23 4 vs Fluffy

The quartet went all the way to the second floor without any trouble. Although they saw Miss Norris walking around, they walked past her. However, just like in the book, at the third floor stairway, they saw Peeves.

"Who's there?" Peeves asked as he searched through the corridors. "I know you're there. Is it students or some ghoulies?"

"Harry," Argus whispered. "We don't have time for this buffoon. Do you think you can do an impression of the Baron?"

"Yeah, I'll try," Harry said.

"Peeves, the Bloody Baron has his reasons for being invisible. Do you think you have the rights to question me?" Harry now asked in a hoarse voice.

Peeves looked obviously scared, but before he could speak, Harry spoke once more.

"Stay away from here Peeves, I have things to do here," Harry said once more.

"Of course your bloodiness sir. I'll go right now," Peeves said as he went elsewhere.

"Nice job Harry," Argus said.

"Yeah good voice acting. We should do this again and scare the bejesus out of him," Ron said.

"He's probably not going to fall for it the second time," Hermione said. "Well what are we waiting for. We have a stone to recover,"

With Peeves gone, the four of them quickly arrived in front of the door that was ajar.

'Good we weren't too early. If Quirrell found us while we're doing the riddles, we'd be screwed,' Argus thought.

"Guys," Argus whispered. "It is your last chance to leave. If we get in trouble for this, we might all be expelled. I'm willing to take that punishment, but I know how much this school means to you guys,"

"Don't be silly Argus," Hermione whispered. "If even one person is doing this then we're all doing it,"

"Yeah," Ron said. "We're Gryffindor. We're the brave ones here,"

"Yeah and I'm going to make sure that the slimy Voldemort won't be able to hurt anyone else anymore," Harry said with determination.

"Alright then," Argus said. "We're going in,"

The four proceeded to go inside and was greeted with Fluffy, the Cerberus. It was wide awake and was growling at them as they opened the door. However, as it couldn't see them, it didn't attack.

The four saw a harp by Fluflly and looked at each other.

"It must be You-Know-Who," Ron whispered.

"Yeah," Hermione said. "I guess he beat us to it,"

Harry immediately took out a flute and started to play it. It was terrible, but it was enough to put Fluffy to sleep. The four slowly walked towards Fluffy's paw that was blocking the trapdoor.

While Harry was playing the flute, the other three were slowly moving Fluffy's paw. Argus thought that the operation would be smooth as Harry was now able to constantly play the flute.

However, Fluffy suddenly breathed out a huge amount of air making Harry drop his flute before the other three could finish opening the trapdoor.

'SHIT!' Argus thought. Before anyone could even move, Fluffy woke up and started growling at them. Harry, Ron, and Hermione were frozen with fear while Argus anxiously ran towards where Harry dropped the flute. However, before he could reach it, Fluffy ran towards him. Due to its big strides, Argus was forced to run away.

During the mini chase, Fluffy has broken the harp, but luckily the flute was still somehow intact.

'This isn't going to last long. The noise will wake someone up!' Argus thought.

"Harry!" Argus shouted. "Get the flute! I'll continue to distract Fluffy!"

Harry snapped out of his stupor and ran towards where the flute was. Seeing his movement, Fluffy switched target from Argus to Harry.

'That's one smart dog!' Argus thought as he took out his wand.

"INCENDIO!" Argus chanted. A small fire suddenly appeared on one of Fluffy's leg. It started running erratically while barking loudly.

"SILENCIO!" Argus also chanted. It was successful, but it wasn't perfect. As it was a spell taught in the 5th year, it only worked for 3 seconds. However, in those 3 seconds of complete silence, Harry was able to get the flute and immediately started to play it.

"Aguamenti!" Argus chanted once more to quickly get rid of the fire. A small stream of water was ejected from Argus' wand putting out the fire on Fluffy's leg. Luckily, the power of the flute was stronger than the pain left from the slight burning and Fluffy was once again completely asleep.

"That was quite scary," Ron said still a bit shaken from the event.

"I'll say," Harry said. "That dog was literally at my face before Argus put it on fire,"

"Luckily, it didn't bite your head off," Argus said. "I didn't want to put it on fire at first since I didn't want to harm it at all, but since it went after you, I was forced to,"

"Well, good thinking Argus," Hermione said. "Come on, we have to get down there," Hermione said as she got help from Argus and Ron opening the trapdoor while Harry was playing his flute. Harry made sure that he was holding the flute extra tight so that it wouldn't fall out of his hands,"

When they finally fully opened the trapdoor, it was completely black with no floor to be sighted.

"Alright I'm going down there," Argus said as he jumped. It was a soft landing due to the Devil's Snare. He noticed a faint feeling of the plant coiling around him. However, he had to get the rest down here.

"It's a soft landing," Argus said. "Just jump!"

The three nodded and jumped. Harry was the last one to jump and he was still playing the flute mid-air. Once he landed he put away his flute. Harry felt his surroundings and felt weirded out by the texture.

"What is this?" Harry asked.

"Don't know, but we're lucky that we got this plant to help our landing," Ron said.

"It's the Devil Snare," Argus said. "Quite the nasty fellow,"

Suddenly the Devil Snare started wrapping around all of them.

"AHHHH!" Harry and Ron screamed.