I would like to express my highest condolences to the families of the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre. As those involved attempt to return to normal life, though they know that it will never be the same, our hearts and prayers go out to and with them. May G-d only allow good news in the future for all them and us all, may G-d console the families of these victims, and may G-d bless America and her citizens.
A/N:
Sorry about the delay, but I have a surprise for you! A double-feature! That's right. This one is over 2,000 words, excluding the Author's notes, totaling it at 2609! A lot of confusion will be cleared, but I haven't revealed all ;). Enjoy, and please review. I can almost promise you that the more reviews, the faster the next update.
Harry Potter and all related people and items are copyrighted and registered trademarked to J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers. I get absolutely no fiscal benefit from this story, though I do get emotional benefit from other people's enjoyment of it.
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Confused: Chapter 6 by CleanFics (gl1346)
Day 1, 4:18 PM EST
Hermione woke up to an orchestra rendition of Beethoven's Ninth. An instant later she realized it was her phone ringing and picked it up.
"Hello"
"Hi, Hermione, it's Todd. The ball's rolling. Good luck." *click*
Hermione smiled. 'Good, so they're on their way. I hope this works, 'cause if it doesn't, I'm really in trouble.' She sat up, remembering that day not so long ago...
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Day -4, 3:22 PM GMT
Heathrow International Airport: British Airways customer service
Hermione wandered through the house, lost in thought. She was planning for this "great escape" as she called it, and it had to go smoothly. Going over the thousands of permutations in her head, she tried playing out the scenario.
"I leave a note, I leave, I get there, they get home, they come chasing me. But how will I know when?" After thinking for five minutes, she came up with a plan. She quickly apparated to Heathrow and went up the customer service counter. An agent came over to her.
"Good afternoon. How may I help you?"
"Hi, my name's Hermione Granger. Can I ask you for a huge favor?"
He cracked a smile. "You can always ask. Whether I'll do it is a different story."
She smiled and went on. "I'm going on a trip soon, and I'm afraid a couple of people are going to follow me. Oh, not maliciously," she added quickly, seeing his hand reaching for the phone, no doubt to call the police, "they're friends. I just want to take this vacation alone. The thing is, they're probably going to call and ask if I was on a flight."
"Oh, don't worry about that, ma'am, we never give away information like that over the phone." But Hermione was shaking her head,
"I'm sure you don't, but my friend's an, umm, accomplished hypnotist, and he might get it out of you."
Now the man was starting to look amused, and Hermione sighed and handed him a slip of paper
"Look, if it happens please give me a call at this number. It's a local call that'll forward to my cell phone there."
"Ok, Miss Granger, but what if one of my colleagues picks up the phone?"
"Well, you'll be able to tell if they're hypnotized, so you know what? Here's the signal. If they call you, call me Hermione, and if it's your partner, call me Miss Granger."
"Ok, that sounds fine. I hope whatever it is you're doing works out."
"Yeah, me too. Thank you."
"You're welcome. Next!"
Hermione then walked off, satisfied with how that had gone, found a quiet corner, and went home.
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So, they had come after her, and used suggestion magic to boot. She quickly followed the plan she had set up weeks ago and twirled off to the pre-programmed location
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4:22 PM EST
Residence of Mr. and Mrs. Josh Goodman
Sarah was sitting at her dining room table chatting with her husband at the recently-completed dinner table when they heard the knock on the door. Although they usually had a no-disturbing policy during this time, Sarah got up from her chair and went to answer it, answering her husband's questioning glance with a reassuring one of her own. Opening the door, she broke into a huge smile.
"Hermione! Great to see you! Hey, Josh, come quickly, it's Hermione Granger!"
This outburst was, of course, pre-planned, but Josh Goodman wasn't to know of the secret meetings between his wife and her childhood friend. The FBI agent knew of his wife's "witch-hood," and, unlike the TV show, had full respect for it and its advantages. As such, he knew of Hermione's family and had even had the opportunity to meet her parents during one of their vacations. This visit was a surprise for him, but he supposed these witches didn't have to worry to much about air-fare.
Josh listened as his Sarah and Hermione carried out an animated discussion.
"It's so great to see you!"
"You too! How long will you be in for?"
"A week, maybe two."
"Oh, that's all?"
"It might be longer. Depends on what happens."
"Ok, but will we be able to see you much?"
"I don't think so. I'm probably going to be busy the whole time. That's why I came over now."
"Oh, that's too bad. Josh?" She now turned to face him and saw him leaning against the door and laughing.
"Yes, you go and have a good time. I'll clean up."
"Oh, no need for that." Sarah interjected. She snapped her fingers and the dishes all cleaned themselves off, the remainder of the food finding the garbage can, the dishes flying into the sink, washing themselves and setting themselves in the drain board. Josh simply stood there and mouthed "thanks" as they walked out the front door.
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Robert stood at attention as he waited for further orders. He hoped it wasn't what he never wanted to do, but with Him, one never knew. Suddenly, He turned to Robert and exclaimed, "Don't you know anything?! It's 683-336! 948's are our female cadets. And it's 267, not 287. Oh, never mind. You'll never get it anyway. Where is she." He was more interested in obtaining information then in punishing Robert, so he allowed him to ramble on.
"Currently at her temporary 784, sir. Shall I dispatch a team?"
"Yes, unit E-3."
"Unit E-3, sir?" Unit E-3 was the best of the best, and were only deployed for special operations. Robert didn't know why they were being deployed in a standard terror operation like this, and he didn't dare open his mouth, except that the Code required confirmation when deploying E-units.
"Are you deaf as well as dumb?! I said E-3, did I not?" Unfortunately the code said nothing about how polite the confirmation had to be.
"Yes sir" he said in one breath, and disappeared.
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05:03 PM EST
Tool shed of Mr. and Mrs. Josh Goodman
"So you know where she is?"
"I know where she is right now. I'm not sure where she's staying, though."
"Well, could you tell us that?"
"I told you, she asked me to be her decoy since I'm an AMP officer, and thus my power ratings are higher than most. She obviously doesn't want to be found, so how can I tell you?"
"You know I can find out just by
searching your brain. Why not just tell us?"
"Because I know you won't."
Harry sighed. She was right, of course. Once Harry was convinced a person meant no harm, he would never use the link to extract information against the person's will. It was comments like that that had kept them here for the past ten minutes.
"Can I at least see her so that I can trace her?"
"And be able to pick her brain, too? Isn't one enough?" For some reason she was extremely sensitive about that mind link. The only thing keeping Harry from blowing up at her was his Auror training, which was why Ron had stopped talking a long time ago. He took a deep breath, blowing out as slowly as his next statement came out.
"No, I'm not going to make a link because I trust her. I wasn't sure who I was tracking before, hence the link. Since I know who Hermione is, no link. Ok?"
Sarah sighed, wondering why in the world Hermione had to come up with such an elaborate scheme for so simple a task, but hey, that's what friends were for, wasn't it?
"Very well, follow me."
She led them out of the broom shed to the kitchen window, through which they could see Hermione talking with Josh about the recent headlines and how his department was reacting to them. Immediately Harry breathed a sigh a relief, let out a breath, and, pulling out his wand, cast the tracking spell. This done, he turned to Ron and said,
"How about getting out of here before she comes back."
"Good idea" he responded. They both turned to Sarah, who was looking a little uncomfortable at this point.
"Thank you very much" Ron started off, "We know what it meant for you to do this, and you made the right decision. We'll just make sure she's ok during her stay here. We won't intrude on her privacy, we promise."
She sighed and nodded.
"I guess I feel better knowing she's being watched. Just take care of her, ok."
They both smiled, about to assure her that they would, when they heard the screen door slam. They quickly ran back towards the shed, muttering invisibility spells under their breath. Thankfully they reached it in time and, looking out the small square of light in the back of the shed, saw Hermione about to leave the house.
"Ok, I'll see if I can drop by later. Tell Sarah I'm sorry I wasn't able to say good-bye to her."
"Ok, will do. Good luck and have a nice vacation."
"Thanks. I'll try." With that, she spun around and disappeared.
At the same time, Harry felt a small tingle telling him that same fact. When he had designed the spell he had realized that there might be times when he wouldn't want to pop out right next to the person, but rather in a hiding place nearby, so he and a number of highly-trained friends had built a tricky feature into it where you could see a layout of the area in your mind's eye and pick a place to go. It took a lot out of a person, but it had been worth it. The basic design was Harry's. He had always loved video games as a kid. Not so much playing them- as if Dudley ever let him anyway- but watching them being played. The Dursley's had thought that his constant staring was due to jealousy, but in reality it was fascination at how they worked. When he had grown up and leaned the art of personal spell-making and casting*, he started designing extremely graphical spells in nature.
*I know it's against etiquette to put a note in the middle of a story, but I have to make an exception her. Personal Spell Design is my own little invention so that Harry can use spells that shouldn't exist. Essentially, each individual witch or wizard, if powerful enough, can create their own spell and incantations, but only that wizard can use them. The reason for this is that the spell exists only in their mind, so only that mind can cast the spell. Multiple people may create the same spell, however, and each would have the ability to use it. And now back to your regular reading...
His tracking spell was no exception. It had the ability to see the person as a dot on a map, Marauder style. That wasn't so surprising, considering that the last remaining Marauder had helped him build it. Remus had spent a lot of time explaining how the map had worked, something which Harry was very thankful for. This was one of favorite spells, and he used it quite often.
He now checked it to see where Hermione was now, and was surprised to see her in a small house in a rural area. After thinking about it for a little, however, he realized that that sort of lifestyle might actually suit her, and he might consider it if they ever... 'Hey! Where did that thought come from?' Pushing it out of his mind he told Ron where she was, eliciting raised eyebrows from him. Holding onto Ron's hand, he then performed an assist-apparation and transported both of them to a safe street corner close by where they could see but not be seen.
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8:08 PM
3.6 meters away from where Harry and Ron are standing
Unit E-3 stood at a street corner where they could see the target area without being seen by the target. The attack was slated for twenty-four hours, and since the witch in question was known to be extremely cautious and, well, good, the attack had to be planned very precisely. Surveying the layout of the house would take about that long and they wanted to get started. They were extremely tempted when they had seen her going for a walk earlier, but protocol dictated that they carry out the mission appropriately. Later they saw her re-enter her residence and retire for the night.
Invisibility boosters were activated, tents set up, and planning began.
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When they saw Hermione come home from her walk, Harry knew something was wrong, but Ron finally convinced Harry that there was nothing they could do and that they might as well go home and wait. Both of them feeling much better, they spun around and went home.
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A/N: So, the plot thickens and andreneline starts pumping (well, not really). Remember, this is rated G, so don't be so scared. The problem is that I realized school's coming to a close and there's no way I'll be able to write this in college, so I have to start wrapping it up. At this point, I'm guessing ten chapters, but that's still up in the air. I hope you were happy with this chapter, please tell me. Thanks guys.
Oh, and before I go, here are the codes translated. From now on they're all going to be in the end-of-story note, and I'll make sure not to write any spoilers before them. There may be some after, so be careful!
Basically, it's all based on a phone. For example,
"6" = 'm','n', or 'o',
"8" = 't','u', or 'v',
"3" = 'd','e', or 'f',
so 683 = mud, obviously a rude hint towards Muggle-Born.
336 = FEM, or female, telling which kind of muggle born.
948 = WIT, or Women In Training, their female recruit system,
267 = AMP, the American Magic Patrol first introduced last chapter. In this context, however, he means BMP, or British Magic Patrol, which, of course, doesn't exist, but Robert doesn't know that.
784 = QTH, or the term used by amateur radio operators (like me) to speak about a location. For example, "I'm reaching my home QTH, I'll talk to you later."
One last thing, I know people are going to ask this, so I'll say it now. The disillusion charm, though quick, is not fool-proof for a stationary person who's trying to hide from someone like Hermione, so a more complicated one was necessary.
Thanks for reading everyone! See you next time!
- CleanFics, gl1346
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