So, I'm back! Again. Hopefully this makes up for the last one. . I'm so sorry for not updating and working on the other thing instead when quite honestly this should've been my top priority. I'll update as soon as I can, I swear!

Disclaimer: Just borrowin'.

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Chapter Eleven

Later that night, he sat up on a tree branch in his clearing of the Forbidden Forest, trying to remind himself that he was not allowed to be freaked out by anything. Since he was three, he'd seen and done his fair share of fucked up shit and by now he'd been in this place for ten weeks, so he really had no right to get this messed up over absolutely nothing. Though maybe absolutely nothing wasn't the right way to put it.

For some reason, seeing a hand groping around in a fire was a lot more screwed up than a head bobbing around one. Especially when that hand belonged to Professor Umbridge and looked like some sort of mutant creature in the guise of a human arm. Basically, getting this whacked out was not something Hatake Kakashi was known for. But it happened anyway. And probably didn't help that he was currently stuck in a tree.

It was all his fault too. Even this far away from Konoha, his unhealthy coping mechanisms persisted. It was only natural that he left the moment after he, Ron, and Harry said goodnight in the dormitory and disappeared off to the forest when initially he planned on taking a break for the next for days out of bodily necessity and proceed to train until he dropped, mostly because he had no access to copious numbers of sleeping pills. As it turned out, working to himself that hard then trying even minimal amounts chakra (well, not quite minimal—he practiced some genjutsu to the best of his ability on a frog, then created a couple dozen kage bunshin and practiced some actual wizarding spells before he finally shorted out) was enough to cause the seal to act up. This happened midway through climbing a tree, which was how he ended up on this branch, in too much pain to climb down the normal way. And this also wasn't like him.

You really have to stop doing that, said Rin.

I hadn't noticed.

No, seriously—you keep saying that, but you haven't stopped yet.

You know, you're still pointing out the obvious.

That because you need it, you idiot! said Obito suddenly.

I—

Sheesh, for some so smart, you're sort of a fucking idiot.

Obito…

Hey, you swear too!

GUYS! he shouted in his head because any argument was probably going to cause a headache by this point. Just shut up.

Sorry…

Yeah…

There was silence until Obito broke it. Look, we're just trying to help.

I know.

And we didn't exactly get an opportunity before.

Rin did. And succeeded.

Obviously I didn't, or you wouldn't be practically killing yourself every time you get upset.

I'm not upset!

Oh, don't even try it, Hatake.

Whoa, you haven't called him that in a long time.

Yeah, well he also hasn't pissed me off this much in a long damn time.

Cool it, Rin.

I'm not going to! Listen, Kakashi, we're just trying to help.

So you've come back from the grave to give an intervention? Fuck, I'm crazy.

No you aren't. You're just dealing with a lot right now. Isn't that right, Obito?

Yeah, basically.

Can't you go back to just being my guilty conscious?

Nope, this is way better.

The pain in his shoulder was starting to reside and he could breathe a little easier. After today, he was taking a break. He was still fit and active and Minato and Rin told him about a thousand and ten times that it wasn't healthy to train every single day—which he wasn't doing, but he was still obviously overdoing it. Even though he was apparently gifted in self-denial, he knew when to draw the line. Today pretty much drew it for him. At what was slow for him, but average for other people, he climbed down the tree the normal way, trying his hardest to ignore the argument that somehow started in his head.

If he really was crazy (and against all logic, he allowed himself to half-hope that it wasn't true) then this had to be considered getting progressively worse. The worst part was that there was nothing to really cause that—a conscious taking the voice of a deceased friend apparently wasn't too unusual, or so said the psychiatrist who evaluation him and every other survivor involved in the Kyuubi attack and that was without Kakashi even volunteering information. But this? Well, he had a feeling this wasn't quite normal, especially considering that it seemed to happen all at once.

Since it started his first day in England, it was possible this was just a side effect of basically hopping into a different world, or whatever hell he did. But…that didn't seem right, for some reason, and he couldn't think of anything else. If he'd finally snapped, then technically Rin and Obito should be gone because his mental state had legitimately been getting better over the past few weeks. And since they were talking to him, why not Minato-sensei? In terms of insanity, it made more sense for Kakashi to hear his voice rather than his old teammates.

Oh, whatever. He didn't feel like thinking about it right now. His shoulder was hurting, from the lightening in the sky he guessed it was nearing dawn and his body desperately needed sleep right now, especially since he had Charms first thing in the morning and it was so loud in there that Harry, Ron, and Hermione would want to talk. And he did too, because yesterday was a little nuts and it was going to be pretty good hearing someone else's opinion on this. Especially the opinion of the three people who knew a lot more about the Wizarding world than he did, for obvious reasons.

When he entered the dorm, exhausted and shivering, he was too groggy to take in his surroundings much, so it was a complete surprise that when he finished changing into his pajamas (hiding himself from the rest of the room by habit) a quiet voice said, "Kakashi?"

It was a good thing he no long had his weapons on him, or Harry probably would've had a kunai to the face. Kakashi was not in the right mind at the moment to be caught off guard at all. Outside it began to rain. Even without his friends in his head, it still felt like something was blocking off his full thought capacity. Probably sleep deprivation and chakra depletion.

"Yeah?" he said just as quietly, rubbing his good eye and sitting on his bed. "Why aren't you asleep?"

"Couldn't," Harry answered and he looked exhausted. "And I figured if you came back and weren't tired…er…"

Though he was flat out exhausted, his mind seemed to be whirring with too many worries and annoyances that he didn't really mind a distraction. He sat on his bed, facing Harry. "They're all heavy sleepers, right?" he asked. His friend nodded. "Okay, so what is it?"

"Hermione said she asked you if you could help teach," he said, "but never elaborated. What did she want you help with?"

Oh. That. He said, "She just wanted me to give them a look at reality or something—not say anything real of course."

"You're really going to do it?"

He shrugged, too tired to care. "It makes sense. Doubt most of them, if any of them, going into this are getting a full picture of what's actually happening. They have no basis for it. You're probably the closest."

"The closest?" Harry's eyebrows knit in confusion and Kakashi realized what he said probably didn't sound good. "What do you mean?"

He pinched the bridge of his nose and pulled up his legs so he sat cross-legged. Offending his friend wasn't his intention, but there was a possibility this could come out sounding like one anyway. While he hated explaining, he saw no real way around it.

"I mean that you're going into a war, Harry," he said, exhausted and dizzy and god he wanted to sleep so badly but his mind didn't seem to want to let him. "You've fought Voldemort, which is more than anyone else in this organization thing can say, but you haven't been in an actual war. I have. The ramifications of living through one are terrible if you don't go in prepared." He paused, then added, "Actually, they suck regardless. Let me just put it this way: war isn't fun."

Surprisingly Harry didn't seem insulted at all, which was a relief. Maybe Kakashi's obvious rambling took away from it. Fuck being tired. After a moment, Harry sighed and said, "Yeah. Yeah, you should tell them. Have you figured anything out yet?"

"No idea." He rubbed his good eye. "Seems like no one keeps in track of Japanese wizarding politics around here. I can just make anything up and I'm sure it'll work."

"I guess you could work it into why you came here," Harry said. "You look exhausted, mate. What happened?"

Well, maybe he could get away with a half-lie. Lately, Kakashi was a little backwards, feeling uncomfortable when he wasn't telling the truth to these three because the more he liked them, the less he wanted them to just like his persona. Rin said that was what being friends meant, but he didn't like getting too sentimental. Hogwarts was screwing with his head too much, and hopefully the repercussions wouldn't be awful. No need to fail becoming the captain of the ANBU because he forgot to shield emotion effectively.

He asked, "Remember what I told you about my teammate over the summer? How she couldn't move fast enough from chakra depletion?" The other boy nodded. "Yeah, well I totally overexerted myself out there. The human body can't take five nights' training in a row. I should've given myself some time before going out again."

"Then what're you doing up?" Harry smiled at him, looking a lot more like his usual self and it didn't seem forced, which Kakashi supposed was a good thing. "G'night, Kakashi."

With a yawn, he slipped under his covers and gave a sleepy, "You too, Harry," before abruptly losing consciousness.

.

"Okay, this place is awesome," said Kakashi as they stood in the middle of the Room of Requirements, surrounded by all manners of Wizarding things. "How much do you think this room could do?"

"Dobby didn't mention any limitations," answered Harry as Hermione sank down into a cushion with a book. The things he could do with this place given the opportunity. It could be more private than the forbidden forest…he could make actual opponents (dummies, of course, since he doubted this thing could make real people), do anything he could think of. "Why?"

"Mind if I stay after for a bit?" he asked, calculating in his head exactly what he would need to make a realistic training ground. The forest was nice, but recreating a place in Konoha sounded like a better idea. Harry shrugged. "Okay."

"Are you—"

Before the boy could finish, there was a knock on the door and the first people entered. When he turned around, he discovered that Ginny, Neville, Lavender, Parvati, and Dean had arrived.

Dean surveyed the room with wide eyes. "Whoa," he said. "What is this place?"

After Harry began explaining, more people showed up so he had to start over and all in all it took about eight tries to finally get the whole bit out. During the half hour, Kakashi wandered around the shelves in the back, looking to see if the room picked up anything from him. But considering that he mostly wanted to learn higher level spells at the moment, it was hard to tell from the books.

"Well," Harry was saying as he came back, slipping into the back of the group so as not to cause a distraction. "This is the place we've found for practices, and you've—er—obviously found it okay—"

"I think it's fantastic!" said Cho excitedly, but her eyes were on Harry rather than looking around like anyone else's.

Fred, though, was frowning. "It's bizarre. We once hid from Filch in here, remember, George? But it was just a broom cupboard then…"

"Hey, Harry, what's this stuff?" said Dean, pointing to some random mechanical-looking things that probably weren't mechanical.

"Dark Detectors," answered Harry. "Basically they all show when Dark wizards or enemies are around, but you don't want to rely on them too much, they can be fooled…" Oh, that sounded reassuring. "Well, I've been thinking about the sort of stuff we ought to do first and—er—What, Hermione?"

"I think we ought to elect a leader."

"Harry's leader," said Cho, and while she was sort of right, Kakashi could see what Hermione was trying to do. Didn't agree with it, of course, but he also didn't grow up in a society where "electing" bothered to get anyone anywhere. Team leaders were not elected, it went to whoever was most experienced, but considering these were a bunch of school children who could have easy divisions in their group, it was probably a pretty good idea.

"Yes," said Hermione, completely unfazed, "but I think we ought to vote on it properly. It makes it formal and it gives him authority. So—everyone who thinks Harry ought to be leader?"

Along with everyone else, Kakashi put his hand up. Harry blushed. "Er—right, thanks. And—what, Hermione?"

"I also think we ought to have a name," she said, and he sensed an intervention moment about to come up. "It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity, don't you think?"

"Can we be the Anti-Umbridge League?" asked Angelina.

"Or the Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group?" said Fred.

"I was thinking," said Hermione, the corners of her mouth twisting down, "more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside meetings?"

Using team numbers was what Kakashi was used to, but that could get confusing in a school environment. He suggested, "How about something that can be shorted down to, um, that word for when a name is abbreviated down to letters?"

Well, his English still wasn't perfect, apparently.

"An acronym," said Cho and he felt really, really embarrassed. "What about the Defense Association? The D.A. for short, so nobody knows what we're talking about?"

"Yeah, the D.A.'s good," said Ginny. "Only let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army because that's the Ministry's worst fear, isn't it?"

Before Kakashi could say anything about the utter stupidity of the name, laughter and talking broke out and Hermione said, "All in favorite of the D.A.?" Almost everyone raised their hand. "That's a majority—motioned passed!"

She wrote the name down on the attendance sheet, but as she went to actually paste it on the wall, he managed to get in, "Shouldn't you keep the paper hidden, Hermione?"

Abrupt silence. Then Smith said, "In here it is hidden," like he was the one who found the room and not them.

Hermione, though, seemed to remember Kakashi's guidelines because she rolled the paper up and slipped it into her robes. "He's right," she said, looking at him. "There's a slim chance this place will be discovered, since nowhere in this school is foolproof anymore. I'm sure we're safe, though. Right?" He nodded. "Good."

"What makes him sudden authority?" asked Smith.

"RIGHT," said Harry loudly, cutting him off. "Shall we get practicing then? I was thinking, the first thing we should do is Expeliarmus, you know, the Disarming Charm. I know it's pretty basic, but I've found it really useful—"

"Oh, please." Yeah, that boy really needed to shut up. "I don't think Expelliarmus is exactly going to help us against You-Know-Who, do you?"

Really anything could be used to defeat anyone, Kakashi learned, but he wasn't going to volunteer this bit of wisdom. Instead Harry said, "I used it against him. It saved my life last June. But if you think it's beneath you, you can leave." No one moved. "Okay. I reckon we should all divide into pairs and practice."

Since Smith was pissing him off, and he'd been in a bad mood for about the past week, Kakashi popped up next to him and innocently asked, "Want to partner up?"

"Sure," the boy said, scowling and sounding not at all displeased. "How can—"

"Expelliarmus."

Smith's wand went soaring out of his hand and clattered into the floor about ten feet away. "Hey!" he said, ears red. "Give a little warning next time!"

"In a real fight, no one's going to give you a warning," Kakashi said, before Summoning the wand back and tossing it to its rightful owner. "Here. Your turn."

"Expelliarmus!"

Kakashi moved out of the way before the spell could hit, and the Weasley twins laughed somewhere behind him. "Try again," he said, thoroughly enjoying himself because he never claimed to be a nice person in the first place. Completely fucking with this kid sounded like a pretty good way to burn out frustration.

So Smith tried, and he dodged. Again. And again. And again. It continued on for several minutes before the other boy finally snapped. "How are you doing that?" he asked, balling his fists to his side like a child.

"I'm not going to just be an immobile target," he said, running his fingers through his hair and looking at the boy like he said the stupidest thing in the world because he really was having way too much fun with this. "Here, I'll go now. How about you try to dodge?"

"I—"

"Expelliarmus."

"HEY!"

The Weasley twins were dying with laughter by now, which probably wasn't a good thing, but it was nice to know this had an audience. Maybe Smith could finally get a little humbled by this. His rampant egotism was annoying as hell.

"I gave you warning like you asked," he said innocently. "Didn't I give you enough time?"

The redness of Smith's ears was almost inspiring by this point. Kakashi pointed his wand and said, "Expelliarmus," anticipating the other boy's move so that in an effort to dodge, he hit it straight on instead. Now that he finally got to actually use magic against someone, he could totally see the tactical use behind it. Still, not as good as what he grew up with in terms of stealth and everything, but it left no mess. At all. And since he'd been on clean up duty after a fight before, this was kind of awesome.

"Stop doing that!"

"Doing what?"

"I don't know…that!"

Eventually a whistle blew (when did Harry get a whistle?) and Harry said, "Well, that was pretty good, but we've overrun, we'd better leave it here. Same time, same place next week?"

"Sooner!" said Dean, and was meant by great enthusiasm by most others.

"The Quidditch season's about to start," said Angelina, "we need team practices too!"

"Let's say next Wednesday, then," said Harry, "and we can decide on additional meetings then…come on, we'd better get going…"

The exodus from the room took longer than was probably advisable, but they had to keep dividing people up to make it less noticeably. Harry watched that map of his until they were sure everyone was safe, but Kakashi didn't care so much about that, instead looking around the room and trying to decide what he was going to do with it. To think there was a place here where he could actually recreate a piece of his hometown was amazing.

"That was really, really good, Harry," Hermione saying once everyone was gone. "Kakashi, are you coming?"

"Hm?" He turned to look at her. "Oh. No. I'll get back later."

"Want me to leave you the map?" Harry asked. He shook his head. "You sure?"

"Yeah. I've been making it back and forth long enough without it."

And it probably helped that he had a jutsu that could camouflage himself, but that would take way too long to explain. "Well, see you late then," he said.

"Bye, Kakashi."

"See you later, mate."

He returned their goodbyes automatically, not really thinking about it. The moment he was sure they were gone, he closed his eyes, pictured his team's old training ground, and thought, I want this.

When he opened his eyes, it was there. Grass was around him, and the body of water and three stumps and a forest and above him the night sky. Looking up, he saw the constellations were the constellations of the Hogwarts' night sky rather than Konoha's and realized that he was looking up at real stars, that the grass beneath him was real, and so were the lake and the trees and how the fuck did a room do this, he thought. He slipped off his shoes and the Hogwarts' robes, leaving himself in his black shirt and pants and barefoot on Konoha grass. Even the air smelled right. There was a possibility that this was an illusion, but he doubted it. Just like he doubted that this went on past the horizon, and if he walked through those trees he was going to hit a wall because this place wasn't endless. The door was still there, out of place between two trees.

Kakashi let himself fall, lying on his back under a real night sky, breathing Konoha air again, and knew this moment was going down as one of the best in his life.

.

So far, there had been many, many moments in this mission where Kakashi wished he could break his orders. Still, no matter how many other moments there were, this one really had to be the worst.

"Hold on a second," he said to his friends, both the real ones in front of him the two in his head. "Really—give me a moment to think."

On several occasions now, he'd been told he could break school rules, but at the moment he wasn't sure if school rules crossed over into mission orders, so he was more torn than he was used to. Harry and twins had just been banned because he couldn't stop a fight in front of an entire student body (and Umbridge) and Ron was miserable, so he could understand why they wanted to go see Hagrid so badly. While he'd never been in this particular situation before, he had enough empathy left in him to see the logical connection between a horrible, horrible day and the desire to break rules and common sense to go see a friend who returned after three months of no word. So he wanted to help, but he wasn't sure if he was messing up the mission by not stopping them and he was basically stuck with the last option which was figure out how to do it without leaving a trace.

That, and he wanted to kill Umbridge so badly right now, but he wasn't an idiot.

"Please?" asked Hermione, voice weak and almost desperate sounding. "I know it's risky, but—"

"Look, I'm saying it's okay," he answered, running his fingers through his hair, "but I'm trying to figure out a way not to leave evidence. I know I can do it for myself, but I have no idea how I'd even begin to spread it to other people." In actuality, he probably could figure out a way if given long enough, but the amount of chakra it needed would be detrimental. "I—Harry, take your cloak, but I'm sure you guessed that by now. Is there any way for you guys to cover your steps?"

"An Obliteration Charm should work," said Hermione. "What're you going to do? I'm not sure the cloak can cover all of us."

Well, they were going to have to see it eventually considering how often he was stuck using it to sneak around now. "I know how to camouflage myself," he said, "and how to walk and not leave footprints. And the camouflage is as good as invisibility anyway. If we're doing this, we should make it quick because the longer we take, the more likely we're to get caught, so go get your cloak, Harry."

With a tired nod, Harry disappeared up into the dormitory and Kakashi was pretty sure doing this was the definition of corrupting objectivity. But, technically he was only breaking school rules and not mission orders and he was already given permission to do that but several people, so he was fine.

But if it was fine, then why did he feel so worried?

"I've got it," Harry said, reappearing with his cloak draped over his arm and holding an already activated map. "Quick, get under."

As the other three situated themselves and successfully disappeared from Kakashi's sight, which was unnerving, he activated the Iwa-nin jutsu. He was using this way too often for him to be fully comfortable, but it was annoyingly useful. Silently, he followed them out of the castle, listening for the quiet sounds of their footsteps against the cobblestone floor. Once they were out on the snow covered lawn, Hermione began her Obliteration Charm and he channeled chakra into his feet, correctly judging exactly how much was necessary to walk across snow without harming it. He'd already had his scarf and gloves with him from the Quidditch match and was profoundly glad that he hadn't put them away.

They made good time getting to Hagrid's door and after a quick inspection he was relieved to see that there was no evidence left in the snow. Obliteration Charm—yet another thing that would go to waste once he went back to Konoha. Well, at least it could help for cleaning he supposed.

When they reached the hut, Harry knocked three times and a dog barked somewhere inside.

"Hagrid, it's us!" Harry said through the door after receiving no answer. Again, a dog inside barked.

"Shoulda known!" came a voice from the other side and from the first word alone Kakashi knew Hagrid had a dialect that was going to confuse him. Second languages sucked so much. "Bin home three seconds…Out of the way, Fang…Out of the way, yeh dozy dog…"

Then the door opened and it was only because he was fast that he was able to cover Hermione's mouth before she screamed. Still, her squeak was audible and Hagrid's blackened eyes zoomed around over their heads. He said, "Under the cloak, are yeh? Well, get in, get in!"

"I'm sorry!" said Hermione as the four of them entered. She, Ron, and Harry threw off the cloak and he dropped the jutsu.

"It's nuthin'," said the horribly injured man, "it's nut—Merlin's beard! Who are you?"

The dog—Fang—was already circling around his legs, barking happily. "Kakashi Hatake," he said, petting the dog behind the ear. Something in here smelled horrible and he resisted the urge to cough. "Dumbledore hired me to guard the school from Voldemort and/or the Ministry."

Hagrid stared, or at least as close to staring as he could get with eyes that blackened. Even as a high class shinobi, Kakashi had never seen eyes get that banged up and still be useable, but he supposed that a half-giant could have higher resistance. "Since when does Dumbledore need a guard?" he asked.

"Um, since the first week of August apparently," he answered, realizing that though he knew a lot about Hagrid, that knowledge didn't run both ways. "I'm undercover, though—in fifth year. Technically it's the whole school I'm supposed to guard, but these three and the rest of the Weasley's are my top priority. Or at least that's the shortened version, anyway. So, when you have me in class, all you know is that I'm a random, single-year exchange student from Japan who's really smart."

"Fifth year?" said Hagrid and he somehow managed to pull off looking confused. "Yeh look like yer abou' twelve!"

Despite their obvious horror, the other two boys snickered. "He gets that a lot," Ron said. "He's fourteen."

Before Hagrid could comment, Harry asked, "What happened to you?"

"Told yeh, it's nuthin'," he said in his dialect that thankfully wasn't impossible, probably because he'd been living with Seamus and his Irish accent, which took a good week to figure out. "Want a cuppa?"

"Come off it," said Ron, gapping with disbelief, "you're in a right state!"

"I'm tellin' yeh, I'm fine." The smile looked painful. "Blimey, it's good ter see you three again—had good summers, did yeh?"

"Hagrid, you've been attacked!" said Ron.

"Fer the las' time, it's nuthin'!" said Hagrid.

Sheesh, said Rin, he's as bad as you, 'Kashi-kun.

Keeping his mouth shut was normally something Kakashi was quite good at, but the blatant display of denial was almost on par with his own. After choosing his words carefully, he said, "First, nice to meet you. Second, that isn't 'nothing' no matter how you look at it. My medical knowledge is limited to what I learned on the front—" As well as what was constantly spewed in his head. "—but I know anatomy. I've spent the majority of my life studying it, so I can say with all legitimacy that you were attacked while on the defensive side because all of your wounds are defensive." The staring continued, and he sighed. "I'm a trained professional telling you this. Go get help."

"What're yeh trained in ter make yeh an expert?" asked Hagrid, though he seemed more bewildered than indignant. "Harry, wha's goin' on?"

Oh, he didn't want to spend a long time on explanations right now, but he knew this wasn't going to just be dropped lightly. Again, he sighed and waved his hand, indicating it was okay for Harry to say whatever he thought was important. He was most likely a better candidate for explaining than Kakashi at the moment.

"He's a ninja," answered Harry with a shrug like this was perfectly normal, "from a place called Konoha that we shouldn't know about. But that's not important right now."

Before Hagrid could ask any more questions, Hermione said, "Kakashi's right. You ought to go and see Madam Pomfrey, Hagrid. Some of those cuts look nasty."

"I'm dealin' with it, all righ'?" While Kakashi wasn't worried about Hagrid, having sustained worse injuries himself and having seen worse injuries, but for some reason his eyes and the fact that he could still see was mind-boggling. Just…just how?

Hagrid walked away from them to the countered where he uncovered something. Immediately, the smell got worse and when he turned, a giant, oddly colored stake appeared.

"You're not going to eat that, are you, Hagrid?" asked Ron, again look horrified. "It looks poisonous."

"It's s'posed ter look like that, it's dragon mean," he said, looking at them like it should be common knowledge. "An' I didn' get it ter eat it."

Though Harry, Ron, and Hermione looked about ready to protest to whatever he was planning on doing, Hagrid ignored them and slapped the stake over one eye, breathing out a sigh of relief.

There's no way that can be sanitary.

Thanks, Rin. I hadn't noticed.

"Tha's better," he said, sitting down and looking at them with his other banged up eye. "It helps with the stingin', yeh know."

Oh, shut up. Some things are worth commenting on no matter how obvious.

Do you have any idea how he can still see?

"So are you going to tell us what's happened to you?" Harry asked, gaze still fixed on the stake.

No idea. I mean, they don't even look bloodshot.

"Can', Harry," Hagrid answered. "Top secret. More'n me job's worth ter tell yeh that."

"Did the giants beat you up?" Hermione asked quietly. Hagrid coughed in surprised and the stake slid a little down his face.

"Giants? Who said anythin' about giants? Who yeh bin talkin' to? Who's told yeh what I've—who's said I've bin—eh?"

"We guessed," she said, glancing at Kakashi accusingly like he should've told them.

"Oh, yeh did, did yeh?" he said.

"It's kinda…obvious," said Ron, and Harry nodded.

Hagrid glared at them, though it was barely visible, and tossed the stake on the table, heading towards the stove.

"Never known kids like you three—or, four, I s'pose—fer knowin' more'n yeh oughta," he said, filling his large mugs with tea. "An' I'm not complimentin' yeh, neither. Nosy, some'd call it. Interferin'."

As the four of them sat down, Kakashi said, "I knew already. The Order never explained anything, but they mentioned it a few times."

"He didn't tell us, though," Hermione said quickly as Hagrid opened his mouth to speak. "So, you were really looking for giants?"

"Yeah, all righ'," he said, resigned. "I have."

"How?" said Hermione, and though Kakashi already knew the answer to that one too, he wasn't going to say anything. They could figured it all out on their own, and regardless of what the adults said, it was a good idea to actually include them in something for once.

"Well, they're not that difficult ter find, ter be honest," said Hagrid. "Pretty big, see."

"Where are they?" asked Ron.

"Mountains," answered Hagrid

"So why don't Muggles—?"

Hagrid said, "They do. O'ny their deaths are always put down ter mountaineerin' accidents, aren' they?"

"Did one follow you home or something?" Kakashi asked. "A lot of those wounds look fresh—as in within the past week or so."

"'Course not," said Hagrid and he avoided eye contact, or at least it seemed so. "They jus' reopen'd."

And he was really, really bad at lying.

"Come on, Hagrid," said Ron, skipping over it. "Tell us about being attacked giants and Harry can tell you about being attacked by dementors—"

Hagrid somehow managed choked on his tea and dropped the steak at the same time, covering the table with dragon's blood, spit, and tea. The stake slid completely from his face and onto the floor, some of the greenness spreading, the rancid smell increasing. Kakashi needed to get of here, soon.

"Whadda yeh mean, attacked by dementors?" he asked.

"Didn't you know?" Hermione answered, surprised, eyes wide.

"I don' know anything that's been happenin' since I left," said Hagrid. "I was on a secret mission, wasn' I, didn' wan' owls followin' me all over the place—ruddy dementors! Yeh're not serious?"

"Yes, I am, they turned in Little Whinging and attacked my cousin and me, and then the Ministry of Magic expelled me—"

"WHAT?"

"—and I had to go to a hearing and everything, but tell us about the giants first."

"You were expelled?"

"Tell us about your summer and I'll tell you about mine."

While curiosity didn't seem like a particularly good bargain, it worked. "Oh, all righ'." He bent down and tugged the dragon steak out of Fang's mouth.

Okay, it's sanitary level just dropped further.

"Oh, Hagrid, don't it's not hygien—" Hermione started, but he'd already put the stake back to its original position.

Well, it looks like we aren't the only ones who think so.

"Well," he began after a large gulp of tea, "we sent off right after term ended—"

"Madam Maxime went with you, then?" she said.

"Yeah, tha's right," said Hagrid and suddenly sounded much happier. "Yeah, it was jus' the pair of us. An' I'll tell yeh this, she's not afraid of roughin' it, Olympe. Yeh know, she's a fine, well-dressed woman, an' knowin' where we was goin' I wondered 'ow she'd feel abou' clamberin' over boulders an' sleepin' in caves an' tha', bu' she never complained once."

So she basically has the apathy level of a kunoichi? Rin said.

I don't get why that's such a surprise.

Seriously? You've been here four months and you still don't get it?

"You knew where you were going?" asked Harry. "You knew where the giants were?"

That's not it. The statement just seemed a little sexist. That's the word, right?

I think. At least it isn't as bad as Kirigakure.

True.

"Well, Dumbledore knows, an' he told us," asked Hagrid.

"Are they hidden?" asked Ron. "Is it a secret, where they are?"

"It doesn't seem possible to hide an entire population," Kakashi said, only half paying attention now because the conversation in his head was much more interesting.

"He's righ'," Hagrid said, nodding to Kakashi. "It's jus' that mos' wizards aren' bothered where they are, s' long as it's a good long way away. But where they are's very difficult to get ter, fer humans anyway, so we needed Dumbledore's instructions. Took us abou' a month ter get there—"

"A month?" repeated Ron. "But—why couldn't you just grab a Portkey or something?"

Hagrid looked at Ron with some sort of expression on his face, but Kakashi couldn't figure out what it was supposed to be.

"We're bein' watching, Ron," he answered.

"What d'you mean?"

"Yeh don' understand," said Hagrid. "The Ministry's keepin' an eye on Dumbledore an' anyone they reckon's in league with him, an'—"

"We know all about that," said Harry. "We know about the Ministry watching Dumbledore—"

"So you couldn't use magic to get there?" asked Ron. "You had to act like Muggles all the way?"

"Well, not exactly," said Hagrid. "We jus' had ter be careful, 'cause Olympe an' me, we stick out a bit, so we're not too hard ter follow. We was pretendin' we was goin' on holiday together, so we got inter France an' we made like we was headin' fer where Olympe's school is, 'cause we knew we was bein' tailed by someone from the Ministry—"

"Any idea who you were being tailed by?" Kakashi asked and Hagrid shook his head.

"We had to go slow, cause I'm not really s'posed ter use magic and we knew the Ministry'd be lookin' fer a reason ter run us in. But we managed ter give the berk tailin' us a slip round abou' Dee-John—"

"Oh, Dijon?" said Hermione, suddenly distracted. "I've been there on holiday, did you see—?"

"We chanced a bit o' magic after that, and wasn' a bad journey. Ran inter a couple o' mad trolls on the Polish border, an' I had a slight disagreement with a vampire in a pub in Minsk, but apart from tha', couldn't'a bin smoother."

He drank a bit of tea and told them his story. He told them more than was probably advisable, even by Kakashi's standards.

"A woman named Dolores Umbridge, who's from the Ministry, is a new teacher," Kakashi said when Hagrid was done. "She's also something called a High Inquisitor, so she'll be inspected you class."

"A teacher 'as the righ' to inspec' classes?" he asked.

Before anyone could explain thing, there was loud knocking on his door. Hermione gasped and dropped her mug, breaking it. Fang barked. The five of them looked at the window beside the doorway. It was the shadow of someone very, very familiar.

"It's her!" Ron whispered, horrified.

"Get under here!" Harry said, throwing the cloak around all of them. Kakashi was squished in between Hermione and Ron, unable to move his arms without a frightening about of wiggling. "Hagrid, hide our mugs!"

"You were in France helping to save a family of unicorns and got attacked by a manticore," Kakashi said quickly, keeping his voice low. Hagrid looked back, startled, but nodded.

He pulled open the door and stood there, smiling cheerily.

"So," she said, loudly and slowly like he was hearing impaired, "You're Hagrid, are you?" She walked inside without an invitation. "Get away," she added to Fang, waving at him uselessly.

"Er—I don' want ter be rude," said Hagrid, "but who are you?"

"My name is Dolores Umbridge."

His eyes went straight to the corner as Umbridge's gaze swept across the room, missing the look entirely.

"Dolores Umbridge?" Hagrid said. "I thought you were one o' them Ministry—don' you work with Fudge?"

"I was Senior Undersecretary to the Minister, yes," she said, pacing the cabin. The four squeezed closer together, which was extremely uncomfortable. "I am now the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher—"

"Tha's brave of yeh," said Hagrid, "there's not many'd take tha' job anymore—"

"—and Hogwarts High Inquisitor," said Umbridge as if she hadn't heard him.

"Oh," said Hagrid.

"What might that be?" Umbridge asked, pointing to the broken mug that he should've grabbed.

"Oh," he repeated, and glanced in the corner again, "oh, tha' was…was Fang. He broke a mug. So I had ter use this one instead." He pointed to his mug, which was still on the table, and Kakashi had to admit that it wasn't too bad of a lie.

"I heard voices," she said, eyes narrowed.

"I was talkin' ter Fang," said Hagrid, which wasn't nearly as believable.

"And was he talking back to you?" she asked.

"Well…in a manner o' speakin'. I sometimes say Fang's near enough human—"

She cut him off with a sound of skepticism and suddenly turned around, walking the length of the cabin. She started looking everywhere, checking in the cupboards, in the cauldron, under the bed. As she came over to the table, Kakashi pulled the cloak over the soles of their shoes. She straightened and looked at Hagrid, offering no explanation.

"What has happened to you?" she asked. "How did you sustain those injuries?"

"Oh, I…had a bit of an accident," Hagrid answered.

"What sort of accident?"

He smiled sheepishly. "Well, I go' on the bad side o' a manticore. Nasty creatures, they are."

"You were attacked by a manticore," she said, raising one eyebrow.

"Yeah, tha's right," he answered. "I came across a mother's nest abou' a week ago an' she attacked. Getting away is 'ard without fighting, yeh see, and I didn' want ter—"

"Where have you been?" Umbridge asked, cutting him off.

"Where've I…?"

"Been, yes. Term started more than two months ago. Another teacher has had to cover your classes. None of your colleagues has been able to give me any information on your whereabouts. You left no address. Where have you been?"

"I was in France," he answered. "Ou' in Alsace-Lorrain."

"And what were you doin' in France?"

After a slight pause, he said, "I was called down by a friend ter save a family o' unicorns. There are these things called minefields down in Alsace. The mother go' injured and the foal wouldn' leave 'er side. I was given leave 'til I could get 'em healed."

"I shall, of course, be informing the Minister of your late return," she said, and she seemed to believe him.

He nodded. "Righ'."

"You ought to know too that as High Inquisitor it is my unfortunate but necessary duty to inspect my fellow teachers," she added. "So I daresay we shall meet again soon enough."

Without giving even a polite goodbye, she turned and walked out the door.

"You're inspecting us?" said Hagrid before she could leave.

"Oh, yes," said Umbridge, hand on the doorknob. "The minister is determined to weed out unsatisfactory teachers, Hagrid. Good night." Then she left, shutting the door tightly behind her.

Harry went to go pull off the cloak, but Hermione grabbed his hand and said, "Not yet, she might not be gone yet."

Hagrid pulled the curtain back an inch or so. "She's goin' back ter the castle," he said quietly after a moment. "Blimey, inspectin' people, is she? Yeh weren't lyin'."

"Yeah," said Harry, pulling off the cloak. They scooted apart and his arms could work again. "Trelawney's on probation already…"

"Um…what sort of thing are you planning to do with us in class, Hagrid?" asked Hermione.

"Oh, don' you worry abou' that, I've got a great load o' lessons planned," he answered. "I've bin keepin' couple o' creatures saved fer yer O.W.L year, you wait, they're somethin' really special."

"Erm…special in what way?"

"I'm not sayin'," said Hagrid, "I don' want ter spoil the surprise."

"Look, Hagrid," she said with an edge of panic to her voice. "Professor Umbridge won't be happy if you bring in anything to class that's too dangerous—"

"Dangerous?" said Hagrid and he looked honestly confused, which didn't bode well. "Don' be silly, I wouldn' give yeh anythin' dangerous! I mean, all righ', they can look after themselves—"

"Hagrid! You've got to pass Umbridge's inspection, and to do that it would really be better if she saw you teaching us how to look after porkocks, how to tell the difference between knarls and hedgehogs, stuff like that!"

"But tha's not very interesting', Hermione," said Hagrid. "The stuff I've got's much more impressive, I've bin bringin' 'em on fer years, I reckon I've got the on'y domestic herd in Britain—"

As he started going through the hand seals for a Shunshin, he said, "I have to go. Dumbledore needs to know your cover. Nice meeting you."

"Wait, wha'—"

And he disappeared.

.

Again, so sorry!