Snips and Scars In Which Cups are Finalized, a harry potter fanfic

Chapter 45, everybody! In which the writer continues to work on the buffer….

In other news…started rereading book 4 to familiarize myself with that version over the movie version (which glosses over a lot pre-Hogwarts) and the Weasleys can't complain too much about the caps over the ton-tongue toffees and such. Sirius, of course, is happy to help.

Granted my rereading of it also says that wizards did apparate to the Final but uh…we'll just gloss over that bit. Do have to comment on the portkeys, though, considering the series is set in the nineties and recycling and environmentalism was in full swing by then. Also Harry is a sass king even in canon and Remus and Sirus are quoting The Road to El Dorado.

Slytherinsal, thanks for the review! Oh I feel that pain…and dang I wish I had thought of dog latin when writing that that's good. XD

James Birdsong, thanks for the review! Thanks, and hopefully I can keep it up for the rest of the summer. :D

Mrs. Weasley was right, they did have an early start the next morning—as in, the sun wasn't even up yet. And no, coffee was limited in how much it woke them up.

"Don't forget some breakfast I'll be doing your school shopping while you're gone and what are you taking?" she demanded as Fred and George came down, stuffed duffel bags in tow.

"Sirius helped us modify the disguise caps," George said.

"You can't tell, but they turn your hair orange," Fred said, tipping the ball cap, now in Irish colors and with a shamrock where the button on top would be.

"Honestly we could price-gouge," Sirius admitted; you could tell the hat changed his hair. "But everyone else is going to be doing that too so we're sticking with what we calculated would be a profit for it."

"Arthur," Mrs. Weasley said.

"Honestly Molly I don't see where I can scold them on this," Mr. Weasley said. "And it'll probably be one of the least egregious items for sale at the Final—which reminds me we need to be going."

"Can I have one?" Harry asked them as they left. "I'll pay for it—"

"Of course, Harrykins," Fred said, tugging a cap out and putting it on Harry's head.

"And you can pay for it by advertising for us," George agreed.

Trudging along the ridge helped more insofar as waking them up, even if most of the start of it was spent leaning against each other and trying not to fall back asleep—Snips snapped his tail and bit a couple of times to keep them awake, and by the time they met up with the Diggorys, Harry was mostly awake.

Harry vaguely remembered Cedric Diggory from the Quidditch match that lost him his Nimbus, and he was heartened by the fact that Cedric also felt that that sucked, even if his dad kept crowing about how his son beat Harry Potter.

"We'll get a proper rematch this year though," Cedric told him once his father was out of earshot, before running off and helping the others look for…something.

Sirius found it first, bounding around an old boot and barking before morphing back into a person. "Got it!" Harry followed the others over—wasn't sure how to react to the fact that they were all crowded around an old boot that had seen better days and smells.

"Why is the boot special?" Harry asked.

"It's a portkey," Mr. Weasley said, checking his watch. "Everyone gather round, we all need to be touching it in the next—oh crud grab it!"

Harry would have rather not, but Snips bit his ear at his hesitation and prompted him to latch on with everyone else.

The next several seconds felt unhappily like apparition, except with the added bonuses of feeling like someone had hooked him in the gut and then flushed him down the drain. At least he wasn't the only one who disliked the trip.

"Why," Ron groaned, spitting turf out as he pushed himself up. "Couldn't we have flooed?"

"Or apparated," George agreed, brushing down his bag.

"We're but a handful of hundreds of wizards converging on this very spot," Percy told them. "At best apparition would have people popping in right on top of each other and floo would have everyone piling up at the grates."

"Mistakes were made," Mr. Weasley agreed.

By the time they had all picked themselves up (and Harry had crossed off portkey as acceptable means of travel), they had been checked in and were heading off to the Irish side of the field in search of their tent—which Harry had high hopes for, seeing how the other tents looked. It became very clear to him that, like the Burrow, there was either dozens of enchantments to keep Muggles from noticing or they were so far away that it was only the one family they needed to be concerned about (although Harry wondered why they were bothering enchanting him, seeing as how major concerts and the like were also Muggle things and there was a certain refuge in audacity, as he was learning).

"Well if he let it get round people would be questioning why they hadn't heard of it, now wouldn't they?" George asked when he posed that question.

"I am liking the refuge in audacity, Harry—there's hope for you yet," Fred said.

"No," Percy said. "No—do not follow in their footsteps you've got a relatively clean record don't ruin it now."

"Now see, Perce, the way we see it Harry's got a lot to make up for."

"Oh no you don't—no nonsense or I'll be telling your mother," Mr. Weasley said—and then had to pause the group as Fred and George were stopped to sell a couple of their hats.

"Already we're having a success," George cheered.

"While I'm glad that's working, what are you planning to do with the profit?" Mr. Weasley asked.

"Pay for schoolbooks."

"And open up a joke shop," Fred added in an underside as they continued on. "Remus and Sirius are helping us iron everything out, and Sirius says he's going to fund it. We've got a name down and now we're just trying to find a good place in Diagon Alley to set up."

"So you were actually doing something in your room all this time?" Charlie asked.

"We just figured you liked the noise," Ginny added.

"The noise is a bonus," George said.

By this time they had reached their tent, Mr. Weasley hustling everyone in and telling them to get settled before going off (don't get lost, by the way)—Harry ducked in behind Hermione, had to take a moment at the sight of the inside of the tent: much bigger than on the outside, with beds and a kitchenette and a dining table and a stove. Very comfy, very homey.

"I love magic," Harry said, grinning.

"And it loves you too," Fred said. "Well we're off—must to sell these before the game starts!"

"They'll be back in five minutes," Sirius assured Mr. Weasley.

The twins were indeed back before Harry, Ron and Hermione were back with the water (Mr. Weasley insisted on doing it like Muggles do in spite of a working tap in the tent), Sirius sitting by the tent with an extra bag and selling caps to people that Harry had pointed this way.

They were also talking to someone that Mr. Weasley introduced as Ludo Bagman, who was happy to wager against the twins, to Mr. Weasley's displeasure.

"'Ireland wins, but Krum gets the Snitch,'" Sirius repeated as Bagman left. "You two know something the rest of us don't?"

"Krum's the best seeker, but Ireland has the better team all around," Fred explained.

"I see—Moony keep an eye on the product I have to find a bookie real quick."

"You have money—you don't need to gamble—Sirius," Remus sighed, burying his face in his hands as a big dog bounded off (it was worth noting that the hat remained when he transformed and turned all his fur orange to boot). Harry shrugged and ducked into the tent for refreshments and to get out of the sun, and enjoyed a soda as he sat in on Hermione informing Mr. Weasley and Percy of the dangers of relying on litter for portkeys, as Muggles had started taking a very strong stance on littering and were oftentimes taking it upon themselves to keep areas clean.

"So perhaps we'll have to put some anti-Muggle spells on them too," Percy said, making a face as he took notes—to give to Mr. Crouch, he informed them all and puffing up a bit as he did so.

"And they take this trash to eh, 'landfills'?" Mr. Weasley asked.

"Well they can't just vanish the garbage like wizards can," Hermione said. "People have been working to figure out how to better dispose of their garbage, and recycling is really starting to pick up, but it's been slow going."

By the time the topic was exhausted Sirius had come back, and evidently must have had some luck in finding someone to make the wager with, considering the way his tail was wagging. And by the time the sun was going down and everyone was moving to the stadium, the hats were all sold and the money safely tucked away in an expanding inside pocket.

"We got the idea from Muggle comics," Fred explained, patting the outside of the pocket. "It's called hammerspace."

"But do you have a hammer in there?" Sirius asked.

The twins did, which had Sirius talking with Remus about doing an inside pocket as they joined the throngs heading for the stadium.

"So how did they do this?" Harry asked as said stadium started to dominate the view. "Is it like with the house, where they just sort of…transfigured stuff and they'll turn it all back when they're done?"

Percy was more than eager to explain the why and how of the stadium, how it had taken the whole year to put together and was coated in anti-Muggle spells and other protective spells such as bludger retrieval (mistakes had been made). After a while Harry and Hermione were the only ones paying attention, and by the time they started heading up the stairs Harry's brain had gone fzzzt and he decided to just accept that it was magic and leave it at that.

Climbing up to their seats was not without incident, though, seeing as how they ran into the Malfoys.

Harry was reasonably sure that witnesses were the only reason nobody in the two passing stairwells tried to hex each other, although Harry was pretty sure that Malfoy's crack at the Weasley house made that a dangerously close possibility. The Minister of Magic being one of those witnesses probably cemented this.

"The Malfoys are here as my guests," Fudge explained. "Made a sizeable donation to St. Mungo's recently, been doing such good charity work as of late."

"Joy," Sirius noised—gave Mrs. Malfoy a curt nod. "Cissy."

Mrs. Malfoy looked like the foul smell she had scented had worsened, and Harry was really starting to feel the heavy awkwardness and the bottleneck building behind their respective parties.

"How's Buckbeak doing?" he blurted out, desperate for a subject change.

Draco Malfoy, having the unfortunate position of being sandwiched between his parents, flinched before jumping for the subject change. "Buckbeak's doing fine, we have our house elf watching him while we're here."

"Yes, and you will resist calling him for the umpteenth time just to check in on that ridiculous bird," Mr. Malfoy hissed under his breath.

"I'm guessing you're not helping with him, Mr. Malfoy," Harry said before he could think it through. "Since I doubt he lets you near him."

Sirius and Remus had a hot debate after that particular burn sent everyone on their way.

"We can't be rewarding sass, we are responsible adults we have to set a standard," Remus said, gesturing with his hands pressed together.

"It seems a shame to ignore such a good backhand, though," Sirius said.

"Yes I agree but we're supposed to be setting a good example."

"We can't do that and reward appropriate sass?"

There was a long silence between them as they debated this.

"Both?"

"Both."

"Both is good," Sirius said, nodding.