Picking up the thread, A Dare Options

[McGonagall's Cat]

... away along the corridor. As other teachers and students rushed to help untangle those caught in the disaster that the thread had already caused, it picked up speed.

Before long the tangled sphere was merrily bouncing along, ricocheting of the walls like a billiard ball. As it bobbled onto the stairway that went to the fourth floor on Thursdays and the Third floor on Tuesdays, Harry Potter attempted to take the last two steps up in one stride.

The thread, seizing its chance, rolled directly where his foot would fall, successfully causing him to tumble head-over-heels back down the stairway while simultaneously catapulting the tread high into the air. Harry pointed his wand at the offending flying string and shouted “Imobilus!” - which unfortunately did nothing as it was made up for the movie - and the string fell onto…

[Azgard]

and the string fell onto… Hermione Granger as Harry fell onto Ron.

"Geroff me!" Came a muffled voice from beneath Harry who was struggling to untangle himself from his squished friend beneath him.

Hermione turned back to look at Harry and Ron. "Come on you two, we're going to be late for - Oh my!" Hermione had suddenly realized what she had in her hand. She was looking at the ball of thread with a mixture of horror and fascination on her face. "So this is the famous Ball of Thread of Doom..."

Ron and Harry had finally managed to straighten out which limb belonged to whom and were standing up again. "Hermione, we need to get to Transfiguration, if we're late again McGonagall will pitch us off the Quidditch team!" Harry said as he and Ron dashed past Hermione without even looking at what she had in her hands.

'Oh dear, he's right' Hermione thought to herself. 'I'll just wind the thread as we go and give it to Professor McGonagall when we get to class...' And so she began to wind the thread as the three of them walked to class.

When Harry, Ron, and Hermione walked into class Professor McGonagall, who had only gotten to the class seconds before, immediately demanded explanations as to why they were late.

Hermione started to explain, "Well, Professor, it was the Ball of Thread of Doom that held us up. You see -"

"Do you know," Professor McGonagall interrupted, "how many students have tried to blame being late on that ball of thread? I'm getting sick of it! I'm afraid I'm going to have to take some points for this."

Hermione's mouth opened up, and then closed, and then opened up again. "Professor, it really was the Ball of Thread of Doom! Look!" She held out the partially wound ball in her right hand. "I have it right here! Harry was running up the stairs and tripped on the ball. The ball went flying through the air and landed in my hands. Of course I immediatly realized what it was and knew I had to give it to you as soon as we got to class."

Professor McGonagall looked at the ball and sighed. "Alright then, would you please take that to the headmaster, he's currently in the Great Hall dealing with two students. You two," she indicated Ron and Harry, "sit down. We need to..."

Hermione didn't hear the rest. Professor McGonagall trusted her to take the Ball of Thread of Doom to Professor Dumbledore! She continued to wind the thread as she walked down the stairs, being careful not to trip.

"Miss Granger." Said a cold voice from Hermione's left causing her to jump. "Fancy seeing you here when you should be in class." A thin smile played over Professor Snape's face. "Just what would you be doing that would allow you to skip class?"

"I was asked by Professor McGonagall to take the Ball of Thread of Doom that I had found to Professor Dumbledore. He's in the Great Hall." Hermione stated defiantly, knowing there was nothing he could do to get her in trouble. Especially seeing as she had the ball with her to prove her story. As she went to show the ball to the Professor she realized that she did not, in fact, have the ball anymore! 'Oh no! I must have dropped it when he startled me!'

"Is that so? Well then," Professor Snape challenged, "you will, no doubt, be able to show me this Ball of Thread of Doom you claim to have found?"

Hermione was looking around for the ball. "Umm, well, I dropped it when you startled me, you see, and -"

"A likely story. Come with me." As he led her away, the ball bounced away to...

[zymurgy]

... to the Hufflepuff common room, where Hanna Abbot saw it, and being a good Hufflepuff was true an unafraid of toil.

Seeing as she was on her way to visit Professor Hooch in the Hospital anyway, she figured there could be no harm in rolling the ball of string up on her way. The poor Flying Instructor had had a nervous breakdown resulting from her two narrow brushes with fate brought on by the String of Doom!

Hanna went on her way, rolling up the string as she went, when she reached the Hospital Wing.

Madam Pomphrey smiled at her, and let her by, with a motherly, "Good to see you again, my Dear."

Hanna arrived at the sickbed of Madam Hooch and was just about to hand her the box of chocolate and the token speech of Hufflepuff Sympathy, when Hooch leapt out of bed with an awful screech.

"GET IT AWAY FROM ME!" she shrieked.

In the resulting confusion, as Hanna frantically tried to help Madam Pomphrey calm the patient, the ball of string fell to the infirmary floor, and rolled on ...

[McGonagall's Cat]

...its merry way until it fell through the shortcut hidden behind the statue of Wandering Wanda. It bounced down the twisting stairwell, gathering speed, and launched itself through the tapestry of The Lady of Devonshire with Whippets, landing squarely on...

[zymurgy]

the nose of a Basilisk, the Son of the Mediocre Basilisc that Harry Fought, son of the Slightly Spiffing Basilisk Who Never Fought Anybody, son of the Great High Basilisk Tommy Boy Created.

Fortunately, this being was asleep, and merely blinked a bleary eye as the ball bounced from his nose onto....

[pinkpanther]

. . . the floor, where it rolled along through the corridor unnoticed until it stopped with a little bump at the foot of a door. The door opened and Filch stormed through muttering oaths against Peeves under his breath. He stepped over the ball of string without seeing it, but Mrs. Norris, with her huge lamplike eyes, stared at it cuiously. She gave it a timid sniff, the grasped it in her mouth and trotted after her master.
She had barely held it for five minutes, though, when Crookshanks came bounding through another door and, seeing Mrs. Norris, swatted at her head. Ducking, she hissed and dropped the string, which rolled determinedly toward the Great Hall, where Dumbledore had just opened the door. . .

[zymurgy]

"My word," said Dumbledore with a twinkle, bending to pick up the ball of thread, "The Ball of Thread of Doom! I shall bring it over to the Ministry to have the curse broken."

Rolling it up as he walked the Supreme Mugwump had every intention of getting it out of Hogwarts, but it was not to be.

"HEADMASTER!" shrieked Poppy, running towards him, "Hooch is having a nervous breakdown! She's threatening to resign!"

"Oh dear," said Albus, dropping the thread in his haste. "I shall just have to talk her out of it...

The thread bounced to the floor and rolled on to...

[McGonagall's Cat]

...tangle itself around the feet of poor Sally-Ann Perks who was just coming into the Hall to eat.

She fell with a shreik, causing several students in front of her to turn around to see what all the commotion was about, and others behind her to trip over her prone form. Being a huge crowd intent on food, those in the back didn't stop. Soon great masses of students were collapsing and stumbling, completely blocking the main doors of the Great Hall.

Derek, who still hadn't gotten over the trauma of Dumbledore speaking directly to him at Christmas Dinner when Harry was 13 (though how and why Derek knew Harry had been 13 at the time was a mystery even to himself), began twitching as he lay sprawled on the floor. (This was the beginning of a food phobia which would plague him for the rest of his life.)

In the middle of the horrid mess, Eloise Midgen began grabbing handfuls of the foul string, wadding it into an unceremoniuous tangle. Eventually the pile of students sorted itself out and she was able to extricate herself. Stompping over to the nearest trash chute with the gob of thread, Eloise angrilly shoved it through the flappy door.

The Thread grinned evilly to itself as it swooshed through the chute and landed....

[pinkpanther]

with splash in the lake. On its way down the rubbish chute, it had spontaneously switched directions and slid down through the plumbing and out into the lake. It began to float along the glassy surface of the lake, seeking more mischief, when a large tenacle stretched out and caught the tangled mass. Lazily, the giant squid began to wind it up, when suddenly it was snatched out of the water by a low-flying . . .

[zymurgy]

...student on a Cleansweep five.

"Tada!" yelled the student. "I've the Ball of String of DOOM!"

But his joy was short lived, as he was distracted by the sight of Hooch, in ugly Hospital Wing Pajamas, running across the lawn chased by both Dumbledore and Pomphrey.

"Come back!" yelled Albus. "We've got a contract!"

"Come back!" yelled Pomphrey. "You might have contracted something!"

"Take it up with my lawyer!" shrieked Hooch. "I refuse to stay here!"

Nonplussed, the student let the ball drop, unheeded to...

[McGonagall's Cat]

...be swatted like a high fly ball by the Whomping Willow.

The thread flew through the air like a comet and careened off the nearest tower. With a thud and a sproing it arched even higher, bounced off the roof of one of the lower parapets and crashed through the top of Greenhouse Three directly onto...

[entr'acte]

... the Ghost of the Fat Friar who was spending some time with Professor Sprout's plants (to get the feel of life, you know). Of course being as insubstantial as a ghost he didn't feel anything as the thread entered the top of his head and landed on the ground by his feet. In fact, he didn't notice anything at all until he looked down.

"My," he chuckled, "What have we got here?" Being ghostly as he was, he couldn't pick the thread up. Instead, he sat down on the ground to examine the ball of thread. "Quite um... interesting."

"Well..." he attempted to pick it up, "I can't just leave it here, somebody might trip on it."

He grabbed hold of a random plant (plants in this story, of course, are special and allow ghosts to manipulate and touch them) and said to it, "Pick it up for me, will you, and throw it out of here ="

The plant rushed to obey, ignoring the Friar's last words which were...

"GENTLY!!"

The ball of thread sailed out of the green house to land ...

[McGonagall's Cat]

... square on the point of the Unicorn's horn that Hagrid was talking with near the edge of the forest. The fine specimen snorted! It reared high, pawing the air with its front feet, then wheeled on its heels and dashed deep into the woods.

"Wait!" Hagrid shouted and ran after the shining white beast.

Dashing between the increasingly dense trees, the unicorn shook its head violently and the thread flew from the end of its horn to fall onto...

[zymurgy]

... a spider's web. An especially ENORMOUS spider's web.

Aragog jabbed it with it's pincers, blindly thinking it was some fat tasty forest animal, and got a jaw full of wet contaminated disgustingly dirty string.

With a howl of pain, he let out a string of Arachnaic words which were so off-color and impolite that the other Acrumantulas blushed. Considering that spiders CAN'T blush, this was quite a feat..

Aragog rolled up the string in the webbing it had become entangled in, and shoved it mightily from his web. It bounced, a sticky mess, and landed...

[McGonagall's Cat]

... in the pine tree that Grawp was bending almost in two.
He happily let go of the bowed tree which recoiled and flung the sticky, dirty ball of thread high into the distant treetops.

There the string bounced and bumped through the branches until it fell upon ...