Chapter 1
With a Little Help From My Friends
What would you think if I sang out of tune (c)
1991
„Come on, Tonks, aren't you even curious? Isn't this the time for experiments and pushing our boundaries? Don't you even want to see how good you really are?" „Not that kind of experiments and, thanks, I am that good." „Well, don't you want to shed your friendly fumbling Hufflepuff role even for a little while? Try something different?" Penelope coaxed. Tonks looked at her friend, her brow furrowed, „What's this really all about?" „Well, I don't know, I have just been thinking about what you said earlier, you know. It does get a bit tiring to be just one version of yourself," Penelope sighed. „This imposed restriction to be this one thing, your personality , body and time tied to one house and it's few virtues, boxed in with people so similar to you in so many ways, it's.. somehow limiting, it's lacking." „I'm not agreeing to anything, but.. How exactly would you go about it? Infiltrate the Houses?"„Tonks, your Auror is showing," Penelope smirked. „And it's not 'infiltrate', it's, uh.. an unofficial interhouse exchange programme." „If you say so," Tonks grumbled sceptically. „Polyjuice for laypeople and, well, you are already covered. The tricky part is that we need two more so we can just switch." „Just switch? Two more? Polyjuice? All of that goes under „barmy" and „get caught", Penelope!" „It's not that crazy. Brewing would take about a month, so we could do this before spring brake, and my parents wouldn't even blink if I asked for the ingredients. We just need to decide who to invite.." „To share our bodies?" Penelope was interrupted by Tonks, who had buried her face in her hands and was now making unarticulated sounds with only few decipherable words reaching Penelope. „Arrrgh.. always...the ravens, urgahaha.." Finally she looked up. „How many rules exactly would we be breaking?" „Well, technically we wouldn't be breaking any rules, but it.. certainly would be something strongly frowned upon." Tonks lifted her eyebrow. „Well, you have to live and learn with your house upholding it's honour, earning points, et cetera. So if you look like a person who was sorted, for example, in Gryffindor and do just that, no problem." Tonks shook her head. „And I can do Polyjuice as an extra-credit for potions and if someone happens to mistakenly or misguidedly take it.. Well, you were just goofing around, then got scared and hoped you could hide it till the potion wore off." „Accident that keeps happening on regular multiple times per day?" „Oh, I checked up on that. You can't really prove how long somebody has been taking Polyjuice 'cause it gets metabolised pretty fast, that's why the effect is so short. And you get caught only if you mess it up and start transforming in front of somebody. Just feign embarrassment and innocence and plead not guilty." „This. Is. Crazy. But also... Wouldn't this be the sort of mischief that Dumbledore or, for that matter, Mad-Eye would get into during their school years? " Tonks thought to herself. „Just think about it, Powerpuff," Penelope winked, leaving her friend to brew.
„Who do you have in mind?" asked Tonks as she accompanied Penelope on her patrol. „Not sure," smiled Penelope. „Recruitment was always supposed to be your part, you know I'm not, err, that popular." „Well, can't be anyone below your year, you still have your exams to pass. Can't be anyone on Quidditch team or in a relationship, either," Tonks mused. Penelope chuckled at that particular order of priorities. „Has to have their wits about them and has to be, well, nice. That is if we do this switcheroo." „If we do, yes," smiled Penelope.
There they were, four member from four houses. The two invites looked rather stunned, but also deep in thought. „Yes," agreed Portia, the Slytherin. „But I'm not disclosing any reasons," she added. „This is not a group therapy, no worries," said Penelope. „Adventure," said Gryffindor. „I'm in."
They met again and again, observing and trying to repeat the characteristic movements, learning essential information. „What if they sense something's wrong?" asked Gryffindor. „Just blame it on girl problems, boy problems or Snape problems?" suggested Slytherin. Gryffindor chuckled. „I rather like Snape, so predictable with his old bat act," Penelope said. „Just don't look him in the eyes," warned Slytherin.
„Six days a week, three weeks with one week intervals inbetween, four houses," Penelope said, adding ingredients to the brew. Tonks sighed, Gryffindor looked excited and Slytherin smirked.
„Oh, this is so weird," Penelope said warily. „Weird is the word," agreed Tonks, „How come you look like me, but..don't?" „I could ask you the same?" „Maybe it's the expression? You, that is me, oh, whatever, there's this.. edgier look?" Penelope looked at Tonks reflected in her mirror, „Are you politely trying to say that I have given you a resting bitch face?"
McGonagall sometimes wished she could keep Nymphadora Tonks on as a counselor at Hogwarts. While a menace in potions, she showed great skill in any other of her subjects. She was warm and funny and beloved by her 'puffs, who flocked to her with their troubles as she listened patiently, kept their little secrets and gave unobtrusive advice, often accompanied with sweets, probably snuck from kitchens. Well, there had been that troubled fourth year, but it looked like that phase was over. So the first week of March left McGonagall baffled, while Professor Sprout liked to remember it as The Week of Bad Advice and a certain student of hers received the honorary title of Hufflepunk.
„What happened?" „I don't know! They just turned blue and I can't get them to change back!" „Raving Rowena, Penelope! Blue? Electric blue!?" „Woah, has Michael's vocabulary rubbed off that fast?"
„I'm not sure Hufflepuffs get sarcasm that well," Penelope said thoughtfully after an incident with a first year and a toad. „You don't say," sighed Tonks.
„Now, why am I being blamed for trying to kill Gryffindor team captain?" „Well, I do try to keep up the appearances, so, you know, I drop things now and then or run into this or that, and.." „Do go on, please," said Tonks, drumming her fingers. „Well, I tried to tumble and Charlie was there assisting Kettleburn and it sorta looked like I tried to push him in the water tank with those flesh-eating.." Tonks couldn't even speak. „I know, right? Totally Riddikulus! They don't even eat males."
„What the hell did you do? You got the whole House drunk?" „Drunk on power," corrected Penelope. „Consider that a parting gift. Nobody messes with my 'puffs. But seriously, I just wondered whether they could and would do it, that's all."
Tonks considered if she wanted to continue this. And by this she meant Penelope's ascent into crazy. She had been wary about the Slytherin-Gryffindor exchange, but they hadn't even caused a spark to fly, while House of Hufflepuff had suddenly caused more gossip and chaos than probably in it's entire existence. She herself had tried out dry sarcasm, assortment of inventive swear words and spells, experienced some of the weirdest and funniest conversations of her life and found out that the Ravenclaw motto basically was, „We remember about the official curriculum just before the finals start". She had forgotten this, how freeing it was not to be nice all the time, voicing your opinion as long as you could back it up and, honestly, Ravenclaws should throw workshops on how to disrupt the class. No Gryffindor dung bomb or Slytherin manipulation could compare to their innocent questions about something they had read and would the professor, please, elaborate? And it was surreal to watch her doppelganger do something she feared and still be liked, no detentions or serious talks, whatsoever. Well, maybe, she could try that when in Slytherin. Not playing nice.
„Penelope, have you been cutting Gryffindor classes?" Tonks asked trying to defuse the situation. „Yes, I thought it the best." „You can't do that," grumbled Mary, „we had a deal!" „Yes, but then on Monday I broke some sort of House record by Minnie or something?" Penelope looked at Mary. „Minnie, Minerva McGonagall," whispered Mary. „ Academic House points earned by one person throughout the whole school year," Gryffindor explained, her eyes wide. „That. Well, we don't do that in Ravenclaw, but yes. So your mates started to eye me weirdly, Snape got suspicious and I just though it best to, well, exhibit some more relaxed Gryffindork behaviour." „Oh," Mary frowned. The Slytherin had tried not to smirk or roll her eyes throughout the conversation as she actually liked these witches. Or maybe it was the Hufflepuff rubbing off, Portia wasn't sure. Still it took only a day and a half for Hogwarts student body to catch up on „Gryffindorks".
There was a confrontation between a certain Gryffindor and a certain Slytherin later that week that resulted in a fast-paced duel and some ruined trophies. Nobody cared about the trophies, but many later tried to recreate the spell that Slytherin had thrown and there was a rumour that even Flitwick, past duelling champion, had smiled approvingly in his beard before substracting points and giving out detentions.
This incident didn't live a long life on Hogwarts grapewine, though. Apparently throughout Saturday morning Gryffindors from fourth year and up had been arriving in a steady stream to the hospital wing with hangover and asking for different additional tests. According to the rumours there had been an impromptu House party, some were really mad about being left out and Percy Weasley had been found naked in The Great Lake. Someone mentioned a modified party game called „Veritaserum or Chickroar", while some believed there had been crazy amounts of Firewhiskey that had burned out entire internal organs.
„Do I want to know?" „Could you be a little more specific?" „Chickroar?" „It's similar to your traditional „Veritaserum or Dare", but more „Dare and Dare", I guess." „What?" „Well, I wanted to know something, but there was no time for Veritaserum. So to get to the truth I enhanced recklessness in some, so they would just blurt it out when asked. And as for the rest, they got just one drop, so I could test their „daring and nerve". Some really were lions, but most were chickens. Rather disappointing for the House of Gryffindor." Tonks just stared. She had spent a week in Slytherin, but they didn't even come close to this. „I know, I know. The study group was too small and there was no control, it was badly executed." „Wait, what did you want to know?" „Emm, some involments and such." „And?" „Well, there's a reason why they had their health checks yesterday." Tonks groaned. „Almost incestuous, you know. I would really advice to look for partners outside of Hogwarts, to be honest."
It was another Monday and Tonks was changing her colours to red. Just six more days and this would be over, hopefully without anyone knowing any better.
She was actually relieved. Tonks had been a bit apprehensive about what she would be stepping in, remembering recent events in Gryffindor tower. Everybody was a bit high strung, faster to react or confront, but she observed that though their tempers were quite explosive, they also could laugh it off and let it go. It even seemed, well, that they were actually enjoying it, all the teasing, tension and release of energy. It reminded her of the duel she had participated in not that long ago and she smiled.
It was early Saturday morning and Penelope was sitting in the common room, just watching the light and shadow play of the water, contained behind a glass wall. She had enjoyed her stay in Slytherin. There was reserve, method, ambition, smarts, but also mystery and challenge. Sometimes she was sure they knew, though nobody said anything. „So who are you?" Penelope sighed. Of course, here she had been wrong. She turned and saw a dark haired first year, direct in her question and stare. „Would you like a game of chess?" Penelope suggested. „No," answered the girl. „If you win, I will answer three of you questions," coaxed Penelope. „And if not?" „You walk away." They played and Penelope was surprised when she let the first year win. „So who are you and why are you here?" „Penelope. I just wanted to see the lake," she gestured at the wall of green. „Why?" „My mother used to tell me about it," Penelope said still looking at the glimmer behind the glass. „Your mother's a Slytherin?" „Oh, but that would be one question too many, wouldn't it?" Penelope winked. „You still have to learn the game, young Slytherin." „Pansy," the girl said.
It was only after the spring break when Tonks headed to the classroom to serve her last detention. What she hadn't expected was to be instantly attacked as she opened the classroom door. She scrambled behind a desk and breathed hard. Helga and Hufflepuff, what was going on? She pulled out a small mirror and tapped it, sending out a distress signal they had agreed upon way back in March, but she had no hope Penelope would even be carrying it around anymore, even if she remembered where Tonks was supposed to be that night. There had been no more attacks, but Tonks was sure that whatever it was, it was still there, she could feel it, goosebumps on her skin. Heart racing, she looked again at her mirror, she had to know who that was. Slowly she positioned mirror and tried to gain as much vision as possible. Attack, counterattack, desks cracking, wood splintering, silence. She tried again. Mad-Eye Moody? Had she gone mad? Or had he? Wait, there already was „mad" somewhere in the name, wasn't there? Suddenly she was lifted up and dangling in the air and he was laughing. He was mad! But so was she and suddenly the positions were changed. He was still laughing, even heartier than before. „Constant vigilance, lassie! Constant vigilance! Ahahahahahahaha!" This was so confusing.
Penelope felt her pocket mirror act up, but she was stuck with Flitwick, helping him clean, well, whatever this room was supposed to be. Flitwick flashed a smile and Penelope frowned. Her Head of House was always rather chipper, but this was a bit too much, like some sort of an inside joke. He even seemed to be chuckling silently.
When they finally met up, Penelope had dust bunnies in her hair and Tonks had been accepted in the Auror training programme under the tutelage of one Alastor Moody.
A/N: I do not own anything.
