Once Upon a Hogwarts-Chapter Ten
By Lily in a Pond
Disclaimer: The only thing I own of Harry Potter are the DVD's and the stupid games on them are stupid! It's too hard to play with a remote! (And yes, I do realize that I am quoting Ben or Andrew from some MuggleCast episode, but hey, he doesn't have copyrights!)
0o0
"BOO!"
"ARGH!"
"Gin? Are you okay?"
Ginny groaned and sat up. "Why, why, why did you have to do that, Harry?"
"Sorry, Gin-Gin, but I couldn't resist blowing off some steam," replied a grinning Harry.
"I wanted him to put on one of those scary Muggle Halloween masks, but he wouldn't listen," Ron grumbled behind Harry. His eyes immediately lit up as he spotted a house-elf doing around the room with a platter of finger food.
"If he had convinced you to do that, you would be at my funeral right, Harry Potter," said Ginny. "And though you are my cute, sweet, adorable boyfriend, do not ever call me Gin-Gin again. Or I will be at your funeral."
"Oh, don't worry, I won't again," said Harry, laughing nervously. "Oh hey look, there's Ron! And….uh…..food!"
Ginny rolled her eyes.
"Hello Ginny."
Ginny spun around. "Oh hi Luna. Attending the meeting?"
"As a matter of fact, yes. I have to report what I've done."
"You mean with the carrot?"
"I overheard the Ravenclaw girls talking about it earlier. Apparently, they think Malfoy's gone mad."
"That'll be the day," Ginny snorted.
"Don't say before you think, Ginny. Some things may come true," said Luna mysteriously, wagging a finger at Ginny before going off to eat the food.
Hmm. Seems like everyone in the world's the same, Ginny thought. They all love free food.
"Hi Ginny! It's nice to see you again!" Mandy Brocklehurst smiled at Ginny widely. In fact, she was glowing.
Wonder what's made her so happy? Ginny wondered.
"Hey Weasel Queen," said Blaise Zabini, strolling through the door, hands in his pockets, and grinning in a self-satisfied way that made you think that the cat just ate all the cream in the world.
"What's up with you? You look so happy."
"There comes a time when you fall in love and admit it, Weasley. And that time was now."
Ginny stared back blankly at him.
"I love this room," Blaise commented idly, staring at the blue curtains. "Well, I'll be off now, Weasley. No time for small talk when there's food." He walked-danced off to the house-elf, humming some tune that sounded incredibly like "Just the Girl", by the Click Five.
Ginny raised her eyebrows at that.
"Hey Mrs. Potter," Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown sang in unison as they stepped through the door.
Harry whirled around. "Mom?" he asked in disbelief.
Ginny rolled her eyes. "No, silly. Lavender and Parvati were just joking around." She turned back to them. "So when is this meeting about to start?"
They shrugged. "I suppose when Theo gets here," replied Parvati.
And if on cue, Theodore Nott ran – no, burst – through the door of the Ravenclaw Common Room.
"PEOPLE!"
Everyone fell silent.
"Why aren't you all at the library?" Theo bellowed. Steam was practically coming out of his ears.
Nobody answered.
Theo sighed. "Potter. Weasley."
"We know," Harry and Ron replied in unison. "We're sorry."
Theo took a deep breath, then let loose. "WELL, IT'S A LITTLE TOO LATE NOW BECAUSE JOCULAR'S COMING!"
Everyone started screaming and running all in different directions.
"Silencio!" Theo hissed, his eyes narrowing.
The whole room looked like someone had hit the mute button on it.
"Now, we are going to go up to the girls' dormitories calmly, rationally, calmly, peacefully, calmly, silently, and calmly," Theo snarled dangerously. "I don't care that the boys won't be able to ascend the staircase. Get the girls' broomsticks."
"You," Theo pointed to Luna Lovegood, Mandy Brocklehurst, Terry Boot, Orla Quirke, Lisa Turpin, and Anthony Goldstein. "Stay here and pretend to be doing something."
Theo headed towards the staircase. Most of the people were already up the stairs, but there were still some boys at the bottom of the staircase, waiting for a broomstick to be tossed down to them. "C'mon men, let's move!"
Blaise rolled his eyes and said something that when mouthed, looked suspiciously, like "F (electronic beep!) off!"
As a male voice could be heard saying the password outside, Mandy gasped and racked her head to find a possible situation to what they could be doing.
As the door swung open, Mandy screamed. "Aaaahhhhhhh – I've got a crush on you!" she warbled out. Seriously, Mandy Moore? she screamed at herself.
Mandy glared at the others. "I hope you feel the way I do!"
Joining it, they finished the chorus, "I get a rush when I'm with you! I've got a crush on youuuuuuuuuuu!"
Professor Jocular stared in disbelief. "Er………….wonderful…….."
"I won't even ask how you guys all know the lyrics to that song," hissed Mandy as Lisa Turpin said innocently,
"So, what brings you here to our homely abode, Professor?"
"Well….I suppose someone changed the note telling all the members of some group to meet here. Hmm…..this is rather interesting……but first, may I check the boys'and girls' dormitories?"
They stared back at him in horror.
"…………er……sure……," Anthony volunteered timidly. "Go right on ahead. It's not like we have any secrets to hide in there or you know, like…..like…….things to hide…..or – " He was cut off when Mandy kicked him sharply in the shins.
"I'll check the girls' dormitories first, if you don't mind."
Oh yes we do mind, growled Mandy mentally.
Jocular turned back around. "Oh yes, and I'll need your wands, just in case you lot try to pull something funny on me while my back is turned."
"Why would we do that?" Mandy exclaimed superficially.
"I know you would, Miss Brocklehurst," said Jocular snidely as a reluctant Mandy handed her wand over.
As he headed up the staircase, Mandy sighed and whispered, "I guess the no-boys rule doesn't apply to teachers," to Anthony.
Luna slipped her wand out and the others gaped in surprise. "I gave him a fake wand," she mouthed as she pointed her wand at the staircase and narrowed her eyes.
Suddenly, Jocular slipped on the staircase and slid down all the way. "What? Why did I fall down?" Jocular asked, dazed. Then he felt the staircase. "Why is this staircase so slick?"
Luna grinned as the other Ravenclaws nudged her.
"Who's there?" came a very fake high-pitched that Mandy recognized as Blaise's. "Why are you trying to come up the girls' staircase, you pervert!"
"I'm Professor Jocular! I can come up the stairs any time I want to?"
"You can't! This is a girls' dormitory! I'm going to tell McGonagall!" Blaise fake-squealed from above. "I can get you fired for harassment and breaking and entering into the girls' dormitories!"
"Alright, alright, I'll leave," said a dejected Jocular. "You win this time."
As soon as the door was closed, everybody came running down the staircase and – to the Ravenclaws' amusement – slipped on the still slippery stairs and landed in a big heap on the floor, with Pansy Parkinson on the bottom.
"Get – off – me," she wheezed out. "Or – I'll – kick – you – in – the – "
"O-KAY!" The boys exclaimed as they hurriedly got up.
"So now that our little moment of drama is over, we need to go to the library to hold our meeting," Theo declared pompously, brushing some invisible lint off his robes. He, miraculously, was the only person not to fall off the stairs, maintaining his balance with his superhuman abundance and control of cerebellum. "And transfigure your face back, Morag, though it was funny back there, Madam Pince won't let you in like that."
The Slytherin ducked his head, which was slowly changing back from chestnut feathers into his normal brown hair. "Sorry, couldn't resist scaring some girls," he said as a way of explanation.
While all this was happening, Draco Malfoy was desperately trying to get into the Gryffindor Common Room……….
"Let me in, let me in, let me in!" he was yelling at the Fat Lady. "I need to in there to find my true love!"
"You're that swarmy little Slytherin boy, aren't you? Draco Malfoy. I will never let you in, I have my Gryffindor pride!"
"Screw Gryffindor pride! I need to get in!"
"Then guess the password!" The Fat Lady boomed out.
"I don't know it! That's why you have to let me in!"
"Shan't let you in if you don't know the password," the Fat Lady sang out, which slightly reminded Draco of Peeves.
"Fine, I'll guess it then," Draco snarled. "But if this takes more than half an hour, I'm doing a Sirius Black on you!"
The Fat Lady's eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't dare."
"We'll see, we'll see. Anyways, is it 'Harry Potter'?"
"No."
"Ron Weasley?"
"No."
"Hermione Granger?"
"No."
"Boy-Who-Lived?"
"No."
"Quidditch?"
"No."
"Lions?"
"No."
"Malfoy sucks?"
"I like it, but no."
"Ferret?"
"Also accepted and used, but wrong again."
"Godric Gryffindor?"
"No."
"Dumbledore?"
"That would have been an incredibly obvious one, but no."
And so it went on, until –
"Just give the bloody password to me!" Draco yelled in frustration, banging his fist against the wall.
The Fat Lady's portrait swung open.
"How…….?"
"What a naïve little boy you are," the Fat Lady chided. "The password was 'password'. You just had to say, 'Give me the password' and you would have gotten in."
"What kind of a prat would think of that kind of password?" Draco yelled, trying to hide his frustration that he wasted twenty minutes thinking of potential passwords.
"Well, Hermione Granger did. She reasoned that since nobody would think that the password would be such an obvious one like ' password', nobody would actually guess that," the Fat Lady explained. "It's something she called………er…..reverse psychology, I think."
"But wouldn't someone think that because nobody would think that the password was so obvious, the Gryffindors would use it?" contradicted Draco, finding a flaw.
"Shut up and go in already, you're giving me a headache," complained the Fat Lady.
Draco flipped the Fat Lady off with all ten fingers – courtesy of Blaise and Pansy's finger fight, of course – and dashed in before the Fat Lady could close the door on his behind.
"So girls, who wants to try a carrot?" Draco asked in a falsely perky car-salesman voice. (A/N-No offense to car salesmen, but your voices really do sound very happy all the time. That's a good thing! Don't kill me!)
No one answered. The common room was empty.
0o0
As the group of seventh years, plus two sixth years, trooped past an empty classroom, Blaise Zabini saw his opportunity and pulled Mandy Brocklehurst in.
"Who the hell are you?" Mandy screeched before she started squirming in Blaise's arms and gave a strong kick in the direction of someone's………er….crotch.
Blaise opened his mouth, but nothing came out. It seemed that the pain had rendered him silent. Either that, or he had lost his capability to speak along with most of his ability to produce children.
Mandy gasped when she turned around and saw who she had kicked. "Ohmigosh, I am so sorry!"
"S'not your fault," Blaise managed out between gritted teeth. "After all, you did warn me about my Blaise babies." He looked up. "D'you have any ice?"
"I'm sorry, but I don't happen to live in Antarctica right now," Mandy said sarcastically. "Here." She pushed an ice pack towards him. "Put that on your……….thing."
"Thanks," Blaise grimaced. "So….before you kicked me in my special area, I was going to tell you something."
Mandy nodded. "Go on."
"You know how I'm nuts about you?"
Mandy held up a hand. "Yeah, actually, I'd prefer it if you didn't mention the word 'nuts' in this sentence. Or in this whole conversation."
Blaise flushed and looked away. "Yeah, I think I'd prefer it too. Anyways, I was thinking that since we're now officially together, but the school doesn't know it yet, how 'bout we play a huge prank or throw some kind of weird, but funny party to end all the pranks and in doing so, sign a 'peace treaty' with each other, and then snog in the hallways and finish our snogging session in the Slytherin dormitories."
Mandy raised her eyebrows. "You started off nice and sweet, but now you're just plain cocky."
"I would prefer if we didn't use that word in our conversation also," said Blaise, placing his ice pack back over his crotch.
"Ah, yeah."
"Yes, it reminds me of a certain area that you abused earlier."
Mandy scrunched up her nose. "That was in self-defense, Blaise! And there sure are a lot of words that can relate to that area."
"Blimey, don't get too balled up in anger, I may just have to pour slime on you, like in third year," chortled Blaise. "Oh look, I did it again!"
"And don't you get too testy, I might just kick you again!" joined in Mandy, practically shrieking with laughter.
Anyone passing by would see Mandy Brocklehurst and Blaise Zabini falling over with laughter, leaning on each other for support.
0o0
"Order order, people!" Theo rapped his knuckles against a table. "Order in the library!"
"I'll have three glasses of pumpkin juice and a bucket of chicken drumsticks!" wheezed out Ron, using that same old line.
"Ron, you know how juvenile you sound?" Dean Thomas asked, raising an eyebrow.
Ron flushed and immediately stopped laughing.
Theo rolled up the sleeves of his robes, flicked back his hair, and dropped a book on the table. "Silence!"
Madam Pince appeared, looking extremely infuriated. "You've got one more chance, Nott, before I kick you and your friends out," she hissed.
"My good lady," jumped in Morag. "Here, take this as compensation for your silence." He held out a handful of Galleons.
Madam Pince looked at the coins, then at Morag. "You've got yourself a deal," she said cheerfully before walking away, humming slightly.
Harry glared indignantly at Morag. "I was about to do that!"
"I'll bet you anything your moneybag's still in your dormitory," Morag shot as soon he as the words were out of Harry's mouth.
"He's got you there, mate," Ron muttered, nudging Harry.
Harry rolled his eyes and hissed, "Traitor!" to Ron.
"Okay, so now that Madam Pince is gone, and we've had our daily adventure – Theo's words were practically dripping with sarcasm – we can now start our meeting. Does anyone have anything to report? Progress that's been made for Draco and Hermione?"
Seamus Finnegan raised his hand. "I repeatedly told Hermione about how thin the line between love and hate is until she threatened to disembowelme." He looked down at his hands.
"I did my………….thing in Hogsmeade," mumbled Ernie.
"I made 'Mione try on every green or silver dress in that dress shop in Hogsmeade," volunteered Ginny.
"Me and Harry are making loads of references to fairy tales and Cinderella," said Ron.
"I secretly sent her a silver coiling snake bracelet," said Anthony Goldstein. Pansy immediately pulled him closer to her.
"Susan and I wrote Daphne-bashing letters earlier today and posted them in all the common rooms," said Hannah Abbott.
"Don't ask how we know all the passwords," Susan Bones muttered, looking down.
"Speaking of which," Justin Finch-Fletchey cut in. "Where is Daphne? I haven't seen her around lately."
"I saw her coming out of the Hospital Wing," said Harry. "But that was about a week ago."
"She's in her room a lot," and Pansy. "And she's been visiting the Defense Against the Dark Arts room a lot recently ."
"What do you do, Pansy? Stalk Daphne?" joked Morag. Pansy rolled her eyes and elbowed Morag.
"I gave Malfoy a carrot that tells you who your true love is," came the dreamy voice of Luna Lovegood.
Everyone's heads swiveled towards Luna.
"Are you serious?" asked Theo skeptically. "Are you sure that kind of carrot even exists?"
"Yes," Luna snapped, her dreamy tone completely disappearing. "I tested it out on Harry and Ginny and they said it worked."
"Yeah, we both tasted cherry," Ginny smiled, kissing Harry.
Ron made a gagging noise. "Haven't you guys ever heard of PDA?"
"Yes," Harry said as they came up for air.
"We're doing it right now," Ginny added as she pulled Harry down again.
"But still," Theo looked doubtful. "You only tested on one couple."
"Well, I believe her," interjected Morag. "I totally believe her! It's a perfectly reasonable fragment of...er...reality."
Luna smiled at him.
"You know, I'll taste it right now, to see if it really does have special tastes." Morag held out his hand to Luna.
Sighing, Luna pulled another carrot out of her bag. "I'm running out really fast," she muttered.
"Rock candy?" Morag asked, raising his eyebrows. Luna paled and snatched the carrot from his hand and practically ran from the library.
"What's with her?" Theo asked. "Anyways, good work, men."
"Is it just me or is the living soul of Oliver Wood in him?" whispered Harry to Ron."
"Nah, that's not possible," Ron whispered back.
"But it's not nearly good enough. We need to get them together at least two weeks before the HUB. So we need to work harder – better – and more consistently." He punctuated each word with a slap to the table.
"No, you're right, Harry. Wood's living spirit has divided into halves and one half is in this guy," Ron whispered.
"I know,that little speech was practically copied from Wood's speech in second year," Harry whispered.
"You two!" Theo barked in Harry and Ron's direction. "Shut up."
"So…..if anyone has no more questions, then meeting adjourned!" Theo declared. As he turned around, he whispered sinisterly, "Just wait a few days and see. Theodore Nott's first plan will be starting. I'll get you back before long, Daphne. Then we'll live happily ever after."
0o0
The next morning went off with a bang. Literally.
Whenever students walked in the Great Hall for breakfast, dancing snakes and ravens wearing ballet costumes and sparkly tiaras would slither or fly in front of the student and do an enthusiastic attempt of the "Cha-Cha." (though seeing as how snakes do not have feet, they merely slithered along the ground, waving their tails to the salsa music)
Even some of the staff was amused. Some.
After ten minutes of breakfast had passed by, Mandy Brocklehurst caught Blaise Zabini's eye and they stood up on their tables.
"Sonorus!" Mandy whispered, pointing her wand at her throat. "ATTENTION EVERYONE!" she boomed. "Blaise Zabini and I would like to make an announcement."
"Ahem," Blaise cleared his throat loudly. "Okay, first off, I'd like to say that snakes will rock forever and ravens will die alone. Second, all of you guys know how Mandy and I've been fighting over the years, right? Well, today, we're calling a truce."
Everyone more or less gasped/screamed/fainted.
"Yes, the world is not ending, but we are making a 'peace treaty'." Mandy made quotation marks with her fingers. "So, in honor of our unity, we've decided to give you guys a little show. You know it's going to be the best you've ever seen when Mandy says so."
Blaise rolled his eyes. "What she means is that since this will the last event to end all the other events, it's definitely going to be the most exciting – "
" – extravagant – " Mandy jumped in.
" – fizzling – " Blaise cut in, glaring at Mandy.
" – bombastic – "
" – humorous – "
" – smashing – "
" – supercalifragilisticexpialidocious! – "
" – EVENT!" Blaise and Mandy finished on a high note, which sounded absolutely horrible.
The Great Hall burst into enthusiastic applause.
"And starting off our event is the dancing ravens and snakes, which are currently posted at the door! Let's give a big hand to them! Ravens and snakes, do the hula!"
As Hawaiian luau music came on, the ravens and snakes' tutus immediately changed to grass skirts and multicolored leis. The snakes started shaking their stuff while the ravens flapped their wings and actually did a somewhat correct version of hula dancing.
Professor McGonagall stood up. "Now now, settle down. We've have our fun for today, so why don't you two just reverse everything and – "
Mandy and Blaise acted like they hadn't even heard her and instead turned the volume up higher.
"C'mon everybody, let's dance!" Blaise called out, as he started wiggling his hips with Mandy on the table.
The music changed into a popular song, "Unicorn Wand," from a new wizard rock band, "Kruptonite," and everyone started screaming and dancing.
A mere ten minutes later, the bell rang, and moaning and groaning, the students headed off to their different classes.
Mandy smirked as she hefted her bag over her shoulder. "Looks like the professors have no idea what they're in for. If they thought this was something, well, just wait and see, kids. You haven't seen anything yet."
"The professors think they can outsmart us!" Blaise scoffed. We'll just see about that."
"With Blaise and Mandy working as one, anything is possible!"
"Why do we sound like an advertisement?" Blaise wondered.
Mandy shrugged.
"Ah well, let's go to History of Magic. Convince Binns to fall asleep," said Blaise with a wicked grin. "Then the fun will begin for today."
Behind their retreating bodies, three ravens finished chewing up a snake and one of them spit the grass hula skirt out.
0o0
A/N-Whew, that was the longest chapter I wrote! I wonder if it's because I included a lot of unnecessary details like the whole Draco and the password thing or the beginning of the HUGE PARTY. Which, by the way, includes a celebratory duel next chapter.
Brocklehurst vs. Zabini. Who will win?
On a further note, I am very, very, very sorry for not updating. My chapter was all ready on Wednesday, but then this message kept popping up, saying, "There was an error processing your request." So, now I'm posting it!
The answers to those scalding hot, burning reviews……..
dramioneshipper – Wow, keyboard's that bad? BTW, if you're still in France, you don't have to leave a review. Actually, you don't have to leave a review anyways. But don't get ideas from that! Leave reviews. Anyways, so how is France? Nice weather? I've always wanted to go to France. Instead, I got to go to Russia, where it is freaking cold in the winter and borsch is always on the menu. (no offense to anyone who likes borsch, but really, it makes your pee red!) But Russia was very sparkly. And yes, Draco is and always will be an ass……smoochie smoochie!
White-Pink-Fluffy-Strawberriez - Yes, the plot indeed thickens. And the betrayer? Well, you may be right, but you may also be wrong. If you read Chapter Nine and now Chapter Ten carefully, you will definitely know who the betrayer is. And I think this story is going to be about twenty-something chapters or more. Maybe in the early thirties. There is still stuff that I have to introduce in the story, what with my story featuring the Last Battle (oops, I mean the Final Battle, sorry, Narnia moment there).
Dom-Basher CHAMPION – Really? When I started writing this, I thought this was just one more of those overused Masquerade Ball plotlines with a little twist in it: the whole not getting the right Cinderella thing. Thank you, I'm finding easier to be funny in the Slytherins and Ravenclaws, strangely, with the exception of Ernie's thing in Hogsmeade two chapters ago.
StarArrow – OMG, you are so FA-BYU-LUS! Thank you!
pinkicing101 – Yup, this is definitely planting then first little seeds of doubt in him when he realized this. When Draco finds out that Hermione is Cinderella, it's definitely be interesting.
Anticlownperson – Huzzah! The carrot returns in this chapter as well, and it gives out at least one obvious couple who's going to end up together. But I think I'm going to keep the carrot in my story for a while; I was thinking that since Daphne still had the earing, the carrot could act as the 'glass slipper'.
apruhl GEE – Thank you! Yes, I've read a lot of fanfics that have Blaise and Ginny conspiring to get Draco and Hermione together, seeing as they are said couple's best friends and then Blaise and Ginny wind up falling in love too and then they all go and have a great big double wedding or something.
serpentine17ice – It's probably going to be about twenty-something chapters, maybe in the early thirties.
chaotic.flying.kitten – I think you know the answer already. And by the way, Vellofides isn't his complete last name. Try adding the 'de' part to 'vellofides' and maybe spelling it differently and see what definitions you get, because I think I used a different definition that included the 'de' part. But you're really close!
Additional thanks to HPFanatic-Andie, Setsuna-chan09, and Natural-181!
See you guys in (hopefully) five days! Summer's finally here!
Please review!
-Lily in a Pond