A/N The characters in this story look as they are described in the books. Especially most of the adult ones are at least 10 years younger than their film versions, even if they did do a formidable job. (This applies to all of my HP stories, even if I forget to explicitly say so.)
Also, Colin Creevey doesn't get petrified on November 7th as he does in the book, but everything else happens up to the day the duelling club happens on December 17th. So, only Mrs Norris had been found petrified by then for the sake of this story. Oh, and the trio has decided to brew the Polyjuice potion anyway, mostly because Hermione wanted to at that point.
There will be no outright bashing but the story isn't friendly toward Dumbledore, McGonagall and Pomfrey. There might be some swearing though, but no f-bombs in this one.
It's an absurd situation the characters find themselves in that they need to react to, but it is a fix-it story first and foremost.
Also, once again, it is a finished story by now, of about 60.000 words, but it might take some time to go through it once again. So the chapter-size is much smaller than in my last one and posting might take a while.
Disclaimer: not mine, no money is being made.
Beta-read by randomskittles. All mistakes we didn't catch are my own. Feel free to point them out. :-)
A Most Surprising Duel
The students entered the Great Hall and excited chatter soon filled the vast room that was empty of its usual long tables. Just one long podium stood in the middle of the empty floor.
"Just like a catwalk," Hermione muttered.
Ron gave her a funny look, "Muggles walk their cats on platforms like this?"
"What? No!"
Hermione explained the concept of a catwalk to an increasingly bewildered-looking Ron while Harry laughed his head off.
After a while, Harry saved Ron (and Hermione) by asking, "Who do you think will lead the duelling club?"
"I hope it's Flitwick! Bill told us he was a Dueling Champion when he was younger!"
Hermine nodded, but admonished, "It's Professor Flitwick, Ron."
And off the two of them went again, much to Harry's amused dismay. The two were like water and oil sometimes.
Harry got much more dismayed when it was Lockhart who hopped lightly onto the platform in the middle of the room, and beamed down on the assembled mass of students, "Welcome, all, to my newly established duelling club!" He walked along the dais showing off his light blue ensemble of swishing robes and clattering boots.
"Catwalk indeed," Harry muttered, annoyed and started groaning when Lockhart introduced his "assistant" Professor Snape. "Great, now both of the worst professors at Hogwarts are running the show."
Hermione dug her elbow into his side and shushed him while looking at the peacock on the stage with stars in her eyes.
Harry and Ron debated whether it was worth staying when Lockhart proposed a show duel with Professor Snape, and both immediately decided they had to see this. They didn't want to miss it for anything in the world, rooting for Snape for the first time ever.
The two men took their places back-to-back, and Harry watched – quite entertained now –, as Professor Snape prowled down the platform like a black and very displeased panther.
Ron seemed to have the same thought because he exclaimed, "That's why Muggles call it a 'catwalk'!" much to the amusement of any Muggle-raised student close by.
Luckily, Hermione was entranced by the events in front of them, so she didn't bother to correct Ron. If she was honest, he had a point.
Colin was taking pictures left and right, but he concentrated on photographing the two men.
After the two teachers had walked ten steps away from each other, they whirled around and Snape immediately yelled, "Expelliarmus!"
Lockhart, who still was trying to cast his overly complicated bogus spell was hit squarely in the chest and thrown backwards in a high arch, while his wand rocketed towards Snape, landing with a clatter next to the man.
The last went unnoticed because Lockhart did something extremely unexpected. He cast a wordless and wandless spell while flying backwards, with his hands pointing towards Snape!
A colourless, but still somehow slightly visible spell shot toward the surprised Potions Master who nonetheless had the presence of mind to flick his wand and wordlessly cast a shielding spell. But the incoming spell went through the shield like it wasn't there and hit Snape squarely in the face.
Under the disbelieving eyes of at least three-quarters of the student body and parts of the staff, something even more outlandish happened.
Snape became handsome.
Very handsome.
So handsome, most of the teenage girls and some of the boys sighed and got wobbly knees!
His hair was shiny and seemed to move in an air current that existed just for this, his cheekbones were oh so prominent and elegant, his nose patrician, his mouth sinful, his eyebrows arching, and his tall body was broad-shouldered and long-legged, with small hips. Curiously, nothing much had changed, but it was like all the formerly mismatched and discoloured pieces fit together now to an overall extremely pleasant-looking result.
When he tried to scowl at the staring students, one could see his blindingly white and straight teeth, and many students sighed again.
But all were pulled out of their bespelled state by a girly shriek coming from the direction of their Defence teacher. All eyes quickly moved to Lockhart and many students shrieked as well, while Colin snapped one photo after the other. (His loud flash had given up before the duel had even started, but it was light enough anyway.)
Lockhart looked hideous now!
His hair was unwashed and mousy, his skin pimply and sallow. It could be said that Lockhart and Snape had switched looks completely. Even the formerly dashing robes Lockhart was wearing looked threadbare and ridiculous.
Lockhart, who had been staring at his hands, pulled out a little hand mirror and shrieked loudly again. His feet seemed to work now, and he ran out of the Great Hall amazingly fast.
Snape still stood rooted on the platform and wondered what had just happened. He had never seen or heard of the spell Lockhart had used and wondered what it had done to him. He hadn't felt the spell when it hit, and he didn't feel any different now. Well, maybe less tired but why had Lockhart turned into such an ugly version of himself, after he had cast the spell on Severus? And why were students staring at him with hearts in their eyes? It was exceedingly disconcerting.
"Ah, Minerva, please tell me what's going on."
Minerva McGonagall, who had pushed her way through the (again) excitedly chattering masses, now stood in front of the podium. She transfigured her handkerchief into a handheld mirror and wordlessly handed it over.
Snape took one look and startled heavily. He nearly threw the mirror away, but the presence of the children surrounding them kept him from doing so. He might've injured one accidentally, after all.
He hopped off the platform and many students sighed again. He just looked so dashing!
Snape pointed his wand at himself and cast, "Finite Incantatem."
Nothing happened.
Snape made sure to check with the mirror.
"Minerva?"
McGonagall cast the same spell on him as well with just as much success, except Snape was holding a handkerchief now. So, the spell worked at least.
After checking, Snape looked at her again, "Do you know what spell that was?"
"No, Severus. I'm as clueless as you are."
Snape looked at the older students with questions in his eyes and was met with many clueless faces. But he noticed that some of the prettier girls, especially those from his own house, didn't meet his eyes. He quickly noticed that only the pretty and pure-blood students seemed to have an inkling of what had just happened. But none stepped forward, so he decided to investigate discreetly later. It just annoyed him that Lockhart knew a spell of which he hadn't heard.
A whispered, "So dreamy!" reached his ears, and he nearly choked on his own spit.
"The show's over, back to your Common Rooms!" he barked.
Reluctantly, the crowd dispersed, and Snape stalked toward the Hospital Wing, hoping Poppy had an idea of what had happened. And more importantly, how to fix him.
In the meantime, Lockhart had reached his quarters at a run and had crawled under his four-poster bed, hiding.
He trembled and sobbed for quite some time.
How? Why?
It was the absolute worst that could have happened! He had promised his grandmother never to cast THE SPELL on someone else. Never! She had warned him that he would lose all of his good looks and would never be able to regain them through this particular spell again. Never!
Lockhart howled in despair.
It was the only spell he could perform word- and wandless due to necessity. He couldn't even do a wandless memory charm! He had practised The Spell for years because one had to cast it on oneself while in the company of a few others. It didn't work when one was alone, and one should never cast it when more than ten people are in the room. And. No. One. Could. Know!
His grandmother had beat it into his head for weeks. It was forbidden and dark magic!
Why oh why had he cast this spell on Snape of all people? He wailed internally. Yes, it was embarrassing that the man bested Gilderoy so utterly, but he hadn't even thought about that! He had just reacted! He had no wand and so had cast the only spell he could perform without one. Stupid!
Lockhart scowled and then imagined how ugly he must be looking right now.
He curled up and cried himself into a fretful sleep.
In the Hospital Wing, everyone was stumped and amused, much to Severus's annoyance.
By now Poppy, Albus, Filius, and Minerva were casting spells on him with little to no success. He stayed looking like a character out of a romance novel his mother had secretly read. He had found her stash once and had been very disgusted by the pictures on the covers. Even though he might've imagined himself in one of those positions with Lily, once. He had been sixteen. So, sue him!
"It looks like Dark Magic, my dear boy. I'll need to research this spell extensively. It cannot be legal, but Gilderoy will certainly help me with this," Albus said with some steel in his voice. "I wonder why he isn't here, anyway. It seems telling. Maybe he knows it's not reversible?"
"Don't even think that!" Severus yelped. "I cannot teach like this!"
"Gilderoy seemed to have managed to do so, while looking very handsome, Severus. Surely you can do so as well," Albus said with twinkling eyes.
Snape huffed and swirled around dramatically and stalked out of the room.
"Students will faint left and right if he continues to behave like this," McGonagall muttered.
Dumbledore chuckled, "May I ask you to show me your memory of that event, Minerva? Maybe we can find some clues in it."
"Certainly. Your office?"
"After you, my dear. Filius? Are you coming?"
While Dumbledore, Flitwick, and McGonagall watched the memory a second time, they noticed that some of the older pure-blood girls seemed to know that spell and looked at Lockhart in anger after he had cast it.
"Something's going on," Flitwick said. "Something all the pretty pure-bloods know but don't talk about, wouldn't you agree?"
McGonagall and Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully.
"Mostly Slytherin and some Ravenclaw girls, it looked like. The Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors were clueless," McGonagall added.
Dumbledore and Flitwick nodded thoughtfully.
"We'll question them all tomorrow after class," Dumbledore decided.