Gilderoy woke up at dawn the next day, feeling tired and groggy. He opened his eyes and tried to focus in the dim light coming from a small window, knitting his brows in confusion at his unfamiliar surroundings. He sat up on the rather hard and uncomfortable bunk he'd been sleeping on, yawned, rubbed his eyes, then tried to get his bearings. When at last his brain clicked into place and he realised that he was in fact in a prison cell, he was mortified. Clearer memories of the previous night's events began to come flooding back, revealing just how he had got in this terrible predicament.

His belly clenched up with fear and dread, while his heart began thumping wildly in his chest and sweat beads appeared on his forehead. His first thoughts were – "What the hell am I going to do now?" and "How the hell am I going to get out of this?" But the initial panic soon gave way to despondency at the seeming hopelessness of the situation. The truth was, he'd been caught red-handed and there was no getting away from it.

He bent forwards, leaning his elbows on his thighs, then with the ends of his fingers, rubbed his temples in an attempt to soothe the headache that had now taken up residence. It wasn't just his head that ached either; his whole body felt bruised and battered.

He sat upright again and looked around his cell. With its damp stone walls, rather primitive en-suite bathroom (a toilet and a sink with a sign "do not drink this water!" over the top) and ceiling complete with atmospheric cobwebs - it was certainly a pretty depressing place to be. He made use of the facilities then sat back down on his bunk again. It was only then that he noticed that the bunk beds opposite him were both occupied with sleeping figures. He sincerely hoped, whoever they were that when they eventually woke up – they weren't too large or too angry – or even worse, people that he might know. He had a great fear of being in a position where he couldn't escape from people he knew, just in case they asked him awkward questions or horror of horrors - for money.

Sincerely worried, he stood up to look hopefully out onto the long empty corridor, beyond the barred window in the door of the cell, to see if there were any signs of guards around – but there were none. There was only the shouts and groans of other prisoners starting to wake up in neighbouring cells, to break the silence.

Gilderoy's mouth was now starting to feel very dry and he badly needed a drink of water, but didn't dare try any from the sink. After some thought, he at last decided to try his luck at asking for some and called out softly at first, so as to try not to wake his cellmates.

"Hello?" he ventured tentatively, shooting a look over his shoulder to the other side of the cell – but no one stirred.

On getting no response and seeing his cellmates hadn't woken, he dared to try a little louder

"Err..Hello? Is anyone there? I..I need a drink!"

On still hearing no reply, he became a little indignant, momentarily forgetting his previous caution.

"I have rights you know! You have to provide me with adequate food and water at least!"

On still hearing no response and in a fit of pure frustration, he took off his shoe and began to bang on the bars, making a hell of a racket.

"You just press the red button, if you want assistance mate!" said a sleepy voice.

Gilderoy was immediately shocked into silence and his head whipped round towards the source of the helpful advice; that voice sounded worryingly familiar..

As the owner of the voice sat up on his bunk, Gilderoy jumped back in shock and cursed under his breath..was he just in prison, or in hell? His fellow cellmate looked at him and grinned like a Cheshire cat – who'd just been given cream.

"E..l..l..o, I thought I recognised that voice!" announced Fred Weasley cheerfully, then looking up, he shouted to his brother on the top bunk

"Hey George.. wake up! You'll never believe who's come to share a cell with us! It's old 'Lino Lockhart'! Must have brought him in while we were asleep!" then turning back to Gilderoy, "Little worse for wear last night, if you know what I mean!" Fred confided, winking. "Bit of celebrating you see - we'd just clinched a major deal to make some of our patented, quality products for some Magical Joke shop they've got out in Oz.." he stopped to yawn and stretch luxuriously, then went back to smiling at the dumbstruck man now standing before him.

George had by now woken up properly and jumped down from his bunk to sit rather awkwardly beside his brother on his; now Gilderoy had two Cheshire cat's smiling up at him.

To say that these two would probably be the last people he would want to share a cell with at this particular time might be exaggerating a bit, but it came very close.

"How are you mate!" said George cordially andnodding "fancy seeing you here, eh!" he added with a grin

After staggering back to his bunk, Gilderoy at last managed to find his voice.

"Err.. what..what are you in here for then?" He asked nervously, sincerely hoping it wasn't for GBH.

"Oh just a little misunderstanding that's all.. over a joke potion we sold to someone – I mean, how were we supposed to know it was going to have such a bad reaction?" Fred explained "I mean - we shouldn't be responsible for bad usage, should we? But it was someone quite high up in the ministry and he got us on trumped up charges! Our lawyers a genius though – he'll get us out in no time! Well he'd better do, or our Mum 'll have him if he doesn't!"

"Yeah, seeing as he's our Uncle!" George chuckled, raising his eyebrows knowingly at his brother

"Yeah got us out of a lot of scrapes has good old Uncle Mentior!" agreed Fred

"So, what you in here for then?" George enquired, raising his eyebrows questioningly, as he walked over to sit by Gilderoy. Fred joined him, sandwiching the unfortunateman in the middle.

Gilderoy gulped and was about to make up some excuse, when there was the sound of doors being opened in the distance and heavy footsteps coming down the corridor.

Thecell door banged open and a heavy set, balding man, dressed in black robes walked in. He was obviously some sort of court official and was flanked by two other, younger, much larger men, who looked at Gilderoy menacingly.

"Gilderoy Lockhart..I will now read out your charges, as last night you were considered to be in no fit state" the man announced, pausing to look disparagingly down his nose at his intended quarry. Then he continued

"The charges are as follows...

On hearing this, Gilderoy began to panic and looked from left to right at the flame haired men beside him, who now looked as eager as two dogs about to be given the juiciest bone they had ever seen.

He groaned, he'd previously thought things couldn't get any worse, but he'd been wrong...very wrong.

Molly sat at her kitchen table, nursing her sore head, waiting for the morning after potion she'd taken, to do its work.

She was sipping disinterestedly on a cup of herbal tea, deep in thought about what had happened the night before. She'd left Arthur in bed, as after he'd brought her home, he'd had to go back to the Ministry to explain about Gilderoy and had come in pretty late.

A tapping at the window prompted her out of her reverie and she looked up to see a very elegant snowy owl, looking back at her. She stood up, went over to open the window and the owl stepped in. It held out its leg for her to untie the message, she slid it off then opened it up and the first thing she noticed was the Ministry heading. It also said she had to swipe her wand over the page in order to read it, she did so and sat down exitedly

As she read the contents, her mouth opened in shock and she put her handover herheart as if to quell it's quickened pace.

It read

Dear Mrs Molly Weasley

Since receiving your letter some months ago, we have been considering your application and are now pleased to announce that you have been selected to join our training program, which starts at the end of this month.

We, of course, found out as much as we can about you and heard great things about your skill with the wand, as well as your great resourcefulness and intuitiveness. We feel these are valuable skills in an auror and would be pleased to welcome you to our team. Once you have passed the basic training program you will progress on to specialist training. We of course know that your husband works for us, but we hope that will be no barrier to you!

Please send us a reply as soon as possible and we hope to see you soon!

Goodbye

Yours Faithfully

Minister of magic

Molly could hardly contain herself, the thing she had wanted most in the world had just been offered to her. Her heart pounding so hard had made her weak and shaky, sowhen she stood up, her legs could barely hold her weight. Even so, grinning from ear to ear,she rushed to tell Arthur straight awayand began to climbthe stairs, but half way up she stopped and her smile faded.

"What if he gets angry? After all I didn't tell him I was applying. What if he thinks I'm just doing this to check up on him because I don't trust him? Then again what if he already knows and got them to take me?" she said to her self , losing a little of her previous enthusiasm

She looked at the precious letter, sighed and sat down on the steps. She hadn't told him about the application before because she had thought that he'd laugh at her, thinking her not serious. She'd always been a nervous person and having children had made her even worse. She had calmed down a little since most of the kids had grown up, but seemingly to her husband, she still worried about everyone and practically everything. Molly had really wanted to do it though and prove to everyone and herself that she could.

She looked at the letter again, then took a deep breath and set her mouth in a determined line.

"No..that's it! I'm going to tell him and he's either going to like it or lump it! I'm not going to miss out on what is probably my last chance at the career I've always dreamed about!"

Mollymarched up the rest of the stairs and across the landing to her and Arthur's bedroom.

After some length of time she managed to wake her drowsy husband and get him to a state of where he could understand what she was talking about.

After his initial shock at her disclosure, he congratulated her and was genuinely pleased, but had reservations

"What about the kids? Who'll look after them when the summer holidays come?"

"I'll get their older brothers to come and keep an eye out and keep them out of trouble and I'll be here some of the time anyway! I could get my Aunt Clara to come and stay sometimes as well, to help out. And they are old enough to look after themselves most of the time anyway now." Molly reasoned confidently

"Humph! Their brothers are likely to lead them into more trouble!"Arthurcommented with a smile, "and I thought you couldn't stand your Aunt Clara! You said she was a snob who had a thing about half-bloods!"

"Well...she'll just have to learn to like them won't she? I'm serious about this Arthur and I hope you and the kids will support me"

"Of course we will - we all will I'm sure of it!I love you Molly and I want you to be happy, but you know how dangerous our job has become lately...I'll be really worried about you!"

"I know, but..." she sighed and paused "but I really want to do my bit..more than just cooking and cleaning...I want to fight like the rest of you"

"Hmm..I wouldn't want to be the bad guy that gets on the wrong side of you when you're mad, he wouldn't know what had hit him! That left hook you gave Gilderoy, that was unreal! I didn't know you could punch like that!" Arthur laughed

Molly smiled, chuckled then shrugged

"He deserved it the little creep! Anyway I don't want to talk about that now.." her face dropped and she looked down

"It's okay Molly.." Arthur said reassuringly, touching her arm, "I don't blame you, I just want to forget about this whole episode too and get on with our lives. I want to start afresh. I love you the same if not more than I did when we first met, you knowand I don't want anything to get in the way of that, not even being an auror. I'd even stay at home and be a house husband if you wanted me to!"

"Oh my, NO! the house would turn into a junk shop! No Arthur, I think we can work this out..I mean there is no saying we'll be on the same assignments anywaywill there?"

"No, we never know where we're going to be sent most of the time" Arthur agreed

"Well I suppose I'd better write back and tell them I want to accept then," she said sounding determined, but then began to bite her lip uncertainly

"Yes, you'd better" Arthur said encouragingly, smiling and rubbing her hand. "But first, I wonder if you could do me a favour?"

"What?"

"Come and give me a cuddle!"

Arthur pulled his giggling wife into bed, kissed her and stroked her hair lovingly.

"Nothing and no one will get between us again and that's a promise Molly! I think for a while I forgot just how important you were to me and I have Gilderoy to thank for reminding me"

Molly looked thoughtful for a while, then said

"I wonder what he's doing now, I hope he feels guilty for what he's done. It's going to take me ages to undo the damage he's caused. Oh! I'd completely forgotten - the business! I'm going to have to wind that down aren't I? Well I wouldn't want to carry on anyway, not now after what he did. My customers will be disappointed, but maybe I could sell it as a going concern to someone? I'll advertise it in The Daily Prophet"

"Yes, it was a good business -thanks to you, people were always complimenting me on your work,"Arthur agreed, but then pursing his lips added,"but I heard a few rumours about Gilderoy"

"What? You didn't tell me!"

"Oh I thought you would think I was just trying to undermine youor that I was just jealous"

"So what were the rumours about?" she pressed eagerly

"Oh that he was shagging nearly all the female customers, especially rich ones over forty five"

"Oh.." Molly began, then smiled ruefully "I'd thought that was a possibility, but I was in denial. What a fool I was.."

"Don't worry, he took an awful lot of people in, he's good at that, but he won't be able to do anything were he's going, I think he will learn his lesson this time." Arthur assured her, lying back, with his arms behind his head.

After this conversation,Arthur and Molly just lay for a while in each others arms, then Arthur turning to his wife and smiling, said

"I think I'll call in sick today..."

Molly smiled back then giggled as they disappeared under the covers.

Molly did write back accepting the place they offered and began her auror training only stopping to give evidence at Gilderoy's trial. She passed at the top of her class and became the auror she'd always dreamed of being.

Because of her sympathetic and forgiving nature, she pleaded Gilderoys case as he'd aplogised to her and was truly sorry for what he'd done. She'd felt sorry for him as he had looked so pathetic and a shadow of his former self.He was let off on the condition that his wand was broken and he never practised magic again – he agreed. He was sent to Bulgaria as a stable-hand for a dragon breeding centre and spent his time shovelling muck out of the pens- of which there was always a plentiful supply. But knowing Gilderoy he would probably try to find money in it somewhere!

The end