Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter

Main Characters (alphabetically by last name): Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Ginny Weasley, Ron Weasley

Timeline: Begins 2001 (3 years after war)

Rating: M and in some cases M+ for future rape and sexual harassment

Summery: Hermione Granger, the first and only junior unspeakable gets sucked into a mysterious dark object in the shape of a cube hidden in the department of Mysteries and "This is all your fault Malfoy!"

Chapter 1

Hermione was late for work. Something that rarely happened due to expert organisation skills but one thing a person can't organise is whether their boyfriends lie beside them or on top of them. That fateful morning it was the latter and Ron was a heavy person especially when he didn't want to be moved. It took her five minute to finally push and squeeze her way out of his arms. Now she was 5 minutes behind her schedule.

She pulled on her best Ministry robes all the while running through that days schedule, grabbed an apple and arrived at work in a flare of green flames.

"Good morning Miss Granger" squeaked Dedalus Diggle as he past, a box of fireworks in his hands. She forced a smile as she strode past her heals making an impressive clicking noise while teamed with the marble floor.

The ministry had changed a lot in the last few years, it had been completely redone and almost everyone had helped return each department in turn to its former glory or in some cases better than before such as the department of magical law enforcement which is where Hermione had been working for the last 6 months. But she had been moved last week to become the first and only junior unspeakable.

Usually you only became an unspeakable after 10 years of solid hard work at the ministry however many of the people who had been able to take such important jobs were either dead or had been controlled so much during the great war that they were unstable to return to such a place as the department of mysteries therefore they needed a few younger candidates and Hermione being the best witch her age was nominated for the job.

Of course she was also given a massive pay rise which just made the whole situation better as she and Ron had started saving up so they could afford better things, like a bigger house. Ron however complained that they would be able to afford a bigger house if Hermione stopped buying so many books. That had made Hermione snort. She was the one bringing the money in, not Ron.

No both Harry and Ron were in Auror training which didn't pay well at all. It was alright for Harry though as whenever he attempted to buy something it was always on the house as a gift from the owner for defeating the dark lord and saving the whole world. Ron was not as lucky. He just got a discount.

Hermione stepped into the lift and waited a full three minutes till the compartment finally reached the bottom floor, the department of mysteries.

"ah Miss Granger, you are right on time, excellent, excellent" Hermione scowled, she was usually 5 minutes early just in case.

"We were just discussing what we should work on first. We believe after you excellent progress with time basin we have decided to move on and leave that in the hands of others as we have basically finished that. So we think the 'challenge room' would be a good place to start"

The challenge room was the room where all things that could not be explained were stored and examined therefore a challenge to figure out. But it had been partly destroyed during the little adventure during her fifth year and now everything had been cleaned up and it now just needed to be sorted. Easier said then done.

"Well then let's us not waste time gentlemen" Hermione said happily. She did love a challenge no matter how difficult or frustrating. The room was bamboozling and the first major challenge was sorting out one unexplainable object from another as they all tended to be very small with a large layers of confusing magic surrounding it at odd angles. By lunch her head was spinning dangerously forcing her to go outside to have her quick lunch consisting of the apple she had brought with her. She was about to re-enter when she heard footsteps behind her and a loud voice chatting away happily

"-progress is just excellent our whole team is just fantastic job, despite the unfortunately small staff choice however this really is one of the hardest areas in the whole ministry" fudge said leading a tall pale young man with him. Draco Malfoy. He looked paler then she had remembered and thinner two and his sneering face had gone but he was still the filthy rich pure-blood Malfoy he had always been wearing a black shirt over black trousers with top class black shiny shoes and a extremely expensive black cloak. Talk about depressing.

"Ah here is Miss Granger. How is it going in there? Mr Malfoy as just recently been added to our team for a week or so till we get a few more members and he has lots of experience dealing with dark objects so I think he will be useful" Fudge said in a hopeful tone. Fudge had been brought back, not as minister though. No Kingsley Shacklebolt had the honour of that job and was fantastic at it too.

"We have almost finished sorting out the challenge room. Just two items left and of course we can't identify them as they are the trickiest items which make no sense at all." Fudge chucked nervously

"Mr Malfoy is still here to help though. You know what they say: many hands make light work"

"Yes of course but do they not also say 'too many cooks spoil the broth' Fudge?" Malfoy raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow but refrained from commenting. God he was such a girl getting his eyebrows waxed.

"I had better show you in then" Hermione said icily. She turned and strode back into her puzzling room not checking to see if Malfoy was following.

The room was almost pitch black except for the bright lights that circled the room and the spotlight highlighting the two objects left: a red cube and a blue sphere. They were inside a large white ring drawn on the floor to show the danger zone. Two of Hermione's colleges were pointing at the objects several feet away, mumbling under their breaths.

As soon as Malfoy entered the room he started circling the objects fixing it with his steely gray eyes. After a few minutes he took one big step forwards. Hermione's heart gave a stutter, no one had dared get two near the objects but then he took another in examining then closely. Was he crazy or just plain stupid?

"Anything Malfoy?" A colleague asked but he didn't reply for several minutes

"Yes. I think so" that grabbed everyone's attention.

"What?" Hermione called out speaking to him directly for the first time.

"The red cube had two buttons on it. I think it's meant to be pressed by two people, one from either side. It's in the shape of a finger print". Hermione frowned. That hadn't been there before.

"Where did they come from?"

"They appeared when I took a step forwards. I think respond only when they sense a presence close by." Hermione took two careful steps in and gasped. The cube had started to flash.

"I think we should touch it" Malfoy reached out with his left hand and places his finger on the button. Everyone stood gapping at Malfoy.

"It feels like plastic covered in silk..." Hermione frowned and reached out to touch it but instead of placing her finger on the pad she hovered over it unsure. It went completely against her ways. You never simply touched it to see what happened, that was childish.

"Touch it Granger, it's starting to vibrate" Hermione in slight panic started to remove her hand but the strangest thing happened. The cube jumped. There was no other was to describe it but it jump up forcing Hermione's finger on the button and before she knew it the pair of them got sucked into blackness.

It was approximately then, the screaming started

When Hermione awoke she found herself lying on the floor in a bright, medium sized, red, cubed room. She heard Malfoy beside her groan as he sat up holding his head.

"Granger? You awake?" Hermione didn't feel like answering 'yes' as that was far too boring.

"This is your fault Malfoy!" Better, Hermione praised herself.

"Yeh I got that much so what do we do now?" Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Cast a spell which sorts this out obviously"

"Yeh? With what wand exactly?" Hermione shot up and regretted it when the room started to sway.

"Our wands are gone?" she said in a shocked/dazed voice.

"No I just hid then so I can annoy you." Malfoy sneered sarcastically reminding her of the old Malfoy she knew. Hermione snorted bringing the conversation to an end leaving the pair of them in a very awkward silence.

Malfoy got up and started pacing the room "We can't just sit here doing nothing!"

"Do you have any other ideas?" Malfoy's cheeks turned slightly pink "Actually yes." That surprised Hermione

"The cube is obviously a magical object and I don't believe that its only function is to suck people inside it other wise it would be sent to Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office or something similar, therefore the object must be more complicated and may have it's own source of intelligent thought which is not created by a simple enchantment."

"So you are suggesting that we investigate the room for areas of complicated magic?"

"Yes" Hermione was actually smiling at the logical idea as the pair of then stood up and started feeling the wall. They had gone round the room twice but no area had given off any hint of magic.

"It was a good theory Malfoy but it I'm not sure it's correct. Where did you get the idea from anyway?"

"My father had a strange book in his library once." Hermione froze. He was talking about Tom Riddle's diary which had only responded when written in... so you needed to contract the intelligence...

"Cube?" Hermione said shyly.

"Level. One. Complete"

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