Chapter Sixty-Six: Mr. MacGregor's Garden

"You know," John remarked to no one in particular, "I was just thinking, why did Peter Rabbit bother with Mr. MacGregor's garden anyway? I'd think the blackberries and cream a darned sight better than vegetables."

"Well, you're not a rabbit, dear. Maybe he really liked vegetables." Cass slowed down on the accelerator a bit. "My question was always why didn't he get those gits Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail to provide a distraction while he got some nice radishy loot for the four of 'em?"

"Are you two getting philosophical over Beatrix Potter?" Snape inquired confusedly.

"Not philosophical, just inquisitive."

"Like, maybe Flopsy could be the stall, then Cottontail could crack the safe while Mopsy blew up a flowerpot with plastic explosive, then Peter could get some good vegetables."

"Are they sober?" Hermione asked Draco quietly.

"I don't know. But where in heck would Mopsy get plastic explosive from?"

"From the gopher, of course."

"Didn't you ever see 'Winnie the Pooh' or 'Caddyshack'? Gophers are great at that kind of thing."

"And that way Owl could do reconnaissance while Roo and Piglet jury-rigged the fence and Eeyore could pile sticks against the gate, so MacGregor'd trip."

"But why would Eeyore help a bunch of little rabbits out?" Draco asked, fully into the game by now.

"Ten thistles an hour, plus thanks for noticing him."

"I don't think Rabbit would go for it, though," Severus remarked in spite of himself. "I mean, he's a gardener, too, so he'd likely sympathize with the old guy about thievery."

"Aw, Rabbit can be bought," Cass shrugged knowingly. "Either his little nephew Brass-Button Pete could get him in with the prospect of cuttings from MacGregor's prize cabbages, or the famed strong-arm Honey Pot Pooh could lean on him a bit."

"Naw, Winnie-the-Pooh's no strong-arm," Hermione asserted with unusual vim. "Even if he is a bear of very little brain, I'd say it would be Tigger who leaned on people."

"And of course, Kanga's the brains of the operation, she and Peter Rabbit's mum."

"In two minutes, we've turned two of the most beloved children's books in history into a gangster film," John observed.

"Yeah." Cass frowned slightly and then smiled. "Neat!"

"Why did we start again?" Draco asked.

"I was trying to make Hermione laugh, but it all got so involved and serious and..." John thought for a second. "What about Christopher Robin?"

Severus smiled indulgently, for once not minding the utter silliness of his American friends. Hermione had been pale, gaunt, and completely confused when he first saw her, trying to sit up in the bed her captors had kept her in. Draco had tried his best to explain her situation, but still she had no memory of what had happened. In her mind, she had gone out to visit Hagrid and suddenly woken up in a house in Godric's Hollow with a scar on her wrist and the look of an Azkaban escapee. The months she had been gone were merely minutes to her, and she had been surprised over and over since awakening. Draco's hair was much longer and he was about two inches taller, as well as sprouting a downy first moustache. Severus had a few days' worth of scruffy beard stubble and looked, in his own opinion, ridiculous. Cassandra had gone from a sick-looking newly bitten werewolf to the portrait of health and glow –not to mention her waistline. John had shaved his beard and taken to tying his long hair back. Hermione could scarcely comprehend the changes in herself; those in her friends were bizarre.

One thing was certain, though, even dazed and ill, she still liked kisses. Severus was afraid to touch her at first, but once she smiled, he hadn't been able to resist. She was at his side, looking better since the Day-Spa-In-Seconds charm but still weak. Carrying her to the car, a few kisses, and keeping an arm about her to make she wouldn't disappear was all the contact Severus had the courage to offer. In the weeks and months of missing her, the longing for her smile, her laugh, their conversations, just her presence, even, had grown so strong that, confronted with the subject of that longing, he was afraid. The fact that he was nervous about whether she was sick or what the Dark had put her through was secondary to this odd fear.

Even as Draco and the Tylers argued the points of Tigger and Rabbit's love-hate relationship in shockingly precise and vehement detail, Severus felt a sudden warmth in his left palm. He looked, and Hermione smiled at him, her left hand in his above her shoulder. She moved a little and slipped her right arm around him, leaning closer.

"I missed you." She snuggled close, something they had never had much time to do, and inhaled. Suddenly, she laughed lightly. "Severus, you smell like…you smell like firewhiskey and cat hair."

"Oh, yes." He went a little red. "Er…I was on a bit of…I had been…your cat's been coming to stay with me, and Cassandra quit drinking, so I just…well…I was quite lonely, and…"

"He's just coming off a bender," the ever-blunt professor explained. "Can't blame him, either. Just a while ago we had a Death Eater on Polyjuice trying to pass for you, we've had raids and …casualties…oh, and the Chudley Cannons beat the Wimbourne Wasps!"

"Was Ron pleased?"

"Er…he smiled when we told him, but that was about it. He and Harry and Ginny've been kinda worried about you."

"Kinda?" Draco asked incredulously. "More like completely. Professor McGonagall's going to be beside herself when she hears you're safe."

"Omigod!"

Everyone turned to stare at the recovered hostage, whose eyes had gone wide. "I owe her homework!"

"Don't worry about it, Hermione," John smiled. "I think you have all the time in the world to catch up on what you missed."

Severus sighed and hugged her closer. They both did.

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Peter Pettigrew was a rat.

No, literally.

He had arrived in the Forbidden Forest clearing just in time to see his master raise his wand for the final curse against Harry Potter, who had bravely and stupidly come out to meet him alone. A split second later, there was a zipping sound. Lord Voldemort uttered the Avada Kedavra in a thunderous voice.

Nothing happened.

It was only as the green light began to fume backwards from his wand and consume his arm that Tom Riddle realized what had happened.

Potter had not come alone.

Arrows just as suddenly sprouted in the chests of the remaining Death Eaters, Pettigrew excepted. The centaur archers drew again, their bows aimed at Voldemort. Harry whistled softly and the 112th World Aurory, the D.A., and the Order of the Phoenix stood up from behind their trees and bushes. Ginny Weasley blew the smoke from her gun, grinning at Voldemort and his splintered half-wand.

"Sorry, Tom."

It was right at that point that Peter Pettigrew realized he had backed the wrong horse. He bolted, disapparating in the most cowardly and bungling way imaginable. He found himself with a now crying baby girl, in a Muggle back alley of all places. It occurred to him that even if the Dark Lord was killed, the Filius Replicatus charm would work on the infant. Maybe, bringing up the new Dark Lord –no, Dark Lady, he supposed, would grant him the protector he needed to stay alive against the Aurors and wizards of the Light.

In retrospect, it could be said the outcome of the war was already decided by that point. Voldemort was trapped, wandless, by no less than thirty sentient beings, including the centaurs and four D.A. members mounted on thestrals to provide aerial support. Remus Lupin rode Buckbeak and Tonks rode his mate, Fledgemare. The theory had been that brooms could be counter-spelled. The Machine, operated by Mel Watling from the Shrieking Shack, had placed a rebounder spell on Voldemort and every Death Eater the reconnaissance had warned them off, effectively damning every action they took with wands. Ginny shooting the wand in half had actually been something of a just-in-case, as well as a psychological attack on the enemy.

There was a lot going on at the Machine, as the communications base was located two feet from the computer that controlled the wand antenna. Mel, poor girl, was trying to synchronize Aurors, D.A.'s, Phoenixes, and of course, centaurs, and naturally the cell-phones kept fuzzing out from magical interference. Finally Mel gave up, opened another instance of the Machine program on the computer, and began to tamper with the cell-phones magically, all the while keeping track of the communications by means of an assistant, who repeated everything she told him to into the mike. Theodoric was surprisingly effective. The theory of the Machine's being able to take out Voldemort's own amplified wand device, block his power, and even provide a tactical base, was very Mugglefied in its computer dependency. Had Voldemort employed any Muggle-born hackers, the war might very well have ended differently.

Another theory had been that Muggle and centaur-style tactics could likely best wand-dependent wizards, if they had the element of surprise. Ginny's gun and the centaurs' bows proved this.

Of course, these theories were given as historical fact by the end of the day. Another given fact, known even before Voldemort rose, was Peter Pettigrew's inept ability with magic, especially complex charms.

To put it mildly, the Filius Replicatus didn't work.

Pettigrew was now left with a really crying baby girl, whose palm had been cut by the wand's failure. What was he to do? He thought of killing the child. No, he hadn't the nerve. Abandoning her? But what if the spell had worked?

In the end, he settled on the easiest decision, which was not to decide. He began to sing softly and rock the nameless baby, who eventually went to sleep against his coat, still wrapped in Narcissa Malfoy's makeshift blanket of old bedsheets. Night fell and he was left in the dark, in a poorer quarter of London, in a neighborhood known as Dennon Street.

Dennon Street?

The memory stirred. Tom Riddle had grown up in an orphanage. Its location, Pettigrew recalled, was in the Broughton district …and its address was forty-one Dennon Street.

He deposited the sleeping baby on the back step, despite the rain, rang the doorbell, and transformed, going to hide in the shadows and watch.

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Judy Parkington was fifteen and had been at Broughton since she was seven. She could type fairly well and liked to study late, so she had managed to con the elderly secretary into giving her the graveyard shift in the office. She answered any phone calls that came in, the doorbell, any emails over the shabby computer, and made ample use of the desk space to study and do homework. She was a responsible girl, so they trusted her not to steal paper clips and to do what was necessary, but in truth, nights were almost always uneventful, so she was free to immerse herself in history, science, geometry, and the occasional salacious book from the loose-board library in her dorm.

That is, until January sixteenth, at about ten after midnight, when the doorbell rang.

The elderly secretary and nurse were perfectly used to abandoned babies and therefore somewhat unimpressed by the little black-haired creature. Judy was tremendously excited, however, so they exchanged looks and maintained a ceremonial attitude while weighing, measuring, bathing, inspecting, and even diapering the little one. The nurse had the secretary fix a bottle of formula while she tended to the infant girl's cut palm and then let Judy feed the baby. After the infant was peaceably, if rapidly, slurping up dinner, the secretary fetched the leather-bound Shakespeare to seek out this baby's name.

Judy relinquished the small, cute parcel to the nurse and set the book on its' spine. Since she had found the baby, it was her honor to choose her name. On the count of three, she let the book fall open.

"Julius Caesar, act one."

"Hmm. Shall we call her Calpurnia?" the nurse inquired.

"No! Poor little kid's got it rough enough." Judy looked over the page, and, to her chagrin, found only Roman men's names. "Oh, dear…wait. What if we feminized Julius? Call the baby Julia?"

"If you like," the secretary yawned, thinking more about getting back to bed than the child's name. "Last name?"

Judy thought. Judy thought hard. She noticed the baby's bandaged hand, and remembered the weird, asterisk-star pattern the cuts had made, and wondered how she got it. Then the idea struck.

"Julia Star-catcher."

"Alright. We've got a Quartertil or two, after all. Julia Starcatcher." The secretary scribbled down the name next to length and weight, the added the date and time. "Better get her up to the infants' ward."

"Actually…may I…?"

"Of course. The formula's right here and the instructions are on the package. I'll get a few blankets and a bassinet." As the nurse spoke, she raised an eyebrow at the secretary, as if to say 'Be nice, Winifred.' She patted little Julia's arm. "What a sweet baby."

"I'll look out for her," Judy promised. "You can be sort of my sister, eh, Julie? And you'll grow up big and strong, yes you will, cutie…"

"She'll likely have a scar on her hand," the secretary remarked as the nurse returned with blankets. "Only thing her parents left the poor little creature with."

"Well, except for that…very characteristic nose." The nurse caught Judy's glare and smiled hastily. "But she has darling ears, and quite a lot of hair."

"I wonder what color her eyes will be," Judy mused. "Have you polished off that bottle already, sweetheart? I'll fix you more, hold on…"

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