Angela Cross and the End All Spell

Angela Cross and the End-All Spell

--a Harry Potter Universe fanfiction--

Chapter Fifteen

**Conference Call**

And the months came and went as the term moved along. Classes, even ones dealing in magic, can become routine (fun, but routine), though Angela's lessons with McGonagall regarding the Book of Black had started simply becoming moot without being able to probe her mind. And with all the books in the library proving useless to expanding their knowledge of either the book or its creators, the two were severely limited in just what they could do: either they would spend an hour or two on Friday afternoons searching through the library - which, Angela found, had even more books than it first seemed; it was as though every time she thought she had completely covered one row of books, another had somehow appeared just around the corner with even more content - or they would try and duplicate the conditions to allow Angela to use the pillar of fire spell from the book. During this time, Angela and Professor McGonagall had discovered a couple of interesting things:

Firstly, it was not a curse from one of the Slytherin girls that had kept her from flying during the first term: it had, in fact, been because the Book of Black's beginning potential within her hadn't been tapped until she first used the fire spell; Angela likened it to using Drano on a stuffed pipe, freeing any magical ability that had been stopped-up before, but McGonagall had absolutely no idea what Drano was so Angela just nodded and said she understood.

Secondly, recasting Vas Flam was not as easy as it had been the first time: the two had gone out to the farther reaches of the school property (both to avoid drawing attention and to avoid blowing up any more of the school), near the hill that led to the lake, and spent weeks trying to use the spell again. Results were varied at best and apparently completely random in their effectiveness, as sometimes Angela got little more than the contents of a cigarette lighter to come out, most of the time she got nothing at all, and only once or twice had she been able to make a decently sized column of flame spew from her palm. None of their attempts, however, produced the kind of pyrotechnics Angela had created back during December; while McGonagall would just take notes on the matter, Angela was personally disappointed she wasn't able to do much more than roast marshmallows with her newfound powers.

The young girl did take a tiny bit of secret satisfaction when on a couple of occasions during their lessons McGonagall attempted to cast Vas Flam herself to see if the words were usable by anyone else with magical potential. Nothing came of it, no matter how many times she tried those days, and the witch had even attempted to use the spell without a wand just to be certain, but again without result. If anything, Angela at least got the satisfaction of deducing that no one else would be utilizing the Book of Black's spells but her.

Each lesson had consisted of the professor trying to see if Angela had unlocked any more unusual witching abilities, so they customarily went down a long list McGonagall had compiled of rare magical skills to see if Angela could do any of them: among the selections were controlling the weather or being able to make the land move at will, being able to speak to certain animals (McGonagall was particularly curious to know if Angela could talk to snakes for some reason), the ability to control the minds of others, superhuman physical ability, being able to transmute one material into another, seeing into the past or future (the instructor, while expressing a certain distrust of such abilities, had been fairly certain this would be something Angela would be able to do), being able to see in the dark or access to a variety of other senses... Time proved that the young girl in fact had none of these abilities, which again disappointed Angela just a little, but her teacher told her that they were just beginning in their studies on the matter and time could very well prove different with practice. Just to make sure, they always ended their lesson to see if Angela could cast certain magic without a wand, which as always proved negative.

"Have you tried twitching your nose from side-to-side?" asked Jason at lunch one day.

"What?"

"Well, I once saw on television this witch could cast spells without a wand by making her nose twitch. I don't really watch soap operas, but you could always try that."

"Bewitched wasn't a soap opera, it was some stupid show where this witch's Muggle husband wouldn't let her use any magic and just wanted her to sit around and have babies all the time," Angela said.

"Sounds like drama to me," Jason replied while heaping a steaming wad spaghetti onto his lunch plate.

Tired of just having to keep all this to herself - that, and the fact that Kathy was wondering just where Angela was running off to on Friday afternoons now - Angela had eventually told her friends what she and Professor McGonagall were doing, though her explanation had focused more on learning the origins of the Vas Flam spell, which was already old hat to everyone at the school anyway, and didn't include any reference to the Book of Black; she had mentioned it once the first time she brought it up with them, and then had to repeat the entire conversation when they forgot what they were discussing. When she had to approach the book's role in everything, she just mentioned it was hush-hush Hogwarts business and left it at that; Kathy was initially offended that Angela wasn't being more forthcoming about the situation, but as Angela wouldn't budge on more details (not wanting to risk having to discuss the whole thing over again from scratch) Kathy just had to begrudgingly accept that was as far as she would get on the matter.

Talking to her friends about it would have proven to be inevitable anyway, as Hermione Granger had done a little research of her own into how Angela blew up part of the school: as the foursome - Angela, Jason, Kathy, and James - had lunch at the Ravenclaw table (which seemed to be the most tolerant of the varying houses sharing space), the Gryffindor girl came striding up to them, the book The Synthetic Wizard tucked neatly under her arm and a cat-caught-the-canary look in her eyes, a look that every first-year (and many other classes) immediately understood meant she knew something before anyone else did.

"You're the fourth Twink!" she said excitedly.

"... Yep," said Angela absently, taking the pickles off her hamburger. Despite being magically created and probably healthier than burgers had a right to be, there was something to be said about greasy American-made hamburgers that Hogwarts-burgers lacked.

Hermione sat down next to Angela, shoving Jason out of the way as though he wasn't even there, and looked at Angela up and down. Angela looked at her once and then returned to her burger, ignoring the feeling that she was being put under a microscope.

"So, how did it happen?" Hermione asked in a very businesslike sense.

"Can we talk about this later tonight when I'm in the common room? I'm having lunch right now."

Angela knew Hermione didn't mean to be this way, but over the course of the school year she had succeeded in irritating and alienating many of the student in her class, even within her own house, with her holier-than-thou intellectual superiority and how she always treated everything around her either like a science experiment or like a mother hen would her chicks. She had somehow managed to befriend Harry Potter and Ron Weasley ever since Halloween, and Neville had latched onto her since day-one as she was constantly pulling his fat out of the magical fire, but the rest of the students tended to keep their distance from her due to her bossy, smug nature.

"It certainly must have been something big," Hermione continued, oblivious to Angela's request - she saw an opportunity to learn something and that was all that concerned her at the moment. "My guess would be either a djinni like the Flame Vizier, or since you were from Oklahoma in the United States it was probably some sort of tribal Indian spirit."

The girl paused a moment to see if Angela would attest that her theory was correct. Angela just looked for some avocado to put on her burger.

"I think it was aliens, personally," interjected Jason, sprinkling grated cheese on his spaghetti and meatballs.

Hermione blinked and looked around at Jason as though he had antlers suddenly growing out of his head.

"... Aliens?" she asked incredulously.

"Sure. Like Q, he (or someone like him) could have given her those powers. Or maybe it's like The Greatest American Hero. Maybe Angela's wearing a special costume under her uniform?"

"What?" Another pause. "Are you mad?"

Jason stopped focusing on his food and looked at Hermione irritatedly. "Why is everyone so quick to say I'm nuts when I say aliens? How is that any different than werewolves or dragons or ghosts or vampires or whatever the heck else Muggles think don't exist even though they do?"

Jason looked at James for backup, but James just raised his eyebrows and put his hands up. "Keep me out of this," he said with a chuckle, trying to hide behind a slice of pizza.

"Angee said it was hush-hush Hogwarts stuff, so we should respect her decision to be quiet on the matter," said Kathy, though she was obviously curious to know as well.

"I can't tell you what it was, Hermione," Angela said, feeling hungry and wanting to eat her burger in peace. "Professor Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall want me to keep the whole thing quiet right now."

Hermione just found some open space on the table and opened the book she was carrying to the back pages where Angela had last noticed herself being mentioned. There was more writing this time:

Recently the young witch has been discovered to carry extraordinary power, as she displayed in December of 1991 at Hogwarts School: during a scuffle, of which the details are sketchy at the moment, Miss Cross produced a destructive fire-blast that destroyed a good chunk of school property. Not only was the casting of this spell extremely advanced for a witch of any age, but she was reported to have done so without the use of a wand, a rare talent shared by only a handful of persons in the wizarding community.

And the pages went on and on, about ten more pages which focused on Angela's spell and comparisons to her and the abilities of the Flame Vizier in his heyday, followed by plenty of conjecture, theory, and guesswork on just where she gained her abilities and what were the limits of her power. Unsurprisingly, no mention of the Book of Black was printed.

"So as you see, your origins are still a mystery to everyone except yourself. And perhaps Dumbledore and McGonagall know about it too, I'm not sure."

"Uh huh," Angela muttered, beginning to eat her burger so it wouldn't get cold.

"What were you doing the day it happened? If you aren't allowed to tell me anything, it wouldn't hurt if I did some investigating on my own. Did you eat anything strange, or read any magic books, or maybe find some kind of magical charm?"

"Like a red costume with a cape? And some kind of zigzag pattern on the chest?" Jason added in.

As long as Hermione was there, Angela knew she'd never get to eat her burger.

"Alright, you really want to know what it was?"

Hermione smiled a look of triumph and nodded enthusiastically. Kathy and the others just looked shocked; Angela hadn't told any of them, and she was going to tell Hermione Granger out of the blue?

Angela looked around, then got up and motioned for Hermione to follow her; the girl grabbed her book and together they walked down between the tables and out the doors of the Great Hall, where they had some privacy.

And Angela told Hermione about the Book of Black.

Kathy was practically fuming when Angela returned to the table, though she tried, ineffectually, to keep a face of nonchalance regarding it.

"So, you told her?" Kathy asked coldly.

"Don't worry, she doesn't know anything you don't already know," Angela said, patting Kathy on the shoulder and feeling a tad bit guilty inside.

Kathy just shrugged, obviously still miffed despite the consolation, and went back to her lunch while Angela went back to her burger. It was all-in-all an annoying situation, but one that Angela was sure would blow over soon enough...

... Until about fifteen minutes later, as she and her friends were preparing to leave for their afternoon classes:

"You're the fourth Twink!" Hermione said, walking up the length of the Great Hall to the Ravenclaw table with The Synthetic Wizard tucked neatly under her arm and looking excitedly at Angela.

It was around Wednesday, the 18th of March, that Angela's nightmares began to come true.

The day had started pretty much as usual, Angela finishing her breakfast and heading off to her Defense Against the Dark Arts class with Kathy; as expected, the situation with Hermione a couple of weeks previous blew over quickly, especially after Professor McGonagall told Granger to stop pestering Angela about it. They passed Fred and George in the adjacent hall as they were in the process of being lectured by the professor, who was furious at them for hexing the exit to the Slytherin common room so that anything green passing through it turned red; the boys' justification was that Slytherin students always took advantage of the St. Patrick's Day holiday by pinching everyone in sight, and as Slytherin house-colors gave them an unfair advantage in the pinching war they were just leveling the playing field. Though the girls had ceased being in earshot range after this, they didn't need to be there to know just what McGonagall thought of their excuse.

Professor Quirrell's lecture was as usual dull as dishwater, the instructor avoiding any of the more scary parts of his lesson regarding zombies; all the students could garner from his discussion was that dead people shuffled around a lot and smelled like month-old cabbage (not the exact scent Angela and Kathy could attest to from personal experience, though they had to agree the one they had met so far was not easy on the nose). Quirrell was even more jumpy than usual in these more recent months, his eyes darting about nervously and his fingers or feet continuously tapping on surfaces around him impatiently, and many of the students were beginning to wonder if the stress of his job was going to make him snap sometime soon.

It was halfway through class that everything began.

As the days were getting nicer and spring had finally sprung at Hogwarts, Professor Quirrell had left the window to the room open to let in some fresh air (and, undoubtedly, more sunlight, just in case any vampires were skulking about in the shadows). As he droned on about what kinds of clothes zombies tended to wear, a fluttering of wings came through the window, much to everyone's surprise. Even more surprised was Angela, when she saw the glint of a gold pin around the owl's neck: it was Percy, with a red note in his beak. He landed on her desk right in front of her and it was quite obvious he was completely embarrassed to be flying into a classroom in use; owls tended to follow a rather disciplined schedule when it came to delivering mail, and unless it was a dire emergency they never interrupted a lesson, always waiting until their owner had left class first. As this could only be an emergency situation, then, everyone, including a flustered instructor, looked at Percy and Angela, curious to know what the trouble was.

Angela took the note from Percy's beak when Kathy's eyes opened in surprise and she backed off a bit from her friend. "Is... that a Howler?"

"A what?" Angela asked, looking at Kathy and then at the letter curiously, wondering if she should open something that was beginning to spew smoke from its sides.

She promptly found out what a Howler was as the red note pulled itself from her hand and fluttered about over the table, its shape bending and folding into that of a large, toothy mouth. Percy turned tailfeathers and didn't waste a second bolting out of the window, and half the students in the room promptly covered their ears as a sonic boom proceeded to blast half the room back from it.

"HI, ANG! ISN'T THIS LETTER NEAT? THE LADY AT THIS DERVISH & BANGS PLACE TOLD ME THE LETTER SAYS WHATEVER YOU WRITE ON IT, AND IT'S ON PRETTY PAPER! ANYWAY, TODAY I SOLD FOUR BOXES OF PAPER CLIPS FOR TWO SHEKELS! THAT'S LIKE TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS, MAYBE MORE, I'M NOT SURE, JUST FOR FIFTY-CENT PAPER CLIPS! THESE PEOPLE NEVER SAW PAPER CLIPS BEFORE! I'M GOING TO HAVE RUBEUS TAKE ME BACK TO OKLAHOMA TONIGHT AND I'M GOING TO BUY A HUNDRED CRATES OF PAPER CLIPS, I'LL BE RICH IN ONE DAY! SOME OF THE OTHER STUFF ISN'T SELLING AS WELL AS I'D THOUGHT SINCE NO ONE HERE NEEDS AN ELECTRIC RANGE OR LAMPS THAT USE LIGHTBULBS, BUT I'M SURE BUSINESS WILL PICK UP SOON. TALK TO YOU TOMORROW, ANGELA! LOVE, MOM!"

The letter then proceeded to curl up and explode in a small ball of fire, leaving nothing but ashes and a vacuum of sound in its wake. The tables and ceiling beams were still resonating with shakes when the voice stopped, and Angela noticed the glass to some of the windows had cracked. Quirrell looked absolutely speechless, as did the other students present. Angela just shook her head and tried to get her hearing back in her ears, which were swollen almost shut from the resulting explosion of noise.

Kathy took her hands off her ears and said something. Angela couldn't hear her at first, though she could see the other students were now all yammering amongst themselves, undoubtedly about the Howler, while Quirrell was still struck dumb. After a couple of minutes, Angela's ears cooled down and she could hear Kathy once more.

"What?"

"I SAID-" Kathy lowered her voice when it was apparent Angela could hear just fine again. "I said, why did your mom just send you a regular letter using a Howler?"

"Because she's my mom," said Angela, burying her reddening face in her hands and hoping Defense Against the Dark Arts would end very quickly.

Of course, when you want something to end quickly, it seems to take even longer to end than usual. Quirrell's lecture for the rest of the session was even more nervous and stuttery than usual, as he was still apparently recovering from having the Howler go off right in front of him (as mentioned before, Angela's preferred seat in any classroom was at the front near the instructor). Meanwhile, as students rarely paid much heed to his useless lessons anyway, Angela found herself being giggled and laughed at for the rest of the period by her fellow Gryffindors. When asked, Kathy explained that Howlers were letters specifically designed for people who deserved a good yelling at, such as a student doing poor in class or a husband who spends his nights gambling instead of coming home.

"I can see your mum's grocery list now, Angela," said Dean Thomas as they left the classroom. "FOUR EGGS! BUTTER! MILK! TOAST! JAM! BACON! AND A HALF-POUND OF CHEESE!!! BOOM!" He blasted his hands apart in mid-air for added effect.

Kathy promptly put a stop to any fun-making of Angela with what had become a trademark glare, though in truth the young Gryffindor girl really didn't care about the attention she got after class; she figured it would have been funny to anyone who didn't have to deal with Sheri on a regular basis anyway and just blew it off.

Not wanting to risk any further mishaps like this, though, Angela had prepared a letter to her mother later that day and sent it off with Percy after Herbology class.

Dear Mom,

First of all, they're called Sickles, not Shekels. Second, GALLEONS are the ones worth around eight dollars each, Sickles are worth like 50¢. So you sold four boxes of paper clips for exactly the same amount you paid for them.

Also, about that letter you sent me yesterday: please don't send me any more notes on Howlers, and PLEASE don't make the owl bring me any notes while I'm in class, he can bring them to me during lunch or breakfast instead.

Talk to you more at the end of the week.

Love,

Angela

The next day, as she was enjoying soaring through the heavens on her broomstick during Madam Hooch's Flying class, she got the inevitable response.

Sunlight shone down upon the Slytherin and Gryffindor students that afternoon; there was a slight chill in the air, though nothing Angela's robes couldn't easily handle. There had been a few rains that week, but the nice thing about using broomsticks was that it involved very little trudging through the muddy grass below. The students were all crowded together in midair in a rather tight mass of broomsticks and people as Madam Hooch was instructing them on maintaining flying position while in a traffic situation: everyone was to maintain a relative spot as they flew slowly around the field at low altitude without coming into contact with anyone else. It was a bit of a difficult exercise, as even skilled students like Potter had to avoid coming into contact with not-so-skilled students like Goyle (who took up quite a bit of room in the mass of brooms at that) and yet not bump into anyone else as they tried to avoid them. It was particularly difficult for Angela, as she had discovered that while it was easier for her to move much faster than anyone else on a broomstick, it required much more concentration and effort to move slowly. To not just move slowly but to match the slow pace of the other students was especially hard, though when it came to using the broomstick Angela certainly enjoyed whatever challenges came her way. Adding to the challenge was the fact that Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy, who were for some reason placed next to each other, kept trying to maneuver the other into other students (Draco had initiated this game, but Harry wasn't above trying to give him a turn in retaliation).

Through the slowly moving crowd of students, at which the young Gryffindor girl was near the center, Angela caught a glimpse of tawny wings and, to her immediate dismay, a small square of red amidst those feathers. While many of the students were busy watching the display between Potter and Malfoy, some Gryffindors quickly caught eye of Percy and immediately recognized what it was in his beak.

The thinking process can be a slow thing sometimes: should one break formation and potentially get in trouble with the instructor, or should one stay in formation, keep the grade, and potentially be blown up and deafened for life? In the end, it all boiled down to priorities.

Percy made a beeline straight into the formation to give Angela the note which, having detected she was nearby, began to smoke. Having nowhere to go, most of the inner-formation students stayed in place. The Slytherins, who had no idea what the owl was carrying at first, either stared at this owl that maneuvered itself into the crowd with a letter in its beak or continued to watch Harry and Draco go at it. Most of the outer-formation quickly broke from the group and got as much distance as they could, though a few, like Hermione Granger, stayed with the crowd and covered their ears as best they could with one hand still on the broom. And all the while Madam Hooch, on her own broom floating at the center of the Flying practice grounds, was blowing her whistle and wondering what the heck was going on.

Percy knew better than to stop, throwing the letter from his beak toward Angela as he (quite deftly) climbed straight up and out of the group, his speedy form finally distracting Malfoy and Potter enough so they could look downward at Angela who didn't bother using either hand on the broom and simply covered her ears as tightly as she could when the note smacked her in the face and then proceeded to open itself.

"DEAR ANGELA, WHAT'S A HOWLER??"

Had Angela witnessed the resulting explosion from the outside, it would have been beautiful in its form, like the blossoming of a flower or fireworks going off on the Fourth of July or something similar, an array of Gryffindors and Slytherins dispersing simultaneously in midair. Unfortunately, she saw nothing from the dead center of it as the detonation of sound, which was surprisingly more powerful outdoors, blasted all the remaining students outward in an assortment of directions. Amazingly, almost every student kept hold of their brooms, though the degree of recovery varied wildly. The ones knocked upward recovered the easiest, while due to the low altitude of the flight the ones near the bottom either were knocked into the muddy field ground or on top of those who were below them. Neville, near the back, was knocked off his broom, but through sheer luck actually landed on his feet with the best recovery of anyone since the blast simply eliminated his forward momentum and put him at a complete stop; to his disappointment, no one witnessed this triumph. Hermione was spared landing in the mud by landing flat on top of Crabbe, who had been in the process of removing himself from the mud that was caked all over the front of his robes and face.

Angela, due to her proximity to the sonic boom, was knocked straight backwards through the entire crowd. She had kept her legs tight enough around the broom that through some miracle she resisted being knocked off of it, though her ears were ringing and head was spinning so heavily that she had no idea which way was up, down, or side-to-side. She just clumsily grabbed ahead of herself over and over until she gripped the wooden shaft and then just thought 'stop stop stop stop' over and over again till wind stopped whipping against her back. What brought her to a complete stop, though, was when she settled backwards into what felt like a rough, tightly bundled pile of straw, sinking into it a tiny bit before her broom no longer moved. Feeling something beneath her feet, Angela stopped willing the broom to fly and dropped down, only to find the ground she had landed on was rather inclined. She had since opened her eyes, but was so dazed by the whole instance that everything was topsy-turvy and she stumbled forward on this strange surface, rolling over twice before getting the scary sensation of freefall below her. The fall was cut short, though, as something large caught her in midair, something large, dark, and hairy.

"'Ere now, what're you doin' on my roof?" asked Hagrid, sounding a little of breath from apparently having to run to catch her.

Had Angela been able to hear him, she still wouldn't have been able to give him a reasonable explanation. Fortunately, her temporarily deaf state left her free of having to endure Madam Hooch's fury when the teacher finally caught up with her in Madam Pomfrey's care in the hospital wing. It wasn't until the nurse placed what looked like purple broccoli sprigs in her ears that the young girl could finally hear her.

"-almost half the class in the hospital, you should know better than to have mail delivered in class! And a Howler of all things?? Be glad it's only twenty points I'm deducting from Gryffindor!"

This time, there were no jokes from the Gryffindor students, just a lot of glares and unhappy faces. The Slytherins attempted to pick up the slack, but in the end they just laughed that there was little they could say that would be more insulting than having a Muggle mother like hers.

As she spent the night in the hospital wing, her ears slowly being fixed from being so thoroughly lambasted by the Howler, Angela wrote up another note to Sheri and sent it off with Kathy, who sat by her friend's side doing homework for the rest of the day and kept both the Gryffindors and Slytherins at bay.

Dear Mom,

I specifically asked you not to send any more mail while I was in class. Howlers are those red letters you keep sending me, I'm now in trouble because of them. I will write to you after I'm done with detention this weekend. Please: NO MORE NOTES.

Angela

Kathy was charged to tell Percy that under no circumstances was he to bring any future letters from Sheri to her in class. Angela wasn't sure if the bird would understand such a complex instruction, but the owl had to date proven pretty sharp so it was worth at least trying. Considering the volatile nature of Howlers, Percy couldn't be blamed for having to dispose of the letter as fast as possible, but Angela's future at Hogwarts was at stake here...

Which was, of course, why Sheri responded with another Howler the following morning.

Of all the classes Angela had wanted to avoid trouble in, Professor Snape's was around the top of her list.

Having spent the night in the hospital wing was a mixed blessing, as she didn't get to sleep in her own bed, but avoiding her classmates was a boon at the moment. The broccoli out of her ears and breakfast in her stomach thanks to Kathy bringing some nourishment from the Great Hall, Angela headed down to Double Potions and took her seat, ignoring the jibes from Slytherin; apparently the fear-effect from Angela's Vas Flam spell months before had worn off and she was as much a target (at least verbally) as the rest of the student body. Angela considered seeing what would happen if she opened her palm at them - perhaps that would shut them up - but before she decided the students got bored poking fun at her and went back to insulting the other Gryffindors present. Ignoring them, it seemed, was as good a defense as any at the moment, and she'd save incinerating them for another day.

Snape came in and the students all promptly shut up, and so the lesson began as usual. The first hour went by, no incidents. The second hour went by, again free of episode. Snape then wrapped up his lecture, prepping the students on what they were to have ready for him in next week's class, and with that, Double Potions ended.

The doors to the room opened automatically as they always did when class was over, and as the students got up and turned to exit they found their way barred by a tawny owl wearing a Prefect's badge and a red note in its beak. Class being over, Percy unfurled his wings and leapt up over the students, flying towards Angela who had not yet gotten up from her desk; the Slytherins and Gryffindors that noticed the bird's entrance either wasted no time and bolted out of the classroom as fast as they could in a mad panic, or they ducked-and-covered, throwing their hands over their ears and squeezing their eyes shut. Angela, unable to get out from the desk before Percy could deliver the letter, grabbed the red card as it started smoking at the sides and flung it aerodynamically across the room into the back corner (which, as she did so, was an unwise location since many students had dived for cover right there), slapping her own hands over her ears. Percy, finding the windows to the room were the kind that don't open, dove for his own cover behind Professor Snape, who, having undoubtedly heard two accounts of this already by Madam Hooch and Professor Quirrell, proceeded to pull out his wand.

"I MADE YOUR BIRD WAIT UNTIL CLASS WAS OVER FOR ME TO SEND THIS SO YOU WON'T GET IN TROUBLE THIS TIME! AND PLAYING ON BROOMS ISN'T A CLASS SO DON'T GET MAD AT ME IF YOU'RE GOOFING AROUND INSTEAD OF WORKING! MAYBE IF YOU INVITED ME UP THERE TO SEE THE SCHOOL YOU WOULDN'T HAVE THESE MISUNDERSTANDINGS WITH ME, BUT I'VE BEEN HERE SINCE CHRISTMAS AND YOU HAVEN'T EVEN COME TO SEE ME OR HELP ME WITH THE BOOTH OR ANYTHING AND I-"

Before any more of Sheri's mega-amplified voice could shake the walls or shatter eardrums, a flash of blue light shot from Professor Snape's wand and promptly obliterated the screaming Howler. A rain of white and red paper splashed across the corner of the room, and for probably the first time in the entire school year both the Slytherins and Gryffindors looked at Snape with total appreciation.

The instructor merely twirled his wand casually back into the sleeve of his black robes and walked up to Angela in slow, steady steps, his face unreadable. Her hearing wasn't as impeded as before since she wasn't at ground-zero for the Howler to go off this time, but Professor Snape simply stood there, unmoving, patiently waiting just in case Angela needed a moment to get her senses back. He would occasionally glance back and forth at the room, his expression still totally unreadable as he eyed the students who had taken the full force of the note in the back of the room, then the bottles and jars which had either cracked from the sound or had completely fallen off the shelves and smashed on the solid stone floor, then at the owl which had ceased using him for a shield and realized it had worn out its welcome; Percy got out of the room as quickly as possible, the only thing moving in an otherwise motionless class. Apparently, everyone present wanted to see just what Professor Snape would do to someone who had brought this kind of turmoil to his own private domain.

Angela just sat there at her desk, feeling impending doom settling upon her. What would it be: the rack, the gallows, hanging by her thumbs? Every student had heard Mister Filch go on about the various means of punishment for students, and as Snape had made it clear over the school year that he was not particularly fond of Gryffindor House, she sat there feeling sick and wondering just what he had planned for her.

When enough time had passed to his satisfaction, Professor Snape broke the silence with his slow, purposeful voice. "If your mother wishes to visit the property, Miss Cross, I'm sure we can arrange it. Though," he said as he looked again at the dark room, leaving a pause that was just long enough to be uncomfortable, "there are certainly less... tumultuous ways to ask. But, then again, who am I to argue with... your mother?" He raised his eyebrows slightly on the last part. Though his expression was unreadable and his voice was as collected as ever, there was no mistaking that he was not pleased one iota that his class, even if it was over, had been shaken about so thoroughly. Angela remained sitting there, utterly mortified. "Parent-Teacher conference for your mother will be arranged immediately, I'll see to it an owl is sent to her residence right away, though I will limit myself to a quiet, ordinary scroll... if that is alright with you?"

He stood above her long enough that she could see he wanted her to verbally confirm the last part in front of the class. Humiliating a student that had caused trouble was part of his well-known modus-operandi, though while this should have been expected it certainly wasn't something she wanted to do. But as he was obviously not going to budge until she replied...

"Yes, sir," she said quietly.

"Good," he simply said, and walked past her down the length of the tables to survey the damage to his room and his students more closely.

"Oh," he added as he reached the halfway point of the room, stopping and raising a finger as though he had just remembered something. "Thirty points from Gryffindor. And detention, see me Sunday, please."

Snape began to continue down the row when Angela, begrudgingly, spoke up.

"Um, Professor. I already have detention on Sunday. With Madam Hooch."

"Mm, yes," he said, nodding, "that's right. Saturday then. Be here at seven in the morning." And with that he continued on his way.

In just the course of three days, she had cost Gryffindor fifty points, thoroughly peeved both the entire Gryffindor class and a good number of first-year Slytherins, been humiliated in front of three instructors, had her Flying class ruined, received two detentions, and, the punishment she was sure Snape knew would outdo thumbscrews or a hot poker, had a conference with her mother and the Hogwarts faculty scheduled...

Angela was understandably in a right-sour mood when dinner rolled around. Her lesson with Professor McGonagall after lunch had been spectacularly unproductive: she had hoped to let off some steam by firing off some columns of flame into the sky (while simultaneously hoping that some of her classmates would accidentally wander into view and get a glimpse of her awesome power) and she didn't even get off a puff of smoke the whole time. And before she had left her instructor's care, McGonagall got a note which was addressed to both herself and Angela: it informed them that their presence would be required for the parent-teacher conference the following Friday afternoon, so Book of Black research would have to be cancelled that day. Angela left her teacher's presence under the scrutiny of a disappointed McGonagall who was obviously taken aback that one of her house's students had gotten in so much trouble so fast.

Detention over the weekend was neither easy nor enjoyable. Unlike before, when Angela did some manual labor for Professor Snape and actually did it in record time and with ease, the instructor wanted to make sure Angela actually got punished this turn. As such, he had her bring in new jars and bottles from the upstairs store room and replace every single disgusting item from the shelves into new, clean glass containers. While the work wasn't as time consuming as she had expected, the gross-factor was more than enough for her: bottle contents were mostly preserved corpses of varying animals and magical beasts, pickled body parts, brains, and that was just the first shelf. On the others were collections of spores and fungi, one section containing mucus from a variety of creatures, one vat with nothing but eyeballs, and even a selection of jars with still-moving, still-living worms and caterpillars. On more than one occasion Angela had to rush off to the lavatory, worried she might get sick, though she was lucky enough to hold it together for the day. Though she was initially upset that she was forced to miss breakfast for this task, having nothing but the two slices of bread Professor Snape was kind enough to provide her from his own breakfast in her stomach spared her any real contents to throw up; whether he purposefully made her avoid breakfast to keep her from getting sick or he just wanted the detention to be tougher without a good meal, she had no idea, though she hoped it was the former.

The rest of Saturday following lunch was devoted to cramming as much homework as she could in before she lost another half-day to Hooch's detention. All the while she tried not to concentrate on the fact that her mother was bound to do stupid things to mess up her time at Hogwarts, while she herself couldn't do more than send her letters and hope she got the message from them; she personally would have preferred to walk down to Hogsmeade and shake Sheri by the shoulders and tell her 'No more screaming red letters!', but thanks to the Book of Black and its writers leaving school grounds was a big no-no at the moment. When she mentioned that she was quarantined to the school property to Kathy, her friend informed her that trips to Hogsmeade for first- and second-years were forbidden anyway, so the point was moot. The Weasley twins, who apparently couldn't have cared less about points, tried to console her, saying Snape deducted points from them all the time; in fact, they were rather primed to meet Sheri, saying that anyone who sent Howlers as regular everyday mail was alright in their book. Angela replied by saying that while they might have enjoyed causing mayhem, she wasn't as ready to rock the boat at Hogwarts; this just got a shrug from the boys who didn't seem as convinced of this as she was, considering just how much damage she had caused since she first came to the school.

Madam Hooch's idea of detention was considerably less sickening than Snape's, though still rather time consuming: with some sandpaper and a polishing cloth, Angela was given every broom in the school inventory and told to sand them all down and buff them off so that no students would get any splinters. And again, when done, the remainder of Sunday was spent getting homework prepped as fast as possible for the classes ahead.

The rest of the next week was thankfully free of Howlers, though Angela saw nothing of Percy since the fiasco in Snape's room; she assumed he had had enough of delivering explosive mail and was taking a breather from being the bearer of bad news so often. The absence of loud mail didn't stop her stomach from twisting in knots at the thought that at the end of the week her mother would be at Hogwarts, gabbing it up with her instructors; the only positive thing she could think of regarding this would be that perhaps Quirrell, Snape and Hooch would see how nuts Sheri was and realize the events of the previous week weren't her fault (if Hagrid was going to be at the meeting perhaps he could back her up on this).

And then Friday finally rolled around.

The appointment was at 2:00pm, so Angela ate her lunch, all the while being encouraged by Kathy that it might not be as bad as she anticipated.

"You're not going to be in trouble with your mom or anyone else, I'm sure; this is just a little meeting so the teachers can get to know her is all, and so they can show her the school."

"That's what I'm afraid of," said Angela as she munched on a sprig of broccoli.

When the time came around, Angela took in a deep breath and tried to relax. Okay, so Sheri would undoubtedly spend the entire meeting humiliating her daughter and telling everyone about her many get-rich-quick schemes and probably ask Dumbledore to conjure up a million dollars for her with his wand, and then during the tour of the school property she'd give every student a face to go with the legend of the Howler-Mom... At least there were only two-and-a-half months left in the school year, if she could just endure until the end of term then everyone might forget about the whole thing over the summer break.

For being such a reputable school of magic, the administrative department of the facility was surprisingly out of the way from the regular hustle and bustle of school life and difficult to find; the entire section was on the opposite side of the castle from the main entrance, and Angela wondered why she had never even seen it before today. She also wondered why it was such a distance from the entrance to Professor Dumbledore's office (or for that matter from the offices of any of the other faculty members); perhaps his office had multiple entrances and another one was located near here.

"May I help you?" asked a small, roundish woman seated behind a large wooden desk at the entrance to the department; Angela noted she looked quite a bit like Professor Sprout, save that her hair was in a tight bun, she wore the witch's equivalent of a school-marm uniform, and seated on her nose were a much-too-tiny pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. Upon the desk was an interesting shelving system with cubbyholes, each one sporting a different scroll in it; for some reason, the scrolls were constantly rearranging themselves in the square shelf, floating out of one cubbyhole and into another seemingly at random. There was also an inkwell and number of differently-sized quills placed neatly into an ornate gold cup next to the woman. On the wall behind her was a large, bronze plaque the size of a table of the Hogwarts crest, and at the edge of her table more turned towards herself than to passersby was a photograph of herself and some tall, skinny brown-haired teenage boy in a Hufflepuff uniform; both were smiling and waving to the camera. There was also a hanging cage near the woman with an assortment of small bats in it, all of whom were sleeping upside down within at the moment; Angela guessed they were probably the bat-equivalent of delivery owls.

"I'm Angela Cross, I have an appointment?"

"Ah, yes," the secretary said politely, looking to a piece of parchment to her left for confirmation, "take a seat and the headmaster will call you when he is ready."

So Angela took a seat in one of the many purple-cushioned wooden chairs lined against the wall and waited. Unfortunately, there was no clock anywhere in sight, so Angela had no idea just how long she had to sit there, though she suspected it simply felt longer than it truly was.

Without any actual indication from anyone, the secretary suddenly looked up from her work. "The headmaster will see you now," she said out of the blue. "Just up the hall in the conference room, they're waiting for you." She promptly went back to her paperwork.

Angela got up and headed down the door next to the secretary, into the administrative area. It was like stepping into the library, a series of desks on one side and seemingly endless shelves of books on the other that stretched off into the distance. Instead of books on magic, though, the shelves were covered from top to bottom with what seemed like records and detailed files, on what she had no idea. The isles were also not populated by students, but rather by goblins, either on foot or on sliding ladders; though their uniforms were different from Gringotts Bank in Diagon Alley, their smart suits seeming to sport the various colors of Hogwarts' houses, their dispositions and stern, businesslike demeanors were a spot-on match. Angela just walked on past them to the end of the row, where a T-intersection awaited her. While there were a series of doors to various offices in both directions, the one that stood right before her was her destination: CONFERENCE ROOM was emblazoned on the tall, dark-wooden doors, so the young girl took the wrought-iron ring-shaped knocker and banged on the door lightly.

The doors clanked and slowly creaked open on their own, which was good as they originally looked too heavy for Angela to open without some effort. Ahead of her was a large, rectangular-shaped room about the size of her old house in Oklahoma that was decorated with some of the most lovely wood-carvings Angela had ever seen. The wall's framework and columns were cut out of the same dark wood as the door and had some amazingly detailed artwork delicately cut into them; all gleamed as though they had just now been polished to a smooth finish. On the left side of the room were a series of extremely tall lead-lined windows that stretched from floor to ceiling and let in amazingly beautiful shafts of light that were neither too bright nor too dark; though Angela hadn't climbed any stairs, the view from the window suggested they were in one of the taller parts of the building, a magnificent view of the lake and mountains beyond visible. On each wall were the varying crests of the Hogwarts houses, and in the very center of the room was a humongous roundtable made out of a lighter wood, lacquered and smooth and currently adorned with various refreshments. Seated around the table were Professor Snape, Professor McGonagall, Madam Hooch, Professor Quirrell, Professor Dumbledore, and Sheri. As opposed to the wizards and witches present in their robes, Sheri was wearing her faded blue jeans, a big wool sweater, sneakers, and funny enough a pair of strange, metal-rimmed glasses perched upon her nose.

"Ah, Miss Cross, welcome, welcome," said Professor Dumbledore in a friendly, smiling tone. "Please come in, take a seat."

"Hello, Professor," Angela said, looking at the other instructors present Aside from Dumbledore, the other teachers looked at her with a gaze that was anything but amiable. When she made eye contact with her mother she received a tut-tut look from her, though she doubted this was due to Sheri feeling any actual disappointment in her for getting in trouble; considering it was her fault Angela got in trouble in the first place, she would have been rather angry were that perceived to be the case. The young girl sat down in the chair next to her mother, who whispered in her ear that she looked cute in her school uniform.

"Your mother has been fascinating us with tales of her life across the sea, Angela," said Professor Dumbledore. The other teachers shifted in their chairs uncomfortably at this.

"Oh?" asked Angela, looking at her mother dubiously.

"I find antiques quite fascinating, myself," he said. "Items that to most may seem to have little use left in this world, yet still hold a great value all their own in the hearts of the right people."

"You know that's so true?" said Sheri, seemingly happy that the headmaster of the school voiced his appreciation of her chosen trade, as though it was something many people she had talked to in the past about it didn't seem to understand; considering Angela knew better since her mother primarily looked at antiques as a means of paying the bills, it was more likely she was just taking advantage of the opening to talk some more. "In fact, just before I came here I was cleaning out one of my booths in Tulsa and I had this collection of old soda bottles that hadn't been selling for a while - I had Pepsi and an old A&W rootbeer one and two kinds of beer bottles, one was in green glass - and some old man comes up to me and tells me how he wanted to buy the bottles I had on the shelf, and he tells me it's because he used to drink those from those same bottles with his sons that he lost in Korea a long time ago - this was while Rubeus was loading that box of horseshoes on the flatbed outside - you know him, right? He works here - so he bought them from me for five dollars each, though he didn't need the beer bottles, but I can always sell those later..."

Given the opportunity to talk about antiques, Sheri, as always, didn't seem to come up for air. Snape, McGonagall, Hooch and Quirrell just watched her in growing shock (and maybe a little horror) that anyone could just go on forever on the topic of antique bottles, while Professor Dumbledore just smiled and nodded; Angela couldn't tell if he was merely being polite or he truly found the topic fascinating, though from what she knew of him she suspected it could very well have been the latter. It occurred to Angela as she listened that perhaps the headmaster was also letting her continue on so the other teachers present would get a better understanding of just who Sheri Cross was.

As she was getting into the topic of how she had originally acquired the unsold beer bottles in the first place - stealing them from the backyard of some hillbilly who was planning on using them for target practice - Professor Snape spoke up.

"Yes. Well. That's quite... interesting, Mrs. Cross," he said, his patience already pushed enough, "but if we may return to the point of your visit, which would be the repeated disruption of our classes during the previous week."

"Yes, yes," said Sheri, obviously a little annoyed that her story had been interrupted and waving her hand at the Potions Master, "I'll talk to Angela about it and we'll make sure it doesn't happen again."

The teachers were all a little surprised, not just at the fact that she had addressed Professor Snape so absently (he was, after all, a reputed Hogwarts instructor and head of Slytherin house), but that the way she said it seemed to indicate she was really just dismissing the whole situation off onto her daughter without really knowing what it was; the instructors were obviously under the impression that this was not simply the fault of the schoolgirl on her own.

"Ma'am, if I may," said Madam Hooch, "this isn't something to blow off here. Skipping past the fact that sending letters during class is prohibited, your choice of mail is simply incomprehensible. Many students were injured because of this."

Sheri looked confused. "What, did the owl attack someone?"

Snape groaned, rolled his eyes and muttered something under his breath that sounded like cr-zy ug-l oon-ie, which while Angela couldn't make out was enough for McGonagall to look at him direly. She shook slightly and the Potions Master winced; odds were McGonagall had just kicked him under the table for his comment.

"Mrs. Cross," said McGonagall, ignoring the annoyed look she received from Snape, "as you are a Muggle and thusly not familiar with the wizarding culture, you are most-likely unaware of the rules and regulations this institution enforces upon its student body. Now, the code of conduct we have here applies not only to students like Angela, but to their parents as well. It is rare that we need to reiterate those rules to both parties together, but we here at Hogwarts do wish to make sure that there is no question on the matter, if anything to spare your daughter any future problems. This is the primary reason we have asked you here today."

McGonagall's lecture was totally calm and reasonable, and Angela looked at her mother to gauge just how receptive she had been to it. Unfortunately, it came as no surprise to her that her mother looked positively hurt; Sheri undoubtedly felt she had just been talked down to like a little kid, and was apparently insulted.

"Well, I'm sorry if I sent a letter to my girl here at your school," Sheri retaliated, "but I haven't even gotten a chance to see Angela since I first moved to England, and you people don't have telephones or anything so all I can do is send her little letters using that owl of hers, and I made sure it only came to her when she wasn't in her classroom after she told me not to, and if that bird hurt somebody then it certainly isn't our fault, that's what you get for using owls instead of the post office, and-"

"Mom!"

Angela had had enough. These were her teachers (and in some ways the entire wizarding community) she was talking down to, and while she was free to lose her temper with her daughter, Angela was definitely not okay with Sheri getting mad at McGonagall or anyone else at Hogwarts.

Sheri ignored her. "And besides, it's not like you can throw Angela out of school anyway, she's been sent here by the Ministry of Magic and -"

"MOM!"

Sheri finally turned to Angela. "What do you expect me to do when they make it sound like I'm a bad mother and don't follow the rules?"

"Mom, you don't follow the rules, you don't even know what the rules are!"

"And she called me a Muggle!"

Angela groaned. "Mom, you are a Muggle. Anyone who can't do magic is a Muggle. That's what Muggle means, you even said that yourself back around Christmas at Mister Hagrid's place. It's not meant as an insult."

Sheri didn't look like she believed Angela, while Angela was just feeling utterly humiliated that this was all transpiring in front of the faculty. It was her nightmare come to life.

Before her mother could do any more damage, Angela quickly continued. "Now let her finish talking and stop getting insulted. This is important."

After a second, Sheri huffed and folded her arms, clamping her mouth shut and just looking hurt. It may not have been the ideal resolution, but at least it got her to be quiet for a little while. Angela just tried to maintain her own cool, which she could feel was ebbing fast with her mother around, and looked back at the faculty, hoping they'd continue without noticing too much had just transpired before their very eyes.

An uncomfortable silence filled the room, only broken when Professor Quirrell couldn't repress a cough, which he looked rather shaken to have done; he apparently didn't want to draw any more attention to himself than was necessary at this moment. It was enough to prompt McGonagall back into speaking.

"Yes, well," she went on, regaining her businesslike composure at remarkable speed, "our rules are designed with the intent that the student life be centered primarily around Hogwarts and the lessons it provides, avoiding external distractions as much as possible. Some of these rules include: a set curfew every evening; no leaving the school grounds without permission, especially enforced for first- and second-year students; no correspondence during class-"

"I didn't send it during class the second or third times." Hooch raised her eyebrows and suddenly gave Sheri a "what did you just say?" look, but was stopped before she could say anything by a quietly raised palm from Professor Dumbledore.

McGonagall continued as though she hadn't been interrupted. "-no disruptive magical items to be sent without due cause, and definitely not any of a destructive nature; no unscheduled visits by anyone not on school business; and no use of magic in the hallways that is not of a specifically class-required nature. Now, these are just a few of the more predominant rules, but just so there is no question..." She proceeded to pull out a small-but-thick paperback book bound in metal rings with the Hogwarts crest on it; it read Rules and Regulations for Students of Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry: Muggle Edition. "...this is a list of all the specific policies of this school. As this is the Mu- the non-magical edition, it has an extended appendix in the back that explains some of the basic rules for the wizarding community as a whole, so that you might better interact with those around you. As I've been informed you are living in Hogsmeade now, it should prove quiet useful." The instructor placed the book on the table and pushed it to Sheri, who stopped fuming long enough to take the it; looking at the book was enough of a distraction that she stopped pouting and began to flip through its pages curiously.

"What is said here today is not meant as an insult, Mrs. Cross," said Professor Dumbledore with a smile, "it is merely so that we can all get to know each other better. Like you, we want only what is best for your daughter and her future. As the instructors present can attest to, she has been doing quite well at school, and with your help I'm certain we can make sure that it stays that way for the rest of her time here."

It was hard to argue or get upset with someone as friendly and genuine as Dumbledore, and as he already endeared himself to Sheri with his apparent curiosity about her antiquing she was more than willing to listen to him. "Alright, Mister Bumblebore," she said, pleasantly resigning herself to make peace with the faculty, "I'll read your rulebook and try to keep Angela out of trouble for you."

While everyone else in the room reeled at both the utter mangling of the headmaster's name and Sheri's apparent inability to take any responsibility for her actions, Professor Dumbledore didn't bat an eye, simply smiling and chuckling. It was growing obvious to all that this was probably as good as they were going to get with Angela's mother for the time being.

"Now that we have that settled," the headmaster said with a pleasant clap of his hands, "it might be a good time for a tour of the school property. As you are both familiar with Professor Quirrell, I should ask him to show you the grounds."

"M-M-Me, sir?" Quirrell stammered out; he looked somewhat shocked to be asked to play tour guide. "I, ah, have s-s-so much work to do this afternoon, Headmaster, perhaps Hagrid would be more s-s-suited to the task, Mrs. Cross has been getting to know him quite w-w-well over the last few months."

"I'm sure you can spare an hour for our guest, Quirenius," Dumbledore said, standing up and stretching his legs, "it's a lovely day to take a walk about the school. I would do it myself, but alas a single hour is far more than I can spare at the moment. Please take your time and show our student's mother the castle. Oh, and the Quidditch field, perhaps Mrs. Cross would enjoy seeing that as well."

"But-"

"Professor," Dumbledore said with an unusual air of finality, "I think you would be best suited to the task. Just an hour is all I request." Though his tone had not changed much, it had an added sternness to it, the twinkle in his eye going as he said it.

"Ah. Well. Alright then," Quirrell said, clenching his jaw slightly; taking her mother around the school wasn't something Angela was looking forward to either, but for a teacher to make such a deal of it, especially in front of the headmaster, was somewhat disconcerting. Then again, Professor Dumbledore's attitude on it was a little baffling at that; perhaps his enthusiasm regarding Sheri's exploits wasn't as genuine as it had originally seemed. Not that Angela could blame him.

"Enjoy yourselves," Professor Dumbledore said, the twinkle returning to his eye as he smiled at both the Cross girls. "It was wonderful meeting you, madam." He bowed slightly to Sheri, who smiled in return. Quirrell, taking in a deep breath, headed out the door, followed by Sheri who waved a polite goodbye to everyone (though more to the headmaster than anyone else). As Angela headed out herself, she noticed that while Coach Hooch had gotten up to leave, Snape and McGonagall hadn't budged an inch, watching Quirrell intently as he left. Professor Dumbledore had himself began to return to his seat, also eyeing Quirrell and asking Hooch to fetch Professor Flitwick as quickly (and discreetly) as possible on her way out.

The tour of the school was far from eventful (much to Angela's relief). In fact, Quirrell seemed so distracted throughout the entire trip that Angela was the one that had to explain the majority of school facilities to her mother. As Sheri craned her neck to see everything they passed by, including a classroom where some seventh-year students were practicing vanishing and reappearing in another place (Professor Quirrell dubbed this kind of magic Apparating) she gained the attention of more than one person on the way, including Hagrid, who unsuccessfully attempted to hide at the sight of her walking down the hall at him, and the Weasley twins who were practicing their beater routine on their own at the Quidditch field; the boys immediately recognized her from the train station back in September and broke from their midair formation (a sight that, Angela was pleased to see, totally awed her mother), wanting very much to meet someone with such an aptitude for causing mischief. They were slightly disappointed when they realized she had no idea what a Howler actually did, but quickly recovered from their disappointment claiming that she obviously had a raw, natural talent for chaos - Angela had no argument for this whatsoever and just nodded.

George lent Angela his broom for a moment so she could show her mother what she had learned while in school; after a few full-speed rounds of the field, which she enjoyed immensely as she hadn't gotten to really cut loose on a broom in ages, Angela was greeted not only with wide-eyed, wide-mouthed shock by Sheri but by Fred and George as well, as neither of them had seen yet just what kind of speed the girl was capable of on a broomstick. Once all the ooh's and aah's had finished, Quirrell quickly shuttled Angela and Sheri on their way, though not before the Weasleys tried to hand Sheri a spare Howler in case she wanted to write anyone a letter (they had bought stacks of them after getting the idea from her); Angela quickly yanked the unsealed red note out of Fred's hand and gave the boys a scathing look. When Sheri complained about Angela's rude behavior (and the fact she had taken something that was given to her for free), Angela considered telling her mother she'd give it back later after the tour - which in Angela's mind would be in the mail a day or two later, written on and sealed - but quickly dismissed the idea when she considered what damage a Howler might do to her mother's new antique shop and instead just explained as best she could just what Howlers really did; when Sheri said it couldn't be as bad as Angela described, the girl handed the Howler back to her mother and told her to address it to herself and open it when she got home if she wanted proof, adding that she might want to stay away from anything glass or fragile at the time.

With an hour passed, Quirrell concluded the tour promptly and headed on his way with little more than a half-conscious goodbye, running off to whatever business he had for the rest of the afternoon; it initially struck Angela as strange that Dumbledore would make Quirrell do the tour if he was so busy, but it didn't take a genius to see the headmaster had for some reason wanted the Dark Arts instructor occupied or otherwise out of the way for an hour. Something about Quirrell was definitely up, she could see, but what specifically it was she had no idea; perhaps Dumbledore was planning on firing him for gross incompetence or something (perhaps he was on drugs? He was sure twitchy enough) and needed to talk to the heads of the school about it without him around...

"You got to see the school and meet my teachers finally," said Angela as she walked her mother to the front doors. "Sorry I can't come down and see the place Mister Hagrid built you, but you know the rules: no leaving the grounds until the school year's up." In actuality she wasn't allowed to leave the property until the Hogwarts staff somehow wrapped up the Book of Black debacle, which could be years or maybe even never, but telling this to her mother didn't seem prudent at the moment.

"Well, the summer can't come fast enough, I have plenty for you to do when you're finished with magic school." Angela suppressed a groan and tried to maintain a pleasant demeanor despite her mother's apparent thoughtlessness, just nodding and smiling in return. "Anyway, I'll tell you all about it in my next letter."

"Please, Mom, don't use those red letters next time. Just use regular paper, or maybe a scroll, those things are easier for Percy to carry and you can write tons of stuff on them."

Sheri sighed and rolled her eyes in exasperation, as though Angela had just told her to push a bus uphill. "Okay, okay, just regular paper." Whether her mother truly intended to follow on this Angela had no idea, but at this point she had no choice but to take her word and cross her fingers.

Arriving at the doors, Angela hugged her mother. "Good luck with the booths, I'll write to you as soon as I get a chance next time."

Sheri blinked in confusion. "Wait, you're not going to leave me here, are you?"

Angela paused. "What do you mean?"

"How do you expect me to get back to town?"

The young girl looked at her mother confusedly and shrugged. "Didn't you walk here?"

Sheri just looked at Angela like she was crazy. "I'm not walking all those miles back."

"What are you talking about? Hogsmeade is just a few miles down the road and around the lake, you can see it from the cliffs on a clear day."

Sheri just looked like she had no idea what Angela was talking about when Hagrid walked up quickly out of nowhere; from the resigned look on his face, it was apparent he had been wanting to delay this as much as possible.

"Ah, there you are, Missus Cross, been, ah, lookin' fer you," he said, patting his chest heartily.

Angela's mother lit up as the giant man walked over to them both. "Rubeus, hi! And what's with the 'Mrs. Cross' thing, I told you, you can call me Sheri." She laughed and patted him on the arm in that "I'm-looking-for-a-husband-and-you're-the-next-choice" manner Angela had become so acquainted with over the years; she looked sympathetically at Hagrid, who had the expression of someone in line for a root canal.

"Um, right. Well," he said, trying to muster his bravado, "shall we be goin' then? Got yer carriage all set up outside."

"A carriage," Sheri said to Angela excitedly, "isn't that sweet? And they don't even use horses, Ang, that's just wild; I think the motors are on the bottom or in the trunk somewhere."

"Oh, I'll be needin' those back," Hagrid said, pointing at Sheri's face.

"Oops, sorry, almost walked out with them," she said, removing the metal-rimmed glasses from her face and placing them in the man's massive hand. "They're the same as my prescription too, how did you know?"

"Don't know how they makes 'em," he said, pocketing the spectacles, "I just knows they works is all. Never needed them, personally, not a lot of folks 'round these 'ere parts do."

Hagrid threw Angela a friendly wave and then stepped out, oddly enough taking Sheri's hand as he did and leading her out the doors. Sheri waved a quick goodbye to Angela before stepping outside and then headed for the ornate black carriage that had pulled up outside. To Angela's surprise, the carriage was indeed horseless, as whatever animals were hitched to the front of it were certainly not horses: the black skeletal creatures may have been generally horse-shaped, but had white eyes, faces that looked almost lizard-like, and large wings folded at their sides. Why her mom made it sound like the carriages just drove themselves she had no idea. Disturbingly, the animals were looking up the school steps right at her, their unblinking white eyes completely fixated on her position; she wasn't sure why, but she got the impression she was making them hungry. The young girl quickly tried to turn her attention to her mother, whom Hagrid had just finished helping into the carriage car. Angela waved one more goodbye to Sheri, who for some reason looked back in what could only be described as a bizarre expression of complete and utter confusion. Hagrid said something inaudible to her and waved another goodbye to Angela as he got into the other side of the cart, Sheri still looking around in absolute bewilderment at the school grounds.

As her day had been disturbing enough without strange, scary-looking creatures sizing her up for dinner, Angela stepped back inside quickly, wanting to leave this wearisome day behind and get some dinner of her own from the Great Hall.