Harry Potter One Shots

The Desk

All rights belong to the author, opalish

Malcolm considered it one of the great injustices of the universe that Harry Potter wound up being his boss. It wasn't that Potter didn't make a disgustingly good Auror-he was practically prodigal when it came to violence and nosiness, after all-but an administrator he was not.

For instance:

"Sir," Malcolm said sharply, cornering Potter in his own office the second his superior stepped through his personal Floo connection. Late again, he noted absently. "Have you read my report on the Illegal Kneazle Breeding Ring Incident yet?"

Potter froze, running a hand through his ridiculously untidy hair-sloppy, everything about him was sloppy, Malcolm thought disdainfully. Green eyes glanced automatically at The Desk, a near impossibility of existence-the surface hadn't been seen since Potter's second week as Head Auror, and paperwork was piled so high and so precariously that there was no explanation for how it managed to stay in place aside from 'magic'. Those bizarre little 'post-it notes' that had recently come into fashion practically plastered the sides, until the only glimpse Malcolm could get of the desk itself was its legs. Charmed memos fluttered in constant low orbit around both The Desk and the chair. Malcolm and Su Li had once done a little late night investigation and discovered that ignored howlers had burst into flames deep within the pile, creating charred caverns of ash invisible to the naked eye.

Suddenly Potter looked at Malcolm-no, not at him, over his shoulder. Bespectacled eyes went wide. "Look," he cried dramatically, pointing a finger. "A fuzzy puppy!"

Malcolm didn't mean to turn and look, but instincts honed by seven years in Slytherin had him pivoting on one heel, his other foot already raised, ready to kick. It wasn't that he particularly disliked fuzzy puppies, but kicking them was just what one did when one was in Slytherin.

The office was empty of canines, and when Malcolm whirled back around, eyes narrowed, it was empty of Potters as well.

Hmm. Malcolm was not generally in favor of office warfare, but clearly something had to be done.

The Desk was impervious. Malcolm stared at it in frustrated fascination, the scritch of Su Li's quill against parchment barely registering. She was taking notes, and he couldn't blame her.

Nothing worked. Whizzing Whizbangs failed to budge the petrified slab of old reports. Repeated hexes were absorbed into the pile. Shoving only led to bruises and multiple papercuts. Parchmentcuts. Whichever. Probably both, knowing Potter.

"Maybe if we had lava," Su Li said thoughtfully.

"It's fighting back," Malcolm said, ignoring her. He was grimly certain of it-somewhere along the line, The Desk had acquired a life of its own, a bloody-minded sentience. It wouldn't easily let itself be denuded-Malcolm was almost certain it had even started grumbling at him at one point, and the words it hadn't quite been able to pronounce had all been rather filthy.

"How does Potter stand it?" Su Li asked incredulously. "Perhaps we should just...send in a house elf?"

"You fool, Granger would rip out our spines!" Malcolm cried. "And return them to us by shoving them down our gullets!"

"Graphic, but accurate," Su Li sighed. "Perhaps we should send in Weasley, then."

Malcolm considered it, but reluctantly shook his head. "No. Not until we've exhausted every other possibility. First, I want to alert the Minister."

Su Li smiled slowly and viciously. "Checkmate."

Minister Shacklebolt took one look at his old office and shuddered. "My God," he breathed. "I'm not going near that thing."