Here are some important ramblings:
I know some of the chapters are boring and I'm rambling like a little old lady and not every chapter has something to do with the plotline. HOWEVER there are little details here and there that will totally make sense in the end of the story when the last two or three chapters ties everything together. If you really want to know the outcome of everything and stuff, too bad…hahaha, I'm so evil. Anyway, there is something else at the bottom on this chapter that's important to the plot and will make you think. Overall, this is a love story. That's all I'm sayin', I am not givin' away anything else, and I know you guys alllllways come up with the little predictions and thinking I'm going to let something slip….ha! I'm wiser than that (besides, I've let too much slip already) so happy reading and pleeasssse bare with me. This is a long, sappy, some-what humorous, romantic, adventure, mystery, blah blah, story.
Yours,
Writer007
PS: Even my little author's note is really long and incoherent. See what I mean when I say I ramble?
Star_shadow-14- thanks so much for what you said! I'm glad my story entertained you. Enjoy the rest! : D
Dedbabydoll- nah, she won't kill Harry. I do check my spelling and grammar, but I don't catch everything. If you find a mistake, let me know! :D
Kim- hehe, sorry I scared you. : (
Aubyn Lin- YAY! THANKS! And I'm not going to tell you what happens!
MysticalEnchantress- I understand what you mean when you don't like stories based on Harry and Cho. They always make Cho this sad, sad person with no life and no humor and nothing.
Tyrranis- Yeah, there are a bunch of extra stuff in my story. Read my lil' note above. I'm planning on thirty something chapters.
Lils- Well, I have no idea whether you've been reading, but I'm awfully glad you are now. Lol. Thanks for your review!
The Great One- Lots of other people agree with you on that one!
Rachel- Yes, I'm writing other chapters. Check about once a week, and I'll post up a new chapter.
t24_zone- : D here it is.
Slytherinqueen87- My April Fools joke was quite good, if I don't say so myself. Hehe. Katie goes with one of the twins, not the Slytherin quiddich player. Lol!
Jaje- I can't tell you the name yet, you'll have to wait. Yes, that part will be in the story. :D
MJ- Actually, in the last book, Fred went with Angelina to the Yule Ball, I think, and I don't know if any one of them went with Katie. I'm not having the exact same couples as the fifth book, and it's not even out yet…how did you know who goes with whom? The thing with the parchment is a hint to the story.
Slone- hehe :D
Phoenix- They are cute, aren't they? Thanks for your review.
Meow- Guys will be guys. Lol.
PoisonIvy734- I'm glad you enjoy my story!
Christie- Thank you!
MagicalMoonPrincess- you'll find out which hair Hermione got in this chapter. Nobody's potion will go wrong. Read on. :D
Fyre Pixie- You'll see here. :D
Chapter 18- The Polyjuice Contest
"Welcome to the polyjuice contest, young wizards and witches!" Dumbledore said in the Great Hall. "Let's look at our five contestants. Their potions were the only ones that Professor Snape proved to be correctly done. Sorry, Misters Fred and George Weasley, your potions already contained a part of something to turn into…. animal hairs in fact. You know that the consequences could be very fatal if you gave it to each other to drink?" Dumbledore gave an amused smile.
"I was this close to turning him into something hideous." Fred and George said at the same time.
"The five contestants are," Dumbledore continued. "Mr. Dean Thomas, whose victim to test is Neville Longbottom!"
Everyone stared at Neville, imagining who he might turn to be. Neville looked so nervous he was about to fall over. He only agreed to be a victim because Dean persuaded him that this is good Potions practice and Neville needed every kind of help he could get. Finding victims were very hard.
"Our second contestant is Mr. Harry Potter---" there were excited whispers as the crowd looked at Harry. "Whose victim is….Cho Chang?" Dumbledore looked at Cho who sat on a chair blindfolded by the other victims. "I'm sorry, but Cho, you're not in condition to be taking the polyjuice potion."
Cho pulled her blindfold off. "Oh, alright." She said gently and stepped down from the stage. She shot Harry several, dark looks. Cho agreed to be Harry's victim before their fight so she couldn't back out. She looked very relieved not to do Harry any favors.
Malfoy. Harry thought as he clutched his fist. Malfoy wanted Harry to turn Cho into a "proper teacher" but knew the consequences were fatal.
"Any volunteers to be a victim for Harry?" Dumbledore asked. He looked at the crowd.
"I can." A small voice spoke. Everyone hushed and looked in the voice's direction.
Ginny.
"Alright, Ginny." Dumbledore smiled. "Go up to the stage."
Harry helped her up and blindfolded her.
"Our third contestant is Mr. Draco Malfoy, whose victim is Crabbe." The Slytherins all cheered and hollered. Draco gave a smirk.
"Our fourth contestant is Miss. Hermione Granger whose victim is Ron Weasley." Dumbledore announced.
Ron was very nervous and blindfolded in his chair. "I better not be turned into Snape." He said. He said this a bit too loudly and Snape looked over in Ron's direction. Hermione kicked him.
"And our last, but not least contestant is Miss. Maggie Hallspell whose victim is Roger Davies."
Maggie gave a smile and Roger, even though blindfolded, got up and took a bow. The Ravenclaws cheered and Roger continued taking bows until Dumbledore went over to him and cleared his throat. Then, Roger sat down fairly quickly.
"And now, the contest shouldn't take too long; each of the contestants should have received a small bottle which contains a single hair of one of our Hogwart's teachers, myself included. Behind me are the four other possible teachers in which your victim could be turned into. The victims are blindfolded so they cannot see the hair color and will be completely surprised when they look into the mirror." Dumbledore paused and let the crowd look at the teachers who sat with fixed smiles on their faces.
There was Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape, Hagrid (who was blushing "Can' believe they picked me; great man, Dumbledore."), and Professor LeBlanc.
Five goblets of polyjuice potion were set in front of the victims, and slowly, each one of the contestants uncapped their bottles and dropped a hair in. Flashes of clicks were heard. Colin was taking lots of pictures.
"Hey Harry! Look over here, Harry!"
Harry looked up for a brief moment after dropping a reddish brown color hair in his potion. He hoped he wasn't going to turn Ginny into Hagrid. Harry looked over to Hagrid who gave a wave and then looked down at his hands. "Picked to be a professor for this contest!" Hagrid said, trying to hide his huge grin.
The potion smelled faintly of oil and turned to a slime color. It looked like boogers.
Harry was glad Ginny couldn't see.
Malfoy dropped a dark color into his goblet and it dissolved quickly. The potion turned into a brownish color that made Malfoy's nose twitch.
Dean dropped a dark color into his potion and it turned greasy. It was yellowish and smelled like cabbages.
Maggie dropped a long, curly hair into her potion and it sizzled a bit before dissolving. The hair was silvery and it was a clear guess that she had Dumbledore's hair.
Finally, everyone watched as Hermione drop a dark strand of hair into her goblet. Ron was still muttering things like, "If I look like that greasy ball, I'd break a mirror that's what. I can't believe I agreed to this."
"Right then!" Dumbledore said, eager and beaming at the ten students on stage. "Please, contestants, give the goblet to your victims and let them drink!"
The five contestants pushed the goblets to their victims' hands and the victims, carefully and hesitantly drank.
The changes were amazing. In about five minutes time; four, clear copies of the Hogwart's teachers including their headmaster were in the place of the previous students.
Everyone gasped and pointed.
"Please! Silence!" said Dumbledore. With a wave of his wand, he had a mirror placed before the five victims and then with a snap, the blindfolds disappeared.
Neville took one look into the mirror and gave a huge scream. He saw a greasy haired, pale faced, Snape staring back at him.
"I LOOK LIKE SNAPE! I LOOK LIKE SNAPE!" He said screaming.
Everyone pointed and laughed.
"I can't believe this," Lavendar said.
"Yeah, Snape screams like a girl." Denise noticed.
The real Snape stared at Neville screaming and the look on his own face was certainly nothing less than of shock.
Neville continued screaming and ran around practically crying of horror. Ever since their third year, everyone knew that Neville's worst fear was Professor Snape.
Meanwhile, beside him, a stern woman appeared. McGonagall. Malfoy looked at Crabbe and raised his eyebrow.
"Hey, I'm a woman." Crabbe said stupidly.
Ron was now a few feet above his normal height and looked into his mirror.
"I'm Hagrid!" He said excitedly. "Man, do I feel tall! Say Hagrid," he sniffed his armpits. "When was the last time you showered?"
Hagrid pretended not to hear this.
The silvery hairs grew and half mooned spectacles now set on Roger's nose.
"I'm the old man!" Roger said excitedly. "Everyone do as I say! Man! I've got power! I'm the most dangerous and powerful wizard ever! Wow! Hey you!" He said to a random student in the crowd. "No kissing in public!"
"Ahem." Dumbledore cleared his throat and walked beside his twin.
"Oh," Roger stopped, but was too happy to calm down.
Everyone was now watching one of the Dumbledores do the can-can on stage.
Crabbe was still fascinated that he was a woman and examined himself. The two Hagrids stood next to each other, amazed and bewildered.
The last person was Ginny, whom after putting the mirror down, received whistles and whoops of the men in the audience. She had received Professor LeBlanc's hair and was stunning. Ginny, who had never really gotten personal attention before, was shy and blushing. Harry couldn't keep his eyes off her.
"Wow, Ginny, it's so strange to see you so…..womanish." Harry said.
Nearby Cho was giving Harry a dangerous look.
Ginny, who was having so many boys trying to talk to her at the same time, felt nervous and surprised and she turned to Harry and said worriedly, "Do I look okay?"
Harry was at a lost of speech.
"Hey! Nobody better be staring at my sister like that!" Ron, who was now Hagrid said, storming through. Ron was never a half giant and surprised himself with the booms each step he took. Several people never seen Hagrid this angry before, and backed away.
"Yeah! Go on! Keep your hands off my sister! Hey!" Ron spotted Seamus trying to flirt with the blushing Ginny. "What do you think you're doing?" Ron lifted Seamus up and set him down ten feet away. Then, he stopped to admire his strength. "Wow."
Neville was in the corner, still screaming until finally someone took the mirror away from him.
"And nobody better mess with me! Ha! Dumbledore!" Roger said happily after finishing the cancan and now doing the hokey pokey. "The greatest wizard of all! You put your right hand in, you put your right hand out…"
The real Professor McGonagall practically suffered a heart attack as Crabbe, as McGonagall's twin looked down his shirt and then back up and a look of disturbance appeared on his face.
"Excuse me, Headmaster," the real Snape said to the real Dumbledore. "But I personally think it's time to retrieve the emergency antidote."
* * *
A week after the polyjuice contest, everyone still talked about it. Roger seemed to think that he had enough power to become headmaster when he got to be around Dumbledore's age and Neville had to be taken to Madam Pomfrey after his polyjuice potion worn off for some quick therapy.
Neville got the Hogsmeade shopping spree because everyone agreed that he went through the biggest shock and deserved it. Neville may never be the same again.
The snow fell more heavily and no one could concentrate on studies, so the teachers (even Professor McGonagall) decided to give the students a break. With the Yule Ball and the holidays coming up, all anyone could talk about was what dress they were going to wear and who they were going with and how they couldn't wait to go home and see their little sister or father and such.
Harry, Ron and Hermione spent an afternoon in the library looking up books on parenting for Harry. They didn't find any, so Harry send Hedwig to Flourish and Botts to purchase a book with some money. Hedwig arrived three days later with a brand new book, 'New Father to a Little Wizard, Now What?'. Hedwig suffered a bad cold and was sent to the hospital wing right away.
Three days before the Yule Ball, the three best friends sat in the library reading through this new book, which turned out to be very interesting for Ron and Hermione, and made Harry very nervous.
A section included:
Congratulations to being a brand new father to your darling little witch or wizard! First, if you are a Muggle and you've come across this, it's important to know that wizard babies are very different from Muggle babies. Wizard babies have magic and will perform tid-bits of magic with their tiny little hands.
For example, when wizard babies sneeze, sometimes they can make things appear, like a foghorn or a hat. When a wizard baby is very angry or upset, they can break things such as windows or glass with their cries. Wizard babies also have great fun in experimenting new things with their father, such as making their dinner fly across the room and hitting daddy in the face or banging a pan on their father's head.
Sometimes, if you accidentally drop your baby (not recommended), your baby can bounce, fly, and slide, skip, or float.
"Well, Harry, this is all very interesting." Hermione said, reading with great concentration.
"I don't like the banging a pan on their father's head part," said Harry.
"Well, think about it this way, you can buy him a little toy broomstick or something and train him up to be a great Quiddich player!" Ron suggested.
"That's what I said to Cho once." Said Harry, remembering his conversation with Cho.
"I say we buy him lots of Quiddich things, so he can train up to be a great and valuable player. Personally, I think the Seeker requires the greatest amount of concentration." Said Harry.
Cho gave him a look.
"What?" Harry said.
"A Quiddich player before she can even walk?" Cho said with a raised eyebrow.
"I don't see the problem, we can buy him toy broomsticks, toy Snitches and toy Quaffles and take him to all the Quiddich games----"
Harry came back to the present after thinking of this memory.
"Look, Harry, look what I found." Hermione said pulling out a dusty and old book. Hermione was apparently leaning on one of the bookshelves and this one struck her. It was difficult to remove and had been hidden so well in between the books that it looked like a part of the shelf. Ron helped her pull it out.
It was a normal book, called 'Potions of Animal Breeding'.
"It was poking my back," Hermione said and then tried to put the book back on the shelf so it didn't stick out anymore.
But Harry had a seeker's eye and noticed something sticking out from the book. "Wait, Hermione." He reached for the book, and pulled out a long, thin folded letter. It was very old parchment, perhaps older than anything was, and it must've taken a spell for it to be held together. It was very thin and hackneyed, but something about this struck Harry and he carefully unfolded it.
Hermione and Ron looked at the letter curiously. It was apparently a love letter.
My Dear Love,
I never pass a day without thinking of you. I'm so sorry for our argument. Gryffindors do tend to be very stubborn my dear, but you're quite a feisty little Ravenclaw as well.
Darling, I want to mend things and perhaps you could visit me once again and let me hold you. Don't marry him, dear, he will never love you as much as I. I think, perhaps you only said yes because he was so determined and wouldn't take 'no' for an answer.
Love, if we were to be wed, I promise you our wedding will be ten times more fabulous and twenty times more lovely.
I ache just loving you, dear.
Please don't let this flame die.
Remember Glen, and the day we sent her free?
Set my heart free from pain, dear, sweet, clever Rowena.
Yours,
G. Gryffindor
Harry thought his heart had stopped beating.
Here was a true letter written in Gryffindor's own handwriting! Imagine how worthy it must be!
He eagerly looked up to Ron and Hermione. "Godric's own, handwritten letter!"
But Ron and Hermione turned pale and looked at Harry strangely.
"Harry….." Hermione said studying him carefully.
Harry didn't understand. "What?"
"Look at this." She said, pulling a thin, flat locket out of the book.
Harry curiously looked at the locket and felt his heart pound.
The woman, fair and beautiful was smiling and running her fingers through her hair. She was wearing an old medieval style dress with lace and her dark hair hung down her shoulders.
The man beside her was tall and distinguished with dark hair and light eyes. He was handsome and laughing. The two names below the picture were engraved Rowena and Godric.
And Rowena looked strikingly similar to Cho.
A/N: Next chapter is called 'The Yule Ball'. Things to look forward to, Christmas at the Weasleys! I'm very proud of those chapters. Please review!