"Didn' know she could run this fast, mate," said Ron, breathin' heavily.

"Me neither," said Harry as he saw her running up the Girl's dormitory.

"What's gotten into her, she's been acting weird," said Ron with a frown that vanished as soon as he saw her coming back down.

Hermione sprinted towards her companions, clutching a small parchment tightly in her hand. Beads of sweat glistened on her forehead, indicating her haste and urgency.

"What's gotten into you? I thought you were running to McGonnagal about the dragon," said Ron.

"I came here for this, look," she said, stretching out the parchment for the two to see.

'The deal was sealed in a drunken haze, the beast obtained, but the key was given in exchange. Now two will climb the midnight stair, as the third slumbers beneath the sheets in despair.'

"What is it?" asked Harry.

"It's supposed to be a prophecy," replied Hermione.

"A what? By whom, and since when did you start taking these things seriously," asked Ron surprised.

"I don't take them seriously, Professor McGonagall said that it's the most imprecise branch of magic," said Hermione, looking at the weird expression on Ron's face.

"But look here at the first part," she said, pointing with her finger.

"You think it's about Hagrid and the stranger?" Ron said.

"It must have been Snape behind that cloak, and now he knows how to get past Fluffy, it's only a matter of time before Quirrell gives in too and tells him how to get past his enchantments," said Harry with a frown.

"If Snape is the one behind the cloak, then who's the third? It says 'Now two will climb the midnight stair, as the third slumbers beneath the sheets in despair,' If Hagrid's the one in despair, cause he's let Dumbledore down, then that means-"

"-that Snape's got a helper," said Harry completing her sentence.

"Or he forces Quirrell to come with him," said Hermione.

"Snape's done it, then!" said Ron. "He now knows how to get past Fluffy, it's only a matter of time before Quirrell gives in."

"There's Dumbledore, Snape won't try anything under his nose, will he?" said Harry, he was quite sure that Dumbledore was the greatest wizard in the world, even Voldemort was afraid of him.

"It's until Dumbledore's away then, that's when he'll do it," said Ron, "what do we do?"

The light of adventure was kindling again in Ron's eyes, but Hermione answered before Harry could.

"We should go to Dumbledore, we should have done ages ago. If we try anything ourselves we'll be thrown out for sure."

"But we've got no proof!" said Harry. "Quirrell's too scared to back us up. Snape's only got to say he doesn't know how the troll got in at Halloween and that he wasn't anywhere near Hogsmeade; who do you think they'll believe, him or us? It's not exactly a secret we hate him, Dumbledore'll think we made it up to get him sacked. Filch wouldn't help us if his life depended on it, and all we have is this piece of parchment for proof. And don't forget, we're not supposed to know about the Stone or Fluffy. We're going to get Hagrid in trouble as well."

"This isn't really proof, it doesn't even make any sense; where did you get it anyways?" Ron asked Hermione.

"It's from Brown, he's in Ravenclaw, remember?" she said.

"Oh him? then it makes proper sense. Snape's definitely going to get the stone," said Ron.

"What do you mean?" asked Harry.

"You don't know mate but he's never wrong about these things, he's made more money betting on Quidditch matches than I'll ever see."

"He even predicted you breaking the record for the fastest-ever capture of the Snitch, nobody believed him then," said Hermione.

"You should ask him for a cut mate, he's made quite a bit betting on you," said Ron.

"So that's why he sent me presents on Christmas and on Easter too," said Harry.

"Anyways, I think we should forget about all this, even if Snape gets the stone, it's got nothing to do with us, we should make sure the Hargrid doesn't burn down his hut," said Harry.

He had promised himself to stop meddling in all this, and even if he hated Snape, there wasn't much he could do about it right now.

They now had more important things to worry about, like what would happen to Hargid if anyone found out he was hiding an illegal dragon in his hut.

---

Soon the holidays were over and everyone was back in the castle, the trio tried looking for Brown, but he was nowhere to be found; he was still seen in classes, but it was as if could disappear right after. They too were quite busy to go looking around for him.

"Wonder what it's like to have a peaceful life," Ron sighed, as evening after evening they struggled through all the extra homework they were getting. Hermione had now started making study schedules for Harry and Ron, too. It was driving them nuts.

Then, one breakfast time, Hedwig brought Harry another note from Hagrid. He had written only two words: It's hatching.

Ron wanted to skip Herbology and go straight down to the hut. Hermione wouldn't hear of it.

"Hermione, how many times in our lives are we going to see a dragon hatching?" Ron said, trying to persuade her.

"We've got lessons, we'll get into trouble, and that's nothing to what Hagrid's going to be in when someone finds out what he's doing-"

"Shut up!" Harry whispered.

Malfoy was only a few feet away and he had stopped dead to listen. By the look on Malfoy's face, he had heard more than he was supposed to.

After arguing for the whole morning, everyone agreed to run down to Hagrid's straight after the Herbology lesson. At the edge of the forest, Hagrid greeted them, looking flushed and excited.

"It's nearly out." He ushered them inside.

The egg was lying on the table. There were deep cracks in it. Something was moving inside; a funny clicking noise was coming from it.

Despite having a literal dragon in the room, their attention was grabbed by the fifth person who was already sitting at the table, waving at them.

"Yoh, wotcha," he said with a smile.

"Bloody 'ell, wot's 'e doin' 'ere?" Ron said with shock.

"Hagrid! You're not supposed to tell anyone about this," said Hermione, a little shocked and worried.

"E already knew, I didn't say a word."

"An' I thought ye'd be tickled pink t'see me here, 'tis a cryin' shame," Ben said, with a heavy accent, putting on a very sad expression.

--Dreamscape--

Yes, a lot of dialogue from the books here, I had to do it to show what's going on with the trio.

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