Topsy Turvy

Topsy Turvy

Chapter Eight: So, You're Going To Raise The Dead

Hermione was jumpy the whole next day. The anticipation of that night was overwhelming. Neville and Luna kept giving her nervous looks as she passed. Professor Gravis was in a particularly bad mood, and accidently blew up her desk.

Hermione needed to get away from it all. During lunch, she walked up to the Gryffindor common room, her hand to her forehead. The only other people there were the seven first years, who were giggling about something that had happened in their class with Professor Claws. Apparently, he ate four raccoons and a beaver. Don't ask why.

Hermione sat on the couch and sighed. The fireplace's flame turned green. Hermione looked up just in time to see a boy with an army helmet tumbling through the fire place, followed by a girl with bushy, brown hair.

"Wow! That was fun!" the girl exclaimed.

One by one, five more figures came through the fire place, along with a small, grey owl. Hermione didn't have to guess who they were.

"What are you doing here?" Hermione asked. Somehow, she wasn’t very surprised to see them.

"We found that Leaky Cauldron place and thought we'd give you a visit," Lauren said. "You don't mind, do you?"

"Uh..." Hermione began. She turned around and saw that the first years were staring in awe.

"That place was really hard to find, too!" Kelsey exclaimed. "Why does it have to be invisible to us Moogles, or whatever you call us? We wouldn't have found it if Jared hadn't tripped and crashed through the window!"

“Not to mention that they’re suing me, now,” Jared added.

"Is this a bad time?" Lauren asked Hermione, ignoring Kelsey and Jared.

"Um..." Hermione began. She heard someone outside the room saying the password to the Fat Lady in the painting. "Listen, I can't explain right now, but I need you to all jump out the window."

"Huh?" the seven Muggles asked together.

"There's a ledge, so you won't fall. But just be quick!" Hermione said.

Jesse was the first to reach the window. "Adios!" She pushed herself out the window onto the ledge, the top of her head still visible.

"Get down!" Hermione whispered.

The others swung over the ledge, with only one “stop pushing!” and “you’re stepping on my foot!”

The door swung open just as Garry had hopped out the window. Fortunately, it was only Luna and Neville.

"You two scared me!" Hermione said. "I have seven Muggles and an owl out there that I just had to hide.”

Kelsey popped her head up. "Howdy, ya'll!"

"Come back in," Hermione said.

A few of the Muggles groaned, but ultimately climbed back into the common room.

"They can't stay here," Neville commented wisely.

“Well, duh!” Hermione replied.

"We can take them outside and hide them for now," Luna said, her voice so dreamy that Hermione was positive she was on something. "I would say that they should go back, but a certain somebody did say that we'd need more people to help out with you-know-what."

"Neville, go get Harry's Invisibility Cloak," Hermione said.

Neville stared at her blankly.

Hermione sighed. “It’s in his trunk.”

Neville stared at her blankly. Again.

“Under his text books,” Hermione specified.

Neville nodded and ran upstairs, his baby fat jiggling and his pants slipping down as he hopped up the stairs. It was not a pleasant sight.

But, several minutes later, he returned with the cloak. It was hard to wrap it around the seven teenagers and even harder to have them all walk in unison together outside to the Whomping Willow’s passageway, the only place they could think to hide them.

But, as you've probably realized, everybody in this thing is stupid, explaining why no one stopped to think about the first years, who decided to keep a close watch on Hermione, Luna, and Neville from there on out.

Night seemed to come quickly. Neville, Luna, and Hermione made their way outside, stopping to get the Muggle teens. It was a bit of a challenge guiding the Muggles to the Hogwarts gate and then having to Apparate all of them, but it didn’t take too long.

Once again, everyone here is stupid, so they didn't notice the first years grabbing the brooms and following Neville and Luna. This especially was stupid, because Luna and Neville should really just have Apparated, rather than flying, which they considered more romantic. Ick. Also, the first years were really loud, so anyone even mildly smart or even cognitive would've noticed them. Oh, well.

Now, rather than going over the trip in detail, let's just skip to the interesting stuff.

As Hermione entered the small, grey house with the Muggles following her, the first thing she noticed was Snape and Lupin giving each other death stares, Pettigrew singing, and Percy holding his head in his hands.

"Who are they?" Malfoy asked, looking at the Muggles.

"They're my friends," Hermione replied.

"How come I don't recognize them?" Malfoy asked.

"Because we're a bunch of ignorant, little Muggles," Jesse said. "Deal with it."

Malfoy opened his mouth to say something, but Tommy the owl flew onto his head, causing him to shriek like a little girl and run around in circles.

The darkened room was almost eerie. Hermione shivered as she saw the "dead" bodies lying around, all of them with a vacant look on their faces. Only one body was still in it's coffin. It was distinctively Dumbledore, who was lying so peacefully.

The door burst open. Gravis walked in, haughtily. "You've sure let this place go to hell, Severus. Oh, and you’re all out of toilet paper. You like Angel Soft, if I remember correctly."

Snape scowled, but didn't say anything, not wanting to risk Gravis losing her temper.

"So, how did you find out that they're not dead, anyways?" Lauren asked.

"Experimenting," Snape said. "I did a lot of experiments when I was at Hogwarts."

"Yeah, you were creepy that way," Gravis said.

"Experiments on what?" Lauren continued.

Snape shrugged. "Rats mostly."

Pettigrew squeaked.

Hermione, the animal rights activist that she is, said, "What? So you killed a bunch of rats to find out if this would work?"

"Pretty much," Snape replied. "When I noticed that the bodies weren’t decaying, I knew something was wrong."

"Sick freak," Hermione muttered.

"It took me years to find out how to bring them out of it," Snape continued. "I haven't tried it on humans, though. I'm not quite sure what will happen if it doesn't work."

Hermione shuddered. She didn't like the idea of the bodies being in a death-like coma for the rest of their... lives.

Neville and Luna arrived a few moments later. "Okay, we can start now," Malfoy said.

Hermione gave Malfoy a look. “Were you waiting for them?”

Malfoy blushed. “No. I wasn’t waiting for them. Not at all. I wasn’t... I don’t even like Longbottom!”

Hermione blinked.

“No, of course not,” Malfoy mumbled, more to himself than to Hermione. “It’s not like I’ve had a huge crush on him since first year and I’ve just been mean to him to hide my feelings. No... of course not...”

Snape raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. He pulled out two bottles of potions, each a dark, green hue. Oddly enough, the bottles were shaped like hearts and had prints of hugging Care Bears on them. Everyone in the room chose to ignore it. "Alright then. Any volunteers?" Snape asked.

"For what?" Lupin asked.

"It's the biggest part in waking them up," Snape explained. "I need two people to drink a bottle of this."

"Why can't you do it?" Gravis asked.

"Because I'm the only one that knows the series of spells involved," Snape said, sticking his overly large nose in the air. "So, does anyone want to volunteer, or will I have to pick out two victims?" An almost happy gleam popped into his eyes as he mentioned that last part.

Hermione looked around the room. No one was volunteering. Finally, Malfoy said, "Oh, all right! I'll do it."

For once in his life, Malfoy actually decided to do a very brave and very stupid thing. Well, he'd done plenty of stupid things before, but without the brave part. The only thing stopping him from being a Gryffindor.

"Anyone else?" Snape said, surveying the room.

Hermione had never been one to turn down an opportunity to raise her hand. So she shot her hand into the air, waving it frantically. “Ooh! Ooh! Mememe!!!”

Snape rolled his eyes. "This isn't class, Miss Granger."

"Oh," Hermione said, putting her hand down, slightly red. "What I mean is, I'll do it."

"Okay," Snape said. "When I say to, I need you each to drink a bottle of this."

"Alright," Malfoy and Hermione said together.

Each of them held a bottle in their hand, facing each other.

"Go ahead," Snape said, raising his wand.

"To your health," Malfoy said.

Malfoy and Hermione clinked glasses and they both drank.