Thanks for sticking with the story. I'm really appreciative of all the kind things you've all had to say. A few quick notes before this chapter. Yes, I'm aware I've changed some of the dialogue, and the order of some of the dialogue and events from the way they've occurred in DH. I still plan to follow major events from canon, so just relax, lol. It just seemed to flow better for the purposes of my story and the tone I'm trying to create. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter. The next one will be coming soon.
Several minutes of huffing and puffing later, Molly finally lumbered through the other end of the tunnel, feeling as large and ungainly as Hagrid. Looking around, she saw a room that was, at once, entirely new, filled with hammocks and House banners and clothing lines full of robes and socks, yet strangely familiar, as if she'd been there before. Also familiar to her were the people that turned to look as she entered.
"Mum?" Bill and the twins asked simultaneously.
"Mon dieu!"
Fleur looked just as surprised, turning away from the group of Hogwarts students and Remus Lupin she had nervously been talking to.
Arthur whipped around, too, a look of shock, then almost immediate anger washing over him.
"Molly, I thought I told you to—"
"Silencio!"
Before he could finish scolding her, Molly whipped out her wand and applied a small Silencing Charm to her husband.
"I know what you told me, Arthur, but my children are here. My children are here, so I have to be. I'm not going to argue about this."
He sighed, or at least he would have, could he have been heard, and nodded, defeated.
Molly smiled sadly as she lifted the charm, and gave him a small kiss on the cheek.
"At least promise me you'll be careful?" he asked. "That you won't do anything reckless?"
"If I can avoid it, I will," she nodded, then stepped back, demonstrating the Concealment on the cloak by opening and closing the folds around her. "And look what Aberforth gave me. No one will see the belly so I might move with a little more anonymity."
"You haven't been that thin for months," Fred called, trying to lighten the mood.
"Watch it, you," his parents called in unison.
Just then, they heard the clatter of footsteps down the entrance stairs and Harry burst into sight, bruised and breathless.
"Harry!" Molly cried, rushing to him and crushing him into a long-overdue embrace. "My boy! Are you alright? Is Ron?"
"He's fine!" Harry replied, pulling back gently. "We're all fine… for now. What are you all doing here?"
"The DA coins," Fred explained. "Neville activated them, and we sent the message along. We had to."
"What's the plan?" George asked. "What's going on?"
"They're getting the younger kids ready for an evacuation and everyone's gathering down in the Great Hall," Harry replied. "We're fighting."
"Where's Ron and Hermione?" Molly asked, suddenly looking more worried.
"I was just about to ask you the same thing," said Harry quickly.
"You mean you don't know?"
"I'm sure they went up to the Great Hall already," said Arthur, trying to ease their fears.
With that, most of the crowd darted for the door, poised to begin battle.
"I thought I heard them mention a bathroom," Seamus Finnegan called behind him as he raced up the stairs toward the hallway.
Within moments, only a few people remained, the Weasleys and Lupin among them, turning around as Ginny crawled through the tunnel opening.
"Ginny!" Molly shouted angrily. "You turn around and take yourself right back down that tunnel. What did I say?"
"I'll kill that Aberforth!" she added under her breath.
"I'm not going!" Ginny yelled back. "I won't! I'm in Dumbledore's Army! We've a same duty to fight as all of you!"
Molly was about to argue when another clump of red-hair tumbled in from the open portrait.
"Am I too late?" Percy asked, the familiar goofy Weasley grin slapped across his normally stern face.
The rest of the room was shocked into silence.
"Has it started yet? I only just found out, so I—I—"
Everyone continued to stare at him, and he sighed, trying to explain himself.
"I was a fool, alright?" he announced. "I was an idiot, a pompous prat! I was a—a—"
"Ministry-loving, family-disowning, power-hungry moron?" asked Fred.
"Yes, I was," Percy sighed, humbled.
Molly burst into tears, rushing to her prodigal son, wrapping him in a hug so tight she might have strangled him.
"Oh, Percy," she sobbed into his shoulder.
"Hi, Mum," he said gently, pulling back and wiping away her tears with the pad of his thumb across her cheek. "I'm so sorry. You, too, Dad. I'm so terribly sorry."
Arthur and Molly smiled softly.
"You're here now. That's all that matters," she said.
"And you're alright?" he continued. "The baby? Everything?"
"Wait, what?" Harry asked, surprised, but was ignored.
Molly nodded, grinning, and pulled back the cloak, exposing her baby bump. "Doing fine. And before you scold me, too, I wasn't going to sit around while my children fought for me. No arguments."
"Let's go, then," George interrupted. "Before all the good Death Eaters are taken."
"Wait, your Mum's pregnant?" Harry whispered to Ginny during the whole exchange, who nodded impatiently as she began to slowly sneak towards the door.
"Ginny!" Molly's voice caught her.
"No, you're—"
"Molly, wait!" Lupin's voice of reason stopped everyone. "Why doesn't Ginny stay here, then at least she'll be on the scene and know what's going on, but she won't be in the middle of the fighting?"
"Well…"
"I think it's a good idea," Arthur said firmly. "You can stay with her, too, Molly."
"Like hell I will, Arthur," she replied with a snort. "But, I suppose if she stays here…"
Ginny nodded begrudgingly, and with that, everyone else raced from the room, just as Harry's scar leapt to life, his vision clouded for the moment with the sight of Voldemort leading his legions toward the castle, wands drawn to kill.
