The worst part of Halloween to Flynn, at least conceptually since he'd never actually gone before, was the idea of the Halloween feast. While it was difficult for him to be disappointed by the idea of bigger meal, the wizarding obsession with drowning out any "food" that had the word pumpkin in it with a bathtub full of sugar and only adding a pinch of pumpkin to give the food an orange colouring was something that he had never fully adapted to.

With his usual desire to avoid large crowds, combining with his desire to keep his teeth from rotting out of his mouth without having to pay for a dentist, skipping the Halloween feast was a given. Just like the last year's Halloween, and also every other day of the school year, Flynn spent the breakfast hoarding enough food to last him the day, with the only noticeable difference in his food being the tiny decorations of bats and pumpkins that had been coloured into the bread of his sandwiches.

He had planned to have a nice meal alone in an abandoned classroom, with a textbook in his lap, but his plans were put on hold when, in his last class of the day, Transfiguration with the Hufflepuffs, Lily gave him a note from Hagrid, that had been delivered to her by owl in his absence.

The note was a simple one, with Hagrid simply asking Flynn to come drop by the Hogwarts vegetable gardens after his last class, if he was free, as soon as possible, but no rush.

Flynn hadn't looked too deep into the contradicting messages, but even if he had, he doubted that he would've expected the utter chaos that the vegetable gardens had devolved into. Despite the partial nonchalance that Hagrid had portrayed in his note, Flynn found himself stepping into a warzone.

Dressed in a gardening apron, thick clothing, and what looked like a beekeeper's hat, and armed with two oversized spray bottles in each hand, Hagrid sprayed down an army of enormous slugs that were the size of small dogs and had a translucent flesh-like colouring to them. Though the slugs moved slowly, with how many of them there were, Hagrid was only barely able to hold off the massive wave of slugs. Though whatever was in the spray bottles seemed to be highly effective, causing the slugs to shrivel up and practically disintegrate if even a drop of the liquid mist hit them, the slugs didn't seem to care and continued to advance over the bodies of their dead, pausing only to consume what was left before continuing on.

When Hagrid finally noticed Flynn and a look of intense relief washed over him.

From the very brief shouted explanation that Flynn got from Hagrid, it seemed like this is what Hagrid had been doing since lunchtime. Though he had applied the flesh-eating slug repellent (or the flesh-melting ointment, rather) to the surface of the oversized pumpkins they'd been growing in the vegetable garden, eliminating any hint of flesh-eating slugs during most of the school year so far. Unfortunately, it became apparent that a surviving population had taken shelter underneath the pumpkins and had started a sizable colony there. When Hagrid picked them, exposing them to the world and releasing them from their state of semi-dormancy.

While Hagrid had held on for the past few hours by throwing old food to distract them, it only gave Hagrid enough time to load up his bottles and to write and send his note, before the slugs finished Hagrid's food and started heading for the chicken coops. Though they generally weren't a threat, since they were slow enough to walk away from them without any real effort, Hagrid had found himself pinned for hours, as he protected the chickens, and his spray bottles were nearly empty.

Glaring at the slugs for daring to threaten his supply of chicken, Flynn jumped into the fray without hesitation, and with the opportunity to reload the spray bottles and a second man to shoot, Flynn and Hagrid were slowly able to push back the horde of slugs.

After reloading Flynn's spray bottles, and filling up two more by his side just in case, Hagrid entrusted Flynn with protecting the coop while he delivered the pumpkins to the Hogwarts kitchens for the Halloween feast. Flynn had been forced to give up a good portion of his pocket food to lure back a handful of slugs that tried to wander away from the horde, but by the end of the hour, Hagrid had finished delivering all the pumpkins and they were able to eliminate the last of the infestation together.

Though Hagrid offered to have Flynn sit at his home for a moment, just to take a moment of rest after their battle, an unfortunate stroke of luck had Hagrid accidentally spray his own hands with the flesh-melting ointment that they had been using to destroy the slugs, and with a pained apology, Hagrid rushed into the castle to find Snape.

Not having anything else to do, Flynn scanned the vegetable garden and the area around the chicken coop one last time for any signs of surviving slugs, before he went back to the castle. Sticking his hands in his pockets, he was disappointed to find that he had used up most of his food reserves. Though he had mostly lost track of time during the battle against the slugs, it had gone on long enough that he couldn't help but assume that the feast was almost over, though he might be able to catch the tail end of it if he was lucky.

But when he heard a familiar set of voices travelling through the halls, he couldn't help but think that maybe he shouldn't rely on luck for anything.

"We might make it for the end of the feast if we hurry. Pudding might not be finished yet."

"I can't believe you're still hungry after sitting around rotten food for hours. I don't know whether to be impressed or repulsed."

"I'd rather be full than either of those things," Ron grumbled, as the trio turned the corner.

Though Ron was looking down at his stomach, as he rubbed it forlornly. Harry and Hermione seemed to notice Flynn from down the hallway, both of them freezing in their tracks for a moment. Hermione was quick to snap out of her surprise and give Flynn a smile and a wave, but Harry stayed where he was, giving Flynn a complicated expression that he couldn't interpret from the distance they were standing at.

"Hello, Flintstone," Hermione called. "Have you finished eating at the feast already?"

Ron's eyes shot upwards at the mention of his name, widening in recognition when they landed on him, before darting back to Hermione.

"What are you doing, Hermione?" he asked.

"What does it look like, Ron?" Hermione said, rolling her eyes so intensely that Flynn could see it clearly even from so far away. "I'm saying hello."

"But he's a snake," Ron replied. "He's an enemy."

Hermione let out a sound that sounded halfway between a sigh and a groan.

"Ron, we've been over this," she said. "Being a Slytherin doesn't automatically make him a bad person."

"Listen to yourself, Hermione," Ron said, utterly scandalised by the suggestion. "You know every single dark wizard in history has been a Slytherin."

"That is quite literally untrue," Hermione responded.

"Really?" Ron asked, frowning. "I'm sure I remember Hagrid saying something like that last year."

"And as great of a person Hagrid is, I wouldn't exactly assume he's well studied," Hermione said. "And if we're going on his word, remember that he said that Flynn was the only reason he was able to keep Norberta."

"Norberta?"

"Hagrid's dragon."

"I thought his name was Norbert."

"They discovered that she was a girl, after Professor Kettleburn gave her a check-up."

"Professor Kettleburn?"

"The Care of Magical Creatures professor," Hermione said, with a sigh. "You really ought to be more aware of what goes around you, Ronald."

"Well, it's still a menace," Ron said, trying to ignore the comment entirely, though his ears were tinged with a hint of red. "That thing almost bit me, remember? No matter how much Hagrid likes it, I'm not sure you can exactly call letting him keep a dragon at a school a good thing."

"Then what about the unicorn he helped save?" Hermione asked, with a flat stare. "Surely you won't suggest that saving a unicorn somehow feeds into Flintstone's master plan to sow chaos in Hogwarts."

Though Hermione gave Ron a smug look, clearly feeling triumphant in her argument, Ron was able to shatter her confidence with a blank stare and two words.

"What unicorn?"

Flynn stared at the bickering duo for a few more seconds before he started to wonder why he had stopped for them for so long. He had better things to do than listen to them.

Unfortunately, as he started to walk away, the trio somehow decided that that was the signal for them to follow him to the Great Hall. Not wanting to speed up and potentially imply that they mattered to him in any way, Flynn was stuck listening to the pair's arguments as their voices echoed through the hallway.

"I still don't see why you have any reason to persistently be so rude to him," Hermione said, continuing to talk as if he weren't in earshot. "It's not like he's done anything to you."

"He's a Slytherin," Ron said, with an exasperated sigh, as if it explained everything. "Have you already forgotten how terrible those folk are? Don't you even remember the awful word that Malfoy called you recently? He'd probably call you the same thing, if he bothered to actually say anything."

For the first time since they ran into each other, Harry contributed to the conversation by coughing awkwardly as Hermione laughed.

"Oh, Ronald," Hermione said. "That was the worst possible argument you could've made."

"What do you mean?" Ron asked, suddenly cautious of Hermione's tone.

Hermione laughed to herself, and didn't offer an answer, but Harry spoke up in her stead.

"Sorry, Ron," he said. "But Flintstone is probably a Muggleborn too. Or at least he might've been named by one."

"What do you mean?"

"Flintstone Fredericton," Harry responded. "It's a Muggle thing. Dud- my cousin was obsessed with it for about half a year and-"

"And what?"

There was a short silence as the footsteps following behind him stopped. Flynn spared the trio a single glance to see that Hermione and Ron were staring at Harry as the short boy glanced around the hallway, his eyes darting nervously from wall to wall.

"Harry, what are-"

"Shh!"

There was a moment of silence, as Ron and Hermione turned to each other, and the ginger boy shrugged, but Harry didn't seem to notice as he glanced at the ceiling before his eyes widened.

"This way!" he shouted, before breaking off into a sudden run, in the opposite direction of the Great Hall.

Though Hermione and Ron were quick to chase after Harry, Flynn watched them go until they quickly turned a corner and disappeared from his sight. Letting out a sigh of relief, he turned around and tried his best to forget that they existed as he made his way to the Great Hall.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

When Flynn marched into the Great Hall, and found an empty spot at the end of the Slytherin table, he ignored the stares of the Slytherin First Years that he found himself surrounded by and inspected the plates for any food that didn't have enough sugar to melt his teeth off. Though he didn't see anything substantial immediately, not long after he sat down, a few plates popped into existence, carrying chicken, wrapped sandwiches, and other more palatable food items that he could store in his pockets.

A simple glare seemed to be enough to stop the Slytherin first years from staring, and once his pockets were filled comfortably, Flynn spent the rest of the dinner shovelling some of the less transportable food into his mouth.

Thankfully, Dumbledore clinked his glass and called for an end to the feast in only a few minutes, saving Flynn from completely gorging himself on eggs.

Standing up with the rest of the students, Flynn was about to rush towards the exit in hopes of avoiding being caught in the wave of students heading back to the dorms, before he felt something latch around his wrist.

Looking down, he glared at the blonde barnacle that had spontaneously appeared by his side.

"Hiya, Flynn," Lily said.

"What do you want?" Flynn grunted, as he resigned himself to the fate of being swept along in a tidal wave of bodies.

"Just wanted to check if you were real," she said. "You usually don't come to dinner, so I thought I might've just been imagining you."

"Well I'm real," Flynn grumbled.

"So it seems," Lily said, with a nod.

"Do you plan to let go of me?" Flynn asked, though he suspected the answer that would follow.

Lily stared up at Flynn, raising an eyebrow like she couldn't understand what he had just asked, before turning her attention to the crowd of students around them, apparently not thinking that his question had been worth answering.

Flynn grumbled something that not even he could understand as he walked through the sea of students, with Lily in tow.

Though he wasn't sure if he should be heading to the Slytherin or the Hufflepuff dorms in this situation, the route towards both was somewhat shared, so they followed the large mass of students towards the large staircase in the front hall. It was only when Flynn saw something in the middle of the main hallway on the second floor, that he stopped in his tracks, along with the other students.

"Hey, why'd we stop?" Lily asked, too short to see over the wall of students in front of her.

Flynn didn't answer her as he frowned at the sight of the trio that he'd abandoned only a few minutes before, not knowing whether to be impressed or annoyed by their ability to find trouble in such a short period of time. Standing over a dead cat, hanging by its tail in the middle of the air, the ominous words painted in red over their heads seemed to echo in the hall, without sound.

"THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE."

"Enemies of the heir, beware!" a familiarly whiny voice read out loud from the front of the crowd. "You'll be next, mudbloods."

- - - - -

The two months from the start of the school year to the Halloween feast was always the busiest time of the year, according to Hagrid. As the Hogwarts Groundskeeper, he was responsible for cultivating and harvesting the oversized pumpkins, and unlike the Christmas trees that he also cared for, they needed constant care to grow past their natural, non-magical limits.

While Flynn's presence and assistance was a large boon, especially with how much of a green thumb he had, taking care of the pumpkins was still arduous enough that he could barely afford to do anything besides it, and with him still taking care of his regular Groundskeeper's duties, it had been a long time since he had used his hut for anything other than sleeping and eating.

Though it had been relatively empty at the beginning of his first year, having nothing but a bed, a firepit for cooking, and various household items scattered around the floor, over the past year and during the summer, it was clear that Hagrid had slowly been putting in work to make the place more hospitable to guests.

Now there was a small semi-circle of small armchairs sitting around the fireplace, and two tables on opposite ends of the hut, one for eating, and one for studying. Though most of the chairs had plush cushioning on them, all of them looking like they'd been pulled from different sets, being nowhere close to matching another in shape, colour, or patterning, most of them were too soft for Flynn's liking, and he was grateful that they were easily detachable.

Flynn didn't like to admit it, but Hagrid's hut was probably his favourite place in all of Hogwarts to be in.

But right now, he couldn't help but feel a shard of annoyance pricking at his mind, as an awkward silence filled the air in Hagrid's hut. It wasn't completely quiet, but it was quiet enough that the sounds of the crackling fire echoed around the single room, along with Fang's quiet grunting with his neck and chest being squeezed in Sally's tight hug.

Sitting in the seat beside her, Lily sat in a rare silence as she stared blankly into the fire, not having spoken more than a few words in the time that they'd been there. Behind them, Hagrid stood awkwardly behind them with a teapot in his hands, peering over their shoulders to see that neither of them had touched their tea since the last time he'd checked, about a minute ago.

Flynn scowled at all of them, before he let out a huff and closed his textbook shut, annoyed that the three idiots had somehow ruined silence for him.

"For the last fucking time," he said. "The fucking cat isn't even dead. The message on the wall was edgy, not threatening. And Draco's a fucking idiot. So stop fucking moping."

Lily glanced back at Flynn with a strained grimace, but Sally didn't turn around as she talked.

"She was still hurt," she said.

Fang grumbled and shifted his position so he wouldn't be choked to death by Sally's tightening grip, and Sally flinched back in surprise before whispering a near silent apology and started to scratch his head instead of squeezing him.

Hagrid glanced at Flynn with a lost expression on his face, as if the older man were deferring to his opinion on what to do despite likely being more than three times his age.

Flynn let out a heavy sigh.

"I'm learning how to cook."

The effect, though barely tangible, was immediate. Rather than a loud gasp or exclamation, everybody responded with a silent turn of the head, and a look of mild surprise, though he couldn't be sure if they were more surprised by the subject matter of what he said, or the fact that he'd said it at all.

He scowled at each of them in turn.

"What? You fuckers think that's funny, or something?" he growled.

The rhetorical question backfired on him immediately, when they each silently answered with their amused smiles. Though Hagrid at least tried to cover his up with a cough and Sally turned away and tried to hide her face behind Fang, Lily turned around completely and leaned over the back of her chair.

"A little bit," she said, giggling right afterwards, as if she was trying to prove it.

Flynn glared at her, but when he slowly felt his face heating up with annoyance, he tore his eyes away from hers and turned back to his textbook, opening it with enough force to slam the front cover hard against the table.

Fang let out a snort as the loud sound of impact woke him, making Sally giggle in turn. Picking up where he left off, Flynn did his best to burn a hole into his textbook with his glare, blocking out the rally of laughter that had inadvertently started between the two girls as best as he could.

"What are you going to cook first?" Lily asked, grabbing a chair and placing it beside him before he could stop her.

"Fuck off," he grumbled, tilting his body away from her.

It did nothing to stifle the aura of a smile that emanated from her very being, as she pressed her shoulder into his.

"Aww c'mon, Flynn," she said. "Don't be shy."

"Fuck. Off," Flynn said, glaring a picture of Dorian the Unrepentant that the previous owner of his History textbook had drawn a moustache onto. The picture glared back at him as it tried to wipe off the smudge, to no avail.

"Are you gonna cook anything for me?" she asked.

"Yes," Flynn grumbled, as he flipped the page, refusing to give Dorian any more attention as he yelled silently at Flynn, probably demanding for him to erase the moustache off his face.

There was a moment of blissful silence, and the pressure of Lily's shoulder against his lifted away for a moment, relieving him from the angry rush of heat that pooled in his head.

"Really?" Lily asked.

The simple question was enough for Flynn to tear his eyes away from the very interesting article on Dorian's brother, Timothy the Repentant or something like that, to glare at Lily.

"What?" he said. "You think I'm such a piece of shit that I can't keep a fucking promise?"

Lily blinked a few times, and tilted her head in confusion.

Flynn scowled at her.

"I told you I'd get you back," he said. "Don't think I fucking forgot."

Lily's confusion refused to fade at first, but when Flynn suddenly saw a slow look of understanding in her eyes, he suddenly realised that he might have made a mistake.

With his entire head burning with annoyance, he turned back to Thomas the Repellent.

"Flintstone Fredericton," Lily said, leaning on his shoulder once again. "Are you perhaps, possibly, perchance talking about first year? On the Hogwarts Express?"

Apparently Tommy travelled all across Europe to make amends for his brother's actions.

"You are, aren't you?" Lily said.

"Fuck off," Flynn grumbled.

Lily's annoying, annoying laughter rang in Flynn's ear, as she practically draped herself over him. Flynn was too focused on his textbook to shove her off, despite very much wanting to.

Flynn couldn't remember why he had bothered to bring up the topic of cooking anyways, but now that he had, he couldn't help but think that whatever his original reason was, it hadn't been worth it. The sounds of chatter and laughter returned once again to Hagrid's hut, robbing him of his sanctuary once more, and combined with the heat of annoyance that festered in his head and from his shoulder, he found that he couldn't focus on whatever Tristan did hundreds of years ago, or whatever.

Instead, his thoughts wandered to what he might learn to cook, to give Lily exactly what she deserved.

With the burning heat of vengeance fueling his promises, he swore to himself that he would get his revenge.