Hermione was standing outside of the Gryffindor common room, flipping her D.A. coin on the palm of her hand.
"Where are those two?" She questioned while wondering where Magnolia and Nicole could be at that moment. They usually would walk together to all of the secret club's meetings, but the girls were running late.
"Niki, I swear to Merlin if we are late because of a damn muffin I'm going to murder you." Magnolia said, gasping for breath after running down the long hallway towards the Great Hall.
"It'll be fine! Just let me look. I promise it won't take long!"
As soon as the witches started to gain their pace back, a tall blonde boy appeared in front of them and stopped them in their tracks.
"Um excuse us." Magnolia said annoyed.
"Hey Nicole, Magnolia." Draco said, looking the pair up and down.
"Look Draco, not to be rude but we're kind of in a hurry so if you would just-" Nicole was quickly cut off.
"I enjoyed spending time with you last night Magnolia. I left you a little gift back in the Hufflepuff common room." He said with a smug grin on his face.
"What the hell are you talking about?" Magnolia said, getting quite angry.
"Just go look to find out. Anyways see you later Mags. Nicole."
"What the actual fuck is he talking about Magnolia, and why did he just call you Mags?"
"I genuinely have no clue! I swear!"
"I thought you were over the boy crazy faze!"
"You really think I would do that to Neville? Besides, I was literally sleeping with you last night!"
"I hope for everyone's sake you're right, let's go check out your dorm to make sure he didn't get his nasty Slytherin gang to trash it or something."
The girls swiveled in place, forgetting all about Nicole's muffin craving and headed up to Magnolia's Hufflepuff dorm.
When they approached the un-touched room, the girls were highly confused. Nothing was out of place and no one had even stepped foot inside the dorm.
"See, I told you it was probably just a prank. He more than likely just heard you call me Mags and that's why. I don't understand why he would prank us though."
"Yeah that is strange... Damn it, we're late for the D.A. meeting. Come on, let's go before we completely miss it." Nicole said, turning towards the door.
**The Hallway Outside Of The Room Of Requirement**
"Niki, I know we're late but do we really have to run everywhere?"
"I just don't want to miss anything." Nicole said, stopping to take a breath.
As the girls approached the door to their meeting spot, they frantically dipped behind a long column after seeing an unfortunate sight.
"Is that... Umbridge?" Magnolia questioned.
They peeked around the corner to see the whole of the new Inquisitorial Squad, Mr. Filch, and Dolores Umbridge grabbing students out of the Room of Requirements and into the hallway.
"No way she found out... Who could have told her?!"
"Shh Mags, I want to listen..."
When the girls looked back at the scene, they saw Draco staring at them like he was trying to warn them to stay away. They started seeing each one of their friends being pulled out by various members of Umbridge's cult. They refused to say anything to the polished, pink woman and the squib that stood next to her. Nicole and Magnolia did not have the best view from where they were standing so they couldn't see that Goyle was holding another Ravenclaw student by the arm and shoving her to the front so that all of the D.A. could witness.
Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville were the last of the club to be yanked out of the room and into the crowded hallway. Harry was giving Umbridge an horrifying look as they all were escorted back down the hall to her pink detention dungeon.
Nicole and Magnolia followed a few feet behind the group, trying not to make any noise. When the door to Umbridge's office shut with a quiet click of a lock, the girls gathered as close as they could to the door to see what they could hear.
"Did you get a glimpse of who Goyle was holding?" Nicole questioned.
"No, everyone was standing in the way. Oh god, I hope that they don't hurt Neville or any of our friends. We did absolutely nothing wrong!"
**Inside Umbridge's Office**
The many decorative cat plates were glaring through Hermione's soul when Dumbledore's Army was thrown into the office. She had been infuriated at what had just happened but everyone swore that they would not utter a word about the club.
"It came to my attention that you all have decided to break Educational Decree number Twenty-Four. For this you will all be searched and have to answer for your actions. Why all of you young students were practicing Defense Against the Dark Arts outside of my classroom is a mystery to us all!" Umbridge said, not taking her glare off of Harry.
"Maybe because you don't actually teach us anything." Neville said, gaining a bit of courage when thinking about his friends.
"If you want to be the first one to speak up Mr. Longbottom, you will be searched first!" Dolores said with a giggle. "Draco, will you do the honor?"
Draco dragged Neville to the front of Umbridge's desk where she could get a proper look at him. Draco started by patting Neville down, uncomfortably until he found something shiny in his right pocket. He turned out the pocket and of course found the signature Dumbledore's Army coin. At first, he didn't give it a second look and just handed it to the professor behind him. She however, did not give the coin a sparing look.
"Dumbledore's Army? Well, well, well, this is all the evidence I need to show to the ministry. All of you will be receiving detention at a later time. For now, I need to talk to Cornelious. Squad, please escort these rule breakers back to their dorms at once and make sure they stay there."
**Back Outside Umbridge's Office**
When Magnolia and Nicole's eavesdropping led them to hear that everyone was being taken back to their dorms, they ran to the nearest column and hid, waiting for all of their friends.
Slowly the club was all tugged forcefully out of the room and down the hall. One students however, was let go and was not walking with the rest of the group. It was none other than Cho Chang with the word "Sneak" scribbled all over the side of her face.
"I'm going to beat her ass!"
"No Niki! You can't have another Pansy incident! Look calm down, let's stay here a minute to see what Umbridge will do."
"Fine but this is being done in the name of research. NOT because I don't want to beat her to a pulp."
After what seemed like an eternity, Dolores finally exited her office and happily marched towards the entrance of Dumbledore's office.
**The Secret Entrance to Dumbledore's Office**
Magnolia and Nicole crept up the long, winding stairs to the headmaster's office. They decided that this time they wanted to get the full story and Nicole morphed into Draco. Magnolia returned to her cat form and hid in Nicole's dark robes.
"Draco? What are you doing here? Oh, never mind you can witness the greatness that I am about to exude." Umbridge said, escorting the two hidden witches inside.
When they entered, there was a huge group of very powerful wizards and the Minister of Magic himself all staring at Dumbledore.
"Cornelius! So good to see you! Like I told you, Dumbledore is building his own army to attack the ministry. This simply must not go on. He must be replaced."
Nicole's whole body tightened, and she tried her best to keep her composure and her character of Draco in check.
"Yes Dolores, you would be correct. Dispatch an owl to the Daily Prophet, if we hurry, we should still make the morning edition. Dawlish, Shacklebolt, you will escort Dumbledore to Azkaban to await trial for conspiracy and sedation." Fudge stated.
"I thought we might hit this little snag. You seem to be laboring under the delusion that I am going to... what was the phrase? Come quietly. Well, I can tell you this... I have no intention of going to Azkaban." Dumbledore said, not breaking eye contact with the Minister.
"Enough of this! Take him!" Dolores shouted.
As soon as she uttered the words, a bright orange phoenix flew right over Dumbledore's head. He clapped his hands high and magically vanished into thin air. Everyone was speechless and Umbridge quickly told "Draco" to leave.
The girls walked out of the door, down the spinning steps and then took off for a run towards the Gryffindor common room. When they reached the entrance, they gathered all of the Gryffindor D.A. members to explain what they had just seen.
"What the bloody hell do you mean he just disappeared?" Ron asked.
"That's beside the point Ronald, Dumbledore was almost arrested! What does that mean for the school?" Hermione worried.
The group chatted for a while longer then parted ways to go to sleep. It was already getting late and they didn't need to stay up worrying about their future at their beloved school.
Later on in the night Nicole, Magnolia, and Hermione were startled awake at the sound of a curdling scream. It was Harry who had just been awakened due to another dream. This one though, was about Sirius Black.