When Dumbledore stepped out of the fireplace in his office at Hogwarts, he took only the briefest of moments to shake the residue of ash from his robes before heading for the door.

"If you're looking for the others, they're in McGonagall's office," a voice said.

He turned and looked at one of the portraits hanging on the wall.

"Thank you Phineas."

The wizard in the picture shrugged, affecting disinterest, and vanished, leaving Dumbledore shaking his head.

"Ignore him, Dumbledore," another portrait occupant said. "You know how he is."

"Of course I do."

Smiling, the headmaster headed out the door, and only moments later found himself outside Minerva McGonagall's office. He tapped lightly on the door and opened it a moment later when he heard the Transfiguration professor call for him to enter.

The room wasn't empty, Dumbledore saw. He wasn't surprised to see Samantha Carter, Daniel Jackson and Teal'c with Minerva – although he was surprised to see Sybill Trelawney sitting in the office as well. It was no secret that McGonagall and the Divination instructor didn't get along all that well.

"Headmaster," Minerva said, smiling a greeting.

"Minerva," Dumbledore replied, bowing slightly. "Am I interrupting?"

"Oh, no. We're done here," Sybill said, standing up. She nodded her head in farewell to those in the room and left quickly with a look towards McGonagall that Dumbledore couldn't read.

Dumbledore watched her go, and then turned to the others.

"Why do I get the feeling I was interrupting…?"

"You weren't," Minerva said, standing up and moving away from her desk so that the large black dog could move out from under her desk. "We were having a fairly important conversation, but we'd just wrapped things up."

Before Dumbledore could ask what she was doing, Minerva pulled her wand from her robes and pointed it at the dog. Instantly, Sirius appeared, holding his hand up and moving away.

"Hold on, now. I don't want to get caught up in the spell," the wizard said, moving over to stand by Sam, but still looking at the spot he'd just vacated.

Dumbledore looked as well, and saw what looked to be a tick on the floor. Minerva muttered something softly, and instantly Lupin appeared, sprawled where the tick had once been.

"Well, that wasn't all that much fun," he said, rolling over and getting to his feet.

Dumbledore looked at Minerva, the question in his eyes.

She smiled.

"We needed some information from Sybill, but decided that she wouldn't be willing to share it with too many people."

"Hopefully it is the location of the small cottage in the Forbidden Forest that is said to house Cassandra Trelawney's lost prophecies?" Dumbledore asked.

Minerva wasn't surprised Dumbledore knew about it; the Headmaster had a good network of contacts as well – even more than the rest of the Order, and probably more than all of them combined.

"Yes."

"Good! I won't ask you to tell me where it is, since I'm sure you've been sworn to secrecy, but I do hope you don't mind me tagging along with you when you go?"

"Not at all."

That way they weren't telling him where it was, after all – and since he already knew about it, they didn't have to tell him anything about it, either – thereby keeping their word to not tell anyone.

"We'll stop and get Hagrid," Dumbledore said decided as they all headed for the door. "Hell know the best way to get where we want to go."

"Not to mention he knows everything and everyone in the Forest by name," Minerva added, obviously in agreement.

OOOOOOOOOOOO

"So…?"

"Shut up. I'm trying to concentrate."

"You're staring at the wall. How is that concentrating?"

"I'm looking for a hidden latch."

"I don't see anything."

"I just told you it's hidden. Now be quiet. Please."

Voldemort wasn't even trying to hide his annoyance, now.

Jack sighed, not even having to pretend that he was bored. He and Voldemort had been walking around the little shack and staring at the walls for the last fifteen minutes, and as near as O'Neill could tell, Voldemort hadn't so much as looked at the door.

"What kind of latch?"

Voldemort sighed, and looked over at him, and obviously decided that if he explained, maybe Jack would shut up. Small hope of that, really.

"There should be a spot in the matrix of spells that will release all the protections on the place. If I can find it, we can go in."

"The door is right there."

"And if I didn't need you, I'd tell you to walk on in – and then watch as you were killed. Probably in some very messy and painful fashion."

"I thought you were the most powerful wizard in the universe," Jack said, ignoring the part about being killed messily – and how much relish Voldemort said it with. "Why don't you just magic your way in? Surely your better than whoever set the spells…?"

And hey, if he was fried by the magic in the process, Jack wasn't going to lose any sleep over that.

"It doesn't work that way," Voldemort snapped. He was so tempted to use a spell to shut O'Neill up, but he knew that if he angered him, he'd get absolutely nowhere with him after that. It was already proven that the imperious spell didn't work on him, after all. "Just shut up, okay? I'm the wizard, not you. Let me figure this out."

Jack shrugged, spreading his hands wide.

"Be my guest… I was just trying to help. Jeeez."

Voldemort took a deep breath, and turned back to the building, reminding himself over and over that he needed O'Neill in one piece and that frogs couldn't activate prophecies.