"So, uhm, you're Derrik, right?" Ron asked, a confused look on his face.
"Derrin."
"Oh, sorry."
The three teens were sitting on the ground off to the side of a sidewalk, talking.
After letting the boys going on for a few minutes, Hermione interrupted them.
"Derrin, where's Harry?"
Derrin stopped, and looked at her, then said, "He's at the tattoo parlor. He sent me to find you, and in case you had been caught in the spell-curse thing, I was to contact you, get to know you both, and relay messages between the three of yo-"
"Why do you need to relay messages? Why can't we just talk to Harry?" Ron asked.
Hermione gave him a look. "Do you seriously think that Harry would risk enhancing the curse? I mean look at us! We're invisible! If Harry's the same as I remember him, he's probably beating himself up about us getting involved and dragged into this in the first place. He won't risk anything worse happening."
There was complete silence between the three for a minute.
Two minutes...
After three minutes of contemplation, Ron broke the silence. "So, what're we gonna do?"
There was a sigh, and the boys turned to look at Hermione. "I don't know. We can't pick anything up, we can't be seen, and we can't be heard. I don't know how we can contact anyone."
Everyone pondered his for a second, then Derrin jumped up. "I got it!"
"What?"
But Derrin didn't answer. He ran up the sidewalk towards a man who appeared to be in his early fourties; graying brown hair, business suit, and dark blue eyes. Derrin walked up behind him, rubbed his hands together, and, with a look of deepest concentration, jumped into the man.
Hermione and Ron's jaws dropped.
A second later, Derrin fell through the other side of the man.
"Daaah!" Whump!
He hit the ground, blushing with embarrassment.
The man then proceded to walk through Derrin, and continue on his way.
After a second of silence, Ron burst out laughing.
"AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! What in the bloody hell was that about? Hahahaha!"
Derrin slowly got up and brushed himself off, mumbling something like, "Well, it worked on T.V..."
Hermione stood up and walked towards him. "Well, it was a good idea, but it didn't work, so now I guess we'll have to try something else." She paused and glared at Ron, who was rolling on the ground laughing.
She turned back to Derrin, who was staring sheepishly at the ground. "Well, it was a good idea."
Derrin looked up. "Yeah, well, I think I'll go back to the parlor and tell Harry that I found you guys." He turned to walk off.
"Wait!" said Ron, who had stopped laughing and had caught his breath.
Derrin stopped and turned around.
"What do you want us to do? Sit here and wait?"
Derrin seemed to ponder a moment, then said, "Well, I guess you can come to the parlor, but you should stay out of sight when we get there."
Hermione and Ron both took a breath, then started on there way to the parlor.
"So, you're both, uh... wizards, right?" Asked Derrin as they walked.
Ron nodded. "Well, actually, Hermione's a witch, but Harry and I re both wizards, yeah."
"So did you really have all those adventures that he said? I mean, Secret chambers, dementors, dragons, it's all so...so...incredible!"
Ron chuckled. "Well, I'm sure it sounds incredible afterwards, but," He seemed to think about what to say next for a second, then continued. "Imagine, you're in a dark scary forest in the middle of the night, and there's a thin layer of mist on the ground, and your pal's talking to a twelve foot tall spider, completely unaware of all the other giant spiders surrounding you and dropping down all around you, and then trying to get away. It's fun to look back and laugh and celebrate once we're sure that we're still alive, but it's damn scary while it's happening."
Derrin seemed to have paled a bit. His mouth hung open. Hermione watched with a bemused expression as Ron continued.
"Did Harry tell you about wizard's chess?"
Derrin slowly shook his head. "Well, the pieces are basically alive, you see. You tell them where to move, and they go there. But if you're killing one of the older pieces, you know, taking over it's place? Well, then they attack each other. One of the pieces ends up as rubble. So it's chess, with living pieces. We were stuck in a life sized version. Harry, Hermione and I were all pieces. Now imagine trying to win the game to be able to get away, without you or your friends dying. That is scary. Now-"
"Ron, we're here." Hermione interrupted.
The boys looked up just in time to stop from running into the wall.
"Woah!"
"Jeez!"
They looked at each other. "That was close." "Yeah."
They heard someone giggling behind them.
They looked back and saw Hermione laughing at them. "You are both so stupid. You would have just gone through the door you know."
The boys glanced at each other.
"Besides," Hermione continued. "Ron, you and I need to hide somewhere."
"Oh, yeah." He stepped back to her. "Uh, yeah. Tell him 'hi' for us, okay?"
"Sure thing. I'll be back in a moment." But before he could sink through the door, a voice spoke from behind them all.
"You know, you don't need to go in there. I'm right here."
They all gasped and spun around. Harry stood, leaning against a house behind the parlor, watching them with amused eyes.
There was silence for a second, when everyone was looking at Harry. Then,
"Harry?" It was Ron.
"Yep. It's me."
"But what about-"
"The curse?" He laughed. Derrin stared at Harry. He could feel the short hairs on the back of his neck prickle. Something wasn't right. But he couldn't put his finger on it.
Harry looked at Derrin. "Remember I told you I had a few things to check out myself? Well, I found out that I could be around you all, and not have anything happen. I was following you that whole time."
Hermione gasped happily and ran to Harry, throwing her arms around his neck. He returned the embrace, laying his head in the crook of her neck.
They stood that way for a while, with Ron standing awkwardly next to them, until Harry pulled him into the embrace.
"I missed you guys," he murmured. "You have no idea how much I missed you."
"We missed you, too Harry." Hermione cried. Ron didn't say anything, just clung childishly to his friend as if he would disappear again if he let go.
All the while, Derrin glared suspiciously at the black-haired boy.
Something just wasn't right...
Something was missing...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hey everyone, sorry for the wait. I hope this chapter was better than the last. Please review!
-Kybo