Book 4: Draco Malfoy and The Golem Army
Chapter 9: Break the Freak Out
"Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves."
When classes resumed in January, the Fifth House were immediately ushered into Umbridge's office.
The Headmistress's Office took up the entire top floor of № 30 St. Mary Axe. It was a huge glass dome that was originally slated for the Astronomy Classroom, but had been taken over by Umbridge. She had set up pedestals all over the floor with decorative plates on them. The plates featured kittens gamboling, kittens playing, kittens dressed in lace, and something about cheeseburgers.
Umbridge was sitting behind an overly large desk sipping tea.
"Can I offer you some tea?" she asked sweetly.
"No." they all answered.
"It's no trouble." she said.
"No." they all answered.
"Go poison someone else." Draco added.
"Very well." said Umbridge putting her cup down and standing up. In her case that meant she got shorter. "You all know why you're here. You kidnapped Draco Malfoy last year."
"I wasn't actually involved." said Hermione.
In response, Umbridge pulled a note out of her desk drawer and held it up. An insulting and incriminating note was written in heavy black calligraphy:
We kidnapped Draco Lucius Malfoy.
Suck it Umbridge.
Sincerely, Hermione J. Granger, Ron B. Weasley, Harry J. Potter, & Marcus Montefiore
"That doesn't prove anything." said Hermione. "Everyone's signatures are in the same handwriting."
"What's your middle name, Marcus?" asked Draco.
"That's immaterial." said Marcus. "It's true. We kidnapped Draco. We'd do it again. He did not run away out of fear that Voldemort was at his house."
"Never the less, you will all be punished." said Umbridge.
"That's not fair." said Draco in mock anger.
"Shut up, Draco." said Hermione in a hollow voice.
"Let me introduce you to your new handlers." said Umbridge pointing behind them.
Draco turned around to see five hulking wizards in black robes. They looked like a frightening parody of the Secret Service.
"From now on they will accompany each of you to all your classes." said Umbridge. "They will follow you down the halls. They will be with you at meal times. They will bunk in your dorms. When you sneeze, they're going to be right there to blow your nose."
~o!o~
Later that week, Draco was seated at his usual table with his handler, Mericet. Marcus was sitting across from him next to his handler, Cruces. Marcus was calmly reading the fully illustrated autobiography of Donatien François, the Marquis de Sade. Cruces was slowly scooting away from him.
"Balls to this." said Ron, sandwiched between his and Hermione's handler. "We can't get away with anything anymore."
"Not that we were before." said Hermione, stirring around her lasagna.
"This won't last forever." said Harry. "If we keep out of trouble, Umbridge will get bored and pull back her dogs." His handler, Selachii, sneered at him. "No offense." Harry added.
"'S alright." shrugged Selachii.
~o!o~
Two months past. Mericet was just as attached to Draco' side as the first day they had assigned watch-dog duty. Harry's plan of waiting it out was taking forever. Forever had taken on transfinite values. It was going to be a slow, abrasive eternity of dull classes and being followed to the bathroom by a lumbering pervert.
"Why so glum, Draco?" said Marcus as they were coming out of Transfiguration.
"School is as dull as dishwater and I'm being followed around by an obtrusive shadow." Draco answered pointing his thumb back at Mericet.
"Our shadows aren't so bad." said Marcus, looking over his shoulder at Cruces. Cruces was leaning against the wall, looking rather pale.
"It's different for you." said Draco. "Your shadow is scared of you." Cruces gave Marcus a wide berth that the rest of them weren't allowed. This was in no small part due to Marcus's new found taste in literature. In the past few weeks, Marcus had read The Methodology of the Holocaust, The Connoisseurs Guide to the Spanish Inquisition, and The Psychopathy of Edward Gein. When he was feeling particularly malicious, he would read passages out loud.
"It can't last forever." said Marcus. "The weather is changing."
"It is not." said Draco. "Umbridge is ruling with the same iron fist that she always had."
"I mean the actual weather is actually changing." said Marcus pointing outside.
Draco turned to look over the city. There was a huge black cloud bank sweeping toward them. Lightning was leaping between different thunderheads. In a few minutes, the city would be invisible in the storm.
"Things will change, Draco." said Marcus, grabbing Draco's wrist and giving it a squeeze. Marcus walked off towards Potions with a reluctant Cruces following him.
Draco walked to History of Magic and got his parchment out to take notes. Professor bins began droning about the Giant Wars of North Africa. If anyone else was teaching this, the subject would have been interesting.
Mericet put on his sunglasses and a few minutes into the lecture Draco heard him snoring gently.
Draco reached up his sleeve and pulled out the small roll of paper Marcus had stuffed up his sleeve.
Pack everything. Keep your bag with you. We meet in Umbridge's office when it goes dark.
~o!o~
Pack everything he says. We'll meet up in Umbridge's office he says. We'll hang her corpse out the window he says.
Ok, he hadn't said that last part, but that didn't exclude the possibility.
It had been a week since he got that note from Marcus. Since then, he had been carrying his back pack with him at all times. He made sure all his school books were right near the entrance, so Mericet wouldn't notice his backpack had an undetectable extension charm on it.
Draco had been waiting patiently. He assumed Marcus had a cunning plan. He was a Slytherin, after all, that was their job. Cunning plans were their life's blood. He had no idea what he meant by 'it goes dark', but he knew he'd know it when he saw it. Or didn't see it.
Day eight after he'd gotten the note, he was sitting in Defense Against the Dark Arts with Hermione. She had been carrying her backpack around with her. Marcus must have slipped her a note, too.
Draco, uninterested in anything Umbridge was prattling on about, focused out the window. The weather had been getting worse since the first storm system descended on the island last week. Draco couldn't see anything through the window but a wall of gray and the occasional burst of lighting. For all he knew, the entire city could have been reduced to rubble or painted pink.
"Now," said Umbridge from the front of the room, "What is the appropriate course of action when you see someone being assaulted with unfriendly spells?"
"Contact Ministry wizards and retreat a safe distance." chimed the class in response.
"Use Aufbau's Incendiary Barrage." said Draco.
"I was thinking Celdebrand's Reduction Wave." said Hermione.
Umbridge turned red and drew herself up to her full (short) height.
"Those are not Ministry approved tactics." said Umbridge.
"There is more to life than what the ministry approves." said Grace Augustine. It said a lot about how hated Umbridge was when Ravenclaws were becoming confrontational.
"Classes were good before the Ministry took over." said Neville getting out of his seat. "I'm getting dumber attending your classes. I didn't even know that was possible!"
"Sit down, Mr. Longbottom!" trilled Umbridge. "I will give you detention if you don't take your seat!"
"Who bloody sodding cares?" yelled Neville.
"I don't!" yelled Padma Patil. She threw her book at Umbridge who ducked to avoid it. "It's not even worth it to stay in this joke of a school!"
Umbridge was red with anger and pale with fright. She had just realized one of the fundamental truths of being a teacher: You were outnumbered.
Draco and Hermione's handlers were looking around the room. Watching a brat was one thing, but fighting off a whole crowd of them was something else.
"Now listen here!" said Umbridge backing up. "I am Headmistress of this school! And all of you will -"
Then a cloud of black smoke came shooting into the class around the seams of the door. Umbridge jumped away, but wasn't fast enough. The dark cloud enveloped the room in seconds. Draco seized his chance and shot a stunning charm where Mericet was a second ago. He couldn't even see the red light of the spell in the black cloud, but he heard a satisfying grunt coming from Mericet's last location.
He groped around in his pocket and pulled out his monocle. He set it in his eye and the shapes of the classroom showed themselves. Students were groping around in the blinding smoke. He saw Hermione standing over what looked like a weasel and her handler's body was no where to be seen. He guessed she had gone a more creative route than stunning.
"I guess this is what Marcus meant by going dark." said Hermione reaching out and grabbing Draco's arm. "Do you have your monacle? I left mine in my backpack."
"Yes." said Draco, trying not to inhale.
"You can breath, Draco." said Hermione. "This isn't smoke."
Draco started breathing again. He had automatically held his breath when the cloud engulfed them. He inhaled and found it didn't have the texture of smoke, it felt as natural as breathing air. It didn't bother his eyes either.
"What is this?" asked Draco as he grabbed his and Hermione's backpacks.
"No idea." said Hermione. "Marcus will explain it when we get to Umbridge's office."
Draco pulled Hermione behind him out of the classroom. The hallways were just as pitch dark as the classroom had been. On their way up to Umbridge's office they passed a lot of students stumbling through the hallways.
As they past the shape of Slytherin Prefect Montague, Draco punched him out as they ran past.
"What was that?" asked Hermione as he hit the floor.
"I knocked over a coat rack." said Draco.
They ran up the last staircase and came up into Umbridge's office. Her office was clear as day. You could see the storm clouds roiling overhead.
Ron and Marcus were already up there. Cruces was sitting against the wall, sobbing quietly.
"Do you have everything?" asked Marcus, shaking his own backpack.
"Everything." said Hermione. "I stole some curative potions from Madame Pomfrey for when it really hits the fan."
"Good thinking." said Harry coming up the stairs. He was dragging Selachii's unconscious body behind him. "He slapped these manacles on me before I could stun him." he explained jingling the chains on his wrist.
"I'll cut off the hand at the wrist." said Ron, pulling his wand out.
"No!" screamed Harry, backing away from Ron.
"Not your hand. His." said Ron.
"Oh," said Harry, relaxing.
"How did you make the school go dark?" asked Hermione looking away.
"We sunk our allowance into Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder." said Marcus.
"I had it delivered to Fred and George in bottles of ink." said Ron. "They released it into the water for the sprinkler system."
"That's brilliant, but what did it accomplish?" asked Hermione. "The darkness will clear up, Umbridge will go spare, and we'll have two handlers following each of us around."
"Fortunately, you have the next part of the plan." said Marcus.
"I do?" she asked. She had a foreign expression on her face. Draco imagined it was the one she would wear if a teacher asked her for an assignment that she had forgotten.
"Did you find where that number was coming from? The one that was calling Joan Rauling." Marcus asked.
"That's a dead end." said Hermione. "It's a public telephone box in Dover."
"It's a telephone box that has a Golem visiting it every night." said Marcus walking over to the nearest glass panel. "It's something to go on."
He waved his wand and the glass panel melted. Wind and rain blew in from outside.
"What are you doing?" yelled Hermione over the gale.
"We're leaving!" answered Marcus, pulling his titanium broom out of his backpack.
"You want us to fly away from school?" yelled Hermione. "There's a storm out there! With lightning!"
"It's perfect cover!" yelled Draco, pulling his own broom out of his backpack.
"We can't just run away!" yelled Hermione. "We'd miss class and fail tests." This sentence replayed in her head and she was unimpressed with her own excuse. "Well, people would worry about us."
"Mother never worries about anything!" said Marcus.
"Mine worries about everything!" yelled Ron.
"Yours won't even know!" yelled Harry, who now had a bloody manacle dangling off one wrist. "You can ride shotgun!" he held up his own broom and wiggled his eyebrows.
"If you stay behind, you have to explain everything to Umbridge!" said Draco.
Hermione looked around at Umbridge's kitten adorned office.
"Okay, fine" she said. "But first." she pulled out her wand and waved it above her head. There was a sound like a cannon going off and Draco felt a wave sound reverberating through his body. All of the plates shattered and the glass ceiling fell in.
Draco got on his broom and made sure his backpack was on snugly. Hermione climbed on Harry's while Ron got with Marcus.
"There's no going back after this!" said Marcus.
"I don't want to go back after this!" said Draco and kicked off into the air. He flew up through the empty pane. The ice shards in the clouds stung his face as he raced through the air. Lighting flashed around him and rain soaked through his hair.
Then, like he was stepping across a threshold, the clouds were gone. He had flown above the storm. He saw Marcus, Ron, Hermione, and Harry punch through the clouds behind him. The sky was an endless blue above him and the clouds twisted and swayed below them like an ocean. Some thunderheads rose like giant pillars. Draco looked farther up to see the sun shinning on them.
"It's beautiful." said Hermione.
They turned and flew off towards the White Cliffs of Dover.
~o!o~
Cruces and Selachii were having a bad day. They had been stunned. One of them had his hand cut off. Madame Pomfrey had reattached it in a trice, but waking up to find you can only count to five is disturbing.
But nothing compared to this. Being held off the ground by your neck in the iron clutch of Cynthia Montefiore.
"HOW!" she thundered. "DID THIS HAPPEN!"
They both tried to croak out an excuse, Cynthia's grasp was too tight to let air through.
Dumbledore surveyed the damage to the Headmistress's office of № 30 St. Mary Axe. The once beautiful glass spire was a birdcage of metal struts. The floor was covered in glass shards and broken china. Rain was falling down on them freely. With every step he took, there was a crunching sound underfoot.
"Chairwoman," coaxed McGonagall, trying to pull Cruces back to ground level. "Violence isn't the answer."
"They lost my children!" yelled Cynthia. "If I had a third arm it would be twisting Mericet's head off!"
"Can I go?" asked Hermione's handler in a small voice.
"You're next!" brayed Cynthia.
He cowered behind Lucius Malfoy. He had never been afraid of Cynthia before, but seeing her holding up a two hundred pound bodyguard in each hand inspires fear in person.
"Mericet was guarding my son." said Lucius. "If anyone is going to tear his head, off it's going to be me."
Cynthia dropped both men on the ground and rounded on Umbridge.
"How did this happen, Dolores!" she yelled at the cowering woman. "This building comes equipped with a state of the art security system! But I guess you didn't bother to even read the fucking manual!"
"Your son was the ring leader here!" said Umbridge defensively.
"Which?" asked Cynthia.
"Pardon?" asked Umbridge.
"Which of my sons. I have five." clarified Cynthia.
"Oh, Marcus." said Umbridge.
"Marcus!" Cynthia yelled into the storm. "When I find you, you are cleaning all of this up! Diego!" she spun back around.
"Yes?" said Diego.
"Fetch Raleigh and bring him aboard the Silvana." said Cynthia. "He's to stay there until further notice. Impress upon him very strongly that any attempt to run off and find his brothers will be dealt with harshly. Tell Molly to do a search of the island. Set the scanners for dunce."
"What's a Silvana?" asked Lucius.
"It's a jam donut." said Cynthia. She marched over to the window, or where the window used to be, and stared out into the storm.
The five bodyguards slunk away while Lucius and Umbridge got together to collude on how they could put this on Dumbledore.
Dumbledore walked over to Cynthia and handed her a hanky. Cynthia took it, wiped her eyes quickly, and handed it back.
"There out there somewhere." she said quietly. "It's a world of hazards and monsters and they can't protect themselves."
"They'll be alright." said Dumbledore. "They were taught by the best."
Cynthia looked around the ruins of the Headmistresses office.
"I think we might have skipped a crucial lesson." she said.