Challenge #10 - Musical
Title:Musical Madness
Rating/Warnings:PG for some sexual insinuation.
Characters/Pairing:Main Character: Harry, various others; no pairings
Summary: A magical object causes Hogwarts students and professors to express their thoughts via Broadway showtunes.
Word Count:1,159
Author's Notes:My first attempt at HP fanfic! :)
Registered purchases?:Both registered
Perhaps Harry should not have been so surprised by how his Saturday morning would turn out. He had a hint of what was to come as he excited the Gryffindor tower to head to breakfast.
“Good Mornin’, Good MOOORRRNNIN’. It’s great to stay up late! Good Mornin’, Good Mornin’ to you!” Harry heard the screeching that the Fat Lady’s must consider singing and unwisely had excused them as a consequence of her imbibing too much ale the previous night with some of the barmaids in the paintings on the 5th floor.
Harry picked up his pace as he hurried to the grand hall. He’d promised Ron he’d meet with him and go through some quidditch drills with him after breakfast. Ron was already eating, having been forced by Lavender Brown to go on a morning walk. In fact, the Gryffindor tower was deserted when he’d walked through it, so he he’d most likely be one of the last to arrive for breakfast.
As Harry rushed through the hallways, he heard something very strange coming from one of the adjacent classrooms.
“Boy, boy, crazy boy! Stay loose, boy! Breeze it, buzz it, easy does it. Turn off the juice, boy!”
“I’m sorry, Professor, but I’m not quite sure what you are talking about.” Harry recognized the voice Draco Malfoy used when he was trying to suck up to teachers, and the only professor Malfoy seemed to respect was Snape. But there was no way that the voice Harry heard belonged to Snape, because, well…it had been singing.
“Go man, go, but not like a yo-yo schoolboy. Just play it cool, boy, Real cool!”
Harry was both intrigued and frightened by the prospect of Snape singing, but also didn’t want to get caught spying either. So he continued onto the Great Hall so he could share with Ron what he had overheard.
The scene that met Harry would stay with him the rest of his life.
Ron was already in his quidditch practice gear and was clutching a broom to his chest singing, “Too late for second-guessing. Too late to go back to sleep. It's time to trust my instincts. Close my eyes: and leap! It's time to try defying gravity. I think I'll try defying gravity and you can't pull me down!”
“Ron!” Harry said loudly, trying to gain his attention. “Are you alright man?” But Ron didn’t answer, for at that moment he was forced into the embrace of Lavendar Brown who was going on about loving him a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck.
Hermione, who was seated a few people down from them burst into tears when she heard that. She stood up from the table, held her fist against her heart, and then, just as Harry feared she would, she started to sing. “Guess mine is not the first heart broken. My eyes are not the first to cry. I'm not the first to know there's just no gettin' over you. Hello, I'm just a fool who's willing to sit around and wait for you. But baby can't you see, there's nothin' else for me to do. I'm hopelessly devoted to you!”
As Harry looked around the Great Hall the singing was everywhere.
From Flitwick, “Matchmaker, Matchmaker, make me a match. Find me a find, catch me a catch."
Frome Trelawney, “This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius. The age of Aquarius. Aquarius! Aquarius!”
Even Dumbledore was singing. Of course he seemed to be rather enjoying the chaos. He was going around and listening to everyone’s song, all the while encouraging everyone to smile and be happy. “Gray skies are gonna clear up, put on a happy face! Brush off the clouds and cheer up. Put on a happy face! And spread sunshine all over the place, just put on a happy face!”
The most disturbing so far seemed to be a tie between Professors McGonagall and Sprout. They both seemed to be needing to free themselves from some repressed thoughts, because while McGonagall was calling herself Mamma and encouraging everyone to be good to her, Sprout wanted people to touch her, demanding “Touch-a-touch-a-touch me! I wanna be dirty!” Harry really hoped she was referring to potting soil when she referred to being dirty, but he had an inkling that that wasn’t the case.
Just then Harry was tapped on the shoulder. He turned around and was confronted by Malfoy. Harry was about to asked he why he was there, when he felt an odd sensation creep over him. It was a weird compulsion stirring from the bottom of his soul. He felt like he was going to burst, to break into a million pieces if he didn’t find a release for the energy building up. It reached a zenith and then a song burst forth from his own mouth…
“Anthing you can do I can do better! I can do anything better than you!” Harry slapped his hand across his mouth. What had he just done?
Malfoy had an equally confused looked up his face, but after a moment seemed to be unable to stop himself from replying, “No, you can’t!”
“Yes, I can!”
Malfoy then took up the next verse, “Anything you can be I can be greater. Sooner or later, I'm greater than you!”
“No, you aren’t.”
“Yes, I am!”
Just then Hagrid burst into the great hall waving around what looked like a wooden music box.
“Don’t worry everyone. I found the source. Had to get through a chorus or two of You Can’t Stop the Beat before I could touch it, but I think I figured out how to make it all stop.”
Hagrid then threw the music box down on the floor and smashed it beneath his giant foot. Instantly, the hall quieted. Some people fell down to their knees in exhaustion. Harry silently stared at Malfoy, and the turned and walked away. He could hear Malfoy retreating to his own table too. Harry was glad for their silent agreement to just move on from their encounter.
“What kind of sick person would make a music box that would cause everyone to sing showtunes? ” Ron asked.
Hagrid answered that question, having heard it as he walked up to say hello to them, “It seems it was some man named Sondheim. Suppose it helped him get new ideas.”
“Well it seems evil to me. It not natural to sing your feelings like out loud like that,” Ron replied.
“Honestly Ron, you don’t really think it’s dark magic do you?” Hermione asked him, having dried her tears but still sporting red eyes.
At that moment, Neville could be heard softly whispering, “We go together like ramma lamma lamma ka dinga da dinga dong. Remembered forever as shoo-bop sha whada whadda yippidy boom da boom
Chang chang changity chang shoo bop that's the way it should be Waooo Yeah”
“Nevermind. Maybe it is.” Hermione laughed, and they all joined in.
Points:
1,173/30 = 39.1 39 points + 10 points for bonus items = 49 points for Gryffindor
