Good Friends, Bad Memories

George ended up leaving the Library reluctantly with the yellow book in his possession. He hadn't lost all hope yet since Pince had inadvertently given him another option. Maybe she was right and some of his friends had borrowed the books he was looking for. He checked the time and realised the Gryffindor Quidditch team practice was about to begin in ten minutes.

He headed down the moving staircases and towards the exit of the school until he was blocked by a group of boys and girls standing in the middle of the corridor. They were all dressed in orange protective clothing and carrying brooms, two of the girls were struggling to carry a large wooden chest. The group were standing around a boy who appeared to be giving a pep talk. Everyone listening looked exhausted even though they hadn't started practice yet.

After a minute, the monotonous pep-talk ended and the team stopped blocking the corridor. They walked out of the castle and headed toward the quidditch pitch. George recognised Harry with his new Nimbus 2000 at the front of the group talking to a guy much taller and older than him who must have been Oliver, the Gryffindors team captain and keeper.

Behind the team of Quidditch players was another group comprising the people he'd been hoping to meet. George saw Neville, Ron, Seamus and Dean tailing the Quidditch team with excited looks on their faces. He could overhear the conversation from a distance, they were discussing Harry's new broom. George increased his pace and caught up with the group.

He snuck up behind Neville and whispered into his ear, "boo."

In typical Neville behaviour, he leapt into the air in surprise and stumbled over his own feet. He almost pushed over Seamus if it wasn't for George grabbing hold of his robes and pulling him back upright. Neville turned around with his face flustered, but he relaxed upon recognising George.

"Stop doing that to me, you're gonna give me a heart attack. Why can't you say hello like a normal person?", Neville panted with his hand pressed against his chest.

George shrugged his shoulders, "and where would be the fun in that?"

Neville looked at George from top to bottom with a perplexed expression on his face.

He asked George, "did you get taller?"

George shook his head, "nope, you must be getting smaller."

By this point, the rest of Neville's group stopped following the Quidditch team and turned to face George. It was only when George was standing around a group of boys the same age as him that he realised how tall he was for his age. Seamus and Dean had expressions which clearly showed they had no idea who George was. However, Ron's squinting eyes and furrowed brow seemed to be putting two and two together.

George kept a jolly smile on his face as he turned back towards Neville, "aren't you going to introduce me to your friends?"

Neville took a few seconds to look back and forth between George and his roommates before he realised they hadn't met yet.

Neville eventually gestured toward each of the other boys while introducing them, "err… okay. He's Ron, that's Seamus and that's Dean."

George maintained a reserved attitude as he just held up his hand and waved. He was letting the group take the initiative to start the dialogue.

Ron was the first to break the silence, "are you really a muggle-born, or is that just something Slytherin made up?"

"I can't say for certain since I've never met my parents. Both of my foster parents are muggles though so I'm basically a muggle-born either way", George answered openly.

Ron didn't seem convinced, "well how come you're so good at potions then? Even Hermione can't make them as good as you. Are you trying to tell me you've never touched a cauldron before coming to Hogwarts?"

George merely lifted his hands and wiggled his fingers, "it's my magic fingers."

Ron seemed to take this answer as some form of provocation as his face stiffened.

Ron gestured toward Dean, "Dean, you're a muggle-born. Ask him something only a muggle would know."

The attention was shifted to Dean as the poor boy's eyes darted around nervously.

Dean took a moment to think of a 'muggle question' before he asked George, "who do you support?"

George chuckled in response to Dean's question since it was so predictable, everything always came down to football.

George answered confidently, "Man United, and you?"

Dean looked equally surprised and happy after hearing George's answer, "West Ham."

George acted surprised as he filtered out the relevant information from his memory, "really? I've never met a West Ham supporter before. Let me guess. You're from East London, Essex maybe?"

Dean looked even more surprised, "yeah, I am. You could work that out from the team I support?"

George held his hands out and tilted his head, "you can tell a lot about a person from the team they support, especially when it's barely in the league. How do you fancy your chances this season?"

Dean looked to be offended, "what ya sayin? West Ham is going to thrash Man United, just you watch."

George played along with the banter, "I don't know what world you're living on, but there's no way Man United is going to lose to West Ham. I wouldn't be surprised if West Ham is kicked out of the First Division."

George might have said a little too much as Dean looked like he was about to throw down the gauntlet.

"What are you two going on about?", Ron said irritably.

Dean turned to Ron whilst pointing at George, "he's saying my team sucks."

Ron just looked even more confused than normal, "is this about that 'leg ball' you've been talking about?"

George and Dean rolled their eyes simultaneously at Ron's ignorance of the most popular sport in the world. On the other hand, Seamus was looking toward the Quidditch pitch with a concerned look on his face.

Seamus said anxiously, "I think Harry is flying on the Quidditch pitch, they've started without us."

Seamus's announcements got everyone's attention as they all looked toward the Quidditch pitch. George could faintly see the ant-sized orange figures of students riding brooms. They were flying back and forth whilst throwing balls at one another.

Ron hurriedly proclaimed, "you guys can talk about muggle stuff another time, we have to go now before Harry thinks we've forgotten about him."

All of the children ran off toward the Quidditch pitch without saying another word except for Neville and George.

Neville shyly asked, "was there something you wanted?"

George looked back towards the book he had been carrying and remembered why he had introduced himself in the first place.

He shook his head and answered, "since you asked, I was wondering if you've loaned any books out of the Library recently?"

Neville thought about it for a second and answered, "just one about water plants in the Mediterranean. Why?"

It was a long shot and George hadn't expected much, Neville never had an interest in animals anyway.

"It doesn't matter, don't worry about it. I'll let you go and catch up with your friends. Have a good weekend", George said whilst turning to leave.

He was just about to turn around when he heard Neville's voice, "you could come with us if you like. I know it isn't your house practising, but it's still pretty cool to watch. Harry has got this new broom that is really fast, everyone's talking about it."

George stopped walking and seriously considered Neville's offer. He didn't have a reason to agree, but he also didn't have anything better to do other than read his book about dragon breeding. Since the relaxation project was still in effect, it was probably in his best interest to do something conventionally fun for a change.

Having made up his mind, George turned around with a big smile on his face, "sure, why not? I could do with a little fresh air."

Five minutes later and George was sitting beside Neville in the Gryffindor stand. Harry's team were whizzing back and forth just ahead of them as they practised. George had taken off his robe to hide his Slytherin badge so Oliver, the Gryffindor captain, didn't think he was a mole trying to steal Gryffindor's stratagems.

George looked over to his left, past Neville, and saw Ron, Seamus and Dean who were all eagerly watching and discussing quidditch. All of the boys seemed to be very excited about the upcoming Quidditch House Cup which was starting in November. They couldn't wait to see their friend, the youngest Seeker in a century, compete and hopefully win the Quidditch House Cup for Gryffindor.

It should be noted that Slytherin was statistically most likely to win the cup because of their recent consecutive victories in prior years. Therefore, George and the rest of the snakes were the ones to beat in Ron's eyes. Instead of being friendly and subsequently digging himself into a hole, George sat quietly at the end of the bench and started to read the book he had taken from the Library.

George quickly searched through the pages and was disappointed to find only a few short paragraphs dedicated to the Ukrainian Ironbelly. Once he started reading, he realised the reason for his species' lack of detail was simply because they weren't ever recorded to be bred in captivity. According to the book, Ukrainian Ironbellys were incredibly temperamental about choosing their breeding partners and had an intricate mating ritual that couldn't be simulated in an enclosure.

Dragonologists had concluded that the Ironbellys were naturally antisocial creatures because they spent the majority of their life alone in their caves. They speculated that only once in the Ironbelly's lifetime would they feel the compulsion to reproduce. During the rare instances that these dragons did attempt to attract a mate, the females would scorch the outside of their caves and roll around in the ashes to impregnate the ashes with their scent.

Males would fly miles across vast mountain landscapes to follow the scent and, upon arriving at a female's cave, would be judged by the female if they were worthy of fathering the clutch. Females have been observed turning away over a dozen males and it was unknown what characteristics they found desirable. Some predicted the wingspan or reflectivity of their scales might be the deciding factor, but these are merely speculations observed from other breeds of dragons.

Failed encounters between male and female Ironbellys would be evident by the injuries seen on the retreating males. This behaviour proved that the females were generally stronger and more aggressive. Dragonologists would only know if an encounter had been successful after waiting two years. At that time, they would witness adolescent Ironbellys leaving the mother's cave.

George had a look of disgust on his face as he finished reading the section on the Ukrainian Ironbelly's breeding ritual. He didn't like the idea of possibly inheriting these impulses as he got older. It was bad enough that he slept twelve hours a day and had a hair-trigger anger problem because of his species. Just because he was turning into an animal didn't mean he had to act like one, his pride as a rational-thinking being wouldn't allow it.

The book wasn't completely useless to George since there was some general information related to maintaining the health and wellness of a captive dragon. There were two common ailments in dragons, Scale Rot and Squabbs Syndrome. Scale Rot sounded quite nasty as it was an airborne fungal infection that would grow underneath the scales of a dragon. The symptoms started with the scales becoming dull or flaky and would worsen until the scales started to rot and fall off.

George had always been checking his body for infections after he transformed, but from this point onwards he would certainly ensure that all his scales looked in good health as well. The book also offered a treatment for Scale Rot; if the infection was noticed early, a concoction of saltwater, tar and white spirit should be rubbed into the infected area daily for at least a month or longer if the symptoms persisted.

Squabbs Syndrome is a type of lung infection that could only affect dragons, it shared many traits with a common cold. A dragon infected with Squabbs is not able to breathe fire, instead, it would dribble a white viscous liquid and frequently sneeze. Unlike Scale Rot, this illness is not lethal and most dragons would recover without the need for medical attention. This infection could only travel from dragon to dragon so it was recommended the Keepers isolated the infected dragon.

George didn't find this illness disconcerting since he had no intention of socialising with his draconic brethren, most of his kind lived two thousand miles away. Another point worthy of note from the book was the emphasis on providing your dragon with copious amounts of alcohol for the sake of its 'well-being'. The book claimed the alcohol would ensure a healthy dragon with good social skills, but George doubted that since whisky or rum wasn't naturally occurring in the wild.

It all sounded like nonsense, but George wasn't going to start making assumptions about treatments he knew little about. He was rather desperate to find a way to ease his emotions outside of using potions and taking time off. Alcohol would be a much more convenient method if it worked. However, it wasn't going to be easy to secure a large quantity of alcohol at Hogwarts since he was under the legal drinking age.

George was momentarily distracted as he heard a loud whooshing sound followed quickly by a large gust of wind blowing right past his face. The pages of the book were turned back to the index by the gust of air and his neatly combed hair was blown over his eyes. George brushed his hair aside and looked up to see Harry flying rapidly away while chasing the golden snitch. Then he heard cheering coming from beside him as Ron, Dean and Seamus stood up and wave their hands around like idiots.

George derogatorily thought, "children", before closing his book and placing it inside his enchanted sack.

He noticed Neville also having a great time as there was a big smile plastered on his face, but the boy hadn't stood up to cheer like the rest.

George nudged Neville's shoulder, "why don't you join in with them?"

Neville looked up at his hysterical friends and his face turned red in embarrassment.

Then the boy's smile faded as he looked down at his feet and mumbled, "I don't know."

George nudged his shoulder again and said reassuringly, "don't ever feel embarrassed for not acting the same way as everyone else, you are your own person. If you just want to sit down and watch Harry fly then that's fine."

Neville lifted his limp head and his smile returned after hearing George's words, he seemed to have taken them to heart. Both of them looked back towards the Quidditch practice and saw Harry tantalisingly close to catching the snitch. Fred and George Weasley both stopped on their brooms and cheered Harry on as he finally caught the snitch for the first time. Harry held the snitch into the air and the morning sun glistened off the golden ball like a beacon to the rest of the team.

Everyone's attention was on the chosen one as the entire Gryffindor team flew toward him. They smiled and cheered as if they had already won the Quidditch House Cup. The mood was generally optimistic for Gryffindor's chances in the upcoming House Cup, but George was finding himself becoming irritated as he watched them congratulate Harry. The sight of the team taking pleasure out of what he saw as clear exploitation and manipulation lit a fire inside of him.

This was a mild example of why the plan was necessary, for some reason only he could see what was intrinsically wrong with the wizarding world. Due to their ignorance, George had to take up the mantle of responsibility and make the hard choices that nobody else could. Even if they damned him for what horrors he'd committed, George would leave this plane of existence happy knowing what he'd done was a necessary sacrifice. He could rest in an eternal slumber knowing that he had finally granted her final wish.

And then George forgot.

Neville looked over whilst clapping and saw George's normally smiling face was starting to grimace. Blood was trickling out of the corner of his mouth and dripping down his chin.

Neville stopped clapping and asked with clear concern in his voice, "is something wrong? George!?"

George's face immediately relaxed in response to hearing Neville's voice and his lips formed back into a genuine smile.

He wiped the blood with his sleeve as he looked toward Neville, "everything's fine. I just had a bad memory. Don't worry about it."