The Darkest Hour

It was a little after dinner, and the inhabitants of Number 12 Grimmauld Place were gathered in the hall to watch a highly interesting game of chess: Ron was playing Alan.

Both were highly skilled players, and they were very well matched. When two players of such caliber played against each other, the game was taken to a new level altogether.

It was a treat to watch the game unfold, the two players thinking ten moves ahead, slyly setting traps, sacrificing pieces in order to get an advantage later on in the game. To some, like Molly and Tonks, the game didn't seem very different than the thousands of others they had seen, and they were quickly bored.

Remus, Arthur, Ginny and Bill, however, who were all chess enthusiasts and had played Ron quite often, found the game to be a treat. It was a challenge to be able to spot the traps, to try and guess what the two players were up to and to see the rapid moves made by them.

Chess was a game of the mind and for you to master it you had to have a great deal of focus, clarity of thought and a certain amount of ruthlessness. It was the mind operating at its peak and it was a glorious thing to see.

They had very different playing styles. Ron relied more on his own instinct and experience. His main forte was defense, though he had the ability to put up a strong offense when called upon.

Alan, on the other hand, was more of an offensive player. He had a lot of knowledge about chess and had watched hundreds of the great chess games and players in action. He had read a lot of books on the game and knew a lot of highly spectacular plays. His style was very adaptable due to all his knowledge.

The game was almost halfway through and both were in a sort of stalemate. Each had lost a number of pieces and the game just got more and more complicated as it proceeded. The table they were playing on was littered with half broken pieces that would revert back to normal once the game was complete.

At first Alan was more than a little excited and awestruck at seeing the animated pieces. But he soon realized that they were more a hindrance than help.

They started out by shouting all kinds of advice at him, contradicting each other. Alan, being the experienced chess player that he was, noticed that most of the advice would actually harm him than do him good. This caused him to become very confused. On one hand was his years of experience in playing chess… on the other were these magical chess pieces who probably knew what they were talking about. Fortunately, Ginny took pity on him and told him to ignore the pieces and play his own game. It became much easier from there onwards.

Harry and Hermione sat a little distance away in a corner of the room, well away from the excitement of the game, as she coached him in the basics of advanced Arithmancy.

He was amazed how simple she made the whole subject seem and he finally began to understand Arithmancy a lot more clearly. What surprised him most about it was that it was the very same thing he was tearing his hair out trying to understand a few days ago and failing spectacularly.

She had a way of getting to the root of the problem extremely fast, discarding the unnecessary and finding the mistakes with a brief glance. He had shown her the problems he had been working on and where he was stuck, and she had immediately seen where the problem lay. Apparently, he had been applying the formulas incorrectly and that's why the equations were always coming out wrong. She had also pointed out that he used far too many unnecessary steps in solving the problem and had shown him a way that would require half the amount of steps.

She then proceeded to drill him thoroughly in all the formulas until he understood them perfectly.

Harry mused that if there was even a slight chance that he might pass the Arithmancy OWL exam, it had only been made possible because of Hermione. He was extremely grateful for having the bushy-haired genius as one of his friends.

He knew that teaching had never come easily to her. She had such a quick mind that it was sometimes frustrating for her to realize that others could not see things as clearly and quickly as she could. Over the five years helping him and Ron with their studies, she had managed to curb her impatience, but sometimes it still surfaced.

Pat sat nearby making notes in her long flowing handwriting, the Muggle Studies textbook open before her. Most of the coursework was extremely easy for her but occasionally she would turn to Hermione for help with some problem or the other.

Suddenly, Harry was distracted by the sound of muffled laughter and whirled around to peer in the direction it came from. He noticed that Sean, Jack and the twins were sitting in another corner of the room far away from everyone else and talking in low voices. He shook his head and grinned. Getting those four together meant a lot of trouble for everybody. All four were pranksters at heart and troublemakers of the first order.

It seemed that he wasn't very wrong in his estimation.

Sean and Jack were busy swapping stories with the twins about the pranks they had pulled. Back in Stonewall High, they had done their share of terrorizing hapless teachers.

"We had this really nasty literature teacher once... name of Harold Hemmingway... got on my nerves," Sean said slowly. "You remember him, Jack?"

Jack nodded. "Horsy faced, wore those horrible tweed suits and had that disgusting habit of spitting while he spoke."

"Yep, that's the one. He had this real mean streak... liked humiliating people, you know? Like he would make the person who wrote the worst essay publicly read it in front of the class, always seemed to take a savage pleasure in failing people. Nearly failed us a couple of times, too," Sean said, a frown flitting across his face.

"Yeah," Jack agreed. "One day he went on for half an hour about how stupid a girl was for writing a substandard essay. It wasn't really her fault either, her mother was sick and she was taking care of her… didn't have time to write anything till the last minute. By the end of it, she was so humiliated that she started crying."

Sean grinned. "We got him real good though. Put a copy of Playboy in his office and hid nearby with a camera and a decent zoom lens. When he picked it up, we managed to get a few shots off that he had a very hard time explaining away."

Jack sniggered. "He was nicknamed 'Dirty Harry' and left soon after that."

The talk drifted to other topics and soon they were discussing their love lives... or the lack thereof.

"Girls! Pah! I'll be damned if I can figure them out," Sean said bitterly.

"You and the rest of us," George said sympathetically. "They tend to get awfully moody."

"Yeah," Fred said with a fearful glance at Ginny. "Especially during certain times of the month."

"Well, you did act a bit stupidly, mate," Jack pointed out.

"I did not! It was a reasonable question," Sean grumbled.

Jack shrugged. "Suit yourself."

"What happened?" Fred asked, leaning forward interestedly.

Jack grinned. "Well, this girl, Meg, agreed to go on a date with him and when he arrived to pick her up she wasn't ready yet. So he's waiting for her… and waiting is something that Sean isn't very good at…"

"She took a bloody hour!" Sean said hotly.

"Yeah, well, she comes down and Mr. Eloquence here goes and asks her why the hell she took so long to dress up for a movie where its going to be dark and nobody can see her anyway. What happened next you can guess…"

Fred and George joined Jack in snickering at poor Sean, and he gave them a dark look.

"So, isn't there some sort of hocus pocus magical stuff to make girls fall for you?" he asked irritably.

The looks the twins suddenly shot at each other made Sean and Jack sit up straighter, expectant grins on their faces.

Five minutes later...

"So... you're saying a few drops of this and any girl will fall in love with you?" Sean asked excitedly, fingering a vial of purple potion like it was the elixir of life.

"No. While you do get potions which do that, they are highly illegal," Fred explained. "We can't very well sell them in the shop, so we came up with our own little version."

"Yep, what this does is enhance any feelings the person who you are wooing has for you and makes them a tad more friendly," George said, winking.

"You guys are geniuses!" Jack said with a huge grin on his face.

"Why, thank you," Fred said buffing his nails carelessly on his dragonhide jacket.

"We try our best," George finished modestly.

Sean and Jack didn't respond. They were too busy plotting how they would use the marvelous potion on a number of girls in Stonewall High.

"Guys," Fred said slowly, his voice suddenly serious. "Be careful with that potion. If you get caught with it, it's all our necks."

"Yeah, I'm not saying don't use it… but in your world it becomes a whole different ballgame. Using it for pranking might not be such a good idea," George joined in.

Sean nodded. "We know… using it on somebody who doesn't like us would come too close to rape for us to be comfortable doing it. Don't worry; we will be careful."

Fred grinned. "Ok, then, lets see what else we have to show you…"

"Do you think they'd be interested in seeing the Weasley Blaster?" George asked thoughtfully.

"A truly splendid idea, brother mine!"

"The Weasley blaster?" Jack asked uneasily, afraid that they were going to be shown some sort of gun.

"It's the music system we developed for Ickle Harrykins," George explained.

Sean looked highly excited at this as he had a great love for music. He wasn't disappointed. The system was something from his wildest dreams. No Muggle music system available even came close to the sound quality. The added functions like the sound bubble and ability to run without electricity thrilled him even more. He could just imagine being able to listen to music however loud he wanted at any hour. It would be sheer bliss.

"Guys, how much would something like this cost?" he asked slowly, the longing shining through his eyes.

The twins looked at each other and did a few quick calculations. "Hmm… well… I'd say about two thousand pounds," Fred said slowly.

"Yeah, it cost a lot more to make the first time since we ruined several music systems trying to figure out how they worked," George explained.

"Two thousand pounds," Jack said in astonishment. "That's a lot, guys… I don't think most people would be able to afford it."

"Yeah…" George said slowly. "It's the Muggle parts that are so expensive."

"Where did you buy them from?" Sean asked curiously.

"Some shop on New Bond Street," Fred replied.

Sean stared at him. "New Bond Street? But that's one of the most overpriced places to shop!"

"Guys… just what system was it that you bought?" Jack asked suddenly. The shape of the music system seemed faintly familiar even though it was changed so much it was almost impossible to tell.

When George named the company which made the music system Jack slapped his head in frustration. "You guys went to one of the most exclusive shops in London and bought the most overpriced system they had. No wonder it cost you so much!"

Fred and George looked at each other, highly irritated with themselves. It seemed that they had spent a lot of money quite irresponsibly. It didn't matter if they didn't know the Muggle world that well or that they had known next to nothing about Muggle music systems. Money wasted was money wasted.

"Next time you guys want to buy a music system, you come to us," Sean said. "We'll take you to a few places where you'll get them at discounted prices. Hell… you can buy parts second hand… sometimes people just use their music systems for six months and then buy a new one… they are hardly used. You can get a great deal if you get lucky."

The twins grinned. "We will definitely take you up on that," Fred promised.

"Yeah, if we can get the Muggle equipment more cheaply, then we can probably reduce the cost to make it," George said excitedly.

"Hmm… tell you what… why don't we go out one of these days into London and we can show you the shops we visit," Sean offered.

"Sounds good to us," George said with a huge grin.

"In return, we'd be happy to show you Diagon Alley and if we can slip away from Mum, a few more exciting places," Fred said with a wink.

Sean and Jack grinned. They already loved the magical world.