A/N: I know I've been gone for a while, but I swear I had a good reason. Internet access is hard to come by in bootcamp. I'm back, but I'm not making any promises on regular updates- I'm pretty busy these days. Review and let me know what secrets you think the rest of the Weasleys are keeping. I still need ideas on James, Victoire, Dominique, Hugo, Fred, and Roxanne!
That time that Rose accidentally blew up her potion and melted the ceiling wasn't actually an accident.
"This is going to be so boring," Al complained behind her as they pushed through the masses of students outside the Great Hall after breakfast. "2 hours of a lecture and laboratory? Alan said his class had to do it step by step with the professor because it's 'volatile'."
Rose shoved a couple of fourth years out of her way and pushed open the door down to the dungeons. "I heard that too, but it can't be that bad. It's not like it's really safe for us to do it ourselves, I heard that it's actually really easy to blow up if you're not careful. Louis said somebody in his class melted a table because they weren't paying attention."
Al got a thoughtful look on his face, and Rose matched it. "Nah, that'd be a bad idea," he said.
"Melting a table?" Rose questioned. Her smile got wider and Al got that calculating look on his face that meant he was thinking things that would probably result in hours upon hours of detention should they get caught.
"Please don't," somebody said behind them. "The last thing I need to deal with today is people intentionally melting furniture." Scorpius fell into step with the both of them. "Forsythe's gone and gotten sick again so I've been...invited...to take over prefect duties until he's better."
"That blows, mate," Al said. "Anyhow, furniture wasn't what I had in mind."
"You know what?" Scorpius said. "I'm just going to ignore the rest of this conversation on the grounds that if I don't hear it, I can't be held liable. Please don't cause too much damage."
Rose laughed. "Oh, calm down, how much trouble can we possibly get into?"
Scorpius mumbled something to the tune of "I still remember what you did fourth year" but denied saying anything when Rose demanded to know what he said.
Class turned out to be as bad as Al had expected. The professor went through each step at least three times, and kept stopping them to ask if anybody had any questions. When they got to the part where explosions tended to happen, Rose took notice of an asterisk, and read the footnote written in tiny font at the bottom of the page. "Excessive powdered dragonroot combined with excessive heat can cause this potion to react danerously with nonorganic materials," it read.
"Now, remember to turn down your flames before continuing with the next step!" Professor Hawley said. "Everybody, turn down your heat before you measure your dragonroot out!"
Rose glanced around; most of her classmates did as they were bid and raised their wands to lower the flames on their cauldrons. She met Al's eyes, and he jerked his head towards his cauldron, with the still-raised flame. "I've got it," he mouthed. She nodded in response, but right as she turned to grab her wand, the professor boomed out behind her, "Mister Potter! Your flame?"
Al jerked and instinctively grabbed his wand. Rose cursed, and grabbed her powdered dragonroot before the professor could see her flame. She dropped her entire vial of dragonroot in her cauldron, then faked a scream as the potion started to bubble ominously.
"Miss Weasley!" Professor Hawley screeched. "What did I tell you-"
Before she could finish her sentence, the potion exploded, sending purple globs everywhere.
Rose gasped, covered in liquid that was not as warm as it should have been. It dripped down her forehead and she scrunched her eyes shut and flailed at it to keep it out of her eyes.
"What have you done?" the professor demanded once the screaming stopped and people realized that they weren't dying or melting. "You could have killed us all!"
"The potion's not dangerous to organic materials, Professor," Rose said. "It says so in the book."
A few seconds after she said that, before Professor Hawley managed to gather herself for a proper screaming, something dripped down and thunked on the floor between Rose and the professor.
Rose glanced up, and stared in horror. The ceiling was sizzling and melting, but the stone was solidifying and slamming into the floor below. "Every out!" she screamed. "Now!"
Some of the students started to argue, but those who were paying attention started towards the door. Scorpius started yelling orders and shoving people through the door, and Professor Hawley seemed to be in a state of shock. "Professor?" Rose asked as she and Al grabbed her arms. "It's time to leave.
By the time the teachers got the melting under control and stopped it spreading to other rooms, Rose had racked up a good fifty hours of detention for destruction of school property. They couldn't prove she'd done it on purpose, and the best they could yell at her for was being incrediblt stupid, but Rose felt that most of her teachers suspected it was intentional. Insofar as Rose had planned to see what would go wrong, it had been; the ceiling itself was mostly just an unintended side effect.