Sleeping Through Anything

Sleeping Through Anything

It was midnight, and the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff fourth years had just parted ways after a session of Astronomy.

"I can't believe Sinistra," Ron groaned as he climbed the stairs. "A four-foot essay on what we saw tonight? For tomorrow's class?Is she mad? With that essay on Somnora potions from Snape, too? How are we going to get all this done? I'm dropping..."

"Well, why don't you get up a bit early and do it?" Hermione asked. "I often handle it that way, after Astronomy. I'm tired from my Somnora essay, too, and Professor Vector gave us some nasty problems, but I'll meet you at six-thirty to work on the Polaris assignment."

"A-a--ahll right," Ron nodded heavily, yawn stretching his jaws until she could count his tonsillitis scars. Hermione was a little dubious, but she bid her friends goodnight in the common room and went upstairs, setting her Wendy alarm clock for six.

The next morning, slightly sleepy, Hermione waited impatiently for Ron at the table where she had spread out her chart and a new roll of parchment. Finally, when it was nearly seven, she picked up the Howler she had been studying (seeing whether the charm on it was sonorus or something a little more unusual) and recorded a message, Banishing it to the sixth-year dorm.

A few minutes later, Harry was downstairs, shaking violently. "Godric, Hermione. Do you have any idea what you turned loose up there?!? I hope I never see Seamus woken up from his terrorist dream by an explosion again...Dean's still covered in boils. And I hope I never wake up to the sound of your voice screeching "dolt" like bending nails, either."

"I'm sorry, Harry..."

"And Neville's still shaking. He thought you were his Gran for a minute..."

"I am sorry...but...where's Ron?"

"Ron? Ron's still muttering about getting your hair in his mouth...I think your voice penetrated as saying something like 'dear' or 'dove' instead of 'dolt.'"

Hermione blushed. She knew Harry wouldn't have told her that if he hadn't been so shaken, and she began to feel the first faint pricklings of remorse. She had forgotten the other boys...

At the same time, she was fascinated by the coma Ron appeared to be in. "You mean he didn't wake up? Not at all?"

"You didn't seriously think that a little thing like being in a stone room with a small hurricane was going to wake him up, did you?" Harry's hair was beginning to lie in a tangled mass again, as the effects wore off. He was beginning to see the funny side of it. "Ron doesn't wake up to noise, Hermione," he explained, wearily amused. "You have to shine a light in his eyes, or pour barely-liquid ice over his ears, or borrow Fred and George's idea of an enchanted feather duster that never leaves off tickling his feet. Even then, there's only a fifteen percent chance you'll wake him before he would have woken up anyway."

Hermione was still incredulous. All around her, boys from the staircase on the left, and the first three floors of girls from the right, were peering out of their doors as though afraid the British government had somehow failed to notify them that World War Three had begun and was starting with a nuclear explosion in Scotland. The first years looked as though they thought Dumbledore had suddenly gone on a killing rampage. The others merely looked as though they thought the Dark Lord was attacking them in lime green boxer shorts.

Faintly, there were sounds of an Irish accent being profusely sorry. A few minutes later, Dean Thomas came running off the staircase and headed for the hospital wing, his skin visibly throbbing from the burst boils. Hermione winced. "I'm so sorry, Harry...I didn't think..."

"Obviously. Next time, just let him fail, will you?" Harry turned and climbed the staircase, pushing his way through the crowds.

Hermione was left to smile nervously at the huge crowd of sleep-deprived adolescents. "I'm so sorry...I was just...er..." Her nerve failed her. She took a deep breath and finished: "leaving."

Quickly, she pushed her way up the stairs, her skin the same color as peonies in blossom. Her own year were still sleeping peacefully--they were at the top of the tower--so she humbly shut the curtains and began to scribble an essay on the position of Polaris.

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Three months later, Ron was once again yawning widely as they descended the Astronomy tower stairs. "I don't know what I'm going to do...I can't think well enough to finish that essay on Tri-Species Transfiguration for McGonagall..."

"Well, I'm planning to work on it tomorrow morning..." Hermione offered.

"No." Harry stepped between them, eyes blazing and mouth set firmly. "You are not going to offer to get him up early. For the sake of my ears, Dean's head, and Neville's sanity, you are not permitted to offer anything of the kind."

"Oh, don't worry, Harry," she assured him, smiling demurely. "I'm going to lend Ron an alarm clock, so I won't need to disturb the rest of you."

"No alarm clock that could wake Ron could avoid waking the rest of us." Harry pointed out.

"I am still here, you know," Ron cut in.

"Oh, but this is specially attuned to only affect the person it's supposed to wake. "See..."she pulled it out of her bag and stuck Ron's finger in it. "Now it knows his genetic codes and aura and things, so that it will only wake him up."

Ron inspected the plain brown box sticking off of his hand. "Are you sure? I am a rather heavy sleeper."

"Oh, don't worry, it'll work, all right."

"Well...all right. I really need to do that essay, and it'll be even less coherent if I write it tonight..."

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In the morning, the box began with an innocent bleaping. It rose in fever, pitch, and volume. Ron never stirred.

A tickling charm began working energetically at his feet. He kicked.

A dousing charm started work on his left ear. He stirred as he rubbed restlessly at it.

A bright light burst into being. He cracked open an eye. Oh...that alarm clock was going off. He moved to hit the button on top.

Just in front of his barely-unweldedeyelids, a smarting pink message appeared. GET OUT OF BED. Irritably, he squinted and pushed the button again. The message was now blinking on and off in front of his eyes. He knocked over the box. The message grew in size and brilliancy. He groaned and stuffed his pillow over his head. The message followed his eyeballs, lined itself on his eyelids. A high pitched voice began saying, "GET OUT OF BED, RON. GET OUT OF BED, RON." Five minutes later, a horn began to blare.

"All right, all right," he moaned.

He stumbled out of bed and headed for the bathroom. When he returned, he found that the message had changed. It was now an electric blue. GET DRESSED. The voice was still repeating itself. He used some language his mother had most certainly not taught him and pulled his wand out of his robes. "Finite Incantatem!"

A ringing blow was delivered to the back of his head. "Ow!" Rubbing the spot, he glowered darkly at the floating message. For a moment, below the command, he read lemon-yellow letters that spelt: "Nice try. Move it!"

The words vanished, and he stared, wondering if he'd dreamed it. No...there was quite definitely a knot on the back of his head. Muttering darkly, he pulled his robes over his head.

The bright purple letters now said, "NOW GO DOWNSTAIRS." The voice was now very loud and insistent. But Ron had taken enough. He began hurling curses at the innocuous brown box. Soon it was covered in bumps, wobbling on its legs, the voice had a giggle to it. He even began trying Avada Kedavra on the thing. Invisible hands pushed at him rudely.

"All right, all right, I'm going..." He yawned, swore again, and stumbled out the door. The noise stopped.

Ron flopped down on his face, once again fast asleep. He slid on his chest down the flights of stairs, and arrived, pate first and snoring gently, at Hermione's feet, where she was smugly standing in anticipation of a good essay session before breakfast.