The Largest Spider in the World

Summer was creeping over the grounds around the castle; sky and lake alike turned periwinkle blue and flowers large as cabbages burst into bloom in the greenhouses. Without Hector, however, the beautiful sight meant very little to Lily. She knew perfectly that they had grown apart after being placed in different houses, but this was different from a healthy distance. Having him petrified in the hospital wing made her feel lonely.

Rachel had come to the school to see Hector, but Lily didn't find the courage to see her. What would she say when her aunt asked why she hadn't been warned about a monster lurking around in the school? It was only later, through a letter, that Lily was told that her mother had been at Hogwarts too. Violet had gone back to Edinburgh to support Rachel through the difficult time. Remus was watching over the Lakeside. They were all devastated.

The worst part was that Lily wasn't allowed to visit Hector. She, Harry and Ron had tried to go to the hospital wing, and had been barred at the door by Madam Pomfrey.

"We're taking no more chances," Madam Pomfrey told them severely through a crack in the infirmary door. "No, I'm sorry, there's every chance the attacker might come back to finish these people off . . ."

With Dumbledore gone, fear had spread as never before, so that the sun warming the castle walls outside seemed to stop at the mullioned windows. There was barely a face to be seen in the school that didn't look worried and tense, and any laughter that rang through the corridors sounded shrill and unnatural and was quickly stifled. Hannah, Susan and Megan no longer were trying to cheer Lily up. Being cheerful in those times felt wrong.

Hagrid's hint about the spiders seemed to be utterly useless. All of the spiders seemed to have vanished from the castle. They looked everywhere they went, even though Ron had a terrible fear of spiders. Naturally, it didn't help that the students weren't allowed to go anywhere without being in a pack with their respective Houses, and could only meet in Herbology and DADA class, when they discussed their unfruitful search in low voices. Lily had asked Susan and Megan to keep an eye out for spiders, having no choice but inform them of Harry's and Ron's nightly excursion to Hagrid's hut, but they had no luck either.

It wasn't until a week after Dumbledore's suspencion that Snape and Lily had their first conversation. He had just taken the Hufflepuffs to the Great Hall for dinner, when he stopped Lily with one hand to her shoulder, and separated her from the rest of the group.

"I-" Lily started, but Snape interrupted her.

"I am sorry about what happened to Allen. I wish I had the power to change that," he said.

Lily didn't know what to answer, so she said the only thing that came to mind.. "Hagrid said to follow the spiders. I don't know. It might help."

Snape didn't answer, and gestured for her to go join the other Hufflepuffs. He probably found it ridiculous, but said nothing in order not to hurt her. But he gave her an awkward pat on the head when she passed. Lily decided to take it as an affectionate gesture.

With the knowledge that Dumbledore was gone, the nights became the longest part of Lily's days. She spent endless hours laying sleepless, half expecting a sharp pain on her wrist by any next second. There were some nights when she couldn't sleep at all, and then the only thing that would comfort her was looking at the tiny violet caught inside the forever frozen snowflake. It was only after the arrival of summer that Lily realized that the snowflake was constantly beneath freezing temperatures, even when it was in contact with her skin. It was just enough to be aware of it, but not to make her uncomfortable. She looked at it every night, hoping with all her might that the person on the other side of the pendant could feel that she was there, that she existed, that she was alone.

One morning, the Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors converged at the exit to the castle, after being seen to that spot by, respectively, Flitwick and Snape. They were heading to the greenhouses when Lily managed to approach Harry and Ron The latter was ranting about how Malfoy had been loudly boasting about how his father had gotten Dumbledore suspended, and how they would get Snape to be the new Headmaster, and how Malfoy was shamelessly declaring that he wished Hermione had been killed. Lily swore to herself that she would jinx Malfoy the next time she saw him.

The Herbology class was very subdued; there were now two missing from their number. The greenhouse seemed to have enlarged, and it felt a bit cold there in spite of the approaching summer.

Professor Sprout set them all to work pruning the Abyssinian Shrivelfigs. Lily was measuring her next cut when she caught sight of Ernie Macmillan approaching Harry near the compost heap. Lily couldn't quite make out what they were saying, but felt relieved when Ernie held out a hand, which Harry shook. Ernie seemed to notice her gaze. Afterwards, he and Hannah went to work on the same Shrivelfig as Harry and Ron.

"It's good that Hannah had a change of heart, isn't it?" said Susan. "I mean, it was about time you talked again."

"Sure," Lily said. She had yet to be fully convinced that Hannah wasn't just following Ernie's lead. She was still watching the two of them with the corner of her eye, when she saw Harry hit Ron over the hand with his pruning shear. Lily followed Harry's eyes as he pointed out something through the window. It took a moment for her to spot what it was, until she saw a number of large spiders scuttling over the ground on the other side of the glass, moving in an unnaturally straight line as though taking the shortest route to a prearranged meeting. It was quite obvious where they were heading. "Oh, no," Lily whispered.

"What?" Said Susan, and Lily pointed at the trail of spiders. "You're not thinking of…"

"I have no choice," she said.

"You can't go, it's the Forbidden Forest! It's still forbidden in our best days, let alone now!" Said Susan.

"But if it can help Hector… if it can make Dumbledore come back…"

"We have to think this through. Carefully. You can't go on your own, without anyone knowing where you are," said Megan. Lily felt pleasantly surprised by her support.

The three girls walked with Ron and Harry as Professor Sprout escorted the class to their Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson. They lagged behind the other so they could talk out of earshot.

"We'll have to use the Invisibility Cloak agan," Harry said. "We can take Fang with us. He's used to going into the forest with Hagrid, he might be some help."

"Fang?" Said Megan, looking sick. "Hagrid's boarhound?"

"Yes. He knows the forest, he might guide us back." It didn't seem to comfort Megan in any way.

"Right," said Ron, nervously twirling his wand between his fingers. "Er –aren't there – aren't there supposed to be werewolves in the forest?"

"There are good things in there, too. The centaurs are all right, and the unicorns…

"It's not a full moon, anyway" Lily said. She knew she wasn't fooling anyone: she was just as frightened as Ron was. She could literally feel her feet getting cold and heavy with the fear. On the first time she had entered the Forbidden Forest, she had found a slain Unicorn and nearly encountered Voldemort – it wasn't a place she was eager to return to.

"There is one more thing," Harry said. "You can't come, Lily. We can't go all the way down to the basement with all the teachers and ghosts out in the corridors at night, we will get caught."

Susan and Megan looked at Lily, seemingly relieved, but it didn't last long.

"No way. I won't stay behind this time," she said, looking at Ron for support.

"Harry is right," the boy said.

"I am going. There is nothing you can say that will convince me otherwise. Please, I have to go. Hector is in the hospital wing too, remember?"

Harry sighed and seemed to have run out of boys nodded as they walked into the classroom. Lily went to sit in the back of the room with Megan, and Susan went to her usual place at the front row.

Lockhart bounded into the room and the class stared at him. Every other teacher in the place was looking grimmer than usual, but Lockhart appeared nothing short of buoyant.

"Come now," he cried, beaming around him. "Why all these long faces?"

People swapped exasperated looks, but nobody answered.

"Don't you people realize," said Lockhart, speaking slowly, as though they were all a bit dim, "the danger has passed! The culprit has been taken away -"

"Says who?" said Dean Thomas loudly.

"My dear young man, the Minister of Magic wouldn't have taken Hagrid if he hadn't been one hundred percent sure that he was guilty," said Lockhart, in the tone of someone explaining that one and one made two.

"Oh, yes he would," said Ron, even more loudly than Dean.

"I flatter myself I know a touch more about Hagrid's arrest than you do, Mr. Weasley," said Lockhart in a self-satisfied tone.

Ron had started to say something, but stopped. Harry had muttered something to him.

The very sound of Lockhart's cheery and confident voice as he hinted that he had always known that Hagrid was no good, enraged Lily so deeply that she stopped paying any attention at all, or she would jinx the man right there and then – and he would probably not even know the counter curse. – Careful, Lily, she thought to herself. Or you will end up an evil witch.

After class, before Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors were escorted to the Great Hall for dinner, Harry discretely approached Lily and said "we will pick you up at half past midnight. Don't be late. Where is the Hufflepuff common room?"

"When you get to the floor level, instead of walking ahead to the Great Hall, turn right and follow the corridor. It will lead you to a staircase going down. When you get to the basement, turn left and walk until you see a pile of barrels. Wait for me there," she whispered. Megan and Susan were looking worriedly at them, but said nothing. Lily knew they would have her back.

She ate quietly, thinking mostly of how to hide her excursion from Hannah. Lily couldn't hope that she would be asleep, because they all had been staying up late these days, because of the constant tension and to watch Lily – they were still worried that she would go crazy because of Hector being petrified. Perhaps they were right to worry, because what Lily was about to do sounded pretty insane.

So, after dinner, when they arrived at the common room, Lily went to the dormitory and took her recording statue out of the trunk once again. Then, she went outside again and sat next to Megan and Susan where they were watching a chess match between Malcolm Preece and Emily Brown.

"Lily, you can't go," Susan whispered.

"I have to go," said Lily.

"Can't you tell a teacher? Aren't you friends with Snape again?"

"I told him to follow the spiders a week ago. He hasn't done so and I don't think he will."

"And for a good reason!" said Megan. "You are all going to die out there! What if this is where the monster hides?"

"No. The tale says specifically that Slytherin hid the Chamber inside the castle. I don't think we will run into his monster tonight."

"Well, why shouldn't I tell everyone and stop you?" Said Megan.

"Because if you do I won't tell you what we found," Lily said with less confidence than she wished.

Megan closed her eyes for a brief moment.

"If something happens to you out there, I will never forgive myself. Alright, I won't tell anyone, but I am coming too."

Lily considered refusing, but didn't. Susan looked at them as if they were aliens.

"Are you out of your minds?"

"Probably," said Megan. "Su, you need to cover for us. Can you make Hannah fall asleep?"

"I can give her a bit of my sleeping draught- I sometimes have insomnia," she explained."

"And how are you going to convince her to take it?"

"With water. She always has a glass of water in her nightstand."

So they waited together in the common room. And waited. And waited. And waited. They waited all evening long, until everyone had gone to their dormitories. At half past eleven, Susan emerged from their dormitory and gave them the thumbs up, signaling that Hannah was fast asleep. Lily felt safer, knowing that at least someone would be able to inform their whereabouts if they hadn't returned until sunrise.

It was exactly half past midnight when they felt it was finally safe to leave the common room, and crawled through the hole.

Ron and Harry were waiting on the other side, and were a little unsettled by the sight of Megan.

"She's coming too," said Lily.

The four of them squeezed under the Invisibility Cloak. Lily had never been underneath it, nor did Megan. It was surprisingly easy to get to the entrance – there weren't as many teachers and ghosts guarding the first floor. They only had to go through the Fat Friar, and then they had no obstacles. They slid the lock and squeezed between the great oak doors, trying to stop any creaking, and stepped out into the moonlit grounds.

"'Course," said Ron abruptly as they strode across the black grass, "we might get to the forest and find there's nothing to follow. Those spiders might not have been going there at all. I know it looked like they were moving in that sort of general direction, but...

His voice trailed away hopefully, and Lily saw as Megan looked at him with a sort of complicity. Deep down, she also wished that there were no remaining spiders to follow.

They reached Hagrid's house, sad and sorry-looking with its blank windows. When Harry pushed the door open, Fang went mad with joy at the sight of them. Worried he might wake everyone at the castle with his deep, booming barks, they hastily fed him treacle fudge from a tin on the mantelpiece, which glued his teeth together. Lily patted the hound's head. Megan, on the other hand, looked at Fang as if he was a bomb.

"What?" Said Lily.

"I have dog phobia," said Megan, stepping away from the drooling boarhound.

"Oh. What do you want to do?" Said Lily, even though she couldn't help but find a little amusing that Megan was still scared of a dog while in the prospect of walking into the forbidden forest in the middle of the night.

"I think I will just stay away from it." Said Megan.

Harry left his cloak over the table, since there would be no need for it in the pitch dark forest, unless they were intending to risk damaging it.

"C'mon, Fang, we're going for a walk," said Harry, patting his leg, and Fang bounded happily out of the house behind them, dashed to the edge of the forest, and lifted his leg against a large sycamore tree.

The rest of them hurried after the dog. When they reached the edge of the forest, Harry lit his wand, and so did Lily and Megan. There was only enough light to search for signs of spiders.

"Good thinking," said Ron. "I'd light mine, too, but you know - it'd probably blow up or something ...

"Hm… are we looking for any spiders in particular?" said Megan.

"I don't think so. Just any number of spiders following in a specific direction," said Lily.

Harry, then, called their attention to the spot he was directing his wand light at. There were two solitary spiders hurrying away from the light into the shade of the forest.

"Okay," Ron sighed as though resigned to the worst, "I'm ready. Let's go."

So, with Fang scampering around them, sniffing tree roots and leaves, they entered the forest. Every time Fang approached Megan, there was a loud noise of cracking sticks caused by her jumping out of her skin. The lights of the three wands were barely enough to make out their silhouettes, but was enough to follow the steady trickle of spiders moving along the path. They walked behind them for about twenty minutes, not speaking, listening hard for noises other than breaking twigs and rustling leaves (there was none, except for the ones occasionally caused by Megan). Then, when the trees had become thicker than ever, so that the stars overhead were no longer visible, they saw their spider guides leaving the path.

They paused, trying to see where the spiders were going, but everything beyond the spheres of light was pitch black.

"What d'you reckon?" Harry asked. Lily only knew where he was because of the sphere of light at the tip of his wand.

"We've come this far," said Ron.

So they followed the darting shadows of the spiders into the trees. They couldn't move very quickly now; there were tree roots and stumps in their way, barely visible in the near blackness. Lily had taken the responsibility of keeping her wand close to the spiders, but more than once she lost them, and they had to stop and crouch on the forest floor to find them again.

They walked for what seemed like at least half an hour, their robes snagging on low-slung branches and brambles. After a while, they noticed that the ground seemed to be sloping downward, though the trees were as thick as ever.

Then Fang suddenly let loose a great, echoing bark, making them jump out of their skins. Lily could swear Megan had pierced her skin with her nails. The only thing comforting her was that there was no sign of dark magic around, or her bracelet would painfully warn them.

"What?" said Ron loudly, looking around into the pitch-dark.

"There's something moving over there," Harry breathed. "Listen ... sounds like something big ...

They listened. Some distance to their right, something big was snapping branches as it carved a path through the trees.

"Oh, no," said Ron. "Oh, no, oh, no, oh-"

"Shut up," said Harry frantically. "It'll hear you."

"Hear me?" said Ron in an unnaturally high voice. "It's already heard Fang!"

The darkness seemed to be pressing on their eyeballs as they stood, terrified, waiting. There was a strange rumbling noise and then silence.

Lily suffocated a scream, and she could feel Megan shaking at her side.

"It's not a full moon, it's not a full moon," Lily whispered to herself.

"What d'you think it's doing?" said Harry.

"Probably getting ready to pounce," said Ron.

They waited, shivering, hardly daring to move. Lily still waited for the sudden sharp pain on her wrist, but it didn't come. At least it wasn't the monster of Slytherin.

Then, to their right, came a sudden blaze of light, so bright in the darkness that Lily had to close her eyes. She had never heard of being nor beast that could cast a light like that. Fang yelped and tried to run, but got lodged in a tangle of thorns and yelped even louder.

"It's our car!" Ron shouted, his voice breaking with relief.

"What?"

"Come on!"

They followed the light, until they emerged into a clearing. The car was standing, empty, in the middle of a circle of thick trees under a roof of dense branches, its headlights ablaze. As Ron walked, open-mouthed, toward it, it moved slowly toward him, exactly like a large, turquoise dog greeting its owner. The sides of the car were scratched and smeared with mud. Apparently it had taken to trundling around the forest on its own. Fang didn't seem at all keen on it; he kept close to Harry, and Lily could see the way the hound quivered. Once she grew accustomed to it, Lily welcomed the possibility of seeing again.

"And we thought it was going to attack us!" said Ron, leaning against the car and patting it. "I wondered where it had gone."

Megan had released Lily's arm and was now curiously looking at the car. Lily knew she was wondering which spells had been used to animate it. Harry was walking in circles around the clearing, his wand pointing down.

"We lost the trail," he finally said, raising his head. "C'mon, let's go and find them."

Lily started to turn around to trace their footprints and find the way back, but her eyes met something, and suddenly she missed the cover of darkness. She wanted to run, she wanted to run so badly that for a full minute she couldn't understand why her legs weren't moving. Until she felt it. Her feet weren't on the ground. Instead, she had been lifted by two long, hairy things. She tried to scream, but only a suffocated noise came out of her throat. Looking around, she saw that the others had been caught. Ron had lost all the color from his face. Megan had her eyes so widened that Lily thought they could jump from the sockets at any moment. Harry struggled in the air. Poor Fang howled and whimpered as he, too, was carried away.

It took some time for her to gather the courage to look down and see what exactly had grabbed her, and she immediately regretted it when she finally did so.

The spiders that carried them were each the size of a horse, and lifted them so high that Lily could see that the leaf-strewn ground was now swarming with spiders.

After what seemed like an eternity of panic, they finally arrived at a hollow, in which there were no trees blocking the stars. By then, the terror had already aged inside Lily's heart, and she was beginning to get more tired than scared. But the fear was immediately renovated when she met the army of horse-sized spiders that swarmed the hollow. Most of them were in the dark, and Lily could barely make out their shapes, but somehow they were even darker than the night around them. The spider that carried Lily made its way down the steep slope toward a misty, domed web in the very center of the hollow, while its fellows closed in all around it, clicking their pincers excitedly at the sight of its load.

Lily was suddenly released and felt her stomach float inside her body as she fell to the ground, landing on all fours. Her hours on the broom had taught her how to land in relative safety. The loud crackling noise coming from many different sources told Lily that the others had landed as well.

A voice that didn't belong to either of them sounded. It was hard to understand what the spider was saying, because he clicked its pincers with every word.

"Aragog!" it called. "Aragog!"

And from the middle of the misty, domed web, a spider the size of a small elephant emerged, very slowly. There was gray in the black of his body and legs, and each of the eyes on his ugly, pincered head was milky white. He was blind.

"What is it?" he said, clicking his pincers rapidly.

"Men," clicked the same spider that had spoken first.

"Is it Hagrid?" said Aragog, moving closer, his eight milky eyes wandering vaguely.

"Strangers," clicked the spider who had brought Ron. "Kill them," clicked Aragog fretfully. "I was sleeping ...

"We are friends of Hagrid's!" Shouted. Lily had tried to speak too, but her heart seemed to be blocking her voice.

Click, click, click went the pincers of the spiders all around the hollow.

Aragog paused.

"Hagrid has never sent men into our hollow before," he said slowly.

"Hagrid's in trouble," said Harry, breathing very fast. "That's why we've come."

"In trouble?" said the aged spider, and Lily thought Aragog sounded concerned. "But why has he sent you?"

Harry took so long to answer that Lily almost considered speaking for him. But she didn't find her own voice.

"They think,, up at the school, that Hagrid's been setting a a - something on students. They've taken him to Azkaban." Harry finally managed to say. Lily could still hear the fright in his voice, although he was trying to sound calm.

Aragog clicked his pincers furiously, and all around the hollow the sound was echoed by the crowd of spiders.

"But that was years ago," said Aragog fretfully. "Years and years ago. I remember it well. That's why they made him leave the school. They believed that I was the monster that dwells in what they call the Chamber of Secrets. They thought that Hagrid had opened the Chamber and set me free."

"And you ... you didn't come from the Chamber of Secrets?" said Harry.

"I!" said Aragog, clicking angrily. "I was not born in the castle. I come from a distant land. A traveler gave me to Hagrid when I was an egg. Hagrid was only a boy, but he cared for me, hidden in a cupboard in the castle, feeding me on scraps from the table. Hagrid is my good friend, and a good man. When I was discovered, and blamed for the death of a girl, he protected me. I have lived here in the forest ever since, where Hagrid still visits me. He even found me a wife, Mosag, and you see how our family has grown, all through Hagrid's goodness ...

"So you never attacked anyone?" Lily's fear was being slowly replaced by curiosity.

"Never," croaked the old spider. "It would have been my instinct, but out of respect for Hagrid, I never harmed a human. The body of the girl who was killed was discovered in a bathroom. I never saw any part of the castle but the cupboard in which I grew up. Our kind like the dark and the quiet ...

"But then ... Do you know what did kill that girl?" said Harry. "Because whatever it is, it's back and attacking people again -". His words were drowned by a loud outbreak of clicking and the rustling of many long legs shifting angrily; large black shapes shifted all around him.

"The thing that lives in the castle," said Aragog, "is an ancient creature we spiders fear above all others. Well do I remember how I pleaded with Hagrid to let me go, when I sensed the beast moving about the school."

"What is it?" said Harry urgently.

More loud clicking, more rustling; the spiders seemed to be closing in.

"We do not speak of it!" said Aragog fiercely. "We do not name it! I never even told Hagrid the name of that dread creature, though he asked me, many times."

Lily noticed that Aragog was backing slowly into his domed web, but his fellow spiders were still closing in. The fear rushed back into her stomach. She somehow knew they wouldn't be allowed to leave, in spite of Harry's pleas.

"My sons and daughters do not harm Hagrid, on my command. But I cannot deny them fresh meat, when it wanders so willingly into our midst. Good-bye, friend of Hagrid." Said Aragog.

Lily wanted to cry when she saw the solid wall of spiders towering over her. She was, above all, furious for not thinking before going into the forbidden forest once again. Now she would die. They would all die. But maybe she could give at least one of them a chance to escape. Her hands were shaking as she reached for her wand. It wouldn't do much good, but at least she could transfigure a few spiders halfway into tables. Maybe it would open a path through which the others could run. Did the Tarantallegra jinx work on spiders? There wouldn't be any harm in trying it.

But before she could finish the first spell, a loud, long note sounded, and a blaze of light flamed through the hollow.

The old Ford Anglia was thundering down the slope, headlights glaring, its horn screeching, knocking spiders aside; several were thrown onto their backs, their endless legs waving in the air. The car screeched to a halt in front of them and the four doors flew open.

Lily and Megan jumped into the back seats while Harry dived into the front seat, yelling "get Fang!".

Ron seized the boarhound around the middle and threw him, yelping, into the back of the car - the doors slammed shut - Ron didn't touch the accelerator but the car didn't need him; the engine roared and they were off, hitting more spiders. They sped up the slope, out of the hollow, and they were soon crashing through the forest, branches whipping the windows as the car wound its way cleverly through the widest gaps, following a path it obviously knew.

Fang was howling. Megan was crying. Lily was hyperventilating. Looking through the rearview mirror, she could see Ron's face still frozen in a silent scream. She couldn't see Harry from where she was sitting.

After ten noisy, rocky minutes, the trees finally thinned. The car stopped so suddenly that they were nearly thrown into the windshield. They had reached the edge of the forest. Fang flung himself at the window in his anxiety to get out, and when the door opened, he shot off through the trees to Hagrid's house, tail between his legs. Lily was unsure of the strength of her own legs at the moment, and took a few minutes to get out of the car. Harry and Megan came out too, both still trembling. After a minute or so, Ron seemed to regain the feeling in his limbs and followed, still stiff-necked and staring. Harry gave the car a pat as it reversed back into the forest and disappeared from view.

"Well, thank Merlin you were stupid enough to come to school via flying car," said Lily. Harry chuckled a bit and started walking towards Hagrid's cabin. Megan was still crying so much she couldn't walk. "I'm sorry you got through this," said Lily.

"It's okay. We are okay," Megan managed to say between sobs.

"C'mon. Let's go and see if there is some water at Hagrid's," Lily tried to remember what Hector always told her when she was crying. Megan nodded and they started to follow Harry. They found Ron being violently sick in the pumpkin patch. Megan went inside to search for a glass of water.

"Follow the spiders," said Ron weakly, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. "I'll never forgive Hagrid. We're lucky to be alive."

"I bet he thought Aragog wouldn't hurt friends of his," said Harry.

"That's exactly Hagrid's problem!" said Ron, thumping the wall of the cabin. "He always thinks monsters aren't as bad as they're made out, and look where it's got him! A cell in Azkaban!" He was shivering uncontrollably now. "What was the point of sending us in there? What have we found out, I'd like to know?"

"That Hagrid never opened the Chamber of Secrets," said Harry. "He was innocent."

"And, we have the means to prove that," said Lily, proudly holding her recording statue.

"Brilliant!" said Harry.

As soon as Megan joined them again, no longer sobbing, they threw the cloak over themselves and started making their way back to the castle. Again, it was easy to get to the Hufflepuff basement, only the Fat Friar was scouting the hallways. Lily and Megan crawled back to the common room and tiptoed to the dormitory. Susan was in her clothes, laying on top of her bed sheets as she seemed to have tried to wait awake for them. Megan softly poked Susan's shoulder, who blinked heavily and opened her eyes, surprised.

"We're back. Get under the blanket," whispered Megan. Absentmindedly and with imprecise movements, Susan did so and lost consciousness again.

Lily and Megan changed into clean pyjamas and sighed heavily and unissoundedly before crashing onto their beds, and falling asleep instantly.

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A.N : A little bit late, as usual, but I'm sure it's still Monday somewhere in the world. I hope you liked it! Please, if you have any productive suggestions or critiscism, please let me know. I accept complements as well :D