Hi all! Welcome to Chapter Seven of Water Worries. This is a story request from a lovely person called xxxRainLoverxxx, so credit to the idea goes to her. She is a very talented writer but unfortunately due to negative reviews she no longer likes to post her stories which is a true shame for everyone. This story is complete and is Thirteen Chapters long, updates should be weekly unless something drastic happens.
Summary: Harry has a fear of water, when his nightmares manage to get even Ron's attention Ron comes up with a plan for how to keep Harry's mind off the second task. What happens when they go too far? AU. Contains Spanking. No Slash.
Warning: Story contains parental spanking of a teenager, if this isn't your cup of tea, don't read it.
Disclaimer: I do not now, nor have I ever, owned Harry Potter – as much as I'd like to I sadly do not. I did not make any money from this story, and I don't intend too. All characters and recognisable things belong to JK Rowling not me – as sad as that is for me.
A huge thank you to my wonderful Beta Jules Ann, who is again herself a very talented writer on here. Though she doesn't know Harry Potter, I am slowly trying to convert her.
~o~
It took a while for Hermione to forgive Harry and Ron for landing her a Sunday detention, it took a lot of cajoling from them both to soften her up. They eventually had to agree to give the trouble making a break and take a week off. They spent the evening hurrying through their homework, letting Hermione look it over and dutifully making any improvements she suggested. This finally gained them Hermione's forgiveness and they all went to bed with her no longer sore at them.
Harry had gotten used to focusing on what they were going to do to have fun before he went to bed. Knowing they were taking a week off let his mind wander and he found it drifting back to the upcoming task. The pranks and fun were an excellent distraction, but it didn't really solve the problem that in just a few weeks he was going to have to swim in the Black Lake to rescue someone. His thoughts refused to shift from what he was sure was going to be an awful experience, so it was unsurprising when he found himself in the grips of another nightmare.
Harry was surrounded by water, it was all around him, pressing in on all sides, below him and above him. He realised then he couldn't breathe and desperately tried to scramble for the surface, but which way was up? It was dark all around him and everywhere he went he seemed to get no closer to the surface. He was getting really frantic as he was sure he was going to run out of air and drown any minute. To his immense relief he finally saw sunlight and he struggled frantically to get to the surface. He was within arm's reach of it, so close to the sweet relief of air, when he hit an invisible barrier. Alarm and panic coursing through him, he hammered wildly against the barrier. He could see people and knew they could see him, but they were just stood there pointing and laughing. Dumbledore was there shaking his head, insisting Harry had to do it himself and couldn't have help. He tried to show that he couldn't do it, using the last of his air, when he felt something grabbing his foot. He looked down in apprehension and saw Dudley's grinning face as he dragged him down.
With a scream Harry awoke and bolted upright. He was drenched in sweat, tangled in his bedding, and shaking like a leaf.
Ron startled awake at Harry's scream and looked over at the pale and very shaken Boy-Who-Lived in alarm. "Harry?" He asked concerned.
Harry gave a jolt and whipped around to look at Ron, wincing at his best friends extremely concerned face, "man eating sharks again," he insisted. He tried to keep his voice casual, but it sounded strangled even to him.
Ron nodded completely unconvinced but not wanting to push Harry. He was getting a bit of a niggling feeling that something more than what Harry was saying was going on, but he couldn't imagine what else could be bothering his best mate. He had to admit to himself that he'd be a right mess if he was a champion and Harry was still handling it better than he would. He knew enough about dragons to know he wouldn't have had the foggiest at how to get past one and he was pretty sure the dragon would have killed him. He didn't like that line of thought, especially when he considered it was his best mate who had to undertake another probably deadly task in just a few weeks. "I know we agreed to lay off the pranks for a week, but we do have all these supplies from Zonko's…" he hedged.
Harry felt the stress almost drain out of him and was even able to give a real smile, "true, it would be a shame to let them all go to waste," he agreed.
Ron grinned, glad he seemed to have cheered his best mate up at least some, "a damn shame," he grinned.
The two boys headed for the shower, trying to decide what they wanted to do first. They quickly got dressed and rummaged through Harry's trunk for their large stash of prank supplies. They considered the magical invisible slime, but then Ron's hand fell on their bag of prank balloons.
Harry looked at the bag and with a quick glance between the pair they nodded and had decided.
"Brilliant," Ron grinned.
They were the first down to breakfast that morning, quickly eating their fill and hurrying out of the Great Hall before most of the school had even got to breakfast. Once they were clear, Harry threw the invisibility cloak over them, and they headed to the Transfiguration classroom. They ripped open the bag of balloons and started tapping them to inflate them before letting them go into the classroom. The prank balloons all turned invisible once inflated and would move around the confined area they were in. Eventually they would pop at unpredictable and random intervals and each time they popped one of five things would happen. Some just gave a really big bang, some screamed, some threw out a huge volume of confetti, some threw out a large splatter of brightly coloured paint, and others turned into a fish that would flap about for a moment before vanishing.
Once they'd released at least thirty of the balloons into McGonagall's classroom, they released a bunch into the hallways, knowing they'd make their way around the school. Neither of the boys were suicidal enough to even try and put any in the Potions classroom, Snape would definitely murder anyone foolish enough to do that. They did manage to get the Charms classroom, Astronomy classroom, Arithmancy classroom, Ancient Runes classroom, and History of Magic classroom – they both hoped at least some of the balloons would pop during their class. Neither of them fancied getting transfigured into something, so they left Professor Moody's classroom alone as well, neither thinking the old Auror firing curses at invisible balloons in a classroom full of students was a good idea. They were tempted to try and slip some into the staffroom, but they were out of time and almost out of balloons. Letting the last ten go in the corridor they raced down it to get to History of Magic in time.
"Where have you two been?" Hermione demanded unhappily, "you were almost late," she scolded them.
Harry and Ron were both panting too hard to talk to Hermione and waved her off as they filed into the classroom and took their seats, trying to catch their breaths.
Once both her friends could breathe normally Hermione fixed them with an unrelenting glare. "You did something stupid again didn't you? I can't believe it! Really, I would have thought yesterday would have taught you both a lesson," she hissed furiously.
"Merlin's balls Hermione. Will you drop it already, it's just a bit of fun," Ron growled. "If it keeps Harry's mind off the fact that he's got to attempt to do something that frankly sounds rather impossible to me then you're just going to have to suck it up because we're not stopping," he stated firmly.
Hermione opened her mouth to say something, but Harry held up a hand to stop her, "please, let it go Hermione, it's just a bit of fun," he murmured pleadingly.
Hermione wanted to continue on, but there was something in Harry's tone that made her feel… uncomfortable with the idea. "I… fine, but if you both get in huge trouble don't say I didn't warn you," she huffed.
Ron grinned and just about resisted the urge to high five Harry, amazed he'd got Hermione to get off their backs. "You can even say 'I told you so' if we do," he promised her.
Hermione focused back on Professor Binns then, trying to push down her worry about the trouble her two best friends were going to get into. She was dutifully making notes when she heard an odd pop.
It wasn't until halfway through the class that the first balloon popped, a slightly squeaky pop was the only warning before Hannah Abbot let out a scream of horror as a big, wet, smelly, fish fell out of the air and landed on her lap and flopped about in her lap before disappearing. There was an immediate scramble from the class to find out what had happened.
"It was a fish, it just appeared out of nowhere!" Hannah insisted. She was slightly pink cheeked now as she realised that she had maybe overreacted slightly.
It took Binns a few minutes to restore order to his class, but even as he continued on with his lecture, the students were whispering to each other, wondering where the fish had come from.
Harry and Ron had to work very hard not to burst into laughter, digging their nails into their palms and pressing their lips together tightly as their eyes danced with mirth.
Hermione narrowed her eyes suspiciously at Harry and Ron, they didn't seem interested in figuring out where the fish had come from, so it stood to reason they already knew. She only just held her tongue, reminding herself that it wasn't actually hurting anyone and though she wasn't sure how they had done it, it probably wasn't through really breaking any school rules.
A hiss from the left corner of the classroom signalled the next pop, a massive explosion of brightly coloured confetti burst out of nowhere.
Parvati and Lavender, screamed as they were covered in the fine confetti, as Seamus and Dean yelled and tried to get it off them.
Harry and Ron weren't so lucky this time, and both burst into laughter, quickly covering their faces with their hands as they tried to hide their amusement.
Binns paused in his lecture once again and struggled to get his classes attention back this time, shocked at his class being interrupted twice.
The ghost had just managed to get everyone mostly settled down again when there was an ear-splitting bang, causing everyone to jump and about half the class to scream. Everyone looked wildly around to try and figure out what on earth could have caused a loud bang. There was a lot of muffled swearing as even Binns looked utterly flustered.
Harry and Ron had both jumped hearing the bang but were now almost crying in their efforts not to laugh.
Hermione looked at the boys, eyes narrowed, "I won't say anything, but what did you do? How did you do this?"
Ron fought to control his laughter enough to talk, "prank balloons," he choked out.
Another pop and a fish dropped onto Justin Finch-Fletchley's head, causing him to let out a very high-pitched scream, that no one could quite believe had come from the fourth year Hufflepuff, and bat the offending item halfway across the room. It landed on Neville's desk where it flopped about innocently before disappearing with another pop.
The bell signalled the end of class then and the fourth year Gryffindor and Hufflepuffs couldn't get out of the classroom quick enough, all of them scrambling to leave the classroom before something else happened.
As Ernie Macmillan threw open the door to the classroom a hair-raising scream was heard coming from the open door and he stood frozen seeing the mess in the corridor, there were piles of confetti and huge splatters of paint up dotted along.
The prank balloons caused chaos all morning, those who figured it out were laughing and making bets on when the next one would explode and if there was anymore. As these students saw it was no threat, those who hadn't managed to figure out what was causing bangs, screams, fish, paint, and confetti to appear from seemingly nowhere were able to relax as well.
By the time lunchtime rolled around the teachers whose rooms had been targeted had figured it out and were moving their classes into empty classrooms. In the now very messy corridors Filch could be heard muttering more and more furiously under his breath as he attempted to clean up. Several students were either covered in paint or still had bits of confetti in their hair and over their robes.
Fred and George made their way over to Ron and Harry, sitting down on either side of the pair.
"Old McGonagall was fit to be tied this morning," Fred started.
"Indeed, she was dear brother, indeed she was," George agreed nodding seriously.
Harry and Ron couldn't help but glance up at the staff table seeing the formidable Transfiguration mistress with a few bits of confetti still attached to her hat and in her hair. They turned quickly and tried to hide their sniggers behind the sleeves of their robes, eyes watering with the effort.
"You two wouldn't happen to know why she may have been so furious would you?" Fred asked innocently.
George nodded, "by that we of course mean, was, perchance, your classroom similarly invaded by an incursion of prank balloons that popped, creating the most interesting affects?"
Harry and Ron could only nod, both laughing far too hard to even try to talk.
"My, my, Gred, look at these two, do you think they might be behind the sudden appearance of what must be at least a thousand prank balloons?" Fred pondered in mock shock.
"These two? Ickle Ronnikins and ickle Harrypoo? No, not these two sweet innocent young lads, never. I won't believe it," George insisted.
Ginny, who had been sitting opposite Harry and Ron fell off the bench for her laughing, though she was splattered in a fair amount of blue paint.
Hermione rolled her eyes at Fred and George, "of course it was those two, out of everyone here at Hogwarts, it's hardly going to be anyone else unless it's you two!" Though her tone sounded disapproving, there was a sparkle of amusement in her eyes, her best friends had created rather a lot of chaos.
Ginny climbed back up onto the bench, "you gits! You could have warned me," she grumbled pointing out the bright blue paint still glistening as if wet on her robes.
"It washes off with a simple scourgify," Harry told Ginny between his laughter, "at least, it said it did on the packet."
Dumbledore rose and held up his hands for quiet, "please do forgive me for interrupting what I know are most delicious and much needed lunches. I will do my best to keep this brief so as not to take up too much of your time," he started looking around genially. "I do hope you have all enjoyed, and not been too disturbed by, the very exciting events of the morning. For those of you who got caught by the paint I have been reliably informed a simple scourgify will clean you up, if you cannot yet perform this spell simply ask a prefect, I am sure they would be happy to do it for you. Now, I am quite certain the individuals who decided to bring us such excellent entertainment have suitably covered their tracks and will never be identified, and as such will escape punishment, but I would advise against any further targeting of teachers' classrooms, so as not to disturb your fellow students learning. There might be a fair bit more investigation if a teacher's classroom finds itself hosting another prank product and the individual or individuals involved will have to face the mercy of that teacher. That is all, you may return to your lunches now."
Harry was certain Dumbledore had looked directly at him and Ron when he mentioned the individuals never being identified and shared a rueful look with Ron. "He probably has a point," Harry admitted.
Ron nodded, "yeah, I don't think I want to face McGonagall if she ever got proof it was us," he confessed with a slight shudder.
~o~
So, there you go, that was Chapter Seven. Please review to let me know what you thought. I really hope you enjoy this story as I certainly had a lot of fun writing it! A slice of Molly Weasley's Treacle tart for those who do review!