Hello again! Sorry about that Patrick, last time I checked and it was right, but you're right, the chapter after this one had replaced chap 28! Don't worry about me taking offense, it's better that you tell me! I'm glad you like the story :)

Creelluka and Ash-Caro-Lyn, I should dedicate a chapter to you, you've been so supportive with your reviews! They're much appreciated! Creelluka I'm glad you noticed my little mirror trick ;) I was looking up Hogwarts passages, and then thought wait... Ash, your comment was pretty hilarious :D

Thanks also Winterlover6 and Daisy for reviewing! It means a lot! I'm so happy everyone is excited for Emma and Reg to get together, to be honest, I am too!

Without forgetting the followers/favouriters and readers in general, here's the next chap!

Five days later, Emma found herself practicing Shrinking Solutions with Lily Evans in Potions class. Ever since the incident with the Polyjuice Potion, they had struck up some sort of acquaintanceship - not quite friends, not quite not. There wasn't really much to do at the stage they were at, so they chatted amiably: Emma checked the time whilst Lily checked the heat. They mostly talked about schoolwork, carefully avoiding topics to do with Severus's broken friendship, James, or even the outside world. If she was honest with herself, Emma was uneasy around the Muggleborn. She was the polar opposite to the Dark Lord's beliefs and the statistics Regulus had found. Emma told herself that Lily was naturally talented, an exception to the rule, but she couldn't go deeper than that.

The reason they were working together was because most of their patrols coincided, and they figured that they needed to be able to work together. That, and Slughorn had decided that everyone switch partners at regular intervals. Merlin knew how James and Rabastan prevented their potion from blowing up; both were torn between pranking other students and sending each other death glares.

'Um... excuse me?' a third-year Ravenclaw knocked on the door timidly.

'You're gonna have to be louder than that if you want ole Sluggy to hear you,' Sirius cupped his hands and yelled.

"Ole Sluggy" was currently napping at his teacher's desk. He had thrown another of his little parties the night before, but things went horribly wrong when Peeves arrived and wrecked everything. The teacher had probably been up all night trying to set his office aright. The pigtailed girl pitter-pattered over to Slughorn's desk and cleared her throat.

'Excuse me, sir.'

'She's so cute!' Lily squealed in an undertone to Emma, who chuckled then gasped.

'Oh watch out! The potion needs three stirs counter-clockwise: it's started bubbling.'

Lily quickly scooped up the spoon and stirred, adding a sliced caterpillar.

'Wait a minute, it doesn't have anything about that on here,' Emma frowned, looking at her book.

'Just a little something I figured out,' Lily winked as the potion turned pink.

'Nice,' the Slytherin was impressed. Normally it should have taken an extra fifteen to twenty minutes to finish.

'Miss Potter,' Slughorn called.

Both girls turned around.

'It seems that you are required in the Headmaster's office. Ah, Miss Evans, I see that your potion is finished: as Prefect please escort Miss Potter. You are exempt from the remainder of the class.'

'Oooh look who's getting caught now, Padfoot!' James teased.

'She was in the Hospital Wing for a week, what can you possibly think she's done?' Lily hissed to him on her way to deposit their potion.

James looked as surprised as Emma felt, instantly shutting his mouth.

'Thanks,' she said to the Gryffindor girl on their way out.

'Oh, no problem,' Lily smiled. 'Any chance to tell that arrogant…ahem, your brother off. Do you know what Professor Dumbledore wants with you?'

'No idea,' Emma replied honestly.

Not quite honestly, said a niggling thought in the back of her mind, sending a spike of adrenaline to her heart. She squashed it like a bug, stowing the remains in the furthest recesses of her mind

It can't be that, she thought. There's no way he could have recognised me. Besides, they would have said something sooner...

'Well, we're here,' Lily announced. 'I can wait outside if you want...?' she offered tentatively.

'It's fine, Lily,' the Potter girl smiled at her. 'I'm sure you have better things to do and besides, who knows how long it'll take?'

But once Lily had gone, she had to pause, taking a few deep breaths and compartmentalising her feelings. The Occlumency training had been surprisingly useful when it came to this sort of problem, though she and Regulus hadn't tried the practical side of things since that fateful night.

'I can do this,' she said to herself. 'This is no different from getting James and I out of trouble when we were kids.'

But it was different. Before she panicked and gave herself away, she rushed headlong into the office.

'Ah, Miss Potter, there you are,' the Headmaster looked up from the smart man sitting in front of him. 'Please, take a seat. There's no need to be nervous.'

Emma obliged wordlessly, her eyes on the man next to her. He had short black hair, combed so neatly that even Regulus's looked messy by comparison. However, contrary to the Black boy, it was parted rather severely straight through the middle, as if someone had taken a ruler to it. His narrow, toothbrush moustache had undergone a similar treatment and he sat so straight and still that Emma made an attempt to righten her own posture, though she was by no means slouching. She was sure that she had never seen him before, and yet he looked oddly familiar. She was trying to place him when Dumbledore spoke.

'Miss Potter, this is Mr Crouch, the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.'

Emma nearly gasped. So this was the man she had heard so much about - both from her family and Barty. No wonder the boy felt starved of affection. Bartemius Crouch Sr. did not look to be the kind of person to play a game of rough-and-tumble Quidditch in the backyard. Instead, she forced herself to smile politely, before giving them both a confused look. An idea popped into her mind.

'Is this about my chosen job profession? Professor McGonagall said that we would be meeting somebody from the area in which we want to work. Though, with all due respect, I think you may have confused my application with my brother, James Potter's. He's the one who wants to be an Auror... sir,' she added that last word as a generality, not sure if she was coming across as rude.

'What is this, Dumbledore? Some kind of practical joke?' Crouch asked sharply. 'I don't have time for -'

With a look from the headmaster, his sentence died in his throat. Dumbledore turned towards Emma, a kind look in his eye, resting his clasped hands on his desk and leaning forwards.

'No, Miss Potter, this is about something far worse. It has come to the knowledge of the Law Department,' he nodded towards Mr Crouch, 'that there is a discrepancy between the statement of a victim and that of the self-confessed criminal. I realise that I am not making myself clear. Do you know of the attack on the Auror Neil Abbot?'

'Umm...' Emma managed to stammer out. Come on Emma, if you can handle talking to Voldemort, you can handle Barty's dad. Get some perspective. She frowned, pretending to think. 'I think I remember reading about it in the paper a couple of days ago. Is he the one with the Vanished arm?'

'It was disintegrated, as you well know,' Crouch's tone was almost accusatory. 'Mr Abbot gave a very distinct description of a sixteen-to-seventeen-year old girl with an English accent, long black hair and blue eyes. In fact, one of our investigators did a remarkable job on your portrait.' He shoved a picture of herself in front of her nose.

'But I -' Emma was temporarily at a loss for words. The aggressiveness of Barty Crouch Sr. had surprised her, though she shouldn't have been surprised considering his son's intensity. Luckily for her, Crouch wasn't done.

'He also mentioned an accomplice. Now, if you are being blackmailed or threatened, we need to know about it, but Hogwarts students can't just be whisked away from school, it is my guess that you came along willingly. Do you know what the punishment for such a heinous crime is?'

It was an intimidation technique straight out of the books, but it was successfully working on Emma. As she cast about for her alibis, the door burst open.

'It wasn't her, Professor! It was Sirius and me who did it, I swear! Emma's been in the Hospital Wing all week, just ask anyone! You can't punish her for - oh.' James went quiet as his eyes darted from Barty Crouch Sr. to the Headmaster to his sister. His earnest expression slowly turned into one of confusion.

'Relax, Mr Potter,' Dumbledore said, eyes twinkling. 'Nobody is accusing Miss Potter of the pranks you played this week, though I'm sure your Head of House would like to hear your confession.'

'Oh,' the Gryffindor repeated, unsure as to what to do. 'Well, I guess I'll just…let you get back to it, I suppose.'

And just like that, he slouched sheepishly out of the room, though Emma had no doubt that he was attempting to listen behind the door. Thank you James, she thought, breathing a sigh of relief. For once he was getting her out of trouble, instead of the opposite. He would have no idea what he had just done for her. The initial pounding of her heart had slowed, and she was able to resume her role as an innocent Hogwarts student with confidence, taking cue from her brother's behaviour.

'I'm sorry, Mr Crouch,' she said earnestly. 'But as my brother said, I was ill with the Firebug Flu all week. Your Auror must have been mistaken.'

'He has never been mistaken before.'

'There's a first time for everything, Mr Crouch,' Dumbledore said mildly. 'But don't you think that I would have noticed if one of my students went missing? Or her Head of House? There aren't that many students at Hogwarts, you know, and our entrance is well-guarded. Perhaps you have the wrong girl?' he suggested.

'Perhaps,' Bartemius Crouch conceded unhappily. 'My apologies for my brusqueness, Emma Potter, but in a war, there's no time to be lost. Perhaps my Auror was Confunded, though why the criminal would hide his tracks if he was to confess is beyond me.'

After a few more words to clear the mess up, Crouch swept up his documents and Flooed out of the fireplace, leaving as briskly as he appeared to have come. Emma turned to go, but Dumbledore called her back in. She slunk back towards the desk reluctantly and waited for what would come next.

'Miss Potter, before you go... Is there something you wish to tell me? Anything at all?' And he gave her a look that seemed to see into her very soul.

'Nothing, sir. Nothing at all,' she replied, perhaps a little too quickly. In any case, she had the distinct feeling that he knew. Don't be silly, a voice in her mind said. If he knew, then you wouldn't be standing here right now.

'Very well. Off you go then,' he said, turning around. As an afterthought, he turned and said with a wink. 'And tell your brother he needn't fear me so long as he doesn't turn up late for our meeting.'

As Emma had suspected, James was lounging on the staircase leading down to the gargoyle. As soon as he saw her come out, he pounced.

'What did Dumbledore want? Why was the head of the Magical Law Enforcement department there? What did he want with you? What was it about? Did you do something?' He jumped down the stairs backwards as she carried on walking.

'James!' Emma shouted, and her hyperactive brother calmed down. 'First of all, how did you know what Barty Crouch looks like?'

'I read the paper, duh,' James said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

'You, reading the paper?' Emma raised an eyebrow skeptically. James always announced that he had better things to do when their parents tried to get him interested in political affairs.

'Yeah, ever since that night when Dad came home talking about…' he looked around the corridor and dropped his voice, 'You-Know-Who…I decided it was time to get interested. I mean, aren't the people who stand by and do nothing just as bad as those who instigate the violence?' Emma fidgeted uncomfortably, but her brother continued. 'Anyway, that's when I decided I wanted to be an Auror - that you know - and well, I wanted to get to know the kind of profile that people looked for.'

Emma was impressed. She had been so wrapped up in her own affairs that she hadn't noticed her twin shift from the pranking jokester to champion of the people. Not that it surprised her; James had always been quick to defend his friends, and quicker to defend the helpless from a prank gone wrong. One of the reasons he got into trouble so much was that he always announced that it was him if an innocent bystander took the blame (something his Head of House had cottoned onto pretty quickly). Not to mention his almost aggressive protectiveness of her, his twin.

'Mr Crouch is looking for any leads on the case of the assault on an Auror,' she replied, knowing it would get out somehow anyway. 'Apparently someone who might know something looks like me.'

'But you were in the Hospital Wing!' James pointed out.

'Exactly,' Emma nodded. 'And here I was, thinking that the only person who looked like me in the whole of Britain was you.'

'Don't flatter yourself Ems,' James preened his hair. 'Everyone knows I'm the handsome one.'

She shook her head, laughing - partly out of relief. I can't believe that just happened. They continued on their way, the conversation veering from one subject to another, but steering clear of family matters. They parted as Emma turned left to Charms class and James right to Defense Against the Dark Arts.

It was only later that she realised she hadn't asked her brother why he had a meeting with Albus Dumbledore.

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