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"They..." Ron slumped back in his seat as he realised that Hermione just wasn't listening to him. After five minutes of sullen, not-really-listening, Ron pulled out his chessboard and began to play around with an idea. Twenty minutes later Hermione shrieked as she finally noticed that he wasn't listening at all.

"Ronald Weasley, you can't..."

"Hey." Ron gave a frown, an idea at the edge of his head. "You think House-elves need what...a forty-hour work week? Wages? Uniforms? Acceptable accomodations?"

"And an extra day off per month." Hermione's expression was stubborn. "It's everyone's right to be employed under those circumstances."

"Okay, just lemme think about it." Ron sank his attention back into his chessboard, vaguely aware that Hermione had given a huff before stalking off.

"Ron." It was several hours later when Harry flopped into the opposing chair with a soft moan.

"Hey, Harry." Ron pushed the chess-board aside and tugged on the end of his nose. "You agree with Hermione on this spew stuff?"

"No." Harry half-opened an eye. "Give the elves a choice, sure...but she's trying to force it upon them."

"I was just thinking...I don't think she understands house-elves."

"Oh?"

"Well, she see's all their work and thinks how horrible...but they don't see it that way. Imagine if Hermione could only read books for forty-hours a week?"

"You think house-elves see work as comparable to how Hermione sees books?"

"I do...but I don't see a way to convince her of that."

"Well, teach me about house-elves...why do they live and work the way the do?" Harry sat up a bit and shifted one of the chess pieces. An hour and three games of chess later both boys slumped back in their seats and glowered at the surrounding people. Neville had been the first to join them, then he'd dragged Parvati and a couple of fifth years Harry didn't know the name of.

"Winky!" Harry's exclamation caused everyone to start, then the arrival of a tipsy house elf made everybody jump.

"Woss Dobby's 'ArryPotterSir be wantin'?" Somehow the slurring made the house elf accent infinitely worse to comprehend.

"I have a job for Winky."

"A job?" the film seemed to clear marginally from Winky's bulbous eyes.

"A task? An order? Take it in whatever form you like." Harry leant forward, noting that Winky's eyes continued to clear. "First, you need to lay off the butterbeer, you need to be sober for this job."

"Harry!" Hermione descended in a cloud of outrage.

"Hermione!" Harry's tone was flat. "I am making a deal with Winky. She is to work the hours you work. It's an experiment."

"Certainly." Hermione sat down firmly, pulled out a length of parchment and spent twenty minutes baffling everyone with her instructions for how Winky was to live. "Thankyou, Harry for being so supportive of SPEW." Hermione rose and headed for her dormitory.

"Don't thank me yet." Harry's reply was quiet, but quite audible. Hermione simply waved a hand and continued to leave. "Now, Winky." Harry knelt in front of the small elf. "I appologise, this will be hard on you, but I think the result will get Hermione to leave you guys alone. I'll come downstairs later and explain things to the head elf for you, but from now until this deal ends you are a garden elf. You work from eight in the morning until five in the evening, monday to friday. You take a fifteen minute break at ten. You take another fifteen minute break at three thirty. You take an hour at twelve thirty to rest and eat lunch."

"..." Winky's mouth was flapping, her eyes completely clear and totally horrified.

"Harry...what's she meant to do with the remaining 128 hours?" Parvati Patil was almost worried. "They don't sleep like we do."

"Well...Hermione kind of forgot to ask what her side of the deal is." Harry's smile was wry. "I kinda think that she was going to work to Winky's limits of work type, which is irrelevant since the most Hermione does is not throw her clothes on the floor at night...but Hermione didn't really listen. Their work is limitted. Winky is limitted to only forty hours of garden work...but our work is as students. Hermione's side of this deal is to only study between eight and five...with an hour and a half of breaks each day and weekends off."

"You'll never limit her to that."

"I won't...but Winky will. Outside of eight to five and the breaks Hermione will have to haggle Winky for the right to study, or read a book...I think she'll change her mind about the poor, ignorant and oppressed house-elf really, really quickly."

"Vicious, Potter." Lavender Brown was shaking her head slowly. "Why are you doing it this way?"

"She's not listening to us. Worse, she's not listening to the house-elves. If we don't interfer she's going to crusade and make everyone uncomfortable due to the fact that the elves won't get in her face about it. This way she has to negotiate with the people she's claiming to represent...and Winky will happily engage if her right to clean is on the line."

"That's true." Neville grimaced, most people only tried to argue with a house-elf once.

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