"Demons are everywhere. We must learn to recognize them."
Harry Potter grunted and blinked his eyes. Looking up from his prison of dried mud, he saw a dozen pairs of beady little maniacal eyes staring accusingly at him, holding a variety of protest-like signs. He squinted at one and read: "WE DON'T READ HARRY POTTER! WE READ THE BIBLE!"
Hermione and Ron came wandering by, laughing. Seeing Harry, they tried to run away without him seeing them.
No luck. He grunted and shrieked and stared wildly at the Demonbuster gang.
"Oh, for heaven's sake," Hermione groaned, eyeing the signs.
"What?" Ron asked.
"Bible thumpers. Think Harry Potter is evil..."
"CHILD OF SATAN!" one of the women shrieked at Hermione.
Hermione rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue. It morphed and became forked, and she hissed at the crowd. Then her head began to spin all the way around her shoulders.
"Yrrah tnsi na noitanimoba...seh tsuj a taerg gnirehtilb toidi!!!!" she screamed at them and a deep raspy voice. Then she puked guacamole for good measure.
The woman fainted dead away. Hermione grinned at Ron.
"Nothing can be done about these people," she said simply, her head spinning around back to the front. "Might as well have fun with them."
Snape wandered up, spinning a pink parasol and humming "Let's Get Physical."
"What's going on?" he said lazily. He looked at the Demonbuster gang. "YOU again?!"
He whipped out his wand and hexed the nearest man, turning him into a bowl of cheese cubes.
"POWER OF THE DEVIL!" the gang chorused, covering their eyes.
Snape sighed and waved his wand, turning two more of them into giant mice, and set them to devouring the bowl of cheese.
"And the power to change into animals shall be-est a sure sign of the Devil's work among you!" a man, presumably the leader, shouted. "Brothers and sisters! Turn in your Bibles to Revelations--"
"Let me try..." Ron said, screwing up his face in thought before flicking his wand at the Bibles. Ozzy Osbourne blared as the Demonbusters opened their Bibles, like so many musical greeting cards.
The people shrieked and dropped their books, covering their eyes.
"Do not open your oh-so-holy eyes, my brothers and sisters, else they be BURNED in your sockets by the Divine Wrath!"
"Nice!" Snape crowed, and high-fived Ron before sticking his tongue out at the DB gang and doing the funky chicken.
A fiery pillar descended in the midst of the gang.
"Behold the Metatron!" a Voice within the pillar proclaimed. "Herald of the Almighty and Voice of the one true--"
The Voice ended in spluttering and coughing as Hermione doused the flames with a fire extinguisher she found in her robes.
"What else have you got in there?" Ron asked, amazed.
"Oh," she replied, pulling more stuff out, "you know, the usual...floss, cherry tree, oh and here's that sloth I thought I lost...ouch...Peter Pettigrew...cut it out." She whacked the fat nasty man on the head as he tried to gnaw her hand. "Acid-free glue, llama dung, mincemeat pies..."
The Voice cleared its throat. "Got a towel? Honestly, you bottom-feeders and your arrogance..."
Hermione tossed the Metatron a hand towel, and he dabbed himself off. "Now where was I?" he mused. "Oh yes. I AM...THE METATRON." He sprung such huge, impressive wings that he toppled right over backwards.
The Demonbusters hurried forward to help him up.
"Get off, get off, don't touch me," the Metatron said irritably, brushing them aside.
"Finally, a missionary from the heavens, here to put an end to this evil of Harry Potter!" the head Demonbuster cried, tears in his eyes. "Too long has this abomination been going on! Spells against children released, innocent young souls tainted by this witchcraft--"
"Look..." the Metatron said wearily. "Shut...up."
The Demonbusters fell silent, their rapt, tearful gaze upturned to the Metatron, waiting for him to whip out his fiery sword and destroy the most evil and unnatural spawn of the underworld.
And of course I mean underworld as in the fiery pits and lakes of brimstone in Hell, not as in the underworld as in Underworld the movie, which I still have yet to see, with all of those fabulous darling werewolves, nor do I mean underworld as in underworldly associations, like the Mafia, which I very much admire, just take a look at the Black Hand in Sicily and the American Mafia back in the Prohibition era, or the Godfather trilogy, fabulous movies, those...and I don't mean I admire the Mafia of today, no indeed, drug smugglers? Bah. A lot of less disciplined, soft, lazy criminals you'll never find. It's too easy of a business. At least Murder Inc. and bootlegging required some skill and self-discipline...
"Hem hem," Dolores Umbridge coughed quietly from the background, interrupting my tirade.
Oh crap. That horrible beast. Someone get her.
"Who do you think you are, bossing people around?" Hermione demanded.
I am the author and supreme authority over each and every one of you in the confines of this text, you miserable little brat.
"Ha! Supreme authority!! I'd like to see that," Hermione snorted.
Once again, fair reader, I am MOST grieved to report that Hermione Granger will not be joining us for the rest of this chapter.
"Good riddance," the Metatron muttered. "I was just about to work some of my mojo on that insufferable snotrag."
"That's what dissenters against the Hogwarts High Inquisitor get. Come- uppance," that nasty fat toad beast said, sniffing self-importantly.
The Metatron stared at the fat beast.
Ahem. I've found real life pictures of this woman. She is the stranglehold on the object of so many of our affections and lust...no names stated.
The Metatron waved his hands at the toad-beast. She instantly became slimmer, more wrinkle-resistant, with red hair and green eyes and a notably quieter demeanor.
"Alright!" Snape cried. "That'll help home life!"
"I did it...for both our sakes," the Metatron said, eyeing his handiwork.
"The Metatron! Please! Deliver us from the turmoil of these sinners!" the lead Demonbuster cried.
"Oh, right, that's what I came down for," the Metatron mumbled. "Right, so let's get this straightened out." He turned to the Demonbusters. "You all are a lot of loonies, you need to go straight home, lock yourselves in a closet in a Wisconsin truck stop, and not bother anyone with your ridiculous claims for the rest of human history. Understood?"
The Demonbusters looked at each other, shocked.
"I will of course provide you with a lifetime supply of Spam to sustain you to Judgment Day when you'll answer for your most heinous attacks against something so pure and good as Harry Potter. And you will be provided your own prophets...in a manner of speaking. The first one...well, he's sort of the silent type. The second one, that talks...and he will, at great length, whether you want him to or not--"
Harry squealed happily from the pile of hardened mud five minutes later at the mention of his name. The Metatron rolled his eyes.
"I don't mean YOU, you great prat," he said, squishing Harry's face with the heel of his shoe. "I mean the books and movies, which are so unluckily name after you."
Snape picked up a ferret, stroking it lovingly. He proffered it to the Metatron, who shook his head gracefully.
"You're a FRAUD!" the Demonbusters shouted at the Metatron. "You're a demon come to lead us astray! Let us talk to the Almighty!"
The Metatron sighed wearily. "I told you, you lot of spotty dolts, I am the Voice of the Almighty."
"Why can't he talk for himself?" they asked accusingly. "'For in dulcet tones shall the Devil lead thee astray to tear thee asunder!'"
"I have dulcet tones, do I?" The Metatron looked flattered.
"I'd say your deep and sensuous baritone is quite like honey on velvet," Snape replied.
The Metatron looked Snape up and down. "Thank you very much. And I'd say your luscious, even tones ring exactly like liquid velvet would."
Snape grinned happily. "Thank you. Ferret?"
"No, thank you."
"ANSWER US, THOU DECEIVING DEMON!"
The Metatron sighed heavily and launched into a practiced speech. "The Metatron acts as the Voice of God. Any documented occasion where some yahoo claims to be speaking to Him, they're speakin' to me. Or they're just, talking to themselves."
"Why can't He speak for Himself?"
"Glad you decided to join the conversation with an intelligent query, to answer that, humans have neither the psychological nor audial capacity to withstand the awesome power of God's true voice. Were you to hear it, your head would cave in and your heart would explode within your chest, we went through five Adams before we figured that one out."
The Demonbusters looked stunned. They immediately spun around to confer with each other and rifle through their Bibles.
"It says here, 'Witchcraft is an abomination before me!'" they said, thrusting their open Bibles at the Metatron. He waved them aside.
"And ignorant Bible-thumpers are an abomination before ME."
"You have no respect for what is sacred and holy?" they asked incredulously.
The Metatron rolled his eyes. "I was created by Kevin Smith, what do you think?"
They stared, gaping-mouthed. Some of them actually had flies buzz into their oral cavities. They swallowed noisily.
"I'm tired of this," Snape whined. He waved his wand and all of the Demonbusters exploded with loud POOFs, raining chocolate Galleons on them all. The two mice shrieked loudly, and the bowl of cheese cubes ran into the Forbidden Forest. Snape grabbed the mice and stuffed them into his pockets.
"For the Soup Surprise," he said, winking at Ron, who was scampering around, gathering up the Galleons, biting a bunch of first years who go in the way.
Ron was very unnerved by the fact that Snape winked at him.
"Well, these signs here..." Snape said, picking them up and turning them over in digust. "'The End is Near! Learn to Recognize the Demons All Around! You Deserve to Get Saved Today!' Well these are of no good to anyone." He piled them on the mound of hardened mud and lit it on fire.
"Good to have met you," he said, walking over to the Metatron, shaking his hand. "Good to know someone so very good looking is watching over things Up There."
The Metatron shook his hand in return. "Of course. Now if you'll excuse me, the Last Scion has gone and got herself involved in ANOTHER floor show at some dodgy fraternity house..."
And the Metatron disappeared. Snape turned to Ron.
"Another good day's work," he said, offering his elbow. "Shall we adjourn to the Great Hall?"
Ron looked him up and down. "Ummm...no...thanks, I was going to...go check on...something annoying...oh yeah, Hermione. I think she's in the hospital wing again. She always manages to get there in nearly every chapter. Annoying twit."
"Suit yourself, but I'll see you later." He flashed the double-pistol fingers at Ron and clicked his tongue. He pulled on a pair of black sunglasses and bewitched his robe to turn into a black suit and black tie. "Let's go to woik," he said to an imaginary group of similarly dressed men behind him.
Ron stared with dawning comprehension. "YOU'RE Mr. Purple!"
"Yep. I'm that some other guy on some other job. I'm just glad I didn't get the name Mr. Pink. Can you imagine?!"
And, laughing, Snape and Ron headed up to the castle, the fire burning the signs crackling merrily atop the mound of mud. Twenty-five minutes later resounding, piercing screams could be heard throughout the grounds as Harry Potter finally realized there was a fire right on top of him.
Harry Potter grunted and blinked his eyes. Looking up from his prison of dried mud, he saw a dozen pairs of beady little maniacal eyes staring accusingly at him, holding a variety of protest-like signs. He squinted at one and read: "WE DON'T READ HARRY POTTER! WE READ THE BIBLE!"
Hermione and Ron came wandering by, laughing. Seeing Harry, they tried to run away without him seeing them.
No luck. He grunted and shrieked and stared wildly at the Demonbuster gang.
"Oh, for heaven's sake," Hermione groaned, eyeing the signs.
"What?" Ron asked.
"Bible thumpers. Think Harry Potter is evil..."
"CHILD OF SATAN!" one of the women shrieked at Hermione.
Hermione rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue. It morphed and became forked, and she hissed at the crowd. Then her head began to spin all the way around her shoulders.
"Yrrah tnsi na noitanimoba...seh tsuj a taerg gnirehtilb toidi!!!!" she screamed at them and a deep raspy voice. Then she puked guacamole for good measure.
The woman fainted dead away. Hermione grinned at Ron.
"Nothing can be done about these people," she said simply, her head spinning around back to the front. "Might as well have fun with them."
Snape wandered up, spinning a pink parasol and humming "Let's Get Physical."
"What's going on?" he said lazily. He looked at the Demonbuster gang. "YOU again?!"
He whipped out his wand and hexed the nearest man, turning him into a bowl of cheese cubes.
"POWER OF THE DEVIL!" the gang chorused, covering their eyes.
Snape sighed and waved his wand, turning two more of them into giant mice, and set them to devouring the bowl of cheese.
"And the power to change into animals shall be-est a sure sign of the Devil's work among you!" a man, presumably the leader, shouted. "Brothers and sisters! Turn in your Bibles to Revelations--"
"Let me try..." Ron said, screwing up his face in thought before flicking his wand at the Bibles. Ozzy Osbourne blared as the Demonbusters opened their Bibles, like so many musical greeting cards.
The people shrieked and dropped their books, covering their eyes.
"Do not open your oh-so-holy eyes, my brothers and sisters, else they be BURNED in your sockets by the Divine Wrath!"
"Nice!" Snape crowed, and high-fived Ron before sticking his tongue out at the DB gang and doing the funky chicken.
A fiery pillar descended in the midst of the gang.
"Behold the Metatron!" a Voice within the pillar proclaimed. "Herald of the Almighty and Voice of the one true--"
The Voice ended in spluttering and coughing as Hermione doused the flames with a fire extinguisher she found in her robes.
"What else have you got in there?" Ron asked, amazed.
"Oh," she replied, pulling more stuff out, "you know, the usual...floss, cherry tree, oh and here's that sloth I thought I lost...ouch...Peter Pettigrew...cut it out." She whacked the fat nasty man on the head as he tried to gnaw her hand. "Acid-free glue, llama dung, mincemeat pies..."
The Voice cleared its throat. "Got a towel? Honestly, you bottom-feeders and your arrogance..."
Hermione tossed the Metatron a hand towel, and he dabbed himself off. "Now where was I?" he mused. "Oh yes. I AM...THE METATRON." He sprung such huge, impressive wings that he toppled right over backwards.
The Demonbusters hurried forward to help him up.
"Get off, get off, don't touch me," the Metatron said irritably, brushing them aside.
"Finally, a missionary from the heavens, here to put an end to this evil of Harry Potter!" the head Demonbuster cried, tears in his eyes. "Too long has this abomination been going on! Spells against children released, innocent young souls tainted by this witchcraft--"
"Look..." the Metatron said wearily. "Shut...up."
The Demonbusters fell silent, their rapt, tearful gaze upturned to the Metatron, waiting for him to whip out his fiery sword and destroy the most evil and unnatural spawn of the underworld.
And of course I mean underworld as in the fiery pits and lakes of brimstone in Hell, not as in the underworld as in Underworld the movie, which I still have yet to see, with all of those fabulous darling werewolves, nor do I mean underworld as in underworldly associations, like the Mafia, which I very much admire, just take a look at the Black Hand in Sicily and the American Mafia back in the Prohibition era, or the Godfather trilogy, fabulous movies, those...and I don't mean I admire the Mafia of today, no indeed, drug smugglers? Bah. A lot of less disciplined, soft, lazy criminals you'll never find. It's too easy of a business. At least Murder Inc. and bootlegging required some skill and self-discipline...
"Hem hem," Dolores Umbridge coughed quietly from the background, interrupting my tirade.
Oh crap. That horrible beast. Someone get her.
"Who do you think you are, bossing people around?" Hermione demanded.
I am the author and supreme authority over each and every one of you in the confines of this text, you miserable little brat.
"Ha! Supreme authority!! I'd like to see that," Hermione snorted.
Once again, fair reader, I am MOST grieved to report that Hermione Granger will not be joining us for the rest of this chapter.
"Good riddance," the Metatron muttered. "I was just about to work some of my mojo on that insufferable snotrag."
"That's what dissenters against the Hogwarts High Inquisitor get. Come- uppance," that nasty fat toad beast said, sniffing self-importantly.
The Metatron stared at the fat beast.
Ahem. I've found real life pictures of this woman. She is the stranglehold on the object of so many of our affections and lust...no names stated.
The Metatron waved his hands at the toad-beast. She instantly became slimmer, more wrinkle-resistant, with red hair and green eyes and a notably quieter demeanor.
"Alright!" Snape cried. "That'll help home life!"
"I did it...for both our sakes," the Metatron said, eyeing his handiwork.
"The Metatron! Please! Deliver us from the turmoil of these sinners!" the lead Demonbuster cried.
"Oh, right, that's what I came down for," the Metatron mumbled. "Right, so let's get this straightened out." He turned to the Demonbusters. "You all are a lot of loonies, you need to go straight home, lock yourselves in a closet in a Wisconsin truck stop, and not bother anyone with your ridiculous claims for the rest of human history. Understood?"
The Demonbusters looked at each other, shocked.
"I will of course provide you with a lifetime supply of Spam to sustain you to Judgment Day when you'll answer for your most heinous attacks against something so pure and good as Harry Potter. And you will be provided your own prophets...in a manner of speaking. The first one...well, he's sort of the silent type. The second one, that talks...and he will, at great length, whether you want him to or not--"
Harry squealed happily from the pile of hardened mud five minutes later at the mention of his name. The Metatron rolled his eyes.
"I don't mean YOU, you great prat," he said, squishing Harry's face with the heel of his shoe. "I mean the books and movies, which are so unluckily name after you."
Snape picked up a ferret, stroking it lovingly. He proffered it to the Metatron, who shook his head gracefully.
"You're a FRAUD!" the Demonbusters shouted at the Metatron. "You're a demon come to lead us astray! Let us talk to the Almighty!"
The Metatron sighed wearily. "I told you, you lot of spotty dolts, I am the Voice of the Almighty."
"Why can't he talk for himself?" they asked accusingly. "'For in dulcet tones shall the Devil lead thee astray to tear thee asunder!'"
"I have dulcet tones, do I?" The Metatron looked flattered.
"I'd say your deep and sensuous baritone is quite like honey on velvet," Snape replied.
The Metatron looked Snape up and down. "Thank you very much. And I'd say your luscious, even tones ring exactly like liquid velvet would."
Snape grinned happily. "Thank you. Ferret?"
"No, thank you."
"ANSWER US, THOU DECEIVING DEMON!"
The Metatron sighed heavily and launched into a practiced speech. "The Metatron acts as the Voice of God. Any documented occasion where some yahoo claims to be speaking to Him, they're speakin' to me. Or they're just, talking to themselves."
"Why can't He speak for Himself?"
"Glad you decided to join the conversation with an intelligent query, to answer that, humans have neither the psychological nor audial capacity to withstand the awesome power of God's true voice. Were you to hear it, your head would cave in and your heart would explode within your chest, we went through five Adams before we figured that one out."
The Demonbusters looked stunned. They immediately spun around to confer with each other and rifle through their Bibles.
"It says here, 'Witchcraft is an abomination before me!'" they said, thrusting their open Bibles at the Metatron. He waved them aside.
"And ignorant Bible-thumpers are an abomination before ME."
"You have no respect for what is sacred and holy?" they asked incredulously.
The Metatron rolled his eyes. "I was created by Kevin Smith, what do you think?"
They stared, gaping-mouthed. Some of them actually had flies buzz into their oral cavities. They swallowed noisily.
"I'm tired of this," Snape whined. He waved his wand and all of the Demonbusters exploded with loud POOFs, raining chocolate Galleons on them all. The two mice shrieked loudly, and the bowl of cheese cubes ran into the Forbidden Forest. Snape grabbed the mice and stuffed them into his pockets.
"For the Soup Surprise," he said, winking at Ron, who was scampering around, gathering up the Galleons, biting a bunch of first years who go in the way.
Ron was very unnerved by the fact that Snape winked at him.
"Well, these signs here..." Snape said, picking them up and turning them over in digust. "'The End is Near! Learn to Recognize the Demons All Around! You Deserve to Get Saved Today!' Well these are of no good to anyone." He piled them on the mound of hardened mud and lit it on fire.
"Good to have met you," he said, walking over to the Metatron, shaking his hand. "Good to know someone so very good looking is watching over things Up There."
The Metatron shook his hand in return. "Of course. Now if you'll excuse me, the Last Scion has gone and got herself involved in ANOTHER floor show at some dodgy fraternity house..."
And the Metatron disappeared. Snape turned to Ron.
"Another good day's work," he said, offering his elbow. "Shall we adjourn to the Great Hall?"
Ron looked him up and down. "Ummm...no...thanks, I was going to...go check on...something annoying...oh yeah, Hermione. I think she's in the hospital wing again. She always manages to get there in nearly every chapter. Annoying twit."
"Suit yourself, but I'll see you later." He flashed the double-pistol fingers at Ron and clicked his tongue. He pulled on a pair of black sunglasses and bewitched his robe to turn into a black suit and black tie. "Let's go to woik," he said to an imaginary group of similarly dressed men behind him.
Ron stared with dawning comprehension. "YOU'RE Mr. Purple!"
"Yep. I'm that some other guy on some other job. I'm just glad I didn't get the name Mr. Pink. Can you imagine?!"
And, laughing, Snape and Ron headed up to the castle, the fire burning the signs crackling merrily atop the mound of mud. Twenty-five minutes later resounding, piercing screams could be heard throughout the grounds as Harry Potter finally realized there was a fire right on top of him.