Something Familiar

by genericdarklord

First-year students at Hogwarts summon Familiars. While most are harmless, some are things a teen shouldn't be in charge of. Carnivorous flower spirits, armored murder-owls and walking incarnations of fury roam the halls of Hogwarts. This is just as bad of an idea as it sounds. Probably even worse. Our "heroes" might just save the world, assuming they don't destroy it first.

3. When Anger Outweighs Fear

Something Familiar (Mk.2)

Chapter 03 : "When Anger Outweighs Fear"

AKA : "Forensicing Experts Wanted"

=A=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=A=

"Okay, so, what the hell are we supposed to do about this?" George asked.

The twins carefully examined Harry.

The younger boy was slumped over on the seat, as if dropped there by someone only half paying attention. He was sporting a nasty bruise that covered most of the left side of his forehead. A thin dribble of blood was running down his cheek, joining a thicker strand of drool at the corner of his mouth. His eyes were open, but it was pretty obvious that no one was home.

One of his eyes was staring at the wall behind Fred and George. The other eye was fixed firmly on a point forty-five centimeters to the left of Fred's eyes. No matter how the redhead moved, that eye followed to stay at exactly that distance, while it's partner remained fixed starting straight ahead. Both eyes were completely blank and devoid of anything resembling intelligence.

The Adder was coiled up in a tight loop atop his head. Ri (or Ru) was perched on the back of the seat behind Harry's left shoulder. Upon his right shoulder sat Ru (or maybe Ri). All three animals were following Fred with their eyes. They were continuing their unwavering death-glare marathon into its twenty-third minute. There was no sign of them stopping anytime soon.

The twins stared at their friend, as if the answer to their problem could be found somewhere deep in those lifeless eyes.

"I'd like to point out that this totally isn't our fault. Just, y'know, if any potentially rabid parties were curious," Fred said casually. "I mean, I really don't see why we should be blamed for this."

"You're right. We aren't responsible for anything. You are. Seriously, you hit him with your trunk. I don't know how anyone could possibly manage to swing a whole trunk full of crap like a cricket bat, but you did it. I'm thinking I'll just chalk it up to the power of incredible stupidity, just so I don't have to think about it anymore," George hissed.

This seemed to egg the Adder on. He let loose a vicious hiss and lunged forward slightly without leaving Harry's wounded skull. It was something akin to a child taking a swing without any intention of hitting, just to see if the other party flinched.

Fred flinched, producing a faint shriek of horror as he recoiled away.

Satisfied, the Adder eased back on Harry's skull. George could swear it was giving his brother a smug grin. It seemed a bit silly even for him, because how did a snake even grin?

"Fred eats a ton of onions, in case you were interested. Me, I'm all about the garlic, but Fred loves those onions. He eats them so much I'd be surprised if the smell didn't soak right into this skin," George said helpfully. "Probably be pretty damn easy to tell us part if you're good at smelling things."

"George!"

The Adder looked at him for a moment, then tilted its head.

Did that snake just nod at him? It couldn't possibly be Harry's Familiar, since the boy had never been anywhere near the Summoning Chamber. That meant it was just…

"That's a really smart snake," George observed.

"Which is a good reason to not encourage it!" Fred whined. "Don't look at me like that, man! Uh… snake. It wasn't my fault at all! I was saving him!"

George actually snorted at that. "'Saving him?' Saving him from what, Fred? The vicious, man-eating Snapdragon?"

"Yeah, that! You saw it. It was totally eating him. He hit Dean, shot over his trunk, and flew right at it. It even opened its mouth to catch him and eat him!" Fred declared victoriously.

Burying his face in his hand, George growled, "No, I'm pretty sure it was just trying to catch him without the eating bit, Fred. You know, so he didn't get hurt?"

"You don't know that."

"Fred, it's a Snapdragon. They're made of freaking leaves and flower petals. It could chew on him all day and, if he was really unlucky, he might end up with a rash."

"Well… you might be right. I don't think he got hurt when he landed," Fred grudgingly admitted.

"No, no he didn't. He got hurt when you hit him with a Merlin-cursed trunk! What the hell did you even think you would accomplish, Fred? Have you ever, even once, heard of someone successfully bludgeoning a pile of leaves to death?" George grumbled, then sighed. "Seriously, what the heck are we supposed to do about this?"

"Oh, it's we now?"

"Yeah, Fred. We. You get blamed, I get blamed. I'm pretty sure it's just to make sure they get the right one, but it's a pain in the ass."

George continued to examine Harry with obvious concern. On the other hand, Fred was shifting between giving Harry a worried look and watching the Adder warily.

"Maybe we should own up to it and get him some help?" Fred suggested.

George immediately shook his head. "No, I'm pretty sure that's not a good idea."

"Oh, so you're so worried about getting in tr-"

"He hasn't even started at Hogwarts and he's already taken a nasty hit. If someone decides he's bad off, they'll have to pull him off the Express. If they do that, there's no way they can get out of telling his family. What if they get worried and decide to pull him?"

Frowning, Fred nodded in agreement. It wasn't unusual for three or four muggleborn students a year to leave the school for exactly that reason. Even at Hogwarts, under the watchful 'supervision' of the staff and the care of the Hospital Wing, injuries serious enough to force parental involvement happened. The school had - and sometimes used - ways to make withdrawing an unwilling student quite hard, but not impossible.

Harry had never set foot in the castle, and probably didn't count as a student. That meant his family probably wouldn't have much trouble forcing him home. They didn't want him screwed out of his education for a little thing like being brutally bludgeoned, but there wasn't much they could do if it came to that.

It seemed ridiculous, but they knew quite well how stupid these rules could be.

Who really cared what order you washed the urinals in?

"So… what do we do? He's pretty busted up, but it's nothing a wizard can't handle. It won't even be a big deal as long as he isn't totally out of it. Do we just hide him here until he snaps out of it? "

"See, there's a problem with that. I'm not sure if this is due to brain damage, or if it's a reaction to perfectly normal magic-related trauma," Georges stated uncertainty. "I'm pretty sure you only snap out of one of those."

Humming, Fred stared at the floor as the gears in his head struggled to turn. He was really trying to put his brain into it, now that he wasn't preoccupied with thoughts of getting bitten by a venomous snake. The Adder seemed to have calmed down a bit after he volunteered to turn them in. He was still watching Fred a great deal harder than he was comfortable with, but no longer looked ready to bite his eyes out of his skull.

"Maybe one of the 'claws knows what to do? There must be a 'Detect Brain Damage' spell. Merlin knows there's enough use for it. They probably woulda used it on me enough to pay back everything it cost to make it last year alone," Fred giggled.

Their Familiars gave him a look that even someone who had never met them before would have interpreted as, "You shouldn't be proud of that, moron."

George made a disgusted face. "They like finding out something no one knows and making sure everyone knows it more than just about anything. Even worse, they might just wonder what Harrypits was doing slamming his trunk around in a riot."

"And someone might just wonder what started it, especially since he seems to like trunking people," Fred continued.

"Not as much as you do."

"Bite me," Fred muttered. Then, seeing the Adder tilt his head in interest, he threw up his hands and screamed, "Nonono! Not you!"

Looking very disappointed, the snake settled back down on his human's head.

George, looking almost as disappointed as the snake, suggested, "So, we can't do anything about brain damage. He'd probably be screwed if it was anyway. Not everyone handles it was well as you."

"You're just jealous because you haven't developed Blunt Trauma Resistance."

"There shall be no resisting the agonizing pain as every fibre of your being is rent asunder, made whole, and then torn into pathetic fragments of ruined man once again."

"Right. So. We should probably just assume it's not brain damage and move on before I'm turned into a greasy smear," Fred decided.

George looked at him like he was a moron. "Yeah, that's what I just said. Well, aside from the greasy smear bit. What the hell's up with that, Fred? You feeling okay?"

"If it's not brain damage, it must be the trauma thing. Something like the thing King had, right?" Fred soldiered on. "The muggleitosisitis thing."

Frowning at the way his brother disregarded his comment, George disagreed, "That's not what it's called. That's just stupid."

"You know what I mean! It's the weird brain-snap-freakout thing that some of the muggleborn do."

"I don't know if it's all that weird. I mean, imagine someone suddenly told you up was down and down is a banana parfait. You'd probably freak the hell out too," George reasoned. "It just kind of builds up, then something perfectly normal like a talking squid makes you snap."

"Even I don't think getting eaten by a Snapdragon and hit with a trunk is normal, George. Just think about it for a second and consider that."

George sighed. "Whatever. It's the straw that broke the camel's back, okay?"

"You can't break a camel's back with a straw, George. Even if the straw was really big, it'd still be too light and floppy."

"No, brother, the camel isn't getting hit with the straw. He's carrying it."

"Well that's just silly. Why would a camel be carrying a straw? It's not like they can drink through them..."

"I don't think this is helping Harry at all, you know..."

"Don't be so sure, brother! What if we found a really big straw, then hit Harry with it!"

"..."

"Well?"

"I'm really ashamed to admit that I actually considered that for a moment..."

"You did? Really?" Fred asked, sounding highly amused.

"Just shut it! Focus. What did we do when this happened to King?"

"We hit him."

"I swear to Merlin, if you say anything about a giant straw..."

"No. No giant straws. We just hit him."

George lifted his hand and gave it a worried look. "Oh. Right. Yeah, so that didn't work out too well last time. I'm pretty sure he didn't even notice when I belted him. I'm definitely sure I noticed when my hand broke."

"Yeah, that sucked," Fred agreed, nodding.

The hand in question gave Fred a solid slap to the back of his head. "Why the hell would you punch him while I was laying on the floor holding my bloody freaking hand?"

"I figured you didn't know how to punch someone right You're kind of a pussy, you know. How was I supposed to know King just didn't know how to be punched right?"

The comment earned Fred another, harder smack. "Okay then, tough guy. I'm thinking you better take the first swing, then."

Fred joined his brother in giving his hand a worried look. George wasn't exactly sure why Fred chose his hand instead of looking at his own, but that was just how he was. "Ah, exactly how sure are we that Harrykin's face isn't made of bone shattering pain?"

"Pretty sure. I wouldn't use your 'alone time' hand, just in case."

The twins turned towards Harry, only to discover that their Familiars and the Adder were staring at them. The foxes looked like they were considerably less than amused. The Adder was even worse, his eyes burning with a gleam that said, "Just try it, bitch."

"Oh~, that's why you were freaking out earlier," George said quietly as he registered the look in the promise of violence in the snake's eyes. He let out a nervous giggle. "Guys, you know we're doing this for his own good, right? He just needs a little shock to knock the crazy train back on the rails."

They looked at him for a long moment. Suddenly - sudden enough that both twins flinched - Ri and Ru hopped down onto Harry's shoulders. They immediately stood on their hind legs and began pummeling him with their claws. About ten seconds into the assault the Adder began hissing, his body twitching as he was overcome by serpentine laughter. The blows inflicted by the foxes were surprisingly hard, considering they were being delivered by quadrupeds weighing barely a kilogram.

That wasn't saying much.

Seeing the furball assault, Fred snickered. "Come on, you guys are tiny. This is why we wanted to do it."

Six eyes fixed on him and gave him a nasty glare.

"Or not."

Ri and Ru stood on their hind legs again, bracing themselves against Harry's head. They braced themselves, then rocketed away to hit opposite sides of the compartment. Throwing themselves away from the walls, they hurled in and slammed into the sides of his skull at exactly the same time.

Harry giggled.

The Adder started convulsing so hard he fell off Harry's head.

"Okay, seriously…"

The foxes dropped down into the seat next to the Adder. The three put their heads together, like a football team planning their next play. Apparently reaching a consensus, the huddle broke. To the twins' shock, one of the foxes clamped down on the Adder's skull and hauled him up onto the back of the seat. Throwing her head back, she wound up and threw her entire body into the swing.

The Adder slapped across Harry's face hard enough to produce an audible crack.

"Yep. It's official. We just hit a whole new level of weird," George declared. He studied the bruise forming across Harry's cheek with a low whistle. He was pretty sure he could see impressions left by the individual scales. "I do kinda feel like I should point out that it didn't work."

"I don't know, it might have worked a little. He looked kind of shocked," Fred protested. "Maybe they just didn't hit him hard enough. Here, let me give it a-"

There was a solid thunk. The Adder hung there, plastered across Fred's face for a full second. Then he slowly peeled off and fell. Fred stared down at him in disbelief, then shifted his gaze up to Ru. She was still standing there, poised on the seat with her mouth hanging open.

"Did- did you just throw a snake at me?"

That's right, bitch. Suck scale, the Adder hissed as he wound up Harry's leg. Taste the wrath of superior lifeforms. Two feet is the only wrong number.

"Nevermind. That was a new level of weird. Can you do it again, but harder?" George asked.

Fred held up a hand in protested. "No, we should focus on the problem at hand. We should put everything into helping Harry. That's the important thing here."

Reluctantly, George nodded. "Yeah, I guess so. So was it a shock? Getting hit in the face with a snake, that is."

"Not as much as I would have thought. Maybe a 4.3 out of 10 on the shock scale," Fred said, rubbing his chin. "Maybe the girls've just hurt us so often it's kinda lost effect."

George's eyes widened as something occurred to him. "Hey, that makes sense. Maybe trying to knock the sense outta someone that's already been trunked senseless just doesn't work."

"So we need to jack him up- uh, we need to shock him some other way, maybe?" Fred suggested.

Suddenly interested, the snake and his fox companions perked up. The Beast Alliance conferred again. Whatever it was they were discussing was obviously quite horrible. The Adder actually recoiled in disgust, then gave Ri and Ru horrorfied looks. There was another brief discussion, which resulted in the snake slithering aside.

"So, should it worry us that they get along that well?"

"I'm pretty sure it should."

Ri and Ru hopped down Harry's shoulders, one on each. The foxes turned to give the Adder one last look. Slowly and reluctantly, he nodded. Turning back to Harry, both foxes rammed their noses into their respective ear.

He let out a squeal like a wounded pig, shooting out of his seat. Both foxes were unceremoniously dumped to the floor. Harry hopped around while wildly rubbing at his ears for several seconds. Suddenly he stopped bouncing around, threw his head back and shouted, "What the vasco!?" at the ceiling.

"So. He's back to normal...ish... I think..." George announced, not really seeming too sure about it.

Fred shook his head. "It's kinda scary this is 'normal' for him. People look at you weird just because you talk about the voices. What the hell are they going to make of that?"

"For Merlin's sake, Fred. I've told you not to go around talking about that. That was the smiley mushrooms talking. There were no voices."

"Fine, fine. I still think you're just jealous they didn't explain the twenty-seven uses of squid to you," Fred said sadly, shaking his head. "But seriously, this kid's messed up."

"Like you're one to talk."

"Yeah, I am one to talk! Ha!"

Shaking his head, Harry looked around blearily. He had no idea where he was. It looked like some sort of room. With seats. It was definitely a room with seats. At least now he knew he wasn't in a room with no seats. He felt determining this was definitely an accomplishment. It wouldn't do to be in a room with no seats and think you were a room with seats. That would be very embarrassing.

With great difficulty he managed to identify a pair of redheads. He wasn't sure where Fred was or why there was two Georges arguing. He was a little worried, since Fred clearly couldn't look after himself. Still, if there was two Georges around they'd surely be able to handle it. It was a bit confusing, though, since he wasn't sure if he should be looking for one fox, two foxes, or two of one fox. Maybe he should look for one fox and one two of foxes, just to be sure. That was a good idea, he decided. He'd just find four foxes and that would be that.

It only took him half a minute to find his first fox. It was hard, but he eventually found her standing on the back of a seat, at eye level directly in front of him. That meant his fox hunt was off to a pretty good start. One fox was better than no foxes, even if it wasn't as good as seven. He giggled slightly as she hopped onto his shoulder, raising one hand and patting the empty air to the right of her head. Now he just needed… one… eight… four… twelve. He needed twelve more foxes, and then he'd be good.

Apparently fortune was smiling on him, because he found a third fox right by the first. Wait… no… that was a… thing… wiggly thing with no legs. It was a caterpillar. While interesting, he wasn't sure he needed a caterpillar. They were wiggly and had no legs, so they made very poor foxes. But wait… there was something in front of the caterpillar. It was a kitten, which he also had no use for. He wasn't sure who put a kitten there, but it would have been nice if they put a fox there instead. A fox like that one, sitting in front of the caterpillar. It seems someone corrected the kitten problem while he was busy looking at the kitten, all without him noticing.

The fifth fox jumped onto his occupied shoulder and scrambled around his neck to the other. He could also feel the caterpillar squirmy-no-legging it up his leg. He was glad he had a leg, because the caterpillar wouldn't be able to squirmy-no-leg it up if he didn't. It was a really weirdly large caterpillar, but it was probably best not to judge. The poor giant caterpillar'd probably had a hard life, being a horrific freak of nature like it was.

So he had three foxes and an incredibly large mutant caterpillar that probably shot custard out its eyes. All mutant caterpillars had custard-eyes. He'd successfully filled his fox quota, and even had a horrible mutant caterpillar and a kitten to boot. It was an disappearing kitten - probably a ghost - but it still counted. That was good, because apparently it was good at finding him foxes.

Score. Harry though. I should get a job as a forensic scientist. I could use my powers for good, and spend all day forensicing. I already have the glasses. No one would ever know I'm me.

The girls took note of Harry's unfocused, confused look. They exchanged concerned glances, then gave foxy shrugs. Two noses were pulled back in preparation. The Adder closed his eyes and looked away.

"Gyark! Why!?" Harry screamed, effectively ending the twins' argument. "What the where now?" He looked around in a panic.

There was a window to the side, scenery barreling along at a healthy clip. Metal racks up by the ceiling housed a trio of trunks. One of them was his. A long bench ran along the wall on each side of him.

For some reason that realization filled him with pride.

There was a familiar weight around his neck and a unFamiliar weight on each shoulder. This told him he was most likely being used as an animal taxi. That wasn't anything new, even if he did carry three times as many passengers as normal.

Looking around cagily, he gave the twins a suspicious look. "It was the plants, wasn't it? It was the plants. I really, really hope you're not working with them guys. I think I'd be sad if you weren't around anymore."

"He's talking about not hanging out with us, right?" Fred whispered, edging away from the first-year.

"I'm pretty sure he's not,' George replied, equally quietly.

"I don't know what they offered you, but it isn't' worth it. They'll turn on you guys. They'll get you and I'll never see you again," Harry continued.

Both twins relaxed visibly and let out a relieved sigh of, "Oh…"

Clearing his throat, George carefully approached the younger wizard and patted him on the head. "No, Harry. We're not… uh… working with the plants. Why would you think that? For that matter, why would you think they were involved in… whatever?"

"You're kidding, right? The big wolf made of flowers looked pretty, but it tried to eat me! It bit me and trapped me in it and tried to crush my skull! It could have killed me!" Harry said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"I'm not sure that's what happened, kid. Snapdragons are harmless," George said soothingly.

Harry stared at him with wide eyes. "Oh no… They fooled you too, didn't they?"

"Uh… what?"

"They tricked you into thinking they can't hurt you. The plants trick everyone like that," Harry whispered. "I know you guys were right there. I know you saw what happened. How can you think they're harmless when it tried to kill me?"

Fred rubbed the back of his head and let out an embarrassed chuckle. "Harry? Buddy? All I saw was me hitting you. I hit you with my trunk. The Snapdragon was trying to help, but I brained you both."

The admission was met with a pitying look. "Oh, Fred. I'm so sorry. It's not your fault."

Fred sighed in relief.

"It's not your fault you can't see the truth. Your brain just isn't good enough to understand. It's okay. I'll keep you safe," Harry declared. "There's magic that can burn plants, right? Like, all the plants? I think I need to learn how to do it as soon as I can."

"...what are the odds we can prevent that?"

"Not good. Not good at all."

As if suddenly noticing where he was, Harry looked around the cabin. "Oh. Is this the Express? Are we on our way to Hogwarts?"

"Yeah."

"You guys… You guys fought it all the way to the train? It dragged me here, but you still came to help?" Harry asked in an amazed tone.

The twins glanced at Harry's passengers, as if looking for a suggestion. Obviously that didn't go well, considering they couldn't understand the animals even if they did have a suggestion. Judging by the helpless looks they got, it wouldn't have done them any good regardless.

"So, Harry, looking forward to your first day at Hogwarts?" George asked suddenly.

Harry gave him a puzzled look. "I guess. Why are you suddenly- Wait. Are they there?"

"I'm going to go out on a li-" George smacked his brother in the stomach, cutting the word off before it left his lips. "-guess you're talking about the… uh… Them?"

"Hogwarts is an old castle, Harry. It's all stone and dirt and stuff," George quickly said. "There's not a lot for Them to grow on. So, what subject are you looking forward to most?"

Harry stared at him for a long moment. Suddenly his expression changed, becoming quite concerned. "George, are you okay? You keep kind of saying things that have nothing to do with anything. Did you hit your head or something?"

Fred snickered. The punch he received in response was anything but soft.

"I'm good. I think my blood sugar might be low or something," the redhead replied. Suddenly his expression brightened as he slapped his fist into his palm. "You know what'd fix that? The refreshments cart has all kinds of good candy and stuff. Have you ever had magical candy?"

Immediately catching on, Fred nodded enthusiastically. "You'll love magic candy, Harry. It does all kinds of stuff. The girls really like Chocolate Frogs. They hop around and try to get away while you rip their limbs off."

Harry looked at him uncertainty, then glanced at the fox on his shoulder. She nodded in confirmation. The other fox quickly confirmed the confirmation.

"Did you seriously just look at the girls to see if I was lying?" Fred asked.

"Of course not. That would be smart," Harry replied. He looked at Fred's face for a moment. Belatedly, he realized what he'd said. "That would be silly. Sorry, I bit my lip and the word came out funny."

"Why the heck would you think that I'd lie about something dumb like that? First of all, it'd be a pretty easy thing to find out I'm lying about."

Harry considered that for a second. "Well… I guess I don't think you'd lie. I just think you might get confused easy. I mean, your gullible enough to think the pl-"

"Look Harry, a mountain!" George announced, pointing out the window. "You've gotta see this, it's so cool!"

Harry scowled. "I've seen mountains on the telly. They don't look that interesting. What the heck is up with you guys?"

"But Harry, you've gotta see this!" George soldiered on. "It has-"

Fred's face turned white as he let out a strangled squeak. George's mouth was hanging open, left that way after his sentence came to an unceremonious stop. Ri's fur stood on end and Ru nearly fell off Harry. The Adder stiffened around his neck as his eyes shot open wider than should be possible.

There was a pack of wild Snapdragons out there. They weren't even half a kilometer away, in plain view. The creatures were running alongside the train, their powerful limbs propelling their light bodies at high speed. They were falling behind, but would be visible for quite a while if they didn't change speed.

"Forget it, Harry. We were just trying to distract you."

The younger boy's brow furrowed. Did they really just admit to trying to distract him? Why would they do that? Unless... they actually didn't want him to look at the mountain. Clearly they were trying to distract him by distracting him and admitting to distracting him. The line of thinking was making his head hurt, but it still made sense. Maybe.

He began to turn.

Ri's small body slammed into his face, completely blinding him. At the same time, Ru launched off his shoulder and bounded off the far wall. She hit him in the chest like a small, furry sledgehammer, knocking him into a seat. George whipped out his wand and whispered a short incantation. A mass of black goo exploded from the end, covering almost the entire window. The shades were quickly whipped shut, courtesy of George. He made sure to press the curtains into the goo.

Harry lifted Ri off his face. He held her at arm's length, giving her a confused look. "What was that for?" he asked. The fox gave him an innocent look. "I didn't do anything to you! I was just trying to look out the..."

Harry stared at the mass of goo and fabric. He gave one of the curtains an experimental tug. It pulled out a little, but snapped right back into place the moment he let go. The black stuff was both very sticky and very elastic.

Ri slipped out of his hand and hopped onto the back of the seat. She stared at the window in an overly curious manner, as if she had never seen something like that before. Ru was giving Harry a blank look from the floor. He translated the look as, "Window? What window?"

It was a fairly accurate interpretation.

Harry looked down at the Adder. He had fallen to the floor under the window. The snake was wearing an expression much like the fox's.

Holy shit, did you see the size of that bird?

"Oh, look. The window broke, Harry."

"Don't you just hate that? These magic windows can be so unreliable. You never know when one might break all of a sudden," George stated.

"That seems like a really weird way for a window to break, guys..."

Fred nodded in agreement. "It was obviously a magic window, since this is a magic train. Magic holds nearly limitless possibilities. That means there's a nearly limitless number of ways it could break."

"Damn those unreliable magic windows," George sighed. "Always breaking in the strangest way. Why, just the other day the window in our bedroom-"

"-a magic window in a magic bedroom-"

"-broke in the strangest way. I'm not going to turn your stomach with the details, but it involved a rather large number of three-winged moths."

Harry, who was about to break in, froze with his mouth half open. He looked George up and down, clearly trying to decide if he was the butt of a joke. Finally he asked, "Three-winged moths? Seriously?"

"Yes. I… I don't know if I'll ever recover," Fred declared gravely. "No matter how hard I scrub, I can still feel it!"

George nodded and gave the boy his best sincere look. "Trust me, you don't want to know."

"I'm starting to feel like there's gonna be a lot of things I don't want to know."

"That's the spirit!" Fred cheered, apparently shrugging of his supposed moth-trauma in an instant. He gave Harry an enthusiastic slap on the back. "You're bound to go far with an attitude like that. Or, at the very least, you have a better chance of making it to adulthood."

"I think I need to take a walk or something. I feel like I'm getting lightheaded," Harry muttered. He squeezed past Fred and slid open the door.

"Yeah. You're probably low on blood sugar. You might want to look for the refreshment cart," George suggested.

"That's definitely what it is," Harry said sarcastically. "I'm going to leave the Adder here. You do anything weird and he gets to bite you."

Oh yeah, give me an excuse. You guys smell like you take a bath now and then and I know just where to bite.

Pausing, Harry said, "You guys are cool, so I'll warn you. He's fast and he likes to go for the crotch."

You ruined the surprise. You suck.

Harry's last sight as he turned away from the door was a pair of redheads holding both hands over their bollocks.

This, of course, left Harry alone in the corridor with no idea what he intended to do. Looking up and down it, he wondered which way the refreshment cart might be. He was actually pretty hungry, so a sandwich or copious amounts of magical sugar sounded good. Hagrid's agent had given him a small handful of coins for exactly that reason. It seemed silly to let the big man's consideration go to waste.

The smart thing to do would, of course, be to go in the direction that had the most corridor. Unfortunately, he didn't actually know where on the train he was. The smart option ruled out, that left him with only one reasonable course of action.

"Eenie, meenie, miney moe," Harry chanted, closing his eyes and spinning. Coming to a stop, he took a step forward and continued, "In the corridor, which way do I- Crap!"

Unsurprisingly, he had just walked face-first into a wall.

"Ack. Should've seen that coming. Screw it, we're turning left."

Harry started hoofing it down the train, towards the back cars. Taking the chance to look around as he went, he was interested to note the whole thing looked like something out of the first half of the 20th century. Apparently you didn't need modern technology when you had magic.

He had made it about two cars down before someone behind him yelled, "Hey, you!"

Harry flinched and whirled around with the words, "I didn't do it!" on his lips. He didn't quite manage to get it out before he recognized the speaker and paused. "Hey, you're… Draco?"

"And you're Harry Potter, yes?" the blonde asked.

Harry nodded mutely. He was a little too caught up in studying the other boy to form a proper response. Draco looked like he had been put through a woodchipper face-first. His hair was messed up and dirtied with small amounts of what could only be blood. It was easy to see where it came from. His face was cut and scraped, with an impressive bruise forming on his cheek.

"What the heck happened to you?" Harry blurted.

Draco scowled and touched his cheek. "Some jerk hit a 'puff with a trunk and pinned it on me. The guy wasn't real upset, but whoever got him hit a Ravenclaw, too. I think he must be a little sweet on her, because he was pissed. His buddies weren't happy either, but then everyone started fighting before they did anything. I was right in the middle, though, so..."

"Oh."

Draco tapped his own forehead. "What the heck happened to you?"

Rubbing his forehead self-consciously, he replied, "Someone hit me with a trunk…"

Eyes widening, Draco said, "You're kidding, right?"

"Uh-uh."

"Wow. It's going around. I wonder if it was the same guy."

"Could be, I guess. I don't think there's a lot of people that do something like that."

"Seriously, who goes around hitting people with trunks?"

Harry shrugged. "Someone completely irresponsible, mildly insane or both."

"Yeah. Oh, so…" Draco frowned and stuck a hand into his robes. After a moment he withdrew a wooden box that had about the same dimensions as a particularly large tome. "Father was kind of embarrassed he didn't take the time to introduce himself formally. He can get a little weird when he sees something 'completely fabulous' and just has to have it. He wanted me to give you this. I- I don't know what's in it, but I just want to apologize in advance."

Harry took the heavy box and hefted it curiously. It was made of a fine, dark wood that Harry had never seen the like of. The hinges and front clasp were made of a metal almost as dark as the wood. Sparse amounts of fine filigree decorated the sides and top. Overall, it was probably the nicest (and most expensive) thing he'd ever been given.

"I don't know. It's kind of nice," Harry muttered.

He popped the latch and flipped the lid back. There was a brief pause, during which he subjected the box to a confused stare, then he flipped the second lid to the left. After that, there was a third lid that opened the other way. He was left with a box that had opened like a flower. The underside of each lid contained a storage space that was bigger than it should be in a way that hurt his brain.

The lids were full with a dizzying array of vials, bottles and brushes.

Sighing, Draco said, "Yeah, I thought it was something like that…"

"Okay, I give up. What am I looking at?"

Draco drew in a deep breath.

"Those brushes there will color your lips until you use these cloths to wipe it off. These vials here will change the color of your eyes and these do your hair. They stay that way until you use the clear ones. You use these poofy things and those pencils on your face. You use that same cloth to get it off. These are all scents in here. They all hold more than it looks and it's all good quality, so none of it will run out anytime soon. I don't know if there's anything else you don't know how to use, but Father probably left instructions anyway."

Harry stared at Draco with an uneasy look on his face. "Uh…"

"Oh, come on! Don't look at me like that! You saw Father. Do you really think I had a choice? I've listened to him for hours, Potter! Hours!" Draco protested in exasperation. "And now that's yours, so you don't have any right to judge."

"Yeah, I think I'll just-"

"Don't throw it out. You can't throw it out," Draco said quickly. "As dumb as it is, that's a gift from my father to you. That makes it a gift from House Malfoy to House Potter. Ditching it wouldn't just be like refusing his apology. It'd be throwing it back in his face. You've got to keep it for at least a year or two and - I'm really sorry - it wouldn't be a bad idea if he saw you'd used it at least once."

There existed no words in the human language that could accurately describe the look on Harry's face. Very slowly, his every movement trembling with horror, he folded the box closed.

"Yeah, well, that's the way it is. You think you've got it bad? You should see the pictures from my eighth birthday. You can't though, because I hunted down and burned every single one. Then set the ashes on fire, then tossed them in the river."

Harry gravely placed his free hand on Draco's shoulder and whispered, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Not as sorry as I am," Draco muttered. "Look, unfortunately I have to get back to the guys, Pansy and-" Draco paused and shivered. "-Millicent. Where were you going? You could come sit with us, if you want. The guys aren't real smart, but they're decent company. Millicent" Shudder. "-is… Millicent."

Harry slowly began backing down the corridor. "I'll pass. I'd like to meet the guys and… uh…"

"Millicent. No you don't, by the way. If her father wasn't one of Father's business associates…"

"Yeah, so I'm going this way," Harry said apologetically, still retreating. "I've got to do… something?"

Draco nodded. "Understandable. You know there's not much back there, right? There's just another carriage, then it's the cargo cars."

"This carries cargo?"

"Not really. That's where they keep all the big Familiars. The expansion charms on the cabins are pretty good as long as you don't have much more than eight people, Father says. But not even those can deal with an elephant."

Harry shuddered at the last word.

"I'm not even going to ask."

"So, are we not allowed back there or something?"

Draco shook his head. "No, of course we're allowed. Some of the wizards like to ride back there, since it's with their partners. There just isn't much back there aside from a few wizards and a bunch of big things. They'll probably just ignore you, since you're not their wizard. There's not much point in hanging out with someone else's Familiar."

A pair of furry faces popped into Harry's mind. "I guess? I don't know. I've only met a couple, but I like them. They seem to like me, too. I hope."

"Huh. You're a weird guy, then," Draco said with a shrug. "Anyway, I'm heading back before it- she. I'm heading back before she comes looking for me. Later."

The back three cars of the Express where exactly what Draco had said they would be. Unlike the front cars, they were mostly open. The front of the three had dividers forming large stalls, while the back two were a single, large area. They had clearly been made with beasts in mind judging by the odd collection of straw piles, large animal beds and assorted mounds of things like soil.

The collection of beasts was also quite impressive. Well over half of them were fairly standard animals like elephants and large cats. The others were a lot stranger. Among them he saw a huge crab, the weird wolf-thing (the body of a massive wolf, with birdlike talons and face of a bat), and a massive eyeball wandering around on a squid's tentacles.

Harry couldn't help but notice the way the elephant was walking around uncomfortably, as if unwilling to sit down.

He really hoped the Adder was wrong about butt doctors charging by size.

"Hey."

The sudden sound almost made Harry jump out of his skin. The rear cars had been pretty quiet thus far. They were sparsely populated. Most of the wizards that were there were either sitting in small groups or just hanging around with their Familiar. Not a single human had shown the slightest bit of interest in him since he entered the cargo area. The untended Familiars were a bit better, but they generally just gave him a once-over and went back to whatever they were doing.

"Hi…?" Harry replied hesitantly.

The older boy was looking at him curiously. He was obviously a bit confused by Harry's presence. "You're a first-year, right? What the heck are you doing back here?"

"Sorry. I didn't know I wasn't allowed. I'll just-"

"What? Oh, no. It's not that," the boy said quickly. "It's just weird to see a first-year back here. The only ones that end up here are people with big Familiar. As you can see, even most of them sit up front." The tone of his voice made it pretty clear what he thought about that. "I'm surprised you're not with your friends or something."

Harry shrugged, relaxing now that it was obvious the other boy wasn't about to run him off. "I just needed to take a walk. I was kinda curious, so…"

"Ah, wondering what kind of Familiar you might get?" his companion asked, nodding. "Yeah, you can't just poke your head in someone's compartment and ask to get a look at their partner. Trust me, you get a lot of weird looks."

Harry stared at the other boy. "You actually did that?" he asked in disbelief. He might not know much about how wizard's did things, but it seemed pretty obvious that would look weird in any situation.

"Yeah, they looked at me just like that, actually," he said, laughing. "I'm Cedric Diggory, by the way. This is my Familiar, Tank. Get up and say hi, lazy."

Behind Cedric, what Harry had assumed was a large pile of hay shifted and move. Whatever it was in there shifted and shuddered, throwing most of the debris off. This revealed the creature beneath, which was…

A ball.

A huge ball, big enough that it was taller than Cedric by half a meter or more. It was covered in what appeared to be huge, diamond-shaped scales that could easily be mistaken for metal plates. Harry didn't even need to be told that whatever it was could be dangerous. Even if the size wasn't a clue, the way the light gleamed across the edges of its scales made it pretty clear what would happen if you got careless around it.

The ball suddenly unrolled, becoming something like an armor-covered anteater. It shook off the last of the hay and regarded Harry curiously. It looked pretty friendly, but Harry couldn't help but notice the deep cuts its tail left in the floor.

"Tank's a dire pangolin. I didn't even know there was such a thing. Heck, I didn't even know what a normal pangolin was!" Cedric declared, laughing. "He's pretty harmless, as long as you don't rub him the wrong way. I mean that literally, by the way. Trying to go against the scales is a good way to lose a hand."

"Hi Tank," Harry said hesitantly. The creature looked like it could swallow him in about two bites. Its scales and long claws would probably shred an impolite wizard even quicker. If Tank was every in a bad mood, somewhere else would be a very good place to be. "Oh, I'm Harry. Harry Potter."

Cedric stared at him, brow furrowed in concentration. "I know I've heard that name…" he muttered. After a brief delay he slapped his hands together. "You're the guy that took out a dark wizard, right?"

"I guess so. That's what people tell me, at least. It seems pretty silly, if you ask me. How does someone do that when they're only a year old?"

Shrugging, Cedric replied, "Hey, weirder things happen. With magic, there's-"

"-nearly limitless possibilities?"

There was another good-natured laugh. "Yeah, that's the one."

"It still seems dumb."

"Hey, look at it this way: at least it wasn't anyone crazy dangerous you took out. People would be going nuts over you if you took out a full-on Dark Lord."

"I don't even know what that means. The guy I… uh… 'took out' was… uh… someone told me a bunch of guys almost fed him to their Familiars?"

There wasn't really a good way to ask how badass the dude you'd inadvertently killed as an infant had been.

"Oh, come on. They weren't going to actually…" Cedric paused, then shrugged. "Actually, they might have. He did kill a lot of people. From what I hear, that included their families. I'm sure they were pretty pissed. Them feeding him to their Familiars is actually plausible. It's only natural to get mad when someone messes with your family, right?"

"I probably wouldn't," Harry muttered.

Cedric raised an eyebrow. "Why? You don't get on with them?"

Realizing what he'd said, Harry shifted uncomfortably. "It's…"

A look of sympathy crossed Cedric's face.

As unfortunate as it was, it wasn't really an uncommon situation with muggleborn wizards. They frequently had difficulty dealing with the muggles they were raised aside, and sometimes that extended to family. He wasn't quite clear on the details. It had something to do with the fact that, on some level, people could tell you were different. They weren't really aware of it, but somehow they identified the black goat in a herd of white sheep.

"Well, I couldn't've fed him to Tank, even if I wanted to," Cedric announced a little too loudly. It was pretty obvious the subject was making Harry uncomfortable. "He doesn't have any teeth, so I'm pretty sure it wouldn't work."

As if on cue, the dire pangolin opened his mouth. There was, in fact, no teeth in there.

"Oh," Harry said, leaning forward to examine the toothless gums intently. "How does he eat, then?"

"Pangolins are related to anteaters. He just kind of slurps stuff up with his tongue."

Lightening fast, Tank's tongue shot out of his mouth.

Harry reacted nearly as fast, jerking back to what he assumed was a safe distance. He immediately discovered that his definition of 'safe distance' was way off. The tongue just kept coming and coming, shooting out until it was twice the length of Tank's head. Harry was a lot closer than that, so a good six inches of pangolin tongue smacked him solidly upside the head.

"Gah!" He said. It wasn't the most eloquent response, but it seemed appropriate. He wasn't sure what else he should say while wiping pangolin slime out of his eyes.

Smiling, Cedric gave his Familiar a pat on the head. Then, in a voice that clearly didn't match his attitude, he scolded, "Tank! What've I told you about doing that!?" and gave the Familiar a big thumbs up.

"I think he could probably manage eating a bad guy just fine. Or sliming him to death, at least," Harry grumbled. He finished cleaning off his glasses and looked up. Cedric was facing Tank, giving him a disapproving frown. "You don't have to be mad at him. It's not like he hurt me."

Cedric gave his Familiar another glare and reluctantly conceded. "Okay… If you say so," he said with a put-upon sigh. It was probably a bit more dramatic than he intended it to be, but it was the best he could manage while trying not to laugh.

Harry frowned. It seemed like Cedric was pretty mad at Tank. It was just a silly joke, but he could see why the other boy might be upset. The dire pangolin seemed pretty cool, though, so he should probably change the subject. "So, what did you mean when you said he wasn't a full-on Dark Lord?"

"Well, a Dark Lord is a lot worse," Cedric replied. It was a welcome change of subject, since it was getting really hard not to laugh. "Like I said, Tom Riddle killed a bunch of people and hurt even more, but he wasn't nearly as bad as Grindelwald."

Seeing Harry's interested look, he struggled and decided to carry on.

"Grindelwald went nuts back in the 1940's. He started working with… wait, do you know what the Third Reich was?"

Harry nodded.

"Good. A lot of wizards are clueless. Heck, I probably would be too, but Mom's a muggleborn." Cedric took another breath and continued. "So the guy went off his rocker and started working with the Nazis. You ever hear how the fuhrer was obsessed with the occult? Well, he got into it a bit more than people thought, and most of it was Grindelwald. There was only a few people who knew about him, I guess, but he gave the Nazi Regime a lot more push then they should have had."

"Why?"

"All the test subjects he wanted. That's what Mom says, anyway. He was into some really dark ritual magic. That sort of thing takes a lot of 'research materials' that you can't just go out and buy, if you get the drift," Cedric explained with a disgusted scowl. "A lot of the worst atrocities were because of his research projects. That much, at least, is solid fact."

"I don't understand. Why would someone do such awful things?"

Cedric shrugged. "History of Magic doesn't cover that much until next year. Dad says he started out just trying to recreate some of our lost magic disciplines. But he started dabbling in a bit of dark magic, and that's a slippery slope."

"What kind of stuff was he trying to figure out?" Harry asked eagerly. Realizing how that sounded, he quickly followed it up with, "You know, before he went nuts."

"Don't really know. A lot of places out there have at least one or two kinds of magic that aren't wand magic or potion brewing. We used to too, a long time ago. Guess that's what he was after." Cedric shook his head with a thoroughly befuddled look on his face. "Wand magic is the easiest and fastest to learn, so I don't know why you'd bother. Even in the places that use the other stuff are like 95% wand magic."

"Oh…"

"Sorry," Cedric said helplessly. "Hey, is it okay for you to still be back here?"

Harry gave him a puzzled look. "You just said it was…"

"Not that. I'm saying you've been back here for something like a half hour. Your friends are waiting for you, right? They're probably a little worried if they thought you were just going to the loo. Well, they're worried or they think you're really, really bound up."

"Oh. Crap," Harry muttered, smacking his forehead. "Oops. I didn't even find the refreshment cart."

"Just sit and wait. She goes up and down the train a few times."

Nodding, Harry turned to leave. He only made it a few steps before pausing and turning to face Cedric again. "Hey, uh… what happened to your face?"

Cedric raised his hand to touch his cheek, wincing as his fingers brushed a nasty scrape. "Some jackass hit me with a trunk. Can you believe that? I mean, who goes around hitting people with trunks?"

Harry nodded solemnly. Pointing at his bruised head, he said, "Someone hit me with a trunk! Draco got busted up by one too."

"Wow. They got Cho pretty bad. Threw the trunk or something. It landed right on her. Who does that?"

"I know!" Harry agreed. He looked back at Cedric with wide, horrified eyes. "They must be some sort of deranged lunatic! No normal person goes around punching people with trunks."

"Yeah. Unfortunately that sort of thing does happen. Nearly unlimited possibilities, right? Unfortunately that includes deranged, serial trunk-punching lunatics," Cedric said, shaking his head. "It's a good idea to keep an eye out for the weird stuff, so keep that in mind."

Harry nodded. "Thanks. Don't worry, I'll be careful. I don't want to be anywhere near someone that trunk-punches people."

"Good. Now get back to your buddies before they send out search parties."

Nodding again, Harry turned around and left the cart.

"Trunk-punch man, trunk-punch man. He trunk-punches elephants, right in the can. Rams it up, what a surprise! Stuffs in in right up to the eyes. Look out! It's trunk-punch man!" he hummed as he left.