Chapter 8, everybody! Being the first of these chapters I post as a free elf! Yes, master has given Dobby a diploma! Dobby is a DOCTOR! :D

Moving on...writing this out the holes in the logic of this detention were big enough to drive the Knight Bus through. :\ And I think Lumos is an early-on spell; if memory serves me it's one covered in the first game.

Harry Potter © JK Rowling

Professor McGonagall informed Harry at breakfast the next morning that he and Neville would be meeting her in the Great Hall that evening for detention, and recommended not trying to stretch dinner out in an endeavor to avoid it. Harry nodded and went back to his porridge after she moved on to Neville.

He was about three bites in when he noticed the stares he was getting from Ron and Hermione.

"What?" he asked.

That was the wrong thing to say—they both started talking at once, and it took a while for them to get untangled.

"Detention, Harry?" Hermione blurted out.

"When was this?" Ron demanded. "And why didn't I get in on this? I thought you said that you got Norbert out scot-free!"

"We did," Harry said. "But Neville overheard Malfoy talking about Norbert, and he tried to find us to stop us, but of course we had the invisibility cloak, and then he gets caught out of bed and sent to detention, and since it was our fault it didn't seem fair to make him do it on his own, so I told Professor McGonagall a variation of the truth so she'd give me a detention so it wasn't just Neville because that wasn't fair."

That came out in more of a blather than Harry had been intending, but hopefully he had gotten the pertinent information across. Snips, at least, was nodding.

Ron and Hermione still looked floored.

"So let me get this straight," Ron said. "You went and basically asked for a detention?"

Harry considered it. "I suppose you could say it like that, yes."

"Mate, no offense, but that's the dumbest thing I ever heard."

"Well I couldn't leave him stuck with Malfoy—"

"Harry, I highly doubt it was only going to be Malfoy and Neville in detention tonight," Hermione cut in.

"True," Ron said. "Fred and George could be there too."

"You have to be caught first, Ickle Ronnie," one of the twins said, cruising by behind him.

"Ah, but he hasn't picked up that skill yet, has he George?" the second twin asked, ruffling Ron's hair as he passed.

"Not so, Fred—I suppose he'll pick it up eventually."

"Someday."

"In seventh year."

"Or after he retires."

"Did anyone ask you!?" Ron hollered after them.

"Look, it's one detention," Harry said. "How bad can it be?"

Very, Harry discovered that evening.

Start off with Professor McGonagall handing Harry, Neville, and Malfoy off to Mr. Filch because she had fifth years studying for their OWLs to supervise. Continue with Mr. Filch leading them outside, bemoaning the banishment of the old punishments Hogwarts used to dole out—which, if any of what he said was true, made Harry very glad they had been phased out.

Things looked up temporarily when they were led to Hagrid's hut to be left in Hagrid's care, tanked quickly when Hagrid revealed they were going into the Forbidden Forest.

"We can't go in there!" Malfoy protested. "I've heard stories about that place! There's—there's werewolves in there!"

It was a dark day indeed when Harry agreed with Malfoy.

"Are you sure you don't want us weeding your garden or cleaning your house?" Harry asked, Neville nodding so hard he was probably giving himself whiplash.

"Now don' fret—you boys'll be with me an' Fang here," Hagrid said, indicating the big dog. His voice was thick, making Harry think that he wasn't quite over Norbert being gone. "An' under normal circumstances yeh wouldn't even be out here, but this 'ere ain't normal circumstances. C'mon."

There was a lot of hesitation in following Hagrid into the woods—Harry finally grabbed Neville's hand and tugged him forward, told Malfoy to come on because the monsters always got the person who strayed off by themselves (at least, that's what happened in Dudley's horror movies, although he felt no compulsion to share the source—it got Malfoy moving, at least).

The horror movie analogy deepened, he felt, when they came across a silvery pool of something thick and tacky—doubly so when Hagrid informed them that this was unicorn blood.

"Found one dead last week," Hagrid said, further sending Harry's surprise and elation at the concept of unicorns being real crashing down. "Summat's been huntin' 'em, so we have to find it—and kill it."

"I—I'm sorry, you want us to—how?" Malfoy asked.

"You boys know how ta send up sparks, righ'?" Hagrid asked. "If you see something suspicious, send up sparks."

"Hagrid," Harry said, hearing Neville whimper next to him. "Wh-what if we run into whatever it is that's killing the unicorns?"

"Hopefully yeh don't—righ' now I jus' want to find this one tha's been injured."

"Great," Malfoy said, nodding and looking a thousand percent done. "So you want us to go searching through the woods at night for a wounded unicorn, with whatever injured it still loose. Anything else in this ridiculous scheme I missed?"

"Well we'll be splitting up too."

Snips—who had been steadily grumbling through this whole ordeal, finally fell to some temptation and slapped his tiny claws against his face.

"Maybe you should go with Hagrid, Neville," Harry suggested, guessing that he'd much rather be with the gamekeeper than Malfoy.

"Oright—Harry, you're with Malfoy then."

"All right—but that means we get Fang," Malfoy said.

"Oright—jus' so yeh know, he's a bloody coward."

Malfoy looked like he had spotted a werewolf, topped off with him being coated in barbecue sauce.

"Hate ta do this ta yeh," Hagrid told Harry in an undertone.

"It's okay—and Norbert's okay too," Harry assured him quietly.

"Righ'," Hagrid said, clapping Harry on the back hard enough to make his knees buckle. "Let's get on with it then—d'you have watches? Good boys—we'll look for two hours and then I'll be getting' yeh back to the castle. Be careful, don' mess with anythin', something looks funny, yeh send up sparks. Oright?"

They all nodded, split up—Harry had to cast Lumos very quickly.

"This is ridiculous," Malfoy muttered, having also cast Lumos and now glaring at everything. "When my father hears about this—"

"This is your own fault, Malfoy," Harry told him crossly. "You were so caught up in getting me into trouble that you got yourself into a mess instead. I can't even—why do you hate me so much?"

"And what makes you think I care so much, Potter?"

"Oh you're right, I'm sorry," Harry said, waving. "You just sabotaging my potions, trying to get me expelled, and yelling insults at me is just your way of being friendly, is that it?"

"I tried being friends with you! You'd just rather hang out with those filthy blood traitors and mudbloods—"

Snips suddenly shot out of Harry's hood, flashing for Malfoy's face and biting down hard on his nose.

"AAUGH! Get it off GET IT OFF!" Malfoy screamed, flailing back, wand flying off as he dedicated both hands to beating at Snips and trying to pull him off.

Harry had to work to peel Snips off, but finally succeeded, hugging him close and away from Malfoy, now flailing on the ground with his hands pressed to his face.

"Malfoy, I didn't want to be friends with you because you insulted my friend Hagrid, you insulted my friend Ron, and you picked on my other friends like Hermione and Neville," Harry told him. "You don't get friends if you're not friendly, and you haven't been friendly in the slightest."

Malfoy glared at him, wiping blood from his nose. "You would never make it in Slytherin."

"The hat nearly put me in Slytherin," Harry told him flatly. "And if that's what you think you need to be in your house, I'm glad it didn't." he stuck his hand out. "Now come on—we've still got a while before we can get back."

Malfoy ignored his hand, found his wand, spent the next several minutes sniffling and rubbing his nose.

"That thing had better not be poisonous," he spat finally.

"He isn't," Harry assured him, returning Snips to his hood. Snips scuttled around to growl at Malfoy. "Are you okay now?"

"No," Malfoy said, still rubbing his nose and wincing. "That thing mangled me."

Harry looked closely. "It's not mangled, and you did most of the damage yourself. Madame Pomfrey will fix you up."

"This is your fault, Potter."

"Whatever," Harry sighed.

The rest of the evening was actually pretty uneventful—at least up until they did find the thing killing the unicorns, sucking on another of the poor creatures.

The centaur chasing the monster off and then basically telling Harry that Voldemort wasn't dead and was after the Sorcerer's Stone counted as a pretty major event as well.