Author's Ramblings: Hello and welcome to chapter 7, which I am shockingly writing before I've even posted chapter 5! I may be ill, ah wellski, enjoy. Ski. By the way, I'm from Scotland, so the spelling is British, not American, as HP was originally intended. Oh! And I made up Crabbe and Goyle's middle names, and I have also just seen 'The Prestige' so that's where the stuff with Ron comes from (first bit), just as a bit of inspiration. Great movie, kinda freaky and sad though. I recommend it.

P.S. It has been pointed out to me that if Hermione is Head Girl they all must be in seventh year, and so the twins would no longer be at school. So, in an effort to put plastic sheeting on this gaping plot hole, I propose to you that the twins have sneaked aboard to sell their questionable products to innocent young children or they are there, like the teachers, to mysteriously supervise people. Pick your favourite, it doesn't really matter.

Disclaimer: I'm getting them for Christmas. I quite like the two ghosts I got with my own pocket money.

Yay for horntail07 who rocks the proverbial sock and chews through my leather-like 5:30 am writing like a foot with teeth. Where am I going with this? Honestly, I think I've lost it…probably in a large shoe...

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Mind: The Gap.

Chapter 7.

"Hey, does anyone know where that young Gryffindor went?" asked Lord Sylvester.

"Oh for Gods sake! It's not that hard, woman!"

"Flowerpot, flubberworm, fishnet-"

"You're talking a load of rubbish, do you see any of those things here?"

"-I say, has anyone seen the Potter boy?" Lord Sylvester said a little louder, trying valiantly to interrupt.

"Well I think you're making it up!"

"So you give up then?"

The duchess blew herself up to her full height (about 5'2", plus the few inches of floating space), puffing out her chest. "Neva! Fingers, frock-"

"Where is Harry Potter?!" Lord Sylvester practically screamed. There ensued the confused silence of the slightly indignant, and the just plain confused. The ghosts glanced around the compartment; apart from a stunned silent ex-Death Eater turned teenage boy and themselves, the place was empty.

"Where did he go? Did anyone see?" asked Nearly Headless Nick, who felt himself responsible for the boy.

He was met with a chorus of sadly shaking heads; The Bloody Baron's face set grimly.

"Well," said Darla, adjusting her skirts as she straightened and turned to the door, "we'd best go find him then." She marched in a lady-like way through the closed door. Then she poked her spectral head through the solid smoked glass pane that was the centrepiece of the door a few moments later. "Come on then!"

Lucius stared mutely at their retreating and slightly see-through backs. He narrowed his eyes, stupid spell! Why, for Merlin's sake, did they turn me into Neville?! And now why did they render me unable to speak and leave without me? The ghosts of Hogwarts are truly dim-witted…

"Maybe he went back in there? We've checked everywhere else."

Lord Sylvester peered through the sturdy iron door, a smoky hand at his brow. "I see… people, two of them… they look too large to be Harry though…wait," he patted at his dusty old jacket, stuffing frilled sleeves into his pockets, and at last he found an aged leather case. He removed a set of small round glasses from it and breathed on them, sending a shower of ghostly dust into the air, "If I'm not mistaken… that's a Slytherin uniform they're wearing… my they're big lads-"

"Let me see," said the Bloody Baron.

He peered in. "Right, those two are our guest's son's friends- or rather lackeys. Vincent Burswort Crabbe and Gregory Warrington Goyle."

"But what are they doing here? Shouldn't they be in their own compartment?"

"I don't know, and yes, certainly they should, I will be having a word with them when we reach the castle. However, now I think we should be looking for our young Gryffindor, yes? Before he has one of his famous 'adventures'?"

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The walls of the train swayed softly from side to side, outside, the windows were spattered with the insubstantial specks of drizzled rain that seemed almost a permanent fixture in dreary England. Ron rested his head against the cold glass and stared outside at the purple bushes and happily speeding countryside. Pin drops of rain blurred his vision in places, like tears.

Where can she be? How do you hide on a train where there is nowhere to go? What if she's jumped off? Ginny! Oh, where are you?

A door whooshed open, landing with a heavy click.

"You okay, mate?" asked the young Hufflepuff boy. Ron turned around, only to meet himself.

"Haha! Got you with that one!" laughed the boy, snapping his thumb and middle finger, making the clone disappear. The boy was missing his last two fingers. Before the replica vanished with a pop, Ron noticed the beginnings of a very alarmed and disturbingly terrified expression on his face. He shivered.

"I've been practicing that one for ages," grinned the boy, shoving on a pair of black leather gloves. "Come in, come in… let me see," he tapped his chin, "Weasley? Rob – no – Ron."

Ron looked astounded. The boy giggled and ran his good hand through his short, dark hair. "It's a knack- not a spell though, so don't go trying to copy it! And I'm not telling how I do it either, a magician never reveals his secrets."

"Huh? What's a magician?"

The boy bowed and straightened, holding a top hat and cane in his hand where they had never been before. "I am a Master of Illusions! The greatest you have ever seen!"

He placed the hat at a jaunty angle on his head and saluted with the cane, twirling it in his maimed fingers with skill and accuracy. Then he removed the hat, freeing, to Ron's astonishment, a beautiful white dove.

"Thank you! Thank you! And now for my next trick!" said the boy, spinning his cane slowly. Before Ron's eyes the hat and cane disappeared on the upward rotation, as if the cane had opened a magical portal into another dimension and vanished. The boy reached up to Ron's still ear and twisted his fingers in a deceptively slow manner that Ron could only see out of the corner of his eye. He pulled back with a red rubber ball in his two fingers. Laughing, he bounced the ball on the worn carpet, once, twice, three times. Then he threw it in the air, higher, it seemed than the ball could possibly go in an enclosed train. Ron looked up, and time slowed. Suddenly, the boy was behind Ron, and Ron could feel his breath on his warm skin, cold.

"Go now. Your sister is not here, but hurry, hurry little swallow, don't get caught in the cage," he whispered. Ron blinked as his eyes blurred, like rain drops, like tears. Before he collapsed, in the tilting, confused world, he heard light, child-like laughter, and glimpsed, just as his eyes closed, another boy, with glasses and sandy hair, holding out his hand, two fingers missing, and catching the ball as it fell.

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Lucius rotated the unfamiliar jaw as he felt the power of speech return to him at last. Now, he was disguised, against his will admittedly, but disguised all the same, and alone. God knew where that blasted Gryffindor had gone, probably gotten lost or something, and those blundering spectres weren't coming any time soon. So, he was alone. And bored.

He stood up on too short legs that were much more wobbly than was entirely necessary and proceeded at a stately pace out the door. The corridor was empty as far as he could tell, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway, he thought, what's unusual about Longbottom walking down the train? Nothing. He walked.

In a compartment just beyond the one Malfoy had walked out of, two large Slytherins gaped at each other as they heard, in a low disgruntled muttering, "…but that has to be the only benefit of this disguise, why Longbottom? Anyone, well almost anyone, I would have preferred to this demeaning form. Ooh, if only the Dark Lord could see me now…"

To find nothing at all in the baggage compartment and then suddenly this? The Slytherins smiled, Draco would be pleased indeed.

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"OK guys, I couldn't find Ron or Hermione, so we'll just have to hope he doesn't try anythi- where is everybody?" he asked thin air. He stood in the doorway of the now empty compartment, all but leaves and a stray petal or two on the ground, and looked around.

"Oh bugger."

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"We're lost."

"No, no, we've been walking in a straight line this whole time, we can't be lost."

"But we are."

"We are not, look, those blue curtains look familiar to me."

"That's because we passed them five minutes ago, we are lost."

"How- oh never mind, come on, we'll find him soon enough."

The four ghosts floated along in silence for a few more minutes, partially invisible, like a moving cloud, leaving behind only a slight patch of cold air hanging in the corridor. The walls of the train swayed in their well-remembered rhythm, and the blue-carpeted floor rocked gently underfoot. Faded red curtains, bar the odd blue set, framed large windows, outside of which rolled the countryside, grass and trees and purple heather. A group of cows or horses or sheep would, at irregular intervals, whiz past. The sun was getting low, casting the fields in an easy grey glow; it looked cold outside.

"I spy with my-"

Daring Darla pinned the Gryffindor ghost with a stare that could prove dangerous around dry wood and newspaper. "Wai," she said in a heavily put on English accent, "shall not be haiving anai of that, naiw will wai?"

Nearly Headless Nick stayed silent and nodded, carefully.

"That's what I thought," she said, her voice returning to its usual lilted drawl.

"I- I say, is that Granger? What's she doing outside a broom cupboard?" said Lord Sylvester, pushing up his small round spectacles, which he had forgotten to take off. "I always thought she should be in my house, you know, such a smart girl…" He looked around, only to find the others had already floated off to meet her.

"Hermione! So nice to see you, you'll be pulling in the points this year I hope," said Nearly Headless Nick, tipping his head politely.

"Sir Nicholas? Baron, Duchess?" She looked up to where Lord Sylvester stood, a little away from the group, "Lord? What are you all doing on the train?"

Profound silence. It's a fallback for many.

"Just…well…yes…um…quite…" Sir Nicholas rubbed his hands together, rattling a few raggedly remaining chains, "well, what are you doing, young lady? Shouldn't you be in your compartment?

"Yes, but you see sir, well, Neville's been having a bit of trouble."

"Longbottom? He's here?"

"Yes, in the cupboard behind me, he's been hiding."

"What's he hiding for, we got him a disguise and everything- well, open it up, we'll get the rascal to the headmaster."

Hermione looked confused, "What? No, I've been guarding him, you see there was this plant-"

The door flew open as the Bloody Baron stared at it, revealing a scared and dusty Neville to the world. "Whu- what's going on, did you get Ginny?"

"Rrrrright!" The Duchess took charge like a bull at a red flag, "We told you to stay in that compartment mister, what are you playing at? What if someone discovered you and you got arrested, or worse, killed?! Luci- I mean, Neville, come out here right now, we are going to the headmaster, and where is Harry?"

Neville froze, "Arrested, killed? Harry? Hermione?!"

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Ron was not a lucky person, he knew. Between the red, hair, the temper and the humiliatingly paralysing fear of the eight-legged, and the fact that he'd just woken up in an unfamiliar part of the train, he knew. But how hard could it be for an ordinary guy to find one girl in what was essentially a really long room? Apparently harder than people credited. He knocked on another door, hoping to all that was magic that it wasn't full of weirdoes again.

Laaaaaaaaa, sang the door as it opened by itself. Small furry creatures flew out, twittering and playing tag in the air. Inside, there was a meadow of unnaturally green grass, and perfect trees, cut into the shapes of bunnies and cats and mice and unicorns and-

"Bugger this for a laugh," said Ron and slammed the door shut. The small furry creatures stopped playing tag and looked at him incredulously, and one pink one turned with a 'pop' into a beautiful maiden, with golden locks that shimmered down her back with waterfall grace. Her skin was like that of a porcelain doll, smooth and flawless, her eyes striking and crystal blue in this ocean of creaminess. Her lips were set in a perfect pout, pink and inviting. She wore a long shimmering, light blue dress that showed off her supermodel curves tastefully, and pooled around her delicate ankles like liquid silver.

She turned into a hideous goblin, with warty green skin, a forehead like a sledgehammer, and the body of a, well, you can imagine. She pounced on Ron, the remaining furry creatures turning into various weapons on the way. Ron whipped out his wand faster than you could say 'haahaa, so that's what all Mary Sues are like on the inside', and stunned her, which for some reason made her explode into a thousand second class stamps that popped themselves when they hit the ground.

Ron put his wand away and walked down the corridor, trying very hard not to think about, well, anything really. It was for the best.

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Lucius wouldn't have dared admit to it, but he felt that, maybe, just maybe, he shouldn't have left the compartment. Not only was he, well might be, just possibly, not really, a bit, lost- but he was sure he was being followed.

Not that he knew it, but in his nervous state he looked much more like Neville than even Neville. The fear radiated off him in waves, understandably, as he was likely to be one of the following, if he wasn't careful: arrested, given the KISS, tortured, killed, or, worst of all, thought to be the real Longbottom and have to spend the next year pretending to flunk school. He didn't like his options, and was now regretting greatly his decision to stowaway on what proved to be the craziest train this side of the tracks. And someone was following him.

There was a creak of old floorboards under worn carpet. Invisible feet pitter-pattered across the train, and no matter where he turned and twisted, Lucius could not find his disconcerting pursuer.

There was silence for a few moments, and the absence of sound only proved to make him more nervous than before. And who knew, when he caught the slight huffs of breath nearer, nearer, that you could get even more nervous when the sound returned?

Lucius quickened his pace, and when he thought he heard the sound fading behind, he darted into an empty compartment and shoved the door shut, stopping just short of slamming it, so as to make as little noise as possible. Sighing with relief he sagged and slid down the door, eyes closed. After a while, he opened them.

A curious-faced red head girl peered into his eyes, much too close for comfort. In fact, she seemed to be crouching on top of him, pinning him down. Her head tilted to one side in what would be an endearing manner if Lucius hadn't been in such a state of shock. And then she grinned, and he caught a glimpse of shining teeth and glowing eyes before she threw herself at him, knocking him to the floor.

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Author's Ramblings part the second: Hope you enjoyed it, I know, the Ron stuff is getting a bit random, but it's fun to write, so you can't stop me! (waves stick) Reviewing is a fun form of writing too (insert smiley face that fanfiction won't allow to come up)

This is Squibakou signing out.