Chapter 9: Ginny
My name is Ginny.
And I was having a lot of trouble breathing.
The moment we'd seen Seamus stumble his way through the portrait hole, Neville practically dragged both of us up to the boys' dorm. We'd both been worrying nonstop over what was happening and why Seamus had been taking so long in the first place and to see him coming in completely freaked only worried us more. It took Neville a total of two seconds to close the door and put a locking and silencing charm up before getting everything out of the Irishman. Now I kind of wished I'd stayed out of it.
As Seamus' tale progressed, it only got more and more horrifying. The greater number of those creatures in the forest away was bad enough, but mind controlling creatures crawling out of people's ears, bladed beasts and of all places to gather, they'd chosen the freaking Chamber of Secrets? I still had nightmares about that place already, I didn't need it coming back into my life at all, let alone in the use of something that made the horrors of the Basilisk itself sound like nothing in comparison.
"So these things are controlling Slughorn and a group of students?" Neville asked, looking just as sick as I felt. He was as pale as Nearly Headless Nick, not that I was likely to look any different. "How many have they taken?"
"Seven Slytherins, one Hufflepuff and two Ravenclaws were in that group, but who knows how many others have these things in them too." Seamus replied, batting away at a fly as he did. "According to what Anthony heard, they're not taking too many people right now because of the war, but that doesn't mean they haven't got plenty of students or teachers already."
"Great. Just what we need, another enemy that we can't even see." I snapped, throwing my hands into the air. I had to hold on to my irritation, otherwise I was going to have a full on panic attack. "And again, the person sitting next to us could already be taken and turned into an enemy. How many in the DA are infested already? How can we find out, ask them nicely or throw a truth potion down everyone's throats?"
"That would be a good idea if any of us could make a potion that complex." Seamus sighed, shaking his head. "But what would we do with them when we found these things? How could we get them out?"
"I don't know." Neville sighed, flopping onto his bed with his head in his hands. "I don't know what to do. Do we tell the DA and have them help us? If we do and these things are inside our members, then they'll know we know about them and come after us directly. If they want this to stay a secret they can't have us knowing about it and walking free."
"But the other side to that is that we can't handle this on our own." Seamus responded exasperatedly. "Those bladed creatures alone outnumber the entire DA, even if our graduated and on the run members were still here and we don't know how well they're affected by magic. Adding in everything else, we don't stand a chance without more help."
That only made Neville sigh louder. Watching as he laid back rubbing his temples, I couldn't help but feel sorry for him. Even after all he'd done, he was still so unsure of himself, always second guessing himself. He was careful to only reveal it to me, but he was forever wondering if what Harry would do, if Harry would have dealt with it better. If Hermione would have determined a more effective solution to whatever problem we were facing. If Ron could better position everyone and set off their traps the way he did on a chess board. He still doubted himself, he only took the position of leader because someone had to. He was very hard on himself, taking each and every injury any DA member got as a sign of his incompetence. This new complicated mess was the last thing he needed. No matter what way we went, disaster was likely to lurk just around the corner.
If we kept this knowledge within the leaders' circle, we should be able to keep these new guys from discovering that we know, but we'd be hopelessly outnumbered and have no way of fighting them without revealing that we know about them anyway. If we tell the DA and actively fight them, it was he imperious curse scenario, only worse. Not only could an infested member blend in with our group, but they could act on their own power and attack us at the worst opportune time. Or just hand us over in an instant.
"We don't know enough." I said as calmly as I could, cringing. It came out as anything but calm. "I say that we hope Ernie and Luna aren't infested and talk about this with them and Anthony tomorrow. We can spy on the Slughorn and those kids in his group or...or go down to the Chamber again." I stumbled over my own sentence at the end. I couldn't help it. Every fear I'd felt, every act my body was forced into performing in my first year was bombarding my head. Especially the end. Waking up in that horrible place with a giant, bloody snake on one side and a bloody, dying Harry on the other. Dying because he'd risked his own life just to save me.
"I agree." Neville nodded, letting a small, appreciative smile cross his lips as he turned my way. Pulling out two gold coins, he tapped them once each with his wand a moment before a slight warmth started pressing into my chest from my breast pocket. The place I kept my DA coins. "We'll have two meetings tomorrow night, one with the whole group and one with the leaders circle. With the whole group, we'll start planning more actions against the Death Eaters and Dementors, warn the group that it appears that Snape and the Carrows are using the Imperious curse on people around the school and tell them about the large number of centipedes. At the leaders meeting we'll discuss what's really going on." He stated before a shaking his head with a small grin. "Ernie will probably be annoyed, he'll be the only one not knowing what's going on. Luna will have gotten it out of Goldstein by now."
"Probably knows more than we do." Seamus nodded in agreement, growing a little proud and amused. "I'm confident that Anthony failed to mention a few things he noticed. The boy's the eyes and ears of an eagle. He's also putting up a big deal about the wolf that saved us. Though I have to admit that it really was a weird occurrence. It had to have human intelligence. Anthony thinks it was an Animagus."
"Good. That should mean that we have one ally out there." Neville commented. "Either way, wolfie will probably track you down eventually. Now, I think we better call it a night. One of those bloody Carrows will be by soon for sure."
"Yeah. I'm going to bed now anyway." I nodded, pulling out my wand and lowering Neville's spells. "Goodnight."
"Night." The boys responded as I headed out the door and straight to my own dorm. I was going to have a hard enough time sleeping as it was. I never got much anymore, not that any of the known DA members ever did. Now, not only did I have to worry about a stupid Death Eater taking me out, I also had to worry about waking up with a slimy creature slithering around in my head. I never really slept longer than half an hour before jumping up and checking my room.
Shuddering at the very image I'd just painted in my head, I changed into my pyjamas and laid down, taking the time to critically scan every single detail of the room before letting my head hit the pillow. It would be a good long time before I actually got to sleep tonight, as usual, but for once I was glad. The nightmares that were sure to come with the simple mention of that accursed place were not something to look forward to.
Still, I wish that annoying fly would stop buzzing around near my ear.
...
Most of the older students used the free periods they'd gained to study. DA members generally used them to spy and find out when the Carrows were planning to discipline next to so we could be yet another pain in their overly bloated backsides. Or plant nifflers, pixies and stink bombs in their offices and classrooms. I on the other hand, was using them to observe Slughorn.
Anthony and Luna were doing the same thing with the young Ravenclaws. As observant as Seamus had claimed him to be, Anthony had identified his house's mind slaves with ease. They had an advantage too when it came to spying on them. Luna was simply branded weird, so most people that weren't Death Eaters basically ignored her existence whenever she randomly turned up somewhere. It was too normal for her to be seen as suspicious. Meanwhile, Anthony was a Prefect. It was his job to monitor the halls, though Snape had suppressed a lot of the power the non-Slytherin Prefects had. Add to the fact that he was used to not gaining attention unless he wanted it and the Carrows weren't suspicious of him in the slightest, there was nothing to question his motives with if he was noticed.
We were going to get the Hufflepuff under surveillance after tonight, when we had Ernie's help to identify and keep tabs on him. Hopefully our faith in all the leaders being in control of themselves was right. I knew I was free, but the only people any two people could guarantee were fine were Neville for being so determined to learn and expose the centipedes involved and the two who'd seen everything and reported it. Unless this was all some elaborate trap and both boys had been Imperioused, but I highly doubted that.
I had to admit that this freaked me out. Slughorn, or whatever was controlling him, was acting perfectly like himself, right down to the constant nervous sputter and shifty eyes that had been a constant since the beginning of term. I couldn't see the slightest hint of the hot headed general Seamus claimed to see the night before.
"Professor Slughorn?" A Slytherin fourth year called, causing me to throw myself behind a newly added, horrid statue of Salazar Slytherin holding up his wand triumphantly in the corridor heading towards the staffroom. Slughorn on the other hand visibly flinched before turning his scared face to the boy only to sigh and...slightly relax at the sight of him.
"Mr Baddock. W-what could I do for you?" He stuttered, twitching slightly under the boy's gaze. Nothing real surprising there, he sputters and twitches when the most harmless first year looks at him these days, as if he expects them to say or do something horrible.
"I was hoping that you could look at my dreamless sleep draught and tell me what I did wrong." Baddock responded, rolling his eyes as he pulled up a vial.
"Hmm. Not to sound mean, but I think a better question would be what did you do right?" Slughorn frowned, taking the bottle and bringing it up to his eye. He had a point, that potion was a mess. I know from the countless times I watched Madam Pomfrey forced them down Harry's throat that they're supposed to be a very dark violet. This one was lime green. If someone drank it, they'd probably be poisoned. "Why don't we step inside eh? Talk a little more privately." He asked, opening the door to reveal an empty staffroom.
"Ok sir." Baddock nodded. Smiling nervously at the kid as he walked in, Slughorn let loose a shaky breath and looked around the hallway as if he was expecting something horrible to pop out. I retracted my head and ducked down low behind the statue as turned my way, praying that he was about to turn into Moody and see through solid objects. I seemed safe however, for a moment later, the door squeaked its way shut without a single hint of knowledge of my presence.
"Ok, even I know that no fourth year who's that serious about potions would screw up that royally." I muttered, glaring at the door. Checking around to ensure no one would see me, I crept out of my hiding place and headed for the door, pulling out my favourite creation my twin brothers ever came up with. Extendable ears.
I checked around again one more time as I reached the door. If the Carrows, Snape, or even one of the good teachers caught me doing this I'd never hear the end of it, even if I could explain why I was listening in to Slughorn talking to a Slytherin kid. And I couldn't let anyone mixed in with this new side know I knew out them yet either. That would be even worse than being caught by a filthy Death Eater.
Sighing as no one entered my vision, I placed one side of the spy device to my ear and placed the other against the door.
"Construction of the Slytherin common room entrance is almost complete. It should break into the Chamber before nightfall." Baddock stated. I had to catch myself from gasping at the sound of it. I didn't know Baddock well at all, seeing as he was a Slytherin and two years below me, but I did know that he had a thing for being sarcastic and usually had a slightly irritated tone when he talked. This time however, his voice was formal and almost devoid of emotion. I say almost because I could hear a slight nervousness to it that seemed utter wrong considering the wimp he was talking to.
"Good. At least the bulk of our forces will have a quick and safe entrance." Slughorn responded, freezing me with just how cold he sounded. I just couldn't picture that tone coming from Mr Jolly-Coward. "Are we sure no bumbling idiot's going to find it this time?"
"No wizard should notice it Sub Visser. But..." Baddock lost all pretences of being calm at that. his voice was full of nerves, as if he was terrified of how Slughorn was about to attack him for what he said next. "There's no way of guaranteeing that the House Elves won't notice it while they're cleaning and these living portraits are making it hard to keep any secrets around here. they'll get suspicious of the entrance's location eventually."
"Oh, of COURSE!" Slughorn shouted, making me jerk so hard I almost disconnected my ear from the magical one. "Of course, what else would you expect? I told Visser Three during our last meeting that this castle and the Ministry would be next to impossible to perform a subtle invasion. This place should have been left until we had enough magical hosts to take it within two days at the most, but no, he wants to use these magical kiddies the way he does their Muggle counterparts. And still he complains that this plan is behind schedule. If we speed this up even slightly we'll be discovered. This place has enough spies in the least likely places without the kids and Death Eater fools playing their parts in their pathetic war! Ghosts flying through walls, talking portraits, neat freak elves popping around, centaurs foreseeing our arrival and attacking Taxxons and hosts in the forest. Those primitive Andalite wannabes shot another eight Taxxons dead last night. Another one tried to take a bite out of a Acromantula and got eaten himself and that's without the breach in security we had when they foolishly busted themselves to that blubbering twit, Hagrid. If something doesn't start going our way soon, Visser Three will sick his Yeerksbane morph on my head!"
"When the new entrance is completed, the infestation will be able to pick up." Baddock said hurriedly, sounding desperate to please Slughorn. "A lot of the First and Second year students have already been convinced by Astin 9902 that the Death Eaters were planning to surprise the noble house of Slytherin by creating a passageway so they could see the Chamber of Secrets and have been placed under a lip-locker charm to ensure that they 'don't ruin the surprise for the others'. She will lead them down and infest them as soon as it's finished. And it'll be a lot easier to trick most of the other Slytherins into going down too after."
"Yes, but considering the best specimens in Slytherin are likely and expected to join the war alongside their parents, they are not the best choices to infest at this time, nor can we let them inform this so called dark lord of our presence. Without our Dracon beams, Biofilters and Bug Fighters, we'd never be able to hold this position with our meagre numbers."
"True, but...with no disrespect Sub Visser sir," Baddock added hastily, sounding quite fearful for his life. "perhaps infesting them would be a good idea. Potential Death Eaters would give us tabs on the dark lord's actions without direct involvement with him and when the big battled that they'd be expected to join in broke out...perhaps they would be able to step out unnoticed if we didn't want to influence it?"
"I would agree with you. Unfortunately, Visser Three does not." Slughorn sighed, suddenly sounding weary, more like himself. "Visser Three intends for us to infest people and influence the war right into a huge blow out with the minimum number of Yeerks involved. The one time he actually cares about keeping all of his forces alive." He added with a scoff. "He is also quite keen for those Death Eater kids to do their part here."
"I see. Then almost all the kids that have sufficient training to be useful to us are off limits." Baddock muttered softly, sounding almost too terrified to say it at all. "For the most part, if they're not potential Death Eaters, they're working for this Potter's side."
"Yes, the best warriors in the school are all members of that DA group. Another power we will need to influence here." Slughorn muttered irritably, only make me focus even harder on the conversation. "I will have to have a couple of their members infiltrated soon too, though it's difficult enough getting Controllers from the three school houses involved to the Yeerk Pool as it is. Another problem to fix and fix and fix again. This is too much."
"Sir, if I may offer a suggestion." Baddock started hesitantly, sounding as scared and unsure as he had the last time. He must have gotten a sign of consent though, because he continued on. "Perhaps we could..."
Unfortunately, I never heard what his idea was, for at that moment another sound was resounding throughout the entire hallway. One anyone could identify as heavy feet hitting the ground, most likely in a very brisk walk. Panicking, I ripped the extendable ears from mine and shoved them into my pocket just before Professor Sprout turned into the hallway, catching me like a deer in the headlights.
"Miss Weasley? What are you doing here?" She asked. She kept her voice pretty soft and casual for anyone within hearing range, but the crossed arms and raised eyebrows kind of blew that off. Professor Sprout was fully aware of my status as the most active DA member, on par with Neville, and that spying and sabotage were well within the list of things I was willing to do. She knew why I was here no doubt, though she would be surprised if she discovered who I was actually intending to spy on. At least I hope she'd still be surprised, she's a wonderful person. I'd never wish Slughorn's fate on her.
"I was looking for Professor Flitwick." I answered easily, well used to lying. I'm Fred and George's little sister, how could I possibly be bad at it? "I was having a little difficulty with the food transportation charms and I was hoping he could help me out."
"He's in class at the moment dear." Professor Sprout responded, as I knew she would. "You'll have to ask him later. You should be getting ready for your next class anyway, shouldn't you?" She asked sweetly, though the look she gave me was a little more firm. Just how I thought she'd react. That was the amusing thing about the teachers this year. The good ones did nothing to punish you. In fact, if you did something against the rules these days, bar attacking another student, they tried to keep you out of trouble. They tried to stop us from doing anything and still try to nip a lot of what we do in the bud, but they know we won't stop our rebellion and since they can't rebel themselves without sever consequences to us all, they just try to help us stay safe.
"Of course. I'll see you this afternoon Professor." I smiled, walking away. As I got out of Sprout's sight, I let a small sigh escape my lips. I hated it when my work was interrupted. Ever since I was a child, I refused to stop anything I started until I had perfected it and this was something that I can't just go back to later. There was no way to find out what 'Baddock's' plan was now. Even if it was performed, I'd probably never know.
I still got a lot though. I reminded myself, going over everything said. These creatures were named Yeerks. Most people currently infested were Slytherins and it wasn't like I ever tried to interact with them without a particularly painful curse being involved anyway, so no big loss at the moment. The many eyes in all different forms were making their job extremely difficult and they didn't have a single DA member just yet, though they were planning to infest some. And this was bigger than Hogwarts. Whoever this guy pulling the strings was, he was aiming for all of Wizarding Britain.
"Thank you Slughorn." I muttered, letting a small smile cross my face as I realised just how much I had. "I'm sure you've just given me just about everything we need."
Now if only I could take this information right to Neville instead of suffering for an hour listening to a retard telling me that Muggles are stupid and pathetic, despite the fact that said retard's never spent a day with a Muggle in her life. All well, maybe we could find a way to take her down by accusing her of having one of these Yeerk thingies in her hollow head. There sure is plenty of space for one.