A/N: I like to give ficcy presents on my birthday. Here we go. Thanks to Possum & shyfoxling.
CHAPTER TWO: The Most Boring Chapter Ever
MAIN ACTION OF THE BOOK: *commences!*
FIRST LINE: Harry was bleeding.
LONGTIME READERSHIP: Surprise, surprise.
HARRY: "had to admit to himself... [h]e had never learned to repair wounds, and now he came to think of it - particularly in light of his immediate plans - this seemed a serious flaw in his magical education."
THE ENTIRE FANDOM: I KNOW, right?
THE PARTICULARLY SMUG PARTS OF THE FANDUMB: And don't even get us started on the lack of instruction in do-it-yourself plumbing!
HARRY: Will all of you hush? I'm going through my stuff so that we can have a boring previous-six-books-recap.
FANDOM: *reverent silence*
HARRY: ...And when I said boring, I meant boring.
FANDOM: *quiet grumbling*
THE SHATTERED MIRROR: *gives us an excuse to talk about Siriusangst AND Harry's green eyes - ALL IN ONE BLOW*
FANS: Yeah, what's this chapter ABOUT, anyway?
ROWLING: MOURN, all readers, MOURN the magnificent Dumbledore.
FAN #1: Why? We'll be able to talk to a portrait of him, won't we?
FAN #2: Five unofficial "commemorative" Sickles that he comes back in this book.
FAN #3: I've a thousand things I want to get out of this last book, and we're going to waste an entire chapter on... this?
ROWLING: I am the queen of placing, wretched readership. Ask Stevie King.
HARRY: This chapter isn't boring enough yet. Time to read the newspaper! Oh, look, there's Professor Burbage, whom I probably should have found an excuse to mention to the readership before now.
ARTICLE: *is written by Elphias Doge*
THE AVID READERS: Ooh! Ooh! We met him in the kitchen in Book 5! We're good fans, we know this stuff. *smug*
THE CASUAL READERS WHO ARE JUST TUNING IN BECAUSE THIS IS **THE** BOOK OF THE YEAR: Hrrumph.
ELPHIAS DOGE (IN WRITING): I met Albus Dumbledore at the age of eleven, on our first day at Hogwarts. Our mutual attraction was undoubtedly due to the fact that we both felt ourselves to be outsiders.
SLASHERS: *have stopped processing anything after "our mutual attraction"*
THE POOR, IGNORANT REMAINDER OF THE FANDOM: Oh, come on, we know you have to slash every character and the more unlikely the better but could you not do it with Dumbledore?
DOGE: Hush, I know this article makes me seem like a stuffed shirt, but I'm feeding you large dollops of backstory in between.
READERS: Yeah... we'd be more interested in Dumbledore's backstory if he were still, what's the word, alive.
FAN #2: Ten fake Sickles! Don't forget!
HARRY'S THOUGHTS: Why, oh why, did I never ask my headmaster more personal questions?
HARRY'S THOUGHTS: ... oh, yeah, he blew me off every time I tried.
BOOK: The idea of a teenaged Dumbledore was simply odd, like trying to imagine a stupid Hermione or a friendly Blast-Ended Skrewt.
MOVIES: We can help with with one of those, so perhaps we can help with the other two.
RITA SKEETER: This chapter's boring. Here I come from the rescue!
THE CHAPTER: *does pick up a bit, even if Rita's as predictable as ever*
SKEETER: *I* wrote a nine-hundred-page book in FOUR WEEKS. Take THAT, Ms. I-Wrote-OotP-(Eventually) Rowling!
ROWLING: And the sad, bewildering thing is that I created you...
PSYCHIATRISTS: *on it*
ELPHIAS: Skeeter's book contains less fact than a Chocolate Frog card. *looks around eagerly* Huh? Huh? C'mon, where's the love?
MIZ PARODY LADY: I thought it was funny... Dodgy.
ELPHIAS: Er, thank you?
MIZ PARODY LADY: Of course, I thought her nickname for you was pretty funny too.
SKEETER: I'm trying to destroy Dumbledore by suggesting that he has a dark and dodgy past - because that never won anybody any fans before.
SNAPE: Fangirls, if you don't cease and desist, I shall replace your eyeballs with dung beetles.
FANGIRLS: *squee in anticipation of dung-beetle eyes*
SKEETER: Well, of course, everyone knows what a disturbed adolescent Potter is.
HARRY: You LIE, bitch! *hunches over into a ball and stares moodily out the window*
HEDWIG: It's okay, sweetie. I hate this chapter too.