Chapter 42: The Volatile Cupboard and the Solvent of Seams part-2
I gave the jar a mental shove.
It tipped. It fell.
Smash.
The glass shattered on the stone floor right between their feet. A gallon of ultra-slick, magical oil spread instantly.
"What was that?" Hermione jumped.
Her movement caused her boot to hit the oil slick.
Friction left the chat.
"Whoa!" Hermione yelped.
Her feet shot out from under her. She fell backward.
Harry, hearing her cry, turned around.
"Hermione!"
He tried to catch her. But as he stepped back to brace himself, he stepped into the oil.
His legs flew up.
They both went down in the cramped space. It was a tangle of limbs and panic.
Harry hit the back wall and slid down. Hermione crashed into him, landing squarely in his lap.
Crash. Bang.
Their impact shook the shelves.
(Phase Two: The Solvent.)
The vibration caused the jar of Solvent of Binding on the shelf above them to wobble.
(Telekinesis: Tip it over.)
The jar tipped. The lid, which I had conveniently loosened with my Poltergeist Proxy a second earlier, fell off.
The clear liquid poured down.
It splashed directly onto Hermione's chest.
"Ah! Cold!" Hermione screamed.
"Are you hurt?" Harry yelled, trying to scramble up but slipping on the oil. "Is it acid?"
"I don't know!" Hermione panicked, patting her chest. "It smells like... turpentine!"
The solvent did its job. It was designed to dissolve magical bindings, glues and tough stitching.
Hermione's canvas boiler suit was a marvel of engineering. But the zipper was sewn in. The seams were stitched.
The solvent ate through the thread instantly.
Zip.
The zipper, suddenly freed from the fabric holding it, simply fell off.
The seams holding the front panels of the boiler suit together dissolved.
The stiff canvas fell open like a blooming flower.
Underneath, Hermione was wearing a simple white tank top. But the solvent had splashed there too.
The straps of the tank top were held together by stitching.
Snap. Snap.
The straps gave way. The front of the tank top fell down.
Hermione was sitting in Harry's lap, in a dark cupboard, covered in oil. Her boiler suit was open. Her tank top was down.
She was completely topless.
(...cough...)
Harry, who had his arms around her to stabilize them in the slippery mess, suddenly felt skin. A lot of skin.
"Hermione," Harry whispered, his voice cracking. "Your suit."
"It... it opened," Hermione breathed, freezing. "Did the potion melt it?"
"I think so," Harry said. He looked down.
In the dim light filtering through the keyhole, he saw the pale curve of her breasts pressed against his robes. The oil on the floor had slicked everything, making her skin gleam slightly.
"Don't look," Hermione whimpered, but she didn't move. She couldn't move. The floor was like ice. If she moved, she would slip and possibly hurt herself.
"I am trying," Harry said, squeezing his eyes shut. "But... Hermione, we are stuck. The oil is everywhere."
"Just hold me," she whispered, burying her face in his neck. "Just hold me until Snape comes back. If I move, I will flash you more."
"You have already flashed me everything," Harry pointed out, his voice trembling. "There is nothing left to hide."
"Shut up, Harry," she sobbed softly.
But then, something shifted.
The "Pheromone" effect from my previous rewards, combined with the "Dream Weaver" conditioning, kicked in.
Harry opened his eyes. He looked down at the girl in his arms. She was soft, warm and smelling of vanilla and motor oil.
He tightened his grip. His hand, slippery with oil, slid up her bare back.
Hermione gasped. She pulled back slightly to look at him.
Her movement pressed her bare chest firmly against his chest.
"Harry," she breathed. Her eyes were wide, dark and dilated.
"Hermione," Harry whispered.
They stared at each other in the gloom. The tension was electric. It was no longer just embarrassment. It was raw attraction.
"You are slippery," Harry noted dumbly.
"It is the oil," she murmured.
Harry leaned in. He couldn't help himself. The universe (and I) was pushing him.
He brushed his lips against her forehead. Then her cheek.
Hermione didn't pull away. She tilted her head up.
Just as their lips were about to touch...
CLICK.
The lock on the door disengaged.
Light flooded the cupboard as the door swung open.
"Detention is over," Snape's voice drawled. "I trust you have..."
Snape stopped.
He stood in the doorway, silhouetted by the classroom light. He looked down.
He saw the shattered jars. He saw the oil slick.
And he saw Harry Potter and Hermione Granger tangled on the floor. Hermione's boiler suit was wide open, her top was gone and she was straddling Harry, who had his hands all over her bare back.
(...cough...)
The entire class craned their necks to see.
"My eyes!" Malfoy shouted gleefully from the back. "Granger is at it again!"
"Miss Granger," Snape said softly, his voice dripping with venomous amusement. "I asked you to organize the cupboard, not use it for... illicit activities."
Hermione shrieked. She grabbed the sides of her boiler suit and pulled them shut, covering herself. She scrambled backward, slipping and sliding on the oil, looking like a seal trying to climb an ice floe.
Harry scrambled up, slipping and crashing into a shelf, knocking down a jar of dead spiders which rained onto his head.
"We fell!" Harry shouted, his face purple. "The oil! The jars broke! It ate her clothes!"
"A likely story, Potter," Snape sneered. "Twenty points from Gryffindor. For destruction of school property. And for... public indecency. Get out of my sight. Both of you."
Hermione didn't wait. She clutched her canvas suit closed with a death grip and ran. She slid out of the room, past the snickering Slytherins and vanished into the corridor.
Harry followed, dripping oil and spiders.
"System Alert," the voice chimed, triumphant. "Incident recorded. Type: The 'Cupboard Confession'. Total upper body exposure in a confined space. Sustained physical contact. Oil-enhanced intimacy. Target: Hermione Granger. Participant: Harry Potter. Rating: SS-class. Reward: Skill 'Pheromone Control (Minor)' and one hundred attribute points."
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