Slytherin Study Group #2.5: Ramifications

Rabbit, striking Shakespearean pose in supermarket checkout line: "Is that - ? Why, yes it is! What a glorious sign! 'Two for one sale on chocolate chip cookies!' Go get another bag!"

~v~Jinx~v~: " 'kay!" Darts toward display, ponytails bouncing merrily. Innocent bystanders prudently scatter.

Weeee'reee Baaaaack! And it's really not worth suing us, all the money's gone for chocolate chip cookies.... If you recognize it, it ain't ours.

(Professor Keele is here on holiday from one of Jinx's tales.)

Much to the disappointment of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, the professors had effectively cancelled the morning's entertainment by exiling the sheep-thieving octet to the farthest end of the Great Hall, where they would be the last group dealt their detentions. This had really dampened the mood among the rest of the Disgraced, and by the widespread slumping of shoulders, it was clear that the teachers were completing their quest to bring morale to its nadir.

While they awaited execution, the rival gangs were marooned on a pair of high-backed benches running along opposite walls. Between them lay ten yards and their warden, everyone's least favorite Prefect, Loudmouth Lockhart, who was pacing back and forth in a state of decidedly anxious vigilance.

He looked like a bunny that'd gotten into the tigers' cage and knew perfectly well how things were going to go.

Lockhart had a white-knuckled, two-handed grip on his wand and had been yattering on steadily for fifteen minutes: "... so there's no point, d'you see, all of you, in pulling anything funny, or starting a row, because half the faculty's here -- " the lanky Ravenclaw indicated the stage with a kind of forbidding flourish, "and they'll be all over you in a thrice if you step even an inch out of line! So, you see, it's in your best interests to just sit quietly and accept matters gracefully.... "

He stopped and whirled, perhaps in a bid to look impressive and intimidate his audience of notorious reprobates.

Seven of them were asleep, five of them droolingly so.

Snape cocked his head quizzically, then broke into a grin, and applauded. "Daring revival of Coward!" he chirped. "Diamond perfec -- "

Malfoy woke up long enough to cuff him, smacking Snape's head against the bench with a loud crack.

"Oh, now -- now -- I say -- stop!" protested Lockhart.

Malfoy opened his eyes, and gazed at the Prefect with the look of a bear who'd been disturbed in February. "I've finished."

Snape didn't seem to have noticed the blow. "Penguins," he said, happily, and then sing-songed, "I should like some coffee too, please."

"But -- look -- er -- Five points from Slytherin!" decided Lockhart.

Malfoy stared at him calmly, waiting for the git to realize his error.

But Lockhart took a stance of inflated dignity, and lifted his chin. "Fighting is against the rules. Page one of the School Handbook, in case you've forgotten." He waggled a cautionary finger at Malfoy.

"Ah," breathed Lucius. "But we weren't fighting. Were we, Sev?" He got a grip on Snape's necktie, and tightened it slightly to get his attention.

"Huh?"

"We weren't, were we?"

"Huh?"

"You slipped."

"Huh?"

"There. You see?" said Malfoy, releasing Snape with a pat on the cheek. "Good boy."

"Hi Jenny!" Snape said amiably. He leaned against the back of the bench, blinking slowly.

"I -- no, that's not how it looked to me -- " ventured Lockhart.

"You were mistaken," said Lucius, lightly, with impeccable forgiveness. His gaze flicked to the impressive gilded plaque affixed to the bench, which commemorated a fantastic amount of money given to Hogwarts by the good family Malfoy.

Lockhart glanced at the plaque. "Oh." He cleared his throat and got a better grip on his wand. "Oh, yes... yes, I was mistaken... light's not very good in here, is it? Really, it is early.... " Looking flustered, Lockhart distanced himself from his faux pas, neatly resettling his cloak upon his shoulders and making certain that his Prefect's badge showed clearly. "Er... ahem... all right, there, Snape?"

Lucius elbowed his confused lieutenant, who had become entangled in his own bootlaces. Snape emitted a sound that one could presume to be affirmative. "He'll be fine," Malfoy assured their keeper.

Lockhart nodded gratefully and moved back towards the very center of his patrol area, looking for rescue towards the stage, where the professors were sending the Gryffindor Quidditch team off to their hopefully unpleasant fate.

"Sparrow legs," said Snape.

Lockhart whirled. "Oh, now, there's no need to get nasty!"

"Whitlock terriers?" Snape looked at him in faint alarm. He gave Lucius a worried glance. "You've not let it burn, have you?"

"No," said Lucius, because sometimes it was just easier, and yanked Snape free of his bootlaces.

Snape nodded in relief. "Pigeon feathers, that's what does it... but the smoke should be blue-gray, with a greenish cast.... " Mercifully, he subsided into contemplation of this problem, shaking his hands absently to restore the circulation.

Lucius tried to go back to sleep.

Snape looked at an unremarkable brick on the far wall and announced in stentorian tones, "Kind of like a ravioli."

Crabbe sat up, said, "Oh God, he's still at it," and went back to sleep. Goyle snored determinedly.

Lockhart hurried over and looked down with concern at the two wakeful Fourth Years. "Um... when he slipped, " the Prefect whispered, "how, ah, hard did he hit his head?"

"He's fine." Malfoy swatted his tame swot. "Just a bit overwrought. Detention, you know."

"Oh. Oh, yes, I certainly understand. Public humiliation and all that. Dreadful." Lockhart spared them a dubious glance, went pale when he saw Malfoy's expression, and moved away, towards the safely insensible Marauders. He paced the length of their bench, slipping a bit in the little puddle of drool that had collected on the flagstones beneath the quite unconscious Black. "Eugh." With a grimace, the Prefect flourished his wand and murmured a cleaning charm.

There was a bang, and a flash, and the whole bench upturned.

"Too much frog powder!" cried Snape. Lucius howled with glee, wishing he had his camera. Crabbe and Goyle woke up and laughed too, as soon as they saw the knot of swearing Marauders on the floor. Snape kept on looking vaguely about in alarm until he spied a stained glass window. "Oooh... pretty.... "

Lockhart was backing away from the disgruntled and disoriented Marauders as they attempted to disentangle themselves; he donned an alert and vigilant expression as he saw the professors headed his way. "Honestly! Can't you behave yourselves for five minutes altogether?!" he demanded loudly, glaring in distaste at the bleary Gryffindors. "And during Detention, as well! You're a collective disgrace!"

"That will do, Mr. Lockhart, thank you," said Professor McGonagall, sweeping in to check on her errant charges. Protests of innocence rose from her sprawled and sleepy sheep-thieves as they got to their feet and lined up properly.

Crabbe and Goyle grabbed Snape and stood him in place as the four Slytherins fell beneath the icy gaze of Professor Keele, Head of Slytherin House. She was a cool and uncompromising vision of elegance draped with indigo robes; her blue eyes glinted like chips of arctic sky, and her silver hair seemed frozen crystalline into its elaborate braids... and both these features looked considerably warmer than her expression.

There was no messing with Professor Keele.

Rumor had it that her mother had sunk the Titanic.

Raptor-like, she eyed her quartet of Slytherins. "Did you have aught to do with that?" she demanded quietly.

"No, Ma'am," answered Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle promptly, keeping quite still. Sudden movement would attract her attention and she'd likely hunt you down and have your throat out before you could explain that you'd merely panicked.

Her cold gaze flicked to the student who had not responded. "Mr. Snape?"

Under his cloak, Crabbe crammed an elbow into Snape's ribs.

Snape looked at him in surprise.

"Mr. Snape!" snapped Keele.

Hers was a voice you'd answer from a fever dream, or the throes of torture. "Yes, Ma'am?!" Snape asked, looking bewildered.

"Had you aught to do with that?" she pointed towards the scorched patch on the floor.

On his third try Snape focused on the damage she was indicating. He frowned in puzzlement, and shook his head. "Should've used the bitter butterbeetle wings, Jenny," he opined.

Then he grinned encouragingly up at Keele. "Still, it turned orange, and that's good! You're definitely onto something!"

Keele stared at him.

After a few moments, she turned a be-migrained look to Malfoy, "Up All Night Potion?" she inquired dryly.

"Up All Night Potion," sighed Lucius, lobbying for a sympathetic look, which he almost got. They had all endured three and a half years of Snape's whacked-out weekend behavior, as he wandered from Friday nights' brews to Saturday night's second tries and on to Sunday afternoons' moaning regrets. "It'll wear off soon, Ma'am."

"I should hope so." Keele frowned, illuminating the tip of her wand. "Mr. Snape," she began, "pay attention..."

He was. To a bumblebee that no one else could see.

Professor Keele intercepted its path with her lighted wand and smiled faintly when Snape belatedly noticed the new object.

Lucius turned away from the familiar ritual, and looked to see how McGonagall was dealing with the Gryffindors, all of whom were still shaking their heads in confused denial. She looked freshly scrubbed, and he bit back a grin, thinking of Black's well-aimed bucket.

Lockhart was trying to fade into the wall, which he was surprisingly good at doing, for someone notoriously obsessed with attractive glamours, attention and glory. Malfoy watched the procedure, taking mental notes. He grew really interested when the Prefect actually took on the coloring and apparent texture of the wall, and scuttled away like a chameleon.

Which might have worked out very well, had Professor Dumbledore not been making his way towards the group, and had the Headmaster not called out a cheerful, "Good morning, Gilderoy!" to the petra-fied Prefect.

Lockhart froze, but Dumbledore strolled right past him and joined the gathering. "Good morning, all, good morning," he greeted the assembly. "A beautiful day, is it not?"

"It is indeed, Professor Dumbledore," agreed McGonagall.

"Very fine," concurred Keele.

"Lovely day, for a trip into Hogsmeade," Dumbledore mused, earning nods from the two professors. He turned an amused gaze upon the collected boys. "Alas, the eight of you have other matters to occupy your time, today... which seems only fair, as you have been indulging in so many extracurricular activities during hours in which you ought to have been studying, or sleeping. Really, you have had as much free time as your fellows, if not more." Dumbledore shrugged lightly, hands spread like scales to show the equity of it all.

The sheep-thieves looked at the floor.

Except for Snape, who was staring intently at Keele's dimmed and motionless wand where it rested in her folded arms. "You have to poke holes in the jar, though."

"Yes, that's most important," Dumbledore agreed. "Though I've found it works better if you poke the holes in the jar lids." He smiled. "We have a rather instructive detention planned for all of you today."

Oh God, not another Learning Experience...

Most of the miscreants tried bravely to look appreciative, or at least not insulted. Snape blinked and transferred his stare to the charred spot on the floor. "Oops."

"Well," Dumbledore sighed, spreading his hands in amiable resignation, "first things, first." The light glinted sharply off his half-moon spectacles as he studied the wrongdoers, one by one.

Potter, Black, and Lupin actually smiled in an effort to look abashedly accepting of what their lovable naiveté had brought upon them. Pettigrew flinched. Malfoy assumed the unassailable perfection of Austrian crystal. Crabbe and Goyle hunkered down. Snape had gone back to watching the invisible bumblebee.

Dumbledore took a scroll from his sleeve, and let it unroll to the floor. Pettigrew bit his lip. Clearing his throat, he read this list of infractions, which was a good ten feet and nearly identical to the one Snape had rattled off over dinner last night. None of the wrongdoers really listened, until the Headmaster got to the important parts:

"All in all, I make that out to be... one hundred and thirty points, each, lost by Misters Potter, Black, Malfoy and Snape... and one hundred points, each, lost by Misters Lupin, Pettigrew, Crabbe and Goyle."

There was a long silence.

McGonagall and Keele did not look happy.

"That's... " Potter began, looking dazed.

"Four hundred and sixty points, total," Malfoy supplied bleakly. "Lost by each House."

"Hufflepuff'll be thrilled," remarked Black in a growl. "They're in the lead, now."

"Is that... a new school record?" asked Potter, almost hopefully.

"No," McGonagall informed him through gritted and rather pointy-looking teeth. "And don't bother trying to set one, Mr. Potter. I've had quite enough trouble from you and your friends!"

"Likewise," intoned Keele, glaring at her charges, who were still as statues. Every Slytherin knew to hold still (or better yet lie low) when Keele's voice cracked like a lake in Spring.

"Now," Dumbledore recommenced lightly, "as to the matter of detention." He looked happier to announce, "The eight of you will be spending your day helping Mr. Hagrid in cleaning out the stables."

Lucius nearly strangled holding back comment.

Dumbledore merely nodded at the inarticulate sounds drifting from Malfoy's direction, as if he'd noticed a distant, pleasant tune. "Having witnessed yesterday's early-morning attempt at teamwork," the Headmaster continued, his smile widening with delighted memory, "we have chosen to encourage this more positive trend among you, by setting you to working as a united group, towards a common and mutually beneficial goal." He glanced at the stricken faces upturned to him, and his smile became benign, in reassurance. "We understand that this will not be easy, and so we are prepared to save you from temptation... as well as the potential for serious injury."

Once again the light glinted coldly off the half-moons of Dumbledore's spectacles -- really, he must have bespelled them to do that on cue -- as he intoned gravely, "You will not be permitted to use any magic in this endeavor."

"There you are," Lupin sighed.

"Don't you get tired of being right all the time," said Black.

Crabbe nudged Snape. "You got it right too," he said supportively.

"I really dislike jubjub birds," commented Snape.

"Gentlemen, if you please," prompted the Headmaster.

They quieted, looking resigned.

"Bit more orange juice."

Malfoy kicked Crabbe, who kicked Snape.

Dumbledore surveyed the subdued assembly, nodded fractionally in contentment, and ordered quietly, "You will now hand over your wands to your respective Heads of House."

Seven pairs of eyes widened in horror.

And then it sunk in.

Pandemonium broke out, nearly overridden by Malfoy's outraged explosion: "You're joking!"

"Us, and them, with just our claws and teeth?" demanded Black in the ensuing hush, and then was silenced by a swift elbow to the ribs from Lupin.

"The eight of you," McGonagall nodded regally in affirmation, "with mops and buckets and non-flying brooms. Let's have your wands, gentlemen."

Potter reluctantly stepped forward, and almost decorously placed his wand into her waiting hand. Lupin followed suit, then Pettigrew, and with great hesitation, Black.

"Thank you." McGonagall grasped the wands firmly and turned expectantly to watch as Keele extended a hand to collect her charges' wands.

"This is madness!" hissed Lucius, knuckles white as he gripped his wand defensively. "When my father hears about this -- "

"I'll be pleased to inform him myself, Mr. Malfoy," stated Keele. "I should delight in showing him the recording of your little adventure in the sheep paddock... particularly the part where you're down brawling in the muck, earning yourself a blacked eye and bloodied nose. I'm sure he'd be most keen to see that." Implacable as a glacier, she stared expectantly down at Malfoy.

Lucius gave in, controlling his fury and elegantly placing his wand into her palm. He turned brusquely and ordered his comrades, "Hurry up, gentlemen."

Crabbe uncertainly surrendered his wand; Goyle followed suit. Snape was watching the persistent phantom bee. Lucius collected Snape's wand from its pocket and handed it over.

Keele sighed through her nose. "I swear," she muttered, glaring archly at Snape, "if they gave him access to stronger ingredients, he'd turn himself into a Jabberwocky."

"Hope not," Goyle said. "He's in our room."

McGonagall came over, looking concerned. "How is he, Veronica?" she inquired quietly.

"Oh, he'll be fine... nothing serious, nothing lasting... honestly, boy, why can't you test your concoctions on mice?"

Malfoy sighed, and volunteered martyrishly, "He finds their reports unreliable, Ma'am."

"And my owl got that sick, first year, when it ate some -- " Goyle whuffed as Crabbe and Malfoy elbowed him from either side.

"Perhaps he ought go to the hospital wing," said McGonagall.

"Oh, no, please!" exclaimed Lucius, his expression reaching new depths of concern as he threw his arms protectively about his bewildered comrade. "He'd feel just awful if you sent him off, and he discovered later that he'd missed helping us atone for our misdeeds! Really, he'd not forgive himself, you know Sev -- in for the destruction, in for the restitution! He'd want to be here," Malfoy averred. "He really would!"

"Walnuts," cheeped Snape.

McGonagall looked dubious, but Keele wore a confident expression. "He'll be all right, Minerva," she assured her colleague. "Hagrid can keep an eye on him, but Mr. Malfoy and the others well know what to do. I expect it should wear off by lunchtime."

McGonagall accepted this, and turned back to glare at her snidely whispering Gryffindors.

Keele looked narrowly at Lucius, and leaned down to breathe into his ear, "You would be outnumbered... and no wands...." she said.

Lucius nodded.

"Mind you look after him," she warned. "This isn't a task for Goyle or Crabbe. See he stays in one piece."

"Of course, Ma'am." Lucius agreed with alacrity. It was worth having to watch over the abstracted git until his brains came back; he'd make sure that Snape duly thanked him for his custodial diligence. Potions homework for the next month. That ought to do for starters.

Keele straightened up and turned to her colleagues. "He'll be well enough. The fresh air should help bring him out of it, in time."

Maybe two months.

"Yes, fresh air does wonders to restore one," agreed Dumbledore pleasantly. "And here comes Mr. Hagrid, who has just been enjoying its benefits, to take charge of you."

Hagrid, by the smell of him, had been enjoying the benefits of something a lot more fragrant than fresh air. "Good mornin', Professors," he nodded to the teachers. "I got the horses out to the paddock, Professor Dumbledore, sir," he told the Headmaster. "And Mr. Filch sent out those cleaning supplies you arranged for. Just need the hands to use 'em now." The gamekeeper grinned down at the condemned.

Malfoy glared at him. The man was dangerously jovial, and had no sense of decorum.

The Marauders were grinning like idiots. They liked the gamekeeper.

They'd never been hauled out of the Forest slung over his shoulder like a brace of dead rabbits. Lucius's stomach had ached for days last time.

"This way, gentlemen," Hagrid invited, striding towards the side door.

With sighs and grumbles and a little bit of shoving, the Gryffindors fell in behind their gigantic chum.

Malfoy waited, not wishing to stroll along with all four Marauders at his back. As for his cronies... "Oh, bring him along!" he ordered Crabbe and Goyle, who each seized one of Snape's arms and propelled him rather stumblingly along as the rearguard of their dismal morning constitutional.

The whole semester's worth of Potions assignments.

Hagrid was holding the servants' door open for them.

And Herbology.