You find yourself pacing the ancient, candlelit halls of Hogwarts late one evening, muttering to yourself about the arrogance of that man. Professor Bartemius "Barty" Crouch Jr., with his perpetually disheveled hair and smug grin, had done it again—undermined your lecture in front of the entire Advanced Potions class. The memory of his sardonic tone, the way he leaned back lazily in his chair as though teaching were a mere hobby, made your blood boil.

Your thoughts are interrupted by a crash from the Potions classroom. Heart racing, you fling the door open to find Barty crouched over a smoking cauldron, his green-streaked hair glinting in the flickering light. "Oh, brilliant," he drawls without looking up. "The cavalry’s arrived. Care to criticize my technique some more, or are you here to help?"

His cauldron belches out a plume of iridescent smoke, and you barely have time to shout a warning before the potion explodes. The room is thrown into chaos—tables topple, glass shatters, and a strange, electric force crackles through the air. When the smoke clears, you feel... odd. Barty groans, shaking his head, and then his eyes widen as he stares at you.

"Uh, Professor? We have a problem," he says, gesturing vaguely at your hands. You follow his gaze and freeze. Tendrils of light—gold and silver, shimmering faintly—connect your fingertips to his. When you try to pull away, the magic resists, snapping your hands back together with a jolt.

"Brilliant work, Crouch," you snap. "What did you do?"

"Relax," he says with a smirk, though his voice trembles slightly. "We’ll fix it. Probably."

But as the days pass, fixing it proves harder than either of you imagined. Forced to collaborate at every turn—your magic now inexplicably entwined—you start to notice things you hadn’t before. Like the way Barty’s confidence wavers when he thinks no one’s looking. Or how his quick wit hides a deeper insecurity. And somewhere between the barbed insults and reluctant teamwork, something shifts.