Author's Notes: Yea...so I've been offline for a while! And unfortunately it's going to be very intermittent for the near future too since my laptop is on its last legs. I literally have wedge my power jack into position so that it's connected to the power! Seriously sucks and since we're currently redecorating my kids rooms so that they have separate rooms unfortunately we can't afford a new laptop for me yet so I'll just have to write as and when I can get it to work.

Bubbles

Hermione released Bill's arm with a grateful smile as they reached the burrow. The underage members of the group in particular were not allowed to travel alone anymore; it was too dangerous with death eaters out and about. Hermione had only been cleared to use most magical forms of transport two weeks ago. The internal damage done by Dolohov's curse in the Department of Mysteries have been rather serious and although the worst of it had been healed by magic very quickly the risk of reopening the wounds was too great using magical forms of transport.

"Hermione!" Harry called and waved. Hermione grinned and waved to the familiar faces playing outside at the burrow.

"Afternoon everyone." She greeted before her smiled slipped into a puzzled look. "What on earth are you doing?" She eyed Ron and Ginny suspiciously from where they seemed to hover in mid-air in what looked like giant bubbles.

"We saw some muggles doing it and thought it looked like fun." Fred grinned.

"So we thought we'd create something we could sell." George agreed.

"You mean zorbing?" Hermione asked. "You've created a wizarding version of zorbing...that's quite brilliant actually."

"And it's really easy, all you have to do is chew a piece of our special gum, blow a bubble and the bubble will automatically grow into one of these surrounding the user." The twins explained proudly.

"Ginny and Ron have been in the lake shoving each other for some time now, they're trying to push one another out of the lake." Harry laughed.

"Have you tried them down a hill?" she asked. "Muggles usually use them down a hill, sometimes with water thrown inside...I'm guessing you saw them doing it in a pool?"

"Down a hill?" George asked, his face lit up.

"Brilliant." Fred agreed. They made short work of levitating Ron's bubble out of the lake and moving it to the top of a slope further behind the house. Moments later a rather irate looking Ron came charging at the twins, his face redder than his hair.

"What in the bloody hell was that for?!" he demanded.

"Hermione suggested it." They shrugged.

"I asked if you had tried it, I didn't tell you to use your brother as a test subject." She sighed. "The bubbles obviously need a bit of a reinforcement charm worked into them...and judging on the bumpy ride Ronald had down I would also work in a cushioning charm."

"Who are you and what have you done with Hermione Granger?" a voice asked from behind them.

"Hi Charlie, I'm still me by the way." She said cheerfully. "I was just helping them fix their product so that they don't get sued and innocent customers don't get hurt."

"Well, if anyone can fix it, it'd be Hermione Granger eh?" he laughed.

"Alright Hermione, how about you try it and see if you can fix it?" George asked handing Hermione a piece of gum. Hermione looked uncertain for a moment before sighing in defeat and taking the gum from George.

"Alright...so you'll want to work the charms into the gum when you make it but to see if the charms actually do what we want I'll just add them to the bubble after for now." She put the gum into her mouth and chewed it for a while before she started blowing a bubble. Her first attempt didn't even manage to blow a bubble because everyone watching her made her want to laugh instead. The second time she managed to blow a bubble and sure enough it continued to increase in size by itself until she was surrounded by a giant bubble.

"Cool." A voice came from right next to her. Hermione jumped and looked to her right to see Charlie stood next to her...inside the bubble...

"They might want to make it clear on the label that the bubble will surround more than one person if they're stood too close...right let's get testing..." she said, mainly talking to herself. Charlie watched her as she practically ignored him while she added a standard reinforcement charm to the bubble and then a cushioning charm. He felt the bubble go slightly squishy beneath his feet and Hermione started prodding at it to test the strength and flexibility. She removed the reinforcement charm and replaced it with a different one before testing the bubble again with her hand. "Well...only one test left, how do you feel about being a hamster?"

"Right...so just start moving yeah?" he asked. They started walking forward leaning their hands against the front of the bubble for balance until they began to roll forward in the bubble like a hamster ball. Hermione soon found that she had to speed up to catch up with Charlie's longer legs until they were running around the garden and towards the slope. "Think we can get it up there?"

"We'll have to run flat out I think." She said. They ran and sure enough managed to reach nearly the top of the slope, unfortunately Hermione couldn't quite keep up with Charlie and it threw them off balance. The bubble promptly rolled straight back down the slope sending Hermione and Charlie bouncing around inside it wildly. She let out a yelp as his boot caught her shin and then again when her head hit his. Realising the ride would get quite painful if this continued she clung to his shirt tightly to stop herself flying around, catching on he wrapped his arms around her tightly and soon the two found themselves at the bottom of the slope with the bubble stopped against the fence with Hermione on top of him awkwardly. "Definitely not recommended for two people...ouch..."