True to their word, Fred and George took every opportunity over the next week to scathingly humiliate Umbridge at every turn. The yet, by far, had been Thursday's prank, the night Harry and Ron had started their detentions. Fred and George had somehow enlarged Neville's toad, Trevor, to the size of a small horse, then dressed it in a pink cardigan and bow, with the result that it looked exactly like Umbridge. The fact that the pranksters had left Trevor sitting on the Staff Table at breakfast only increased the hilarity. Umbridge was becoming sp paranoid, she could barely walk down a corridor without trying to hex some completely innocent object, for fear that they would attack her, as two suits of armor already had.

While the pranks on Umbridge were enjoyable, and extremely satisfying, Harry and Ron were growing concerned about Operation Pink Flamingo. Nothing was particularly wrong on their end; surprisingly few people seemed to have paid attention to Mrs. Weasley's comment about him being jealous. The problem was that his and Ron's attempts to scare off the Ravenclaw, while working on him, were causing Ginny to dig her nails in deeper, and she was making a habit of kissing him whenever Harry or her brother were in sight. No one missed that looks on Harry's face when that happened, not even Ron, the only one who didn't seem to notice was Ginny.

Harry was trying to put these problems out of his mind, he was in the Room of Requirement, not for a D.A. meeting, but with Cho Chang, trying to make up for the date he would be missing on Valentine's Day. It wasn't as enjoyable as Harry would have thought, the only thing they were able to talk about together was Quidditch, and that could only last for so long. That was how Harry found himself on a couch, with Cho in his arms, snogging passionately. And he was bored! Cho's hands wandered down his back, her nails trailing down his spine. And all he could think about was to wonder if Ginny's nails were long enough to do that, because he was sure it would feel better if she did it. Unfortunately she hated him at the moment, and he wasn't exactly available.

Harry tried not to sigh, if anyone had told him at this time last year that he could be doing this, with Cho bloody Chang, and be bored, waiting to leave so that he could work on trying to break up and court Ginny Weasley, he would have sworn they were crazy, but here he was. Harry was toying with the idea that maybe he had only liked Cho because Cedric had, and he been jealous of Cedric. He seemed to be developing a habit of that, he just hoped he wouldn't have to watch Michal Corner murdered in order to date Ginny, though it would be worth it. It was really funny, here he was making out with Cho Chang, and he was thinking about almost anything else, if this kept up he would have to break up with Cho before long, which would simplify things anyway, apart from Cho crying. Which she did, a lot, before she started yelling at him.

Contrary to the last time Harry had kissed Cho, this time he was staggering back to the common room, feeling guilty, and shocked, but not confused at all. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, for once, but, as usual, he had no idea how to go about doing it. It might just be time to ask someone for help, but who could he go to with this? Ron? No, Ron would over-react, badly. Hermione? No, Hermione would certainly tell everyone, including Ron. Neither of his best friends could know about this, yet. Sirius? Yes, that was it. He had always been able to go to Sirius for help, why not now? The man had to have some experiance with women and, apart from finding the whole situation hilarious, would appreciate the correspondence. At the very least, it would give Sirius a laugh, and that was a good thing in Harry's book. He resolved to write to Sirius, right after he told Ron and Hermione about breaking up with Cho, their reactions would be fun to watch, although Harry foresaw a great deal of teasing in his future.

"Harry what's wrong?" asked Hermione as soon as Harry entered the common room.

"Oh nothing, I ditched Cho just now, but I'm not upset about it." Answered Harry.

He had been completely wrong about his best friend's reactions. Ron looked wildly amused, but not overly shocked, as Harry had thought he would. Hermione had the same smug look that Ginny had been giving him and Ron lately, and it made Harry wonder just how clever the cleverest witch in Hogwarts was.

If I ever do get to date Ginny, thought Harry, Hermione will never let me hear the end of it.

He was a little disturbed by Ron's expression, he hadn't thought Ron would catch on; after all it had taken Ron over four years to figure out that he liked Hermione, but it now seemed that Ron had figured out more then Harry wanted him to. He didn't want to risk his friendship, but he couldn't help the way he was feeling about Ginny right now, and he didn't want to. The whole situation was getting too complicated, too fast, he would have to slow down before things got out of hand, hopefully everything would work itself out in time.

"Harry what in the world have you and Ron been doing to Michal Corner?" Hermione was using her Prefect tone, which usually meant that he was in trouble.

"Nothing, why?" asked Harry, doing his best to sound innocent.

Harry had years of experience at lying, especially to yes or no questions, but Hermione was one of those people who always saw right through him when he was lying.

"Don't 'nothing' me; he's almost as paranoid as Umbridge, going around cursing random objects, afraid that they might jump him. I know it's the two of you doing it, Fred and George are busy with Umbridge, and no one else could pull that kind off and not get caught for so long."

Harry took a moment to think be fore answering.

"Hermione, I'm not going to lie to you." He turned away, letting her know that he was finished speaking.

She seemed shocked for a moment, but quickly recovered, and changed topics at the speed of light, trying to catch him off guard.

"Harry is Mrs. Weasley right? Are you jealous because he's dating Ginny?"

Fortunately, Harry had been expecting this question for some time now, and again he revealed how goof he was at lying, and proved, again, that he could not fool Hermione.

"No, Hermione, I'm not." It sounded entirely convincing, but Hermione was known for her tenacity.

"I mean first what happened on the train, then your little campaign against Corner, now you've broken up with Cho, who everyone knows you've liked for over two years. It all just seems a little suggestive."

"Like I said before 'Mione, I'm not going to lie to you." Hermione took the hint this time, as a grin spread across her face, a very smug grin,

"I knew it! And it only took you four years, congratulations! That's much quicker then I expected. You really should tell her you know, she'll ditch Michal in a heartbeat if she finds out that your secretly in love with her."

Harry gave a snort of disbelief at these words.

"Not bloody likely, she furious with me at the moment, more likely to hit me than anything. And don't even think about breathing a word to anyone, especially if they have red hair. I trust you to keep my secrets."

"Of course I wont tell anyone Harry, but you should." The conversation was apparently over, as Hermione headed up the stairs to the girl's dormitory.

Harry had hoped that Hermione wouldn't figure him out so quickly, but he should have known that he could long escape the notice of Hogwart's cleverest witch. She had told him she wouldn't say anything to anyone, but Harry's faith in girls, even Hermione, was not strong when it came to gossip. And if Hermione were tell anyone, Ginny would be one of the first to know, and Ron would not be far behind. He wasn't sure of, and didn't want to think about, Ginny's reaction, but Ron would absolutely kill him for this, especially given that Ron though Harry was helping him keep Ginny away from any boys, or any boys away from her. That fight would be ten times worse the Tri-Wizard Tournament, Hermione had better not tell anyone.

D.A. meetings were happening with increasing frequency, they were up to three times a week, as Umbridge steadily grew worse, and Fred and George reciprocated. Harry knew that meeting this often was risky, someone was bound to spot a pattern, but it was their only real resistance against Umbridge, the prank war didn't count. Besides, everyone was making remarkable progress. The problem was that Umbridge was giving out detentions like it was going out of style. Gryffindor's were the primary recipients, but the Hufflepuff's and Ravenclaw's were not spared. Harry had mostly been able to avoid them, but he didn't know how much more of his friends getting detentions for "Breathing too loudly" he could take. Umbridge knew exactly the effect she was having too, because every time she put one of his friends in detention, she would look right at him. The final straw came when Ginny staggered through the portrait hole one night, the back of her hand bleeding rather badly. Harry brought Fred and George up to the fifth year boy's dormitory for a prank-meeting.

"Gred, Forge, my dearly beloved pranksters, terrific job, I love everything you've done so far, and I could ask for more. That being said, I want more. That's why I'm returning this to you, and loaning you this."

If the twins were surprised at receiving back the Marauders Map, it was nothing compared to the shock on their faces when Harry handed them his Invisibility Cloak.

"Wow Harry, so this is how you three always get away with stuff, this is gonna be great, Umbridge wont have a clue what hit her."

The twins hurried from the room, already discussing possible pranks with their new tools. Harry hoped it wouldn't just make Umbridge go that much harder, but Harry had declared war, and war it was. He could take detentions and punishments himself, but he wasn't going to sit back and watch his friends suffer without putting up one hell of a fight.

Harry turned in for bed three nights later, dreading another dream, but giving it up as inevitable, they had been particularly bad this week. There was a heavy door at the end of the corridor, and Harry knew that he wanted whatever was on the other side of the door, but every time he would get close to it, something would wake him up. Tonight it was Ron shaking him violently by the shoulders.

"Harry, Harry, wake up, we have to check the map remember?"

Harry's eyes shot open at those words, how could he have forgotten, he and Ron had overheard Ginny telling one of her friends that she was going to sneak out into the castle tonight, and Harry and Ron wanted to know why. Not that it was hard to figure out. Harry had gotten the map back from Fred and George for the night, and he took it out of his desk draw.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

Lines of ink spread out across the parchment, drawing out the familiar map of Hogwarts, with the moving labeled dots that showed the positions of everyone in the castle. Most of the dots were in the house dormitories, Filch was prowling the corridors as always, and Dumbledore was for some reason in The Great Hall, but the only dot Harry was interested in was the one that should have labeled "Ginny Weasley". Should have, but wasn't, only her first name was visible, the "Weasley" was blurred out, as if the map couldn't make up its mind. Harry and Ron exchanged one confused look, and then turned their attention to Ginny's location. She was headed up to the Astronomy Tower, which was a common place for inter-house couples to meet.

A dot labeled "Michal Corner" was headed in the same direction, from the other side of the castle. It was the third dot, however, that made Harry decide to take action. There was no way that person was sneaking up to the tower to meet a girl, and it was not a coincidence that he was headed right for Ginny.

"C'mon Ron we've gotta move!"

Harry and Ron tore out of the dorm and down into the common room, through the portrait hole, and out into the castle. Harry knew they didn't have time to worry about sneaking around; all three people had a big head start on them. Once they had reached the sixth floor, ten agonizing minutes later, Harry checked the map again, and saw, to his horror, that the third dot had caught up to the other two, and Michal Corner's dot wasn't moving at all. Ginny's was trying to back away from the third which, Harry guessed, was holding on to her.

So Harry abandoned all pretense of caution and started running all out for the Astronomy Tower.

"C'mon!" he yelled at Ron, who was catching his breath against a wall. It only took a few moments for Ron to rejoin the chase, sprinting off towards his sister.

Ginny Weasley was scared. She hadn't been this scared since her first year. Michal was stunned and the person who had done it was looking at her with pure evil in his cold, grey eyes. Ginny knew that she wouldn't beg or plead, it wasn't in her character, but nor would she lat down and surrender either, if only she had her wand. She took another step backwards, trying to buy more time, to think, for someone to come to her rescue, anything, but it was too late.

Harry fairly flew down the corridors and around corners. More then once his momentum carried him into walls, and Harry knew that he had at least a few bruised ribs, if not broken ones. He had been sprinting for almost another ten minutes, but he continued to run on, energy born of necessity fueling him, fear for Ginny sustaining him. Nearly there, he told himself, only down this hallway and around the corner. Harry shot around the last corner, and stopped dead, panting hard, disgust etched onto his face, wand in hand.

Ginny was probably even more scared now then she had been in The Chamber of Secrets, this was worse. She prayed for someone, anyone, to find her, for Filch to show up and give her detention, anything to stop this from happening. She could feel rough hands holding her down, hot, rancid breath on her neck. This is really happening, her mind told her, and Harry's not here to save you this time. Ginny wasn't sure why she would have expected Harry to save her, it was the middle of the night after all, and Harry had no idea she was out of bed. She forced her mind to think of something else, anything else, as her shirt was ripped open, and she felt his hands touching her. Ginny closed her eyes, resigned to the fact that she was about to be raped, and that there was nothing that anyone could do about it.

Harry took less then a moment to think, any more and he might have lost control of himself. He could cast a nonverbal Banishing Charm, but he felt that a stronger spell was called for. He watched Ginny's eyes fly open at his shouted incantation, as her attacker flew off her and into a wall. Anger started to build up in Harry as he saw Ginny's torn clothes and tear-stained cheeks. The violently red figure marks on the pale skin of her chest were making Harry want to kill someone, and he didn't care who the boy's father was. But she needed him now more then he needed to punish her attacker, he was at her side in an instant, wrapping his arms around her, as she cried into his shoulder.

Ginny couldn't believe it, he had done it again. This was twice now that she had been in an impossible amount of danger, with no means of escape, and her whereabouts completely unknown, and yet, somehow, Harry had managed to save her again. She herself, for the second time in her life, pressed against Harry, crying her eyes out while he comforted her. She had no idea how he had even know she needed rescuing, let alone where to rescue her, but she would worry about that later.

Ron came hurtling around the corner, not sure if he should be relived by what he saw, or concerned. Harry was holding his baby sister, she seemed to be alright, at least physically, but she was crying her eyes out. Well, that was understandable given the circumstances. Ron knew he should go and help them, but his mind was changed as soon as he saw who was lying, unconscious, across the hallway. Harry seemed to have noticed too, because he walked Ginny over to Ron, placing her in his arms, and then turned his want on Ginny's attacker. The only word his best friend spoke was one that Ron had never expected to hear from Harry Potter, and one that chilled his blood, because he knew what it must mean for Harry to be using that curse.

"Crucio!"