A/N: YAY! Finally, eh? I was, and still am, incredibly busy. I won't get into why and with what, because it's quite boring if you don't know me, and if you do know me personally, like you live in my town, you know exactly what I've been working on.
I still don't own Harry Potter, or Ron, or Hermione, or Viktor, or any other related characters and/or things. I wonder what they go for? Hum…
I know that none of the previous stuff fits with Order of the Phoenix, however, I have decided to continue. But you will notice that time has passed since the last chapter!
SPOILERS! Do not read unless you have finished Order of the Phoenix!
Hermione's Decision By: Weasleyaholic
Chapter Five: "Back at Grimmauld Place"
It had been a year since I had escaped from Viktor's attack. I still hadn't told anyone but Ginny, who had been, of course, sworn to secrecy. I managed to keep up with school, of course, and the D.A. had taken up a lot of my time, not to mention the hats and socks I had knitted for the house-elves. I grinned thinking about how many house-elves I must have freed last year. I still don't understand why not all house-elves want to be free. Well, I'm sure they've just been brainwashed by their masters. Disgusting it is.
A lot had happened in the last year, Harry, from the sound of his letters, seemed to be coping with the loss of Sirius rather poorly. Once again, he was home with the Dursleys until he could come and join us again at the Order headquarters. Surprisingly, Dumbledore hadn't moved the headquarters. We were once again at Grimmauld Place, and I suppose it's a good thing that Harry's not here yet, Sirius only died two weeks ago. I don't know how he would like being here so soon afterward. I'd imagine it would be quite painful. Dumbledore did tell us what was going on with Harry, and why he had to go back to the Dursleys. Something still didn't sit right with me however. Because, according to the prophecy, Harry or Voldemort had to die. But why did Voldemort go after Harry's father? And why didn't Harry die when Voldemort tried to kill him the first time? Because only one can live right? Well, why didn't Harry die when he was one year old? There had to be something else to it. Only question was what?
The house was getting much more livable, though Mrs. Black was still hanging in the hall. But now she seemed equally upset that Sirius had died, even though she seemed to hate him last year. But I suppose she was still his mother.
Many things have happened since we finished our fifth year at Hogwarts. At the end of the last year, the wizarding world was finally informed that Voldemort had indeed returned. And they all suddenly believed Harry and Professor Dumbledore. Dumbledore was given back everything that had been taken from him, and Umbridge now had herself her own bed at St. Mungo's.
There were more and more people joining the Order everyday. Though, only one more person moved in, that was Neville. I was incredibly proud of how much he improved over the last year, why he could disarm me, when prepared too. I couldn't say the same for Ron, though I think he's scared of taking my wand from me. I do not believe he tried nearly hard enough. Though, I was immensely proud of Ron for other things throughout the past year. He had managed to get himself on the Quidditch team, as Keeper no less, and was a prefect. I'm still confused on why Dumbledore picked Ron over Harry, but the same thing happened to Harry's father. Dumbledore might be up to something. But don't get me wrong, Ron's a great prefect, it's just, well, and as George had said the day we got our letters, unexpected.
Another change was that we were now allowed to do some magic outside of school, as long as it wasn't in front of Muggles that is unless you were saving their lives or something of the nature. But also, you could not perform magic for the heck of it; it had to be for practice to defend yourself, or for a practical reason. There are strict rules to it all, and the Ministry is keeping a close eye upon it all.
Speaking of the Ministry, there is an outpour of anger against Fudge, and it seems as if he is going to be kicked out of office soon. No doubt that people would want Dumbledore to take the job, and I think once again he would refuse. I wonder whom will they choose after that? Surely someone who believed Dumbledore in the first place? And there were not that many people who had. Well, we will see when the time comes. Percy had sent an owl to his parents apologizing profusely, and a huge letter to Ron apologizing for, as Ron put it; "The world's biggest git." And I had to agree that Percy was too high on power, hopefully this'll teach him what he should have known from the beginning.
All in all, last year had been rather eventful, with that toad of a woman, Umbridge, and Hagrid's half-brother, Grawp. But the year flew by nonetheless. And I knew that I, just like Ron and Harry, couldn't wait to get back. But we did have to wait a few months and we would be starting our sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I wonder what adventures would be heading our way this year, because we have had a different and equally as scary adventure each year.
First year, Quirrell, though we thought it was Snape, tried to steal the Sorcerer's Stone. Second year, the Chamber of Secrets had been reopened, and everyone thought it was Harry doing it because we found out at Lockhart's Dueling Club, that he could speak Parseltounge. I was petrified that year by the snake, just after finishing finding out that is was a basilisk. Harry and Ron managed to find the entrance, in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom where we had mad the Polyjuice potion earlier in the year. Harry had saved Ginny, who had been brainwashed by Tom Riddle's diary to open the Chamber, and the year ended with a pajama party. In our third year, we met Sirius. However, at that time, we thought that he was trying to kill Harry, not Scabbers, who in actuality is the man, by the name of Peter Pettigrew, that betrayed Harry's parents, and Sirius was an innocent man. Then in our fourth year, the pivotal year, the Triwizard tournament was held at Hogwarts. Harry's name came out of the goblet as a fourth champion. This caused many arguments, seeing as Hogwarts now had two champions, Cedric Diggory and Harry. The champion from Beauxbatons, was, to my disgust, Fleur Delacour, and from Durmstrang was, to Ron's disgust, that is after he went with me to the Yule Ball, Viktor Krum. Harry ended up the winner, but not until after Lord Voldemort murdered Cedric. And then just last year, no one, well, some people, but not many, believed that Voldemort was indeed back, and we had the pleasure, and I say that sarcastically, of meeting Luna Lovegood. Who, might I add, likes Ron too much and needs to bug off. But, last year, was easily the busiest year. I made many house-elf hats and socks; we started the D.A. right under Umbridge's nose, and had to deal with Umbridge. Well, hopefully we'll get a rest this year, though somehow I doubt it.
Dumbledore said that we would be going to get Harry at the end of the month, until then it'd be Neville, Ginny, Ron, and I trying to finish off cleaning the house with Mrs. Weasley. Fred and George were still here, however now, as the constantly reminded Ron and me, they were members of the Order and got to go on special missions. I sometimes wondered how they managed to spend that time apart from one another, because it seemed as if they were always on the same brainwave. Oh well, that's the wonders of twins.
Today we were having the pleasure of cleaning the bathrooms, Mrs. Weasley paired us up, Ginny was with Neville, and I was with Ron. I knew that I was going to have to be strict about actually getting our job done seeing as Mrs. Weasley would be continuing to check up on us, and remembering Ron's knack for getting us into trouble.
I picked up my wand, and the toilet brush that Mrs. Weasley gave us, and proceeded to begin to scrub out the toilet. It wasn't too hard, seeing as the brush did it itself. I knew my mother would want one of these, and then I noticed Ron wasn't doing anything at all.
"Get to work will you?"
"But you seem to be handling it very well on your own."
"Well, make yourself useful and fix that leaky faucet."
"I have no idea how!"
"HAVE YOU GONE MAD? ARE YOU A WIZARD OR NOT?"
Saying this only made Ron laugh, and I was completely confused on why he was doing so.
"What's so funny?" But this didn't help at all; all it did was make him laugh even harder. "I repeat, what's so funny."
"Do you remember first year?"
"Of course I remember first year."
"Do you remember when we went to save the Sorcerer's Stone?"
"No, I completely forgot," I said, using the sarcasm that I had picked up from him over the years.
"Well, let me refresh your memory then. We jumped down the trapdoor—"
"Yes, I know, and we landed in the Devil's Snare—"
"You do remember then?"
"I remember trying to save the stone, yes. But, I still don't understand what's so funny."
"I'm getting there."
"Well, hurry up."
"Impatient are we? Anyway, you landed in the Snare last…."
~*~ FLASHBACK ~*~
The distant music stopped. There was a loud bark from the dog, but Hermione had already jumped. She landed on Harry's other side.
"We must be miles under the school," she said.
"Lucky this plant thing's here, really," said Ron.
"Lucky!" shrieked Hermione. "Look at you both!"
She leapt up and struggled toward a damp wall. She has to struggle because the moment she had landed, the pant had started to twist snakelike tendrils around her ankles. As for Harry and Ron, their legs had already been bound tightly in long creepers without their noticing.
Hermione had managed to free herself before the plant got a firm grip on her. Now she watched in horror as the two boys bought to pull the plant off them, but the more they strained against it, the tighter and faster the plant wound around them.
"Stop moving!" Hermione ordered them. "I know what this is—it's Devil's Snare!"
"Oh, I'm so glad we know what it's called, that's a great help," snarled Ron, leaning back, trying to stop the plant from curling around his neck.
"Shut up, I'm trying to remember how to kill it!" said Hermione.
"Well, hurry up, I can't breathe!" Harry gasped, wrestling with it as it curled around his chest.
"Devil's Snare, Devil's Snare… what did Professor Sprout say? – it likes the dark and thee damp ---"
"So light a fire!" Harry choked.
"Yes—of course—but there's no wood!" Hermione cried, wringing her hands.
"HAVE YOU GONE MAD?" Ron bellowed. "ARE YOU A WITCH OR NOT?"
"Oh, right!"
~*~ END FLASHBACK ~*~
"I still don't find it hilarious."
"Well, I just think it's verbal irony."
"Verbal irony? Since when—"
"Hey, I have to be somewhat intelligent if Dumbledore made me a prefect."
"Sorry," I said quickly, I knew how sensitive he was about that subject.
"It's okay, so, what spell do you suggest to fix this faucet with?"
"Reparo?" I said, disbelieving.
"Oh, right!" I shook my head, oh well, Ron was slow sometimes. "I guess I'm still not used to being able to use magic outside of school yet." With a swish of his wand he had fixed the faucet and tested it out a few times.
"How's it going?" Mrs. Weasley had bustled into the room.
"Fine," Ron and I chorused.
"Good, don't forget to fix the faucet."
"Done," Ron said proudly.
"All of them?"
"What do you mean?"
"Just go through that door," she said pointing at the door on the other side of the bathroom, which I had assumed, was a linen cupboard.
"Okay," Ron said bewildered, he had obviously thought along the same lines as I had.
"Good. I'll come back in an hour." And with that she was gone.
"Fancy a peek on what's on the other side?" Ron asked.
"I suppose, if we're supposed to be cleaning that side too."
"Okay, let's go," Ron said pulling the door open and letting me through first without taking a glance on the otherside.
"Oh, my. We're going to be cleaning for hours."
The once thought closet was really a bathroom that could have easily been found at Hogwarts, with about thirty stalls and an equal number of sinks.
"Merlin's beard!"
"Well, I'll start with the toilets, you start with the sinks, until something else goes wrong, then well, and we'll see what happens then."
"Sounds like a plan to me," Ron replied, "but I wouldn't expect anything less from a genius."
"I'm not a genius."
"Right! And my hair's not red."
"I'm not!"
"Stop being modest!"
"I am not being modest!"
"Sure you are. How could you not be a genius, when you got three hundred and twelve percent on your Muggle Studies Exam third year?!"
"How did you remember that?"
"I'm still in awe."
"Oh… well… um… I'm not a genius."
"Right, of course you're not, reparo!"
And that was that, he didn't press it any further. What was the point of that? And why did he think I was a genius? I am not! I may be intelligent, but so what if I've yet to get less than three points of extra credit on each assignment, from anyone but Umbridge or Snape. Neither of which I'm too fond of, but yes, I still have perfect marks.
I walked into the nearest stall. Without noticing I took the brush and started scrubbing the toilet, well, apparently to hard. All the water came splashing back at me.
"Ugh!"
"What's wrong?" said Ron striding over to me. "Um, you're all wet."
"I'm aware of that. I scrubbed the toilet to hard."
"Don't you just put the brush in the toilet and it scrubs it for you?"
"Yes, but I forgot, I started to do it the Muggle way."
"Well, I think this is something gone wrong, SWITCH!"
"Okay…" I said, wondering why he was yelling. "Why such enthusiasm?"
"I dunno. It's fun?"
"If you say so…"
"I do."
"Well, then," but in attempt to get out of the stall I found myself completely blocked in by Ron. I tried to make my way around him, but with his arms on either side of the stall, there was no way out, as the stall's walls went to the floor. "Um, excuse me?"
"I don't mean to be rude, but something's been bugging me."
"And that would be?"
"What happened last summer?"
"What?"
"You know, when you came home and, there we were having a quaint old time, trying to get a hold of you, and then Dumbledore shows up and tells us that we have to go to Order Headquarters. And you're all sad and then you're suddenly over it, but still, any time anyone yelled last year, you got upset, 'Mione, you know you can tell me, I'm one of your best friends!"
"I know, but it's complicated."
"I don't care, I'm all ears."
"That's for sure. But—"
"No buts, you're going to tell me."
"I suppose."
REVIEWER'S CORNER
Miss Bea Granger- I'm glad you like my story so much.
Lady Death- I hate Viktor, I was sad he didn't come up much in OotP, I want to kill him personally. Don't ask me why, I just hate the guy. ;)
Clearly Clayr- YAY! Just wait for Ron's reaction. It's gonna be funny. I promise!
Ron Weasley- One, it's to bad you're not the real Ron, but then if you were you would not be able to breathe, I would have stolen you from where ever you were. I LOVE RON! Why, it's sad. But that's okay. Don't worry, you'll find out what happened to Viktor later. *grins evilly*
SugaAngel86- That scene will be coming; good things come to those who wait! Lol.
Kavilitiy- So I was slow getting the chapter up, but hey, it works no?
Dancing Queen- Well, you've still got to wait for the Weasley reaction, but I had to make it fit OotP. So yeah. It's gonna take one more chapter than expected.
Harryalltheway- Harry all the way? If you have Harry can I have Ron? Please? Hey, you reviewed yesterday, ha, this was a recent update for you. Don't get used to it! Lol!