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Chapter 53
Green Goo and Preparations
It was just as well Albus and Philip knew their way to Heep's office as Professor Ebullio had forgotten to give them directions. All the same, walking around the school covered in green goo was no easy feat. They had to be very careful not to leave a drippy trail or smudge the walls.
For a long time neither of them talked. Eventually Philip asked,
"So, what happened?"
Albus hadn't really thought about that yet. He had been too stunned at first and now he was just concentrating on getting to Heep's office without getting the messy liquid on the floor. He thought about it now, long and hard and it almost seemed Philip had given up on an answer when he finally reached a plausible theory.
"Do you think it could have been Malfoy?" He asked.
"I dunno, I guess it could have been." He laughed.
"I reckon it was."
Philip laughed, "You know, I'm actually relieved! I was afraid for a moment you'd lost your talent at Potion making! Without you we'd be doomed!"
Albus looked at his friend, mouth-open laughing, green gloop plastering his hair and dripping off the end of his nose, soon he found himself laughing too. For a few minutes the two boys stood and laughed and laughed at themselves and each other and remembered the looks on their classmates' faces when the Potion had exploded.
Upon reaching Heep's office they found the door ajar and when they looked into the office they found it deserted.
"Should we go in?" Asked Philip nervously as he remembered the last time Albus had gone into the office while Heep wasn't there and nearly got caught.
Albus was unsure too, he made a quick decision and tried to speak in a reassuring voice, "We might as well, who knows when he'll be back. If he comes back we'll just quietly explain we were collecting something for Professor Ebullio."
"Alright Al, but you might want to let me do the talking, he probably doesn't like you much." Philip added.
Albus nodded, Philip was right Heep probably didn't like him at all after he was caught fleeing his office last December.
The office was just as Albus remembered it from three months ago. It didn't take long to locate the 'Practical Potion Remover', which was sitting on a hardwood shelf with a variety of other cleaning utensils. Just as Albus reached up for the bottle Heep entered the room silently. Albus wouldn't have even noticed if it were not for Philip's surprised yelp behind him. He spun around on his heel and almost lost balance.
"We were j-just borrowing some Potion remover for Professor Ebullio's class!" Stuttered Philip looking up at the tall, skinny man with wide eyes.
Heep gave a wordless nod towards the shelf and sat down at the heavy desk in the middle of the room.
Albus sighed, that man sure could be creepy; Albus had never heard him mutter a single word all whole year. He took the bottle from the shelf and was just turning back to the door when the closet in the corner caught his eye. The memory of his father's invisibility cloak tugged at his mind. Why was it that he felt strangely drawn to this closet? Was it that he knew it was his last chance? He knew that his father had forgiven him and it seemed even James was forgetting and yet he realized he hadn't quite let go of hope himself. It was then that Albus realized; it wouldn't be until he saw that the cloak wasn't in that closet that he would have closure and could properly accept defeat.
"Come on Al!" Hissed Philip glancing at Heep who was writing at the desk.
Albus hurried from the room and they both traipsed back to their potions class. Albus didn't mention the closet but he knew he would have to form a plan. He decided that he would tell Rose and Philip at lunch when he had had more time to think about it. Maybe he could get Paul or Amanda on his side too, he would probably need them to convince Rose.
When the lists came round for students staying at Hogwarts over Easter, James, Alex and Blue signed up immediately. Letitia had announced to them just a few days previously that her trial with the ghosts of the castle was due to take place just after the holidays and they needed all the time they could get to prepare.
James had written to his parents and asked permission to stay. He had also been told just that morning that the final Quiditch match of the year would be taking place the first weekend of the next term. Rangi had insisted that every member of the team stay and train but as they could no longer win the Quiditch Cup most of the others were ignoring him.
Despite his initial annoyance Rangi was still insisting on training what was left of the team; James, Molly and Astra Hughes. Without any of their Chasers they were concentrating on aim and dodging, also known as "The Beaters Whacking Bludgers at James and Rangi" or TBWBJR. James didn't know why Rangi was so focused on training now, maybe he hadn't yet accepted the team being out of the running but James himself had an ulterior motive.
He had finally become accustom to his new broomstick and everyday he felt himself getting better and better at working with it. He still wasn't as familiar with it as his last broom but much as he had loved his previous broom this one was a much better model.
Every morning after breakfast he spent two hours training down on the Quiditch pitch before returning to the castle to study for Letitia's trial. James wasn't particularly interested in all the boring laws on ghost rights and it was all very complicated but he knew he owed it to Letitia for being such a great friend and he was determined not to let her down. Alex wasn't very good at finding information for the trial either but he had taken to organizing all the relevant information something which he proved to be surprisingly good at.
Blue however was the most help of all, he was the only one able to sort through all the complicated stuff and decipher what it meant and how it could be relevant to Letitia. He worked tirelessly and the only breaks he took were to eat, sleep or work on deciphering the clue they had found in the Great Hall.
It was hungry work but James made an arrangement with Dooey the house-elf and every couple of hours he would come up to the Gryffindor common room with snacks and juice something Alex was very grateful for and which Blue had initially criticized him for telling him not to boss the little house-elf around. However James noticed the relief on Blues face every time Dooey appeared with a tray of freshly squeezed orange juice and biscuits. Dooey seemed pretty happy too, he was quite interested in hearing all about the trial and the children found him to have an undisputable knowledge of the castle that never ceased to amaze them.
Letitia seemed more and more hopeful everyday and Nearly Headless Nick stopped by every day or two to wish them luck and see how they were doing. He told them that there were - ghosts who were members of the "Council" including the four house ghosts but that every ghost in castle sat on the jury and voted in trials. Peeves as a poltergeist and not strictly a ghost was allowed in the committee because he had demanded the right from Professor McGonagall to have a say in the running of the castle as he inhabited it too but Nick told them not to worry, Peeves spent most of his time on prohibition anyway.
One morning James emerged from the dormitories to find Rangi sitting at a desk scribbling furiously and surrounded by piles of parchment. James was very surprised as he hadn't thought anybody else would be awake yet let alone already working hard. It was only by chance that he had woken up and the other boys in his dorm were still snoring soundly. Rangi had seemed to be in this 'workaholic' state of mind all holiday, when he wasn't out on the Quiditch pitch he was writing feverishly in the common room but James didn't expect him to be so busy so early in the morning.
"In fact," Thought James, "He should be sleeping like a baby with all the work he's been doing."
He wandered over to Rangi, he didn't know whether the older boy had heard him or not but he wasn't paying him any attention,
"Rangi? What're you doing up so early?"
Rangi turned around, frowned and said, "I should be asking you the same question, you're gonna need all the energy you can get for our training session later."
"I just woke up a minute ago. I'm going to get some breakfast. I'm starving." James yawned then stopped as he realized what he was doing, "You wanna come?"
"That's ok. I got that little house-elf you're friends with to bring me up some toast and orange juice a while back."
James walked over to the desk curiously and perched on the small, clear space at the side of Rangi's notes, "So what are you doing anyway?"
Rangi smiled, "I've been working on this all holiday and I think I've come up with a solution to our problem."
James didn't know what he was talking about and he couldn't make out the complicated calculations and diagrams on the table so he just waited for him to continue.
"You see we can't win the House Cup. However we can still win."
Now James was seriously confused.
"You see James," Rangi smiled at him, "I'm not just gonna give up here. Why d'you think I've been working you so hard? We can still play this to our advantage."
"So what's your plan?" Asked James curiously.
"Well James, we can't win for Gryffindor so what we have to ensure now is that no matter what, the Slytherin don't win either!"
James grinned finally seeing where this was headed, "But how can we ensure that? Surely there's nothing we can do."
"On the contrary my friend! If everything works to my plan the outcome of the cup will come right down to the final match of the season."
"Gryffindor-Hufflepuff." James said automatically.
"Exactly. Now let's face it Ravenclaw are not very good this year. That means our hopes are now pinned entirely on Hufflepuff and if you look at this," Rangi showed him a sheet with all the scores of the cup on it, "they've had a very productive year. The Hufflepuff team is strong, stronger that any other year I've been here. They're the only team with a chance against Slytherin and we can't let Flint- I mean Slytherin- you know what I mean; we can't let them win!"
James nodded enthusiastically.
Rangi went on to explain that if Hufflepuff got more points in the overall points than Slytherin they would win the Quiditch cup and it was up to Gryffindor to make sure they got this amount of points before the snitch was caught ensuring victory over Slytherin. As Rangi pointed out a lot of this was up to James. As the Slytherin-Ravenclaw match had yet to take place Rangi didn't know how many points Hufflepuff would need but it was a plan if nothing else and if it worked it would ensure that Lysander Flint and his Slytherin cronies didn't win the Quiditch Cup and that was enough to satisfy both Rangi and James for now.
As Rangi finished showing James all his plans James's stomach gave a loud grumble and he remembered his breakfast.
"You better go James, we can't have you starving for training later! I'm going to show this to the rest of the team the plan so don't tell any of them, I want it to be a surprise." Smiled Rangi.
James grinned and hopped off the table, "And to think I actually thought all this work you were doing could have been studying!" He grinned.
Rangi's mouth fell open, "Oh no! I have to study!"
James laughed. Rangi muttered something about the OWLS being stupid anyway as James left the tower and headed for the Great Hall.
A/N: Hope you enjoyed this chapter. I know I'm not updating as regularly as I used to but I'm trying really hard! Please review and let me know what you think! I'll have another chapter up ASAP! :D
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