I don't own Hellsing or Harry Potter, and I'm not making any money from this.

Hermione woke up with a splitting headache. As she pushed herself upright in bed, it took her a moment to figure out where she was. Her room in the Gryffindor dormitory, she realized. But how she had gotten there, she had no idea. The previous night was a complete blur. She tried to focus on what happened, and memories slowly came back to her.

Mihnea Bassarab had caught them. Even without Connie knowing what they were doing, he still managed to figure it out. Maybe he had seen Harry and Ron coming back from the Slytherin dorms and followed them. Whatever it was, his actions were surprising. He hadn't left them there to figure out how to fix Hermione's unwanted animal transformation on their own, and he hadn't reported them to a teacher. He sat there on the floor of the girls bathroom for hours, working to find a way to undo the mistake she had made. The girl was beginning to understand why so many people found him intimidating. He had been so quiet as he worked. Only speaking when he had to. He wasn't mean or tormenting, but he wasn't particularly friendly either. Businesslike, she decided. His entire manner had been businesslike. Respectful, but giving off the impression that there were invisible boundaries only he could see that he wouldn't cross. When he did open his mouth to say something to any of them, there was something about his tone that commanded attention. And his eyes... it had to have been a trick of the low light in the bathroom, but they seemed so... vivid. A shade of green Hermione would swear straddled the border of being unnatural. Even when he was being polite it was still a bit nerve-wracking. Of course, the sensation could have been brought on by the confusion of a Slytherin not trying to hex them into oblivion or get them in trouble. That sort of thing tended to make one feel off balance.

He wound up brewing a new potion to combat the effects of the one she'd made. Apparently, even though her polyjuice had worked for Harry and Ron, she had added one or two ingredients a bit too early – which slightly changed it's properties. It was strange to her that he'd been able to come up with something viable in only a few hours. With the polyjuice potion taking a month to brew properly, she would have thought a concoction to negate it would take a week or two at the least. Bassarab's mysterious response to her concern was: 'there are ways to get around that'. The other thing that was strange was that the potion he made had knocked her unconscious the moment she drank down the amount he measured out for her. Hermione had never heard of a potion that did such a thing. All the ones she knew of took effect immediately without any side effects. But then, the Slytherin boy made it sound like an advanced, complex process, so there was a possibility it was something she hadn't encountered in her studies before.

Just what Bassarab's motivation was for offering assistance, she didn't know. However, one thing was certain: she owed him a huge thank you, and Connie and equally large apology. After everything he'd seen last night, there was no way the girl wouldn't have been filled in on all the details. She was probably going to be upset with all three of them for not telling her about it.

Hermione rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hand, then gave a start when she saw the clock. It was nearly seven in the afternoon! Good lord, she'd slept the entire day away. Supper would be starting soon, and everyone was probably already downstairs. She clamored out of bed to get dressed so she could head down.

The food was already laid out when she arrived. Three of the four house tables had been moved up against the walls, leaving a single table in the center of the Great Hall for everyone to use. So few students stayed at school during the holidays that there was plenty of room for all. Even the teachers shared the table with them. Hermione located her friends and walked over to join them.

"Hey, Hermione." Harry greeted as she sat down next to Ron. He peered around to make sure no one was listening, then lowered his voice to a whisper. "You look better without all the fur."

She certainly hoped she looked better. Hermione knew she felt better now that she wasn't covered in fur and suffering the awful sensation of needing to cough up hairballs. She watched as Constance elbowed the boy in the ribs.

"Shut up!" she admonished quietly. "Someone will hear you." Connie looked around herself, then turned her attention to her. "How are you feeling?"

"Better." Hermione replied. She bit her lower lip. "I'm... really sorry, for not telling you about what we were doing." she told her. "I thought..."

"I know what you thought." Constance interrupted, looking like she was more annoyed than truly angry. She studied her for a moment, then sighed. "I'm not going to say I'm not upset because it would be a lie. But it's over and done with now and there's nothing I can do about it. I'm just glad all of you are okay. It could have been a lot worse than it was."

Hermione inclined her head. Yes, it could have been. It felt weird to be on the receiving end of that sort of comment. She was usually the one who lectured others about doing stupid things. At least Connie was sensible about it. She glanced down the table. There were a handful of Slytherins sitting about halfway down, but she didn't see Mihnea anywhere.

"Has Bassarab not come down yet?" she asked. "I wanted to thank him..."

"I imagine he's still asleep." Constance replied. "He's a night owl, so he sleeps during the day when he's able to."

Oh, Hermione thought. Well, considering how late he'd been working with them, that wasn't surprising. She'd slept most of the day herself. Perhaps she'd run into him at another time.

The rest of dinner was spent discussing things that they didn't have to worry about others overhearing. Hermione was absolutely shocked to learn of Constance going out on a date with George Weasley. It didn't seem like he would be her type. She seriously considered pointing out how bad it could have been if they had gotten caught in Hogsmeade, but thought better of it. After what she and the boys had done, she really had no right to lecture her about doing something similar. Ron looked completely flabbergasted. Like he couldn't fathom how anyone would even think about dating one of his older brothers.

"Why?" he asked, looking extremely confused. "You always complain about them acting stupid in class!"

Connie rolled her eyes. "Doing stupid things doesn't mean they're stupid. They're actually extremely intelligent; they just don't apply themselves in class. And I honestly don't see what the big deal is. It was one date. It's not like I'm getting married or anything..."

"Married?" a voice questioned from their left. "Awesome! At least I'll get one sister-in-law I know I like."

Constance turned a bright shade of red as Fred deftly maneuvered himself between her and Harry. He slid an arm around her shoulders.

"I'm totally telling on you." he whispered in a mischievous tone.

The girl's mouth fell open, and she picked up her spoon to hit him on the head with it. "Don't you dare! I was being facetious and you know it!"

"Ow! Hey! You're supposed to beat up on George, not me!"

"Stop being an ass then." she replied with a sniff. "What are you doing down here anyway? Aren't you and George supposed to be working?"

Fred lifted a finger as if to give a speech. "Sustenance, Stryker! We need sustenance! Been up all night without eating a thing. I'm here to get supplies while George keeps an eye on the cauldron."

They're working on something? Hermione wondered. What on earth would they be working on during a break from classes? Even Harry and Ron looked confused.

"What are you doing?" Harry questioned.

"Inventing." Fred replied. "It's a serious business, you know. Our future livelihood depends on our success." he paused for a second and pulled something that looked like a toffee out of his pocket. He held it out toward Ron. "Try this."

Ron narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "What is that?"

"What, are you scared of a piece of candy?" his brother teased. "Just try it."

The boy still looked like he didn't trust him, but he slowly reached out to take the candy. After unwrapping the plain white paper it was wrapped in, he popped it into his mouth and started chewing.

"Huh." he said, pleasantly surprised. "That's not half bad. What is it?"

Hermione and Harry both gasped, their eyes going wide as blood started to seep from his nose. Not very much blood, to be honest, but enough to be noticed. Ron noticed their expressions and blinked.

"What?"

"Ron." Hermione said. "Your nose..."

His brows furrowed and he touched his fingers to his nose. When he pulled them away, he saw the red fluid for himself.

"What the bloody hell!" he exclaimed.

Fred studied him thoughtfully. "Well, that's not very impressive." he commented with a frown, as if trying to figure something out. "We'll have to change the mix."

Connie considered Ron's appearance. "You should add more Amaranth." she suggested. "It'll make the blood thinner so it will drip more."

"Oooooh... Good idea!"

Ron looked back and forth between them in shock, clutching at his nose in an attempt to stop the bleeding. "This was on purpose! What did you do to me?"

"Used you as a guinea pig, that's what." Fred replied. "I told you we were inventing things."

"Candy to make your nose bleed!" Ron asked, still upset. "You could have said something!"

"I could have, but then you wouldn't have eaten it would you?" his brother said smartly. "Nosebleeds are just the first ones we're working on. There's a whole list of other things we haven't started yet." he paused to point at Constance. "It was all her idea."

She made a face. "Actually, I just told George about the sorts of things that you could find in a muggle joke shop." the girl corrected. "They're expanding and improving on them."

Hermione wasn't quite sure what she thought of that. With the twins being the way they were, giving them ideas for more outrageous things to do was like opening a can of worms. But she couldn't really see the point of candies that caused nosebleeds. Why on earth would anyone eat such a thing?

"What do you plan on doing with them?" Harry asked, voicing the question that was floating through her mind.

"Sell them, of course." Fred told him. He made a sweeping gesture with his arm. "Imagine it, Potter. You want to give one of your mates a good scare? Find a convenient excuse for getting out of class? Get revenge on an enemy without getting caught? Just use one of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes!"

Constance coughed. "Wheezes?" she questioned, blinking at him. "That's the best you guys could come up with? Wheezes?"

Fred looked somewhat affronted. "What? It flows. And it's catchy. You cant say you wouldn't remember that name if you ever heard it. It's going to be our trademark! We've got a logo figured out and everything." He used his wand to conjure up a basket, then filled it to the brim with a selection of food from the platters on the table. "Got to run. Lots of work to do!"

With that, he pushed himself up from the table to leave. The moment Fred was out of earshot, Ron huffed.

"I am never taking candy from them again." he muttered.

Constance held out a napkin. Ron took it and pressed it against his nose. Once he was sure the bleeding had stopped, he gave her a look.

"You're helping them, aren't you?" he asked accusingly.

The girl shrugged. "They're doing all the major stuff themselves. I just told them I would help get the proportions right and keep track of their experiments. They don't write anything down, so someone needs to be a records keeper so they'll be able to duplicate the recipes they come up with."

"Jesus, Connie, you're just as bad as they are!" he exclaimed.

"What do you want me to do?" she asked. "Sit around for two weeks and die of boredom? It's interesting and it passes the time. "

She made it sound so innocent and innocuous. The last thing anyone needed was more mayhem around the castle – which those 'Wizard Wheezes' would surely cause if they were a selection of things similar to the nosebleed candy. But Constance had a point. Without classes to go to, it did get boring. Perhaps if she were involved, the twins wouldn't come up with anything that was too bad.

A.N: I imagine the only reason why Hermione isn't questioning how she wound up in her bed in the Gryffindor dormitories is because Mihnea used some kind of vampiric hocus pocus to make her and the boys forget about him being in there and erase any urge to ask about it later. Just so no one would go freaking out about a Slytherin boy being inside of her bedroom.

And all that money George won for pay for the date? He probably used most of it to buy supplies. They have a one track mind, those boys. God, I love them. :)