Patrick was amused. In front of him was one of the strangest looking men he had ever seen. His face was wrinkled, but portrayed a calm, patient expression, yet his eyes were alive, twinkling in the light. He could tell this would be fun.

The flickering light from the candles on the wall brought some of the wooden interior to light, swathing the rest in shadow. But he stepped in anyways, ignoring the sudden feeling of anxiety about the truth. Pssh, why was he anxious? There was nothing to be anxious about.

Jane looked up at McGonagall from his seat, and waited for her to continue. Because she would definitely continue, he just knew it. Probably because she was holding a stack of papers and books that were slowly coming towards him.

He wasn't ashamed to admit that his mind was actually hurting. Dumbledore had mentioned that for an untrained mind, it might take him a while to get used to the sensations, but he wasn't expecting a headache.

Putting his cup back down, he picked the item up with his free hand and just grinned manically.  Oh, this would be a glorious day, and they had no idea.

And if he had felt any sort of guilt at looking through Bedhead's stuff without permission, it had disappeared completely upon first opening the book, and seeing the inscription: This book is the property of the Half-Blood Prince.

Jane had moved on from butterbeer. Because as sweet and delicious as it was, it didn't have the same alluring sound of Firewhisky.

The fireplace in the office suddenly glowed a bright green, the flames turning emerald and roaring with a new, sudden life.  Jane jumped up - why hadn't Lisbon and the rest come earlier? All the interesting stuff was happening as soon as they had shown up!

If he had this much trouble facing a memory, how was he supposed to find Red John and finally get his revenge; what would actually happen when he tried facing the real thing?

 They both turned to face the source of the noise, and were met with an unlikely sight. What looked like a flare was shooting up into the sky, leaving behind it a trail of smoke. They watched as it circled, and curved, tracing an unmistakable and familiar outline into the sky...

The sun was out, though it was still low in the eastern sky, the morning still being relatively early. It took Jane a moment to realize why the courtyard wasn’t full of procrastinating students – the rising horizon was betraying just how early in the morning it was. It suited him just fine; he didn’t want to talk, except for the person next to him.

The morning paper had already been delivered earlier that day. And yet, there was quite unmistakably a newspaper attached to the owl. He wondered what could have been so important that a second edition was printed the same day and immediately distributed...