AN: Hello my lovelies. I was randomly attacked by this idea last weekend when I was driving through a couple of states on my way home from visiting friends, and thus it made it onto my computer and has evolved into this little beastly thing. Should be fairly short. I am still working on The After so I haven't abandoned that, it's just slow in the making. Please let me know what you think so far of this one, and I'll have to deal with concurrent fics on my own. Thanks for your time!

Disclaimer: Any character you recognize is not mine and was created by J.K. Rowling. There will be a few OCs later on.

She was not entirely sure how she wound up in this particular predicament. The weight in her arms was a constant reminder that it was not some twisted dream, that someone really had come to her doorstep in the middle of the night, begging and pleading on her good faith, and she had accepted this daunting task without so much as a second thought. Maybe it had been the sleep. Maybe it had been the way tears were splashing down onto her front stoop. Maybe it had been the soft grunts and sighs coming from between the adults.

Maybe, just maybe, it had been her infamous mile wide streak of pity, good intentions, and inability to say no.

Maybe it had been the way he begged her, hair damp from the rain and skin pulled tight over way too prominent cheekbones, with tears balancing precariously on eyelashes the color of moonlight.

"Please take him." He was choking, and it took her a moment or two to realize that it wasn't just from the cold. "Please take him. Don't let him know about me, or his family, please don't. Please help me. Please help him, please Granger, please."

"A-alright." She had taken the crudely bundled infant from the now sobbing man. "But Dra-"

"Never tell him about me. He can never know." Draco Malfoy held her shoulders in a surprisingly strong grip, bony fingers digging into her skin with a sudden passion she never knew he possessed. He cast a softened glance down at the babe in her grasp. "He must never know. He cannot be like me…like my father…please."

"But I-"

"His name is Scorpius. Change it if you want to, if it's best for him, I can't…" He broke off in horrible choking sobs and backed away from her, silver eyes breaking into her soul as he stumbled from her door and into the night, disappearing with a faint pop.

His skeletal face and deathly pale skin had only meant one thing.

Draco Malfoy was soon to die.

He could barely breathe. His head had been spinning for the last few days, it seemed, and his tongue raked desperately through his mouth for some sort of moisture, some relief, but none was to be had. The crying from his arms reminded him of the task he had set out on, the mission he had to complete. Getting out of the Manor had been no small feat, and getting into London itself was like trying to be invisible with only a wish and an imagination. The wailing infant wasn't much help either, even when he ducked into the tightest of alleyways to try and hide himself.

Somehow, by some miracle or divine intervention he wasn't really sure, he had made it into the heart of the city and passed through the barriers into Muggle London. He tripped down unfamiliar roads, crossed over strange yards and stumbled through his task with only one thing, one address on his mind.

The last known address of Hermione Granger, the house where her parents had once lived, on a quiet unassuming street in the middle of goodness knows where.

Draco supposed it was dumb luck that he happened upon the domicile at long last, and he could have shouted for joy at finding it. Instead he sat on the curb opposite her dwelling, watching her silhouette through the drawn curtains as it was backlit onto the neatly trimmed lawn.

A soft gurgle interrupted his meandering brain and he turned his attention to the baby as raindrops began to splatter around them.

"She'll be good for you." He voice was wavering just the slightest bit. "She can give you what I never can. She can teach you how to be good. She can….She can do everything I can't."

He stood, quivering from cold and utter despair, and began to cross the blacktop that would lead to her front door.

Hermione Granger sat, numb, at her kitchen table, a squirming infant in her arms and her brain for once unable to process the enormity of what had just happened. Her mouth was still hanging slightly open and her hands were frozen around the fragile bundle, clutching it to her chest as her heart began to race.

She was just barely twenty one.

She was devastatingly single.

She was alone, and had no prior babysitting experience.

Hang babysitting, she had just agreed to raise a child.

A child not of her own making, either.

Her enemy's son.

Draco Malfoy's own blood, his heir, was cradled in her arms, her Mudblood arms, and she could not for the life of her figure out why in the hell she had shotgun accepted his cries for help.

"Shite." The curse word fell from her lips before she could stop it and she groaned, leaning her head back over the back of the chair as she tried to calm herself. Hermione bit her lip and thought, her left leg bouncing as she tried to put together a coherent mindset.

At long last she rose, pacing in front of the fireplace she had repurposed to receive Floo calls. A pinch of green powder was held tightly between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand. She hesitated and then finally threw it into the grate, sticking her head through.

"Potter House!" She called firmly. A few moments later she was granted with a view of the neatly arranged kitchen that Ginny had decorated herself. "Gin!" Footsteps echoed throughout the fireplace and finally a redheaded woman appeared.

"Hermione! Gracious you gave me a scare! Thought you were Mum for a moment." Ginny Potter stopped suddenly, taking in Hermione's face. "Are you alright? You look ill!"

"Can you spare a bit to pop over? I need to speak with you."

"Yeah, right, sure. I'll just tell Harry to put the boys down." Ginny scrambled out of the kitchen and Hermione pulled her head back into her own home, running the first three fingers of her right hand over the baby's tiny forehead. He was warm to the touch, but not overly so, and his skin felt like nothing she had ever felt before.

The fireplace roared to life and Ginny stepped out, brushing the soot from her shoulders as she began speaking.

"Normally I'd think nothing of someone Flooing me at half past eleven but seeing as it was you, I of course thought…" Ginny finally looked up to see her brunette friend standing in the little dining room, tears burdening her lower eyelids as she gingerly bounced what Ginny knew to be a baby. "Hermione…"

"Ginny, please, I…I don't…" Hermione nearly collapsed into the nearby chair, staring down at the angelic face in her arms.

"Hermione." Ginny rushed to her side, her coat discarded on the floor as she dropped to her knees beside the dark haired girl. "Where on earth did you find him?"

"He came to me." Hermione sniffled, allowing a few tears to leak out of her eyes. Ginny let a hand drift almost dreamily over the baby's forehead, brushing back some of the linen he was wrapped in to reveal a tuft of shockingly light hair. Ginny was back on her feet in an instant.

"Is that…." Ginny started, her hands covering her mouth. "How? How did…Why, better yet? Why in Godric's holy name did you…Oh my god. He was here. He came to your house. Oh sweet Merlin Hermione! He could have killed you and you….You took his child! You…You took his child. You took his child!"

"Ginny please." Hermione was close to a full break down by this point, Ginny's obvious mantra smashing through her resolve. The other woman pressed a hand hard to her lips, her head shaking back and forth wildly. "Ginny what do I do? What do I do?" It was Hermione's turn to repeat the same thing ceaselessly until finally Ginny closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, her hands finding her hips with resolution.

"What we have to."

AN: Please leave me a review and tell me what you think. I haven't seen anything like this written before, but if someone knows of a story that is too similar then please inform me so I can take appropriate action.