By the start of December, FitzSimmons had gone through the dozen real fifth year DADA books that Simmons had picked out for them from the library to secretly read during DADA class.

And so Simmons started getting them sixth year books to learn now, it actually turning out to be one of their top three most productive years of DADA so far, since Percy had them do nothing but read and never checked to see exactly what they were actually reading since Simmons had charmed the real book of the week and the propaganda together, with of course the propaganda cover so as not to raise any flags, be it with Umbridge or now Percy. They felt bad for the rest of the students that they weren't learning anything, and were still being maliciously brainwashed into believing that self-defense was morally wrong, but there was an entire library for them to learn from if they really wanted to, even if it was just out of concern for their OWLs coming up at the end of the school year.

But FitzSimmons were learning more than ever on their own, and in the very first sixth year book that they read they learned about nonverbal spells, the skill of casting spells silently, just thinking the incantation instead of actually saying it out loud. Knowing a strategic advantage when they saw one, they immediately began devoting all of their extra time not in classes or doing homework for other classes, to practicing casting every spell that they had ever learned silently, starting back with first year spells as they assumed that those would be the easiest to cast nonverbally as most of them were the easiest to cast verbally, hence the reason that they were taught first. And while they didn't pick it up immediately, once they did finally start getting proficient at the easiest spells after several days of constant practice, the rest of the spells that they knew quickly began following as they practiced each new spell that they had learned during their time at Hogwarts so far.

They also began casting all of the spells that they were capable of nonverbally every time that they cast a spell for anything, even in their classes, seeing no reason to ever use verbal spells when they didn't have to, and preferring to keep what they were doing private any time they could. Professors McGonagall and Flitwick gave them strange looks the first several times that they realized that FitzSimmons were casting all of the spells that they already knew nonverbally, as that was sixth year magic that even most graduating sixth years still struggled with for most spells. But then again, Potter and Granger had always been the two smartest students that they had ever seen, so if anyone was going to start perfectly casting nonverbally halfway through fifth year, it was little surprise that it was them. If Snape ever noticed he certainly didn't compliment them about their incomparable skill, but as he generally avoided their table like the plague since he couldn't ridicule them since their potions were the best that he had ever seen in his life, it was also quite possible that he never even noticed that they were now doing all of their spells for controlling their fires nonverbally. And none of the other subjects that they took had enough spellcasting in them for their respective teachers to notice that the best two students whom they never had to pay any attention to in order to make sure that they were practicing correctly, were doing what spells they did need to cast in said classes nonverbally now.

And by the time Christmas break had almost arrived, FitzSimmons had nearly caught up to the spells that they were actively learning in Transfiguration, Charms, and their own DADA studies, an accomplishment that they were quite proud of themselves given the warnings that some of the books they had read so far had given about the difficulty that most students faced in trying to cast nonverbal spells at all.

But the nearing of Christmas didn't just mean the nearing of total nonverbal spellcasting domination for FitzSimmons. It also meant the arrival of Christmas decorations, and responsibilities for the prefects that were no longer just an honor system that could easily be avoided by those certain prefects less inclined to do literally the only things that they were prefects for — things like patrolling the hallways for an hour after curfew a few times a week, and making sure that everyone was obeying the school rules especially in their common rooms where the staff never were. But now that Christmas had arrived, the prefects had responsibilities that they actually had to do and couldn't skip out, namely having to help the professors hang up all of the Christmas decorations all over the castle.

In between complaining about having to do actual work as a prefect, instead of just having a shiny badge on his robes to go around boasting about, Ron still found time to tell FitzSimmons that he was heading home for Christmas, and, "You're coming too! Didn't I say? Mum wrote and told me to invite you weeks ago!"

"You didn't tell us, and no, we're not going home with you," Simmons replied curtly.

But Fitz added a little more bluntly, "We never have and we never will, so tell your mum to shove it up her fat arse with a cactus. Also, we're throwing her present in the fire without even opening it if she sends us one again, because we don't trust her intentions, and we've been around the spy world way too long to touch mysterious packages that we don't know the intentions of. So please do pass that along and save us all some trouble."

Ron stared at them in shock, especially at who he thought was Harry Potter, but as it was lunch time when he mentioned it to them and FitzSimmons had already finished eating, they were able to just stand up and walk out of the Great Hall to head towards the library to read for a few minutes before an Arithmancy class that Ron didn't have, and not have to hear anything more that the redhead might try to say to them about it once he had overcome his shock of being turned down.

~FS~

Wednesday night two days before the start of Christmas break, FitzSimmons were peacefully sleeping in each other's arms, all worn out from a full day of classes, practice, and finally extracurricular activities of the more romantic kind right before they had gone to said peaceful sleep.

Arthur Weasley, on the other hand, was not so peacefully being murdered by Voldemort's pet snake right outside of the door into the Department of Mysteries. A fact that remained unknown to anyone but Voldemort himself until the following morning, Fitz having no vision dreams that night, or any other of his four and half years worth of nights in the wizarding world. At which time one of the Department of Mysteries' unknowables walked up to the scene a little early to get some work done that he had left the night before when he'd clocked out, and found the Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office lying slumped on the ground in front of the door, covered in blood from two noticeable, very close together spots on his chest, and upon closer look, an invisibility cloak lying puddled at his feet. The unknowable immediately sent a patronus up to the Aurors office, which always had people around for emergencies exactly like this one.

As it would so happen, the auror on duty that morning to take emergency owls, Floo's, and patroni was not someone who believed Dumbledore, and while not a fangirl of Fudge either, was going to report any incident of this magnitude to the Minister, especially as it had occurred inside the Ministry building itself, and was by all signs an attempted breach of security — the Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office having absolutely no reason to be taking a kip outside of the Department of Mysteries door. And so it was Fudge who learned first about Mr Weasley's death while on a secretive mission for the Order of the Phoenix, not Dumbledore, and he was the one able to put a spin on the incident and direct the narrative how he wanted it to go — which was of course to have the Daily Prophet plaster it all over the front page of a emergency edition Afternoon Prophet just a few hours later, before even sending anyone to tell Mrs Weasley that her husband was as dead as You-Know-Who most certainly still was.

Only this didn't quite work out as hoped for Fudge, as even though he ordered all of the aurors working on the case not to tell anyone who was not on the case, and prevented anyone whom he thought might be associated with Dumbledore from being allowed to work on the case, one of the earliest aurors on the scene had already told someone else, who then whispered it to his new best workmate Auror Nymphadora Tonks, who immediately told Kingsley, who of course sent a secret message to Dumbledore as quickly as possible to let him know that Mr Weasley was dead in the line of Order duty.

Which let Dumbledore pass on the information to Mr Weasley's wife before she had to read about it plastered on the front cover of the Afternoon Prophet that was sent out for free to every single subscriber of the Daily Prophet in the past ten years, and even most of the rare households that had never subscribed to the Ministry's propaganda arm. It also let Dumbledore call the four Weasley students at Hogwarts into his office before classes had even started to tell them that their father had been murdered by a snake while performing duties for the Order, and then portkey said redheads to the Burrow then and there, instead of having to wait two days until the end of term and take the Hogwarts Express to London like they had been planning to do before this tragic turn of events.

What it did not do, however, was prevent Fudge from spreading far and wide his narrative of the story, which was that Mr Weasley had died attempting to sneak into the Department of Mysteries on a secret mission for Dumbledore in Dumbledore's ongoing attempt to overthrow Fudge from his rightful position of Minister of Magic and usurp it for himself. And that was how FitzSimmons found out about the entire thing, their fellow Gryffindor TriWizard champion Sara Jones bringing over the special edition for them to see when it arrived at lunch later that day.

"Damn — that's terrible," Simmons said quietly once she and her husband had finished reading the article.

"Wonder what he was really doing there, though," Fitz replied in an undertone of his own. "Because if the Ministry says he was committing treason for Dumbledore, the one thing we know for certain is that he wasn't committing treason. Probably still something for Dumbledore, but not anything that the Ministry is accusing him."

"Well, we could always go ask Professor McGonagall, but she won't tell us anything even if she does know," Simmons answered. "Pretty sure this one's just going to have to remain a mystery."

"Oh, I don't really care — that's all the adults' business," Fitz replied. "I was just idly wondering. This also might explain why we haven't seen any of the Weasleys around since we left here at breakfast."

"Yeah, he probably sent them home to be with their mum, especially since term's ending in two days anyway," Simmons agreed. "Percy's still here, though — guess his dad dying didn't change the fact that he's still not on speaking terms with any of them."

"Completely different scenario, but it's not like I'd show up for my father's funeral if I ever knew it was happening," Fitz said.

"That is a completely, completely different situation than being on opposite sides of a political war, and anyway, yes you probably would, especially if I prodded you to," Simmons replied. "Deep down you would want that closure. Percy is refusing to go to the same place as the rest of his family all because his family believes something contrary to what the government wants everyone to believe. I mean, it's possible he's just staying until the end of term since it's only two days and this is his job, and he has spoken with his family that we are completely unaware of, but the couple times we've passed him in the halls this morning and looking at him up at the staff table right now, he certainly doesn't seem to be grieving or acting at all like he cares that his dad just died — or was murdered, likely as not, given the very heavy spin the Ministry put on the whole thing."

As it turned out Simmons' suspicion about Percy not caring seemed to be correct, as he did not leave the castle even once Christmas break had begun, being seen at the staff table eating every meal over Christmas break.

~FS~

Despite having told Ron to tell his mum not to send them Christmas presents, and Mr Weasley having just been murdered, on Christmas morning FitzSimmons awoke to three packages sitting at the foot of their bed, including one from Mrs Weasley.

It and the one from Ron they immediately tossed to the side to throw in a fire on their way down to breakfast, having told Ron that that is exactly what they would do if his mum sent them Christmas gifts again this year, that they didn't trust his family. The other gift, however, they did open, finding a furry brown wallet from Hagrid that had fangs as a defense mechanism, though they also did a very good job of preventing one from being able to add any money to it. Simmons was sure that there was some way of making it not try to take your fingers off, the same as his book for third year Care of Magical Creatures class could be tamed, but none of the handful of things that she quickly attempted worked, and so they tossed it to the side until they had time to explore it more sometime later, or possibly never.

After breakfast they spent Christmas Day much the same way that they had the previous four years, exploring outside and frolicking in the snow before the sun set, and then enjoying the Feast that evening. They were thankful that the adults hadn't tried to do a Yule Ball again, as it was nice to have less than a quarter the number of people in the castle for three weeks, and not to have to deal with the castle-wide stress that came with something of that magnitude, that still affected them even though they hadn't been stressed about the event themselves.

But there wasn't a Yule Ball this year, and the castle had less than a quarter of its number of normal occupants, so FitzSimmons had a very pleasant day celebrating the birth of Jesus.

~FS~

After Christmas, there were two and a half weeks before school resumed again.

And on Tuesday morning of the first week of school, Sara walked over to them for the third time that school year with the day's copy of the Daily Prophet. This time there had been a massive breakout at Azkaban, ten of Voldemort's most trusted slaves escaping. The Ministry blamed Mr Sirius Black, the only person to have ever broken out of the infamous wizarding prison before, and widely believed to be one of Voldemort's highest level slaves before the tyrant's demise fifteen years before upon trying to kill a baby Harry Potter. Knowing the truth that Voldemort was on the loose again with a body, FitzSimmons were positive that this breakout had to do with him, as it was only his slave who had escaped, but they had no clue whether Mr Black had actually had anything to do with it or not, as they hadn't heard a peep about him since third year, the school year following his escape when everyone was so panicked about the incident.

Looking around the Hall they only saw a few people here and there huddled anxiously together looking at the article, only a small percentage of the student population getting the Daily Prophet. But as the day progressed the number of people talking about the breakout steadily increased, word starting to get around about what had happened. But as they were all just students, and if any of their parents had any knowledge of what had really happened they hadn't shared it with their kids, it was all just talk about what the article had said and wild theories that students made up, as there really was nothing else for there to be, and therefore of little more interest to FitzSimmons until something real about it became known, and even then it would still just be information, and nothing actionable as they were just students inside a secure castle, not adults outside of it.

But what also increased over the next few days and was much closer to home, was the knowledge that Hagrid was on probation. It hadn't been Percy's decision, he had thought that Hagrid had done just fine teaching in the classes that he had inspected and wrote such in his report, but Minister Fudge had told him to put the gamekeeper on probation at the start of the new year anyway, because Hagrid was definitely one of Dumbledore's, and after the incident with Mr Weasley doing something for Dumbledore in front of the Department of Mysteries, he wanted some way to put pressure on the headmaster and keep him in line.

And while Hagrid had done a decent job of teaching that year since his return, and after two and change years of leading the class had actually improved from his very first day in charge of the class, FitzSimmons were still hoping that so long as Dumbledore was able to replace Hagrid with Professor Grubbly-Planks, that Hagrid would get fired and go back to just being the gamekeeper, as while Professor Grubbly-Plank had been a complete arsehole the very first time that they ever met her, all of their classes with her since then had proven that she was actually a professor, and her arseholary had melted away after that first lesson just like the thick snow it had been in. But given everything that Hagrid had made it through before that Dumbledore had protected him for, they weren't holding their breaths. And they would also prefer having Hagrid to any Ministry agent that Fudge would replace Hagrid with if given the chance, so there was always a risk to Hagrid being fired. But either way it wasn't any of their responsibility, so they just attended their classes and studied well beyond their year, and waited to see what did happen in the latest battle of the war between the Ministry and Dumbledore.

A war that the Ministry took a tactical advantage in on Friday morning with the unveiling of Educational Decree number Twenty-Five, preventing teachers from discussing anything other than their subjects with students.

Because on the Tuesday after the breakout at Azkaban, Percy had noted in his daily report to Fudge that he had overheard a few of the older students, mostly sixth and seventh years, talking with some of their professors after class let out about the fact that there had been a breakout and wondering if the professors had heard any more recent news about how, or about the ongoing manhunt to find the escaped ten, and possibly Sirius Black with them. He had only noted this as a mere observation, not thinking anything of it, merely writing absolutely everything down that he observed as he had been instructed by Fudge to do. Fudge, however, saw it as the end of the world, the fifth, lesser-known sign of the apocalypse, and so when he had read the report on Wednesday morning he had immediately begun drafting up a new decree to stop this treachery of a well-informed public and freedom of information in its tracks. But with his own meetings to go to and tyranny to run, it had taken him until Thursday evening to actually get the new decree passed by his Wizengamot and sent to his trusty Weasel to have posted around the castle by Friday morning.

He also ordered Percy to sack either Trelawney or Hagrid sooner rather than later, and both if he could. So at his master's behest, Percy started observing every single Divination and Care of Magical Creatures class, using the time turner that Fudge gave him so that he would have time to observe two classes, teach his own class, and nosily snoop around the castle looking for dirt on anyone who breathed the same air as Dumbledore.

Like with everything around the castle in general, he took extremely detailed notes about everything that occurred in both classes so that Fudge could tell him when he (the Minister) considered there to be enough grounds to fire one of them. Because while he thought that Divination was useless and unreliable, Percy didn't think that Trelawney was a bad teacher on the subject material that was considered normal for the class, and similarly, he thought that Hagrid was doing a perfectly acceptable job teaching the students about magical creatures that he knew little about himself. So the decision to fire either or both of them was going to have to be made by Fudge himself, and he would just relay that information to the school by executing the firing order on the Minister's behalf when the time came.

Valentine's Day was the first Hogsmeade day of the new year.

As FitzSimmons walked down the main street on the fresh, breezy day, Simmons pointed to the tea shop, Madam Puddifoot's, and asked her husband, "I know that everything we've overheard about it makes it sound like it's not our kind of tea shoppe, but want to stick our heads in anyway and see what it's actually like for ourselves?"

Fitz just shrugged in response, so they walked up to the door and opened it. But taking one look inside, they gagged and immediately turned around and left. They could both stand a fair amount of frilly girlishness, both Fitz despite being a guy and Simmons despite being very scientific-minded and the less romantic of the pair, but this reminded them far too much of Lockhart's disastrous Valentine's Day celebration their second year at the school, and they didn't need a repeat of that just for a cup of tea. Especially when they would really prefer alcohol, they had just thought that they would try to sneak in some tea and sandwiches or something before they got to the good stuff. It also didn't help that it reminded them a little of their brief sojourn into Umbridge's office when they had executed her, and that abusive, tyrannical cunt and everything that reminded them of her could stay buried six feet under and never see the light of day again.

So they headed back up the street towards the other pub in town besides the Three Broomsticks — the Hogshead Inn. Having a reputation as the seedier of the two pubs, they hoped that maybe they would be able to finagle some real alcohol out of the barkeep for them to drink, it having been since summer that they had been able to have anything with an alcohol percentage above butterbeer's 'only enough to get a small and already depressed house elf drunk if they drank six bottles a day'. Stepping inside the small, dingy room they walked up to the bar, where an older man who looked so familiar that he could have been Dumbledore's brother or cousin, came out to them from the back room.

"What?" he grunted at them, like he was irritated that someone was trying to order something in his pub and give him money.

Deciding it best to take the 'act like you belong and usually you won't be questioned' route, Simmons firmly but politely said, "A shot of firewhisky apiece, and a small bottle of wine with two glasses. Also, what do you have in the way of lunch food?"

The man looked at them suspiciously for several seconds, clearly seeing that they were students and probably not of the seventeen or older variety, but finally said, "I've got some freshly baked shepherds pie."

"We'll take that, and two glasses of water as well, so we're not just having alcohol," Simmons replied. "How much do we owe you?"

The barkeep thought for several seconds, before finally saying, "Two galleons — total."

"Have three for your generosity," Fitz replied as he handed the grumpy-looking man three galleons.

The barkeep just kind of nodded as he took the money, before shuffling off. From there FitzSimmons had a pleasant lunch, the man never once questioning their drinks, before they headed back out to the main road to continue walking around the small town.

As they were walking out of Zonko's Joke shop they saw the twins and Ron walking down the road towards it, and Simmons commented to her husband, "Hey, the next Gryffindor quidditch match is next weekend, isn't it? How do you think they'll do without the twins and Ron?"

"Well, from everything we heard, losing Ron might be a good thing," Fitz answered. "Losing the twins will probably hurt them though, as they've been playing nearly the longest of anyone on the team. So I guess it depends on whether Ron's replacement really is better than him and how much, and how close the twins' replacements are to them."

"I'm pretty sure you couldn't have covered all your bases any better," Simmons laughed out. "All while saying absolutely nothing about how you think they'll actually do next weekend against Hufflepuff."

"Forgive me for giving an accurate and thorough assessment of the situation," Fitz grumbled. "And I have no clue — we never talk to Angelina, or anyone else on the team, past or present. Anyway, what do we care?"

"We don't," Simmons chuckled in acquiescence, rubbing her husband's arm lightly. "Seeing the twins and Ron, who were the final straw for you-know-who, just reminded me that they're all still gone, and so I wondered how the team was going to be now. No reason to get all grumpy on me, babe."

"I'm always grumpy — requirement of being Scottish, remember?" Fitz replied. "It's like asking Daisy not to be a hot mess, or Coulson not to be thinking ten steps ahead of everyone else, or Steve Rogers not to be so patriotic, or his wife not to be the world's best assassin, or you not to be so smart, or —"

"Okay, okay! Fair enough," Simmons interrupted with a laugh. "It will be interesting though to see what does happen. Although if the replacement keeper does well, Ron's going to be in a right snit after how poorly his ten minutes of playing went from everything we heard afterwards, and the Slytherins' overjoyedness with his performance or lack thereof."

"I would say we could go watch and find out for ourselves, but — ha. We aren't doing that," Fitz replied. "I'm sure we'll hear about it, though, this castle never talks about anything but quidditch the week before and after every match."

"That is for sure," Simmons sighed lightly, before seeing that they had arrived at the door of Honeydukes and asked, "Shall we head inside and get a sugar high?"

Several weeks later in early March, FitzSimmons were eating supper in the Great Hall when they heard sobbing coming from the entrance hall.

They and several other people who were close enough to the entrance hall to hear the relatively quiet noise walked to the door between the Great Hall and the entrance hall to see what was going on, where they found Percy Weasley standing next to Professor Trelawney at the bottom of the Grand Staircase.

"I'm sorry Professor Trelawney, but this came from the Minister himself," they heard Percy say apologetically to the woman, who was sobbing hysterically.

The Divination teacher looked absolutely terrible — at least hungover if not actively drunk, her wand haphazardly being held in one hand and an empty sherry bottle in the other furthering her drunk look, and her hair, glasses, shawls, and scarves were all messed up. Two trunks that were presumably hers were sitting on the floor next to the two of them as well, though based on the state of Professor Trelawney most likely levitated down from the North Tower by Percy and not her, and probably even packed by him as well given the state she looked in.

"No!" Professor Trelawney shrieked hoarsely, like it was far from the first time. "No! This cannot be happening...it cannot...I refuse to accept it!"

"You'll have to take that up with Minister Fudge," Percy said patiently, trying to move her along towards the great oak doors before she made any more of a scene than she already was, as he could see students starting to gather to watch and didn't want this to be any worse for her or himself than it had to be. "But what I can say myself is that you have routinely been drunk these past few months, behavior very unbecoming of a professor at this distinguished school, and you have made zero predictions that have come true in all the time that I have been inspecting your classes. So I can certainly understand why he does not consider you up to standard."

"You c-can't!" Professor Trelawney howled. "You c-can't sack me! I've b-been here sixteen years! H-Hogwarts is m-my h-home!"

Then she sank, still sobbing uncontrollably, on to one of her trunks, shuddering and moaning, rocking back and forth on her trunk almost like she was about to have a seizure.

"I don't know what to tell you," Percy answered in a more clipped tone than before, his patience clearly starting to wear thin after who knew how long he had been trying to get her out of the castle and on her way. "An hour ago the Minister for Magic signed your Order of Dismissal. Now please kindly remove yourself from this castle before you make this harder for everyone. You're starting to attract a crowd, and I'm sure you don't want this to be the castle's last memory of you."

Right on cue FitzSimmons heard Lavender and Parvati let out muffled sobs near them, both crying softly as they held each other in their arms.

By this point Professor McGonagall had apparently heard of what was going on, and came walking into the entrance hall from where she had been eating at the staff table in the Great Hall. She walked across the entrance hall to Professor Trelawney, and patted the other woman consolingly on the back as she handed her a large handkerchief.

"There, there, Sybill...calm down...blow your nose on this...it's not as bad as you think, now...you are not going to have to leave Hogwarts…."

"I'm sorry, Professor McGonagall, but I'm afraid I don't understand — Professor Trelawney has been fired, by the Minister himself. What makes you say that she can stay?" Percy said.

"I do," came a deep voice from the great oak doors that had silently swung open while the redhead was talking to Professor McGonagall. Dumbledore stood there, framed impressively by the dark mist outside.

"I'm afraid I still don't understand, Professor Dumbledore," Percy replied. "Under the terms of Educational Decree Number Twenty-Three, the Minister has the power to have inspected, place upon probation, and fire any teacher he feels is not performing to the standards required by the Ministry of Magic. And Minister Fudge has decided that Professor Trelawney is not up to scratch. Therefore, I must dismiss her. I have the signed order right here in my pocket — I can show it to you."

"You are quite right, of course, Percy," Dumbledore answered politely. "The Minister does have every right to dismiss my teachers. He does not, however, have the authority to send them away from the castle. I am afraid that the power to do that still resides with the headmaster. And it is my wish that Professor Trelawney continue to live at Hogwarts."

Professor Trelawney, of all the people now gathered, was the one to give a hysterical little laugh and hiccough. "No — no, I'll g-go, Dumbledore! I sh-shall leave Hogwarts and s-seek my fortune elsewhere."

"No," Dumbledore answered sharply, and to FitzSimmons it sounded like a lot more than just looking out for one of his staff unjustly fired by the Ministry, like he had some really important secret reason not to let her leave the castle grounds. "It is my wish that you remain, Sybill."

Turning to Professor McGonagall he continued on, "Might I ask you to escort Sybill back upstairs, Minerva?"

"Of course," Professor McGonagall answered. "Up you get, Sybill…."

Professors Flitwick and Sprout, who had also come out from the Great Hall at some point during all of this, hurried over as well, Professor Sprout joining Professor McGonagall in supporting the unsteady Trelawney up the Grand Staircase as Professor Flitwick levitated her two trunks up in front of them.

Meanwhile, Percy asked Dumbledore, "What are you going to do with her once Fudge appoints a new Divination teacher who needs her lodgings?"

"Oh, that won't be a problem," Dumbledore answered pleasantly. "For one thing — have you ever actually considered the size of this castle, and the number of unused classrooms? There has to be another one or dozen staff lodgings in this place that could be cleaned up in five minutes time with a little magic that the replacement Divination teacher could use. The wards on this castle have even alerted me that one of the students here has been ingenious enough to discover the extra dorms of one of the Houses — but I digress. Because it matters not that there are enough staff lodgings in this castle for another dozen professors and magic could easily turn one of the innumerable unused classrooms into a suitable living quarters if need was, for I have already found us a new Divination teacher and he will prefer lodgings on the ground floor."

"But—! Need I remind you, Dumbledore, that under Educational Decree Number Twenty-two —"

"The Ministry has the right to appoint a suitable candidate if — and only if — the headmaster is unable to find one," Dumbledore cut Percy off firmly. "And I am happy to say that on this occasion, I have succeeded. May I introduce you?"

He turned to face the front doors, through which the sound of hooves could now be heard. A second later, a centaur with white-blond hair, blue eyes, and a palomino body came trotting in.

"This is Firenze," Dumbledore introduced happily. "I think the Minister will find him suitable."

~FS~

Despite getting a sacking, or rather because Dumbledore had thwarted his plans to install another one of his own in the school, Fudge had Percy still attending every Care of Magical Creatures class, looking for any excuse to fire Hagrid next.

And Hagrid was doing nothing to protect his teaching position, and apparently neither were any of the other professors nor Dumbledore. For instead of sticking with non-threatening OWL exam creatures like crups, knarls, and porlocks, he was bringing in a griffin, an occamy, and eventually even a runespoor, all reasonable excuses to fire a professor when you really wanted to fire a professor for political and not academic reasons. Hagrid had also been nervous and rather jumpy ever since he had first been put on probation, so while teaching okay he was far from at his best, providing Fudge with further excuse to terminate the half-giant's position leading a class.

And at the beginning of April, he finally signed the order of dismissal. And this time, he made sure to have a replacement spy already with Percy when the boy went down to Hagrid's hut that evening to fire the half-giant, in an underhanded attempt to fire Hagrid and appoint the new Ministry plant before Dumbledore was ever even aware that any of it was going on. Unfortunately for him, Dumbledore still had friends in the Minister's office, who just like they had with Trelawney — enabling him to get Firenze before Percy had even got Trelawney down to the entrance hall — alerted him to Hagrid's impending sacking. And so when Percy knocked on the door of Hagrid's hut and was let inside, it was to find Dumbledore enjoying a nice, big mug of mead with the gamekeeper.

"Hello, Percy," Dumbledore greeted amiably. "Are you looking for me, or is it Hagrid to whom you wish to speak?"

"I'm afraid I must deliver Hagrid's dismissal," Percy answered gravely. "I am sorry Hagrid, I did not recommend this decision, but Fudge sent it to me ten minutes ago, along with your replacement. She's up in my office now."

"Ah-ah," Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Once again, I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint our Minister. You see, I have already asked Professor Grubbly-Plank to resume teaching in a full-time capacity. I believe the Minister should find her most satisfactory — she informed me that she scored quite highly on Delores Umbridge's inspection of her at the beginning of the year while Professor Hagrid was indisposed. I have no doubt of course that Cornelius will ask you to inspect her again, but I foresee no issues. Hagrid, meanwhile, shall remain on staff as the school's gamekeeper like he has been for decades, and his hut has always and only ever been his. Professor Grubbly-Plank stayed in one of the rooms up at the castle before, and I'm sure she will be happy to return there after I Floo her tonight to inform her that she is needed to teach again starting tomorrow morning."

Percy had nothing to say to this.

~FS~

FitzSimmons, on the other hand, had plenty to say amongst themselves the following morning when they saw Professor Grubbly-Plank sitting up at the staff table as well as Hagrid.

"Hey — looks like our wish came true," Simmons said quietly, nodding subtly up at the staff table at the returned professor. "At least, I can't imagine what other subject she could be filling in for as everyone else is there, unless Percy has stepped down from DADA to focus solely on High Inquisitor, but that seems unlikely."

"Well, we'll find out for sure tomorrow afternoon when we have Magical Creatures class again," Fitz answered. "But it sure looks like you're right. Wonder what brought about this change, though. Did Hagrid get fired and no one know about it?"

Simmons shrugged. "That I can't say. Hagrid is obviously still here like we hoped, but just from looking at him I can't tell what for sure happened. I find it hard to imagine that he would have voluntarily stepped down from teaching, as he's always been really excited about being able to do it if not that great at it, which certainly makes a firing the most likely, but if he was fired it definitely wasn't the public spectacle of Professor Trelawney. Though that makes sense as he lives in his hut out on the grounds, so even if he was tried to be removed like Professor Trelawney was, it would have occurred out there instead of inside the castle where people could know about it. And presuming that he is staying as the gamekeeper that he has been since long before becoming a professor, he probably wasn't even tried to be removed in the first place. But that's all just speculation."

And this would forever remain speculation for FitzSimmons, but what wouldn't remain speculations was whether Professor Grubbly-Plank was back to being the Care of Magical Creatures professor, as the following afternoon they found her standing outside of Hagrid's hut waiting on them all for class, and she continued to be there every Magical Creatures class after that for the rest of the year. A change that FitzSimmons was very pleased with, as she was covering magical creatures that Simmons believed they would actually be asked about on their OWL exams at the beginning of June, as they were the ones in all of the fifth year Care of Magical Creature books that she had looked at in the library.

Hagrid, meanwhile, was still seen going about the castle grounds doing his gamekeeper duties, clearly not completely fired from the castle, which did make FitzSimmons happy as the half-giant didn't deserve to be kicked out of the castle entirely just because he was a bad teacher.

The Monday after Easter holidays, Harry Potter had career counseling with Professor McGonagall.

So instead of heading to Arithmancy like normal, FitzSimmons went to Professor McGonagall's office after lunch.

As their Head of House let them in, she saw that it was two become one, and immediately said, "I'm sorry Granger, but this is only for Potter. Your career counseling is on Friday, I believe."

"Yeah — fat chance," Simmons answered as she pushed past the professor and followed her husband into the office. "Not happening in a million years. We tried doing separate things once — Harry died. Never happening again."

Professor McGonagall stared at her in predictable confusion as FitzSimmons took the seat on their side of the desk, Simmons sitting primly in Fitz's lap since there was only one chair for them, and she didn't feel like conjuring up a chair to sit in when her husband had a perfectly comfortable lap, and it would emphasize their oneness to Professor McGonagall. Seeing that Granger clearly wasn't going anywhere, and deciding that she could get two counselings done in one and have an extra slot free on Friday, Professor McGonagall walked over to her own chair and looked across the desk at the two most amazing, but also frequently infuriating students that she had ever met, as a professor or a student herself.

"Well, Potter and Granger, this meeting is to talk over any career ideas you might have, and to help you decide which subjects you should continue into the sixth and seventh years. Have you had any thoughts about what you would like to do after you leave Hogwarts?"

"Move to the States and raise fish," Simmons answered immediately, she and her husband having decided to go with something completely off the wall that they most certainly wouldn't be prepared for by the school when they saw that they were going to be doing this three years too late. "Specifically ones that can change their colors with chromatophores — bit of a hobby of mine, if you will."

"Or open an ice cream shoppe, also in the States," Fitz added. "Maybe an ice cream shop with walls made of aquariums for Hermione to raise her cuttlefish in while I eat ice cream and watch her — that's a hobby of mine."

Professor McGonagall just stared at them for several long seconds, having only understood 'move to the States' and 'open an ice cream shoppe', neither of which computed in her British wizarding mind — no one ever moved out of Britain, and almost no one ever opened a new business, just the next generation of family members taking over family businesses that had already existed for decades or centuries. Occasionally there were a few like the twins who's ambition was to open a business, but it was very, very rare — everyone pretty much went to work for the Ministry in some capacity, or eventually became a teacher. All inside Britain, of course.

But she finally managed to reply, "Well, uh — you'll want to know which subjects you ought to take, I suppose?"

"Actually, no, not really," Simmons answered politely. "We don't need you or anyone else to tell us anything to be quite honest. We've been around the academic and job worlds a lot longer than you can imagine, and we've got a pretty good grip on how to get from where we are to where we need to be. Also, we are taking ten OWLs, all of which we will take the NEWTs for after we get 'Outstanding's in every single one of them, which will be more than enough for a job where we don't need any OWLs or NEWTs at all.

"You offer no business classes, and being from the normal world ourselves, we don't need muggle studies to know how to interact with normal people better than all of you combined. Whose genius idea was it, by the way, to hire a muggle studies professor who isn't a muggle? Seems an awful lot like hiring a blind man to lead other blind men in a class on still photography or painting. And we've been in the wizarding world long enough — and you stupidly don't offer a wizarding studies class for muggleborns and social muggleborns, preferably from the very start of first year, when they need it most — so there is no class that we need to take in order to better prepare us to interact with the wizarding world. And finally, we are objectively the two smartest, most mature students to have ever walked through these halls since it was opened. So no, we don't want to know what subjects we need to take, we already know and they don't actually exist. But by all means tell us anyway, since you planned for this to take some amount of time, and I haven't talked all of that time away yet, and it would be a little awkward for Professor Vector for us to show up at Arithmancy in the middle of class."

"Actually, didn't you want to point out to her how stupid it is to have career counseling now, instead of three years ago when we had to pick out the classes that we've been taking for the past three years that determine which classes we even have the possibility of taking the next two years?" Fitz reminded his wife.

"Oh, yes, thank you husband dearest," Simmons replied, twisting sideways slightly to peck her husband on the lips, before turning back to Professor McGonagall. "I don't blame this strictly on you, I'm sure this is a tradition passed on from long before you were even a student here, but on the other hand, you also haven't changed it, so you are anything but innocent. But like Fitz said, this is not the time to have a first ever career counseling session with students. It's better than never, but this is what you're supposed to have second year when you make everyone choose two or more subjects to add. Which you did with absolutely no information whatsoever on what any of those classes actually meant long term. What would you do if someone came into this session with their heart dead set on an occupation that requires a NEWT in a particular subject, that as a twelve year old they had no bloody clue that they would need because not a single fucking adult thinks it's important to actually help the students they teach, and you have to tell them now that they can't do their dream job, all because when they were twelve they didn't randomly pick the correct subjects that they would need to take their OWLs and NEWTs in three and five years later? What are you going to do then? Dream job gone, all because you're incapable of understanding the effects of your actions, or lack thereof in this case.

"So get your act together! I'd say use a little common sense, but almost five years in this world and we still have yet to find any. This meeting is important and useful if you've had that counseling first three years ago. Else it's nearly more of an insult than anything bloody helpful!"

Like every time that they pointed out something smart to the adults of Hogwarts, McGonagall just stared at them in shock for a long minute, having no clue what to say. Students had always picked out their own classes over Easter break during second year, and told their Head of Houses their picks in the next class back with said Head of House. And then now, near the end of fifth year when OWLs would soon be coming up, they had career counseling to determine which of the classes they were taking the OLWs of that they would continue on taking the NEWT class for. No one had ever complained about it before, and people found jobs and the wizarding world continued on as it always had. Why change what clearly worked?

But for all of their challenging authority, these two odd students were without a doubt the brightest that she had ever seen or heard about, so maybe there was some off chance that just maybe, possibly, they had a point.

So she finally replied, "Well, I guess can bring the idea up to Dumbledore and the Board of Directors. It is their decision to make."

"No!" Simmons said. "It is your decision to make! You don't need anyone's permission to make every single second-year this year come to your office and talk with you before you officially submit their classes for next year that you may or may not have collected yet. And maybe you can't require it for the other Houses, though as deputy headmistress it seems like you probably could, but if you can't you can still tell them all that your door is open, that you would be happy to sit down with them to talk about what classes they should take starting next year, and that you can get their classes changed if they've already turned them in, because even Snape can't say no to that with you being above him in authority — something you frequently seem to forget, by the way. And you can make every second year in Gryffindor come, because you are the head of their House. But point being, this is not a decision that anyone has to make for you, it's one that you can make right now, by yourself, and then go to them about making it a thing for every second year who passes through here for the rest of the time that this school still exists."

Professor McGonagall had no clue what to say to this. Sure, she could say that she didn't have time, especially with all of the fifth year career counselings that she had to do, but that would just play right into Granger's accusation that she didn't care about the students whom she was in charge of.

So she settled on brusquely dismissing them like she was the smart adult and they were just students who couldn't understand how the real world worked yet, saying, "Potter, Granger, this concludes our careers consultation. You don't want to be late for Defense Against the Dark Arts with Percy Weasley."

"Defenseless Against the Dark Arts, in case you never bothered reading the Ministry's propaganda that you let into this school," Simmons snapped back as she stood up, knowing an obvious dismissal when she heard one. "And I hope a student who becomes a solicitor sues this school for everything it has because you didn't counsel them second year and they didn't have the classes that they needed to take the NEWTs for the job that they actually wanted."

And with that she strode out of the room, her husband quickly following along leaving McGonagall sitting alone in silence, not having done any counseling but rather getting soundly counseled herself.