Disclaimer: I do not own, nor do I make any money, from Harry Potter.
Summary: What do you get when you mix Weasley Wheezes, Death Eaters, Gryffindors, and gunpowder? The answer is, my dear readers, simple: revolution...glorious, explosive revolution.
"When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty."
–Author Unauthenticated
"Can you believe this shite?"
Ron threw down the paper with a disgusted scoff. Harry and Hermione winced at his bad manners, but refrained from commenting. The tension between the triad of friends could be felt. Going on three months now, they had been trapped in this house with only brief forays out into the world beyond. None of them had missed neither the ever-present Death Eater posted across the street from Grimmauld Place nor the constant articles in the Daily Prophet about a certain Undesirable Number One. Harry had stopped caring so much about those—Ron was usually angry enough for all of them. Assuming that one such article was the cause of Ron's outburst, Harry asked Hermione to pass the honey.
"How can you eat at a time like this?" Ron demanded, slamming his fist on the table beside his own plate. The force of the blow made Harry's tea and Hermione's coffee ripple and threaten to overflow their cups. Their bowls of porridge remained unaffected, however, as good porridge should. "They just enacted another law restricting the movements of muggleborns and—and this, I quote—'suspicious persons'! How can you just calmly eat while we lose more ground?"
Harry couldn't help thinking about how Ron must be channeling Hermione in this indigent outrage. Truly, the redhead was practically foaming at the mouth with anger. Harry blinked at him owlishly from behind his glasses as if trying to figure him out. Hermione was the socially minded one of them. Ron was quidditch-obsessed. Did he wake up in an alternative universe? Pity it wasn't one where Voldemort didn't exist...
He looked at Hermione, desperate for some normalcy. Which he got considering that she was reading the article that had so offended Ron. He could only watch as the bushy-haired witch got increasingly and quite visibly upset as she read. Sensing an impending explosion, Harry looked away and tucked into his breakfast. It wasn't that he didn't care about these laws—he did —it was just that there had been so many of them in the last three months since the Death Eaters had had their coup, that it was getting quite foolish to get so viciously upset about them. They had bigger things to worry about than politics. They had two Horcruxes in their possession—thank you, Kreacher—a lead on a third, and still no way to destroy any of them. Laws that would be repealed when they've won the war were the least of their worries.
"Why, I have half a mind to pull a Guy Fawkes and—"
Hermione cut herself off with a click of her teeth. Both Harry and Ron looked at her. Ron's confusion was understandable as was Harry's expression of growing surprise. The two muggle-raised magicians gave each other a measuring look. Their meals lay on the table forgotten. Then they began to speak, interrupting each other and completing thoughts as if they were Fred and George.
"Do you think—"
"It ought to. Masks?"
"Oh, definitely. But where would get—"
"Transfiguration should work, but the Ministry—"
"Polyjuice, obviously—We'd have to buy it this late in the game—Wheezes?"
"A must," Harry agreed. Both Harry and Hermione wore enormous smirks on their faces. This was something to do, and it cried out to Harry's desire for action. Research was all fine and dandy, but with Kreacher doing much of the legwork collecting the Horcruxes, there was no need for more planning or strategizing. This house arrest was making him squirrelly.
"Are you two nutters done imper-imperson—pretending to be the twins? Can you explain what that was all about?"
They broke gaze to look at Ron. Then they looked back at each other. Then looking once more at Ron, they spoke in unison as if they had planned it all along.
"Remember, Remember
The Fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason, and plot
I see no reason
Why the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot."
Ron stared at them dumbly for a moment, looking for all the world like Dudley trying to figure out a word problem. Then his lips twitched and a foolish grin grew on his freckled face. When he spoke, it was with a tone of obvious mirth and clueless certainty.
"You're having me on," the youngest Weasley son announced. "Well, Merlin's saggy y-fronts, you are good, I'll admit it, but you've nothing on the twins, you know. You aren't very good. I still have no clue what the punch line is, but I'm sure it's hilarious."
"Oh, honestly," Hermione huffed irritatedly. "Wizards have no sense of history unless it involves magic in some way, shape, or form. It's a nursery rhyme, Ron. To remember an incident where a man named Guy Fawkes, through a conspiracy, tried to blow up the Parliament building. He wanted to start a revolution because of a series of laws enacted to persecute Catholics: by taking their property, their liberty, their lives. Sound familiar yet?"
Ron looked a bit sheepish around the edges, like he usually did after one of Hermione's lectures. Thankfully, he wasn't trying to start an argument or thinking they were trying to have one on him. Sensing that the conflict bubbling under the surface though, Harry quickly picked up the thread and explained just what he and Hermione had just planned, albeit in the loosest of ways.
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In the end, they were successful. They did a whole lot of damage and got their point across easily enough—especially as ministry workers began joining in on the fun. The battle lasted a whole six hours and destroyed three floors and six fireplaces. Many marked Death Eaters were killed and Voldemort driven into hiding. It bought them the time necessary to locate the remaining Horcruxes and someone who knew Fiendfyre. Turns out Snape—greasy-haired, large-nosed, he-who-killed-Albus-Dumbledore Snape—was a key person in securing Hogwarts during the revolution. Questioning under Vertiaserum revealed that the potion master had a very specific role appointed to him by the late and great headmaster.
But more than just the end of Voldemort's reign was accomplished that day: Guy Fawkes day became celebrated in the magical side of Britain and taught in school. Minerva McGonagall (for Snape was only too please to step down from the Headmaster position) had to get an exorcist to remove Binns, but that was a small price to pay for an update to the way wizards saw history.
And it was all because two muggle-raised teens proved that they remembered.
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Author's Note: I completely and utterly blame Loredian Lightsgrace for the idea behind this one. This is also what happens when I'm fighting with a story and am working on my third pot of coffee after splitting some red and fruity concoction with my girls. Waaaaaaaaaaaaay too much caffeine and sugar.
Looking forward to hearing from y'all.
~Magi Silverwolf
Loredian Lightsgrace