Two weeks into the new term, another note appeared on the notice boards announcing the second meeting of the Hogwarts Dueling Club.
As FitzSimmons walked down to breakfast after seeing it, Simmons sighed, "I guess we need to decide what spells to teach them in case I have to lead again."
So they spent most of their lunch period that day in the library going through dueling books looking for recommended dueling spells that they already knew how to do so that they could teach the rest of the castle in case it fell on them again to save the professors' arses. In the end they decided on the Stunning Spell, the Impediment Jinx, and the Incarcerous Spell.
Five minutes before 20:00 rolled around that evening they walked into the Great Hall, which once more had been cleared of all its tables and a stage set up along one wall for demonstrations. FitzSimmons made their way up to the edge of the stage, the crowds parting for the best teacher that they'd had in pretty much any class ever, in case the two of them were needed again because the adults in the castle were still incapable of understanding how to be responsible with the students entrusted to them. And as the main clock just outside the Great Hall rang out, it became apparent that deputy headmistress McGonagall's definition of 'look into it' was to consider only Lockhart to be the problem of the first meeting, and hand the reigns over to the child abusing Head of Slytherin House. So before the Snake could even walk up the steps onto the platform, Simmons hurried up the ones on the opposite side and walked out into the middle of the stage, glaring Snape the silent message not to get in her way, or else face her wrath.
He wisely slithered back into the shadows from whence he had come.
Facing the crowd, Simmons shouted out, "Alright, guys, you remember how this works! We are going to start with a quick ten minute practice of what we worked on last time to warm up, before starting on a few new spells. So everyone pair up, Malfoy you pair up with Bulstrode again since you're scared of her so that you can't bully any other student, and everyone else don't be gits with who you pair up with. As instructor of this Dueling Club, I have authority to override any pairs I see turning abusive. DON'T MAKE ME COME DOWN THERE AND BREAK ANY OF YOU UP!
"Now once you're all paired up, on your own counts of three, person closest to the door cast Expelliarmus, the other person Protego. Do that twice, then switch. Once you have done that, do two duels where you both cast Expelliarmus only once, each trying to block the other as well, and then direct your attention back to me. Now go, get started."
Everyone quickly paired up and spread out, and spells started flying throughout the room. But unlike when Lockhart had told everyone to practice at the start of the first meeting, no one got injured this time around, and soon everyone had run through their six warm-up duels, and directed their attentions back to Professor Jemma 'Hermione Granger' Simmons.
"Well done, everyone," Simmons said. "Now the first new spell we're going to work on today is the Impediment Jinx. More suited to stop someone or something if they are running at you to attack you, it is still a good spell to know, as it will temporarily freeze your opponent, including their arms, to give you time to cast other spells, like the Disarming Charm."
She and Fitz spread out to opposite sides of the stage, where on the count of three Simmons cast "Impedimenta!" while Fitz merely raised his wand, not knowing what exactly he was supposed to be doing, and therefore doing exactly what Simmons needed him to. He froze when his wife's spell hit him, enabling Simmons to casually say "Expelliarmus", sending his wand flying out of his frozen hand and across the stage to her. She walked back to the middle of the stage and said, "Practice the Impediment Jinx for ten minutes, taking turns casting it on each other," before handing Fitz his wand back since he'd unfrozen while she was talking, and walked over next to her.
Ten minutes later she had Fitz demonstrate the Incarcerous Spell on her, which conjured ropes out of thin air that bound themselves around whatever the caster was pointing their wand at. This spell created substantially more chaos as everyone practiced it, as errant spells sent ropes flying around unintended victims, though most people's spells were weak enough that the conjured ropes were pretty easy to get out of by oneself, resulting in not too much time being wasted with people trying to untangle themselves, though Simmons did let everyone practice this spell for fifteen minutes, instead of the normal ten. But finally, she came to the last spell of the night.
"Snape, make yourself useful and cast a Cushioning Charm over the entire floor, and the stage," Simmons ordered, looking over at where the Snake was lurking in the shadows, sulking over how well Harry Potter's girl was conducting the lesson. "Unlike you, I don't want anyone getting hurt."
As he grudgingly obeyed her, she turned back to the crowd of students and said, "Lastly, we will work on the Stunning Spell and its countercharm, Rennervate. The most efficient spell for winning a duel that we have learned so far, it instantly renders your target unconscious, thus ending the duel immediately. And as this would be a very long lesson if everyone had to wait for their partner to wake back up naturally, at the same time we will be practicing Rennervate, the Reviving Spell, that immediately lifts Stupefy, along with most other kinds of simple unconsciousness. As usual, Harry will help me demonstrate."
Spreading back out, Simmons mouthed 'I love you' at her husband before saying out loud, "Stupefy!"
Light burst forth from the end of Simmons' wand before hitting Fitz full in the chest, instantly rendering him unconscious and thus crumpling onto his back on the cushioned stage. Pointing her wand at him again Simmons said, "Rennervate!", and he woke back up.
Addressing the crowd again, Simmons said, "That, everyone, is the Stunning Charm and Reviving Spell. Spread out, and begin practicing. If you get any bumps, bruises, or concussions from falling, blame Snape as he is the one who cast the Cushioning Charm to soften the floor for you so that no one gets hurt."
All across the Great Hall students suddenly began falling unconscious, before being revived again a few seconds later. Simmons gave everyone twenty minutes to practice this one, as it was a more advanced spell and more time consuming having to revive your fallen partner after every successful spell, but eventually she called them all back to her.
"We are already at curfew, but as McGonagall refused to heed my demand that a professor start showing up to these things, we're going to keep going in civil disobedience against the curfew rule, since we haven't practiced any of the new spells in actual dueling situations. So as we did last time, and at the beginning of this evening to warm up, you will each on your own counts of three cast one offensive spell, before immediately defending against your opponent. Only this time, you have four offensive spells to choose from. And remember, this is practice — don't use the Stunning Spell every time simply because it is the most powerful. You need to be able to do all of the spells, in order to mix it up if you ever get in an actual fight."
It was almost 2200 before Simmons finally bid everyone goodnight, spending twenty minutes with everyone casting single offensive spells per dual, before splitting everyone up into two groups again and giving them each twenty minutes to work on extended duels, which actually started going significantly longer than they had at the first meeting. As everyone meandered out of the Great Hall once it was over, FitzSimmons overheard them all talking excitedly about how much they had enjoyed the lesson again, and how Granger should take over Defense Against the Dark Arts class as well.
For after a very disastrous first lesson — where he lost control of a cage full of Cornish Pixies that proceeded to rampage through the castle until Professors McGonagall, Flitwick, Burbage, Sprout, and Vector finally managed to stun and collect them all that evening after the lesson, since FitzSimmons had decided that it actually wasn't their responsibility to pick up after their 'professor' and so left the door wide open on their own way out — Lockhart had resorted to doing nothing but reading passages from his own books, and dragging students up front to reenact the more dramatic bits.
Of course, after FitzSimmons' class had seen Fitz flat out refuse to participate when Lockhart had called on him midway through the next DADA class, the first class of reenactments, many of them began refusing to participate as well, soon spreading throughout the other years as everyone heard of the progression of students refusing to participate, until finally it was just a few students like Ron Weasley who lived for the spotlight who were doing all of the reenactments, while the rest of the class sat at their desks bored out of their bloody minds, learning nothing.
Hence, after two Dueling Club meetings in which they had learned an infinite amount more about defending themselves, many of FitzSimmons' fellow students were in favor of the intrepid duo taking over DADA class to at least make it hands on with actual magic, though how they expected the two second years to teach classes for all seven grades when they had their own classes to attend, Simmons wasn't exactly sure. But it was of no matter anyway, as Simmons had no intentions of starting to teach DADA, nor did she figure that the adults of the castle would take as kindly to her taking over a real class as they did with the Dueling Club, in their ignorance of what had actually gone down in the two Dueling Club meetings since none of them had bothered showing up for either meeting.
Valentine's Day morning, FitzSimmons were nearly blinded when they walked into the Great Hall for breakfast.
The walls were covered with large, vivid pink flowers like some kind of botanical garden display; the tables, whose normal wooden surfaces now had a pink hue to them, had vases every few feet filled with a wide variety of different pink flowers; and pink, heart-shaped confetti was falling from the pale blue ceiling (about the only part of the room not some shade of pink). But not to be outdone, Lockhart — the clear instigator of this questionable new interior decorating style — was wearing lurid pink robes were he sat jovially at the staff table, surround by very sour-looking professors, and an even sourer-looking Snape.
As soon as they sat down Simmons grabbed a couple of lilies out of the nearest vase and stuck them in her hair, before turning and scrunching up her nose adorably as she stuck her tongue out at her husband.
"I don't care if you have flowers in your hair," Fitz replied, furrowing an eyebrow slightly in confusion at why she would be sticking her tongue out at him because she put a flower in her hair, like he was judging her or something.
"I know — I just like sticking my tongue out at you, and it seemed an opportune opportunity," Simmons answered, before suddenly having a lightbulb moment. "You know, I've got an idea—!"
She hurriedly reached into her bag and grabbed a book, quickly flipping through it. She finally found the page that she was looking for, and after quickly reading it over, grabbed her wand and another lily out of the vase, and cast a temporary sticking charm on it before sticking it behind Fitz's ear. "There — we match!"
Fitz rolled his eyes at her, but made no move to remove it as he turned to grab the dish of bacon in order to dump some onto his plate. In fact, he entirely forgot about it even being there as they began eating and discussing their upcoming classes for the day, until two fellow second year Gryffindors walked up.
"I see you're getting into the Valentine's Day spirit, Harry," Lavender giggled as she sat down with Sally-Anne across from them, pointing at the flower stuck behind his ear. "Looks dashing."
"Hermione did it — you really think I'm suicidal enough to stop her?" Fitz replied good-naturedly, throwing his arm around his wife's shoulder. "And believe me, when you've been through as much in lives as I have, a flower in your hair is pretty low on the list of things to get bothered about."
"Speaking of which, yours are quite lovely too, Hermione," Sally-Anne said, nodding at the flowers in Simmons' hair.
"Thank you," Simmons answered with a smile. "Not normally my style, but they were here, so figured I should make some good use of them since they certainly aren't improving the decor — it looks like Cupid got sick and vomited all over this room."
"I like it," Lavender giggled, looking around the ostentatious room.
"Cut it back to about twenty-five percent of what it currently is and it'd be fine, but this is killing a spider with a sledgehammer, then shooting the sledgehammer with a Barrett, lighting the house on fire, and finally dropping a couple missiles on the burning house," Simmons answered.
Lavender stared at Simmons in shock, though mostly at thinking that the decorations were just slightly beyond tasteful — never having heard of a Barrett or the phrase 'killing a spider with a sledgehammer', and only being vaguely aware of what missiles were from her limited interactions in the muggle world, not being a muggleborn or social muggleborn — before finally just shaking her head in disbelief and turning her attention back to Sally-Anne, who at least pretended to agree that the decor was appealing, even if secretly Sally agreed more with Simmons that it could have been cut in half and would have looked better.
After that nothing more was said about the cupid barf until near the end of breakfast, when Lockhart stood up and shouted out to the hall, "Happy Valentine's Day! And may I thank the forty-five people who have so far sent me cards! Yes, I have taken the liberty of arranging this little surprise for you all — and it doesn't end here!"
A moment later a dozen surly-looking dwarfs dressed in golden wings and carrying harps came stomping through the door from the Entrance Hall looking ready to murder, and not with love and kindness.
"My friendly, card-carrying cupids!" Lockhart continued on. "They will be roving around the school today delivering your valentines! And the fun doesn't stop here! I'm sure my colleagues will want to enter into the spirit of the occasion! Why not ask Professor Snape to show you how to whip up a Love Potion! And while you're at it, Professor Flitwick knows more about Entrancing Enchantments than any wizard I've ever met, the sly old dog!"
For once Snape actually looked like a respectable human being, looking like he was going to force-feed poison to the first person who asked him for a date-rape potion — or perhaps he was simply going to force-feed poison to the first person period who looked at him wrong that morning after Lockhart's usurpation of the Great Hall with decorations. Professor Flitwick also didn't look happy at being included in Lockhart's delusions, though FitzSimmons highly doubted that he would ever tell anyone anything about Entrancing Charms if he did in fact actually know anything about them, unless they were an upperclass student writing a report on the dangers and (muggle, at least) legal ramifications of using them.
But starting in their very first lesson dwarfs repeatedly barged into classrooms to deliver valentines, which was clearly annoying at least the professors whom FitzSimmons had that day, but for some inexplicable reason, the professors did absolutely nothing about it. FitzSimmons had no clue why they didn't just lock their doors so that the dwarfs couldn't get in, instead of simply growling and looking irate while still allowing it to happen, but such was the logic of wizards, apparently. None of this affected FitzSimmons directly, however, other than poor quality classes, until they were walking upstairs for Charms late that afternoon.
"Oy, you! 'Arry Potter!" a dwarf shouted from behind them, pushing past the line of Gryffindor first years waiting in the hallway for their next class. "I've got a musical message to deliver to 'Arry Potter in person."
FitzSimmons turned around to face the dwarf, who came to a stop right in front of them.
Of course, this caused a holdup in the corridor like every between-class valentine delivered all day had, but this particular one was immediately capitalized on by Malfoy, who when the path in front of him was obstructed and everyone didn't immediately move out of the way of the king and lay down a red carpet for him, said in a cold, drawling voice, "What's going on here?"
Then he saw that it was his self-proclaimed arch-mortal-nemesis and added, "Of course — Potter. Who else would be blocking the way but the Boy-Who-Lived. Can't be like normal people and take his valentines anywhere but the middle of the corridor where everyone will know it."
Fitz just gave Malfoy the middle finger as he wrapped his other arm around his wife's shoulder, settling in to hear whatever the dwarf had to say.
Meanwhile, as the hallway continued backing up as more and more people walked up trying to get from one place to another in the hallways that were already always crowded between classes without Lockhart causing traffic jams with his dwarves, Percy's voice cut over the general yakking, "What's all this commotion?"
The dwarf, meanwhile, had finally pulled out his notes and began, "Here is your singing valentine —"
Making an on-the-fly decision, Simmons leaned up and whispered "Fuck it" into her husband's ear, before grabbing his face and planting her lips on his, kissing him the entire way through the dwarf's valentine.
"His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad; His hair is as dark as a blackboard. I wish he was mine, he's really divine; The hero who conquered the Dark Lord."
When it sounded like the dwarf had finished and there were several catcalls and a handful of clapping, Simmons finally let Fitz go, turning back to the crowd that for the most part now assumed that she had been the one to send him the valentine. But Simmons quickly noticed one person who did not seem pleased by her pda with her husband, one Ginevra Weasley covering her face with her hands and running into her next class looking to be in tears, face nearly as red as her hair. Percy, meanwhile, was doing his best to disperse the crowd, many of whom were giving Fitz very obvious winks on doing so well with a lady, especially as a mere second year.
After FitzSimmons had turned back around and resumed their walk to Charms, Fitz asked quietly, "Joke, embarrassment, or someone can't see I'm already taken?"
"This isn't definitive, but did you see Ginevra, Ron's younger sister?" Simmons answered. "She did not seem as enthusiastic as everyone else about my marking you as my own, and ran into her classroom crying right after we broke apart."
"Ron's sister…. Yeah, I've seen her around, and I'm pretty sure she's been one of those who've stared at me a lot, presumably for being the Boy-Who-Lived and all that — at least that's why we've always assumed that I get stared at so much," Fitz replied. "But we've never talked to her, have we? And you think she sent me a Valentine's Day card? Although, now that I think about it like that, I'm a little surprised that I haven't received several dozen from all of the Boy-Who-Lived fangirls, including that Creevey kid."
"I don't know. Like I said, I'm just guessing here," Simmons answered. "But her reaction did not match that of anyone else in the corridor."
"Never doubt your guesses — they're usually very good," Fitz replied.
But by that point they had reached Professor Flitwick's classroom, and all thoughts of valentines and their senders were pushed out of their minds as irrelevant until further information presented itself, which would turn out to be never.
FitzSimmons eagerly awaited an announcement to appear on the notice boards informing everyone of when the next Dueling Club meeting was going to be, but one never came.
Because unbeknownst to them, Dueling Club meetings had been canceled for good. Snape was tired of having to obey the orders of a mudblood, especially a second-year one who was friends with Harry Potter and could run a dueling club more efficiently than he knew even he could for the Slytherins; the professors were just as interested now in being a part of the whole thing as they had been when Lockhart had brought up the idea to start with, which is to say absolutely not at all; and McGonagall had heard that the first lesson had gone a little past curfew and the second had gone an entire hour past curfew, and couldn't let such rule-breaking behavior continue — what kind of precedent would that set for all the students? So the Dueling Club was canceled permanently, as after all, they were just kids safely inside of Hogwarts where nothing bad could ever happen to them, minor incidents like Voldemort occupying the back of Quirrell's head and a secret chamber existing containing a basilisk that killed Myrtle and petrified Mrs Norris more recently, mere inconveniences to be swept under the rug and never let see the light of day for the wizarding parents who sent their kids to Hogwarts, or the Ministry of Magic that could reasonably demand an investigation into such incidents and criminal behavior.
What wasn't to be canceled for the second years, however, was the choosing of extra classes to be taken from third to fifth years, and possibly sixth and seventh years as well depending on how they did on their exams in said classes and their interest in continuing those classes for two more years. And so in the last Transfiguration class before the Easter holes, Professor McGonagall told them that they had to pick a minimum of two new classes to add to the ones that they already had, out of the list of five that she had written up on the board and told them to copy down. Simmons immediately raised her hand.
"Where do we find a description of each of these classes and what we will be doing in each of them, along with which classes will be needed for what jobs when we graduate in five years?"
Like usual when FitzSimmons asked a logical but more intellectually mature question, McGonagall looked startled, like it had never crossed her mind that having answers to those questions and ones like them could be important.
But finally she managed to reply sternly, "There are books in the library on each of these subjects. Good day, and be ready with the minimum of two classes you want to add in our first Transfiguration class after Easter."
But no one besides themselves appeared to be interested enough in what the classes were that they would be having to take in order to look them up in the library — though FitzSimmons did hear many of their fellow second years talking with older students in the Great Hall or Gryffindor common room over Easter break about the choices. Nor did any of the professors seem to suddenly take an interest in their students' futures, as they never once saw or heard about any professor discussing with or guiding a student as to what they should take in order to find a job that they would like and be successful at five years down the road, only further serving to make FitzSimmons disenchanted with the quality of adult at that school.
The intrepid science duo, however, took their (hopefully) nonexistent magical futures much more seriously than any of the bloody 'adults' did, and studied the books used in the five subjects intensively, serious about their education even if they did hope to escape from this world back to their own before they graduated and actually had to get jobs. And on the off chance that they were here that long, most likely setting up Shield's first ever magical department instead of taking any job in the magical world. But in the end, they decided on Care of Magical Creatures, Arithmancy, and Runes, and decided against Divination and Muggle Studies.
Care of Magical Creatures was Simmons' immediate pick to take as it was magical zoology, and while there probably weren't going to be any cuttlefish with their nearly magical chromatophores, there should be lots of magical creatures that she could only study in this world, due to their reality-challenged nature in FitzSimmons' own world. The other two classes, on the other hand, they simply ended up with from a process of elimination.
FitzSimmons wanted to take as many classes as they reasonably could, but Divination and Muggle Studies quickly put themselves out of contention. Because after dealing with Robin off and on for several years, going to the future and the past (especially Simmons), and having legitimately changed the future once, Divination was quickly struck off the list of possibilities, especially given the fact that from all of the books from the Library that they read on it, it looked seriously doubtful that wizards had any more clue of what they were trying to do predicting the future than weathermen had of trying to predict the weather more than a day or two out in our world.
And Muggle Studies fell quickly after that when FitzSimmons found over a dozen inaccurate statements about muggles in a single Muggle Studies book, and every single book on muggles and Muggle Studies that they looked through had at least several inaccuracies in each one of them. And after already having to take over the Dueling Club earlier that year for two meetings, Simmons really didn't feel like having to take over an actual class for an entire year, and like with DADA when people had begged her to replace Lockhart, she very highly doubted that the Muggle Studies professor would be appreciative of her raising her hand every five minutes to point out another area where wizards were woefully ignorant and flat out wrong about the normal world, or taking over outright and teaching their fellow students what the normal world was actually like, not what wizards who had never lived in the normal world thought the normal world was like — because for some reason only wizards could ever understand, they didn't get muggleborns who actually knew the normal world to write their books for them. And that all didn't even include the fact that FitzSimmons came from the cutting edge spy world nearly thirty years into the future, where things were even more different than the wizarding world knew.
Which in the end left only Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Care of Magical Creatures for them to take, giving them only three additional classes to the seven that they had taken the first two years and were still required to take at least through fifth year, just one above the minimum of two that they were required to pick. So when McGonagall asked them to turn in notes with their names and selected courses, FitzSimmons handed in a single note with both of their names at the top and those three classes written below.
After which they heard nary a peep more about their life-altering choices for the entire remainder of the school year, making FitzSimmons wonder what the hell these teachers were thinking (or clearly not thinking at all), and who ever let them be in charge of anything, especially the next generation of witches and wizards.
In between the first two dueling club meetings, FitzSimmons had taken it upon themselves to practice dueling on their own, knowing the life-saving value in it — same as they had taken it upon themselves to learn fighting spells on their own starting in the first couple of weeks of their first year in the magical world.
After all, they had several perfectly empty extra dorms below the one that they had turned into their personal flat that they could duel in, no reason to let all of that space go to waste. Additionally, the presence of four-poster beds and an attached bathroom added to the reality of their training, as if they ever one day did have to duel an enemy to save their or someone else's life, it was far more likely to be an out-of-the-blue, street fight type duel in a real world location, than the formal, open space, one-two-three countdown style of dueling that the Dueling Club had been. And even if it wasn't a street fight to start with, FitzSimmons would try their hardest to make it one, as they clearly had the advantage over the wizards whom they would be dueling against in any situation where there were walls and barriers to duck and hide behind. Because never once in all of their book readings on duels had they run across a single section talking about dueling in and out of hiding spots, while they personally had a decade of Shield fieldwork and training in real combat situations from two of the best fighters out there, Daisy and May.
But after no more Dueling Club meeting notices appeared on the notice boards after the second meeting, and it quickly began to appear as if no more were ever going to, FitzSimmons began stepping up their game. Not limited by spells that the professors would approve of if they found out about them, and having discovered after their first day of practice over Christmas break that the school house elves came through in the middle of the night and fixed all of the destroyed beds and small chinks that they managed to take out of the stone walls that seemed rather impervious to spells to begin with, FitzSimmons began upping the ante on the spells that they were learning, though smart enough to know better that to try many of them against each other — spells like Bombarda, Reducto, Confringo, Expulso, Incendio, and Diffindo, that would never fly in an organized school Dueling Club even if there had been a safe way to practice them.
In addition to improving their magical fighting ability, it also gave FitzSimmons an even greater appreciation of what their BFF Captain Daisy 'Skye' Johnson did on a regular basis, only with quaking and hand-to-hand combat instead of magical spells. Though Fitz did begin to wonder how different and similar pressure waves and magic really were.
"You know, I wonder how Daisy's quaking abilities would fare against magic," he commented casually one evening, ducked behind one of the four posters two floors below their own room. "They're both forms of energy/matter manipulation, as opposed to physical objects like swords and bullets and the shrapnel from bombs."
"What, you think Flower's quakes would act as a Shield Charm?" Simmons replied as she peered around the edge of the bed that she was hiding behind, trying to line up a shot on her husband.
"Well, what exactly is magic? Like what state of matter is it during flight?" Fitz asked as he leapt up from behind his bed, sent a spell towards Simmons that blew the comforter clear over her head, before ducking back down behind a new bed. "Because it's clearly not light, as it travels slow enough to be seen by the naked eye, even if it does glow a color."
"Maybe that's what we should study this summer," Simmons answered, lying flat on her stomach where she could just see Fitz's leg under the beds. "Learn the science behind magic. Expelliarmus!"
Fitz's wand flew out of his hand as her spell hit his leg, and both FitzSimmonses leapt up from their respective hiding spots in order to try to reach the loose wand first. Fitz had the advantage as the wand had flown mostly straight up since it couldn't go through a bed towards Simmons, but Simmons played dirty and tackled her husband onto his back onto the bed behind him, ignoring the wand completely.
Looking down at him from where she lay flat on top of him, she tossed her own wand in the general direction of where Fitz's had landed, smirking, "I win," before planting her lips on his and snogging him senseless.
Needless to say, there was a lot less spell casting and a lot more nakedness and hands and lips on every inch of bare skin that they could find for the rest of the evening, something that they had both noticed frequently tended to occur at the end of practice sessions as they both wearied of training, not that either of them were complaining about it. Combat magic was one thing, and at the very beginning of their first year Dumbledore may have said that music was a magic beyond all that they did in their classes at Hogwarts, but in their opinion sex was the greatest magic of all, and they were never two not to capitalize on their ability to do it together, being husband and wife after all.
~FS~
But nearly all things eventually come to an end, both post-training sexcapades and their second magical school year, and soon it became time for FitzSimmons to plan their yearly escape to America and Shield for the summer.
Meanwhile at the same time and completely unbeknownst to them, Dumbledore and Ron's mum were meeting together plotting Harry Potter's non-disappearance this year, and immediate incarceration at the Burrow. For with Fitz not spending any of the previous summer at his family's house — Number Four Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey, England, Great Britain, Earth, Milky Way — the blood wards that had protected Harry for the ten years of his life leading up to his first year at Hogwarts were long gone, meaning that Dumbledore no longer had any reason to deny Mrs Weasley taking Harry to her house any time that school wasn't in. And if there was any person on the planet whom Dumbledore did fear, it certainly wasn't Voldemort, it was the Weasley Matriarch. Who had in no debatable terms declared that the Boy-Who-Lived was going to marry her only daughter Ginevra Weasley, and that Dumbledore had to make sure that Harry's first introduction to the wizarding world (past Hagrid showing Harry Diagon Alley) was her family at Kings Cross station so that she became his rock and beacon and mother in the tempestuous wizarding world that he was about to be thrown into.
What Dumbledore (and Mrs Weasley) couldn't plan for, however, was Harry Potter now being a world-class spy who'd rescued Jemma Simmons from an alien planet named 'Death', her and the rest of the team from an apocalyptic Kree future, and was expecting there to be adults this time around trying to force him onto the Hogwarts Express to go back to London and the Dursleys — even if that last bit was inaccurate in it's location, if not so much it's general meaning.
FitzSimmons knew enough about the castle by that point to know that there were wards all around it preventing any unauthorized escapes, even across the lake where the first years came and went by boat each year, but they highly doubted that an adult would actually try to ride in their horseless carriage with them from Hogwarts to the Hogsmeade train station. Make sure that they got in a horseless carriage, sure, and obviously be waiting at the Hogsmeade train station to make sure that they got onto the train like they were supposed to, and possibly even be at Kings Cross station this time to make sure that they didn't escape into London proper, but not actually ride in a carriage with them from the school to the station — after all, who would ever consider opening the door and stepping out of the carriage at the normal walking pace that the carriages moved at? Then again, FitzSimmons rather doubted that any other student had ever wanted to escape into the woods outside of Hogwarts on the ride from Hogwarts to the Hogwarts Express. And from there, it would be a simple matter of running through the woods towards where they knew Hogsmeade lay until they happened across a road, where they could throw up their wand hands, and hope that they could outbribe Dumbledore to get the Knight Bus to take them to America and Shield again.
So a week before Hogwarts Express Day, FitzSimmons had one of the seventh years teach them the shrinking and enlarging charms, so that they could shrink their trunks small enough to fit into their pockets, and then enlarge them back to normal size when they got to Romanov's safehouse. Then on the morning of, they shrunk their trunks and stuck them in their pockets, before walking down to breakfast like a good little witchlet and wizardlet fully intending on doing everything that the adults wanted them to, and definitely not planning on stepping out of their carriage and taking the Knight Bus across the pond. But their plans were nearly jeopardized by one Ronald Weasley.
Who sat down across from them near the end of breakfast and said, "Harry, did I ever mention that you're coming home with us?"
FitzSimmons glanced at each other out of the corners of their eyes, before Simmons as calmly and collectedly as she could — though also with a bit of an eyeroll at the fact that Ron had not in fact mentioned any such thing, and it was a little late to be telling them now if they were normal and the Dursleys and Grangers were going to be at Kings Cross that evening waiting on them — replied, "You did not."
"Oh — well, Mum wrote weeks ago," Ron replied, looking specifically at Fitz. "Something about Dumbledore no longer wanting you to go back to the Dursleys first like he did last summer. So you're coming home with us straight from Kings Cross. And I'm sure you can come visit later, too, 'Mione."
Simmons restrained herself from pointing out that she and Fitz never left each other's side, or bitch-slapping the redhead straight into the next school year, passing the summer and not collecting $200, for giving her a nickname without ever asking if she was okay with it, and instead asked, "Has your mum written to my parents or Harry's parents asking for permission for either of us to come over, instead of going home like planned? Because neither of our families told us that we weren't going home as expected."
But Ron brushed that off with a completely unconcerned, "They're just muggles, they'll understand," revealing once again his bigotry of wizarding superiority that he constantly accused Malfoy of having, but was completely ignorant of having himself — like most so-called 'muggle-loving' wizards that FitzSimmons had met in their two years at Hogwarts.
"Mmm," Simmons hummed noncommittally, wondering how much this was going to try to interrupt their escape plans, before going back to looking at the drawing that Fitz had made of Daisy's quaking on a wavelength scale, as part of their goal of figuring out if their dear Flower could block magic despite not having a wand or being magical herself.
Fortunately Ron seemed to think that this was an agreement about going to the Burrow, so there was no more talk between them and him until they walked out to the awaiting horseless carriages fifteen minutes later, and Ron followed them up to a carriage. Forcing Fitz to turn to the redhead and say, "No. You're not riding with us. Go find another carriage."
Ron seemed shocked that Harry didn't want his best friend riding with him, but as Fitz was far bigger and blocking his path, Ron had no choice but to sulkingly look around for someone else he knew to ride with. Fortunately for FitzSimmons, he spotted Dean and Seamus climbing into a carriage in front of the one that FitzSimmons were at and walked up to join them, instead of going to a carriage further back in line than the one that FitzSimmons were at, thereby forcing FitzSimmons to wait until the redhead had climbed in before walking to one even further back than that, so that Ron couldn't see them jump out and run away if he happened to be looking out of his window when they made their move.
On their way out of the castle with everyone else they had spotted Professor McGonagall eyeing Fitz like an eagle, clearly intent on making sure that Potter made it into a carriage, though when it came to that they had ridden the boats like they were supposed to the year before, it was only at Hogsmeade station that they had deviated from the path expected of them. They assumed that there would be at least one adult at Hogsmeade station as well to make sure that Potter got on to the train this year, but they had no plans of sticking around long enough to find out.
Because soon after the horseless carriage that they were in had passed through the iron gates marking the border of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and therefore the wards that trapped everyone inside (and kept everyone unwanted outside), Simmons opened the carriage door and stepped out. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world to step out of a moving carriage onto the road, but at the slow trundle that it was moving at it also wasn't too dissimilar to stepping off of a moving walkway onto the normal floor next to it, and they had both watched the first Jack Reacher movie enough times together to see him do it out of his car, and so they knew that they just had to start walking as soon as their feet hit the ground to keep from falling on their pretty faces.
As soon as Fitz stepped out after his wife he shut the carriage door behind them, and they redirected their steps straight out into the forest to the side of them, and changed their walk to an all-out sprint. They wanted to get out of sight of the carriages and road as quickly as possible, so that the fewest number of people could see them leave, so that there wouldn't be as many possible people to tell the adult at Hogsmeade Station what had happened. Only once safely under the cover of the woods did they slow down to a normal run, as they headed towards Hogsmeade less than a mile away.
But as they expected, before they actually got to Hogsmeade itself there was a side road leading off into the gorgeous Scottish countryside, where they stopped in the shadows of the trees on the edge of the road so that Simmons could throw up her wand hand.