Harry Potter and Hermione Granger (Harmony)

Hermione breathed deeply, filling her lungs with the salty spray of the Indian Ocean. All around her was blue: a sparkling, Neptunian blue, rippling in every direction for as far as the eye could see. Already, she could feel the oppressive heat; the early-morning sun beat down on the bare skin of her tank-topped shoulders, leaving them cracked and itchy, and her hair was frizzing with sweat. Two more hours of direct sun exposure and she’d be well on her way to developing an in situ malignant melanoma.

And she wasn’t even naked yet.

Accompanying Hermione were two muggle men—strangers, who she’d met at the airport near Malé. The man steering the catamaran was a local from one of the nearby Maldivian islands, Dhiddhoo. Or perhaps Mulhadhoo? Hermione’s head was crammed so full of primitive survival skills and ID cards for edible tropical flora that she honestly couldn’t remember. The younger man, she was sure, was named Ethan. Scratch that—Nathan. Yes, definitely Nathan. The other person with her was her boyfriend Harry Potter.

At the moment, Nathan was standing precariously on one of the boat’s long wooden benches, one wave away from tumbling headfirst into the ocean. Even out of the water he looked half-drowned, completely overwhelmed by the heat and his twenty-kilo camera rig. His ginger hair was pasted against his forehead, and his pale, freckled skin looked red and flushed from the sun. He caught Hermione staring and shot her a cheeky grin.

“Almost there, Ms. Granger Mr. Potter. Give it fifteen minutes.”

She her mouth into a thin-lipped smile and turned back to the water. Up ahead, the green smudge of the island she’d call home was peeking over the horizon. Not for the first time, Hermione let her mind wander, racking her brain for why in Merlin’s name she agreed to do this. It was all Ginny’s fault. And also the War’s: Crucio definitely couldn’t be good for one’s brain cells.

At first, it had all seemed so provocative, so silly; the new magical entertainment Naked and Afraid Magical Edition had put out a casting call for survival experts who were willing to rough it naked in the wild to prove that niche skillsets have value in the right context. Hermione had mentioned the show to Harry one morning as a laugh, over her nutritionally-balanced breakfast in Grimmauld Place.

Of course, Hermione had underestimated her boyfriend here as Harry began to grow curious about it. Hermione never figured Harry was the type to be interested in it and from what she read the show was mainly magicals only. Sure, survival skills were a must but by the sound of it magic was given a cripple in the areas they were to be surviving in.

The pair talked about it and Hermione had to admit she was interested after a bit. She and Harry had survived in the wilderness on their own during a war. After Ron had left them, the pair had finally been able to acknowledge their feelings for each other and after a few pleasurable stays in luxury hotels in the muggle world Ron was a distant memory for them.

They ended the conversation but it seems the world was conspiring against them to take part. Ginny had commented on the show enough times to give Hermione the desire for it while Ron had commented about his and Lavender's trips to nude beaches to get Harry interested.

Eventually the couple agreed to send in a heavily embellished application to shut everyone up about it. But the couple did confine that they were interested in the show to say the very least. There was something about surviving with no clothes, minimal to no magical aid, no nothing but their brains that felt like the ultimate test; a real, primal examination that no OWL or NEWT could give her. Passing meant life or , and her survival came down to her wits versus nature.

Now, on the back of a catamaran in the Indian Ocean, Hermione was starting to seriously regret her decision. She’d studied, hard, as always. Consulted all the relevant literature; made checklists and checked them; flown to Australia to visit her parents at their muggle hippie commune and them to teach her naked fire-starting skills. Hermione was confident that she had done as much, if not more, to prepare for this test than her usual level of absolute over-preparedness.

Harry was supportive since he was also stuck on this contest as well. Neither of them expected to be give a call but then again when your Harry Potter and Hermione Granger people will pull down their pants when you ask them to.

From this distance, the island looked like a tropical paradise: green and lush, with a white sandy beach ribboning the perimeter. It was positioned some 50 meters to the left of an even larger, lusher island, reminding her somewhat of a child and its watchful parent.

She could see the silhouette of a catamaran, bobbing gently near the shoreline, but it was still too far away for any real detail. She squinted—If only she could make out the people—but a sunray caught a wave and threw itself up at her face, blinding her.

"Nervous?" Harry asked as he stood next to Hermione.

"Very." Hermione admitted as she and her boyfriend observed the island from afar.

"Having a case of what the bloody hell we were thinking?" Harry asked as well which Hermione nodded.

"Yes, and I claim temporary insanity." Hermione responded making it clear they had second thoughts now.

"Mr. Potter Ms. Granger." Nathan was heard getting the couples attention. "We're five from the shore." Nathan said as the couple looked to the man. "Time for the boat interview."

The Couple Cringed in response but knew that it had to be done. The pair turned around, flashing the camera their best not-nervous-and-definitely-in-control kind of smile. “What should I say?” Hermione asked as she was going first on this,

“Anything you’d like as long as you stop with the face. It’s creepy?" Nathan said with a grin to which Hermione stopped smiling “Don’t worry,” he said, pushing his sweaty bangs out of his eyes, “I’m just going to ask a couple of questions. Nice and easy. We just need some sound bites to, y’know, chop up in post and make you two look like a terrorist.” He clarified with a small joke to which the pair gave him a quick “Ha-ha.” Out of pity.

“Okay, so. You’re a couple of war heroes about to get naked." Nathan said as he looked to the pair. "How you lot feeling about this?" He asked looking to the pair.

“Fine,” Hermione said while a bit annoyed that his first question was the most obvious.

"I mean we survived a war this won't be much different minus people actively trying to kill us." Harry added as he tried to be a bit cheerful about this.

"And the extra breeze will be refreshing." Hermione added trying to relieve the tension a bit on her part.

“Uh-huh.” He gave her a wink. “Refreshing.” He added gesturing to Harry a bit with his eyes.

Hermione cursed herself for blushing knowing what was implied and how true it was.

“Alrighty,” Nathan continued getting back on track. “Moving on in your files it says you were given a Primitive Survival Rating of 5.3. Not bad, not great—just average." Nathan said as he looked to the pair. "Care to comment?” He asked to which Harry shrugged a bit but Hermione was not so happy about it.

Hermione willed herself to stay composed. One more mention of her abysmally average PSR and she was going to jump ship and swim her way back to jolly old England, sharks and human physiology be damned.

As per the Naked and Afraid tradition of ruining Hermione’s life, all contestants were given a Primitive Survival Rating at the beginning of their twenty-one-day survival journey. Basically, a PSR was a professional assessment of how likely you were to shit the bed on a scale from one to ten, and according to the so-called “experts” at whatever clown college the production team sourced their numbers from, Hermione was pretty much destined to fail before she’d even had the chance to being.

Sure, she hadn’t expected anything crazy; even a 6 or 7 would have sufficed. But a 5.3? After all the work she’d put into embellishing her run from Voldemort and his men (“Extended eight-month portage! Completely off the grid! Almost didn’t make it out alive!”), was that really the best they could come up with? It was insulting.

“It is what it is,” Harry said, while shrugging as modest as he was dumb at times.

“Personally, I’m confident in both my own and my boyfriends' skills." Hermione said as she went on taking command of the interview. "You’ll just have to stick around and see what I’m capable of.” Hermione said and thus Nathan smirked to this.

“You can count on it,” Nathan said, winking again. Just then their catamaran stopped some ten metres from the shore. The pair turned, and saw camera operators standing awkwardly on the beach, the island looked empty from what they could see.

"Well time to get started." Nathan said as he looked to the pair. "Cloths off then swim to shore." Nathan said as he looked to the pair. "And be sure to take these." Nathan added as he pulled out a pair of wand straps one of the very few things, they were allowed to carry with them.

After a moment’s hesitation, Hermione reached down and started untying her shoelaces. There was no point in prolonging the inevitable. It would be best to get this over with, fast, like a band-aid. At the end of the day, she reasoned, skin was skin, and it wouldn’t matter how she looked once she actually got down to surviving. Anyway, it wasn’t like she was ugly.

Harry followed suit not long after as he took off his T-Shirt and Shorts after taking off the shoes he brought along for this contest. Once the pair were completely undressed, the couple took the wand straps and tied them on so they could at least use their magic during this contest. The pair then leaned on the edge of the boat to scope out the water and noted that it was shallow and clear with a good chance of being warm.

The couple knew that sharks or other undesirable reef creatures probably wouldn’t venture past the edge of the surrounding coral. But that did not stop their stomachs from lurching from what they were about to do. Harry hated being looked at and this would be putting a lot of eyes on them. Hermione meanwhile saw this as the final plunge because once she entered that water there’d be no going back; unless she starved to or tapped out. But she’d have plenty of time to consider those possibilities later.

Looking to Harry the pair nodded to each other as they had each other to get through this. With their conviction steeled and choice maid they jumped into the water. After taking a moment to catch their breath the pair began to swim to shore.

After several painfully long minutes the pair eventually arrived at the shore. Once there they saw the scene and in turn knew this might be a long month. At least the initial view is breathtaking to say the least.

A.) Another Interview

B.) Start Day 1