Baby Juice

The twins ran out of the office at Hermione’s scream. The sight they found was disturbing. Verity was standing by Hermione, who was beyond angry. Actually, the twins couldn’t ever remember her at this level of anger. This scared them, but they were distracted by the small boy in Hermione’s arms. Dark, messy hair and emerald green eyes.

“Hermione, why are you holding a baby that looks like Harry?

“Yes. That was my question, Fred. Please tell us the answer is you have been having an affair with him, and the little tyke is the proof?” George looked like he would give anything for this to be true.

“No, you idiots. This is Harry. Really Harry. The Boy-Who-Lived. The Chosen One. Look at him.” Though this command was irrelevant as neither George nor Fred had taken their eyes off of him since coming into the store area. “I want this fixed now!”

The twins looked at each other. It was obvious they had to get Hermione calmed down quickly.

“Hermione, we don’t know what happened.”

“Maybe you should fill us in.”

“I went to tell you I was leaving and found him like this when I returned,” Hermione said. Harry began fidgeting in her arms.

“So how is this our fault?”

“Something must have gone wrong with one of your items.” Hermione then realized what item. “Oh, no, the Breath Effects! I was goading him into eating one. He had a blue one.” Hermione let the struggling Harry down and went to the jar of sweets.

“So this is your fault then, “ George said. Hermione gave him a dirty look.

She looked at the sweets. She began running her wand over a few pieces while Harry watched.

“Candy. Want Candy.” Harry tugged on Hermione’s shirt. “Aunt Money, I want candy.”

“Aunt Money?” Fred questioned. And both he and George sniggered.

“He couldn’t say Hermione. A lot of people struggle with my name. Viktor never got it,” she muttered, her focus on her spell work.

“Aunt Money, I want candy.”

“No, Harry, this is bad candy,” Hermione said. “As for you two, this is not the formula. I told you no experimenting until it was verified.”

“Hey. We have not done any experimenting since the Quick Grow Beard.”

“Yeah. I’m still recovering from Ginny’s Hexes. We fixed it.”

“So it was three days, but we fixed it.”

“No, look." Hermione waved her wand over the candy. Little glowing lights created an intricate pattern. “This is not the Latenbra for the original formula.”

“The what?” George stood looking at the light show in confusion.

“Hermione, is that suppose to make sense?”

“Yes! Latenbra shows the mystical properties of a magical substance or item. In this case the properties of the potion used in Breath-Effects. The normal one looks like this.” Once again a little light show shined above the counter. The pattern was vastly different.

“Okay. There’s a difference.”

“But we didn’t do it.”

“Well explain what happened to Harry?”

“Well.” Fred ran his hand through his hair and looked to his mirror image.

“He drank baby juice?” George offered, which he regretted in two seconds. Harry took quite the offense to baby and bit him on the leg.

“Me not a baby!”

George reacted and looked to hit Harry. Hermione quickly grabbed the miniature Harry. “How dare you!”

“He bit me!”

“Well, you insulted him. He’s a child, yes, but I wouldn’t classify him as a baby. He can talk.”

“Okay. Why don’t we get back to what happened to the Breath-Effects. You ate the last one, and we had Brent bring out another bag….”

“Well, there you go, Fred. Brent happened.”

“Exactly how did Brent do this? I will admit he’s clumsy, but this?”

Verity, who had left the three, came back with a forlorn Brent. “I think I can explain, Hermione.” She turned to the twins. “Remember yesterday you asked Brent to put the new disposal canisters away in the store room?”

“Of course.”

“We were there.”

“Well, he didn’t move just the newly delivered ones. He put a full one in there too, right above a box of Breath-Effects.”

“I’m really sorry,” Brent said.

Hermione looked at the twins. “Disposal canister? What is she talking about?”

“Well, see, when we go experimenting and things don’t work out, we have to follow Ministry policy and put the goop in special canisters. Then a member from the Department of Experimental Magic comes and collects the full ones. It looks like this git let one contaminate our supply,” Fred explained.

“Shouldn’t it have been sealed?” Hermione asked.

“Only when full,” George answered.

“Was any sold?” Hermione worried.

“No. When I discovered the mishap, I checked the box. Only one bag was missing,” Verity said.

“Well, I guess we found the silver lining.”

“Aunt Money, me hungry.”

“Look. You two begin to figure out the ingredients in the canister while I beg your mum to watch Harry.”

“Right,” George said. “Though after my leg, you wouldn’t think he’d be hungry. Oh, and Brent…”

“You’re fired!” Fred finished his brother’s thought.

AN: Thanks RR for the wonderful job you did as Beta!