CHAPTER 33: SPIDERS AND GIANT FROGS
The atmosphere at Hogwarts had begun to remind America of the atmosphere in places that were expecting to get invaded. Everyone was on edge, constantly looking over their shoulders and jumping at the slightest noise. Even as summer began to make itself known everyone insisted on being as mopey as possible. And with Hagrid and Dumbledore gone indefinitely, four students and a cat Petrified, and a monster on the loose, America couldn't really blame them.
All the new restrictions placed on students meant that following Hagrid's parting advice was pretty much impossible. And even if the teachers weren't herding them like cattle from class to class, there didn't seem to be a single spider to be found in the castle. Seriously, what happened to them all? Did the fly population get eaten by Slytherin's monster? Was Slytherin's monster a giant frog? Wait, was Slytherin's monster a giant frog?!
That particular thought occurred to him during a Potions class two weeks after the night he had started calling 'The Night I Learned the Ministry of Magic Can Accomplish Nothing'. He quickly turned to Harry and Ron. "Dudes, I think Slytherin's monster is a giant frog!" he whispered. Or stage-whispered, at least.
Both Harry and Ron looked at him as if he'd said something crazy. After a few moments of silence Harry said, "How did you come to that conclusion, Alfred?" He sounded rather like someone talking to an elderly family member they were about to put in a nursing home.
America rolled his eyes. "C'mon, dudes, isn't it obvious? All the spiders are gone, which means all the flies they eat must be gone, and frogs eat flies, so Slytherin's monster must have eaten them, so it's totally a frog! And it must be a giant one, because normal frogs aren't monsters."
There were another few moments of silence. Before Harry or Ron could tell him how amazing his thought process was, Draco Malfoy's (hehehe, stupid name) voice rang through the room and drilled its way into America's brain like a jackhammer. "I always thought Father might be the one who got rid of Dumbledore. I told you he thinks Dumbledore's the worst Headmaster the school's ever had. Maybe we'll get a decent Headmaster now. Someone who won't want the Chamber of Secrets closed. McGonagall won't last long, she's only filling in…"
America started taking deep breaths and struggling with all his might to resist the urge to punch Malfoy in the face. The Bat-Dude swept past the three of them, making no comment about how America had taken Hermione's usual seat. "Sir," said Malfoy loudly. "Sir, why don't you apply for the Headmaster's job?" Because all the first years would run crying from the Great Hall if he was the first thing they saw.
The Bat-Dude wasn't self-aware enough to say this, however, instead saying, with a thin-lipped smile, "Now, now, Malfoy. Professor Dumbledore has only been suspended by the governors. I daresay he'll be back with us soon enough." Huh. Wasn't expecting that. Well, at least he has enough brains to know that someone as badass as Dumbledore won't be kept away by a piece of paper and some signatures!
"Yeah, right," said Malfoy, smirking in a way that meant Harry had to start physically restraining America to stop him punching the Slytherin. "I expect you'd have Father's vote, sir, if you wanted to apply for the job. I'll tell Father you're the best teacher here, sir…"
The Bat-Dude smirked and swept off around the dungeon. Seamus Finnigan pretended to vomit into his cauldron, and America gave him a thumbs-up and a grin once he was back in view. "I'm quite surprised the Mudbloods haven't all packed their bags by now," Malfoy went on. "Bet you five Galleons the next one dies. Pity it wasn't Granger…"
America closed his eyes, took even deeper breaths, and clutched the table in an attempt to suppress the now murderous urges blotting out his thoughts. He felt the wood crack and splinter beneath his fingers, and it let out an ominous creaking sound. This all took but a moment, and just one moment later the bell rang. Be grateful I don't have to deal with you anymore now, you little twerp. He opened his eyes and saw that Harry and Dean were hanging onto a furious Ron's arms. "Let me at him," he growled. "I don't care, I don't need my wand, I'm going to kill him with my bare hands –"
"Hurry up, I've got to take you all to Herbology," barked the Bat-Dude. Then his black beetle eyes fell on America, Harry and Ron's table and widened. "Jones, what did you do to that table?!"
"Huh?" America looked down and saw that a huge crack had formed in the table. It seemed that he'd nearly ripped it in two by accident. "Oh. Whoopsie." He glanced at his hands and realized that they were full of splinters. How did I not notice that?! He quickly hid his hands in his pockets before anyone else saw. He'd have to pull the splinters out and hope they healed before they arrived at Herbology. He stood up, trying to look as nonchalant as possible. "Ah, well, you can just fix it with magic, right? You should probably do that. So, yeah." The last word trailed off awkwardly and he got into line with the other Gryffindors.
Snape regarded him suspiciously for a few heartbeats, then repaired the table with a wave of his wand and started leading them to the greenhouses. America was near the back of the line, in front of only Harry and Dean, who were still restraining Ron. They seemed plenty distracted, so America focused on pulling out all his splinters as quickly as possible. He pulled out the last one with his teeth as they got out of the castle and into the school grounds. He examined his hands and was happy to find that they were already healing. It looked like he'd be ready for whatever was waiting for them in Herbology.
"Alfred, what happened to your hand?!" It seemed he'd been looking at his injuries for too long. America looked over his shoulder to see that Ron had calmed down enough for Harry and Dean to release him, and all three were now staring at America's hand. It had been Dean who called out.
America shoved his hands back in his pockets with lightning speed. "Just some splinters, dudes, nothing to worry about!" he said brightly, trying his very best not to sound at all worthy of suspicion. He wasn't sure how successful he was. Dean looked convinced, but both Harry and Ron were clearly not. Ah, well.
Herbology was even more mopey than the rest of their classes, since two of their number were missing. Professor Sprout put them to work pruning the… uh… Voidian Shrinkingflibber? The name was way too complicated. But, on the bright side, they needed about four per bush, so Canada was able to join their group. He attempted to lighten the very heavy mood. "On the bright side, people have stopped suspecting you, eh," he said to Harry. "Ernie was saying he felt bad for ever doubting you. He'll probably try to ambush you to apologize, and he tends to talk a lot, so it'll probably be best to try to ease your way out of the conversation as soon as possible."
This did seem to perk Harry up at least slightly. The faintest of smiles was on his face as he said, "Thanks for the advice. So, who does everyone suspect, now that I'm off the list?"
Canada shrugged. "Well, it varies from person to person, eh. Ernie thinks it's Malfoy… I tried to tell him it wasn't, but he didn't pay much attention to my arguments." Suddenly his eyes widened and he poked America painfully in the kidney.
"Ow, bro, what was that for?!" Ron let out a similar complaint, but both of them fell silent as their attention was directed to the spiders scurrying across the ground. Finally! I thought the giant frog had driven them all away already…
"Oh, yeah," said Ron, trying, and failing, to look pleased. "But we can't follow them now…" America tried to let out a frustrated scream, but Canada slapped a hand over his mouth and it became much less impressive.
Ignoring America's muffled protests, Canada said, "Looks like they're heading for the forbidden forest, eh…" Ron's already pale complexion gained a greenish tinge at that. Oh, yeah, he didn't go into the forest with us last year… It wasn't that bad! I even nearly got to punch Moldyshorts! Why wouldn't someone want to go to the forest after something like that?
The end of the lesson came both too quickly and too slowly. As the Bat-Dude arrived to take the Gryffindors to sucky hero class, Harry said quietly to Canada, "Meet us in the Entrance Hall at about midnight. We'll bring the Cloak." Canada nodded in understanding and went with the other Hufflepuffs to wherever it was they went after Herbology.
America, Harry and Ron lagged behind their classmates as they were led to their next class, so they could discuss their imminent excursion into the forbidden forest. They were still talking by the time they sat down in the back row of Glinda the Sparkly Wizard's class, as they always did. Harry was just reassuring Ron that the forests' denizens weren't all bloodthirsty killers when he started staring at America, his current sentence trailing off into oblivion. "Alfred, wasn't your hand bleeding?"
America had been scratching his nose. He looked at his hand. It was completely healed, just as he'd known it would be. "Uh, yeah, but it's all healed up now, so I'm ready for anything."
"What, in an hour?" said Ron incredulously. "It looked pretty bad. How could it have healed in so little time?"
America was saved from answering by Glinda the Sparkling Wizard making one of his usual big entrances. Even though every other teacher looked at least slightly grimmer than usual, he looked so buoyant he might float up into space and die of asphyxiation at any moment. Come on, float on up so we can get a better teacher. Go on, you can do it…
"Come now," Glinda cried, beaming around at them all. "Why all these long faces?" The only answer he received was everyone in the class rolling their eyes at each other. "Don't you people realise," he said in the kind of voice one used when speaking to the stupid. "The danger has passed! The culprit has been taken away."
"Says who?" said Dean Thomas loudly.
"My dear young man, the Minister of Magic wouldn't have taken Hagrid if he hadn't been one hundred per cent sure that he was guilty," said Glinda, continuing his impression of a kindergarten teacher.
"Dude, have you ever met a politician? Of course he would!" said America at a volume that made Harry and Ron wince.
"I flatter myself I know a touch more about Hagrid's arrest than you do, Mr. Weasley," said Glinda. America started taking deep breaths again. Dear God, this school is turning me into England! I'm not usually this angry!
Ron started to say that he didn't think so, somehow, but stopped mid-sentence with a pained look. America suspected Harry had kicked him under the table. "We weren't there, remember?" Harry muttered.
One lesson of Glinda heavily hinting that he'd always suspected Hagrid later and America clearly wasn't the only one wanting to cause the man severe bodily harm. Just about the only thing that kept him from indulging his darker fantasies was the knowledge that he'd be working to exonerate Hagrid that very night. Soon, Slytherin's giant frog-monster would be stopped and the flies and spiders could return to Hogwarts!
A/N: Okay, apparently I lied last time. I really should have just had them meet Aragog and move the plot forward, but how about instead we give Harry and Ron more evidence that something's up with Alfred! HUGS \(^-^)/ Now for Q&A! To RussianMochi: Yeah, I had an idea for bringing the 2ps in, but that's sort of died now, so it looks like you'll get your wish! And no, I don't have another account. This is my only one on this site. To SoulxMakaLover37: You are absolved of your great sin. And we'll have to see what happens with Aragog next time, because the thing about the 'pantsing' writing style is that you don't plan stuff out and sometimes you write something completely different than what you intended. Strangest dream? Well, I had a pretty weird one after I first saw the Chamber of Secrets movie. I was in the parking lot of my school, and Horcrux!Riddle had an ent-like creature try to eat me. And for the second question, sometimes when I'm thinking I'll start thinking about the complete futility of the human way of life and wonder why we even bother going on when we'll probably all die before we achieve space travel and OH GOD I'M DOING IT RIGHT NOW STOP IT, ME, STOP IT! DON'T DEPRESS OUR READERS! To Berlin: We'll have to see next chapter... sorry about that. And I'm so honored to be nominated for such a prestigious award! So, we now know Nyo!America lives in Vermont. Useful knowledge. To TheChibitalian: 1) I had to look up what pocky was, so no. 3) *sarcasm* Oh my gosh, you've seen it, too? I thought nobody else in the world liked that show! *endsarcasm* 4) Oh, boy... I think I'd have to go with Goblet of Fire, if only because it will provide the chance to naturally bring in more Nations. 5) GAH YOU GUYS ARE SUGGESTING SO MANY THINGS I HAVEN'T EVEN READ HUNGER GAMES YET! In case you guys hadn't noticed yet, when I start watching/reading/playing a new series, I tend to get completely absorbed, so I'm afraid if I watched/read all the stuff you guys suggested I wouldn't be able to finish this! Yeah, that's the excuse I'll go for. It's not because I'm lazy! Totally not! Thanks for the hug! And thanks to all of you wonderful reviewers for making me feel so happy! NEXT CHAPTER: We actually meet Aragog for real. See you all next time!