Draco Malfoy (apellon) wrote in regulation, @ 2008-03-15 23:42:00 |
|
|||
Current music: | vampire weekend - oxford comma |
Entry tags: | backstory, christopher warrington, draco malfoy |
who gives a fuck about an oxford comma?
Who: Christopher Warrington and Draco Malfoy
Where: The archive section in the Regulator's Department Building
When: March, 2003
What: Draco is messing with Chris' files, who in turn decides to show him who's boss. You know, verbally.
Rating: PG-13 for a bit of bad language
Status: Closed; complete
It was hopeless. Completely and utterly hopeless.
Chris decided this as he looked through the section of the archives he'd organised the day before. Someone - something, more like, given the department - was going through and rearranging everything, no matter how often he set it to rights. It never failed - it was always disorganised again. It was driving him mad, but there really wasn't anyone he could talk to about it because who would listen? He was just the obnoxiously particular legal consultant and it didn't matter that all of their records were being tampered with - possibly compromised. No one bloody cares, he thought, shoving the cabinet closed and turning to walk away, if only for a little while.
Anything to keep him from literally pulling his hair out by the roots.
He blinked, though, when he turned a corner and found... Draco Malfoy ruining yet another section of the archives. "What in Merlin's name are you doing?"
Every time Draco picked out a new record, he felt very tempted to open up the cover and spit onto the parchment. Just to see what reaction he would conjure if someone happened to need that particular set of papers. But then he remembered that spitting was for commoners and the homeless tramps that liked to hang around outside his Muggle flat.
Then again, I’m a commoner now, aren’t I? he thought with a dark scowl, shoving a document into its new place with a little too much force, the paper crumpling underneath his fingers. His palms were covered in ink and he felt dirty. His shirt still smelled like the coffee he’d spilled over the cuff and he’d rolled both of them up to the elbow, the ink on his palms as black as the patterned ink that burned on the inside of his left arm, still painful after all of these years.
“I’m reacquainting myself with my own perseverance, what the fuck does it look like I’m doing?” he muttered, not even bothering to look up from his crouched position on the wooden floor.
"Stop, stop, stop," Chris said, moving forward without really thinking. "You're - have you been doing - you're wrinkling the parchment. For the love of all things magical, stop." He stopped Malfoy's ungentle motions by taking hold of his wrist, the ink smeared all over the other man's hand making him cringe - what did the documents he'd been handling look like? "I can't believe they let you in here. Have you been doing this for - how long have you been rearranging the files?"
He caught sight of the Mark on the inside of Malfoy's arm and frowned intensely. "Perhaps you should find something to do that requires a little less personal perseverance on your part."
The papers balanced precariously on Draco's lap fell to the floor in a mess of parchment and leather bindings, scattering underneath one of the filing cabinets, no doubt scraping up years of dust in their wake. "Unhand me, you cave dweller! I'm alphabetising them by location!" Yanking his arm free and turning his arm away from Warrington's line of sight, Draco offered the darker man a bitter frown of his own, bending down to gather the fallen papers.
He ignored Warrington's question and piled the unorganised parchments together, patting them against the floor noisily to even out the edges before standing on his heel and walking toward the desk on the other side of the room. His things were lying on the wooden surface in some semblance of order - a quill pot here, a half-empty cup of coffee there. Trouble was, Draco did not have-... that many things. Being wandless in a department full of magic-throwing hotheads, he felt handicapped, unequipped.
And what are you going to do with a wand? he reminded himself silently, picking up his coffee cup and giving it an experimental sip. It was stone cold. Use scouring charms to clean the windows?
"By location?" Chris's expression was half-sceptical, half-horrified. "Cave dweller - that's rich, Malfoy. For Merlin's sake, alphabetise by the surname of the Regulator in charge of the case." He muttered something to himself, but kept his voice low enough that Malfoy wouldn't be able to hear it - cave dweller? He, at least, could still move through polite society.
"You sound like a woman, by the way - unhand you. Indeed. As though I'd want anything more to do with you than trying to salvage something recognisable from the mess you've made of the archives." Chris snorted, trying not to notice how the corners and edges of the papers Malfoy was handling had bent. Some of them were probably even ripped. Bugger it. "Move out of the way, honestly - "
He took his wand from the pocket inside his robes where he kept it, casting a charm to heat the other man's coffee before sending the stray pieces of parchment back to their proper places and calling them over to himself so he could file them properly.
“By location,” Draco confirmed, placing his mug down with a bit more force that necessary and reaching forward to snatch the files back from Warrington’s thieving fingers. “I was told to, you idiot, now give them here-…” With a bit of a tug he managed to pull the papers free, hugging them protectively against his chest, his Mark once again in full view. “These are mine. For the time being, that is. Now, scurry off back where you came from.” He waved his fee hand in front of Warrington’s face and spun around, walking away from the desk and back toward a filing cabinet.
"Scurry off? I think not," Chris said, exhaling slowly through his nose and trying to ignore the way his nostrils were no doubt flaring. "You're being ridiculous. I don't know who told you to do whatever it is you think you're doing, but it's wrong. I've been filing in the archives, organising them, since before you got here. It's my system. And you're ruining it."
Moving forward, he reached out and took the files right back. "Cease and desist immediately or I will report you and that will hardly look favourable when the Ministry next decides to look into your performance here."
Stuffing the files back into the order that he’d been instructed to put them in, Draco kept his back straight in defiance and breathed out slowly, before yanking open a new drawer and running his fingers over the folder spines. “You’re a control freak, Warrington,” he bit out sharply, rearranging the papers. “These aren’t yours, they’re everybody’s. I used to think sharing was a redundant phrase flung around by commoners and poor people, but even I can tell you that no one owns a damn thing in this place. We’re swimming around in a mass of distribution.” Wrinkling his nose, he slammed the file door shut and finally turned on his heel to face the other man, blowing some white-blond hair from his face only for it to flop back down into his eyes.
He beamed. “Exciting, isn’t it?”
"No. Not it's not." Chris decided he was just going to have to lock the other man out. He didn't have a wand, so he wouldn't be able to get in to ruin things later. Wards and charms and hexes would surely be enough to keep him out. He might even be able to tweak them so it was Malfoy specifically who got shocked whenever he came near the room in general. "And you're not amusing. I will report you."
He needed to talk to Raphael. Perhaps some of the serenity the other man seemed to exude would rub off on him and he'd feel a little less like flaying that smile off of Malfoy's face. My files. My files.
“Report me?” Draco retorted. “What for? Good God, man – get a life, would you? And leave me alone, I’m working.” Fiddling with the folders in his arms, he quickly flicked through them and check the locations of each one before stacking them into some semblance of order. He was, by now, completely ignoring Warrington.
Chris did the only thing he could think of, in that moment, to keep from actually, physically harming Malfoy. He turned around and walked away. Jacqueline was always telling him to pick his battles and, while the filing system was important, Malfoy was too much an underling, now, to warrant his directly intervention. He would simply speak to the person in charge, the person who gave Malfoy his orders, and go from there. The orders would be changed. Or he could always have Malfoy transferred somewhere else. Nicely. Quietly.
Perhaps he could ask Trimble to move Malfoy into the menagerie. That would be entertaining. Cleaning out animals stalls would certainly give the arrogant little meddler something worthwhile to complain about.