//------------------------------//
// 51 — Surprise! 
// Story: If Wishes were Ponies . . . . 
// by tkepner 
//------------------------------//

The Gryffindors ran to the opposite side of the stairwell and started down that hall only to run into a door partway down it. They looked around and saw no other way out except back to where Filch was surely waiting for them. “It’s locked!” whispered Neville, jiggling the door handle. 

Hermione sighed tiredly. “Are you a wizard or not? Budge over!” She pushed him out of the way, tapped the lock with her wand, and whispered, “Alohomora!”

There was a click and the door swung open. They quickly pushed through it. Just before they closed it, however, Harry quickly cast scourgify on the floor and down the corridor. Hermione cast a colloportus, relocking the door. They pressed their ears against the door, listening.

“They ran down this corridor, I heard them, my sweet,” they heard Filch say.

“Merrrow,” came the response.

“Hmm,” he said, “there aren’t any secret passages down there.” They heard his footsteps coming closer. “Are you sure you don’t smell them?”

Another “Merrrow” was his answer.

Neville tugged on Harry’s sleeve.

Harry whispered, “Get off, Neville!” and shook his arm.

They all jumped and stared at the doorknob as the castle caretaker jiggled it.

“Still locked.” He stomped away. “And you don’t smell them, my sweet? Don’t see why not, they all smell to high heaven, anyway,” he growled. “You’d think they never heard of showers and bathing,” he added bitterly. His voice faded in the distance. “I could swear they went down this corridor. Humph. Next time I’ll get them,” they heard him say angrily.

Neville tugged hard on Harry’s sleeve, “Harry,” he said, his voice low and quavering in fright.

“What!?” Harry turned to Neville. For a moment, he was sure he was back in the Ponyville.

He was looking at a giant dog, a dog who filled the entire room, from floor to ceiling — and it had three heads. Three sets of glaring eyes, three twitching and quivering noses, three snarling mouths with saliva hanging down in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs.

“Woofy!?” Scootaloo said, astonished. “What’s Woofy doing here?”

Sweetie Belle looked at Harry, “Do you think Twilight knows he’s not guarding Tartarus?”

Hermione stared at the three girls, eyes wide in disbelief at their casual attitude.

“Girls,” Harry said, “I don’t think that’s Woofy — and Fluttershy isn’t here. And this guy seems mighty upset.”

It stared at them with all six eyes. Harry knew from his experiences in the Everfree that the only reason they weren’t already dead was that their sudden appearance had taken it by surprise. However, it was quickly getting over that, there was no mistaking what those floor shaking growls meant.

He heard the gulps as they realized that the door hadn’t led to an empty classroom. They were in the banned third floor corridor — and now they knew why it was the Headmaster had said it was banned unless you wanted, “to die a very painful death.”

Meanwhile, Hermione and Neville had not been idle. If it came down to being caught by Filch, and getting an unpleasant detention, or death, they’d take the detention. The door was unlocked and opened far faster than they had done it originally.

Harry yanked the door closed even as they fell backward into a pile. They scrambled to their feet and ran — they almost flew, back down the corridor. There was no sign of Filch, he must have hurried off somewhere else. They didn’t care — they just wanted to do was put as much distance between them and that monster as possible. Astonishingly, when they reached the central stairwell there was a staircase that led directly from this floor to the seventh, right in front of them. They galloped up the staircase at full speed.

Once safely inside their dorm, they collapsed, trembling and gasping for air, sweat covering them head to toe, onto the couches and armchairs nearest to them. “What the bloody hell was that!?” Neville gasped. “What do they think they’re doing, keeping a thing like that in a school?”

“Language, Neville.” Hermione was still working at getting her breath back. “You don’t use your eyes, do you?” she said, staring at him with narrowed eyes. “Didn’t you see what it was standing on?” She turned to the Equestrians. “And you four, Woofy? Seriously?”

“Ah,” Harry said, breathing heavily still. He looked at his friends. “Well, we did tell you we met a cerberus back home, in Ponyville, didn't we now?” He sighed, “It kept chewing on house roofs until Fluttershy distracted it long enough for Twilight to use a giant squeaky ball to trick it into returning to Tartarus.”

“Fluttershy?” Hermione said incredulously, “The witch who hides if you look at her? She confronted a cerberus? Are we talking about the same person?”

Harry sighed. “Well, she’s really good with animals. She started giving Woofy belly rubs and tickles.”

Hermione and Neville stared at him in disbelief.

He shrugged. “I can’t explain it any better.” He snorted in wry amusement. “We did get a poster the next day from Princess Celestia asking everyone to keep a lookout for her lost dog, though.” He shook his head ruefully. “Under distinguishing features, she put ‘Very cute, has three heads, is as large as a house, answers to Woofy.’”

“Cute?” Hermione and Neville, echoed in patent disbelief. “Cute?” They looked as if they were afraid to ask if he was joking.

“And no, I wasn’t looking at its feet,” Neville said.

She gave her head a shake, then said. “It was standing on a trapdoor. It’s obviously guarding something.”

“Well, duh,” said Scootaloo. “Isn’t that what a cerberus does? Guard things?” She looked at Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom. “Wonder what she’s guarding?” she said speculatively, her lips stretching into a small smile. “I think we have some exploring to do . . . .”

Hermione stared at them, flabbergasted, then threw her hands into the air in frustration. “What is wrong with you? We could all have been killed — or worse, expelled,”* she said indignantly. She got up and stomped off to her dorm room.

Harry buried his face in his hands. Between the spiders in the forest and the treasure the cerberus had to be guarding, keeping out of trouble would be impossible this year. Well, at least with the cerberus in the corridor, tree-sap would NOT be involved. He hoped.


۸-ꞈ-۸


Thursday had a bumpy start. First, there was the fact that by the time they had returned from Astronomy class it had been almost two o’clock in the morning, meaning few of the Gryffindor First Years had gotten more than five hours of sleep. There was a lot of yawning at that end of the breakfast table.

When they walked into their Herbology class, Ron and Apple Bloom were ambushed by the Walking Plants. “Ahhh!” they both screamed as they were hit with dozens of the plants dropping on them from over the door. “Get ’em off! Get ’em off!” they both yelled, swiping at their heads and running around in the greenhouse. It took the concerted efforts of Professor Sprout and the rest of the class to succeed in corralling the mischievous plants.

“Well, I never!” exclaimed the professor when they were done, wiping her forehead with a hand and smearing dirt across it. She put her hands on her hips as she glared at the errant plants. “Am I going to have to cage you all?”

The plants did not seem ashamed at all. If anything, they seemed to exude an air of disappointment.

Apple Bloom stalked over to the rack in which the plants were currently cornered. She glared at them. “I got a wand, now, and I’m not afraid to use it!” she said, holding up her wand threateningly. “And I know incendio!”

The plants shuffled away from her.

Sweetie Belle said, “I wonder what they want?”

The class looked at her.

She shrugged, “Well, I mean, they didn’t actually do anything, now did they?”

Professor Sprout looked back and forth between the plants and their targets. She smiled. “Special project, class.”

They groaned and looked at her suspiciously.

“Each of you take one of the plants with you today. After every class cast a diagnostic spell on the plant and each other, and copy the results to paper. Bring the Walking Plants back to me after your last class of the day. As an overnight assignment, compare the results and see if there are any differences. Tomorrow, come by before breakfast and hand in your assignment. Then pick up the same plant you had today. We’ll do this for several days to see if we can figure out why the Walking Plants favour Mr. Weasley and Miss Bloom.”

She motioned them to spread out a bit. “First, here’s the spell for the plants.” It took almost twenty minutes before everyone had it down perfectly.

“And here’s the medical diagnostic I want you to cast on each other. It can’t be used on yourself, someone else has to cast it on you.” That spell took almost the rest of their class.

“And, finally, to make sure you don’t copy down anything incorrectly, use this spell to copy the other two spell-results to paper.” That was a simple spell and took only a few minutes to learn.

Then they each went to the Walking Plant tray and selected one. Ron and Apple Bloom held back, which was probably prudent. Otherwise, there might have been a plant riot as the tiny bushes vied with one another to go with Ron or Apple Bloom.

Harry watched Apple Bloom’s selection as it preened itself after it had climbed her arm to her shoulder and partially hid itself in her hair. Ron’s hair being too short to act as sufficient camouflage, his choice just clung to his shoulder and somehow conveyed an air of smugness.

Like the plants the girls had, Harry’s snuggled up to his long hair in an attempt to hide. The plants the boys chose rode on their shoulders. None opted for hiding in a pocket. 

The Gryffindor and Hufflepuff boys did look a bit unusual with what appeared to be small hedges stuck to their shoulders, which drew a bit of attention from the other students in the halls. The girls, with their plants hiding against their hair, were not nearly as conspicuous, but they too, drew curious looks. For once, Harry and the fillies were not being singled out as the preferred recipients of stares.

“What’s this?” Professor Flitwick said as the First Years arrived in Charms class. He insisted that they demonstrate their newly learned spells, and spent the rest of the class explaining how those spells worked and what their limits were. And giving them an assignment on the spells’ origins and derivations, as well. And the Ravenclaws were, well, green with envy over the rather advanced charms their Herbology professor had taught the other two Houses. And they were studying furiously to catch up.

Harry found it disconcerting to have the little plant hanging out on his shoulder. He kept forgetting about it and then seeing it out of the corner of his left eye — it was on his left shoulder, that being closer to Sweetie Belle and Ron in this class — and jerking his head to look in that direction. He wasn’t the only one to do that, he saw with some relief.

After class was their first try at getting the reports done and copied to paper before they were late to their next class. Fortunately, it being lunch, being late wasn’t a concern. But it would be for the other two classes that day. They quickly paired up so they would be ready.

After lunch, Professor McGonagall merely gave the Gryffindors an arched eyebrow as they came in. Harry figured Professor Sprout must have told the other professors at lunch what the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs were doing with the plants. She continued the lesson from the day before — answering questions, giving an additional lecture, and making their match-cum-needle longer and fancier.

D.A.D.A. was boring. Professor Quirrell’s stutter seemed worse today than usual and the day’s notes barely took up two centimetres on their paper. He seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time staring at Harry, Sweetie Belle, and Hermione, though.


۸- ̰ -۸


The Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs piled out Greenhouse Number One’s door after dropping off their Walking Plants. Ginny and Scootaloo transformed almost immediately and zoomed up into the sky. The rest meandered slowly across the lawn. Harry sighed, watching the five pegasi swooping around each other. “It was fun, wasn’t it, Sweetie, Bloom? Flying, that is.”

They looked up at the pegasi and sighed, “Yeah, it was.” Apple Bloom said as Sweetie Belle nodded. Then Sweetie Belle frowned. “Five?” she said. “Am I seeing things? Or are there really five up there?”

Harry squinted, “Yep, I see five.” He grinned. “I guess Oliver and the girls have decided to come out and play,” he half-whispered to the two fillies. A faint cry of “Quidditch!” reached them and the pegasi suddenly swooped off towards the Quidditch pitch. Harry laughed. Loudly, he said, “Who do you think would win? A Quidditch pegasi team or a wizarding team?” Two of the Hufflepuffs still standing nearby suddenly jerked around to look at him, turned to look towards the Quidditch pitch, and then ran into the castle.  Harry snickered. No doubt they were heading to inform the Hufflepuff team of the challenge — before the Ravenclaws heard of it and could get there first.

“Race ya to the lake,” challenged Apple Bloom just after transforming. Sweetie Belle and Harry looked at her, shrugged, and transformed. So did Ron and Hermione, and the small string of ponies thundered across the lawn in a five-way race. Surprisingly, or maybe not, Harry decided, Apple Bloom and Ron were leading and neck and neck the whole way. Then it was a race to Hagrid’s hut. Again, the two earth ponies stayed out in front.

Harry decided that after spending all day in the castle, kicking his heels up and racing around the lawn was just what he needed. It felt good to stretch his legs.

They reached Hagrid’s hut and slowed to a walk, panting. “That was fun!” declared Apple Bloom. “Just what I needed after being stuck sittin’ all day.”

Before the others could agree, though, the hut door opened and Hagrid came out. “Whot’s this,” he said in surprise seeing the tiny ponies outside his porch. While they were small compared to most people, their heads barely reaching to mid-thigh to the sixth and seventh year students, Hagrid dwarfed them. His boots were bigger than the ponies!

“Unicorn foals?” he said bending down for a closer look.

Harry hurriedly changed back. The others quickly changed forms, too. “Hi, Hagrid!” he said loudly, and waving to keep the big wizard’s attention off the fillies. He knew the half-giant couldn’t remember him from the brief time he had shepherded the Firsties across the lake. “I’m Harry Potter.”

Hagrid put his hands on his hips and laughed. “Hiya, Harry. I’d heard tha Gryffindor Ferst Years were animagi ponies.” He jovially eyed them. “So, yer ar’ unicorns, eh?”

“Yep!” answered Harry and changed back to a unicorn “Hermione and Sweetie Belle are unicorns while Ron and Apple Bloom are earth ponies.” He ran a quick circle around the half-giant. “Scootaloo and Ginny are pegasi. They’re over playing Quidditch right now.” He stopped and pointed off towards the Quidditch Pitch.

“Let meh take a look at yeh,” Hagrid said, lowering his hand.

“Okay,” said Harry. He stopped to let the wizard grab him around his barrel and lift him up to eye level.

“Hmm,” Hagrid said, turning Harry left and right. “Yer a bit different than the forest unicorns,” he said. “Besides being smaller, thet is. A bit thicker in the legs and yer eyes are much, much larger. Facin’ more forward, too.” He mused. “The muzzle is also shorter.” He paused. “I rekon the shape of yer muzzle lets yeh talk, too.”

“Oh, yes,” Harry said. “It feels like I’m talking normally. And my teeth and bite are arranged similar to people, except the canines are small and way back.” He opened his mouth wide and pulled his lips back.

Hagrid inspected him closely. “Yer right, I can see thet.”

“And I can even cast magic,” Harry added, shooting sparks from his horn.

“Now, thet isn’t somethin’ the forest unicorns canna do!” exclaimed Hagrid, looking impressed. “While thay can do magic, thay have to touch yeh wit’ thar horn to do anythin’.”

He set Harry carefully back down. “So’s,” he said, “I guess yer done wit’ yer classes fer tha day?”

“Uh, huh,” Harry affirmed.

“Wouldya like some tea?” he asked tilting his head slightly. “I just put a pot on.”

They looked at each other. After all their running, Harry was a bit thirsty. And the half-giant was the groundskeeper for the school, so he wasn’t a danger to any of them. And he did seem nice. Harry tilted his head towards the hut and arched his eyebrows while looking at his classmates. The others either shrugged or nodded.

“Sure, Hagrid. Sounds good.”

The rough wizard smiled broadly and opened the door. “Be careful o’ Fang. He’s harmless, but a bit enthusiastic.”

Fang, they discovered, was a dog almost big enough for them to saddle and ride as people. Harry hurriedly changed back to human form as they went in. “Make yerselves a home,” said Hagrid bustling over to his fireplace.

Fang spent a few moments inspecting and licking each of them before Hagrid finally hauled him back and made him go to his bed.

“Ah only got four cups, so you’ll have to share,” Hagrid explained, setting the aforementioned cups on a table that was almost as tall as they were, with only two chairs.

Hagrid did not get many visitors, it appeared.

The cups were big bowls with handles on them. As far as the kids were concerned, the cups were almost as big as the pots they used to make tea at home! In fact, the only way they could drink a full cup would be if they shared.

Harry and Sweetie Belle shared one chair, and a bowl of tea, while the other three sat on the bed. Ron got a bowl to himself, and seemed determined to finish it off.

Harry introduced the others as Hagrid placed rock cakes on the table and handed a second plate to Apple Bloom, who was sitting between Hermione and Ron.

Hagrid glanced at Ron “Another Weasley, eh?” He snorted. “I spend half me days chasin’ yer twin brothers away from the forest.”

Only Apple Bloom and Ron seemed to be able to chew shapeless lumps with raisins that Hagrid called rock cakes. Harry wouldn’t be surprised to discover that the “rock” in the name “rock cakes” was literal.

They took turns describing their lessons, so far.

“Professor Binn didn’t know he wer dead, eh?” Hagrid said. “Figgers. Well, can’t say I’m sad to hear yer’ll be getting a new perfessor. Can’t be worse at it, that’s fer sure. He always did put me to sleep.”

Hagrid looked at Ron. “And how’s yer brother Charlie?” he said. “Liked him a lot, I did,  great with animals, he was.”

While Ron and Hagrid talked about Charlie’s work with dragons, Harry noticed a cutting from the Daily Prophet. It was on the table under the tea cosy.

It told of a break-in at Gringotts that happened the same day Harry and the Equestrians were there! Nothing had been stolen as the vault had been emptied just that morning. Harry showed the clipping to Sweetie Belle. She looked back at him, just as surprised. Someone had dared!? They shook their heads.

Harry looked up at the half-giant curiously. He had been in the bank that morning, too. Were the two somehow connected?

Hagrid saw what he was reading and nervously laughed. He handed Harry another rock cake and took the clipping back. “Amazin’ what some wizards’ll do ain’t it?” he mumbled, crumpling the paper in his hand and stuffing it in a pocket.

At Hagrid’s request, they all transformed and stood on his table while he studied them.

“Ain’t never seen colours like that on any horses or ponies,” he stated, shaking his head. “And yer earth ponies, yeh say?” He pointed at Ron and Apple Bloom.

They nodded, as Apple Bloom explained, “Earth ponies are skilled at green magic — making plants grow. Plus we’re stronger and faster than the unicorns or pegasi.”

That required a demonstration, so they all trooped outside. Apple Bloom selected one pumpkin plant and made it quickly ripen. And Harry, using his horn, showed off a few of the spells they had learned.


۸- ̫ -۸


Castor’s day had started early.

“Your Highness, I would like to introduce the United Kingdom’s Government Chief Scientific Adviser, Robert McCredie May, Baron May of Oxford. And this is Doctor of Physics, Michael B. Green, one of our leading experts on string-theory. Gentlemen, this is Princess Twilight Sparkle.”

And that had begun a marathon round of science and math discussions that had thrilled Twilight, reduced both men to near tears, and had left Castor completely in the dark.

Both men went back and forth through the portal no less than a dozen times. The world on the other side wasn’t nearly as interesting as the portal, itself, to them. That Twilight and Castor transformed as they went through the portal, and not the other two, had left them completely gobsmacked.

After the first hour back at the house, and filling an expanded wall-sized chalkboard, Twilight had said, “If we combine your Type I, Types IIA and IIB, and heterotic theories with our Alternates I, III, and V Magic theories, I think an eleven-dimensional comprehensive theory can be made to work.” She had already told them the Equestrian’s theories required at least eight dimensions, and, she had added, “We’ve managed to determine that two of those dimensions are directly related to magic.” Several hours later, after filling several more giant chalkboards and with a considerable amount of arguing, they had decided the new “M-Theory” was the answer. And that was “M” for either Magic or Mystery, depending on if the speaker knew about the Equestrians.

And the scientists were very envious of Twilight’s ability to hover three meters off the ground while taking a closer look at a previous chalk-board equation, its derivation, and final conclusion. And being floated with her was certainly a novel experience.

How it was possible for a macro-being to affect dimensions postulated to be smaller than a fraction of an atom in size was something to be discussed at another time.

Somewhere in that time they had lunch and dinner, but only Castor could have told anyone what they had eaten.

And their new briefcases were going to be guarded treasures for the rest of their lives — once they finished working out the mathematics that let them work, much less exist, without crashing all of creation!


۸- ̫ -۸


“You should have seen the Hufflepuffs floundering,” bragged Ginny at the dinner table, later that evening. “We beat them the way a beater beats a bludger — hard and without mercy!” She and Scootaloo giggled. “They never had a chance! We’re just too fast and nimble for them.

“Scootaloo accidentally showed them how tough a Pegasus is when she tried to make a tight turn chasing the snitch — we were taking turns. She went a shade wider than she intended and rammed a goal post head-on!” Scootaloo blushed. “She hung there a moment, then slid down the post. We all stopped and stared as she hit the ground.” Ginny took a drink of her juice. “I was just heading for her when Scootaloo staggered upright at the bottom of the goal post, shook her head a few times, and then launched herself back into the game. Her flying was a bit erratic, at first, but quickly smoothed out as the game continued.”

Scootaloo grinned. “Pegasi are tough!”

One of the Ravenclaws near Harry asked, “Shouldn’t someone have gone for Madam Pomfrey?”

“Nah,” Apple Bloom said, “Pegasi have heads like rocks. Almost as smart, too.”

Scootaloo stuck her tongue out at Bloom, then sighed. She glanced down at her hip and regretfully said, “No Cutie Mark, though.”

The other two Equestrians also sighed.

“Cutie Mark?” queried a Ravenclaw as the other Gryffindors looked up, too, interested in the answer.

“Cutie Marks define your special magical talent,” explained Sweetie Belle. “We’ve been trying everything we could think of for the last two years to see if that was our special talent, but with no luck.”

“What?” the Ravenclaw said, voicing the puzzlement that everyone else was showing.

Harry sighed and interrupted. “Where these three come from,” he waved his hand at the three fillies, “when you find the one thing that you are especially talented at, the one thing that you enjoy doing the most with your magic, then magic gifts you with a symbol on your hips that shows everyone what you’re especially good at.” His audience nodded, but was still clearly uncertain of what he meant.

Harry thought for a moment. “For example, Apple Bloom’s sister runs the family farm. She loves nothing better than caring for her trees, harvesting apples, and seeing people enjoy the literal fruits of her labour. She got her cutie mark when she realized that that was what made her happy, when she realized she had to be true to herself. Her cutie mark is three Apples.” Everyone stared at Apple Bloom, then back at Harry.

“Sweetie Belle’s sister got her cutie mark when she was making costumes for a school play. Everyone liked the costumes, but she felt something just wasn’t right. She liked making clothes, and even thought she might like to do more of that.”

Several of the listening girls nodded. They could understand that.

“Then, just when she was beginning to doubt herself the most, to think that maybe she should give up on making costumes and clothes, she went outside, the night before the performance and followed a pull on her magic. She discovered a bunch of gems, and realized what was missing from her costumes. She decorated the costumes with gems and when she saw how everyone loved her creations during the play, she knew that she wanted nothing more than to be the best fashion designer in the country. And her Cutie Mark appeared, three gems.”

He smiled, “She made our school robes.”

They all looked at the robes Harry and the fillies were wearing.

Lavender Brown spoke up. “By the way, those aren’t real gems, are they?” she asked, pointing at the thumb-sized buttons on their robes.

Harry looked down at his as Sweetie Belle said proudly, “Oh, yes, they are. Rarity would never use anything but the best materials for her creations.” She pointed at the yellow, almost gold-coloured gem at the top of her robes. “This is a yellow oval sapphire.” Then she pointed at the red one below it. “And this one is an oval ruby.”

The other students stared at them. The two sets of gems alternated down the length of their robes.

“Blimey!” Ron said breathlessly.

“Yeah,” whispered Lavender beside him.

Dean looked up and down the robes. “Just one of those gems is more’n my dad makes in a year, And there must be a dozen on each of your robes!”

The fillies looked around, surprised.

“Really?” said Scootaloo. “I didn’t think they were worth all that much.” She shrugged.  

“Rarity’s got a bucket of them in all kinds of colors in her workroom,” Sweetie Belle said. “Most are much smaller than these, though.”

“Bucket?” said Sean dazedly as everyone nodded dazedly.

“Huh,” Scootaloo said. She looked over at Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. “Guess that must be why the Goblins gave us so much for that bag of gems we gave them.” The other two shrugged. 

The listening Gryffindors goggled at the idea of anyone talking so casually about a bag of such gems. 

She grinned widely, “Pretty good for what we thought would only be enough for snacks through the year.” The other two giggled. Their audience exchanged amazed looks.

“And magic does this cutie mark stuff?” said Lily, bringing them back to the original subject.

“Uh huh,” confirmed Apple Bloom.

“I wonder why we’ve never heard of anything like that,” mused Neville. “I’m sure Gran or uncle Alfie would have mentioned it if they had ever heard of such a thing.”

The rest of dinner passed in relative quiet as the other Gryffindors mulled over what they had learned about the foreign students.

And Harry saw that Professor McGonagall was still peeved at the Headmaster. He was almost positive he saw her hex him, but that couldn’t be right. Professors would never do something like that, would they?

They spent the evening in the library doing their class assignments, to the dismay of all the witches waiting in Gryffindor for the cuddlesome ponies.


۸-_-۸