Harry Potter's revenge.

Harry stood up. "Excellent." He smiled and extended his hand.

The twins mirrored his smile and reached out in turn.

They shook. Twin A frowned. "I understand we're not signing anything legal until we're of age, but how is that going to work with you? You're still not going to be of age then, you know."

Harry grinned. "You let me worry about that." He walked over to the table and glanced down at the marauder's map. "You focus on making awesome things of ambiguous intent."

The map showed the students who weren't fortunate enough to be on free period all filling out of classrooms for a bathroom break. Technically that included him, but… well… Binns.

One of the twins walked over and stood next to him. "You know, Potter, you are so smart it's actually scary. We'd never thought to think about measuring investment in our projects using time as though its just another form of money. Are you sure you're eleven?"

In an out of the way corridor, a point marked Justin Finch-Fletchley stood alone with another marked Draco Malfoy.

Harry frowned. "Oh, yes. I was definitely born eleven years ago."

The two points circled each other as though in a dance.

"We couldn't persuade you to occasionally put in a few hours of your own, could we? You're already in with us quite deep and you seem to really know your stuff."

Draco and Justin's points seemed to settle down a bit. He chewed his lip. "I probably will. I'll certainly put you in touch with another group I'm working with who are similar in scope if not in spirit."

"Who?" Twin B's voice sounded surprised and shocked.

"Can't say right now. They're staying under the radar. Certain people of a dubious nature don't approve of their existence in our world, if you catch my meaning."

"Ah," Twin A nodded. "Say no more, little Slytherin Harry."

Harry snorted and looked down again. The two points had started moving erratically around each other and a third point now shot from another corridor, heading straight towards the oddly moving pair. The point was labelled Hermione Granger and it was moving fast.

Harry grinned. [A few moments previously]

Hermione wasn't sure what had first clued her in to something going on. What she did know is that seconds after she'd passed a particularly ugly painting on the way to the bathroom, she'd found herself turning back, ducking around a corridor corner, and running frantically, wand out, towards a couple of her classmates.

Draco stood, arms folded, face smug, and making no move the defend himself against an irate Justin Finch-Fletchley, who had his wand trained on the Malfoy Heir.

"Justin! Don't!" Hermione stopped a half dozen metres away from the hostile duo, careful not to directly point her wand at either. Malfoy smirked. "Yes, that's right, 'Filth'-Fletchley. Listen to Slytherin's attack kitten."

Justin glared. "This scum was threatening my parents!"

"Yes, but attacking him is just what he wants." She turned to Malfoy, giving him a dirty look. "And you have no right to goad him like that!"

Malfoy shrugged. "I was just explaining his place in our world. You at least have some understanding of that."

"My place is up to my lord," she ground out. "Just as yours is to yours."

Malfoy's eye twitched.

She turned back to her fellow muggleborn. "Justin, Malfoy can't legally do anything to your parents, but that might change if you attack him."

Justin scowled, wand still pointing at the Malfoy Heir.

Malfoy harrumphed. "You know, at the start of the year, I'd hoped the Gray was going to be more understanding. Now I find they're nothing but a bunch of blood-traitors and mudbloods."

Hermione narrowed her eyes. "If we agreed with you on everything, then we wouldn't be the Gray, would we? We'd be the Dark. I didn't see the Malfoys complaining when we blocked that bill on forcing families to open their libraries to ministry inspection."

Malfoy grumbled and looked away. Justin watched the back wand still trained on Malfoy.

and

forth,

Eventually Malfoy turned back. "Fine! We'll see if you're still feeling so confident after the duelling tryouts tonight. I hear Nott can smash through a second year shield charm now. Should be interesting to see you dragging yourself across the common room floor when he's finished with you." And with that, he turned around, swishing his long robes behind him and marched off without looking back.

The two of them watched the Malfoy heir until he turned the corridor corner.

Justin slowly took a deep, long breath and lowered his wand.

Hermione eyed it curiously. "What were you planning to do anyway?" Justin shook his head. "Honestly? I don't know. The only attack spell I know is the tripping hex and it's not like that would have done anything. I was just so angry."

Hermione nodded. "Understandable. What started it?"

"Oh, in history of magic I made a comment to Kevin about how backward some of the wizarding world's customs were. Malfoy heard it." He grimaced and looked down. "I think I may have offended Susan and Hannah as well."

Hermione winced in sympathy. "Possibly, yeah. This is the kind of thing I was talking about when we first met in Madam Malkin's."

Justin looked up, sharply. "That's right! You said you were going to sort out culture lessons! When's that happening?" His voice rang with accusation.

Hermione flushed and took a step backwards. "I'm working on it, Justin, really. I've just been really busy and I wanted to get all the other muggleborns in our year onboard as well — to teach everyone together.

Justin frowned. "How many are in?"

"Just you at the moment."

Justin scowled. "Well, what are we waiting for? C'mon!" He turned and walked off.

Hermione looked after the former Eton-bound muggleborn's back with a panicked expression. She quickly made to follow him. This wasn't in Harry's plans until after Christmas! In the library, Hermione and Justin pulled out two chairs and sat down.

"Hey, Kevin."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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