The Time Travel Crew

Chapter 24: An unpleasant turn for Justin and Draco

Justin had never been more worried for his family and it was their safety that kept him up at night, invisible alongside Flitwick, not to help but to see for himself that Crouch and even Voldemort would be no threat to him. Funny, wasn't it, that Voldemort considered him, Justin the Hufflepuff, to be a threat.

If Justin looked back to his second first year, he was a hundred percent sure that he had been afraid... Not of Voldemort, but for Harry.

Justin let out an irritated sigh... That monster was delusional.

Barty Crouch didn't arrive that night, but early next morning. He was as invisible as Justin and Flitwick but to them, he could be seen as plain as day thanks to Flitwick's forethought.

Before Justin knew what was happening, Flitwick twirled his wand and Junior stood stock still for seven minutes. Then he began to smile. He let out a deranged laugh, held his wand to the sky and put up the Dark Mark and he was gone before the skull and snake had fully formed.

With a twirl of his own wand and an expression of disgust, Justin vanished the mark.

Their next problem was the altering memories bit. It was tedious, Justin realised for there were hundreds of people who knew their family. Hence it was finally decided by Filius that he would cast a charm on the family, making them look different to anyone who thought or wish him to be dead. And their enemies wouldn't hear the name Finch-Fletchley, but anything that sounded similar to it.

By now Junior had begun on the Polyjuice potion and the spying charm on Lucius had been placed. And it was found out that he made regular visits to Dumbledore.

But the old man didn't bother to tell the Heads of House anything when they approached him and they would have to call themselves hypocrites if they found his behaviour irritating. The third small mirror, however, helped them witness Lucius's every move.

Justin, who now had a free hand, with his parents going to work and his brother busy reading his books on magic now that he was invited to go to Hogwarts too, was able to watch the mirrors while the Heads of House got the school ready for the students arrival. Once, Voldemort casually asked Lucius one day, why he hadn't done away with his family.

"They are warded against me, my Lord... It was Dumbledore's doing."

Surprisingly, Voldemort didn't seem angry by this admission. He looked as if he expected it.

"Do you still have the diary I gave you, Lucius?"

"Of course, my Lord." Malfoy said.

Voldemort looked satisfied and Justin found himself wondering about his ability to decipher the expression worn by that ugly a creature.

"And, my faithful servant, have you completed the first chore I gave you?"

Lucius smiled and said, "I finished with it just yesterday, my Lord."

"Excellent," Voldemort said with an unnerving smile.

Justin began to feel uneasy about what that chore was, for all he saw until the previous day was Lucius Malfoy continuously disapperating from one place to another, with each place being exactly twenty miles away from the first, until he had covered every part of England. He raised his wand in the air for a second before he disapperated to the next place and that place glowed on Voldemort's map of England.

No islands were spared either...not even Azkaban. And judging by how his meetings went with Dumbledore, Justin was able to guess that neither Malfoy nor Dumbledore were aware of what was happening.

The days went in and it was a day before Harry and Neville's birthday that Voldemort finally decided on Junior's victim... Gilderoy Lockhart and by the looks of Junior's expression, he wasn't looking forward to it.

The next day was brilliant. Justin enjoyed himself thoroughly and so did Draco and the birthday boys. Justin found himself being reintroduced to Remus Lupin who seemed to be in a deep conversation with Nymphadora Tonks and her mother. Justin's thoughts went to Teddy Lupin, would he be born again?

With a few confunding charms, Harry decided to get them locked at Grimmauld Place together for a few months when 1995 approached. Tonks was still at Auror school and there was nothing they could do till then.

Towards the end of the holidays, Junior had Lockhart stunned imperiused and hidden in trunk which had on it an undetectable enlargement charm. Junior then had to disguise himself as the fraud and behave ridiculously and Justin had to admit that he, Justin, enjoyed watching the show.

Foster Lockhart now had to read those stupid books, boast over his abilities, wear flashy clothing, sent toothy grins at cameras, wink at the overenthusiastic witches and sign hordes of autographs with a peacock quill. His discomfort seemed to give Justin a great sense of pleasure. It served him right for threatening his family.

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Very soon, Draco hugged his mother and siblings goodbye and boarded the train again (He's father had bid him farewell the previous night). Waving merrily at his, Harry's, Neville's and Justin's families until they disappeared, Draco moved to the compartment where Luna sat alone. He pulled her into a strong embrace that was immediately followed by Neville who entered the compartment.

They shared the compartment with Harry and Justin and Keith, Justin's younger brother and inspite of the eleven year old's happy entertaining chatter, Draco could swear Harry was preoccupied by something else. Something in the form of Barty Gilderoy Lockhart who seemed to be radiating mock glory a few hours later at the head table in the Great Hall.

The sorting began and to the crew's good luck, Crouch in the form of Lockhart was busy alternating his stares between Harry, Draco and Neville. But the feast was uneventful, unlike last time when the news of Harry and Weasley flying to Hogwarts had become a hit.

The days went on and Sunday arrived where now Draco was was teamed up with Suzan Bones, Weasley and Liza Turpin. And they spent the day getting to know each other and answering a quiz which Lockhart or rather Barty seemed to have set. The man was practically bouncing in his step and Draco's expression of revulsion was mirrored by Weasley.

The girls however seemed almost dizzy as they gazed at the fake fraud with loud sighs amazement. Draco thought he could never feel sicker.

The days passed and fake Lockhart hadn't done a much better job at teaching than the first Lockhart and Draco found himself very disappointed. To be honest with himself, he had expected Barty to teach them just as he did while in the form of Mad-Eye Moody in the previous time.

Actually, the only difference between the real Lockhart and his fake was that Harry wasn't hounded with advice on how to manage his fame. No doubt had that happened this time, a letter home would have been enough to get Lily Potter storming into the castle, her wand at the ready, shooting out stinging hexes at Lockhart the moment she set her eyes on him.

Draco chuckled at the thought of his best friend's fiery mother.

In the meantime, however, Pettigrew and Lucius kept creature Voldemort healthy with their regular routine. However, Voldemort developed the habit of reading through his now fully glowing map of England and there were many times that he would just send his servants out of the room for some reason and that worsened the anxiety of the crew.

Sometimes, Voldemort through either of his three helper's eyes could be seen grinning maniacally prodding his map with his wand and according to Dumbledore when they watched Lucius pass on the information, Voldemort was simply insane.

"There's nothing to worry about, Lucius." Dumbledore would say. "Nothing at all."

And Now Voldemort had given the Lucius the chore of visiting the centre of every country and raising his wand, this time for half a minute and every time he did so, the country on the globe that Barty bought for the ugly creature would brighten up.

Dumbledore now out of anything valid to describe Voldemort's behaviour was under the impression that the latter was trying to study Geography to either pass his time or to decide the appropriate places to carry out making alliances or he was testing the mapping accuracy of Muggles. The crew obviously found the second option most plausible.

Unlike the previous time, the Chamber of Secrets hadn't been opened and Lockhart had no reason to begin the dueling club, but Flitwick deemed necessary and he and Snape now had two hours of the evenings off where they taught the students to duel and protect themselves.

Flitwick had the dueling clubs on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays on which he guided the second, fourth and sixth years respectively. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays were Snape's to train the first, third and fifth years.

Gilderoy Fake Lockhart had been given to train the seventh years every Wednesday just to appease him. He had put on an appearance during that particular meeting and according to Pomona, he put up quite a fuss, demanding that he teaches the students because he was the DADA professor. According to the Seventh year Slytherins, his classes were one big joke, but they didn't complain, for Lockhart was a great practice target.

Now the problem of Quidditch practice arised among the teams of the four houses. It became clear that they were indeed pressed for time. Draco and Harry had again made their ways into the Quidditch teams as seekers for their respective houses and they realized how hectic their schedules had become.

Soon it became apparent that they wouldn't all get the Quidditch pitch for their respective teams only and the four houses finally decided to keep their practices all on the evenings of the Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays where each house would have a turn to practice on the pitch while the remaining houses practiced over the other grounds of the school.

But there was nothing to it. The school required to prepare itself for the worst. Flitwick stated quite firmly once when questioned that he wasn't going to sit and watch students dying during battle just because of the lack of competent DADA teachers.

The start of the dueling club had probably been read as an innoculant or an omen by Dumbledore who had been seen on various occasions strengthening the the protections of the school. He would call the Professors for tea many times, but they would all sit in companionable silence and nothing more. No plans were exchanged and no discoveries were shared.

Dumbledore continued his own investigations and neither he nor Lucius or any other member of the crew could guess what Voldemort was actually upto with his glowing globe and map.

And apart from worrying about their families and studying and Quidditch and the dueling club and the House United activities, Draco and Harry and sometimes, Neville, Justin and Luna would sit in the library searching for spells that explained Lucius's behaviour. On some days they would even see Dumbledore in the library, probably searching for the same thing they were.

Draco was really worried about his father's safety, but Dumbledore practically assured Lucius Malfoy that he would be safe. Nevertheless, Snape had yet another portkey ready to take him to Lucius if his life ever needed saving. Draco also couldn't help but worry about his mother and his very annoying siblings. On many nights he would wake up from a nightmare that included his family lying dead in their beds with him trying to wake them up in vain.

He began writing to them more often and it was only after he began experiencing those nightmares that he realised how much he actually loved Gerald and Alina.

Draco then had his first match against Harry and the students of Hogwarts began placing bets on what the state of the two boys' friendship would be at the end of the game. They were both, after all, brilliant seekers.

Much to his chagrin, he lost. Draco accepted defeat graciously, however, he consoled himself childishly, blaming the lack of the rogue bludger to be the reason the game ended the way it did. But then he remembered that Harry won the game inspite of the bludger in the previous time and he shook his head and snorted in amusement.

Then the Christmas vacation arrived and Draco, Neville and Justin spent five days at the Cherished Heart where they had enjoyed Petunia's cooking and Dudley's company. How nice would it have been had the Dursleys treated Harry like this in the previous time? If Draco hadn't been made aware of the Dursleys treatment of Harry in the previous time he would have thought Harry to be a liar by their broadminded nature.

But maybe, Draco thought grumpily, Vernon Dursleys influence had everything to do with it. Sometimes he even wondered if Petunia was afraid of her husband. If so that would have explained many things... especially, the change in attitude in this time.

Draco however didn't have the heart to ruin Harry's present bond with his aunt and cousin by telling him his suspicions...Besides, there were other pressing matters that needed to be seen to.

Another change that occurred that year, was Ginny's, Colin's, Luna's and Keith's (who was now a Hufflepuff) steadfast friendship. The four could be seen doing everything together and Draco had never found Justin more pleased.

Colin Creevey had no time to stalk Harry with a camera in one hand and Harry's schedule in the other and Harry seemed to be happy about it. Ginny was bolder than she was in the previous time and that probably had something to do the absence of the Diary. And she didn't seem to blush and run away from Harry, and that seemed to bother Harry just a bit, but Draco simply considered it to be another trivial matter.

Creature Voldemort who seemed to be getting happier and happier every day as the regeneration potion got closer to completion. There was nothing left for them to do now, but wait.

And wait was what Draco did for the remaining months. It was a living nightmare, knowing fully well that they had a Death Eater in their midst... Something that Dumbledore himself wasn't aware of.

Then Draco found himself in a match against Ravenclaw and to his utmost disgust, Barty Lockhart decided to jinx his broom and Draco had never been more grateful to Severus and he couldn't have asked for a worse seeker opponent, Cho Chang made her way through the match following Draco's every move. Pathetic.

So all in all, Draco one the match and celebrated his first victory.

What happened next was something Draco would never have guessed in a hundred years.

It was a Sunday, the third one of March, on the afternoon after their Houses United mission...All the teams had been given an activity that were conducted all over the castle. The first years being the youngest got to do their tasks in the very snow globe itself. Draco's year got the middle of the castle leaving the towers for the third years.

There was however a catch to it. Every member of the team had to be handicapped in some way or the other. They could either choose to have an unremovable cloth band over their eyes or unremovable sound proof earmuffs over their ears or muting charms over their mouth or incapacitated legs. In other words every member of the team had to spend their entire morning pretending to either be blind, deaf, mute or lame.

There were staff and a few aurors in training, whom Dumbledore called upon to help, watching every team from far, ready to take action if necessary, but other than that, they teams were pretty much on their own. And Draco, who felt sorry for his team and opted to be the blind member found being directed around the castle itself scary.

He certainly had to sympathize with the fourth years who got to work in the greenhouses... Not to mention the fifth years who needed to work around the lake... Or even the sixth years who were placed in the Forbidden forest... And if that was horrible, what would one say when they learnt that the seventh years were performing their tasks on brooms?

The students especially the Gryffindors found it exciting, the Hufflepuffs found it scary, the Ravenclaws decided to use it as an opportunity to learn something more and the Slytherin's found it ridiculous. Might it be noted that Draco was the only blind Slytherin in the school. He somehow knew that this was Dumbledore's way of giving his students a test of trust.

Anyway, it was in the afternoon after it was all over, when Draco was returning to his common room - after the cloth band had been taken off - when his vision, that had just begun getting used to the light, was obscured again, this time, by a large hand that had clamped down on his face with a force that could have broken his nose had it landed there. The hand however was more interested on closing his mouth leaving a finger or two to shut his eyes.

Draco was alone and his first instinct was to use wandless magic only to realise that his magic had been restricted by his captor. Without wasting another second, he moved to grab his wand which to his dismay wasn't there anymore. His hands simply closed around the mirror that was watching Barty Crouch Junior!

The very fact that the mirror was throbbing in his hand meant that the person he was watching was near, giving Draco a limited list of exactly who his kidnapper was. Junior was now dragging Draco who seemed to be struggling viciously in vain, somewhere within the castle, but Draco was too agitated to pay attention.

A familiar feeling made Draco aware that he was disillusioned... Another muted him and the third had ropes all over his person, restricting his moments. He found himself being dragged by a now invisible Crouch to the DADA classroom and into the office, where he was immediately dumped on the floor.

"Draco, Draco, Draco." said the bone-chilling voice of Barty Crouch. "Traitor of his house, Dishonor to the Malfoys, Disgrace to his father, Friend of the enemy... Oooooh! I'm going to have fun!"

Draco focussed on putting up his mental shields as a shiver rolled down his spine at the disgusting giggle the Death Eater let out when he took off Draco's disillusionment charm, but not his.

"My, my... scared of me, Draco? Ah, but not as scared as your dear friend will be in a few minutes."

Harry! Oh God! It was his, Draco's fault! All his fault. Draco felt grief move it's way up his system, making his heart painfully heavy. Harry was going to suffer because of his own carelessness.

"You will be okay, Deary. There is hope for a pureblood such as you. But until then, until you realize, young Draco, how important it is to side with our kind, I get a chance to punish you... Crucio!"

Draco's bones were on fire, pain seared his skin, but he could move... He couldn't scream... He was alone... It seemed like hours, though it was less than a minute later that the pain stopped and everything seemed normal, but Draco's heart that thumped harder and faster than ever before.

Draco saw a goblet that was on the table float in the air as Crouch's voice simpered, "That hurt, didn't it, Draco?"

It was then that Draco realized that was was crying, it was then too that he realised that the restrictions on his magic were no longer there. He had no time to ponder on it, for he felt a hand roughly yank out some hair from his head and the hair floated into the goblet whose contents frothed and then the goblet was tilted.

After a few seconds, his own voice said, "Hmmm... Not that bad."

Crouch took off his disillusionment charm to reveal another Draco now, dressing up in smaller Hogwarts robes.

He looked at the real Draco with an awful sneer and raised his wand and said again, "Crucio!"

Agony ripped through Draco again, which lasted for a longer time than before.

"I will be back, honey." his double giggled and picked up a galleon from his desk, probably the portkey Draco realized with panic, and disappeared out of the office. It then struck him that they didn't pay much attention when they watched him go through that stupid fan mail.

Vanishing the ropes was out of the question, thanks to Draco's stupidity at those spells, so he had to magically cut through the ropes, his bones sore from their earlier treatment. Draco got up with much difficulty - his body movements were oddly uncoordinated, thanks to the unforgivable - only to fall to the floor again. He picked up his wand that had been carelessly thrown to the side and he sent his fox patronus to every other member in his crew with the words, "It has happened. Be careful."

To be continued...

Hello everyone,

I hope you are well. I have my last set of exams coming up, all rushed because of the Pandemic, so, I may not be able to upload for a week, but I will try.

Take care!!