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Harry Potter: Thinking like a Thief.

When Harry walked into the Common Room after finishing off the Ancient Rune theory exam (he had needed to find a more indirect route back from the Great Hall to make sure Hermione didn't spot him from leaving, but he had managed it with a bit of work and some practice in evading the bushy-haired muggle-born girl, but as long as she continued to think he was at a lower level than she, then the final result would truly be worth it to him in the long run), the last thing he had expected to see was the unconscious form of Ron Weasley lying on the ground, and an angry Lavender standing over him. Sitting on a couch, just as angry, was her best friend forever, Parvati who was glaring at the unconscious redhead.

"Er…what happened here?" Harry asked as he took stock of the redhead.

His arrival startled the two girls, and a few of the other fifth and seventh years who were busy with their own examinations just pushed the drama out of their minds to focus on their own problems.

"Oh, hi Harry," Lavender's expression became slightly sheepish, but Harry detected a weariness that wasn't normally in the usually bouncing and bubbly Lavender. "We had just had a disagreement with the local idiot here." She glared down at Ron's body.

"What did he do?" Harry walked into the room. He didn't bother taking out his wand.

"We were studying up for our Potions OWL tomorrow when he came up here, demanding we help him with his revision," Parvati explained.

"Help, as in, do it all for him," Lavender finished.

Harry sighed as he gazed down at his 'best friend.' He wasn't surprised this had happened. Ron had been largely unmotivated by the OWL revision sessions, preferring to spend his time goofing off and trying to get others in playing games of chess, or reading from Quidditch Magazines. Harry hadn't given the boy the time of day when he had roped Harry into goofing off. Harry wasn't interested in goofing off. He might want to keep Dumbledore from interfering with him, and he was willing to play along, but Harry would only let it go so far before he snapped back.

But Harry genuinely didn't know how Ron viewed his time at Hogwarts. The other boy hated learning and he spent all of his time goofing off or doing the barest minimum to pass his classes. He never studied. In fact, Ron's idea of learning was getting other people to do the tasks for him while he did nothing. It was not a healthy mindset to have. But what made it worst in his mind was how Hermione likely knew that but she did Ron's work for him, but Harry had a feeling Hermione's patience was wearing thin. She might work with Ron as a spy for Dumbledore, but her loyalty only went so far.

Indeed, more than once over the last couple of weeks, especially with the OWLs on, Harry had seen Hermione lose her temper with Ron and told him to leave her alone, and she had used magic on him to get him to go away. But Ron was nothing if not highly persistent. Harry didn't know whether to applaud his 'friend' or do something drastic himself.

"Are you going to do anything?"

"What, sorry? No, I'm not. To be honest, it's about time he's dealt with by someone who doesn't have Hermione's patience," Harry answered Lavender's question.

The two girls were surprised. They'd assumed that he'd tell on them, or at the very least wake Ron up, but it seemed the rumours about how Harry truly did not like Ron, rumours that had a grounding of reality since they had seen Harry send Ron a few contemptuous glares. Looks, they had noticed, him sending towards Hermione, and indeed the Headmaster as well.

But both of them, the self-styled gossipers of Gryffindor House, both knew only too well that they were never going to get any kind of answers to their questions from Harry. And they had too much respect for him to cause problems.

"We're not the only ones, Harry. Neville and Seamus were trying to study for their Charms OWL the other day while you and Hermione were…somewhere else, and Ron was running around like a headless chicken, trying to find out where you were, but he stopped when he realised they could help him study," Parvati said to break the silence.

"Don't tell me, he told them to do it for them." It wasn't a question, Harry knew Ron a little too well.

"Spot on," Lavender nodded.

"I don't get him. Everyone in our year is trying to study for the OWLs so we can get a good grade, but surely Ron knows Hermione isn't going to do it all for him, so why does he do it?" Parvati shook her head. Even after five years, she still didn't understand Ron Weasley. Nor did she understand why Harry and Hermione, both vastly more intelligent people than he, were friends with someone so bone idle.

"It's the way he was brought up, and it's his pride more than anything else. Ron has always resented being in the shadows of his brothers, and even his sister, who's a more powerful and better witch than he is, but while he's ambitious he just lacks the drive and determination to be as good as his siblings." Harry had spent more than enough time in the company of the Weasley children to know each of them had their own insecurities; the twins had been driven down by Molly's brutal and devastating attacks on their talents while Bill and Charlie had been driven out by their mother, sick and tired of the way she meddled in their lives. Something told him Ginny was thinking of upping and leaving, too. The only problem was he didn't know how she planned to do it. He didn't blame her, and Harry was still surprised when he had discovered Percy's habit of stealing and selling old and vintage magical books from Hogwarts to earn the cash he needed to buy himself a flat, as far from Devon as possible. And after meeting the woman and experiencing her attitude for himself, Harry didn't blame the Weasley children for their decision to leave.

But Ron was not like that. He would likely stay with the adult Weasleys until the day that he died, constantly telling them he would do this, or he would do that, but knowing within his heart he would forever be a failure…and blaming the wrong people for his mistakes.

"That doesn't explain it all," Lavender pointed out, blinking in bemusement at the little insight into the Weasley's lives.

"No, but its the start. Ron has never liked school; I don't even know why he bothers with the place since all he does is goof off, but I can tell you one thing, girls, I haven't helped him with his exams revision beyond the basics. He simply refuses to even try," Harry shrugged.

"That is not a good mindset to have," Parvati shook her head.

"Yeah. OWLs are really important. OWLs can help make or break your future, the more you get, the more doors open for you. Even I wouldn't play around with them," Lavender agreed.

"Yeah, well the problem is Ron just doesn't get the fact he has to study. Even when the OWLs came up, he kept hassling Hermione and me for help," Harry had always known these two girls were underestimated by their peers, taking out his own revision materials before he sat down.

Lavender and Parvati, both sensing an end to the discussion, fell quiet and studied themselves, but Harry levitated Ron and dumped him unceremoniously dumped him on a sofa. Occasionally they tested one another, but otherwise, they were content with the peace and quiet. As the hours passed, students came and went after their own OWLs for their different electives, or they went to the library to look something up because they found they didn't have the materials to complete their revision.

X

When the Potions OWLs came up, Harry was once more passing around calming droughts through the castle and earning another small fortune from the proceeds. But as he expected, the OWL went both ways for varying people; for people like some of the Slytherins and Ravenclaws, or those who had taken tutorials and private tuition because frustrated parents, annoyed by Dumbledore's boundless excuses for Snape's attitude, paid for their children to learn about potions and try to beat the Death Eater and the old fool so they didn't completely destroy their children's lives, but those kids were few in number, and truly did not change anything.

The good news was the unlamented loss of Snape had ensured Dumbledore be forced to hire a Potions Master with a brain between their ears, and a competency when it came to teaching, people's time in Potions had become less of a nightmare, and more of a joy; granted, Professor Slughorn had needed to work incredibly hard just to clean up the mess caused by Snape, but he was a better teacher and he didn't see the need to bully like Snape had done just to magnify his own self-importance. But Harry had been worried that even with Slughorn's patience, the chances of everyone being able to do their Potion OWLs were too remote. Snape had done so much damage, and Harry often thought the Death Eater had wanted it that way, and he believed Snape's self-entitlement under Dumbledore's tolerance would have gotten him into trouble at some point.

Potions had been the most thoroughly revised subjects, but Harry didn't bother paying attention to anyone else while he did his theory test. He was determined to ace this exam if it was the last thing he did. Dumbledore had hoped potions would be one of his weaker subjects, and in a way, it had been because of Snape's petty spite, but now the worthless greasy loser was gone he just wanted the chance to poke Dumbledore in the metaphorical eye. The exam had begun like the others - Professor Marchbanks would give that little speech about cheating, everyone would have their wands kept in a warded box to prevent wand-based cheating, and everyone would be watched and monitored - but as Harry focused on the theory, making sure to keep every single answer as simple as he could, he was looking forward to the Practical.

The practical came in the afternoon. When it came, Harry and everyone else were asked to make simple potions from the first year up to the fourth-year level. The idea was to see how adaptable you were when it came to potions. It was in the practical exam, watched by the examiners, that Harry shone as a potions student. Not only did he make the potions requested, but he also added improvements to the recipe thanks to the tuition granted to him by the Room of Requirement. The Room was incredibly versatile, using magical holograms of some of the greatest potion masters and mistresses on the planet who weren't total jerks like Snape, and Harry had learnt more from Salazar Slytherin's holographic image than he had ever done in a single class with Snape.

With each potion made, Harry noticed how the examiners who were trained potion experts in themselves were delighted by his progress. None of them bothered him, none of them questioned any of the recipe adjustments he made whenever he added something new that was not mentioned in the original formula, but while he wasn't looking at them, he could sense their surprise and their delight about the additions. Hopefully, when they went through his results, they would add more marks towards his OWL.

X

Dumbledore was sitting in his office going over the latest findings into the ICW investigation. In an act, of what he considered to be, excessive spite, the ICW had spent the last month gathering enough evidence to really get through to Dumbledore and all of the other people in the magical world who had listened to his advice about how Voldemort, who had tricked death before in his sick quest for immortality, still being alive.

The ICW, wanting to nip it all in a bud, had presented this report to him. They were brutally conclusive especially since he had made more than enough noise by now that even the rest of the Order, including some of the more loyal members of it who accepted his word, was the law, wondered if he was going insane by obsessing solely on Voldemort being alive, but they needn't worry; by now the old wizard had started to accept the fact Voldemort and his followers were dead. Dumbledore knew he was obsessive at times, but even he knew when to surrender to logic, but he just found it hard to surrender the desire he'd had ever since Voldemort's original rise to power.

To become the first wizard to successfully fight off two Dark Lords, and win, all in one lifetime.

But the more Dumbledore had it shoved into his face Voldemort and his followers were dead, the more he began to listen to the ICW. It had been a long fight, given how stubborn the old wizard was. But they had made him accept the truth, but he could easily admit they were right and he was wrong, it was just he had been waiting for Voldemort to return for so long, he had assumed it was a trick.

But while the humiliation would damn him and likely dent his reputation, Dumbledore knew it would survive, especially since he had a new Dark Lord to create. He hadn't gotten rid of his original desire for fame, fortune, and personal recognition by fighting and defeating two Dark Lords, so why not make it happen by creating a new one?

And he had the perfect person.

Harry Potter.

It would be tricky, of course; but since the boy had a reputation at Hogwarts - picking fights, speaking parseltongue, it should be easy to find a way of twisting the public's perception of their Boy Who Lived to make him out to be a monster. And when he was, then the Great Albus Dumbledore would sweep in and make the kill.

It was good, and this time he would succeed in becoming the greatest wizard since Merlin himself. After all, Merlin had never defeated more than one Dark Lord. But right now, he had to come up with a decent plan to make the boy a pariah and turn him into a Dark Lord.