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"What the fuck is this?!"
In the grand Entrance Hall of Hogwarts, an enormous crowd of students gathered around the bulletin board. There was turmoil bubbling in the crowd — spreading, clawing, restricting them, making them feel bound and controlled(not in control).
The board was filled with a myriad of new notices that everyone noticed first thing in the morning of the day after the students returned to Hogwarts after the Winter/Christmas/New-Year break. Every single of the new notices followed the same template, and it was damn clear who was behind them.
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. TWENTY-SIX
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. TWENTY-NINE
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. THIRTY
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. THIRTY-SEVEN
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. FORTY
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. FORTY-SIX
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. FORTY-SEVEN
EDUCATIONAL DECREE -> NO. FORTY-EIGHT
"What in Merlin's hairy balls was that woman on when doing.. . this!" Eddie threw up his hands towards the bulletin board, not able to comprehend the sight in front of him.
"Forbade boys and girls from being within six inches of each other — that's I guess for Diggory and Cho because Diggory hasn't been cooperating," said Marcus, reading the new Educational Decrees, ".. .. prohibited joke products made by Fred and George Weasley — for their candy that makes it look you're sick.. .. banned items that were not of educational value — I'm guessing she's trying to ban Quinn's AID card because she's not able to shut it down.. .. boys to keep their hands outside their cloaks — that's just stupid.. .. proper dress and decorum — was there a real need to turn proper dressing into Decree? She had the power to enforce this even without turning it into a Decree."
"The proper dress and decorum decree makes sure that we don't try to alter our uniforms to get around the hands out of the cloaks decree.. . she's trying to be smart," said Quinn.
'Hmm, that thing at the party really irked her, huh,' thought Quinn, and he wasn't feeling happy about it — the AID cards from the very first generation were built with a feature that showed if the office was open or not because Quinn's timings for consultation were never consistent and because Luna popped in and out whenever she felt like, there was not a single definite schedule where you could come to AID to get help — one needed to look at a card to see if the office was open for a consult.
'I would need to send out a school-wide warning to hide the cards in circulation to protect them from being prohibited.' Quinn sighed because he didn't know how many cards would survive this ban before he did something about it.
Quinn also realized that now with this, he would either need to start sitting in his office for definite hours every day or start an appointment system to predetermine who will get to see him.
'She finally did something to annoy me,' thought Quinn, his lips pursed, 'I guess I'll have to do something to make her life more difficult. It's only fair.'
Quinn felt a hand on his shoulder and turned his head to see Cedric Diggory standing behind him.
"What're we going to do with this?" asked Cedric, "this is already going way overboard." Cedric wasn't as stressed about the NEWTs as his other seventh-year peers and had a solid handle on things to perform well. What he truly wanted from this year was to enjoy Hogwarts before graduating, and this was dumping a bucket of ice-cold water on it.
"I won't say not to worry about this, lover boy. This is an apparent attack on student freedom in Hogwarts, and I would definitely need to think somethings to get a workaround for her rising dictatorship, but I'm sure we can overcome this.. . spread the word in your trusted Prefects, we'll need the help from the Prefect network."
Dolores Umbridge had power inside Hogwarts that was unquestionable, and that wasn't a point of debate, but that power wasn't absolute — she could be challenged; it was just the question of how to challenge that authority.
"Well, we'd need to get creative."
Creative until the time came where the bug had spun enough web to trap a toad in its trap.
- (Scene Break) -
There was a time in the history of Hogwarts when the school required multiple Professors for the same subject because of the number of students attending. The times when the young population was too high for a single teacher to handle and effectively teach, and every subject used to be headed by a Head of Department who would take on apprentices doing their apprenticeships under the Head of Department who were Masters.
The apprentices would teach the younger kids in the lower grades, while the Masters would teach the higher grades consisting of older kids. But that practice had left Hogwarts with the rise of other magical schools around the world (Hogwarts being one of the oldest schools of magic), and the parents not needing to send their children to foreign to learn magic.
When that practice died, the apprenticeship in Hogwarts also closed down because now a single Professor needed to teach all seven grades on their own and couldn't take responsibility for guiding an apprentice.
In recent history, during the Second Wizarding War of Britain and in extension the continent of Europe, the birth rate of the magical population of the British Isles and Ireland slowed down in the wartime, and as such, for around ten to twelve years, the number of children born in the magical households dipped to a low in a very long time. It was interesting to note that the first-generation magicals (muggleborns) population didn't change and the ratio of first-generation magical children to those born in magical households was at an all-time high.
The effect of that dipped birth rate was showing now as for the last decade, the number of children Hogwarts was at a lower end of the scale, with the castle operating at its lowest capacity ever since the First Wizarding War.
Though that trend was now becoming a blip as for the last couple of years, the number of Hogwarts inductees was again at a rise to a healthy amount as it was before the war.
"I haven't done this before, and I'd have to say, it seems like a much bigger responsibility than I thought it'd be when you told me about it before," said Quinn looking up from a stack of parchment.
Filius Flitwick smiled in his high chair that he used to keep himself at the table level and stopped grading the assignments given to the students for the Winter break to look up at Quinn, who was helping him grade assignments.
They say in Flitwick's personal office. Hogwarts had a dedicated staffroom where most of the Professors could be found in the school hours mingling together during their off periods, but after evening, they would retreat into the personal offices to do duties like grading assignments and papers in peace and quiet.
"Grading assignments is a consummate part of a Ravenclaw Prefect's duties even since I took over the position of Head of House," Flitwick said with his toothy smile. "It starts right from fifth-year; I make them grade a portion of first and second-year students' assignments while the sixth-year Prefects such as yourself grade a part of third and fourth-year assignments. The seventh-year Prefects don't have grading as a primary duty because they're busy with their NEWT preparations, but they do take over the fifth-year Prefects from time to time because of the OWL year.
"You didn't get to do this last year because you were too busy with the Quidditch Tournament, so I never assigned you this task."
Quinn read the essay assignment on the Banishing charm from a fourth-year Hufflepuff, and after thinking a lot and going back and forth, he gave up and asked.
"This is tough.. . I don't know if I should grade these based on how they did relative to each other or if I should grade them absolutely on the amount of understanding on the topic," said Quinn because relative grading and absolute grading had their merits and demerits and choosing one could change the way grades came out at the end.
"Don't apply relative grading," said Flitwick, not raising his eyes from the papers as his quill wrote remarks, "rate them on their understanding they have on the topic and remember — they're fourth years and not sixth-years like you, they'll naturally know less than your grade.. . it might not be the correct analogy, but go easier on them."
Quinn nodded and looked down at the parchment. Judging from the structure, how penmanship transformed from the start to the end, and the overall content, it was definitely the last day of the vacation effort. So after thinking it through, giving it much thought, and going back and forth, he wrote A for Acceptable on the top of the parchment and on a grading table for Flitwick's reference and records.
"How was your break?" asked Flitwick.
"It was uneventful," said Quinn, "I didn't do much other than roaming outside for half a day and hang out around the house for the rest of the day.. . nothing special, I suppose."
Ever since Quinn had come to Hogwarts, every time he went back home, be it in the winter or in the summer, he would spend a lot of time outside the house, roaming around the country, which was made easier with floo-travel and later apparition. Being "stuck" at Hogwarts for the most part of the year really tingled Quinn's exploratory tick, so he would just go around looking for anything new he could find.
"And how about your return? What do you think?"
"Uhm, eh, they're a bit annoying, but we will see how it turns out," said Quinn, then looked up, "how about you? I heard that she ended her inspections before the break.. . how do you think you're going to fare when the results are out?"
"That.. . I wouldn't know, and I try not to think about it," said the half-goblin, "I did my job to my best, and my work speaks for itself. There's nothing for me to worry about," Flitwick looked up with an almost bored expression, "I've held this position for decades. There have been many attempts from parents who don't like the idea of a half-breed goblin teaching their children; this isn't the first I have had the threat of getting fired from Hogwarts, and I'm sure it won't be the last time either, but just like every other time, this will pass like a silly little breeze," said Flitwick with utter confidence.
Quinn nodded in admiration.
And Flitwick didn't need to be worried about his job.
The Progress Report of Magical Didactics was a document used to evaluate Hogwarts teachers. It was passed by the Department of Magical Education. Some basic biographical and magical information that the document required included name, age, star sign, address, magic rune, expiration number, agility, magical technique, accuracy, wand control, among others. Based on answering some questions (like Do you consider yourself a risk-taker? Give an example), the teacher would be graded Appalling, Bad, Fair, Good or Excellent.
But the truth was Umbridge used it ostensibly as a means of evaluating Hogwarts teachers. In actuality, however, Umbridge targeted any teacher close to Albus Dumbledore that she felt she had a reasonable chance of dismissing without raising suspicions.
There was a great chance that Umbridge might target Flitwick because of her blatant hate for half-breeds, but the thing was that Flitwick had exceptional credentials — Master of Charms, A long time Champion in various Duelling Circuits, and an excellent, memorable Professor who provided outstanding guidance to essentially everyone who had graduated out of Hogwarts in the last few decades.
If Umbridge touched Flitwick, she'd be attracting eyes from all over. The same thing went for McGonagall and Sprout, and well, Snape, who was like a guardian angel to all who strutted under the banner of Slytherin. To be direct, there was no way to kick out the Head of Houses without the four making grievous errors, which they hadn't, especially after Umbridge was on everyone's tail.
"Well, if she annoys you, tell me," said Quinn, "I'll add it to the list of things that need to be retaliated upon. Maybe, it'll turn into a great spectacle."
"I will keep that in my mind," said Flitwick before sighing, "I just hope that everyone will come out this safe and sound."
But both knew that the chances of that happening were meagre. Umbridge was on the warpath from the moment she stepped into Hogwarts. She was going to get someone, and there were a few good candidates for her to whack; the question was how many of them would go.
- (Scene Break) -
Eldon Pembroke, fourth-year Hufflepuff, dawdled his way, feeling the lowest of low — this afternoon, he was given detention in the Defense Against The Dark Arts because he got frustrated and raised a question and maybe got into a "heated" debate with Umbridge, which landed him into the mess.
"Ugh, what I'm going to do?" he groaned. How was he going to spend hours on end alone with Umbridge for an entire week continuously.
He arrived at the Hufflepuff common room entrance and sighed for the umpteenth time today. He couldn't even open his mouth to utter the password and enter the common room.
"Hey, Pembroke."
Eldon turned left where the voice came from and saw Quinn West standing at the end of the hallway, which surprised him because he thought the voice came from somewhere nearby. Eldon walked towards him when Quinn beckoned him.
"Hello," said Eldon, his confusion, which mixed in with his misery, sounded downright pathetic.
"So, I heard you have a detention with Umbridge."
"Yes."
"You're not feeling great about it, are you?"
"No."
Quinn stared at Eldon for a good moment before patting his shoulders heavily. "Wait here for a bit; I'll be back in a bit. Don't go anywhere."
Eldon watched as Quinn walked away. He didn't have anything to do, so he stayed still, and even if he did, Eldon had no energy to do anything.
After a couple of minutes, Quinn returned but in his hand were two piping hot bacon sandwiches. He handed one to Eldon and took a bite from another one.
"Eat it. You'll feel better," said Quinn.
Eldon looked at his sandwich for a while before looking up and saying, "What do you want?"
"The detention with Umbridge," said Quinn, "it's not going to be pretty."
"I know that. Who doesn't know that." Detention with Umbridge made it automatically fated to be awful.
"Well, I can make it much more bearable. I can make the next week, which is supposed to be hellish to feel like normal detention," said Quinn.
Eldon perked up hearing that. It was the greatest proposition he had heard in his entire life, and that was when he was offered the Albus Dumbledore's Chocolate Frog Card in return for some Exploding Snaps, which was a ridiculously good deal.
"What is it?" asked Eldon.
Quinn took out two potion vails from his robes and handed them to Eldon. "Take these two before you go in Umbridge's office, and you'll be set for the day.. . I can give you one of these every day till your detention ends."
"What are these?"
"The less you know, the better, kid."
One was the same potion he had given to Harry before he went for his detentions but with some modification — Harry knew the pain of using the Blood Quill, but Eldon didn't, and even if Quinn gave him one day to experience the pain, there was no telling how good was Eldon's acting were — so he made it so Eldon would feel extreme irritation when using the Blood Quill, that would make his discomfort believable.
The other one was the antidote to the Veritaserum that Umbridge might give to get some blackmail material out. There was no reason for the second one, but it was precautionary. There was no telling what was brewing in Umbridge's twisted mind.
Eldon took the vials and stared at them for a good while before looking up at Quinn. "Will they really work? Are you absolutely sure?"
"One hundred percent. But there's a condition for this."
"What is it?" Eldon was willing to follow if it would make his life easier.
"You can't tell anyone about this. Not a single soul can know that I give you this. If you tell anyone, you'll not be feeling good about it," said Quinn. Hermione Granger wasn't the only one who could weave in special little traps into things.
"Deal!" said Eldon almost instantly.
"Good, now scurry away and remember the deal," said Quinn and watched Eldon walk to the Hufflepuff entrance with a renewed vigor.
"That's one more," Quinn muttered as Eldon disappeared from his sights.
The more Umbridge dished out detentions, the more people Quinn would get to give the potions, and more detentions meant that the web that the bug spun for him would be more lethal.
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Quinn West - MC - I realize that the difference between Arachne and Bugs.
Filius Flitwick - Head of House - Yeah, I'm not getting fired.
Eldon Pembroke - Hufflepuff - The bacon sandwich was surprisingly good.
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