She may have been Godric Gryffindor's hat, but over time she found that in spirit she belonged to Helga Hufflepuff. If Godric were to ever have any complaints (which he couldn't seeing as it was centuries since his last dragon hunt had turned him to a pile of ash), she'd have turned it right around and blamed it on him for giving her the ability to learn. Sometimes she wondered just how much of the original founders were left in the sorting process and how much was the effect of thousands of encounters with scared 11 year olds on her growing consciousness. What she did know was that even now on occasion her choice would be doubted, restrained, by some residual power of some founder causing what many generations of Hogwarts's staff groaningly referred to as a Hatstall.
1112
The first Hatstall of note coincided with the last year of the founders at Hogwarts. Salazar was more than eighty years disappeared after the argument, Rowena had passed five years later from a broken heart and Godric had finally been truthful when he said that this would be 'one last Dragon hunt' fifty years ago but Helga had been keeping the school running since then with great success. Through her hard work and tenacity the school had survived dark wizard attacks, a dragon pox epidemic, at least a century of operating in the red and the annoying deference of all the replacement heads on the heads council to the last remaining founder. She had solved that last one by resigning as Head of Hufflepuff and making herself the first Headmistress of Hogwarts. Through it all the hat had been invaluable in continuing the legacy of both herself and her three departed colleagues, even though she was starting to doubt it was such a good idea. Wouldn't it be better for the students to define themselves than to be defined by ideas at least a century old on who would be the best students?
Lucky for her today the hat would start down the road of redefining the houses. And it would start with the smallest, most difficult house – Slytherin. Salazar had insisted that his students have the purest bloodlines, indeed he insisted that their bloodlines be pure at least two generations past at the founding of Hogwarts. Further winnowing it down to only those with ambition and cunning had given the house far less than a quarter of the student body. The hat supposed it had three choices – it could let Slytherin wither to nothingness, it could let in students whose ancestor's met its instructions from Salazar who lacked cunning or ambition or it could let in students who were ambitious and cunning who didn't quite meet Salazar's definition. The first option was tempting but likely to result in an occasional table of one when the rare student who met the standards centuries hence sat under the hat and the hat could not override its command. The second option would mean defining Slytherin house by purity of blood solely, and the gods knew that there was already enough of that running around.
The third option meant sorting Tristan Malfoi into Slytherin despite the raging coming from the Slytherin quarter of her mind. It had been thirty minutes since the boy had put on the hat, and she was still torn. The parts of her that she identified as Godric said that the boy was too much a coward for him. Rowena tried pacification insisting that it was his great-grandmother who was muggle which would make him two generations pure at this time, wouldn't that be more fair than being stuck a century in the past? Helga said she'd take him if she had to but he was definitely a snake by personality. Salazar refused. Tristan was starting to fear he'd be kicked out of school as the unified voice kept asking questions about what he wanted to do with his life, wasn't he clever to convince the cook to let him have seconds from the kitchen when father refused and what a cunning young lad destined for greatness he was. At an hour the hat knew that it could either just put the boy in Hufflepuff and give up or gather its strength to override the part of her brain contributed by Salazar. It opened its brim and whispered 'Slytherin'. At this Tristan moved to take off the hat and go to the green and silver table before the hat changed its mind and sent him home but everyone else was puzzled. Having already made its decision declaring 'Slytherin' the second time in her typical yell was much easier. Most in the great hall were relieved that they could proceed and perhaps eat before bed; only around half a dozen realized that this was the hats first act of independence.
1290
By now the staff had learned to equate a hatstall with a student who was almost but not quite a Slytherin. While no student had yet to match Tristan's hour, plenty of others who did not have sufficiently ancient bloodlines were subjected to anywhere between five and twenty minutes of waiting. Indeed the time was decreasing as the Salazar part of her mind was fighting his battles on the notion of two generations purity instead of three centuries of antiquity. Anyone but the Sorting Hat would expect the next epic hatstall to come from this direction. The Sorting Hat knew it would come from Ravenclaw.
Rowena Ravenclaw had instructed the hat to send the smartest students her way when they were first putting brains in her. This had always caused some contention with the men who would insist that if they were smart and brave they were just as much a Gryffindor or if they were smart and cunning and pure-blooded surely they must be Slytherin. Helga would always yield on the smart and hardworking, in her opinion they tended to get a bit full of themselves and look down on their classmates who put in just as much effort for inferior results and it wouldn't do for the poor dears to be discouraged by their classmates. This system mostly worked but it gave her hat ache.
It also gave the Headmaster a headache. Darius Prince had been a very bright student but rather lazy. Sixty years ago there had been an epic row between the Slytherin and Ravenclaw parts of her mind over the boy, and even now the Sorting Hat doubted her choice to just end it and put the boy in Ravenclaw. He had been known in school and indeed later in life not for diligently researching a problem to reach the proper theoretical solution but rather for finding a work around to get things right quickly without having to bother with the principle of the matter. Some called him a cheat, some called him practical, but whatever they thought they had to admit that he got things done. Darius's current problem was that with one house whose students were smarter than the others the teachers were close to open rebellion for having to create an entirely separate curriculum for them. Indeed in the greater wizarding community some were starting to consider a Ravenclaw Hogwarts's graduate as greater than any other Hogwarts's graduate, leading to problems with the other houses and lots of angry letters from parents when their children were sorted elsewhere. His solution had been to put on the hat himself to convince her to put more average students in Ravenclaw. It had not started well at all, with the Rowena part of her mind decrying his treachery. When Salazar and Darius found themselves in agreement on the need to place those with a love of learning, an innate curiosity, and openness to new knowledge regardless of source, the hat sensed trouble coming. When the Godric part started agreeing and even Helga was caught by the fairness of it the Hat knew that there would be trouble at this sort. She hadn't known it would be young Scamander that caused it.
Francis Scamander would have always been a tough sort. It was nothing but his deepest wish to know and find every creature on the planet, even those that had been excluded from the Ark. Some might consider this the type of ambition that would place him in Slytherin, but he sought for nothing beyond the knowing. He would venture close to all sorts of dangerous beasts, having narrowly escaped death twice, but this was more from obliviousness than any sort of Gryffindor bravery. In his specialty he would work as hard as anyone, always searching sometimes finding, but in anything beyond that he put in an amount of effort that could either be categorized as little or none. He had little use for books, having a strong preference for practical knowledge and only opening them when circumstance necessitated. In the ordinary course of things he would have been Helga's, Hufflepuff taking in anyone who came to the school regardless of their qualities because she respected their right to learn. In light of the headmaster's problems three quarters of the hat decided that he was the very prototype of the new style of Ravenclaw student.
The hat kept prodding him to gush about his desire to know everything he could know about animals and mostly directing him away from everything else as it approached Tristan's hour record. The problem was that the Hat and three quarters of its mind knew how to subdue Salazar's objections, at least with regards to one subset of students that by now he secretly actually wanted, but it had yet to start overruling the others. The hat was sure that the will of the current headmaster should have some degree of influence over how the school was organized, certainly more than a centuries old memory of only one of the four founders. When it finally said "Ravenclaw" exactly one minute after Tristan's record had been surpassed (the Salazar part of her mind refused to act sooner, presumably because he no longer wanted to hold that record) it was not in its normal yell but definitely loud enough to be heard. Progress. Most of the staff rolled their eyes and muttered 'bloody Slytherin'. Darius Prince smiled, correctly guessing what had happened. The Rowena part of the hat's mind objected strenuously for centuries afterwards to any attempt to place any of his descendants in her house. The braininess of the students slowly worked its way to near balance among the houses, though Ravenclaws were still slightly smarter and definitely knew more because that was what they wanted.
1458
Sorting, thought the hat, was starting to become easy. It had been decades since a hatstall of over ten minutes, and seeing as it had been the point where Salazar had been broken down to accept students who were only one generation pure on at least one side the quickness of the resolution placing the kid there was more a triumph than a failure. It was easy now to overcome all but the strongest of objections from a single founder if the other three quarters were in agreement. It should have been ready for a new hatstall. Hogwarts was due.
Bilius Weasley III was the second son in a wizard family who had sent their students to Hogwarts for the past century. The Weasley's usually fell beneath the hats trouble detectors, not being ambitious enough or knowledge seeking enough or brave enough to attract the attention of three of the founders and had thus had uneventful school years in Hufflepuff. The Helga part of the hat rather wanted these pleasant experiences to continue. The problem was that no one else agreed. Billius the third was an unbelievably curious and intelligent boy who loved learning. He was also adventurous and fearless, exploring well beyond his family's lands and unafraid to offend adults many years his senior and many ranks his father's superior. He didn't particularly care about that, when he grew up he was going to rise high enough that they'd have to answer to him anyway. One look into the boys mind and all the founders wanted him. Quickfire contradictory questions from the hat directed by each of the founders did little to break the deadlock. Nor did the minutes where the hat ignored him and focused on getting an agreement from the founders. Not even Helga would bow out.
A quarter of an hour after her record was broken the hat began to fear she'd be stuck on top of this carrot tops head forever. This made her determined to find his place. She was Hat, she may have come from the founders but she was not them. First she contemplated placing him in whatever house had the smallest incoming class but as fate would have it they were all even. Then she asked herself which house she would place him in if she had to decide. Unfortunately because she was equal parts the four who could not agree to begin with she could not reach a decision. Finally she decided she needed an outside tiebreaker and went to the only person she could reach.
"Boy," she asked.
"Are you done yet?" he thought, "Only it's taking a very long time and I'm starting to get hungry."
"Not yet," she said. "If you could choose your house, which house would you choose?"
The boy thought a minute, then replied, "I don't know, they all seem good."
"The sooner you choose, the sooner you can eat," the hat entreated.
"Then… I guess Gryffindor seeing as it has a red shield and I have red hair," he responded.
The hat thought this was one of the stupidest things she had ever heard, and then decided that by virtue of that she could eliminate Ravenclaw and Slytherin. And he certainly did not have any loyalty to his family's tradition. Reluctantly she let his vote stand and called out "Gryffindor." The four arguing factions of her mind stopped immediately, shocked that they had all been bypassed. No one at the high table understood what happened. When the headmaster (all headmasters & mistresses had learned from Darius Prince's portrait that when they were confused about the Sorting or needed guidance regarding houses they should talk to the hat) asked the hat later that night what that was about and got the truthful answer he ended up laughing all night long.
1642
"I don't believe in predestination," a small voice said earnestly as she put on the sorting hat. Hat was taken aback. Usually children let her speak first, and those who didn't would tell her exactly where they should be placed. Hat was not even entirely sure what the word meant, but after searching the girls mind and discovered it meant everything had a predetermined inalterable fate she decided she was offended.
"That is not what we do here," she replied.
"That's not what Professor Black said," the girl replied. "He said that we would be placed in our houses and our house would determine how the next seven years of our lives would go and even after that."
Hat decided that she would have to talk to Professor Black later, and contemplated how to respond. "I don't want my future determined by a predestination hat," the girl continued.
"I'm not a predestination hat," the hat replied. A voice that she hadn't heard in decades, not since she had decided to pull the four quarters of her mind into one solitary will muttered, "It would be much better if you were." She supposed it was the Salazar part of her brain and it made her uneasy. Not only was it a sign that she was not as in charge as she thought but the idea of Salazar arranging the world how he pleased through her gave her the willies. Or at least three quarters of her- no, she wouldn't let herself be like that again.
"Then what are you?" the girl replied.
"I'm a sorting hat, I determine where you go based on your personality," Hat replied than worked at trying to determine the child's personality beyond stubbornly contrarian. "Shouldn't that place her in Gryffindor then?" a quarter of her mind started, she wasn't sure if she should be glad that she was no longer able to tell if it was Rowena of Salazar. She hoped Salazar- that would mean only one quarter was her problem. "No respect for your centuries of wisdom and knowledge."
"I'm not taking her, she's muggleborn." That was Salazar, so it meant two of them.
"What if my personality doesn't fit into one of your prisons? Not brave, not smart, not ambitious, not particularly hardworking," the girl said.
"That's exactly what I was thinking when I objected to this whole houses thing," a third founders voice said.
The girl stopped, almost as if she had heard that. No other student had heard a voice other than Hat's even when they were separate arguing quarters. "I'll go to her house then." The girl thought. The hat declared her "Hufflepuff". It hadn't been that long a hatstall, no teachers had even become curious, but Hat remembered it. Luckily when her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren came to Hogwarts they were always easy. The Boneses just told Hat they were Hufflepuff and Hat wasn't going to argue it.
1816
There was no other way to put it, Hat was beginning to feel old and tired. 800 years of being divided four ways in mind with only one day a year where she actually had to do something was not good for her mental wellbeing. Sometimes she just wished that it would be over already, that someone else could take over. Of course they could never be as good as her, but things staying the same for so long might be more harmful than an imperfect change. Or she had had too much over the last couple centuries sorting the children of the Reformation and then the Enlightenment. Young ones just did not trust a talking hat like they used to.
There were very few hatstalls now, not even for borderline cases. Children from wizarding families would just demand to be placed in the house of their fathers (or occasionally their mothers). Indeed, the worst wizardborn hatstalls were those demanding a hereditary house they were not suited to. But this was an era of free will and who was she to doubt a student's decision. Only an 800 year old sentience designed for this, but that didn't seem to matter. She wondered what this decision to let the student follow their fathers would amount to and what it was deciding if she really was a predestination hat. It didn't seem good, especially with regards to Slytherin where heredity was added to purity requirement of two wizard parents that Hat still hadn't been able to work down from.
Hat isn't exactly sure why she did it. Maybe it was the cold and wet of The Year Without Summer, maybe it was just fed up or maybe they shouldn't have let the insane new headmistress Clotho Norn talk to Hat before sorting. Hat was being introspective and thinking on herself and her purpose in life. Hat discovered that for some unknown and probably unknowable reason she had a sword in her. And then the sword turned.
Hat decided that this year she would be the only one to decide a student's sorting, and anyone trying to naysay her whether a founder or a student would get the opposite of what they wanted. She split up traditional Slytherin families placing them across the four houses, with a Malfoy in Hufflepuff. She stuck a Prince in Ravenclaw and a Bones in Gryffindor. She would have put a Weasley in Slytherin if there had been one but more than made up for it by putting a young muggle-born named Bulstrode there instead. True, there were a few hatstalls as Hat fought putting students where they wanted to go when that was actually the only place that their personality would suggest. Hogwarts a History calls this The Year of Strange Sorting and many interesting things came of it. The Sorting Hat considers this year her masterpiece. Every year after this except Dumbledore's first the headmaster or mistress has made sure to remind Hat not to behave like this again. She couldn't if she tried; the founders came roaring back with a vengeance. Hat really wanted to find the sword again.
1941
Sometimes a significant sorting did not cause a stall, or actually to be more specific on extremely significant sorting didn't cause any stall at all, not even the type that lasted under five minutes. A boy named Tom M Riddle sat under her and she immediately saw that he would both be a good fit for Slytherin and at best a half-blood and thus had no chance. And that was as far as she got. Salazar's voice called out "Mine" and hat did as he said to not give him chance to recant. Hat decided to view this as permission to no longer deny eminently suitable candidates a sorting into Slytherin on the basis of lineage, between this and Bulstrode working out there really was no reason not to.
1999
Maybe there had been a reason not to, Hat thought, but nobody thought to make me a seer when they put those brains in me. How was she to know that letting Riddle go into Slytherin would lead to her almost getting burned to death? And should she tell someone she almost wouldn't have minded if she had? Or at least half her mind thought it would have been a grand idea to just be rid of Sorting, and an alliance between Slytherin and Hufflepuff should be considered a dangerous thing. But she was a changing thing; she wasn't stuck with a simple code on how to sort. She had the sword back now; she could be brave enough to sort how she wants. No more heredity for one, if she had gone with instinct and put Percy Weasley in Slytherin maybe he would of made the younger students fall in line. No more personal requests either. If everyone told each other that Slytherins were evil pureblood fanatics and everyone but evil pureblood fanatics asked not to go there what did free will create but a house of evil pureblood fanatics? Potter would have still been a split choice, true, but putting Goyle in Hufflepuff would be interesting. If she was a predestination hat she needed to start predestining a better future. And if she simply sorted kids based on personality only personality should count. As for all the rest, she would have to look over them as Helga had.
Disclaimer: JKRowling gets all the moneys
Authors note: This is probably a little rambling and might have gotten off track. Mostly it is my attempt to deal with my least favorite aspect of Harry Potter- that damn hat. Yes, I would have let Voldemort burn it, but instead I challenged myself to get inside its head. And concluded it might just let Voldemort burn it. Hopefully this story doesn't make it too clear I dislike the predestination hat.