They appeared with more of a fizzle than a pop, squinting at one another as their eyes adjusted to the abrupt change in lighting and as their ears adjusted to the onslaught of sound. Upon re-attaining their disturbed equilibrium, they picked up their argument where it had left off. Sort of.

“I am so telling Dumbledore that you kidnapped me,” the redhead threatened, poking her companion in the chest with a gloved finger.

“It was your damned potion that exploded,” he rejoined. “I’m going to file for assault.”

“How am I assaulting you?”

In response, he caught her hand in his and raised an effeminately-groomed and arched blond brow. “Repeated jabbing,” he stated, “certainly punishable by detention at the very least.”

Her lips pursed, and he was certain that a torrent of vulgarities and general screeching was about to burst forth when he was smashed into by a barreling hippopotamus-like-creature and knocked to the floor with an undignified whoomp sound.

Shortly after he relearned how to breathe, the redhead and the hippopotamus attacker were treated to a string of curses in something that sounded like German, because his mother had always taught him not to cuss in front of a lady. And of course a man couldn’t be expected not to swear, so he figured that she wouldn’t know he was swearing if she didn’t know the language. Never mind that the only lady present knew more vulgarities than did any honest sailor.

But that was beside the point.

He was swearing, she started to giggle, and the hippo-thing was peering down at him like he was some kind of circus-sideshow freak. Not, in other words, a pleasant situation for such a sophisticated sophisticate to find himself in.

And then, horror of horrors, the hippo-thing was offering him a hand up and speaking. The language sounded suspiciously like English, but it was kind of twang-y and kind of drawl-y and he deduced as he was helped to his feet that they had somehow been abducted by aliens and that this place must be their mother ship.

Pansy had told him about aliens once. She said they liked to transplant peoples’ brains. He shuddered.

“Well?” the alarmingly comforting sound of his female companion’s voice – irritated as always, how soothing – brought him from squeamish thoughts of being chopped up for use in some alien’s transmogrification potion and he blinked owlishly in response.

Er… blinked not-owlishly, because Draco Malfoy does not do anything that could be considered remotely ‘owlish.’

“Well, what?” he returned, crossing his arms in front of his chest in what was most definitely not a defensive position, because Malfoys simply don’t do defensive. If anything, they’re always offensive.

“Aren’t you going to accept his apology?” she was tapping her foot now. He’d always thought that a good point to either run away or duck for cover.

“What apology?” now was certainly not an appropriate time to appear weak – he was confronting aliens, after all. Hippo-shaped aliens, but aliens nonetheless.

“The one you’ve been listening to for the past two minutes.”

“Erm…”

There passed a brief moment of awkward silence during which she glared furiously and he considered the merits of trying unlicensed apparition and what that might do to a person when one is surely orbiting Pluto in a giant space-ship-thing. He’d just reached the point about null gravity and light-years when the hippo-alien spoke:

“So… are y’all doin’ some sort’a publicity stunt here then, all dressed up like tha’?”

It took him several moments to decipher just what the alien was saying, and he looked to his companion for help.

“Erm…” he employed the use of puppy-dog eyes, which had never before failed him in any sort of situation when dealing with a female. Ever. It was a proven fact.

“We’re, erm, that is, we, ah, there’s this… thing… and-“ she caved to the power of the puppy-dog eyes, but seemed equally at a loss for words. The alien saved them coming up with a plausible excuse for their strange raiment.

“Movie release, down at the theatre. I gotcha. On’y, we don’t get so many of you foreigners comin’ out to ‘em. Thought maybe you were tryin’ to market that ‘Harry Potter’ stuff I b’n hearin’ about lately.” And, just like real magic in slow motion, the alien wandered off bobbing his head and muttering to himself in a completely unintelligible language.

Draco breathed a sigh of relief as they were left alone, and peered suspiciously at his companion.

“You aren’t an alien too, are you?” he asked cautiously, tensed to run.

Ginny Weasley’s eyes widened in surprise. Surely to god… It wasn’t possible…

“No, Draco. I’m not an alien. Only, I think the Muggles call them ‘Yanks.’”

Deeply troubled by this revelation – who on earth would consent to be called a ‘Yank’? – Draco found that he needed to sit down. Conveniently enough, situated as they were in the centre of a food court located innocently in a shopping mall in suburban America, there was a chair nearby.

Unfortunately, someone had spilled cola on it, but that’s a story for another day.