"Hey Usagi!" Startled out of a daydream session, Usagi looked up at the trio before her with a slightly alarmed expression. Harry and Ron looked like they just won a lifetime supply of free candy, both sporting huge grins, and Hermione looked somewhere between annoyed and amused. Harry brandished a flyer in front of her face.
"Have you seen this yet?" He asked. Usagi grin deviously and took the flyer from him, skimming over the bold letters once again.
"Why, yes, I have seen this." She nodded, handing the parchment back to him, "The work of your twin brothers, no doubt?" She questioned towards Ron.
"Only ones it could have been, though I have no idea how they pulled this one off." Ron said with his grin still bigger than ever. "This is like a dream come true."
"Glad you're enjoying it," Usagi laughed.
"It looks like you got your hair back to normal" Hermione commented as she gestured to the blonde's pigtails.
"Yes, well, oddly enough, you had to put more of the stuff in to get all of it out. I guess it made the previous stuff liquid-y again and washable, like when you put on more than one coat of nail polish and it takes longer to dry." Usagi shrugged. Harry and Ron exchanged glances, but Hermione nodded slightly. "Anyways, I have a Transfiguration paper that I've been ignoring the past three days, so I'll see you guys later."
"Okay, bye Usagi." The three waved to the girl as she sprinted off towards the library.
(Warning: There's about to be a major time warp between the Yule Ball and the Second Task, just so you know.)
"Watcha working on, Usagi?" Fred asked as he popped out from under the table she was sitting at, quickly trailed by George. Usagi nearly jumped out of her skin.
"I thought I heard someone talking under there, I believe I told you two not to have meetings under the table I'm sitting at unless I'm invited too." She scolded the two. George scratched his head.
"Oh yeah, I remember you saying that now." He said.
"I'm finishing up this assignment. Once it's done, I'll be caught up on all the work I missed." Usagi said, answering Fred's earlier question. The twins looked over at the huge stack of books at the other end of the table.
"Then what is that?" George asked. Usagi looked at the stack and flushed.
"That's all the work I got since I've been trying to make up what I missed." She answered. Fred and George exchanged looks of surprise.
"Usagi, I think it's about time you just...gave up for this year. Cram for your exams and scrape by." Fred commented submissively.
"Yeah, it worked for us." George nodded.
"You're probably right." Usagi agreed, setting down her quill and looking at the stack of work.
"Anyways, we're supposed to be getting Ron and Hermione for something or other on McGonagall's orders. See you around." The twins waved and wandered off. Usagi sighed and propped her chin in her hands, looking remorsefully at the abandoned homework.
"It looks like I'm no better at magic school than I am at regular school." She groaned and packed her books back into her bag. "Maybe I can get some leeway from Dumbledore since I am on a mission and all. There's no time to do all this school work. That's what I'll tell him, maybe he'll pass me. Humph, I doubt it."
"Are you talking to yourself?" Usagi jumped and turned to see Helios behind her. She smiled.
"Yeah, and answering myself to, a sure sign of craziness. How's Fleur?" Usagi inquired innocently with a playful grin. Helios reddened.
"How should I know?" He asked. Before Usagi could respond, Professor McGonagall breezed into the room and targeted the two immediately. Usagi visibly shrunk as the woman approached, sporting one of her cold expressions.
"Good evening, Miss Tsukino. I need to borrow your friend." She said, and Usagi exhaled with relief.
"Helios? What do you need him for?" She questioned, raising an eyebrow at her companion. He looked more bewildered than she did.
"I'm afraid I can't say." McGonagall said apologetically.
"Um...okay. Bye then, Helios." Usagi waved as the he followed the Professor out of the library, looking completely perplexed. Shaking her head, Usagi turned and made to leave the library as well when she spotted Harry on the other side of the room, deeply immersed in Saucy Tricks for Tricky Sorts. She bounced over to his table and sat her bag down.
"What are you working on?" She inquired, leaning over his shoulder to look at the book. Harry jumped clean off his seat.
"Bloody hell, you scared the crap out of me!" He exclaimed. "I'm trying to figure out how to breathe underwater, but there doesn't seem to be any plausible way of doing so."
"That's easy; get a scuba suit." Usagi shrugged, taking a seat across from as he tried to slow his heart rate.
"I wish I could, but I don't think they'll allow that in the Triwizard Tournament." Harry said regretfully.
"Oh yeah, the second task is tomorrow. How long do you have to stay underwater?" Usagi asked.
"Nearly an hour, I'd wager. The clue works out to mean that the merpeople in the lake are going take something important to me and I have to get it back before an hour or it's gone forever. Ron and Hermione were helping but Fred and George came and got them a while ago, something about seeing McGonagall." Harry explained. Usagi's eyes lit up.
"There are merpeople in the lake?" She asked breathlessly.
"Apparently so," Harry nodded.
"That's so cool! Hey wait a minute, Ron and Hermione went to McGonagall? She was just here, she came and got Helios but she wouldn't tell me why. Looked rather dismal too," Usagi mused, thinking back to McGonagall's attitude. "You don't think it has anything to do with the task tomorrow, do you?"
"I don't see how..." Harry replied, looking pensive. Then, it clicked. "Unless the 'something you'll sorely miss' is a person! Of course! The merpeople can't just waltz into the castle and take something, it has to be delivered, and it couldn't really be a material possession. Each champion has to save a friend from the merpeople! Usagi, you're a genius."
"Um...thanks, but you still have to work out how to hold your breath for an hour." Usagi reminded him, which dampened his spirits considerably. "I'll help you figure it out, though I'm no where near as smart as Hermione."
"No one is," Harry shrugged and handed her a thick book entitled 'Madcap Magic for Whacky Warlocks'. "Just browse for anything that might be able to help."
Later on that very same evening, huddled in the corner of the common room, Usagi and Harry sat Indian-style with stacks of books around them, looking like they were conducting a study pow-wow of some sort. They had figured out what they were trying to get back, sure, but that didn't making breathing under water any easier. Both of them kept fading in and out of consciousness, the common room being completely empty.
"Say Harry," Usagi yawned, rubbing at her eyes.
"Hmm?" He replied, eyes half opened as he looked over at her.
"What are you going to do if we don't find anything?" She asked.
"Forfeit?" He said with a shrug.
"We're out of books." Usagi commented, tossing the last one into the 'browsed needlessly' pile.
"Yeah...might as well just go to bed." Harry yawned.
"We can't, what about the person you're supposed to save?" Usagi asked.
"I dunno...hey, I'll be right back." Harry sprung to his feet with a kindled bit of hope and rushed up the staircase to the dormitory. He snatched up the Invisibility Cloak from his trunk and sprinted back down stairs. Usagi was waiting for him, looking exhausted but very curious.
"What's that?" She inquired, pointing at the silvery object in his hands.
"Invisibility Cloak, now we can go back to the library." He explained, throwing the cloth over the two of them and pulling out a piece of parchment that Usagi immediately recognized as the Marauder's Map. They traveled to the library swiftly, not bothering to be extremely quiet since no one was out at this hour. As soon as they reached the library, Harry threw off the cloak and sped over to the shelves. He pulled down book after book, stacking them onto a nearby table. Usagi took the hint and picked one up, sitting down and preparing for another rigorous search.
"See you later, Dobby! Usagi, wake up!" Usagi swatted sleepily at the hands that were trying to rouse her. Harry was persistent, however, and she was out of her seat in no time.
"What's going on?" She asked drowsily, patting down her tousled hair. Her mind jolted awake, however, as Harry grabbed her arm and sprinted out of the library, dragging her behind.
"The task starts in five minutes!" He yelled back at her. Usagi's eyes widened.
"But we didn't figure out how to breathe underwater! Did we?" She questioned uncertainly.
"I'll explain later!" Harry said as he parted with her to join the other three champions. Usagi walked towards the spectator seating in a daze, spotting Lee and the twins. She joined them immediately.
"Hullo," Lee greeted, "you look like you just woke up."
"10 minutes ago," Usagi nodded, pointing to her messy hair. She sat next to Lee and stretched her legs out, yawning. "How are we supposed to watch the champions underwater?"
"I dunno, I think we just wait until they pop back up again." Lee shrugged. The crowd quieted as Ludo Bagman's voice rang over the crowd, enhanced by a charm no doubt.
"Well, all our champions are ready for the second task, which will start on my whistle. They will have precisely and hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three then; One...two...three!" Just like that, the stands exploded into cheers and applause. Usagi observed with interest as Fleur held her wand up to her head, said something she couldn't make out, and a large bubble appeared around it. The boy next to her, she couldn't remember his name, did the same thing. The guy from Durmstrang muttered something and changed his head into a shark head, which made Usagi giggle before he dived underwater.
"Hey Usagi, what is Harry doing?" Lee asked.
"Beats me, he figured something out after I fell asleep I guess." Usagi shrugged and watched Harry pull a clump of some kind of plant out of his pocket. He broke off a large chunk and stuffed it in his mouth, chewing fast. Her eyes widened as he began to morph into something fish-like, with webbed hand and gills. He seemed to struggle for a moment before plunging underwater as well. The crowd died down and took their seats once more.
"That was interesting." Lee commented.
"Very. I wonder where he got that stuff." Usagi mused.
'Come to think of it, wasn't he in the library with me the whole time? Wasn't he saying good-bye to Dobby when I woke up? I wonder if Dobby brought him that stuff. But then, where did he get it from?' She cleared her thoughts and sighed, she wasn't going to even try figuring it out. She could just ask Harry about it later, right now she was extremely tired. Curling up in her chair, she took the liberty of resting her head on Lee's shoulder and almost immediately fell asleep. Fred, who was sitting on her opposite side, quickly spotted the snoozing girl and scooted closer to George.
"I don't know if I like her when she's sleeping, she gets awfully violent." He said, sending a cautious glance at the blonde. The group settled in for a long hours wait
"GO CEDRIC!" Usagi jumped up and looked around. Most of the people in the stands were on their feet cheering, and Usagi soon realized why. The other Hogwarts champion, who she now remembered as Cedric, was wading to the lake shore with a pretty black-haired girl that Usagi had never seen before. She looked around expectantly, but Harry apparently hadn't resurfaced yet.
"Stupid pretty boy," Fred muttered under his breath. Usagi laughed.
"No sign of Harry?" she asked.
"Not yet." Lee replied, shaking his head. Usagi settled back into her seat to wait. After some amount of time, the boy with the shark head popped up from the water with Hermione in tow. It was then that Usagi spotted Fleur Delacour on the shoreline drinking something that Madam Pomfrey had handed her. The girl looked particularly battered, her robes were torn in several places and she had an assortment of cuts on her face and arms. Usagi fought her way to the front of the stands and waved Fleur over.
"What happened, are you alright?" Usagi asked, gesturing towards the cuts and bruises.
"I was attacked by grindylows." Fleur explained, shaking her head in shame. "I'm fine, but Helios is still down there."
"What? Helios was your hostage?" Usagi questioned in surprise. Fleur blushed and nodded.
"I don't think that the hostages are really going to get hurt though. At least, I hope not." She said anxiously. Usagi glanced over at the where the judges were seated. A few of them were talking among themselves, and she quickly zeroed in on Dumbledore, who was having an animated conversation with Ludo Bagman.
"I'll be back." Usagi said before marching towards the group with determined bravado. She came to a halt in front of Dumbledore and waited patiently for a break in the conversation. None came for several moments, until Dumbledore looked up at Usagi and smiled brightly.
"Miss Usagi, may I help you?" He asked.
"Um...Fleur's hostage, my friend Helios, is still under there with the merpeople and I wanted to know if he is seriously in danger." Usagi said uncomfortably, aware that the other judges were watching her.
"Excuse me Miss, I don't think that it's--" Karkaroff began contemptuously, but Dumbledore put up his hand to silence the man's tirade.
"Surely you don't think--" but Dumbledore's words were drowned out by an eruption of cheers from the stands. Almost everyone had jumped to their feet, yelling and screaming at the top of their lungs. Usagi looked around before she spotted the cause of the commotion, Harry. His head was visible and bobbing on top of the water some distance offshore. Next to him, Ron was saying something and looking extremely exasperated. On the other side, Helios was already swimming towards the shore.
Around them, more heads began to break the lake surface. Each of them sported a head full of wild, green, seaweed-like hair and bright yellow eyes that had no pupils. They were all smiling in Harry's direction and talking to each other in what sounded like a string of low screeching noises. Usagi drew in a gasp as she realized they must be the merpeople that lived in the lake. Helios waded out of the water, dripping wet and shivering. Usagi rushed to his side, eyes still on the merpeople.
"Wow, they're merpeople Helios." She breathed, mesmerized. Helios shook his head and was about to respond when the school nurse, Madam Pomfrey, snatched him up and wrapped him in a thick blanket.
"Come on, dear, you need to drink some of this." She said, dragging him towards the other champions and hostages. Usagi blinked as Helios disappeared from her side, and quickly followed after him. Harry and Ron joined the group moments later. Harry looked rather annoyed as Madam Pomfrey attempted to choke him to death with the Pepperup Potion. He watched as Dumbledore spoke with the merpeople. Usagi observed this spectacle too, still enthralled by the presence of the creatures.
"I thing they're quite creepy." Fleur commented as she realized what Usagi was looking at. Usagi nodded absentmindedly, and then turned towards Fleur with a mischievous grin.
"So, Helios was your hostage, eh?" She asked teasingly. Fleur reddened again. Usagi was about to continue when Bagman's voice cut her off.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our decision. Merchieftainess Murcus has told us exactly what happened at the bottom of the lake, and we have therefore decided to award marks out of fifty for each of the champions as follows..."
"Fleur Delacour, though she demonstrated excellent use of the Bubble-Head Charm, was attacked by grindylows as she approached her goal. We award her twenty-five points." The crowd applauded while Fleur shook her head.
"I deserved zero." She said.
"Don't be so hard on yourself, you did well." Usagi scolded, turning back to Bagman.
"Cedric Diggory, who also used the Bubble-Head Charm, was first to return with his hostage, though he returned on minute outside the time limit of an hour. We therefore award him forty-seven points." The Hufflepuffs roared and cheered, while Usagi grumbled that he'd also woken her up.
"Viktor Krum used an incomplete form of Transfiguration, which was nevertheless effective, and was second to return with his hostage. We award him forty points." The crowd applauded politely, making Karkaroff stand out with his obnoxiously loud clapping.
"So he's the Durmstrang leader guy." Usagi muttered to herself, giving the headmaster an unpleasant look.
"Harry Potter used gillyweed to great effect. He returned last and well outside the time limit of an hour. However, the Merchieftainess informs us that Mr. Potter was first to reach the hostages and that the delay in his return was due to his determination to return all hostages to safety, not merely his own." Hermione and Ron gave Harry annoyed looks, but Usagi beamed at him.
"Most of the judges," Bagman paused to glare at Karkaroff for a moment, "feel that this shows moral fiber and merits full marks. However, Mr. Potter's score is forty-five points." The stands erupted into cheers once more, and Usagi cheered just as loud as the people in the stands, making those around her cover their ears. Ron said something to Harry, but she couldn't hear it. Fleur was clapping right along with Usagi, though she couldn't manage the same level of enthusiasm.
"The third and final task will take place at dusk on the twenty-fourth of June." Bagman announced, making the crowd settle down just enough to hear him. "The champions will be notified of what is coming precisely one month beforehand. Thank you all for your support of the champions."
"Harry, you were wonderful!" Usagi exclaimed, pouncing and enveloping him in a hug. "You saved Helios, thank you!"
"Um...you're welcome." Harry said awkwardly, his face extremely red.
"Now I'm really hungry, let's go get some food." Usagi announced, grabbing onto Harry's and Fleur's robes and dragging them off towards the castle, leaving the rest of the group to follow.
Aloha! Well, I dunno. Not really much to comment on. I'm supposed to be out of town right, now, but I'm not leaving until tomorrow so I figured I would get this out. I was going to have another scene but I realized it would be too long for me to finish tonight. Next chapter should be full of surprises, unlike this mediocre one. Meh. Unless you thought the Helios/Fleur pairing was a surprise.
It seems that most of you liked the lovely little Malfoy prank last chapter. In fact, some of you wanted more. Wow. Also, I completely revamped the first chapter because...well...it was horrid. Read it, it's quite different, though there are no major plot differences really.
I went and saw PoA in theatres. My main complaint: Sirius and Lupin should have been sexier! Sheesh, they're Marauders for crying out loud. Speaking of sexy Marauders, check out my new SM/HP story called 'Oh Brawling Love'. Yay, free advertising. It's set in the Marauders era, and it's a Sirius/Usagi pairing.
Well, after review replies, it doesn't seem like Lee's as far behind as I thought he was. I have to officially count the votes now. Let's see...OH MY GOD! -falls over and dies- It seems I was wrong, Lee has beat Harry in the voting by ONE point. That's right, it's nine to eight. Wow. Just wow. Just so you know, the polls are officially closed, and the couple is final. This story is officially going to be a Lee/Usagi. Who would've though?
-SachiNyoko- Talk show host: "What were you thinking right before you hit the ground?" Evil Kanieval: "I remember thinking 'Hey, did I turn off the iron?' Then my leg cracked in half and I thought 'Hey, maybe I should get a puppy!' What do you think I was thinking? I was thinking 'AHHHH! AHHHH!'"