Note: Here you go, the final 5 chapters of Potter – The Stone. It's best to show all 5 of these chapters in one large file. Let me know what you think!

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Potter – The Stone
Chapter 18
By Cory D. Rose
© 2005
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Ranma moved through the deeper parts of the castle. Even after all these months of wandering around at night when Harry was asleep, he was still amazed. No matter where he went he always found something that could catch his attention.

One night he spent about an hour jumping from staircase to staircase even as they moved around. One night he even explored the towers and got to look out over the land for miles around. The Astronomy tower had the best view though. Now he was deep inside the castle, even lower than the dungeons and from the amount of dust he was wading through, no one had been here in a quite some time.

He wasn't sure, because magic could make rooms bigger on the inside than the outside, that he might be well below the surface of the lake. Though he could be wrong. Lighting was also nonexistent and he was holding up a bright ball of Ki to light up the area.

On the other side of the room a portrait watched Ranma moving around the room. Ranma didn't really pay attention to the moving paintings since he didn't consider them a threat. Though if he talked to them they were usually more than willing to tell him a bit of their history. He still hadn't gotten around to telling Harry about that aspect.

He spotted and archway on the other side of the room and moved past several collumns. Opening his senses he could tell that a barrier of magic covered the entrance. A gentle red glow covered the whole entrance and Ranma wondered just when it was created. Even now he could feel the power radiating off it.

"Interesting." He muttered.

"And what might that be?"

Ranma jumped back, scanning his surroundings for the voice. "Where?"

"Idiot! Look above eye level." The voice sneered.

Blinking, Ranma turned to look up at the portrait. "Oh, hello."

The man in the portrait, dressed in school robes that were several centuries out of date, rolled his eyes. "You aren't supposed to be in this room. Leave."

Frowning, Ranma glanced around. "Maybe later, right now I'm exploring."

"Leave, or you will be removed."

Ranma smirked a little and wondered just what the painting could actually do. "Yeah right."

The man's lips curled upward a little, though Ranma wouldn't call it a smile by any stretch of the imagination. "So you want to challenge me?"

"Why not? I'm just looking around. I'm not even causing a problem or anything."

"This room is abandoned for a reason boy. I'm simply the sentry to what lays beyond that archway.

"Sounds fun. What's back there?" Ranma asked.

"A mistake."

Ranma shrugged. "Open the door, I'll check it out for you. It can't still be around after all this time."

"It's been around since the school was founded idiot."

He glared at the painting. Why did half the wizarding world have to treat each other so badly? "I'll still check it out."

"There have been three others that went in there and they never returned."

The painting sneered, looking down his nose at Ranma.

"So open it up already."

"You accept the consequences?"

"Sure." Ranma said with a smirk.

The painting nodded at him and the doorway flared with light and with a little pop, the doorway was open. "Don't say I didn't warn you fool."

The air in the room suddenly moved, sucked into the now open doorway, along with quite a bit of dust. Ranma could even feel the floor vibrating for some reason and grinned. The amount of magic in the walls seemed to have increased ten fold as the shield went down.

He ignored the painting as he casually walked over to the doorway and looked through into the room beyond. He wasn't to surprised to find that it was a staircase leading deeper into the bowels of the castle. His magic sight lit up the whole area along the stairs.

Whoever had cast the spells along these stairs had been very powerful. The magic was even stronger here than it was in the upper areas of the castle. He thought about to when he used his Ki to touch the magic on the walls in the Occlumancy room and figured this magic was about twenty times as strong.

After a couple of minutes of going down several hundred yards of stairs, he finally reached the bottom and stepped out onto a landing. It was about twenty feet by twenty feet surrounded by nearly black water. Lighting was filtering down from somewhere high above.

"Now what's so dangerous about an under ground pool?" Ranma asked himself as he surveyed the area.

There wasn't anything obviously dangerous about the place. He walked over to the edge of the platform. He couldn't seen anything beyond the surface, just that it was gently shifting around. His senses were telling him something dangerous was nearby.

Nothing he could see anyway. Then he spotted a ghost standing on the water, several feet from the edge of the platform. He moved a little closer and saw that it was that ghost that he saw in the dungeons all the time. "The Bloody Baron?"

It looked at him, the ghostly blood dripping off its ghostly body and into the water, where it vanished. "Leave this place, Muggle."

The voice was dry and dead, but it didn't bother Ranma. "I don't think so."

"You don't have the power to survive, Muggle. No one does. Get out before you awaken the danger."

Ranma didn't like being told what to do. "What exactly is the danger of this place?"

"Leave, now." The baron threatened.

"Nope, got to find out what it is first. I've faced monsters before, even the King of Phoenix mountain, this thing can't be as bad as that arrogant moron."

The baron seemed to just stare at him for several seconds, ghostly blood dripping into the water, and then he just sneered. "Then don't complain when you end up dead this day, muggle."

Seconds later the baron vanished through the wall on the far side of the room. Ranma's senses were also telling him that the danger in the room was growing by the second. He scanned the area, walking slowly around the platform, but then stopped and spun around to stare at the water.

"The…w-water?"

His eyes widened a bit as the water started to shift and bubble. This was exactly what he wanted to see. A true monster, something for him to fight just for the fun of it. It was one of the things he missed about coming to Hogwarts with Harry. His free time was very limited, but if he had a monster to fight, he could work off some steam.

Though that large dog might make a good sparing partner too, but it wasn't here, and this thing was. Made sense to him. "Bring it on."

Like a wave of black sludge, the water rose out of the pool and tried to drown him. Smirking, a sphere of energy formed between his hands and fired into the sludge. The energy ripped through the monster and it gave out some kind of scream.

Jumping into the air, Ranma fired off about a dozen balls of Ki into the pool and made the monster writhe around in pain. The screaming kept up, but as Ranma landed on the platform several long tendrils shot out of the muck. He dodged and fired several more times, but the thing sludge wasn't making any noise.

A tendril suddenly grabbed him by the ankle and pulled him into the air. Ranma cursed and twisted around, formed a large Ki blast, and fired it right into the center of the muck. The stuff rippled and writhed for several seconds, but not enough gain his freedom from the stupid tendril.

It whipped him around and slammed him into the wall a few times, against the platform, and then suddenly retracted. Pulling him into the sludge. He cursed, knowing that he wouldn't be able to free himself as easily from inside the thing.

Just as he went under he saw several ghosts hovering above the sludge watching his fight. All of them looked quite sad, except for the bloody baron, who appeared as cold as normal. Ranma wasn't that worried though. He had several moves left, even when it looked like he was going to lose.

He reached out with his aura and felt the magic around him and remembered what he just learned with Harry. His aura exploded outward and he channeled the magic from around him through his Ki. That strange screaming filled the room once more and he poured on the power.

All around him the sludge started to writhe and shift, pulling him deeper and deeper. His eyes snapped open, glowing brightly as power exploded outward. The monster seemed to just implode as the room lit up with light. Ranma yelled as he found himself standing on the bottom of the pool.

He stood there gasping for air, his aura still flaring brightly. The ghosts were just staring around them in shock. They were the only witnesses to the event and even then only one of the ghosts knew what Ranma had just accomplished. The baron floated down to the floor and moved over to Ranma.

"Amazing."

Ranma waved his hand. "That thing wasn't that tough."

"Slytherin himself created that thing to guard the castle, but it would kill anything that got close to it. The founders couldn't destroy it and even Rowena foretold that it would live on long after they were gone."

"Interesting."

"Slytherin left that for whoever got rid of the monster." The baron said and pointed to the base of the platform.

Ranma turned and saw that a door had appeared. He used his senses to scan the door before he stepped through and realized that the room hadn't been touched in years. Maybe even a thousand years like the ghost suggested. It was a small space, about six foot by ten foot.

More of an alcove carved into the rock than a room. Walking through the doorway, he made his way to the end where a small marble pedestal sat. Sitting on the pedestal was a thin book glowing with magic. Tendrils of magic that he could see with his newest sensing abilities trailed from the book to the walls.

Behind him, the bloody baron hovered above the floor, watching him silently. Ignoring the ghost, Ranma refocused his attention on the pedestal. Some presence in the alcove knew he was there and swirled around him. After several seconds, the magic around the book dissipated and another ghost suddenly formed in front of him.

This one stood was unlike any ghost Ranma had encountered yet. He examined Ranma for several seconds before grinning. "Amazing, I knew one of your kind would come along eventually."

"Who are you?"

"I'm the last living…I guess impression, of Salazar Slytherin." The ghost of the founder said with dignity.

Ranma heard several gasps of shock behind him, but ignored them. "Ranma Saotome."

Unlike a regular ghost, Salazar looked like a normal person. Except that one could see right through him. "Now, my boy, let me get a good look at you."

Anyone that lived at the castle knew the kind of reputation that Slytherin had, but Ranma knew that people never got things right. The ghost stared at him for several seconds and Ranma felt a bit of magic directed towards him. After the scan was over Slytherin had to smirk.

"Excellent, I knew I was right."

"What are you talking about?"

"Even when I was alive, there were legends of Muggles like you. Muggles that could surpass their limits and become something so much more. Merlin himself taught that Muggles could become magical if they wanted to, but instead the majority of them were lazy and useless. They would much rather run around killing everything in sight, then working a little bit to achieve true power."

Ranma knew that his early childhood, under his father's thumb was anything but…lazy.

"I spent a good portion of my life searching for a Magical Muggle. A contradiction in terms, true, but an idea that fascinated me. I traveled the world looking for them, but even though I found countless hints buried in history book, I never found a living example. Those hints sent me down many paths, explorer, warrior wizard, prisoner, teacher, even the dark arts."

"How does this apply to me?" Ranma asked. As fascinating at the story was, he was about to yawn from boredom.

"You are what I've been searching for all these years. That monster out there could never have been defeated by a regular wizard, I created it to fight off an army of dark wizards. But a muggle with magic could bring it down with only a little trouble due to the type of magic you wield. Life energy itself." Slytherin said happily.

"You mean my Ki?"

The ghost nodded. "Yes, whatever the name, it comes down to manipulating

life energy to direct magic and leach the rest from your surroundings. Just

my looking at you, I can see you have a rudimentary core of magic forming within you. Within a few weeks it will be fully formed and you will be the first muggle in thousands of years that has learned how to wield magic. Just like out ancestors did."

Slytherin's grin nearly split his face. "That book behind me is everything I've collected on magical muggles. Stories, theories, and even some experimental spells. I give it to you and hope you will use it well."

With a shrug, Ranma just nodded his head. "Sure."

Waving his hand, the ghost conjured up a pair of chairs. "Sit, I'd like to learn everything about you. Tell me about your life."

"Ah…well, my life really began when I was only five years old. When I was taken from my mother and dragged on ten year martial arts training trip…" Ranma started.

Slytherin listened eagerly, a gleam in his eyes that could be best explained as a twinkle.

oooooooooo

A couple of days later, Ranma kicked Harry out of the trunk and told him to practice on his own for the day. Harry wasn't sure why, but Ranma was holding several books, so he didn't complain too much.

Ranma must've come up with a new training idea. Now he was going to research it or something. Harry put on his blue silk shirt and pants again. The house elves had just returned them after a thorough washing.

"Alright, but I may be able to help you if you need it." Harry said.

Ranma shook his head and held up a thin book. "Naw, I got this down, but I want to practice a few things that might be dangerous. I found some interesting research material that gave me some ideas."

"I do know more about magic than you do Ranma." Harry insisted.

"So, I'll do this on my own."

"Let me bring Hermione by, she's a marvel with it comes to fishing information out of books."

Ranma made shooing motions. "Out."

"Yeah, yeah. I'll be down by the lake if you need me."

"Great!"

He didn't see anyone as he moved through the castle Harry sent his senses out to scan the area. Now he wasn't all that good at this particular skill and knew it would be a few years before he mastered it completely, but he did sense a couple of people moving around nearby. They were easy enough to avoid. So a few minutes later Harry stepped outside. As usual the morning practice took place before the sun came up.

Harry was pretty sure that one of them was Snape, but he wasn't completely sure. His morning practice took two full hours and had him performing a number of the Saotome mid air kata thirty feet above the ground. Because it was so early he tried to make as little noise as possible.

He was still working with the weighted clothing as well, making his practice even harder. While his body went through the motions, he focused his mind as well, something Ranma had recently taught him, allowing him to do things that would have amazed the professors. Several people did witness his early morning workout, but they were only students.

Then he did something he probably shouldn't have done outside, by the lake. He went through his cool down workout, performing a number of stretches and movements that increased his range of motion. This included doing the splits, a number of rolls, and handstand push ups.

All of it took quite a bit of muscle development and control. He really should haven known better than to do this in full view of the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw towers. For he never noticed the hundred or so girls watching him from the windows of each tower. Some of them nearly hanging out the windows looking at him in awe.

Once he finished that he took his shirt off, tossed it to the ground, and ran around quidditch pitch several times. By the time he finished this the sun was well up and breakfast would be served in about half an hour. He grabbed his shirt and headed back for the tower, the shirt slung over his shoulder.

"Potter." A voice sneered.

Harry stopped inside the door and looked over at Professor Snape. "Sir?"

"What were you just doing?"

"Practicing my martial arts. I do it every morning."

"I haven't seen you do that every morning kid."

"I don't normally do it by the lake."

"So you're showing off again? I should give you a weeks worth of detention for that."

Harry almost growled. This man brought out his anger faster than any other person in the whole castle. "I haven't done anything wrong."

Snape sneered again. "So? I can give you detention for smelling up the castle."

Now Harry was gaping at the man.

"I won't let you get away with breaking every rule you come across just because you want attention."

"I want no such thing."

"Don't lie to me Potter. I've seen the way you preen and pose yourself in class. You are an attention seeking trouble maker, just like your father." Snape growled.

Harry's eyes started go glow with rage. "I won't take that kind of crap from anyone Professor. Not even you."

"Attack me then. I'll have you expelled within the hour." Snape smirked at him, pure hate in his eyes. "Well, are you afraid now?"

Then Harry had a stroke of luck. He spotted some movement down the hallway.

"Professor Quirrell?"

The DADA teacher froze as he was leaving a classroom and turned towards them and paled a little as he spotted Snape. "P-p-potter?"

"Could I get you to explain that curse we did in class again." Harry asked, ducking past Snape. "I think I got it, but I want to make sure before we have that test." Harry said.

Quirrell was shaking a little, but he nodded. "S-sure, we can go over again in class today."

"Thank you sir." Harry said. He watched as Snape snarled something under his breath and stalked off. Breathing a sight of relief, Harry nodded to Quirrell and ran for Gryffindor tower. Even in the darker corridors in the early morning, his eyes were still glowing with rage.

The Pink Lady squeaked as he gave the password and stalked inside. If he had been wearing robes, they would have been billowing behind him. His rage kept the girls in the tower from approaching him as he headed for his room. Harry ignored them all and just muttered Snape's name under his breath as he prepared to take a shower.

He didn't head for the gym though, since he knew Ranma was working on something. This kept Harry from taking his frustrations out on the punching bag in the corner. If the bag had known about this, it would have been quite grateful. It took nearly ten minutes for Harry to vent his anger under a cold shower and even then his Ki was hot enough to create enough steam to fill the small room.

oooooooooo

Later that afternoon, Ranma trudged out of the gym. He was completely exhausted and drenched in sweat. He removed his shirt hours before when it started to rip from his body. A smirk covered his face though.

As he walked towards the showers he watched his hand where two balls of pure magic twirled around his hand. His determination won out in the end and he managed to master the first sections of the think book. Slytherin's ideas and thoughts amazed Ranma.

Sure the guy had been a magic user, a strong one, but the guy also looked into non magical beings in a way that no witch or wizard had ever done. A Magic Muggle, or Onmyodo was virtually unknown in society. According to the book, even a thousand years ago, they were only a story told to entertain people.

Unlike Slytherin though, Ranma was working through the information in the book as if it was a hard to understand martial arts scroll. This meant reading between the lines and trying to understand what wasn't being said. The hidden information that tended to get left out of things.

Slytherin's ideas were innovative, but they tended to be a little odd. One of the ones seemed to revolve around extracting a magical core from another wizard and placing it inside a muggle. This experiment brought around several dead muggles and wizards. Slytherin never explained where he got the people though.

Ranma was pretty sure they might be innocents that Slytherin chose at random.

A thousand years ago people looked at life in a slightly more brutal way.

Which was why martial arts was created in the first place. Ranma didn't dwell on it to much though. The years on the road training taught him that time changed everything.

Even Harry's books from the vault were like that, old and out of date information. They gave the basics and seemed to leave out tons of information that could be found in other books. This, combined with his training, Occlumancy practice, and sheer will power, allowed him to form the balls of magic in his hand.

He could feel the magical energies swirling through his body from a central spot in his chest and understood that a magic core had or was in the process of forming. This was just above where his Ki was focused, but the two energies were working together now. Ranma let the magic relax and let it snap back to his new core as he relaxed in the shower.

As he showered he started applying his new knowledge to what he learned from Happosai. The old man was right about quite a few things. Knowledge was a martial artists best friend. A sharp mind and a strong body could make anyone into a dangerous weapon.

It all just depended on how the information was used. Several ideas were swirling around in his head. He would have to check several of Harry's books, but he was sure that his magic was the equivalent of a first or second year student at the moment.

An Onmyodo, or Magical Warrior. A legend that Slytherin came across while traveling though Japan and China a thousand years ago. When the old men heard about this, they would die of envy. After getting dressed, he headed for the library and dug around for the first years books on basic magic.

He read them several months before, but now he wanted to see if his theory was right. It only took him about fifteen minutes to go through the book again. Once he read something it was memorized after all. Once confirmed he checked the time and headed for the ladder.

One thought did occur to him as he used the umisenken to vanish from sight. What that old man Ollivander said to him when they were at the Wand shop. 'I haven't seen one of you in over five hundred years.' Was it possible he would have to get a wand to cast magic like Harry did?

He really didn't want a wand. Using Ki without a handicap like that was easy enough, so magic had to be as well. That book on Wandless magic had been quite vague on the subject though. He headed out of the Gryffindor common room and moved deeper into the castle.

He didn't notice something above the Fat Lady's portrait turn to follow him. In Dumbledore's office one of his gadgets started moving around. The old man glanced at it, narrowed his eyes, and sat back to think. His phoenix Fawks sang an uplifting song.

oooooooooo

'It's hatching'

Harry read the note from Hagrid and sighed. He just knew that it had to happen sometime, but not this soon. Of course he would have to finish Herbolgy first, but he only had a little while to go yet. Harry just hoped what came out of that egg wasn't going to be as dangerous as he thought.

He quickly finished his morning work for Madam Sprout and left a few minutes early with several of the other students. Of course he didn't excel at the class, but he did alright. Hedwig was sitting on his shoulder and he had her take Hagrid's note to Hermione as well. He asked the Ravenclaw to meet him at the shack in case Hagrid did something he shouldn't do.

The morning break was just starting, so he was nearly to the shack when he spotted his friend running out of the castle. She ran across the grass, her bushy hair trailing behind her. Harry could tell that she was a lot more fit than he thought. He was really going to have to talk to her about her martial arts training one of these days.

"She's really in better shape than I thought." He muttered to himself.

"Guess I can't call her a book worm anymore."

The girl caught up with him a few seconds later, gasping for air as she stopped for a second. She ran a hand through her hair. "Hedwig flew right into my Transfiguration lesson. Mrs. McGonagall wasn't pleased at all." She said.

Harry looked a little sheepish. "Sorry about that."

"It's alright, though Malfoy saw what happened as well. He gave me this look that…" She shuddered and shook her head. "It was horrible."

"That git just can't learn can he?" Harry muttered. "I think he may just be spiteful enough to try and hurt one of permanently. We should be more careful round him."

"Me too. Crabbe and Goyle were also eying me like a sandwich and smirking.

Something is going on there."

"We'll have to stop them. Maybe Malfoy should get a martial arts lesson." Harry muttered. They turned and headed the rest of the way to Hagrid's shack. The heat was even worse then before. Harry was amazed that the whole building wasn't one large bonfire.

"I thought Hagrid wan't allowed to do magic?" Hermione asked, tapping his shack with her wand.

Harry grinned a little. "I've seen him cast a couple of spells. He's sneaky

about it so that he doesn't get into trouble."

"I see." The girl muttered, she sounded disapproving.

He shrugged. "Let's see what's going on with the lizard."

The half giant opened his door before they could knock and dragged them in.

He had a huge grin on his face as he sat them down in chairs around a table.

The large black egg was sitting there rocking slowly, a couple of cracks down one side.

"Any minute now." Hagrid explained.

"What's that noise?"

"Just the baby trying to get out."

"Not that, by your door." Harry asked.

Hagrid looked up, moved over to the door, and yanked someone else into the

room. "Now who…"

"Ron!" Harry muttered.

"Hey Harry." The red head said and grinned a little. "Um…you forgot to put your trowel away when you left. Madam Sprout wasn't happy at all."

Harry sighed. "Sorry."

"What's going on?"

"Hagrid's new pet is about to hatch." Harry said, gesturing at the large black egg.

"Woah!" Ron said, running over to the table. "Is that a dragon egg!"

Hagrid nodded proudly. "Yep. Isn't it beautiful?"

"It's not everyday you see a dragon hatching. I'm glad I followed you

Harry."

"Uh, yeah."

"Why didn't' you tell me about this?"

"Hagrid wanted me to keep it secret." Harry said.

Ron just nodded. Suddenly the egg started to wobble around. With a loud crack, it split right down the middle and the baby dragon rolled out. The shack filled with the smell of sulfur as the thing wobbled around. It's wings were folded badly, draped over it's small lizard like body.

"That is the ugliest thing I've ever seen." Hermione said as she backed away from the table.

"Looks like a badly folded umbrella to me." Harry muttered. He also agreed with Hermione.

"What's that?" Ron asked, pointing to the window.

Harry ran over. "The covering's loose and I can see someone running back towards the school."

"Who?"

"It's Malfoy." Harry growled. "This isn't good."

Hagrid reached out to touch the dragon and it snapped at him. "Look at that, he knows who his mommy is."

Harry really wanted to roll his eyes.

oooooooooo

Over the next several days things did and did not happen as Harry expected them to. The biggest surprise was that Malfoy seemed to have kept his mouth shut because the teachers didn't seem to be treating them any different.

Although the weird grin on Malfoy's face over the next few days told them

that he was planning something.

Harry did his best to ignore the moron, but every time he got within a few yards of the blond headed boy he wanted to beat the living crap out of him. Malfoy wasn't going to turn them in. He was going to do something worse according to Hermione. It was how Slytherins seemed to think.

"How?" Harry asked.

"Malfoy is going to turn the situation to his advantage." Hermione explained one day in the library. She was still nervous because she kept seeing Malfoy everywhere she went. No matter how she tried to avoid him. The only place he didn't' show up was in Ravenclaw tower.

"The arrogant moron." Ron muttered.

Harry and Hermione just nodded.

"We really should find a way to put him in his place."

"How?" Harry asked.

Ron shrugged.

"The twins." Hermione suggested.

The two boys looked at her for a second before grinning evilly. "Perfect."

A couple of day later they were still planning with something odd happened. Harry was sitting in the Great Hall eating lunch when he saw several students run by the doors. They were all grinning.

He didn't think anything of it at first, but then more and more students ran by. Several even stepped into the hall, ran over a friend, and they would all leave at a run. This wasn't normal by Hogwarts standards.

Even the teachers seemed to have taken notice of the commotion. Harry got up as people got up to see what was going on. Professor Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall were close behind him as they left the room and headed for the dungeons.

They found about a hundred students crowded into a little hallway. Most of them were either looking at the ceiling or laughing. Harry looked at the ceiling and gaped. A large blob of pink goo was splattered across the ceiling, some of it hanging down in strands that looked ready to fall.

It also appeared to be growing very slowly, even breathing.

This wasn't what was so funny though. Harry could just make out the face and cloak of Professor Snape entangled within the goo. The man was struggling against the stuff and hopping mad. Harry was too shocked to laugh at his hated potions teacher thought. So he just stood there and watched the man struggle, only to get more and more entangled in the sticky goo.

Several flashes of light filled the hallway as pictures were taken. Harry looked over to see the twins looking at the scene in awe. Then they grinned, eyes sparkling merrily.

"Fred! George! Get him down at once!" McGonagall yelled.

"Wasn't us Professor, but it's BRILIANT!" They yelled, still grinning. "We have to find out how it was done."

"Twenty Points from Gryffindor!" McGonagall yelled. "Get him down!"

The twins shrugged, pulled their wands as the students watched. They grinned in a way that made several students step back. Up above Snape had stopped moving as the twins pulled their wands. He had a bad feeling about this, but the Goo was covering his mouth so he couldn't tell them to bugger off.

Two beams of yellow light fired into the goo near Snape. The goo seemed to absorb the magic and went quiet. The twins started firing random spells, but none of them worked. After several minutes they shrugged. "We have no idea."

"Undo it now!" McGonagall yelled. "I know it was you!"

"It wasn't us!" They yelled back.

The Transfiguration teacher looked like she just swallowed a lemon when the goo gave a lurch. A thick strand of the pink stuff fell to the floor, splattering all over the place. The students jumped back as it seemed to roll around on its own. Then it started to swell outward.

"RUN FOR IT!" The twins yelled as they ran away.

"Do what they said." Dumbledore said.

Holding his hat to his head, the headmaster ran after them with his beard trailing behind him. Harry gasped and took off as well when he noticed that all the goo was swelling. The students cleared the hallway in a matter of seconds, leaving McGonagall the only one there along with Snape.

SPLUT! SPLAT!

She screamed just as the stuff washed over them and filled the whole hallway. Everyone else heard Snape's cussing for the next several minutes. Nearly every inch of the hallway was filled with gooey stands of the stuff now. Two teachers were trapped and they weren't happy.

Harry was glad he made it out the stuffs range before it got him. The Goo now hung in large blobs all over the place with thick ropey strands connecting it all. Dumbledore stood nearby eying the scene. His eyes were twinkling up a storm as he prodded one of the smaller blobs with his wand.

"Fascinating." He muttered.

"Sir, what is this stuff?"

"I have no idea." He said, still grinning a little.

Several nearby students gaped at him. Since when did the Headmaster not know what something was? It was unheard of. This was the guy that the Minister of Magic came to every couple of days to get advice. He gave his lone white beard a tug as he examined the goo.

"Shouldn't we find some way to get them out of there?"

"Of course my boy." He said. "In an hour or so, those two need a break anyway." Dumbledore said as he headed for his office. Leaving everyone else to just watch as he left the two teachers.

"Albus!" Snape yelled.

Harry smirked as he left as well. It wasn't Malfoy, but this was a great

revenge against Snape. As he was leaving, he sensed that Ranma was nearby, invisible to everyone else. He tracked the feeling as best he could and found that it was inside the goo.

He had to leave the area before he broke into hysterical giggling.

oooooooooo

"Hagrid you have to let him go." Hermione insisted. "You're going to get into trouble."

"Set him free." Harry added.

The Grounds Keeper just shook his head. "The little guy is too 'oung. He would die on 'is own."

Hagrid was to busy using a large broom to scrub some oil into the dragon's skin because the thing had grown to the size of a large crocodile in just a few days. If that wasn't bad enough Hagrid was so busy with the thing that he hadn't been doing his job. People were starting to notice.

Instead the shack was full of empty brandy bottles and chicken feathers from the dragon's meals. No matter what they did Hagrid wouldn't listen. Then there was Ron, who was out at Hagrid's shack every chance he could. The boy seemed to be helping out.

"I've decided to call him Norbert." Hagrid told them. "He's just so cute."

Hermione groaned. "Hagrid, this little baby is dangerous."

Ron, next to Hagrid, was feeding a chicken to the dragon with a pair of long tongs. Watching the thing eat was enough to turn Harry's stomach too. Now the dragon was eying his shoes with the 'those might be tasty' look. So Harry moved around the table.

"Hagrid, you just can't keep this thing hidden."

The large man sighed. "I know that, b-but I can't just get rid of him either. Too dangerous."

"That's what we've been telling you!" Hermione yelled.

Hagrid didn't appear to hear her.

"We can send him to my brother." Ron said, watching in wonder as the thing downed the chicken in two bites, showing a set of teeth that would send a shark into a jealous rage.

"Who?" Harry asked.

"My Brother Charlie, he's in Romania studying Dragons. Once there Charlie and his friends can send Norbert back into the wild safely."

Hagrid looked worried. "I don' know." He rumbled.

"Hagrid, Norbert just set your bed on fire!" Hermione yelled, pointing at the burning bed. "He needs to go!"

"…my bed!" They spent the next five minutes putting the fire out.

oooooooooo

A couple of days later Harry was in the common room of Gryffindor Tower, using the extra space to stretch. It was late enough that everyone else had gone to bed. He was down here instead of in the trunk because Ranma would give him the evil eye every time they saw each other.

The Goo episode was still the talk of the school a few days later. No one knows how the teachers were freed, but they were back to teaching classes the next day. The corridor itself was cleaner than it ever had been. Everything touched by the goo looked polished.

Snape was on the war path now. Snarling at any of the student that got within ten yards of him in the hallways. He also seemed to have some idea what had happened because Harry was convinced that the man was following him whenever he left the tower. Before it seemed random, but now he couldn't go to class without Snape appearing at the end of some hallway or corridor with a sneer on his face.

He finished up his stretches and stood up rubbing his shoulder. Since it was so late at night he wasn't wearing his shirt, but had it nearby, sitting on a chair. More than once he would finish up his stretches and find half the girls in the tower watching him from the stairs.

How they managed to keep quiet he had no idea. Usually they would all give themselves away by following him and giggling a lot. He figured he was just lucky tonight. He heard the portrait opening though, and turned. At first he wasn't sure who it was, and then Ron pulled the hood back, and appeared, wearing Harry's invisibility cloak.

"I take it all back. Dragon's suck." Ron grumbled. "The bloody thing bit me."

Harry glanced at Ron's hand and saw that it was wrapped in a slightly bloody handkerchief. "Ouch."

"No kidding. I'm not going to be able to hold a quill or do anything for at least a weak." Ron complained. "Bloody Dragon."

Harry wondered if Ron might have more to worry about than a simple bite, but forgot about it as he heard a tapping. They turned to see an owl hovering outside the window. Harry grinned. "It's Hedwig, she must be back with Charlie's reply."

"About bloody time." Ron grumbled as he took off Harry's cloak and lay it over a nearby chair.

Harry let the owl in. She flew around the room a couple of times

before settling on Harry's shoulder. He removed the letter from her leg and

quickly opened it. Ron snatched it out of Harry's hand. "Wha…"

"It's my brother." Ron snapped.

This just made Harry roll his eyes.

"He'll take it, so long as we can get the dragon to the tallest tower by midnight on Saturday. A couple of Charlie's friends are going to pick it up on their way to Romania."

"Sounds easy enough." Harry said, and then groaned.

"What?"

That thing is growing so fast that it will barley fit in Hagrid's cabin by Saturday. The cloak won't even fit over it completely by then." Harry muttered.

Ron's eyes widened and he groaned. "This sucks!"

"Guess we'll have to see what Hermione has to say."

"Sure, see if the know it all has an idea." Ron muttered. "I'm going to bed, maybe my hand will be better by morning."

Harry really didn't think so.

oooooooooo

Harry was quite tired by the time he climbed into his trunk. He hated to admit it, but Ron was beginning to get on his nerves with his constant complaining. There was only so much he could listen to before it got annoying. In the end he was forced to use a pressure point to put Ron to sleep.

The boy's hand wasn't looking good either and Harry knew that Ron would be in the hospital wing by tomorrow. He considered having Ranma look at it for a second before shrugging. Since he was in the trunk he made a quick detour to the kitchen.

After grabbing something to drink he headed down to the training area. He could hear Ranma working out before he even got to the door. The swearing was a new sound though, Ranma didn't usually use words like that. He peaked his head in.

"Ranma?"

"Harry! Come in!" Ranma said, grinning a little too much.

"Um…sure." Harry muttered. It looked like Ranma was a bit mad with him.

Ranma was sitting in the middle of the floor holding a ball of bright light.

"I think I'm getting the hang of this stuff."

"You discovered something else?"

Ranma nodded. "Yeah, I was flipping through some of those magic theory books you have in the library after I got back from my little…incident."

Harry almost laughed, almost. But he wasn't able to keep his mouth from twitching just a tiny little bit. "What did you find?"

The ball of light started to flicker a little, changing colors like a strobe light. Ranma held it up. "This stuff, if I read those books right, seems to be impossible."

Harry nodded. "Well I don't think wizards mess with Ki very often."

"I figured that, but I would have thought someone would've used it at some point."

"Maybe no one has thought of it?"

Ranma shrugged. "Well it's possible, most of those books you have date back to the eighteen hundreds at least. Some go back even further. Anyway, I wanted to show you something."

"Oh?" Harry asked, leaning forward.

Ranma threw his hands forward and the ball of energy turned bright pink and fired right into Harry's chest. The boy flew back before he even had time to dodge and slammed against the wall.

SPLUT!

"There's your lesson for tonight. Figure out how to free yourself." Ranma told him as he walked out of the room. "Night kid."

"Mmmhmmmhmph!" Harry yelled as he struggled against the super sticky goo.

oooooooooo

Chapter 19

oooooooooo

Grumbling, Harry climbed out of his trunk the next morning. To say he was in a bad mood was an understatement. It had taken him hours to figure out how to get out of that gunk Ranma pinned him against the wall with. He could still feel the slimy disgusting goo on his neck and arms even after taking an hour long bath and scrubbing himself several times.

He shuddered. Ranma just grinned at him as they ate breakfast and Harry knew that Ranma was just paying him back for leaving him trapped in that stuff the day before. Of course, Ranma had turned the whole situation into a training exercise.

On the other hand Harry had learned a new move. The goo didn't like cold very well and quickly crystallized. Harry hadn't even been able to use his wand either, even though he did know a couple of cooling charms from all his reading. He just hadn't actually performed any of them yet.

Instead Ranma had forced him to learn what he called the basics of The Soul

of Ice. A way to focus a person's aura to create cold energy. This aura

froze the goo in a matter of minutes. Allowing him to force his way out of the mess and fall to the floor.

Harry just laid there for a few seconds before Ranma came back into the room grinning. "I thought you would figure it out and you didn't even need my help."

"$# you." Harry gasped.

"I've got a slightly different version I wanted to try out. It's green."

Ranma asked, smiling a little.

"I'll…pass." Harry muttered.

Ranma nodded. "Well you get a few hours sleep."

Harry was already asleep, snoring softly. That was only three hours ago and Harry was still a bit wiped out. Ranma even had him put the weighted robe back on too, so he wasn't moving very well. He spotted Ron sitting on his bed with Neville, Seamus, and Dean standing around him.

"Hey guys."

"Harry, the bite got worse." Ron muttered. He held up his hand for Harry to see. The thing had swelled up to twice its size and teeth marks were looking quite bad.

"Drat."

Ron nodded. "I'm not sure I can go to Pomfrey with this."

"You may have to." Dean said. "That looks nasty. We should show it to a few girls."

Seamus laughed. "Yeah, they'll scream and run away."

"I've heard girls like big hands." Dean said.

Harry almost landed face first in the carpet, but controlled himself. "Dean, that was just bad."

"Yeah, it was." He said grinning.

Ron rolled his eyes. "Actually, it feels like it's about to fall off."

"Do you think you can get through the day?"

The red headed boy shrugged. "Hard to say. I can't even move my hand at the moment."

Harry glanced at Seamus and Dean. "What do you two think?"

"Any idea what bit him?" Seamus asked. "I've never heard of a spell that could do that to anyone."

"Let's get him to the Hospital wing, Madam Pomfrey should be able to fix that right up." Dean offered.

Ron stood up stubbornly. "I'll go to class. This is just a scratch."

"Ron, that isn't a scratch." Insisted Seamus.

"I don't care." The boy said.

oooooooooo

"Harry, Ron's in the hospital wing." Dean told him as they were heading for lunch.

"He decided to have his hand looked at?"

Dean shook his head. "The git started to complain about how much his hand hurt between classes. Professor McGonagall heard him and was shocked when she saw his hand. She dragged him to Madam Pomfrey instantly."

Harry laughed a little. "Guess we should have taken him down there last night."

Dean laughed and nodded. "Yeah, but I'd still like to know what bit him."

"Who knows." Harry lied. "I'll head over and see how he's doing."

"All right, see you around Harry." Dean said as he ran off.

A few minutes later Harry stepped into the hospital wing and saw that Ron was laid out on one of the beds across the room. Harry was glad that Madam Pomfrey didn't seem to be around. He ran over to Ron's bed. "Hey."

Ron didn't look he was in the best shape. "Harry, I didn't mean to."

"Um, what?" Harry asked.

"Malfoy stole one of my books when I was dragged off the Quidditch pitch. I didn't even know that McGonagall had him go and get my bag till he brought it in."

Harry cursed under his breath. "What did the jerk do?"

"I had the letter from Charlie in one of the books. The one he stole."

"Just great." Harry muttered.

"He must have searched by bag before bringing it back here. McGonagall didn't even give him a second glance."

"This isn't good Ron. We just have to pray that nothing happens on Saturday."

Paling a little more, Ron could only nod.

oooooooooo

"Are you ready?" Harry asked as he met Hermione outside the large door to the castle.

"Let's go, we have about an hour to get Norbert to the top of the Astronomy Tower."

"Plenty of time." Harry said as he draped his invisibility cloak over the two of them.

They weren't wearing their robes for this either. Harry was wearing his every day clothes. A pair of loose black pants, and his blue silk shirt. Ranma had insisted when he heard of Harry's plan. The robes were too confining and wouldn't allow him to move if he needed to.

Hermione was wearing a pair of blue jeans and a black t-shirt. He had to admit that he hadn't expected her to wear something like that. The girl didn't even have her glasses on. Instead she was wearing a pair of contact lenses and had her hair pulled back into a pony tail.

"Let's go." Hermione said.

They arrived at Hagrid's hut a few minutes later. Hagrid had Norbert all crated up. "He's got several rats to eat and a teddy bear to keep him comfortable."

The crate rocked a few times as Norbert tried to get out. They could hear the thing growling as smoke washed out of several cracks in the crate.

Hagrid beamed.

Harry shook his head and didn't even comment on their friend's complete insanity. "Let's go, we only have a little while to get up there."

"Be careful Harry." Hagrid insisted. "Bye Bye, Norbert."

The dragon hissed.

Reaching into one of the invisibility cloak's pockets, Harry pulled out his Dragon hide gloves. He knew the crate was going to be a pain to handle and wanted some kind of protection for his hands. He handed Hermione Ron's gloves since he couldn't use them.

They headed for the castle as quickly as they could carrying the rather heavy crate. Hermione really had to strain to keep a grip on the box, but she didn't complain. They were just glad that the crate made hiding the dragon a lot easier than they expected.

"We're just to the doors." Harry told her.

"Good, we need to be extra careful from here on out."

"I know, but Ranma is lending us a hand for this."

Hermione blinked. "How?"

"He's going to keep the teachers away from us."

"Fascinating."

They made their way into the entrance hall, up several stair cases. They had to take several breaks along the way to rest their arms. Harry tried to sense if Ranma was around, but couldn't find any trace of his guardian. Midnight was ticking closer with every passing second as well.

They were nearly to the top of the tower when they heard a noise and stopped

in a shadow covered doorway. The invisibility cloak was more than enough to keep them hidden, but Harry was worried that Norbert would start hissing again. Then just down the hall, less than ten feet away, they spotted movement.

It was so dark that Harry couldn't tell what was going on till a nearby torch flared to life, revealing Professor McGonagall. She was dressed in a gray nightgown. She had Draco Malfoy by the ear. "You! Detention!"

"Professor, Potter is out of bed as well!" Draco simpered.

"If he is, then he'll get caught as well." The teacher said, dragging the blond haired boy along by his ear. "Severus will deal with you."

"He's got a dragon!"

"Nonsense!" The matron snapped. "How dare you lie to me! Twenty points from Slytherin."

They waited a few minutes in utter silence before they moved again. They headed up the last few staircases and didn't stop to rest until they could feel the cool night air on their faces. Norbert, sensing the change in climate thrashed around a little.

They sat the crate down and sighed in relief, then Hermione started bouncing up and down on her feet and grinning. "Malfoy got detention!" She crowed, in a whisper.

Harry laughed. "Serves the little bastard right."

"Agreed. Now where are those people? I will not get expelled for this." She muttered as she looked around.

"I'm not sure."

"Where's Ranma?"

"He's around somewhere."

"I'm right behind the girl." Ranma said as he materialized right behind Hermione.

She squeaked and spun around. "Don't do that!"

Ranma laughed and grinned at her. "Now I've heard that before."

"Ranma." She growled.

Ignoring the girl, Ranma stepped around her and walked over the crate and knelt down. "So this is an actual dragon?"

"Yep."

"Interesting. I've met an Orochi before, but never a real dragon."

"It's just a baby, it's too dangerous to be around a school like this one."

Ranma's hand started to glow as he ran it along the edges of the crate. He didn't notice that Hermione was watching him in amazement. She started bouncing again, as if she wanted to ask a lot of questions. "I can sense the magic flow of the creature and its life force."

"Really?" Harry asked.

"Yes, I think I've encountered something similar to this as well. I'm just not sure where. It kind of reminds me of Herb, but that's understandable." Ranma said, and then spun around. "Company is coming. I'll be around Harry, but you need to get back to the tower on your own."

"Alright." Harry said.

Ranma looked at Hermione. "If you're interested in learning more of the Art, let Harry show you his trunk. You'll be amazed."

"Huh?" Hermione asked, but Ranma was already fading from sight.

Harry laughed. "Guess he wants to train you."

The girl looked excited. "Really?"

"Yep."

A few seconds later four people on brooms converged on the tower and landed with almost no sound. Harry didn't know who they were, but they were nice enough people. They had Norbert out of the crate and into some kind of harness within seconds. Less than three minutes later four brooms took off and they quickly vanished into the darkness over the Forbidden Forest.

Harry and Hermione felt as if a weight had been lifted from their shoulders as they raced back down the stairs. In hindsight this might not have been the best of ideas, but they were just so relieved to be rid of the Dragon that they didn't think.

Typical eleven year olds really. That was why as they exited on to the final landing, they skidded to a halt. A form moved out of the shadows created by a torch. Argus Filch's face loomed out of the darkness and the man had a creep grin on his face.

Then Harry realized that the man could see them and he groaned. They forgot to put the invisibility cloak on. It didn't do any good stuffed in his pocket, that was for sure. "Damn it."

"Well, well, well." Filch snarled evilly. "A student out of bed. That makes two caught tonight alone."

Harry blinked and looked around. "Um…"

"Filch grabbed him by the arm and started dragging him along. "Professor McGonagall will want to talk to you. I'll make sure you don't get out of detention until after you graduate!" The man yelled at the top of his lungs.

Harry winced and wondered where Hermione went off to. As they were moving along he didn't see Ranma holding the girl in the shadow's of a door. He had his hand over her mouth as he watched Harry being led away. They stayed that way for a couple of minutes.

"This isn't good at all." Ranma muttered as he let the girl go. "You alright?"

Hermione kicked him in the shin. "You!"

Ranma grinned at her. "I'll take that as a yes."

"You just left him."

"I didn't have much choice."

Hermione glared at him. "I'm heading back to my dormitory."

"Let me escort you."

"Yeah right."

"Who's the one here that can turn invisible?"

oooooooooo

"I was just exploring." Harry insisted.

"Shut up Potter." Filch growled. "I remember your father when he was here. All Potters are trouble makers. You should be hung from the ceiling by your thumbs for a week. A proper beating might make you little brats more agreeable. Instead it's always breaking the rules, pranking the teachers, making our lives hell with your weird ideas."

Harry had to admit, the man had ranting down to an art. "But…"

"Be quiet, we'll find a just punishment for you." The man said with a grin full of yellow and black teeth.

He shuddered just as they entered McGonagall's office on the first floor.

Filch gave Harry a shove and nearly sent him stumbling across the room.

"Find a seat trouble maker."

Catching his balance, Harry saw that there were a couple of chairs in front of a desk and quickly sat down. He was trying to come up with any excuse he could think of that might get him out of this mess. Harry was still kicking himself for not using the cloak. How could he have been so stupid?

"Filch?" McGonagall said as she entered the office. She was wearing her normal robes now. Instead of the night gown she had on earlier. Her eyes widened a bit when she spotted Harry sitting there. Her lips firmed into a line as Filch quickly filled her in on what was going on.

She turned towards him. "Why were you in the astronomy tower this late at night? Why weren't you in bed with the rest of your classmates? Explain yourself!"

Harry didn't know what to say, his mind was completely blank. The truth would get him expelled, so he knew that wasn't an option. So he looked down at his feet and didn't say anything. He was just glad that Hermione wasn't there to get punished like this. She didn't deserve that.

"Hmph!" The teacher said. "I have a very good idea what is going on. You Gryffindors and Slytherins, always going after each other. It never ends." Confused, Harry didn't say anything and let her draw her own conclusions. He would only speak up if she started suggesting that he be expelled.

"You made up some cock and bull story and used it to get Mr. Malfoy in trouble, didn't you?" She snapped. "I've already caught him tonight and now, just like he said, you're out of bed too. I'm disgusted in these actions! I've never been so disappointed in one of the students of my own house!"

Filch smiled at him evilly.

This only told Harry that McGonagall was about to lay out the punishment. Professor McGonagall glared down at Harry. "You will have detention and fifty points taken from Gryffindor for this!"

"Fifty!" Harry gasped.

"Want me to make it a hundred?" McGonagall yelled.

Then Filch grabbed him by the arm and yanked him to his feet. "Come along, time for you to go to bed."

Harry could barely keep up with Filch as he was dragged through the corridors. The man didn't seem to know or even care about what he was doing to Harry either. Harry finally managed to pull his arm lose as they reached the entry portrait.

The caretaker glowered at him for a second. "Your detention will be decided soon and I'll make sure that it's something positively horrible. Students like you shouldn't be coddled, but beaten." The man hissed.

Harry ignored him as he entered the portal, though he really wondered what could make a man so bitter.

He quickly made his way up to his room and went to bed. People weren't going to be happy with him for the next few days. Losing fifty points in one go was only done for the worst offenses. Harry didn't think McGonagall was being fair.

Sure, he was caught out of bed. They didn't have a clue what the two of them did up there. He would have to work extra hard to make up for the large point loss. Then he had to grin because he recalled that Malfoy got detention as well. He briefly considered the blond and wondered if he had anything to do with influencing McGonagall.

He looked around the room and saw that Neville, Seamus, and Dean were all sound asleep. Dean was usually a light sleeper too, so Harry figured that Ranma had used that sleep point on them again. He crawled into bed and down into the trunk.

After everything that happened he really needed something to drink. He spent several minutes drinking a large glass of orange juice while going into a light meditative trance to calm himself down. Most of the night had gone perfectly, but the one point that kept jumping out at Harry was Draco

Malfoy.

He just couldn't understand what was going through the brat's mind when he pulled stunts like this. This was the third attempt to get Harry expelled from school. The first was the for the broom, then the duel he never showed up for, and now this.

Draco also started rumors about him that everyone seemed to believe. Even the teachers believed some of them. Hermione was about the only reason that Draco wasn't laid up in the hospital wing at the moment. The boy didn't know when to quit.

Maybe it was time to do something about the little pest. Harry was considering options, ones that wouldn't get him expelled, when Ranma returned. "Ranma."

"Harry, I see you made it back I one piece."

He nodded. "Yeah, though I lost Gryffindor fifty points and have to perform some kind of mysterious punishment."

"They didn't tell you what it was?"

"Nope, but Filch was grinning as if Christmas was here and that's not a good sign."

Ranma laughed. "Whatever it is I figure it will be good training."

Harry snorted. "Still."

"I escorted your female friend back to her tower while you were with the teachers. She's worried about you."

"At least she's safe."

"True." Ranma nodded. "It would have been worse if she was with you."

"How do you figure that?"

"Well, two students sneaking out of their houses to meet up at the top of a tower in the dark. One male, one female, draw your own conclusions."

Harry started coughing. "I'm only ELEVEN!"

"So?"

Harry pounded his head on the table and tried to banish the image of him and Hermione doing that to each other.

It didn't work.

oooooooooo

Chapter 20

oooooooooo

"Aghaaa!"

Harry stopped as he heard the scream. The corridor he was walking down seemed to be empty. He glanced around and heard some thing coming from a nearby classroom and crept over to the doorway and knelt down. He pressed his ear against the edge of the door and heard whimpering.

"No, no…please no more…"

Harry's eyes widened a bit when he realized that it was Quirrell. His eyes narrowed as Quirrell seemed to be talking to someone, but Harry couldn't hear whoever it was, just Quirrell's slightly hysterical responses.

"I'll do it, I p-promise…" Quirrell sniffled.

Harry heard movement and jerked away from the door just as it was thrown open and Professor Quirrell raced out of the room as if a hoard of demons was after him. The man looked as if was about to completely break down as he adjusted his over sized turban.

The man moved down the hall at a quick walk and vanished down a stair well. He never even noticed Harry sitting on the floor next to wall. Harry waited till the sound of Quirrell's foot steps vanished before he let out burst of air and realized he'd been holding his breath. Standing slowly, Harry hurried down the corridor away from Quirrell and headed for the library.

He raced in and ran over to the table where Ron and Hermione were studying. They looked up from their astronomy homework as Harry grabbed a nearby chair and sat down. They noticed that he looked a little nervous.

"What's up?" Ron asked.

"Quirrell just broke." Harry muttered.

Hermione sighed. "It was only a matter of time."

Harry nodded. "I was hoping it wouldn't happen at all."

"If Quirrell broke, then Snape will be after the stone." Hermione said.

"Snape tried to kill me." Harry said slowly. "Does that mean he would kill any of the students to get the stone?"

Hermione gasped. "You don't think he would go that far do you?"

"I'm not sure." Harry shrugged. "He was willing to kill me in front of all those people at the match."

Ron shook his head. "I don't think we have to worry about that. Snape seemed to be trying to keep a low profile, plus he'll need to get by Fluffy. That dog could eat him whole."

The other two nodded.

"Could he have figured out how to get past Fluffy though?" Hermione asked.

"I don't think so. Hagrid did say that the other professors didn't know what was down there." Harry offered.

"Well there might be a book here that explains about Cerberus, maybe even how to get past them." Hermione said.

"I think this is getting too big for us." Hermione said and looked nervous.

"We should go to Professor Dumbledore and explain all of this to him. We could be kicked out if we're wrong."

Harry shook his head, thinking some more. "That won't work."

"Why?"

"Because it would be our word against theirs and what teacher would take the word of an eleven year old over another teacher." Harry muttered. "I've experienced this kind of thing before when I was growing up."

Hermione sighed.

"All Snape would have to do is deny whatever we say and bang, detention and more points off for lying."

"But we wouldn't be!" Ron snapped.

"Teachers won't listen to a student Ron." Harry muttered. He did think of Ranma and figured he would listen at least, but Ranma didn't have any way to really help them with this.

"I think we should still try." Ron said.

"No." Harry said, making Ron jump. "We've done enough for now."

oooooooooo

A mean looking owl flew down and dropped a ratty looking envelope off in front of Harry the next morning. It flew off before Harry could even say anything. The note was from Filch telling him that his detention would be held with Draco Malfoy at eleven that night.

Harry grumbled a bit. He was going to have his training with Ranma even if it was held a bit late. By then he would be completely exhausted. Maybe he could get Ranma to go easy on him, but doubted it. Shrugging, he folded the note and put it in his robe pocket as he quickly finished his breakfast. Hermione and Ron were eying him, but didn't ask any questions.

"My detention." He told them.

Hermione paled a bit and nodded, understanding what Harry was talking about.

Ron was still mad about being left out when they got rid of Norbert, but was glad he didn't have to serve detention like Harry did.

"It shouldn't be a be a problem." Harry said with a shrug.

"Harry, I should be there too…"

He shook his head. "No, better that you aren't there. Think of the rumors that would have been started about us if you had been caught."

Ron started laughing just as Hermione put the pieces together and blushed.

"Um…"

Smirking, Harry stood up. "I'll see you two tomorrow."

"If you survive." Ron said.

"I'll be sure to use Malfoy as a shield." Harry said as he walked off. Later that night Harry met Filch and Malfoy in the entrance hall. Filch was holding a large lantern. "You two will think better about breaking the school rules after this." He snapped at them as he led them outside. "A little fear will make you obey the rules. Little bastards." He yelled at them.

Malfoy sneered at Filch.

"Yes, hard work and pain are the best teachers for you little monsters. I only wish I could torture you like I wanted to, but Dumbledore said no. I've still got the chains in my office too." The man snarled at them. "Now come along, if you run things will only get worse."

Harry just nodded in the right places. He was really starting to wonder what their punishment was going to be. What could make Filch so delighted? The man condoned torturing students too, things weren't looking very good. Then Harry noticed that they were headed towards Hagrid's hut.

"Filch, over 'ere!" Hagrid voice boomed out.

The man sneered and looked around and spotted a second lantern in the distance. "Now you two, don't think the large oaf will go easy on you. He's taking you little trouble makers into the forest."

Even Malfoy gaped at that. "Now see here!"

"Quiet!" Filch yelled in the blonde's face. "Into the forest with you and I hope you don't make it back out."

"It's against school rules to go into the forest at night, you…" Draco

growled.

Filch just grinned at him.

The two of them were about to start a shouting match when Hagrid strode over to them, holding his lantern high. "What's keeping yeh?"

Harry noticed that Hagrid was wearing his large brown jacket with a large crossbow and a bag of arrows slung over his shoulder. Fang was at Hagrid's side. Hagrid glanced at Filch. "Let's ge' started, been waitin over half an hour for you to ge' 'ere."

"They're here to be punished Hagrid, don't be to nice to them."

"Bugger off Filch." Hagrid snapped. "It's not yer place to punish them, I'll take it from 'ere."

"I'll be back at dawn for whatever's left of the little bastards." Filch snarled and stomped off.

Draco Malfoy turned to Hagrid. "I won't go into the forest."

Leaning down, Hagrid glared at Malfoy and Harry could swear that Draco wanted to move back a few steps. "If yeh want to stay at 'ogwarts, then you'll do as yer told."

"My father is on the board, I refuse to do this."

"Then yeh can start packin boy." Hagrid growled.

Draco paled. "But…but…"

"Make yeh mind up! Expulsion or the forest? Which is it?"

Draco backed down and looked away.

"Thought so." Hagrid said. "Now both of yeh, what we be doin tonight is a mite dangerous. Now yeh listen to me, I don want either of yeh to be hurt."

He led them towards the forbidden forest, using the large lantern to light their way. Harry gulped a little as they neared the trees. He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck rising up the closer they got. Even Malfoy could feel the change in the air and he was getting more and more pale with every step he took.

A winding trail of crushed leaves and earth could be seen moving into the thick black trees. Harry could feel a slight breeze moving through the leaves to ruffle his hair. Harry shivered a little and wondered just how dangerous this detention really was. He didn't feel right about this and Malfoy seemed to agree with him.

"Now come on and keep up with me." Hagrid said as they moved down the trail.

"You see that stuff shinin' on the ground? Tha's Unicorn blood, it is. It's been 'urt and we are goin ter see why."

Malfoy sneered. "And what if whatever hurt the Unicorn finds us?"

Hagrid grinned. "Nothin in this forest will hurt yeh, so long as yer with me and Fang anyway."

"Oh right." Draco drawled scathingly.

Harry could tell that the boy wanted to say something else, but kept his mouth shut. He decided not to say anything either, Hagrid seemed to have everything in hand.

"Keep to the path and yeh'll be fine." Hagrid said. "Now we be splitin up. If yeh be findin anything get yer wand out and send up some sparks. That way we can git to yeh as quickly as possible. I'll go wit one of yeh, Fang with the other. Malfoy, 'ick which one yeh want."

The blond boy sneered. "I'll take Fang."

"Fair nuff, just remember tha' Fang is a coward." Hagrid said as he placed Draco's hand on Fang's collar.

"You expect me to go alone?" The boy squeaked.

"Fang'll keep yeh on the trail." Hagrid explained. "Jus send up sparks if yeh need 'elp."

Harry almost felt sorry for the boy, almost.

"Me and 'Arry will head down this other trail." Hagrid told them. "Jus follow the blood."

They nodded and moved off. The forest was dark and ominous, setting him on edge as he moved down the path watching the glowing spots of blood on the ground, leaves, and bark. Once they were quite some distance from Draco, Hagrid leaned down.

"Don worry about the ponce, Fang will keep 'em out of trouble. So long as they stay on the trail."

Harry nodded. "This is a lot of blood Hagrid."

The man nodded. "This is the second one I've stumbled across this week."

"Could it be a werewolf?"

"Naw, the Werewolf's are fast, but a 'Corn is faster and stronger." Hagrid explained as he checked another large pool of silver blood. "Somethin nasty is hunten the 'Corn."

"Any idea what it is?"

Hagrid looked worried. "Naw, never knew one ta be 'urt before either."

"Ah…"

"Drat!" Hagrid growled, grabbed Harry by the back of his robe and hoisted him behind a tree. Then the large man stepped in front of him and brought up his crossbow. "Come out! I'm armed, show yerself!"

The night was completely silent for just a brief second, then Harry heard someone moving and peaked around Hagrid's arm to see a large shadow move out of the bushes several yards away. Hagrid eyed the new comer for several seconds before he entered the range of the lantern.

It was a centaur. Harry gaped at it for several second before Hagrid relaxed and nodded. "Evenin Ronan."

"Good evening Hagrid, you're a bit jumpy tonight." Ronan said, smiling a little.

"Can't be to careful when in the forest." Hagrid said. "I'd like you to meet 'Arry Potter."

"Why are you here Hagrid." The Centaur asked.

"There be somethin bad in the forest."

Ronan looked at the sky. "Mars agrees with you."

"Right." Hagrid said.

"You learn much at that school, Harry Potter."

"More than you would imagine." He said.

"Good, you will need every bit of it." Ronan told them.

"A 'Corn has been 'urt, Ronan. Yeh seen anything?"

"The innocent are always the first to be hurt." Ronan said, staring at the sky.

"Right." Hagrid grumbled. "So nothin strange?"

"The forest hides many secrets Hagrid. Many secrets." Ronan told them, then turned and started walking away. "Bane is in the area as well, watch Mars, he may warn you of danger."

Grabbing Harry by the shoulder, Hagrid steered Harry down the path while grumbling under his breath.

"You alright Hagrid?"

"Yeh, just don' get along with those ruddy stargazers that well. Yeh'll never get a straight answer out of them, even in a life or death situation. Its always Mars this Jupiter that. Bloody annoyen."

Harry smiled a little. Then saw something in the distance, above the trees. "Hagrid, sparks!"

The large man turned around, cursed, and brought his crossbow back up. "Yeh stay here 'Arry, stay on the trail!"

Seconds later Hagrid ran off the path and moved right for the sparks. With him and the light gone, the whole area went dark. Harry looked out into the trees and gulped. He could feel the danger in the air as he stood there. A trail of silver blood continued to move deeper into the forest as well.

Harry briefly wondered what happened to Malfoy, then shrugged it off. As the minutes dragged by, Harry sharpened his senses even as they adjusted to the inky darkness around him. He could feel the slight breeze on his skin, every crackle of a leaf or twig.

Then Hagrid came stomping back with Malfoy, filling the area with light from his lantern. The large groundskeeper was fuming as he came over to Harry and glared at the Slytherin. Harry looked at Malfoy and raised a questioning eyebrow, but the boy ignored him.

"Harry, yeh and Malfoy take Fang and 'ead up the trail. I'll be there in a few minutes."

"You're abandoning us!" Draco gasped.

The large man glared down at the boy. "Yeh keep yer wits about ya. I have to check on the trail you didn't check."

Draco snorted.

"Arry will keep you in line." The large man smirked. "I've heard the rumors too."

This made Malfoy spin around to gape at the large man. "You wouldn't dare!"

The large man was grinning as he vanished back into the trees around them with the lantern. Draco and Fang moved several paces closer to Harry the instant Hagrid vanished into the forest. If something hadn't been in danger Harry would have laughed at the way Malfoy was acting.

"So Potter, this seems like the perfect opportunity to me." The blond said, reaching into his robe to pull out his wand.

Harry gave him a bored look. "Oh really?"

"I can hurt you now and blame it on the oaf's stupidity. Maybe this time he'll be fired or thrown in Azkaban and I'll be rid of you permanently."

Fang whimpered and looked around, his tail hanging between his legs as he sensed something in the air. Normally Harry would have looked to see what was bothering the dog, but he could tell that the instant Malfoy found the courage to do so, he would start throwing spells.

Pulling his own wand out, Harry quickly reviewed several spells and a couple of the moves that Ranma had taught him. Even as first years they hadn't really been taught anything really dangerous, but Harry that that Malfoy might know more than just first years spells.

"You afraid Potter? I'm going to hurt you." Malfoy hissed.

Harry just moved into a relaxed stance, arms at his side, and stood there waiting for Malfoy to make the first move. It would give Harry the edge he needed to put the boy out of commission for several days at least. Fang whimpered again and tried to move down the path, but the boys ignored him.

"No light trick is going to stop me this time Potter."

"Malfoy, shut up and fight. Either that or just shut up and do something.

I'm bored." Harry sneered.

"Densaugeo!"

Still glaring at the boy, Harry twisted his upper body and let the spell fly by, where it hit a tree behind him. "Gotta do better than that."

Malfoy's eyes were wide with shock. "I-impossible…"

"I told you last time, you're a wimp and way too slow to hit me." Harry taunted, smirking a little.

The blond boy ground his teeth. "Then dodge this…Incendio!"

Dodging a beam of light is one thing, avoiding a burst of fire is completely different. Harry stayed in control as he dropped to the ground, rolled, coming to his feet a few feet away. He was just slightly off the trail. Several yards from the boys, Fang was hiding under a bush.

Malfoy's fire spell set several bushes on fire. He had a large grin on his face as he started to move towards Harry. "Aren't so tough now, are you?"

"You talk to much Malfoy." Harry said as he put his wand away. "No need to waste my magic on you."

"Why you little…"

Suddenly Harry dove forward in a blur of motion, rolled, and swept Malfoy's legs out from under him. As the boy cried out and went down, Harry reached out and grabbed Malfoy's wrist and pivoted. As Harry came to his feet, he twisted the blond boy's arm and forced him to the ground.

"Aghaaa!" Cried Malfoy.

Kneeling down slowly, Harry placed his kneed on Malfoy's neck and applied a little pressure. No matter how hard the boy struggled, he couldn't get out of the hold. "Malfoy, it takes more than an old family and lots of money to be dangerous. You completely suck at this. I didn't even have to use my wand to take you down."

"I'll m-make you PAY!" Malfoy yelled.

Twisting his arm a little more made Malfoy quiet down. Harry spun his wand around and tapped it against Malfoy's skull. "Stupefy."

With a burst of light, the boy's struggles ceased. Harry waited several seconds before releasing him and standing up. He turned and looked at the dog cowering under the bushes. "Fang, make sure the moron here doesn't get eaten. Hagrid can sit on him if he wants. Being a footstool is about all Malfoy is good for anyway."

Harry made sure his wand was alright and noticed that he'd ripped the sides of his robe up quite a bit, but shrugged it off. He decided to head up the trail a little ways just to keep out of Malfoy's sight. Otherwise Harry had a feeling that he might do something worse to the Slytherin Ponce.

A couple of minutes later Harry stopped as his danger sense went up several notches. He crouched down next to a bush and glanced around slowly. He couldn't see anything out of the ordinary, but that didn't mean anything. This forest was supposed to be very dangerous.

He sucked in some air and for just a split second his vision faded and he could see a wall of black fire all around him. Gaping, he tried to figure out where it came from, but as quickly as it appeared it vanished and his normal eyesight returned.

Shaking his head, Harry stood up slowly and moved a few paces down the trail, just to the top of a little rise in the path. What he saw on the other side shocked him more than he wanted to admit. It was a beautiful clearing in the middle of the trees.

Lying in the middle of the clearing was a large white horse. Its white fur appeared to be glowing slightly. It was the injured unicorn. Kneeling near it's stomach was some cloaked thing drinking the unicorn's blood. Harry wasn't sure how he knew, but the Unicorn was still alive, but fading fast. He had to help it in any way he could.

An instant later three throwing stars shot across the clearing. Just like last time he used one, they were glowing a dark red color. Harry yelled as he finished his throw and the thing started to turn towards him. The throwing stars slammed into its back and sides.

It grunted as it was thrown off its feet and almost catapulted into the trees. Harry didn't think about how he just pulled that off, instead he ran over to the Unicorn and started ripping large strips out of his robe. He wrapped it in a ball and pressed it against the Unicorn's side.

The horse jerked a little, but didn't seem to have the strength to stop him. Harry could tell that it was frightened and confused. Shaking his head, he pulled his wand and held it above his head. He sent a shower of sparks into the air.

The cloaked thing was getting back to it's feet, but stopped when Harry sent the sparks up. Then it turned and ran into the forest. Once he was sure that the thing was gone, Harry lowered his wand and let the sparks die. After putting it back, he continued to press against the unicorn's wound.

"Arry!" Hagrid yelled, bursting out of the trees.

"Help Hagrid, the poor thing is still alive, but I don't know how to heal him."

Hagrid saw the unicorn and gasped. Then a look of pity crossed his face and he looked away. "Arry, once a 'corn is touched by…evil, they never survive."

All Harry could do was gape at Hagrid. "But…"

"Unicorn's is beings of light magic 'Arry, they can't survive once dey are touched by evil."

"I won't just sit here and let him DIE!" Harry growled.

"There be nothin we can do." Hagrid said miserably. "The 'Corn is suffering,

we need to…"

"You aren't touching him!" Harry yelled. He closed his eyes and reached for his Ki. It was a long shot, but he had to try. A minute later Harry's aura flared around his body.

Eyes wide, Hagrid backed up a few paces. "Arry?"

After nearly ten minutes the glow around Harry dimmed before it vanished completely. Harry snarled something, twisted around, and punched the ground as hard as he could. He slowly came to his feet and walked out of the clearing. Looking a little scared, Hagrid stepped over to the unicorn.

The wound was completely healed, but the unicorn was still dead. "Bloody

Hell…"

oooooooooo

Chapter 21

oooooooooo

Harry stalked through the school snarling at anything that got in his way. After the Unicorn died he was forced to admit that Hagrid was right, but he still didn't want to accept it. He still didn't want to think about everything that happened tonight.

There were emotions raging through him that were nearly impossible to ignore. That poor unicorn's death was bad enough, but he saw that thing drinking the blood as well. He wasn't sure who or what it was either. All he could tell was that it was wrong.

As he confronted the thing, he felt the aura of magic it put out and could instantly tell that it was pure evil. The thing took three of his stars as well and just ran off with them. Harry wasn't to worried about that, but he would need to find some new ones. He only brought a small amount with him from home. There were only two of them left now.

He snarled as Mrs. Norris, Filch's cat hissed at him. The cat's fur stood up on end and it raced away from before he could even think to throw a spell at her. In some way the cat reminded him of the Unicorn and he felt a little guilty, but only for a second.

A few seconds later he arrived at the entrance to Gryffindor tower and stalked inside. It was pretty late, so he was a little surprised to see Ron asleep in one of the chairs next to the fire. Harry took a few deep breaths to calm himself down and walked over to his friend.

"Ron, get up and go to bed." Harry said, shaking awake.

The red headed boy jumped out of his chair. "Who! What! Wher…"

Harry snickered. "It's late, lets head to bed."

"What was detention like?"

"Bad." Harry said. "Filch took us to Hagrid, and he took me and Malfoy into the forest."

Ron gasped. "But…it's dangerous!"

"They didn't seem to care. We still went in there and Hagrid had us tracking an injured Unicorn."

"Did you find it?"

"Yeah." Harry muttered. He really didn't want to give Ron all the details.

"It died though."

Ron nodded in sympathy. "Do you have to go back?"

"I don't think so."

"Then put it behind you and get some sleep."

"Sure, may as well." Harry made his way to bed and climbed down into the trunk. He wasn't sure what to do and wanted to talk to Ranma before he went to sleep.

Even as he climbed down the ladder he could hear Ranma working out in the gym. A few minutes later he stepped into the gym to see Ranma bouncing around the room with four balls of glowing energy swarming around him, attempting to hit Ranma.

Ranma seemed to be paying very close attention to what he was doing, ducking and weaving his way though the exercise at high speed. Then as he watched, Harry noticed that Ranma would occasionally flex his fingers and glow for a split second.

This would set off a very tiny burst of magic that Harry could sense. He took a second to focus and realized that Ranma was actively using magic to track the balls of light. Ranma created a kata of some kind to practice magic! "Woah!"

Ranma didn't miss a move as he weaved his way through the balls. "I figured out the first steps!"

"Are you doing that wandlessly?"

"Yeah, but I have to keep a very close eye on my power levels though. It's so easy to over power the magic and drain yourself." Ranma explained. "This just takes minimum concentration and a basic knowledge of Occlumancy."

"That mind stuff you've been trying to teach me?"

"Yep, I'm in a light meditation trance right now. I can feel everything around as it move through the magic in the air and my aura. Took me nearly twenty minutes to get used to the feeling though."

"What all can you do?" Harry asked.

"I've actually been having problems with the actual spells. The conversion to wandless magic seems to disrupt the spells for some reason. I still haven't figured that one out yet. On the other hand I have figured out that levitation spell you learned a few months ago." Ranma said.

"Amazing, what about the balls of light?"

"Once I formed those, I didn't have to work on them anymore."

"Show me!"

"Not till I master it kid, I want to make sure I know everything in case something bad happens."

"Looks like you have it down to me."

Ranma smirked, waved his hand, and one of the balls flew right at Harry. The

boy gasped, dropped and rolled to the side, avoiding the ball as it missed his head by a few inches and headed back at Ranma. "Hey!"

"Hah!" Ranma cackled. "So what did you do in detention."

An innocent question, but it still reminded Harry of the Unicorn's death. He growled a little. "It was horrible."

"What happened?"

"Turns out we were out there to find an injured unicorn. We found it, but the thing that injured it was some dark wizard in a thick black robe. I came across the thing as he was drinking the Unicorn's blood."

"It's blood?"

Harry nodded. "Unicorn's are creatures of pure innocence. Their blood is full of magic with healing qualities, if you drink it you can be brought back from the point of death, but it comes with a curse."

"What kind of curse? I drove the guy away and tried to heal the wound with my Ki as you taught me last year."

"You've never healed any one but yourself. How did you help the unicorn?"

"I healed the wound, but it still died." Harry muttered.

"Why?"

"That guy that injured it corrupted it in some way, according to Hagrid. No mater how hard I tried it just wouldn't live."

"I see, and you think you failed."

"Of course I failed!"

"No you didn't, did you try your best?"

"Yes."

"Then you did all you could, there is nothing to be angry about. You will find that it's possible to be the best and still fail from time to time. I had that lesson beat into me by pops as he constantly pushed me to my limits." Ranma said as he flicked his wrist and the balls all vanished from sight. He took a deep breath and sat down.

"Maybe…"

"Well for now, let's think about something else you said. Who was the guy that drank the blood?"

"I don't know." Harry muttered.

Ranma shook his head. "Think about it kid, just who do you know that would benefit from drinking that blood?"

"Well, I thought that Snape was working to get the stone, but he's not injured, other than his leg, and that was months ago."

"Kid, I told you that Snape isn't one to do that. His aura would have told me, but you know one who's aura fits."

Harry frowned and thought about it. "Well, Quirrell has that odd aura, but I don't think it's him."

Ranma shrugged. "Then who else do you know that would want to live at all costs."

He wracked his brain trying to think of someone, but the only person that came to mind was supposed to be dead already. "Voldemort?"

"Yes."

"But, he's dead."

"Is he? I read those books and even read between the lines a little. One thing they all agree on, is that his body was never found, just a pile of ash."

"I don't know."

"You told me what that stone can do, what if Voldemort is after the stone and isn't worried about drinking unicorn blood because of it."

"It makes sense." Harry conceded. "I just don't know if I can believe it.

How could he survive without a body?"

"I don't know, but with magic, anything is possible."

Harry nodded. "So, Snape is going to steal the stone for Voldemort? Well I'm safe so long as I'm in the school, since Dumbledore's here."

Ranma just gave him a certain look.

"Don't say a thing. Dumbledore's the only one Voldemort's ever been afraid of as far as I can tell."

"What did I tell you about letting others thinking for you?" Ranma said.

"That's just rumors and unproven facts."

"Say's the great martial artist." Harry teased.

"You got that right." Ranma smirked.

"I wonder what Hermione will say?" Harry muttered, looking away.

"Hard to say, but we need to discus some plans if Voldemort does show up.

Better to be prepared than to be caught off guard."

They talked most of the night and for the second day in a row Harry only got a few hours sleep. He even decided to keep his invisibility cloak with him at all times, just in case something happened. That and Ranma still refused to teach him the Yamasen and Umisen Ken moves.

The next couple of days flew by as he took exam after exam. When he had the time he would swing by the third corridor and check on the giant dog and knew that it was still in there. Usually sleeping or barking at something playfully. He even spotted Hagrid roaming around the area a couple of times carrying a rather large side of meat.

If that wasn't odd enough, his scar had started to throb constantly, even sending spikes of pain through his brain every few hours. His housemates got used to seeing him rubbing his forehead and suggested various types of headache potions to him. Harry took the advice, but since Snape refused to teach potions properly, there was no way he could make them.

He'd long ago decided to spend his summer practicing potions at home. Of course during the exam with Snape, the git stalked around the room sending death glares at him and a couple of other students. Harry was pretty sure he failed that exam, but didn't really care either. He was still considering not coming back next year.

Harry plodded his way through the Transfiguration exam and really didn't care that it was possible to turn a snuff box into a porcupine. Of course Neville managed to turn it into a blue cactus that shuffled around and sent the class into hysterics. Luckily he managed to get it on his second try as his wand sent a burst of sparkles to the floor.

Then there was Hermione. She managed to submerge herself into the whole ordeal so much, that she barely remembered to eat. She spent twenty hours a day buried to her hips in books, scrolls, and notes. Then waved him off when he tried to talk to her about Voldemort and said she had more important things to worry about than something that may not even happen. Ron barely said three words to him during exam week.

As the week went by it just got hotter and hotter as well. Being cooped up in a classroom for most of the day didn't help. He was just glad they actually taught the cooling charm to first years. It was about the only thing that kept him from going spare. As if his nerves weren't on edge as it was. Snape was still following him around as well.

Whatever the git was up to had to be bad to keep up this level of hate and bitterness, Harry just hoped Ranma was right. He just couldn't find one clue that explained away the man's unwavering hatred of him. The death glares, potions marked with a lower grade than they really were. How he even encouraged the Slytherins to throw things into the Gryffindor potions.

The git even tried to fail his exam because he didn't cut one of the ingredients perfectly. Instead he only lost thirty points for it. Harry already had several plans for revenge thought up. He just had to find the right way to pull them off. The man was going to pay for his actions.

Harry really thought the man should be fired and tossed out of the castle. Three quarters of the school hated his guts as well, even a few Slytherins who were on the receiving end of the viper's tongue. Harry gave thanks to Ranma for bullying him into learning a bit of Occlumancy. Without the calming influence that the skill brought him, he was sure he would have attacked the bastard by now.

His shields weren't that strong yet, but he was over halfway through organizing his memories. Surprisingly this gave him the ability to focus on any subject. Ranma said it was this effect that allowed him to finally tap into the magic around him and cast a couple of spells.

That they backfired, more often than not, didn't matter, it was still magic and he was learning more and more every day. Harry shook his head and wondered if Hagrid had the same problems as Ranma did with magic. In one of their earlier conversations the half giant explained that he was expelled form school years before, but wouldn't elaborate.

He didn't think so, but didn't want to ask the man such a question if didn't have to. Hagrid didn't like to talk about his past very much and tended to focus on his animals a little to much. He even talked about the giant dog and named him Fluffy. That thing was not a Fluffy. Maybe Scruffy, but never a Fluffy. He laughed to himself and suddenly thought about Norbert.

"Uh oh." Harry muttered and jumped to his feet.

"Harry?" Hermione said, looking up from her History of magic notes.

"I'm going to talk to Hagrid."

"Why?"

"It just occurred to me that it's a bit odd for Hagrid to get his hands on the one thing in the world he wants more than anything else. That a complete stranger just shows up out of the blue and has one handy? Are they that common that anyone can get one?"

Hermione shook her head. "You're right. That is odd, and the eggs are actually quite rare since dragons only lay one every decade or so. They live so long that they don't need to breed that much."

"Well it's quite lucky Rubeus 'I've always wanted a dragon' Hagrid was around to take the egg then." Harry said as he started walking away. Hermione grabbed a few books and chased after him before got to far.

It only took a few minutes for Harry to race over to Hagrid's hut. The large man was sitting on his porch resting and petting the head of his dog. He looked up as he heard them running and waved them over. "Hullo! Finished all the exams?"

"Hagrid, on the night you got Norbert, what did that stranger look like?"

Harry asked, completely ignoring Hagrid's own question.

"Just a stranger in a cloak, kept his hook so I didn't see a face. Why'er you askin?"

"Did Hogwarts come up at all?"

"Sure, we talked about a number oh things." Hagrid said with another grin.

"The school, the students, even some oh the animals that are around here."

"You didn't tell him about Fluffy did you?" Hermione asked, looking shocked.

Hagrid fidgeted a little. "Well, er, yeah, I did. I told him after raising

Fluffy, a cute little dragon would be easy…"

Hermione gaped at him.

"Hagrid, was he interested in Fluffy?" Harry asked, but feared he knew the answer already.

"Well yeah, who wouldn't be interested in a giant three headed dog? Fluffy's easy ter take of, just play him a little music and he goes right to sleep after spinning around a few times. Just flopps over on 'is side and closes his eyes. Gotta be calmin music though…" Hagrid growled. "I ought not have told yeh that! Don't say anythin to anyone."

Harry and Hermione thanked him for the information and raced back to the castle. "We've got to tell Dumbledore." Hermione said.

"I know, I just don't know how to actually find him. He could be anywhere in the castle."

"We can try his office."

"Where's that?"

Hermione looked confused. "I have no idea. No one has ever actually said anything about it before. I haven't even thought about it before. Is it a secret?"

"Who knows, I guess we go to a teacher then?"

"Right, they can take care of this."

Harry just shrugged and spotted McGonagall. "Professor! We need to see the Headmaster."

The woman was lugging around a rather large book and didn't look very pleased to see either of them. She stopped and gave them a look. "Why do you need to see the Headmaster?"

"Ah…" Harry started.

"He isn't here anyway." The woman snapped. "He left the school right after the last exam after receiving an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic. Which is far more important than anything either of you have to say to him."

He didn't even seem to hear the irritation in her voice, though Hermione

did. The girl stepped behind Harry and tried not to look at the teacher. "He

isn't here? This is bad…"

"The Headmaster is a great man and has many demands on his time Mr. Potter, now if you will excuse me…" She dismissed them and walked off, ignoring Harry trying to tell her about the Stone.

"She won't even listen." Harry gasped and Hermione looked a bit surprised as well.

"Let's find another teacher."

"No, I've learned that I usually have to do things on my own. I tried to do this the right way, now I'll do it my way." Harry growled.

"Harry, no, we can go to Professor Flitwick…"

Harry ground his teeth. "It's tonight, I know it is. Snape sent that note, got the Headmaster out of the school, and now has everyone out of the way. All he has to do is charm Fluffy and jump down the trap door to get the stone."

"Harry, we've got an upper hand on the first years, but what can we do against trap or traps set up by the teachers to protect the stone? We wouldn't stand a chance."

"I'm going, I have to stop that git…"

"Good afternoon." A smooth voice said, laced with hate.

Harry turned to find Professor Snape standing behind him, out of the corner

of his eye he saw Hermione pale a little. "Snape…"

"This is a warning, Potter, if I catch you wandering around the castle at night one more time, I'll make sure you are expelled. So, please, make sure you are out of bed tonight. It would be the perfect present for me and the rest of the school to get rid of you once and for all." Snape said with an evil grin. "Good…night, to you."

As he walked away an aura of red energy flared around Harry, even his eyes turned red and made the lenses of his glasses glow. He ground his teeth and growled, forming a ball of energy in his hand. Snape stopped walking, stiffened, but for some reason didn't turn around.

Hermione had never seen Harry this angry before and could even feel the energy of his aura washing over her, making her hair shift around. "Harry, calm down or you really will be expelled. Please."

Whirling around, Harry threw up his Occlumancy barriers and forced himself to calm down. He pictured a bonfire within his mind and fed his anger to it for several minutes before he calmed down enough to think straight again. Hermione was looking a little worried.

"Snape is gone, he walked off while you were doing whatever that was." She said.

"That man has gone too far. I've reached the end of my patience for this crap. I've done nothing to him, ever, but he just won't let up."

"He does it because he wants you angry."

Harry looked at her. "He's an adult, not a fourth grader. Adults aren't supposed to act like we do Hermione. I can understand Malfoy, he's a bully and a jerk, but that 'man' is supposed to be a teacher."

"You can't let his actions get to you, that's what he wants."

"Not to worry, I'm only going to break every bone in his body with my bare hands, he'll live, I'm sure of it." Harry snarled. "I'm going to get that stone before he does and put it some place he'd never look for it."

"What?"

"I'm going down the trapdoor tonight." Harry told her, then turned and stalked off. Hermione watched him as he headed off and wondered just what she should do.

Why were the teachers acting like this?

oooooooooo

Chapter 22

oooooooooo

After reaching Gryffindor tower, Harry made his way down into his trunk where he spent about half an hour relaxing in a nice bath. Every now and then he had to use a charm to heat the water again, but it helped him calm down. He considered his actions and had realized something Hermione hadn't, Snape was goading him into action.

The man wanted him to be there so he could either kill him or punish him in some way. There was also something else that Harry was starting to wonder about. Whenever he was around Snape, Harry wasn't as calm or as in control as he usually was. He wasn't sure, but he wondered if Snape was casting spells on him to make him lose control.

He wouldn't put it past the bastard, but he couldn't figure out why. It would be so much easier to just ambush him with a few well placed curses to kill him in the halls. Hell, it would be easy to hid his body if Snape really wanted to. It just didn't make sense.

His parents fifth year books had some magic detection spells listed in them, but he didn't know how to cast them yet. His eleven year old body just wasn't mature enough to handle the strain of that kind of magic. He would have to slowly build up his magical stamina to pull them off at some point. Right now that was just impossible.

For now he would have to just go with what he knew. He was far more advanced in his martial arts training than he was in magic, but he thought he could pull it off. He would just have to be careful since he didn't know what was down the trap door.

While floating in the bath, he prepared himself mentally for what was going to happen. He used Occlumancy to focus his mind and bring all his spell knowledge to the forefront of his mind, incantations, theory, and the most useful spells he could think of.

"Snape is going to pay." He muttered to himself.

After getting out of the bath, he dried off, then went to his room within the trunk and opened the wardrobe. Hanging inside was his family's battle robes. He had only worn them once since he got them last summer, but they still looked good. He pulled them out and slowly got dressed in the oddly cut red and gold robe.

Ranma stepped into the room as he was tying the robe in place. "It's tonight?"

"Yeah, Snape threatened to have me expelled if I was out after curfew

though."

"You aren't worried about that?"

"He's just trying to prevent me from stopping him."

"Want me to help?"

Harry looked up and saw Ranma had an odd look on his face. "I have a choice?"

"This is a real battle kid, one of pride, real danger, and pure combat."

"I think I can do this on my own and I owe Snape a beating. He's pushed me to far this time."

"You could get…killed."

"I know." Harry said, it was as simple as that.

"So long as you understand the danger and willing to put everything you have

into the fight."

"I will."

"You represent the Saotome School tonight." Ranma said.

"I won't let you down."

Ranma nodded. Take your staff with you."

"Staff?"

"The one Hagrid got you for Christmas, I have a feeling it will come in handy. Break it over the head of your enemy."

"But it's a tool?"

"A tool is a tool, use it wisely is all I'm saying."

"Alright."

Harry got the staff out from under his bed and checked it over to make sure it was still in good shape. "It looks like fine."

"There's some spells on it." Ranma said. "I can see the magic swirling around the wood. Haven't seen anything like it before."

"I don't know what they would be. Hopefully they are useful."

Ranma nodded.

"It's nearing midnight kid, you had best head out."

The invisibility cloak was on a few seconds later and quickly left the trunk and made his way out of the tower. There were a few people still in the common room, though they were older students, and the really didn't want to know why they were making out in front of the large fireplace.

He opened the portrait and stepped out into the corridor, ignoring the Pink Lady as she asked who was there. He let the portrait close before making his way through the school. As he moved through the school's darkened passages he spotted both Peeves and Mrs. Norris skulking about.

Peeves did glance in his direction. Harry held his breath for a few seconds as he leaned against the wall, but the poltergeist eventually went away. He exhaled in relief before continuing on towards the third floor corridor. The school was eerily silent as he walked, a lot different than it normally was at this time of night.

There seemed to be an ominous quality to the silence, as it something

horrible was about to happen. It made Harry a little nervous, but he ignored it as he approached the door to Fluffy's room. The door was in several pieces, ripped completely off the hinges that held it in place.

Harry tiptoed forward and glanced into the room. Completely asleep, Fluffy lay on the floor next to a small floor harp that was playing itself. Harry sighed as he looked at the floor and saw that the trap door was wide open. Pulling the cloak off, he stuffed it in his pocket and glanced down the trap door. He couldn't see a thing beyond ten feet.

One simple step and he was falling through the trap door. He kept his eyes peeled at the floor below him and landed in a crouch. He could smell smoke all around him. Ashes filled the air and littered the room. Foot steps made their way to the only door in the room.

He moved cautiously, looking for anything that might attack him. Off in the

corner he could make out some kind of smoldering plant matter, but couldn't

tell what it was. He had no doubt that it was something dangerous though.

Snape had destroyed it completely.

That was when he heard the noise and smelled something very familiar. The door across the room suddenly caved in and pieces flew across the room. He could only gape as a troll, even bigger than the one he fight in the library, stepped into the room. A small part of his mind noted that it had on a leather loin cloth, a belt of human skulls, and a very large club with spikes through it.

The thing sniffed the air and looked right at him. It roared, loud enough to wake the dead, and burst into a lumbering run. As it ran at him, the club was raised above its head. For a split second, he started to panic, but then he started to feel completely calm.

His staff seemed to move around with him ease. The troll roared again as came within striking range and brought the club down. Harry deflected the club to the side and let it crash the floor. He gazed at the monster, snarled, and plowed the other end of the staff between the thing's legs.

A burst of light came from the staff as it hit and sent the troll to the floor screaming. It's hands grabbed between its legs as it lay there, but Harry didn't give it a chance to recover. The staff spun once more, almost cutting the very air, and came down on the thing's skull. Another burst of light and the thing's head was buried in the floor.

It twitched several times before it went limp. Gazing down on the thing, Harry was pretty sure it was dead, but didn't really want to fight out for sure. Clunk! The tip of the staff just missed his foot as it skittered across the floor, and then the rest of the staff just fell to pieces in his hand.

"Great." He muttered sarcastically. "That sure came in handy. Now I just hope there aren't any more trolls.

He made his way over to the destroyed door and saw that the troll hadn't been very kind to the room when it passed through. The walls were covered in shattered stone holes. Fluttering noises filled the air above him, grabbing his attention. Winged Keys soared around in the upper regions. Most of them looked rather ragged.

Off to the side several shattered brooms lay in pieces on the floor. That didn't matter though, because the door out of this room didn't exist either, at least as one piece. Bits and pieces of it were scattered around the room. He was beginning to see a pattern here. Snape seemed to have just blasted his way through all the obstacles in his path.

A pile of rubble filled the room. From what he could see it had been a giant chess set at some point. He wove his way through the damage until he reached the next room. Ten dead trolls littered the room, smashed into walls, crushed under ruble, and more. He was careful not to make any noise here, he could tell that he was close to his goal.

What was left of the next room was obviously something that Snape had set up. He found several shattered potions bottles. He glanced at where the door should have been and found himself looking at a wall of black flames. He stared at it for a second. He could remember seeing the thing before, but just not where.

He placed his hand near the fire and could feel the heat instantly. Frowning, he glanced around the mess and saw that one of the bottles was still intact. There was something inside it as well. He sniffed it and felt chilly. Shrugging, he drank the vial and carefully made his way through the fire.

It didn't even singe the hair on his arms. What he found on the other side wasn't what he was expecting at all. He scanned the area, noting that it looked like some kind of theater room. Stone steps descended down to a small floor. Standing at the far edge of the room he instantly recognized the mirror he found earlier in the year.

"Quirrell?" Mr. Twitchy himself. "What the hell are you doing here?"

The man and that over sized turban turned to smile at him. "Potter, I had a feeling I'd be seeing you down here."

"But, but, I thought…Snape…" Harry gasped.

"Severus? Yes, he does seem the type doesn't he? Parading around school like an over grown vampire, threatening students, and all that other stuff. Everything he does worked in my favor, after all, with him around who would suspect little ol'me?"

Nearly everything that fueled Harry's anger vanished in a hurricane of confusion. In a split second he realized that Ranma had indeed been right, Snape wasn't the one. "But Snape tried to kill me! I saw him!"

Quirrell started laughing evilly. "He tried to save you. I was the one trying to kill you. Why do you think he refereed the next match? He really shouldn't have bothered, I wasn't in the castle during that game. Had some business to take care."

Harry just couldn't see it. Then he had been acting just like Snape wanted

him to. "But…"

"Snape has even been using his Legilimancy skills to push your buttons. It's quite funny to watch him tear a student down and ruin everything enjoyable about school. He's been taking an unholy glee at your struggles to survive his class and you can't even stop him." Quirrell sneered. "Even better, he's been wasting his time, cause I'm going to kill you tonight."

He didn't react in time as Quirrell snapped his fingers. Ropes suddenly appeared out of thin air and wrapped themselves around Harry. "I swear, I nearly killed you on Halloween. You just couldn't go back to your tower, instead you have to stick your nose where it doesn't belong. That mudblood girlfriend of yours got in the way as well, but she survived."

Quirrell sneered again and continued. "Then if that wasn't bad enough, you start poking your nose into everything! I let that troll in so that I could distract everybody, but Snape ignored it and made beeline for me. Cutting me off just as I opened the door to see that giant dog. Thing nearly got me too, but Snape took a bite instead. Now shut up, I need to finish looking at this mirror."

The man turned his back on Harry and did just that. Leaving Harry tied up on the floor. Harry struggled against the ropes, but they wouldn't budge. He heard Quirrell muttering something about Dumbldore and the mirror. Then Quirrell started cursing. "I can see the stone! I can see myself giving the stone to my Master! How do I get the stone?"

"That mirror only shows you what you want to see, idiot." Harry snapped and Quirrell whirled on him.

"What do you mean, brat!"

"All I see in that mirror are my parents."

"Yes, yes, it's called the Mirror of Erised for a reason. Just read the words at the top of the mirror backwards, simple and easy. Dumbledore hid the stone in the mirror somehow."

"I still think Snape has something to do with this!" Harry growled, hoping to distract the man.

"Snape went to school with your father, Potter, they hated each other's guts. Snape therefore hates your guts as well, because you look just like a young James Potter. He will make your life at school a living hell, brat, but he doesn't want you dead. Not when he can spend seven years long years torturing you day in an day out for what your father did to him." Quirrell said. "Snape was also trying to break me, but he failed."

Harry shook his head. "I heard you sobbing the other day. I thought Snape had finally broken you."

"Bah, I find it hard to follow all of my Master's instructions, he is strong and I'm weak."

"You mean to tell me that Voldemort was in that classroom with you!" Harry yelled.

The man shuddered. "He is always with me. Wherever I go, he is there. Ever

since I failed to steal the stone from Gringrotts he's been keeping a closer

eye on me, punishing me when I get to weak…"

He turned back to the mirror, dismissing Harry from his thoughts.

Harry's mind raced, he had to find a way out of these ropes and find the stone before Quirrell did. He struggled against the ropes a little harder, but they wouldn't budge. Harry crawled like a snake, lifting his butt and using his legs to slither forward until he could see the mirror.

Who would have thought all those hours creeping around Ranma's house like a snake would come in handy? He was almost there, just a few more feet.

Quirrell wasn't even paying attention to him though. Instead the man slammed

his fists against the mirror.

"Master! Help me, what should I do? Break the mirror?"

Then to Harry's horror, a voice as dry as death seemed to echo around the

room. "Use the boy, he knows…"

Quirrell turned. "You know…"

"Use him." The voice ordered again.

The man snapped his fingers again and the ropes vanished. "Come here boy, show me what I need to know. Look, look in the mirror and tell me what you see."

Harry looked and it was only his Occlumancy that allowed him to keep a straight face. In the mirror an image of himself holding the stone smiled at him, held it up, then placed it in the inner pocket of his battle robe. Harry had almost forgotten that he was wearing them.

"WELL! What do you see?"

"Ah…me, holding the quidditch cup." Harry lied.

"Bah!" Quirrell yelled and pushed Harry to the side. Harry turned to make a break for it when that dead voice spoke up again.

"He lies, lies…"

"You lied to me!" Quirrell screamed, the madness in his eyes was starting to show for the first time. Then the man started to scream, grabbed his head and fell to his knees. "Master! I'm sorry!"

"I…will talk…to him…"

"You aren't strong enough yet."

"I am…for this." The voice sneered.

Whimpering in pain, Quirrell stood up and started to remove his turban, layer by layer. Harry stepped back as he felt ward after ward fall away and he could feel something dark and disgusting emanating from inside the turban. Then things got worse as the final layer of the turban came away and Quirrell turned his back to Harry.

A grotesque white face was attached to the back of the teacher's head. A sunken dead face glared at him with evil red eyes. Where his nose should have been, a pair of slits stood out. It took a ragged breath and sneered at him. "Potter, Harry Potter…the bane of my existence."

"What the #$ are you?" Harry muttered in shock.

"See what I…have become? You did this…to me, brat. I am a mere shade of what I once…was, but the Unicorn…blood strengthened me."

Harry shuddered, the things voice rattled his bones.

"Now, give me…the stone, or die." Voldemort said. "I want the elixir of

life, so that I can live again…"

"N-never." Harry said, backing up another step. He hadn't expected anything like this!

"Don't be a fool!" Voldemort suddenly screamed. "It's far better to save

your own life and join me, than to suffer what I have planned…"

The thing was growing stronger, Harry realized. He noticed that Quirrell's arms were hanging limply at his sides. His hands were looking a little bony, as if aged.

"Your parents died…begging for mercy…"

His anger started to rear its head once more and he snarled at Voldemort. "Maybe, maybe not Potter, but if you don't give me that stone I will kill you in an instant."

"No." Harry said as he stood up straight. "I'll keep it, the thing might come in handy."

Voldemort's face twisted around in shock and surprise, and then pure hate formed on his features. The red eyes lit up like beacons and seconds later Quirrell started to scream. "Master! Don't, you promised me! Please!"

"You will do my bidding Quirrell, you belong to me and I will use you as I please." Voldemort said as his head suddenly sank into the back of Quirrell's head and vanished. Quirrell convulsed and fell to the floor, then arched back and screamed louder than Harry had ever heard before.

A black mist formed around Quirrell's body and started to burrow under the man's skin. Harry could actually see it moving inside the man's body like a poison and in a matter of seconds Quirrell succumbed. It lay still for several seconds before the eyes opened and the body uncurled itself.

Glowing red eyes peered out of Quirrell's skull, black tendrils of mist swirled away under the man's skin. Voldemort had taken over Quirrell's body completely. "Now, Potter, give me the stone." Voldemort said.

"What did you do to Quirrell?"

"The weak willed fool is no more. I've taken his body and will put it to good use."

"Why didn't you do that before?"

Voldemort sneered and pointed Quirrell's wand at Harry. "Because I wanted my own body, but I'm willing to change my plans to take care of you."

"#$& me." Harry muttered in shock.

Voldemort cackled. "That can be arranged."

Harry broke into a run for the exit, but something slammed into his back before he even got close, sending him sprawling across the floor. He rolled until he reached the edge of the stairs. Voldemort stalked across the room slowly, laughing just loud enough to be heard.

"Aren't you even going to use magic to attack me? You, a first year student?

I want to see what you can do."

Fear filled Harry. He knew his magic couldn't handle this. He would have to be unpredictable and use his Ki instead. Harry's arm went forward and his last four throwing stars flew from his fingers. This time he consciously filled them with his Ki and they glowed a deep red color.

With a wave of his wand, Voldemort sent them flying to the sides and they hit the wall at the back of the room. Voldemort sneered for just a second, but Harry was already above the monster's head. He came down feet first on Voldemort's head and sent the man to the ground.

Flipping away, Harry pulled his wand. "FLIPENDO!"

Quirrell's body slammed into the ground as the spell hit.

"REDUCTO!" Harry yelled, but as the spell fired he knew he hadn't done it right. Voldemort brushed the spell away like a gnat. Even as it hit the wall it didn't break anything.

"For a first year, you're quite talented brat." Voldemort said. "Let me show you how it's done. REDUCTO."

A bust of light fired right at Harry, moving almost faster than expected. Harry twisted at the last second and dodged the spell. The stairs behind him exploded outward though. Harry felt several chunks of rock bounce off his back. He didn't just stand there for long.

Harry grinned; he had an advantage. "I got you now and I know how to beat you."

Rushing forward, Harry poured his Ki into his legs and jumped. Voldemort wouldn't get caught off guard by the same trick twice, but Harry had something else in mind. In mid air Harry brought his wand around. FLIPENDO! REDUCTO! STUPEFY!"

The three spells flew out perfectly and Voldemort threw up a shield to block each of them. Harry flew over Voldemort, landed, and spun around. His aura flared and a large ball of red energy formed in his hands. "DRAGONS' WRATH!"

Voldemort was turning to face him when Harry yelled. The ball fired out of his hands as he thrust them forward, less than a foot from Voldemort's chest. The man's red eyes widened just as the ball of Ki fired. Voldemort screamed as the energy engulfed his body and sent him staggering back.

Harry could only watch in shock as the possessed body of Quirrell disintegrated in a matter of seconds. Voldemort's screaming filled the room. Then the body just fell the floor and turned to dust. Then the world lurched. That was the only way to describe it.

The scar given to him by Voldemort so long ago throbbed and exploded in pain. Harry screamed and grabbed his head as he fell to his knees. He could vaguely tell that blood was dribbling down his face from the scar, it hurt to much to notice anything else.

oooooooooo

Harry could barely remember a pair of arms lifting him up and carrying him out of the room. Eventually he focused enough to see that he was in the Hospital wing. Sitting on the other side of the bed was Dumbledore.

"Sir, Voldemort, the stone!"

The old man grinned and nodded. "Calm yourself, no one got away with the stone." Dumbledore reached into his robe and pulled it out for Harry to see. "There, safe and sound."

Harry relaxed and nodded. "I was worried."

"You've impressed quite a few people Mr. Potter, just look here at the table. There must be gifts from nearly every student in the school." He said, indicating a rather large collection of candy, cards, and gifts.

"How did they…"

"What happened in the dungeon was a closely guarded secret, so as with all things of this nature, everyone knows about it. I believe Fred and George Weasley sent along the privy cover."

"How long have I been here?"

"About ten hours, you were completely drained when Severus and I found you and carried you back up here. You refused to go to sleep until we gave you some Dreamless Sleep Potion. By now your energies should be quite replenished." Dumbledore explained.

"And what about Voldemort?"

Dumbledore smiled again. "From what I've been able to figure out, you destroyed him, completely."

"Huh? How? I wasn't nowhere near strong enough to take him down."

"It involves a number of factors. For instance, when you Voldemort tried to kill you the first time, I've always believed that your mother gave up her life to place a shield around you. That shield had been with you for your entire life. I believe that when you fired that Ki blast of yours, you imbued it with the energy of your shield and it ripped Quirrell/Voldemort to pieces, leaving only a pile of dust behind."

"I wasn't sure the Ki blast would be that effective. I knew throwing spells at him would be next to useless, but he didn't know much about my martial arts."

"Indeed, Quirrell never really talked about you." Dumbledore said. "I think Voldemort underestimated you once more and paid for it."

"Will he be back this time?"

"It's hard to say, I don't think so, but it's so hard to tell. Now, I'd like to hear the whole story from your point of view."

Harry stared explaining, starting with what he learned around Christmas, overhearing Snape threatening Quirrell on several occasions, and even Hagrid's involvement. Dumbledore didn't say anything as he took the story in and seemed to glean something from its telling. As if he was confirming something. "Very good Mr. Potter, now I have some rather bad news for you, I hope your up for it."

He gulped. "What news?"

"It seems someone attacked and hung Professor Snape to the ceiling of the Great Hall last night around midnight. More of that Goo."

Harry snorted. "How is that bad news?"

"It seems he's blaming it on you. We know you were down the trap door, but he doesn't."

"I'll take my chances." Harry said with a grin. "Is he still up there?"

"No, we managed to get him down after a couple of hours, but he's been calling for you expulsion."

"Eh, let him rant." Harry said with a shrug.

Smiling, Dumbledore stood up. "The other bit of news is that a projection of what happened down there with Voldemort has been released to the public. I'm not sure who or how anyone got it, but it seems you may find yourself even more famous by the time tomorrow's edition of The Daily Prophet comes out.

Reporters have been swarming the castle for the last few hours trying to get an interview with you."

"Oh, joy." Harry muttered as Dumbledore left the room. He waited about a minute before talking again. "Ranma?"

Ranma appeared at the end of the bed grinning a little. "You getting better at detecting me?"

"I just guessed."

This just made Ranma laugh. "You'll figure it out here pretty soon."

"So what did I miss out on?"

Ranma took Dumbledore's recently vacated seat and put his feet up on the bed as he leaned back in the chair. "Well, I took a little stroll after you left last night and made sure your girlfriend didn't interfere. She tried to meet you there too, but I knocked her out and dragged her back into her dorm. She woke up hopping mad too. Cussed me out pretty good this morning." Ranma said with a smirk.

"Thanks for keeping her safe, but she's not my girlfriend." Harry grumbled.

"She's close enough, you two hang out all the time these days."

Harry blushed and looked away. "Yeah well…"

Ranma just snickered. "You need another twenty four hours of rest to build up your Ki reserves completely. Practice your Occlumancy, make sure to meditate, and get your new memories sorted. Then its back to training for you."

"Alright."

oooooooooo

As it turned out, being more famous was an understatement. Harry realized the next day as he made his way down to the leaving feast. At the beginning of the year he was Harry Potter, The Boy Who Live. At the end of the year he was now Harry Potter, The Boy Who Defeated Voldemort.

The papers were hailing him as the greatest thing since sliced cheese. A pack of students were following around now and it wasn't just giggling girls either, but students from every house. They didn't say anything either, but just stood there staring at him, as if he was Merlin himself.

Harry wasn't as irritated as he would have been though. The fact that Voldemort had been possessing Quirrell sent a bunch of students and even their parents into hysterics. The entire Hospital Wing filled up by the end of the day. Most recovered quickly, but several would be out of it for days. Just mentioning the name Voldemort cause people to scream and run for their lives.

Harry didn't know whether to be amused or shocked that anyone could be afraid of a person's name. Sure the man was a psychopath, but it didn't summon the man himself every time his name was mentioned. As usual, Ranma kept a low profile and stayed in the trunk.

He was busy setting up some new moves to teach him for when they got home.

Then, surprisingly, it would be time for him to go to summer school again.

Ranma insisted that he keep busy and learn about both worlds completely. Harry still wasn't sure about that one, but he could deal with it. Besides, it would give him an advantage.

He wondered if Stevenson would be around again, then shrugged. There were also whispers around the school about the Ministry talking about giving him a reward, after they examined the projection a little more closely of course. They wanted to make sure he wasn't' lying. Harry knew it was true, so he didn't care one way or the other.

As he was rounding a corner he sensed something and paid attention to his surrounding for the first time all day. He looked around him and knew that something was watching him, but he wasn't sure what it was. Reaching out with his magic, he detected three living entities nearby. Narrowing his eyes, he formed a small ball of energy in his hand. And stared at the source of the biggest one.

"Who are you, speak up or else." He snapped.

The form didn't move for a second, but then it reached up and pulled the hood of an invisibility cloak back to reveal a tall black man. He smiled at him. "Kingsley Shacklebolt, Auror. I was assigned to keep an eye on you for the next few days until this whole mess calms down."

"True, but you aren't telling me the whole truth." Harry said, trusting his instincts.

The man blinked in surprise and smiled a little wider. "Good guess kid, there's also been a threat on your life from an anonymous source. I'm here to prevent that as well."

Harry nodded. "Alright, are those two others, there and there, with you?"

"They are, how can you tell where they are though?"

"They need a bath." Harry said, smirked, and turned to finish his walk to the leaving feast. He heard the man laugh as he pulled the hood back up and vanish. The other two just grumbled something about punk kids.

Just as he entered the great hall, a bushy haired Ravenclaw tackled him and burst into tears. He consoled her as best he could until she calmed down. "Calm down Hermione."

"But, but…"

"You're worried because you fell asleep, right?"

"Yes."

"Ranma told me that he knocked you out for the night. He didn't want you getting hurt in case something bad happened." Harry explained.

The girl glared at him for a second before just nodding. "I can understand that, but I can also take care of myself."

"Hermione…"

"I've got some training too, I could have helped out, planned strategies, anything. Yet you left me behind." She said, huffed, and walked away.

He watched her go and sighed. Hopefully she would get over it and they could be friends again. The hair on the back of his neck suddenly stood up and Harry glanced around the room. There was something dangerous nearby and it was focused on him.

Whatever it was, didn't seem to be moving any closer though. Just a general kind of danger that made its presence known. He couldn't see anything that it might be and was to indistinct to focus on. After a few seconds he continued on into the great hall and headed for the Gryffindor table. Several of the students nodded to him, but everyone else looked at him awe.

Ignoring the morons, he took his usual seat and turned to say hello to Ron, but the red headed boy turned away and stuffed some food in his mouth. Frowning, Harry tried to get his attention, but the boy growled, grabbed some candies out of a nearby bowl, and moved down the table.

"What the heck?"

"He's been bitching about you ever since he saw the paper this morning."

Fred Weasley said from across the table. Or was that George?

"Indeed, such course language from our little brother."

"I wonder who the Bloody Hell…"

"…He learned it from."

"Couldn't have been us…"

"…we're to innocent and lovable."

They grinned as little halos formed over their heads. Harry snorted and shrugged. Ron was quite fickle when it came to things and was blowing everything out of proportion. "I take it he's done this before?"

"He thinks the worlds one big hand me down and that he's cursed to be a loser for the rest of his life."

"A right pain in the back side, he is."

Harry shrugged. "Well, at least I learned this now."

"He'll forgive you…"

"…for getting your name in the paper, eventually. Maybe…

"…next year."

The twins said and rolled their eyes. That was when Harry noticed Headmaster Dumbledore standing up at the Teacher's table. The room quieted as he raised his arms, his eyes twinkling. "May I have your attention please? Thank you, now as quite a few of you know, we had quite an amazing thing happen. Harry Potter defeated Voldemort once more and this time killed him completely!"

The hall filled with cheers and the twins even managed to get everyone to stomp on the floor and pound on the table as they cheered. Harry just ducked his head and wondered if hiding under the table would work. That was until he saw the murderous look Professor Snape was sending his way.

For some reason Harry just smirked at the jerk and gave him an little wave. If anything, the man got even angrier than before as he started to grit his teeth in fury. Across the room the Slytherin table was the only one not really participating, though several of the students had at first, but now they appeared to be unconscious in their seats.

Over a third of the Slytherin students were glaring at him and fingering their wands, but looked away when Harry caught their eyes. It took a full ten minutes for them to wind down and Dumbledore let them cheer as long as they wanted. "Now that you have that out of your system, we can get on to the year end announcements.

"It seems that one of the students broke into one of the sealed classrooms and took some books. Argus Filch would like the missing books returned so that the ghost that haunts the room will stop haunting him. Now, the house cup was a little hard to determine this year, initially it was going to go to Slytherin, but in the last twenty four hours members of the house lost nearly three hundred points for various infractions. Curing students in the halls, insulting teachers, and dozens of other things."

The Slytherin students all glared at Dumbledore. Harry really wondered if they were all taught to glare and finger their wands that way. They must practice it for hours on end.

Dumbledore continued. "Now, I've been told by the School Board that I can't

offer points to Mr. Potter for his actions…"

"What!" Half the school yelled.

"…because what he did is worth so many points that it would give Gryffindor house the house cup for the next couple of generations." Dumbledore said and let the grumbling die down. "Instead, Mr. Potter will be awarded several awards over the next couple of weeks. So I award twenty points to Hermione Granger for helping Mr. Potter to solve the mystery of the third floor corridor."

If she had been there, she would have been shocked.

"That still leaves Gryffindor with the house cup." Dumbledore finished and clapped his hands and the banners above the tables suddenly changed to red and gold. On the other side of the room, Draco Malfoy growled loud enough for even Harry to hear him.

Dumbledore ignored it though. "Now, I've talked long enough. Enjoy the feast and this truly amazing turn of events!"

The students cheered as Dumbledore glanced over at Harry for a second, then moved to sit back down. Harry spent most of the feast talking to Neville and the Weasley twins. After that people started to leave the hall, though a lot of them detoured over to the Gryffindor table to congratulate Harry.

He took it in stride and shook people's hands. That didn't mean he was unaware of the growing feeling of danger around him though. If anything, it was worse now than when he entered. It must have shown on his face, because Neville asked him what was wrong.

"I'm not sure, I'm just sensing something dangerous in the room. It's unfocused and hard to trace. No one seems to be acting out of the ordinary."

Neville took a covert glance around. "I don't see anything out of the ordinary, other than the look of pure hate on Malfoy's face."

Harry shrugged at that one. "He tried to attack me when I was in detention with him. Taught him a lesson too."

"Well you be careful Harry, the Malfoy family keep dozens of lawyers on retainer and can find loop holes in the law that make it nearly impossible to punish them properly. The family is full of dark wizards that always support Dark Lords faithfully, but it can never be proved legally." Neville told him, remembering some of his Grandma's stories.

"I'll just beat him up. He's just a spoiled brat who doesn't know how to do anything except throw around his name. It makes him feel important."

"True, just be careful."

"No problem." Harry said.

oooooooooo

Chapter 23

oooooooooo

Harry wasn't sure how, but Dumbledore managed to get rid of the reporters. It was a relief to have that problem take care of. He also forgot that the exam results would be handed out the next day, but when he go them he found that he did quite well. Better than he expected.

He even noticed that he could recall everything that happened during the year, theory, practical, and even the little details. Ranma explained that it was part of the Occlumancy meditation he was doing every night. It focused his mind and allowed him to have near perfect recall.

According to the results he was first in Gryffindor, grade wise and only twentieth in the school. Hermione got the highest scores of everyone, first in Ravenclaw and the school. Earning her an award from the Board for the smartest witch of the year.

There was even a rumor floating around that Malfoy's two bodyguards, Crabble and Goyle, failed their tests. No one knew for sure, but another rumor said that their fathers came in and had a little talk with Snape about their studies late one night a couple of days later.

No one knew if it was true, but the two boys were known to be dumb as posts and even then couldn't think their way out of a wet paper bag. With a wand and step by step instructions. Harry just laughed and shrugged it off when he heard it though. There was no way Malfoy would let those two think for themselves and kicking them out of school, for a pair of purebloods, would never happen.

Harry and Ranma had to spend the rest of the time securing the inside of the trunk. The two of them acquired quite a bit of notes and material over the year and Harry didn't wan to forget anything. Each level of the trunk was given a thorough cleaning.

Soon everyone's trunks were packed and the teachers took unholy glee in handing out notes about them not performing any magic during the summer holiday. Harry was going to be busy with the summer school again, so he wasn't to worried, and Ranma promised him that he would start teaching him some wandless magic. Which couldn't be detected by the ministry.

He even showed Harry the book where he found the information. Harry couldn't wait to start working on it. Once everything was put away, Harry met the rest of the first year students in the front hall. Hagrid was there to take them back across the lake in the boats.

First years were the only ones that weren't allowed to go back in the carriages. They arrived before the carriages did, so they were able to get some good seats in the first year part of the train. Hermione even managed to track him down a few minutes later.

"Are you still mad at me?" He asked.

"I'm just upset. I don't like being treated like I'm useless." Hermione explained, after she hit him a few more times.

Harry just ginned and took a few hits over the head as the girl let off some more steam. Then she hugged him.

"I'll see you next year Harry."

"No problem."

She left and headed back to sit with some of the friends she made in Ravenclaw. Harry was a bit surprised to find himself alone. Eventually the train started to move and Harry sat back in his empty seat. He was also feeling that impending feeling of danger again.

This time it was much stronger than before. He also noticed that he wasn't hearing anything from the cars on either side of him. Frowning he climbed to his feet and glanced around. He could see that they were passing by the occasional towns and over bridges, but couldn't find anything dangerous.

He wasn't sure what happened next, as he never heard a sound, but the door to suddenly slid open and three spells fired at him from less than a foot away. Harry didn't even see who fired at him, he just reacted to the threat. The first spell missed his neck by less than an inch as his body blurred.

Sailed by his head and caused the glass of the window to shatter. The second and third spells ripped through his robes, shredding the excess cloth and sending the remains out the broken window. Harry had just a second to see a surprised face and a shock of gelled back blond hair, when his counter attack went into motion.

His mind noted that it was the Slytherin moron squad, Draco, Crabble, and Goyle. Another part of his mind realized that they had all just fired a dark magic spell at him. Light magic spells weren't designed to cause blood shed. Harry's foot shot out and took Crabble right in the chin, lifting the boy off his feet. Even as the boy crashed to the floor, Harry's hands lashed out faster than the eye could see.

Draco's wand was slapped out of his hand and sent sailing down the little hallway. An elbow to the face sent the boy to the ground, blood pouring from a broken nose. Goyle went down as well to precise blow to the neck that sent him to the floor gasping for air.

In all the attack took a second and a half from when Harry started moving to when he stopped. All three boys were laid out on the floor groaning in pain with Harry standing above them, a red aura surrounding his body. He glanced down the hall just as the door opened up and several prefects ran in to stop the fight.

They skidded to a halt as Harry glanced in their direction. His bright green eyes were glowing with power, making the lenses of his glasses glow a well. Harry growled as he kicked Malfoy between the legs, turned around, and moved back into his car.

"H-Harry?"

"Percy?" Harry said, his voice as cold as ice.

The Gryffindor prefect stepped into the car and gaped at the damage. "What happened?"

"They cast some kind of silencing spell on the carriage I think. I didn't hear them as the door opened or they said their spells. All I saw was the door moving and three spells flying at me. I dodge on instinct and you can see what their spells did.

"You didn't hear what the spell was?"

"No, the area was silenced."

Percy nodded. "You hurt those three pretty bad."

"They did try and kill me." Harry said.

"Yeah right, a first year doesn't even know how to fire those kinds of curses, Potter." Percy snapped. "I'm going to have you punished for hurting those boys."

Harry could only gape at Percy for a second, then started to laugh. It was a mocking laughter that only a few people had ever heard Harry do before. Percy paled a little and back away slowly. "You know what Percy, I don't care anymore. With every day that passes in this idiot wizarding world, the less I like it. The bigotry, the hatred, the stupidity just gets on my nerves."

"Potter, you just…"

"Protected my life, but that seems to be a crime in the wizarding world.

While buying your way out of problems is an accepted form of punishment."

Harry shook his head and glared at Percy. "Get out, now."

The boy ran out the door before Harry could do anything else. It wouldn't be several hours before he even remembered that Harry Potter was only a first year student. News of the fight spread through the train almost as fast as Harry's fight with Voldemort spread through the school.

Harry wasn't bothered for the rest of the trip and he enjoyed the fresh air as it moved through the carriage as the train trudged on for several more hours. He didn't see anyone take Malfoy and the other two boys out of the car either. They didn't bother him during the rest of the trip.

He was one of the first people off the train. An old guard standing by the exit told him to be careful as he exited so that he didn't draw any unwanted attention to himself. Harry just nodded, stepped through, and made his way to the closest bathroom.

Once there he let Ranma out of the trunk. "That feels a lot better. Anything happen on the train? I felt your aura fare again?"

"Got into a fight with Malfoy. I hurt him and his two buddies pretty bad."

"Why?"

"They tried to kill me."

After dragging an explanation out of him, Ranma just nodded. "They'll heal and you didn't cause any permanent damage."

"Just a shattered jaw, broken nose, an bruised one's throat." Harry said and shrugged.

"I also had a talk with Hermione, she's mad at me but told me that she wasn't blaming me for what happened anymore. She just doesn't want to be treated like she's useless."

Ranma shrugged. "She wasn't ready for a fight like that. When she gets some better training under her belt, then she can come on your adventures."

Harry looked down as they exited the bathroom. None seemed to be paying them any attention. "I'm not sure I want to go back next year."

"Any specific reason?"

"They treat me like I'm…disposable." Harry tried. "I mean, one minute I'm their favorite thing in the world and the next they're insulting me and making my life hell. Snape for instance I understand. He hates my guts and isn't afraid to tell me so to my face. I just don't understand why I have to put up with something like that without fighting back. First it was the Dursleys, kids at school, even harassment by the neighbors that would listen to the stories my relatives made up about me."

"I've dealt with crap like that all my life, kid. All you can do is ignore it and respond when you need to. You hurt those three, so they may be more wary of attacking you from now on. It might also get us in trouble with the law, but that's never stopped us before."

Harry grinned a little. "I like learning magic, I just don't like the people that control things. They all seem like complete idiots and I'm tired of putting up with the abuse."

"Leaders are like that. They lose sight of the bigger picture sometimes. Me and your Headmaster didn't get along either. Well, let's head home and see if the house is still standing, then make some plans."

"Sounds good to me. How we getting there?"

"I think its time I taught you how to roof hop." Ranma grinned. "Now

listen up…"

oooooooooo

All across Europe strange events were happening that would go unexplained for years. Inside Lucious Malfoy's manor house, hidden deep underground, a book exploded into flames accompanied by the sound of faint screaming. A frightened House Elf responded to the fire, but by that time the book was nothing but ashes.

Thousands of miles away in a small abandoned castle, a cup sitting on a pedestal shrouded in spider webs glows for several seconds. The webs burst into flames that race around the room and a wave of evil energy exploded from the cup as it melted.

Inside the Headmaster's office at Hogwarts, Dumbledore looked up as he sensed a wave of dark energy flare within the room. He glances at a small table across the room where a locket is glowing with a black aura. He stands up just as the locket destroys itself and the takes the table with it.

In the town of Little Hangleton the residents looked out of their windows as several fire trucks raced by. That was when they noticed that the old mansion on the hill was on fire. Flames rose high into the air with a mighty roar as the house was quickly consumed.

It was known that the place had a caretaker, but his body was never found. The fire was declared and accident and the ruins of the place removed. It took years for even the grass to start growing on the lot again, but no one ever bought the place. Just walking on the land frightened people where the air would turn colder than ice, even in the middle of summer.

Though no one knew it, Nagini was also within the house in a magical slumber, waiting for her master to return. She died with the house, hissing in agony as she burned from within and without. Her remains got lost within the devastation of the house.

Within the slightly run down house known as the Burrow, a rat awoke from his position on Ronald Weasley's pillow. It jumped off the bed and silently made its way through the house, heading for the attic. Once there the rat transformed into Peter Pettigrew. The animagus paled a little as his ward suddenly flared and collapsed.

A wave of fire shot out of a small cavity in the floor. He had just enough time to scream as the flesh was burned from his bones. Within the cavity, Voldemort's wand turned to ash as the phoenix feather core purified it of the dark taint. Fawks also appeared above the fire and sang a sad little tune to morn the loss of its feather.

The flames didn't set the house on fire though, instead they just vanished over the next several minutes. Once the event was over, Fawks vanished with a victorious squawk. It would be several years before Pettigrew's bones were found and it would take weeks to identify them. This would eventually start an investigation leading to Sirus Black gaining his freedom.

oooooooooo

Of course, there was one other thing that needed to be mentioned. The sun was bright, hardly any clouds in the sky, and Ranma was wandering down a street. He was dressed in red and black as usual and drew the eyes of all the girls. Every now and then he would check a piece of paper in his hand.

After several blocks he saw what he was looking for. A small martial arts school, the very one that Hermione had learned her own art from. Ranma frowned as he stepped through the door to look around. Several suspects had been considered, but the person standing in the middle of the dojo hadn't even been on the list.

"Well, well, well…" Ranma said.

A figure in the dojo spun around. "Ranma!"

"Hello Ken, its been quite a while since I kicked your ass and it looks like I'll have to do it again."

Copycat Ken backed up a step. "Now Ranma, I've given that life up…I'm just

teaching now…"

"You're teaching a school that's been sealed Ken, sealed because it's too dangerous for a regular martial artist to use."

"I'm doing no such thing!" Ken yelled.

A ball of pink energy appeared in Ranma's hand and slowly expanded. "Well you see, you changed things just a little, just like a copycat would do. Then you taught a number of novices the moves. I'm not very happy about this, Ken."

The man gulped and ran a few steps, but Ranma threw the ball. It slammed into Ken and sent him flying off his feet. The energy turned into a large gob of goo and plastered Ken against the back wall. Ranma strolled across the room, looking at the various posters, equipment, and other items.

"Ranma, please…" Ken whimpered as he struggled to free himself.

"You know, I can't remember where you might have seen the my family schools. I know you weren't around when I fought Ryo…" Ranma stopped as he realized the answer. "You saw Ryo didn't you?"

"Um…no?" Ken tried.

"He swore to seal the school." Ranma said to himself as he drummed his fingers on top of Ken's head. "Now, explain how you learned of my father's schools?"

Sweat started pouring off Ken's head. "I…never really went…away. Just blended i-into the background and continued to watch your fights."

Ranma nodded. "I see."

"Please don't kill me?" Ken begged.

Grinning evilly, Ranma held up a little white bottle. "I think I have the perfect solution and you can even keep teaching the kids what you know."

From Ken's lack of reaction, Ranma knew that he didn't know about the Amazon's memory erasing shampoo. Ken screamed as Ranma stepped forward and blurred. The only thing he would remember later was a pair of twinkling eyes.

oooooooooo
oooooooooo

Author Notes: Well, well, well what do we have here? An ending? Maybe, I'm not sure if I'll continue this or not. Several months ago I was working on one of my stories when an idea popped into my head. What would happen if Harry threw a Ki blast at Voldemort while he was in Quirrell's body?

A Ki blast is a blast of living energy, mix that with magic and Harry is one bad ass fighter. Of course he would need to be kept within character, for the most part, and this fic was born. I actually wasn't sure if I'd even post it, but after writing up the first 200kb of the fic in a matter of days, I decided that it had the right kind of momentum.

Response the fic has been surprising. Quite a bit better than anything else I've done. If a second year is written up, it'll be quite a bit different considering the ending of first year. In all my reading, I've always wondered how Quirrell managed to get past most of the traps without any problems except the trolls. This time he had to fight his way through.

Harry and Draco get on like oil and water, they just can't be around each other without insulting or fighting each other. Every time the fight each other Draco manages to either break something or get scared out of his mind, as on the train.

Horcruxes, I looked up several sites talking about them and chose several that would work with the story. The one I included at the end, Voldemort's wand, seemed to be a logical choice, even though it wasn't mentioned anywhere else. I can't recall if it was mentioned in the book, but it still worked for this story.

That's all for now. If you want to discuss anything or ask questions, feel free to email me and I'll answer anything.

CRose

11/08/05

Omake:

Harry snuck down the hall slowly. Every now and then he would stop to look around, but that didn't help him as a Stupefy hit him in the back. He collapsed to the floor. Fred and George stepped out of the shadows of a nearby room. They were grinning.

"Now what?"

"With him out of the way we can make sure he survives the night."

George nodded.

"And have some fun."

"Truly we are the greatest pranksters ever."

"Truly, my wicked brother."

They levitated Harry into the classroom, sat him on the desk, and cast several spells. Giggling, the two boys left the room and ran down the hall. A few minutes later they reached the third floor corridor.

Their eyes were gleaming as they stepped into Fluffy's room. The huge three headed dog jumped to it's feet and growled at them. They raised their wands and cast several spells in quick succession.

Fluffy yelped and within seconds it was hogtied, on it's back, and muzzled. It's fur was also changing colors, running through all the colors of the rainbow, in florescent colors. It also had giant pink bows on it's head and a diaper.

George fired one last spell at the giant dog.

"What was that?"

"Laxitive spell."

Giggling, the twins admired their handy work, which would scar the poor beast for years to come. They opened the trap door and hopped down. No one would ever know what the twins did to the devil's snare trap, but the plant would flee the room whenever the twins were around.

The next room consisted of the flying keys and they were right impressed with Flitwick's chams work. Of coruse they could never sit back and not mess around with something. So, if the keys had been sentient, they would have shivered in fear.

Grinning, dozens of spells fired into the swarm of keys. The room shuddered and light streamed out from under the door into the chess set room. After several seconds the door fell down and the twins, still grinning, walked into the room like pair of ferrets on the prowl.

Behind them the Keys were dancing around forming the words Weasley's Wizarding Weazes. Underlined by a pair of brooms circling the keys. The giant chess set fell within minutes to the pranksters as stone knights were turned into lemmings, the pawns became giant loaded dice, and the queen fled field before she could have her knickers revealed.

The twins laughter would haunt her the board for years. The trolls attacked them the instant they came into the next room and promptly became pile of break dancing stuffed animals. They even left the music playing the keep them busy. That left the potions room.

The twins looked around the room and frowned. After reading the riddle, they looked at each other, and tossed it away. "What a bore."

"Indead my brother, this needs to be handled carefully."

"What do you have in mind?"

"Why follow the rules?"

They grinned, aimed their wands at the wall next to the door of fire, and cast several spells. The wall quickly pulled upwards and formed an archway, revealing the next room.

"You know, a first year could have gotten past this?"

"Indeed, the teachers are so lazy these days."

"That is why they have us around."

"Indeed, we make their lives complete."

They grinned and entered the mirror room and looked around. Standing in front of the mirror was Professor Quirrell. Fred and George frowned and groaned, making Quirrell spin around. The twins handed each other a galleon and looked dejected.

"I could have sworn it was Trelleway!"

"And I thought it was Minister Fudge!"

"We lost!" They chorused.

"The pranksters?" Quirrell asked in disbelief. "I thought Severus or Potter would be here eventually."

"Their busy, Snape is examining the ceiling of the great hall from up close and Harry is…occupied." The twins giggled.

"I have no time for useless children." Quirrell snarled and raised his wand. "Avada Kedavera!"

The wand glowed and Quirrell screamed as his body suddenly turned into a Giant Pink Chicken, in knickers. Laughing their assess off, George snapped Quirrell's wand and tossed it through the door of flames. The wand didn't survive as it passed through.

The giant pink chicken, in knickers, squawked in shock just before his body returned to normal. Quirrell screamed as Voldemort suddenly surged and possessed his body. "I will kill you lunatics." He hisses.

"Yeah right, Quirrell? The stuttering moron?"

They snorted.

"We need…"

"…to teach him…"

"…a lesson."

"I AM LORD VOLDEMORT! I WILL NOT BE DISREPECTED!" Voldemort screamed.

Fred and George looked at each other and shook their heads. "And he calls us lunatics? Such a sorry waste of a talented mind, but that's what greed does to you."

"Number twelve?"

"Mixed with twenty through twenty eight."

They grinned and fired quick succession of spells at Voldemort as he ranted. The Dark Lord's voice started to change pitch as Quirrell's body slowly morphed. His robe twisted and change, his body shrunk in some areas and expanded in others. Within the span of a minutes Voldemort looked like a hooker, complete with a bright red leather mini skirt, bra, and boots, but she also had glowing green a blue hair.

The victim's eyes were wide with shock.

The twins giggled, raised their wands, and started firing spells. Voldemort screamed like a girl and tried to run in her high heeled boots. The spells flew in and he soon sprouted bunny ears, a cotton tail, and an extra head. It started screaming instantly.

Fred wandered over to the mirror and watched as his reflection pulled the stone from the mirror and reached out to hand it to him. The reflection smirked as Fred took it and found himself with Gold hair. "Thanks mate."

"Looks like it was easy enough to get."

Voldemort the Hooker tried to run over and grab the stone, but the high heeled boots wouldn't let him. "I'll rip your intestines from your bodies and string you up from the rafters!" Yelled a surprisingly deep, male voice. The twins just giggled.

Attaching the Stone to the front of his wand, Fred frowned for a second, then started smirking evilly. The wand pointed and flared, a beam of magic lanced across the room and struck Voldemort in the chest. She staggered back, fell to her knees, and gasped. She started twitching a few seconds later.

"What was that?"

Fred blushed. "The Orgasmous spell, figured it was appropriate."

They fell the ground laughing pair of maniacs. Then Voldemort's body burst suddenly burst into flames as she screamed out "Avada Kedavera!"

Sitting up, George looked at the dead body. "Ooops?"

Fred looked shocked. "Um…was it good for you, as it was for me?"

"Hell yeah!" They yelled.

"Hey?"

"What?"

"I think we forgot something?"

"Oh?"

George snapped his fingers. "Ikleharrykins."

"Oh yeah, he's going to be mad at us."

"Um…maybe we shouldn't have left him transfigured into that goat."

"Truly." They cracked up and went to look for their goatafied friend.

Omake:

"So now what?" Harry asked as he and Ranma stood in the Hospital wing.

"I suppose we should finish getting packed. It'll be nice to be home again, but we will have to clean the place from top to bottom." Ranma muttered.

"Master Ranma!" Kamy the House elf said as she appeared. "I'll help master clean."

"You don't need to help clean our house." Ranma said in surprise.

Kamy's eyes welled with tears. "Master is refusing Kamy?" She Sobbed.

"No!" Ranma yelled.

The house elf grinned and jumped forward. She latched onto his leg and started crying. "Master is so great! Master is powerful and great!"

Ranma nearly fell over as the ugly little thing latched on and hopped back on one foot, trying to shake her off. "Aghaaa…get off!"

"Oooh! Master is so good to me!" The elf yelled at the top of her lungs, rubbing her head against his leg.

Harry would have helped, but he was to busy laughing his butt off.