Author's note. Told you I wouldn't be that long in posting a new chapter. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed, we've reached over 2000 reviews and I'm very happy about that.
One minor issue some people have with the story is that things are going too easy for the trio. I agree it can't last, I just didn't think it would make sense for them to stumble from one crisis to the next. Right now, they've got a head start on a lot of things so up until now, things have gone pretty well for them. But I know it can't fully remain like that and even though I find writing awkward or difficult situations a bit tricky, I'll do my best to shake things up.
There is a warning for bad language.
I looked it up, Beauty and the beast was released in November of 1991 so I think that's close enough to make this realistic. ;)
Enjoy and please review.
"More bacon Harry?" Mrs Weasley asked, hovering over the table, holding a large plate piled with bacon, fried egg, tomato and mushroom.
"Just a little Mrs Weasley," Harry said with a smile and she quickly gave him three slices.
Ron smirked at him as his mother now offered the plate to Percy who only accepted some more tomato and egg. Harry sometimes thought that Dudley would love to spend a night here if only so he could enjoy Mrs Weasley's cooking. Not that Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon would ever allow that but who knows. Maybe one day, Dudley would be curious enough to want to visit the Wizarding world.
"Ginny, where are your brothers?" Mrs Weasley asked her daughter who'd just returned from her room to grab something.
"I think they're still sleeping," the young girl replied, plonking herself into a chair and resuming the eating of her breakfast.
Mrs Weasley tutted to herself.
"They better not stay there too long or they'll miss their breakfast."
Ginny just shrugged.
"I could wake them when I'm finished breakfast, mother," Percy offered, carefully cutting up his mushroom.
"Thank you Percy," she said gratefully. "Now boys, have you completed your homework?"
"Of course," Percy promptly stated.
"Uh, mostly," Ron stated.
"Same," Harry added.
During down moments, they had been working on their homework since neither wanted to do it on the last night. However, not all the essays were completed and Harry was sure that Hermione would scold them for it. Judging by her letters, she'd not only completed them but was revising studies she'd done for the subjects they weren't yet taking. She'd suggested they take a little look at them so they wouldn't have to take Divination again. Harry wasn't interested in Muggle Studies so the choices were basically Arthismancy or Ancient Runes. Right now, he couldn't make a choice but he had about two years to do so.
"There's the post," Ginny said eagerly, pointing at the window as two owls approached.
One flew gracefully inside and the other did a belly flop onto the kitchen floor.
"Hello Hedwig," Harry greeted, offering her a bit of bacon as Mrs Weasley bent to scoop Errol off the floor.
"Got a letter, have you Harry?" she asked as Harry undid the parchment from his owl's leg.
"Yep, it's from Hermione," he said, scanning the letter and recognising the handwriting.
"What's she saying?" Ron asked, digging into his eggs and bacon.
"She's inviting us to go to a film," Harry replied, reading through his letter. "If we take the Floo to Diagon Alley, her parents will pick us up and takes us to the cinema."
"Oh, is that a Muggle thing?" Mrs Weasley asked, now offering some food to Sirius who declined, he was drinking coffee while reading the Daily Prophet. He declined, he was too absorbed in his paper.
"Yeah, it's supposed to be really good," Harry assured her, glancing at Ginny before saying. "Maybe before we go back to Hogwarts, we could all go and see it together, I think Ginny would really enjoy this film."
"I would?" she said in surprise.
"Yes," Harry agreed with a grin. "You can ask Ron what it's like….if we're allowed to go."
"Of course Harry dear," Mrs Weasley said with a smile. "As long as you do everything Hermione's parents tell you, isn't that right Sirius?"
"Hmm?" Sirius said, glancing up from his paper. "Oh yeah, I've no problem with them going to meet their friend."
"Excellent, when does she want to meet you?" the Weasley matriarch asked.
"She's wondering if we can meet us at five at the Leaky Cauldron," Harry replied. "She says her parents will take us out to dinner after."
"Sounds pretty good to me," grinned Ron, shoving in a large forkful of food.
"May I be excused?" Percy requested, having just finished his breakfast and wishing to get back to a book.
"Yes Percy," Mrs Weasley said distractedly, gathering up some dirty dishes.
"I could go and exchange some Galleons for muggle money after lunch," Sirius offered, still reading.
"I almost forgot about that," she gasped, several plates whizzing through to the kitchen. "Yes, that would be lovely Sirius."
"I'll send a reply after breakfast," Harry stated, stroking Hedwig's front as she closed her eyes with pleasure.
Sometime later as Harry and Ron were taking their dishes through, Ron's mother was glaring upwards.
"Those two," she exclaimed. "They've missed their breakfast, probably up to some nonsense."
The two boys shrugged, the twins probably had some chocolate they were scoffing left over from Christmas.
"I'm going up to the room," Ron said to Harry. "Want me to bring down some ink and parchment?"
"Sure, that'd be great," Harry said, going over to sit with Sirius who was now lounging on a sofa.
So Ron climbed up towards his room, pausing beside the twins' door but hearing nothing untoward. Maybe they were studying? Yeah right.
He was feeling quite positive, getting out to see Hermione sounded pretty good. Even if it was to a Muggle thing and he probably wouldn't understand a single bit of it. But the ice cream and chocolate he would enjoy and even the meal was bound to be great. His mum was bound to insist he get some more of his homework done today, since he was going out later.
Maybe he should tackle that essay of Snape's and get it over…
"What are you two doing in my room?" Ron demanded, seeing Fred and George standing by his bed. The twins in your room was generally not a good sign and Ron was instantly wary. The Weasleys had made it a rule that everyone should be able to have some privacy in their own rooms meaning their siblings could not just constantly barge in. Which was probably why Fred and George had been able to invent so many things without the rest of the family knowing.
"What's this?" Fred wanted to know, ignoring the question.
Ron looked and to his horror, saw that it was the Marauder's Map. Even though Harry was normally the one who had it, he didn't mind Ron or Hermione taking a look and it just so happened that Ron had been having a go last night. It wasn't for any particular reason, it was just nice to sometimes take a lot at the castle and see who was there.
"Where did you get this?" George asked.
"I found it," Ron said, trying to act nonchalant. "Why?"
"You know full well why," Fred said, his tone angry, his face slightly red. "What were you doing, poking about in our stuff?"
"I haven't been poking about in your stuff," Ron retorted hotly. "If that's yours, then you lost it."
"No, you stole it!" yelled Fred, finally losing his temper.
"I did not steal it, I found it," Ron roared back at them.
"Oh yeah and you worked out how to use it?" his brother said sarcastically.
"Yeah, I bloody well did," Ron snarled. "Why is that so hard to believe?"
"Because you're stupid!" Fred yelled at him, giving his younger brother a shove. "There's no way you could have worked out the password!"
"Fuck you," Ron shot back angrily. "You think you're so smart, but you two can't even scrape three Owls together. The whole world doesn't revolve around you two."
"What does a goody two shoes like you know?" George now demanded angrily. "You're turning into Percy, mum's perfect little boy. Aiming to be Head Boy like him?"
"Oh here we go," Ron exclaimed, throwing up his hands in frustration. "Okay, what is your deal with that? You always go on and on about how Percy lives his life, why don't you back the fuck off and stop driving him away from this family?"
"You're full of dragon dung!" Fred shouted. "We're not driving anyone away."
"Sure you're not," Ron said with such withering sarcasm that his elder brother whipped out his wand.
"Don't you dare get smart with us, Ickle Ronniekins," he warned.
"Or what?" Ron said contemptuously, hand already on his wand. "Gonna jinx me? I'd like to see you try."
"Listen to the First year," Fred laughed unkindly, sharing a look with his brother. "He thinks he can take us all."
"A concussed troll could take you on," Ron scoffed, tightening his grip on his wand.
There was a flash, a bang and a yelp of pain. But when the smoke cleared, Fred was the one bent over, clutching his face which was covered in boils. George stared before attempting to retaliate but found his wand flying through the air and into Ron's hand.
"You're not pushing me around any longer," growled Ron just as Percy entered.
"What is going on?" he demanded. "Have you been fighting?"
"None of your business," Fred snarled, allowing George to support him, those boils were angry ones.
"It is my business," Percy declared pompously. "We're all going down right now and you can explain this to mum."
Ron glared at his twin brothers before tossing George's wand back at him. He then turned on his heel and stomped downstairs, feeling angry and frustrated. What the hell were they doing poking about in his room? And why the hell did they have to find the Map, how were they going to get it back now?
"Something the matter?" Sirius questioned when Ron stormed into the living room. He and Harry appeared to be have been talking about something.
"No," Ron snapped, dropping moodily into an arm chair and folding his arms. The others would be coming down soon enough and he'd have to deal with the fallout.
Harry glanced upwards, he knew something was up.
"What's wrong?" he asked, hearing footsteps coming down the stairs.
Ron made a grumbling noise and a moment later, they heard Percy calling.
"Mother, the boys were fighting."
"Really," came her exasperated voice and she came through from the kitchen.
When she saw the state of Fred, she said in frustration. "Now what were you to doing?"
"Ron stole something of ours and wouldn't admit to it," Fred said without preamble.
"I did not steal it," ground out Ron as his mother bustled over to Fred and looked over his face.
"Who did this?" she wanted to know as she brought out her wand.
"Ron!"
"Fred!"
They spoke at the same time and glared at each other.
"Fred tried to hex me and I blocked it," Ron said quickly.
"You blocked it?" Sirius said in utter amazement.
"Fred Weasley," Mrs Weasley reprimanded severely. "How could you hex your little brother, wait until you're father hears about this."
"But he stole something of ours and then cheeked us!" George protested, waving the Marauders Map in the air.
"I know that," Sirius suddenly said, making everyone stare at him.
"You know it?" George repeated in disbelief.
"Yeah," Sirius said with a nod, taking a closer look. "I helped to create it."
"You did?" both boys yelped in shock.
"Yep, I was Padfoot," he explained, adding with a grin. "If you learned how to open it."
"Oh we learned alright," Fred said eagerly. "It's fantastic!"
"This belongs to you Sirius?" Mrs Weasley questioned. "Did one of the boys take it from your room?"
"No, no," Sirius said quickly, holding out his hand and George handed it over. Looking it over, he said. "This is something James, Remus and I created while in school and it was left at Hogwarts just before we left. I'm guessing Fred and George discovered it."
"Yeah, we found it in our First year," Fred said eagerly, his mother had just rid his face of those boils. "It's been brilliant."
Then his face darkened. "But then it went missing at the beginning of the year and we just found it in Ron's room."
"Well, I found it earlier this year," Ron said heatedly. "And me and my friends worked out how to use it."
"Yeah right," Fred scoffed.
"It's true," Harry stated, coming to Ron's defence. "We can all use it."
"How did you know it could do something?" Fred wanted to know.
"Easy," Harry said with a little smile. "It insulted us when we tried to use it."
Sirius let out a bark of laughter.
"Oh I bet that was priceless," he chuckled.
"It was," Harry grinned, remembering the moment when he'd witnessed the map insulting someone. It just so happened that it wasn't him who the map was targeting.
The twins were looking a little unsure now. Sirius turned over the Map again before saying.
"I think what's happened is a bit of a misunderstanding. You boys found it but misplaced it and then Ron and his friends came across it. I doubt he would have realised it was yours so he never showed it to you and you never discovered what had happened until just now."
"I agree," Mrs Weasley said briskly. "Now apologise to each other. I think it's best Sirius decide what to do with that…..parchment thing since he created it."
Fred and George looked crestfallen but glumly mumbled. "Sorry."
After receiving a pointed look from his mum, Ron did the same, looking extremely mulish as he did so. Sirius looked down at the Map before saying.
"I think I'll need to have a few days to think about this. But I'll work out something fair, don't worry."
The boys all nodded.
"Come along," Mrs Weasley commanded. "You'd better get on with your homework, Harry dear, you'd better send Hermione that note."
Sirius looked at the Map fondly before tucking it away.
…..
"So that's what happened?" Ron concluded. "Now Sirius has the Map and it'll be up to him what happens."
"I'm sure we'll get it back at some point," Hermione said reassuringly as they followed her parents to the car pack. "But what about your brothers, are they going to hold a grudge about it?"
"Dunno," Ron shrugged. "Depends if they think I really did find it by accident."
"Sirius'll be fair," Harry told them. "He'll want us all to be able to use it somehow."
"We'll work out something," Hermione said positively, turning a corner with her parents.
The weather was overcast and threatening snow so they were all dressed up warmly. Harry and Ron were wearing knitted hats, gloves and scarves, green for Harry, blue for Ron. Hermione wore gloves but her warm coat came with a fluffy hood so she simply wore that over her head. Unsurprisingly for a December afternoon, there was a nip in the air.
"So, what exactly is a film?" Ron asked slowly.
"Oh, you'll love it trust me," Hermione said firmly. "You know how we can make drawings come alive in the wizarding world?"
"Yeah," he said.
"Well, this is what an animated film is like," she explained. "Except it tells a story with music and voices. A non-animated film would be like a photo telling a story."
"Uh, okay," Ron said slowly.
She sighed and said. "You'll understand once you watch it. But just remember, it's only a story so if there's any magic in it, it's from a muggle perspective and not meant to be realistic."
"It's a bit like Babbity Rabbity," Harry cut in. "You know, when she's a rabbit but can still talk?"
"Alright," Ron said, perking up and looking less confused. "So….what are we going to see again?"
"It's called Beauty and the Beast," Hermione said as the car was opened and they all piled in.
"Remember kids," her father said jovially. "Try not to eat too many sweeties there."
"You get sweets at the cinnamon?" Ron asked eagerly.
"Cinema," Harry said with a grin. "According to Dudley, you get popcorn, ice cream, chocolate, sweets, fizzy drinks, you name it."
"Sounds great," the red head said enthusiastically. This day was really starting to look up.
Author's. So what does Ron think of a Disney film? Will Harry's plan be revealed? Find out next time, until then.