Better Be Vigilant

by Promise10

A look at what might have happened if someone else, namely Alastor Moody, had taken in Harry Potter and raised him. Will Hogwarts be ready to face a teenager with a paranoid mind and traits no sane person should possess? Initial plot and some source material by Rorschach's Blot, and used with his consent.

Disclaimer: If you ever had the doubt that I am sane and wise, this should remove all those silly suspicions. Oh, and I am not J. K. Rowling. Best to mention that before I forget about it.

Minerva looked sadly at the house where 'those dreadful muggles' lived and tried again to convince Albus that it was no place to leave a magical child.

"I'm sorry Minerva but . . ." Albus slumped to the ground, the victim of a powerful stunner.

"Albus" Minerva cried before joining him in the land of nod.

Out of the shadows came a heavily scarred man with a horrible grin. Using several well practiced wand movements he modified their memories, "You dropped the boy off, you don't think Figg will be needed, and if you ever need someone to check on the boy then you'll call your old pal Moody."

"I just couldn't let Albus leave you here lad," he wrapped a scarred hand around the sleeping child's basket and gave a rather frightening smile, "you'd never reach your potential living here, but I promise you boy that with me teaching you you'll be great."

Baby Harry didn't awake at the sound of his new guardian's voice and the world changed. That is to say, the world shivered in fear and cursed all those unnamed individuals who had force fed Moody all those paranoia potions all those years ago.

"Constant Vigilance" Moody yelled at the two unconscious Professors before absconding into the night with the sleeping form of the boy-who-lived.

Unknown Location, ten years later . . .

Moody smirked as he entered his son's room. Gathering his energies he cast a stunner at the bed, "Constant Vig . . ."

His trademark phrase was cut short by the impact of a large blunt instrument to the side of his head.

"Constant Vigilance" eleven year old Harry cried as he began pummelling his 'father.'

Grunting in frustration, Moody grabbed his son's makeshift weapon, "what have I told you about attacking with a club?"

"Go for the soft tissue", Harry replied sullenly.

"And why didn't you follow that advice?" Moody's voice was dangerously calm.

"Because you taught me to go for the soft tissue" Harry replied quietly, "and I figured that you would be wearing groin protection of some kind."

"Decided to use my 'Constant Vigilance' against me eh?" Moody eyed the boy, "good job."

Harry brightened, "does that mean that I did the right thing?"

"Means that you're learning" Moody agreed, "Good job. The letter arrived for you today boy."

"What was in it?" Harry eyed his mentor wearily, trying to detect polyjuice, "Who sent it?"

"It was your Hogwarts Letter," Moody smirked, "and what makes you think that I checked it?"

"Constant Vigilance."

"That's my boy," the scarred man said proudly as he wiped a tear from the corner of his eye.

"What are we going to do about the letter?" Harry eyed his mentor, now looking for any opening in the older man's defence.

"Well," Moody responded, "I was thinking that we could go and get your school supplies, be a good idea to get you a wand that is on the record books anyway."

"So they don't think of looking for my other wands?"

"That's part of it," Moody agreed.

"Can I also get a new eye like yours?" Harry asked hopefully, "I don't like not knowing if there are people lurking about under invisibility cloaks."

"We'll see," Moody smiled indulgently.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

The station was filled with tearful good byes as family's put their children on the train to Hogwarts. No one noticed the two figures enshrouded in shadow.

"Well," Moody's eye spun. "You know what I expect you to do, so get to it."

"Yes father," Harry's eye spun too as he regarded the world with suspicion. "Do I have your permission to deal with any unsavoury situations that might crop up?"

"Course ya do son," Moody nodded and took a sip from his flask. "Just remember to keep a low profile."

"Yes father," Harry took a sip from his flask. "Will that be all?"

"One more thing," Moody had a lump in his throat. "Constant Vigilance."

"Yes father," Harry blinked away the forming tears and quashed the urge to hug his father, "You too."

"That's my boy," Moody smiled as he watched his son disillusion himself.

Harry silently boarded the train and set to work. After erecting several wards over his chosen compartment, he set out to find the snack cart.

"Why hello dear," the woman pushing the snack cart smiled down at the odd little boy with the spinning eye. "Couldn't wait for me to get to your compartment?"

"Petrificus Totalus", Harry glared down at the unmoving woman as he dragged her into his compartment. There was no way that he was going to fall for that old trick.

It took Harry twenty minutes to determine that the food in the cart was not poisoned, at least not poisoned with any poison that he could detect. Harry took a sip of his flask, and another fifteen minutes of questioning the woman with truth serum to determine that. Whoever she was, it didn't look like she was planning to kill him.

Looking down at his prisoner, Harry weighed his options.

"What are you going to do?" The snack cart lady asked fearfully.

"Obliviate", Harry frowned.

The woman blinked as she found herself standing in front of her snack cart, her eyes widened when she checked her watch. She was running late, those poor children that had gone so long without food.

Harry frowned as he watched from his place in the shadows, he had stayed in one place for too long. It was time to move. But, not before performing the customary sweep his pa had taught him.

Harry's grin grew nastier as he realised there was an Animagus in the train, a rat Animagus to be precise. He didn't know who it was, but there was no such people in Ministry's records. That meant...Hedwig would have a field day. He released his pet snowy owl after disabling the sixty-two anti-charms he had placed on her and commanded her to devour the rat.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Harry was clinging to the bottom of the coal car when the Hogwarts express pulled into the station, carefully waiting until all the students had disembarked. He dropped to the ground and began to follow them, still disillusioned. The thestral drawn carriages were graced that day with the presence of the first first-year student.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Minerva looked down at the next name on her list, after Sally-Anne Perks was . . . it took all of her immense will power to keep her stern expression. "Ha . . ." She froze as she felt the point of a wand dig into the back of her neck.

"You weren't planning to call my name out for all to hear were you?" Asked a child's voice that was filled with menace, "Why don't we just skip to the next name?"

"And why would I do that?" Minerva asked with a frown.

"Because if you don't . . . " The child gave a horrible and unseen leer, "then we'll have to see if the school's healer can reattach heads."

"I see," Minerva's frown deepened. "I suppose that you could walk up to the hat without having your name called out."

The child let out a wheezing laugh that would have sounded more menacing if it hadn't been so high pitched, "you expect me to walk up there in front of everyone? I don't think I'll be doing that."

"I suppose we could have a private sorting in the Headmaster's office later," Minerva smiled as she contemplated the amount of detention she was going to give to the little . . . angel that was holding her at wand point.

"You suppose wrong." Harry frowned, "I'm not going to let anybody go through my mind."

"Then how exactly are you planning to pick a house?" Minerva was two seconds away from doing something . . . regrettable.

"Not planning on having a house," Harry cackled and tossed a small object out into the center of the great hall.

Every eye in the room followed the object, which exploded in a flash of light when it hit the side of the Ravenclaw table.

"CONSTANT VIGILANCE." Harry screamed at the room full of temporally blinded students and staff, before turning to disappear through one of the unguarded doors.

"ALBUS," Minerva's streak cut through the noise made by the panicking students. "We're going to have a meeting after this."

Albus Dumbledore, a man regarded by many to be one of the most powerful men in the world let his smile slip. Things were not going the way he had planned, and for some reason he had a feeling that it was going to be one of those decades.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"Albus, what's wrong?"

The wise and old wizard blinked, "I think I've been obliviated."

"What?" Minerva pulled out her wand and began eyeing the shadows suspiciously...mostly because she had nothing better to do, "How can you tell?"

"I'm a master Legilimencer," the old wizard blinked again. "And I have a faint aftertaste in my mouth that leads me to believe that I've been given Veritaserum. I remember that I was walking to my office to have our meeting and I think I heard one of the students yell something, after that it's a blank. And the fact that I am missing Harry Potter's invisibility cloak which he would have needed to engage in incredible adventures."

"What did the student yell?" Minerva knew that she should have taken early retirement when it was offered, but noooo she had to decide that instructing Harry Potter was more important than lounging on a beach in the tropics. Well, she got what she wanted.

"I think it sounded like 'Constant Vigilance' or at least something that sounded like it," the old wizard winced. "I would really like to know how a first year was able to pull this off."

"Isn't that what Moody is always yelling?" Minerva asked with a frown.

"Minerva," Albus frowned. "Talk like that could lead me to have undue suspicion on my old friend...You don't want that, do you?"

"Oh," the Transfiguration Professor paused for a second. "What I meant to say was that I don't suspect a thing."

"Neither do I Minerva," Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Neither do I."

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Over the next few weeks, a wave of terror swept over Hogwarts. No one was safe from the thing that stalked the castles halls. It struck like lightning, screaming its catch phrase 'constant vigilance' and left its victims dazed and obliviated. Day after day and week after week and month after month, more and more people fell to the creature's magical might until one day . . .

"What's the meaning of all this?" Snape screamed at the young blood covered boy he found standing in front of one of the girl's toilets.

"What in Heaven's name happened here?" Minerva's sharp voice asked only seconds later.

"Petrificus Totalus, Petrificus Totalus." Harry glared down at the two Professors as he cast a dozen or so charms to prevent them from moving or posing any kind of threat, "Troll in the castle."

"If you even think about Obliviating me," Minerva began in a low hiss. "I'll give you detention for the next eight years."

"How did you know that I was planning to obliviate you?" The small boy with the whirling eye asked. Then a bit of confusion crept into his voice, "I thought the school was only for seven years."

Before Minerva could reveal her awesome powers of un-fogging the future, Snape cut in. "We know that because you haven't bothered to replace memory's with anything," Snape's face showed condescending sneer number fifteen. "What are you an idiot?"

"I'm eleven years old," Harry's voice was flat. "And I'm the one with the wand, what does that make you two?"

"Why you little . . ."

"Though I do have to thank you for the idea," Harry's smile looked sinister (he was trying to look innocent). "Obliviate."

"What did you do to them?" It appeared that the silencing spell that Harry had earlier placed on the bushy haired little girl had worn off.

"Obliviated them," Harry turned away from the unconscious professors. "And now for you . . . don't worry, this . . . won't hurt . . . a bit."

"You can't obliviate me," the young girl insisted.

"Sure I can," Harry couldn't figure out why he was having this conversation. "All I gotta do is wave my wand and say the incantation."

"No," the young girl looked angry. "I mean that if you obliviate me, I could die."

"What?" Harry frowned, "I've obliviated hundreds of people and none of them have died . . . well not from being obliviated anyway."

"If you use magic to modify or erase the memory of a person that may have a head injury," the girl began lecturing. "Then there is a good chance that you will cause permanent damage or death."

"Pops told me something like this might happen some day." Harry gritted his teeth, thinking back to his father's instructions. "And he said that he had faith that I would do what was necessary."

"Son," Moody leered, "there may come a time when for some reason or another, you won't be able to erase someone's memory."

"What should I do?" Harry asked with a puzzled frown.

"Well, the easiest thing to do would be to kill them. The other thing you could do is seduce them, depending on how your tastes run." Moody winked, "just use a bit of the old 'Moody Charm' and you'll have the lasses eating out of your hand."

"Come with me and we'll get this over with as soon as possible." Harry pulled himself out of the flashback, "I've got things to do and people to . . . talk to."

Hermione shuddered, "what are you going to do?"

"Gonna seduce you of course," Harry gave a horrifying smile. "Just need to use a bit of the ol' Moody charm and you'll willingly defect to my side."

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"What happened to you two?" The Headmaster woke up his unconscious staff members.

"Golly gee Mr. Wizard," Snape's voice sounded a bit more . . . high pitched than normal. "I was just walking down the hallways and I found Minny crouched over the body of a troll feasting on its bloody remains."

"And you Minerva?" Albus patiently turned to his other Professor for more...relevant information.

"The last thing I remember is that brat defeating my flying monkeys and melting me with a bucket of water.

"I see," Dumbledore sighed again. Things had been so much easier in the old days.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"Ms. Granger," Minerva yelled in an attempt to get her student's attention. "I would like to know why you weren't in your dormitory last night."

"Hmmm?" Hermione looked up with a dazed expression, "Do you think he really meant it when he said that my eyes sparkled like the stars and my beauty was such that even a memory would keep him warm in the coldest of storms? I'm not sure if he was serious about my lips tasting of liquid chocolate that inflames his soul with desire, it's a nice thought though."

"I take it you have a boyfriend then." The head of house asked with a frown, "Starting younger and younger . . . on the other hand, this would explain what happened to Mr. Weasley."

She had a brief recollection of Ron Weasley being horrified at the Starting Feast and trying to report to their Care of Magical Creatures (could be Grubby-Plank, could be someone else) about a flying angel of death who had devoured his sweet pet rat, Scabbers. To get over his grief, Madam Pomfrey had suggested a few ways to get him to release his emotions. From the bruises and cuts, as well as the grins he frequently sported during his entry to the Common Room, Minerva had thought that he'd taken up magi-wrestling, but now she had a sinking feeling that Mr. Weasley had actually gone with the first advice and was now dating THE very large and burly girl from Slytherin House who for some reason kept cat hairs in her robe and who she could not name due to occupational neutrality.

"What's his name?"

"He calls me his goddess of wisdom and I call him Constant," Hermione grinned. "Isn't that grand? Oh, it's just like I'm a princess in one of those fairy tales that I pretend not to be interested in."

"Twenty points if you can tell me the first rule of transfiguration." Minerva smirked, if this didn't snap the girl out of her delirium then she'd be forced to use her flying monkeys . . . that is to say, that she'd be all out of options.

"Ohhh, he's so handsome and strong." Hermione giggled again, "and the way he refuses to turn his back to me is sooo romantic."

"You win this round Ms. Granger," Minerva gave a horrifying grin. "But next time you won't be so lucky, hehehehehehehe . . . " she stopped in mid laugh, maybe it was time for a vacation.

As the professor stalked off to rest, or to use her transfiguration skills to create horrifying crosses between monkeys and birds, Hermione found herself surrounded by gossip starved girls, all wanting to know every single detail of the time she had spent with her new boyfriend.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Quirell didn't like being tied when he woke up. It brought back bad memories of nightmare number thirty-two from his childhood.

"Who is it? Come out, I say...I am the most feared Dark Lord in twenty years...Muahahahaha." He would have liked to continue on is evil laugh, if not for the coughing fit that overtook him.

"So you are the Dork Lord," Harry's spinning eye never stopped, "Good to know." He raised his wand with a horrifying grin, "I would ask to know your last wish, but I must say I got no interest in fulfilling it."

"Wait." Quirellmort desperately flailed his arms like a baby, "How did you detect me?" Maybe he could get the awesome super-powered wizard on his side by buying some time?

"Bringing a monster in a castle is the classical mistake that every third criminal makes. And I found you talking with a stutter only when you are in front of students. You must follow CONSTANT VIGILANCE." With that last yell, Harry did something to kill Voldemort...possibly using a disfiguring curse, a cutting curse or some other Auror level curse...or he used his touch to burn Voldemort to a crisp. He always liked the fact that his pops had somehow managed to lace his skin with the shell of Euctarian Hinkypunks.

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

"My super evil chamber," Evil Possessed Ginny smiled. "How I've missed you." The girl possessed by the dark lord walked into the chamber, "Come out and cleanse the world of Mud bloods . . . I said come out and cleanse the world. Wake up you stupid snake."

"I don't appreciate you calling me a stupid snake," a cold gravely voice replied from behind the dark girl.

"What?" Evil Ginny spun around.

"I said that I don't appreciate you calling me a stupid snake," Harry's eye whirled.

"Who are you?" Evil Ginny's eyes widened, "how did you find this place?"

"Those are supposed to be my questions," Harry gave an evil leer. "Time to die."

"Wait!" Tom did not like the calm way the strange boy had spoken. "I'm a spirit in possession of this body, if you kill me then you'll be killing an innocent too."

"That complicates things," Harry frowned. "On the other hand I've already seduced one girl into silence and Pop says that they don't like it when you do more then one at a time for some reason . . . goodbye."

"Wait again," Ginny screamed. "He's in my diary, destroy the diary and you'll destroy him."

"Fine," Harry sighed as he took hold of the evil book. "Don't move from that spot."

Harry took care of the book with a few well placed spells and went off in search for the witness he'd had to seduce.

IIIIIIIIII

"And that's why . . . can I help you with something?" Snape glared at the intruder who had dared to interrupt his class.

"No," Harry shook his head. "I'm just here to change your memories and take her away."

"Ok," Hermione stood. "Let's go."

"Sit down or I'll take a thousand points from your pathetic house," Snape screamed. "What makes you think that you can just come in here and defeat us all?"

"Because I already did," Harry yawned. "You'd think a Potions Master would have noticed the additive I put in his food . . . but I guess that you're better at baiting then potions."

"What?" Snape and most of the students slumped to the ground.

"Ready to go Hermione?" Harry yawned.

"Aren't you going to mess with their memories?" Hermione looked around the room.

"No need," Harry smirked. "I've been experimenting with a new potion that will wipe the last fifteen minutes of memories."

"Oh," Hermione nodded. "Any side effects?"

"Explosive bowel disruption and violent nightmares," Harry nodded. "But only when mixed with certain hair products."

"Ok," Hermione shouldered her bag. "What did you want to talk with me about?"

"Found another girl that I can't Obliviate," Harry frowned. "So I was going to ask you if you had any idea what I should do . . . dad said that girls didn't like it when you seduced more than one at a time."

"Why don't you take me to go see her and we can decide what to do then," Hermione suggested as the two of them walked out of the room. "So . . . exactly how did this all happen?"

"Well . . ."

In the class room behind them, Draco and Snape soiled themselves . . . then began to scream. They were discovered half an hour later when the next class showed up . . . the students looked at each other and as one decided to pick up their sleeping class mates and to leave Draco and Snape to their fates. No matter what the circumstances, they being evil and disliked was a great constant.

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

"So that's how it all happened," Harry put a large plate in front of both girls and another in front of himself.

"This is good," Ginny smiled. "What is it?"

"Yeah," Hermione agreed. "I didn't know you could cook?"

"Family tradition," Harry gave a suspicious glance at the two girls. Were they keeping tabs on him?

"So what is it?" Ginny prompted.

"Tandoori Basilisk," Harry grunted.

"Oh," the girls froze. "Where did you get the Basilisk?"

"Found it in here last year," Harry took another bite. "Enough meat to keep me fed for the next few years . . . it was a big one."

"Oh," Hermione poked her meal with her fork.

"Yeah," Ginny agreed.

"I don't think it will be necessary to seduce her to keep Ginny from talking," Hermione smiled at the other girl. "I'm sure she'll keep quiet."

"I disagree," Ginny shook her head. "The only way you can trust me is if you seduce me . . . who knows what I'll do if you leave things to chance."

"Don't listen to her," Hermione's smile widened. "She's the sort of person you can trust to keep quiet . . . right?"

"No," Ginny shook her head. "I'm a blabber mouth, the only way to be sure is if you seduce me . . . you do want to be sure don't you?"

"I don't think pop ever told me what to do in this situation," Harry said with a rather frightening frown. "I'm going to have to write to him."

"I'm sure he'll say that she can be trusted to keep her mouth shut," Hermione said. "RIGHT, GINNY?"

"No," Ginny disagreed. "Seduction is the only way to be sure."

"I agree", Luna said entering the conversation, "Harry has to seduce all of us."

"Where'd you come from?" Everyone looked at the odd girl. Harry was in a speculative mood; she was a Lovegood by her appearance, and didn't his Dad say that unless you got a Lovegood on your side, you better stay the hell out of their way?

"That door over there", Luna replied. "There's a secret passage from the girl's showers to this room which also returns back to the girl's showers." She raised her eyebrows and blinked with wide eyes, "Isn't it so very odd?"

"Indeed", Hermione sighed. It was mostly fun being seduced by Harry unless you counted in these odd occurrences.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Sirius pranced up the ancient castle in his Animagus form. He had duties to do, catch a rat and corrupt his manly godson. He knew Moony would never be able to perform them...he was still too afraid of Lily. Come to think of it, he was too.

Suddenly, Snuffles' nostrils twitched. Even after a decade in Azkaban, he would always recognize that smell. Moving in that direction, he first found a floral panty...and then another. By the time he had reached the third one, suddenly a blue spell (research is ongoing to determine its exact nature) shot out from somewhere and knocked him out.

From the shadows, Harry Moody came into view. He leered at the fallen convict before blowing at his wand-tip, "You must practice to be constantly vigilant."

"Can I have my panties back now?" Luna purred, demurely.

"How did you know that I nicked them? Tracking charms?" Harry growled, his wand now pointed at the petite girl.

"Lucky guess."

"All right then."

Hermione cleared her throat after she had gotten her thought process organized (these scenes always left her a little befuddled), "What are you going to do to him? Hand him over to the Ministry?"

"Nah, he's innocent. At least an amateur, anyway, or else he would not have waited for twelve years to use his talent to break out of prison." He mused for a second, "Although I guess the current record is for thirty-eight years."

"Then?" She prompted, as she realised that part one of her question was not answered.

He smirked horrifyingly again, "Madam Bones wanted me to hand him over directly to her. Said it would be a bright start to my Hit-Wizard career. Something about his punishment about stealing undergarments from (produces a really long list) all these witches in his seventh year, anyway."

"Really?" Luna squealed, "That's seems like so much fun. Do you think she is going to ravish him as a punishment or will they play 'Good Cop, Bad Cop'?"

Hermione shook her head to clear some...disturbing images and frowned at Luna. She started in her Margaret Thatcher tone ('Minerva Mcgonagall' tone never panned out as Harry kept kidnapping her from that class) "I think I told you not to give me weird ideas. Now I will have to take a looong bath to clear my mind."

"I can help you with that", Harry smirked, turning on the Moody Charm again.

"And we could join in", suggested Ginny, waggling her eyebrows while wearing her basilisk leather jacket. It did...interesting things to Harry's groin region.

"Yay", Luna chirped in arousal...err, approval. As they marched through the grounds, they ran into several dementors stationed in the school by the Ministry, but it was rather disconcerting to see all of them shy out of the way of Harry Moody and shiver violently as if they were cold.

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

Dumbledore greeted the assembled foreign guests with a benevolent smile. He was just about to tell Igor Karkaroff and his entourage to seat themselves when suddenly all the candles in the room went off. Out of the darkness, a figure leaped into the great hall, crackling madly and pointed his wand at Karkaroff, "Hello Death Eater who pretended to betray their friends but is really in their side." Karkaroff would have protested against the accusation, but he found the Hogwarts meal was too good to waste.

"Hello, unknown figure", Dumbledore began kindly, "Will you explain your reasons for acting like this?"

The unknown figure probably smirked (you couldn't see his face), "Igor Karkaroff is a convicted Death Eater, so he must be put down."

"It hardly is your right to take someone's life", Dumbledore protested.

"Doesn't matter. I poured a potion into the food; it will kill everyone with a Dark Mark and it should kick in...right now."

Far away...err, on the farthest dinner table from Harry, Igor Karkaroff passed away.

"No!" Snape screamed, pushing away his plate of food, "I ate the gummy bears." Seeing the raised eyebrows, he snapped, "I like deserts before the main course, okay."

"Heh." The unknown figure gave an astounding leap which should probably be an Olympic record and landed on the Stuff Table, rolling up Snape's sleeve, "You mean nobody else figured out till now that it's a tattoo?"

"Severus?" Dumbledore asked, shocked.

"Tattoo?" Minerva questioned.

"I never knew you were that into fashion, Severus." Flitwick commented, chuckling.

"The fashion started in Magical Britain in the year 1407...". Binns droned. What was he doing there, anyway?

"You should probably come to me once a week for medical check-up." Pomfrey suggested.

"Bwawawawa." Snape was unable to take the constant stream of questioning and fled from the stuff table in tears. Maybe it was time to make more modifications in his Potions book...or go home and play with his fluffed Teddy bear.

The girls crowded around Harry Moody and started, "How did you know that Snape had a tattoo?"

"He's too much of a sissy to have the real DARK MARK." Harry grinned. "My father told me that Bellatrix actually had two; one in her arm and the other in her...". The rest of the comment shall go unsaid to prevent the readers from unwanted nightmares.

Ginny asked curiously, "Don't you think you would get into trouble for doing what you did?"

"Nope."

"THAT potion again?" Hermione sighed.

"Yep. Now, come on, we got to take care of Madame Maxime's horses."

"Why?" Luna pouted, "Are they paying you to take care of them?"

"He meant to kill them, Luna." Hermione explained, patiently. She had to develop that skill after counting to infinity didn't work.

"Yep. You know that Troy fell by the use of a wooden horse...so it never hurts to be thorough."

"Okay." All three of them nodded amicably.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"Susan Bones?" The dark assassin...or someone like that accosted her and her friend, Hannah Abott in a gravely voice.

"Who are you and what are you doing here?" Susan asked, worriedly. Although her aunt was the head of the DMLE, so she had nothing to fear, right?

"I am here to seduce you and get you defect to my cause." He grinned in an evil manner.

"Reasons?" Hannah enquired. You understand, of course, a Hufflepuff is all about team work...and she couldn't let her friend alone get seduced all alone by herself, could she?

"Nothing special. Just thought that if I suddenly am forced to participate in an insanely tough competition with thousands of loopholes and the whole school turns against me...it'd be nice to have some support. Come to think of it, I might even participate willingly...it'd be in the true spirit of things."

"Oh, you care so much about friends...you're a true Hufflepuff." Both the girls gushed.

"Nah, I am just worried about the poor bugger who they'd mistake as me and torment." Seeing the blank looks, he sighed, "If I'd be here with you all and my other girls, it's only logical that they would mistake someone else as me, won't they?"

"I suppose you're right..." Susan considered, "But I need more incentive."

"I can speak in Parseltongue." Harry leered.

"What are we waiting for?" Susan took hold of the outstretched hand.

"Uh, to get our books from the library?" Hannah volunteered.

"YOU WERE NOT SUPPOSED TO ANSWER THAT!" Susan stomped her foot angrily and went away along with Harry. Hannah considered if she should follow...well, if hesitating for a nanosecond is considered as considering a proposal that needs to be considerably considered.

In a far part of the castle, Cedric Diggory suddenly ended up weeping. He had a feeling that now he would never die a tragic death which would lead his girlfriend to always mope about him. Isn't love eternal?

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

Sirius' godfather senses tingled as soon as Harry accomplished his mission of seducing the two Hufflepuff girls and he screamed with obvious pride, "My godson is soooo manly!"

"Something you wish to share with us, dear?" Came the menace-filled voice from the doorway-on second thoughts, it wasn't so menacing, but don't let that fool you.

"Nothing my loves." Sirius quickly back-tracked, oh how he cursed fate for leaving him in Azkaban and unable to perform his gentlemanly duties towards these women. Well, now they were getting their revenge...were those leather belts?

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

Rita Skeeter groggily woke up. What had happened to her? All she remembered was that she was walking in the hallways of Hogwarts, trying to score an interview with the elusive fourth champion, when someone had yelled "Constant Vigilance!" and the world had went dark.

"Oh good, you are finally awake." Looking to her left...no, she had to turn right again to view her addresser... and then she had to blink-and blink again-and again.

Finally, she realised that an infinite amount of blinking would not make the man in front of her go away and she finally took in his appearance. Was that an Erumpent Horn sticking out of his head? And were those gloves made of Nundu skin? She also used to think that necklaces were supposed to have gold or silver chains, and they were certainly not supposed to be hung with the help of devil's snare. And why was he blinking too?

"Why are you blinking?"

"Nice to see that you ask whatever you have in mind." Xeno nodded his head, pleased to have found a decent reporter, "And weren't we playing The Blinking Game?"

"Blinking game?" She asked in a hollow voice, wondering if she had a little too much alcohol again.

"Oh yes. My pumpkin and I play it every year. We currently have the record set for twenty-six hours. Would you like to challenge it?" Xeno asked, eagerly.

"No, but I'd like to know why I am here."

"Straight to the point, eh?" He nodded, another good quality. "Well, my future son-in-law kidnapped you for annoying him and 'cause my daughter asked him to."

"Really?"

"Unless you don't have an alternate meaning of that word in your magictionary, I think I am right." He exclaimed proudly.

"Oh." And then they talked, drank Snorkack milk, talked again, had a bubble-night dinner, talked again...and did something else, you can't exactly tell with the magical folk. Precise details were published in next issue of the Quibbler, but it was now written by Rita Lovegood, formerly Skeeter.

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

"Is this supposed to be a challenge?" Harry Moody...no, he didn't have any reasons to suspect that the unnamed young man in front of him was HIM, Dumbledore chided himself. Anyway, the unnamed child was posing in a quite intimidating manner and had asked him a question. Following the first rules of being an instructor, he smiled grandfatherly smile number two and explained, "Yes, young champion. All you have to do is to get the Triwizard Cup from the middle of this specially constructed maze for this special occasion."

"You mean, I am to enter a maze, which is sure to be a death trap with all of you holding wands and seeing me marching in. I don't think so." He growled, "Put all of your wands in this specially charmed bag designed to hold wands for this specific occasion."

"And what if we don't comply?" Asked Snape, in an extremely high-pitched voice. Frankly it was a bit disturbing, coupled with the fact that the man was wearing a skin-tight pink suit.

"I will hold all of you responsible for withholding a Champion from performing in a task." He cackled, "Who knows what the Goblet of Fire would do to your magic. I even heard that a sixth year could confuse the hell out of it to get it to spurt out random names, so I definitely could make it do worse stuff to you."

Far way, the jaws of all the children, who knew the Confundus Charm, dropped. And they also had to drop their wands a bit later when the collecting bag floated up to them.

Amidst the...blessings of all the assembled guests, Harry Moody stepped into the Triwizard maze.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Fleur Delacour had many scenarios in her mind for the moment when she would catch the sight of the Triwizard Cup, but seeing a boy sitting beside it while pointing her wand at random things, while eating tomato ketchup was not one of them. Then again, she couldn't expect anything else from the Champion who had poisoned it's dragons food to give it a bad case of dragon-gastroenteritis and left it unable to face him, leading to him gaining fifty points from the first task, could she?

She also shuddered a little at the memory of the second task. It was the one where he had summoned a leviathan into the middle of the Black Lake (personally, the water looked blue to her) , rescued three hostages with its help and left Cedric Diggory and Victor Krum very bedraggled, indeed. Apparently, the organisers had been unable to find any hostage for him to find.

She was just glad that she had hesitated before slipping into the lake.

As for the Yule Ball...there he had cast a charm which made everyone on the dance floor absolutely unable to move while he carried on with his search. Apparently, history suggested that Traditional Balls were the most favoured hotspots for the assassins, assassinations and the assassinated.

"What are you doing here?" She was both cautious and curious.

Harry shook his head, ruefully. He was willing to give her a chance...after all, both his pa and the girls had told him to treat a lady with respect, but she had blown her chance. "Stupefy", he drawled, stunning the exotic beauty without preamble. "Your first inclination should have been to stun me without wasting time by asking stupid questions. Be a good idea to carry a Sneakoscope on your person, too." He lectured the stunned girl. Then he raised his wand and hit the Triwizard Cup with a series of detection Charms.

"Thought so", Harry smirked in his mind. A portkey? Did they think that he was a child who was blind without his glasses, loved playing Quidditch, attended useless classes where he was insulted, rushed into dangerous situations with no prior knowledge, relied on his friends' brain to keep him safe and feared overly large squirrels? He didn't think so. Tapping the portkey with his all of his wands, he spoke, "Portus Changus Explosivus", which turned the portkey into a powerful explosive and sent it to wherever it was supposed to go. Using his eye, Harry quickly marched out of the maze un-noticed by anyone.

As for Victor and Cedric-they were still busy over arguing who was the better Quidditch player. None of them noticed Ron Weasley look at the scene with a...disturbing gleam in his eyes.

IIIIIIIIIIIIII

The Dark Lord Voldemort was pleased to find that his previously unknown, super-secret (so much as even he didn't know about him), super-evil minion had provided him with the blood sample of the Potter scion, as required. He cackled evilly (an art perfected by three years with the Muggle Drama Company he used to work part-time for) and proceeded to do the necessary steps required for his nefarious resurrection ritual. He had the perfect flow chart, nothing to worry about.

Well...he didn't account for the fact that the cup might be rigged. As soon as it was put into the cauldron, it exploded in a spectacular show of lights which led many scientists to scramble their head and try to find out why the Aurora Borealis suddenly occurred over England.

As for Voldemort-he survived, sort of. Although, his new plans for world domination was moot, since he had no solid body to carry out his plans. It was all liquidy. By some strange quirk of fate, however, ketchup sauces were re-named from that day in the magical world as That-Which-Must-Not-Be-Consumed.

A/N: A huge Thank You to Rorschach's Blot for allowing me to borrow his 'Harry Moody' idea, found in his odd ideas file. Quite a lot of the initial material was also provided by him. I hope this was at least some-what humorous and allowed you guys to smile. I will add to the missing scenes to this story, but it would have to wait for a bit. Now review and tell me what you thought.