Krum and Fleur had each been sent into the maze in turn shortly after Diggory, and eventually it was time for FitzSkimmons to enter.
At Bagman's whistle they ambled into the maze, instantly noticing that almost all outside sound disappeared as soon as they stepped inside.
When they reached the end of the fifty meter straightaway that was the start of the maze and arrived at the first fork, Fitz said, "So this is clearly smaller on the outside since we just walked like half the length of the quidditch pitch — did they borrow the TARDIS to have the maze in? And did 12 and Clara finally fix the Chameleon Circuit to make it actually be able to disguise itself as a quidditch pitch?"
"I don't know, but either side of this fork looks like a great place to make out for a while, since we'll be hidden by the hedges from the crowd, who I don't think could see down the entire fifty meters anyway," smirked Daisy, looking around at the fork they'd strolled up to.
"We can't snog! Mad-Eye can see though the hedges with his eye, even if no one else can see!" exclaimed Simmons, scandalized.
"We're just making out, not having sex," replied Daisy, rolling her eyes. "Who cares if he sees us snogging and groping a little — everyone knows we're a couple anyway. Well, 'couple' might be the wrong word — a 'trouple'?"
"We're 'trouble' all right," smirked Fitz, earning him simultaneous smacks from both of his wives.
"Come on, loosen up a little, wifey — who knows how much time we've got before anyone finds the cup," said Daisy. "And we can still take our stroll in a little while, but let's enjoy ourselves and make out for a bit first."
Simmons finally relented, and they spent the next hour rolling in the smooth grass between the hedges, thoroughly enjoying themselves more than they had in any task before. But eventually Simmons wanted to get up and explore the maze some, and so they set off again, looking for an adventure.
Unbeknownst to everyone except one very specific wizard, before FitzSkimmons had even stepped a single foot into the maze, all three of the champions had already fallen. Diggory to Krum. Krum to a bit of viney hedge that hadn't originally been enchanted. And Fleur to a well-placed stunning spell. And now said wizard was waiting impatiently for Potter and his two companions to sprint through the maze and find the cup.
Or snog behind the bushes for a while, and then leisurely stroll through the maze like it was an evening walk in Hyde park instead of the most famous tournament on the planet with unending fame and a thousand galleon prize for the winner.
But that's exactly what the three idiots were doing, chatting away about who knew what — his magical eye could see, not hear — as they strolled down the paths. He needed them to face a few obstacles, and wander around enough to feel like they actually were in a maze, or else they might become too suspicious if they reached the cup too easily — they were far too smart for his own good, he already knew — but at this pace it was going to be next week before they got there, if they got there at all. So he began subtly closing shrubs to give them fewer options to choose from, and force them towards the cup. However, he had vastly underestimated FitzSkimmons' proclivity for making out when no one was watching, and so he watched with increasing irritation as they stopped to snog at what seemed like every turn they came to.
The crowd wasn't feeling particularly festive at the moment, either. There was nothing to look at but hedges, with no action whatsoever going on, and already an hour and a half had passed since the last competitors had entered. Half of them were already asleep — those fortunate enough to have other halves' shoulders to sleep on — while the less fortunate half were grumbling to themselves about how boring this task was, even more so than the previous task where they'd had to just sit there freezing for an hour, watching the Black Lake ripple in the icy February air.
But inside the maze, FitzSkimmons had finally happened upon their first obstacle. A dementor was looming in deadly proximity as they rounded a corner, all menacing and scary-like in its emo/goth all-black hoodie ensemble. But FitzSkimmons had the Queen of Goth with them, the one and only rogue Quake from half a decade before, and weren't in the least bit intimidated by this pathetic poser.
Also, they knew from the previous year that they weren't affected by dementors, since their brains weren't connected to their characters' bodies in the normal way.
So they just strolled on past the wheezing, rattling undead-ish being, like it was just a taller, scabbier version of Malfoy that hadn't showered in a month. Of course, once they were safely past it and around the next corner, they all felt like that was very good reason to celebrate, having passed their first test, and so were distracted for a while again, before they finally resumed their leisurely stroll.
A few turns later, however, they turned a corner and saw Leopold determinedly striding down the path towards them.
"I'm not the only one seeing this, right?" Fitz asked hesitantly, as at the exact same time Daisy said, "Welp — he's not supposed to be here."
Simmons turned to Fitz and gently said, "We can all see him, Fitz, it's not just you. But it does mean that there's a boggart coming towards us."
"We've been wanting to try the unforgivable curses on something larger than insects," said Daisy. "Should we trying crucifying it? See if boggarts can be crucified?"
"It's 'crucio' not 'crucify', and don't you remember that we never could seem to get that one to work, except the one time the mouse started chasing Fitz and he was screaming like he was in fear for his life, and you and I successfully cast it to stop the mouse from hurting our husband? Like with the other two, I think it can only be cast if you're sure you need it, and none of us can justify to ourselves making that boggart writhe in pain — it's Leopold, not Ward. But I'm fine with trying Imperius against it, I think we can all consider that a reasonable way of getting rid of this obstacle. And Mad-Eye only said they'd instantaneously throw you in jail without a trial for using these spells against people, not whatever the hell boggarts are," answered Simmons.
So the three of them pointed their wands at Leopold, before realizing they couldn't all three cast it at once.
"Ladies first," said Fitz.
"Elders first," smirked Daisy, looking at Simmons.
"Just for that, I'm only kissing Fitz when we get past this boggart," retorted Simmons, before turning back to Leopold and saying, "Imperius."
A few seconds later, Leopold was merrily skipping backwards down the row singing 'I Want it That Way' by the Backstreet Boys horribly out of tune, FitzSkimmons joining in for the chorus in not much better tune. Once the boggart had reached the end of the row they were in, Simmons dropped her wand, and Leopold began stalking towards them again.
Daisy lifted her wand, and said, "Imperius."
This time, Leopold ran back and forth across the path throwing himself headlong into the hedges on either side, which just proceeded to spit him back out into the path, on his arse as often as not. But every time, Leopold dutifully picked himself back up and ran as fast as he could into the other side of the hedge, until finally Daisy dropped her wand and let Fitz step forward.
"Don't hurt yourself too badly — you've been through enough trauma not to add literally torturing what looks like yourself to that list," whispered Simmons in his ear as he lifted his wand and muttered, "Imperius."
"I'd rather just never see him again," answered Fitz quietly, as Leopold began climbing the hedge next to him.
Despite the hedges not being the best for climbing, and Leopold nearly falling several times and doubtlessly getting quite scratched up, the fascist Hydra shadow had soon made it to the top of the hedge, and disappeared over the other side, out of their path.
"Better than I would have done — hell, better than I did," said Daisy as they began walking again, making sure to get a few turns and paths away from the area before they stopped to celebrate their victory.
They continued on like this through several more obstacles, defeating them at their leisure before taking a break at even more leisure to celebrate their accomplishments, slowly making their way towards the center of the maze purely through the fact that all paths of the maze eventually led towards the center, especially when a certain wizard outside the maze was closing off all dead ends and all possibilities of looping back to the same path twice.
The only particularly interesting obstacle they encountered though was a Sphinx, who when Simmons had quickly answered his riddle correctly and he had stepped aside to let them pass by as was his arrangement with the wizards who had brought him up from Egypt, was surprised to see the young girl sit down in the middle of the path and ask him for more riddles to solve. When the young boy and other young girl with the riddle answerer had sat down in the grass next to her, he had simply mentally shrugged and begun asking them all the riddles he knew, until eventually they had answered them all. And even then, to his great astonishment, after thanking him for his time, they had turned around and walked back the direction they had come from, the first girl saying, "We just wanted to solve some puzzles, we aren't actually interested in reaching the cup. But thanks again."
~FSK~
Several hours after they had entered the maze, FitzSkimmons walked into the center clearing of the maze, where the TriWizard Cup stood standing on a plinth in the very center.
"We've been in here for hours! How did we beat everyone?" exclaimed Fitz, staring around them at the three champions definitely not there first, or at all.
"I would say we're magical," Daisy replied teasingly, "but so is everyone else, and if anyone here's not, it's actually us."
"Well, since we aren't trying, I guess we just sit back and wait for someone who actually is trying to arrive and take the cup," said Simmons, walking over to the hedge and sitting down with her back against the very lovely shrubbery.
Daisy gasped in mock shock. "Is Jemma Anne Simmons FitzSkimmons actually suggesting we make out in the middle of the maze where anyone could wander up on us?!"
"Because you haven't spent the entire time we've been in here making us snog," retorted Simmons, rolling her eyes. "And we haven't actually ever got married anywhere official enough to have a single last name, and I'm certainly not sure that that's what it would be if we ever did, or that our daughter and any other kids we decide to have will have that as their last name."
"Three marriages, and none of them have ever been officially recorded, because the first time we were wanted fugitives, the second was just with this version of me so you were sorta still half-married, and the third was all three of us — we really have had the weirdest collection of nuptials ever," said Fitz, walking over and sitting down next to Jemma.
Daisy took the more flying jump into their laps approach of laying down next to (on top of) them, but they were all soon a tangle of limbs anyway, so it didn't really matter.
~FSK~
Eventually Fitz glanced down at his watch.
"It's nearly 03:00 — we've been in here six hours, and here at the cup for just shy of two hours. I don't think anyone's coming."
Simmons sighed. "No, it doesn't look like it."
"Now what? Walk back out and say we couldn't find it?" asked Daisy, sitting up from where she'd been stretched out across FitzSimmons' laps, Fitz playing with her boobs through her catsuit as Simmons rambled on about cuttlefish or something sciency with Fitz.
"I'm pretty sure they'd say we're not allowed out without someone finding the cup, and make us turn around and walk right back here," replied Simmons. "And the same with red sparks for a rescue — I'm pretty sure after five hours and us not even trying the first two tasks, without all three of us being too injured to even crawl, which I don't want to do to either of you or have done to me, they'd make us keep going at this point. Also, I really think the three champions are all eliminated by now, and knowing how these books are all so self-centered on Harry, it's most likely that he won anyway. So I say we just grab the cup together, avoid having to find our way back out on our own, and get out of here — I'm tired of this tournament."
The other two nodded their agreement, so they stood up and walked over to where the Cup stood gleaming and glowing on its plinth.
"Now remember, this is a portkey — so get ready for what our characters felt going to and from the World Cup, and maybe we can actually stay upright when we land this time," said Simmons as they gathered around it. "And we have to all touch it at the exact same time so that it will take all of us."
"On three," said Fitz. "One — two — three!"
They grabbed onto the cup, and immediately felt the jerking sensation and swirling storm of traveling by portkey. Fitz just barely heard Jemma shout, "Ground incoming!" before seeing it rushing towards him very fast, and he braced himself for impact. His feet slammed into the ground hard, but as Daisy's free hand had clasped onto his shoulder at some point during the ride, his free hand had apparently found its own way onto Jemma's shoulder, and Jemma was grabbing Daisy's arm, they just barely managed to stay upright.
The Cup dropped between them as they let go of it and looked around, instantly sensing that they weren't outside the maze in front of the stands like they were supposed to be. Without even having to consciously think about it, they simultaneously pulled out their wands and muttered, "Lumos."
"We definitely portkeyed, but not where Bagman said we would," said Fitz as he took in the dark graveyard they were standing in.
Instantly feeling the sense of foreboding that something bad was on its dark and evil way, Daisy instantly went into full-blown Commander-of-Shield-in-Coulson's-stead mode and ordered sharply, "Kill anything that moves. Remember, it's all just a book, no one here is real, good or bad, and it will all reset in a couple weeks."
"And if our Avadas don't seem to work because we can't justify killing book characters, then stunning spells, disarming spells, severing spells, anything you can think of to permanently incapacitate them," added Simmons, her brief stint as the Director of a Shield that only included her, Fitz, Enoch, and the handful of agents they were able to save from the Chronicoms rising to the surface once more as well.
They hadn't been looking around them for more than a few seconds when Daisy suddenly shouted, "Avada Kedavra!", her wand pointed between the gravestones in front of her.
Green light sizzled through the air, and something cloaked collapsed to the ground. After not hearing any more movement for several seconds, they slowly crept towards the body, Daisy's wand covering it as FitzSimmons' wands covered everywhere else around them. Arriving at the body, Daisy levitated back its hood to discover that it was none other than Petter Pettigrew, holding a bundle of robes.
But before she could levitate the robes open to make sure there was nothing of importance inside them, Fitz suddenly hissed, "Shhh!"
He motioned for both of his wives to hold their lit wands in the air in the direction he'd heard the slight noise from, pointing his own wand directly where he thought the noise was.
Finally spotting the gigantic snake trying to hide all secret-like in the bushes, he shouted, "Avada Kedavra!"
This time it was harder to tell if it had worked, as the snake had been lying still on the ground when he shot it, and so couldn't very well collapse anywhere obviously dead. But a few Wingardium Leviosa's by Simmons proved that they had a dead, limp, Nagini noodle now, so they turned back to Pettigrew's body to finish checking it.
Daisy Wingardium Leviosa'ed the robes open, just to find a slimy, ugly, scaly, reddish-black creature from hell laying there in a curled up fetal position staring up at them with gleaming red eyes out of its flat, snakelike face.
"Ouch," said Fitz unenthusiastically.
"Umm…?" replied Daisy, turning to look at her husband.
"Harry's definitely in excruciating pain right now, but to me it just feels like you quaked me into the wall again or something and gave me a dull headache — I'm fine," said Fitz. "So I'm guessing this is Riddle, or whatever exists of him, especially since we know that Pettigrew was with him, and that's Pettigrew."
But before Daisy could reply, the thing in the blankets spoke in a high, cold voice. "My name, is Lord Voldemort."
"You, are a disgusting-looking creature that lives under a rock in alien horror movies," corrected Daisy. "And you don't get to speak right now — the adults are talking."
"How dare you talk to the most powerful wizard that ever walked this land like that!" exclaimed baby slime-Riddle. "I, who have gone further along the path that leads to immortality than any—"
"I could literally step on you right now," cut off Daisy boredly. "Squish — no more Tom Marvolo Riddle. You're an ant — I'm a boot. So shush it!"
Whether out of shock at being addressed thusly, or something else, Riddle did actually shut up long enough for Daisy to look over at her spouses and say, "Well, I guess we should kill the little cunt, shouldn't we? Put him out of our misery. How about you take a turn, Jemma? I killed Pettigrew and Fitz killed Nagini."
So Simmons looked back down Riddle, pointed her wand at where she assumed his heart would be if he hadn't been heartless, and a quick "Avada Kedavra" later, he was shut up permanently.
"So what do we do now, Captain?" Simmons asked ever so slightly teasingly when she had finished.
"Leave 'em, hope we can get the portkey to work again, and go back," answered Daisy, after having very captainly-like stuck her tongue out at Simmons when the older girl addressed her as 'Captain'. "If we try taking them back, or even tell them anything that happened when we do get back, it's just going to be the equivalent of a bunch of paperwork, which I don't want to have to deal with. So I vote we go back, pretend we came straight from the center of the maze, keep an eye out to see if there looks like anyone who distinctly looks like they weren't expecting us to come straight out, or out at all since doubtlessly Riddle and his associates intended for us to die, and probably very painfully, but otherwise pretend like everything is perfectly normal."
"I vote we go with Wife Two's plan," Fitz said immediately.
"You both always did hate both the 'paper' and the 'work' parts of paperwork," said Simmons rolling her eyes, "but in this case I agree. But only because we're out of here in a couple weeks, and nothing sticks."
"Well, obviously," replied Daisy, walking back over to the TriWizard Portkey. "If taking Riddle and Pettigrew's dead bodies back would actually solve any problems, I'd be all for it. But none of this will matter when we return next year, so it's not worth it."
"So how do we get this to take us back?" asked Fitz, staring down at the innocently gleaming elaborate drinking vessel.
"I'm sure there's magic, but let's think about this from the book's perspective," replied Simmons. "Obviously Harry would have come here, the books are entirely about him, and I'm really not sure the 0-8-4 could make up something this complex if it wasn't part of the book — though that's actually a really interesting thought for some other time. But assuming Harry got transported here, Riddle probably came back because let's face it, that's bound to happen eventually as the main antagonist, as much as Malfoy wishes he was. But Harry obviously can't die, so he had to make it back to the maze somehow to alert everyone that Riddle was roaming about under is own volition, and that 'somehow' is almost guaranteed to be this same portkey. But Harry doesn't know any portkey magic, and would probably have been in a hurry and under great duress at the time of beating his hasty retreat, so he wouldn't have done anything himself, even if he knew anything, to make the portkey work again. So I'm guessing, time delay before it works again, somehow returning outside the maze in front of everyone this time, instead of immediately back to the center of the maze? Which means we probably just grab it again all at the same time, and we're magically where we want to be."
"Sounds worth trying to me," replied Daisy. "On three?"
Not ten seconds later, FitzSkimmons landed with a thud, instinctively looking around them to make sure their plan had worked like expected. It thankfully had, and they found themselves standing just outside the entrance to the maze, the catatonic crowd in the stadium taking several seconds to realize they had appeared to begin going wild in celebration.
"Is that celebrating our win, or the fact that a six hour wait is finally over?" whispered Simmons to the other two as they watched the judges and patrollers all hurry towards them.
All the patrollers except Mad-Eye, that is, who they noticed was going in rather the opposite direction, and at a rather hasty pace for someone with only one leg.
But as FitzSimmons both registered this, before they could even think about whether or not they should report it, Daisy hissed, "Not a word!", answering that question for them.
As Dumbledore made it up to them a few seconds later, the rest of the adults only seconds behind him, they heard Bagman's magnified voice shout out over the noise of the crowd, "Everyone, your TriWizard Champions! Harry Potter, the youngest winner in history, and — !" There was a slight pause in which he clearly had no clue what Simmons and Daisy's names were, before he continued on smoothly, "— his companions!"
But it really made no difference what he did or did not say, as the crowd was too busy cheering (and booing, by the Slytherins) and generally going nuts to be paying any attention to anything Bagman may or may not have been saying.
Meanwhile, all the adults were heartily congratulating FitzSkimmons, with the noticeable exception of the fifth judge Percy Weasley, who stood off to the side scowling, clearly unaccepting of their trio-win when the rulebook very clearly stated that there was supposed to be one champion from each school competing, not three together, meaning that Hogwarts' champion Potter should only be able to win if he'd done all three tasks completely alone as the rules actually never stated, so long as anyone helping him wasn't a teacher.
But Hagrid especially did not share these qualms, as he was excitedly telling them, "The other three champions all had to be rescued and brought out not long after yeh three went in. If yeh could survive, which I had no doubt yeh could, it was on'y a matter o' time before you had to win! I told yeh you would win, Harry. I told yeh!"
But Hagrid's loud voice wasn't the loudest a moment later, as Bagman's magically enhanced voiced boomed over all the noise, "If everyone can return to the Great Hall, we will have a late night, early breakfast feast, and give Harry Potter his prize for winning this year's TriWizard Cup!"
A stampede immediately started towards the castle, everyone more than happy to finally get inside again, and eat again — supper before the third task had been a long time ago. But FitzSkimmons slipped into the shadows between the outside wall of the hedges and the quidditch pitch wall, quietly making their way around to the back of the stadium, and that completely person-free exit.
"Skip it?" asked Simmons as they came to a stop under the archway out of the stadium, the sounds of the crowds entering the castle echoing faintly across the grounds. "Stand them up? Because I assume you don't want to stand in front of everyone and get handed a sack full of gold, hubby."
"Unless you two want to don your Yule Ball dresses again and be the queens of Hogwarts, no, that isn't really my scene," answered Fitz.
"Not me," said Daisy before Simmons could even ask. "I like the dresses, but not for breakfast and not to stand up in front of everyone and get handed a thousand galleons for something we literally tried our hardest not to win."
"Then I'm all for skipping it as well," said Simmons. "So what should we do instead?"
"Wander around in the dark until we're sure everyone's in the Great Hall eating, and then sneak inside and head up to our room, and do what we do best?" suggested Fitz.
"Of course that's what you'd think of to do," replied Simmons rolling her eyes, even though she was more than happy to go have endless sex with her spouses instead of being paraded around the Great Hall like Big Damn Heroes.
But Daisy said, "You know, I'm a little worried that they may have someone covering the Entrance Hall as soon as they realize we didn't show up with everyone else — I certainly would. So I suggest we go try to find that secret entrance into the dungeons that Quirrell let the troll in through first year at Halloween."
"You actually think that exists?" answered Simmons. "I've never heard of any entrance into the castle besides the main one except for that one time."
"I think it has to, unless the architecture of the castle can change between years," said Daisy. "Because the troll was definitely let into the castle according to the book, and not through the Entrance Hall. Which means that there has to be another entrance, unless it's literally been written out of the castle since then. And since it's never been mentioned to no longer exist, that I remember at least, I'm working on the assumption that it must still be here by default."
"Is it bad that that actually made sense to me?" said Fitz.
"A little," replied Simmons. "But I'm all for searching for it, because there's a secret tunnel near the Slytherin common room that leads up to the floor below our dorms — remember, we found it exploring during one of the quidditch matches last year."
"Exactly — that was my thought," answered Daisy. "So how should we do this?"
"Wait a few more minutes just to make sure everyone's disappeared from the grounds, keep our wands dark and sneak through the night towards the forest, before looping back around to the back of the castle, and then just work our way along the outside walls in the dark, as best we can, looking for anything that looks like it might be an entrance," replied Simmons.
Five minutes later, when they were sure everyone had made it into the castle, FitzSkimmons exited the stadium, and quickly and quietly snuck their way towards to the Forbidden Forest. Twenty minutes after that, they had looped their way back up to the castle and were starting to search the walls for any kind of secret entrance that would allow them to avoid the Entrance Hall, and the adults who wanted to show them off in front of the entire castle like prize livestock.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the walls they were walking around, on the inside of the castle, the adults were trying with absolutely no avail to find Harry Potter, Boy-Who-Lived, TriWizard Champion. The feast had started out well enough, with everyone swiftly congregating in the Great Hall and the house elves quickly making a scrumptious breakfast appear in front of everyone, but ten minutes later as Bagman began scanning the Gryffindor table to find Harry Potter to bring him up to the front to give him his prize and duly earned attention, he didn't see the boy champion anywhere. He quickly enlisted the help of the champions' Head of House, so they could shower the Boy-Who-Lived TriWizard Champion with all the glory he'd earned, but no matter how far and wide they searched for him, they could not find his presence anywhere. Professor McGonagall sent Filch to prowl the Entrance Hall to catch Potter if he was just late coming up from the pitch, while she went up and down the Gryffindor table looking for him and his two partners, and Bagman wandered around the rest of the Great Hall continuing to look for him. But ten minutes later there was no more Harry Potter than there had been when they'd first started looking.
But while Bagman and Professor McGonagall were becoming increasingly frustrated, FitzSkimmons were excitedly, but very quietly, jumping up and down with joy. They had just found a tall, wide, secret entrance that they knew they really probably wouldn't have been able to find if they hadn't known what to be looking for, since Fitz and Daisy had seen the secret entrance in the castle where Fitz dove through a hole in the universe to pull Jemma back from Maveth in. But when fully opened, there was plenty of room for mountain troll to squeeze through, and they knew they had found Quirrellemort's secret entrance from Halloween year one.
Walking inside and closing the door back behind them, they found themselves in what was doubtlessly the dungeons, but a part even they had never seen before. Lighting their wands they started walking, several minutes later coming up to the blank stretch of wall where they knew the Slytherin common room door was.
"So we just came in the back way," said Daisy as they hurried on to the secret passage they knew would take them up to their dorms. "The opposite side from how you normally get to the Snake den."
"Looks like," replied Simmons. "Good to know that entrance is there, though, and possibly even better to know that exit is there, if we ever have reason to need to leave the castle when the professors just wouldn't understand."
"Yes, but I have no interest in leaving even our dorm for a long time at the moment," said Fitz.
"Was something like four hours of making out in the maze really not enough for you?" sighed Simmons, shaking her head.
"I meant, sleep," answered Fitz, rolling his eyes. "I wouldn't say no to a round, but we've been awake nearly twenty-two straight hours, which we — well, never do here. So what I meant was, that we sleep till like lunch tomorrow before we leave our room again."
"Oh — sorry," said Simmons with a slightly embarrassed smile.
"I love the plan, but I do think making lunch might be a little ambitious," said Daisy. "Finals are over, we haven't really slept in for a while even here, and I feel like when we do finally wake up, four hours of making out will be nothing more than a very distant memory, if you know what I mean."
"Since you always mean exactly the same thing, yeah I think we know what you mean just fine," replied Simmons, rolling her eyes at her wife. "But let's just start with the sleep, and see what we feel like whenever we wake up."
~FSK~
The following afternoon, FitzSkimmons walked into the Great Hall for a very late lunch.
But they had barely sat down when they heard McGonagall storm up behind them and demand loudly, "Where were you last night, Potter?!"
Deciding it best to go with the blunt truth, not that it would get through, Fitz answered, "We didn't want paraded around in front of the entire school, lauded as champions of a tournament we literally did our utmost not to win, and be handed a bunch of gold we don't give two shits about. We wanted a quiet evening alone to celebrate just with ourselves, and honestly just sleep since it was four in the bloody morning and we'd been awake for twenty-two straight hours."
"We don't want to be recognized, or called champions at all since we shouldn't have been in the stupid tournament to begin with, and we will pull out our wands and curse you into oblivion if you try to drag us up to the front and make a big deal out of us, right now or at any other time before we leave on the train," added Daisy.
"And as for the money, put it in a Hogwarts fund to give to muggleborn children who's family's don't really have the money to send them here," finished Simmons, before turning to her spouses and asking, "You don't mind, do you? The idea just popped into my head."
"Not at all —"
"Of course not —"
" — I like it."
" — sounds like a great idea."
"There you go," Simmons said to Professor McGonagall. "Give the money to muggleborn students in need of school supplies and tuition, and leave us the hell alone. And speaking of being alone, you guys ever figured out who entered Harry?"
"Oh, well, um…" stuttered McGonagall.
"I'll take that as a no," sighed Daisy. "Go use your time figuring that out, instead of wasting it complaining about the fact that we don't wan't paraded around like show dogs or cattle. Now shoosh, we haven't eaten since supper last night, we're hungry."
And with that she turned her back on their Head of House, and began eating.
Surprisingly, Professor McGonagall didn't approach them again for the rest of the term, except to hand them their grades the morning she walked down the table giving them out to everyone.
Bagman had also apparently left the castle, as they never saw him either, who they'd really expected to try to make a big deal out of their winning. But he seemed to have disappeared as thoroughly as Mad-Eye, who after they saw hurrying off in the opposite direction of the maze right after they had come back from the graveyard, had persisted in his absence, as well.
Whether any of the adults noticed and were suspicious of this or not, FitzSkimmons never found out, as Dumbledore never called them into his office to inform them that it turned out that Mad-Eye was actually a double agent for Riddle, and had been the one to put Harry's name in the Goblet way back in October in order to get him to the graveyard at the end of the third task so Riddle could cruelly and unusually murder him. Of course, FitzSkimmons had no proof that this was in fact actually the case, for all they knew it really had been Karkaroff, or anyone else, who had entered Harry, and Mad-Eye had simply heard of an all-you-can-eat ice cream buffet opening up in a nearby town right as they had returned from squashing the bug formerly known as Riddle, and he simply hadn't returned yet, as classes were done for the year, after all. They highly doubted that this was the case, but they couldn't absolutely rule it out at the moment — and if it was the case, they were only disappointed that he hadn't told them about it before he left so they could join him.
Not that they actually cared to rule anything out at all, as they were safe and happy, with eight blissful days of nothing in a Scottish castle at the end of June before they were to return to Shield and their real lives. Blissful days they happily spent exploring the grounds and lounging around in the beautiful nature, until they finally had to pack their trunks up and head out into the courtyard to hop into the horseless carriages in the courtyard that would take them to the train.
Only when they stepped through The Great Oak Doors into the courtyard, they discovered that they were no longer so horseless as they had previously thought. Or, at least, they might still have been just as horse-less as previously thought, but they weren't as animal-less as previously thought. For standing there peacefully between each of the carriage shafts were the strangest looking creatures they thought they had seen yet, and they'd seen a lot, including blast-ended screwts.
They looked like a combination of horse, bat, zombie, reptile, and dragon, mashed together by someone who had only ever heard descriptions of the aforementioned creatures, and never actually seen them for himself.
"What are those weird things?" Daisy asked as Simmons surged forwards to study them.
But she was unable to study them for long, as everyone else was clearly too concerned with getting to the train than looking at the new creatures that had suddenly appeared to pull the carriages, and so FitzSkimmons had to climb into the carriage being pulled by the creature Simmons had hurried up to to study, so it could begin rolling down the road to Hogsmeade station, so all the carriages behind it could begin rolling as well. On the ride to the train station, they briefly discussed the creatures, but as they knew absolutely nothing about them except for their weird looks, and none of them had any magizoology books that had the creatures in them, there wasn't really much they could discuss, and so they pushed them into the back of their minds to look up in year five when they inevitably returned.
The train ride back was mostly uneventful, Malfoy of course popping by for a bit to act like FitzSkimmons had been using their recently acquired status as TriWizard champs to try to gain even more fame and popularity, but he was relatively quickly done away with, and on the whole they were able to enjoy their ride back in peace. A peace they were reluctant to break as they saw the shining platform of Three Quarters more than Nine approaching out of the window, too content all snuggled up together on the train seat. But before they could try to convince themselves to roust up and start getting their things ready, the train suddenly screeched to a hard stop, and FitzSkimmons felt themselves being thrown forward.
Only as soon as they all grabbed onto each other to try to keep themselves and each other from falling, they found themselves sitting quite comfortably on the Shield common area couch, home again at last.