Summary: Welcome to Hogwarts' own Day Care Centre. Please take a seat, and I'll be with you as soon as I've stopped Severus and Albus throwing blocks. Poppy, sand isn't a food, and Minerva, nor is paint. No, I don't think Sybill likes the taste either …

Rating: PG but may go up

Warnings: Mild language, but other than that I don't know yet

Disclaimer: Anyone who thinks it belongs to me must be mental. It doesn't!!!!

Author's Notes: Thanks for all the wonderful reviews! Harry is Head Boy and Hermione is Head Girl. Ron is still a prefect. Just so that clears that up. I know Harry wasn't made a prefect in OotP, but James wasn't a prefect either and we know he was Head Boy. So there.


Kiddie Kare for Hogwarts Teachers

Chapter Two: The Roundup

By Alexannah

"Keep still," Harry grunted. Albus continued to squirm, trying to make a desperate break for freedom, but Harry had him pinned between his legs.

"It'll only take a minute. You'll hurt yourself if you keep moving." Harry finally managed to get at his face with the cloth. "There, all done."

Albus stuck his tongue out at him sulkily as Harry released him, making a face as it made contact with the inky cloth.

Hermione watched in amusement. Harry had said a minute ago that all three of the ex-teachers creeped him out, but as Albus creeped him out the least, he had volunteered to clean his hands and face. It had taken nearly ten minutes just to get one hand clean. Hermione had to admit seeing Snape's eyes in the toddler's face was rather unnerving.

"Need help, Harry?"

"Not now I'm finished, thanks, Hermione," Harry glared at her, looking down at Severus and Minerva, who were sitting peacefully by her feet with Minerva's book open between them. She seemed to be explaining it to Severus, who obviously didn't have a clue what any of it meant, but was looking at it with her anyway.

"So, what's the plan of action?"

"Well," Hermione said thoughtfully, "we need to round up the rest of the staff – I mean, kids – before one of them gets into trouble."

Harry groaned. "Great, just what I need: my own nursery in my bedroom. Why couldn't the mushrooms just have turned their faces blue or something?"

"Oh Harry, use your brain. Someone obviously did this deliberately; there must be a reason why whoever sent the mushrooms wanted all the teachers as children."

"Except Professor Lupin. He didn't eat them."

"No, thank goodness, but that doesn't help us now; he's away for his break, remember?"

Harry slumped on the floor, burying his face in his hands. "So, with all the teachers like this, who's in charge?"

Hermione snorted. "Well, us, obviously. We're Head Boy and Girl."

"This wasn't quite what I had in mind when Professor McGonagall offered me the badge," Harry murmured. Hermione slapped him. "Ouch!"

"Will you stop thinking of yourself for just one minute, Harry Potter? You do realise we've got …" She began counting on her fingers. "… about ten other little children loose in a magical castle? We've got to find them before something happens!"

"Okay! But we can't take these three with us."

Both teens looked over at the kids. Albus was sitting cross-legged next to Minerva, reading eagerly over her shoulder.

"We'll have to leave them here," Hermione sighed.

"In my rooms? No thanks. And they've nearly finished that book. What happens when they get bored?"

Hermione strode over to Harry's belongings and, after hunting for a minute, pulled out a Remembrall and Harry's old Sneakascope. "These should keep them occupied for a while." She placed a quick Unbreakable Charm on them and placed them on the floor beside the kids, none of whom looked up. "Come on then."

"Hold on." Harry crouched down next to the children, who looked up at them. "How old are you three?"

"Six," said Albus.

"I'm four."

Severus was silent for a moment before saying quietly, "Two."

Harry raised his eyebrows and looked over at Hermione. "Noticing a pattern?"

She shook her head. "Dumbledore's about four or five times Snape's age. The order's the same but it's not in proportion. We should remember that."

Harry nodded, still trying to follow the maths, and turned back to the kids. "Albus, you're the oldest, so you're in charge for a bit, okay?" Albus nodded obediently.

"Do you think that was necessary?" Hermione asked as they left them in the Head Boy's Room, shutting the portrait behind them.

"I thought it better to be safe than sorry. Okay, if you start in the North, starting with Trelawney – Oh Merlin, I dread to think what she's going to be like – and I'll get Ron and start the other end of the castle, he can cover the grounds and Hagrid's hut. I'll meet you back here once we've covered the lot."

Hermione nodded, turned and hurried off to the North Tower. Harry began in the direction of the Gryffindor common room.


"You've got to be joking."

Harry shook his head seriously. "All the staff members have been turned into kids and we've got to round them all up before something happens that doesn't bear thinking about."

Ron just stared with an open mouth.

"I'd rather you helped me find them rather than sitting there catching flies, Ron."

Ron blinked and closed his mouth quickly. "But where are we going to start?"

Harry waved a piece of parchment in his face that he'd been writing on. "I've made a list of all the teachers, and where their classrooms and offices are. Hermione's got the North part of the castle covered, which narrows it down -"

"Harry."

"What?"

"You said all the teachers were ill, right? Doesn't that mean they'll all probably be in their rooms?"

There was a long pause before Harry said, "Ah."

"You must have got lucky with those three."

"Yeah, I suppose so. Um … I think we'd better start in Dumbledore's office."

"Why?"

"He's bound to have a record of where all the staff live. Let's just hope he didn't use it for paper aeroplanes or something … I wouldn't put it past the kid."


Hermione climbed awkwardly off the silver ladder into the deserted Divination classroom. "Professor? … Er … Sybill?"

The last time she had been in this room she had been in third year. She was a seventh year now and Head Girl, Hermione reminded herself as she inched nervously towards the shadows Professor Trelawney always entered from.

Pulling a pair of heavy dark curtains open, she saw a door. Pressing her ear to it, she could hear nothing. Hermione tried the handle but it was locked.

After a moment of thought, Hermione knocked clearly. "Sybill?"

There was the sound of running feet from the other side and something heavy slammed into the door. Something that was crying.

"Can you open the door?" Hermione said. When the person the other side simply continued to cry, she continued, "It's okay, I'm a friend. I've come to help you."

A shaky girl's voice answered. "I w-want t-to g-go h-h-home!"

"You can't, not yet," Hermione said soothingly. "But I can look after you till you do. Can you open the door, Sybill? It is Sybill, isn't it?"

A sniff answered her and after a moment there was the sound of a key turning in the lock. Hermione stepped back as it opened, revealing a girl of about five with shortish dark hair and huge glasses.

"I'm Sybill," she whispered quietly. She hesitated. "Where am I?"

Hermione held out her hand. "You're at Hogwarts school."

"Hogwarts?" Sybill frowned for a moment, then suddenly smiled, all misery forgotten. "Hogwarts!"

"That's right," Hermione assured her, leading her across the classroom. Sybill was glancing this way and that, but didn't seem interested enough to go and examine her surroundings properly. "My friend and I are going to look after you till we can get you home, okay?"

"Okay!" Sybill said brightly. Hermione smiled at the change of attitude and quietly thanked Merlin that the girl wasn't as difficult as Hermione found her as an adult.


Ron stopped in his tracks outside Hagrid's hut. "Oh, no."

The door looked as if it had been opened so forcefully that it had come off its hinges. Either the person who had opened it was deliberately trying to break it, or simply didn't know their own strength. And it had been opened from the inside …

Ron rushed into the hut. Fang was curled up peacefully on the massive bed. The rest of the hut looked undisturbed. He groaned and left it again, not bothering to try and shut the door. Looking out over the grounds, Ron couldn't see anyone. When the Ministry had been forced to accept Voldemort was truly back and announced it publicly, most students were reluctant to leave the safety of the castle. Closely protected Hogsmeade visits and the Quidditch were the only escape. Ron groaned again – they'd have to cancel the Hogsmeade trip coming up. It would have been the first one of the term – the third-years were not going to be happy.

But at the moment, he had bigger problems.

"Okay, I'm Hagrid," Ron muttered out loud. "I've just found myself in a strange place and I don't know where I am and no-one else is here. Where do I go?" His eyes scoured the grounds, pausing at the Forbidden Forest, and his heart sank. "Oh, no. Not in there."


When Harry had been a small child, he had always been afraid of anything different. Whenever he was afraid of something, he either ran or hid. He knew if he'd suddenly found himself in a strange place with no memory of getting there, he'd find a cosy place to curl up in till someone found him and took him where he was supposed to be. Which was why Neville found him crawling around under the Hospital Wing beds.

"Lost something, Harry?"

"Ouch!" Harry banged his head on the metal frame as Neville announced his presence. "Yeah, I have, as a matter of fact."

"Anything I can help with?"

"How good are you with kids?"

Neville frowned as Harry crawled out from the end bed and dusted himself down. "Well, I don't know about that. Why?"

"Look Neville, have you seen anyone under the age of eleven in the castle in the last day?"

"I thought I saw a little girl run through there when I passed here earlier." Neville pointed to the door at the end that led into Madam Pomfrey's office. "But I was probably imagining it."

Harry looked at the door. He'd already tried it and it wouldn't open. It still wouldn't open when he tried it again, even with Alohomora. The handle turned but the door wouldn't open, yet there wasn't a keyhole.

"I did say I probably imagined it," Neville repeated.

Harry ignored him and rapped hard on the door. "Is anyone in there?"

No answer. Listening hard at the gap, Harry could hear someone breathing. He knocked again, more gently. "Who's in there? It's okay, I won't hurt you."

"There's no-one in!" cried a girl's voice, then a gasp.

"Bingo." Harry grinned up at Neville, who was staring in surprise at the door. "Can you open the door, Poppy?"

Neville looked more surprised and the voice inside gasped again. "How did you know – I mean, I'm not Poppy!"

"Really? Who are you, then?"

There was silence for a moment, then someone walked up to the door. "Who are you?"

"I'm Harry."

"I don't know a Harry."

"You do now. You're at Hogwarts School, and I'm going to look after you till we can get you home, okay, Poppy?"

"No," the voice said sulkily. "I want to go home now."

"You can't, I'm afraid."

"I want to go home!" she cried, starting a tantrum. Harry sighed.

"Who's she?" Neville whispered.

"Madam Pomfrey as a kid, apparently," Harry whispered back over the yells.

"What do you mean?"

"Keep this to yourself okay Neville, but the staff have been turned into kids. It was something served to them at dinner last night."

"What? All of them?"

"Apart from Professor Lupin, cos he didn't eat it, but yeah, everyone else. Snape included."

Neville gulped. "How old are they?"

"It's varying. Snape's two, McGonagall's four, and Dumbledore's six. He's a nightmare: he'd wrecked his own office by the time we'd found him. I tried to go through his stuff to see if I could find out where all the teachers live in the castle, but he'd finger-painted half of it and eaten the other half. So we're using our initiative to round them up. Poppy, please come out," Harry directed to the closed door. She'd stopped screaming now and was just silent.

"No."

"Why won't you come out?"

"I don't want to see him!"

"Who?" Harry asked, puzzled.

"Him! The big boy!"

"How big?"

"Big! And scary!"

At this point, right on cue, Ron came running into the Hospital Wing. "Any luck?"

Harry gave him a "Don't ask" sort of look. "What about you?"

"I think Hagrid's gone into the Forest!"

TBC …

A/N: Please review! I live off them! Especially when they say what you like rather than just the fact that you liked it! Please don't flame!
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