Hermione, Ron, Harry and Ben had just finished their last Hogwarts final exams. They hadn't been as hard as some made them out to be, but that didn't take away from how badly they had spent the last few days, studying until late at night and hardly being able to take breaks.

"You know," commented Hermione as they walked out of the castle, on their way to visit Hagrid. "I had always heard Hogwarts end-of-year exams were frightful, but I found them rather enjoyable."

"Oh yes, they have definitely become my favorite leisure time activity."

Harry chuckled at his friend's comment, but his laughter was cut by him clutching his forehead in pain.

"You alright, Harry?" Ron asked.

"It's the scar," he answered. "It keeps burning."

"Do you want us to take you to Madam Pomfrey?"

"No, no, it's fine, we're close to getting the stone!"

"Yeah, but trying to solve a mystery with a burning scar doesn't sound like a very bright idea to me," Ben remarked, staring at Harry.

"I think it's a warning, that danger-" he replied, but cut himself off with a groan, lifting his hand to his forehead in pain.

"Harry, honestly, you should go to the hospital wing, y-" started Hermione, but Harry interrupted her with a gasp.

His green eyes were fixed on Hagrid's hut. "Of course!" He quickened his pace, Hermione sprinting after him as Ron and Ben exchanged confused glances before following them.

"Don't you see?" Harry asked, looking at the three of his friends. "Don't you think it's a bit odd that what Hagrid wants more than anything is a dragon, and a stranger turns up and happens to have one?" He made a small pause to let them process his words. "I mean, how many people wander around with dragon eggs in their pocket? Why didn't I see it before?"

The quartet ran as fast as they could to Hagrid, who was playing a nice song on his flute.

"Hagrid!" Harry yelled out of breath as soon as they arrived. "Who gave you that dragon egg at the pub that night? What did they look like?"

"Well, I don't know..." Hagrid admits, surprised by the boy's intensity. "I never saw his face, he kept his hood up."

"But this stranger and you must have talked, right?"

Hagrid went silent for an instant, thinking. "He wanted to know what sorta creatures I looked after, and I told him. I said 'after Fluffy, a dragon's gonna be no problem."

"Right, and did you tell him anything else? Did he seem interested in Fluffy?"

"Well of course he was interested in Fluffy! How often d'ya come across a three headed dog, even if you're in the trait? But I told him, 'the trick with any beast is to know how to calm it'. Take Fluffy, for example, just play 'im some music and he goes right to sleep." Hagrid told them casually.

"You told him that?" shrieked Ben, sounding much more high-pitched than intended.

"Yes- Oh no. I shouldn't have told you that."

The four Gryffindors exchanged glances, and ran back to the castle, faster than they had ever run before.

"Thanks, Hagrid!" Hermione called over her shoulder. The gamekeeper yelled something, but they were already too far to hear him.

They kept running until they stopped in front of Professor McGonagall's office. "We have to see Professor Dumbledore, immediately!" Harry panted, catching his breath.

"I'm afraid Professor Dumbledore is not here," the woman informed them. "He received an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic and left immediately for London."

"When's he coming back, then?"

"This is very important, it's about the Philosopher's Stone!"

McGonagall's serious and strict expression disappears momentarily, exposing confusion. "How do you four know-"

"Someone's going to try to steal it!"

"I don't know how you found out about the stone, but I assure you it is perfectly protected. Now, if you would please go back to your dormitories. Quietly." She gave each of them a stern look before going back to her work.

They looked at her for a second, but they turned and left the office helplessly.

"There is no longer any chance to protect the stone if Dumbledore is gone," said Ron, crestfallen.

"Don't be so pessimistic, Ron..."

"But he's right, Ben," Hermione agreed. "Snape now knows how to get past Fluffy!"

"But so do we," he reposes, with an enigmatic smirk.

"Good afternoon," said Snape's voice behind them. "Now, what would four young Gryffindors such as yourselves, be doing inside on a day like this?"

Hermione began stuttering crazily, and Ben was reminded of Alycia. "We-We... We were just..." She might be a wonderful student and a very good friend, but the ability to lie well was not among his qualities.

However, it was among Ben's.

"Is there a problem with staying in during a hot day to avoid having a sunstroke, professor?" He asked, giving him an innocent look.

"No, there isn't, Mr. Walker," Snape replied sharply. "However, you should really be careful walking around the corridors. People may think you're..." He made a pause so long that Ben began to think it would be dark before he finished the sentence. "Up to something."

"Five points off Gryffindor for your insolence, Mr. Walker." Snape turned and walked away without saying a word more.

"Forget all my efforts the other day in transfiguration class to get McGonagall to give us five points," Ben groaned.

"Don't worry, you'll see when everyone finds out that Snape works with Voldemort, it'll all be worth it, and nobody'll care about who wins the House Cup," Harry assured. "We'll do it tonight."

"Do what?" asked Hermione.

"Get the stone before Snape does."

———————————————

Harry, Ben and Ron waited silently in their dormitory until everyone else was asleep. Hermione did the same in the girls dormitory, and the four of them met in the common room quite late at night.

As soon as the girl came down the stairs, the croaking of a toad almost scared their hearts out. "Is that Trevor?"

"Oh, Neville's gonna be so scared if he loses Trevor again," whispered Ben. "We should take him upstairs."

"We'll do it after we finish this, or we'll end up getting caught," said Hermione.

Trevor croaked again.

"Trevor, shh! Go, you shouldn't be here." Ron scowled the toad.

"Neither should you," said a voice from behind a sofa. Neville got up and turned to face them.

"Neville-"

"No!" Neville snapped angrily. "You're trying to sneak out again, aren't you?"

"Neville, please listen to me," Ben spoke in a calm voice, approaching the boy cautiously. "Look, we're not going to do anything wrong, we're just going to protect something very valuable, something that if it falls into the wrong hands will make us all pay the consequences."

"I don't care!" he cried out. "You'll get Gryffindor in trouble again, we've already lost more than a hundred points because of you four." He gulped, and raised his feasts. "I'll fight you."

Hermione took a deep breath before stepping forward, taking her wand out and pointing at Neville with it. "Neville, I'm really sorry about this." Neville's face went white in terror, realising he had nothing to protect himself with. "Petrificus Totalus."

The boy fell to the floor with a loud thud, his body as stiff as a board.

"He'll be okay, right?" Ben stuttered, turning to Hermione.

"No, she just murdered him in cold blood in front of us." Harry said sarcastically as the boy rolled his eyes.

"You're a little scary sometimes, you know that? Brilliant, but scary." Ron gulped.

"Let's go, then."

"Sorry," Harry whispered, stepping cautiously around Neville's body.

"Sorry," Hermione repeated.

"It's better this way," Ron adds, sounding like he was at a funeral. "You know, for your own good."

"I promise we'll return, and Hermione will turn you back," Ben concluded. "Unless our plan doesn't work, and we die a horribly painful death caused by Fluffy-"

"Merlin's sake, Ben!"

"Sorry, sorry..." he mumbled, rushing after them. The four huddled together, pulling Harry's invisibility cloak over themselves. They got out of the common room and through the halls.

"Ow!" Hermione half-screamed at Ron. "You stepped on my foot."

"Sorry..." the red headed boy answered sullenly. They kept walking as silently as they could until they finally reached the third floor corridor. "It seems like it's been forever since we were here the first time, doesn't it?"

"Well, it's been quite a few months."

Hermione raised her wand towards the door and whispered, "Alohomora." The door opened slightly with a small creak, and the Gryffindors held their breath before Harry pushed the door open.

Expecting to hear crazy growls and barks, Ben almost laughed at the sight of Fluffy sleeping peacefully. "He even looks cute like this."

"Every day it gets clearer that you're crazy," Harry whispered.

"I feel brutally offended right now."

Fluffy snored heavily, throwing the invisibility cloak off them. They suddenly became aware of a soft, lulling melody coming from a harp to their right.

"Snape's already been here," said Harry, disappointed. "We're too late."

"Hagrid said there's more things protecting the stone, maybe he's having trouble with one of them and we can get to him," Ben told them, refusing to let them lose hope.

Harry nodded. "We've got to move the paw, then."

Carefully, they crouched down, taking places on the sides of the creature's paw. "Okay, push!"

They pushed with all their might, barely able to get his paw out of the trapdoor. Harry opened it and looked up to his friends. "I'll go first," he declared. "Don't follow until I give you a sign. If something bad happens, get yourselves out."

Ben wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea of abandoning Harry to his fate there, but he decided not to say anything to avoid arguments.

"Does it seem a bit... quiet to you?"

"The harp!" Hermione gasped, turning to look at it. "It's stopped playing!"

A thick white substance fell on Ron's shoulder. "Eughh!" he groaned in disgust. "Yuck!"

"Is that..." They all looked up slowly, already knowing what they were going to see.

"Jump!" Harry yelled.

Knowing there wasn't any other option but that, the four of them jumped through the trapdoor, with Ron barely able to escape being bitten by the dog. 

A/N: the rewriting of first year is almost over!