(2012)—Edited.

Disclaimer-How many times am I going to have to say this? I don't own it.

Hermione heard the doorbell ring from her spot in the library, where she was pouring over an essay about the ways modern social conventions influenced and shaped the practice of charms. And ring. And ring. And keep on ringing. So she pulled herself away from the essay she was reading and went to answer it.

"Hello, darling." Sheila strode through the door and James followed, along with their entourage of guards. "Would you mind getting your friends for us?"

"Would you mind telling me why?" She asked in response, watching the guards size her up.

"Oh, there's no need for that." James smiled, "John can fetch them." One of the guards detached himself from the ranks of the others and lumbered away.

Sheila and took out a nail file. "How did you enjoy your party, Hermione?"

For a brief, wonderful moment she wondered how they even know about it, before remembering that she was being filmed at all hours of the day. "It was fine."

"Who was that delicious guy you were dancing with?"

Hermione ignored her last question. Under no circumstances would she identify Jacob as a 'delicious guy'. "Wait—how do you know I was dancing with someone?"

"The cameras, dear. Do we have to explain this whole being-filmed-constantly concept to you again?"

"But I was out of the house," Hermione frowned. "Do the cameras follow us around?"

"Yes, they do." James said with a grin. "The only places they don't go are the ones with a special charm around the door to keep them out."

"That's…" Smart. "I have a question for you, actually. Where did you get all the pictures of us that you use for the show? The ones of our eyes in the song, for example."

James shrugged in response as Sheila kept filing. "Honestly, we just hired some people to put together a portfolio on you. So we're not even really sure."

Hermione frowned at this news. "Portfolio?"

"Of course you have a portfolio," Sheila watched her as if she'd just announced she would be backpacking through an active volcano. "Take it as a compliment."

"I'd like to see mine." She said anyway, determined to see anything they'd collected on her.

"The material belongs to the show." Sheila answered, her hand pausing mid-file.

Hermione crossed her arms. "You can't legally withhold this information from me, when it was obviously obtained without my permission. Especially considering you didn't have my consent before I came on this program—"

"Actually, your guardian acted on your behalf," James interjected as the rest of her house mates filtered in. "Perfectly legal."

"Now now, Hermione." Sheila smiled at her, "Pretty face back on, please."

Harry and Ron joined them in the room and she wheeled around to face them. "Did you know that they have portfolios with information and pictures on each of us?"

"Information?" Ron frowned, head cocked to the side. "I'm sure there's a load on me, but what kind of information could they possibly have about you or Harry?"

Harry smiled tightly. "Honestly, I'd rather not even know. I'll bet its all complete lies."

"I want to see mine." Hermione turned back to them. "We could take this to the Wizengamot. You know there are all kinds of wizarding laws that apply to this situation, including distribution of information and—"

"Okay," James finally said. "If you'll stop talking we'll let you see them."

"Fine." She finally agreed, reaching for hers when Sheila conjured them. As she thumbed through the pages she snorted with disgust. "This is complete rubbish. It's just random photographs, journal articles I'm mentioned in from fourth year and a ton of speculation."

James grinned sheepishly. "Yes, well…"

Sheila moved forward and breezed by them into the living room impatiently. "If you don't mind we'd like to carry on, now. We've decided to make things a bit more exciting in here. A few new rules, you could say." All the inhabitants groaned.

"Now, now, I think you might be happy about these. They're not so much rules as activities. Like games."

"Activities?" Pansy grimaced, as if there was nothing in the world that interested her less than any activities Sheila and James had planned.

"Yes." James grinned. "The first one, a scavenger hunt, is tomorrow. The groups are as follows, Pansy and Hermione, Ron and Blaise, and Harry and Draco."

Each member of the group turned to their counterpart and grimaced in distate.

"You have to meet us down here at 11:00 sharp. If you win, you get a prize that I'm sure you'll be quite interested in." They all perked up. "Bring along a bag and some money. We'll give you the rules when you get down, and then drop you off in your different stations."

"Right now, however, we're going to give you one hour to group with your partner and discuss strategy. The only thing we can tell you now is that you cannot use magic."

"How about we forgo the group meetings?" Draco spoke aloud, and Ron was in the process of agreeing when Sheila cut in frostily.

"It's mandatory. So start strategizing."

Reluctantly they all moved over to their partners and split off. Hermione and Pansy sat down on one of the couches and neither spoke for about a minute or so, before Hermione gave in. "Alright, so I think it would be best if we categorized everything on the hunt list by what store we're most likely to find them in when we get it tomorrow. That way we'll be much more organized."

Pansy turned to look at her like she was a slug who was crawling over her shoe. "I've never been to the village, so I really don't know how you propose we do that."

"I have," Hermione said in reply, deciding to ignore the expression of distaste. "I'll make a list of store names, or the kind of store we should look for. That should make categorizing them tomorrow faster."

With a shrug Pansy leaned back. "Whatever reduces our time spent together is fine by me, Granger."

Hermione pulled out her notebook and began to scribble. "The first is the grocery store, which also sells other random items, like paper or pens…"

"You realize, Weasley, that we have the biggest disadvantage here? Neither of us is accustomed to muggle anything." Blaise said and looked at the red-head across from him at the table. He could see Hermione and Pansy hunched over a notebook, while Harry and Draco seemed to be bickering.

"Which is why I think we should just give the list to someone in every store and ask them to get it for us. Quickest way." Ron answered and Blaise nodded slowly, watching him.

"How will we pay?"

"With money." Ron said and rolled his eyes. "I guess cunning doesn't really cover intelligent, does it?"

"I mean, do you know muggle currency, because I don't." Blaise snapped, his back stiffening.

"No," Ron admitted. "I can always ask Hermione tonight. Or we can say we're foreign, tons of wizards do that when they mingle with the muggle world."

"Fine." Blaise said and they lapsed into silence.

"So we have to wait here for an hour…?"

"Look Potter I think we both know that we're not going to win so I think we should ditch the hunt and go to a bar or something. I need a drink. I'm sick of being in this bloody house." Draco said after they finished glaring at each other and silently telling the other to go to hell.

"Unlike you, Malfoy, my first instinct isn't giving up." Harry said in a stiff voice. "I want to win. But by all means, drink yourself to death today. Maybe they'll let us have a party tomorrow instead of doing the 'activity.'"

Draco raised an eyebrow in response. "How hostile of you, Potter."

"Malfoy, we don't have to get along to win. All we have to do is keep from using magic and we have a chance. There's a chance the prize could mean getting out of this house, and I wouldn't mind going to Diagon Alley or something for a bit." Harry shook his head, wondering in what universe he had to be in to try and work with Draco as a team. "That might be the prize."

"I suppose you have nowhere else to go, do you?" Draco sneered. "Or are you afraid to bring me along to see your Weasel girlfriend?"

"She's not my girlfriend." Harry snapped and then forced himself to breath deeply. "Listen, all we have to do is take the list and search every single store for what we need. It's easy. Okay?"

"Fine. But we're not agreeing."

"Definitely not," Harry said, "we're just looking towards the same goal."

Draco nodded once, sharply, and then they plunged into silence, ready to wait out the hour with no talking rather then having a conversation with each other.

During dinner that night Ron started asking Hermione about muggle money, so she explained the different values of the bills and coins. She invited Pansy to sit with them, thinking it might help them the next day. Although it dampened Ron's spirits and shocked Hermione's the blond agreed.

Besides Ron's questions that she couldn't answer ('But why is it paper?' 'Because it just is, Ron.') he seemed to understand everything and definitely had a better grasp on what she'd taught him. After she'd finished explaining Pansy asked, rather politely, too, that Hermione come to her room in twenty minutes. Surprised, she agreed and bade the other girl farewell.

Ron waited until Pansy was out the door before he turned to Hermione. "What's up with you and Parkinson?"

Hermione shrugged and cleared up the money she'd taken out to show them. "If we want to win then Pansy and I are going to have to get along. Besides, we're going to be here for a while, so I think it might be a good idea to try and improve our relationship."

"I am not going to try to be friends with any Slytherin, especially not those three."

"I never said I was going to be with friends with her. I just don't want to spend the entire summer trying to avoid them, or fighting them so that people across Britain can watch me arguing. Besides, if things improve next year may be a lot more peaceful."

"I'm not befriending one!" Ron insisted, getting to his feet and pacing back and forth across the small space. "The way I see it, as long as I don't have to look at Malfoy's pointy face, this summer won't be so bad. Avoidance is the best thing."

Hermione got to her feet and the pair headed out of the kitchen. "I told you, Ron. I'm not trying to befriend anyone. Just have some kind of working relationship. Avoidance isn't going to work for the whole summer."

"We'll see about that. Anyway, I'm going to play with the telly-vishion."

She giggled at his mis-pronunciation and headed upstairs. As she passed Blaise in the halls he nodded slightly in recognition of her presence. She knocked on Pansy's door and it swung open to reveal the blonde girl holding the basket they'd all been given.

"Follow me." She past Hermione and led her into the bathroom, where she closed the door tightly. "I need you to teach me how to use these."

"You want my help…to learn to use muggle objects?" She asked, wrapping her mind around the idea.

Pansy nodded, "I just want to know how to use them."

"Which one do you want to learn about first?" She asked and sat down on the edge of the bathtub. Pansy was still a whiny snob to her, but if she was asking about muggle technology it was already an improvement. Maybe all she needed was the right influence to change her ways, and since they would be there the entire summer, Hermione might as well be that influence.

"This one." She held up her camera.

Hermione took it and held it up in her palm. "This is a digital camera. Basically it takes pictures that don't move and are stored on a memory chip attached to this so you can view them. To turn it on you press this little circular button right there…" She pointed and pressed it, "to turn it off you press it again and hold for about three seconds."

Pansy nodded and Hermione told her to freeze, then she snapped a picture of her. "Here, to view a picture you press the button near the bottom right corner, it's a circle and has an arrow pointing to the right." She got Pansy to push it and the picture she'd just taken appeared on the rectangular screen.

"I can't believe they really don't move." Pansy exclaimed. Hermione smiled at the girl's astonishment and went on explaining the basic controls that would be necessary to know for picture taking. When she finally glanced at the time she realized it was already 10:00 and they'd been talking for several hours.

"Oh! We should probably go to sleep soon, I don't want to be tired tomorrow."

Pansy looked up from playing with the options dial and snapped a picture of her. "Okay. For awhile I forgot those gits were making us their puppets."

"Yeah, I can't believe my parents agreed to this." Hermione grumbled and then sighed, "we can't do anything without being caught on tape. Except when we're in here."

"Don't pretend you don't like the attention. Isn't that what you Gryffindors thrive on?" Pansy asked her, and there was only a hint of malice in her voice so Hermione forced herself to wait five seconds before replying.

"No. Not at all. Everyone I know hates attention." Hermione finally said, unwilling to go into details about just who and how much.

Pansy looked unconvinced. "Well, I need to go to bed. Meet me here tomorrow at 7? There's more to do."

Hermione didn't understand Pansy Parkinson, that much was clear. But she felt she owed it to the other girl to at least give her a chance, because she hadn't started off on any rants about blood purity yet. "Alright."

Pansy gathered all her belongings up and they split up in the hall, going their separate ways as though they hadn't spent the last few hours together. Before she went to sleep Hermione browsed through her instruction manual for the camera so she could explain more the next evening and then fell asleep.

The next morning Hermione woke up and showered, mentally preparing herself for the challenge and Pansy's. After she'd eaten breakfast she went to her teammate's room, knocking once before Pansy swung it open.

"Granger?"

"Er, yeah. I just wanted to make sure you're ready for the challenge."

Pansy nodded and stepped back, forcing Hermione to stop the door from closing on her. Hermione began to talk as Pansy brushed through her damp hair. "You'll want sneakers so we can have good mobility. A backpack of some kind, or a large bag. We don't know how much stuff we'll have to carry, so better to be too prepared. Have you given any thought to how much money you'll bring?"

She looked at Hermione and blinked once. "I thought I'd bring one hundred pounds."

Hermione nodded, "I'm going to bring fifty, so if you bring fifty too, we should have enough. I'm also bringing a notebook and a pen, so we can jot down the things in our store categories."

"You seem to have put a lot of thought into this." The Slytherin dried her hair quickly with her wand and then used a hair band to keep it out of her eyes.

"I'm interested in the kinds of things we'll be given if we win. If they let us get away from this place, it will make us all a lot more competitive." The feeling that she was constantly being watched was not one she enjoyed experiencing, even if it sometimes slipped her mind. The absence of visible cameras made it easier to pretend she wasn't always being watched, but there were still moments she couldn't seem to forget it.

"I think there's something we need to get straight before we continue," Pansy said, and met her eyes. Her next words were enunciated clearly. "We're not friends."

Hermione blinked, startled, and then nodding slowly. "Of course. This is just to win."

Pansy nodded, "Exactly."

"What time is it, anyway?" Hermione asked, running her hands up and down her arms as she stood.

Pansy pulled a watch from her pocket and glanced at it, "10:30."

"Okay. I'm going for a cup of tea…I suppose I'll see you down there."

She let herself into her room and glanced back at Pansy. She caught sight of a blonde head of hair before it closed with a snap.

Draco, Blaise and Harry were downstairs eating breakfast. Draco was sitting at one end of the table reading the paper, Harry was directly opposite him eating cereal, and Blaise sat on Draco's right reading a letter. They were sitting in silence and all three had their wands beside them on the table. She dropped her bag on a chair by Harry and put the kettle on.

"Ron isn't up yet?"

Harry finished chewing his cereal and shook his head. "I'll have to go wake him up when I go back upstairs, if he's not up by then."

She smiled and fished a teabag from the box. "He'll have to eat fast."

Harry chuckled, drawing Blaise's attention. "Doesn't he always? Mrs. Weasley would probably have a fit if she saw his eating habits. He's not as bad at home as he is at Hogwarts."

She poured some milk into her cup as she replied. "I suppose he wouldn't be Ron if he didn't eat like that. It's one of his less appealing but definitely characteristic habits."

"I wonder if the wizarding world thinks of it that way."

She waited until the kettle had boiled and then poured the hot water into the mug, taking a seat at the table and tracing her fingers over the grains of wood.

It was then that Pansy appeared and made a quick breakfast. They spent the remainder of their time in silence until Ron came dashing into the kitchen ('Why didn't you wake me?') and gulped down a bowl of cereal. There was a faint knocking on the door that no one seemed inclined to answer so they waited for Sheila and James to let themselves in.

"Oh good, we're all here." James smiled widely at the six. "Did everyone sleep well?"

There were a few mumbles of no real answer. "Lovely." Sheila smiled. "Would you all please move to sit with your partner?" They shuffled around reluctantly.

"Thank-you. So we're going to give you a list of items that can be found somewhere in the village. You have until one o'clock, at which point the challenge is forfeit. If you find all the items before them hurry back, because the first team back with all the items is the winner. You can't split up, you can't join another team, and as we said before, you can't use magic."

James flashed them all a smile, "Do you want to know the prize?"

They nodded and he grinned. "You and your partner get a prepaid dinner at this lovely French restaurant Sheila and I went to the other day, they serve a great foie gras—er, right. You also get one hour at a location of your choice, though it must be somewhere in Britain. It will not be filmed."

If there was one thing that could have made them be more determined to win, it was the idea of time off camera.

"Now please collect yours bags and meet back here in five minutes."

The group assembled quickly and they were transported down to the village in a limousine, which she found utterly ridiculous.

They drove slowly, giving Hermione plenty of time to think about where she would go if she won. As they stopped she decided that if they did, she would go to Andrea's. She didn't want the cameras inside her actual house, and since she'd already been filmed at Andrea's there was nothing much she could do about that.

"Hermione and Pansy, this is you." She stood up and followed Pansy back out of the vehicle. They stood back and watched it pull away from them and drive down the street, attracting curious looks from shoppers. The road they were on was lined with shops because the village wasn't big enough to have a mall. In fact the Fire Department, Police Station and Medical Health Centers were all located in Great Hangleton, their sister town. Surrounding the large strip were streets with houses on them.

As soon as the limo was gone Hermione settled against the side of the grocery store and pulled out a notebook and a pen. She looked at Pansy expectantly, who began to read the list she'd been given.

"A rubber duck." The blonde blinked uncertainly and Hermione paused.

"The Department or grocery store." She scribbled it down in her book and then looked up again.

"A leaf from a maple tree."

"I suppose we'll have to find a maple tree… Next."

"A pink pen."

"Department Store…Next."

"A heart shaped rock."

"On the ground, I suppose…Next."

"Herbal Essence shampoo."

"Department store…Next."

"The second season of Friends."

"Movie and music store…Next."

"A wedding picture."

Hermione paused, "Anywhere I suppose. When I came down here I got a pretty thorough look of the street and I didn't see an art store."

"A painting of the landscape."

"Maybe there is an art store…keep your eyes open."

"A beer."

"The grocery store…Next." Suddenly orange sparks came into Hermione's line of vision. "We need to hurry."

"A picture of someone named Jack."

"Slightly problematic, we'll ask around if anyone knows someone by that name."

"Mint gum."

Her pen was moving so quickly it was a blur, "the grocery store, I think."

"Two pairs of sunglasses, sunblock, and one article of clothing."

"Clothing store, and drug store. Next."

"We both have to get the phone number of someone of the opposite sex and a CD."

"Music store and we'll have to ask strangers."

"That's it." Pansy looked up and Hermione jumped to her feet as she threw her bag over her shoulder.

"Okay, the grocery store is closest let's go there first." They climbed the two stairs leading up into the store.

"A rubber duck, mint gum, a beer, we should ask about Jack while looking for a wedding picture, picture of the landscape and a rock shaped like a heart." They stepped inside.

"Let the games begin." Hermione muttered.

Harry and Draco were deposited beside the department store. Draco stared down the street as if he'd just been dropped into his worst nightmare, while Harry snatched the list from his hand and held it in front of his face.

"A rubber duck…" Harry read the first item of the list.

"What the hell do muggles use rubber ducks for?"

"Er…Dudley used one in his bath once but chucked it out the window because he sat on it and it popped."

"Dudley?" Draco raised an eyebrow.

"My cousin." Harry said and returned his gaze to the list. "A leaf from a maple tree."

Draco scanned the area surrounding them, "I don't see a bloody maple tree."

"Maybe there's a fake tree somewhere. It doesn't say it has to be real. We need a pink pen."

"A pen?"

"It's like the muggle version of a quill."

Their conversation was put to hold as sparks blew up in front of their faces signaling the start.

"Let's go into the department store first." Harry said quickly, leading the way to the front door of the building. "Let the games begin, I guess."

Ron stepped out of the limo after Blaise and watched it drive away before turning to his partner. The village was the kind his sister might describe as quaint, but personally he thought it was quite uninspiring. "Read the list."

Blaise read through all the items and when he reached the bottom looked up and stared at Ron in silence. "Right. Well, this is just dandy. I don't know where muggles would even sell half these things, and now we have to wait for sparks—" Sparks erupted before their eyes and they both started.

"May as well start anywhere." Ron said, gesturing across the street at the first store he saw. "How about that?"

Blaise followed the line of his arm, "Adult Video Store? Sounds good to me. I wonder why the windows are covered."

Ron shrugged, "probably the muggles are just paranoid."

They set off across the street quickly and leapt up the steps into the shop.

Let the games begin, indeed.

A/N Eclipse is out today! I'm so excited. I cannot wait to read it. I thought I'd post this chapter up first so I can get lost in Bella's life and not feel guilty about updating. :D

By the way I am open to suggestions about other activities, if you have any.

Please review!