Harry Potter And The Title That Is Too Long For FA

The Second, and Thereby Final, Half of the Third Chapter (a.k.a. the Fourth Chapter--If You Really Want To Get All Technical About It): The Cameo Spot, Part Two

"Dobby!" exclaimed Harry quite predictably...and for the second time in this story.

"Yes, it is Dobby, sir!" exclaimed the ugly, tea-towel-toga clad creature, looking up at Harry adoringly. "May Dobby spit shine your shoes, sir?" he asked squeakily, apparently forgetting Hermione's luggage in his eagerness to cater to his idol's every whim.

Harry started to decline the house elf's offer, and to comment on the apparent fact that Dobby's tea towel was made from an old 'New Kids on the Block' T-Shirt, when suddenly Ron's tanned, muscular, freckled brow wrinkled (adorably) in puzzlement. A hush fell over the platform as everyone stopped to behold the beauty that was this redhead's thought process. Hermione's eyes began to look rather glazed over.

Harry sulked.

Finally, Ron's perplexed expression vanished. As the background characters returned to milling around the platform and doing whatever other menial Background Character tasks they usually did--which, in this case, was accurately reproducing the Battle of Pearl Harbor--Ron turned to the elf and said, "Dobby, I thought you were working in the kitchens at Hogwarts? Why are you here at Platform 9 ¾?"

"Well," said the elf, in an unusually apathetic tone, "the fluctuations in the Hogwarts economy have been particularly inconsistent as of late, and therefore Dobby was transferred to the Platform in a rather last-ditch effort to boost the school's rapidly declining growth as a major wizarding stock holder."

"Dumbledore been betting on the hippogriff races again, then?" came a familiar voice from somewhere just below Harry's left ear.

Suddenly, the half-forgotten image of a squeaking redhead popped into his head as the Trio looked around, in perfect unison, at the source of the voice.

"Oh, hi Ginny," said Harry, surprised.

"Ginny, weren't you just with Dad? I thought you were going to put your luggage on the train and find a compartment? What are you doing here?" demanded Ron in a rush, a look of deep suspicion on his face. He quickly pulled out his Overprotective Big Brother License, in case he should need it.

"Yes," said Hermione thoughtfully, "where is your father, Ginny?"

"Oh, I tried to push him off the platform onto the tracks," said the redhead nonchalantly, "but he ended up falling through a rift in the space-time continuum instead."

"Ginny!" Ron's adorable, aforementioned brow wrinkled again, this time in consternation. "Are you being sarcastic?"

Ginny looked up at him incredulously, perhaps because she was shocked that he would accuse her of such a thing, but most likely because she was shocked that anyone could be so persistently and impenetrably stupid. "No, of course not!" she exclaimed. "Why ever should you think something like that, O Favorite Brother of Mine Whom I So Adore?" she said, the sarcasm dripping so thickly from her voice that it began to condense around Harry's head.

Ron smiled, apparently relieved. (It is probably worth mentioning here that his unbelievably white teeth reflected the sunlight and proceeded to blind everyone within a ten mile radius, with the exception of Ginny, Harry and Dobby--who had prudently thought to bring their Smile-Proof SunglassesTM--and Hermione, who has just fainted again in light of exposure to yet another run-on sentence, and improper verb conjugation.)

"Right then," said Ron, "sorry I even suspected you, Ginny." He quickly slipped his Overprotective Big Brother License back into his pocket, and positioned himself just in time to catch Hermione again.

"Apology accepted," said Ginny, slightly mollified. "I guess I'll see you all later then, on the train?"

Ron and Harry nodded.

Ginny began to walk back the way she had apparently come, and before she disappeared into the crowd, she yelled at them over her shoulder. "Say bye to Hermione for me when she wakes up, then--I've got to go find Malfoy and snog him senseless! See you!"

Harry stared at the rapidly shrinking, still waving figure, his mouth agape.

"What did she just say?!" whispered Ron, who had turned a very unflattering shade of off-white. He looked (and sounded) as though he had just been punched very firmly in the gut by an elephant. An elephant with a grudge. An elephant with a grudge and steel-plated boxing gloves.

Harry shook his head, trying to clear his mind of the heavy fog that seemed to have permeated it as soon as the full implications of Ginny's parting statement had hit him. Was that sarcasm? Or was there something going on between Malfoy and Ginny that he didn't know about? Why, if Ginny so much as touched Draco, Harry would hurt her so badly she wouldn't know--wait...wasn't that supposed to be the other way around?

Deeply pondering the sudden uncertainty of his sexual orientation (which had little relevance in any case, as by the end of this fic every couple will have been chosen in accordance with the author's favorite ships), Harry was unpleasantly surprised to see a familiar, mysterious figure making its way through the crowd to the (mostly conscious) Trio.

"Oh great," he muttered; and then to Ron, "look who's back." Harry jerked his head towards the cloaked and hooded figure, which was now only feet away, and approaching rapidly.

"Who?" said Ron stupidly, dropping Hermione onto the ground as he raised his hand to shade his eyes from the sun, and surveyed the platform.

"What do mean, 'who'?" called the figure, who was now close enough to hear Ron's remark, and had almost attained the Trio's squatting grounds.

"What's going on?" moaned Hermione from the region of Ron's feet, sitting up dizzily and rubbing her head where it had struck the ground. "What do you mean, 'what do you mean 'who''?"

Then she looked up and saw the cloaked figure, who was now standing just in front of the Trio, and looking extremely miffed. "Oh," she said, "you. Greeeaat." And with that, she promptly laid back down.

"I don't get it," said Ron, "who's 'you'?"

"I'm 'you', as in me!" said the cloaked figure. Harry had a great suspicion that he or she was glaring daggers from underneath the hood.

"What," said Ron, "so, you mean you're you as in I am me?"

Harry, Hermione and the enigmatic figure stared at him.

"Oh my gosh!" a random H/Hr shipper reading this fic suddenly exclaimed. "Harry and Hermione's names are written beside each other! They are so going to end up together now!"

Sure they are.

Anyway...

"Right," drawled the obscure figure sardonically, managing to sound remarkably like Malfoy.

"But who are you?" asked Ron, perplexed.

"Oh come on!" exploded the mysterious, adjective-changing figure. "It's me! You know; the mysterious, cloaked, hooded, over-described figure? From the first half of the third chap--I mean, from before?"

Ron stared at her blankly.

"You know," the figure pursued, now gesturing wildly in the air, "with the big neon sign?"

"Ooooh. Right, that mysterious figure."

The cabalistic figure sighed in exasperation. "Honestly," he or she muttered to Harry and Hermione, "how do you two put up with him?"

"What do you mean 'put up with him'?" bristled Hermione defensively. "We don't 'put up with him'! He's part of the Trio! Without him, Harry and I...well, we'd...we'd be...a...a...Duo!"

"Gasp. No. Oh, the sheer horror of it all," said the abstruse persona dryly.

"Believe me," said Harry, after a moment's reflection, "all the moments of Ron's unmatched idiocy are more than worth the occasional but extremely valuable instances of enlightened brilliance. Or," he said, looking over at Ron, who was now trying to coax a fly into landing on his nose, "so I fondly imagine."

"Harry!" gasped Hermione, scandalized. "Are you on her side, or ours?"

"Excuse me!" said the mysterious figure offensively. "How dare you assume that I am a female--and without any confirmed indications!"

"Well," said Hermione slowly, considering, "are you?"

"Of course I am!" exclaimed the enshrouded female indignantly. "What, do I look like a man to you?!"

Hermione and Harry both scrutinized the figure intently. They could not see her face, or her hair, as these were covered by the voluminous hood. The robe held no clues either, as it was shapeless, and hung on her rather like an overlarge lampshade.

"I guess..." said Hermione slowly, after a lengthy pause, "erm...I mean...well...actually--"

Harry jumped in and cut her off before she could say something that could provoke the concealed-and-cloaked woman into unfathomable violence. "What Hermione means is that your cloak is so...convincing....that you...erm...could have been mistaken for a man...or a woman! I personally thought that you looked more female." He nudged Hermione covertly with his elbow.

"Erm...right!" said Hermione, wincing as she rubbed the place where Harry had elbowed her a little harder than necessary. "That's exactly what I was thinking, Harry! In fact, that's...erm...that's why I...why I first assumed...what I assumed! That you were female, that is...that's what I meant," she added hastily.

The woman (or girl) under the cloak grunted in what Harry assumed was grudging forgiveness.

"Fine," she said sullenly, "well, that's not what I'm here for in any case."

"Excuse me, madam..." began Hermione tentatively.

Harry shot her a look. 'Madam?' he mouthed incredulously.

Hermione scowled at him, shook her head, and took a deep breath. "Excuse me madam," she said again, this time more forcibly, "may I ask you..."

"Yes?" said the figure impatiently.

"May I ask you...what exactly is it you are here for?"

"Mmfphmump," said the woman under the cloak.

"What?" said Hermione and Harry in unison.

"AHA!" said that same Hr/H shipper of an indiscriminate gender, "I knew it! They said something in unison! It's their psychic bond of love!"

"Mmfph...oh, this is ridiculous," snapped the cloaked figure suddenly. "Not you, Hermione," she said exasperatedly at the highly affronted look on the girl's face, "I meant this stupid getup. Just give me a minute, will you?"

Harry and Hermione (and Ron as well, having finally returned from the happy pink place in his head) watched in curious silence as the cloaked and hooded figure slowly worked through a multitude of buttons, fasteners and drawstrings to become...well, un-hooded and uncloaked.

After what seemed like an hour (but was actually closer to seven and a half minutes), the cloaked female finally let out a triumphant shout and threw back the massive hood of her cloak. "That's much better," she said happily, "seeing as now I can actually breathe."

Harry had thought her voice sounded more than a bit muffled.

"So..." said Hermione, apparently unimpressed by the not-so-much-as-a-figure-anymore-so-much-as-a-teenaged-girl's successful extraction from the hood, and made bolder by the apparent adolescent's very un-formidable appearance. "Are you going to tell us what you're here for, or not?"

"My, snarky, aren't we?" said the girl, sounding quite irate herself.

Hermione bared her teeth and growled deep in her throat. Harry and Ron watched in alarm as miniature lightning bolts crackled around Hermione's hair, which was rapidly losing its lustrous shine and regaining its former bushiness.

"So," cut in Ron hastily, stepping in front of Hermione. He looked at Harry desperately, pleading for help, but Harry merely shook his head and gave him a look that quite plainly said "Hey, man, it's your death wish".

"So," said Ron again, having abandoned all attempts of engaging Harry in the service of Greater Good, in favor of making strained conversation, "so...erm...what--what's your name, then?"

The uncloaked girl looked at him disbelievingly. "My name?" she asked. "Your girlfriend's about to tear you apart just to get to me, and all you can ask for is my name?"

Hermione's newest growl died in her throat, as instead she began to splutter indignantly, a faint blush appearing under the heavy rouge on her cheeks. "He--we're--he's not--we never--I can't believe you'd think--he and I, were just--"

"Friends?" finished the girl dryly. "You can save it. I've heard that a million times before."

"Haven't we all," said Harry sourly.

Hermione continued to splutter and steam, and while Ron tried to calm her down, Harry approached the girl. "So," he asked curiously, as Hermione and Ron duked it out behind them, "how did you know that that would distract her? Hermione, I mean."

The girl leaned forward and winked at him conspiratorially. "Trade secret, Harry. I'm a professional, you know."

"Erm...right..." Harry stepped back a bit, until the girl was no longer violating his personal space, and then said "So...what is your name?"

The formerly-hooded girl sighed. "Gods, what is it with you people and your names?"

Hermione and Ron, who had finally stopped fighting, and were now holding hands in a way that made Harry question their platonic feelings for each other, both looked at her inquiringly. Harry, deciding there was not much else he could do, reluctantly followed suit.

"Alright, fine," sighed the girl. "My name is Renee--er, I mean, Renetta. Yeah, Renetta."

"Alright, Renetta," said Hermione suspiciously, "what exactly are you doing on the platform? You don't look like a first year...are you a squib?"

"Yeah..." Harry began quietly, apparently considering something. Then he exclaimed, "Why are you here? And how--hey, how did you know our names?"

'Renetta' looked sheepish. "You can call me Ren for short," she said, "and I'm here to bolster the failing storyline and to trigger an unpredictable plot twist."

The Trio looked at her blankly.

Ren reconsidered. "I mean, I'm...er...I'm an...oh, a--a foreign exchange student! Yeah, that's it. I'm from Canada, and I'm...ah...part of the Wizarding... Schools...International Unity...um...Exchange Student Program! I'm starting my fifth year...what year are you?"

Hermione, Ron and Harry exchanged nervous glances. They had just seen this girl go from sarcastic and irritable, to sheepish and incomprehensible, to chipper and eager to make new friends, in the space of a few sentences. They exchanged one more glance, this one meaning that they would pretend that they hadn't heard all of that 'storyline' and 'plot twist' rubbish, and that they would just take it from the last three sentences this potential maniac had uttered.

Of course, the smarter thing would have been for them to have backed slowly away from me--er, I mean her, and then as soon as they were out of her sight, to have run for their lives.

But then again, this is a parody fic.

So never mind that.

"We're going into fifth year as well," said Harry cautiously. "I'm Harry Potter, and these are my friends, Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley."

He waited to see if she would play along. She did.

"I'm Renetta...um...Renetta...Beaulieu," she said finally, with a grimace of disbelief accompanying this last word, as if even she could not believe she'd actually said that out loud. "But you can call me Ren. I've heard of you, Harry, of course...and Ron and Hermione, too."

"Right," said Hermione, looking slightly less cold, but still suspicious.

"So," said Ron, uncomfortably aware of how tense Hermione was by the way she was leaving deep imprints of her nails in the flesh of his hand, "should we go find a compartment on the train, then?"

"Yeah," said Harry, and so they walked into the compartment that Harry had already put his luggage and Hedwig in, all the way back during chapter one.

And then they walked back out of it, with Harry's luggage, to find an empty compartment, as they had walked in on a rather unsuspecting Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan, who had been busy snogging the heck out of each other...

...each other's girlfriends, that is. You see, they had decided to swap and see, if that was the case, what they had been missing by dating one person exclusively. So, the Trio and Ren walked in on Seamus snogging Lavender, and Dean trying to feeling up Pavarti. (A/N: Got you there, didn't I?)