It was safe to say that Filch wasn't exactly happy about the article. However, it took a few days for him to even realize that there was an article about him. After a couple of days, Hermione had given up hope of letting Filch find the article on his own and decided to help him find it. She walked up to his office and casually slipped the copy of the Quibbler under his office door and then ran like hell for fear of Mrs. Norris ratting her out. By that same day, much to Hermione's delight, Filch had discovered the story. At first, Filch behaved as if nothing had happened for he still patrolled the halls and handed out detentions to unsuspecting victims. But eventually, one person who received a particularly nasty detention decided to try his luck. The student simply said to Filch's face these exact words, "I'm glad that you are a circus clown, because now you have some make-up to cover up your ugly face."

Filch wasn't happy. The only reason that he didn't give this one student at least one hundred more detentions was because there were five other students in the hall at the time that had heard the clown comment. Upon hearing it, they started to laugh and this scared the hell out of Filch. He stood there stunned for about five whole minutes, his lip twitching in anger and his face turning as red as a clown nose. Only after several other students drawn by the sound of laughter had appeared did Filch turn on his heel and run away while the students threw various fruit at him such as tomatoes and lemons. Mrs. Norris also had her share of taunts and torture. Apparently a small group of the students had actually sewn a small jester hat for the sole purpose of catching Mrs. Norris and forcing it upon her. She eventually stopped patrolling the halls as well as Filch.

Once again, Hermione was a hero. With Filch and Mrs. Norris out of the way, the students had a little bit more freedom to do as they pleased. However, after about three consecutive days of walking into a dungbomb-scented hallway, Hermione quickly regretted her decision to attack Filch.

"I'm getting sick of this," Hermione said as she plopped down onto one of the common room's comfortable armchairs.

"Sick of what?" asked Harry.

"I'm sick of smelling like a dungbomb everyday," she groaned, smelling a sleeve of her robe. "I'm sick of the widespread chaos running throughout the halls every day."

"You're just picking the wrong halls to go through," Ron said with a grin.

"Yeah, this is great. As long as we don't run into Snape, we'll never get another detention," Harry said happily.

Hermione didn't look happy at all. "We should have never done Filch, he keeps all of the nitwits around here under control. It's all your fault, Ron."

"My fault?" Ron yelled indignantly, dropping a half-eaten chocolate frog as Hermione's anger was directed towards him. "You wrote the bloody story!"

"Well it was your idea to do Filch!" Hermione fired back.

"You said it was a good idea!" Ron said, looking hurt.

"That's because you didn't give me any other good ones!"

"Harry and I suggested loads of other people but you didn't want to use them!" shouted Ron.

"So what! I can't help it if you have bad ideas!"

"Guys!" Harry yelled.

"They weren't bad ideas!" Ron continued, ignoring Harry.

"Crabbe and Goyle would have been perfect but you were too selfish to use our suggestions weren't you? Wouldn't have gotten enough satisfaction from your little story because they weren't here to make fun of!"

Hermione looked like she had been slapped, "How dare you say that! You know I'm doing this to help Harry! I don't want the satisfaction for myself!"

"Then why don't you let one of us write a story for once?"

"Because you're too thick to put something other than a simple sentence on parchment!"

"GUYS!"

This time Harry got their attention. Both had whipped around so fast that they could have gotten whiplash.

"Will you listen to yourselves?" Harry scolded. "All you ever do is argue!"

"So Filch wasn't exactly a brilliant choice," Harry reasoned, "but we can't just sit here and argue about it. I think we should just stop doing this whole thing since it's obviously doing more harm than justice."

"No, we can't stop doing this!" shouted Hermione.

"Why not?" asked Harry, glad that they weren't arguing anymore.

"Because..." she seemed to be searching for an answer. "Because these people deserve some humiliation."

"Why?" Harry asked.

Hermione was taken aback by this question, "Because they humiliated you." She looked at him quizzically, "Don't you want revenge?"

"No," said Harry plainly, "I don't want to sink to their level."

Hermione looked shocked.

"That's what bothered me when you came up with the idea," Harry continued, "You usually aren't the kind of person who seeks revenge on people."

Now Hermione was on the verge of tears, "Well when I used to just let things go and ignore every little remark, you two would always get angry with me. Now when I change my ways to help you out, you're angry again."

Ron's expression softened slightly but he still looked angry, Harry only sighed.

"Okay, okay," Harry said, "let's just forget about the whole argument and think about who we could attack next."

Hermione smiled weakly, "Alright."

"Fine, but this time either Harry or I get to choose the next victim." Ron said venomously.

"No." Hermione said at once.

"Why not? You said we could give Rita stories if we wanted to." Ron's voice was rising again.

"I meant you could write the stories. I was going to be the only one who chose the victim."

"Oh and why is that? So we wouldn't run into trouble? Didn't really work out last time, did it?"

"Let's just go with Ron's idea." Harry interjected quickly before Hermione could respond.

The look on Hermione's face suggested that she didn't think much of the situation but she apparently was keen to stop arguing for she didn't speak up.

"Now, who will it be?" said Harry.

Both Harry and Ron sat there thinking hard for a while as Hermione stared at them with a tortured look on her face. Harry was almost positive that she was just bursting to shout out that it was a horrible idea to let them think of a victim. Suddenly Ron's eyes widened and he looked as if he were going into shock.

"I have the perfect person," he said, still wide eyed, "I just don't know why I hadn't thought about it before."

"Well who is it?" Harry asked impatiently.

"Snape."

Harry's eyes widened as well at the mention of their potions professor. It was a brilliant idea but it was going against one minor rule.

"No way," said Hermione sternly, "I said insignificant people."

"Snape is insignificant to me," said Ron with disgust, "plus you have to let us pick Hermione."

"I know, but this is ridiculous. Snape would murder us. You know how he is, he's always waiting for an opportunity to punish us."

"That greasy git doesn't need an opportunity to punish us, he'd punish us if we breathed wrong."

"I don't care, it's too risky."

"Hermione!" Harry exclaimed, "this is a great once in a lifetime opportunity! Just say yes."

He stared at her with a large frown and overly large eyes. Hermione figured he was trying to make a puppy-dog face. It wasn't working.

"No. It'll ruin our chances of keeping this going."

"I'm going to do it," Ron said firmly, "I don't care if he finds out it was me, I don't even care if I get detention for the rest of my life, it will be worth the humiliation I'm going to cause him."

Hermione and Harry were shocked by his sudden confidence. Hermione actually thought secretly to herself that he looked kind of sexy, but she quickly dismissed the thought.

"Fine, go ahead and get into trouble, but I don't want to be any part of it!"

With that, she gathered her books, strode over to the stairs, and stormed off to the girl's dormitory.

"Fine by me!" Ron shouted after her.

"Great!" Harry said. "Now let's think of a story."

>>>

After several hours of brainstorming, fine-tuning, and some more arguing the two of them had a story. They both agreed that it was a brilliant story and considering how much Snape was disliked by most of the students, the Quibbler was sure to gain many more fans than the previous two stories had gained. Plus they added a little more to this story than the others.

The very next day around lunchtime, Harry, Ron, and Hermione had taken one of the secret passageways out to Hogsmeade. Hermione went with them only because she thought Ron and Harry were untrustworthy with such a risky article and she said (at least one hundred times) that she was only going to make sure it made the journey safely. They met with a very twitchy Rita Skeeter in the Three Broomsticks. She seemed very nervous and kept glancing over her shoulder as if expecting an attack. She was also wearing horrible looking robes that made her look like a homeless person. Considering the fact that she kept looking over her shoulder every two minutes suggested that she was trying to hide from somebody or something and Hermione thought that her robes, if they were an attempt to camouflage her, were actually doing the opposite of what was intended. After about the two hundredth time that she looked over her shoulder Hermione asked what her problem was.

"I think I'm being spied on," she said as she lowered her voice to a whisper and checked to see if anyone was listening.

"By who?" Hermione breathed with the same volume of voice.

"Malfoy," she said nervously.

Hermione, Ron, and Harry all yelled out, "WHAT?" at the same time causing other people in the Three Broomsticks to turn and stare.

"Be quiet!" she hissed.

"Are you sure Malfoy is actually spying on you or are you just being paranoid?" Hermione said, regaining her whispered tone.

"I'm almost positive he's spying on me. I've seen him and his huge friends here everyday around twelve thirty in the afternoon, which is the time I usually come here to eat lunch."

"Oh no," Hermione said, "he must be coming here every time we're having lunch at school."

"We thought he was just avoiding the Great Hall out of embarrassment," said Ron.

Both Hermione and Ron exchanged looks of fear.

"But how would he know that we were meeting here?" asked Harry. "He would have had to overheard one of us talking about our meeting place."

"Ooh that sneaky little ferret, I bet he's been spying on us ever since he read that first article." Ron seethed.

"Maybe we should stop." Hermione said.

"I agree with Hermione," said Rita, "He knows I'm (she lowered her voice even more) an animagus too. He could turn me in, he could ruin me."

"No, we aren't going to stop just because Malfoy has been snooping around," said Harry firmly. "The only thing I hate more than Malfoy himself is when he ruins things for us."

"But if he finally runs into Rita, then he might..."

"I don't care. Like Ron said about Snape, whatever happens as a result of this is worth the humiliation on our part. Now give her the story, Ron."

Hermione turned up her nose at the article as Ron handed it over as if to show her disgust for it. Rita handled it as if it were a poisonous spider and curled her nose at it in disgust.

"So, who is this one about?" Rita finally said, with a definite note of annoyance in her voice.

Ron was about to tell her when Hermione jabbed him hard in the ribs and pointed at the front door. Malfoy, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle, had just entered and he definitely was behaving as if he was looking for someone.

"Come on!" Hermione whispered to Harry and Ron as she motioned them to follow her. "Rita, whatever you do, do NOT let him see you!"

With that, Hermione, Ron, and Harry slithered passed Malfoy, luckily without being spotted, and headed back towards the secret passageway into Hogwarts.

>>>>

They sat at the breakfast table, waiting for the Quibbler to arrive in a tense and unnatural silence. They were all a little nervous about Rita and them being seen by Malfoy and therefore had little to be calm about.

"What happens if she was seen?" Ron suddenly said.

Harry shrugged. He was absently toying with his half-eaten sausages.

"She probably turned into her animagus form," Hermione suggested as she joined them at the table with her breakfast in hand. Hermione was annoyed that an article that she didn't support was currently headed towards Hogwarts but she still never missed a chance to show off her knowledge.

"Yeah, I'll bet she did," said Ron, suddenly looking more cheerful, "yeah, it'll be fine, he didn't see her." He started to shovel down his food rigorously.

All of a sudden the morning post arrived, causing Harry and Ron to jump out of their seats and stand ready to grab the copies as soon as they were dropped. Ron caught the first stack and tore it open rapidly. His eyes searched every page until he came to page four and a grin spread across his face that let Harry know that everything was fine. Forgetting that he had a copy of his own clutched in his hand, Harry stared at Ron to watch his reaction as his eyes traveled down the page. Finally, Ron burst into tears of laughter causing Harry to rip open his copy and the crowd in the Great Hall to run over and snatch up the remaining ones. Hermione simply rolled her eyes and went back to her breakfast but Harry saw her throw an occasional sideways glance at a copy next to her plate.

The picture showed Severus Snape sitting at a table and looking around suspiciously. This table looked very much like the tables you'd see in the Three Broomsticks and the set-up of the building looked very much like the Three Broomsticks. As the picture moved, Snape looked around several times, leaning back in his chair and looking towards the door to the outside as if he were waiting for someone. Finally a pool of light poured over Snape signaling somebody had entered the building. A hooded man walked over, sat down next to Snape, and lowered a bundle containing a squirming something onto the table. The bundle made Snape's eyes light up as if it contained treasures of his wildest dreams. The man whose face was hidden by the hood of his robes finally revealed himself to be none other than Peter Pettigrew. Peter Pettigrew then discreetly revealed to Snape the bundle that turned out to be a flobberworm. But not just any flobberworm, this was Draco's flobberworm. You could tell by its size. Below the picture was the familiar bold headline that was followed by the story. It read:

Severus Snape, Peter Pettigrew, Caught in Bizarre Love Triangle with Draco Malfoy's Flobberworm Partner

Onlookers in the Three Broomsticks were appalled and shocked at the sight of Severus Snape and Peter Pettigrew fondling Draco Malfoy's flobberworm lover. Although the meeting was meant to be a secret, passersby couldn't help noticing the horrid display of "inter-special" bonding.

"It's just gross," said a drunken old wizard sitting at a nearby table who was shouting ridiculously loud. "Not just because it's a little wormy-thing but also because I thought that worm was happily married." The drunken wizard slams his drink onto the counter in a rage.

Students from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry who frequent this wonderful place saw their "ugly git" of a potions professor in this unruly, and disgusting sight.

I tried to get an interview with the devilishly handsome and incredibly intelligent Ron Weasley but all he could do was dry heave. I luckily did get an interview with Severus Snape himself.

"What do you mean why are you kissing that Flobberworm? I can kiss it when I damn well please! Now go away! 500 points from Gryffindor!"

I tried to ask him more questions but at that moment he started snogging violently with the gluttonous flobberworm that, until this meeting, belonged only to Draco Malfoy.

By that time, all of the people in the building had thrown up, passed out, or stormed outside in disgust. The two disgusting perverts seemed to think this was a good idea for they now had more privacy.

I asked Peter Pettigrew how he got the flobberworm.

"I just stole him from Draco," he said simply. "Their marriage was on the rocks anyway." He then spat on my shoes so I spat in his face and ran like hell from the bar and joined the other people outside, some of which were still vomiting. I found certain people who weren't vomiting and got interviews from them.

"Snape smells like cheese," said one random person who oddly enough smelled like cheese himself.

"Snape doesn't deserve that flobberworm!" said a young Ravenclaw girl. "He treats magical creatures horribly! I heard he once caused and oil spill in the Hogwarts Lake from falling head first into it! He's so greasy!"

"I thought Peter Pettigrew was dead," said the same random person who smelled like cheese. That's when I got my pepper spray out. No more cheese man.

"I heard those two were trying to get Mrs. Norris at first," said a really ugly, putrid smelling, hairy, pug-faced Slytherin girl. "But she was too busy with circus training."

I then saw the lovebirds leave the Three Broomsticks and disappear down a dark alleyway. I would have followed them but...that's nasty. I really didn't want to find out what they were doing in that dark alleyway.

So there you have it. Snape, Pettigrew, and the Flobberworm in a weird love triangle. Gross isn't it? Next time you see Draco Malfoy in the Three Broomsticks looking around you'll know why. So help him out and keep on the lookout. Together we will put a stop to this horrible and disgusting crime. I am currently making up flyers to help aid in the search for the missing flobberworm. Don't hesitate to make some of your own flyers. Oh and in case I forgot to mention, Severus Snape is a greasy git.