Chapter 5 - Meet Bernie and a Hallowe'en of Suspicious Nature
Harry had been spending a lot of time away from the Slytherins, and all other humans, ever since the day he had come out of the infirmary. The only real times he spent with them were during classes and occasionally during meals. He didn't go to the meals very often after he found the entrance to the kitchens, but he didn't have much choice as it was the Hallowe'en Feast that night.
He truly didn't feel like attending. He had always hated the day, after all, and he couldn't see any reason in celebrating the anniversary of his parents' deaths. So that pretty much explained his mood as his housemates offered him countless amounts of food whilst he just pushed what was already on his plate around. Funnily enough his appetite hadn't just fallen that night. It had dramatically fallen over a month ago when Harry had fallen off of the broom (which had never been successfully recovered).
Harry was just about to leave and spend the rest of the evening on his own when Professor Quirrel came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone stared as he reached Professor Dumbledore's chair, slumped against the table and gasped, "Troll - in the dungeons - thought you ought to know."
He sank to the floor in a dead faint.
There was uproar. It took several purple firecrackers exploding out of the end of Professor Dumbledore's wand to bring silence.
"Prefects," he rumbled, "lead your houses back to the dormitories immediately."
Harry saw Flint roll his eyes, and then heard him call for all the younger years to follow him. They did so, trying to keep up with his fast pace in all of the disorder. Rather than bothering with listening to his own year mates conversations, he choose to listen in on a couple of second years.
"How could a troll get in?" asked one. "They're really stupid."
"I don't know. I mean, even Peeves wouldn't let one in for a Halloween joke, would he?"
"I don't know, I wouldn't put it past him."
By this point Harry had slowed down, and was at the back of the group when he tripped purposely. Fortunately no one noticed, and he smirked. Perfect. The troll may be dangerous, but he would rather deal with that than his housemate's unintelligent babble.
Ducking through a passage, he slowly made his way upwards, towards the top of one of the towers, having quickly prepared an excuse in his mind the moment he had decided to get away from the group. He couldn't get in trouble for simply pointing out that the troll was in the dungeons, and that was where the Slytherin dorms were located, could he?
Harry's smirk faded at a noise. A screech, similar to that of a bat he had once heard back at Privet Drive when the Dursleys had made him do chores well into the night. It sounded hurt. Letting his uncharacteristic caring side come, he set off in search for the bat that had caused it.
When he found it he was met by a terrible stench.
'Troll' he thought darkly, but saw that the troll had already passed, leaving a trail of destruction in its' wake.
Rubble was everywhere, and a few pipes hung, broken, from a smashed section of wall, water dripping from them. Thee screeching got slightly louder as Harry walked towards to pipes, and he saw a small bat on the ground.
If he had been a girl he would have said it was cute. As it was it was enough of a pain to admit it was cute in his mind. But cute it was, looking helplessly up at him with eyes far to large for its head, just laying there. Then Harry spotted what was wrong. One of its' wings was hurt.
"Hey, little guy," he said quietly, kneeling down next to the bat. "I'm not gonna hurt you. Will you let me help you?"
The bat looked up helplessly at him, and Harry took it that look meant that the bat felt it didn't have a choice. He cradled the creature in his arm, amazed at its' weightlessness. He knew bats were light, but surely they weren't this light?!
"Mr Potter! What are you doing here?!"
Harry looked up from the bat to see all of the professors running towards him, or, in Snape's case, limping. Professor McGonagall looked as if she had been the one to speak.
"I tripped and fell when I was following Flint down to my dorm, Professor," he said, putting on his old innocent act.
"That doesn't explain what you're doing so far away from the dungeons, without the rest of your house, I might add," said Professor McGonagall.
"Well, um, when I tripped and fell I kinda realised that since the troll and the Slytherin dorms were both in the dungeons, that it might be smarter to, well, get as far away from them as possible." Hah! Muggle-loving fools! They were way too trusting. "And then I came across this bat. He looks hurts."
He showed them the bat, and Professor McGonagall seemed to look like she wanted to say something more, until Dumbledore stepped in.
"Very well, Harry. Now as the troll has left the dungeons and is somewhere else in the school, I suggest you get back to your dorm. Severus, if you would."
Snape nodded, and walked side by side with Harry until they were out of hearing distance.
"Just tell me Potter," his head of house said, still walking. "What you were really thinking when you left the rest of you house?"
"I believe I have already told Professor Dumbledore that, Professor."
Snape nodded as the two arrived at the entrance to the Slytherin common room. The professor turned away, only glancing over his shoulder at the young boy who quickly said the password. He was so different from his father.
"Oh, and Potter?"
The boy turned.
"Twenty points to Slytherin for your compassion to another living creature."
Harry nodded, smirked, and went inside the common room, still cradling the bat as his professor limped away.
The following day Harry decided to go to the Great Hall for dinner, a rare thing in itself nowadays, especially since it was the weekend, as has been mentioned previously, only to find that the room was draped in black.
"Yesterday," Dumbledore said gravely after Harry sat down. "You will all recall that a troll somehow managed to gain access into the castle. It is my unfortunate duty to inform you all that before we were able to subdue it and remove it from the castle, one of the students, first year Hermione Granger, was killed in the troll's attack. She was a top student, with great prospects and her entire life ahead of her. It is a great shame that such a bright spark was snuffed out before being brought fully to fruition. I would like you all to raise your glasses to Hermione Granger."
Most of the hall raised their glasses, though a couple of people didn't, some, like Weasley, seemed to be so deeply grieved at Granger's death that they would could not seem to bear to toast the dead girl, whilst others just couldn't be bothered. Benches scraped across the floor as everyone who would stand stood, and echoed, in one loud, low, rumbling voice, "Hermione Granger."
The rest of the meal was a sombre affair, and Harry soon left, sorry that he had decided to come in the first place. But gone he had, though only because that the bat (Bernie, as he had decided to call her, and yes, the bat was female) he had found seemed to be getting better at a remarkable rate, and could now fly short distances at low level. Also, the Great Hall was on the way to left hand side third floor corridor, where as the kitchens were in the opposite direction.
Finally outside the oppressive atmosphere of the hall, Harry smirked. He would know what was going on at the school, and why the third floor corridor was currently forbidden, and hopefully he would manage it by the end of the night. It was all a matter of how.
Over the past month or so he had been studying the arts of Legilimency and Occlumency. Both perfectly interesting. Occlumency being the magical defence of the mind against external penetration, and Legilimency being the opposite, the attacking rather than defencesive. He could already managed some mild legilimency, after having tried it out on a couple of dorm mates whilst sleeping, and he planned to use it on one of the faculty if he couldn't find out by himself.
He glanced around, then set off, making it look as if he was wandering aimlessly around the castle, thankfully avoiding everyone until...
"Potter!" called out Filch, a malicious smirk on his face. "What are you doing here."
'Dammit!' Harry inwardly seethed, but outwardly put on a look of partial innocence.
"Mr Filch? What do you mean?" he asked, starting his disgusting task of peering into the man's mind.
"You know exactly what I mean, you little filth, always strutting about, as if you own the place, I swear all of you students are the same, making the lives of the staff hard. Trouble-makers, the lot of yer!"
Philosophers' Stone...
"Just because you can do magic don't make you special! I've got my eye open you all!"
A Cerberus... called... Fluffy?
"You're all plotting to destroy all that's good about the school! Why in my day..."
Nicholas Flammel...
"They shouldn't have let the old punishments die out, in my opinion! If they knew how much trouble you all caused!"
Harry stopped probing the unsuspecting man's mind, not going any further than was necessary.
"Uh, Mr Filch? I've never actually gotten in trouble."
"But you will do!" the caretaker exclaimed. "And when you do I am going to make sure they have the old punishments back! They'll make you think twice about breaking the rules!"
"But I already do," Harry tried to pacify the obsessed man, then got an idea. "But I agree that there should harsher consequences for rule-breakers and trouble causes. Detention and house points just aren't enough. Good day."
Filch looked gobsmacked when Harry turned and left him standing there as the Slytherin retreated to his common room to check on his bat and try to remember where he had heard the words 'Philosophers' Stone' and 'Nicholas Flammel' before.
A/N: Now, everyone say 'awwww!' together! Isn't Bernie cute? I named her after a tree at my school which we have Christened Bernie.
Samurai Demon-God Sekikage: Lol, sorry, up to chapter eight is written so far, so anything that will happen to Draco won't happen until after that. Unless I was to alter them.... nah, too much effort!