Obligatory Disclaimer: I don't own the Harry Potter universe or any of the recognizable characters living there. I am just borrowing them to tell this story.
Summary: Ron shows more of his darker side as he torments a few helpless animals as well as a fellow student.
Harry and Hermione didn't eat much at breakfast the following day. They needed to speak to Dumbledore and McGonagall and wanted to make sure that neither Professor left before they could get their chance. As it turned out they had nothing to worry about. Less than halfway through breakfast Professor McGonagall asked them to join her at the head table. Harry and Hermione looked at each other and knew that the other was thinking the same thing: McGonagall knew that they wanted to speak to her.
They both apologized to Dean and Seamus for having to leave in the middle of their story about their last Hogsmeade trip. Gathering their book bags, they followed Professor McGonagall up to the head table where they found that two additional chairs had been placed between and just behind Dumbledore's and McGonagall's chairs. As soon as McGonagall sat down, both Professors turned their chairs to face the empty chairs. Dumbledore indicated that Harry and Hermione should sit and waited while they did so.
Dumbledore was the first to speak. "I gather from the number of times the two of you glanced up here that you wanted to speak to us. I imagine that this has something to do with a certain wayward Gryffindor?" Albus Dumbledore gave both prefects a look that seemed to say that he was just as worried about Ron's recent actions as they were.
With only the slightest glance to Harry, Hermione correctly deduced that he wanted her to start. "Yes, Professors, Harry and I think that we should talk to Ron. Our hope is that we might be able to talk some sense into him before things get any more out of hand. However, Ron has been avoiding us all week. We were hoping that the two of you could help us."
The four of them talked for the remainder of breakfast and had worked out a plan. After Transfigurations, Professor McGonagall would ask Ron to stay a few moments to discuss his poor class performance. Harry and Hermione would head to Dumbledore's office. As soon as they arrived, Dumbledore would summon Ron to his office. Once Ron arrived, Professor Dumbledore would receive an owl that he'd pretend to be from the Ministry and would excuse himself. Once out of the room he'd charm his office door to not open again until the counter-charm was used, which Harry and Hermione would know, of course.
Both students left the Great Hall in higher spirits than they had entered with. They had their plan, and they only had to wait two class periods to put it into action. Harry and Hermione walked hand in hand out through the main entrance to the castle and headed toward Hagrid's hut for Care of Magical Creatures. As if reflecting their mood, the weather was the nicest it had been for several weeks. Even though it was still early, there was a warm breeze and the sun was shining brightly from above the Scottish hills that surrounded Hogwarts. The few clouds that could be seen were showing signs of disappearing as well. The sky itself was already a warm shade of blue. There was no doubt that today would be a great day to be outside.
Since they had left a few minutes earlier than the other students, Harry and Hermione were the first to arrive. The sight that greeted them made them smile even more than they already were. Sitting on the steps to his hut, Hagrid was surrounded by what looked like about fifteen large kittens, except the color of their fur. Struggling to escape from Hagrid's lap and the clumsy petting from his oversize hands, a bright orange whatever-they-were didn't look pleased. A dusty blue one was chewing on one of Hagrid's pant legs. Rolling and playing at his other side were a pair of lime green ones. Lying in the shade on the western side of the hut the rest were in various stages of sleep. Some were dark brown while the others were different shades of yellow-brown. The one nearest to the approaching students yawned, briefly exposing two rows of sharp, feline teeth before lying back down. With the exception of the one in Hagrid's lap, every one of them was purring.
"'Ello 'Ermione, 'Arry. Would ye like ter pet one? Don' worry, dere not dang'rous." Hagrid leaned down, picked up the blue one, and handed it to Harry.
When Harry took it from Hagrid it looked him in the eye before curling up in his arms. Harry thought that he'd seen its fur become a deeper shade of blue while it was looking into his eyes. He just figured that it was a trick of the increasing sunlight. When Hermione started to pet it, there was no mistaking that its fur had changed color. It went from the pale blue to a bright greenish-blue and started to purr once again. Harry didn't know what to make of it so he looked up at Hermione and he could tell that she didn't know either. She was smiling, though. She couldn't help it; she loved cats.
Hermione looked toward Hagrid and noticed that he had stopped petting the one in his lap. Oddly enough, its fur was no longer orange. It turned blue moments before it sunk its claws into Hagrid's thigh. Hagrid was startled and made a motion as if to swat it away. It quickly jumped down from his lap and went over and joined the two that were rolling around with each other. As it did so, its fur changed color again to closely match the lime green if its companions.
"Hagrid, what are they?"
"Purrmeleons. Dey were jus' weaned from der mutter las' week. It took some coatsing, but I got ser to let me to bring dem ter shows da class. Ah, 'ere dey come now." The rest of the class had arrived and Hagrid stood up and making sure not to step on any of the purrmeleons, started class.
Purrmeleons weren't like the usual creatures that Hagrid liked to show to his classes. They weren't dangerous, unless you bothered it when its fur was red. Red fur meant that the purrmeleon was about to attack whatever had angered it. It seemed that their fur acted on much the same principle as a muggle mood-ring. Its color indicated how it was feeling. Brown meant that it was asleep. Yellow was relaxed, orange annoyed, and green happy. Blue meant that the purrmeleon was being mischievous or deep in concentration. Purple meant that something was upsetting it.
They are larger than normal felines and grow to be about the size of a small horse. When they're young they tend to be very independent, oftentimes they'll go off on their own and not return for weeks at a time. As they mature they start to stick to smaller areas.
A purrmeleon's purr can lift a witch or wizards spirit, as well as quiet a disturbed mind. St. Mungo's is visited almost weekly by an elderly witch and all of her younger pet purrmeleons. Once a purrmeleon allows itself to become a pet, it is very loyal and protective of its owner. Although they aren't aggressive by nature, they are quite capable of killing smaller animals. If it were to attack a wizard, the wizard may not be killed but he'll most likely be missing several large chunks of flesh.
Purrmeleons do not roar as some large felines do. In fact, they have no need for any vocalizations, except for the purring. Some witches and wizards theorize that the purr isn't a vocalization at all. They believe it to emanate from an organ in the purrmeleon's upper abdomen. No matter how many tests that are run on it, the organ has no discernable function.
After Hagrid had explained everything about purrmeleons, he had the class break up into pairs. Each pair was instructed to pick out one and see if you can pet it. The pair that could get their purrmeleon to relax enough around them to go to sleep would earn an extra ten house points. Most of the class had no trouble getting the purrmeleon to let them pet it, but they couldn't get it to go to sleep. Perhaps because they had a head start or because their purrmeleon could sense that they were pure of heart, Harry and Hermione had no trouble getting theirs to relax and go to sleep.
Ron and Draco weren't having very good luck. Theirs wanted to play, as was indicated by its blue-green fur. Each time they tried to pet it, it would briefly change pale orange and go back to running through and around their legs. When he had had enough chasing it around his feet, Draco grabbed the purrmeleon firmly and picked it up as if to hold it. It immediately turned bright orange and started to squirm and scratch him. Ron tried to pet it again to try to calm it down. It didn't have the effect he'd hoped. The purrmeleon turned bright red. Although he had seen this and started to pull his hand away, Ron wasn't quick enough. The purrmeleon bit his hand, drawing two sets of blood trails. Upon seeing this, Draco dropped it roughly and backed away. Ron made a move as if he was going to kick it, but at the last moment stopped and simply glowered at the orange-red purrmeleon. Neither one tried to touch it for the rest of class.
* * *
Divination had been a waste of time, as always. When Professor Trelawney noticed that Ron was not in class, she made as if she had seen his absence in a vision. She went on to say that she had seen his illness coming. Harry didn't bother correcting her by telling Trelawney that Ron was probably in the hospital wing getting his hand looked at. Trelawney had the students break into groups of four and gave them Tarot cards to practice with. Each student would do a reading of the student to their right while the other two took notes about the reading. Once finished, the student that had the reading done on them would do the reading for the next student and so on. Naturally, when it came time for Parvati to do Harry's reading, Trelawney made sure to 'correct' the reading so that it signaled Harry's death. Harry couldn't help thinking that he'd wished that Hermione were in Divination with him. He had enjoyed seeing her point out flaws in everything that Trelawney predicted.
* * *
Finally, they arrived at Transfigurations. As they entered the classroom, Hermione glanced at Professor McGonagall and saw her give a brief nod. McGonagall hadn't forgotten their plan. Harry and Hermione took their customary seats near the front of the room; the seat to Harry's right remained empty. Harry turned around in time to see Ron entering the room and sitting in the empty seat at the back of the classroom. Since the Gryffindors had Transfigurations with the Hufflepuffs, Ron sat alone.
As it was close to the end of their fifth year and they would be starting human transfigurations the following year, Professor McGonagall had been having the students working with chimpanzees for the last month. They had transfigured the chimpanzees into inanimate objects, such as an old book or a coat rack, as well as into another living creature, a mouse.
Today's class would be the next step. They were going to be transfiguring the chimpanzees into something larger than a mouse, a badger. This had met with general excitement from the class as it signaled that they were almost ready for doing important transfigurations.
The chimpanzees, however, weren't the least bit excited at this prospect. When McGonagall had explained the steps to perform the transfiguration, the chimpanzees started to get restless and kept looking around nervously. It seemed that they almost knew what was coming and didn't like it one bit. They began to throw whatever they could get their hands on regardless of what it was. In a matter of seconds, the room went from neat and organized to total disarray.
Professor McGonagall quickly calmed them down with a few choice words and a flick of her wand. Another flick and the room was back as it had been. No doubt she's had to do this before. Not all creatures liked being turned into something else.
As the class progressed, more and more students had gotten the transfiguration correct. Hermione was the first, of course. When she had finished she turned to help Harry, but was greeted by the sight of another successful badger. The two of them started to go around the room and help the other students.
Minerva McGonagall silently congratulated herself once again for choosing the two of them to be the fifth year prefects. The two of them had both taken to their roles as prefects so quickly at the beginning of the year and were continuously proving themselves to be outstanding prefects. Not only did they enforce the school rules, they also followed them almost religiously. Oh, they had a few incidents earlier in the year, but overall their performance has been exemplary. The only other prefect in recent years that outdid their rule enforcements was Percy Weasley. Unlike Percy, however, Harry and Hermione hadn't allowed the fact that they were prefects to give them inflated egos. Instead of showing everyone that they deserved to be prefects by outdoing everyone else, they made sure that everyone else was as proficient as they possibly could be. They truly cared about their fellow students. Not since James Potter and Lily Evans has Hogwarts been blessed with such students.
As Harry and Hermione helped more students, they in turn helped others. This had led Susan Bones to try and help Ron, whom she had thought was having troubles. The chimpanzee in front of Ron had only partially transfigured. Both its legs on the right side had been successfully changed, as well as the fur down its back and its tail. Ron would restore the chimp before beginning again, this time its head and upper torso would transfigure but the rest was unaffected.
Susan was a quiet student that had been sorted into Hufflepuff. She may not be as smart or clever as Hermione, but she always managed to be near the top of her classes. She wasn't afraid to put in the extra time studying if it meant she could get good grades. She was liked by her entire House, and she was proud to be in Hufflepuff. Some of her dorm-mates wished to be in Gryffindor, but she knew she was right where she belonged. She differed from the other female Hufflepuffs in another way. Where they all seemed to have a crush on Harry Potter, Susan had always liked Ron. Like Ron, she had red hair and her fair share of freckles. Although she would never win any awards for beauty, she wasn't a Millicent Bullstrode, either. She had tried to get Ron to notice her before by sitting near him in every class that she could. She had even 'accidentally' spilled potion ingredients in his direction hoping to start a conversation with him.
When she saw the sorry state his chimpanzee was in she saw this as her opportunity to get him to notice her. She went to the back of the room, pulled out the chair next to his and sat down. She smiled in his direction and said, "Hi, Ron, would you like some help with your transfiguration? You seem to be having a little difficulty."
Ron didn't even bother to look at Susan. He kept his eyes on the chimpanzee, which was staring back at him with fear in its eyes. Once again he restored the chimp before proceeding again. This time the lower half of the chimpanzee successfully transfigured into that of a badger's hind quarters, but the upper half didn't so much as change color.
Susan looked from Ron to the badger-chimp and back and smiled once more. "You've almost got it. You just need to concentrate a little more and it'll happen." As she spoke she reached out and lightly placed her hand on Ron's forearm. This got Ron's attention.
Ron glanced down at the hand on his arm and then up at the person attached to it. For the briefest of moments Ron gave her a warm smile, but almost as soon as it appeared it reverted to a scowl. He removed the hand from his arm and pointed his wand directly at Susan. Moments later, sitting in the chair once occupied by the Hufflepuff student, was a perfectly transfigured badger. He bent over and looked it directly in the eyes before he spoke. "As you can see, I'm perfectly capable of doing the transfiguration. Now stop badgering me!" He smiled again, only this time it wasn't the warm smile of a few moments ago; it was the kind of smile that sent shivers up the spine of some of the bravest people. The badger/student jumped from the chair and ran directly toward Professor McGonagall.
The Professor looked down to see a badger pulling on her robes with its teeth. Her first thought was that one of the students had lost control of their animal. That thought disappeared as soon as she looked into the badger's eyes. She quickly restored the student to her normal appearance and questioned her as to what lead to her transformation. Susan quietly told McGonagall about how she had gone to help Ron with his chimpanzee and how he had transfigured her instead. When asked if it had been an accident, Susan meekly informed her that it was not. Speaking loud enough that she was certain that the entire classroom could hear her, McGonagall said, "Mr. Weasley, although I must congratulate you on a successful transfiguration, I must also tell you that I am very disappointed in you. Using this lesson to change another student into a badger is absolutely unacceptable behavior. You will be receiving detention and twenty points will be taken from Gryffindor. You will see me after class, so that we can make arrangements."
The class fell into immediate silence the moment Professor McGonagall started speaking. Harry and Hermione didn't know what to think of Ron's latest stunt. Did he just ensure his expulsion from Gryffindor? Would all of their planning have been for nothing? They sincerely hoped that wasn't the case. Ron may have been making a major nuisance of himself for over a week, but he was still their friend and they had hoped to talk some sense into him.
When McGonagall finished speaking, Ron noticed that she went directly towards his two former friends and bent down to talk to them. No doubt telling them that she was glad that she hadn't made me a prefect, he thought.
"Hermione, Harry, I do hope that the two of you can talk some sense in him. I don't like the direction he seems to be headed. If he does another stunt like that, I will have no choice but to remove him from Gryffindor."
Harry and Hermione both nodded solemnly. Hermione was the first to reply. "So do we, Professor. No matter what he's done, he is still our friend. We just hope he'll listen."
It was McGonagall's turn to nod. The three of them turned to look toward the back of the room. Ron was once again engrossed in his transfigurationing of the chimpanzee. Twice he did a successful transfiguration, and twice he returned it to its original state. He seemed to think for a moment before doing another transfiguration. This time he transfigured the chimp into a coat rack. Unlike the coat rack the class had done earlier in the month, this one had something hanging on it. Hanging on the topmost post of the rack was a coat. It wasn't just any coat; it was a chimpanzee fur coat.
The end of class could not have come a moment sooner. Immediately all of the students quietly filed out of the room. As they passed the coat rack, each student gave Ron a look of disgust. Ron simply sat in his chair and smiled at each student as they passed. He noticed that Harry and Hermione avoided looking in his direction as they left.
A/N: I know that the student into a badger thing was done before, but this time it was done on purpose. It wasn't an accident, like it was in CoS. When I was thinking about what antics Ron could pull, I was reminded of that accident. I immediately envisioned the new Ron spouting the line, "Stop badgering me." And so it became.