I'm soooooo sorry I took so long to post, guys, I really had no idea it had been a month!

I can explain myself…please…don't hurt me…that's right put it down…see, I had homework, loads of homework. Colonial houses, election journals, and we began these insane term papers and there was everyday homework, too.

Like those effing proofs.

Hey, did anyone recognize the word effing from the second chapter of OotP?

Okay I'm stalling again, aren't I?

Well, anyway…um…this is my new chapter. 'Nuff said.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The morning of the second Triwizard task dawned clear and bright. Tina set her alarm clock for eight thirty, hoping she'd be able to eat and dress without rush, and that Hermione would wait for her.

She was right on one account; she dressed lazily for over fifteen minutes, making somnolent faces at herself in the mirror to enhance her bedraggled appearance. Hermione, however, was nowhere to be seen.

"She probably left early," said Parvati as she sprayed her hair with a potion from Hogsmeade. (Tina covered her nose and shook her head) "Or she might've gone to the library to meet with Viktor." Lavender laughed and took the spray in turn; ignoring Tina's gagging motions just as Parvati had on the first day she showed the potion to everyone.

"Morning, Tina!" Tina whirled around in the process of brushing her own hair and smacked herself in the face with it.

"Oh, hey Ginny," she said brightly. On some weekends Ginny came up to their dormitory in the mornings and luckily, this was one of them. "Hey, did you see Hermione anywhere?"

"Er…no, actually," said Ginny thoughtfully. "Oh, well, I suppose she's gotten an early start again. No use trying to find her now, though; we'll just nip down to breakfast and save her a seat in the stands."

"Sounds good," replied Tina, grinning.

The students in the Great Hall were buzzing excitedly at breakfast. Fred, George, and Lee could be seen making more bets and even the teachers seemed rather preoccupied; Hagrid put his elbow in his pumpkin juice in an attempt to look relaxed and Professor McGonagall seemed oblivious of the fact that her wand was on her plate and it was trying to walk away from the table. Professor Flitwick was talking to Professor Sprout and then gave and excited squeak and toppled into her hands; Professor Sinistra and Professor Vector were surreptitiously jinxing each other so their heads changed color.

"Wow," said Tina, watching Professor Vector's face turn a magnificent shade of orange. "Never thought I'd see this. It's worse than the day of the First Task…can't wait till the third."

Ginny laughed as they took seats opposite Parvati and Lavender at the Gryffindor table. "Hey, Hermione's not here either. And come to think of it —" she leaned back and looked up and down the table, "— neither is Ron or Harry. Where could they be?"

"I have no idea," Tina muttered through her pancakes. "Maybe they all left early in an evil attempt to ditch me when I'm asleep and completely zoned out."

"I doubt that," said Parvati airily, startling the two of them.

"Were you eavesdropping on our conversation?" asked Ginny, raising her eyebrows.
"It's hard not to, you're right in front of us," Lavender pointed out. Tina rolled her eyes.

"Anyway, Harry's probably at the first task," said Parvati. "And Hermione could be wishing…Viktor good luck." She winced.

"Gosh, Parvati, get over yourself," said Tina in a withering tone. "You have your own little boyfriend…Jack or whatever his name is from Beauxbatons. Leave Vik and Hermione alone, okay?"

Parvati pursed her lips and went back to gossiping with Lavender. This time Ginny joined Tina in rolling her eyes.

"That could be true, though," said Ginny. "Hermione might've gone to wish him luck."

"Yeah, but that still leaves Ron unaccounted for," said Tina. "He probably didn't go to wish Harry good luck, he could've done that last night or this morning when he left."

"True," said Ginny, nodding. "All right, well, it's all we can do to go and save them both seats…I've got my omnioculars from the World Cup so we can scan the crowds for them as well. Shall we go, then?"

"Yeah, why not," Tina swallowed the last of her breakfast and followed Ginny out the doors.

The enclosure where the dragons were had long since disappeared; it had been replaced by stands rising nearly half as high as the castle itself…and they were around the lake.

"Let's go to the top," said Ginny eagerly.

"You don't have to ask me twice!" They raced up the stands to the top as quickly as they could without falling back into the lake. Conveniently enough, the seats they chose near the top were right next to where Michael, Terry, and all their friends were sitting.

"You evil genius," said Tina. Ginny grinned wickedly. "Hi, Terry!"

Terry had been talking to Anthony Goldstein and Lisa Turpin but he turned around. "Tina!" he cried, sounding surprised to see her there. "Ginny! Come sit over here, you two!"

The evil geniuses grinned at each other once more and headed over to the Ravenclaw cluster. Ginny smoothed her robes out and sat next to Michael, while Tina grimaced and brushed a bug off the stands before sitting down next to Terry.

"Where's Harry?" he asked her.

Tina's eye grew wide. "You mean he's not —"

She looked down at the golden judges' table. Viktor Krum (wearing swimming trunks), Cedric Diggory, and Fleur Delacour were standing next to it, but Harry was nowhere to be seen.

"Gin!" called Tina, for Ginny was chatting animatedly with Michael. "Gin! Harry's not down there!"

"What?" cried Ginny, breaking off in mid-sentence. "You're joking!" But there was no two ways about it, Harry wasn't anywhere near the lake.

"And still no sign of Hermione," said Ginny.

"Or Ron," added Tina. Hermione might've sat a bit lower; though she wasn't afraid of heights, the thought of falling into water from any sort of height didn't please Hermione at all. She had told Tina that she never jumped into pools if she could help it. Ron, on the other hand, wasn't afraid of heights at all. He would've come straight up once he spotted Tina and Ginny through his Omnioculars and not thought twice about it.

"Well, as long as Hermione's not here…" Tina reached inside her robes and pulled out a silvery-green lizard, about five inches in length. Lisa Turpin gave a muffled squeal and moved over several seats.

"What's that?" asked Terry, looking fascinated as opposed to frightened.

"A moke," said Tina proudly. "My moke. Chipki. See, because chipkili means lizard in Hindi, I decided it'd be a cute name. I normally don't take her out much because Hermione isn't too fond of her, but sometimes I do."

"How long have you had her?" asked Terry, petting Chipki's smooth Slytherin-colored back.

"Got her this summer, actually," replied Tina. "I had her out a lot then, but it's been harder lately because of the cold. But last night she looked a little blue-ish, which means she might be getting warm, so I brought her here today. I thought she'd have to stay in my robes the whole time, though."

"Can I hold her?"

"Sure!"

Terry carefully picked the lizard up by placing his thumb and index finger on either side of her neck. Tina was impressed; Harry and Ron had both attempted to pick Chipki up by her tail, which resulted in Chipki shrinking out of fear whenever they came near for the next month. Terry's hand lightly brushed Tina's as he lifted the moke out of her hand. They both acted as if this was nothing, though a smile fought to break through each of their faces.

"Welcome to the Second Task of the Triwizard Tournament," said Ludo Bagman's magically magnified voice, making them all jump. Chipki ran up Terry's arm and hid somewhere in the region of his shoulder. "In this task, each of the champions must swim to the bottom of the lake and recover a precious possession of theirs that the merpeople have. Or rather, a precious person of theirs. Now, since Mr. Potter —"

"Look, there!" shrieked Ginny, so loudly that even the judges below jumped. Everyone looked in the direction she was pointing, though they were by no means silent. Harry was bolting out of the castle doors towards the lake, his robes and his hair flying wildly as he did so. He finally skidded to a halt next to the judges' table, splashing Fleur Delacour with mud as he did so. Ludo Bagman, who had quieted his voice upon seeing Harry, whispered a few words to him then magnified it again.

"Well," he said cheerfully. "All our champions are ready for the second task, which will start on my whistle. They have precisely an hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three, then. One…two…three!"

Tina clapped and cheered with the rest as the champions got ready. Cedric quickly performed a bubble-head charm on himself then dove into the lake. Krum pointed his wand at himself and jumped in with the head of a shark that looked quite confused. At first they weren't sure what Fleur was doing—she appeared to be medidating on the shore—but then she too pointed her wand at her face and performed a Bubble-Head Charm before gliding into the water.

Harry, looking nervous, pulled off his shoes and socks, then took something out of his pocket. It looked like a large ball of live worms; Tina shook her Omnioculars to see if there was something wrong with them. When she put them back to her eyes the ball had vanished and Harry was chewing furiously, one of the worms dangling from his mouth.

"Eurgh," muttered Ginny. Terry looked somewhat ruffled as well. Harry stopped, waist-deep in the water, as though waiting for something to happen. The Slytherins were laughing, as were some people of other houses and possibly schools. Tina heard Lisa Turpin giggle from her left, but before she could walk over and smack her, Harry threw himself into the lake.

"What happened?" asked Tina disbelievingly.

"He grabbed his neck, didn't you see?" asked Terry. "Like he could breath or something. Next thing we know, he flings himself into the water."

"Gills," murmured Ginny.

"What?"

"Don't you see, it's brilliant! Whatever Harry ate gave him gills!"

Both Tina's and Terry's jaws dropped at the same time. "Wow," said Tina. "And yesterday he had nothing."

"Really?" inquired Terry. "He doesn't seem like the procrastinating type."

"Oh, he is," said Tina, laughing. "He didn't for this though; he just couldn't find anything. But he definitely procrastinates for other things, like homework. So does Ron! It's almost funny to watch when they both make up stuff to put on their Divination homework or have to copy off of me and Hermione for notes and things."

"Hey, I do that too!" said Terry indignantly, but he was grinning.

"Nothing to be ashamed of, I've had my fare share of last minute work as well. And Harry has Quidditch, too, even though that doesn't apply this year. But Ron just does this by himself. He doesn't do any other activities or anything, yet manages to have loads of work. Still, I can't help but feel bad for him when he does."

"Yeah," said Terry. "But my parents start nagging about this sort of thing, how is it Ron's don't?"

"Well his dad's pretty busy," Tina said. "You know, working for the Ministry. Even if it is for the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office, they had all those raids a couple years back, and now there're jinxed objects everywhere just screaming at Muggles to be found. And his mom doesn't have a whole lot of time either, what with six other kids, especially Fred and George. Sometimes I wonder how Ron deals with it all. I mean, not only does he have loads of siblings, but he has three best friends who have either no siblings or two. We can't relate that well, can we?"

"True," said Terry. "I've only got one brother, so I can relate to you quite well as you've got one. But it's a lot harder for me to relate to someone with no siblings at all. Also, you've got a sister which must be fun."

"Oh, it is! She's five years younger than me; not too much, not too little. Actually when I first met Ron and listened to him talk about his sister, he made it sound like she was Ria's age! Of course, she still acts like it sometimes…"

"Hey!" cried Ginny, looking away from Michael. "I heard that! Don't think I've been sitting here with my ears closed up or anything!"

Tina made a face. "Oops," she muttered. Terry laughed. "Seems like you all are really good friends," he said sounding pleased.

"Yeah," said Tina. "I don't know why, but I've never had problems being friends with guys at all. I mean, there was Rahul back in Boston, and there's Sean, Dave, and Tad in America now as well. You started out as my friend, too, but instead of becoming one of my best friends like they did you tried a different route."

Tina raised her eyebrows and Terry flushed. "It's their loss," he said with a shrug and they laughed without any sort of awkwardness.

Time continued to pass as they talked with one another and with Ginny and Terry's friends. Soon enough, Ginny consulted her watch to say that one hour had passed, and the stands fell silent as the students watched and waited.

After about a minute, ripples appeared on the surface of the water, and a bubble started to rise. Seconds later, the large bubble revealed Cedric Diggory's head beneath it; he emerged from the water carrying Cho Chang.

"Oh, no!" said Ginny in a childish whine. "Why did he have to get here first?"

Cedric swan to shore clumsily and plopped Cho onto the grass. She looked rather dazed but was barely able to register her surroundings when Madam Pomfrey pounced on her with a towel and a tub of potion. As soon as Cedric was out of the water and free of his transparent helmet, he too was bundled up and force-fed the liquid that made steam come out of his ears.

Several minutes later, after the excitement of Cedric's return had died down (the Hufflepuffs had broken into a chorus of cheers for Cedric), the water's surface was disturbed once again. Something gray became visible…the head of a shark.

"Krum!" cried Terry excitedly. And as the half-man, half-shark rose out of the water, his shark's head shrinking as he did, Ginny gasped and Tina's mouth fell open. For in his arms was none other than…

"Hermione!" the girls cried in unison.

"She was the Bulgarian shark-boy's most precious possession?" said Michael Corner incredulously. Ginny lightly smacked him upside the head.

"Does that surprise you?" she asked in a menacing tone. Michael shook his head fervently before the two of them chuckled.

Krum and Hermione were soon covered in blankets, and had taken the potion Madam Pomfrey gave Cedric and Cho. Ginny and Tina seized this opportunity to jump up and down madly while screaming Hermione's name. She finally noticed and waved brightly.

"We should go down there," said Ginny thoughtfully.

"Not just yet," said Tina. "We can wait for Harry and…oh my gosh."

"What?"

"Ron!"

"What about him?"

"He's — why didn't' we see it before — he's the person most precious to Harry!"

Ginny's eyes grew to the size of snitches. "He…but…of course! Harry doesn't have a girlfriend or anything, and Ron's his best friend!"

"Someone should've told us," said Tina, shaking her head. "All that worrying for nothing."

A few minutes after that Fleur came out of the lake, and though she still had a bubble over her head, it wasn't difficult to see that she was sobbing hysterically.

"What's wrong with her?" asked Michael.

"Well, it's not that hard to see, is it?" said Terry. "She's got two grindylows on her feet and four more behind her. Not to mention the fact that, oh, I don't know, she's alone? Where's the person she cares for the most, eh?"

The crowd seemed quite stirred by Fleur's empty-handed return. Indeed, Madame Maxime also looked enraged at the grindylows for stopping her champion and demanded that Dumbledore have the Second Task redone. It didn't work.

"All right, that's it," Tina announced as she stood up. "I'm going down. Coming, Gin?"

"Say no more," replied the redhead as she jumped to her feet. They ran down the stands as fast as they could down to where the champions and their hostages were.

"Hermione!" said Ginny in mock concern. "You had us worried sick!"

"Don't you ever do that again!" said Tina in the same voice, slapping Hermione's arm gently. The three of them laughed.

"So…is Ron Harry's…person?" asked Tina.

"Yes," said Hermione. "McGonagall called us down to her office yesterday and told us, then put us under this spell to keep us asleep until we left the lake. Did Viktor take long in bringing me up?"

"Not as long as Harry's taking with Ron," muttered Ginny, consulting her watch once again. "Where is he?"

As though in answer to her question, the water of the lake rippled again, though this time it did so in many places. Tina saw one of the most strange sights she had ever seen before in her life: Harry, Ron, and a little blond girl surfaced from the lake, and then nearly a dozen merpeople bobbed up beside them. Ron looked around stupidly and the girl seemed frightened. The merpeople, who looked quite intimidating, were smiling at Harry and all the students. Fleur, who had been fighting with Madame Maxime to go back into the lake, finally broke free and hugged the little girl as they walked onto the grass. Madam Pomfrey grabbed Harry and brought him over to the others, wrapped tightly in a blanket. She forced him to drink the potion as well, and steamed came out of his ears, too, giving the impression that his head was a giant kettle.

"Harry, well done!" Hermione cried. "You did ti, you found out how all by yourself!"

"Well – yeah, that's right," said Harry.

"You haff a water beetle in your hair, Herm-own-ninny," said Viktor Krum, oblivious to Tina and Ginny's muffled giggles. Hermione brushed it away.

"You're well outside the time limit, though, Harry…did it take you ages to find us?"

"No…I found you okay…"

Dumbledore was talking to the chief mermaid and then had a short conference with the other judges. Harry looked annoyed and nervous at the same time. He did seem slightly more calm after Fleur thanked him for saving her sister with a kiss, though, as did Ron. Hermione looked thoroughly flustered.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our decision." Said Ludo Bagman. "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 received twenty-five points, though she didn't seem to think she even deserved that. Cedric got forty-seven points, and Krum got forty. Then it was time for Harry's verdict.

"Harry Potter used gillyweed to great effect ("That's what those things were!" Tina)…he returned last, and well outside the time limit of an hour. However,t he 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. Most of the judges —" he glared at Karkaroff, "— feel that this shows moral fiber and merits full marks. However…Mr. Potter's score is forty-five points."

Tina gave a tiny squeak of joy and hugged each of her three friends in turn through their blankets.

"There you go, Harry!" on shouted over the nose. "You weren't being thick after all — you were showing moral fiber!"

"Awesome job, Harry," said Tina with a grin as Ludo Bagman announced the date of the next task. "We can all try this out for your next birthday. But…no worms."

The four of them laughed as they walked back to the castle.

A/N: And so, here I stand for all of you after finishing the fifteenth chapter of my first Harry Potter fanfiction, and I can only say: My hair's a mess, my stomach's grumbling, my mother's calling, and my hands are almost numb from cold. But I don't care, cause it takes a lot more than that to keep Tina Gupta from her fanfiction. (It takes some homework)

I don't actually have a sister or brother of any sort, I'm afraid. The siblings Tina refers to in this chapter are depictions of my two closest cousins in real life, who are the same ages as her brother and sister.

flagstonejester-Yay, thanks! Well, Hermione did look triumphant when Tina soaked Rita, but since they were all pretty ticked off at her they couldn't say much. Ron was too busy warning the girls about the dangers of messing with Rita and Harry was just…stunned and annoyed, I guess. And since they march up to Hagrid's house after that to talk some sense into him, there isn't a whole lot of time for it.

Venus725- Really? You seriously laughed that hard??? Wow, I'm stunned. Only almost topped Draco? Darn, better luck next time. I hate to hear that high school sucks…I'll be going there next year. Actually, if I were born just over a month earlier, I'd be there now, but thankfully I'm not. None of the people in the grade above mine are especially nice in any way. ::shudder:: It's your hardest year…shall I take that as a clue as to which year you're in? Oh, well. Actually my friend did review, as I said in my last review to your story (yay for the dance!), Lmcmuffingirl. She's registered now, so she's gotten author alert and favorites lists and things like that and she loves it. We spend all of fourth hour science class using sign language, notes, and secret visits to communicate all this stuff to each other. Hopefully she'll start giving longer reviews in the future, though. Oh, by the way, thanks for reading Ode to the Shippers! It was totally random.

Tikvah Ariel- Yes, she's dirty. I don't see many other opportunities I've had to do this, though. Hmmm… Really? You thought this was mediocre? Ah, well, sorry about that. Yes, Tina does have a sort of crush on Terry, but they're going out so it isn't a huge deal. Ron and Ginny notice each other all right, but they're brother and sister so they're not going to spend a whole lot of time together. I'm trying to portray Ginny as the girl we see in OotP, post-liking-Harry. She's changing from the smitten little girl to a spunky young woman and it's such a refreshing change when she comes around in book five!

SmileGirlVMV- You spelled stupendous right. Ack, the Faygo, yes indeed. I never touch the stuff now. Rite? I assume you meant Rita, but yeah I know what she's going to do. It's not…well I'll just tell you at school, shall I? Yeah Virginia will be awesome and Toronto…my god has it been that long since I updated??? Toronto was ages ago!!!! Sidetracking is good in reviews. Oh, I'm rooming with Pierrette and (groan) Rawan…

xBlackMoon-y- Glad you liked it. Well, I do follow Tina's story, but when I say Point of View I mean the person whose thoughts and feelings are being included. In the things from canon that we've seen in the books, I use Harry's, because they're his thoughts and ideas added to what's happening. When it's Tina's POV, we see her thoughts and comments. Oh, don't worry about accounts and computer problems…I'm just glad to have the review!

Funness- You're back! Welcome. Life keeps me busy too. As for what Rita does to Tina, argh, I don't know if I'll satisfy, but it goes along with what I planned and have written…

Tata, my lovely readers!

SOOOOO SORRY FOR UPDATING LATE!!!!!