A/N: above/to the side, you will see an attempt I made a while back at Ava and Lily. Not sure why I didn't attach it sooner, I guess I just forgot about it. But anyway. Here they are. Lily is obvs the MCR fan.

*'*'*'*

Rose had trouble processing reality after Voldemort hung up. The terrible feeling
building inside her was the only thing anchoring her to reality at that point. That, and the burning hate for Panther and all the bullshit that came out of her mouth.

— Scorpius, give up on life? The Scorpius who Rose knew would never. But then again, Rose didn't know this Scorpius.

There they were, back again in that four-roomed cell with the teasing little block of sunlight trickling in. Scorpius slumped down against the wall and stared unseeingly at the opposite wall, and Rose strode the length of the tiny room and back again. Unsuccessfully, she tried to force herself into the frame of mind necessary for drawing up an escape plan.

She'd had a plan, hadn't she? Yes... something... but her brain was foggy and Scorpius wasn't helping, just sitting there like a rock, watching something that was invisible to Rose with his sad, sad eyes. Where did his cold eyes go? What had really taken that barrier down within the past days? Panther... that bitch.

"Malfoy," Rose said decisively, stopping in front of him and putting her hands on her hips. "Snap out of it. I need your help with the plan."

Goddamnit, she'd just asked Scorpius Malfoy for help, hadn't she. She'd never do that in her right mind. This place was taking its toll on all of them. They had to get out, and soon...

Scorpius raised his eyebrows a little, tilting his chin up to study Rose's face. "The plan, huh? What's the point? We may as well just let our families figure it out. They'll get us outta here eventually."

That stumped Rose for a second. "But that's the thing, they're our families. As long as we're here we're just dragging them down. We have to get out — then we can even expose Voldemort's location to the police. And family doesn't let each other down." Unless you're Hugo Weasley, she added silently.

And Scorpius just shrugged.

"Family," Rose persisted, her temper rising. "Doesn't that mean anything to you?" It means nothing to Hugo.

"Nah," said Scorpius, with an alarming amount of indifference. "In my experience, family just hurts each other. And in yours, too, I would think."

Rose's heart sank. Of course he would say that — of course he would give up — of course he just didn't even fucking care. Of course he was Scorpius Malfoy and he wasn't anything like the boy she'd held hands with in seventh grade.

"The sewers," said Rose.

Scorpius' head snapped up, eyebrows raised. "The sewers?"

Rose drew a shaky breath. "How well do you know your way around down there?"

He sat up a little straighter, hooked on her budding proposition. "Well, I can navigate them if we can somehow obtain a flashlight and figure out exactly where we are."

"That isn't something we have time to figure out."

"Then this is pointless." He sagged back down again.

"No, it's not. Listen to me, Malfoy." Rose strode the length of the room again, once, twice, thrice. "Just outside this room, there's a grate. I saw it earlier today, it's one of those ones you can lift up without too much trouble. If we can get down there, will we be able to get to somewhere we know? Just think about it for a minute."

There was a stiff silence, in which Scorpius bit his bottom lip and stared down at his hands. He seemed to do that a lot. Then, "Yeah. Yeah, okay. So here's what we'll do. The pipes that run under the road, they have grates about every five, eight minutes. If we can get to those we'll be able to get out at some point."

"How?"

"You know those drain grates that are on the sides of the road? If we can find one of those, we'll be able to push it open and get out. Make it home on foot. We don't have to take the Potters with us, the police can bust them out if we make it back."

"That's a big if," Rose noted. "But okay."

Scorpius looked up at her inscrutably. "You got a pen or a pencil?"

"Why?"

"Just give me one if you have one."

"I don't have any."

"Shit."

Scorpius got to his feet and brushed past Rose, stopping in front of the door. He rolled his shoulders back, and the leather of his jacket crinkled, and he raised a fist.

Rose stiffened. "What are you doing?"

He didn't reply. Thud thud, went his fist on the bolted door. Thud. "Open up!"

A large clanking could be heard from outside, and then the door swung open halfway. A gun was suddenly in Scorpius' face. Rose gasped and sprang back, heart thudding.

"No need for that," Scorpius said calmly, staring down the length of the gun unflinchingly and raising his hands. "We just need a pen."

The Death Eater guard stepped around the door. "A pen," he said slowly, as if he wasn't entirely sure what exactly a pen was.

"Yes, a pen. See, Rose's anxiety is kicking in, and if she doesn't calm down somehow, she'll go on full-out panic attack mode. Usually she draws to calm herself down when her anxiety spikes. It's what her therapist recommended, you know."

Well, that was unexpected — and the Death Eater clearly thought so too, because he lowered his gun hand a little, turning to scrutinize Rose. She stood frozen — what was she supposed to do? Cry? Collapse? Breathe rapidly? She had no idea what Scorpius had in mind — so she did all of those things. Well, a strange mixture of them.

Slowly, uncertainly, the Death Eater lowered his gun and reached into his pocket, producing a green ballpoint pen.

"Thank you so much, it really means a lot," Scorpius gushed — Scorpius Malfoy gushing? Will wonders never cease? Rose shook her head as the door swung closed again, locking them in.

"What was that for?" Rose demanded, dropping her anxiety-stricken facade. "Anxiety? Seriously?"

Scorpius tossed her the pen, letting out a short, humourless laugh. "The more false info they have, the better. That pen is for marking our route in the pipes. So we can come back with the police and bust old Voldy."

Rose turned the shiny pen over in her hands. "Oh, okay. Smart. But I don't even act like I have anxiety! It's unrealistic."

"So? What does it matter? We'll be outta here by tonight."

"If we can get out the door and past the guards, yeah." Rose watched him carefully, already moulding her own plan to fit his. Reaching into the pocket on her skirt, she dug around and produced a little jar of her favourite anti-bitch solution — pepper spray.

"They never took it away," Rose explained. "I guess they just never found it."

"Shit," said Scorpius. "Shit. You carry pepper spray around with you?"

"So? You never know when it might be necessary."

"Still!"

"Knock it off. It's a tiny bottle."

"Still terrifying."

"Shut up or I'll spray you."

And then an unsettled silence descended upon them, and the realization exploded in the dead air like a death-bearing missile — the realization that this, this playful banter, was the way they used to communicate... before everything went sour and they stopped communicating at all. Rose was almost tempted to bring it up — to bring them up — but these things are like cliff jumping; you get right to the edge, all ready to jump, but then you look down and you just can't.

"So tonight," she said instead.

"Tonight," Scorpius agreed, his voice dripping with unspoken things, and his eyes went cold again.

*'*'*'*

A/N: yeah so I went on this loooooong sailing trip with my friend. And the parentals decided that we had to take a break from our devices which meant I couldn't write or Wattpad or ANYTHING for over a week. Yup. Torture. Also, sorry for this very short crappy filler. But you have my excuse. So there.

~ an dead Unicorn Queen