(A/N Harry Potter and the associated characters, etc., belong to J.K. Rowling, not to me. The only things that belong
to me are the plot of this story, and the characters: Christina, Gavin ,Fiona, Alex, and Savana Walker, as well as a
few others.)
Harry Potter and the Staff of Time
Chapter 3
Back to the Burrow
Dudley peered into Harry's darkened bedroom through the partially opened door. He figured he had about twenty minutes to find Harry's stash of birthday sweets, before Harry would be done preparing dinner. Dudley knew that Harry had recieved a package from Ron for his birthday and knew there would be edible treats in it. So, now he needed to find them before Harry returned to his room. After all, it was only fair. He figured Harry owed him that much, and more. He thought it was Harry's fault that he didn't get a birthday party this year.
Dudley had been pouting all summer because he didn't get the lavish birthday party he expected. Uncle Vernon had been layed off from work last month and the family had no savings. They had used most of their money to spoil Dudley all these years. Uncle Vernon had asked his family for some money to tide them over until he got back to work, but, no one would lend them any. They had all heard about the strange nephew living at the Dursley's and they wanted nothing to do with him, or with anyone associated with him. So, they couldn't give Dudley the Birthday party he wanted, nor, could they afford to do anything else. Therefore, Dudley felt justified helping himself to most, if not all, of any sweets Harry had been given for his birthday. Hence, Dudley's present trip to Harry's room.
Dudley had already figured out several possibilites of where Harry might have hidden anything he wanted to keep secret. Now, he just needed to check them until he found what he was looking for. As he was checking under the bed, he noticed Hedwig starring at him from her cage.
"You'd better keep quiet, or, I'll make sure you're turned into a featherduster." Dudley quietly threatened her. Hedwig blinked, then went back to sleep.
Dudley found nothing in the first few hiding places he checked. Then he checked under a loose floor board, which he recalled using himself at times...
SUCCESS!!! Nestled in the space below were a cake (with a note saying "Happy Birthday" from Hagrid) ; and a bag containing several different types of sweets. Dudley helped himself to everything in the space and quickly went to his room to sample the goodies. But, just as he closed the door, he heard his mother calling him down for dinner. So, he put the sweets in his closet. Just in case, Harry was stupid enough to try and find them. Then he went down to dinner.
...~'*'~...
Dudley noticed his parents seemed to be in very good moods when he sat down to dinner. He wondered why and asked them as much.
"Harry will be leaving us tonight. He'll be spending the rest of the holiday with those awful friends of his." Dudley's mother said with a distainful sniff.
"The ones who destroyed the fireplace and the sitting room the last time they were here."
Normally, the Dursley's wouldn't do anything that would make Harry happy, but, this year, they resented spending any money on their peculiar nephew, now more than ever before. Consequently, they couldn't be happier to send Harry away.
Harry, for his part, was busy trying to hide his happiness about leaving.
"Toad in a Hole, again!" Whinned Dudley.
"It's the only edible meal Harry knows how to prepare." Stated Uncle Vernon, with enough distain for Harry to know that,once again his uncle was insulting him.
"I should have used real toads." Harry thought darkly as he glanced at his spoiled, obese cousin.
Dudley had gotten so large, that the chair in which he sat, was invisable under his bulk. Aunt Petunia had put him on a diet. He was so large that they would have to pay a tailor to make Dudley a new school uniform. The school's regular uniform supplier didn't make a uniform large enough to fit Dudley, at his current size.
Harry wished, for perhaps the thousandth time, that he could stay with his godfather, Sirius Black, instead of here. The only place he could think of that would be worse, was Azkaban, the Wizarding World's prison. At least, in a few hours, he would be leaving here for The Burrow. He wished he was already there.
...~'*'~...
Dudley grinned as he surveyed the sweets spred out on his bed and contemplated which ones he wanted to sample first. He decided to eat Hagrid's cake, which was dry and lumpy, while he checked out the rest of his goodies.
"...Cat Tails; Fruit Mutants; Laffey Taffey; Drooble's Best Blowing Gum; Ice Mice; Chocolate Frogs (with Wizard cards); and Bon Bons.1 The names on these candy packages are almost as weird as Harry and his friends are." Dudley muttered to himself. "OOPS!" He squawked, as one of the Bon Bons rolled off the edge of the bed.
BOOM! Dudley lept backwards and fell off the other side of the bed and onto the floor. The Bon Bon had exploded when it had hit the floor. Suddenly, Dudley wasn't quite as sure he wanted to eat all of the candy. His stomach, however, wasn't expirencing any such problems. He'd felt deprived all summer since his mother no longer kept an abundance of sweets and junk food around the house. She claimed they were an ''unnecessary expense."
He turned his attention to the Chocolate Frogs, thinking they looked rather innoccuous. He opened the package, popped the frog into his mouth and tossed the wizard card into the trash bin without a second glance.
The wizard on the card scowled up at Dudley, then marched indignantley out of the picture while Dudley opened and consumed the rest of the frogs. He also continued to throw the rest of the wizard cards into the trash bin.
Dudley then opened the package of Ice Mice and inspected one. It was small, about the size of a lifesaver candy, hard, clear, and shaped like a mouse. He tossed it into his mouth and began to chew.... His teeth begain to chatter,as if he were terribly cold, and a muffled squeak issued from inside of his mouth! He quickly swallowed and decided not to try any more of the mice.
He decided to chew a couple of pieces of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, which appeared to be innocent enough, while he figured out which candies would be safe to eat next.
"Laffey Taffy, it would probably make him laugh until he was sick." He tossed it on top of the Ice Mice and blew a bubble. "Cat Tail's, who knew what would happen if he ate those?'' He added them to the growing rejected unless I get desperate pile and blew another bubble...
"Hmmm...Fruit Mutants..." They looked like taffy kisses. Dudley decided they appeared to be harmless enough, maybe he should give one a try...Something bounced lightly against his ear and Dudley swatted at it absently while he tryed to decide whether to listen to his stomach, which demanded more candy, or to his intuition, which whispered that Fruit Mutants had to be something more then a strange flavor of fruit. He spat out the wad of gum, which had lost its zip anyway, and hesitantly unwrapped a piece of the Fruit Mutant taffy. He put the candy into his mouth and began to chew it. It tasted like raspberries at first, then changed to green apple, lemon, and lastly, cherry. Dudley grinned, if one was good, he figured, more would be better. So, he gleefully unwrapped the rest of the candies and shoved all of them into his mouth at once and began to chew again.
He was enjoying the tangy, varied, flavors when something gently bounced off the top of his head and in front of his face.
"What the. . ." Dudley muttered as a bright blue bubble, which was as big as his head, bounced in front of his face. He swatted at it, but, instead of popping, the bubble simply broke apart into several smaller bubbles which floated out of reach.
Dudley then noticed several more of the blue bubbles floating around the room and some of them were as big as he was! He tried to pop all of those as well, but, his efforts met with the same results as with the first one. Soon, the room was filled with bright blue bubbles that wouldn't pop and disappear, no matter what he tried.
He began to wonder where the bubbles had come from, as he swallowed the last of the Fruit Mutants. He knew they were connected to Harry and the candy, somehow. Oh, how he hated the little begger!
Dudley's attention shifted from the bubble problem to a persistant itching on his back, near his shoulder blades. He reached as far around his back as he could, so he could scratch the itch, and felt something strange sticking out from his shoulder blade. He repeated the procedure on the other side, with the same results. He went over to a mirror so he could see what was happening to him and shrieked when he saw the image reflected back to him!
He was green and a pair of wide, blue, cat eyes stared back at him. He twisted around, to look at his back, and saw something that looked like large, purple bat wings there. He began to scream loudly!
Harry heard the commotion coming from down the hall and dashed toward the source to find out what was happening.
When he threw open the door to Dudley's room, he had to put his hand over his mouth to keep from laughing out loud at the sight that greeted him!
Standing before him was the oddest creature he had ever seen in his life! It still sounded like Dudley, but, didn't look like him at all! The beast had the head of a toad, a neck like a frilled lizard (Harry especially liked the way the frill faned out and changed colors when Dudley became angry.), a body like a horse, the legs of a giraffe, and the tail of an alligator. The beast's color was changing constantly and when it spoke a snake's tongue darted in and out.
"Dudley, it isn't Halloween yet, or, is that a new school uniform you're trying out?" Harry quipped while unsuccessfully trying to hide his laughter.
Harry heard muffled laughter coming from the rubbish bin by the bed, as well as assorted nasty comments. "....must be from the shallow end of the gene pool...should've caught on after the Ice Mice...Best mutation I've ever seen! Must have eaten the whole pack of Fruit Mutants at once....absolutely brilliant!"
Harry moved quickly toward the rubbish bin to rescue the wizard cards. He also wanted to make sure that his Aunt and Uncle didn't hear them, which would only add to his problems.
Dudley's continued shrieking, predictably, brought his mother and father thundering to his aide. They stopped long enough to take in the ridculous tableau before them, while Harry hastily stuffed the protesting wizard cards into his pocket.
"....WAIT! JOLLY GOOD SHOW! We want to see what else this idiot muggle becomes!" The now hidden wizards cards continued their protesting.
"HARRY! What have you done to your poor cousin now!" Wailed Aunt Petunia.
"I didn't do anything, Aunt Petunia, honest!" Harry protested. He knew his aunt and uncle would blame him for this mess, no matter what happened. He,
therefore, decided to keep any further explainations to himself and searched for some avenue of escape.
"Can we keep him, dad?" Quipped a familiar voice that was new to this entire drama. "He's SO cute and cuddley! And look at all of the pretty, blue bubbles!" The voice continued, dripping with sarcasim.
Harry looked past his uncle's angry, purple face and saw George's grinning visage in the doorway. Next to them, he also saw Ron, Fred and Arthur Weasley. Their entrance couldn't have been timed better! Thanks to Dudley's piggish behavior, Harry knew he needed to make a hasty retreat.
"Now, George, you mustn't make fun of Dudley's misfortune." Arthur said to his son while trying to hide a smile of his own. He was familiar with the effects of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum and of Fruit Mutants.
The blue bubbles, which filled the room and were also escaping into the hallway, were the result of the bubble gum. The bubbles would last for hours. The results of the Fruit Mutants, however, were another matter entirely.
Normally, the effects of the prank candy were short lived, lasting only 15 minutes or so. The victim of the joke only became one animal, not a mixture of animal parts. It was obvious to him that Dudley had eaten many of the candies at once, something every wizard knew should never be done, lest they suffer the same fate as the creature before him.
"I demand you all leave this house IMMEDIATELY!!!" Raged Uncle Vernon. "This is the last time you will harm my son, or, make fun of him."
"Oh, my poor, little Dudykins!" Wailed Aunt Petunia. "What has that mean, nasty wizard done to you this time?" She continued, as she attempted to comfort the now wailing beast that was her son. She glared over its shoulder at Harry and the Weasleys.
Harry and the Weasleys decided this would be a good time to beat a hasty retreat to Harry's room. Once there, they broke into hysterical laughter.
"We sent you the prank candy because we knew Dudley would eat at least some of it!" Fred said, while rolling on the floor and laughing. "We never knew the results would be this good! I haven't had this good a laugh in years!I think I'm going to wet my pants!"
"This will be something to tell everyone at Hogwarts!" Ron said while holding his sides. "How long will it take for Dudley to turn back into his usual, rolly, polly self?"
"I suspect it will be several hours, at least." Arthur chuckled. "I suspect no one really knows, since most wizards aren't such pigs."
"Whatever. . ." Harry snorted, as tears rolled down his face from laughing so hard. "We'd better get out of here."
"How did you get here, anyway? Floo Powder?" Harry continued.
"No, after our experience with the fireplace the last time we used Floo Powder here, we didn't dare try it again." Arthur explained. "This time, we used a portkey. It is located outside in your relatives' backyard."
"We've got all of your stuff, so, let's get going." Ron told Harry.
Harry grabbed Hedwig's cage. Then he quickly followed the Weasleys down the hallway, past his uncle's murderous look, and out of the house into the backyard.
"The portkey is over here, Harry!" Shouted Fred. "It's this broken bird bath."
Harry joined the others and they grabbed the edge of the portkey at the same time. Harry felt himself yanked up through a swirling vortex and had to concentrate on holding onto Hedwig's cage with one hand and the edge of the birdbath with the other one. He was aware of Ron on his right side, and of Fred on his left, as they traveled onward.
They landed with a THUMP! outside of the Burrow, where the rest of Ron's
family were waiting for them. Harry let go of the portkey and shook his hair out of his face. He then re-seated his glasses on the bridge of his nose and smiled as Mrs. Weasley engulfed him in a welcoming hug. Harry couldn't be happier to see them, or to be here, where he felt loved and cherished, at last.
1. Rowling, J.K.; HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
