Submission for QLFC Round Three
Chaser #1 for the Chudley Cannons
Prompt: The Kabuki Dance of Japan; write about a character, excluding Neville, who spends most of their time behind the scenes, but eventually gets their moment to shine
Optional Prompts: 2. (action) dancing the tango, 7. (object) snow, 11. (emotion) happiness
Word Count:1533
Percy couldn't remember a time when he'd had either of his parent's full attention all to himself. He was sure, for some time after he was born, he must have had the majority of it, but that time was over as soon as the twins came along.
He didn't blame them, of course, but being the middle child was difficult, especially when you weren't even the only middle child.
Barely a toddler, the young Percy had decided not to make more trouble for his parents. Mrs. Weasley had enough to deal with, and it was for the best if he did as he was told, followed all the rules, and didn't make any more trouble than he could help making.
He rarely got attention that way, but young Percy wasn't bothered by it, because if he was good, then his mother had more time for the twins, and Merlin, did they need it. There would be time for his parents to notice him when they were grown.
But then there was Ronald, and Ginevra, and it turned out there was never time for Percy.
That was okay, though, because then he was off to Hogwarts. People would notice him there, finally.
He wasn't wrong. He did get noticed, just not by his classmates.
Every teacher was full of praise for Percy. He was a perfect model of obedience, but it made him no friends. On the other hand, it didn't really make him any enemies, either.
Percy was top of his class, and he was a prefect, and then he was Head Boy, but no matter how much he followed the rules, all it got him was scorn, even from his own family.
Well, if his family wouldn't appreciate him, he'd try elsewhere.
Percy wasn't rich, he wasn't noticeable, and he wasn't popular. All he ever had was following the rules. It was all he knew to do.
So that's what he did.
He got a job at the Ministry because that's where the rules were made, and Percy wanted power over those rules.
He worked hard at his job, there was no doubt of that, and it paid off when he got promoted to Junior Assistant to the Minister of Magic. Mostly that meant he took notes and ran errands for Fudge, but Percy didn't care.
He was brimming with happiness when he told his family the news, but they promptly shut him down.
"Percy, they're only trying to keep track of us, and Harry and Dumbledore."
"They're using you, Perce."
Percy had protested. They weren't using him; he was a hard worker, and he deserved this promotion. They were all wrong.
"Percy, they've spelled the wool so far down over your eyes they could be dancing the tango on your face and you wouldn't know it," one of his brothers said. It didn't much matter which; they all felt the same way, and it stung, that they thought so little of him. His family had never really cared much for him anyway, though, had they?
There was quite a bit of yelling, after that, and then Percy left.
He'd been the one following the rules, so why had it all fallen apart?
The snow fell thickly that Christmas, as Percy sat alone in his flat with his pathetic dinner for one, watching it Errol make his erratic trip back through the falling flakes with his jumper.
His mother had been the only one to remember him.
His mind flew to memories of past Christmases in the Burrow, his raucous family tearing open their gifts carelessly. Percy had never ripped the wrapping paper. His presents were always opened carefully, the wrapping paper folded and saved for another year.
Wasn't that his whole life, there? His family making loud, dramatic, unnecessary scenes, and Percy, overlooked in the back, embarrassed by the spectacle and trying to salvage the smallest of pieces.
He looked around his empty flat bitterly.
He'd shown them, hadn't he?
He should've apologized, he realized, after it was too late. After the Ministry fell.
Assistant to the Minister didn't mean as much when it was really Voldemort behind the scenes. Percy watched his precious rules become twisted and perverted and wondered when he'd gotten so blind.
He was watched, constantly. His break with his family still hadn't put him totally above suspicion. The paranoia had him constantly on edge, which was probably why he found himself at the Hog's Head one evening with an Endless Firewhisky.
Percy wasn't the kind of drunk that got into bar fights (Charlie), or got excessively emotional (Bill, surprisingly), and he especially wasn't the kind of drunk that suddenly became the life of the party (Ronald). No, Percy was the kind of drunkard that got quietly sloshed and increasingly melancholy.
Aberforth had watched him cautiously for the first hour, but when Percy didn't display any inclination to do anything except sit on the barstool and nurse his drink, his glare relented.
Two hours into Percy's pity party, he was startled by Aberforth suddenly speaking.
"It'll all be comin' to an end soon."
Percy squinted at him, confused. Aberforth met his eyes stoically.
"Everything alright with your drink, Mr. Weasley?"
Percy knew he must look foolish with his mouth hanging slightly open, and quickly closed it.
"Yes. Yes, it's fine," he said, and then he paused. "Keep me posted?"
Aberforth's twinkling eye really was a lot like his brother's, Percy thought, as it winked at him.
"Watch out for my goat," the gruff man said, and then turned toward the other end of the bar, completely ignoring him.
Percy suddenly found he was done with moping.
"It's started," the Patronus said, and then it leapt away on cloven hooves, going to warn the next person.
Percy stared after it.
He could stay here, in his office, or he could go, and join the fight.
Oh, who was he kidding? He strode to the floo, grabbed a handful of the green powder on the mantel, and stepped in.
"The Hog's Head."
He was ready.
Well. He thought he was, anyway.
Percy scrambled awkwardly out of the tunnel behind Ariana's portrait, overbalancing and falling over. He pulled himself up on the nearest chair, looked around and said, "Am I too late? Has it started? I only just found out, so I – I –"
He spluttered into silence, not having expected to run into most of his family. There was a long moment of astonishment, broken by Fleur turning to Lupin and saying, in a wildly transparent attempt to break the tension, "So - 'ow eez leetle Teddy?"
Lupin blinked at her, startled. The silence between Percy and his family seemed to be solidifying, like ice.
"I – oh yes – he's fine!" Lupin said loudly. "Yes, Tonks is with him – at her mother's."
Percy could barely breath, frozen.
"Here, I've got a picture!" Lupin shouted, pulling a photograph from inside his jacket and showing it to Fleur and Harry, who saw a tiny baby with a tuff of bright turquoise hair, waving fat fists at the camera.
"I was a fool!" Percy roared, unable to bear it any longer, and Lupin nearly dropped his photograph. "I was an idiot, I was a pompous prat, I was a – a –"
"Ministry-loving, family-disowning, power-hungry moron," said Fred.
Percy swallowed hard.
"Yes, I was."
"Well, you can't say fairer than that," said Fred, holding his hand out, and Percy took it, choking on a smile and a sob.
His mother burst into tears, and ran forward, pushing Fred aside to pull him into a strangling hug.
"I'm sorry, Dad," Percy said, meeting his father's eyes over his mother's back.
His father blinked rather rapidly, and then Percy found himself enveloped between both of his parents. He couldn't help the tears that escaped, overcome with happiness.
"What made you see sense, Perce?" George asked, when he was finally released from his parent's hug.
"It's been coming on for a while," said Percy, mopping his eyes under his glasses with a corner of his traveling cloak. "But I had to find a way out and it's not so easy at the Ministry, they're imprisoning traitors all the time. I managed to make contact with Aberforth and he tipped me off ten minutes ago that Hogwarts was going to make a fight of it, so here I am."
"Well, we do look to our prefects to take a lead at times such as these," said George in a good imitation of Percy's most pompous manner. "Now let's get upstairs and fight, or all the good Death Eaters'll be taken."
Percy grinned. "Yes, let's."
"Hello, Minister!" Percy bellowed, taking vicious satisfaction in the jinx he landed on Thicknesse. "Did I mention I'm resigning?"
"You're joking, Perce!" shouted Fred as the Death Eater he was battling collapsed under the weight of three separate Stunning Spells. Thicknesse had fallen to the ground with tiny spikes erupting all over him; he seemed to be turning into some form of sea urchin. Fred looked at him with glee, and Percy felt a jolt of happiness at his brother's unexpected appreciation.
"You actually are joking, Perce… I don't think I've heard you joke since you were —"