A/N: Alright I have an excuse for my long absence. I took finals yesterday and Wednesday so all month I have been studying for them. You will be happy to hear (or at least I am) that all the studying paid off. I got two B+'s and two A's. But besides just finals I had made up my mind that I was postponing this story and starting a story about Harry after Hogwarts but then I got some reviews for this one that made me change my mind. But I am still interested in the other story so I have decided that when I'm done with this one, I'll start that one. I have some really good ideas for it, I think anyway.
Thank You's: I can't get in to read my reviews right now but I'll thank everyone for the last two chapters next time
Harry Potter and the Return of the Dark Lord
The rest of Harry's day went by pretty much uneventfully. They had an introduction to what they would be doing in Herbology right after lunch, and then the fifth year Gryffindor's were free for the rest of the day. Everyone was sitting around the common room talking. Harry had filled in Ron and Hermione about what happened in Snape's room after they left. Ron called him some names but even Hermione found it hard to disapprove considering what he did.
"Well, I have to go see Dumbledore. He told me he wanted to talk to me today. I'll see you guys later." Harry said after Ron beat him for the fifth time in chess. As Harry climbed out of the portrait hole he heard Ron trying to convince Hermione to play. Harry walked through the halls of Hogwarts. Finally he reached the gargoyle and gave the password. He knocked on the door and Dumbledore called for him to come in. Dumbledore was shuffling around some papers when he realized it was Harry.
"Ah, Harry, I've been expecting you." He greeted him with a smile. Then looked down at the papers he was holding, "I didn't remember how much work it was teaching."
"Maybe you shouldn't give any homework? Then you wouldn't have to correct any of it." Harry said with a small laugh.
"Nice try, Harry. Please, sit down." He gestured to the seat in front of his desk which Harry took. "From what I hear you had quite an interesting day." Dumbledore said.
"Yes I did. But it wouldn't be a true year at Hogwarts if someone didn't threaten to kill me, right?" Harry tried to keep up the joking mood. "We might as well have gotten it over with right away."
"I have spoken with Professor Snape Harry, and I assure you he was caught up in the moment and would not have acted on the threat."
"Does Sirius know what happened?" Harry asked.
"I'm afraid so. And I had almost gotten him to put aside his dislike for Snape. I don't think this will do anything for that. But in any case, I did not call you here to talk about this. I hope we can all put this little incident behind us."
"Of course, sir. Consider it forgotten." Harry said what he thought Dumbledore wanted to hear.
"Thank you Harry. What I called you here for is Order business." Dumbledore started searching in his drawers for something when there was another knock on the door. "Who is it?" Dumbledore called. From the other side of the door they heard a bark. Harry looked questioningly at Dumbledore. The headmaster nodded his head and Harry got up and opened the door. He was greeted by a large black dog. The dog stepped into the room and when Harry closed the doors he changed into Sirius Black.
"Running a little behind schedule are we, Sirius?"
"Sorry, Albus. Lost track of time." Sirius answered with a smile on his face.
"Doing something productive I assume?" Dumbledore answered back with the same smile.
"Of course." Was all Sirius answered.
"Well I was just about to give Harry his headset, so why don't you explain it to him while I go back and look for it.
"Hey, now that we're at Hogwarts, I have a mission for you." Harry looked at him quizzically. Sirius lowered his voice, "Not a Order missions or anything like that, a marauder mission. But I'll have to tell you another time. Dumbledore will know we're up to something if you don't know about the headset when he comes back out."
"What headset?" Harry asked.
"That's what I'm about to tell you. You see, it started back when the marauders were at school. We had to be in different parts of the school to set off pranks, but everything had to be timed perfectly for the pranks to work. Well, I won't tell you how it all happened right now, but let's just say that Dumbledore was walking down the hall instead of Snape. And we weren't expecting this. It was too late to call off the pranks because once the first one went off they all went off. Dumbledore wasn't very happy, we ended up with two weeks detention." Sirius ended with a smile.
"I don't think you would have been happy either. It took me those two weeks to get that smell off me." Dumbledore was standing in a doorway off to the side of his main office. "Anyway, that isn't part of the story." Dumbledore still had a smile on his face. He seemed to have a soft spot for pranks, and for the marauders.
"Well we decided we needed to be able to talk to each other while we were apart, so we came up with the idea of magical headsets. The way they work is you just think of the person you want to talk to, and as long as they have a headset, you can talk to them. And if you're close enough to the person, all you have to do is talk inside your head and they can hear you. But you have to be close, almost in the same room. Of course we had to make them invisible so the teachers couldn't see them."
"What does this all have to do with the Order?" Harry asked.
"Well, one night during the summer Remus and I were telling the story about a prank we did using the headsets, and Albus suggested that we, oh what did you say?" He asked the last part to Dumbledore.
"Use that idea a little more productively." Dumbledore laughed. "Something that could go along with most of your ideas."
"Right. So since then me and Remus have been working on these things. Albus, do you have it?" Sirius asked Dumbledore.
The headmaster pulled a headset thing out of his pocket. It was strange looking. It had a small earpiece on both sides, and it had a strap that connected over the head. Then coming down from the left ear piece was a small microphone. Dumbledore handed Harry the headset and Sirius stepped up in front of Harry. Sirius put it on Harry and looking in the mirror Harry saw that you could not see it at all. Amazingly you couldn't feel it either.
"It feels like it's not even there." Harry announced his thoughts.
"I know, isn't it cool? And it will always stay in spot, you'll never have to adjust it. Its range is about 10,000 miles. But it gets real hard to hear after about 7,000."
"This will come in very handy. If we are going out on a mission, we can connect all of the headsets so you don't have to think everyone's name. Or if we are in a small group you can connect just their sets." Dumbledore explained its real advantages until Sirius broke in.
"Ya, and just imagine all the pranks we can pull now." All three men laughed.
"It's about time we all went to sleep. Harry, I know you'll tell Ron and Hermione no matter what, but try and keep this a secret besides them." Dumbledore said.
"Yes, sir." Harry answered.
"Hey Harry, when you get to the common room try it out. All the people in the Order have them now."
Harry left the room with a big smile. He walked back to the common room and everyone was asleep. He looked at the clock and was surprised, it was already 11:00.
The rest of Harry's week was normal. If you could consider anything that happened at Hogwarts normal. "Wow, I can't believe it's already Friday." Ron said during lunch.
"I know. One more class and the first week is over." Hermione agreed.
"And our last class is Dueling!" Neville piped in. Harry's face lit up at this. He had been looking forward to Remus's class.
"Well we better leave now or we'll be late." Hermione was always concerned about being late.
When the Gryffindor's arrived at the dueling room they were happy to see that they didn't have this class with the Slytherines. In fact, they didn't have this class with anybody. They all looked around the room very impressed when they got in. It was set up much like the DADC room but in the middle was some sort of circular ring that was enclosed with an orange type glowing orb. "Ok, all right, everyone sit down I'll explain the ring." Everyone in the class was eager to learn about the ring so they rushed to their seats. "This ring is the standard ring for dueling competition. And if any of you make the Hogwarts team, then this is what you will be dueling in. The ring itself is just a standard 6 foot diameter circle. The orange orb is the amazing part. It revolutionized the sport of dueling. While in the orb, nothing can hurt you."
"You don't feel any pain?" Someone from the back shouted.
"Oh no, you feel the pain. You feel the pain as much as if I were to put a curse on you right now. But the beautiful thing is, that no matter what happens to you in there, it's not permanent. This way even if you are dueling with your best friend you don't have to hold back at all. If I were to kill you inside that orb and then drag your body back out of it, you would still be alive. Depending on what I did you might be a little shaken up, or even blacked out for as long as a day, but you're not dead. If I cut your arm off and you stepped outside of the orb, your arm could just be placed back on you."
"Why don't auror's and other dark wizard fighters use it?" Harry asked.
"Because for the spell to work, the two people who are going to duel have to touch wand tips outside of the orb and then step into the orb together as they keep their wands together." Everyone was amazed at what this orb could do. "Now there are two ways to win a proper duel. The first way is to get a hold of your opponents wand and keep a hold of it for ten seconds. If you do this by using a simple disarming spell, or if you do something to incapacitate your opponent and then walk up to him or her and just take it away it doesn't matter. The other way to win is to make your opponent step out of the orb. Now you cannot force them to leave through any means, it won't work. The dueler has to leave under their own free will. This is the drastic way of living because someone usually leaves to stop the pain that they are going though. Are there any questions? Yes, Ron?"
"What if someone accidentally steps out of the orb?" Ron asked.
"Good question. That can't happen. The dueler has to have the intention of leaving the orb or the orb will not let them out. It will act as a wall. No more questions, good then I want to see what you guys are made of. Who is our first volunteer?"
A/N: Alright who do you guys want to see duel? I'll leave it up to you. I took a big chance with this orb thing, either you guys will love it or hate it I think. Tell me in you REVIEWS!!!