Categories > Books > Harry Potter > The Improbability Factor
Harry Potter and the improbability Factor
Disclaimer, to all who care: ...Meh, no one cares.
Chapter 2: Friday Night Fights
"Standards set and broken all the time, control the chaos behind a gun
Call it as I see it even if I was born deaf, blind and dumb...
I have no belief, but I believe
I'm a walking contradiction And I ain't got no right."
Walking Contradiction - Green Day
Friday, August 2nd, 1996
----
When we last left Harry Potter, he was becoming increasingly confused as a Dominoes pizza delivery guy, called 'Guy,' spoke.
"No, you don't understand," said Harry. "I didn't call you this morning; I also don't have a credit card. For that matter, I don't even like olives."
"You said you'd say that," the man had said.
Harry blinked owlishly at 'Guy.' He had blinked back.
Harry had blinked again. So had the pizza delivery guy.
Legend has it that during some of the darker times of the Spanish Inquisition, there was a well-known scholar who came under suspicion of heresy. Apparently, he was teaching a class when several members of the Inquisition found him, and hauled him off for "questioning." After about three years of torture and interrogation without any sort of confession whatsoever, they finally let him go.
He then went back to the university to resume his post as professor, and on his first day back, he said to his students, "As I was saying the other day..." as if nothing remotely interesting had happened.
Harry had never made it into High School history classes, and so never heard this or anything like it, but if he had, this man would have brought it back at this moment. Of course, this wouldn't have been the first time, either. Bloody Inquisitorial Squad, indeed.
----
"Ex- Excuse me?" asked Harry, once he had gotten his voice back under his control. "What do you mean, 'I said I'd say that?'
"Precisely what I said, my good sir," he answered, leaving Harry wondering if anything ever bothered this Guy. "And by the way," he added, "you said you'd say that as well. My, but you're really good at this, you know."
"So," he said, offering the pizza box to Harry. "If you'd just like to take this, then I can be on my way, and you can get back to whatever it is that you do."
Harry hesitated. "You want me... to take the pizza?" Harry asked. He was quite sure one of them wasn't completely sane, but couldn't figure out if it was himself or not. He shook himself, but it didn't help.
"Of course," Guy said, "after all, it is yours." Harry couldn't argue with that logic, so he reached out, and took the box from Guy. "Thanks."
"Oh, no problem at all. Err..." he added, loosing his good natured grin for the first time. "Are you alright, sir? You don't have amnesia, or anything, do you?"
"If it helps," said Harry wearily, "maybe you should go ahead and believe that."
"Ah. Righto, then." The slightly nauseating look was back on his face. "Well, I'd best be going. Taa taa, and all that." With that colorful statement, Guy left.
Harry closed the door and made his way back to his room, his head stinging slightly. He set the pizza box down on his desk, got out a quill and parchment, and began to write the letter to Professor McGonagall about his courses for the following year.
As he wrote, he absentmindedly ate a slice of pizza, grimacing as he bit into an olive, which he had forgotten to get rid of. Sighing, Harry brought his wand out of his pocket, and with a small wave of his wand cleared away the offending slices of foul tasting matter. /Magic can be really good sometimes, /Harry thought, as he went back to his writing.
You might think that this was a bad idea, especially after the last time Harry ate anything without thinking about it, and you'd be right. After all, if he dealt with Voldemort in the same mindset he was in now, he'd have been dead long ago. Surprisingly, though, nothing bizarre happened to him, or rather, nothing too bizarre.
Once Harry finished his letter, tied it to Hedwig's leg and she flew away, he went back to his desk and sat down. He was surprised to find that half the pizza was already gone, but even more surprised to find a note, folded up and stuffed into a sandwich bag, in the box, half hidden under a half eaten crust.
Carefully, as though he might get burned, Harry picked up the letter, pulled it out of the bag, unfolded it and began to read:
Hey Harry,
If I remember right, you've had a very interesting couple of days. Well, let me assure you that it's about to get worse.
The pizza that was delivered to you earlier was indeed ordered by you, about 1 year after you received it. I should know, as I called it in. That's right. You, that is to say I, will, or rather have...
One of the problems with time-travel, besides meeting yourself and having the universe collapse, is that it plays hell on past-tenses, which is one of the reasons MENSA started to petition a bill to have it banned near the end of the 21st century. The letter continued, seeming to have made an effort to compose itself, though of course, a letter composing itself is just another one of those impossibilities, nice as it might be.
Look, your name is Harry Potter, right? Well, so is mine. About a year ago I received a letter just like this one. So of course I knew I'd have to send it, because I already had sent it. Don't worry, it'll start to make sense eventually, trust me.
At any rate, The point of this is to inform you that all of your important documents, i.e. passports, credit cards, Gringotts bank certs., and absolutely real, 100% non-fake I.D. will arrive within the next few days.
Furthermore, on the next page you will find your itinerary for 6th year. It gets a bit confusing, so be sure and read the fine print. I would say have a good year, but I know better, so
Later then,
Harry Potter
Harry sighed, and wondered why he was being so cold with himself. It sounded like he was writing himself a bank statement. He didn't think he'd done anything wrong; he was just being a cold-hearted bit-
Wait a second, Harry cut himself off. How do I even know that was me? What if I was lying? Harry's head was spinning. No, that can't be, I mean, why would I lie to myself? /Then the solution came to him. /I'll write myself a note, ask me for proof... Yea, that would work.
With that in mind, Harry turned to the second page, the title of which read: Itinerary.
Most of it seemed perfectly normal. For instance, he'd be leaving for Grimmauld Place in on Monday, he'd be catching the Hogwarts Express at 11:00 on the first of September, and he'd have a pop quiz in Potions on the second week of October.
Other things, unfortunately, weren't so normal. They ranged from 'predictable,' Fudge getting kicked out of office in early December, to 'a bit out of the ordinary,' Ron confessing his undying love for Hermione at the end of summer, to 'out to lunch,' the sudden appearance of a Doohickey in the Gryffindor common room, startling Dumbledore into a mild heart attack, to 'freakin' nutso,' Harry's appearance in the "Inter-Dimensional Good Guy's Convention," to 'questionable,' in May, Harry was scheduled to destroy Voldemort, though underneath that was a footnote reading "Subject to change."
He was just reading about how in April a Nunduu would attack Hogsmeade, killing three people, simply because he had nothing better to do with his time, when an owl flew in and dropped a letter on his desk. It was from Fred and George. They didn't say very much, only asking what Harry thought of their new product, "Tommy Biscuits." They explained how WWW was going, and told him that since he was now one third owner, he'd better get off his butt and help out a bit.
----
Later that day, Harry was walking through the park when he heard a loud yell coming from somewhere to his right. He followed the noise, and saw Dudley, his cousin, arguing with a small boy named Mark Evans, who was about 12 years old.
"Give me your money!" Dudley said.
"I don't have any," Mark replied.
"Give me your money!" Dudley argued.
"I don't have any," Mark amended.
"Do you know what's gonna happen to you if you're lying to me?" Dudley negotiated.
"Do I have a choice?" Mark offered.
"So it's gonna be like that, is it?" Dudley concluded.
"Just make it quick." Mark affirmed, putting his arms over his face.
They hadn't seen Harry yet, so he tried to think of a plan before Mark was pounded into oblivion. Unfortunately he didn't have that kind of time, so he put his hand into his pocket and brought out one of Hagrid's rock cakes, which he'd been carrying around ever since he'd gotten the idea to use them against Dudley, as the idea had been too damn good to ignore.
Taking aim, he lobbed the rock cake right at Dudley's large head as hard as he could. It hit him squarely above his left ear. It seemed that Dudley didn't even notice the cake hitting him in the head hard enough to make an elk get on with what it was doing, but his ears worked fine, and he heard Harry's yell of "Oy! Pea Brain!" loud and clear. He looked around stupidly for a moment and his eyes found Harry.
Unfortunately, Harry was distracted by a sudden nagging sense of Déjà vu. This is just too familiar, Harry thought, and was suddenly jolted back to his senses as he barely dodged a 400 pound muggle that was charging at him. This time, though, luck was on Harry's side. He had been standing in front of a very large, very solid tree, and when he dodged his cousin...
Smack!!!
Dudley slowly picked himself up off the ground, grunting like a winded rhinoceros and glaring at Harry and Mark. Harry looked over at Mark. "You might want to leave now." Harry said offhandedly, as if he were commenting on the weather.
Mark Evans was indeed a muggle. He was also 12 years old. And he was also male. However, despite all these setbacks, even he didn't need telling twice. He left. Quickly.
After he left, Harry had a quick look around, wanting to take a good stock of his situation. The park Harry was in was very nice. It was in a very wealthy part of town, and as with anything else involving very wealthy people, it was definitely not done half-assed. Off to Harry's right was a hiking trail, leading off into a woodsy area, that would have been perfect for walking the dog, except that it was complete with signs reading No Pets Allowed. To his left, a very large, very green field, with a row of trees almost a quarter of a mile away. Behind the trees was a fence guarding the row of tall suburban houses barely peeking over the top of the trees. In front of him was a large white gazebo, surrounded by a small rocky moat.
Yes, the people of this neighborhood definitely did not do things by half. They were proud of this place, so proud in fact, that they christened it Pride Square. However, if they would have known that the suburbs main income was generated by the outrageous movie theater snack and beverage prices, they probably wouldn't have been quite as smug with themselves.
Harry turned around and looked the other way. There was nothing very interesting here, just Dudley and a bunch of trees, one of them with a good-sized crack in it.
By this time, Dudley had finally picked himself up, and had started to charge at Harry again. Harry sighed, and pulled out his wand, almost lazily, and used the levitation charm, meaning to pick Dudley straight of the ground.
The result, however, was a bit different than Harry expected. The combination of Dudley's weight, with his rate of travel toward Harry, arcing him straight over his head, directly into one of the wooden pillars holding the gazebo up, and then crashing face-first into the moat, his head meeting with one of the larger boulders in the water.
Harry stood shocked as Dudley pulled his head up out of the water, looked around dazedly and muttered a few incoherent nothings before passing out, where he would have drown if Harry hadn't taken pity on him and pulled him up out of the water.
Harry had thought about leaving him there, but reluctantly, he cast a quick drying charm on him, as well as the feather light spell, before starting to drag him toward number 4.
----
By the time Harry made his way home, he was feeling very tired, and wanted nothing more than to deposit Dudley on the couch and make his way to his room so he could sleep.
Unfortunately, fate had other plans for him. Harry opened the door to number four, and walked inside, maneuvering Dudley as best he could so he'd fit through the doorway. Finally, he was at the couch, and he threw Dudley on to it, then removed the feather light charm. He turned around to make his way up the stairs, and saw his Uncle Vernon standing in the doorway to the kitchen, looking livid. Nothing new.
"What do you think you're doing, boy," He bellowed. "What did you do to my son?"
Harry had a large grin on his face as he answered, "Well, he was bullying a kid half his size, so I did what any self-respecting Gryffindor would do."
His grin widened even more, if it were possible. "I kicked his ass."
Sorry if this chapter seemed a bit forced toward the end. I had to re-write almost all of it, so I kind of bit the bullet on this one.
The next chapter ought to be a bit better in that respect, as I only have to redo about half of that one:)
Disclaimer, to all who care: ...Meh, no one cares.
Chapter 2: Friday Night Fights
"Standards set and broken all the time, control the chaos behind a gun
Call it as I see it even if I was born deaf, blind and dumb...
I have no belief, but I believe
I'm a walking contradiction And I ain't got no right."
Walking Contradiction - Green Day
Friday, August 2nd, 1996
----
When we last left Harry Potter, he was becoming increasingly confused as a Dominoes pizza delivery guy, called 'Guy,' spoke.
"No, you don't understand," said Harry. "I didn't call you this morning; I also don't have a credit card. For that matter, I don't even like olives."
"You said you'd say that," the man had said.
Harry blinked owlishly at 'Guy.' He had blinked back.
Harry had blinked again. So had the pizza delivery guy.
Legend has it that during some of the darker times of the Spanish Inquisition, there was a well-known scholar who came under suspicion of heresy. Apparently, he was teaching a class when several members of the Inquisition found him, and hauled him off for "questioning." After about three years of torture and interrogation without any sort of confession whatsoever, they finally let him go.
He then went back to the university to resume his post as professor, and on his first day back, he said to his students, "As I was saying the other day..." as if nothing remotely interesting had happened.
Harry had never made it into High School history classes, and so never heard this or anything like it, but if he had, this man would have brought it back at this moment. Of course, this wouldn't have been the first time, either. Bloody Inquisitorial Squad, indeed.
----
"Ex- Excuse me?" asked Harry, once he had gotten his voice back under his control. "What do you mean, 'I said I'd say that?'
"Precisely what I said, my good sir," he answered, leaving Harry wondering if anything ever bothered this Guy. "And by the way," he added, "you said you'd say that as well. My, but you're really good at this, you know."
"So," he said, offering the pizza box to Harry. "If you'd just like to take this, then I can be on my way, and you can get back to whatever it is that you do."
Harry hesitated. "You want me... to take the pizza?" Harry asked. He was quite sure one of them wasn't completely sane, but couldn't figure out if it was himself or not. He shook himself, but it didn't help.
"Of course," Guy said, "after all, it is yours." Harry couldn't argue with that logic, so he reached out, and took the box from Guy. "Thanks."
"Oh, no problem at all. Err..." he added, loosing his good natured grin for the first time. "Are you alright, sir? You don't have amnesia, or anything, do you?"
"If it helps," said Harry wearily, "maybe you should go ahead and believe that."
"Ah. Righto, then." The slightly nauseating look was back on his face. "Well, I'd best be going. Taa taa, and all that." With that colorful statement, Guy left.
Harry closed the door and made his way back to his room, his head stinging slightly. He set the pizza box down on his desk, got out a quill and parchment, and began to write the letter to Professor McGonagall about his courses for the following year.
As he wrote, he absentmindedly ate a slice of pizza, grimacing as he bit into an olive, which he had forgotten to get rid of. Sighing, Harry brought his wand out of his pocket, and with a small wave of his wand cleared away the offending slices of foul tasting matter. /Magic can be really good sometimes, /Harry thought, as he went back to his writing.
You might think that this was a bad idea, especially after the last time Harry ate anything without thinking about it, and you'd be right. After all, if he dealt with Voldemort in the same mindset he was in now, he'd have been dead long ago. Surprisingly, though, nothing bizarre happened to him, or rather, nothing too bizarre.
Once Harry finished his letter, tied it to Hedwig's leg and she flew away, he went back to his desk and sat down. He was surprised to find that half the pizza was already gone, but even more surprised to find a note, folded up and stuffed into a sandwich bag, in the box, half hidden under a half eaten crust.
Carefully, as though he might get burned, Harry picked up the letter, pulled it out of the bag, unfolded it and began to read:
Hey Harry,
If I remember right, you've had a very interesting couple of days. Well, let me assure you that it's about to get worse.
The pizza that was delivered to you earlier was indeed ordered by you, about 1 year after you received it. I should know, as I called it in. That's right. You, that is to say I, will, or rather have...
One of the problems with time-travel, besides meeting yourself and having the universe collapse, is that it plays hell on past-tenses, which is one of the reasons MENSA started to petition a bill to have it banned near the end of the 21st century. The letter continued, seeming to have made an effort to compose itself, though of course, a letter composing itself is just another one of those impossibilities, nice as it might be.
Look, your name is Harry Potter, right? Well, so is mine. About a year ago I received a letter just like this one. So of course I knew I'd have to send it, because I already had sent it. Don't worry, it'll start to make sense eventually, trust me.
At any rate, The point of this is to inform you that all of your important documents, i.e. passports, credit cards, Gringotts bank certs., and absolutely real, 100% non-fake I.D. will arrive within the next few days.
Furthermore, on the next page you will find your itinerary for 6th year. It gets a bit confusing, so be sure and read the fine print. I would say have a good year, but I know better, so
Later then,
Harry Potter
Harry sighed, and wondered why he was being so cold with himself. It sounded like he was writing himself a bank statement. He didn't think he'd done anything wrong; he was just being a cold-hearted bit-
Wait a second, Harry cut himself off. How do I even know that was me? What if I was lying? Harry's head was spinning. No, that can't be, I mean, why would I lie to myself? /Then the solution came to him. /I'll write myself a note, ask me for proof... Yea, that would work.
With that in mind, Harry turned to the second page, the title of which read: Itinerary.
Most of it seemed perfectly normal. For instance, he'd be leaving for Grimmauld Place in on Monday, he'd be catching the Hogwarts Express at 11:00 on the first of September, and he'd have a pop quiz in Potions on the second week of October.
Other things, unfortunately, weren't so normal. They ranged from 'predictable,' Fudge getting kicked out of office in early December, to 'a bit out of the ordinary,' Ron confessing his undying love for Hermione at the end of summer, to 'out to lunch,' the sudden appearance of a Doohickey in the Gryffindor common room, startling Dumbledore into a mild heart attack, to 'freakin' nutso,' Harry's appearance in the "Inter-Dimensional Good Guy's Convention," to 'questionable,' in May, Harry was scheduled to destroy Voldemort, though underneath that was a footnote reading "Subject to change."
He was just reading about how in April a Nunduu would attack Hogsmeade, killing three people, simply because he had nothing better to do with his time, when an owl flew in and dropped a letter on his desk. It was from Fred and George. They didn't say very much, only asking what Harry thought of their new product, "Tommy Biscuits." They explained how WWW was going, and told him that since he was now one third owner, he'd better get off his butt and help out a bit.
----
Later that day, Harry was walking through the park when he heard a loud yell coming from somewhere to his right. He followed the noise, and saw Dudley, his cousin, arguing with a small boy named Mark Evans, who was about 12 years old.
"Give me your money!" Dudley said.
"I don't have any," Mark replied.
"Give me your money!" Dudley argued.
"I don't have any," Mark amended.
"Do you know what's gonna happen to you if you're lying to me?" Dudley negotiated.
"Do I have a choice?" Mark offered.
"So it's gonna be like that, is it?" Dudley concluded.
"Just make it quick." Mark affirmed, putting his arms over his face.
They hadn't seen Harry yet, so he tried to think of a plan before Mark was pounded into oblivion. Unfortunately he didn't have that kind of time, so he put his hand into his pocket and brought out one of Hagrid's rock cakes, which he'd been carrying around ever since he'd gotten the idea to use them against Dudley, as the idea had been too damn good to ignore.
Taking aim, he lobbed the rock cake right at Dudley's large head as hard as he could. It hit him squarely above his left ear. It seemed that Dudley didn't even notice the cake hitting him in the head hard enough to make an elk get on with what it was doing, but his ears worked fine, and he heard Harry's yell of "Oy! Pea Brain!" loud and clear. He looked around stupidly for a moment and his eyes found Harry.
Unfortunately, Harry was distracted by a sudden nagging sense of Déjà vu. This is just too familiar, Harry thought, and was suddenly jolted back to his senses as he barely dodged a 400 pound muggle that was charging at him. This time, though, luck was on Harry's side. He had been standing in front of a very large, very solid tree, and when he dodged his cousin...
Smack!!!
Dudley slowly picked himself up off the ground, grunting like a winded rhinoceros and glaring at Harry and Mark. Harry looked over at Mark. "You might want to leave now." Harry said offhandedly, as if he were commenting on the weather.
Mark Evans was indeed a muggle. He was also 12 years old. And he was also male. However, despite all these setbacks, even he didn't need telling twice. He left. Quickly.
After he left, Harry had a quick look around, wanting to take a good stock of his situation. The park Harry was in was very nice. It was in a very wealthy part of town, and as with anything else involving very wealthy people, it was definitely not done half-assed. Off to Harry's right was a hiking trail, leading off into a woodsy area, that would have been perfect for walking the dog, except that it was complete with signs reading No Pets Allowed. To his left, a very large, very green field, with a row of trees almost a quarter of a mile away. Behind the trees was a fence guarding the row of tall suburban houses barely peeking over the top of the trees. In front of him was a large white gazebo, surrounded by a small rocky moat.
Yes, the people of this neighborhood definitely did not do things by half. They were proud of this place, so proud in fact, that they christened it Pride Square. However, if they would have known that the suburbs main income was generated by the outrageous movie theater snack and beverage prices, they probably wouldn't have been quite as smug with themselves.
Harry turned around and looked the other way. There was nothing very interesting here, just Dudley and a bunch of trees, one of them with a good-sized crack in it.
By this time, Dudley had finally picked himself up, and had started to charge at Harry again. Harry sighed, and pulled out his wand, almost lazily, and used the levitation charm, meaning to pick Dudley straight of the ground.
The result, however, was a bit different than Harry expected. The combination of Dudley's weight, with his rate of travel toward Harry, arcing him straight over his head, directly into one of the wooden pillars holding the gazebo up, and then crashing face-first into the moat, his head meeting with one of the larger boulders in the water.
Harry stood shocked as Dudley pulled his head up out of the water, looked around dazedly and muttered a few incoherent nothings before passing out, where he would have drown if Harry hadn't taken pity on him and pulled him up out of the water.
Harry had thought about leaving him there, but reluctantly, he cast a quick drying charm on him, as well as the feather light spell, before starting to drag him toward number 4.
----
By the time Harry made his way home, he was feeling very tired, and wanted nothing more than to deposit Dudley on the couch and make his way to his room so he could sleep.
Unfortunately, fate had other plans for him. Harry opened the door to number four, and walked inside, maneuvering Dudley as best he could so he'd fit through the doorway. Finally, he was at the couch, and he threw Dudley on to it, then removed the feather light charm. He turned around to make his way up the stairs, and saw his Uncle Vernon standing in the doorway to the kitchen, looking livid. Nothing new.
"What do you think you're doing, boy," He bellowed. "What did you do to my son?"
Harry had a large grin on his face as he answered, "Well, he was bullying a kid half his size, so I did what any self-respecting Gryffindor would do."
His grin widened even more, if it were possible. "I kicked his ass."
Sorry if this chapter seemed a bit forced toward the end. I had to re-write almost all of it, so I kind of bit the bullet on this one.
The next chapter ought to be a bit better in that respect, as I only have to redo about half of that one:)
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