Harry Potter Abridged! GOF Chapter 26

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

THE [drumroll] SECOND TASK!!

[The next day in class, Harry speaks to Ron and Hermione about what he'd seen last night.]

Harry: Thank goodness nobody's listening to us because they're all shooting things violently around the room with Banishing Charms.

Flitwick: Help! Navel Longbottom's got meeeeeeeee! [Flies across the room]

Neville: My name is not Navel! [Cries] Why does Professor Flitwick hate me?!

Ron: So you think Snape's in trouble with Moody, then?

Harry: Yeah, probably. Surely this could in no way mean that Moody is acting strange or out of place.

Ron: Maybe Snape put your name in the Goblet of Fire?

Harry: That could be!

Hermione: But why would Snape want to do that? He saved your life once!

Harry: That was an anomaly! No doubt since he's being mean to me he REALLY wants me dead this time!

Hermione: Yeah, well, Dumbledore trusts Snape. And I know we can trust Dumbledore, because Dumbledore introduced us to our personal friends Lupin and Hagrid. I can think of no way in which that might show that Dumbledore's judgement is suspect!

Ron: Nonsense; Snape is evil.

Hermione: How do you know?

Ron: Because Moody searched his office!

Hermione: What makes you think Moody was in the right to do that?

Ron: Because we like Moody and not Snape! So there!

Hermione: Whatever. Harry, if Crouch is sick, then just how did he get into the school at night if he couldn't even be at our dance?

Ron: Clearly you're just upset about the TOTALLY JUSTIFIED way Crouch treats his House-Elf. I can think of no other reason why you don't trust Crouch!

Hermione: Oh, yeah? Well I could say the same thing about you and Snape.

Harry: To be fair, if Moody doesn't trust Snape I want to see all the gory details; maybe I can actually prove that he's a bad man!

[The Second Task, meanwhile, draws ever nearer.]

Harry: Maybe I could summon an aqualung from a nearby Muggle town?

Hermione: Harry, since when have you shown any interest in totally-inferior Muggle devices, anyway?

Harry: Oh, boo hiss! Now I actually have to go to the LIBRARY again, and RESEARCH! Why is my life so haaaaaaaard?

[Harry and his friends do their research, but turn up no results.]

Harry: Oh, but it's not like I can actually question Dumbledore's decision to let me compete in a tournament like this when I've never learned how to do any spells to help me breath underwater!

[Meanwhile, Harry gets a letter from Sirius asking to visit him in Hogsmeade.]

[In Care of Magical Creatures, meanwhile, Hagrid is teaching the students more about Unicorns.]

Hagrid: So today I've brought you some cute little golden baby Unicorns. Don't ask what happened to their mother or anything, thought!

Harry: Gee, Hagrid—I'm sure nervous about the second task coming up! Could you give me an injection of self-confidence?

Hagrid: Oh, sure! Harry, you're going to win—I know you will. You're Just That Awesome, after all, and everyone knows it!

[Harry later gets back to researching but still turns up nothing.]

Hermione: I'm certainly not going to question Dumbledore's judgement in giving us a task that requires a spell that can't even be found in any of these books!

Harry: Maybe I should have been a watery Animagus....

Hermione: You? The Gryffindoriest of all Gryffindors? A water Animagus?! Besides, it takes far too long to register to become one!

[Just then, Fred Weasley appears out of nowhere!]

Fred: Ron! Hermione! Professor McGonagall wants to speak to you! Now come leave Harry alone so he can angst by himself!

Ron and Hermione: Yes, Fred-who-is-not-with-George-for-some-reason!

Fred: Thanks for reminding me of how little personality I have!

[They stride away, leaving Harry to his own devices.]

Harry: Oh, woe is me! I must now valiantly return to my room to cram-study for the task that's TOMORROW! And hope that a Deus ex Machina comes to help me out!

[Harry returns to his room, where he drifts into and out of sleep several times. Eventually, he wakes up to see Dobby!]

Dobby: Harry, it's me! Your most useful plot device!

Harry: Oh, Dobby! It's you!

Dobby: I've brought you something—you'll need to eat this before you go in the lake. [He produces Gillyweed, which he hands to Harry] Now hurry—the task starts in ten minutes!

Harry: Thank you so much, Dobby! You are the greatest plot device!

Dobby: Oh, by the way, the Merpeople are holding Ron hostage!

Harry: WHAT?!

[Harry mad-dashes out to the lake to do his task and save Ron!]

Percy: Oh, Harry! You're finally here! I'd love to two-dimensionally reprimand you for being late, but unfortunately none of your adoring fans will let me do that so just go take your place!

[Bagman blows the whistle and Harry jumps in with the other champions, eating the Gillyweed as he does so. Harry grows gills!]

Harry: Noww I really can be like Eridan Ampora! All I need is a hipster cape, a feww rings, a seahorse friend, and a genocide complex! Fuck, I'vve evven copied his wway of speaking!

[Harry tries to navigate the lake, fighting some Grindylows along the way. Eventually he spots Moaning Myrtle.]

Moaning Myrtle: They're that way! [Points] Oh, but I won't come with you; you can figure the rest out myself. I'm sure if I helped you any more blatantly it'd be cheating.

Harry: I havve the best plot-device friends evver! Wwoohoo!

[Eventually he comes upon the merpeople, and sees Ron, as well as Hermione, Cho, and Fleur's little sister, tied to a statue in the center of their community.]

Merpeople: Eridan Ampora?!

Harry: No I'm Harry Potter you idiots!

Harry: Oh, but howw shall I free them? Oh, maybe I'll just take one of the mermen's tridents.... [He finds a merman with a spear.] Mr. Merman, can I borroww your spear so I can free my friend?

Merman: No this is mine.

Harry: But I'm Eridan... I mean, Harry Potter! I deservve all the help I can get!

Merman: Forget it. I don't lend my weapons to trolls!

Harry: But I'm not a troll! I'm the main character; honest!

Merman: Whatever--this trident is still mine; not yours!

[But Harry finds a sharp rock, which he uses to free Ron.]

Harry: Yay! Oh, but wwhat about the others? Since the other champions are incompetent and havven't gotten theirs yet, because they're thick as bricks and not as awwesome as me, then I wwill do the honor of rescuing the others too, so I look even better! [He reaches for Hermione only to be pulled away by the merpeople.]

Random mermaid: Idiot—you take your own and get out!

[But just then, Cedric appears and frees Cho. Krum comes by momentarily, halfway-transfigured into a shark.]

Harry: Oh, but wwhere is Fleur? Since she's so delicate and female, she's clearly gotten held up permanently! I must therefore savve her hostage from certain death as wwell!

Merpeople: Not this shit again! [They block Harry, but Harry pulls out his wand.]

Harry: Let me get her right noww or I'll coat you in my swweet magic from my massivve wwand!

Merpeople: Damn! Don't hurt us, Mr. Troll!

Harry: I'm not a troll! I'm Harry Potter, the awwesomest wwizard ever!

Merpeople: Whatever! Don't attack us with your wand!

Harry: That's better. Wwe wwizards are still better than you since wwe can do magic—don't forget that!

Merman: Get back to Homestuck!

[But Harry takes the little girl as well as Ron and away he goes. Ron and the girl wake up soon after breaking the surface.]

Ron: Harry, that was incredible! But you didn't rescue that inferior French girl too, did you?

Harry: But I couldn't just let her die!

Ron: Silly—there's no reason to think we'd have died! After all, Dumbledore told us we were safe, and I have no reason to doubt that Dumbledore takes our safety seriously!

Merpeople: You completely broke the rules of the task for no good reason, and impersonated a Homestuck troll, but let's cheer for you anyway!

[They go to the tent with Madame Pomfrey and the others...]

Fleur: Oh, Harry, thank you so much for saving my sister! I was menaced by these Grindylows and there was no way I could have ever gotten past them, seeing as I'm so delicate and female and all...!

Hermione: Harry, you've actually done something for yourself for once!

Harry: [to self] Need I mention that actually it was Dobby who gave me the magic Eridan Ampora-fying plant and Moaning Myrtle who pointed me in the direction of the merpeople and who indeed was the only reason I figured out the egg in the first place?

Krum: Hermione, need I remind you that I was the one who cared about you enough to go looking for you in the first place?

Hermione: Go away, Foreigner! Nobody likes you!

Krum: Need I mention that you have a water beetle in your hair? I wonder what that could possibly mean...?

Harry: Oh, shut up, you! Whyyyyy did I take that riddle seriously?! Of COURSE Dumbledore would never let anyone drown! I'm such an iiiiiidiooooooot!

[Meanwhile, Dumbledore converses with the Mer-chieftaness and the other judges.]

Bagman: So, once again, Fleur is last because she's a stupid girl; and Harry ties with Cedric for first!

Ron: See Harry? Your heroics got you glory again!

Harry: Yeah, you're right! Hooray! Being a hero is awesome when you get showered with praise like this!

Krum: But I did okay too... right Hermione?

Hermione: That's nice, Foreigner. We don't care. Harry rules!

Krum: Fuck you! Why didn't I get my own series?

Bagman: So, the third task is at the end of June; until then, bye!

[And they all go back to the castle in high spirits.]

EXTRAS:

[Later that night, in Harry's dorm...]

Harry: I must thank Dobby for his plot-device weed. Even when partially transformed into a Homestuck troll I still looked better than the other competitors under the water!

Neville: I could've told you that! I read the book! [Produces a book on plants.]

Harry: You know something, all the merpeople down in the lake thought I was Eridan Ampora.

Neville: So... this means you've finally come around to how much it sucks when nobody knows who you are or what your name is?

Harry: ...LOLNOPE! Sorry, Navel; can't say I sympathize.

Neville: I hate you so much.

Comments

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

Ron: Because we like Moody and not Snape! So there!

Sadly that pretty much sums up the standard of judgment in these books.

Why is Myrtle helping Harry again? In CoS Harry promises to visit her again. In PoA she is forgotten. When Harry needs her there she is, because he's Harry. Not because he's done something to deserve her support.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/Harry: That was an anomaly! No doubt since he's being mean to me he REALLY wants me dead this time!/

And somehow it takes Harry the whole series to figure out that somebody disliking you doesn’t automatically mean that they want you dead.

/I can think of no way in which that might show that Dumbledore's judgement is suspect!/

Not even the safety precautions regarding the Goblet of Fire or the fact that Harry’s compelled to compete despite being underage.

/Harry: Oh, boo hiss! Now I actually have to go to the LIBRARY again, and RESEARCH!/

Yet another reason why many people say that Hermione should have been the main character.

/Ron: Silly—there's no reason to think we'd have died! After all, Dumbledore told us we were safe, and I have no reason to doubt that Dumbledore takes our safety seriously!/

You know, now that I think about it, not only are the tasks very dangerous, but they must be very boring to watch. I think that the first task was the only task where the audience got to see what was going on. The second task? Everyone’s stuck waiting to see when the champions will come back up to the lake’s surface with the hostages. The third task? Nobody can see the champions because they’re in a maze. I know that some fans have called Quidditch boring to watch, but at least the spectators can actually see the players whizzing around on their broomsticks.

/Fleur: Oh, Harry, thank you so much for saving my sister! I was menaced by these Grindylows and there was no way I could have ever gotten past them, seeing as I'm so delicate and female and all...!/

Yeah, first Fleur gets the smallest dragon in the first task, is incapacitated by the same grindylows that Harry, a fourth-year, managed to fend off, and then is quickly attacked by Barty Crouch Jr. before he heads over to the other champions. I know that the movie had Moody vouch for her worth by saying that, despite her appearance, Fleur’s not a delicate “fairy princess” by any means. But the book itself doesn’t do much to make Fleur more than her appearance.

/Krum: Hermione, need I remind you that I was the one who cared about you enough to go looking for you in the first place?/

And who seems to treat you well, is reasonably mature, and whom you haven’t attacked with vicious birds at any point? And yet you break up with him for some reason and head for Ron?

/Neville: I could've told you that! I read the book! [Produces a book on plants.]/

That’s why I liked that the movie changed it. Instead of Dobby telling Harry about the gillyweed, Neville did.

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, first Fleur gets the smallest dragon in the first task, is incapacitated by the same grindylows that Harry, a fourth-year, managed to fend off, and then is quickly attacked by Barty Crouch Jr. before he heads over to the other champions. I know that the movie had Moody vouch for her worth by saying that, despite her appearance, Fleur’s not a delicate “fairy princess” by any means."

Come to think of it, was she actually any better in the movies? Because having Moody vouch for her is one thing, but unless her role itself got an upgrade she'd still be the weakest champion for no apparent reason.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

I don't think so. In the movie, Fleur is also incapacitated by the grindylows and is the first champion that Harry sees taken out in the maze. We don't get to see her face the dragon in the first task...but then again, we don't get see Cedric and Viktor's turns either. The camera just focuses on Harry waiting and overhearing what's happening outside before it's his turn.

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

they must be very boring to watch

That occurred to me watching the movie. In GoF they have the dragon escape unnecessarily and go off where the spectators would have a hard time seeing Harry. Which made me think about what the spectators could see during the tasks the other tasks.