Helltanz's notes: this chapter was notably complicated by writers block, and parts of it are hardly my best.
-scene break-
Fred did a few last minute checks over his preparations. He and his brother were running awefully low on time. Easter break was nearly upon them, and of course with Easter here is was time to spread a little Holiday Cheer, in their own special way of course. Naturally this meant pranking. His brother flashed a thumbs up and flicked his wand as dung bombs lifted up into the air over the archway of the hall.
McGonnagal was still going on about how they should be acting, but really they thought about how she was acting. So it was time to strike back, hit the snakes without even being on sight. For all that the Headmaster was wise, and old he was still going on about House uniting in times of strife, and how the school needed to do the same. Well he was proving half right the houses were uniting in a time of strife, but it didn't look like the school was going to follow any time soon.
The thing about this prank was that it was ingenious. It was time delayed, the Weasley's were going to back off after they finished setting up. Then they go off, the charms would trigger when the conditions were met, during the break. It was a craft bit of spell work for sure, and Fred was sure it'd catch the optimum number of Slytherins in the prank, because after all this hallway lead straight to the dungeons.
"We're done here, its all set." George remarked finishing the last bit of spellwork application to the last set. No body would be looking for spell hidden stuff, and people hardly looked up anyway so it was the perfect surprise.
Fred nodded, "Lets get out of here then," The two headed quickly away and back towards the safety of the areas of the castle around Gryffindor tower. For all the daring that the fighting, and attacks by the snakes there had been no attacks around their dorms. At the same time of course there had been no attacks at the Slytherin dorms either. They'd considered pranking the entrance, but even with the maruaders map it'd be too risky to try and set something up.
The twins looked around, no one else was around for the minute when the approached the portrait of the Fat Lady that lead into the Common Room, and thus up to the dorms. They'd passed a couple of the upper years, who were free from class 'patrolling'. The prefects, Percy more than others, were considered unreliable or stooges at best in the present situation. So Richard along with some of the others had organzied 'Pride Patrols' or some such. It was meant to give a warning if Slythering mounted an attack, which was nonsensical to begin with, but it at least let the older years look like they were doing something proactive.
Fred grunted the password, and the two jumped through the portrait hole. Inside things were a lot busier than outside. The teachers had assigned a lot more work, maybe even more so than normal to try and keep people busy over the break. Of course the break would say how things would play out of course.
The twins laughed as they safely settled by the fire. The snakes would never know what hit them once it went off. The tweaks to the Marauder developed control charm was only a minor improvement, but it prevented any unwanted interfence from the other parts of the prank. There was no way the snakes would be able to dodge the trap. They'd been extra careful to test everything before hand on the spellwork. It'd taken most the past month to tweak the spell to get it the way they needed it. If this worked well they could use this same framework of spells to prep better, more impressive pranks. Still paying the Slytherins back would be a good first test run.
"Where have you guys been?"
It was Lee Jordan who was asking, and the two looked at each other, "No where in particular." Fred remarked, "Someone looking for us, Lee?"
"No, nothing like that." He remarked, well no one but him. Lee had crushed whatever small part of him didn't like the way things were playing out. He'd been glad Gryffindor was doing well in Quidditch there was no denying that, but there was a voice in the back of his head nagging him that all of this was getting out of hand. "No, I just wanted to talk to you."
-scene break-
Harry gasped, his face was flushed from the burn of energy, and all the magic spent. It had been both exhilirating, and exhausting as only the expenditure of so much magic could be. He'd never teleported that far, and if he didn't need to go back he wouldn't plan on doing it any time soon. His head was pounding all the same from the blur of magic. He knew he'd need a minute to get himself straightened out, maybe sit down.
It was a miserable wet and rainy day in Surrey unfortunately, not that Hogwarts would really be that much better weather wise. He'd sent Petunia a letter earlier in the week, surprisingly she'd responded fairly quickly, but then again he'd basically said he was going to stop by for grocery shopping. Of course her response hadn't been at all what he'd expected, when he had arrived in the backyard with his shopping list.
There was a doctor waiting a Privet. A shrink, a pyschologist, or psyichiatry Harry wasn't sure which of them the man was, of all things. It took some effort not to loose it, the notion of psychology bothered him on a more basic level. Of course then the guy had started talking and that had made things easier, and harder at the same time. Petunia, and Vernon wanted little part in the man's discussion, as to be expected, but the news he brought regarded magic. The news was not the kind of thing that he'd expected to here. It was the kind of news that was going to tie him down for hours longer than he expected. Of course Petunia hadn't wanted to wait, but the trip itself had left him panting and out of breath for nearly an hour.
It was Dudley of all people who broke the silence after Harry had gotten back with his aunt from the grocery store. "So one of your wi- you know friends went to a head doctor?" Dudley could show some tact when he needed to, he also knew that his dad did not want the word wizard uttered in the house. His cousin took to munching on a bar of chocolate as he waited for a response. Petunia had bought Dudley plenty of sweets when they'd gone to the store.
"So it seems," It didn't make any sense to him either. Alex had never seemed the type, but then again they'd gone their separate ways well over a year ago, and supposedly that had been when the other had started getting treatment. "I," Don't know was what he wanted to say, all this had him at a loss this wasn't something he could explain. "Its got some importance," There had to be something important, he refused to believe something like this wasn't important, just like the book. It had to be a clue it had to be.
This was all Harry's opinion of course. The shrink really did think he could, and did want to help with the situation. He also knew that he had wandered into a situation where there was something completely out of control in play; magic. He lost his chance to help the first one. The first one had gone and unleashed a fire that burned through anything it touched, but he did have a clue. The first one had said he was going North, and he'd been obsessed with the Norse, and vikings, and the legends of Scandinvaia. It wasn't the best lead he had to help his patient though. His best lead had led him to back track to Surrey. Everything he'd shared with Harry he honestly hoped would help come to a solution.
Harry had burned, melted a tin cup into charred and blackened piece of slag after gtting the news. It didn't make any ruddy sense. Myths were always a big thing, but some of this wasn't making a whole lot of sense. All of this kept diving further into the muggle things, and yet Alex was now supposedly going off to look for magic far to the north.
Then there was the constant warnings from the Centaurs as well, never mind the Death Eaters. The message was still clear that Mars was getting brighter. All the astronomy classes had noticed it already, and the weirdness had already prompted the crazy divination teacher to start making appearances regularly at meal time where she prattled on about doom and gloom. Unfortunately the crazy bat might have had a point. Harry wasn't looking forward to heading to dinner as a result, as the weirdo rotated between eating and rambling on as she wandered around the great hall. She been rambling on aobut cursed magics, and black wings, and doom, doom, doom, doom, and more doom waiting to befall the wizarding world.
It wasn't as if the clue of the book had been bad enough, now this. There was no telling what kind of weird ideas talking to that muggle shrink had put in his head. The image of that gold and black trefoil was held tightly in his mind's eye. His toes curled in his shoes reflexively, the warning for nuclear material. He'd kept the book in the bag, but he'd asked about it. Asked the shrink at least about what it could mean. He really didn't like the possible answers. So for the moment he was going to ignore it. It was a choice that he made that he would regret down the road, but for now it was his choice.
He had the food, and fresh paper, and plenty of pens amongst other things for school. He had everything hed' come to get and more. He'd even found a book on gardening at the local mart, which probably wasn't going to be that helpful but it was another option to try. Not that he really expected orcs to like eating tomatoes... but that didn't really matter. Harry collected everything he'd bought, and focused his magic around him. He had decided to make two trips, he'd teleport with half of the supplies for the castle distribute it, and come back to number four, and then repeat. When he was done he'd rest for an hour, and then teleport back to Hogsmeade. He figured the magic absorbing materials in his clothing had probably played a major role in exhausting him the first time, which wouldn't be as much of an issue this time.
-scene break-
The thing about break was that it was supposed to be relaxing. That had gone at the window when the professors had decided to heep so much work on them. This however, this was pure chaos undiluted uncontrolled melee. Some people weren't even bothering to throw spells anymore and were just throwing fists or even books. The problem though was the people who could still display the good sense to use their wands.
Some of that was just sparks, mainly from first years, and that was only a handful. Even amongst the first years most of those who could keep their wands were able to cast the fire charm. Draco had never been more greatful for 'Uncle' Severus's precautions as he was now. As another wave of fire splashed across his sleeve failing to over take the protective charms cast on his robes. Damned Gryffindors, he thought, there were always starting things.
The fight had broken out along one of the upper wing corridors on the fifth floor well away from the stairs, and there was no sign of teachers. Hogwarts was a massive castle after all, so even if they knew there was a fight getting here might take some time. Katie ducked around the corner, it didn't make sense a fight like this should not have been possible. Fred's smoke spell had gotten some space in between them and the Slytherins for the moment, but that wasn't to last to long as the Slytherin's seemed too pissed off to actually care. Still she knew this couldn't go on, but the question was how to get free from this. What was worse was that there was no sign of help forthcoming.
George vocalized the question she had been wondering, "Any idea where Harry is, a bolt of lightning be great I'd think, but I'll settle for you firing up the corridor eh?"
"I," Her response was cut off as Selwyn cast something down the corridor forcing everyone to hastily move for cover. It was just a precaution, Max had caught some curse in the side from one of the upper year snakes and was busy vomiting all over a suit of armor and couldn't stand at all. It was probably just a disorientation spell, but no body was eager to take chances. It wasn't like the snakes were in a different boat as several upper years amongst the lion had their own spells. She flicked her wand, and the gout of fire snarled roaring into existence and lashed down the hallway. She really hoped no one got hit.
Boyle threw himself to the ground. He wasn't the only one, that damned smoke of Weasley meant anyone on opposite sides of the hall had no chance of seeing someone on the other side. There was still a small smell of burned hair but the spell had went high for the most part. One of his year mates looked at him, and asked whether it was... "No, to innacurate, you saw the station," He said remembering the fight with the Death Eaters at the platform. He was never more grateful for that fact either. Wherever Potter was he hoped he stayed there for a long time, a very long time. He flicked his own wand, and uttered the flame freezing charm. He'd used it a couple of times, especially when people had gotten it into their heads to start throwing the fire creation charm at each other.
A couple meters to his right and down the hall a bit, Selwyn cursed. "Potter and his fire spells," He growled angrily flicking his wand. There was a glow of sea green on his wand and he splashed a Gryffindor that they could see with some kind of gellatinous subject. The first year tumbled slipping and sliding on the stuff before it became sticky and adhesive holding him down on the floor.
Redmond nodded, that looked like a useful spell to know, especially in these situations. He didn't bother reiterating he didn't think Potter was around. This whole idea had been stupid, getting pranked was one thing but going marching off to ambush Gryffindors was the most retarded move his house had made this entire year.
Some of the Gryffindors were having much the same thoughts a little down the hallway. Both sides had walked into this thinking it was their house that was coming in with the advantage of surprise, and both thought they were attacking preemptively to put a stop to the other's planning for another attack. George groaned, it was no joke, as it was the anti flame protections Snape had had the Slytherins take was reducing everyones fire spells.
"We've got to do something," Their 'fearless leader' proclaimed. It had been Richard's plan to come in and charge the Slytherin's down. He'd gathered up everyone he could after having overheard Kettleburn, and another professor talking in a concerned manner about how there was a gathering of Slytherins on this floor. He thought that by knocking the snakes down they could settle this. That didn't look like it had played out as planned.
Lee nodded to George, who looked back at Fred, "Who all can do a summoning spell?" He asked if they were going to do something they needed to get everyone else free of this convulted mess. "If we can summon the people who-" A red bolt, a stunner, smashed into a suit of armor forcing Lee to move a big further out of the way, "are out of it we can sort this out."
Elsewhere Quirrel took the time to check on his handiwork. The scrying spell was of limitted usefulness beyond certain ranges. To really hope to get any use out of it you had to mark your target, or preferably the area. If you didn't you had to expend time and vast amounts of energy to monitor far away areas. He didn't have those kind of problems though.
It had been easy to convince a few of the already angry upper year Slytherins to mass at the corridor to plan. A simple illusion spell here, a minor compulsion there, and a little emotional magic helped immensely, but it had been letting them over hear, 'accidentally', that there was a shortcut that lead the Gryffindor tower, and that there may have been plans for fruther attacks that had sealed the matter.
The Gryffindor's had been nearly as easy to convince. The same illusion spell with a few tweaks on the professors talking had given the angry upper years all they needed to go running off. Now there was a fight well away from him. He knew that Dumbledore had to have other defenses. His own troll defense would be the easiest to get by for him, but the other defenses would be where he needed to prod and exaimine the others.
He knew that a lot of the defenses would probably reflect the defenses. No doubt Snape's had something to do with with potions. At first he thought that Snape was increasingly worried about the fire threat a little too much, but then it clicked. Fire made sense as a defense after all. It was an elemental force, and Dumbledore had to be linking the defenses together into a larger defensive complex of spellwork. That was what he was researching now.
-scene break-
The Gryffindors were all settled around the fire in the common room. Quirrel had ended up stumbling onto the fight, and everyone had been grateful for that considering he'd swept the whole thing under the rug. The defense professor had even patched everyone up in a surprising display of ability. McGonnagal didn't even know about the fight and that was exactly how everyone wanted it to stay. Right now though everyone was still plotting their next move.
Harry sipped at the freshly brewed coffee, and exhaled blowing the steam away. "Thats why you go through that so fast, you're always drinking it," Hermione commented, complaining as she looked at the steaming beverage.
It really wassn't something that Harry wanted to hear. He snorted ignoring her, most of the house were still around the house's tower. There were a minority who were off studying in the library, working on homework, and such, while a smaller group were distributed elsewhere around the school.
There had already been some complaints about leaving the common room without at least one other member of the house arround, and Fred and George had disappeared earlier with the rest of the quidditch team for practice. As it was there was no telling how long Wood would keep them out on the Quidditch pitch. It kind of put him in a bind, but he was definitely leaving the common room one way or another.
"We know Snape's got to be behind it," Ron was saying to a couple of the other first year boys loudly enough that Neville visibly edged away from him and further down the sofa. "He knew there was going to be a fight, and made sure those dirty snakes were ready for it." Dean Thomas, and a few of the others noddedd.
Here it came yet again one more round of its all Snape's fault. It was like Ron never got tired of blaming things on the abrassive potions master, still Snape had made sure the Slytherins were taking precautions. All the same it definitely meant Harry was leaving now before this discussion got any louder.
As far as breaks went the hallways were rather earily empty. Most people had done like his own house, and were holed up in their common rooms, or in the library studying. He'd considered heading to the library but there was a less than accademic urge boiling within him at the moment, which desperately clawed at him. The library was no place for that. So he headed elsewhere, and it certainly wasn't Hagrid's. The giant still had that infernal dragon egg on the fire, and there was no telling when that infernal thing would hatch into a fire spewing lizard of doom.
The problem was getting around the castle without being noticed. The few ways he knew were really common ways of getting around so it ran the risk of the very real chance of running into one of the other houses, or other Gryffindors. Everybody was avoiding the upper floors, he'd considered the option, but then gone back again and decided against it.
-scene break-
Harry flipped the page, at least they were nearly done with this. All they really had to do was wait for the potion to cool so they could move it the containers. Snape had nearly had a coniption fit when Thomas had tried to rush this part of the brewing. Not that it had been just that, throughout the class the tension had been thick enough to cut with a knife. It was serious relief that this class was nearly over.
"Is it the right color?"
"Its close enough," Harry responded, close enough that he didn't care at least.
Across the room their sallow faced teacher was billowing about loudly reminding everyone that as soon as their potions had sufficently cooled they were to collect their sample and put it into the rack labelled, and then they were to get out. Snape also took the time to remind them they were to make sure to leave only after making sure that their potion was safely cooled. Rumor was the Hufflepuffs hadn't done that, and Snape had yelled and docked a bunch of points from them. For the moment at least they'd dodged that bullet at least, which was certainly a good thing.
It took another few minutes for their own brew to simmer, enough time for a couple of the working pairs to go ahead and leave as it happened. Harry tossed his book in his bag, and let Daphne go ahead and take their vial of the potion up to the rack. Snape had wanted everyone out of the dungeons as soon as they were done so Harry and Daphne had waited just down the hall for Tracy and a few others to finish up to avoid the already annoyed potions master. The rest of the class shouldn't, and weren't far behind them.
Naturally all this had been to good to last. They'd been waiting for a few minutes, and then the other students had started filing out that the arguing had started. They could hear down the hall. It'd turned out that Draco had found out about the dragon. It was a kind of annoying irony that it had played out like this. In this of course Draco had to go running his mouth to Ron as well, and it'd started a fight... twenty, or less, meters from Snape.
That was where they were now... Weasley hunched over Malfoy, and Malfoy screaming about Hagrid having a dragon. Snape was pissed, and the Gryffindors were still poised to jump down the other class of first years throat. This was not how they wanted the first day of classes back to play out. It really was too much to hope for that Quirrel would show up and smooth all this out again, but that was the best possible outcome.
Harry looked at the teacher and loosened his hand the distortion of clear liquid fading into the air as he did, and hoped that Snape didn't notice the nearly meter long scouring along the wall from the acid bolt that had been a 'warning shot'. Daphne nodded beside him, and then it went back down hill.
"Professor," Malfoy cried loudly, "That great oaf has a dragon in his hovel."
Ron had clearly had enough, and punched downward hitting Draco squarely in the nose. "Shut up you inbred dark wanker-"Once, and then twice, he was drawing back for his third when Snape flicked his wand and a red bolt of energy surged outward and splashed across Weasley's torso. The red head dropped like a stone.
"That will be enough," Snape said silkily, "I will not have any more of this nonsensical behavior in my dungeons, and Draco I will not have you spreading outlandish rumors around the school like this it is unbecoming of house Slytherin." It would have made Ron's day to be sure to have heard that except he was out cold. "We will put an end to this now."
It was at that moment that Quirrel happened upon the scene, to much annoyance from Snape, "Uh is there perhaps," The defense professor began shakily looking around. His murmuring, and tremebling a bit more pronounced than they had been in recent weeks, "that I could to help here does young," he stammered, "Need to be revived, I can," He produced his wand, "handle that." The stammering didn't make sense it was far more pronounced than it had been these past two months had been.
"I do believe I have everything under control here," Snape snapped irritably, "That will be all Quirinus." That was one of the few times they'd even heard Quirrel's first name, and indicated really just how annoyed Snape was. The potions master rounded on the students, "I would ask what happened, but I don't see the point in wasting time with concotted renditions. Two points each for not having the forethought to break this up before it got out of hand, now get out of here." Some of those closer moved to leave as well, but Snape held up a hand, "No you lot will be staying detention spend scrubbing cauldrons will fix this I think, or at least make you think." As most began to go their seperate ways they noted Quirrel looked as if he was going to stand up to Snape, that would be great. No one noticed the way Quirrel's fingers were tightening around his wand's shaft.
-scene break-
The fighting had gotten the first years in a bit of trouble. Not of whole lot, but the upper years were convinced that every point counted now. It seemed that the race being this close was driving everyone into a frenzy. On the plus side Hagrid had dodged the bullet about the dragon, but now there was apparently something evil in the forrest eating unicorns.
Not that Harry cared, he didn't actually come out and say it, but it was a freaking magic horse. That was to say as far as things went not all that interesting. "You should consider it, I mean maybe just the Gryffindors." There was a snort from Daphne.
"No," He had enough problems as it was, and the last thing he wanted was to hear Dumbledore go on another speech about how 'being a teacher means taking the inititiave to make sure your pupils are responsible in how they use what they have learned'. One of middle years from his own house had asked after the fight that Quirrel had broken up, and Sid hadn't been the last. He didn't need anymore last minute visits to Dumbledore. "and I've already said that." More than once. That was the problem though wasn't it.
Fred growled throwing his arms up as his pet project went up into flames, metaphorically speaking at least "Damn," He grunted it had almost been stable that time, he and his twin had kicked their tinkering with charms into high gear, "Look, I'm getting no where with this, and I can't see Snape or anyone short of Dumbledore or the like getting through whatever defenses are around that alchemist thing, so I say we say sod it." He was getting fed up with all the chatter about Flammel going around the common room, they all were. It was part of the reason that they were out here instead of tucked away in the tower.
"Fred's right," George grunted flicking his wand to clean away the mess, "Ron's obsession might have a point, but whats Snape going to be able to do." He glanced at Daphne who was rolling her eyes, "He's a death eater, and besides maybe its just greed, maybe he's scared but the thing is he's doing something dodgy."
No one could fathom that maybe it wasn't Snape, because the master of potions was doing his own poking and prodding. Everyone could see he was up to something, and the teachers didn't think anything of it. However everyone seemed to have Quirrel firmly in their blindspot, especially the students. Quirrel who was the one teacher that all four houses could agree with each other on. It was making everyone blind to him.
His brother nodded, "Yeah, what would be able to do, anyway," Ron, and Richard thought and they were talking like they were going to end up doing something to somehow save the school from whatever it was Snape was trying to steal. "Lets just sit back, and make sure we've got everything nailed down if the snakes do try and rush us."
"Yeah because thats going to happen," Daphne declared as she rolled her eyes again. Snape was already two steps from locking the entire house in the dungeons, and he'd given Selwyn, and Marks three weekeends worth of detention just the other day. "We're as locked down as you,"
Fred snorted, "Yeah sure you are, you've got Snape at least," and he'd never thought he'd say that but that was the sentiment that had been building since new years, "we're stuck with McGonnagal and she wont back us for shit."
"I say we need to start playing defensively, knick us a bludger, put it in the hall." George grunted, "I think thats definitely the best way to keep the snakes from slithering up on us." He remarked, "And there are more than few spare bludgers."
There was a minute of pause as if Fred was thinking, "Didn't you say Malfoy had a set of Quiditch balls?" He asked, Malfoy had apparently gotten a set of balls sent from home, and had spent a lot of evenings now, well when he didn't have to do detention with Snape. "We could definitely charm his to screw him up that'd be fun?"
Harry flicked his hand and there was a surge of warmth and rippling heat. The bolt of fire ripped a quarter of a metter oblong trench into the dirt. He'd been poking through a book on wizarding history in the north. "We're not, though." Last week had been a debacle, and then the scrap with Malfoy in the dungeons.
"Professor Snape has Malfoy drilling spells nightly," Daphne interjected, seeing the looks of surprise, she went on to explain, "Malfoy and Nott went at it in the common room,
He'd tried asking around, but really no body could really say. Historically a lot of England's magical heritage was a hodgebodge of sources Romans, French, and 'Germanic tribes' amongst a handful of peoples like the Danes and such alledgedly, but the books he'd paged through so far hadn't been at all helpful.
-scene break-