AN: Sorry this took so long; lost my first draft in a crash. It was way, way better, I guarantee! As always, single quotes are for mental communication, which in this fic more or less exclusively means Hermione-in-Luna's-head. (Hermione cannot hear Luna's thoughts; Luna has to speak out loud to communicate back at Hermione.) This is a note I should have probably given a while back, but I'm sure you'd figured it out.

People have asked about pairings; wait and see, mostly, though I will say there probably won't be a romantic plot between Luna and Hermione. Same answer for Hermione getting her very own body.

There's a 'prequelish' oneshot fic up I wrote not that long ago explaining, in part, Luna's role in the war. It's called Dying Dreams; you can find it from my author page.

As always, what's not mine isn't mine.

Luna smiled to herself as she headed back for the Gryffindor common room, wand in hand. "Well, I gave away a bit more than I wanted to there, but I think it was really for the best. And it'll be at least a week before Malfoy can hold a wand again..."

'Well, yes, but I can't believe you told him you might be a hit-witch.'

"It was my own fault, I tried to say auror, but... We both know that I could never join them, not while they're still running the Rotfang Conspiracy, and I was a hit-witch for all intents and purposes Before, even if there wasn't a Ministry for me to really work for. I'm still surprised he used Truth Seeking Solution on me, really. Anyway, I don't think I gave away anything else in that regard, so it should be okay."

'Well, yes, and even if I'm rather annoyed at what you called me in it, it is good that you've finally decided to start helping. Do you think that will be enough in Sirius' case?'

"Probably not, unless they figure out the animagus thing, but it might at least make room for some doubts. Anyway, I had to do something; you said the only reason that he found out about it last time was due to the Weasleys winning the grand prize drawing, and they probably won't this time. Random things change completely, you know."

'...Well, yes. I do wonder where he'll end up, anyway, I can't imagine Dumbledore sending Harry back to them after that. On that note, where exactly are you going?'

It was nice to have a conversation that wasn't a squabble with Hermione, something that had been happening less often in the past year or so due to Luna's initial decision not to interfere much, Luna mused.. but she had a habit of asking kind of silly questions. "Gryffindor common room. I remember the Ravenclaw one still, of course, but they might be even less happy to see me now then they were last time."

'...What about Harry?'

Oh, hell. Harry, Luna thought. She'd forgotten. But she didn't want to admit that to Hermione, and so... "Oh, I'd have thought you or Ronald or someone would have tracked him down by now; it's rather late. But we can go by and check on that, I guess. Better safe than Harry missing overnight, and.." A note of worry crept into her voice, try as she might to hide it. "I should try to make friends with them."

'...Well, yes. When are you going to tell them about... everything?'

"Never." Luna refused to clarify her reasons, walking along to the sixth floor, keeping her eyes open for Filch. "Time to play more games..."

And with that, Luna opened the cabinet door wide enough to slide through, facing it as she shut it behind her, gasping for breath she didn't really need.

It came as quite a surprise when a weight hit her in the back, sending her sprawling against the door and onto the floor. Luna rather dazedly felt hands roughly turn her over, and with a whispered "lumos", a bright light erupted from a wand held and aimed at her. Well, it seemed Harry had gotten out of her ropes, though he must have just done so or else he'd have presumably left – she hadn't really locked the closet.

"Ah, hallo! Were you hiding from Filch in here first? Only, you don't mind if I share with you, do you? I didn't mean to surprise you, you know."

'You are much too good at that, Luna'.

"Oh.. I thought you were.. someone else." Harry said, rather lamely. "...Is Filch nearby, then?"

"Well, I think so, yes. It's harder to tell without his cat around to warn in advance, though! It was a rather sweet kitten, don't you think? I do hope it recovers..."

"...Right. You're.. ah, Luna, wasn't it?"

Dear sweet Harry. He must have heard her once again granted nickname, and just as last time, he stuck to her actual name. Luna believed that she wasn't bothered by being called Loony, but if so, she thought, why did someone calling her her actual name make her feel so much better? Even when it was just Harry being polite.

"Oh, yes, and you're Harry Potter." Luna smiled, vaguely, up at him.. "Do you spend much of your time in closets, or is this an exception?"

"No, I don't. As it happens I woke up.. Well, never mind that. We need to get back to the common room. You said Filch was after you? It's after curfew, then?"

"Oh, yes, by quite a lot, you know. I was on my way back from meeting with Professor Dumbledore, but I don't want to have to meet with him again, so I decided to hide. And then I was assaulted by Harry Potter. You are Harry Potter, aren't you? Only I suppose you could be a monster in disguise, hoping to take advantage of my trusting nature."

"Well.. wish I had my bloody cloak, then." Harry said, mostly to himself.

"Oh, you can borrow mine! I think it may have gotten just a little blood on it, at the end."

"...That's not what I.. wait, what? What were you meeting with Dumbledore for, anyway?"

"Oh, directly? I think it was for making Draco Malfoy's wand explode in his hand. But it might just have been because Snape was in a foul mood over that and the fire this morning, you know. He's not a very fair professor, really."

"...Yes, I know. You made Draco Malfoy's wand explode in his hand?"

"Oh, yes, it was dreadfully exciting, at the dueling club, earlier. Would you like to hear about it before we sneak back, then..?"

Luna managed to introduce herself to Harry rather well, she thought, and he'd introduced her briefly to Hermione and Ronald, as well. Hopefully it would last; it would be rather nice to stay friends with the people she'd separated herself from, after all. In any case, if Riddle had been able to fix the basilisk's wounds, there had been an attack the day after the dueling club, before, and Luna meant to end that possibility forever. This was going to be stressful, however, and it was going to involve something a bit unpleasant.

"I never really liked this feeling, you know." Luna said, the dripping egg sensation washing over her as she disillusioned herself. "And he might see through it, eventually, or Dumbledore will notice if things go wrong enough..."

'Oh, shush. Do you feel up to the other part of the plan? Will it work?'

"It should; I rather wish I'd thought of it before getting smashed into a wall."

'Well, yes. Oh, there goes Ginny, follow her!'

It was nice not having classes, Luna thought as she stepped along behind Ginny, following her through the school to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, her eyes widening as the Chamber was opened. Luna ducked into one of the stalls. Just wait a few minutes, ambush it, and the basilisk threat would be done with, and the year could go nice and calm through to the end...

And then, naturally, things got much more complicated.

The door opened, and the sound of footsteps echoed through the bathroom, whispers echoing through the room. "Come on, we need to stir it for fifteen minutes and add several ingredients today; lucky that Herbology was canceled, really. I didn't really want to come here by myself, you two."

'...Oh, no! The Polyjuice potion! I was hoping we weren't making it, with the mess you made of things... Without Harry being upset.. You have to get us out of here, you know! Right now!'

Luna shook her head, slipping out of the stall as the trio went into the stall with the potion, holding her wand out and whispering 'Colloportus'. It wouldn't hold them in long once things started getting bad, of course, but it might be long enough... As she did that, she felt the Disillusionment charm begin to wear off; hopefully it wouldn't really matter, anyway.

Though it might be bloody inconvenient.

Luna slipped back into her stall, waiting on the sound of the sinks reopening, listening to the sounds of potion-making in the next stall over, removing a large rock from her robes as she waited. Finally, there was a grinding sound.

"Blimey, what was that?" came Ronald's voice.

"I don't know, I'll check it out." came Harry's, followed by him tugging on the door. "...It's stuck!"

Luna heard the sound of scales sliding across the floor, and acted.

It was astonishing, really, the effect a rooster's call could have. Monsters sometimes had the strangest weaknesses, and the transfiguration wasn't even that difficult. However, Luna had not expected what came next, having sighed in relief as the stall's doors had not yet opened when the basilisk had came.

Well, okay, the howl of rage in Ginny's voice was probably to be expected, really. But what came after...

"ABOMINATION! Fairy freak, I know you're here! I should have killed you in your sleep, but I will fix that now!"

Well, he'd reached the entirely wrong conclusion about where her abilities came from, though that was rather flattering; still, this was probably going to be rather awkward. Especially as the sound of banging from the other stall finally resulting in it crashing open.

"...What the hell is THAT? ...GINNY?" came Ronald's voice, with quieter but similar echoes from Harry and Hermione... And then came a swift scream from Hermione, with Harry and Ronald crying out again.

"Come out, abomination, or they will die, mudblood first!"

"Fine!" Luna said, over the noise of the other two, stepping out of the stall, wrapping her wand through her hair. There was a rather impressively large dead basilisk, halfway through the door; undoubtedly, that would eventually draw attention, but for now it merely blocked the door. No issue for her, of course, but the others... and she could only side-along one person. "Let her go, demon, or else..."

"Or else? Tell me, fairy, did you think I wouldn't notice you, moving to stop me?"

"I'm no fairy, you know. You should get your facts straight; in any case, your monster is done, and so are you. You won't be able to force her to cast any truly.."

"Avada kedavra!" came the cry, and a green bolt streaked out, much to Luna's surprise. Not enough so that she wasn't able to move, of course; battle senses that dull would have left her dead long before. Still, as she dived back into the stall, she heard the sound of something shattering, and worried a bit. How was she going to do this..?, she contemplated, until she was interrupted once more by Ronald's voice. "Hermione! NO! Ginny, what did you DO?"

Harry Potter hadn't been having a very good week. Assuming it was actually still the same one; he wasn't entirely certain. First, he missed out on a very informative and entertaining dueling club, instead having woken tied up in a closet and then, once he'd eventually gotten loose, been utterly unable to find out who had attacked him.

More importantly, though, their trip to check on the Polyjuice Potion had gone very, very badly, he thought as he sat in a bed in the hospital wing, rubbing the side of his head as he thought back over it, trying to decide just how to explain what had happened. He was, evidently, the only one who could just now.

"Well, Professor, I.. we were brewing a potion in the bathroom, you know, to look into Slytherin's monster, and we were using one of the stalls for it. Well, we heard a loud grinding sound, and the door to the stall was stuck, and then... there was another noise, a rooster call. We got the door to the stall open, but it wasn't a rooster outside it. It was a giant... green thing, a big snake we saw later, though it was already dead, and Ginny Weasley, but it wasn't really her." It was important, he was sure, to get that out as early in the conversation as possible. Whatever trouble they might be in for the potion, it was nothing next to Ginny's problems. If she was even alive; they hadn't told Harry what condition the others were in, exactly.

"She was.. possessed, by something. Luna called it a demon, at one point. But, anyway, Ginny seemed to know that Luna was there, even though she was hiding... Called out for her as an abomination, and a fairy, and then she took Hermione as a hostage, had her wand to her throat and everything, and made Luna come out. They talked, a little bit, and then..." Harry swallowed. The light had been so familiar.

"Ginny, or whoever she was, cast something, sounded like the muggle abracadabra... And there was this green light." Harry blinked up at Dumbledore, who was now leaning forward intently. "...Did she? I assume noone was struck by this spell?"

"Well, Luna dodged it, Sir, but it hit a mirror and reflected to strike Hermione. Ron and I... we thought she was dead, really, she looked it. Anyway, Ginny hit the two of us with a blasting hex, but Luna got behind her somehow and knocked her out with a spell, stupefy or something like that. I don't know how the two of them knew so much, really... But Luna knelled down over Hermione, and there was this.. bright light. Brilliant, white... I don't know what it was."

"Luna passed out after that, but Hermione was back on her feet, and she seemed to know what had caused Ginny's possession. She grabbed a book from Ginny's robes, and set it on fire, but... It exploded, and then the next thing I remember is being here. Sir, may I ask a question?"

"...Of course, Harry," said Dumbledore, looking more than a little surprised, now.

"Just what happened? I don't understand it."

"Neither do I, my boy, yet. We shall learn more when your friends recover, particularly Miss Lovegood, but she shows no signs of stirring. Your encounter brought the room down on you; you are fortunate to have lived, let alone have recovered in the three days that you have. It may be some time yet before the others do, but I assure you, I shall inform the school when I have reached a conclusion. One thing that I can tell you, Harry, is that the 'snake' you spoke of was a very dangerous magical creature called a basilisk, whose major weakness is the call of a rooster. It was this that was the monster in the Chamber of Secrets; the school is, at least, safe once more."

For now, Dumbledore thought, images of two first year girls, demons, and fairies going through his head.