Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Danny Phantom.
"And this," Binns said, sweeping his arm towards a door, "is where the registry of all Hogwarts students, past, present, and future, is kept."
Danny, who had been forcing himself to maintain an expression of polite interest, perked up at the mention of this.
"What do you mean 'all future'?" The young halfa asked the older halfa. "How do you know which students will enroll?"
"Ah," Binns said, smiling, tapping his nose. The History of Magic professor was currently in spirit mode rather than shade mode. In his current form he gave off the same sort of glow that Danny and the other spirits that he had encountered had. He was dressed in modern looking ghostly t-shirt and jeans. However, being a spirit, they couldn't be normal. No, they had to be ludicrous in some manner. The jeans were purple and glowing, and the shirt was a red color that clashed horribly with the pants.
Professor Binns had ambushed Danny as the young halfa was leaving the headmaster's office. He had been practically bouncing up and down in anticipation of meeting such an important figure in modern magical history. Phantom had no chance to defend himself; the professor had zoomed to right in front of him and grabbed his hand, pumping it up and down, gushing about the honor of meeting him.
There had been a rapid fire barrage of questions from the professor, too many for Danny to even consider beginning to answer. Binns had continued babbling almost ignoring Danny's silence, and then dragged his fellow spirit on comprehensive tour of the castle and its history. Danny went along with it so he could avoid alienating a future teacher. Up until the current point most of what he had seen had been uninteresting, dorm locations, bathrooms, Hospital Wing, and other such mundane fixtures.
This however, was slight different.
"It's a relatively recent addition," Binns informed Phantom. "After the institution of the Statute of Secrecy and the growth of the human population after the start of the, ah, what was the muggle term... Industrial Revolution I believe it was called, in order to recruit muggle-borns or orphaned half-bloods a system to detect magical potential in children was created. It can monitor the whole of the British Isles, finding every magical child, muggle born or otherwise."
"How does it work?" Danny asked, a bit curious.
"That's a secret," Professor Binns replied. "There are several... unsavory types who would love the ability to detect the magical potential of children. The Ministry makes do with detecting magic use around wands, or in known households. Other countries have their own methods, usually not as accurate."
"What sort of unsavory types?"
"I can imagine that Voldemort-" A spirit or a shade, especially one interested in history, would have little reason to avoid saying the name of the Phoenix Slaying Lord, Modern Terror of Britain, the Pure Lord of Darkness. "-would like to exterminate them before they can be accepted to Hogwarts. He did use to publicly execute captured muggle born children whenever he could manage during the last war. This was actually the staff's greatest fear three years ago, when the Chamber of Secrets opened, and Dumbledore was forced out of office. The fear was that Mr. Malfoy would use his influence to gain access to the registry and start secretly hunting the poor children. Luckily Dumbledore returned before any damage could be done."
"Really? Killing kids?" Danny frowned. He'd encountered beings that were focused on destruction before, but they had always been omnicidal. There was something... refreshing about them and their equal treatment of everyone that made them a bit hard to really hate.
(Jazz had done some psycho-babble when Danny had talked about this sort of thing with her; mentioning everything from earlier Freudian and Jungian theory, to cognitive and gestalt interpretations, and even various schools of ethical thought. Danny understood absolutely none of it and had left with his head spinning.)
Someone deliberately targeting kids for a political agenda (rather than to eat them or something like that, something more understandable to the halfa) left a bad taste in his mouth.
"Yes, there are too many muggle borns youth scattered around the country to guard them all," Binns went on. "But rest assured, now that Malfoy's been removed from the board of governors there's no way Dumbledore could be driven out of the school this year."
"Good," Danny replied. "Well, that's always nice to hear."
"As long as we're stopped, let's discuss a couple of things about you," Binns moved on. "What sort of halfa are you?"
"Isn't that rather private information?" Danny asked, worriedly. He hadn't had too much casual social interaction with other spirits before so he didn't know how to appropriately respond. From what he had gathered from the wizards, spirits tended to be secretive, but was that only with wizards or was type an exception, or was Binns just rude?
"About types?" Binns replied. "I heard from the ghosts that work more closely with Dumbledore's group that you were young and not very knowledgeable, but this is worse than I thought."
"Hey!" Danny protested. "I don't talk to too many other spirits, most of the time I'm just fighting them. The only one I really spend any time with is Frostbite and we usually are talking about crises or powers at the time."
"Yes, I have heard about your relationship with the leader of the Far Frozen," Binns stated. "But really, asking about another spirit's type is a bit like asking a human about the exact color of their hair."
"It's a bit more personal than that," Danny said a bit defensively.
Binns found that reaction interesting. He had originally guessed that Phantom was simply a sentient spirit with maybe a guardian nature, but that wasn't necessarily true, given his recent reactions. And why was he so secretive about it, it would come out eventually, there simply wasn't anyway to hide it...
Unless it had something to do with his strange connection to Danny Fenton that he had heard the ghosts that had business with the Order gossip about. Was he protecting the human boy? In that case it was best to simply let the subject drop.
They continued talking for a while, Binns explaining things about the castle, its history, and recent events. He also pestered the younger halfa about some of the events of his life. The older halfa was also secretly plotting into finding someway to force the younger into helping him with some of his classes.
Danny forced himself to be polite, while secretly wishing that he was out in the field, getting pummeled by Death Eaters.
Time passed, as it will always do until the end of all things, and the Hogwarts trip grew closer and closer. Snape spied and lied, Danny and Sam rested and learned, Harry and friends packed, Dumbledore planned, the Fentons invented, Jazz read, and the Order continued to gather its strength. Life at Grimmauld Place grew a little more hectic as the Order held more and more meetings to attempt to figure out Voldemort's plan involving the strange circles, and his other plan involving the prophecy.
And while all that was going on, Fred, George, Ginny, Harry, Hermione, Jazz, Ron, and Tucker all found time to plot to deal with a situation that was annoying them. Sam and Danny 'interactions', so to speak. It was no easy task to ensure that two wizards, with wands, could be locked in a closet they couldn't easily escape from and make it look like an accident. And to make sure that no outside interference, from either the adults or from Phantom, could get them out of there. Their plan had taken all of their social smarts, technological savvy magical expertise, chaotic creativity, and pranking experience, all driven by their increasing exasperation at the pair's behavior.
(Jazz and Tucker also focused on making it difficult for a halfa to get out)
The result was a work of art. Far too magnificent for any description (or cheap cop out) to do it justice. It was the sort of thing mad scientists and sorcerers laughed maniacally about.
The plan went into action, and Harry, from under his invisibility cloak, smirked as Sam tripped into Danny, sending them both tumbling into a closet, the door 'accidently' catching on their clothes and slamming shut.
"How long do we have to wait?" Fred voiced reached Harry through a muggle communication device provided by Tucker.
"Danny will get bored after ten minutes and after that we should only have to wait half an hour before we secretly unlock it," Jazz informed them electronically.
"Don't you mean retrieve them?" Ron asked.
"No. They'll be occupied," Jazz replied.
"What do you mean occupied?"
"Ron, put two and two together," Hermione chided her red-headed friend.
"What-? Oh, right. So what do we do until then?"
"You could try reading ahead in your textbooks," Hermione suggested, before their conversation devolved into their usual bickering. Harry rolled his eyes.
"I'll unlock it later," he told the others. "You guys are done for now. I'll inform you of the success of the plan later."
Unaware of the plotting and bickering outside the small enclosed space, Danny and Sam were trying to get out. Their efforts were impeded by the lack of space; there barely room for the two of them standing up, and even then they were constantly baning into cleaning supplies, shelves, and other inanimate occupants of the closet.
"Alohomora doesn't work and Mrs. Weasley would probably get mad at us if we broke down the door," Danny stated. "I suppose that I could make a duplicate, go invisible and intangible, and then rescue us..."
"Give it a try," Sam urged, staying back against a stack of boxes.
Danny focused and then there were two Dannys in the closet. One of him went ghost, invisible, and then intangible. He flew upward into the ceiling-
And promptly hit his head.
"Ow," he said. "It's not letting me through. I can't tell exactly what it is."
"Come back," Danny told himself. "We need to focus for a second."
The duplicate vanished with a pop. Danny closed his eyes and emptied his mind. The halfa focuses on his core, on the small amounts of energy he was absorbing from the environment. He could 'taste' the magic and other energies, but he couldn't make heads or tails of what was going on.
"I have no clue what's stopping me," Danny said. "It doesn't feel like a ward. I'm pretty sure I could blast our way out-"
"It always opened from the outside," Sam said. "So we don't need to do that. We just need wait for someone to walk by and then make some noise. Then they can let us out."
"Uh, okay," Danny complied, leaning against the door.
The two of them were quiet for a couple minutes before Danny started to fidget. His attention span wasn't much to brag about.
Of course, being in the confined space that they were in it meant that he brushed up against Sam.
"Sorry!" Danny, said, instantly flinching back. There wasn't a good light source in the closet, so no one could see his cheeks change color. Nor could anyone see Sam's cheeks change color.
"It's okay," Sam replied, rubbing her arm.
They went back to waiting for a bit, Danny holding himself perfectly still. But once again he grew bored. Once more he fidgeted and brushed up against Sam.
"Sorry!" He repeated, flinching again. But this time he bounced off a side wall, lost his balance, and in a convoluted series of clumsy events, ended up tripping himself and Sam.
There was a crash as they fell to the floor, almost knocking over some of the boxes.
Danny winced. Way to go hero, always had to make a mess of things...
And then he realized there was something on top of him. Or rather someone.
He opened his eyes and met Sam's violet ones. An electric thrill ran through him, one part fear, one part embarrassment, two parts excitement, and one part 'oh universe, please don't let me fuck up'. The feeling gathered in his stomach and chest, feeling curiously empty and yet lively, like he felt when he was invisible, intangible, and in flight, or fighting against a superior foe and winning. A sense of electric elation, dancing from nerve to nerve.
Both teenagers opened their mouths, and let out simultaneous 'ah's of awkward embarrassment. Their faces were close enough that they could make out each other's expressions in the dark.
Danny saw her lips, in that position, and thought how good it would feel to press his own lips against them, like so...
And then he realized what he had done. The halfa jerked his head back... right into the floor.
"Shit!" he swore in pain. The least the universe could have done was to have that mistake knock him out. Or kill him. Or maybe he would die of terminal embarrassment, because he was reaching new levels of 'oh please just let me slink away to some dark cave where I'll never have to see another human for the rest of my life' style embarrassment and shame.
If he hadn't had all the practice he had with controlling his powers he might have turned invisible and intangible on instinct. As it was, Danny was about to when he felt lips touch his own again, but this time it wasn't his fault.
There was some activity in the closet for a little while, some very fun, nice, and pleasurable activity. Nothing that went too far; both parties were inexperienced teenager after all.
Unfortunately for fun times, neither of them were ordinary teenagers.
Next time they broke off for air, Danny put a hand up.
"Look, we need to talk," he said to the girl sort of pinning him down.
"I guess," Sam admitted.
"I'm not sure this is a good idea," Danny said from his spot on the ground.
He was secretly involved in a war among wizards, a secret war at that. And even without that, he was the otherworldy guardian of the most haunted location on Earth. It was bad enough that they were friends, known to be friends among his enemies, which alone would enough to put her in horrible danger. But he had accepted that he couldn't drive them away two fights ago. He would simply have to do his best to protect her and Tucker. And he would have to do his best to keep his secret from the wizarding world.
But if they started going out, if their lives became more entangled... then what would his enemies do to her just to get him?
It was a fear that lurked in the dark recesses of his mind. A fear that threatened to make Danny lose control of himself if whenever he gave it conscious attention, forcing himself not to rush out of whatever he was doing and making sure that they were alright. Like when one is twenty miles away from home and struck with the sudden notion that they left the gas on, but much more extreme. Whenever the fear struck him, it was a chill worse than the depths of the Far Frozen, worse than the evil he had seen in the eyes of his possible future. Worse of all was the uncertainty. In some ways it made it arguably worse than those desperate seconds after he had sealed away his evil future. Though it could be easily argued that the ordeal with his future was a catalyst for the growth of the fear.
The point was that if he and Sam went out, his fear about his enemies coming for those close to his heart could come closer to be being realized.
To be fair Skulker probably wouldn't care too much, he just wanted to hunt him. Most of the other ghosts hated him, but preferred to go after him directly with their obsessions (or maybe natures as he was learning). The more human among them, the most dangerous, would be the ones he would have to worry about, and they would be the cruelest.
And, worst of all, there was Vlad, who might try to give him... dating advice! Danny shuddered internally at the thought.
But in all seriousness, even before the war, going out would increase the amount of danger she was in. But now-
"You know, as a true feminist I know that females can physically abuse males as well as the other way around," Sam growled. "And that, if I'm considering violence, I should pretend for a moment that our genders were reversed, would I still hit you? Would it be considered abusive? Would it be considered wrong? Would it still be worth it? Or I should ask myself if I'm hiding behind outdated gender values if I plan on striking you. So you should be aware of just how serious I am when I say, if you're about to say it's a bad idea for us to get together because it would put me in more danger," neatly summarizing Danny's thoughts, "I will sock you in the gut. Hard."
Danny closed his eyes and nodded fearfully.
"Yes, that was what-"
Harry winced as he heard the sound of flesh hitting flesh and Danny's grunt of pain.
"I think she's beating him up in there," he told the others via the communication device. "I'm calling off the-"
"Oh, give them a little time," Jazz advised him. "I was expecting something like this to happen. It just means that they're almost done."
"Oh," Harry replied.
"I don't get it," Ron spoke up. "Why would she hit him if she's sweet on him."
Most of the conspirators thought that Ron's cluelessness answered his own question. Most of them left the thought silent.
"Ron, you're an idiot with the emotional range of a tea cup," Hermione groaned, opting to give him the simpler explanation.
"What did I say?"
"Now do you understand me when I saw that what you're thinking is bullshit?" Sam asked, still on top of Danny, glaring down at the halfa.
"Yes, yes," the halfa wheezed. "Jeeze, you pack a mean punch. Maybe you should have gotten the powers instead of me."
Right, and then there was the reason why he hadn't just cut contact with them in the first place. It's not like they'd stand for it, as he had discovered. They worried about him as well. He would've expected the same reaction from Tucker if he had suggested to the tech geek that they stop being friends. Though Tucker's punch probably wouldn't have been as strong as Sam's. And they wouldn't have been making out before hand.
"That's a question for a different time. Don't forget, just being in the town puts us all in danger," Sam continued, her eyes firery. "Heck, just having been your friend is putting me at risk now because of the wizard Nazis. In fact, now that I've actually got some powers of my own, I might be in less danger then ever before. And even if I didn't have magic, I've fought plenty of baddies too."
For all the hero-ing he did, Sam and Tucker were right beside him, even if he didn't want them to be. It's not like Danny didn't know that they couldn't take care of themselves; at least he knew this on an intellectual level, even if the knowledge couldn't reach the part of him that spawned the terrible fear. And she raised some good points.
Besides, it was hard for the fear to last in the presence of those violet eyes when they were shining so resolutely. The fear would return when he was alone, or when they were in the field together... but that wasn't liable to happen anytime soon, not with the current war, not when she wasn't participating.
Maybe it wouldn't be a mistake, not if they started now, away from Amity Park...
Fear and affection warred within Danny. Fear lost. He smiled and looked up.
"Fine you win," he said.
"Of course," Sam said, smirking. "Now, if we are going to talk, it is going to be about how we break this to the others, if we do so. Or we can go back to what we were doing previously-"
"Yes, let's go make love, not war," Danny said, reaching up to pull himself so that their faces could meet.
Outside Harry heard a 'bonk', dual, ows, followed by some giggles. Then it was quiet again.
"I think we can unlock it now," the cloaked boy informed the others. "The operation is a success."
"Feel free to unlock it, but we probably won't see them again until dinner," Jazz informed him.
Jazz's prediction turned out to be accurate. The two weren't seen again until dinner. Over the next few days they didn't try to hide their new relationship, but they didn't go about announcing it either. Not that it mattered as everyone under the age of twenty, who resided in the old house, had been in on the plot to hurry up and get them together, and out of the older folks, the only two who cared, Jack and Maddie Fenton, were always a bit surprised to find out that they weren't going out already.
(Jazz kept smirking at Danny, almost making the halfa suspicious about the closet that magically locked itself and sealed him in there, but then he remembered he was in a magic house and she was just annoying like that.)
The days until the start of term continued to tick down. Harry practiced his spellwork, his meditation, and his Occlumency. By the time packing day rolled around he had finally gotten some control over the fire blasting spell, could do a quarter ways decent water blasting spell, and had pretty much mastered the wind blasting spell. Surprisingly his work on a wandless spell of wind flying was actually making progress. That was to say he could wandless create a small (very small) breeze on command. He'd borrowed a couple of books from Hermione on the subject of wandless spell creation and occasionally went to her for help with some of the calculations.
Reading the book Harry also found out why it was wrong to call what he was doing 'spell creation', or at least why it was wrong if you wanted to get technical. 'Spell creation' was creating things like the Stunning Spell and the like; things that could be done by any wizard who knew the incantation. Or spell discovery, which would be like how the Killing Curse was found, finding the incantation to produce the effect, rather than manufacturing both. Wandless magic, the sort that Harry was working on, didn't really fit into either of those categories, even if it was in essence a spell.
(Of course that led into what exactly spells were and how they were different from things like spontaneous magic or forcing magic to produce and effect, with or without a wand. It made Harry very glad that he didn't have to take magical theory until later in his Hogwarts career.)
Hermione continued to improve to the point where Ron and Harry suspected that she was easily on or past the level of a sixth year. Ron had been caught in her wake and had grudgingly been dragged up to the point he would have been a quarter of the way through the current year.
Harry, outside of his DADA work, hadn't really improved. But then again, his DADA skills were probably around a seventh year's or above. (Hermione hadn't let him escape with only one book, but Harry had found that he had enjoyed reading about curses, jinxes, tactics, and all the other things related to Defense Against the Dark Arts.)
The experiments with pure ectoplasm continued as well, Hermione recording a great deal about the substance. Her name would eventually go on the paper that published the results, along with Snape's. She would perform the final round of the standard classifying experiments at the labs located in Hogwarts, before moving on to some of her own ideas.
"I think there might be some connection between pure ectoplasm and the Patronus Charm," she had told Harry and Ron. "Especially given what Mrs. Fenton has told us about the collection process. So, Harry I'm going to need your help here, and as long as we're at it, Ron and I might as well learn the charm as well."
Ron sighed.
"I suppose it will come in handy if we encounter anymore Dementors," the red hed admitted. "But what brought this on?"
"Ohhhh, I want to say, but I shouldn't," said Hermione. "You're both acceptable at interpreting data and lab results, and I might need your help later, so I don't want to taint your views."
"Fair enough, fair enough," Ron responded. Harry was tempted to make a joke about how it was surprising for Ron to be acceptable at an academic pursuit such as that, but he didn't for two reasons. First, he didn't trust himself enough to not make it hurtful, and secondly, he and Hermione both knew that Ron was apathetic, not dumb.
The spars with Phantom continued, and Harry got confirmation that Phantom was indeed coming to Hogwarts. Harry was glad; he was becoming friends with the spirit and it would be nice to have a source of information about the Order on hand. (Even if it told him almost nothing.)
Sam had managed to pull herself up to around a fourth year's level of magical competency; she'd be able to catch up easily enough during the year.
Danny... well, he was around a third year's level maybe? It was hard to tell, when it came to theory he was only slightly behind Sam, which according to Danny himself, was a miracle. When it came to practice he was all over the board. Hopefully he'd stabilize soon.
The three Americans spent their last weeks together, often in the company of Jazz, enjoying their last bit of joy together before their inevitable separation. The adults arranged for Tucker's schooling during the upcoming year, and for Jazz's further education.
Finally the day arrived. There was a hectic bustle during the dead and corpse like hours just before dawn, with certain proactive people (Mrs. Weasley and Hermione) finishing a good portion of their work by the time the sky began to lighten, but before the sun rose. Their noise woke the others prematurely, creating a plague of the unawake. Bleary eyes and fumbling hands attempting to force items into portable containers, not realizing that certain items needed to go into certain containers. After stuffing drawers full of schoolbooks, or attempting to jam clothes into toiletry bags, the unawake shambled out of their rooms and down the stairs, where the cure awaited them.
After drinking some tea the occupants of the house began to move at full speed. Magic was liberally used to speed up the process. Liberal use of magic also slowed down the process, added some burn marks, a couple of stains, and other small problems. Liberal use of duplication added Danny Phantom (who complained about the noise and commotion bothering him) to the mix to help out.
Liberal use of anti-ghost weaponry was narrowly avoided.
In the end everyone was fed and ready to leave. Cages sat on trunks, and teenagers stood at the ready.
"So, when are we leaving?" Hermione asked, Crookshanks in her arms.
"After Sturgis Podmore gets here," Mrs. Weasley answered. "Moody wants a full guard in case something happens."
"Like what?" Harry asked. "A pack of rabid Death Eater kittens swarm onto the London streets and devour us alive? Voldemort's lying low, remember? As much as he'd like to slowly dismember me and torture me until I'm willing to eat my own limbs, he's got enough self control to lie low for awhile."
"You never know," Sam spoke up. "I mean there have to be ways he could do it covertly; he could disguise it as a muggle terrorist attack, mind control some random person, poisons,-"
"Okay, okay, okay," Harry replied. "So he's got a couple of ways of doing me in. Although, to be quite honest, I doubt his ego would allow him to kill me in any of those ways."
Of course Harry's ego would gladly permit him to kill Voldemort in any of those manners, and his imagination began to do a slideshow of Voldemort being murdered in the methods Sam had listed.
"Get down here you lot!" Molly shouted. "We're leaving now or we're going to be late!"
Everyone jumped at her command. The teenagers instantly began to file down the stair, taking their luggage with them, Sam and Danny struggling with the unfamiliar setup. They gathered in the hallway right by the front door. Sirius, Molly, and Mad Eye were waiting by the door.
"Alright Harry," Sirius said to his godson, giving him a hug. "It's been a fun summer-"
"For you," Harry retorted. "Getting to battle Death Eaters and ruin a couple days for the Malfoys."
"True enough," the canine animagus admitted. "But it's been great having you over. Stay strong, have a good year, and above all else, try to stay safe. I know it's probably futile, but I'd be a horrible godfather if I didn't at least ask you to do that."
"You're a bad influence, but a good godfather," Harry shot back, grinning. Sirius smiled and ruffled the teenagers hair.
"Someone go fetch Phantom," Moody growled, growing impatient. "He's going to Hogwarts soon, so he can fill in for Sturgis."
"Right here," said the Danny in ghost form, who had been waiting in the entryway invisible and intangible.
"Good." Moody growled. "Find someone to hitch a ride in and we can get going as soon as Tonks-"
"Here!" Tonks shouted, narrowly avoiding tripping as she rushed down the hall.
"Finally," Mad-Eye said, magical eye swiveling about to scan outside. "Move out!"
It took them a little while to make their way to King's Cross Station on foot. The Danny in ghost form had hitched a ride with in Ron (Sam would have been far too awkward and he had no idea what would happen if he tried to hide in himself) and was quietly resting.
Ron had described the sensation like the feeling one got when there was something one should be remembering but one couldn't. A tugging or weight at the back of one's mind.
Once they reached the station, the group casually loitered by the barrier, sending people through in small groups. (The Danny in human form fought the urge to turn intangible as he approached the barrier, the Danny in ghost form forgot for a moment, giving Ron a brief scare).
Sam, Tucker, Danny, Jazz, Jack, and Maddie looked around curiously at the hustle and bustle, and the old fashioned steam engine that was the Hogwarts Express. Harry gladly took in the sights as well. He was finally back. Even if the Wizarding World hated him, doubted him, ostracized him, and hurt him, he was still back where he belonged.
The Americans began to say their good-byes while Moody and the British adults discussed security and Sturgis's screw up. Everyone then unloaded their trunks from the trolleys and loaded it onto the train.
Then the teenager said their final goodbyes. The British children were hugged by Molly Weasley and reminded to write. The Fenton's hugged their son, Tucker hugged his friends.
There was a warning whistle from the train and everyone who was leaving got onboard.
The Danny in ghost form casually slipped out of Ron and began to explore the train. Fred and George dismissed themselves, claiming that they had things to discuss with their friend Lee Jordan.
"Shall we go find a compartment then?" Harry asked.
Ron and Hermione looked at each other.
"Err," Ron began.
"We're-well-Ron and I are supposed to go into the prefect carriage," Hermione said awkwardly.
Harry felt a stab of dark emotions at this.
"And probably be stuck with Malfoy," Harry replied, forcing out a joke. "I'm getting more and more glad that I didn't get the job."
Ron blanched at this.
"No, we just get instructions from the Head Boy and Head Girl," Hermione explained. "Then we need to patrol the corridors for a bit. We'll see you then."
"Ugh," Ron groaned. "Why me? I'm definitely not prefect material."
"You were willing to help me face a basilisk to save your sister, and try and fight a supposed mass murderer to save me," Harry told him. "Dumbledore figured that probably made up for your lack of qualifications. Or maybe he thought you'd be the perfect henchman for Hermione."
"Henchman?" Ron seemed offended.
"Do a good job and I'll promote you to minion," Hermione said, and then grimaced. "Sorry, bad joke. Harry you're a terrible influence on us all."
"Eh," Ron shrugged. "See you later mate."
The two of them then departed, filling Harry with a strange sensation. He had never been on the express without Ron before, from his very first ride to Hogwarts to the end of last year.
"Come on," Ginny told him, "if we get a move on we'll be able to save them places."
Harry nodded. He turned to the americans.
"You two want to join us?" He asked.
"Sure," Sam replied with a shrug. "Why not?"
They headed towards the end of the train, looking for a relatively empty compartment. Harry pretended to ignoring the staring and the whispering. He forced himself to discreetly do some of the breathing exercises Lupin had taught him for meditation. His temper reared, untamable, but he could stop his expression from changing. No need for any spontaneous magic to cause accidents or the like.
Right outside the very last carriage they met Neville Longbottom (a very old and respected family, thank you very much, you can quit snickering now you bloody tosspots), struggling with his luggage and toad.
"Hi Harry," the fellow fifth year greeted his classmate. "Who're they?"
"They're transfer students," Harry explained. "This is Sam Manson and Danny Fenton. Transfer students from America."
"Nice to meet you," Neville said, fumbling with his toad for a moment to offer a hand to shake. "Wait, Fenton? Like from Modern History?"
"Yeah," Harry replied. "Recently discovered to be magical, confirmed not to be affecting his parent's work. Binns will be publishing a paper on it later I hear."
"Really?" Danny asked.
"That's what I heard from Hermione who heard it from McGonagall," Harry informed him. "Hopefully you shouldn't receive too much attention."
"Anyway," Ginny spoke up. "Is the next compartment open?"
"Uh-" Neville began, but the red haired Weasley sister looked past him. "Yep. Only Luna's in here."
Neville muttered something about not wanting to disturb anyone. Ginny laughed.
"Don't worry," she reassured him. "She's nice."
The group filtered into the compartment. Already inside, wearing a butterbeer cork necklace, and reading a magazine upside down, was a girl with waist length dirty blonde hair. Harry figured that she must be Luna.
"Hi Luna," Ginny called out. "Mind if we take these seats?"
Luna nodded, her silver gray eyes scanning the group. They were slightly protruding, giving her a permanently surprised look. Harry noticed that she didn't need to blink as much as a normal human. She seemed a bit owlish to him.
They took their seats, Harry sitting across from the new girl, Danny and Sam sitting together.
"Had a good summer, Luna?" Ginny asked.
"Yes," said Luna dreamily, without taking her eyes off Harry. "Yes, it was quite enjoyable, you know. You're Harry Potter."
"I know I am," said Harry. "Though you could probably call me Unlucky too."
Neville chuckled. Luna turned her pale eyes on him.
"And I don't know who you are," the blonde girl stated.
"I'm nobody," said Neville hurriedly.
"No you're not," said Ginny sharply, giving the boy a disapproving look. "Neville Longbottom-Luna Lovegood. Luna's in my year, but in Ravenclaw."
"And you're Danny Fenton," Luna said, looking at the American. "And you must Samantha Manson."
"Sam please," the goth girl requested.
They were quiet for a while while the train rattled onward under the dreary gray British sky. Eventually Neville decided to break the silence.
"Guess what I got for my birthday?" said Neville.
"Another Remembrall?" said Harry.
"No," said Neville. "I could do with one, though, I lost the old one ages ago... " A statement which nicely summed up the primary design flaw of the product. "It's something else."
He dug the hand that was not keeping a firm grip on Trevor into his schoolbag and after a little bit of rummaging pulled out what appeared to be a small grey cactus in a pot, except that it was covered with what looked like boils rather than spines.
"Mimbulus mimbletonia," he said proudly.
Harry stared at the thing. It was pulsating slightly, giving it the rather sinister look of some diseased internal organ.
"It's really, really rare," said Neville, beaming despite the horrid thing he held in his hands. "I don't know if there's one in the greenhouse at Hogwarts, even. I can't wait to show it to Professor Sprout. My Great Uncle Algie got it for me in Assyria. I'm going to see if I can breed from it."
"So you can use it to poison Snape?" Harry asked, innocently.
"What?" Neville looked shocked at the idea.
"Turnabout's fair play," Harry told him.
"What no!" Neville protested. "It's got other uses and a really interesting defensive mechanism. Here let me show you-" As he spoke what were undoubtedly some of the more common last words (probably coming just after 'hold my beer and watch this) Harry got a real bad feeling. His wand was in his hand in an instant.
"Neville, wait!" He called out to his fellow fifth year. But he was too late. Neville had given the plant a sharp jab with his quill. Liquid squirted from every boil on the plant; thick, stinking, dark green jets of it.
The liquid hit a shimmering translucent blue dome. Harry had acted on instinct and cast a shield spell around Neville and the plant. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed that Danny had also gotten his wand out, and Sam had just finished doing so. Why were they so quick on the draw?
Harry let the shield spell die down. Neville sat in a very large puddle of the disgusting liquid, shaking his head to get the worst of it out of his eyes.
"Wow, didn't expect it to be so... well, at least Stinksap isn't poisonous," the filth covered Gryffindor said. "Nice reflexes Harry."
"Thanks," replied the-boy-who-avoided-a-mess. "Let's get you cleaned up- Scourgify!"
The sap vanished, just as the compartment door opened. A very pretty girl with long, shiny black hair was standing in the doorway smiling at him: Cho Chang, the Seeker on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team.
That could have been really awkward, Harry thought to himself.
"Hello Harry," Cho said. "Thought I'd stop by."
Harry's brain struggled to think of something either meaningful or witty. Harry's brain failed. Harry hated his brain.
"Uh, hi" he replied blankly. Curse his deficient mind! He was stupider than Crabbe or Goyle.
"So how was your summer?" She asked him, evidently not noticing that he was no longer capable of any higher processes.
"It was uneventful," Harry answered, which was a miracle, because he was supposed to be currently too stupid to talk. "I evidently read all the wrong article; I had no clue that I was an attention seeking brat until recently."
"The Prophet's really been horrid of late," said Cho. "I really wish we had other news sources."
(Danny noticed that Sam was about to jump into the conversation, probably try and start some sort of new cause regarding freedom of information in the wizarding world. While it was probably a nice idea, Danny didn't think it was currently the place or time, so he quickly distracted her.)
"If we had other news sources we wouldn't know what and how the people in charge want us to be thinking," Harry responded. "Just think of the chaos that could cause. We might have a happy functioning society."
Cho smiled a little at that, though the look she gave afterwards was slightly strange.
"What about yours?" Harry asked.
"It was-" When he saw her downcast look Harry wanted to hit himself. Of course, her boyfriend had died at the end of last year. But then again it was supposed to be meaningless small talk; completely safe topics. Asking someone about their summer wasn't supposed to be taboo. "Okay, I guess. Uneventful as well." Cho's expression returned to normal. "I should probably get going. Just thought I'd stop by and say hello."
"Alright," Harry replied. She left.
It was nearly an hour until Ron and Hermione showed up. The food trolley had been by and everyone had fun encouraging the Americans to try wizarding treats and snacks. Danny shied away from any snacks that had a magical effect on the people who ate them for some reason, while Sam tried a bit of everything. The new arrivals were accompanied by Pigwidgeon and Crookshanks.
"I'm starving," said Ron, stowing Pigwidgeon next to Hedwig, grabbing a Chocolate Frog from Harry and throwing himself into the seat next to him. He ripped open the wrapper, bit off the frog's head and leaned back with his eyes closed as though he had had a very exhausting morning.
"Well, there are two fifth-year prefects from each house," said Hermione, looking thoroughly disgruntled as she took her seat. "Boy and girl from each."
"And guess who's a Slytherin prefect?" said Ron, still with his eyes closed.
"Malfoy of course," replied Harry at once, certain his worst fear would be confirmed. "The universe wouldn't want to start showing any mercy now."
"Who's Malfoy?" Danny asked. "I've heard you mention that name before."
"Stupid, pretty, rich git," Harry told him. "Arrogant, elitist, Death Eater wannabe. We hate each other."
"Your school nemesis?"
"Pretty much." Harry wondered if Phantom would be able to give any advice on how to deal with nemesis's- or was it nemesi? The english language was stupid, he should learn an artificial language. Maybe Esperanto. Too bad he didn't know anyone who could speak it...
He shook his head and returned to the earlier subject.
"And let me guess, the other prefect is his hanger-on Pansy," Harry asked Ron and Hermione, who nodded. "Typical."
"Why were they made prefects?" Sam asked. "From the sound of things, it doesn't seem like they'd do a good job."
"Snape," Harry told the transfer student. "Probably his idea."
"Seems like it will end up hurting his own house," said Sam. "Why's he a teacher again?"
"Who knows," Harry shrugged.
Well it's not so bad with the other houses," Hermione told him. "Hufflepuff has Ernie Macmillan and Hannah Abbott. Ravenclaw's got Anthony Goldstein and Padma Patil."
"Your friend went to the Yule Ball with Padma Patil," said a vague voice.
Everyone turned to look at Luna Lovegood, who was gazing unblinkingly at Ron over the top of The Quibbler. He swallowed his mouthful of Frog.
"Yeah, I know I did," he said, looking mildly surprised.
"She didn't enjoy it very much," Luna informed him. 'She doesn't think you treated her very well, because you wouldn't dance with her. I don't think I'd have minded,' she added thoughtfully, "I don't like dancing very much."
She retreated behind The Quibbler again. Ron stared at the cover with his mouth hanging open for a few seconds, then looked around at Ginny for some kind of explanation, but Ginny had stuffed her knuckles in her mouth to stop herself giggling. Ron shook his head, bemused, then checked his watch.
"We're supposed to patrol the corridors every so often," he told Harry, Danny, Sam and Neville, "and we can give out punishments if people are misbehaving. I can't wait to get Crabbe and Goyle for something..."
"You're not supposed to abuse your position, Ron!" said Hermione sharply.
"Yeah, right, because Malfoy won't abuse it at all," said Ron sarcastically.
"So you're going to descend to his level?"
"No, I'm just going to make sure I get his mates before he gets mine." Though he had been thinking tactically instead of philosophically Ron had managed to sum up several dilemmas, problems, and issues of the human condition, the fight between good and evil, and why life sucked.
Hermione and Ron argued. Nothing new there. Harry tuned them out.
At some point Ron must've made a joke that made Luna crack up, and then the Americans began asking about English slang. Harry ignored them in favor of reading an article out of the magazine that Luna had dropped. Evidently Sirius had neglected to tell him about his singing career. He'd have fun teasing his godfather with this.
Once more the compartment door slid open. Harry stood up. He'd been expecting this.
It was Draco Malfoy and his two thugs. Of course. Harry knew why he was there.
"Alright, so you're here to taunt me about your badge," Harry said. "Probably throw in a few threats about how you intend to abuse your newfound powers. Maybe throw in a couple of taunts and other hidden threats. It's too obvious. Go away for five minutes and come back with something creative."
"Uh-" Draco seemed slightly taken aback. "Well, I was also planning on taunting Weasley and Granger a bit, maybe show the transfer students their place. This was supposed to be a general start of the year thing- wait, what am I saying?" Draco realized he'd been sidetracked. "And why should I listen to you? I should give you detention for disrespecting a prefect!"
"Please, just being in your presence is punishment enough," Harry told the Death Eater in training. "If your boss wins, he'll probably execute me by making me spend a week with you. Course he'd kill you soon afterwards because you're a slimey, incompetent, bootlicking git."
"Watch it Potter," Malfoy's voice had gone soft and cold. He held his right hand up by his chest, fingers slightly apart. A blue spark crackled from fingertip to fingertip. "There's plenty of danger around, things that can't be traced back to wands."
Death threats from Malfoy. Harry had sort of missed them. The nice thing about Malfoy was that he was so refreshingly constant.
"I'm well aware of that," Harry told him calmly, his eyes narrowing. A small breeze began to ruffle his hair and clothes as he called upon his summer research. As the breeze reached Malfoy the blonde's eyes narrowed.
Harry was bluffing of course. Malfoy had probably been taught some of his family's lightning magic over the summer. When it came to wandless magic, he was by far the more dangerous of the two. All Harry could do without a wand thus far was make a small breeze.
But the Boy-Who-Lived had read up on magical battles as well. He was aware of the main issue with lightning magic. Ironically, it was slow. A wielder had to take great care and effort in controlling it, otherwise it would be worse than useless. When the actual attack came, it would be fast, but it would take some time before it could be ready. That was probably why Malfoy kept Crabbe and Goyle close by; they could buy him such time.
There were other methods of using lightning magic of course, but they were usually something along the lines of a jet type spell acting as a carrier or container for the energy; those attacks lacked the speed and power of using lightning directly. The Malfoys probably would regard those methods as secondary and train with them later.
What it came down to was this; Harry was pretty sure that either he could manage to bluff the stupid buggers down, or he'd just use his wand to hex them. He knew his draw would quick enough. And they wouldn't be expecting it.
If a fight hadn't been about to start Harry would've taken a moment to enjoy the imagined expressions on their faces if he were to do so.
"Bugger off Malfoy," a voice said beside him. Harry nearly started; he had been so focused on Malfoy that he hadn't noticed Ron come to his side. "You're not the only prefect here."
"I don't think this is the time or place for you to be doing this," Hermione scolded from Harry's other side. She had her wand in hand. "I'm pretty sure you'd regret taking any rash actions." She left the nature of the regrets vague
Draco sneered at them.
"It's not like you have numbers on your side or anything," Sam told the blonde boy, standing up, her wand also out. Danny was by her side, but he seemed strangely hesitant.
(Danny was used to simply enduring fights in his human form. Or when he did have to actually fight, he used his ghost powers. If something started on the train, neither approach would work. He'd have to break those habits at sometime.)
"Yeah!" Neville said, joining the Golden Trio.
"Get out of here," Ginny added.
"You're not a very nice person Mr. Malfoy," Luna said dreamily. "You could make more real friends if you acted differently."
"I see you've got your pets well trained," Draco snarled. "Fine, we'll go. It's not like I even have to do anything to make you get what you deserve."
The three of them backed out of the compartment and closed the door behind themselves. Hermione rounded on Harry.
"And you didn't need to go escalating things," she scolded him. "Ron and I are prefects. You should have let us handle things."
That honestly hadn't occurred to him.
Wasn't it supposed to be his job to stand up to Malfoy, Voldemort, and their ilk?
"It's probably best if you try and avoid him if you can mate," Ron told him. "He's going to be nastier this year. You lot should do the same," referring to Neville, Danny, and Sam, "especially after this incident."
"I'm not scared of him," Sam eyes flashed dangerously. "I've seen worse."
"It's not a bad idea," Danny disagreed. "There's no need to go looking for trouble."
"Easy for you to say," Sam muttered, quiet enough that only Danny could hear, and rolled her eyes. He could always deal with the prick in secret.
"Sorry," Harry replied meekly to Hermione. "I-, nevermind." It was his job, not theirs. Except it wasn't.
"It's okay," Hermione assured him. "Just don't let it happen again."
The rest of the ride continued without incident. Eventually they neared Hogwarts and had to change into their school robes. Danny complained about having to wear a uniform and then he and Sam started to bicker. Ron and Hermione left to go help with the upcoming departure of students from the train, leaving Ginny and Neville to take care of their animals.
The train stopped and the usual chaos that followed began. Harry, his friends, the Americans, and Luna all filed out, sticking together in the crowd.
Harry looked around for the familiar sight of Hagrid.
"First years over here please," he heard the familiar words, but they were spoken in a woman's voice. It was Professor Grubbly-Plank, not the lovable half-giant.
Harry felt a stab of worry. Where was he? Maybe he had a cold?
He looked around, for either Ron or Hermione, to talk to them about this new development, when his eyes fell upon the carriages. What he saw made him do a double take.
Winged black horse reptile things were pulling the carriages. Black bat like wings twitched, vast ones that sprouted from each bony back. And these creatures were definitely boney, Harry didn't think they had a spare ounce of flesh anywhere on their bodies. Their heads resembled dragon heads, and their eyes, their horrible eyes, were completely white.
Did someone put Snape in charge of the carriages this year?
"There you are," Ron's voice said behind Harry. "Come on, let's grab a carriage."
Ron and Hermione rejoined the group, and everyone went to the carriages.
"So what are those things?" Harry asked, gesturing to the terrible horses.
"What things?" Ron asked, puzzled.
"Those things!" Harry hissed, pointing.
"The carriages?"
"No, what's pulling them," said Harry.
"There's nothing there," Ron said, giving Harry a worried look.
"No, there's something there," Danny said. "Sam, can you see them?"
"No, I can't," she answered, peering into the darkness. "At least not well. There's something, but I can't make it out. What do they look like?"
"Reptile horses with wings," Danny answered.
"That sounds about right," Sam said.
Ron and Hermione gave them both alarmed looks.
"Are you two feeling alright?" Hermione asked. "Malfoy didn't sneak off a curse or anything, did he? Come on, just get in."
"Oh, I can see them too," Luna spoke up. "I've been able to see them since my first day here. You're both as sane as I am."
In this crazy world, Harry reflected as the group filed into the coach, it was quite possible that her statement was one hundred percent correct.
AN: So I had wanted to give you all a nice long chapter to make up for the delay, but all I could squeeze out was this pathetic 9K excuse. But it's been busy. Graduation approaching, job hunt is intensifying, and someone stole a crucial table from the dorm lobby. Luckily they returned it, otherwise I would have hunted them down and cast them into the Primordial Void, where not a single bit of light would ever reach them ever again.
(Crap, I missed the new Doctor Who episode to keep writing. I'll have to watch it tomorrow on my dinky computer screen rather on one of the nice big tvs around here. I hope you're all happy with yourselves.)
Sam's speech, since I know some people will be confused, was to get across the nature of the blow that followed. It wasn't the 'girl punches guy in shoulder thing cause she's angry and of course it couldn't really hurt' (last part of that is utter bullshit) or the anime slapstick double standard. It was more like a dramatic slap or a punch between two guys. It just seemed more Sam like to punch him in that position rather than slap him. Maybe I was wrong.
Anyway, on to more serious matters. Or less. Depends on your point of view. Managed to get this story back on track, I've sort've been wasting time for the last couple of chapters. Well, no not really, been setting up a lot of things for later, but I feel I was screwing around too much with the humor. But then again, the Harry Potter side of the crossover, in terms of themes, setting, and tone, hadn't really begun yet. Now that they're at Hogwarts I can start digging into that stuff.
Also, I need a beta for this story. Originally this was a fic that was supposed to be written fast. Betas would only slow that down. But since I've been failing at the speed thing, I might as well get a beta. It would also be nice so I can hear someone's thoughts on it before I publish it; there are plenty of risks I don't take because I don't know if they'll work or not. And then there's my spelling and grammar. So if you'd like to beta say so in a PM or in a review.
Let's see, what else...
Surprised at the number of reviews praising my portrayal of Dumbledore. Admittedly he's fun to write but I didn't know he'd be that well received. Some people have mentioned that they haven't seen this sort of portrayal before and that makes me curious. If you've come across a portrayal of Dumbledore that's like mine, could someone point me to it? I don't know if it's actually that rare or it's one of those cases where the people who read my fic simply don't read those fics very often.
(Snape's also fun to write, partially because I haven't revealed everything that's going on in his head, and partially because of what I know that's going on in there)
I think that's it, so make sure to leave a review.
REVIEW! REVIEWS FOR THE REVIEW GOD!
Otherwise I might decide to turn this fic into an essay about the relationship between madness and magic.
Though actually I plan to deal with that in the Hellblazer/Another crossover I have planned for when I finish this, so I'll probably commit some other heinous act. (FUCK YOU DC! There was no need to end Hellblazer like that! You could have at least given them another year and time to set up a really grand ending. And fuck your new kiddy friendly series as well.)
Anyway REVIEW.