!”
Harry could take no more. He leveled his wand at the lock. “Alohamora!”
Malfoy stopped laughing when he realized Harry was coming through the door. He slammed it shut behind him and Harry lunged forward in the torchlight, furious when he saw Draco sitting on the floor with Hermione’s belongings spread out in a wide arc. Harry plowed into Malfoy, the two of them rolled into the wall of the small room, and Draco managed to push him away. He leaped to his feet, scared senseless by the physical assault, and ran for the door. Harry stood, glaring as Malfoy tried the door again and again, tugging on it, then yanking on it, using the weight of his body to somehow pull it free. It was shut fast. It didn’t budge, nor did it even rattle in its frame. Draco drew his wand.
“Alohamora!” he said and yanked again and again. He tried every spell he could think of as the reality of the situation slowly dawned on Harry and he forgot all about Hermione’s bag. He shoved Malfoy out of the way and tried all the same spells – with all the same results. None.
“Great!” Harry shouted, “Wonderful! You always have to do something stupid, Malfoy! Don’t you? We’re locked in!”
“You’re the one who shut the door, genius!”
“It was shut when I opened it!”
“Well how was I supposed to know it locked from the outside? I didn’t see any sign saying ‘don’t shut this door’! Did you, Potter?”
Harry gritted his teeth, trying his best not to punch the Slytherin pretty-boy. “We wouldn’t be here at all if you hadn’t stolen Hermione’s bag! This is all your fault!”
“Whatever, Potter. Just bang on the door until someone lets us out.”
“Bang on the door? We’re in an unused part of the castle! No one even comes down here!” Harry clenched his fists.
This idea hadn’t occurred to Draco and fear slowly crept over him. “Well… um… how will we get out? We’ll starve!” Suddenly, Draco felt thirst overtake him and his throat shriveled up, dry and parched. “They won’t even know to look for us until we miss classes! Do something, Potter!”
“Like what? Hand puppets?” Harry raged, “You got us into this! YOU get us out!”
Draco thought a moment, and then leveled his eyes on the door. He ran at it and rammed it with his shoulder. “OWWW!” he yelled and winced, rubbing his shoulder where it had struck the hard old wood.
Harry laughed out loud. “Well, that was brilliant.”
“I’m no good in these situations!” Draco defended, “You’re the expert when it comes to hopeless predicaments, Potter; let’s see what you come up with!”
Harry was about to lose his temper. “There’s no way out except through this door!”
“Then open it! I have to go to the bathroom!”
Harry stared for a moment, and then burst out laughing. He laughed until he thought his stomach might cramp, bellowing the most belligerent fit of laughter Draco had ever heard.
“Stop it!” he yelled, “It’s not funny!”
Harry’s laughter cut off like someone had flipped a switch. Suddenly, Draco was rammed into the wall again and the two of them fell to the floor, throwing punches and bellowing unintelligible phrases. Neither heard a word the other said.
Finally, they sat up and looked at each other. “This is stupid.” Harry said. “Fighting and assigning blame isn’t going to get us out of this room.”
“True enough.” Draco agreed and his eyes landed on the floor behind Harry. “Don’t get mad, but do you suppose Granger might have something that could help?”
Harry turned and saw the scattering of things. Books, the heart shaped frame Draco had made such a fuss of laughing at, scrolls, notebooks, quills, useless odds and ends - and a purse.
Draco looked on as Harry tore a sheet of parchment from a notebook, took a quill, and wrote “HELP: Harry & Malfoy are locked in!” Harry then slid the sheet of paper under the door. That way, if someone was passing by, hopefully looking for them, it might draw attention.
“We could use our wands to set the door on fire.” Draco offered.
Harry looked at him as if Malfoy had completely lost his mind and then went back to considering the items on the floor. Most he put back in the bag.
Draco cleared his throat, expecting to be assaulted once again. “Um… what’s in the purse?”
“No way! It’s one thing to look at her books and stuff.” Harry argued, “Malfoy? If you had any tact at all you would know better than to even think it. I’m not looking in a girl’s purse.”
“But it’s just Granger!” he insisted, “She’s obviously madly in love with you; I hardly think she’d mind. We are in a life or death situation here!”
“Hermione and I are friends, Malfoy!” Harry defended, “And I would hardly call this life or death. They’ll find us eventually.”
Malfoy gave him a smug grin. “Sure. Whatever you say, Potter. Give it to me, then. I have no qualms about snooping through Granger’s stuff.”
“I’m sure she’d prefer that I didn’t.”
“Open it or I will.”
The two of them had a staring match and finally, Harry sighed and opened the purse.
Draco craned his neck, trying to see inside.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” Harry exclaimed after rummaging for a minute, “I swear, she thinks of everything!”
“What is it?” Draco wondered, “Don’t say that and then refuse to show me!”
Harry smiled and withdrew a small box the size of a muggle sewing ensemble, and held it up with a grin. “Morton Snivel’s Wizard Wilderness Survival Kit.” He slid back to make room, undid the clasp, and jumped as a small dining table leaped to full size, complete with food, drink, an umbrella, a tent, (which barely fit in the small room, but Harry knew it would be spacious and comfortable inside) and a strange, blazing campfire that nearly landed in Malfoy’s lap.
Harry took a seat at the table and grinned. “Come on, Malfoy. Looks like we’re set for a long night. Dig in!”
“Um, Potter?” Draco said as he stood. “I still have to go to the bathroom.”
