Fender awoke to the sound of bells. Well... not quite bells. In reality, it was as if two gongs had been pressed to both sides of his head, and his whole body then used as a clapper in a giant steel drum. But from the ringing in his ears, and the tang of metal on his tongue, and the horrible pressure waves that resounded weirdly in his stomach, the only thought in Fender’s mind was that of bells, especially of the one he wanted to ring to get some room service in his dormitory in the Slashering dungeon.

He rolled out of bed, brushing fine, dark hair out of his eyes as he slunk toward the bathroom to be thoroughly sick. He had been dreaming about his old fanfiction again, The Black Glass Wall. In his dream, he watched as Snape... his Snape... lamented his torturous soul and how misunderstood he was because he had never gotten the deluxe potions set he had wanted for his birthday. He had been particularly proud of that idea; he had based it off his own experiences at a family reunion.

Coming out of the lavatory, Fender looked at the giant clock on the mantelpiece. (It read “Any time’s a good time for reevaluating misunderstood characters!” across its face, a present from Peter Pettigrew and the Dursleys in hopes of cultivating a few sympathizers among the fanwriters.) It was three in the morning. Turning to go back to bed, he paused when he heard a voice echoing down the corridor adjoining the common area to the outer dungeons.

“... can’t do this anymore,” said the girl. “I miss everybody so much! And the people around here are crazy! You have to watch everything you say, and put one toe slightly out of line... like, thinking something ‘unapproved’ about the films, and they jump all over you! Were it not for... certain people... I’d toss this any day!”

Fender’s eyes widened in the dark. It was Phayn. He stepped into an alcove housing a statue of the Slashering newt, and listened carefully. This was not the Phayn he knew, always (annoyingly) eager to gush over HFA. He wondered offhandedly what had caused her to change so drastically. Probably found out that her lusting is trivial in the grim drama of our lives, he thought.

Phayn entered the common room, apparently alone. Fender furrowed his brow slightly, looking around for the person she had been talking to, but there was no one in sight. He would have thought her alone but for a slightly male murmur on the edge of his hearing. Phayn lifted something flat and angular to her face, kissed it, slipped it into her bag, and flopped bonelessly onto a tall-backed chair.

It was then that Fender realized that what he was doing could be considered eavesdropping, and that eavesdropping was quite obviously much above the Deep Master of Fanfiction, and turned around silently to creep back to bed. He was halfway down the corridor when a voice stopped him.

“Hey-a, Fender! You’re up late!” said Phayn with her usual exuberance. Fender jumped nearly a foot in the air and spun around to find himself nose-to-nose with the girl, who was apparently a lot quicker (and quieter) when she wanted to be.

“Gngh—Phayn,” he said, leaning quickly away from her.

“Nice to see you, too, Bumper,” said Phayn, a trace of tiredness lacing her voice. “Whatcha doing up?”

“Going back to sleep,” growled Fender. “What are you doing? Hunting down Snape?”

“Snape? Oh, I am so over him,” squealed Phayn. “He’s evil, Fender; he killed Dumbledore! And I trusted him!” she wailed.

Fender looked on bemusedly. He himself was sure that Snape had an ulterior motive... and he knew about these things, too, being the Deep Master of Fanfiction. Still, whatever else he might be, he was not foolhardy enough to argue with a fangirl scorned. “So I guess that’s the end of the you/Snape ship?”

Phayn wiped her nose on her sleeve. “Sorta. If he’s better in the seventh book I might go back, but, well... can you keep a secret? Oh, of course you can, right, you haven’t any friends to tell it to: I’m in love...”

“That’s not—okay, so maybe—what?” sputtered Fender.

“I never knew it, but after Half-Blood Prince, he’s just so sweet and adorable and not evil like some people, and he cares about me, I know it!” said Phayn.

“What are you—”

“I’m in love with Remus Lupin!” said Phayn.

There is something of fiction that slips into even the most ordered of fanficto-realities. Thus it was with ease that Fender performed a perfect facepalm.

“What is it?” asked Phayn. “Don’t you like my new soulmate?”

“Phayn... it’s just... haven’t you ever tried not lusting after somebody?”

“Oh, loads of times,” said Phayn airily. “It’s called shopping.”

Facepalm the second.

“You really shouldn’t do that, Fender, you’ll leave a mark,” said Phayn. “Fender? Are you okay? You look kinda... kinda green...”

Fender staggered, then sagged against the wall, throwing his arm around the Slashering newt’s scrawny neck. A splitting headache was pulsing at his temples, and in his mind’s eye he could see a ravaged laboratory full of broken potions equipment. Phayn kept him from falling over, then helped him sit down on the cold stone floor.

“Fender? What is it?” she asked.

“Nothing, nothing,” he gasped.

Phayn smacked him upside the head.

“What was that for?” he exclaimed angrily.

“Don’t lie; tell me what’s wrong,” repeated Phayn.

“There’s nothing—ow!”

“What’s wrong?” asked Phayn, and there was an anxious edge to her voice. “Malathyne didn’t try to feed you a ‘lighten up’ potion again, did she?”

“Do I look iridescent?” said Fender, rolling his eyes.

“Well, if you’d just tell me what’s—”

Fender ducked as she lifted her hand to smack him again. “Look, all right, I’ll tell you, just stop hitting me... Jeez, you’re worse than Lord Voldemort Sr.... If you must know, I’ve been getting these headaches, and dreaming about—”

Crunch.

“What was that?” said Phayn, looking up sharply.

The sound echoed through the common area once more.

“Probably Fire Sidoni coming back from a late-night Lupin-boxer raid,” said Fender, still rubbing his skull. “Now I am going back to be—”

But Phayn had grabbed him under the arm and hoisted him up, and was steadily stalking toward the exit of the Slashering dorm.

“Look, if you really want to run into Fire Sidoni after Lupin’s given her one of those pterodactyl-head curses, fine with me, but I’m not—”

“Shut up, Fender,” hissed Phayn, and before Fender knew it the two of them were out in the dungeon corridor, moving toward the sound.

“What are you, Nancy Drew?” said Fender, prompting a confused look from Phayn. Further irritated banter was prevented, though, when another sound rent the corridor, this one quite obviously that of a person falling over in long robes.

Suddenly they turned a corner, and Fender and Phayn found themselves face-to-face with Snape, who burst into tears and looked down at the collapsed figure of... Snape.

“What on earth...” gasped Phayn.

“I didn’t mean to?” offered the now-whimpering Snape. He blew his nose in a long flower-print apron that had been tied unceremoniously around his neck. “I just need to find it... then everything will be all right... you’ll help me find it, won’t you...?”

Phayn blinked, a look of disgust on her face. “So over him.”

“Of course you’re over him,” said Fender, walking deliberately around the Snapes. “He’s miles and miles out of character.”

Phayn sighed. “Oh, right... My Snapie... who I don’t love, of course. Nope. I’m on Remus now.”

“Remus 6.0?” said Fender snidely. “Tonks may have something to say about that, you know.”

“Huh? Oh, never mind... what are we going to do about him?” said Phayn, pointing to the gibbering Snape. “Or him, for that matter,” she said, indicating the second Potions master, still sprawled on the ground.

“Nothing, of course,” said Fender, turning his back to return to the dorm. “You think I’m going to wait here for that satanic Order of the Sphinx to come and cart me away to that inferno of theirs? Are you out of your mind? Wait, don’t answer that. I’m leaving, that’s all.”

“But you can’t!” protested Phayn. “You must help me get him back to normal! You don’t want the Order to think we did something to him—them—err... the Snapes.”

“After all he’s done to us, you still want—look, maybe I should have asked you when we first met, but are you or are you not totally insane?”

“I’m not,” said Phayn, pouting. “And you’re being awfully cruel, not to want to take them back to the canons. What if his lusters find out? The Sevvie’s Angels could be along at any minute, or, or Sevvies’ Angels,” said Phayn, correcting her punctuation with ease. HFA had started to rub off on her grammar, even if it had done little for her goals concerning men.

“I think the question is not, when are the Sevvies’ Angels coming, but why are there two Snapes?!”

“Watch where you’re sticking those interrobangs!” hissed Phayn as a punctuation question mark-exclamation point thumped her on the head.

“Oh, would that I knew that, too...” said the conscious Snape dreamily. “... But I must find it... you know, I’m lost without it... even after I had to, had to, had to kill my own dear father figure... sob... have you seen it, dear children...? Will you show it... to me...?” said Snape, in a voice not unlike that of—

“Sybill Trelawney Complex muchly?” said Phayn, picking up the other, unconscious Snape and throwing one of his arms across her shoulder. She squeed, but it wasn’t as strong as it once would have been, more of a residual demi-squee. “You grab Sappy, there, and we’ll see if there’s anyone who can help them.”

“You mean you’re not going to steal their underpants and enshrine them for all his lusters to see?” said Fender skeptically, hauling Sappy!Snape forward by the hem of his robes.

“Remus!” reminded Phayn, struggling under the weight of the lanky Potions master.

Fender shook his head in a surly manner (though this was quite the norm for the fanboy). “Let’s just leave these two outside Oedipus Inferno, then, let the Order of the Sphinx sort them out. I have a high enough profile cleaning up your mistakes half the time, I’m not getting into any more trouble with that group.”

“Oh, goody, goody!” cried Sappy!Snape weakly. “Are you taking me to see it? Only they said I must see it, and return it to them, so you see, I have to—”

“What are you talking about?” demanded Fender, as Phayn passed the ticklish pear and the two students plus Snapes entered the cobwebby halls that led up to the staff section and Oedipus Inferno. “What is this thing that you so need to see?”

“Oh, not only see,” said the sappy one, a glassy look in his eyes. “I must... must... retrieve...”

“Retrieve what?” said Phayn.

“... Muse Stone...” breathed Snape, his out-of-character meter going through the roof. He then fainted, and cemented his place in the red.

“Ugh,” said Fender distastefully, stepping away from the swooning canon character. “Is he even in this fandom? Let’s just leave him here, we’ll get into more trouble than it’s worth to show up with him in the middle of a fit.”

“But no!” said Phayn, her eyes widening in horror. “What if the Dumbledore Avengers come!”

“The who now?”

“You know, the Sevvie’s Angels that left the group after you-know-who did you-know-what!” said Phayn, shifting her own Snape so that his elbow wasn’t digging into her shoulder.

“Like you?” said Fender, rolling his eyes. If one could harness the power of that single motion of Fender’s, one would be able to run two small refrigerators and a toaster oven for three days. To put this into perspective, the power gleaned from Fender’s eyerolls would have matched .12 of the Grave-Roller’s output, a mechanism created to harness the power of deceased authors rotating in their graves. The Order of the Sphinx had a prototype model using the corpse of the smalltime Victorian novelist Simon Hershfeld, and had taken it upon themselves to write modest pieces of badfic concerning his characters through which to measure the amount of squick needed to produce a certain torque. (The line “And Lucinda sad too Batholomomu tha t he was chiken an sh loved Jak Spaworrow mor than him an his violets OMG” had given them 390 joules alone.)

“The Dumbledore Avengers will have his head, Fender! They’re not all as sane as I am! We’ve got to get him to safety!” squeaked Phayn indignantly. “You’re so, so, so heartless sometimes!” she said, bending down to prod at the whimpering Sappy!Snape and nearly losing her grip on the other Snape as well. She looked up at Fender, her eyes welling with frustration.

Fender continued to move away. Phayn was interesting every so often when he needed to take some anger out on fangirls in general, but the whole idea of taking her seriously was completely unknown to him. He rolled his eyes (12 joules) and looked pointedly at his watch.

Phayn lost it. “Why can’t you for once just try to be a decent human being!” she yelled, letting Sappy!Snape fall back to the floor and casting off the other Snape to land in a pile with his copy. “Get over here and show some backbone!” she yelled, face flushing. “He—they need help!”

“I’m the Deep Master of Fanfiction,” explained Fender, a little perplexed by her sudden outburst. “I’m not some love-and-bunnies sentimental idiot... this’ll go badly for me if we’re caught!”

“You don’t even care about the canon characters!” shot back Phayn. “It’s just about you, you, you, what a sad little worldly boy! Poor Fender! Other people have problems, too, you bastard!”

“And they can sort them out themselves!” said Fender, getting defensive. “I don’t need this; I’m going back to bed, and when they string you up by your ankles over a pit of Mini-Aragogs, well, you can just remember that I told you so!”

“Told me so?” shrieked Phayn. “Told me so-o-o-ooo—”

The panicked expression on Phayn’s face caused Fender to whip around, where, just as he had predicted, stood trouble for the fanwriters should they be caught up late. Three bits of trouble, actually, for Lord Voldemorts Collectively currently came in three sizes: Lord “I’m so secure in my evilness that I can ponce around in my Strawberry Shortcake nightie and still exude hatred and cruelty” Voldemort Sr., Tom “You are such an idiot, grow up, Me Sr.” Riddle, and LVJ “Stop whining so we can go torture Muggles, but first you must change my nappie,” the pre-resurrection grotesque baby form of the trio. And all three of them had just stepped out from the entrance to the kitchen carrying two tubs of chocolate ice cream and a popsicle for LVJ, who was teething.

“I ask myself, what is the racket going on out here? I wonder if they know exactly what time this is?” said Lord Voldemort Sr., his red eyes narrowed as he strode up to the two fanwriters, idly tapping a spoon to his lips. “I wonder if they think it’s funny to be up at this hour when certain people have certain... business to attend to.”

Phayn practically sighed with relief, causing Fender to glance at her in abject confusion. “So glad we ran into you, your, errr, terrornesses, sirs. See, we found two—”

“Why on this good earth is Severus sleeping on the floor?” gurgled LVJ, gnawing on his popsicle.

“That’s what I mean,” said Phayn. “We found him and—”

“The better question,” interrupted Tom Riddle, “might be: why are there two of him?”

“I don’t kn—” said Phayn.

“You don’t think they’ve tried to copy him?” cooed LVJ, a faint hint of repulsion in his cultured voice. “To have their own private... lust-object... do you think?”

“That’s a good thought, LVJ,” said Lord Voldemort Sr. “I ask myself, why didn’t I think of duplicating Harry and the Weasley twins and using their copies as bribes for the ignorant fangirls? World domination through supply and demand of lust-objects... such a novel idea...”

“I’m a lust-object,” said Tom Riddle hotly.

Phayn once again tried to break in with the dire case of the duplicate Snapes, but found it hard to get a word in edgewise between the three Voldemorts. Fender wondered why she even bothered, and tried to look for ways of escape. Perhaps he could slip away while the dark lords’ attention was diverted.

“Yes, but you’re not a very good one, boy,” said Lord Voldemort Sr. “You could learn much from the master,” he said, polishing his fingernails on his nightie.

“Says the walking snake-man,” muttered Riddle under his breath.

“But what about—”

“Nevertheless, what are two fanwriters doing in the middle of the night with two incapacitated Snapes?” squealed LVJ, ever the head of reason in the Voldemort Co-op.

“Is that what’s happening, then?” said a new voice. Another character emerged from behind the picture of the bowl of fruit. This was a tall handsome boy who looked rather like a cross between Tom Riddle and Lord Voldemort Sr., which was precisely because he was the both of them: he was the Voldemort who had visited Miss Hepzibah Smith and stolen her heirlooms. He smiled cunningly and relieved Tom Riddle of his ice cream. Phayn’s eyes widened, and Fender inched toward a tapestry to his left that he was quite sure concealed a secret passageway.

“Ah, there you are, Voldemort-in-the-Middle,” said Lord Voldemort Sr., turning to the newcomer. “As you are new and just learning the art of being a Voldemort at HFA, you must watch as we deal with these culprits who have kidnapped a canon character and duplicated him to be their very own lust-object.”

Voldemort-in-the-Middle smirked. “Shall I take notes so I can usurp your position and rule the Voldemort Co-op forever?”

“What was that?” said Lord Voldemort Sr.

“Nothing,” said Voldemort-in-the-Middle, oozing charm better than any of the other Voldemorts ever could.

Fender was nearly to the tapestry. He felt the thick fabric brush against his hand. Very slowly, he inched toward the edge, feeling for a good place to push it aside. Phayn continued to stare, in shock, at the newest Voldemort. A new lust-object, Phayn? he thought mockingly. What about your dear little Remus? God, fangirls are fickle.

“Very well,” said Lord Voldemort Sr., patting his pockets. “Watch as I teach them a lesson—where’s my wand! All right, one of you, ’fess up, who’s got the wand? I thought it was my day to carry it!”

A small chuckle caused the four ages of Lord Voldemort to turn to where a young boy of about eleven was leaning against the wall, twirling a wand between his fingers. The boy seemed to be a bit of a walking magpie: he had Luna Lovegood’s Butterbeer-cap necklace draped around his neck, Dobby’s tea cozy worn at a jaunty angle on his head (rather like a frilly pink yarmulke), Rita Skeeter’s green pen stuck behind his ear, Neville’s Remembrall bulging in his pocket, and a whole horde of Sues’ dei ex machina rings and pendants hanging from his wrists and neck. He bore a striking resemblance to Tom Riddle.

“Give me that, young upstart!” snarled Lord Voldemort Sr., grabbing his wand from the boy. “You, too, have much to learn, Little Orphan Tommy.”

“Don’t call me that,” said the boy sulkily, pick-pocketing twelve sickles off of Voldemort-in-the-Middle as he sidled past him(self). The more charming Voldemort cuffed him upside the head.

Fender found the opening. He pulled the tapestry away from the wall surreptitiously, and sure enough felt a cool draft at his back. Phayn glanced at him, an expression of fury on her face at his impending desertion. Fender rolled his eyes (another 12 joules) and wondered what she had expected him to do, wait around and take the blame for something he had been opposed to from the start?

LVJ tsked and shook his head as Little Orphan Tommy kicked Voldemort-in-the-Middle in the shins and was treated to a hearty backhand. “I suppose it’s better than having too little of one’s own body and being forced to share with that turbaned weakling... still, there is such thing as too little of a good thing. Now, are we going to see some punishment or not?” he crowed.

Fender stepped back, and let the tapestry fall into place. Not even stopping to hear if his departure had been noticed, he turned and ran, hurtling through the stone corridor as if the devil himself were after him, which, all things considered, was very probable. He turned right at the nearest branching he could find, and didn’t stop running until the tunnel rejoined the main walkways of Hogwarts.

Fender glanced around, clutching a stitch in his chest as he looked for any sign that he was being followed. He recognized where he was; it was not far from the Slashering dormitory. Panting slightly, he reached the commons and barreled inside, not stopping to look behind him until he was in his own room and had snuck gratefully under the covers.

He tried to still his breathing, to make it seem as if he had not just run the length of the castle. And eventually his breathing did return to normal, and he did drift off to sleep. But when he did, dreams of Phayn’s angry face filled his head, and rumblings of LINK disturbed his sleep.