Chapter 11 - Barty Crouch Junior

Mrs Weasley's raised voice greeted Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Fred and George as they entered the kitchen two weeks later, on the last day of the holidays.

"...can't let them go, they'll be in grave danger. Ron was kidnapped and replaced with an alien, and now this!" she shouted.

"Now what?" asked Fred innocently, plonking himself down in the seat next to Sirius, who was looking at Mrs Weasley tiredly.

"It's the paper, Molly, and, given the current climate, you know they'd do anything to taint Dumbledore's record. I wouldn't be surprise if all this was concocted by Fudge to give him an excuse to interfer further at the school."

"But what if it isn't? What if there is a real danger?"

"It happened to Ron only; one person out of a thousand. And please, Molly, remember that Dumbledore did promise to look into the situation. He won't brush it under the carpet."

Thoroughly confuse, Harry scanned the table for anything that would shed some light on the debate Mrs Weasley and Sirius were having. His eyes soon found the morning's edition of the Daily Prophet, which had a headline that screamed:

MYSTERY: HOGWARTS STUDENTS HAVE DISAPPEARED! MINISTRY AND SCHOOL ARE INVESTIGATING!

Harry, Ron, Hermione, Fred, George and Ginny exchanged glances. All knew what everyone was thinking; the Zygons were undoubtedly responsible.

Sirius, with the help of Mr Weasley, Tonks and Lupin, eventually managed to convince Mrs Weasley to let the children return to Hogwarts. They would be travelling via the Knight Bus, a fact that greatly concerned Harry given his past experiences with the method of transportation.

The actual journey itself was only a few minutes long, but even so, no one spoke a word. Harry was certain that they were al, thinking the same thing: whether or not the rumors about disappearing students were true.

Upon arrival at Hogwarts a few minutes later, their worst fears were confirmed. There was a conspicuous lack of students wandering the hallways and corridors of the school, and a number of students looked lonely without a friend by their side.

Harry, Ron and Hermione glanced at each other, silently resolving to talk to Professor Smith about the disappearances as soon as they could.

"Where is he?" moaned Malfoy as the class waited outside the science room the next day. "It's the first day back and he's late? Come on!"

"You were saying, Mister Malfoy?" Professor Smith said, popping his head through the doorway. "Sorry I'm late, I've been filling out Miss Oswin's paperwork, she still hasn't recovered from that mental breakdown after she asked me to explain faster than light travel in as much detail as possible. She'll recover...I hope!" He gulped. "Anyway, come in, come in."

He stepped back and allowed the class to take their seats. Once they had done so, he sprinted up to the front of the class and whirled around.

"Ooh," he frowned. "Where is everyone? I'm not that bad, am I?"

"You haven't seen anything?" Terry Boot said disbelievingly. "You've been at the school all holidays and you haven't seen a thing?"

"No..." said Professor Smith. "Should I have? Why, what's wrong?"

"People have disappeared, Professor," Parvati said sadly. Lavender's absence from the adjacent seat was very noticeable. "No one knows where they've gone."

A shadow briefly flickered across Professor Smith's face, but he covered it with a smile.

"Right, today, we're moving onto the Andromeda galaxy, the closest spiral galaxy to ours. There are around one trillion stars in it, that's more than double the amount in the good old Milky Way..."

The class was very taken aback and the sudden switch from disappearances to Astronomy, but nevertheless found themselves engaged in the lesson very quickly. By the time the class had almost finished, student disappearances had been driven from their mind by a much more alarming fact.

"The Andromeda galaxy's moving towards us!" Pansy Parkinson shrieked in alarm.

"Yeah, nothing to worry about, though. It won't be here for another few billion years, so you'll all be well and truly dead by then," Professor Smith said reassuringly as the bell rang.

"We asking him, then?" Ron asked as the class began packing away their parchment and quills.

"Of course," Hermione said. "We'll just wait till everyone's gone."

A minute later, Harry, Ron and Hermione nervously approached Professor Smith's desk.

"Err, Professor?" Hermione said tentatively.

Professor Smith looked up. "Yes?" he said. "No questions about faster than light travel!" he added hurriedly. "Miss Oswin's case was bad enough."

"Oh, no, it's not about...that," Hermione said reassuringly. "It's just that we, um, wanted to talk to you about the disappearances of the students andi whether or not the Zygons were behind it..."

Professor Smith sighed. "Yes, the Zygons are probably behind it," he said wearily. "They're probably doing it to gather as much information about your species as possible, so they can find better ways of killing you."

"Yes," he added, seeing the trio's horrified expressions. "If the Invasion Fleet gets here, that's what they'll do."

"Now," Professor Smith said. "You all need to forget all about me and leave me alone. My enemies have a habit of getting to me by hurting people I know, and I don't want that happening to you three. If you keep trying to investigate me, talk to me, contact me in any way that isn't related to school work, the Zygons will find out, realize that we're close, and then, in all likelihood, kill you."

Ron snorted. "How would they even find out that sort of stuff? We're inside Hogwarts, for Merlin's sake!"

"And the Zygons have replication technology, Mister Weasley," Professor Smith said cuttingly. "Anyone here could be a Zygon duplicate."

"Yeah, well, we've survived against the odds before," Ron shrugged.

Professor Smith gathered some papers from his desk and stood up. "Not against these kinds of odds, you haven't," he said, walking up the stairs to his office.

"What's that supposed to mean?" asked Harry.

"Leave me alone before it's too late," answered Professor Smith, and he walked into his office and closed the door.

The trio returned from dinner that night to find a reminder that the next Hogsmeade trip was scheduled for next week.

"Cripes, I'd completely forgotten about that!" exclaimed Hermione upon seeing the note. She turned to Harry. "Harry, you won't be doing anything important next weekend, will you?"

Harry blushed. "Well, err, I'mkindagoingonadatewithCho," he mumbled.

"Sorry?"

"I'm going on a date with Cho," Harry said, looking determinedly at his shoes.

"You – what?!" spluttered Ron. "When did this happen?"

"We err, arranged it before the holidays," Harry replied, grinning bashfully.

Hermione beamed. "That's wonderful!" she said encouragingly. "But I'm really sorry; I need you to meet me in the Three Broomsticks at around midday. Would that be alright?"

"I dunno," Harry said. "I'm not sure that Cho'd appreciate it, being our date and all."

"Well, bring her along too, if you must, this is really, really important," Hermione said forcefully.

"Fine," Harry glumly agreed. "We'll be there."

Ron was more sceptical. "What's so important that Harry needs to interrupt his date for? Surely you can wait!"

Hermione sighed. "If you must know, I've organised an interview with Rita Skeeter, so that Harry can get his version of events out there."

"Rita Skeeter? The one who kept publishing lies about you and Harry last year?" Ron exclaimed, eyes wide. "Are you mad?"

"No," Hermione said indifferently. "But the fact that I know that she's an unregistered animagus has its...benefits."

Harry groaned and sank further into his seat. The thought of an interview with Rita Skeeter did not appeal to him one bit.

The Hogsmeade apparition zone was setup in order to leave the residents and shoppers of Hogsmeade to go undisturbed by people appearing and disappearing with a loud crack in the middle of the street. As such, when Rita Skeeter arrived for her interview, she had to walk a mile to the actual village, passing the Black Lake along the way.

'Foolish girl,' Rita thought as she followed the winding path. 'She thinks she can blackmail me. Me! Just wait till I turn the tables on her, she won't know what hit her.'

Rita's contemptuous thoughts continued, distracting her so much that she didn't notice a large reptilian head rear out of the lake beside her. In fact, she was only realised something was wrong when she was bathed in a blue light.

"What the hell?" she said as she started vibrating, dropping her handbag. Before Rita could process this, her body disintegrated into thousands of blue sparks. Everything went black.

A minute later, Rita appeared on the shoreline, in the exact spot that she had disappeared from. Hesitating briefly to pick up her handbag, she soon resumed her walk down the path to Hogsmeade.

"Cho's not here," Hermione noted as Harry said down at the table she shared with Luna.

"Yes, well," Harry said miserably. "It was a disaster."

Hermione opened her mouth to reply, but upon seeing the look on Harry's face, she decided not to pursue the subject.

"Hmm, Rita's late," she frowned.

"She better be coming, Hermione. I didn't screw up my date for nothing."

"She promised she'd come!" Hermione said quickly. "I even told her that if she didn't come, I'd tell the Ministry about her secret."

"Ooh, what secret?" asked Luna eagerly, just as Rita walked in the door.

"Right, what do you want?" she snapped, sitting down at their table.

"For starters, you can be polite," Hermione said coldly.

"Why? I'm not normally polite, so why should I start now? I'm only here because you blackmailed me; I've every right to be rude," Rita replied cuttingly.

"Fine, but tone it down a bit, please, or the deal's off," Hermione said irritably.

"What deal?" said Rita. "You haven't mentioned a deal yet, Miss Prissy, you just told me to turn up. Oh, one of these days ..." She took a deep shuddering breath.

"Yes, yes, one of these days you'll write more horrible stories about Harry and me," said Hermione indifferently. "Find someone who cares, why don't you?"

"They've run plenty of horrible stories about Harry this year without my help," said Rita, shooting a sideways look at him, and adding in a rough whisper. "How has that made you feel, Harry?"

"Why ask when you could just use your limited psychic ability to probe his mind and get the answers?" interrupted a familiar voice.

"Excuse me?" said Rita, looking up. Harry, Hermione and Luna followed her gaze to see Professor Smith glaring down at them, holding a weird device that kept going 'ping'.

"Hello, Professor!" said Luna brightly.

Professor Smith ignored her. "Psychic ability, all Zygons have an extremely low-level telepathic field, but it's still strong enough to look into a human mind," he said.

"Professor, what are you doing here?" hissed Hermione. "We're trying to conduct an interview!"

"Well, by all means, continue," Professor Smith said, sitting down in the table's last vacant seat. "I've always wanted to get the juicy details about a Zygon's life."

Rita rolled her eyes. "Zygon, what in Merlin's name is a Zygon?" She turned to Hermione. "Do you really believe this lunatic? I'm most certainly not a Zygon, whatever that is."

"I believe him," said Luna dreamily, catching everyone by surprise. "You seem...different, somehow. Maybe these will help." She took out her spectrespecs and put them on.

"Well, you are...different, Ms Skeeter," Luna said in surprise, staring at the journalist through the brightly coloured glasses.

"Give me a look," said Hermione, and she all but snatched them from Luna and jammed them on. "Ah!" she screamed in shock, drawing reproving glances from the pub's other patrons.

"She's a Zygon!" Hermione trembled, pointing at Rita, who sighed.

"Fine, you've got me, I am a Zygon," she admitted.

Professor Smith leaned forward, looking at her coldly. "What are you doing here, and how did you know to capture the woman you're impersonating?"

'Rita' rolled her eyes. "As if I'll tell you that, Doctor," she spat, demeanour changing completely. "Why would I hand over our advantage?"

Professor Smith sat in silence for a moment before replying. "Why are you abducting students? Where are you taking them? What have you dohe with them?"

'Rita' sneered at him, but said nothing.

Professor Smith's eyes narrowed. "I'm giving you one more chance. Tell me, now."

"Never," 'Rita' hissed.

Professor Smith sighed, took out his sonic screwdriver, pointed it at 'Rita', and pressed the button.

As soon as the screwdriver's tip lit up and the whirring sound began, 'Rita' started shimmering.

"What are you doing?" she shouted, standing up.

"Just disabling your replication field," Professor Smith said coolly. "No more disguise for you, I think."

A second later, 'Rita' had been replaced with a seething Zygon.

The other patrons of the Three Broomsticks didn't immediately notice the orange figure, but when they did, it was complete and utter pandemonium. Tables were overturned, butterbeers and firewhiskeys spilt as most of the patrons immediately started running to the door, but a few took out their wands.

"Stupefy!" they cried as one, and the red bolts of radiation sped towards the Zygon, only to be absorbed with no ill effect.

"What the hell?" said one of the wizards who'd attacked the Zygon. This gave the Zygon a chance, and it immediately darted forward with surprise speed and whacked the wizard aside.

"Stop, stop!" Professor Smith cried, jumping in front of the Zygon, arms raised. The Zygon swung at him, but Professor Smith ducked. He felt a painful tug on his head as the zygon managed to grab a handful of his hair. Quickly moving backwards, he stood up and turned to the patrons of the Three Broomsticks. "Don't hurt it, just leave and let me deal with it!"

"Are you crazy?" said a witch.

"No, please, just listen to me!" Professor Smith said desperately. "Go!"

"Fat chance!" said the witch. "That thing could be dangerous!"

Blue sparks clustered around the Zygons, causing the onlookers to shriek anew. Professor Smith whirled around and groaned.

"It seems as though I am about to depart," said the Zygon. "Before I go, though, Doctor, you may want to know that the Invasion Fleet will be here in a few weeks - and there's nothing you can do to stop it."

Grinning evilly, the Zygon vanished along with the blue sparks.

Professor Smith sighed, hit the device in his hand, and walked out of the pub without another word.

Harry, Hermione and Luna hastened after him, leaving the adults to clean up.

"Professor, what is that thing going 'ping'?" Luna asked.

"A Winklegruber neural parameter predictor," Professor Smith explained crossly. "It predicts that neural capacity of whoever you point it at. It's how I knew that woman was a zygon."

He rounded on Harry and Hermione. "See what happens when you associate with me?" he said furiously. "The Zygons went after you! I don't know how they knew - or where and when to go - but the fact is that youwere in danger!"

He's stalked off without another word, the Winklegruber neural parameter predictor's 'pings' echoing behind him.

As Harry and Hermione made their way back to Hogwarts some time later, they both realised that what Professoe Smith said was true: associating with him was dangerous. Maybe they should stay away from him after all.

Professor Smith ran through the corridors of Hogwarts. He was late for a staff meeting, which had been called by Umbridge five minutes ago. He kne it was unreasonable that Umbridge should expect him to get to the staff room from the first floor in five minutes, but then again, it was Umbridge.

All the teachers were already in the Common Room by the time he arrived.

"You're late, Mister Smith," said a man in a bowler hat whom Professor Smith didn't recognise.

"Sorry," he replied. "Clara Oswin's paperwork is still taking ages. Not that it really matters now; she left the Hospital Wing earlier today, completely recovered."

Dumbledore moved to introduce the bowler hat man. "John, this is Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic. Cornelius, this is John Smith, our science teacher."

"Pleased to meet you!" Professor Smith said, walking over to Fudge and giving him his signature air-kiss.

"Ah, well, moving on," Fudge said, flustered. "Dolores, you mentioned something about Hogsmeade?"

"Yes, Minister. It has been brought to my attention that was a disturbance in The Three Broomsticks at around midday yesterday," Umbridge said.

"What's that got to do with us?" Professor McGonagall said sharply.

"I was getting there, Minerva," replied Umbridge reprovingly. "According to eye-witnesses, three Hogwarts students, a teacher and Rita Skeeter were involved."

"No doubt that Potter, Weasley and Granger were the three students," said Snape drily. "But who was the teacher?"

"Well," said Umbridge smugly. "Professor Smith matches the description given to me."

Everyone looked at Professor Smith.

"Is this true, John?" Dumbledore asked.

Professor Smith sighed. "Yes yes, it's true," he admitted.

"Would you care to enlighten us as to what occurred?"

"Potter, Granger and Miss Lovegood (he shot Snape a 'you-were-wrong' look) were in The Three Broomsticks meeting Rita Skeeter for some reason. I walked in just in time to see Ms Skeeter attempt to attack Granger, and interfered. Unfortunately, Ms Skeeter escaped."

"Thank you, John," said Umbridge. "It is interesting to note how much your version of events differs from the version my informant gave me. Apparently, Rita Skeeter turned into an orange creature after you pointed your wand at it. When patrons attempted to attack it, you told them to stop and ordered them to leave. However, the creature disappeared before anything else could happen, and you stormed out immediately afterwards." Umbridge's eyes bulged triumphantly. "This means that you caused the entire disturbance by illegally transfiguring a respected journalist!"

Professor Smith was sunk, and he knew it. There was no way he was getting out of this one without explaining everything, and even then it was very likely that he wouldn't be believed. Grimacing, he decided to go clean.

"Okay, you've got – ouch!" A stab of pain shot through his forehead.

"Anything wrong?" asked Snape smoothly.

"No, I'm fine, I'm completely – OUCH!"

Everyone stared as Professor Smith doubled up in pain, clutching his forehead.

"What the devil's wrong with him?" said Fudge, slowly backing away.

"Severus, Minerva, Filius, do you have any ideas?" said Dumbledore.

"No," McGonagall and Flitwick said together, frowning.

"Not at all, Headmaster. He could be faking..." suggested Snape.

"Does it look like he's faking to you?" asked Madam Promfrey as Professor Smith let out another yell. She rushed over to him, taking something out of her pocket. "Quick, drink this, it'll ease the pain!" she said urgently, shoving a bottle full of a dull red liquid under his nose.

Professor Smith took one look at it and recoiled. "No, that won't help, nothing will!" he panted. "The problem's temporally based; someone's interfering with my timeline! OW!" he yelled, making everyone jump.

"What's he saying?" asked Fudge, clueless as ever.

"Something about his own timeline, whatever that means," Umbridge frowned.

"Poppy, take John to the Hospital Wing now!" Dumbledore ordered.

Not wasting time to reply, Madam Pomfrey took out her wand. "Stupe –"

"NO, don't do that!" Professor Smith gasped, eyes wide. "Someone's managed to get their hands on a time reverser; it's reversing my timeline so that I become younger! Their eventual aim is to make me so young I can't pose a threat! They must have got the required bio-sample from me in The Three Broomsticks – the hair!" he said, realising in horror that the Zygon had managed to get a clump of hair from him as he ducked under its arm. The air around him began to shimmer. "Stay back!" he warned.

The occupants of the room watched in horror as Professor Smith disappeared behind a cloud of golden energy.

"ARGH!" screamed Professor Smith. It was agony, pain far worse than any regeneration he'd experienced.

"Can't we do something?" sobbed Professor Sprout, who was almost in tears.

"Like what? We don't know what we're dealing with!" Professor McGonagall said sadly.

The crowd watched with a mixture of horror and awe as the golden mist thinned slightly. Behind it, they could see a figure writhing in agony, but it didn't look like Professor Smith. Instead, it looked like...

"Merlin's beard!" gasped Fudge. "That's Barty Crouch!"

"How can it be?" shouted McGonagall over Professor Smith's screams. "He had his soul sucked out!"

"It doesn't matter, he's still a dangerous criminal!" replied Fudge, bristling with anger. "Dolores, when this gold stuff dissipates, immobilise him!"

"Yes, Minister!"

Suddenly, the golden mist-like substance disappeared.

Professor Smith blinked. "That wasn't meant to happen," he said, before collapsing on the floor, unconscious.

"Incarcerous!" chanted Umbridge, and ropes flew from her wand and wrapped themselves around Professor Smith, binding his hands and feet together.

"Take him to Azkaban," Fudge ordered.

"WHAT?" McGonagall exploded. "You're not even going to give him a trial?"

"I seem to remember he's already had one, Minerva, and was found guilty," said Fudge loudly.

"Minister, it might be ... prudent to interrogate him before sending him off to Azkaban, after all, who knows what ... condition he'll be in when he's there?" said Snape.

"Yes yes, alright," Fudge said begrudgingly. "Severus, fetch some Veritaserum, Dolores, take Barty down to the dungeons for interrogation. The rest of you are no longer required, thank you."

"But -" protested McGinagall, but she was silenced by one look from Dumbledore. Pursing her lips, she, along with the other teachers, followed Umbridge and Snape as they levutates Professor Smith between them and left the room.

Dumbledore sighed in relief.

"Don't think this is over yet, Albus," Fudge said triumphantly. "The fact that an extremely dangerous criminal managed to infiltrate your staff and go undetected for over five months, and has succeeded in abducting students right under your nose – yes, I know about that – speaks volumes of your ability to lead this school. I hereby relieve of your duties, appoint Dolores Umbridge as Headmistress of this school, and place you under arrest for negligence of duty!"

Dumbledore, however, was unfazed. "Ah yes, I was afraid this was going to happen," he said calmly. "But I ask the question: how do you intend to arrest me?"

Fudge realised that he'd foolishly sent everyone except Dumbledore out of the room.

"Oh," he said stupidly.

Dumbledore smiled. "Goodbye, Cornelius," he said as Fawkes the phoenix appeared above him in a fiery flash. Dumbledore grasped Fawkes' leg and disappeared with the phoenix in a second bright flash.

Author Note: Dumbledore's gone, and the Doctor's been degenerated and now looks like Barty Crouch Junior? What will happen next?

Replies to reviews:

Insanityisgood25: I decided to cut it from this version, as I wanted to focus more on Harry and co at Grimauld Place. It also leaves the details of how the Doctor managed to rescue Ron to the imagination of the reader, something I think works for the best.

Considering that the story's an AU of Order of the Phoenix. I felt I just had to have a chapter set in Grimauld Place, which meant that a lot of people would see the Zygon. There are..other reasons as to why so many people got to see it, too...

I like your suggestions for Harry's dreams, but unfortunately that's not the direction I'm going with. You'll find out why the dreams are happening later in the story.

Thanks! And yes, the sequel thing will tie up a lot of loose ends, even the ones that people haven't spotted yet. I will say that the previous chapter was quite pivotal in where I'm taking the story and the sequel. In other words, it was the point of no return!

shtoops: Sorry for ignoring your head canon! :p I'm afraid to say that, as much as we'd like him to be, the Doctor isn't immune to everything, and Upsilon radiation is something that can hurt him! I'm still deciding how Hermione will finally come to realise that the Doctor was telling the truth. The beginning of the universe sounds good, but I'd prefer something related to the wizarding world, so that Hermione would be affected more strongly.

SuOmAlAiNeN92: Yes, I'd say Hermione is at the obsessed fanatic stage right now. She really wants to find out who Professor Smith is, it's really bugging her. Astheirs chapter revealed, she didn't see the Doctor degenerate (it sounds good to me!), but she will come across him when he's 10. It'll take quite a lot to get her to believe that 10 and 11 are the same person!

Nursery books and toddlers...I'm mean! One word out of about 4900...quite frankly, I'll be astounded if anyone gets it. I might tell you all what the word was when the story's finished; it'll give you something to think about while you wait for the sequel.

Unfortunately, no, 9 won't be appearing, though him calling Umbridge a stupid ape does sound very appealing!

Regarding Tonks and her sci-fi references, I just had to! She's cool, she makes jokes, and she likes to annoy others. What better way to get her to annoy Hermione by giving her an explanation of how to make a wormhole that she got from a movie? I'm very glad you liked it!

TracyFace93: Doctor/Umbridge confrontation coming soon! Hmm, sounds interesting. I'll see if I can work it in to the story some how, but I doubt I'll be able to. If I do manage to, however, it won't be Hermione, I've already got her 'arc' planned out.

Whovian123: Thanks! The story's set before Series 7, so the Ponds are currently preparing for their contrived divorce that should never have existed in the first place. :)