Chapter 22 – Whomping Willow

The next scene showed many people who were walking outside of Kings Cross station, the Weasleys with their enchanted cars that they parked. "10:58. Come one, come," Molly said stressed, as they rushed to get through the platform before the train left.

"The train will be leaving any moment," Arthur said to his wife.

"Alright, Fred, George, Percy, you are first," Molly said as the three of them rushed through the barrier, one after another.

"Okay…" Ginny said, taking a deep breath before she ran through, followed by Molly and Arthur. "Come, Ginny. We'll get you in a seat dear, hurry." Says Molly once the three of them are on the platform.

"Let's go," Hadriana told him, as she and Ron began to run towards the wall, only for them to crash right into it making everything fly off the chart.

"Wait what! The barrier has never closed like that before!" Fleamont Potter said, outraged for the future students.

Even the students and the professors looked at one another in shock, trying to figure out what had happened, but they were coming up short.

"Don't worry! It all will be explained at the right time!" Hadriana said as she laid her head on Sirius's shoulder who had stayed suspiciously quiet through it all, though, she knew that he was enjoying having her beside of him.

One of the train workers looked at them in displeasure, "Oi! What do you think you're doing?" he asked them.

Hadriana gave him a small smile from the floor, "We just lost control of our trolly." She said to the man who was rolling his eyes before he walked off.

Ron looked at her like she had saved the day, making Hadriana just sigh in wonderment of the wizarding world.

"Why can't we get through?" she asked Ron, who only looked at the wall fearfully making her wonder if Ron wouldn't have done better in Hufflepuff.

"Hey!" Ron exclaimed indulgently, and with a smile that told them all that it didn't do anything.

"You know that I've talked to the hat. So, I know now what the hat sees and how he thinks." Smirked Hadriana, from where she was sitting snuggled together with her family munching on a snack she had somehow gotten from the house-elf.

"Then by all means…" laughed Ron, as they both went back to watching the movie of their previous life much to everyone's confusion.

"I don't know, the gateway has sealed itself for some reason," Ron told her and looked towards the clock which by now was going off indicating that it had now struck, 11:00.

"The train leaves exactly 11:00, we've just missed it!" Ron said again and looked fearfully towards Hadriana who rolled his eyes.

"I'm sure everything will be fine, just owl the school and someone will come and escort you to the school." Professor McGonagall told them now. Never taking notice of their faces when she said it, but others did.

Ron and Hadriana rolled their eyes and looked at the screen fondly remembering what they had done.

"Hadriana… If we can't get through, then maybe mum and dad can't get back" Ron said, while Hadriana just looked a little bit fascinated.

"You know, aren't there more ways of transportation than this?" asked Hadriana pointing towards where the gateway was situated. "Or we should just go a wait by car for them."

"The car…" Ron said, and his face lit up as he had thought of something genius.

Hadriana closed her eyes dreading the idea already, "No, No Ron… That's not something we should do, we can wait!"

Ron looked at her, "Don't you have a sense of adventure? They won't come for a while." He told her and began placing his things into the trunk of the car.

It made her smile, because somehow she knows that something will go wrong but someone had to ensure that he wouldn't be killing himself, so, she began to place her own stuff with his, hoping to every deity out there that things would go better than she hoped it would.

The scene changed then to showing them the Weasley car flying through the air with a lot of people gaping at the sight of a flying car.

"Shouldn't you make the car invisible? Muggles aren't accustomed to seeing a flying car." Hadriana told him before slapping the back of his head.

"At least one of you has a head on your shoulders." Molly told them with a smile, making the other adults look at her wide-eyed.

"Your mother is pretty cool." A couple of first years cheered happily towards Ron who was sitting with his face in his hands laughing.

"Yeah, we got it from her," Ron smirked knowingly towards his uncles and his mother who was smirking happily for having shocked all of them.

"Mom, can I do something like that?" Teddy asked with his puppy-dog eyes at Hadriana and even Sirius.

"No!" exclaimed Hadriana and Sirius both at the same time making them smile and hug their little boy so that he was sitting in between them, with Sirius's arm around them both.

"Ugh… Right." Ron said and pressed a button that made the car turn invisible.

The next scene changed again to the two of them sitting peacefully in the car in the middle of the air as it became visible once more.

"Oh, no. The invisibility booster must be faulty." Ron told her, trying to press the button repeatedly.

"Then we'll need to go lower, we need to find the train tracks, so we know where we are going." Hadriana told her and did.

"I just love seeing the two of you doing something none of us would have thought about doing." James smiled brilliantly, while Lily just rolled her eyes.

"Now all we need to do is catch up to the train!" Hadriana told him with a smile.

"We can't be that far behind," Ron responded when they suddenly heard a loud whistle behind them.

"DO you hear that?" Hadriana asked him.

"We must be getting close!" Ron told her before the two of them slowly turned around when they heard that noise again.

They looked at the train that was behind them in shock as it was getting nearer where they were driving. Looking at one another they screamed in terror like they couldn't believe what they were seeing.

Teddy hugged his mother tightly, laying his head on her neck as it calmed him down and made him realize that she still was with them.

"It's okay," Hadriana whispered, running her fingers through his short hair calmly.

Sirius was also trying to calm him down, kissing them both on the head because he knew how they both thought.

The others in the room could only look on in shock and a little bit of awe over how things had gone so incredibly well for them.

Lily held on to James, and the only thing holding her back from screaming was the fact that she was sitting there with her family safe and sound.

Ron suddenly grabs the wheel and steered them off the tracks completely. Making the car do a flip in mid-air flying it under the tracks, it made Hadriana slam right into the door, hard, such as it opened mid-flight, and she was barely managing to hold on to the door with one hand.

"YOU FELL OUT OF A BLOODY CAR!" Lily yelled without a care for the people around the room, and it also made some people like her less in the way that they could see how uncomfortable Hadriana became by the loudness.

Ron winched too, but he knew that they would do it – however, he hated how every time someone did, his friend didn't know what do to.

Sirius was becoming pissed that none of them was able to hold it in, and of all the people he believed would flip off and not be unreasonable it wouldn't have been Lily – James looks like to be the most observant of his past friends, and he looked at them discretely there were discrepancies in how he remembered them and how they would act. *You are fine, breath…* Sirius told her, and it was a relief to hear her take a deep breath.

*I sometimes wonder how I managed to keep the flinch from showing up throughout school…* Hadriana pondered over the past.

*It could be that you suppressed everything, and you knew that things were more hectic in that school and had much more to worry about those loud noises. * Sirius told her soothingly

*Yeah, I had a lot more to worry about hat notice when something was loud, and it was first when everything had settled down after the war that things became more noticeable. * Hadriana told him thoughtfully.

Sirius hummed, and with a smile let her and Teddy rest their heads on him.

Everyone else in the future and the past ignored what Lily had said and went back to watch how they managed to get out of the situation unfolding in front of them.

"HADRIANA!" Yelled Ron, as he watched her dangling from the car.

Hadriana had finally managed to grab the handle with her other hand, as the car flew higher and was now over the train.

"Hold on! Take my hand!" Ron said, holding out one of his hands to her while the other held on the steering wheel.

Hadriana tried to grab his hand, only for her to slip again from his grip.

"Hold on!" he yelled to her again.

Hadriana could not help but give him a slightly angry glare, "No, I reckon I'm gonna take a nap. What do you think I am doing?" she said sassily while rolling her eyes.

Draco groaned, "Really? Only you would say something like that when you were hanging on for your dear life."

"Everyone should know this by now!" Hadriana smirked and shrugged her shoulders thinking about everything that has happened in her life where she had responded the same.

"And, plus your hands are all sweaty!" Hadriana told him, making Ron wipe his hand on his trousers before he grabbed Hadriana's hand once again. Where he finally managed to pull her into the car.

"I think we finally found the train!" Hadriana said with a laugh, after a few minutes.

"Yeah." Ron snickered, still slightly pale over having been this close to death.

Every student and even some of the teachers broke out in laughter by the last bit of their conversation.

The sun had finally set on the horizon, the day turned slowly tonight, and the car could be seen flying over the great lake placing Hogwarts in their path.

"Welcome home!" Ron smiled.

It made Hadriana smile widely at the castle before they heard something weird happening to the car, as it jerked and made loud noises. "UP! UP!" she told him, as they closed into the water.

"It's not working!" Ron yelled again.

Hadriana looked up terrified, "Mind the tree!" and pointed at the tree in front of them, a tree with long branches going in different directions.

"Why at all is it that tree?" James said terrified over what they were seeing and shared a bewildered look with his other friends. "You just had to crash into that tree, I mean honestly! What are the odds?" he continued with a shrug.

The others nodded wholeheartedly agreed, and the teachers knew what kind of tree it was that they were going to crash into.

Ron then takes his wand from his pocket and began to fanatically hit it against the dashboard. "Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop!" he yelled with his wand, snapping it in half at the last hit.

In the end, they crashed into the tree, as it stabilized in the tree's branches.

Ron's eyes widened as he looked at his wand. "My wand! Look at my wand!" he said.

Hadriana gave him a pitiful smile, but she wasn't surprised that it happened. "Be grateful that wasn't your neck!" she said when a loud screech was heard as the car moved violently.

Remus groaned knowing what was happening and looked at everyone but didn't say anything because what was happening was serious.

"What's happening?" asked Hadriana.

"I don't know?" Ron told her confused.

Suddenly, the tree was starting to attack the car as its branches were beginning to hit the hood of the car repeatedly. One of the branches shattered the back window, and another left multiple dents on the roof.

Hadriana and Ron let out a lout scream when Hadriana noticed one of the branches coming down at them hard ready to crush them.

Teddy snuggled down in his mother's neck, not wanting to see what was happening. Having parents like them was great because they never said anything when he wanted comfort.

"Come on!" "Go! Fast!" Hadriana yelled.

Ron got his foot in gear, managing to get the car driving out of it as quickly as he could before the branches attacked the spot where the car was once sitting.

They both managed to look at one another in shock, before the car doors opened by themselves and threw them out alongside their trunks, even Hedwig, and Scabbers before diving off to the forbidden forest.

The more they watched their children, the greyer their hair became though they were incredibly proud of them.

"The car! Dad is going to kill me!" Ron exclaimed and stared at the car as it drove off.

Hadriana sighed, "and you think of it now?" and got closer to her owl, "See you, Hedwig!" she said, and watched the owl fly off without so much as looking back. "I think she's angry!"

Making Ron snort in amusement, "she did roll around a few times." He told her, before looking away when Hadriana glared at him.

"That is why I told you we should just wait or maybe owl the school… but no…" Hadriana said, wiping off her clothes while Ron looked outraged over at her, she just raised an eyebrow, making him nod his head glumly.

"The two of you are really lucky, you know that right?" Professor McGonagall said to them while shaking her head already dreading everything they would be up to at school.

"It's the Potter Luck!" Hadriana and James exclaimed at the same time to their own surprise that they managed it at all.

"Yep, it's in our genes. Sometimes it's in our favour, and sometimes not!" sighed Fleamont looking at the generation of Potters that must live with it.

"So, a house elf shows up in my bedroom, we can't get through the barrier to platform 9 ¾ we are almost killed by a tree… clearly, someone doesn't want me here this year." Hadriana sighed discontentedly before they are stopped by Mr Flitch who was glaring at them with an evil smirk, as if he has been waiting there for them.

"Great! First, they must deal with a bloody car, and almost dying now they have this horrid excuse of a man." Evan said out loud from the Slytherin table, making Barty and even Young Sirius and Regulus nod in agreement.

"Well take a good lad, lass, this night might as well be the last you spend in this castle!" Flitch told them.

Hadriana rolled her eyes, she knew that they had miscalculated but she didn't think they would be expelled. The thing was, she knew that the headmaster was up to something and wouldn't dream of expelling them!

"Hadriana has something there…" Professor Flitwick processed it more clearly than everyone else in the room.

A copy of the Daily Prophet could be seen with the headline, 'Flying Ford Angela mystifies muggle's sat on Professor Snape's desk, as he glared at the two of them.

"You were seen by no less than seven muggles. Do you have any idea how serious this is? You have risked the exposure of our world. Not to mention the damage you inflicted on a Whomping Willow, that has been on these grounds since before you were born!" Professor Snape told them sternly, staring at the two, but mainly at Hadriana who avoided looking into his eyes.

"Really? Damage to the tree? It hurt them a lot more!" Barty muttered looking at the other seventh-year Slytherin at their table.

Snape just shook his head and wondered why at he had become a teacher of all careers when all he wanted was to focus on his potions.

"It's good to see that you have your priorities right!" Hadriana told him looking at him without looking him in the eyes.

Professor Snape twitched at that like he wanted to say something but was stopped by Ron.

"Honestly Professor Snape, I think the tree did more damage to us!" Ron told him, while Hadriana just sighed and glared at him to stay quiet.

"Silence! I assure you… that if you were in Slytherin your fate rested with me… the both of you would be on the train home… tonight!" as it is…"

"They are not!" Dumbledore said sternly and walked into the room with McGonagall.

"It's like he has monitoring charms around the school for when Gryffindor is in trouble!" Hermione exclaimed, seeing it for what it mattered.

"That's true!" Ron said nodding along to it.

"Right there!" Hadriana nodded.

Everyone looked at them with the acceptance that they would be some of the people who secretly were on the side they always thought was right, and not anything less.

"Professor Dumbledore!"

"Professor McGonagall!"

"Headmaster, these children, have flouted the decree for the restriction of underage wizardry. As such…" Snape continued, as before Dumbledore cut him off.

"I am aware of our bylaws, Severus, having written quite a few of them myself. However, as Head of Gryffindor House, its for Professor McGonagall to determine the appropriate action."

Hadriana was watching the byplay between the teachers, she could see that something more major was going on.

"We'll get out stuff then," Ron said with a sigh.

McGonagall looked at him sternly, "What are you talking about mr Weasley?"

"You are going to expel us, aren't you?"

"Not today, Mr Weasley. But I must impress on both of you the seriousness of what you have done. I will be writing to your families tonight, and you'll receive a detention." Professor McGonagall told them.

Hadriana shrugged because she did not care at all that her relatives would know, because they wouldn't have cared. Ron on the other hand was dreading his parents' reaction. Snape was also glaring at them, but something about him set Hadriana on the path to something else.

"Love you, Minnie!" James said together with the other marauders on the topic at hand.

Professor McGonagall was trying not to smile because they were her favourites and she wondered who her favourites would next be after them.

Lily on the other hand was frowning over the interaction her old friend was having with her child, however, there was nothing to do about it.

*Looking back, there is a lot we overlooked about how much Dumbledore knew…* Hadriana pondered with a smile.

*Looking at this now, I can see what you mean. He had a weird way of ending up whenever some specific people were. * Sirius said, holding her hand.

*Yeah, he did, didn't he? * She fondly told him.