A/N: And this is where the fun begins! For this first prank, I got inspiration from the 2003 movie Cheaper By The Dozen. Anybody who's seen the movie will see what I'm talking about. ;)

Enjoy!

Chapter 2

Bite Worse Than The Bark

"See? He's a good boy, yes he is," Abby cooed to Nigel.

The little girl was crouched beside the Greyhound in question, who had his tongue hanging out and was panting heavily. Abby was rubbing her left hand along the dog's side while her right was holding onto his leash. Hermione, meanwhile, was patting his head. This action was causing Nigel to gaze up at her with accepting eyes.

Hermione liked dogs, and she could tell Nigel was indeed a sweetheart. In the time since Abby had brought her outside, Nigel warmed up to Hermione instantly, with a few licks of her hands and cheek serving as proof of that. Was there any member of the Weasley family who wasn't so welcoming?

"Hey, Hermione, can you hold his leash for a minute?" asked Abby. "I'll go get one of his toys and we can play Fetch with him. I think I see a ball under that tree." She pointed towards a tree that was just a few steps away.

"Sure, not a problem," Hermione replied as Abby handed her the leather leash.

Abby quickly ran over to the base of the tree and knelt down.

"He sure seems to like you, alright."

The sound of Ron's voice behind her caused Hermione to turn around and see him and Jack approaching her.

"It seems to run in the family," commented Hermione as she scratched Nigel behind the ears, something the dog visibly took pleasure in.

"Where's Abby?" asked Jack, his eyes darting all around.

"She's over there getting Nigel's -" Hermione stopped once she noticed that Abby had vanished from the spot she'd been in only moments before. "Well, she was right there ..."

"Don't worry, she probably just went behind the tree," said Jack as he walked in that direction. "I'll get her!"

This left Ron and Hermione alone, discounting Nigel.

"You, Jack and Abby really seem to be hitting it off," remarked Ron.

There was a note of slight surprise in his voice that Hermione picked up on without even having to pay full attention. "You seem surprised at that. Why? Am I so hard for kids to get along with?"

"No, it's just that those two have never really been ... so quick to warm up to new people."

Hermione arched an eyebrow. "Meaning ...? They seem lovely!"

Ron shook his head dismissively. "Forget about it. It doesn't seem like something you should worry about, anyway. Listen, Uncle Albert and Aunt Gwen only took half the day off so they could be here to greet us. So that mean after lunch, they have to go into work for the rest of the day. And it'll just be us, Jack and Abby all that while. I told them that'd be alright."

"Why wouldn't it be?"

Ron looked relieved to hear this. "Great! Well, Aunt Gwen asked me to help her in the kitchen. I suppose I don't need to ask if you'll be alright if I left you alone with Jack and Abby?"

Hermione smiled, kissed him and playfully pushed him away. "Go! We'll be fine!"

Ron grinned at her and headed back into the house.

Hermione went back to petting Nigel, who now appeared to be getting restless. Hermione glanced up at the base of the tree, and her stomach dropped slightly when she saw that Jack had now disappeared as well. "Oh, Merlin," she breathed as panic started to overtake her. "Jack? Abby? Where did you go?" she called out. Hermione looked around at the expanse of grass and trees, but saw no sign of the young Weasleys.

Gripping Nigel's leash tighter, she began to guide the Greyhound forward to the tree. "How could I lose them?" Hermione berated herself.

But Hermione's panic was short-lived.

Without any sort of warning, Nigel's ears perked straight up and he stared intently ahead of him. He also stopped in his tracks.

"Nigel? What is i-"

But before Hermione could finish the question, Nigel took off running in the direction he'd been looking. That wouldn't have been so much of a problem if Hermione hadn't still been holding onto the dog's leash.

Since she was, Hermione was jerked forward once the motion caught up through the leash, and the force of the action was so strong that it literally propelled her through the air slightly.

"WHOA!" she exclaimed in the midst of her brief moment of flight.

Hermione also let go of the leash while she was still in midair, which let Nigel run free after whatever it was that had gotten his attention. Unfortunately for her, though, Hermione's landing wasn't pleasant. She belly-flopped face down right into a sizeable mud puddle that had been leftover from a rainstorm two days ago. Hermione made contact with the brown muck with an audible grunt and squelch.

A moment of shock passed before Hermione dazedly raised her face from the mud and she was immediately met with the sight of Jack and Abby standing in front of her, each of them wearing shocked expressions.

Jack moved his hand away from his pants pocket as if he'd just put something away. "Oh, wow! Hermione, I'm ... so sorry." But he was clearly trying not to laugh.

She couldn't blame him, though. As Hermione raised herself up on her hands and knees, she took stock of her current appearance. The front of her cream-colored blouse was now dark brown, as was the front of her jeans.

Abby whistled with her fingers, which made Nigel come racing back to where they were in an instant. He wasted no time in licking a good bit of mud off of Hermione's face.

"Eugh, Nigel, don't lick that!" Abby chastised her pet.

Hermione slowly got to her feet and looked down at herself once again. From the front, she appeared to be a mud creature, with not a clean area to speak of. Only the back of her clothes remained spotless. It was a sort of icky Yin and Yang image.

"You should use Scourgify on yourself, Hermione," suggested Jack.

Hermione sighed. "No, I think I'll just wash off in the shower and be fresh for lunch."

"Again, we're sorry Nigel did that," said Abby.

"It was just an accident," Hermione concluded. With that, she turned around and trudged back towards the house.

Once she was gone, Jack and Abby grinned widely and low-fived each other.

"Phase One of Operation Meat Nigel complete!" Jack crowed. He took from his pocket a dog whistle, which he admired triumphantly for its successful use only moments earlier. "Everything's going perfectly. Now onto Phase Two!"

"Good boy, Nigel!" Abby said to the dog as she rubbed the side of his head.

Hermione had the same thing to say to Ron, Albert and Gwen about her appearance that she did to Jack and Abby: "It was an accident." After proceeding upstairs, quickly washing off her hands so she could retrieve a clean change of clothes as well as a Muggle hairdryer from her bag and going into the bathroom to strip off her muddy attire, Hermione stepped into the shower and gratefully let the flow of warm water wash away any residual muck. She reasoned that she shouldn't be too upset at Nigel, partially because he didn't know what he'd been doing and also because it was she who had let go of the leash too late. This incident could be chalked up as "no one's fault."

During her shower, Hermione thought she heard the bathroom door open for a moment, and when she poked her head out to look she noticed her dirty clothes were gone.

Someone must've just taken them to clean, she thought.

Hermione took a bit longer to finish her shower in order to make sure she was extra clean. By the time she was done, the water had started to turn cold. She took a minute to dry herself off and changed into the clothes she'd left on the sink counter. Then came her hair.

Like his brother, Albert Weasley shared a fascination for anything Muggle. He had even taken the time to learn about electrical outlets and had them put into his house. That meant Hermione could use her hairdryer from home without any trouble. Every once in a while, she liked to be able to still do a few things "the Muggle way."

As she was running her hands through her now-dry hair while looking in the mirror, there was a knock at the door.

"Come in!" Hermione called out.

The door cracked open partway and Ron stuck his head inside.

"Lunch is ready!" he announced as he took in Hermione's clean state. "Perfect timing, too, it looks like."

"Yeah, I'll be down in a minute. Hey," Hermione said before Ron closed the door, "did somebody come and take my other clothes?"

Ron nodded. "Yeah, Jack and Abby came in and got them and gave them to Aunt Gwen to clean. She said she'd prefer they get a 'proper cleaning.' Anyway, they promise they didn't see anything," he added with a wink before closing the door.

Hermione rolled her eyes at his joke and gave herself one last once-over while straightening out her dark green top. Satisfied, she exited the bathroom and went to her room and made a beeline for her bag that was sitting on the bed. It was her intention to retrieve her wand and place it in her pocket like she always did in magical settings, but there was one problem: her wand was nowhere to be found.

"What the ...?"

Hermione spent a few more minutes looking through all the compartments, but still came up empty.

"Hey, are you coming or what?"

"Do you know where I put my wand?" Hermione asked Ron, who was standing in her doorway.

"Why?"

"Because I can't find it. I swore I packed it." She resumed searching.

"Well, I'll help you look after lunch," said Ron hurriedly. "Now come on, while the food's still hot." Whenever food was involved, there was no arguing with Ron Weasley.

Hermione sighed deeply, looked one last time at her bag and joined Ron in the hallway. They went downstairs and into the kitchen, where Albert and Gwen had just finished organizing plates of chicken, sandwiches, fruits and dessert tarts.

When Gwen laid eyes on Hermione, she smiled. "You clean up well!"

"It's better to be thorough in cases like the one I just had," Hermione smiled back as she pulled out the seat at the end of the table and occupied it. Ron took the seat immediately on her left.

"Again, I apologize for Nigel," said Albert with a shake of his head from his seat at the other end of the table. "Sometimes he gets too excitable. He must've seen a rabbit or something."

"Really, apart from some muddy clothes, it's fine," reassured Hermione. "Nothing that can't be fixed."

Albert smiled back. "Now, then, where did Jack and Abby wander off to? I swear they're late for everything," he said while chuckling.

"They went to put Nigel in his crate in the other room," answered Gwen as she sat to the right of Hermione.

"We're back!" proclaimed Abby as she and her brother tore into the kitchen and hopped into the chairs on either side of their father.

"Well, now that we're all here, let's dig in!" Albert announced cheerfully.

Everybody did just that, helping themselves to whatever they wanted. The first ten minutes of the meal passed with normal conversation made. But that soon changed.

After Hermione finished a few sips of pumpkin juice, there came a crashing sound from somewhere in the house, followed by the sound of claws rushing against hardwood floors. Everyone paused and watched as Nigel, obviously free from his crate, bolted into the kitchen and maneuvered his way under the table.

Hermione barely had time to register what was happening before she felt Nigel's face in between her legs. He was growling and furiously nibbling at an area of Hermione's body she did not want a dog to be nibbling at. Shocked, she abandoned her food and tried to push Nigel off of her.

"Get away! Get away!" she said desperately. It was starting to get very awkward and uncomfortable.

"Nigel, stop!" Ron commanded, but the dog persisted.

Everyone's attention was now focused on the confusing incident, but Jack and Abby were the only ones finding any humor in it. They had their fists pressed to their mouths to suppress their laughter.

Nigel's attack was so forceful, it was causing Hermione's chair to wriggle violently. It finally became so strong, that Hermione tumbled out of the chair and was momentarily free of the canine. She used the chance to scurry across the floor, but her reprieve was only short-lived. This time, Nigel's teeth found something to clamp onto: Hermione's upturned butt.

"YEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOUUUUUCH!" she yelled out.

As Nigel continued to shake his head and retain his toothy grip, Ron, Albert and Gwen leapt to their feet and all swarmed down on the Greyhound. They started to try and pull Nigel off Hermione, but he had a firm hold.

"GET. HIM. OFFFFFFF!" Hermione pleaded.

All the shaking eventually made Nigel relinquish his hold on Hermione's butt, but the fabric of her pants stayed in his mouth. It was then that Hermione heard the last thing she wanted to hear.

The sound of tearing fabric.

Hermione could feel that Nigel had finally been hauled off of her, but with it came a sudden draft down below. The only sound now was unrestrained laughter from Jack and Abby.

Hermione cautiously turned her head around to see that Ron, Albert and Gwen were all awkwardly looking anywhere but at her. It was no secret why, though.

Nigel had torn off not only the seat of Hermione's pants, but also those of her underwear as well, providing for a clear view of a sizeable portion of her butt.

Hermione squealed in embarrassment, scrambled to her feet and ran off to her room to find replacement pants. After she'd left, it took a good minute for the stunned Weasleys to recompose themselves.

"Let's put him outside!" ordered Ron. Albert and Gwen nodded their agreement and together, the three of them pulled a still-struggling Nigel out into the backyard.

Now that they were alone, Jack and Abby let the rest of their laughter out unfiltered.

"Operation Meat Nigel accomplished!" declared Jack happily. He shared a high-five with Abby.

"That was great!" Abby said between laughs. "Did you see how Nigel ripped part of her pants off?! That was priceless!"

"Oh, there's plenty more where that came from!" grinned Jack. "Trust me, the fun's just beginning!"

Like Jack said, this is just the beginning! So imagine what ELSE they have in store for Hermione.