Chapter 58: Summer Plans
"What if there iss third, ssomeday?" -HPMoR Ch 65
It had taken a great deal of convincing throughout the month of May for Neville's grandmother to finally grant him permission for a trip to Hogwarts on the day of the Leave Taking Feast – under the personal guard of a full auror trio, of course, with strict supervision at all times, even in the Hufflepuff Common room, even during that one trip he took to the bathroom, and especially during the Defense Professor's final lesson of the year.
The original plan demanded he Floo back to Longbottom manor immediately after dinner, but with his Grandmother at Hogwarts due to the tomato fiasco, Neville had one last chance to ask if he could stay the full night, and his grandmother had one last chance to say yes.
And she did.
She personally informed the trio guarding him that they were no longer needed, that Neville could stay the night and ride the Hogwarts Express back to London. She was not doing this because he asked politely, she explained to Neville, but because the ill-doings at Hogwarts had been the machinations of Voldemort. With Voldemort gone, so is the danger.
…meaning he can spend time with his friends again, and he plans to use every second that way, even on the Hogwarts Express.
When searching for a cabin of first year Hufflepuffs to join, he instead found a cabin with Theodore Nott (Slytherin), Seamus Finnegan (Gryffindor), and Dean Thomas (Gryffindor).
He decided he slightly prefers the company of his fellow Chaotic Lieutenants to his fellow Hufflepuffs. Even if two of them had been forced to join other armies in the end, they're still loyal Chaotics at heart. Once you go Chaos, you never go back.
That's one of General Potter's mottos.
Blaise Zabini was there too, which made Neville a bit nervous, though not enough to stop him from sliding open the door and sitting down between Seamus and Dean. Neville doesn't trust the traitorous Slytherin at all, but he can't deny that Zabini's actions had earned him the right to be an officer of Chaos. So long as they don't actually talk about anything serious, Neville doesn't mind Zabini that much.
The topic of conversation, even before the train started moving and Hogwarts disappeared behind them, didn't involve plans for the summer, and in particular not plans to meet up over the summer. That disappointed Neville a little, but he couldn't blame his fellow Chaotics for trying to figure out what really happened.
"The most confusing thing," said Blaise, who seemed to be trying the hardest to figure it out for some reason, "is that some of the Death Eaters were spared. Everyone knows the Imperius was an excuse. I won't ask you to confirm or deny it, Theodore, but you have to agree that most of the country didn't believe it."
The noble, blood purist Slytherin, son of an 'Imperius'ed Death Eater, neither confirmed nor denied it. He simply asked, "And?"
"And that means we start there," said Dean Thomas. "General Potter says you always attack a problem at the point of greatest confusion. So now we have to come up with a simple explanation that makes the confusion go away."
The boys sat in silence for a while.
"I'm drawin' a blank," said Seamus. "Can't really come up with anything."
"I must admit to the same," said Theodore. "But from the way you spoke, you sound like you already have an idea, Zabini?"
His fellow Slytherin nodded. "Here's what I've been thinking. What if the whole thing was staged by the DMLE to get rid of the Death Eaters they could actually touch? You know, all the ones without Wizengamot votes and strong wards on their homes. That would explain why the aurors couldn't beat him- they were secretly on the actor's side, maintaining the barrier or something. And everything else was just an illusion. Or maybe everyone was memory charmed."
"Woulda had ta be one heck of an illusionist," Seamus said. Then he shook his head. "I mean, it might'a been fake, it's possible, but I don’t think that was an actor, I think it really was You-Know-Who. He had Bellatrix Black and everything."
"He was more powerful than all the teachers," said Dean. "Not just the aurors. And when Harry blocked his killing curse, he exploded. And Harry started screaming too, and that didn't look fake either."
"And the teachers likely would have seen through any illusions," Theodore pointed out. "Flitwick and McGonagall at the very least. And memory charms cannot fake results. The Sunshine General seems pretty real to me. I wasn't at the match, but I was at dinner. How do you fake a resurrection and a phoenix and the Defense Professor's new health and body?"
Zabini shook his head. "Alright, alright, point taken. The Dark Lord was probably real, and some of what we saw was probably true. So the only thing that doesn't fit is that all the old Death Eaters should have exploded. And that's not a criticism of your father," said Zabini to Nott. "Even if he was under the Imperius, you would think the Dark Lord would kill him anyway. You know, just for the insult, or the betrayal. I heard that all the Death Eaters in Azkaban died too, so distance clearly didn't matter, and he must have had some control over the Marks he put on the Death Eaters he had to 'Imperius'. So why not kill Malfoy and Jugson and your father? You can't deny that it doesn't make sense."
"Right," said Dean Thomas. "The Dark Lord was cunning and evil. He wouldn't overlook that."
"Not unless he wanted to," Zabini amended. Even as the Slytherin said it, Neville could see Zabini come to some sort of realization. "Wait!" the schemer said, suddenly excited. "What if he did want to?"
Dean, Neville, Theodore, and Seamus all looked at him.
"Why would he want to die?" asked Seamus.
"Not die," Zabini denied. "Pretend to die."
There was a pause.
"Um… what?" asked Neville.
"Look at what happened," said the Slytherin, "and ask who benefits. That is rule one in Slytherin. The Dark Lord was more Slytherin than anyone else. What if he wanted it to look like he died? What if he survived again, just like last time? What if he planned the whole thing?"
"Why plan all that?" asked Dean. "Didn't he just lose… pretty much everything?"
"My thoughts exactly," said Theodore.
"Not really," said Zabini, "because he didn't kill anybody with a Wizengamot vote. They all get to claim that they were innocent all along, and now the Dark Lord can manipulate the Ministry from the shadows." The Slytherin nodded conclusively.
"But why kill the rest of his servants?" Theodore asked. "Especially Bellatrix Black. She was more powerful than Dumbledore's strongest allies. Why dispose of such a useful tool?"
"She was his most powerful servant," Zabini agreed. "Then she spent ten years on the lowest level of Azkaban. Maybe he decided he didn't need her anymore."
"And the rest?" Theodore pressed. "Some of them were very powerful, and they weren't exposed to Dementors. Why kill them too?"
Zabini shrugged. "To make the whole thing more convincing."
"I don't buy it," said Seamus, leaning back in his seat with crossed arms. "I was at the Quidditch game. I don't think it was an act."
"I don't either," said Dean.
"You don't think it was just a little hammy?" asked Zabini. "I mean, I didn't see it at the time, but now that I think about it, the Dark Lord did seem to be putting on a big performance."
Neville hadn't been there, so he couldn't comment.
"Eh," shrugged Seamus. "Hard to say. Maybe he's always like that?"
"Only sometimes," said Theodore, who refused to elaborate further.
"Well…" said Dean, "Even if it was a performance, I don't think he was expecting Harry to block his killing curse."
"What if General Potter was in on it?" asked Zabini.
"You think the Dark Lord and the Boy-Who-Lived are working together?" the son of a Death Eater asked derisively.
"It's all just speculation," Zabini said, arms raised in defense. "It's like what Slytherins say about Dumbledore waiting until just the right moment to defeat Grindelwald. If you were friends with Dumbledore, you wouldn't believe it for a moment. If you watched their duel yourself, you probably wouldn't believe it. But from the outside, what does it look like? Dumbledore became Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, and apparently he got the Elder Wand as well. All because he fought an unbelievable duel that lasted for twenty hours. Slytherin House knows it's ridiculous. No duel lasts that long, no matter how evenly matched."
"Hmm," Seamus Finnegan hummed, sounding curious. "Never thought o' that."
Neville had the impulse to leap to Dumbledore's defense, but his Chaotic training was getting in the way. The initial reply he wanted to say hadn't been sensible. He'd been to professional duels, not to mention all the first-hand experience he'd gained from the armies. One-on-one fights rarely last longer than five minutes at the absolute maximum, even at the highest levels. And according to Susan, her aunt says that real fights between really powerful wizards are really short. A twenty-hour duel does sound suspicious.
"Maybe Dumbledore was way more powerful, but he didn't fight seriously because he didn't want to kill his friend?" Neville suggested. "It's easy for a stronger wizard to last forever against a weaker wizard. They were friends before the war. He didn't even send Grindelwald to Azkaban afterwards."
"All the more evidence they were working together," said Zabini. "Until Dumbledore betrayed him at the last minute."
Theodore chuckled, and Neville dragged a hand across his face in frustration.
"So you really think Harry and Voldemort were working together?" Dean asked Zabini. As a muggleborn, he didn't have the same fear of the name as everyone else.
Zabini didn't quite conceal his flinch, though he did better than everyone else, even Theodore. "I think it's possible."
"What's your proof?" asked Neville, who was the most skeptical, at least when it came to indicting Harry, and therefore he was the best person to question the claim, though not the best one to weigh the evidence.
"The killing curse was impossibly blocked," Zabini answered. "Or rather, a fake killing curse was possibly blocked."
There was a pause as that sank in.
"Um..." said Seamus, "Pretty sure it wasn't fake. He said the words and everything."
"And it was exactly the right colour," said Theodore. Everybody chose not to question that claim, even though the boy hadn't been at the Quidditch match.
"Look," said Zabini, "the Dark Lord can cast spells wordlessly, right?"
There were hesitant nods around the table.
Zabini continued slowly, carefully laying out the logic. "Then that means he can cast one spell without saying what it is while pretending it's a different spell by saying a different incantation. Like, he says the words for Stupefy, and a red bolt comes from his wand, but it's secretly a wordless Rictusempra because he and the target are working together, and he only wants to make it look like he stunned them. Only instead of Stupefy and Rictusempra and the other person taking a dive, it's the killing curse and a different green spell, something he can cancel mid-flight so it looks like it was blocked, and then the Dark Lord takes the dive."
Zabini met everyone's gaze afterwards, especially Neville's, as if to see if they understood. He didn't look at Theodore, either because he was sitting next to him instead of across and it would have been awkward or because he trusted his fellow Slytherin to understand. But even though Neville did understand the proposal…
"Wordless magic does not work that way," said Theodore, the source of the objection catching Zabini off-guard. "What you just described is impossible. Right, Neville?"
Neville nodded. "The dueling circuit would look a lot different."
"Isn't the Dark Lord known for doing impossible things?" asked Zabini.
That caused another one of those pauses.
"Even if that was all true," said Dean, "why would Harry team up with Voldemort? That's even more confusing than the Death Eaters surviving, so it's not a better explanation."
"That part is easy," said Zabini. "General Potter got an Order of Merlin yesterday for defeating Voldemort, right Theodore?"
"First class," Theodore nodded, to the surprise of everyone across from him except Neville.
"It was a unanimous vote," Neville contributed and confirmed.
"Right," said Zabini. "That means the Wizengamot has officially recognized Harry Potter as Voldemort's vanquisher, and that means he can finally collect all the bounties on the Dark Lord."
"You think the General is in it for the money?" Neville asked incredulously.
"It's the simplest explanation," Zabini shrugged. "When in debt or doubt, follow the money. That's what mother always says."
"Now that," said Theodore, "makes sense."
"But doesn't Harry already have a lot of money?" asked Dean. "House Potter is a noble house, right?"
"Maybe the Malfoy debt made him realise he needs more," said Zabini.
"How much do all the bounties total to?" asked Dean. "Would it really make much of a difference to him now that he's got his money back?"
"I'm pretty sure Nicholas Flamel put up a big one," said Zabini. "I don't remember how much." The boy's eyes widened in sudden insight. "Oh! That's another thing. The thing, actually. Now Harry has it in with Flamel. Everyone knows Mr. Potter wants to be immortal, and now he can be if he plays his cards right. The bounties would be payment for services rendered up front, with promise of apprenticeship in the future. That is right up the General's alley, even if plain old money isn't."
"Gotta give ya that one," said Seamus.
"But wouldn't that mean Professor Quirrell-" Dean began, then caught himself, "-I mean, Professor Monroe is in on it too?"
"Oh, I thought that was obvious," said Zabini.
"Um..." said Neville. "What's obvious?"
"David Monroe benefitted more than anyone else," said Zabini. "He became Chief Warlock, he got the Elder Wand, he got himself healed because he helped Flamel, or maybe he healed himself because he stole the Stone, and he can basically swing the entire Wizengamot to vote however he wants. It's even more likely that he's the one who planned it all. He just brought his little teacher's pet along for the ride. I bet the Dark Lord and David Monroe were working together to take over the country from the beginning, and Harry Potter is just tagging along now that their plot is all coming together."
"The Dark Lord killed House Monroe," said Theodore. "Hard to think they'd work together after that."
"Maybe Monroe hated his whole family," Zabini speculated, "and he asked the Dark Lord to do it so he could become the sole inheritor. Someone in Slytherin got someone in Ravenclaw to look him up in the library yesterday and summarize the big points in his life. He wasn't even close to the main heir of House Monroe. Not until the day everyone else just happened to be killed by the Dark Lord." He said that last line in a voice that was mocking the very idea of coincidence.
There was a pause as this sank in.
"But didn't the Dark Lord kill his muggle fighting teacher?" asked Seamus.
"Maybe he hated the teacher for teaching him that lesson," Zabini speculated, "and he asked the Dark Lord to kill his teacher and all the students. Remember how Professor Quirrell's friend was spared to tell the tale? Maybe that fellow was the only one who didn't beat him up and that's why he asked the Dark Lord not to kill him. Maybe he only pretended to lose when the other students were spitting on him. Wasn't that the whole point of the lesson?"
There was another pause as this idea sank in.
"Okay," said Dean, "this is starting to get scary."
"It is, isn't it?" asked Seamus.
"It does make sense," Theodore agreed.
"It feels crazy," said Neville.
"Just like everything else the General does," Theodore pointed out. "Until you 'see the light', as he says."
"I still don't buy it," said Neville.
"Oh, I don't either," Seamus agreed. "Fun to think about though. What about you, Dean?"
"Same," said the muggleborn Gryffindor. "Theo?"
"I'm keeping an open mind," said the pureblood Slytherin, frowning at the nickname but not objecting. The boy looked at the source of what will probably become the school's next wonderful rumor. "I bet you're going to say this is all harmless speculation, Zabini?"
"Of course," said the traitor with a smile. "There's no way to know for sure unless they come right out and say it, and I'm pretty sure they won't ever do that. Oh, and don't forget: if it is true, and they hear the rumor, and they trace it back to us, we'll die by natural causes for sure, just like all my mother's husbands, so we better keep it to ourselves if we know what's good for us, and I'm actually serious about that."
Neville didn't allow his relief to show on his face, just in case it gave the Slytherin an idea. Maybe it won't become a rumor after all. Then again, if Neville is fearful in the first place, it means he thinks the story is believable. Neville found it disturbing how even talking to Zabini runs the risk of turning you traitor.
He decided it was time to change the subject. "So... what are you guys doing over the summer?"
Elsewhere and earlier.
Harry and Draco sat next to each other.
Hermione sat across from them.
Vincent and Gregory stood guard outside the cabin.
Harry, apparently, didn't think that was enough security. Harry had asked Draco if casting magic on the train constituted the use of 'underage magic', and Draco had replied that the train is officially recognized as Hogwarts grounds. Therefore, no.
Harry had then taken out his wand and cast a few security charms, causing Draco's eyes to widen. Those were second and third and even fourth year spells.
"You want to be the one to ask?" Harry prompted when he was done, keeping up the illusion of them being equals so the conspiracy wouldn't fall apart at its very first expansion.
"Yes," said Draco. He decided to pretend like the spells he'd just seen weren't a big deal, even though Granger probably thought they were. Maybe that would give the impression of magical power being a benefit of membership. "Ms. Granger, Harry and I are formally inviting you to join our..." calling it a conspiracy so soon might not be a good idea "...science group."
"That's what this is about?" Granger asked, looking at Harry.
"Yep," said Harry. "This is your official invitation to the Bayesian Conspiracy."
So much for not calling it that.
Granger didn't look impressed. "That's what you called it?"
"You don't sound surprised," Draco observed.
"Er," said Harry. "Yeah, sorry, Draco." Draco turned to stare at him. "She already figured out we were secretly doing science together from your testimony under veritaserum. Full disclosure, I was secretly doing science with her, too. I'd have liked to do this from the start, all three of us together, but..."
A few feelings were going through Draco rather rapidly. There was the feeling of betrayal at the admission, immediately followed by understanding once he heard the reasoning. All in all, it was par for the course when dealing with Harry Potter.
"...But I wouldn't have accepted that," said Draco, his face perfectly calm.
"You're taking it better than I did," Hermione observed. "He told me the day I died, you know. The troll only got me because I was crying in a bathroom."
"Ouch," said Draco with a wince. "Yeah, I'm not that bothered. But I am feeling very lied to. Harry, you know what this means, right?"
"I... owe you a favour?"
"Yes," said Draco. "And you have to tell me about the research you did with her, since we're going to be telling her the research we did." That had already been part of the plan, but now it was even better. If he had leverage on her secrets, she'd be less tempted to betray his.
"There's... really only one," said Harry. "One success, I mean. The rest were all failures, and after that she convinced me that we should just study together. Though on second thought, maybe you would find some of the failures informative-"
"I'm sure he would find them very informative," said Granger. She smiled at Draco. "You know, Mr. Malfoy, it'll be nice to finally have someone else to let Harry know when he's being silly. Did you know, in his first month of school, Harry thought he was smarter than all the wizards who wrote our school books?"
"I can believe it," said Draco. "What'd he do? Assume everything we thought about magic was wrong?"
"That's pretty close, actually," said Hermione.
"Can we please not talk about this?" Harry said, his face in his hands.
"But scientists are supposed to collaborate," said Hermione. "It's the common endeavour, you know. Maybe he'll think of something when he hears that you tried to have me learn new spells with one wrong gesture, or one wrong word, or not knowing what it did."
"That's... extremely dangerous, you know," said Draco. "Didn't you hear Professor Quirrell's lecture?"
"Oh, I know," said Hermione, staring hard at Harry. "Believe me, I know that. Now. This was before that lecture."
"I'm sorry, alright?" Harry pleaded. "I didn't think it was dangerous! It was just a bunch of joke spells! I avoided the ones with warnings about what happens when you cast them wrong."
Granger's glare was almost lethal. "And you didn't think that maybe someone hadn't ever cast them wrong in the exact way you were having me cast them wrong, and that's why there wasn't a warning?"
"I didn't change anything that would have been out of the ordinary!" Harry protested. "Students make mispronunciations and wrong gestures all the time in Charms class!"
"Where Professor Flitwick is watching us," said Draco. "He knows exactly what happens when you make mistakes with spells that are on the curriculum because he's been teaching them for so long. And he always tells us not to make certain mistakes in advance. Unlike you, right?"
"I'm sorry!" Harry repeated. "I didn't know!"
"But you did know the rules of transfiguration," pointed out Hermione. "And you had us experiment anyway."
Draco gasped.
"I know better now!" said Harry. "I know how stupid I was! I can own up to it!"
"I know," said Hermione.
"Then why are you still bringing it up?"
"Because I thought you should own up to it in front of Draco, too. If we're all going to be lab mates here."
Harry passed a hand over his face. "Fine, okay? I confess. Draco, when I first came to Hogwarts, I was impulsive and arrogant and I didn't know all of the common sense that children raised by wizards are supposed to know."
"Just when you first came to Hogwarts?" Draco asked with deliberate disbelief in his voice.
"And for a few months afterwards," Harry allowed. "Improvement doesn't happen overnight. But even when I was being stupid, I still took plenty of precautions. Just... not enough to see the bigger picture. It wasn't only luck that stopped me from dying in a tragic experiment, okay?"
"I can believe that," said Draco neutrally. "You are better now, right? What Professor Monroe said about you having the wisdom of wizards was true?"
"Yes," Harry said confidently. "Definitely. I was getting better even before I took that Unbreakable Vow about it. Now I can't take any chances or risks when it comes to wizardry even if I wanted to."
"Me either," sighed Hermione.
Draco stared at them. "You're joking."
"Nope," said Harry. "Guess who set it up."
Oh.
Well, that was plausible...
And then the implication set in.
"Hold on," said Draco. "Does that mean David Monroe, maybe the strongest wizard alive right now, thinks you're so reckless that he was willing to pay for you to take an Unbreakable Vow not to be?"
And before he had access to the Monroe vaults, too. It must have taken most of his teaching salary.
Harry grinned. "And a really complicated Vow at that," he said, making it worse. "Don't worry, Draco. He took the exact same Vow himself, and he's the single most cautious wizard I know. It's more that we don't want to take any chances as we make moves on the world stage. But if we don't make any moves at all, that could be even worse."
Draco stared at him. "Just what are you planning to do?"
"You'll have to become an Occlumens before I can really explain it, but the basic problem is that muggle technology is eventually going to catch up to the dangers that old wizardry could produce, if it hasn't already-" Draco gasped in horror "-and the statute of secrecy is probably going to break down on its own at some point thanks to cameras and satellites, and if things keep going the way they're going, it's almost a guarantee that some idiot is eventually going to do something stupid that destroys the world, even if the integration of the two societies is completely peaceful. It could be as simple as a muggle making a creative suggestion about magic to a wily wizard who decides to try it, and boom." Harry snaps his fingers. Draco unthinkingly flinched, but nothing happened. "Instant end of the human race. If we don't preempt it."
Draco had never been so terrified. He'd thought the idea of losing magic was too horrible to be imagined. The idea of losing his life because of someone else's stupidity – and being utterly powerless to stop it – was far, far worse.
"What do we do?" Draco asked, his voice practically begging.
In the short term, the plan was to research the Interdict of Merlin. If Merlin could make it so that all wizards have to follow a certain rule for the rest of Time, and there's no way to break that rule, then maybe something similar can be done to prevent Transfigurations on the subatomic level. Or even just the atomic level. At least, that's how Harry guessed it would be easiest to destroy the world, since you only need a first year's power level to do it. In the long term, the answer to existential danger is space travel and colonising other planets. If someone does something stupid and destroys Earth, it would help if humanity was a bit more spread out. Of course, Harry couldn't say any of that out loud.
"Learn Occlumency," said Harry. "And I'll tell you the plan."
Draco's terror seemed to be meliorated by the fact that there is a plan, even if he doesn't know what it is, but he still looked scared out of his mind.
"You know, Draco," Harry said, hoping to make it better by what he said next, "what you're feeling is pretty much what a good chunk of muggles felt during the most recent world conflict."
His dad would sometimes talk about the mental effects the cold war had on normal people. Professor Michael Verres-Evans sometimes had moments of existential terror himself before Harry came around, or so he says.
Harry figured Draco could benefit from the same advice. "I've heard the best way to cope is to realise that the world is actually more stable than it seems. I mean, there are a hundred different space phenomena that could have destroyed us in an instant, and it's not like that's ever happened for the millions of years that we've been around. Except maybe once, to the dinosaurs. Professor Monroe is handling the bigger stuff, so the world is probably safe for at least a few more decades, even if we-" he gestured at the three of them "-don't do anything at all."
"Harry," said Hermione, "sometimes you need to learn when to stop helping."
"No," said Draco, after taking a few deep breaths. "I'm all right. He's right, stressing over it is pointless. But you will tell me how you plan to stop it if I become an Occlumens?"
"Of course," said Harry. "I'll need your help to stop the obvious disaster of an arms race during a muggle-wizard war. Preferably by avoiding war in the first place. And don't forget, there are benefits to advancement too. Pretty soon, Professor Monroe is going to open a public clinic of age reversal. No more death by old age, or by non-magical diseases." He couldn't quite keep the pride out of his voice. "Just one more step on the mountain of progress."
"Okay, stop," said Draco. "I've hit my limit. No more surprises for the rest of the day."
"But it's only noon," Harry protested.
"Too bad," said Draco. "Find something normal to talk about."
"Okay..." said Harry. "Um... why's Dean talking with Mr. Crabbe?"
It started when Dean Thomas suggested they go see a movie over the summer.
Seamus, whose father was a muggle, thought it was a good idea.
Neville, Blaise, and Theodore all asked what a 'movie' was.
It developed that movies are like muggle plays, except they aren't. Movies are like the moving pictures you see in the Daily Prophet, except they aren't. They don't loop and they last for hours instead of seconds. The moving pictures are displayed like the repeater screens that Professor Monroe used, except it's one big screen, not a bunch of little ones, and it's in a theatre that's sort-of set up like a lecture hall, so multiple people can watch at the same time. That part was familiar to the wizard-born children.
Neville and Blaise were both curious.
Theodore had balked at the idea of 'muggle' entertainment.
Dean pointed out that Theo seemed to enjoy himself at the 'muggle' entertainment yesterday, i.e. the tomato throwing.
Theodore still refused.
"What if we can convince Draco Malfoy?" Dean had asked. "Would you go then?"
Theodore had snorted and said, "Good luck."
Dean took that as a challenge, quickly leaving to find his new general. Blaise decided to tag along, claiming that he might be better at convincing his fellow Slytherin.
Mr. Malfoy wasn't hard to find with his bodyguards standing outside his cabin. He was hard to reach, though.
"Da boss isn't ta be disturbed," said Mr. Crabbe before Dean could say anything.
Dean, upon seeing the inside of the cabin, immediately changed tactics. "I want to ask Harry something, actually."
"Da boss is talkin' wit 'im," Mr. Crabbe denied. It was like talking to a brick wall.
"Vincent," said Blaise, causing the muscly boy to look at him. "What would it take to ask them a simple question?"
"Noble blood," said Mr. Crabbe, sarcastically and disdainfully. "Now scram, yous twos."
Three minutes later, they returned with Neville Longbottom.
Mr. Crabbe grumbled unhappily at the sight, and Mr. Goyle gave his companion a glare.
"I told you you shouldn't have bluffed like that," said Mr. Goyle. "I apologize for the joke of my companion," he said formally. "But he wasn't being serious-"
At that moment, the door behind them opened. "It's fine, Gregory," said Mr. Malfoy. "I could use the distraction. Did you need something, Officer Thomas?"
"Er," said Dean, surprised for a moment, then stuttering for another as he tried to remember the reason he wanted to talk to the general in the first place. "Ah, yes, actually. I wanted to ask if you and Mr. Potter wanted to come see a movie with us."
"What's a movie?" asked Draco, at the same time Harry asked "Which one?" behind him.
"Uh..." said Dean. He hadn't really thought this far ahead, but an obvious answer came to him as soon as he was asked the question. "Star Wars?"
"Count me in," said Harry.
"Count me out," said Hermione.
"What's a movie?" Draco repeated, now seeming to ask Harry and Hermione.
"It's basically the muggle version of a play," said Harry. "Moving pictures on a big screen. Like what Professor Monroe set up in his class, except for storytelling."
"With actors and everything?" asked Draco, sounding curious.
"And music and sound effects," Harry added. "And visual effects too... though it might not be as impressive as real magic. I haven't seen one since Hogwarts."
"Sounds interesting," said Draco. "I'll ask father if we have any muggle clothes," he decided. He turned back to Dean. "Do you have a date in mind?"
Dean was surprised at the easy agreement... then again, now that Lucius Malfoy was involved maybe it wasn't that easy.
"We haven't set a date," said Neville. "We just had the idea a few minutes ago."
"You haven't picked a date?" Draco asked with only the slightest of sneers.
"Maybe it would be best if we didn't set a date," said Zabini. "Our parents control our schedules, remember?"
"Hm… that's actually a good point," said Draco. "They're the ones who need to coordinate. But I was asking for the general timeframe. Most theatres only run the same play for a few weeks before switching to a new one. When will 'Star Wars' be on rotation?"
"We'll have to wait 'til we get back to check," Dean answered.
"Some theatres are still playing Star Wars year-round," said Harry. "It's not like a play with live actors and set pieces that they have to replace each week. It's... kind-of like a pensieve memory."
"A what?" asked Dean.
"Oh," said Draco, sounding a little disappointed. "It's the same every time you watch it? No differences at all?"
"Correct," said Harry. "It's more artificial than a play, but it's also more perfectible. It's a different entertainment philosophy than what you're used to. The director has the actors try the scenes over and over until they get it exactly right, then they pick the best performances of every scene. Imagine the best performances of your favorite play, all strung together in a single sequence. It's the same every time, but that's why they try to make it as good as possible. No mistakes, no bad moments, no forgotten lines. And I think you'll be surprised at the quality of the set pieces."
"I thought you said there aren't any set pieces."
"I said the theatres don't have to replace set pieces and actors each week. I didn't say there aren't any at all."
"How does that work?" asked Draco.
"If I showed you two memories in a pensieve, one from the Wizengamot, and one from a Hogwarts classroom, I don't need to drag props from the Wizengamot chamber into the pensieve room, then replace those props with Hogwarts desks. The props are built into the memories."
Draco looked considering. "I think I understand. So theatres can have any movie at any time? There aren't any restrictions at all? Not even set-up time or available actors or artists?"
"Basically yes," Harry confirmed, "but it's up to the theatres which movies they actually decide to play. There are a lot of movies to choose from. They usually only play the new releases. I can ask Dad to look into it and pick out a showing of Star Wars. Hermione, do you have an idea for something that witches would like to watch?"
"Cinderella," she said at once.
"Of course," Harry sighed.
"Boys," Hermione huffed.
"Girls," Harry huffed back.
"What's Cinderella?" asked Draco.
"Princess story," said Harry, his voice not containing all the disgust that Dean's voice would have. "A cartoon musical."
"Animated musical," Hermione corrected.
Dean decided now was a good time to excuse himself, and he quietly urged Zabini and Neville to follow.
"Trust me," he said as they went back to their cabin. "You don't want to get a girl started on Cinderella."
Neville and Zabini seemed to understand, even if they didn't know what Cinderella was. There are plenty of plays like that. Heck, The Wonderful Adventures of the Boy Who Lived is like that. For the sake of your own sanity, you don't bring up that series around a witch. Especially Ravenclaw witches.
"The generals agreed to come," Dean said to Theodore when they got back. "General Potter and General Malfoy are on board."
"Well done," said Theodore.
...
"Well?" said Dean.
Theodore smiled evilly. "I never agreed I would go if you convinced Mr. Malfoy. That was your idea. I only said 'good luck'."
"What?" said Dean. "That's not fair!"
The noble boy snorted snobbily and smugly. "That's Slytherin," replied Theodore. "Too bad you're not a Ravenclaw. The riddle door trains them to pay close attention to exact wording so they can actually stand a chance against us, but Gryffindors are hopeless."
"Bastard move," said Seamus in the tones of a compliment.
Dean just fumed and sat down.
"Then again," said Theodore, "If both generals think it's worth their time, I don't want to miss out on the fun. If Malfoy's father can convince mine, count me in."
Dean only got more indignant at that.
Seamus laughed. "Good to have ya, mate." He turned to Dean. "What movie?"
"Star Wars."
"Heard good things about that one," said Seamus. "Me mum wouldn't let me watch it though. Said I was too young."
"Just tell her all your friends are going," said Zabini. "Actually, no, let's have our parents send him our letters when we know the date, saying things like 'see you there' and 'can't wait to meet up with you'. That way it seems more genuine."
"That's not right," said Neville.
"That's brilliant," said Theodore. "But I'm curious, Mr. Finnegan. Why did your mother say you're too young? Does she think 'Star Wars' is too violent for children?"
"It does have wars in the title," Neville observed.
"It does, doesn't it?" asked Theodore.
"It's not that bad," said Dean. "I don't even think they show blood. Not in the first one, anyway."
"Pity," said Theodore.
"I heard a guy's arm gets cut off," said Seamus.
And that was the moment that Theodore Nott seemed to become genuinely interested in going.
Even after Dean corrected him with, "No, that's the second movie. Plenty of explosions though."
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Nice
Plenty of explosions?
Stand By.
Stand By.
:Discord:SPOILERS:Discord:
I nice down time chapter after so much excitement.
Always fun
I like how they actually attempt to address their confusion about what's going on, and just how close they get to the truth. I'm not sure that they could get any closer with the information that they have available to them.
this chapter is amazing.
i love the word play and how plans are made.
and here is a good bit of truth i was told years back and yet no one ever does.
"When in debt doubt or looking for corruption, follow the money.
This chapter feels incredibly like HPMOR, I love how you use the side characters so effectively! I've been missing that, with so much time spent in Equestria (though the plot obviously demanded it), and what an excellent way to show how true to form you are.
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The chapter titled "Return to Equestria" is four uploads away - 2 weeks, if I stick to my accelerated upload schedule.
Though if by "new ponies" you mean the 3-D animated ones, they won't be making an appearance. I have little enough knowledge of the 2-D show as it is.
Tee hee :-). This is getting back to form -- things just happen quickly, as fast as a <snap!> :-)
"Encouraging" muggles to nuke themselves allright seems to solve that problem at least short-mid-term.
That wasn't the biggest extinction event.
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That's the biggest one that was caused by a space phenomon, as far as I'm aware, which is specifically what the sentence was referring to, not extinction events in general. Unless there was a bigger one I don't know about?
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Who knows? Possibly all of them (except Oxygenation). Out of big ones Cretaceous–Paleogene is most recent so it's easier to find evidence.
Sometimes I underestimated how wild human imagination can be. No wonder the world is filled with strange conspiracy theories.
My favorite example of how wild human imagination can be has to be the electron.
Consider how crazy and unusual the behavior of an electron is, and think about what had to go to somebody's mind when they first proposed it.
Dean is mistaken. There is an arm lopped off by Obi Wan in the Mos Eisley Cantina, and IIRC there is even some blood spatter in the same scene.
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Meh, he's twelve and it's been over a year since he's seen it. He's allowed to be mistaken. 'Guy's arm gets cut off' evokes strong memories of the second movie, not the first.
11439752
Yeah that was my thought, haha XD More blood than in the second movie. Obi-wan's sword must not have been set to "cauterize".
Luke... I am ...
YOUR MOTHER