There\'s No Place Like Home

Chapter Three

Exploding Cauldrons

Hermione walked into her classroom on the fifth floor corridor. Having already been to it earlier, it was already tuned to what she thought that it should look like. She settled down into her high-backed, black leather swivel chair behind the mahogany teacher\'s writing desk. Just as in her workroom, all four walls of the rectangular room were hidden by bookshelves, which were full of massive volumes about Defense Against the Dark Arts.

Finally, the students slowly started to trickle in. This claas, as, according to the schedule on her desk, fifth year Gryffindors and Slytherins.

\'Oh, joy. The Rivalry first thing in the morning.\'

As soon as all of the students were seated, Hermione stood up.

\"Hello, my name is Professor Hermione Granger. Now, some of you may remember me from your first year here as the Head Girl, but I shall hope that doesn\'t make you think that I\'ll you you get away with any nonsense you manage to conjure up. Any fooling around will result in house point deduction, or, if the situation calls for it, detention,\" she smiled, \"I\'m sure that none of you would like that, so I expect good behavior.\" At this she glared at a Slytherin raven-haired boy passing dungbombs to the boy beside him. She sighed and walked over to him.

\"Hand them over, stand up, and state your name,\" Hermione said in an acidic tone to rival Snape\'s.

Raven-hair did as she said, looking up into her eyes as he talked.

\"Alex Redmond, Professor,\" he smirked.

\"Ten points from Slytherin. Never bring dungbombs, or anything else that would be disruptive to my class again. The next time you\'ll be spending your free time reading and reporting on the four largest texts in my classroom library. You will then not leave until I have seven feet of parchment written on what you read in my hand.\"

Redmond looked cross, and opened his mouth to retort.

\"Sit down. And shut your gob.\"

As soon as Alex sat down again, Hermione continued her speech.

\"In this class, we\'ll be studying and researching the Dark Arts. To learn how to defend against something, you must first learn how that thing works. So, stand up with your things, and I\'ll tell you where to sit.\"

As her students did as she asked, Hermione picked up her attendance sheet from her desk, and walked over to the first desk. \"Asaka, Sakura,\" Hermione called out.

The Japanese girl in a silver and green kimono and obe walked up to the desk, put her bag on it, and turned to Hermione.

\"Konnichiwa, Granger-sensei,\" Asaka said, bowing.

\"Hello. Please sit down, Miss Asaka,\" Hermione said.

\"Hai,\" was the only reply.

The rest of the role call went without incident, but for when Hermione got to Redmond. He strutted to his seat in the third row and sat down, putting his feet up on the desk. That cost Slytherin another two points.

Hermione had the students pull out their DADA books to read the first chapter silently. She then settled into her chair, mind wandering off.

~*~*~

Hermione was in the potions lab, again, working on her research project. She wanted to find a cure for lycanthropy. Her detailed notes, books on the subject, other wizards\' and witches\' attempts, and potions supplies were orderly scattered on the tables surrounding her. A bubbling jade-green potion was in the cauldron on the center of Hermione\'s table.

Just as she was about to pour in the next ingredient, the door slammed open to reveal an anxious and flustered Professor Snape.

Hermione\'s hand slipped on the vial, and all of the blood-red liquid dropped into the cauldron.

Hermione\'s eyes, as well as the Potions Master\'s, widened in horror as the cauldron exploded.

~*~*~

At the sound of the memory-blast, Hermione jerked out of her reverie.

\"Are you alright, Professor?\"

It was one of the Gryffindors, Anna Rose. The entire class was staring at her.

\"Oh, ev-everything is fine! Er..write a summary of the chapter you read and have it ready to turn in by Monday. Class dismissed.\"

The students groaned collectively while picking up their stuff to leave.

Hermione sunk back down into her chair, massaging her forehead.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Well, here\'s the next chapter! I\'m not going to be able to post the next chapterfor a few days, because I have a project due on Monday that I have been working on for months, and I want to make sure that it\'s perfect. Also, there\'s going to be a Leap Year party at my house tomorrow, and I\'m going to need to clean up my room. Reviews:

Denali: I\'ll have you know, Denali, that I\'ve been working on this fic for almost all of the school year. I\'m a slow writer, and I get writer\'s block very easily. I\'m not, infact, holding up the story for reviews, because I was planning on posting it today, anyway. Also, for your \"childish\" comment, I AM a child (16). My writing ability is just so-so, but I\'m working on it. I also find that people that flame stories are extremely childish. If you don\'t like it, then why do you read it? It\'s not my fault that you are wasting your time reading something that you don\'t even LIKE.

J: See, what I\'m doing is a little bit confusing. I think I\'m going to have a few chapters of only memories, to make it so that you understand where I\'m going. And why does Granger hate Severus? It\'s in the memories later on.

Stratyllis: Like I said with J, you\'ll see it later on. I prolly should have waited until I had up to chapter ten written to post this story up, but I ended up getting ahead of myself. I happen to like that bit in the story. I know that some people won\'t, but that\'s their opinion...and yours. Thank you for pointing the beta note out. ^^;; I forgot about that one. Thank you for giving me your input; I like it when people are honest.

cofaym: The way I see it, Albus was in serious need of an Arithmancy professor, and Draco just stepped in. Thanks for the review!

Well, that\'s all! Oh, and one last note. I REALLY need a beta reader!!

~*~rosie-chan~*~