Chapter 16 – Welcome to Fight Club

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Disclaimer: I do not own the My Life as a Background Slytherin webcomic by Emily McGovern. And no, this is not simply a shameless plug to get you guys to check it out!

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"Where are we going?" Neville asked as they headed across the grounds.

"Just here," he answered as he brought them to a stop near the shore of the lake.

"Why here?" Neville asked in confusion.

"Because it doesn't look like we'll be disturbed out here," he replied as he looked around, confirming that there was no one in sight.

"Oh," the timid boy meekly replied, drawing a look from his companion.

"So, what's your story, Neville?" he asked, putting his hands in his pockets and looking at the boy expectantly.

"M-my story?" the boy squeaked nervously, and in a fair amount of confusion.

"Yeah, your story. Tell me about yourself. What's your family like? How'd you get here? Why do you think you're a squib"

"I– …," the boy started, once more appearing overwhelmed by the other's train of thought. "Um, well, I grew up with my grandmother, mostly."

"What's she like?" he asked, curious to hear how the boy described her.

"Uh … strict, I guess," Neville answered first, somewhat tellingly. "Very proud of our family name, wants me to uphold it and do it proud." The boy withered a bit. "I'm afraid I'm not very good at that."

He kept his expression blank as he slowly nodded. "And the rest of your family?"

"Fine, I guess," Neville said, looking confused about the entire line of questioning. "They were all really afraid that I was going to turn out all muggle, though. My Great Uncle Algie would even try to catch me off guard to force some magic out of me when I was little, and one day, it worked. He had come 'round for dinner one night and was hanging me out an upstairs window by my ankles when Great Auntie Enid offered him a meringue and he accidentally let go. But I bounced … all the way down the garden and into the road. They were all really pleased. Gran was even crying, she was so happy. And you should have seen their faces when I got in here. They thought I might not be magic enough to come, you see. Great Uncle Algie was so happy he bought me my toad."

Holy fucking hell!

He had more than a little difficulty keeping his expression level upon hearing this story of the near murder of a young Neville, and how he and his family were all apparently completely unphased by it.

"And so Gran gave me my father's wand, made me promise to be worthy of it, and now, here I am," Neville finished, though he suddenly looked nervous and fingered his wand as he did, as if he'd said too much.

"And you two exchange letters while you're here, I assume?" he asked, eyeing the other boy's wand, but not saying anything about it, or the obvious loss it represented, for the moment.

"Well, yes," Neville answered in surprise.

"And what does she think about how you've been doing here?"

Once again, Neville wilted. "She's … not happy. I'm doing terribly in my classes, I can barely cast anything, and she … she …," Neville hesitated.

"Let me guess … she thinks you're disgracing your family name with your performance," he bluntly interpreted.

Neville stiffened, but nodded sadly. "She's not wrong, though. My father—her son—was a great wizard, one of the best. I'm barely more than a squib, and everyone knows it." A tear started trickling from his eye. "Every time Gran looks at me, I always see disappointment," he admitted as the floodgates opened. "I know she's comparing me to my father … and I know I'm falling short." His shoulders shook as he took in a hiccoughing breath. "And that was all before I came here. What's it going to be like now, when we both know just how terrible I am at magic?"

He stood silently and watched as tears started falling down the boy's cheeks, his expression still level.

"May I see your wand?" he asked quietly.

Neville didn't answer, simply reaching out and handing it to the other boy.

"Thank you," he said, tucking the wand behind his waist and gently lifting the other boy's damp chin until he was looking him square in the face.

"W-what are yo–," the confused and crying boy began before he was interrupted by the other boy's fist crashing into his mouth.

Neville yelped and clapped his hands to his face. As he pulled his hands away, he stared in shock at the smear of blood from his split lip, his tears utterly forgotten. He looked at the expressionless boy in a mixture of confusion and anger.

"What the hel–?!"

This time, his nose was the target of the other boy's punch, and he staggered back with another pained yelp as he clutched his nose.

By now, the light spark of anger in his eyes had flared into a roaring flame as he glared at the other boy in outraged fury. "Stop that!" he yelled, his teeth stained crimson from his bleeding nose and lip.

His next attack wasn't the tightly controlled and relatively light blow that the previous two were. This time, he outright slugged Neville in the stomach, forcing the groaning boy to hunch over grabbing his stomach before looking up with pure, unadulterated rage.

There we go, his attacker noted in satisfaction.

With an inarticulate yell, Neville threw himself at the other boy. His punches were wild and uncontrolled, but powerful, fueled as they were by rage.

The other boy stood silently as blows rained down on him, neither dodging nor blocking the boy's attacks as the snarling Neville struck his face, stomach, sides, and everything and anything else he could reach. He felt his own nose break under the other boy's fist, tasted blood from his torn and bloody lips, and still Neville kept on, until his breaths came in panting gasps and his punches came slower and slower, eventually stopping.

Neville stood there, fury still in his eyes as he panted from both exhaustion and sheer emotion as he stared at his bloody opponent.

"Feel better?" he asked Neville, turning his head and spitting blood.

"What is this?" Neville asked in confusion.

"That, Neville, is called 'anger'," he explained, feeling the ever-present fire in his veins start repairing the damage to his body as he wiped blood from his mouth. "Handy little emotion, that," he continued. "And one you've been far, far too long without, I think."

"What?" Neville asked, raising his hands defensively as the other boy stepped closer. However, his attention was pulled from the other upon feeling massive spikes of throbbing pain from his bleeding fists.

"Some light fractures," the other boy interpreted as he took the boy's hands. "Fair amount of torn cartilage. Not to mention broken skin." Neville's eyes widened as his hands flared with heat and healed before his eyes, the skin pulling together and the stabbing pain from deep inside his knuckles fading away to nothing. "That tends to happen when you throw a bunch of bare-handed punches at someone's face if you don't know what you're doing."

"What are you talki–"

Once again, he was interrupted by the other boy's fist lightly, but still painfully, popping him in the face. However, as Neville instinctively punched back, his fist was caught in the other boy's hand.

"No no no," he told Neville, "not like that. Clench your fingers and lock them with your thumb, like this."

Neville stared in confusion as the other boy adjusted his fingers into a proper fist. But before he could say anything, he had to throw his hands up to block the other boy's return blow.

"Better," he praised as Neville threw his own punch. "But don't cock your arm all the way behind your body when you throw a punch. It doesn't give you enough extra power to be worth it, usually. It just slows you down and advertises your movements. Instead, bring your arms close to your body and snap them out, like this." He positioned himself into a boxer's stance and jabbed his fist at the clumsily blocking Neville. "Always return to this position. It's simple, and it keeps you ready to defend and attack. Great for a beginner like you."

"What the hell is all this?!" Neville finally demanded, even as he copied the other boy's position and successfully, if still clumsily, blocked two of the other boy's punches.

"Malfoy," he barked, jabbing at Neville's face. "Your grandmother." He slugged Neville in the stomach, the boy not managing to block that blow. "Your great uncle Algie." His right hook caught Neville in the cheek. "Your great aunt." He blocked Neville's punch and popped him in the nose, making it resume bleeding. "Every single one of them have convinced you that you are less, and worse, you've allowed it!"

"What the hell are you talking about?!" Neville demanded, copying the other boy and jabbing at his face and torso, though he was more adept at blocking than Neville was, so the blows didn't land.

"Your family was so ashamed of the mere thought that you might not have magic, they were willing to risk killing you!" he accused, jabbing twice at Neville's face. However, the boy had improved his defense by copying his technique, so the blows didn't land. "How old were you when your great uncle was hanging you out that window? Ten years old? Nine?! And no one, not your great aunt, not your grandmother, not even you, thought anything was wrong with this?!" His next blows had more force behind them as he struck at Neville's stomach, though the other boy blocked them. "No one even told him to stop! Your great aunt apparently just handed him a fucking snack as if this was the most normal thing in the world!" Neville finally started to copy his movements and weave from side to side as he jabbed at him, though Neville's eyes were furious and confused. "If you hadn't had magic, you would have died that day! And there was no guarantee you would have survived that fall even with magic! But did your family care? Did you?! NO! They were willing to kill you rather than bear the shame of having a member of their family be non-magical." His uppercut caught Neville square on the chin, snapping his head back. "Where's your anger over this?! These people are your family! They're supposed to love you! To care about you! To protect you!" He leaned his head back to avoid Neville's own uppercut. "And they tried to kill you!"

"We're an ancient magical family!" Neville yelled back, throwing wild, furious haymakers at the taller boy. "It was important that I have magic!"

"More important than your life?!" he demanded, catching Neville in the ear with a left hook. "Your family thinks so little of you?! You think so little of you?!"

"Shut up!" Neville shouted, throwing punch after punch in a fury, at least until his circling opponent suddenly pushed back, forcing Neville to trip over the rock he hadn't seen and fall flat on his back.

"You are worth more than that, Neville!" he growled as the pudgy boy scrambled up out of the dust and raised his fists once again. "You are worth more than some name, or the respect of some dusty old fucks who would rather torment and kill a young boy than bear the shame of having a member of their family be something different. Something freakish! You! Deserve! More!"

"And how would you know?!" Neville howled, resuming the attack.

"BECAUSE I'M YOU, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!" he shouted back, belting him in the face so hard that Neville ended up flat on his back once again.

He stood over the panting, groaning boy. "No one," he hissed, "not your family, not your teachers, not some idiot blonde schoolboy with a daddy fetish—NO ONE—has the right to convince you that you are less." Neville lay there silently, staring up at him with an unreadable expression. "No one has the right to make you feel ashamed of what you are … and what you are not," he continued, still tasting blood from his split lip. "You don't owe anyone anything, because at the end of the day, none of their opinions mean shit. It's you that you have to face in the mirror every goddamn day. It's you that you have to answer to. And it's you that you have to live with for the rest of your life." He spit blood off to the side. "They don't deserve the power to dictate your life. To make you feel weak, or afraid, or ashamed." He held out a hand to the boy. "So don't give them that power."

For a long moment, the blood-stained Neville simply stared at that hand silently. However, finally, he raised his own torn, bloody hand and clasped it, and allowed the other boy to help pull him to his feet.

"Courage isn't something you're born with," he explained to Neville. "It's a choice that you make, just like fear. You can choose to make yourself the cringing pet of anyone who looks at you funny, or you can choose to tell them to fuck off, and simply be who you want to be. It's that simple … and that hard."

Neville wiped his mouth free of blood. "It is, huh?" he asked quietly.

"Yup," he answered. "If you want to fear something, like your grandmother's disappointment, or Malfoy's curses, then those things will always control you, shaping your every move like a leash. But you can choose to tear that leash in half. You can choose not to fear them. And if you do …" He gave the boy a bloody grin. "… you have no idea what you can be capable of."

Neville nodded slowly, though he winced and grabbed at his now thoroughly broken nose. "And all of this?" he asked, gesturing around them.

"I find that anger is the easiest way to conquer fear," he answered. "And the way you've apparently just been laying down as a doormat for everyone from your family to Malfoy …," he shrugged, "anger is apparently something you need to get more in touch with." He reached out and touched the boy's nose, ignoring Neville's wince as he healed it. "It's what finally pushed you to fight back against me, after all," he explained. "Maybe it'll help you defend yourself elsewhere, too." He grimaced apologetically. "If I knew a gentler way to make this point, I would have used it, but it was a painful lesson for me, too, so this is kinda the only way I know, and I'm sorry about that. But it was still something you needed to learn."

"It's okay … I think," Neville told him somewhat uncertainly, though still with more confidence than he had when they arrived.

However, he shook his head at the boy. "Don't rush to forgive me without thinking about it," he told Neville, earning a look of surprise from the bruised and battered boy. "Forgiving others too easily and too quickly is part of what keeps you under everyone's thumb. Sometimes, it's better to ignore the pressure to simply make things right by forgiving others, and to instead actually think about it and decide whether it's something you actually want to forgive or not. This keeps others from taking advantage of you so easily, and ensures you actually stay true to yourself."

"… You're weird," Neville decided.

"Thank you," he told the boy sincerely, earning a snort. "Now come on, put your hands back up."

"Wait, why? I thought we were done?" Neville asked, though he was quick to do as he said, even if this was mostly just to block the sudden jabs he made at Neville's face.

"What, are you kidding? You still have a lot to learn if you're going to beat the shit out of Malfoy later," he told him, blocking Neville's blows and returning a flurry of his own.

"I'm doing what now?" Neville asked in confusion.

"Right now, you're working on your footwork," he told him, snapping his feet out to kick Neville in the shins to force him to actually move his feet like he needed to. "And later, you're going to goad Malfoy into challenging you to a duel, and you are going to hand his ass back to him on a silver platter."

"I am?" Neville responded, bouncing on the balls of his feet much like his opponent. "Wait, what if I don't want to?" he asked suddenly, already applying what they'd just been discussing.

"Don't you?" he asked with a grin as he broke through Neville's guard and slugged him in the face. "The boy who's tormented you, looked down on you, called you scum … you really don't want to leave him a bloody puddle of tears on the ground?"

Neville didn't answer for a moment, his eyes flaring with anger from the blow, even if he didn't lose control and start flailing at him like in the beginning. This time, Neville simply added more power to his punches as he pondered the other's words. "That … actually sounds pretty nice," he finally answered.

"You're damn right it does," he answered with delight, continuing to work on improving Neville's form. "Especially when you use nothing but 'all muggle' means to do it."

"Wait, when I use what?"

"There he is," he he told the nervously shifting Neville as he spotted Sir Flounce and his hulking entourage headed towards the Great Hall for dinner later that evening. "Feeling confident, Neville?"

"I'm not sure. I don't know what confidence feels like," the Gryffindor replied uncertainly.

He rolled his eyes at him. "Come on, you're fine. You've got this," he assured him, grabbing him by the shoulders and directing him towards blondie.

"No, I don't. I don't think I can do this," Neville whispered nervously. He had since had his wounds and clothes fixed, and he felt as fresh as if he'd just woken up from a long, deep sleep. However, despite all this, he still exuded a certain degree of nervous skittishness, especially now.

"Of course you can. The real question is whether you want to," his black-haired, green-eyed coach corrected.

"Fine. I'm not sure I want to do this," Neville complained instead.

"Of course you want to do this! How could you even say that?"

Neville groaned in exasperation.

"Look," he said, turning Neville around to face him, "in all seriousness, there's a reason I think you should go through with this. As of right now, everything we've said? Everything we've done? That's all still just in here." He tapped Neville's forehead. "Until you actually put any of this into practice, it's all just words. If you want to actually make a change, you need to act on those ideas, to make them real. You need to fight." He gestured towards the ponce to end all ponces. "And may I present Draco Malfoy, aka the perfect target? From what you've said, that idiot has tormented you—and everyone else, as far as I can tell—since the day he arrived here. He's the perfect example of everything we talked about. He's tried day after day to convince you that you are less than him, tried to grind you under his heel. And you know that he isn't going to stop on his own. Year after year, for as long as you're both at Hogwarts, he's going to continue treating you like garbage, and as long as you tolerate that treatment from him, you'll be tolerating it from everyone. So I guess the real question is whether you want to sit quietly and allow him and everyone else to walk all over you, or whether you want to finally put a stop to this, once and for all, even if it means getting your fists a bit bloody?"

Neville blinked at him. "Wow … you really like talking, don't you?"

He narrowed his eyes at the boy. "Okay, now I'm about to hit you for a whole 'nother reason," he threatened, only partly kidding.

Neville sighed. "I know, I know. I'm just … I'm nervous about going through with this."

"I understand," he replied. "I would be surprised if you weren't. In the end, though, you simply have to decide whether you want to control your fear … or allow it to control you."

Neville looked at him in indecision, but only for a moment. Glancing back at the Slytherin trio, who were currently laughing and tormenting some other student, Neville's face tightened and his eyes lost their glaze of uncertainty. With a firm nod, he strode towards Blondie and the Trolls, his expression resolute and unyielding.

"They grow up so fast," he sniffled as he watched.

"Whatcha' doin'?" a voice suddenly sounded in his ear, making him jump, a fact that was apparently rather amusing to Daphne and Blaise, though not nearly as much as it was to the beaming and giggling Tracey standing right on top of him.

"Oh, you know, starting a fight, wreaking a bit of havoc … the usual," he explained.

"Between Malfoy and … Longbottom?" Daphne observed in befuddlement as she watched Neville reach the terrible threesome and start saying something to everyone's favorite daddy's boy.

"Oh, this should go good," Blaise sardonically predicted, watching the encounter with interest.

"What exactly are you expecting to happen here?" Daphne asked curiously as they watched Malfoy and his goons start laughing at something the former had said, which it would be fair to assume was something derogatory. However, while Neville still seemed extremely nervous and uncomfortable, to his credit, he held his ground and continued speaking, and was hopefully keeping to the lines they had worked up together, too.

"Well, violence would be a good start," he answered with a grin, earning an unimpressed look. "Fine, we're hoping to get Malfoy to challenge Neville to a duel so he can kick the crap out of the ponce using some stuff I taught him. It should be good for him," he explained more thoroughly. "Uh, for Neville, that is. Not for Malfoy."

"You're trying to orchestrate a wizard's duel between the last scions of two of our oldest pureblood houses?" Daphne asked in a fair amount of confusion and alarm.

"Do what now?" Tracey asked, glancing back and forth between them both.

"No, I'm just trying to help one kid get over his inadequacy issues and learn to stand up for himself by whaling on his bully," he replied.

"And you have absolutely no idea how this can affect their families, which are not far removed from royal bloodlines in our culture, do you," Daphne didn't really ask.

"Why would it?" he asked in puzzlement. "Their families aren't fighting, Draco and Neville are."

"Yes, who are the heirs and future lords of their families," she explained in exasperation.

"You're not saying they can lose their family's titles and money and junk to the other just because of some stupid schoolyard fight, are you?" he asked, not really sure what to expect from these people anymore.

"Of course not," Daphne replied. "They're still minors. Something like that could only happen if they were legal adults, and even then, the matriarch or patriarch of their families would likely need to be involved. But even still, what they do reflects on their families. If one fights another, that signals that their families are in conflict, and if one loses a fight like this, his entire family loses face and could potentially demand restitution from the other, if they feel the incident was unwarranted and the insult grave enough."

He simply blinked at the blonde. "You guys are weird," he declared, shaking his head and heading towards his protege and his hopefully soon-to-be victim.

"I … I can't Blaise," Daphne whined. "I swear, this idiot's going to end up turning our entire world inside out, and when someone points it out to him, he's just going to say, '… huh …'."

"That's alright," Blaise comforted, wrapping her arm around the girl. "Tell mamma all about it."

"Ah, crap," they heard him curse upon spotting Snape stalking towards the Great Hall, and the quartet of boys currently standing between him and it. "Hey, quick question," he said quickly, turning back towards the girls, and Daphne in particular. "Those weird-ass rules you guys have for all this junk … I don't suppose one of them says something like, I don't know, teachers are not allowed to stop someone from challenging another to a duel, does it?"

"Of course not," Daphne answered, causing him to curse under his breath once again. "I mean, once the challenge has been laid out, they're not allowed to interfere, but–"

"Perfect!" He started running towards the hopefully brewing fight.

"Wait, what are you doing?" Daphne called after him.

"Stall him!" he yelled back, pointing at the approaching head of their house.

"What? 'Stall him'?" Daphne asked, flustered. "How are we supposed to–"

"On it!" Tracey happily interrupted, scampering towards Snape.

"… We're going to get expelled today, aren't we?" Blaise asked as they watched the oncoming collision.

"Very likely, Blaise," Daphne tiredly replied.

"Would you get a load of this guy?" Malfoy mocked Neville to his bodyguards, who both gave a totally sincere and in no way sycophantic laugh. "You hear the stuff he's saying? Looks like Madam Pomfrey managed to grow you a spine after all, Longbottom. I guess magic really can do anything."

"Well, hello again, everybody," the black-haired newcomer happily greeted them all, earning rather displeased looks from Malfoy and Company, and a surprised look from Neville.

Sorry, man. With Snape on the way, we need to move up the timetable, he mentally apologized to the boy, since they planned for Neville to do this part by himself.

Though he also suspected Neville wasn't exactly brokenhearted by his assistance, if the boy's grateful expression meant anything.

"Ugh. You again," the ponce groaned. "Can't you tell where you aren't wanted?"

He shrugged. "You know, I'd ask you the same thing, but the fact that you're ever even in the same room as another human being says that you can't."

Some of their crowd of onlookers laughed at his comment, which didn't exactly do wonders for Malfoy's complexion, which was now a mottled red. However, he didn't let Malfoy interject, knowing they likely didn't have much time.

"But as for Neville here," he clapped his arm around the pudgy boy's shoulder, "well, I think it's clear to everyone why you're so desperate to make fun of him."

"Oh? And why's that?" Malfoy asked with a sneer.

"Well, because you're afraid of him, of course," he answered, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Dead silence reigned in the circle, eventually broken by Malfoy's hysterical laughter.

"Me?! Afraid of him?!" he managed to get out, tears of laughter sliding down his cheeks.

Some of the mutters in the circle of onlookers seemed to express the same sentiment.

"Of course you are. I mean, we both know Neville could kick your ass any day of the week," he casually explained.

"He can?" Neville whispered in his ear, instinctively reverting back to his nervous, cringing self.

He simply tightened his grip supportively on the boy's shoulder in response.

"You're dreaming! I could wipe the floor with Longbottom in a duel with one hand tied behind my back!" Malfoy boasted, to cheers of support from his lackeys, as well as a few members of the crowd.

From the corner of his eye, he spotted Snape approaching, the wildly gesturing form of Tracey unable to keep him back much longer.

Now or never, he thought to himself.

"Yeah, yeah, Malfoy," he told the boy as patronizingly as possible. "You think you could take Neville in a duel? Well, if you say so."

There he goes, he thought happily as he watched the boy's temper take hold of him, right on schedule.

"Fine!" he snapped, his crimson face matching Neville's Gryffindor tie. "I'll prove it!" Malfoy turned to Neville for the first time in several minutes. "You'd better thank your new friend for screwing you over, Longbottom, because I'm challenging you to a duel! And everyone will see just how–"

"I accept," Neville spoke up, quite clearly.

Malfoy really seemed taken aback by the response, as did most of the wildly muttering circle of students. However, Malfoy quickly recovered. "Oh, you accept, do you?" he laughed, smirking broadly. "Well, that's just great. Now I get to kick your arse, and there's nothing anyone can do about it." He gave a wickedly gleeful laugh. "Tonight, trophy roo–"

"Um, excuse me," a certain green-eyed monkey wrench interjected. "But I believe the standard practice with duels is that one party issues the challenge, and the other decides the time, place, and rules. Correct?"

Malfoy seemed to deflate a bit at that, but his smirk was soon back in full force. "Fine. Longbottom wants to pick when and where he gets his arse handed to him? He can. I don't have a problem with that." He folded his arms and looked at Longbottom in amused expectation.

Despite how they'd been talking about Neville, most everyone had actually been looking at either Malfoy or their resident green-eyed mischief-maker the whole time. But now, for the first time in several minutes, Neville was actually the focus of everyone's attention. To his credit, though, he didn't cringe, or whine, or try to scurry away. Instead, he simply took a deep breath, and carried on with the plan.

"Here," he said clearly, causing Malfoy's pale eyebrows to raise halfway to his hairline. "Now," he continued, causing mass waves of excited mutters to sweep through their crowd. But it was his next response that truly shocked most everyone there.

"No wands."

Malfoy took a moment to respond. "No wands?" he finally sputtered. "What do you mean, 'no wands'?" What kind of wizard's duel doesn't use wands?"

"Actually, I don't think you ever specified that you were challenging Neville to a wizard's duel," their completely unbiased mediator happily pointed out. "And as the challenged party, Neville has the right to decide on the weapons, no matter what kind of duel it is."

Malfoy clearly struggled to find a way to argue against this, but couldn't. However, something suddenly seemed to occur to him, and his uncertain look was once again replaced with smug confidence. "Fine. You want us to brawl like muggles? I don't have a problem with that. It makes sense, even. A squib like yourself couldn't possibly hope to stand a chance in a proper wizard's duel, so I guess it's fair to give you a handicap." Malfoy's smirk deepened. "But, like with any proper duel, I still get to choose a second, of course." He turned and appraised his hulking, muscle-bound shadows. "And I think I'll choose Goyle for mine." The ogre in question cracked his knuckles threateningly, his face showing nothing but dumb, simple pleasure as he stared down at the comparatively tiny Neville Longbottom.

"Fine," Neville agreed simply. "Then mine's Harry."

As if synchronized, Malfoy's and Goyle's faces fell dramatically, and they turned decidedly less confident gazes on the pleasantly waving Harry Potter.

A nervous-looking Goyle began massaging his right hand in pained remembrance as Malfoy suddenly looked paler than ever.

"… –telling you, I bet a ton of students would go to that, Professor! I know I would!" Tracey's voice cut through the crowd's excited murmur as she and Snape finally arrived.

"I don't care, Davis!" Snape barked, clearly at the end of his rope. "I am not holding 'an extracurricular module on skulking, lurking, sneering, cape-swishing, and the fundamentals of flouncing'!"

"How about just a private tutoring session, then?" Tracey begged, looking so earnest that he honestly couldn't tell whether she was simply trying to keep stalling Snape like he asked, or if she was actually serious.

It didn't make much difference either way, though.

"No means no, Davis!" her head of house snapped in exasperation. "Though if you are truly desperate for work, I'm sure a few sessions of detention would …" Snape trailed off as he spotted an ashen-looking Malfoy standing across from Neville and–

"Potter," Snape growled, practically on pure reflex.

"Professor," he responded, perfectly mimicking the tone of the "adult."

"And what might you be doing here, hmm?" Snape asked in his oily voice, a wicked gleam in his eye. "Disturbing your classmates? Creating illegal gatherings in the hall? Verbally assaulting Mr. Malfoy, perhaps?"

"Arbitrating a duel, actually," he answered candidly.

Even in the crowd, he could faintly hear Daphne mutter "Oh, for Merlin's sake!" at his blunt confession.

Snape soon regained his mental balance, however, and his look of surprise was replaced with triumph. "Is that so? Well, it seems a detention is in order, then. After all, fighting is strictly forbidden at Hogwarts." His lips curled up in a sneer. "Even for celebrities."

"Oh, I'm not duelling," he corrected Snape, gesturing at the two boys next to him. "Neville and Sir Ponce-a-lot are."

Snape's dark eyebrows lifted in surprise at that. After glancing at Malfoy and Neville, however, a condescending smirk spread across his face. "Well … thrilling though I'm sure that would be …," he paused as a mocking chuckle escaped his throat, making it perfectly clear what he thought of any duel involving Neville, "I'm afraid I must cancel this, um … 'duel'." His smile seemed wider than ever as he stared down at Neville contemptuously.

Neville's response was not what Snape expected, though. Rather than cringe and scurry away as he had in the past at even a sideways glance from the potion's master, his back straightened and a furious light filled his eyes as he glared openly back at Snape.

Atta' boy, he mentally cheered as he watched Snape's jaw drop slightly in shock at Neville's behavior. Even better, Neville didn't stop there.

"Apologies, professor," Neville muttered through furiously clenched teeth, "but an official challenge to a duel has been levied by Draco of House Malfoy, and I have accepted. Which means there is nothing you can do to stop this. With all due respect."

That last part was clearly tacked on as an afterthought.

Snape's eyes widened in astonishment at both the boy's newfound spine and his words. Looking to Malfoy, he received more than just confirmation.

"He wants us to duel without wands!" Malfoy complained. "That can't be allowed, can it? I mean, what kind of wizard's duel doesn't use wands?"

"You issued the challenge," their green-eyed mediator spoke up before Snape could. "Neville decided the terms. That's how it goes. If Neville had challenged you, you would be deciding the terms."

Snape's face looked like he was sucking on a lemon. "I'm afraid," he began slowly through clenched teeth, "that Potter is correct." It sounded physically painful for him to utter those words. "If you were foolish enough to challenge Longbottom to a duel," he paused to glare venomously at Malfoy, "then he may decide the terms." His darkly glittering eyes fell on Neville. "And if he wants you to brawl like uncivilized muggles, then brawl you shall. Disgraceful though such terms are to the name of wizard."

To his credit, Neville didn't rise to the professor's bait. "So what say you, Malfoy?" Neville asked the slightly shorter and much skinnier boy. "Are you going to fight, or run?"

Malfoy's eyes flared as he stared furiously back at Neville. "I'll fight," he spat. "And I'll grind your fat face into the ground, you worthless squib."

This news was received with much excitement by their crowd of onlookers.

"Fight! Fight! Fight!" several students began chanting as Malfoy and Neville began stripping off their outer robes and handed their wands to Snape and Harry, respectively.

"Kick his arse, Neville!" many other students who would never have even deigned to speak to Neville on any other day cheered, evidence of both just how skilled Malfoy was at making friends and how fickle a crowd could be.

"Oh, Merlin … what have I done?," he faintly heard Neville mutter as the rush of the moment faded and the reality of what was happening started to sink in.

"Place your bets! Place your bets here!" the red-haired Weasley twins cried as they circled through the crows exchanging slips of paper for fistfuls of coins. "Who will win, the sneaky little snake, or the brave and bold lion? Place your bets!"

He was starting to suspect some bias on their part, oddly enough.

"You really are allergic to subtlety, aren't you?" Daphne complained in exasperation as his friends finally rejoined him on the edge of the crowd, which was now backing up to leave room for the imminent fight between the angry-looking Malfoy and the increasingly pale Neville. "And look, now the headmaster is here. This just gets better and better, doesn't it?"

Sure enough, the bearded Professor Fabulous, today sporting stunning baby-blue robes encircled by moving images of birds, had emerged from the Great Hall and was conversing with Snape. And given they way their eyes fell on the black-haired instigator of this little incident, it was clear who they considered responsible.

Sheesh. I get blamed for everything around here, he thought with amusement.

"Oh, would you just relax and enjoy the show, Daph?" Blaise cajoled her. "And spot me a few galleons while you're at it. I think I left my money pouch in my room," she added as she rummaged about in her pockets for money as the Bookie Twins approached.

"Sorry, Blaise. I need it for my own bet," Daphne answered smugly as she strode up to place her wager.

"Aw, dammit!" Blaise complained, turning her pockets inside out to reveal nothing but coinless lint, which was generally not considered a valuable commodity.

"Ooh, what's this? A Slytherin wagering on a Gryffindor to win?" one of the twins exclaimed dramatically upon taking Daphne's bet. "For shame! Where is your sense of house loyalty?"

"Longbottom outweighs Malfoy by at least four stone," Daphne said dryly upon taking her slip of paper. "My loyalty is to common sense."

"Common sense?" the other twin repeated in feigned confusion. "Well that doesn't sound very witchy at all! Are you sure you're in the right school?"

"Don't worry, Fred. She's only a first year. She still has time to learn the proper manner of magical thinking," twin one assured him.

"Oh, quite right, Fred," twin two agreed. "Ah, youth." He tousled a squawking Daphne's hair before moving on through the crowd.

"Ooh, they gonna get it," Tracey predicted as they watched Daphne glare murderously after their retreating backs, her hair in disarray.

"You can say that again. You can practically see their names going on 'the list'," Blaise agreed as Daphne made her way back through the crowd, quietly fuming and smoothing her hair.

They didn't get any farther than that before things started shaping up in the circle, though.

"Alright, Longbottom," Malfoy announced, bereft of robes and tie as he rolled his shoulders loose. "I hope you're ready, because I'm finally going to give you the beating you deserve!"

In sharp contrast to his boasting, Neville didn't say a word. He simply shot a slightly nervous look at his boxing instructor, who gave him an encouraging nod. Swallowing, Neville nodded back. Turning back to Malfoy, he lifted his fists in the defensive stance he had been taught, resolve somewhat filling his nervous face.

Snape and Dumbledore joined the fringes of the crowd while Malfoy and Neville began circling each other, both hesitant to throw the first punch. For Malfoy, this seemed to be discomfort at fighting physically—or really just doing any of his fighting himself, given that he usually contracted this out to his lackeys. For Neville, though, this was due to a war going on inside him. You could see it in his face. He was torn between the meek, cringing personality that had been his default for so many years, and the desire to stand up for himself and embrace his anger like they had talked about. Every time his face started showing confidence, it was immediately undercut by anxiety and uncertainty. His fists clenched and unclenched as he fought with himself.

Leaving himself completely open to Malfoy's punch.

The crowd jeered and groaned as Neville staggered back, clasping a hand to his broken nose as blood gushed down his face.

"Come on, Neville," he muttered as he watched the boy stare at his blood-stained hand as if in shock that this was really happening. "Shake it off. Get angry."

"Did that feel good, little squib?" Malfoy taunted, apparently gaining some confidence from the successful hit, even as he shook his hand in pain.

"Get 'im, Malfoy!" one of his goons yelled from the crowd, proving that they actually were capable of speech, much to a certain black-haired boy's surprise.

Malfoy apparently took his words to heart as he lashed out at Neville once again … and then a few times more. Each punch was met with a groan from the crowd as his fist crashed into Neville's face with a series of wet smacks from the blood. All the while, Neville simply staggered back, a dazed expression on his face as he stared at Malfoy without even trying to defend himself.

Shit. He's in shock, he interpreted with a groan.

"You know … I must say," Malfoy panted, shaking his hand and grinning at the still non-responsive Neville, "it actually feels pretty damn good to get my hands dirty and put a little shit like you in your place."

Oh, hell no!

"Is that it, Neville?!" he yelled over the crowd. "Is that what you're made of?! Malfoy's scum! He's a cringing little coward who struts around like he's ten feet tall, but runs whenever anyone looks at him sideways!" Malfoy, and most of the students in the crowd, stared at him in shock at his words, but he simply kept going. "Are you really going to just lie down and let someone like that beat you?! Do you really think so little of yourself?! He's nothing! So if you let him win, then what does that say about you?!"

Dead silence reigned throughout the hallway answered his shouts as everyone stared at him in open-mouthed astonishment. But he didn't care. His eyes were on Neville … and Neville was looking back.

Come on, he silently begged. Get angry.

Neville's eyes slowly narrowed, and his fists clenched.

A furious, nearly purple Malfoy opened his mouth, but whatever he was about to say died as Neville snapped his gaze to him and he saw the look in the "little squib's" eyes.

The room echoed with a resounding crack as Malfoy's nose practically exploded under Neville's fist. Malfoy howled as he clutched his face, blood pouring from between his fingers as the skin around his eyes already started darkening into matching black eyes from his thoroughly broken nose.

The twisted snarl etched onto Neville's face said this was just the beginning, though.

As Malfoy threw blind, enraged swings at his opponent, Neville stepped forward, crudely blocking the blows with his forearms as he stepped inside Malfoy's reach and slugged him in the face once again.

Their positions were now completely reversed, as the furiously yelling Neville was now the one laying blow after blow on the stunned, silently staggering Malfoy. There was none of the grace and precision imparted on Neville in their practice earlier. Now, there was only raw, unflinching fury as his fists fell again and again on Malfoy's cringing form.

The crowd of students loved it, cheering with the kind of vicious satisfaction only children can know as the boy they all hated so much was savagely beaten by a boy they would have spit on any other day, but now hailed as a hero.

As the onlookers jeered and hollered, Malfoy tried fighting back, but to no avail. He was practically blind from the tears his broken nose had forced into his eyes, and even when he landed a punch, Neville simply shrugged them off like water breaking on a rock, too furious and swept up in the moment to even notice.

Malfoy's backward staggering finally came to a halt as he tripped over his own feet and was sent sprawling across the cold stone floor. But Neville wasn't done. Still snarling, the enraged boy straddled his downed opponent, and just kept on swinging.

The crowd whooped and cheered as he did, reveling with every blow … at first. But Neville didn't stop, and the room soon fell into a deep, disturbed silence, except for the dull, wet smacks of Neville's fists against Malfoy's face, and the sad, small whimpering of the boy beneath him.

"Merlin," Daphne breathed as they watched the display of pure merciless savagery in the formerly gentle boy.

Oh no, he thought. Shoving people aside, he rushed towards them.

"Neville! Neville!" he yelled as he grabbed the snarling boy mid-swing and bodily pulled him off the sobbing, bleeding Malfoy. "It's over! He's down!"

Neville didn't seem to hear him. Yelling mindlessly, he struggled and fought tooth and nail to pull himself free and throw himself back at Malfoy.

"Neville!" he yelled again, shaking him.

With that, the world finally seemed to come back to the boy, and his thrashing ceased. Cautiously, he let Neville go and stepped back, watching him carefully and ready to grab him again if necessary.

It wasn't.

Neville simply stood there, staring down at the beaten and bloody Malfoy lying piteously on the ground. Slowly, he turned from the boy and looked at his own hands. They were stained a deep crimson, Malfoy's blood mixing with his own from his torn knuckles.

Turning, he half stumbled, half ran away, the crowd of students hastily parting to let him through as everyone started muttering and whispering about what they just witnessed, glancing uncomfortably at Neville's retreating form.

Somehow, though, the boy who started all this found his gaze drawn to something else. Turning, he looked over the head of the whispering students to see Professor Dumbledore staring after Neville, an unreadable look on his face. Lowering his gaze, the towering professor looked closely at all the disturbed children whispering to each other as they glanced at Neville, the moaning Malfoy, or even Harry himself. Dumbledore finally turned to Harry, and his stony expression broke into a disturbing smile.

He shivered as he met the man's gaze. Despite how bright those blue eyes were, in that moment, they seemed very dark, and very, very cold.

He didn't have time to deal with that, though. Turning, he darted after Neville, not noticing how the gathered students pulled back from him just as they did for Neville, or how Dumbledore's smile deepened upon spotting this. His focus was on finding Neville, and on the tiny drops of blood scattered down the hallway that were leading him to the boy. After following the trail for a bit, he drew up short upon reaching a corner in the hallway, as he heard Neville's faint sobbing coming from just the other side.

"Neville?" he gently called out.

"… yeah," Neville whispered back hoarsely.

Turning, he leaned back against the wall and dropped to a crouch. "You okay?"

"… no," the boy answered honestly. While he couldn't see Neville, he knew the boy was looking at his blood-stained hands. "But I will be … I think."

"Do you want to talk abou–"

"No," Neville cut him off. "I don't want to talk. I just … I'm sorry, but I just want to be alone right now."

With a faint rustle of cloth against stone, Neville stood up and began walking away.

He didn't follow.

"Did I do the right thing?" he quietly asked. "I thought I was helping him. Did I make things worse?"

Daphne stepped up beside him. "I don't know, Harry," she answered honestly.

He nodded, not really expecting any other answer. "Did someone finally scrape Malfoy off the floor?"

"One of his goons did, yeah," Blaise answered. "Snape made sure they got him off to the hospital wing. He didn't look too bad. Nothing Madam Pomfrey can't fix, anyway. His pride, though … I suspect that's beyond anyone's power to fix now."

"Stomped by the 'filthy little squib'," Tracey remarked, "and left crying and bloody on the floor in front of everyone and their brother? Yeah, there's no coming back from that."

"Well, at least some good came from all this," he commented, feeling marginally better.

"I'll say," Daphne agreed, hefting her new bulging money pouch with a smile. "But I hope you're done playing with Longbottom for a bit, because we really need to work on my plans for getting past a certain gauntlet to retrieve a certain special rock."

He shot her a bemused look. "I thought this whole thing was my plan?"

"Oh, it was, but I've decided I would be more comfortable if it was my plan now," Daphne told him with a gentle pat on the cheek.

"But … but …," he tried rebutting.

"Don't bother. She does that," Blaise told him. "It's easier to just go along with it. Trust me, I know."

Tracey nodded in fervent agreement.

"Quite right," Daphne agreed unabashedly, heading down the hall and leaving everyone else to catch up and follow. "Now, the first thing we should do …"

He shook his head and smiled as he watched the girl just assume command of their whole enterprise. As she kept talking, Blaise began miming her behind her back, while Tracey linked her arm with his and began gazing distractedly at virtually everything but the talking blonde, just as she had been ever since Daphne mentioned the word "plan." He chuckled at the sight.

"… so what do you think?" Daphne finally finished, looking at him expectantly.

He smiled more deeply. "I think I'm really glad you three are my friends," he said fondly.

Daphne blinked and stared at him in surprised confusion, while Blaise froze with her mouth open mid-mimic to do the same. Even Tracey paused in her distracted gazing to look at him.

"I'm … glad you're my friend too," Daphne admitted with a faint blush.

"Same here," Blaise agreed, giving him a warm, genuine smile that was a far cry from her usual sardonic, teasing grins. "You big softy."

Though she apparently couldn't keep her wry grin off her face for long.

"I'm happy you're my friend too," Tracey said with a bright smile. She squeezed his arm more tightly and rested her head against his shoulder as they all continued walking in comfortable silence.

"… You weren't listening to a word I said, were you?" Daphne finally realized.

"Not really."

Author's note: I'm back, everybody! Sorry for the hiatus. Life caught up with me for a bit (that sneaky little bastard just can't take a hint!), and on top of that, I had some difficulty writing this chapter. But here's hoping I can get back on schedule with my updates now!

Also, I'd like to thank you all for your comments, both on the story in general and in response to my previous author's note. I really appreciated all of them :)

Till next time!