[OOC - takes place after all other threads]
Once everyone had settled in, Neville took his place in front of those gathered. He cleared his throat to call up the crowd's attention, but before he said a single world, he started fumbling with a sheet of parchment. His eyes roamed over the parchment's contents, his mouth silently moving as he read through what he needed to say. Right. Just be swift; it'll be over sooner if you keep to what you've planned out.
Harry ought to be here. Hermione at the very least. She's brilliant at public speaking.
"Erm," he started, krinkling up the paper in his hands. "Th-thanks everyone for coming on short notice. It's been ages. Um...well, I suppose we ought to just get to it. You've all read the, um, the Prophet. You've read what they and the Ministry want us to think, and you all know it's wrong. But you've not known why. There've been too many mysterious disappearances and leave-takings. And now Dumbledore's retiring so it seems as if Hogwarts isn't going to be the same as it was.
"Hermione, she thinks Dumbledore's retiring to concentrate on helping win the war." It was a war now, and if anyone had any doubts about it, then he'd have to make them see sense. The attacks, the incident at the Weasley wedding. It wasn't a simple skirmish anymore. It was a full-on conflict. "Professor McGonagall's doing everything she can to still keep Hogwarts Castle and everyone inside it secure, but we've got to keep an eye on the new professor. This Pittiman bloke, the one taking over Binns' post, could've been appointed directly by the Ministry. We've got to steer carefully around him. For all we know, he...he might be another Umbridge come sneaking about the castle trying to discredit Dumbledore.
"So. In the meantime, we do things like we did before. Secret meetings for spell practice and to exchange news. And...and I think it'll be good if we try and recruit more students in once we're back at school. Remember Harry wrote up Hermione's instructions on how to put more protection on that journal privacy hex? Um...I want to make sure everyone knows how to do the spell perfectly. It could be the difference between being safe and getting caught.
"Maybe...maybe it'll all rest on Harry's shoulders in the end, but I don't think that's entirely true. It'll have to be everyone working together, protecting one another. And if Harry needs us, I don't want to be the one to let him down."
It rambled; it went all over the place, but at least he got most of the bits he needed to share out to the rest of the DA. He hoped.
"Ummm...any questions?" He hadn't realized that he'd scrunched up the parchment into a tight little ball, not needing to read from it since he began speaking to everyone.