Operation Homeward (A Harry Potter Fanfiction)

Fourteen

Perhaps it was just his anxiety talking, but for a few moments, Teddy forgot how to breathe as they waited for the passage to open. It took a few moments of creaking and groaning, followed by a sheet of dust raining down over their heads, light illuminated the familiar Hogwarts corridor. A blanket of relief swept over the four of them, hopeful and reassuring.

With a quick and quiet Nox from each of them, Teddy, James, Albus, and Lily quickly exchanged their wandglow for natural sunlight as they crept up through the opening.

"Any sign of staff?" asked Lily softly (and Teddy's nerves were thankful for that).

"No," said Albus, looking over the Marauder's Map. "The closest footprint is McGonagall, but she's up in her office."

Teddy relaxed ever-so-slightly at that, but now that he knew for sure that McGonagall was here ... Professor McGonagall had always been very kind to him during his time at Hogwarts. Believed in him, and, dare he say it, seemed to understand him. Whenever something happened, he had always felt safe to go to her. Harry had once reasoned that McGonagall was really a mothering softie at heart, while also likely holding Teddy in high esteem because of his parents. Should Teddy be caught, and especially by her, he wasn't confident that he could ever look her in the eye again.

As lost in thought as he was, it took Teddy far too long to realize that Lily was talking. "—don't seem to show on the Map, we have no choice but to go try to search for Nick. Where do you reckon he goes during the summer?"

"Doesn't he float around in the dungeons a lot?" asked James, his naturally-loud voice, despite his obvious attempt to quiet it, making Teddy wince. "He's been trying to get into the Headless Hunt for decades, but his Nearly-Headlessness always stops him from getting in. Ever since they hired Professor Haywood, he's taken to lingering around the Dungeons in hopes that she'll drop some brilliant new potion to make him fully Headless. Well ... Either that, or he's having an affair with the Bloody Baron."

Dumbfounded and slightly creeped out, they all stared at James for a long second until Lily wrinkled her nose and asked, "How in the blazes do you know that?"

"I think why he knows it is more concerning," said Albus warily. "You're not turning into a necromancer, are you?"

James rolled his eyes. "Your faith in me is flattering. No. I've just had to talk to a lot of ghosts over the years, since they have a habit of always being around when you're not following the rules. So if you ever do, you have to be ready sweet-talk them into not snitching ... which usually implies listening to them drone on and on about gossip until they forget why they're talking to you in the first place. For instance: did you know the Fat Friar fancies the Circe portrait on the Grand Staircase?"

To be frank, Teddy was relieved when Lily said, still cringing, "Okay, moving on from Jamie's weird ghost obsession." The boy in question opened his mouth to argue, but Lily quickly charged forward. "We ought to head to the Dungeons. Albus, what's our safest route?"

————

After trekking from the East to West Lower Floors, they finally made it to the Dungeons. It was a miracle that there were very few portraits to avoid contact with, and so it was likely out of luck that they arrived unscathed. Unfortunately, the Dungeons were also just as musty, dark, and gross as he remembered—if slightly less swampy in some areas, as he recalled the remnants of an old, extremely effective prank had once left the area entirely swampified. Over the years, it had been reduced from a full-on ecosystem to patches of marsh when he had been in school. In fact, it had been one of his goals to help clean up as Head Boy—which gained a lot of support from the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs, as both of their Common Rooms were located near or in the Dungeons and stepping in sludge on your way to your dormitory gets pretty disgusting.

As Teddy, James, Albus, and Lily continued down their path, luck seemed to once again appear in their favor, as a bustling commotion and wispy, white figures could be made out from a room on the opposite end of the hall. Along with, to their dismay, a rancid smell that could easily be mistaken for that of a mauled animal carcass.

As they approached the room, Teddy realized that "animal carcass" probably wasn't far off, as there were definitely a group of ghosts hoarding around a table of what seemed like rotten food.

"Ugh," hissed James, tugging the collar of his shirt up over his nose. "Ghosts are fucking nasty."

"Agree," whispered Lily, gagging.

"Shh," snapped Teddy as quietly as he could. The last thing they needed right now was to offend a ghost and get sent to Nurmenguard or Azkaban.

Standing flat against the wall outside the open door, Teddy carefully craned his neck to peer inside the room. It was hard to make out who was who amongst all the pale, smoky figures, but his eyes eventually locked on Nearly-Headless Nick engaged in a conversation with an entirely-headless soldier in the far left corner of the room. Teddy suddenly felt like cheering.

"He's in there," he whispered excitedly.

"But how are we going to get to him?" asked Lily. "We can't just walk right in; the other ghosts would see us, and we can't trust they won't report us."

"Why not?" asked Albus thoughtfully, and Teddy could practically see the gears turning in his head. "Remember what Uncle Ron said about the favor Dad did for Nick his Second Year? He attended his Deathday Party ... If Dad's name was held in such high esteem then, it definitely is now, and especially since it's just after the anniversary of his death. It would probably even be enough for whatever this celebration is. Us being here as a a supposed 'guest' might allow us to worm our way in if we come up with a good enough lie."

James's hazel eyes sparked—a sure sign that something in Albus's plan had given him a both brilliant and devious idea. "Al, I could kiss that Slytherin brain of yours." He smirked as he pulled his wand out from his pocket. "Alright, here's what we're going to do ..."

————

I know, short-ish chapter compared to some of the previous ones, but I usually try to keep a minimum of 1K words per update. We've just kind of been lucky with the longer ones most recently.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! Pleaseeee comment your thoughts and such. It really helps out.

Also, I feel the need to say this: one of the many things I hated about the Cursed Child is that Albus absolutely hated his connection with his dad. Like, in some ways, I get it—but come on, my guy is a flipping Slytherin. Resourcefulness and craftiness is in his instincts. Surely he'd see some benefit to his dad's connections as a means to repel bullies and other such things. Hence why I wanted Al's sneaky snake side to show a bit in this story, because he really didn't seem to have it in CC. It kind of felt like he was just stuck in there for the drama of it sometimes.

But that's just my opinion.

Anyway, see you later! Thanks again for reading (and ✨ commenting ✨).