Disclaimer: Splish Splash Applesauce . . . let's see if anyone else remembers that shall we?

Lies, Damn Lies, and . . .

"I'm back," Luna announced. "And I had daddy print off some new master copies."

"Thanks, Luna," Hermione said. "You've been a big help."

"I always being helpful Hermione," Luna said seriously. "For example, if you ever find yourself frustrated, and unable to find a way to relax. Then I'm always willing to lend a hand… or a mo…"

"I'll keep that in mind," Hermione interjected quickly.

"That goes for you too, Harry," Luna said happily.

"Thanks, Luna."

"Now then," Luna said as she began unbuttoning her blouse, "The Teen Witch office should be closing soon and I…"

"What are you doing Luna?"

"Taking my clothes off," Luna replied as if it were the most natural thing in the world. "Can't you see? Harry, make a note to take Hermione to an opti-mage to get that checked out please."

"Why are you taking off your clothes, Luna?" Hermione tried another track.

"Because I intend to help you and Harry break into Teen Witch's offices," Luna said in exasperation. "It's not like either of you have any experience doing this sort of thing."

"And you do?" Harry asked.

"Daddy says that there are a number of skills a good reporter must master," Luna replied.

"How is taking your clothes off going to help?" Hermione asked through clenched teeth.

"Really Hermione, over three fourths of all criminals are identified by the clothing they wore when committing breaking and entering."

"Just a second," Hermione said in triumph. "Put this on Luna."

"One of your kinky sex outfits?" Luna said in excitement. "Does this mean…"

"No."

"But how are we going to…"

"No."

"Fine," Luna agreed. "Humph."

It seemed odd to both Harry and Hermione to have a third person along as they crept across the rooftops towards the Teen Witch offices.

"This skylight is above their printing room," Luna whispered to her two companions. Harry and Hermione nodded in understanding as they set to the task of removing the glass.

"How are the wards?" Hermione asked.

"Child's play," Harry replied. "Where do you think the master copies will be?"

"In the safe," Luna said as she walked over to the aforementioned item. "Twenty four, forty four, ten and open."

"How'd you know that?" Hermione demanded.

"It was easy to guess," Luna explained. "Twenty four was the age of the owner when she opened the business, issue forty four was on the newsstands exactly two hundred days ago, and ten is the number of fingers most people have."

"I…." Harry and Hermione shared a look of confusion. "Good work Luna."

"Thank you," Luna accepted her praise with a smile. "Would you like to switch the master copies now?"

"Done," Hermione said. "Let's get out of here." They quickly climbed back up to the roof and replaced the glass.

"Let's get home," Harry suggested. "I'm hungry."

"Can we have a Potato?" Luna begged.

"There is a place close to the apartment," Hermione added with puppy dog eyes.

"Fine," Harry sighed. "But you two are coming with me to help carry everything."

"Ok Harry."

"Love to."

IIIIIIIIII

"Another one?" the clerk asked in disgust.

"We just don't think the other candidates are dark or perverse enough," Healer Brown explained. "None of them ever attempted to kidnap Harry Potter for their own sick pleasure."

"The Dark Wizard Jeremy might," the clerk protested weakly.

"His followers might," Healer Smith corrected. "And even then, it's unlikely that they'd do what Snape was planning to do."

"You know what the man likes to do with Dragons don't you?"

"Yes… it was in the Prophet."

"So everything is in order then?" Healer Brown demanded. "We had everyone at St. Mungo's sign the petition."

"Before I file this, I want to be sure of one thing."

"What's that?"

"You're never letting the bastard out are you?" the clerk asked nervously. "It's just… I really don't want to take the chance of walking home late some night and running into him."

"We might bring him out of the hospital for fundraising events," Healer Smith mused. "But he'll be strapped down and drugged to the gills at all times."

"No chance of ever allowing him out into the public," Healer Brown agreed. "I'm afraid that his psychosis is much too deep seated to ever be completely cures."

IIIIIIIIII

"Something wrong Luna?" Harry asked, the girl seemed a bit more spaced than she normally did.

"Why would anything be wrong Harry?" Luna replied after a few seconds of silence. "Would you like to go shopping after this Hermione?"

"Shopping?"

"Uh huh," Luna agreed. "I hear that they have a sale on new books at…"

"Let's go, Luna," Hermione said as she grabbed the girl by the hand. "We don't want to be late."

"Can we get ice cream after that?"

"Sure," Hermione agreed. Luna blushed as Hermione led her out of the building by the hand. Daddy would be ever so proud when she told him that she finally had her first date.

Luna's shoulder was close to giving out when Hermione finally slowed to open the door to the bookshop. "Come on Luna, don't dawdle."

"Ok," Luna agreed as she popped her shoulder back into its socket. "Not so rough next time."

"Hmm?" Hermione looked up from a book. "Did you say something?"

"Ohhh, look at this," she said cheerfully. "Hmm."

"Right." Hermione picked up another book and began idly flipping through it.

"Don't bother with that book, Hermione," Luna said absently as she flipped through a book on cooking charms.

"Why not?" Hermione asked. "Cryptography could be a useful thing to know."

"That book isn't very good," Luna explained. "If you want something better, take the one with the red cover. It'll at least explain how to use magic in codes, for something better you'll really need to go to the muggle world."

"Wha… how'd you know that Luna?"

"Hmmm?" Luna looked up from her book. "Grammy's family was into codes."

"Oh… ok."

"It's how she met Grampy," Luna continued. "They were working on codes during the war, Grampy was a mathematician and Grammy had special permission to use magic."

"Your grandfather was a muggle then?"

"Uh huh," Luna agreed. "Why?"

"Just curious," Hermione replied. "Which side of the family was this?"

"Mummy's side," Luna replied. "But I'm still heir since there's no one else in direct succession."

"You can be heir to more then one group of family spells?"

"Of course you can," Luna said. "I'm heir to the Lovegood spells, mummy's spells, and my Grammy from daddy's side's spells… not that I'd want to use them."

"Why not?"

"Grammy was Grindelwald's chief enforcer before Grampy Lovegood convinced her to stop," Luna sighed. "It's so romantic."

"Let me guess, he took off all his clothes and chased her around until she finally gave up?"

"You've heard the story?"

"It was a lucky guess," Hermione deadpanned. "So what were your grandmother's spells?"

"Dark magic," Luna said. "I remember one that could shred souls, it's all icky stuff. But like Grammy likes to say, you never know when you might want to shred someone's soul so it's best to be prepared."

"She's still alive then?"

"She retired with Grampy and they live in a house in Spain," Luna said. "Do you want to visit them?"

"Maybe some other time."

The girls gathered up their purchases and headed to the cash register. "And how would you like to pay for these?" The clerk asked as he put the books into an expanding and magically lightened bag.

"Charge it to the Potter account," Hermione said automatically. "When is the new shipment coming in?"

"She's with you then Mrs. Po . . . Ms. Granger?"

"She is," Hermione confirmed. "Well, about that shipment?"

"Reprints in two weeks," the clerk replied. "New books won't arrive for another five I'm afraid."

"Why?"

We're ramping up for the school year," the clerk explained. "Unless it's a textbook, we're not going to have any new stock."

"I see," she sighed. "It can't be helped I guess, thank you."

"Thank you Ms. Granger."

"Come on Luna," Hermione said. "Let's go get that ice cream now."

"Yay, ice cream." Luna cheered. "Hurry up Hermione."

They walked into the shop and Luna made a bee line to the counter.

"One strawberry milkshake, two straws." Luna ordered with a bubbly smile.

"Two strawberry milkshakes, one straw in each of them." Hermione said firmly.

"Are you sure you can drink two all by yourself?" Luna asked in concern. "And even if you can, won't it all go to your thighs?"

"One milkshake for me then," Hermione corrected. "And one for Luna with two straws."

"Much better," Luna said in approval. "You don't want to loose your figure."

"I suppose not," Hermione agreed. She should have known, she really should have known.

"Hermione, I've got a question for you."

"What is it Luna?"

"What's an Acomoclitic?"

"A what?"

"It says here that Harry is an Acomoclitic and I don't know what that means," Luna explained. "I was hoping you would."

"What book are you reading?" Hermione demanded. "The Vampire with Hierophilia?

"I'm not sure what it's about," Luna admitted. "But they've got these fun little tests. It says here that I'm a Gymnophilic Gynonudomanic . . . I'm not sure what that means either."

"Neither am I Luna," Hermione admitted. "I can guess some of the meanings by breaking them down and looking at the roots, but . . ."

"Oh how fun." Luna clapped her hands together. "A chance to learn a whole new set of words."

"You like learning words huh?"

"Daddy says that a good journalist has to know a lot of good words and several of the bad ones."

"I agree," a woman said as she approached their table. "May I have a moment of your time Mrs. Potter?"

"Who are you?" Hermione asked bluntly.

"Morganna Halaman," the woman replied. "I own Teen Witch magazine."

"How fascinating," Hermione dead panned. "Don't you think so Luna?"

"Not really," Luna replied. "Why?"

"Forget it Luna," Hermione sighed.

"Ok."

"I came here to offer up my apologies," Morganna said with a smile. "I notice that my chief editor had dedicated a section of my magazine to his odd vendetta against Harry Potter. Upon seeing this, I immediately had him sacked and rushed out of my office in an attempt to stop the issues before they shipped, alas I was too late. Imagine my surprise to learn that the article in question had been swapped out at the last minute for one about 'he-who-has-bad-fashion.' I was quite pleased to find that my little magazine had not just declared war on the powerful Potter family, and even more pleased to find an informative article written in such a way that my targeted audience will read it."

"Uh . . . that is . . . well . . ." Hermione stuttered.

"Here," Morganna laid a sack on the table. "We're having to make a special reprint, the demand is so high that we've already sold every issue on the stands. This is your share of the profits, I'll send the rest of your royalties later."

"What?"

"Who else has the ability to go through my wards like they weren't there?" She asked in amusement. "Who else has the knowledge to write this article? And who else has the motivation?"

"Uh . . ."

"If it's not too much to ask, I'd really like more articles for this series."

"I can't," Hermione said quickly.

"Why not?"

"Because we both wrote it," Luna said with a dreamy smile. "Hermione provided the information and I rewrote the article for the audience."

"Ah, should have guessed. I thought it looked like your father's style."

"Thank you," Luna said primly. "We thought it would be good publicity for Hermione's upcoming book."

"I hadn't realised there would be a book too," she mused. "Tell you what, you two write another book in the same style you wrote this article and I'll talk to some people I know in the business. For now, could you please send me more stuff? It doesn't even have to be about the same stuff, just something."

"Hermione?"

"Ok," Hermione agreed.

"Thanks," Morganna said as she stood up. "I look forward to seeing more from you ladies, have a good day."

"Farewell," Luna said happily. "That was fun wasn't it Hermione?"

"We're published," Hermione gasped. "Do you know what this means?"

"That you're going to kiss me again?" Luna asked hopefully.

"No, it means that we're authors."

"And we might have a book deal," Luna added.

"That's right," Hermione agreed. "This is so mumph."

"I got tired of waiting for you to do it," Luna explained. "Oh it will be so much fun to write a few books together."

AN 01: There was a baked potato stand in Hiroshima run by Brits who told me it was common in the UK. Fairly good stuff, you'd get a potato and it would have tomato sauce or something on it, just the thing after a night of drinking . . . or before a night of drinking . . . or during a night of drinking.

AN 02: The ongoing list of people that contributed to this fic without whom, it would not have been nearly as good . . . one might go so far as to say it would be quite bad: nonjon, Ed Becerra, ausfinbar, David Wangen, neil.reynolds, dogbertcarroll, hattenjc, the caitiff, AlanP, Lone Wolf, meteoricshipyards, Shawn Pickett, Morris Rague, luinlothana, Treck, Drake, David Brown, Moshehim, Arthur Hansen, Marneus Calgar, Goblin214, Chris LeBron, khadon99, Freddie and everyone else on my yahoo group. They gave me scenes, ideas, and all sorts of other things. Tell me if I missed you so I can add to this list. Another thanks goes to meteoricshipyards who wrote the majority of the continuing adventures of the tentacle monster as well as several others. Anything I wrote on that sub plot was fairly minor so kudos. And still another goes to neil.reynolds who wrote a large number of scenes.