A/N: Here we go, shadows fall... Thanks as usual to Lady Starlight for her splendiferous work. And as usual, I own nothing really. Except, Em, Xan, Harriet, Sirius, Abby, Wendel, Elliot, Rain....You get the idea.
Chapter 23: Crime and Punishment
*****************************Hogwarts*********************************
December 1, 2015
8:55 pm
Soft footsteps disturbed the silence of the otherwise empty seventh-floor hallway leading from the Library wing to the warmth and companionship of Gryffindor Tower. The solitary girl slipping down the hall jumped as a suit of armor crashed to the floor behind her and she spun, her wand filling her hand as her overfilled pack crashed to the floor, spilling out a couple of books.
A scraggly kneazle staggered out, shaking its head as if to drive out some errant thought and she laughed to herself. It looked up at her, and glared with lamp-yellow eyes as if it were her fault, before sauntering off with its tail high.
She shook her head and slipped her wand back into her thigh sheath, before kneeling next to her bag and started to stuff her books back into her pack. A muttered curse slipped from her lips as an inkpot rolled away and under another suit of armor just as she reached for it. She crawled after it, reaching for the pot...
A sudden sharp pain, and blackness were all she knew, as she collapsed to the floor with a thin trail of blood dripping from her scalp.
Quiet, scuffing sounds came from next to the collapsed brunette girl, and a neon-red head of hair, cut in an artfully mussed shag, appeared hovering a few feet above the floor. A fall of silvery fabric slipped to the floor, and the rest of a sixteen-year-old woman in a green-trimmed, short, black skirt and a charcoal jumper with a small, twisted serpent on one breast, appeared.
She leaned forward and yanked up Kris' skirt, ripping it partially in the process as she pulled out the fifth-years' wand and slid it into the waistband of her skirt behind her back. Maraisah looked back over her shoulder, towards a dark alcove, "Well, you fools, are you going to sit there forever?"
Another pair of girls scampered out from the shadows and quickly bound Kris' hands behind her with a glowing rope one of them conjured with their wand. The other flicked her wand, levitating Kris into the air. Kris' books and bag were tossed into a convenient dustbin and they looked back at Maraisah, "What now, Maraisah?"
"Bring the little slag," Maraisah smirked, as she stood from her crouch and folded her invisibility cloak over one arm like a normal garment. She stroked Kris' cheek; "We can have some fun...show that little Potter bitch and her...friends the consequences of going against their proper places."
The trio left with only a faint, dark chuckle, bringing along their unwitting fourth, and vanished into the winding corridors of the castle.
A minute later, two more girls in Gryffindor togs passed the scene, Chastity laughing quietly at some joke that Virginia had heard from her father the last Hogsmeade weekend.
****************************Gryffindor Tower*****************************
11:20 pm
Emilia sat crossed-legged on her bed, just behind Harriet as she tried to work out a knot that Harriet had somehow gotten into her hair during Charms and only noticed when she was brushing her hair out for bed.
Harriet whimpered softly as Emilia tugged on it, trying not to hurt her unduly. "This wouldn't have been so bad if you'd taken care of it earlier," Emilia griped, even as she finished with the brush, freeing the tangle, and running it through Harriet's now past shoulder length hair. Emilia tossed the brush toward her dresser, not watching as it halted halfway and floated over at a sedate pace to drop next to a small compact.
She turned and crawled back up the bed to sit with her back to the headboard next to the other occupant in the room. She grabbed a handful of crisps out of the bowl between her and Rain, and munched on a few, feeding them to herself one at a time with her other hand.
"You really going to stay the night with us girls?" Rain asked sidelong, glancing over at Emilia out of the corner of her eye.
Emilia nodded forcefully, tossing her hair over her face to hide her left eye, "Yeah, it's just one night, and I can feel him," she tapped her temple with one finger, "he's always there..."
Emilia closed her eyes contently, missing the combination on both the other girls' faces of an eyeroll with looks of faint jealously. She opened them again, watching as Harriet flopped on her stomach, facing them, and crossed her bent legs. She laughed as Harriet took a portion of chips twice what she had just eaten, even with Emilia's rather amped metabolism.
Emilia did not say a word, even though she fully expected that someday Harriet would share the increased metabolic load, courtesy of a certain black-haired Gryffindor that Emilia could feel, even now, sitting in the Common Room several floors below.
Neither Emilia nor Rain had mentioned him all night.
The pair had fastidiously been avoiding each other since the near disastrous duel in the Room of Requirement. They still talked occasionally; it was almost unavoidable in the environment of the Tower after all. But neither sat near each other, sitting across and well separated from each other at meals, and always at different tables in the Library or the Common Room, as if they were afraid to touch, even accidentally.
Em shared a quick glance with Rain, after six years they knew what each was thinking, almost as well as she and Xander knew each other. Rain returned a small shrug and looked back to Harriet as the redhead straightened back up from grabbing a bottle of butterbeer that had been set on the floor by the bed. Rain sighed, as Em rolled from the bed and walked over to an enchanted music player that was setting on her dresser. She started to fumble through a box of data crystals, as Rain glared at her back.
"He didn't mean it, Harriet," Rain said into the sudden silence as Em changed one of the crystals. The music started again, now playing Default softly, picking up on Count on Me. Rain gave Em a glance and she just shrugged.
Harriet remained silent, looking away as she grabbed for her butterbeer again.
"Sirius never'd hurt you, Harriet," Emilia said softly as she dropped on the bed next to her. She reached over to brush aside her hair where it covered her eyes, forcing the slightly-older girl to look back at her, "You have to know that." Emilia took a breath, considering what she wanted to actually say, looked over to Rain, and then back at Harriet. "He-"
A crash came from out in the hall, the sound passing through the one-way Silencing Wards on the room, and Emilia turned to the door, her thought unsaid. The door opened a moment later, and another redhead invaded the room, looking out of breath. Virginia looked around, her eyes darting here and there. She was still mostly in her uniform, lacking only her tie, with her white shirt untucked and half-hiding her skirt. Her hair was disheveled as if she had been running her hands through it worriedly, and she had replaced her patent-leather Mary Janes with soft trainers, as if she had been running.
"What's wrong, 'Gina?" Rain asked before anyone else could speak.
"H...Have you seen Kris?" she asked quickly. "She was supposed to meet me back in the tower a couple of hours ago, but no one's seen her, and ou...her bed is still made."
Emilia shook her head, not outwardly noticing the faint slip of the tongue. She stood and walked over to her armoire, "Let us get changed real quick and we'll help you look. Meet us downstairs in a couple of minutes, I'm sure she's just up in a classroom studying or something and forgot the time." Virginia looked as if she believed Em as much as she herself did, but she did not argue as she spun quickly enough for her skirt to flutter up and vanished at a run.
"It's after hours, Em," Rain reminded her as she exchanged her bottoms for jeans. She knelt next to her trunk and touched a discrete rune. A long, low drawer slid out. She pushed up the left sleeve of the sweatshirt she had been planning on sleeping in as she examined the contents of the hidden compartment. Her long, thin sword held the center, with several other objects scattered about, ranging from several palm-sized silver discs, to a vicious-looking curved knife with sharp teeth set on the inside of the curve to a book-sized flat black box with a Muggle push button lock. She ran her fingers over the box, and grabbed out a battered brown leather sheath holding a black handled, use-worn stiletto. She strapped it to her forearm, pulled the shirt down to cover it and looked back at Em. "You have the map?"
Harriet crossed behind Emilia, and dropped to her knees next to her bed as she dug under it for trainers, setting aside her issues for the moment.
"Um...no," Emilia admitted with a frown, "I think, actually that Justin has it, he was going to try to use it replenish his Firewhisky stash, after Ravenclaw's party last week." Rain rolled her eyes but nodded. Emilia looked over her shoulder at Harriet, as the redhead concealed her collapsed staff in the small of her back, "I know..." Her eyes went blank for an instant; "Xander will meet us in the Common Room with Elliot."
Only a few minutes passed before Emilia, Rain and Harriet scampered down the ancient stone stairs to the Common Room. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending how one saw it, the room was almost empty, with only a few Gryffindors, the ones grabbed by Virginia or sent for by Emilia's flicker of a thought. An obscure portrait opened in one corner of the room, and Anna stepped through, yawning, as she finished pulling her hair back into a messy tail.
"I told Nate to wait here," Anna said, looking across to Emilia and Sirius as the latter finished retying his shoes. Nathan appeared as she finished her thought, pulling a shirt down to meet his jeans.
Emilia nodded, not even smiling faintly at the slight flush still on Anna's cheeks, even several minutes after Xander had summoned them with a quick mirror call. Emilia looked over as Lawrence, who had been studying with her brother, wrapped an arm around his sister and murmured something in her ear. She snapped something unheard in response, and Em looked back.
"Good. Anna-"
"He's not going to say anything to the Professors unless we need him to...Em, Dumbledore's not in the castle, he left to go to London right after dinner, some meeting of the Wizengamot, an emergency appeal, I think."
Emilia nodded, understanding what she said as much as what she did not say. "Alright, lets go...We'll split up to cover more ground. Sirius...take Harriet, Virginia and Lawrence with you, start towards the Library. Rain, you and Anna take the Astronomy wing, she might have gone to study in the Arithmancy classroom; I know that there was an assignment due tomorrow. You also might want to swing by Ravenclaw to get you-know-what." She nodded. "Elliot, go with them...Xander and I will head down to the dungeons and start there...We're both Prefects, we should be alright since Smityh is most likely to prowl around down there."
Anastasia nodded, "Listen...if any of the Professors catch you, just tell them that we are looking for...Rachel Caine's Kneazle...she won't sleep without it..."
Just as she finished, Hipper padded past in the company of a white, rather fluffy member of his species, and Emilia nodded to him as he looked up at her with his green eyes. The pair of cats vanished into the castle, slipping out the portrait hole.
Gaheris came down from the girls' stairs and followed, along with a pure white Ferret named Whitey that just happened to belong to the Head Boy.
"If anyone finds her, call in on your mirrors, or if any of your Familiars get a hit."
The rest moved out quickly, slipping out the portrait hole, "Anna?" Em whispered.
"There are more important things, we'll find her, worry about the Professors later, I can always sneak into Ravenclaw, if they sack me."
...................
Sirius moved quickly along the fourth floor hallway, his senses pushing outward and sweeping the area around them. He gave Harriet a small headshake as he found nothing. Slightly ahead of them, Virginia was slamming open doors, with each becoming more frantic in her gestures.
"Sirius," Harriet muttered stepping closer to him than she had in days. A brief flicker of something crossed her eyes and she looked back to Lawrence and Virginia as they examined another room, "are you feeling anything...I'm..."
Both of them fell silent as a familiar aura pulsed, once, weakly from somewhere in front of them and vanished again. Their eyes met and they sprinted past the twins, who fell in after them. Harriet did not question the flicker of power that let her match Sirius stride for stride, her mind was on other things as they headed inexorably towards the door hanging half-open about a hundred meters down the corridor.
Harriet gasped softly as she dodged into the room, just ahead of Sirius. Several desks were overturned and broken. She looked back, and nodded to Sirius as she drew her wand, and pointed it into the room, before waving him forward with her free hand. He darted forward and to the side, and nodded as he covered forward. She leap-frogged him, stepped around the Professors' desk, "SIRIUS," she snapped dropping her wand as she fell to her knees next to the crumpled girl she found there.
He ran to her, "Aw bugger..."
*****************************Godric's Hollow*****************************
"What's wrong, Harry?" Hermione asked quietly. His finger paused for a moment, in its endless orbit of the point of her hip, before it started to move again. She slowly rolled over on the couch, facing him where he lay behind her, and snuggled closer. Hermione picked at the hem of the old Quidditch jersey she was wearing, pulling it loose where it had caught under her.
He moved his fingers down, to trace patterns on her thigh, "I don't know, Mione...do you think we've forgotten something...It just doesn't make sense. They attacked Diagon Alley...and then the Train, going after our kids directly, though the first time was probably a fluke...and then someone went after your parents and Remus, though that last could have just been a fuck up-"
She shrugged and tucked her head under his chin. There were those that would have been bewildered at the cases that were worked on just like this, curled together on their bed or the couch. "I don't know, Harry. With the attacks on us...too..., You're right, something just doesn't add up." Hermione sighed and shivered slightly, even though a fire roaring in the hearth warmed the room.
Harry smiled faintly, and kissed the top of her head, "Should I write this one down?"
"What?"
"You saying that I'm right."
Hermione snorted, "It happens...rarely, though its not like you're Ron or something, that would be memorable." Hermione fell silent and Harry kissed the top of her hair again, leaving his lips pressed lightly against her curls.
It always comes down to that, doesn't it?
Honestly...it does...Luna better hurry her arse up and get back, she still owes me a bloody case of Chocolate Sugar Quills.
Harry laughed; You know that you could just buy a new case...We probably can afford it.
Not the point, Hermione groused.
The gold and red jersey moved up as Harry stroked the small of her back, before letting the tips of his fingers dive under the band of her knickers. I know...Want to go up to bed?
Nah, she smirked and slowly started to nuzzle his throat, we might as well use the time while the kids aren't here.
*****************************Hogwarts*********************************
"No, Virginia," Sirius snapped as the twins ran into the room. Lawrence barely managed to catch her, enfolding her in his arms as she past. She started to fight him, twisting to escape his arms as Sirius dropped to the ground next to Harriet and the girl.
Her uniform was torn, the white back of the shirt bloody. A long rip decorated one side of her skirt, and as Sirius carefully rolled her over onto her back, Harriet whimpered quietly as Kristina's battered face came into view. A large bruise covered one cheek, and blood dripped from a cut above her eye. Her shirt was ripped where the Gryffindor shield normally rode over her left breast. Sirius pointed to the side of the desk, where a small knife was stabbed through the missing patch into the scarred wood.
"KRIS," Virginia screamed as she ran around the desk, having escaped her brother. She pushed Harriet aside roughly and gathered the brunette's head and shoulders in her arms. Virginia sobbed softly as she watched the slow, slightly erratic rise and fall of her chest. "Is she going to be alright, Sirius?" Virginia whispered, her lower lip trembling and slurring her words slightly.
Sirius glanced up as Harriet reached over and plucked his mirror from his pocket and flipped it over, to talk into it lowly. He could just nod, not quite convincingly as Harriet leaned over to whisper in his ear. "Em's on her way, she sent Rain to get Poppy."
Sirius nodded, and sat back to wait for the Mediwitch, as Kristina was breathing, he had done what he could for her. Harriet wrapped her arms around his side, and let one arm fall back over her shoulder. He looked over at her, distantly hearing Virginia's murmurs and entreaties for Kris to wake, and Lawrence's attempts at reassuring his sister.
A heavy, leaden feeling filled his gut, as he looked over at Harriet, and then at Kris, closing his eyes as the brown hair reddened, becoming a spill of color that matched the traces of blood under her unresponsive body.
********************************Hospital Wing****************************
2:20 am
Poppy Pomfrey glowered at the report that wrote itself onto a blank sheet of parchment. She picked up the clipboard and tilted it into the light provided by several Illumination Orbs floating around the Infirmary. She had thoroughly appreciated the day that the newer lighting sources were installed in the castle, supplementing and occasionally replacing the old candles and oil lamps that had driven generations of young wizards and witches to spectacles years too early.
The faintest sigh of relief passed her lips at what she did not find, the beating seemed to be the most of it. A quiet, occasional beep pierced the silence of the room, issuing from the colored orb floating above Kristina's head. Poppy set the clipboard aside and paced to the head of the bed, checking a pair of Potions drips as they fed into the sixteen-year-old's arm.
Her face and hair had been cleaned, and she was wrapped in a soft, hospital robe as she slept while Poppy regenerated several broken bones and innumerable bruises. She shook her head at the thought, that if Miss Spurr had been a Muggle then she might be in trouble, even more than she was. But generally, except for those dark nights after the battle here seventeen years ago, if they were alive when she got them, they stayed that way.
"How is she, Poppy?" a tired baritone asked from well above her ear and behind her.
She spun, jumping slightly, and just for a beat she thought that the old voice was rather odd coming from the apparently, not-even middle aged Wizard in front of her. She took a breath and her gaze hardened, "She is alive, Albus...I thought these things were over in this school."
"Alas, dark times may be upon us all once more, Poppy." He took a breath, and slowly examined the unconscious Gryffindor with more than human sight. "Have they said what caused her...accident?"
"Of course not," Poppy growled, even as she tenderly felt at Kris' forehead, "They told me she was studying and must have fallen and hit her head or something...I don't understand why they won't tell us, it's not like-"
"I am afraid that that is, in the main, by fault," Dumbledore replied sadly, "I squandered my relationship with Harry...did not tell him many things, or others much too late or at the wrong time years ago, and their entire families' trust in me has suffered ever since. You were not able to detect any magical traces on her?" he asked, changing topics in midstride.
"No," a tap of a wand to an empty IV bag and a fresh one flew over from an open cabinet to replace a clear yellow fluid with a red one. "'They' have gotten smarter since Mr. Malfoy's incessant feud with Harry...she was beaten up by fists. Not spells." Poppy tucked a blanket up to Kristina's chin, "Young Mr. Potter was quite livid when they brought her in, though not as much as Miss Weasley...
"Harriet?"
"Virginia."
"Ah...yes."
Poppy nodded, "They are much more open about it, these days, than they were in mine or yours. Under other circumstances it would make me happy to see that...I had to have her dragged out by her friends...Albus, you have to step in, stop this."
"How?" He shook his head, cutting off her objections. "The house of Godric had fallen on hard times before Harry came here, remember that Poppy, when Gryffindor lost everything, when Slytherin simply played the rest of the school like a harp...But then, an eleven-year-old boy arrived, and suddenly he had given them back their spirits, their souls...There were rough patches, yes, but in the end they showed the world exactly who they were..."
"Not all of them made it out of here alive."
"That any did was a miracle," he countered faintly. "That house has found its soul once more, and I, or Merlin himself will not dissuade them now. At least three of their own have been ambushed, including Sirius'...consort."
"Then stop the Slytherins, make Draco..."
"And what, then? We need to find out the reason why, not just stop them, in the end that could be as important or more so than actually finding the perpetrators. No...we will wait and see."
"If one of them dies, Albus, I will never forgive you."
"You will not be the only one, Poppy, I fear I will be the first in that line."
***************************The Great Hall*********************************
December 2, 2015
7:30 am
Virginia ate distractedly, not noticing the food that occasionally passed her lips as she sat under the watchful eyes of her brother and Sirius.
The Great Hall was as normal, full of life and mirth with only an occasional tiff between siblings or lovers to interrupt. Except for a small group at the center of the Gryffindor table, where a sudden, watchful silence had fallen.
They had been successful, for the most part, in explaining Kristina's absence, to those that might notice, as an accident. Poppy, of course, despite her reservations would not say anything, and Dumbledore kept his own council, at least to the students.
Neville had looked sidelong at the small group occupying his table, but had not commented, constrained by Dumbledore's words to him earlier this morning, as he passed to get ready for his morning's classes. Waiting might not be the best course, but it seemed the safest, for now.
Dumbledore watched as Virginia stood, slinging a pack over her shoulder and heading for the hallway, followed by Sirius and Lawrence. He remembered that the fifth years had Charms first thing in the morning, and made a mental note to send a missive to Filius to look after the girl.
"Are you alright?" Sirius asked softly as they gained the hallway leading from the Great Hall towards the rest of the castle and classes. He looked over as Virginia looked over at him with red-rimmed eyes and said nothing, before looking back away from him. Lawrence gave him a helpless look, and turned back to their path.
Sirius shook his head helplessly and followed, he started to reply when an annoyingly familiar voice called from up ahead.
"What's wrong?" Antares Parker sneered from a darkened alcove. He stepped out with his bookend bodyguards at his side, but no hint of Maraisah...who Sirius thought, personally, was much more in charge than her theoretical boyfriend, though he rather thought it was more likely more in the vein of shagging buddies than anything. "Did the little girl have her plaything taken from her...I suppose that you got tired of using your own fingers, eh?"
Virginia slowly darkened, the flush of anger darkening her features even past her normal pallor.
He turned to Plessy, "Though I did hear that the pair of them did give a hell of a show...do you want to give us a show, you'll do, I suppose..."
"Shut the fuck up, Parker," Sirius growled stepping between the now-quivering teen and him. Lawrence set his hand on her shoulder, only to have it shaken off violently.
Parker sneered, "Another Potter butting in..."
A flush of magic filled the youngest Potter, and he fought to keep it from showing. He took a breath, settling himself even as a darker, more practical side was calculating the exact distance to the three Slytherins, and the opening moves to a dance that would leave the trio of serpents on the floor, moaning if they were lucky. Even as the thought crossed his mind, another part of him understood they had learned from their attack on Harriet, this confrontation was in a major hallway, one that would mostly likely hear the footsteps of a Professor soon.
A flare of red passed to his side, cutting off his ruminations, as Virginia charged. A roar sounded in Sirius ear as Virginia escaped from her brother, dodged under Sirius' frantic grasp in a move that she had been trained in since she was eight or nine, under the same trainers who trained the Aurors and operatives of the Ministry.
A small fist flashed, and impacted with a wet crunch on the side of Plessy's nose. He staggered back, his hands coming up to his nose.
"MISS WEASLEY," Minerva McGonagall snapped from somewhere behind her, and Virginia froze, even as she was already starting to engage the others. Sirius glanced back as McGonagall came up, her dark eyes flashing behind square frames. She stopped with her hands on her hips, "Was there a reason for this...outrage?"
Virginia's brown eyes flashed, "Just that he is a...wanker, Ma'am."
It was only through the dint of knowing Minerva McGonagall literally since he was born that allowed Sirius to notice the faint flicker of amusement that crossed her face, before her expression tightened even further. "That may very well be so, Miss Weasley, but that is not an excuse for fighting in the halls."
Plessy snorted and moaned as the sound passed his nose.
McGonagall spun on him, "And you, go to Madame Pomfrey this instant, I am sure that you do not want me to properly investigate your activities." She pointed and Plessy and his minions scurried off, like cockroaches when someone turned on the kitchen light. "As to you, Miss Weasley, I think that a week of detention with your Head of House will cool your temper."
Virginia nodded glumly, even as she looked up and to the right, towards the hospital wing where she had planned to spend the night until Poppy drove her out, and where, if she thought she could have prevailed against her family, Sirius and Emilia included, she would be still. Her complaints that Emilia had not left Xander's side, except for that brief morning in Charms fell on deaf ears. "Yes, Ma'am."
"I will tell him to expect you this evening," Virginia just nodded, and McGonagall took a step, and paused, briefly to rest her hand on Virginia's shoulder, in lieu of the hug she could not give.
"Let's just get to class," Virginia snapped lowly, heading off at a near run to Charms.
******************************Hogwarts Tower****************************
December 3, 2015
2:12 am
Virginia Weasley lay awake, carefully not moving as she looked out the window at the light snow falling outside. Her remaining roommates had not said a word as she crawled into what was technically Kristina's bed and pretended to sleep. She had felt Emilia and Harriet come in and check on her earlier, they had already dragged her from Kristina's bedside earlier this evening after Virginia had served her detention. A detention that under any other circumstance she would have taken with a bit of pride.
The entire day, even as she sat through the seemingly never-ending classes, and then the detention with Neville, who had only made her grade third-year papers, she had heard Plessy's words over and over again in her head, like a never-ending newsreel. The words all but admitting that he had had at least some knowledge of the attack on her girlfriend.
A hard, dark look filled her eyes, and had probably caused Em's bedcheck on her before midnight. She silently rolled from the bed, and grabbed a small, leather pouch from her bedside table, one that she had inconspicuously placed there earlier. Bare feet made no sound as she slipped out of her room and down the stairs to the empty Common Room, bare of even a cleaning House Elf or a napping Familiar. She looked around the room, even though she knew Emilia had gone up to sleep with Xander.
Virginia gave one last look around the common room before she reached into the pouch and grabbed a handful of sparkling dust and flinging it into the low fire. Instantly the flames filled the large fireplace, and turned emerald green. "Laughing House," she muttered stepping into the flames and vanishing.
She stepped out into a large, darkened living room, a thousand kilometers from Hogwarts. There was only the dim light coming in from the windows to guide her as she effortlessly dodged the tables and other furniture, having lived in this house since she was two, when her father had completed construction on it. She looked around, and walked straight at a wainscoted wall, passing through it, to the landing of a set of spiral staircases down. Softly glowing illumination orbs lit as she headed down, her bare feet still making no noise.
Fred Weasley had always taken his work home with him, being as apt to work on a joke or invention in his room with George or in his dorm room, or in the apartment over the original store that for a brief period he, Angelina, Alicia and George had shared. Like their fortunes and business interests, Fred's workshop had expanded, and even though he now had paid teams of researchers working under the Weasley Enterprises banner, he and George for that manner, still worked on inventions on an almost daily basis.
Especially on things that would, could, possibly be used by family.
During the war, the Twins had developed more than a few weapons and gadgets that were still in use by the Ministry's forces, but that had never really stopped. It was only when Hermione had laughingly called them Q1 an Q2 that they had stopped and realized that somehow, some of the more, special, inventions were reserved for the use of the Potters and Lupins, and a few others, Gabrielle among them.
Virginia padded along the concrete floor of the secret basement, passing effortlessly through several defensive wards that would have frozen in their tracks, or worse, anyone who literally did not have Weasley or Potter blood flowing through her veins. She passed a table filled with new, prototype versions of the Fanged Frisbees, several flashbangs, and a large, glowing crystal that she knew fed the gatling.
But none of those were her primary goal. All through the day, she had thought about what Plessy had said, smirking in his safety as he lounged in Slytherin's Dungeon. A brief thought of a direct confrontation had passed her mind more than once, only to be shot down.
Instead she smirked darkly as she stepped into a small, partitioned room, and looked at a baggy jumpsuit hanging on a mannequin. The fabric it was composed of seemed to drink the light, as if it were a body-shaped black hole. A large bellows pocket sat on either leg, and a hood fell back from the top. Soft boots were built into the legs, and if one looked closely, a band of faint runes, a bare shade lighter than the rest of it wrapped around the each of the legs and arms.
A flick of a wand and it lifted from the dummy to float over to her, and dropped over the back of a chair. She stared at the suit for a minute and with a sudden decision, jerked off the sweats she had 'slept' in. She stripped the rest of the way, briefly flashing back to her mild embarrassment this summer, when her father had let her help test the first prototype, and had informed her, with slightly red ears, that the suit was designed to be worn against the skin, and just the skin.
She stepped into it, and shrugged the sleeves on, before closing the front with a finger running along the seam, activating the Sealing Charm. The suit hung on her small frame like a huge, shapeless black sack for a minute, then with a sudden rush shrank to her skin, outlining the curves that she had just started to develop this summer. The runes around her arms and legs flared blue, once, and vanished, establishing the speed and strength enhancing charms.
Sobs tried to rise up, as she remembered what Kristina had said to her when she first saw it on her this summer, only to be shaken off by a fresh flare of anger. She stepped to her abandoned clothes, and flicked her wand, vanishing them, before slipping it into a conformal sheath on her leg and filled the thigh pockets with several of the gadgets from the tables and cabinets surrounding her. She looked around the room once more, and pulled up the hood, covering her fire red hair, and vanished.
Only the sound of a single groaning tread on the cast-iron stairs filled the basement, before the lights went out, plunging it into darkness.
A/N: Next Chapter, Hell hath no fury.