//------------------------------// // Chaos Flu and a Boggart too! (OLD) // Story: Scoti 2: Muggles and Mudbloods // by SamuelK28 //------------------------------// Yeah, but with all the extra security, maybe, just maybe I can have a peaceful month for once. Scootaloo remembered the words she had spoken just a few days before. Why oh why had she tempted fate? “AAAACHOOO!” she sneezed once again sending even more confetti shooting across her bed before laughing uncontrollably once more. Of course, she had woken up on October first feeling like a ton of bricks had hit her. Her dormmates, upon seeing Scootaloo’s sudden sickness, had immediately called for Madam Pomfrey and Professor Sprout. Yet, they were not experts in draconequus health and they too had been flummoxed by this new chaotic illness until Professor Sprout had called Professor Discord for assistance. “Chaos Flu,” the older draconequus said seriously in a hazmat suit as Scootaloo vomited cupcakes into a bucket beside her bed. “There’s no cure or medicine that can be prescribed; we’ll just have to wait it out. Usually, it disappears just as randomly as it appeared within forty-eight to seventy-two hours as long as it can be kept contained and its spread minimised. Thus, we’ll need to lockdown the school until it has had its fun, gets bored and disappears.” “Lockdown the school, are you sure…” Professor Sprout began only for a scream in the hallway outside to cut her off. “Nobody told me I’d be covered in polka dots when I lost my horn!” It was Melody Song’s voice. “And why do I have an uncontrollable urge to laugh about it?” Then came Maddie Fairweather’s voice. “Yeah, well at least you don’t look like a frog and have a craving for flies. AAAAACHOOOO! Just what is this bizarre sickness anyway and why am I constantly sneezing confetti?” Discord simply gave Professor Sprout an all too knowing look before saying, “And by the vines that now seem to have replaced your hair, I’m going to make the assumption you’ve caught it…AAAAACHOOOOOO. Oh shit,” he grumbled to himself before letting out a slight chuckle. * Scootaloo stared at herself in the mirror. She was going to kill him. "Your torso will always be made up of your birth form," he had told her. She was going to kill him. "Immune to lycanthropy," he had told her. Her tail, which had been behaving itself mostly these past few weeks, decided to make an appearance, tapping her on her now-hairy left shoulder. “Oh, and you can settle down. Where were you when I needed you to distract my werewolf girlfriend? Hiding between my legs no doubt just because she chewed on you a bit,” Scootaloo grumbled continuing to stare at herself in the mirror. Her entire chest was covered in coarse neon pink fur. She had hoped it had only been a side effect of the flu but twenty-four hours later it remained. It was most certainly permanent. When she got her hands on her father… “Hey Scoots, you okay? You’ve been in there over ten minutes and we need to get to breakfast,” Apple Bloom’s voice interrupted her thoughts. It had been four pretty miserable, if not occasionally hilarious days for the students, spent stuck inside their dormitories as the Chaos Flu had swept across the school like wildfire, infecting almost every student and member of staff. For many it had been nothing more than an inconvenience, just a few hours of feeling rough, sneezing confetti, vomiting cupcakes and laughing uncontrollably before returning back to doing whatever work they could from their textbooks. For others it had been longer and had had other peculiar side effects, such as blurting out secrets, unusual transformations, a sudden interest in being a pirate and so on and so forth. Nobody though had had it worse than Scootaloo. Three whole days she had spent tossing and turning in her bed, barely even able to eat! When she had finally awakened to feeling back to normal on Sunday morning the first thing she had done was order a huge fried breakfast. Thankfully, for some unknown reason, the house elves seemed unaffected by the illness that had ravaged the school and were quite happy to deliver food to individual dorms. It had taken her most of Sunday to fully recover and it was only now, on Monday morning, that she was seeing the full effects the Chaos Flu had had on her. She was going to kill him. “Scoots?” Apple Bloom’s voice came nervously along with a knock on the bathroom door. Scootaloo yanked open the bathroom door and stared at one of her two best friends in the entire world. “What’s with the…” Apple Bloom paused for a moment as it dawned on her. “That isn’t a fur coat, is it?” “Nope,” Apple Bloom couldn’t help but let out a little snort of amusement. “Look on the bright side; I’m sure Hermione will love it!” “Where’s your spade?” Scootaloo deadpanned. “What?” Apple Bloom asked, her laughter abruptly stopping and instead replaced with a look of confusion. “I need to dispose of a body, specifically my father’s,” Scootaloo growled as her hair ignited. * To Scootaloo’s relief, after her bout of Chaos Flu the next few weeks proceeded as she had originally hoped October would, peacefully without much incident. It had taken her a while to calm down over the whole werewolf chest incident that her father had simply described as a unique phenomenon caused by your immune system being overwhelmed from having to deal with the lycanthropy still in your body and Chaos Flu at the same time. She had not taken kindly to that description and had promptly deposited a whole pile of bull shit atop his head, which had ultimately earnt her yet another detention. Still, despite constantly waking up to find pink fur all over her bed or the occasional destroyed pillow, she had slowly become accustomed to her latest body change as time went by. It had also helped that Hermione had, after laughing uncontrollably for nearly ten minutes, adored her new look. Hermione had stated that it was something to constantly remind Scootaloo of her and had got Scootaloo to order some crop tops so that she could rest her head on her fluffy tummy when no one was looking. As for lessons, nothing to out of the ordinary happened. They moved on to Vera Verto in Transfiguration, where, much to Professor McGonagall’s relief, Scootaloo managed to achieve similar results to the rest of the class, even if her goblet was a little more chaotic looking with a zigzagging stem, square bowl and luminous yellow colour in comparison to her peers'. After her struggle with Finite Incantatem in Charms, Scootaloo found herself back to her best when they moved onto Expelliarmus, with Professor Flitwick staring in disbelief as she managed to disarm five of her classmates before even one of them could cast a jinx on her. The most noteworthy thing to occur was the slug outbreak in the greenhouses, which Professor Snape took advantage of by testing the second-years on the herbicide potion they had originally brewed in their first year for if brewed and used properly on dummy rubber plants it was also a sure-fire way to kill off pests. This also resulted in a rather nasty and tedious homework assignment on The Importance of Flobberworm Mucus as a Potions Ingredient. Meanwhile, Professor Sinistra had been absolutely flummoxed at how Scootaloo had no idea on the correct order of the planets yet could somehow pinpoint the current location of every planet in the sky, without a telescope, and tell her how that would impact her life over the next couple of days. She had initially scoffed when Scootaloo had told her that Neptune was angry with the actions of Pluto recently and as such would be sending a storm their way very soon. It had been one of the best nights for star gazing of the year so far with no rain or cloud cover predicted at all. Within an hour of Scootaloo’s prediction the wind had picked up and the rain was pelting the castle ferociously. Professor Sinistra, not a big believer in astrology or divination, had been at a loss for words. In History, Professor Binns moved on from werewolf revolts to the history of wizarding Britain’s political structure and topics such as the Wizengamot and the formation of the Ministry of Magic and the Wizards’ council that preceded it, while Scootaloo had particular fun in one Cultural Diversity lesson talking about Draconequui. At this particular moment though the lesson on everyone’s mind was Defence Against the Dark Arts. Every student had been very relieved Discord had not bought either a nundu, a chimera or a manticore with him a few weeks backs, although the thestral Fluttershy had brought along to the training grounds last week had resulted in a rather amusing lesson as half the class couldn’t actually see it as they were yet to either witness death or accept its reality. “So, what do you think Discord has got up his sleeve today?” Apple Bloom asked as they entered the Discord Tower. “As long as no invisible horse attempts to eat my hair again, I don’t mind what it is as long as it isn’t something extremely dangerous,” Hermione grumbled glowering at Scootaloo. “Why are you looking at me like that?” Scootaloo asked guiltily. “You know why,” was all Hermione said tetchily in reply to a round of sniggers. “Apple Bloom, is she lying?” “Now, what kind of friend would I be…” Apple Bloom began. “I’ll help you with today’s Defence Against the Dark arts homework,” Hermione interrupted. “Oh, most definitely. I can tell by her eyes,” Apple Bloom replied instantly. “Traitor!” Scootaloo growled before a cold shiver went through her spine as Hermione placed a hand on her left shoulder and squeezed. Just when had her girlfriend got that strong? Oh, right, werewolf. “So, are you going to tell me just what you did to get that thestral to start munching on my hair or am I going to have to swing you by your tail to teach you a lesson for being a bad girl?” Hermione whispered into Scootaloo’s ear. Scootaloo gulped. “Maybe, just maybe, I levitated one of the steaks Fluttershy had brought with her behind you.” “Oh, did you now. And let me ask you. Will you be doing anything similar again in future?” Hermione said coldly as she squeezed Scootaloo’s shoulder. “No ma'am!” Scootaloo squeaked as the sniggers continued to reverberate around them. “Good girl,” Hermione whispered into her girlfriend’s ear as she slowly released her “Well, I think we know who wears the trousers in their relationship!” Sweetie said between sniggers. “Although it is quite ironic she’s the one wearing the collar!” Hermione often now didn’t go anywhere without her sparkly pink collar on. Despite finding it slightly peculiar to begin with, it was just yet another thing her fellow students had gotten used to over time. Any who had enquired about it had simply been told it was a tracking device and electric shock collar for both her safety and her fellow students. As Hermione turned ready to snap a retort back at Sweetie, Scootaloo took her chance. Having learnt over the past year of the precise location of a number of the Discord Tower’s traps that didn’t randomly change location she leapt forward and slammed her feet down on the floor. As Scootaloo pelted it down the corridor, she gulped once more as her girlfriend’s voice echoed throughout the corridor. “SCOOTALOO, YOU ARE SO DEAD THIS TIME!” Totally worth it Scootaloo thought to herself. * As the majority of the class squelched into Classroom 104 covered in snot coloured gloop, Scootaloo sat whistling at her desk not even attempting to hide her guilt. “Hermione, what happened…” She began with feigned ignorance only to have a bucket of the gloop deposited over her head. “Now, we’re even,” Hermione growled sitting down next to Scootaloo as Discord attempted, but failed miserably, at holding back his laughter at the front of the class. “My, oh my,” Discord wheezed sat atop a chained trunk that was struggling underneath him. “Do I even want to ask?” “Never date a werewolf; they have dominance issues,” Scootaloo replied removing the bucket from her head. “I think the same can be said about draconequui,” Hermione said flatly before sticking her tongue out at her girlfriend. “Enough, please,” Discord wheezed once more. “You two are acting like an old married couple!” This caused the whole room to burst out laughing and both Hermione and Scootaloo to go red in the face. Slowly, as the laughter subsided, Discord took charge. “Settle down please. I’ve something extra special for today’s lesson. Who here might be able to guess what is in this chest?” Everyone except Hermione and Scootaloo just looked blankly at one another. Discord sighed. “Anyone else aside the dog and her bone? No, okay then, go ahead Miss Granger.” “Looking over the list of creatures we’ve got left to study this term the obvious one would be a Boggart. It’s a shape-shifter that can take the form of whatever will frighten us most.” “Excellent Miss Granger. Now why don’t you come up here and show us all how to deal with one?” Discord replied. Hermione’s eyes went wide. “M-me sir?” she squeaked. “Yes, you. No time like the present. Chop, chop,” Discord instructed. Scootaloo snickered next to Hermione. It was just like her big brain to get her in over her head. “Ah, Miss Prewett. How kind of you to volunteer as Miss Granger’s second. Master Potter, why is it useful for more than one person to face the Boggart at any one time?” Scootaloo immediately stopped snickering as Harry’s eyes shot open in surprise at being put on the spot. After a moment, Harry made an attempt at the question. “Er – because I’m guessing the boggart can only take the shape of one person at a time. So, if there are two people, it will become confused and not know what to transform into.” “Excellent. Get up here and bring that grinning ginger haired nitwit next to you as well,” Discord instructed. Ron’s face immediately dropped. As the four students gathered at the front of the class Discord gave them some very simple instructions. “The charm that repels a boggart is very simple. The only difficult part to it is that it requires force of mind. You need to force the boggart to assume a form that you find amusing as the only true way to finish a boggart off is through laughter. You all got that?” The four selected students backed by the entire class nodded in reply. “Excellent, so who’s first?” Discord asked. Three sets of feet all took a step back at the same time. “Excellent. Master Weasley. How very brave of you,” Discord stated reassuringly. Ron looked to his left and right suddenly realising his so-called friends had left him up a river without a paddle, or even a boat for that matter. All the colour suddenly drained from his face. “Now, now, no need to look so scared. First of all, what is your biggest fear?” “Sp-sp-spiders,” Ron whimpered as the chest continued to shake under Professor Discord. “Splendid! I want you to imagine the biggest, scariest spider possible, as that is what is about to come out of this trunk in a moment,” Discord explained. Ron looked like he was about to have a heart attack. “But don’t you worry. I won’t release the boggart until you are one hundred percent ready, okay?” Discord continued. “I-I don’t think I’ll ever be ready,” Ron whimpered again in reply physically shaking at the knees. The class chuckled in the background at that reply. Discord ignored them and continued to focus his attention on Ron. “Oh, you will be, I’ll make sure of that. Now that you’ve got that image ingrained in your mind, I want you to think for me really hard, what would Professor Discord do in this situation? Okay,” Discord explained some more. “W-what w-would Professor Discord do? What w-would Professor Discord do?” Ron began to mutter under his breath “What would…” And then he paused and to everyone’s surprise he began to laugh. “Excellent,” Discord said with a smile. “Now, focus solely on that image. Focus really, really hard on it and let nothing else distract you. When I jump of this box and unlock the lock I want you, while focusing on that image to point your wand at whatever comes out and shout Riddikulus! Got it?” Ron nodded his head, the colour slowly returning to his face along with a look of steely resolve. “Riddikulus,” he muttered under his breath. “Outstanding,” Discord stated jumping off the trunk. “Perfect pronunciation. Just remember that Riddikulus requires force of mind to alter the boggart into an amusing form and you shall be fine.” He then turned to the rest of the class. “I hope every one of you were paying attention to what I was just telling Master Weasley here as it’ll be each of your turns shortly. While he attempts to deal with the boggart, I want each of you to think of your biggest fear and then either think about how you can make that comical or if you’re struggling to do that, think about what I would do in that situation, okay?” “Yes sir,” the class replied as one. “Amazing. Now without further ado.” Discord placed himself behind Ron and pulled his wand from his suit. “Alohomora,” the lock on the trunk clicked open and fell to the floor with a thump. Slowly the lid lifted open and two long spindly legs poked themselves out of the trunk followed by a mass of beady eyes and then a huge abdomen. To Ron’s credit he didn’t take a second glance at the ginormous spider before pointing his wand at it and shouting “Riddikulus!” Lime green Roller skates immediately appeared on the spider’s feet along with a giant rainbow afro wig atop its head. Ron laughed. The boggart looked stunned as its legs went from underneath it and it struggled to stand. “Exceptional Ronald, twenty points to Gryffindor. Now, step back and let someone else have a turn. “Scoti, you’re up next,” Discord instructed. Scootaloo took a reluctant step forward as Ron stepped back. The boggart suddenly changed into a huge slobbering, and bright pink, werewolf that slowly began to advance on Scootaloo with a wild look in its eyes. Scootaloo took a deep breath, closed her eyes for a moment and then with a look of grim determination cried, “Riddikulus!” The werewolf was immediately replaced with a giant chicken much to everyone’s amusement. “Excellent, ten points to Hufflepuff. Now Hermione. And the rest of you start forming an orderly queue please,” Discord instructed once more. Hermione stalled as she approached the boggart and it suddenly changed into a very stern looking Professor McGonagall shaking her head. “Failure, utter failure,” boggart McGonagall tutted shaking her head. Hermione’s wand faltered, her hand shaking. Discord, seeing the trouble Hermione was having immediately intervened, pushing Harry forward and causing the boggart to become confused. And then, to Discord’s dismay, it took the shape of a dementor. Rushing forward he pushed the two children aside and faced the boggart, which immediately turned from a dementor into nothing but an inky dark mist. “Oh, nice try,” Discord said with smirk. “Riddikulus!” he cast and the inky darkness was replaced by Fluttershy in full clown gear and makeup riding a unicycle. Discord threw a banana peel onto the floor in front of boggart Fluttershy and in an instant the boggart went flying through the air and landed with a crash, into the chest that Discord slammed shut afterwards before locking it once more. “Okay, well that was unexpected. I do hope you two are all right,” Discord said with just the most minuscule bead of sweat on his forehead. “It is unusual for even me to be caught unaware. I was not expecting one of my students’ biggest fears to be fear itself. Very sensible Master Potter, ten points to Gryffindor and a further five for your brilliant answer earlier on.” Discord held out his hand and helped Harry back to his feet before turning to Hermione who was likewise being helped to her feet by Scootaloo. “Miss Granger, five points to Gryffindor for your knowledge earlier but you have a long way to go in overcoming your fear of failure. Keep practicing and I’ll let you have another crack at the boggart on Friday. For now, go take a seat and have a rest,” Discord stated before turning back to the remainder of the class. “Now, who else would like to tackle the boggart?” Apple Bloom gave Sweetie a slight nudge in the back sending her flying forward as she whistled nonchalantly. “I saw that Miss Bloom. Why don’t you and Miss Belle come and tackle it together?” Apple Bloom gulped and stepped forward alongside Sweetie Belle. “Now, so that we don’t have any more unwanted surprises, what do you two believe you fear the most?” “Death,” Apple Bloom admitted sombrely without a second thought. “Oh, now that’s an interesting one. How do you think that fear could possibly be beneficial for you though?” Discord requested while stroking his beard. “Well, I’m guessing it’s like Harry said earlier. The boggart will have trouble focusing on just what to portray,” Apple Bloom replied just as sombrely as before. “Precisely, this will give you just a slight edge and an extra second or two to cast Riddikulus! Use them wisely. And what about you Miss Belle?” Discord explained to Apple Bloom before turning his attention to Sweetie Belle. Sweetie’s face had gone red and she was staring at the floor. “My sister,” she said so quietly even Discord struggled to hear her. “A little louder so everyone can hear please,” Discord instructed. “MY SISTER,” Sweetie roared before realising just how loud she had been and covering her mouth with her hands in embarrassment as the entire class burst into laughter. After a moment to compose himself, Discord replied. “Fair enough. Now, who wants to go first?” Getting her revenge, Sweetie nudged Apple Bloom forward. After giving one of her best friends a stern look over her shoulder, Apple Bloom sighed. “Lets just get this over with.” The lock on the chest clicked open and fell to the floor with a thump. Slowly the boggart re-emerged and faced Apple Bloom. The girl froze in terror at what greeted her. “Apple Bloom, help,” boggart pony Applejack cried weekly lying on the floor. Her stomach had been completely ripped open and her insides were now on the outside of her body. She stared pleadingly into the young girl’s eyes. “No, no, no,” Apple Bloom stuttered trying to raise her wand but suddenly finding her body unwilling to cooperate. Sweetie was just about to step forward to help her friend but before she could someone else stepped out of the crowd wand raised. The boggart turned to the newcomer and immediately took on the form of Professor Snape. “Riddikulus!” Neville cried and suddenly Snape was dressed like an old lady in a garish green dress with a fox-fur scarf and a hat with a hideous vulture atop it. To top the whole look off he had a giant red handbag. This was too much for everyone, and, as the class erupted with laughter, the boggart suddenly exploded and burst into a thousand tiny whisps of smoke before disappearing completely. “Outstanding Master Longbottom. Ten more points to Gryffindor although now we no longer have a boggart to practice on. Might I ask, just what made you think of Professor Snape in such horrifying yet humorous attire?” “W-well I was wondering who I was frightened of more, Professor Snape or my grandmother and the image of him wearing my grandmother’s clothes suddenly just popped into my mind,” Neville admitted sheepishly. “I see. Well, you’ve earnt everyone the rest of the lesson to concentrate on their homework instead. If you work hard enough, you’ll have no homework this week other than practicing the Riddikkulus charm. The double sheet of questions can be collected from my desk and all the answers can be found in the chapter about Boggarts in your textbook,” Discord stated. “Hopefully I can find another boggart for our lesson on Friday.” * “Seriously Hermione? Your biggest fear could have been anything and yet it’s failure. Wow, that’s seriously lame,” Scootaloo said somewhat mockingly as they departed Defence Against the Dark Arts. “And you couldn’t even stomach facing it, super lame.” “Hey, I wasn’t the only one to fail!” Hermione snapped back. “Yes, but Bloom had to deal with literally seeing her sister dying, while Harry’s fear is fear itself. You could have at least frozen by seeing something truly frightening, like your parents dying or I don’t know, the moon?” Scootaloo suggested. “The moon?” Hermione quipped looking at her girlfriend sceptically. “Yeah, you know, being a werewolf and all. Ooh, now that would have been a cool thing to fear the most, yourself except in werewolf form!” Scootaloo stated excitedly. “Like you then? Are you really afraid of me?” Hermione asked, the tone of the conversation suddenly taking a drastic and much more serious turn. “N-no,” Scootaloo stuttered taken aback by her girlfriend’s question. “I-it’s not like that. M-my biggest fear is…” she paused for a moment staring forlornly at the floor before blurting out “…losing you to your werewolf side and not being able to do anything to help.” Hermione immediately stopped walking and grabbed hold of Scootaloo’s arm to stop her too. “Seriously?” she asked raising Scootaloo’s chin to see tears in her girlfriend’s eyes. Scootaloo nodded sombrely in reply. “You can remember everything you do as a werewolf but can’t do anything to stop yourself from committing the atrocities that your alter ego does. My biggest fear is that one day I won’t be able to be there for you and you’ll do something as a werewolf that you’ll regret for the rest of your life or worse, it will be me you rebel against and it’ll be all my fault for putting you in that position,” Scootaloo rambled barely making much sense towards the end of her tirade of emotions as the tears started to stream down her face. Hermione tenderly reached out with a hand and wiped away the tears, along with a dollop of green gloop, from her girlfriend’s cheek. “Thank you,” was all she said before she leaned in and planted a kiss upon Scootaloo’s lips. For Scootaloo, the soft and tender kiss ended way too quickly, although this time it was because of outside interference. “Oh no, you two can have lovey dovey time later,” Sweetie Belle said firmly as she pulled Scootaloo way from Hermione by her right ear. “Right now, Scootaloo has a date with mine and Apple Bloom’s hair. It’s going to take us all afternoon to get this goo out,” she finished with a scowl. “Sweetie!” Scootaloo whined to deaf ears as she was dragged unceremoniously away from Hermione. “Hermione help me! Hermione simply shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. “Sorry, you’ve brought this one on yourself,” she shouted down the corridor with a devilish smirk as she turned and raced to catch up with Harry, Neville and Ron.