Chapter 116 - A naughty ghost

Unbeknownst to them, Myrtle sneaked near the potion and slowly but surely filled a whole vial with the murky liquid before dropping a small orange hair into it, all that while wearing a devilish smile on her ghostly face. She had been watching them for a while and knew they were brewing a Polyjuice Potion to disguise themselves as someone else. And because a particular boy didn't give her the attention she deserved, Myrtle decided to have some fun and make Hermione look like her cat, so that she could see how her friends would react.

She waited until none of the kids were not focused on her direction before she flew close to Hermione, who was talking with one of the other girls, Daphne if she remembered her name correctly. She quickly slipped the half-open vial into Hermione's robe pocket, hoping that she wouldn't notice before she flew away, giggling to herself.

It didn't take long for Hermione to feel something wet and sticky in her pocket, and because of that, she reached into it to see what it was and touched an opened vial, one that she didn't remember putting in her pocket.

"What's this?" she wondered.

As soon as the potion dripped onto Hermione's hand, a strange sensation prickled her skin. To her growing horror, she watched as tiny orange hairs began to sprout from her arm, like a wave, it rapidly spread, first around her hand and then up her arm. The potion seemed to have a life of its own, consuming her skin, replacing the human touch with a coat of orange fur. Before she could even process what was happening, the fur had spread to her shoulders and then began to crawl up her neck.

"Uh-oh," she muttered, her voice barely above a whisper.

Without a second to spare, she darted towards the bathroom stalls, The fur was now spreading across her face, changing the shape of her features, and her ears felt like they were elongating. Thomas and the others watched in surprise as Hermione vanished into one of the stalls, slamming the door shut behind her.

The last thing they heard before the transformation was completed was a soft, frightened whimper, sounding eerily like a cat's mewl. At the same time, Myrtle, who was watching from a distance, couldn't contain her laughter. The ghost had her revenge, and Hermione was her victim.

Unsure of what to do, Thomas decided to take a leap of faith and ask his mentor if he had felt something, after all, who knows, maybe this was some kind of curse.

'Did you feel anything?'

[The ghost used that potion of yours against you. I can't tell you more than that, because I don't know what she had done.]

As soon as he heard Bahamut, Thomas turned his head and tried to find Myrtle, but the ghost seemed to have vanished. Letting out a sigh, Thomas got up from the floor and made his way towards the stall where Hermione closed herself in.

Rather than forcing himself in, Thomas did the only thing someone should do and knocked on the door gently before calling out her name.

"Hermione? Are you okay?"

For a second nothing came, but then he heard a faint meow from inside the stall.

"Hermione, please let me in. I want to help you."

He heard another meow, followed by a sob.

"Please, go away. I don't want you to see me like this," Hermione answered back between purrs in a voice that sounded half-human and half-feline.

"Hermione, listen to me. You're not alone. I'm here for you. Whatever happened to you, we can fix it. We always do."

Despite knowing that she heard him, Hermione didn't say anything to him and only sobbed softly inside the stall. Once again left with no good option, Thomas turned towards his friends and with an almost begging expression on his face looked at Daphne, who let out a sigh as soon as she saw it.

Daphne walked towards the stall with Tracey shooing the boys away from the bathroom. As soon as Thomas and the boys left, Daphne told Hermione that only she and Tracey were in the bathroom.

"Hermione, you can open the door now. Thomas and others left. Only Tracey and I are left if you don't count the perverted ghost."

Hermione hesitated for a moment before finally opening the door and letting Daphne and Tracey in. They both gasped at the sight of Hermione, who was now half-human and half-cat. Her hair was bushy and her eyes were yellow, and she had a tail that swished back and forth.

Upon seeing her friend like that, Daphne quickly hugged Hermione, trying to comfort her as she sobbed into her shoulder. Tracey stood by the door, making sure no one else entered the bathroom, not that many had the courage but still it didn't hurt.

"Don't worry Hermione, everything will be alright. We just have to wait for the effects to disappear right?"

After a few minutes, Hermione calmed down and looked up at Daphne with tear-filled eyes. "Thank you," she whispered.

Daphne smiled at her friend. "We'll always be here for you, no matter what."

"Let's wash your face and then we'll take you up to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey will take care of the rest, after all as cute as you look, I'd rather not let something happen to you because you are half cat." Tracey said with a sagely aura, making her two friends giggle slightly.

For some strange reason, most likely courtesy of Myrtle's involvement with the potion, Hermione remained in the hospital wing for several weeks. There was a flurry of rumors about her disappearance when the rest of the school arrived back from their Christmas holidays because, of course, everyone thought that she had been attacked. So many students filed past the hospital wing trying to catch a glimpse of her that Madam Pomfrey took out her curtains again and placed them around Hermione's bed, to spare her the shame of being seen with a furry face. If that wasn't enough to scare the students away, the fact Thomas stood guard almost every day after classes scared a lot of the troublemakers away, to both Hermione and Madam Pomfrey's relief.

In all honesty, it wasn't easy to make Hermione allow Thomas to see her, but as soon as she finally caves to the boy's pleading, she let him see her, fearing the worst. However, to her surprise Thomas didn't laugh or look disgusted, instead for some strange reason unknown to her, he just blushed and turned away after telling her in a trembling voice that he was glad she was doing okay, he left the hospital wing in a hurry, choosing to chase away everyone who wanted to see if she turned to stone.

At the same time, Harry, Ron, Tracey, Daphne, Adam, and Michael went to visit her every evening and when the new term started, the two Gryffindor boys brought her each day's homework.

"If I'd sprouted whiskers, I'd take a break from work," Ron joked hoping to lighten Hermione's mood while tipping a stack of books onto Hermione's bedside table one evening.

"Don't be silly, Ron, I've got to keep up," Hermione answered briskly. Her spirits were greatly improved by the fact that all the hair had gone from her face and her eyes were turning slowly back to brown, as well as the fact that a certain someone was keeping all of the annoyance away from her. "I don't suppose you've got any new leads?" she added in a whisper so that Madam Pomfrey couldn't hear her.

"Sadly not. We are trying, but frankly, we might as well start searching for the needle in the haystack." Michael added with a frown on his face.

"Well look on the bright side, our shining knight managed to force the Slytherin students to stop their rumors that you have turned to stone. "Adam added with a smile while winking at Harry and Ron who were holding their laughs.

Daphne on the other hand elbow him so hard that poor Adam had to sit on the bed to recover.

"Anyways, we are planning to see if Tom's dream might shed some light on this."

Hermione looked at her with her eyebrows raised, not knowing what Daphne was talking about.

"A few days ago, Tom started having these strange dreams about some huge yellowish eyes staring at him in his sleep and every time he woke up, he was covered in sweat. We don't know what's going on, but for some reason, he's sure that it had something to do with the Myrtle's bathroom."

But before Hermione could them more about Tom's dreams, Madam Pomfrey came over with her evening dose of medicine, sending the kids away.

With nothing better to do, all of them decided to go back to the second-floor bathroom and see what they could find. As Thomas and the others made their way to the bathroom, they stumbled upon Filch, who was mumbling to himself. The kids quickly hid behind a corner and watched as Filch paced back and forth, muttering under his breath.

"Even more work for me! Mopping all night, like I haven't got enough to do! No, this is the final straw, I'm going to Dumbledore …"

His footsteps receded along the out-of-sight corridor and they heard a distant door slam. The moment they heard the door slam, they poked their heads around the corner. Filch had been manning his usual lookout post, the very same place where Mrs. Norris had been attacked.

Luckily for them, it didn't take long to find out what Filch had been shouting about. A great flood of water stretched over half the corridor, and it looked as though it was still seeping from under the door of Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. And since Filch disappeared and with him his shouting, all of them could now hear Myrtle's wails echoing off the bathroom walls.

"Now what's up with her?" Ron asked quite annoyed at the ghost girl.

"How knows? But as much as I don't like her, we should take a look." Thomas added while preparing his robe to walk into the flooded bathroom.

Being the first to walk into the flooded bathroom, Thoams was the first one to be hit by Moaning Myrtle's cry, which was probably the louder and hardest he had ever heard her cry before. She seemed to be hiding down her usual toilet. It was dark in the bathroom because the candles had been extinguished by the water that had left both walls and floor soaking wet.

Even though he wasn't all that keen on talking with this particular ghost, Thomas knew that despite everything she had done, Myrtle was not a bad person.

"Hey, Myrtle, are you okay? Did someone bother you again?"

"Who's that?" glugged Myrtle miserably at him. "Come to throw something else at me?"

"Now, why would I out of all of the people do that to you? I mean we might not be on the best terms, but still, that's pretty awful, especially when you are a girl."

Myrtle felt a bit better when she heard Thomas indirectly complimenting her, even though that was not his intention. She looked at him with a small smile on her face before continuing, "Don't ask me, here I am, minding my own business, and someone thinks it's funny to throw a book at me."

Thomas frowned, feeling sorry for the ghost. "That's terrible, Myrtle. I'm sorry that happened to you. Do you know who did it?"

Myrtle shook her head, still looking miserable. "No, I didn't see who it was. They just threw the book and ran away."

"If you don't mind me asking, where's the book?"

"It's over there, it got washed out."

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