Author's Note: Now things get interesting. Question, should I put the Snape ghost I created for some of my one shots in this story?
War
"How much trouble do you think we're in?" asked Scorpius as the three Slytherins trudged sullenly through the door to Headmaster McGonagall's office.
"At least your dad isn't a professor," grumbled Albus.
"We are so in for it," howled Rose in distress.
"Do you think they'll call my dad?"
"I know Uncle Harry will tell my mum and dad, I bet your dad will hear about it too Scorpius."
"I'm in so much trouble. I can't believe we got caught."
"What's this?" asked Al from across the room. Listening to his two best friends bemoan their fates was making him feel queasy and he'd wandered through the office looking at the magical gadgets to get his mind off of it.
"I dunno," answered Rose, curiously approaching.
"Don't break it. We don't need to be in anymore trouble," grumbled Scorpius also making his way to Scorpius' side.
"It looks like a television," muttered Al, ignoring Scorpius.
The three friends watched as scenes from a muggle government building flipped across a misty screen suspended above a strange lens. Rose recognized many of the locations. Hermione had a TV in their house and used it primarily to watch the news, particularly politics. Being a lawyer Hermione liked to stay on top of the latest bills. Hermione's legal focus was impoverish individuals in wizard courts, but she could hold her own in a muggle courtroom as well if she needed to. Rose told her friends what the buildings were, but without sound the students could only speculate what the muggles were talking about.
"What are the three of you doing here?" asked Snape's portrait from across the room.
The three students had been at Hogwarts long enough to have visited McGonagall's office before, for past transgressions, and had met Snape and a few other portraits previously. In the middle of the day, however, most portraits were off running errands so Snape's comment startled the three students, causing them to jump.
"Professor McGonagall sent us here," answered Al. He'd always gotten along well with Snape, which was rare for a student, even postmortem.
"Obviously," he drawled, "did she send you here for any particular reason?"
"We're not winning any good citizenship awards," he answered, resisting the nearly irresistible urge to fidget.
"I do not play guessing games."
"The third floor," grumbled Al.
"Why, pray tell, did you see fit to visit the third floor?" asked Snape, his mannerism were all serious, but underneath he was enjoying himself. He liked tormenting students.
"We wanted to ask my dad what was going on."
"And you just guessed he was on the third floor?"
"Well…we have this map…"
"Your father gave students his map?" asked Snape, slightly shocked. Sometimes Potter's idiocy was staggering.
"He didn't exactly give it so much as mention it and leave it out in the open," explained Al, now unable to resist the urge to scuff his food against the floor.
"And you took it upon yourself to put it to good use?" asked Snape, raising his eyebrow in amusement.
Snape was about to continue the interrogation when McGonagall came sweeping into the room dramatically. She glanced at the scene and decided to ignore Snape, he could cause so much trouble for a portrait.
"Potter, Weasley, Malfoy, what do you have to say for yourselves?" she snapped, she really didn't have time for this.
"We saw Professor Potter rushing off in such a hurry we wanted to help," answered Scorpius. He nearly winced. He'd been trying to think up an excuse while Al talked with Snape and this was the best he could come up with. Lame.
"Really Mr. Malfoy? You wish for me to believe that in your rush to provide assistance you had the forethought to obtain Mr. Potter's invisibility cloak and enter the Inner Chamber during the most delicate point of an operation?"
"We didn't want to interrupt," offered Rose, catching on and trying to help Scorpius out.
"I do not have time for this nonsense," announced McGonagall, "Since none of you wish to share why you were in an off limits portion of the castle you will each receive two weeks of detention, and 50 points from Slytherin, each," they each winced as the punishments were pronounced, "and Weasley, Malfoy, I will be writing your parents," Scorpius went pale, "now-"
The three students believed they were being dismissed when McGonagall was interrupted by a loud siren from the strange mist image machine which was now flashing red. She completely forgot about the students in her presence and rushed to the machine. She waved her hand through the mist and suddenly the room was filled with sound.
"We have official word from Parliament, war has been declared," announced a breathless reporter from the mist, "The Prime Minister has declared he will rid the world of the wizard curse. We're cutting to his speech live."
"My friends!" called a portly old man with a drooping walrus mustache and a sharp business suit that the students recognized as the muggle Prime Minister Houghton, "The time has come for us to stand for what is precious. We must protect our children from the evil that is among us. We now know our enemy. We must eliminate all those who would sell their soul to darkness to obtain these powers called magic. We must destroy them, before they destroy us!"
"Severus," murmured McGonagall tightly, as the Prime Minister paused for applause, "gather the professors, send them here, tell them what has happened."
Snape nodded and disappeared from his portrait. The students watched the screen their eye's bulging. They listened to the rest of the speech before McGonagall realized they were still in her office.
"You three, wait just outside the door," she ordered wearily as her professors began to file into the room, somber expressions on every face.
The three students numbly walked out the door and sat on the steps, waiting. The professors seemed to be in the office for an eternity. An hour past and the three Slytherins waited for their headmaster to return her attention to them. At first they sat in shock at the top of the steps, but then the shock wore off and they began to discuss what they'd heard.
"I guess we know what all those weird laws were for now," murmured Scorpius.
"I hope grandma and grandpa Granger are ok," worried Rose, not listening to her friend.
"Do you think they'll close Hogwarts?" asked Al, gaining both his friend's attention.
"Why would they do that?" asked Scorpius in shock.
"If we're at war, wouldn't it make sense for the muggles to attack concentrations of witches and wizards? It would make sense to close Hogwarts so we'd be more spread out and harder to target," explained Al.
"Muggles can't see Hogwarts," answered Rose, her mother had quoted enough Hogwarts: A History throughout her childhood that she was full of fun facts.
"No, but their planes can. You saw the blue prints dad found on their computers," answered Al, referring to the hacking job they'd eavesdropped on which had landed them in McGonagall's office in the first place.
"They'd never close Hogwarts."
"They almost did when the Chamber was opened."
The kids continued these arguments until the office door behind them opened and their professors filed out again, each hurrying off to complete various tasks. Harry looked wearily down at the three children and motioned for them to join him in the headmaster's office once all the other professors had left him and McGonagall alone.
"Are they going to close Hogwarts?" blurted out Rose.
"No, no one's closing Hogwarts," Harry reassured his niece, "sit down."
The three sat.
"Have a chocolate."
They each took a piece of chocolate.
"Harry, I'll leave you to handle this," murmured McGonagall as she too swept out of her office.
"Alright kids," muttered Harry, running his hand through his already disheveled hair, "you saw some things you weren't supposed to see today. You weren't meant to hear that speech by the Prime Minister. We're going to explain the current situation to the rest of the school at an assembly this evening. I want you guys to keep this to yourself until then. Can you do that?"
"Yes sir," the three friends answered in unison.
"Alright," said Harry awkwardly, "get out of here."
The three friends leapt to their feet and rushed out of the office. They didn't slow down until they were in the dungeons. Al vaguely wondered why he hadn't had his invisibility cloak confiscated, but he figured the professors were too preoccupied to worry about something trivial like his cloak. The three friends silently mulled over the discovery they'd made. They found themselves standing in front of the entrance to their common room when they realized they didn't want to be around other people.
"Too bad we can't go outside," grumbled Scorpius.
"Astronomy tower?" suggested Rose.
The other two nodded their agreement. The three turned and trudged up to the tower. They were in such a state of shock it seemed like no time had passed before they were headed to dinner.
"Attention students," called McGonagall, standing at the head table, "there has been a major development in muggle and wizard relations. The muggles in the UK have formally declared war against the wizarding world," she paused as the hall erupted in confused chatter, before clearing her throat for silence again, "because of this there are some precautions Hogwarts will be taking to ensure the safety of our students in these difficult times."
Professor McGonagall went on to explain lock down drills and illustrate the proper procedure in the event that the school would be attacked by muggles. She then invited any student who had confusing feelings about the war to talk with any of the faculty. Al, Scorpius, and Rose listened carefully. They weren't in shock like most of their peers. The assembly was long. The students practiced the lock down procedures, and most students headed straight to bed as soon as they were permitted to return to their dorms.
A few days later and the effects of the war could already be felt. The students were never allowed onto the grounds. The paper was full of attacks by muggles on wizards.
"This is terrible," murmured Draco, he had long abandoned his breakfast in favor of the daily prophet.
"What is it?" asked Rose, looking up for her jam and toast.
"The muggles found the Leaky Caldrons. The raided it and arrested nearly fifty people. They're being held in huge warded prison. They then blasted their way into Diagon Ally where they used fire and machine guns to destroy most of the stores. They set Olivander's on fire and when the wands caught fire they exploded. The explotion took out both shops on either side of Olivander's, killing twenty people, including Olivander himself.
It seems wizard wards do very little to hold out muggles."
"That's terrible," murmured Al, stabbing a slab of ham on his plate, he suddenly found that he had lost his appetite.
"How could they do something like this!" exclaimed Rose, anger tingling in the air around her.
"I don't know, but if they keep going through our wards like they're not there this is going to be a very short war," answered Scorpius, "we can't do anything against their technology."
The three friends continued to discuss the horrible state of the world as they walked back to their common room. It was the week end and they were going to collect their homework and try to find a quite place to work. They had just entered the dungeons when they heard a rumbling like thunder above them. The students in the hall were looking around in confusion when Professor McGonagall's voice filtered through the halls without her present.
"Students this is a lockdown. This is not a drill. Commence with lockdown procedures. Students this is a lock down. This is not a drill. Commence with lockdown procedures," repeated the disembodied voice calmly but firmly.
The students all rushed towards doorways and other stable points in the architecture. The students in the dungeons scrambled towards the first floor. Most of the Slytherin house was in the dungeons so this wild rush for safer ground cause a back up in the hallway.
Five floors above Al, Rose, and Scorpius, James was running down the hall towards his sister. He knew it was his job to protect her. He wanted to find Albus also, but he was farther away.
"Lilly!" he shouted, catching his sister's attention.
"James!" she called back, rushing towards her older brother.
Just as she reached him a bomb crashed through the ceiling on the other end of the hall. The two siblings held onto each other until the shock waves died down.
"Lilly, we need to get everyone out of the school," stated James, looking his sister in the eyes.
"How?"
"There's a mirror at the end of the hallway. It opens to a passage to Hogsmead. We need to get as many people through there as possible."
"We should be able to reach the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw towers from here," answered Lilly, gulping and nodding nervously.
"Good, I don't know how to get everyone to come here though," answered James, casting around for an idea.
Just as he was considering summoning his broom and flying through all the corridors telling people to evacuate McGonagall's voice filled the halls again.
"Students, due to structural damage done by the muggle bombs we must ask you to evacuate to Hogsmead. Proceed to the school gates in an orderly fashion."
James grinned as her message repeated. Perfect.
"Lil', you stay here and tell everyone to take this short cut," ordered James as he started to run towards the stares, "I want to go find Albus."
Lilly nodded firmly. As James rushed away students began pouring into the hall.
"This way to Hogsmead!" she called, ushering the students to the passage. The students were so confused they didn't even question the first year taking them through a strange passage.
There were screams in the dungeons as the impact from the bombs higher up caused chunks of the ceiling to fall on the students.
"Aresto Momentum!" bellowed Albus, pointing his wand at a chunk of ceiling falling on Rose who was slightly in front of him.
"Depulso!" shouted Scorpius, preventing a large rock from falling on him and Albus.
"We've got to get out of here!" shouted Albus, just as McGonagall's voice filled the hall, echoing his conclusion.
The entirety of Slytherin house surged for the one exist from the dungeons, but between the number of students and the falling rocks the halls grew clogged and getting out was slow going. Just as they were forming an orderly escape another explosion rocked the castle and the dungeons began to collapse in earnest.
Al, Scorpius, and Rose had been able to see the exit to the dungeons when the ceiling collapsed, trapping almost all the Slytherins in the dungeons.
"Use bombarda!" shouted someone from the back.
"No don't!" shouted another students, "if you shift the rubble you might bring down the section of ceiling above us!"
"ALBUS SEVEROUS!" bellowed James from the other side of the rubble.
"I'm here, James," called Albus, using Sonorus to amplify his voice.
Can you blast your way out?" asked James, now also using Sonorus rather than relying on his copious hot air for volume.
"We're worried the rest of the hall will collapse if we use Bombarda," answered Al.
"You use bombarda," called James after a pause, "while I use Wingardium Leviosa to hold up the rubble."
"Alright."
"Ready?"
"Yes. NOW!"
The two brothers cast their spells at the same time. Albus neatly blasted away all the rubble and, although a few small stones fell, James held up the remaining rubble.
"Hurry!" called James, already sweating from the effort of holding up the ceiling.
"Wingardium Leviosa," called Albus, helping his brother hold up the ceiling. Scorpius followed suit and Rose was about to help as well but the boys told her to help make sure everyone got to Hogsmead. She nodded and lead her house to safety. It took only a few moments for the Slytherins to evacuate the dungeons. As soon as everyone was out the three boys dropped the rubble they'd been suspending and rushed after the other students.
When they reached the grounds it was in shambles. Debris littered the ground, but the planes didn't seem to be overhead so that was a relief. Rose had hung back to ensure that everyone made it out. Her cousins and friend rushed up to her and they all raced towards the gates together.
When they reached the main street of Hogsmead professors were waiting for them.
"Hufflepuff in the Three Broomsticks, Ravenclaw in Tomes and Scrolls, Slytherin in Honeydukes, and Gryffindor in Hog's Head." Called McGonagall's disembodied voice through the streets, repeating her message constantly.
"Are these all the students from the dungeons?" asked a worried Madam Pomfrey, rushing over and examining the students who had been hit by falling chunks of ceiling.
"Yes ma'am," answered James, breathless from running across the grounds.
"What were you doing in the dungeons?" she asked, turning to the only Gryffindor in the group.
"I had to go looking for my brother," answered James sheepishly.
She gave him a withering look before returning to the injured students. She ushered the more grievously injured parties to Dogweed and Deathcaps where she'd set up a makeshift infirmary. The other students were sent to the shop that housed their respective house.
"James! Albus! Rose!" called Harry who had just come around the corner. The children ran to embrace their father and uncle, "Scorpius, you all made it out alright!"
Harry hugged all four children close to him. He had grown quite fond of Scorpius. Even though they weren't related by blood, the boy was so close to his Albus and Rose he'd become like another son.
"We're find dad," muttered Al, slightly embarrassed, as he pushed himself out of his father's embrace.
After a tearful reunion Harry pulled himself together and sent the children to the buildings where their houses were being collected. The rest of Slytherin had already made its way to Honeydukes and the Gryffindors had all found their way to Hog's Head long ago. Harry was rushing off to attend to his other duties when the sounds of a muggle helicopter filled the air. Harry spun around and stared as ropes unfurled from the hovering machine just above the three children he'd just sent to Honeydukes.
Rose, Scorpius, and Albus looked up, saw the helicopter, and tried to run for the nearest building. Harry and James turned on their heels and ran towards the three Slytherins, but none of them were fast enough. Before the trio could get inside a building there were muggles standing around them with guns. The muggles were so heavily armored the students couldn't see anything but bullet proof vests and shiny helmets with goggles. They couldn't even tell if they were male or female.
The muggles threatened the three children with large guns to prevent the other wizards from rushing to their aid. They quickly strapped the three children into harnesses and raised them to the waiting helicopter above. Harry watched helplessly as the flying contraption speed away with three of the most important people in his life.