The Great Hall had only a few people in it when the Gryffindors all arrived, but it was all the sixth years. Both the Slytherin babies were crying. Blaise Zabini was holding his group's baby at arm's length, clueless as to what to do. His teammates, Pansy, Daphne Greengrass and Malfoy, were all looking irritated. Pansy was shaking her head, which was resting on her hand. Daphne was sitting a few seats down talking to Malfoy admiringly, holding their pet Knarl's leash.
A Knarl looks like a hedgehog, but is very distrusting. Knarls are known to attack people or people's property if you try to feed it anything. They obviously didn't do any research; Malfoy had a large gash on the side of his face.
The second group composed of Millicent Bulstrode, Crabbe and Goyle, looked very hopeless. Goyle was trying to get his baby to stop crying by making faces at it. The poor baby just cried harder. Crabbe looked as if he was sleeping and Millicent was sitting there, arms crossed and face only showing anger towards her group and their new creature.
Their little pet resembled a lobster, although it was gray with green spots. It was a Mackled Malacaw. They are supposedly very unlucky beasts, a single bite giving bad luck for about a week.
The Hufflepuffs had seven sixth years, so there were two groups; Hannah Abbott, Susan Bones, Justin Finch-Fletchley and Ernie Macmillan was one group and Zacharias Smith, Megan Jones and Wayne Hopkins was the second. Hannah was humming to her sleepy baby and Megan Jones was simply holding her own. Ernie and Susan were playing with their Kneazle and the second group's Hippogriff was standing outside.
Kneazles are little felines, with large ears, a lion-like tail and a spotted coat. They can lead its owner home if he is lost and can even act like a living Sneakoscope, detecting suspicious characters when need be.
The Ravenclaws were the least numerous. There were only four of them. Terry Boot, Mandy Brocklehurst, Anthony Goldstein and Padma Patil were there together. Their Jarvey was wearing a muzzle, being held by Terry. They had what looked like an overlarge ferret, but they have the ability to talk. Jarveys usually only say short, rude phrases that annoy and insult people.
Padma seemed to be hogging the baby, playing with the little girl with her back to the others. She only looked up when the Griffindor group entered to wave at her sister.
Parvati waved back, "Hey Padma!" and she headed towards her.
"Hi Parvati! Aren't the babies cute?" Padma cooed. "This is Natasha!"
"I got a girl too! She's Jamie."
"Parvati, come on! We have to go sit down!" Lavender called.
As soon as the Gryffindors sat down, Dumbledore stood up. The Heads of Houses were sitting at the teachers' table, waiting patiently.
"I trust you've all met your babies and settled yourselves into your homes. If you have any problems, don't hesitate to ask your Head of House." He glanced over at the Slytherin table before continuing. "You will be mailed assignments by owl every Saturday. You will store the finished assignments in the cupboard under your stairs until the end of the project. Your babies will age slightly faster than normal. They will age one year for every month that passes. Your Heads have given instruction on birthdays. Are there any questions?"
Hermione shot her hand up right away. "Professor, how will we be graded on this project?"
"You will be graded on how well you take care of your baby and creature, if you have one, how well you keep your house, and if you succeed in completing your assignments. Your grade will lower if anything major happens. For example, if a child gets hold of a wand and receives injury, you will be penalized. Yes, Miss Patil?"
"What will happen to the babies at the end of the project?" Parvati asked. "Can we keep them?"
"This is the first time we gave this project. We will see if it's worth continuing. If we continue this project, you must give the babies back. If not, you can buy them from us. You can buy them in France, however, if we do continue the project. No more questions? Very well. Tuck in!"
Every plate along the table filled with food as other students came in and took their seats. Pansy and Millicent stood up immediately and went to talk to Snape.
"Professor, Blaise won't let me take care of the baby! He keeps saying he knows what to do, but…" Pansy said, looking at Blaise trying to calm the baby by rocking him way too hard.
"Who chose the teams? Crabbe and Goyle cannot take care of a baby! Look at Goyle! He's scaring the poor girl!" Millicent cried hysterically.
"Calm down, girls. I, personally, don't know how to take care of babies, but I trust you both can. I will talk to them so that they give you two your respectful babies."
Back at the Griffindor table, Ginny had just sat down. "How's the project going, Ron?"
"It's not as bad as I thought, being a project and all…"
"I told you, Ron! What did I say? I said it wouldn't be boring, didn't I?" Hermione teased.
"Yes, Hermione… Ginny, do you want to come see our house?" Ron said.
"Sure. Halloween's next week, you know. We're going to have a ball, do you guys have costumes?"
"I need a costume!" Amari whined.
"Don't worry, we need costumes too. We can all go! It'll be like… a family outing!" Hermione said happily. She was really getting into the mood of this project.
"That's so cute!" Ginny said. "You guys are like a family, aren't you?" it wasn't really a question. Ron's ears looked like they were going to catch fire – they were very red. He was thinking about Hermione being a part of his family. Although he wasn't going to tell anyone, he liked the idea.
"Harry! Help me for a second, would you? Caleb's got my hair!" Lavender cried. The little boy had a very firm grip on Lavender's ponytail.
"Caleb, hey, let go…" Harry practically sang, trying to pry the baby's little fingers off Lavender's hair without hurting him. Finally, her hair was free.
"Thanks, Harry! I don't think I'd be able to take care of a baby alone without you, you know…" Lavender said, blushing.
"So, Amari, what do you want to be for Halloween?" Amari asked sweetly.
"Umm… What are you and Ron gonna be? I want to match you!" Amari asked them both.
"I haven't thought about it, really…" Ron answered honestly.
"Maybe we can be royalty?" Hermione suggested.
"Oooh! Like the king of the jungle! Ron can be a king lion, you can be a queen lion and I can be the little baby princess lion!" Amari said with a twinkle in her eye.
'Do I have to?' Ron mouthed to Hermione.
"We'll put that on the maybe list, okay? We'll see if we can find anything else." Hermione said to try and dissuade the little girl. "What about the three bears? We're only three, but we can take out Goldilocks…"
"Yea! I can be baby bear and you can be mommy bear and you can be papa bear!" she said, pointing at Hermione and Ron accordingly.
"Sure, It's better than-"
"Ron!" Hermione warned.
"It's better than… anything I can think of…" Ron was going to say it was better than the lions, but Hermione didn't want him to hurt Amari's feelings.
"Let's make him a little bee!" Lavender begged. "Please, Harry? It will be absolutely adorable!"
"If we have to, but I'm not going to be a bee!" Harry countered.
"You don't have to – we don't have to match Caleb… But I want to be a bee too. You'll just be the outcast!" Lavender was trying to persuade Harry into agreeing.
"What? Oh, fine… but nothing too bulky or embarrassing!" Harry caved.
"You two sound like a married couple, bickering like that!" Parvati joked. "We're all going to be characters of the wizard of Oz. I'm going to be Dorothy, Neville's going to be the Scarecrow, Jamie's going to be little Toto and Seamus and Dean are still fighting over the Lion and the Tin man. We're going to be great!"
"Why am I the Scarecrow?" Neville grumbled.
"You were nominated and everyone agreed. You didn't seem to mind…" Parvati answered.
"And anyways, the Scarecrow is in search of a Brain!" Dean bugged him. "I'm the Lion, Seamus is the Tin man, by the way."
"So, when's the next Hogsmeade trip?" Hermione asked Ron after their meal.
"I think there's one next Saturday…"
"But that's the day before Halloween!"
"Well I don't choose the days!" Ron said angrily. "It's not my fault! We can just ask McGonagall if we can go today or after classes sometime this week, okay? No need to get your knickers in a twist!"
"Fine. I'll go ask, you take Amari home, okay?" She stalked away without waiting for an answer. Ron stared at her, frowning.
"What's wrong Amari?" Ron asked Amari, who looked extremely frightened.
"Don't be mad at Mommy!" she started to cry.
"Mommy? I'm not mad at Hermione! It's okay, shh," he tried to comfort her.
"When Mommy and Daddy are mad at each other they're really mean… Don't be mad at Mommy, Daddy!" Ron was really confused. She had never called him 'Daddy' or Hermione 'Mommy'. She was really repeating what she had so many times when her real parents were fighting.
"It's alright, I'm not mad! Here, let's go home, we can plan out our costumes, okay?" Ron picked her up and continued walking. She nodded and buried her face in his shoulder.
"Where's Hermione?" their door asked. Apparently, she could hear and see everything that went on inside her room, so she already knew their names.
"She's gone to ask McGonagall a favor… Are Harry and Lavender here?"
"They're opening the assignment, you'd better go see!" Ron merely nodded and carried Amari through the front lawn and went into the living room. Sure enough, Harry was unraveling a letter from the leg of a school owl.
"Hey, Ron. What's wrong with her? Where's Hermione?" Harry asked.
"Hermione's going to ask permission to go to Hogsmeade before the actual trip this Saturday to shop for Halloween costumes." Amari was sleeping, so he laid her down on the couch. "Amari's okay – Hermione and I had a little argument and Amari's parents – according to her – are 'mean' when they're mad at each other. She thought we'd be mean and she even called me 'Daddy' and Hermione 'Mommy'! But I assured her everything would be okay."
"Aww, poor girl…" Lavender sympathized.
"Well, might as well read the assignment…" Harry changed the subject. "It says: To Gryiffindor group A, you must make a Confounding Potion with ingredients from inside your property. Signed, Minerva McGonagall"
"A Confounding Potion? I've never heard of it! If we don't know what it is we can't make it! He could've at least given us a book reference!" Lavender panicked.
"Hermione might know, we can ask her when she gets back." Harry comforted with an arm around her shoulder. She smiled at him and rested her head on his shoulder.
'Awkward…' Ron thought. This was a situation that he could tell he shouldn't interrupt. He picked Amari back up and brought her upstairs.