The Trio's Detention

by MoonlitPhoenix1

Disclaimer: I do not own anything that you may recognize in this story. This is merely a piece of fanfiction that I have written for fun. The credit all goes to J.K. Rowling.

Harry – Harry's written words

Hermione – Hermione's written words

Ron – Ron's written words

The chair that Harry currently resided on was not meant to be comfortable. Harry found that out very quickly. It was an unfortunate thing that Professor Snape had no obvious sentiments for the comfort of his students, especially those lucky students who were in detention.

That included him among the lucky ones. Harry snorted quietly and looked over at his friends who sat several chairs away on either side of him. He felt some remorse for having brought Hermione and Ron into this mess with him, but it couldn't be helped that they had willingly come to his defense when he had blown up at Snape.

Harry sighed. He had not meant to say anything at all to the sour man, but it just sort of slipped out. Lack of sleep did that to a person. Harry rubbed at his eyes and then yawned. At least this time, the lack of sleep had come from the overload of schoolwork instead of the frighteningly real dreams like last year.

Now, he was becoming more and more bored by the second. Harry slouched in his seat at the desk. They had at least another hour that they had to sit there without saying a word and without getting up. For once Harry wished Snape had given them some sort of manual labor to do.

Over on his left, Ron leaned forward and rested his head on his outstretched hands. Harry blinked over at him and had a sudden idea. Reaching into his bag, he pulled out a quill, a small bottle of ink, and a pocket notebook which he flipped open. The shuffling of the pages caught both of his friend's attention.

They stared at him in wonder, but Hermione's stare looked stern. Harry shrugged and gestured to the notebook and then to themselves.

Hermione let out an audible sigh, but rifled through her bag and pulled out a nearly identical notebook. On his opposite side, Ron eagerly took his own notebook out.

Harry grinned. He didn't know why he had not thought of this earlier. For Christmas, Hermione had given them all these notebooks with which to write to each other with. These were no ordinary notebooks though. No. These were enchanted so that if one person wrote something in theirs,' it would appear in the other notebooks in the set.

Excitedly, Harry set the quill to paper and wrote his first message there.

'Testing, one two. Testing. Hello? Anyone there?'

Immediately, Ron scribbled back a reply. A second later, a few sentences appeared on his own paper as if written there by an invisible hand.

'I'm here! Woah, this is a cool idea.'

'Thanks! We can't talk, so I thought this could bend the rules a little.'

'Yeah. This works out really well.'

'You both know that the Professor is going to come back and find these notebooks, right?'

'Aw, stuff it, Hermione. You're no fun. Besides, we aren't exactly breaking the rules, are we Harry?'

'No. Snape only said that talking aloud or getting up was not allowed. He didn't say anything about notebooks.'

'This is talking and you both know it.'

'Then why are you 'talking' to us, Hermione?'

Hermione huffed in exasperation and threw her quill on the table. Harry knew she hadn't given up on them entirely, because her notebook still laid open in front of her. He turned his attention back to his own notebook where a new message from Ron spelled itself out.

'She's only being like this because Snape gave her a zero on her potion today and detention to top it all off.'

'Yes, I know.'

Hermione threw Ron and Harry a ferocious glare but otherwise did nothing. The two boys ignored her.

'Why do you think Snape let off so easily with detention? He normally would have had us chopping up ingredients for potions or scrubbing out cauldrons.'

'I dunno. Maybe he's going soft.'

'Yeah right. I'd believe that just as soon as he awarded points to Gryffindor or praised the 'boy-who-lived-to-annoy- him' in class.'

'Or the day when Neville doesn't melt a cauldron.'

'True. Or the time when he doesn't call me a dunderhead or a twit.'

'More like the whole class, really.'

'Can't either of you say anything positive about Professor Snape?'

'Nope.'

'After five years of his treatment, what is there positive to say?'

'Like the fact that he saved your life in first year. Or have you forgotten that already?'

'Of course I haven't forgotten that! What do you think of me, Hermione?'

'You're acting very childish, that's what.'

'Said the girl who can't get over one zero in class.'

'Ronald! Would you stay out of this?!?'

'Fine. I'll just sit over here by myself and be bored to death.'

'Like I was saying—–'

'I can't believe that I'm actually wanting Snape to come back now.'

'Ronald Bilius Weasley!'

'Okay, okay. I'll stop. Just don't call me by my middle name again.'

'You two really do fight like a married couple.'

'Harry!'

'Sorry.'

'Can I join in the conversation now, or are you still lecturing Harry?'

'That would be 'may I', Ronald.'

'So may I, then?'

'No.'

'Then hurry it up. I'm bored.'

'Fine. Harry ––'

'May I just sum up what you're about to say? I've heard it a million times already.'

'I have to say it so many times because you don't listen.'

'I do listen. I just don't see any merit in what you say about the git.'

'Quit calling the Professor a git, Harry. It's rude.'

'I'll quit calling him a git when he quits ridiculing me in class. Before he earns my respect, he's going to have to act like a sensible adult.'

'He is sensible. He just. . .dislikes you.'

'Ha! That's the understatement of the year.'

'Yeah, it is. I can understand why he treats me like that somewhat because I remind him of — nevermind. . .'

'Remind him of what?'

Harry let his quill hover over the page as he tried to think of a response to Hermione's question. He couldn't just tell his best friends about what he saw in the Pensieve that Snape had last year. Not for anything would he share that painful and quite embarrassing memory with anyone else.

Lowering his quill down to the paper, Harry finally came up with an answer.

'Some things are best left unsaid, Hermione. That's all I have to say, so don't question me about it anymore.'

Though her face still shone with curiosity, and just a tad of disappointment, Hermione nodded understandingly.

Ron didn't seem to mind whether Harry explained or not. He rolled his quill back and forth on the table, looking between the other two Gryffindors impatiently.

Hermione caught his gaze for a second, and quickly wrote down something.

'Since I know that you are about to say something along the lines of if you are allowed to talk again, Ronald, I'll tell you the answer now. Yes. You may.'

'Finally! Do you realize how boring it is watching you both 'talk' while I have to sit here?'

'Quite, I assume?'

'You probably couldn't even pay me to stay out of the conversation for much longer. By the way. When is Snape going to come back?'

'He didn't say. Just gave us a really detailed list of things that he would do to us should we break the rules that he set before he left.'

'Do you really think that he'll torture us into madness by forcing us to drink some of his experimental potions?'

'Oh, do grow up, Ronald. He only uses that one to intimidate the first years who don't know whether to take him seriously or not. Besides—'

'Dumbledore wouldn't let him.'

'That too, but what I was going to say is that we as sixth years shouldn't have to be threatened because we — as role models for the younger ones — should know 'better than to disobey him.'

'I think he was serious about the 'hanging us by our feet over a boiling cauldron filled with acid' though.'

'I know for a fact he wouldn't mind doing that to me. Sounds fitting too. Voldemort hasn't been able to kill me, but Snape finally finishes the boy-who-lived by dipping him into a cauldron full of acid.'

'Sounds more like a muggle's idea than a wizard's.'

'True.'

'Do you two have to be so morbid?'

'We're not being morbid, Hermione. We're being logical.'

'I agree with Ron actually.'

'Well, seeing as you are being 'logical,' wouldn't the logical thing to do involve putting away these notebooks before Professor Snape comes back?'

'Okay, now I think that I'll have to agree with Hermione. Sorry Ron.'

'Come on, Harry! He probably won't even be back here for another hour. Quit worrying about him coming back. If we put the notebooks away, we'll just be sitting here, bored like we were before we started writing.'

'Well, I for one don't want to be taking any chances when it comes to further punishment. You boys go ahead and keep writing, and we'll see whose idea was better.'

With that, she shut the cover of the notebook and stuffed it into her bag, throwing her quill in there right after it. Ron rolled his eyes and mouthed 'worrier' at her since she could no longer see what he wrote.

Harry thought that Hermione's thoughts were well founded. Anyway, he didn't want to be on the receiving end of Snape's wrath, so he followed the girl's lead and put his own notebook and quill away.

Ron pounded his fist on the table in front of him and gave Harry an incredulous look.

Harry just shrugged his shoulders. 'Put it up,' he mouthed over at his friend, throwing a cautionary glance over at the door.

Ron blinked once, following Harry's gaze. Before he could even do so much as move, the wooden door to the Potion's classroom banged open, and the person whom they had just been talking about strode inside.

As fast as he could, Ron attempted to cover up all traces of evidence that they had been writing. He slid the notebook off the desk and sat on it, then, seeing his quill, moved his arm and covered it with his sleeve.

Snape's black eyes scanned every inch of the room, and a sneer crossed his face.He moved forward silently, his black robes billowing behind him as he walked. When he reached the front of the desks that the three Gryffindors sat behind, he twirled around to face them.

Harry gulped, and tried to keep his eyes away from the Potion Master's piercing gaze. To his right, Hermione stared at a spot on the stone wall at the front of the room.

Ron though, fidgeted in his seat, and Snape's eyes immediately moved to him.

"Weasley," Snape said softly, an underlying edge in his voice. The man crossed his arms and looked expectantly at the red-haired boy.

Ron lifted his head upward, but did not look Snape in the eye.

"Stand up," he continued in the same tone.

Very slowly, Ron slid out of his chair and moved his arms to where they hung limply at his side.

A smug look appeared on Snape's face as he spotted the open notebook and quill. "What do we have here?"

Harry's heart plummeted all the way to his feet. They were in deep trouble now.

Snape extended a long-fingered hand and picked up the notebook, his eyes scanning the pages. After a moment, he closed the notebook with a snap. "Twenty points from Gryffindor for trying to hide the fact that you brought a book to your detention when I gave you all explicit instructions that you were forbidden to do so," he said a little more loudly, then slammed the book back down onto the desk."As for you two," he spat upon catching sight of the bespectacled boy who had been trying to look innocent. "I am quite aware that the Golden trio does not do anything unless they are all involved in it together."

Harry looked over at the notebook. The pages were filled with words, but there was nothing there that they had just written. He looked over at Hermione who smiled thinly. Harry returned his gaze over to Snape and held his breath, hoping that they would be let off easily.

"So," Snape continued, "that will be another detention for the three of you."

Well, forget getting off easily. At least it was only another detention and not anything extremely bad.

But Snape wasn't finished. "For the whole of the week," he said with a curl of his lip.

Harry groaned. This was going to be a long week.

Author's Note:

I am still considering whether I should continue this and cover the rest of the Trio's detentions with Snape (and the possibility of more in the future). If anyone is interested, please leave me a comment in your review saying so! Also, if you have any ideas for further detentions, I would like to hear them. Just keep it clean and --- something clever like Snape would do.

Please Read and Review! I really do enjoy comments and even constructive criticism. No flames please!

MoonlitPhoenix1