Doing what Hermione does best

[Hermione Granger]

"Don't try me," Hermione narrowed her eyes for more affect, then went back to the subject about Harry.

"Ron, will you never stop that? Voldemort will, too, you know. After what happened in," Hermione looked around quickly, hoping no one was around to hear. "The Department of Mysteries, I'm betting he's going to be even more eager than ever to come back. Harry's feeling it too, I'll guess. I don't want to say I pitty him," Hermione thought for a moment, "but I really do. And I'm worried about him. I don't know how much I can stress that. I'm worried about all of us, really. You, Harry, myself, Ginny, Luna, Neville, even Lupin! It's got to stop." 'It's got to stop' was not choice words, but it was how Hermione felt. Voldemort, and everyone... It was horrible, and she couldn't help but thinking, no matter how much she hated this all, if it hadn't been for Voldemort she probably wouldn't be friends with Ron and Harry.

Quirrel would never have let the troll in, and Harry and Ron would've never come to her rescue and she'd be a lonely little bookworm without any friends. It was really strange to think about it that way, even though Hermione would never admit to herself, nor anyone, she was only slightly, just the tiniest, tiniest, molecular sized bit glad that Voldemort had hired Quirrel. She'd never admit it. Never.

[Ron Weasley]

"But there's nothing we can do!" Ron exclaimed, rather loudly. Lowering his voice again, he continued. "I mean, You-Know-Who is somewhere, and I reckon he's buliding up his army again. That's what they said at the one Order meeting we were allowed in last year. Anyway, he hasn't been on the news besides to say he's back, so..." Ron trailed off, thinking. "I mean, we can't do anything. We're just stuck here at Hogwarts, supposed to be being good kids, while we're supervised by twenty Order members!" Ron shook his head. "Actually, I shouldn't say we. It's more just Harry. I don't really want to pity him, either. I've spent the past five years trying to be better than him in something." Ron blushed. "But now I've stopped comparing myself to him, and I guess, I do pity him."

[Hermione Granger]

"I know. I know. We all pity him. He's the Jesus of the Wizarding World almost." Hermione looked down at the ground for a few moments. "Ron, when you think about it, we've never been good kids. Even me. If we had any other Headmaster, we'd all have been expelled four times over! Possibly five for you... Right now, I think the only thing we can do, besides wait, is support Harry as much as we can. Be good friends and all that. Can you do that?" Hermione looked up at Ron through her mascara-clad eyelashes. If she had to, Hermione was going to take it upon her self to make sure Harry was doing all right this year. However, she refused to do his homework for him.

[Ron Weasley]

Ron looked puzzled, apparently counting, then laughed. "More than that, probably." He grinned at Hermione. "Harry's definatly going to need some looking after. Time for ickle mummies Hermy and Ronald to step in, eh?" Ron glanced down at Hermione, who was still shorter then him, even after she had grown taller. "I just hope I yell at him less than my mum yells at me."

[Hermione Granger]

Despite herself, Hermione couldn't help but laugh. The thought of her and Ron looking over Harry like he was just an infant was definatly and image to remember sometime when she was older, or at least, having a very bad day to say the least. "Your mum doesn't yell at you..." Hermione said, instantly realizing she was lying. "That much," she finished, smiling brightly, hoping it shead some light on the situation.

[Ron Weasley]

Ron, too, grinned. "No, she uses all her breath yelling at Gred and Forge." Ron mingled the letters of his brother's names on purpose, just to amuse himself. "They're doing amazing, by the way. Invented some new sort of sweet, one of their Snackboxes, you know? Anyway, it's selling amazingly well. I'm surprised, really. I'd never have expected them to do this well." Actually, Ron was lying. He had, in fact, expected his brothers to do this well, if not better, at their jokeshop business. They were rather brilliant, they just didn't study. Regardless of their three OWLS apiece, they were rolling in the dough by the ton.

[Hermione Granger]

"And the sweets are bound to show up here too soon, without a doubt. I have a feeling we'll be spending a lot of time up after them," Hermione paused for a moment before she continued. "What does your mum think? About the twins, I mean. And Ron, I've known you long enough to know that you're lying through your teeth." Hermione grinned slightly as she said this. Not like knowing Ron was a bad thing. No, not at all. He was funny. He made her laugh. And gave her someone to bother about doing their homework when she was bored.

[Ron Weasley]

Ron grinned. "She practically fainted when she heard the news, but she was alright with it. Wanted to avoid another row like Percy's, I suppose." Ron shook his head, his smile fading. "I suppose she had no choice in the matter, they were hell bent on doing it and it only made sense to agree with them. Bloody brilliant, really. Perfect opportunity to tell her, not that they tried to make it that way, or anything." Ron pondered for a moment, gazing across the library. He changed the subject a bit, but he stayed on the topic of the twins. "D'you really mean to confinscate their sweets? If they ever got wind of it..." He trailed off and surveyed his hands, his ears turning red. He didn't want to admit that he rather looked up to his brothers, and hated it when they were angry with him. Their constant ridicule hurt him on occasion, but he had learned to deal with that. He hadn't wanted to interfere last year, and he didn't think that anything ws really different, even though they were gone from Hogwarts.

[Hermione Granger]

Hermione had to think about that for a moment before she answered. "I meant to do it last year. It's a prefect's duty. Make sure the students get the best education they can." And those sweets definatly took away from it. How could anyone study with people fainting or puking or getting nosebleeds all over their homework? It was enough to drive a person insane. And what if a first year from a Muggle family came? It was always a possibility that they would think the castle was infested with nasty bugs and that they would be next. Or what if someone over-dosed on the nosebleed nougats? They could bleed to death. And if the health-department came and saw what was going on with all the students, and then the health-department would blame it on the food and fire the...houseleves...? Well, maybe some good could come from them. But she wasn't about to tell this to Ron, unless he pressed on.

[Ron Weasley]

"There's no point in getting an education if you can't stand to sit in class. I think that the kids should be able to leave class when the want to, and then they won't implode from the workload." Ron voiced, glancing at Hermione. "Not everyone has the tolerance for homework you do."

[Hermione Granger]

"Then no-one would sit through any classes! The classes would consist of me and a few Ravenclaws. And, Ron, if no one sat through classes, where would your brothers get it all?" Haha! Hermione was going to win this one! She couldn't help but do a mental jig at the fact that she had managed to turn the tables on Ron. Sure, the twins got a lot of it from books and trial and error, but they wouldn't be able to do any of the wand-work or potion mixing properly without the classes.

[Ron Weasley]

"People wouldn't not go to classes." Ron objected, his ears turning red. "Honestly, Hermione, the people who go to this school aren't stupid. Besides, they aren't officially banned. Wait until Filch adds them to his ever-growing list of things that are banned at school. Then we can worry about them. Honestly, Hermione." Ron repeated himself, just because he was frustrated. He didn't want his brothers centering their rage on him, no siree.

[Hermione Granger]

"Ron, if classes were optional, would you go to Potions?" She fixed him with a 'I-dare-you-to-answer-otherwise' type of glance. Ron was now being incompitent.

((Sorry it's short. School is a-calling. I'll come back eventually and fix it.))

[Ron Weasley]

"No, but it will be optional after this year! I say again, they aren't banned. Let's go catch fanged frisebees or something." Ron glanced down at his hands. "I don't even know why I'm a prefect, I'm certainly bad at this kind of thing, and school, and pretty much everything, too."

[Hermione Granger]

Ron was not a failure at life. "Ron, you're not bad at anything. Think about all the things you've done to help us. We wouldn't have been able to stop Quirrel from getting the stone if it wasn't for your Chess. And," she paused and looked at him. "Ginny would be dead," she smiled comfortingly, "We probably all would."

Now, wasn't that a nice, comforting thought? They would all be dead. Well, most of them except Hermione, who if Ginny was dead, then she'd probably still be petrified, and not dead. And Ron certainly helped with the Death Eaters in the Department of Mysteries. He helped hold them off for a large part of it. So, he was definatly not a failure at life. If they wanted to talk about a failure of life, they could talk about the Dursleys. No, not even them. They could talk about Hermione, as her entire life revolved around books and school with a little bit of adventure on the side. Come to think of it, the Dursleys weren't a failure at life. Who really was, anyways?

[Ron Weasley]

"Yeah, right." Ron said, but his ears turned red and he made a move to drop the topic, glancing abashadly at Hermione. "But thanks, anyway. Harry could have done it alone. I just care about Ginny so much." Ron stopped talking and glanced at his hands. "Anyway, I think that you're a fool for thinking that you can take the sweets from the students." Ron grinned at Hermione. "And for studying right now."

[Hermione Granger]

"I'm a fool, Ronald? I'm the one here who's trying to get a head on her studies and make sure no younger student gets themself hurt by trying to follow your brothers bad example. Don't get me wrong, but Fred and George are some of the nicest people I know, but sometimes it's just too much." Hermione finished, crossed her arms in front of her chest and waited for Ron to reply.

[Ron Weasley]

"Yes, you are." Ron grinned at her. "And Gred and Forge are some rather stupid brothers, but they're still quite cool as brothers go." Ron wasn't going to make it public knowledge that he was practically obsessed with all of his older brothers, and that he looked up to them like he looked up to none other. No one, particuarily Hermione Granger, who would just make fun of him, was going to know that.

[Hermione Granger]

"I," Hermione said, with an air of coldness in her voice, "wouldn't know."
As she was an only child, the only older-sister-like-figure she had would have had to be Tonks. Hermione, Ginny and Tonks had bonded over the past two summers, being stuck in Grimmauld Place, and the girls had gotten all sorts of information and funny stories out of Tonks. It was going to be odd, that Hermione knew all sorts of things about their new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher that no one else knew. Rather like Lupin, when she knew he was a werewolf and no one else cared nor was smart enough to figure it out.