Harry jumped on his broom, opened the doors with a wave of his wand and sped off onto the seventh floor corridor. He attracted very odd looks from other Hogwarts students ("What's he doing now?" "Oh, well, he really is off his rocker, then."). But that didn't matter because he had something much more important to do.
"Mr. Potter! POTTER!" yelled Filch. "DETENTION! I'll get you for this!" Harry ignored him, and landed in front of the gargoyles blocking the entrance to Dumbledore's office. He didn't wait for them to ask him for the password; he crashed straight through them (with at least a few scrapes) and met Dumbledore as he was running down from his office with surprising speed.
"Harry!"
"Sir! I don't know if you know; the Death Eaters are attacking Hogwarts tonight, we have to get everyone to safety!"
"Yes, Harry, I am aware. I received Remus's patronus; let's go. Have you gotten Dumbledore's Army to work yet?"
Harry did a double take. "Wait - you know about us?"
"Yes, Mr. Potter. In fact, Minerva and I have been following you quite obsessively."
"What?" murmured Harry, shaking his head, before shooting off to tell the other Gryffindors about the attack, while Dumbledore went down to the Hufflepuffs and sent Professor McGonagall up to Ravenclaw tower with Professor Flitwick.
Remus shivered under his thin, holey sweater. Sirius had offered to lend him a jacket, but he didn't want to tip the Death Eaters off to the fact that he knew where Sirius was; after all, he was wanted by both the Ministry and Voldemort. He was standing in a crowd of around a hundred people who were also werewolves. Thankfully, the full moon was not tonight, so he did have control over himself, and could therefore warn the Order of the Phoenix. He closed off these thoughts in case anyone was employing Legilimency against him and focused intently on Greyback's words.
"Meet me at the edge of the Forbidden Forest - the Hogsmeade side, and we'll all go through it together. 9'o'clock sharp," he growled. "Got it? I don't want anyone to be late. Well, go on, then." He waved them all away, and Remus walked to a small bunch of trees before disapparating to 12, Grimmauld Place.
"Sirius! SIRIUS!" he gasped.
"What? How was the meeting? You're not hurt. are you?" asked Sirius anxiously, rushing forward.
"Hogwarts - tonight - attack - werewolves - Voldemort!" he panicked.
"WHAT? No, Harry, and all the Weasleys, they're still-" Sirius cut himself off. "All right, when are they going to attack?"
"Nine…" said Remus.
"Alright, sit down, I'll get you a glass of water, and then you can send a patronus to Albus," said Sirius.
Remus collapsed onto the sofa and pulled out his wand. "Expect-Expecto Patronum," he said feebly. A light flickered briefly at the end of his wand, before going out again.
"Moony!" said Sirius, walking up the basement stairs with a cup of water. "Don't tire yourself out. Drink this first." He accepted the glass gratefully and took a long sip.
"Thanks, Padfoot. Expecto Patronum!" A great, silver wolf burst from the end of the wand. "The Death Eaters are attacking Hogwarts tonight in an hour; The Order's coming; tell Dumbledore in case he doesn't know, and GET AWAY FROM HOLLY REBUS!" he said all in one breath.
"Oh no!" said Sirius. "We haven't told anyone about her! Oh, Merlin, this is all my fault, it's all my fault…"
"No, it isn't; I could have told him, too," said Remus.
"Well."
"Well?"
"Okay, so why are we sitting here? Let's send Patronuses to the rest of the Order!" Sirius and Remus got to work, conveying the details of the attack to everyone as quickly as possible, and then disapparated together to Hogsmeade.
"Get on!" said Sirius, swinging onto a broom.
"What - can it hold us both - wait - Siri!" said Remus.
"Oh, come on, Moony, not now!" And despite himself, Remus got on behind Sirius, and screaming into the evening, they shot off from Hogsmeade station towards Hogwarts.
They crashed.
Into the fountain in the middle of the courtyard.
And got wet.
"Sorry," said Sirius, shaking out his hair and brushing himself and Remus off. Several students in the courtyard goggled at them; a fugitive from Azkaban and their old Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher had just crashed into a fountain on a Nimbus 2000, gotten wet, and now the escapee was shaking himself off like a dog.
A shy third year girl walked up to them. "Professor Lupin?"
"Oh, hello, there, Ellen. I don't really have time to explain, but everyone is to head to the Great Hall IMMEDIATELY. We're being attacked. Do you understand?" he said very fast.
"Yeeeeees," she said slowly, staring at Sirius Black. "Er…why is Sirius Black with y-?" She cut herself off. "Never mind. This isn't the weirdest thing I've seen, I mean, I saw a black dog dancing on two legs in the pumpkins by Hagrid's hut in first year - I'll just go now…" she ran off.
"Dancing in a field of pumpkins?" said Remus incredulously, shaking his head.
"Hey, I was BORED!" said Sirius defensively. "Come on, let's go find Minnie."
They ran up the castle steps and almost ran into Hermione, who was leading a bunch of fifth and sixth years down the hall, jogging.
"Hermione?" said Remus.
"Sirius Black?" said a Hufflepuff boy.
"Professor Lupin?" said Neville.
"You got the message, then?" he asked.
"Yes, we were just going down to see if we could get in position to try and hold them off-" said Hermione.
"What?" said Sirius. "Hermione, there are werewolves down there; they're dangerous - no offense, Moony ("None taken," he said), but you're FIFTH years, for Merlin's sake!"
"I'm a sixth year," said Katie Bell.
"Yeah, me too," said Cho Chang.
"Well, you're CHILDREN! You shouldn't be fighting!" said Remus.
"We know how," said Neville. "Harry taught us."
"Get everyone to the Great Hall!" said Sirius.
"Draco and the other Ravenclaws are doing that," said Hermione. "We're going to help!"
"Malfoy?" said Sirius. "He's helping you?"
"Yes, yes, long story…" said Hermione. "Why are you wet?"
"That's also a long story," sighed Remus.
"We're wasting time, Sirius, come on, let us fight!" said Ginny.
"Ginny?" asked Sirius. "You're not even fift-"
"YES?" she said angrily.
"Oh, all right, then," said Remus. "You lot take the North entrance, then; we're getting all the teachers."
Harry, Dumbledore, and half of Dumbledore's Army (the ones who hadn't gone off to defend the castle), as well as the Order of the Phoenix were all standing in the Great Hall when Sirius and Remus ran into the room.
Half the room yelled, "AAAAARGH! SIRIUS BLACK!", and the other half yelled "PROFESSOR LUPIN!" Chatter broke out immediately.
"SILENCE!" said Dumbledore loudly, and everyone fell quiet at once. "They are here to help. Now, let me explain what's going on. Voldemort's forces are planning to attack the castle (Holly and Snape exchanged very surprised glances, which Sirius noticed and was also confused about), and we will be setting up an evacuation system through one of the passageways out of the castle -"
Sirius ran up to the teachers' table and whispered something in Dumbledore's ear.
"Ah. Of course," he said. "Well, then, we will be using a new one. Everyone, please follow Professors Sinistra and Vector up to the seventh floor, where there will be a passageway out of Hogwarts and to Godric's Hollow."
"And what if we want to stay and fight?" asked Angelina Johnson.
"Students who are of age may stay if they wish to. And all of you others will have to go back -" Sirius interrupted him again. Dumbledore's eyes went wide. "Oh, Merlin," he muttered under his breath. "Very well, as it is, we have a group fourth year and up setting up outside already. Fourth year and up, you may stay. Third year and below will go to the passage, no objections."
Most of the Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws stayed in their seats, but a lot of the Slytherins filed out of the room.
Dumbledore assigned groups of students to various Order members, and after Sirius had whispered in his ear about something else, he sent Professors Snape and Rebus off to the third floor. Fred, George and Lee Jordan were noticeably missing.
A/N: So now all of our characters are in the same place. The action can start! Thanks for your reviews!
MyWriterBlock: Let's see what happens in the next chapter.
And Yaw6113: Thanks, and we hope you liked this chapter.