CHAPTER 15-THE BOTTOM FALLS OUT
Albus said, "Get ready" as he handed out floo powder and told them the password. Then he reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a handful of infirmary port-keys and handed a couple to everyone. Stick these on the kids and tap them. They will bring the person they are attached to directly to the infirmary.
One at a time they floo'd to the Malfoy Library, much to the surprise of a group of kids who were busy searching the place.
The adults were standing on one side of the Library and the kids on the other, staring at each other in shock.
About that time they heard rumblings coming from out in the hall. They were to soon find out that a group of Death Eaters had arrived, when one of them cursed the door with Confringo, sending it flying into the room in splinters.
The Adults attached the port-keys to as many kids as they could reach and tapped them as quick as possible. When the door was blown off its hinges, they threw the remaining kids to the ground and behind furniture and tried to protect them as best they could.
Albus stupefied the first Death Eater coming through the door but the second one made it in and hid behind the desk. Lupin was near the bookshelf where a couple of the kids were hiding and threw up a shield charm around them, but that left him vulnerable and the Death Eater hit him with the 'Furnuncular' spell. He was miserable with the boils but it didn't stop him from protecting the youth.
The battle continued and the Death Eaters realized they were out numbered and losing so they started disapparating out. The adults were still busy with their priority being to tag the teens and port-key them out, while fighting off the Death Eaters.
There was one left who by chance, grabbed Harry by the hair. No one wanted to chance sending a hex into Harry and just stopped in their tracks.
About that time the floo set off again and Cassy tumbled out. She was the last person in the world that anyone expected to see at that moment. She sat up, looked around and saw a bad man with a mask on trying to hurt her Harry.
Before anyone could even comprehend she was there she jumped up on a chair in front of the bad man, tore off his mask and punched him in the nose, yelling, "Don't hurt my Harry!"
Things happened fast and simultaneously after that. Alice grabbed Cassy and dove for a space behind a wall of books. The Death Eater dropped Harry. Albus, Lupin and Arthur all aimed their wands at the Death Eater. And finally, the Death Eater, who now had no mask 'Disapparated'.
Lucius Malfoy was gone.
The adults said not one word. They tagged the remaining children and tapped them, sending them to the infirmary.
They then, not wanting to spend anymore time there, just in case more Death Eaters arrived, went to the fireplace and floo'd to the infirmary. There they found Madam Pomfrey was busy pulling pieces of door splinters out of some of her patients, applying bandages to others and handing out potion to others.
NO ONE SAID A WORD.
The kids knew it was best to keep their mouths shut, and the adults were afraid of what they might say. It was a very quiet infirmary, even though it held a large population at the moment. The only sounds that were heard were a bit of crying and Poppy giving directions to her patients.
Once everyone was sorted out by Poppy she took Albus aside and gave him a report. "There are no lasting injuries and I have been able to heal all the minor stuff. Everyone should be fine and without pain within the hour. From what Minerva told me, I would hazard a guess that my status report will quickly change" and as she said this she looked at the students.
"I would hazard a guess Poppy that you will be correct once again. With your permission I am going to send them to their corners so that each side can cool down, well, at least the adult side needs to cool down, before we all sit and talk this out.
"That is probably a good idea Albus" replied Poppy, looking at the anger on the faces of the Adults.
"Alright everyone" said Albus. "Children, I want you to go to your dorm, go to bed and stay there. Do not come out for any reason until you are told to. I will have the House Elves bring food to you. We will deal with you tomorrow."
"The rest of us will go up to my office where we can have a drink and cool down. We also need to talk a bit before we hit the sack" he added.
Nobody argued. The Kids knew they were in big trouble and the adults knew what Albus said was wise, they were all too angry to deal with the situation right now and needed a 'time out' themselves and a good nights sleep.
The kids silently left the infirmary, with their heads hanging. The Adults let them go.
Alice looked at Albus and said, "Cassy is already asleep so I will put her to bed and call a House Elf to watch her then I will be up."
The adults then started walking toward Albus' office, each deep in thought.
When the kids arrived in the common room there were sandwiches and juice waiting for them. "This is our last meal, you know that" said Draco.
Ron was nodding his head in agreement and added, "We are definitely dead, big time dead!"
"How did it all go so wrong?" asked Hermonie.
"I wonder where this rates on the punishment scale?" asked Harry. They all looked at him like he had lost his marbles.
"This one isn't even on the scale Mate" replied the Twins.
Harry turned pale and said, "I'm not very hungry I think I'll go to bed" and with that he left the room toward the dorm.
None of them said a word and one at a time they started going off toward their beds.
The adults nibbled on their sandwiches and sipped their drinks in quiet.
"How in the world did Cassy get there?" asked Minerva.
Alice took a deep breath then said, "It would seem from what I could understand, she overheard them talking about using the floo in the room behind the Great Hall. She figured they were going somewhere fun and wanted to go along but wasn't invited."
Alice looked at Albus and smiled then said, "She swiped some floo powder from Grandpa, watched the other kids and then just mimicked what they did. She had no idea where she was going but it was an adventure. She will be punished but I will worry about that after we take care of the perpetrators of this fiasco."
Albus looked at his floo pot and said, "I guess it's time to move it up a bit higher.
"When I think about what could have happened I just want to explode' said Severus.
Molly and Arthur seemed to be at opposite ends of the spectrum. Molly was ready to kill them all for risking their lives like that, and Arthur wanted to know why they were there.
Lupin had a pretty good idea why they were there but wanted to wait until the kids could speak for themselves. Even if he was right it wouldn't change the outcome much. He was sure they would not forget tomorrow for a very long time.
Albus cleared his throat and said, "Usually we are concerned with the discipline of one or two students for this and that. This is different in that we have ten and a half kids all in trouble for basically the same thing. I know you are all accustomed to taking care of this sort of thing yourselves but I feel it's important that in this situation we all are on the same sheet of music."
All of them nodded their heads in agreement. Then Molly asked, "What do you have in mind Albus?"
Albus smiled and said,"The easy part of this is that I think we can all agree that a memorable spanking is in order but we can divide the labor up a bit and throw them a surprise. It's using their 'all for one and one for all' philosophy against them."
"I really feel it is important that blame is not thrown in the direction of any one child so it would be a good idea to punish them all at the same time. When they all come back together they will all have experienced the same thing and all will feel equal in the misbehavior."
"Arthur and Molly would be worn out if they had to take care of all their kids and we have a couple of kids who do not have parents in residence and we cannot contact them."
Albus continued, "Harry and Draco are special cases but they can't be left out without damaging them and the group. They have bonded to Severus and he is the one who needs to handle them."
"Molly you know how to deal with Ginny but perhaps it would be wise to have you deal with Hermonie also. I know you can be tough and they are friends who can complain together when it's over."
"Alice you know how to deal with Neville and if you are willing perhaps you can take responsibility for Luna also since her dad is off God knows where this time. She needs to be punished with the rest of them but she also needs to feel that the person cares about her."
"Arthur, you have had Remus discipline the Twins before so that would not be a new situation and it would leave you to deal with Ron and Percy."
"Severus and I were talking the other day about increasing the training time for the students to help them get in shape and be able to defend themselves. Tonight probably proves that this might be a good idea."
"Alice I have seen you out on the grounds many a morning running around the lake. When I asked you about it you said that the morning fitness routine helped you to stay in shape for dueling. Perhaps you wouldn't mind ten kids who are probably out of shape, joining you?"
Alice smiled and said, "Not at all Albus, in fact it would be good for them to work on their fitness a bit. They don't get much exercise and the exercise they do get seems to be for the wrong reasons. They will have to be out on the grounds at six in the morning."
Molly started laughing and Severus even cut a smile on that one.
"GOOD, GOOD, GOOD, "said Albus. "That would be for the whole summer.
"I am thinking we can add three weeks detention on top of that. Detention to be served during their play time. Minerva and I will put together some creative detentions. They are not tasks made up just for this occasion but need to be done each year before school starts."
"To give you all a break I think it would be acceptable to assign Flich to supervise them during these detentions. He would not be allowed to harass them, to punish them or touch them in anyway, just to be there and report that they followed directions and completed the assignment. He would love it and they would hate it I am sure."
"Since they will all have sore bottoms I know that Severus has about ten barrels of nasty things that have to be cleaned and pickled before school starts. Since you sit on hard stools at a table to do it I figure it would be a very good task for their first couple days. And since Filch would be watching, you wouldn't have to be there Severus."
"Then there are things such as mucking all the animal cages or 'Thestral' stalls for Hagrid."
"Professor Sprout has a huge crop of Mimbulus Mimbletonia ready to be harvested. It produces stinksap and smells like rancid manure. We keep some of it but if we could harvest them all then we could sell some of it to help out on the student party budget."
"I hear the green houses all need cleaning, plants trimmed, and a lot of replanting to be done, much more than Professor Sprout can handle by herself."
"Hagrid needs to spend a couple days in the forest picking Unicorn Hair out of the bushes. He uses it for animal bandages and also sells some of it to buy exotics."
"OH, there are a million and one nasty tasks we have to do around her that nobody thinks much about."
"Like I said, I don't want to overstep my boundaries but what do you think?"
"Sounds like a plan to me," said Arthur and Molly nodded with smiles on their faces.
Severus nodded yes, as did Alice and Lupin.
"Good, then we can meet with them right after breakfast in Minerva's classroom and share with them the good news."
"Remind me not to get on your bad side" said Alice, laughing.
"Oh, I didn't think of those things, Minerva did, she is the one you have to watch out for" said Albus with a twinkle in his eye.
"Now for the good news" said Minerva.
With that announcement, those who had begun to stand, sat back down with question mark looks on their faces.
"Severus, you were looking for a reason to take over guardianship of Draco were you not? asked Minerva.
"Yes" replied Severus.
Minerva smiled and said, "Out of all the madness tonight Cassy accomplished what we didn't think could be accomplished. When she pulled the mask off Lucius face he virtually lost his rights to Draco. All we need to do now is testify and show the memories and Fudge will not be able to do much about it."
They all smiled, thinking about a little six year old girl punching Lucius Malfoy in the nose.
With business done they all excused themselves and went to try and grab a few hours sleep.
When they were gone, Minerva walked over and kissed Albus. "You did a wonderful job. They came in here ready to kill those kids and left with at least a smile on their face."
"Yes, I think they are just realizing that Voldemort being back will change a lot of lives, including their children's lives. Do you still think they went over there to get something on Malfoy so Draco wouldn't have to go back home Minerva?"
"Oh yes, they are very bonded and I am sure they decided that we didn't care enough to make sure he was never to be returned to his father. Someday they will learn to trust us but not today." said Minerva.
Breakfast the next morning was a very quiet affair. The students had been informed to join with the adults in the Great Hall then meet with them in Professor McGonagall's class room.
As each of student or adult finished they left for the class room and eventually everybody was there. The chairs had been set up so that they were facing each other.
Lupin surprisingly started off the discussion by asking the students to explain to them why they were at Malfoy Mansion, adding, "You each know how your parents or your teachers feel about lying so I would strongly suggest that you stick with the truth, unless you want lying to be added to your list of indiscretions."
If no one else knew, Draco and Harry knew and they saw the look in Severus' eye. They figured it was going to be bad enough without adding more to it.
The kids had voted Hermonie as their spokesperson and she began to explain to the adults all the reasons why they felt they had to secure information against Lucius so that Draco would not have to go back to that abusive place. She told the truth in how they managed to floo out of Hogwarts and how they were able to floo into Malfoy Manor.
Her presentation was clear and full of good reasons for their being in that situation. She never mentioned anything about knowing where the Order was meeting.
Given the circumstances all they could hope for was that the adults would take pity on them because they were trying to help a friend who was in desperate need.
When she finished, Remus asked if they wanted to add anything to what she said and none of them did.
Albus then started speaking. "Did you all really believe, after all we did to secure Harry and Cassy from their abusive situations, that we would allow Draco to go back to his father? The kids just hung their heads.
Albus continued, "Did any of you come to us and share your concerns? No, not one of you did. If you would have asked we could have told you that we were working on it and whatever it took, Draco would never be turned back over to that man. What we were trying to accomplish was to keep it out of the court system because of the influence that Lucius Malfoy has with the ministry."
"Did any of you stop to think that Lucius didn't get to be as strong as he is by being stupid. The minute you entered his house uninvited the wards went off alerting him. If we had not arrived when we did, you might all be dead right now or worse."
"On top of that a little six year old girl decided she wanted to join you on your little adventure and could have very easily been killed or worse, sold again into slavery."
"You not only disobeyed us, you put yourselves, a little girl and all of us into mortal danger last night. You didn't think about the consequences of your actions and now you will be held accountable for them."
"Is there anything else you might want to share with us?"
By this time a few of the kids were already crying, and the rest were hanging their heads and checking out their shoes since they were too embarrassed to look the adults in the face.
"I want you to remember that while we are all very disappointed in the choices you made we are not disappointed in you and we have all the faith in the world that you will, in time, learn to make better ones. We love you all very much, and we want to watch you grow up and have your own children, and enjoy your lives."