Disclaimer is in chapter 1.

For one Wednesday Addams, watching Xander pull off his prank was a confusing series of moments. She wasn't used to that, her view of life tended to be quite flat and few things held any true surprises for her. So when she saw Xander for the first time, standing in the doorway in full Vader regalia, she felt a flash of something she didn't recognize.

He looked truly menacing for an instant, until she remembered that it was all just a childish prank over a beverage of all things. She played her part, as agreed, more out of curiosity and a desire to quell the boredom than anything else. Banishing the tables was tricky, not so much because the spell was difficult for her but because it had to be done fast enough to appear simultaneous on both sides.

After that she was a mere spectator until the end, so Wednesday settled in to watch and see if Xander would be able to pull it off or if he was about to earn detentions until graduation.

She was surprised when the first years screamed. Certainly, he looked imposing, but he wasn't that frightening. Was he? She frowned, but shook the thought off. When he knelt to Dumbledore, she smirked.

' The respect he deserved, indeed. ' She was amused. It was one of the few ways Xander could effectively take a jab at the powerful old wizard, and he had so far pulled it off masterfully. The look on the headmaster's face confirmed that he knew exactly what was being implied, and obviously didn't appreciate being compared to the Emperor.

When Malfoy opened his mouth, Wednesday felt a thrill run through her at Xander's response. The cold contempt in the altered voice was magnificent, and she was shocked that he could even manage it. Xander was such a goof, his love of magic notwithstanding, she'd never heard him like that before. Even in an act, Wednesday found it twisted up her stomach just enough to make her really anticipate what was about to happen.

Her jaw hung loose, like most of the halls, when Xander casually deflected the stunners with his hand. Even knowing that the wands where there, she was impressed. She made a note to acquire a pair for herself, and learn whatever method Xander had used to anticipate the target points.

And when he casually moved to strangle the blond brat with a force choke that she was CERTAIN he couldn't do, only to be 'convinced' by the headmaster to reconsider, well… for the first time Wednesday wondered if she had done Xander a disservice in her thoughts.

A flush of emotion filled her, but she ruthlessly suppressed it without bothering to even note what it was. Perhaps she had been unkind to him in her thoughts, he was proving to have more… internal fortitude than she had expected.

She would consider it, she thought as she helped him blow out the lights and make good his escape. From the beginning, Wednesday had known that Xander was someone special. Now, though, she was beginning to wonder if she had mistaken what kind of special he was.

Xander was immediately accosted when he left the Hall, a bushy headed and rather irate bookworm yanking him to one side.

"Ow! Hey!"

"Alexander Lavelle Harris! Just what did you think you were doing!?" Hermione demanded, her tone brooking no argument.

"What are you talking about?" Xander tried faking innocence.

"Don't try that with me!" She hissed, "How many other students, heck how many other PEOPLE, can cast with two wands like you did with the Nox spell?"

Xander winced.

Damn, he should have remembered that.

"Do you realize you absolutely terrified some of the first years?" She hissed, looking around, "I have a good mind to tell the headmaster it was you."

Xander leveled an even look at her, but didn't say anything. After a long moment Hermione backed down.

"Fine. I won't, and you know I won't, but that was still uncalled for." She hissed.

"Hermione, it was a prank. No one was hurt, and it's Halloween for god's sake! A little scare is good for the soul." Xander grinned. "Did you see the headmaster's face when I called him Master? Ha!"

"Honestly," She huffed, crossing her arms, "Implying that the headmaster is as bad as the emperor. What possessed you?"

"Hey, he banned my cola! First Cola, then what? Twinkies? A line has to be drawn," Xander said, rather pompously.

Hermione groaned, palming her face, "You did NOT organize all of that over a soft drink."

Xander shrugged modestly, smirking.

"Merlin, Xander. I shudder to think what you could do if you put that self-righteous energy to work on something productive." She sighed, shaking her head. "How on earth did you manage to deflect Malfoy's stunners anyway?"

He grinned, tipping his head slightly. "I'll tell you later. Let's move before we draw a crowd, a Gryff chewing out a Slytherin is a spectator sport around here."

Hermione looked around quickly, face flushing slightly, but was glad to see that they hadn't yet picked up any observers. "Fine. Later."

Xander smirked, flipped her a sloppy salute, and headed away.

Hermione watched him go, shaking her head. "Thank Merlin that boy wasn't sorted into Gryffindor. He and the twins would be impossible to deal with."

Speaking of the twins, the dastardly duo were cursing up a storm when Hermione made it back to the Common room.

"Language!" She shrieked when a particularly nasty non-magical epithet filtered out.

"Sorry…"

"Hermione."

Hermione glared at the not remotely contrite twins, "What on earth is possessing you two to swear like muggle sailors in front of the first years!?"

The twins glanced at each other, looking guiltily between themselves and Hermione.

"Right scary this one is," One uttered.

"Bit like Mum, really." The other finished.

Hermione reddened, her wand coming out.

"We!"

"Surrender!"

She ignored them, brandishing her wand at the duo. "Just because you're older than I am doesn't mean I won't teach you a few painful lessons. Right?"

They nodded, speaking as one. "Right."

"Now," She said again, lowering her wand, "What's this all about?"

"What's this all about, she asks?"

"We missed the prank of the year!"

"Well if you two nitwits hadn't messed with Dumbledore's age line you'd have been there for the visit from…" Hermione couldn't help but snicker, "Lord Vader."

Two first years squeaked in fear.

"Oh honestly!" Hermione turned on them, "He's a muggle entertainment character, like a storybook character. He's not real."

The two stared at her, obviously disbelieving, then bolted for their rooms. Hermione sighed, pinching her nose. "The Wizarding world is completely and totally insane."

"Who was it?" One twin asked eagerly.

"Who is the maestro we have to top?" The other demanded, "Did the professors figure it out?"

"As if I would tell you even if I knew," Hermione stated flatly, shaking her head. "The last thing this school needs is you two teaming up with someone like that."

"Someone like what?" Harry asked as he and Ron came into the common room.

"The most marvelous Dark Lord Vader," The twins parroted together.

Hermione couldn't help it, she started giggling.

"The whole castle is on about that," Ron muttered, "Bloody insane, if you ask me."

"But WHO was it!?" The twins roared as one.

"James Earl Jones," Hermione answered.

The twins looked at each other, "Do we know him?"

"Ravenclaw, perhaps?"

"We can ask Cho Chang."

"Who's this James Jones fellow, Hermione?" Harry asked, confused. "I thought it was pretty clear that Vader was…"

"Harry!" Hermione cut him off, glaring.

"Harry!"

"Friend!"

"Fellow Gryffindor!"

"Teammate!"

The two twins crowded around Harry, who was now looking very uncomfortable.

"Who is it clear that this…"

"Vader chap was?"

"Uh…" Harry gulped, recognizing the bad position he'd put himself in. "No one?"

"Oh, bad show, Harry."

"Yes, indeed. Now we'll have to…"

"Convince you." The duo said together.

"Back off!" Hermione growled, her wand out again.

"You're all bloody mental." Ron announced from safely on the other side of the room. He didn't want to be anywhere near the twins when they were in this sort of mood. "Besides, he was a Dark Lord, right? Must have been a Slytherin."

The twins laughed.

"Ronnie, there are no snakes that good."

The second twin paused, "Except maybe one, brother mine."

"Oh yes, how did I miss that?"

"Well I always was the smart brother."

"True, true…" The other sighed, "I've always had to settle for being the handsome one."

"Well, shall we investigate our suspicious, brother?"

"We shall, brother."

Hermione grimaced as the twins linked arms and goose stepped out of the common room. She then turned and glared at both Harry and Ron.

"You… you… Arrrgh!" She threw her hands up in the air, then pointed at Harry. "Your spell phone. Now."

Harry swallowed, but nodded and pulled the device from his pocket.

Hermione took it and thumbed in the runic number for A. . "It's Hermione. Bad news, Ron and Harry gave the twins enough clues to guess that you may be behind the Vader incident. Watch your back. Alright, I will. Good luck."

"Blimey, Hermione, what's that thing?" Ron blinked, staring at the device he had yet to see.

Harry was a little more nervous, eyeing Hermione closely. "Uh… Hermione, what did you tell him you'd do?"

She drew her wand, "He asked me to hex you both. I'm thinking that maybe you deserve it."

Ron and Harry exchanged glances, then bolted for the boys' stairs as Hermione fired jinxes after them. When they were gone she shook her head.

"Boys."

Luckily for Xander, and unluckily for the twins, only one of them had a Marauders map and this time it wasn't the twins. Knowing where they were hiding in wait for him made it easy enough to use alternate routes around to school, and so he was able to avoid their presence for the rest of the day until the interschool feast that night.

Amid the Halloween decorations and the crowding of the three schools, Xander took his seat and carefully positioned himself to be hind Crabbe and a hulking Durmstrang boy, and thus nearly entirely out of sight.

The feast came and went and soon the moment the schools had been waiting for was come. The Goblet of Fire was rolled out, and with Dumbledore and the Ministry presiding over the ceremonies, the names were drawn.

Fleur Delecour, of Beauxbatons was first and Xander recognized her as the source of the Veela charm from the day before. She was thankfully reining it in now, however, and he applauded with the rest as they walked to the back room where the Champions would be briefed.

Viktor Krum was next, Durmstrangs students initiating a chant of 'Krum, Krum, Krum' to a low beat of their fists on the table. He followed the Veela.

Cedric Diggory of Hufflepuff took the Hogwarts slot, to the roaring approval of Hufflepuff and the enthusiastic applause of the other houses. He too was soon ushered out of sight.

Then Dumbledore began to give a closing speech, only to be interrupted when the cup flared again and another slip of paper came out. The headmaster, shocked and shaking a little, picked it up and read off the name.

"Harry Potter."

There was a long, shocked silence.

And then…

"BWA HA HA HA HA HA!"

The entire gathering turned to look at the Slytherin table where one of the green robed students of Hogwarts was cackling to kill himself as he hammered his fist on the table.

The great hall was silent, except of course for the insane cackling from the Slytherin table, all eyes turning in disbelief to the source of said cackling. There was a long moment before anyone else said anything, then one voice rang out in response.

"Oh SHUT UP, Harris!"

The eyes in the hall shifted to the Gryffindor table, where Harry James Potter was covering his head in his arms and banging his forehead into the table.

"I *TOLD* you, Potter! I fricken TOLD you!" Xander cackled, still hammering his fist into the table as he laughed.

"Mr. Harris!" Albus Dumbledore spoke up, bringing the laughter to a halt.

Percy Weasley stepped forward, "Mr. Harris, is it? Are you saying you warned Mr. Potter about putting his name into the Goblet?"

Xander totally stopped laughing then, looking at Percy like he was staring at a particularly bizarre form of life.

"Excuse me?" Xander asked, puzzled.

"You said you warned him, Mr. Harris. Did Mr. Potter inform you of his plan to put his name in the goblet?" Percy demanded.

Xander blinked, "You actually think Potter would put his name in that thing? Damn. I know you Gryff's don't have much rep for being bright, but you're the stupidest one I've seen yet… and given your brother Ron, that's an accomplishment."

"Oy!" Ron's voice called out from the other side of the hall as Percy shook in anger. "What the hell, Harris!?"

"Oh shut up, you're the only guy here who has cursed himself more than his opponents in a fight," Xander laughed, drawing snide snickers from the Slytherin table and a few others.

"You're disrespect for this gathering is noted, Mr. Harris," Percy bulled forward, "Now what did you mean when you said you warned Mr. Potter?"

Xander rolled his eyes, "Harry told me this morning that he was happy that for once he wouldn't be the center attraction in this circus, he said he was looking forward to watching someone else be the hero for once. I told him right then that he'd just jinxed himself, and guess what Hermione? I was right, you were wrong! HA!"

Hermione glared at him from across the hall.

Percy was about to snap something when Dumbledore stepped in, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Mr. Harris, thank you for your thoughts on the matter. However, we have a problem to consider."

"Headmaster, I didn't do it!" Harry said, coming forward. "Sir, I don't really have to compete do I?"

Albus looked helplessly back at Bagman and Crouch.

"It is a magically binding contract." Crouch said, frowning.

"I see." Albus said slowly. He slowly turned to Harry, "I'll be looking into this Harry, be assured, however for the moment you should join the other champions."

"Sir?"

"Through this way, my boy," Ludo Bagman said, taking Harry by the shoulder and leading him away.

They walked away as the headmaster and the rest of the hall watched on.

For Harry it was a nightmare that just kept going on and on.

The room in which he met the 'other' champions felt claustrophobic, like the whole world was closing around on him. How did this keep happening to him anyway?

He should have known better, even Xander had known after all. He'd called it just that morning, knowing that somehow everything seemed to center around Harry. Every year had been like this, so why would this one be any different?

The other champions had reacted as one might expect, he supposed. That is to say, they acted with hostility. Even Cedric was fairly put out by his presence, though Harry had to admit that it wasn't to the same degree as the other two. He supposed that he couldn't really blame them, as much as he hated his fame he had recently been forced to acknowledge it more than he normally would.

Xander had told him something a few weeks earlier that refused to fade from his thoughts, as much as Harry tried to forget it.

He had said that Harry would have to use the Boy-Who-Lived fame to work in the favor of his family responsibilities, and when Harry had refused point blank Xander had simple said… Then you fail.

Since then he'd spent more than a few sleepless nights thinking about that as he tossed and turned.

With Harry James Potter in the TriWizard, well even as ignorant of public opinion as he was, Harry expected that the others would have a hard time getting much attention. Well, save perhaps Krum. Harry wasn't sure how that would play out, the Quidditch superstar might trump Harry's own fame, or people might manufacture a rivalry to entertain themselves with.

Harry frowned slightly at that thought as he sat back in the corner of the room and listened to Crouch drone on about the tasks ahead.

Wednesday approached the disaster site that was her normal table in the library with some trepidation, though she didn't let it filter out to her visible persona. She, instead, merely stopped and stared at Hermione until the other girl noted her and straightened up, startled.

"Oh!" Hermione gasped, then clapped a hand over her mouth. "You scared me."

"I am an Addams." Wednesday said with a slight twitch of a smile as she took a seat and glanced over the reams of paper sprawled across the table. "Law research?"

"Magical contracts." Hermione hissed softly. "They said that Harry had to compete, that it's a magically binding contract. But how can that be? I refuse to believe that he entered himself."

"I would not state the same, refusal to believe is a statement of faith, not fact…" Wednesday said thoughtfully, "However I highly doubt that Potter would enter his own name."

Hermione looked confused for a moment, before her mind decoded the statement and realized that it was a backhanded agreement. "Right. Well, there's nothing much here."

"I wouldn't expect otherwise." Wednesday said, glancing at the papers, "Those are all modern legal contract regulations. The Cup is an ancient artifact, it was created under the laws of Magic, not the laws of man."

"So it can force people into things against their will?"

Wednesday hesitated almost imperceptibly, "That Goblet was created during a time when few people were considered their own 'man', so to speak. Legally, should your liege place your name in, you would be bound by it."

"Harry isn't sworn to anyone," Hermione hissed.

"He is a student of Hogwarts," Wednesday corrected, "And a citizen of Great Britain."

Hermione blinked, then her eyes grew wider. "Oh Merlin… That means… any teacher or representative of the Ministry…?"

Wednesday nodded, "That is my guess, yes."

Hermione stared at the papers in shock, "Well… I suppose that rules out the students at least."

"As well as the foreign visitors. So," Wednesday continued thoughtfully, "That leaves the Hogwarts professors and the ministry delegation."

"I doubt the headmaster would do it, he looked as shocked as anyone." Hermione frowned, "also I don't think any of the teachers would either. They've been here long enough, if they wanted to hurt Harry they could have done it before."

"Professor Snape." Wednesday said, half smirking.

Hermione waved that aside, "He hates Harry, but doesn't want him dead. He's risked a lot to save him before."

Wednesday shrugged, "Alastor Moody."

"He seems a little extreme, I will admit, but what does he have to gain?"

"The motivations of murderers are infinitely complex, and infinitely creative." Wednesday smiled thoughtfully, "history teaches us this."

"Fine, Moody maybe. What about the Ministry delegation?"

"Crouch, Weasley, and Bagman." Wednesday said, thoughtfully. "I don't know Crouch or Bagman, Weasley is an imbecile, however I've never seen him be malicious."

"Me either." Hermione admitted, then flushed when she realized that she had just tacitly called Percy an imbecile. "Still, that's three names to research."

"There is also another possibility, Hermione." Wednesday said softly.

"Harry did NOT enter his own name." Hermione hissed.

Wednesday raised an eyebrow, smiling slightly. "I meant the Imperious, or another similar curse."

"Oh Merlin." Hermione groaned, "you don't think the cup would recognize that?"

"I do not know. However, if someone can be forced to enter a name while under compulsion…"

"There's no end to the suspect pool," Hermione groaned.

"Precisely."

Hermione paused, looking at Wednesday with slightly suspicious confusion, "How do you know so much about this?"

Wednesday shrugged, "The Addams Clan has collective learning methods, Hermione… and our libraries extend back to before the written word, as you know it."

Hermione blinked, jaw hanging open slightly, but managed to keep from totally blanking out. "But… even so, how could you possibly know about THIS? It's not something that comes up every day…"

"You may be surprised," the dark girl said in her customary coolness, "The Goblet of Fire is not the only artifact of its type. Once, they were quite common."

Hermione swallowed, rarely did Wednesday turn her coldness fully on to her friends.

"O… Once?" Hermione asked softly.

"What?"

"You said that once they were common? Not anymore."

Wednesday smiled, cold and dark, unlike even the snarkiest smile Hermione had ever seen in her before.

"There have been many organized attempts to destroy them in the past."

"Oh." Hermione said softly. "Why is this one still around then?"

"Because even we Addams' aren't perfect."