"It will be alright Harry, next year Umbridge will be gone and you will be on the team again." Hermione says as she comforts Harry the day after his lifetime ban from quidditch.
"It's not that Hermione, I can live without the game." Harry replies, a deep sadness in his voice. "It's just she took my broom as well. I want to fly."
"I'm sure we can do something to get you in the air again, maybe find a hippogriff?" Hermione suggests.
"No, I want to be in control." Harry mutters.
"I don't know." Hermione answers, and they both sit thinking in the quiet common room.
After some time Hermione begins to stand up feeling hungry.
"Harry, let's go eat breakfast." Hermione says, turning to face Harry.
"Hermione, I have an idea." Harry says, with a gleam in his eyes that Hermione hadn't seen in a long time.
"Alright the books I asked my parents to order have arrived." Hermione says, placing a large stack of books on the table Harry was working at.
"Great, Dobby has helped me collect and dry some wood from beech and pine trees in the forest." Harry says pointing to the large piles in the corner.
"I can't believe you're still using him for this." Hermione complains.
"I just told him about my problems and he offered his help. He's my friend." Harry whines, clearly tired of this conversation, "We wouldn't even have this room without him."
"Alright, but if I think you're abusing his friendship..." Hermione replies, not bothering to finish her threat.
"I'd never." Harry says.
"Good, now I'll start enchanting these power sources and you can find a design you like in the books, and practice your lightening and hardening charms, and don't forget unbreakable." Hermione orders before the two get to work.
"Alright, that's finally ready for it's first flight." Hermione says as she finished the final checks on the machine. "I'll send a message to the twins to get ready."
"This is going to be great Hermione." Harry says, nearly jumping up and down with excitement.
In front of them sat an airplane that would not look out of place back in the 1910's. A biplane with a seven meter wingspan and stretching six meters in length. Using magic it weighed less than a textbook and would take a lot of punishment to break. The pilot's chair was on the bottom wing with a single control rod for the ailerons and elevator with foot pedals for the rudder. The lattice frame was left open to the elements and the wings were covered in what looked like bed sheets.
"The twins say they're ready, people are still asking what they are waiting for." Hermione says.
"Well, let me get in then." Harry says jumping into the pilot's seat.
"So where is the room going to make the exit?" Hermione asks as she prepares to push the craft.
"I don't know!" Harry says, as the room creates a slight downslope and removes a wall.
"What! Stop!" Hermione shouts but it was too late, she could only hope the books they had read and the simulation the room had created would be enough to keep Harry from crashing.
Harry pushed the enchanted engines to rotate the two rear facing propellers next to him as hard as they could, and soon he was racing out of the castle, fortunately not facing anything solid.
Soon he was flying around to the front of the castle.
'It's not my Firebolt, but it's better than a school broom.' Harry thinks before he spots a small crowd by the entrance.
"Why are we all out here?" A hufflepuff asks as he stands with a small crowd just outside the front doors.
"Why? Harry said he had something interesting to show everyone." A Weasley twin says.
"He even taught us a song to go with it." The other twin adds.
"That's it? We should go back inside." A ravenclaw says.
"Yeah!" the hufflepuff shouts, turning to head into the castle, but as he and several others begin to leave a strange machine flies around the side of the castle.
"What is that!" A gryffindor shouts, pointing at Harry's plane.
"An airplane?" A muggleborn says, wondering how that got to Hogwarts.
"Hey everyone!" Harry shouts as he flies low over the crowd before doing a lazy loop. The plane was glacially slow compared to a modern broom but it was massive compared to anything the magicals had seen before.
At this point the twins began the song Harry had taught them.
"Those magnificent men in their flying machines!" they sang, as Harry performed increasingly dubious stunts overhead.
"What is the meaning of this!" McGonagall shouts as she opens the doors. Looking at the crowd in front of her she notices the twins and now Luna singing while looking to the sky.
"Oh dear." McGonagall manages before fainting at the sight of Harry flying upside down over the other students.
"They don't think of danger, they really don't care." the singing continued.
Harry noticed the now open door, and like any new pilot couldn't resist the challenge. Flying through the doors just as a crowd of slytherins entered the hall, sending them fleeing for cover as Harry levels out and flies off to the staircases, the crowd of singing spectators following closely behind.
Madam Umbridge had been having a good day, she had just passed another decree and was smiling to herself as she descended the stairs for lunch. Soon her mood was ruined by the sound of happily singing students.
"Newton would think he had made a mistake." the voices sung as Umbridge looked over the edge of the staircase.
Unfortunately for Umbridge, Harry flew past at that same moment, catching the woman's robes with one of the landing gear.
"Hey, no passengers!" Harry shouts as he loops down, narrowly avoiding the ceiling, earning a slew of curses from several portraits.
The increased weight left the aircraft without sufficient lift to make the turns inside the hallways, so Umbridge had to run along the walls at every turn.
Students were diving for cover in every direction as the craft flew around the third floor, depriving Dumbledore of his hat as it passed.
"I will have you expelled for this!" Umbridge screeched as she dodged between students and teachers.
Deciding he had enough excitement, Harry flies back down the staircase passing the singing crowd as he flies back out the front door.
"They enchant all the ladies and steal all the scenes," The crowd sings as Harry squeezes back through the doors, Umbridge screaming all the way.
At this moment McGonagal regained consciousness to the sight of Harry's aircraft flying overhead with a pink toad hanging underneath.
"I'm throwing out all my catnip." She says before wandering back into the castle.
"I'm going to find somewhere for you to jump off." Harry shouts, still annoyed with his unexpected passenger.
"Land this instant!" Umbridge screeches, her face turning to a familiar shade of puce, familiar to Harry at least, who had seen his uncle take a similar shade.
"Ah! I know, a spider web!" Harry shouts as he flies to the forbidden forest.
Flying a lazy 'S' over the forest, Harry soon spots some web covered trees.
"Alright Jump!" Harry shouts, but his passenger doesn't move, looking down, Harry notices she was unable to free herself, as she was caught by the shoulder of her robes.
"If you were stuck you should have said something!" Harry says, making a quick loop to return to the web, firing a cutting curse at Umbridge's robes, at the jump point.
"Well, that's taken care of, back to the Room." Harry says, with a cheeky grin.
"So, how was your flight." Hermione asks as Harry lands in the room.
"Quite good actually, until I picked up a passenger. Ruined the flight, they did." Harry says casually.
"Passenger? It should be fine though, we chose a design for at least two people." Hermione questions.
"Oh, they didn't board properly, hung from the landing skids." Harry complains.
"Well, just tell them to get off." Hermione says.
"Oh, they were stuck, but I thought they were scared so I flew to something soft. But when they still didn't jump, I checked and they had their robes speared quite thoroughly." Harry responds.
"So then you cut them off over the soft area?" Hermione asks.
"Of course."
Later that day Harry was sitting comfortably by the fireplace when Hermione began questioning the twins.
"HE DID WHAT TO UMBRIDGE!" Hermione shouted, and Harry decided this was a good time to pop off to the kitchens for a snack, he had missed lunch after all.
AN: If you didn't already figure this out this was inspired by the song "Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines" from a film of the same name. My sister was the one who asked if I would do something to Umbridge, and as a good brother, how could I not?