Explanations and comments at the end. Let's just get right to it, shall we?

Chapter 5

Flying the Muggle Way

Whatever protestations Harry may have had never had the chance to manifest. Ginny caught him completely off-guard and before he knew it they were in his bedroom, kissing more intensely than they ever had before, and then their clothes were off and they were touching all over and she was so beautiful and then…

The first time was more than a little awkward and embarrassingly quick. Harry got the distinct sense that Ginny hadn't enjoyed it nearly as much as he had, which made him feel awful because if anything he wanted it to be the other way around. She'd just smiled, kissed him and assured him that was normal, though how she could know that he had no idea (as she assured him up and down that he was her first).

The second time was better for both of them. Harry had worked out some of his excitement and so was able to focus a bit more, meaning it lasted longer. Ginny was over the pain of her first time (which had terrified him initially, to her amusement), and so was enjoying herself more, which made him happy. They had time to work out a few things that the other liked, but even then it was over too quickly.

By the third time they both felt as if they'd hit their stride. They finally knew what they were doing (oh, how that would make them laugh in the future), and it was starting to feel natural, as opposed to some nerve-wracking, terrifying new thing they were completely clueless about. And unless Harry greatly misunderstood everything Ginny had been yelling, he got the feeling that she was finally getting as much out of it as he was.

They were both exhausted after that, but completely sated, and Harry could not remember ever feeling better in his life. And so it was that he awoke the next morning in a blissful haze, not entirely certain of where he was or what was going on, but sure that he didn't want to leave.

Then Ginny shifted and it came rushing back. Even the morning after, everything still felt perfect. All his senses were filled with her and the room seemed to spin with the two of them at its center. He could feel her body pressed against his – her warmth seeping into his skin and her soft curves more comforting than any bedding could ever be. He could smell her – that flowery scent that always clung to her, mixed with the evidence of their activities the night before and something else that was undefinable but had always been just Ginny.

He could hear her breathing and even her heartbeat, and the occasional murmur or whimper as she slept, and her vibrant red hair filled his vision, shimmering like hot gold in the early morning sunbeams coming through the window. He kissed her neck, wanting to taste her and complete the perfection, and she roused.

'Didn't mean to wake you,' he said as she turned to face him.

'No, I'm glad you did,' she purred, and they shared a languorous kiss before she wrapped her arms around him. 'I love you, Harry,' she breathed.

'I love you,' he replied, hugging her back and breathing in her scent again. What else was there to say? He was sure there were a million things he could or should say at a time like this, but damned if he had any idea what they were. As it was, he was still somewhat amazed he'd managed to make it as far as he had without somehow cocking things up – as it were.

The rest of the morning was a pleasant blur not unlike being under the Imperius Curse. They made love again before getting out of bed, and had Kreacher make them breakfast. Harry knew they ate breakfast because he was not hungry later in the day, but under threat of death he couldn't have told anybody what they'd eaten.

'I should go home by myself,' she said while they cleaned up amidst Kreacher's protests. 'You're a horrible liar Harry, and if you talk to Mum or Dad right now it's going to lead to all sorts of awkward questions.'

'Do you think?' Harry asked, trying to sound casual despite the fact that his heart was suddenly gripped in a terror he couldn't describe. He'd nearly dropped the plates he was carrying. The idea of facing Mr and Mrs Weasley after spending the night with their daughter was not something he'd properly considered until just that moment. It wasn't something he was looking forward to in the slightest.

'I know,' she said. 'To be honest, they probably already suspect what we were doing if they haven't outright guessed; I mean, we were out all night together after all. They'll pretend that they don't, and for now I think that's best. We leave for Australia this afternoon. Hopefully by the time we get back we'll have worked out what we're going to say.'

'Blimey, Australia!' Harry said, clutching his forehead. 'Ron! Ron'll figure it out even faster than your parents. He's going to kill me!'

'He can try,' Ginny said, furrowing her brow. 'But I think he remembers what happened the last time he tried to make my love life his business.' Harry involuntarily shuddered, remembering Ginny locked in an embrace with Dean Thomas in a dark corridor. Even now they were together and both got along with Dean fine, it wasn't a pleasant image to relive.

Ginny seemed to realize her mistake, because her features softened and she came over to him and put her hand on his arm. 'It'll be all right, love,' she said. 'Ron might be upset at first, but he had to know this was going to happen eventually. And we can think of him as practice for Mum and Dad. I mean, if we can get him on our side…' she trailed off, still rubbing his arm affectionately.

'Yeah,' said Harry absentmindedly, too focused on thoughts of Ron transfiguring him into a snail to really know what he was agreeing to. 'Our side, yeah.'

~O~O~O~O~O~O~

That afternoon, they all met up outside Grimmauld Place with their luggage. They would be traveling to Australia the Muggle way, since that was how they'd have to come home, and Hermione was sure it would cause all sorts of problems with the Muggle government if there were records of them coming back into the country but no records of them ever having left. The Ministry had issued them Muggle passports, which Ron and Ginny didn't see the need for, and even Harry didn't fully understand.

'Muggles take international travel seriously,' Hermione explained as she handed them out. 'These let them make sure you are who you say you are, that you're from where you say you're from, and that you're allowed to go where you're going.'

'Seems like an awful lot of trouble,' Ron complained, looking at the ID page in his passport. 'I mean, it's not as if Muggles can use Polyjuice Potion or anything. Who else would I be?'

'What are all these empty pages for?' Ginny asked. Harry had been wondering that himself.

'When you arrive in a different country, the customs official will stamp your passport with the time and date you entered,' Hermione said. 'They do it again when you leave.'

'A stamp?' Ron asked, scrunching up his face and flipping through the empty pages. 'Sounds like a children's game.'

'Actually, some people do make a game of it,' Hermione said. 'It's sort of a badge of honor for people who travel a lot to get all their stamp pages filled up, with as many different country's stamps as possible.'

'The things Muggles come up with,' said Ron, shaking his head and pocketing the passport.

'I don't know; I think that sounds like it would be fun,' Ginny said, pocketing hers as well and coming over to take Harry's arm. For the briefest of instants he panicked and his eyes shot to Ron, whose attention was mercifully on Hermione as she explained the plane ticket she was giving him.

'Oh calm down,' Ginny said, exasperated. He turned to look at her and saw her roll her eyes at him. 'Ron's got so much to focus on between Muggle transport and Hermione's parents that you could probably turn me into an elephant and he wouldn't notice. As long as you can avoid shagging me right in front of him, he's not going to know anything until we tell him.'

'Which we will have to do,' Harry said. Quite apart from the practical necessity of it, Harry was uncomfortable keeping any kind of secret from Ron, especially when it involved his family.

'Of course we will,' Ginny agreed. 'Just not right now; he has enough to worry about. Let him focus on Hermione; she needs his attention more than we do.'

'You're right,' Harry said. He took a deep breath and allowed himself to calm down. 'She could use our support too, come to that. No time to be worrying about our own issues.'

'That's the spirit!' Ginny said cheerfully, and they went over to Hermione to get their own tickets.

~O~O~O~O~O~O~

They took the Knight Bus to Heathrow Airport – perhaps not the best idea, considering how tense and anxious they already were, and then boarded a shuttle to their terminal. Harry was amazed at the size of the Airport; it was like a city in its own right.

'So where are the aeroplanes?' Ron asked, looking around. 'I see a bunch taking off and landing, but where's the one we're going to ride?'

'It's not like getting on a train, Ron,' Hermione said. 'There's all sorts of security we have to go through first.'

'Security? For what?'

'Well, to make sure we haven't brought anything dangerous along with us.'

'Do people do that?' Ginny asked.

'Sometimes,' Hermione replied. 'And you can imagine the trouble it would cause. You're miles in the air with nowhere to go; if someone tries to do something, there isn't anywhere to run to or anyone to call for help.'

'Tell me again why we're doing this?' Ron asked, his face having paled a few shades as Hermione spoke.

'Oh relax, Ron, it's perfectly safe. Why do you think they have the security in the first place? Besides, they aren't going to take our wands; as far as they're concerned those are just sticks of wood and nothing to be concerned about. We should put them in our bags instead of our pockets for the security check, though. It will look less suspicious that way.'

Harry wasn't comfortable with the idea of his wand being out of reach for any length of time – nor, it seemed, was Ron – but he could see the logic behind it. 'She's right, Ron,' he said. 'Better to avoid awkward questions and it'll only be for a couple of minutes at most.'

'Well if you say so,' said Ron. 'I suppose if you can stomach the idea, I can manage as well.' Hermione smiled fondly and placed her hand on Ron's arm; Harry looked away and allowed them to have a bit of a private moment.

'Have you ever been on an aeroplane?' Ginny asked him. He shook his head.

'Where would I have gone?' he asked. 'I certainly never went on any holidays with the Dursleys. To be honest, I don't know much more about how this is going to work than you and Ron do.' He had a basic idea of course. He'd seen some television growing up, and inevitably there had been some shows and movies that took place in airports. Beyond that, he was flying blind. He told Ginny as much, and she merely groaned at his horrible pun.

'At least you'll have some idea of what everything is when we go in there,' she said. 'Like this security. What do they do?'

'Well…,' said Harry, trying to remember. 'There's sort of an arch you walk through that can detect if you're carrying any metal, and they put your luggage through an x-ray machine to see what's inside of it.'

'X-ray? What's that? And why would they care if you're carrying metal?' Ginny asked, completely confused.

'Most Muggle weapons are made of metal, or have metal parts,' Harry explained. 'And x-rays let you look through things.'

'Without magic?' she asked, surprised. 'How?'

'I have no idea. You'd have to ask Hermione.'

That would have to wait, however, as the shuttle had arrived at its destination. The four of them gathered their luggage and trooped into the building, which was full of people going in all different directions. There were announcements blaring through loudspeakers, and dozens of computer screens with departure and arrival information flashing on them. It was almost overwhelming, but Hermione seemed to know where she was going so they followed her.

'Do you have your passports and tickets ready?' she asked. Harry, Ron and Ginny stopped to get them out. Hermione waited for them and nodded her approval when they all held up the aforementioned documents. 'Okay, this is the part where we drop our checked baggage.'

'Checked, checked…' Ron repeated, trying to remember. 'What was that again?'

'It's the big luggage we can't take onto the plane with us, right?' asked Ginny.

'That's right,' Hermione said, and Ginny looked pleased to have gotten it right. 'Those desks over there are where we'll drop them off, and they'll give us our boarding passes.'

'And we get it all back when we arrive?' Ron asked. 'How does that work? Surely they don't have elves doing it.'

'Of course not, Ron,' Hermione explained patiently. 'They've people who do it. It's their job. They load it into the cargo area of the plane and then unload it for us when we get there.'

If Ron thought this idea was crazy, he wisely didn't say. The four of them trudged over to the queue for the ticket counter. It looked to be a long wait, but in reality only lasted around ten minutes. Finally they were able to check their bags and receive their boarding passes.

'How is this any different from the ticket we had before?' Ron asked, inspecting his pass.

'This is the one that actually lets us on the plane, mate,' Harry said. 'The other one just shows we paid for seats.'

'Mental,' Ron muttered, shaking his head. Harry privately agreed.

'Okay, we're coming up to the security gate,' Hermione announced. 'Everyone put your wands into your carry-on.'

'Carry-what?' Ron asked.

'Your bag, mate,' Harry said, unzipping his knapsack to put his wand inside.

'Oh, right.' It was a quick affair and they were off again. The queue for security was mercifully short – in large part due to the fact that there were several gates open and running at once.

'What's that thing he's got?' Ginny asked, pointing to one of the security guards who was waving a wand-like device up and down a passenger whose arms were held out to his sides. Hermione opened her mouth to explain, but Harry, pleased that he knew the answer, beat her to it.

'Think of it like a secrecy sensor or a less invasive probity probe. If the metal detector goes off when you walk through it, they wave that over you to see if and where you're hiding anything.'

'How does it work without magic?' Ginny asked. Harry looked to Hermione, who to his surprise shrugged right along with him.

'Hermione?' Ron asked, shocked. For that matter, Harry was too. He couldn't remember the last time she didn't have the answer for something.

'Oh honestly Ron, I can't possibly know how everything works. Nobody can. And this is Muggle technology, which I might remind you I stopped studying when I was eleven,' Hermione huffed.

'Fair enough,' Ron held up his hands in a placating gesture.

'Does that mean you don't know how the x-ray machine works?' Ginny asked.

'No, I don't know,' Hermione said plainly. 'However in my defense, I'd wager the average Muggle couldn't tell you how it works either.'

They'd reached the security gate. Harry was the first to go through, and as he stepped up one of the security officers approached him with a small tray.

'Please empty your pockets, sir,' she said. 'And place your bag on the conveyor.' Harry did as he was told. The conveyor belt to his left spurred into action and his bag began to move toward some kind of chamber – he could only assume that was where the x-ray was. Already he was feeling antsy. If something were to happen right at that moment, he wouldn't be able to get to his wand. He wanted this to be over as quickly as possible.

'Do you have anything else that might set off the detector?' the guard asked politely. 'Like a belt buckle or anything?' Harry thought for a moment and shook his head, then pointed to his glasses.

'What about these?' he asked.

'Those should be fine, sir,' she smiled. 'Please step through.' He did, and nothing happened. He wasn't sure he what he'd been expecting, but he felt relief all the same. He looked to his left and saw another guard seated in front of a computer screen, upon which he could clearly see the x-rayed image of his own rucksack. It was bizarre.

A moment later he was reunited with his bag – and his wand – but managed to resist the urge to take it out of his bag right away. He waited patiently for the others come through after him. Hermione had clearly done this before and didn't give it a second thought, but Ron and Ginny were clearly intrigued by the whole process, and both of them found the x-ray monitor particularly fascinating, to the amusement of the security officers.

'Honestly, could you two be more obvious?' Hermione said in a tone that sounded a mix of fondness and exasperation as they left the security station behind. 'Those guards must have thought you were overly tall children the way you were gawking at everything.'

'Forgive me if I've never looked through my own bag before,' Ron grumbled. Ginny, however, was grinning ear to ear.

'We have to bring Dad on an aeroplane someday, just for that. He'd love it,' she said. That brightened Ron's mood.

'He would, wouldn't he?'

They made their way to the gate, where Harry bought them all buns and a coffee from a nearby café. The wait before boarding was only thirty minutes and so there wasn't time for much besides sitting around. When it finally came time to board, Harry couldn't help but feel a little excited. He smiled at his own enthusiasm; despite having flown hundreds of times, there was something about doing it the muggle way that was inherently exhilarating. One look at both Ron and Ginny confirmed they were feeling the same thing, though Ron also looked a bit ill.

'Mental, this is,' he muttered as the four of them made their way down the jet bridge. 'Flying without magic. It makes no sense! How can it possibly work?'

'It'll be fine, Ron,' Hermione assured him, taking his free hand and squeezing it. 'There are literally hundreds if not thousands of flights a day and nothing happens. Muggles have been flying for nearly a century now. It's perfectly safe.' Her hand seemed to have calmed him more than her speech, but nevertheless Ron took a deep breath and was looking markedly less green.

'I don't suppose you're having second thoughts?' Harry asked Ginny, who grinned.

'No,' she said, 'but feel free to pretend I am.' He grinned back and took her hand in his.

'Right this way,' the attendant greeted them at the door to the plane. 'You all are in the first row here.' She gestured to two pairs of seats separated by one of two aisles running to the back of the plane. Two were near the window, and two were in a center group of four seats, split in half by a divider. Ginny, who had won the window seat in an earlier lot-draw, moved to take her seat.

'Hang on Gin, let's put your bag up here,' Harry said, gesturing to the overhead compartments. He was surprising himself with how much he knew about planes, purely through cultural osmosis.

There was a period of chaos after that. Being in the front row, literally every other passenger had to go past them to reach their seats. Harry and Ginny barely got so much as a glimpse of Ron and Hermione for the next fifteen or twenty minutes.

'These seats are really nice,' Ginny said, squirming around in hers a bit. Harry was caught off-guard by how sexy such a simple action could be, and was suddenly acutely aware of the fact that he wouldn't have so much as a second alone with her for at least the next twenty-two hours.

'They go back too, so you can sleep,' Harry explained. 'I expect that'll come in handy on such a long flight.'

Ron and Ginny were enthralled by the various aspects of Muggle air travel. For his part, Harry himself was rather impressed, having only seen snippets of it on television over the years. Ginny was most excited at the opportunity to watch another film, as well as enthusiastically explaining to Ron what they were. Harry smiled at the air of expertise she exhibited, having just seen her first film the day before.

'I don't know why they call it a "Romantic Comedy",' Ron complained afterwards. 'It was bloody frustrating was what it was. How could two people possibly be so oblivious?'

'Right,' Ginny nodded, pretending to agree, 'stuff like that never happens in real life.'

'I know, right?' said Ron, clearly missing her sarcasm. 'This is what Muggles do for entertainment?'

'They aren't all like that, Ron,' said Hermione, trying to hide both her amusement as well as a light blush. 'There are all sorts of genres to choose from, just like anything.'

'The one Harry and I saw had bandits and sword fighting and was supposed to have taken place over a hundred years ago,' Ginny said.

'That sounds a lot better,' said Ron. 'Why couldn't we watch one like that?'

'I don't think the airline lets you choose, mate,' said Harry, grinning.

'That's right,' said Hermione. 'They have to put on what they think will appeal to most people.'

This of course set Ron off again on how such a story could appeal to anyone, so Harry and Ginny decided to let he and Hermione bicker about it for a while.

'I did like yesterday's film more, but this one wasn't so bad,' Ginny said quietly to Harry.

'I haven't seen very many myself, so it's hard to judge, but yeah it was all right.'

'It kind of reminded me of us, actually,' she said.

'Really? I was never that oblivious, was I?' Harry asked. She giggled.

'No, that was all Ron. I meant the part how I decided to stop pining for you just before you started to like me.'

'Pining?' Harry teased, waggling his eyebrows.

'Oh, stop,' she said, poking him in the ribs. 'What would you call it, then?'

Harry thought for a moment. 'A healthy fascination with my rugged masculinity?'

Ginny burst out laughing. 'Yes, that was exactly it. I could hardly contain my womanly urges at the sight of your scrawny, scruffy manliness.'

'Ouch!' said Harry, placing a hand over his heart. 'That hurt.' He pretended to think. 'Though I suppose it would go a long way to explain why you always clammed up and broke something whenever I came in a room. Holding back those womanly urges must've been tough.'

'You cheeky …' she said, narrowing her eyes and pursing her lips but still grinning.

'I suppose I did my share of pining myself when you were going out with Dean,' Harry said. 'Nice we both finally got our heads on straight, eh?'

'Hmm,' she hummed in agreement, but he knew she was thinking what he was: they barely had any time together before being ripped apart for almost a year. All of a sudden the light, teasing atmosphere dropped into a much more serious one.

'I'm not going anywhere, Ginny,' he said, placing a hand on her arm. 'And if I do, you'd better believe I'm taking you with me.'

'As if I'd even give you a choice,' she said, placing her own hand on his thigh. He kissed her briefly, conscious that they were still essentially in public, but he took her hand afterward and did not let go. He let the sounds of Ron and Hermione squabbling about the merits of Muggle entertainment lull him to sleep.

Hours later, he awoke to find that they were making their descent into Singapore. Ron once again asked why they couldn't just go straight to Australia, and Hermione patiently explained once again the concept of fuel capacity.

The second flight was much shorter than the first, ('Would have been even shorter if we hadn't had to sit around the station for an hour and a half waiting for it,' Ron complained), and there wasn't a film, to general disappointment ('It's better than just sitting her doing nothing,' Ron conceded). When they finally arrived in Melbourne, they were exhausted but exited. This was the farthest any of them had ever travelled – for Harry it was the first time he'd even left Britain.

They took a taxi to their hotel, where there was a bit of confusion at the check-in counter, where Hermione had to explain that they did not want couples' rooms, but rather one for the girls and one for the boys. The receptionist apologized for making assumptions and Harry and Ginny exchanged a somewhat guilty look that they hoped Ron did not see.

'I just think … I just think it's a bit early,' Hermione was saying to them as they walked with their keys to the elevator. 'For all of us. I hadn't even thought to clear that up with them beforehand.' Harry couldn't help but think she'd shot a brief look in his and Ginny's direction before saying 'all of us.'

'Don't worry about it, Hermione,' Ginny said. 'It is a bit soon, you're right.' How she could lie with such a straight face, Harry had never understood, but he was thankful for it at the moment.

Ron was already snoring by the time Harry came out of the bathroom, and Harry was not surprised. How Muggles traveled this way on a regular basis was a mystery to even him; it was completely exhausting. He had no idea if it would even work over so long a distance, but he sent a Patronus to Mr and Mrs Weasley all the same, letting them know they'd arrived safely before turning in himself. He was asleep almost immediately.

The next morning, the four of them met in the hotel's lobby for breakfast. Ginny came over to kiss him good morning, and in in doing so she leaned up to whisper in his ear, 'Hermione knows.'

He was about to ask just what Hermione knew, but then his brain caught up with him and he understood. His alarm must have registered on his face because Ginny laughed.

'She knows better than to say anything to Ron,' she said. 'Besides, she's got other things on her mind, I expect. She did seem excited about it, though.'

'What, really?' said Harry.

'Girls root for each other in these kinds of things, Harry,' Ginny explained. 'I would have thought blokes do, too.'

'We do,' Harry admitted, 'but you and Hermione are sort of special cases.' Then he thought of something. 'Did you tell her or did she figure it out?'

'She figured it out, of course, almost as soon as we met up at Grimmauld Place yesterday,' Ginny said. 'Which reminds me, we were apparently being "too obvious", whatever that means, so be on your guard around Ron.'

'Like I already wasn't, but thanks for the extra stress.'

'Happy to oblige. I look forward to helping you de-stress later,' she wiggled her eyebrows and left him gaping as she went to join Ron and Hermione at the breakfast table.

Breakfast itself was a quick affair, and then they were all crammed into another taxi and headed towards the home of Wendell and Monica was growing visibly more and more tense the closer they got, to the point where she actually started shaking and Ron had to wrap his arms around her to calm her down.

'It'll be all right, love,' he said.

'But what if it isn't?' Hermione wailed. 'What if I can't break the memory charm? (Harry nervously looked in the direction of the driver, who fortunately didn't seem to be paying them any attention). What if I do it wrong and their memories are permanently damaged? What if I return them to normal and they never forgive me? What if they were happier here without me? What if –'

'Shhh,' Ron embraced her tightly now, stroking her hair and her back. 'How could anyone ever possibly be happier without you? And when have you ever gotten a spell wrong, especially when it's so important? Everything's going to be fine, love. You'll see.' Harry added a reassuring hand to Hermione's shoulder and Ginny, who was seated up front, added one to her knee.

'Here we are!' announced the driver suddenly, pulling the car to a stop at the side of a road next to a nice-looking suburban house. Unlike the planned neighborhood Harry had grown up in with the Dursleys, every house and every yard here was unique, telling a little story about the people who lived in them. There were toys strewn around some, others had finely cared-for flowerbeds, there was a net on one lawn for tennis or badminton, and one yard was so overgrown it may have been untouched since the colonial period. The house they'd pulled up to was modest in size but not small, a respectable home for two practicing dentists with no children. The lawn was well taken care of and there were a few lawn ornaments, such as a tiny windmill and a wooden well mixed in among the flowers.

Harry paid the cab driver and thanked him; Hermione could neither speak nor take her eyes off the house and Ron and Ginny had to help her out of the car. As the taxi left, she seemed to snap out of it.

'Here we are,' she said faintly. She took a few deep breaths and gulped audibly. 'I don't know if I can do this.'

'You can,' said Harry without hesitation. 'You're one of the bravest people I know, Hermione. You can handle this, I know it.'

'The hard part will only last a moment, and then you'll have your parents back,' Ginny said. Hermione nodded jerkily, while the others followed her up the walk to the front door.

After ringing the doorbell, it was about ten seconds before it was opened by a man Harry recognized as a much tanner, slightly older Mr Granger than the one he remembered meeting briefly years before.

'What can I do for you?' he asked. He'd already started to pick up a bit of the local accent. There was a moment of tense silence before Hermione pulled out a blank card she'd charmed for this exact purpose.

'Good morning Mr Wilkins, my name is Hermione Granger from the Home Office. May we speak to you and your wife for a moment?'

~O~O~O~O~O~O~

~O~O~O~O~O~O~

~O~O~O~O~O~O~

Gaaaaaahhhh, I hate this chapter so much. I rewrote and deleted it so many times I lost count. I'm still not entirely happy with the result, but I realized I could be stuck on it forever and that would essentially put an end to the whole story I want to tell, so I just bit the bullet and finished it. I've just got to accept that this is as good as it's going to get, I guess.

For those of you who've been waiting two and a half years for this story, I apologize. Really, I do. This isn't the only thing I'm working on, and it's not even the only thing I'm having trouble with, but it was definitely the biggest snarl in my yarn bag. Hopefully now I've forced myself past it some other things will start to flow better as well.

Anyway, if you liked this chapter (what's the matter with you?), please leave a comment, and if you didn't (I don't blame you), I can assure you forthcoming chapters will be better. I'm just so happy to finally be done with this; you have no idea.