Chapter 589: The Common Room at Midnight (Edited)

When Fish and Hermione returned to the Gryffindor common room after their fun day out, Harry, Ron and Neville were still busy with their homework.

This was normal, as only the fifth years had the heaviest workload.

Seamus and Dean were nowhere to be seen, he wasn't sure if they had finished or if they had opted to go back to their dorms to catch up on their homework.

"Haven't they finished their homework yet?"

?(ΦωΦ)?

Fish greeted the trio gloating a little.

Ron looked up, "Fish, Hermione, help us!"

Of the three of them, he had the most homework left to do...after learning that his brothers would be buying him a new flying broom, he had been too preoccupied to concentrate on his homework.

Harry, meanwhile, was plagued by a strange night's sleep and a painful scar, so he didn't do much homework.

Neville's reason was a little more amusing... he was one of the few boys who had finished his homework early, but he had forgotten his Defense Against the Dark Arts homework and, if Seamus hadn't reminded him of it before he went to bed, Neville would have thought he had finished all of it.

It was a ridiculous excuse, but it was something Neville could have done.

"It's no good copying homework nya."

(ˇˇˇ)

Fish rightly refused Ron's request for help.

The reason for his refusal was also simple....

He was being watched by Professor McGonagall and Hermione not to copy from other people's homework, so there was no way he could possibly lend it to anyone else!

"Who told you to put the homework in at the end of the day?!". Hermione began to lecture habitually.

Ron's gaze instantly dropped, I should have known better than to ask them for help, I hadn't copied my homework and Hermione had to tell me...

It was a great loss.

Neville's lips twitched slightly, trying to defend himself, but he swallowed his words under the weight of Hermione's presence.

"Nya?"

(°ω°≡°ω°)

As Harry was lectured by Hermione, Fish shrugged his nose and looked around.

"What's wrong, Fish?"

Harry asked, actually not that curious, but simply wanting to interrupt Hermione's chatter.

"Siri..." Fish looked at Neville and changed his words to: "Has Cold nya arrived? Fish smells it...weak though."

Harry and the others were startled and, after a similar glance around, began to exchange silent glances.

Only Neville, who was standing on the sidelines, looked confused, "Who's Cold?"

"Uh... he's a dog, he used to live in the Forbidden Forest." Harry half-answered, "Maybe someone met him in the Forbidden Forest and brought back his scent?"

Neville didn't doubt it, after all Cold's name sounded like something that would name a dog, so he nodded and went back to his homework.

Fish was about to say something, but Hermione nudged him slyly and he kept his mouth shut.

"Never mind, for pity's sake," Hermione said, shaking her head helplessly, "I'll give you a hand, but I won't lend you my homework."

She hadn't bothered with the boys who deserved it, but the situation was such that Neville had to be dismissed before they could continue their discussion.

Neville had the least amount of work left to do, and since this term's Defense Against the Dark Arts class was all about theory, Hermione rushed to help him with the work Umbridge had assigned him.

As soon as Neville left, Hermione pulled out her wand and cast a soundproof spell.

"What's going on? Has Sirius come?" she asked sharply.

"No..." Harry and Ron shook their heads in confusion, "We haven't seen him at all."

The three turned their attention to Fish.

"Fish doesn't know either!"

⊙ω⊙

Fish was equally confused, "Fish just smelled Sirius... The smell wasn't there before Hermione and I left nya."

"The fireplace!" Harry suddenly remembered Sirius coming in through the fireplace to talk to himself last term, he looked up at the fire beside him and guessed. "He must have looked down the chimney, realized there were too many people in the common room and left."

"But... that's not right..."

(?ω?)

Fish scratched his head and questioned, "Didn't Minerva say that the Red Flu was being watched by the Ministry, so he couldn't use the fireplace to go to Sirius' house? And conversely, she can't use the fireplace at his house to come here, can she?"

Then he walked over to the fireplace and sniffed at it again, turning his nose and mouth into a cat's mouth and opening it for a moment before saying, not quite sure, "But... it seems to smell a little stronger over here..."

Because of the charcoal fire, Sirius' scent had been masked so much that Fish couldn't be sure.

"We'll find out here," Hermione said, "If Sirius really did come by the Red Flu to look for Harry, then he'll be back to check it out.... You two go back to finish your chores! I'll stay here with Fish."

Hermione blurted out without hesitation as she saw that Harry and Ron seemed to want to stay by the fireplace as well.

Ron, however, did as he was told and returned to his task, while Harry dawdled for a while before returning to his homework, glancing up at the fireplace from time to time.

After about twenty minutes like that, a man's head suddenly emerged from the flames of the common room fireplace.

"Sirius!" Harry, who had been watching, immediately dropped his quill and rushed over.

"Ah... Good evening..." replied Sirius, somewhat dumbfounded, as he emerged from the flames.

To be honest, he was startled, after all, seeing a pair of big green eyes staring at him as he peered down the chimney would have made anyone nervous, not to mention the fact that the owner of those big eyes had given him a good thrashing....

"Why can you use the flu net nya?!"

?(ΦДΦ)?

Fish shouted in disgust before Harry could catch up to his godfather.

"Fish was denied access to the fireplace during the summer vacations! Didn't they say that the Ministry would find out?!".

"Ah... this..." explained Sirius fluently after a moment of panic, "Because before I've only been watching myself every hour for a few seconds, without actually going through the fireplace, so the Ministry of Magic wouldn't find out."

"What now?"

(ˇˇˇ)

Fish didn't budge.

"Now I don't come around here either, just poking my head in to see if I'm in the wrong place, lest I attract the attention of the Ministry." Sirius replied with a smile and air of assurance.

"Is that really true?" Hermione looked at him skeptically, then said, "I'll check with Professor McGonagall later."

Sirius' face froze for a moment, then, before anyone else could react, he returned to his carefree look and continued smiling, "Of course, Hermione, you're a very thoughtful girl."

Hermione was taken in by his look and nodded without another word.

But Fish, who had excellent eyes, pointed to the head in the fire and said with assurance, "You're lying!"

(?ω?)