It was a busy day at Hogwarts. Particularly in the Room of Requirement where fourth year Ravenclaw, Jonah Heston was sitting. Alone. In front of a movie screen. While the final scene of Ator was playing out. He wasn't going to admit that he felt like curling up into a ball and crying because he was being watched by fourth year Slytherin, Kinga Forrester and her lackey, fourth year Hufflepuff, Max-or as he liked to be called, TV's Son of TV's Frank.
Jonah contemplated leaving before the end of the movie, if only because he'd sat through five other terrible movies already and he'd been in that spot for the last eight hours.
Kinga must have noticed because her voice suddenly blared out around the room. "Make one move, Heston, and I'll curse your fingers and toes off."
"Ooh, Kinga, isn't that a bit much?"
"Shut up, Max, I'm not paying you for your opinions."
"You're not paying me at all!"
Kinga growled and, by the sound of it, stormed off.
"Max, how long do I have to stay here? I really have to go to the toilet."
"Until the movie's over, Jonah."
Max was undeniably nicer to Jonah than Kinga was. Even though Max tried to kill him last year in Care Of Magical Creatures. Still beat Kinga demanding to marry him, even though they were both only thirteen. Sure, Max had actually been fourteen when he tried to kill him, but... okay. Both Mads were as bad as the other, despite Max being a Hufflepuff.
"The movie's almost over... that Roon girl, look, she's dead now-Max, I really have to pee."
"Hard no, from me, Heston."
"Hey, Kinga." Jonah said. "Look, Ator and what's her name," Jonah hadn't been invested enough in the movie to remember the character's names, or even care about the giant spiders, "they're running off into the sunset, can I go pee now?"
"Heston, it's the Room of Requirement. Think of a toilet and it'll appear."
"You and Max are watching." Jonah pointed out. "Oh thank god, it's the credits." He stood up out of his seat.
Kinga walked into the room, followed by Max.
Kinga was smaller than Jonah, then again, most people were smaller than Jonah. Jonah was so tall, that he definitely didn't look to be only fourteen. Then again, neither did Kinga. She was small, but she looked young to go with it. Her ginger hair was up in a bun at the top of her head, as it always was, with two hairpins sticking out. And those hairpins sort of creeped Jonah out because they had the same colour and texture as bone.
Max, on the other hand, was smaller than Kinga, but looked older. He was quite... portly. Which only served to make him look smaller, compared with Kinga, who was rather slim. His hair was styled almost like Kim-Jong Un's, short back and sides, only with poofy curly hair at the top, which was grey while the rest was brown. Maybe that's why he looked older.
"Well, Heston, how did you survive," Kinga paused for dramatic effect, "the Gauntlet?"
"It was very boring, Kinga." Jonah admitted. "The movies were terrible. And there was nothing redeemable about any of them, but especially not Mac and Me. Is that what you want to hear? Can I go and pee now?"
"No!" Kinga roared. "No, you may not pee now, Heston." She said, somewhat more calmly. Her eye betrayed her, however, it was twitching almost manically.
"What-Kinga, you tied me up, threw me in this room and I'm sure you used the Imperius Curse on me-you forced me to watch this... dreck and I have to go to the toilet and you're not letting me-why?! I fulfilled your stupid-I watched that dumb Gauntlet of yours, now let me go for a pee!"
"No."
"Kinga, just let him go pee." Max said.
"No!" Kinga stamped her foot. "Max, stop getting in the way of my experiment!"
"Kinga, I sat through eight hours-"
"And that's not enough, Heston!" Kinga snarled.
"What about the other nineteen hours last year?" Jonah pointed out.
"Still not enough." Kinga snapped. "My father tortured someone for two hundred and fourteen hours. And my grandmother for a hundred and ninety three."
Jonah gulped. The worry must have flashed on his face because he saw Kinga smirk.
"Oh yes." She said. "Your paltry and pitiful twenty seven hours is pitiful compared to my father and grandmother's combined and mighty four hundred and seven hours!" She shook her fist in the air as if to illustrate a point.
Jonah blinked. "Yeah, uh, whatever." He said. "Just let me pee."
"What-no, Heston, did you not even listen to a word I said?" Kinga's lip curled up in a snarl and she bared her teeth, as if to intimidate Jonah.
Max put his hand on Kinga's arm, trying to calm her down.
"Don't you dare touch me!" She growled.
Max put his hands up in the air and backed away.
"I listened." Jonah leaned back as Kinga leaned in. "I listened."
Kinga narrowed her eyes and smirked. "Good." She wrung her hands. "I own you now, Heston. I say what you can and can't do."
Jonah sighed. "For the last time, Kinga, I'm fourteen, I'm not marrying you."
"I don't want to marry you." She said. "But starting from now, you will come down to the Room of Requirement and you will watch these terrible movies. You will accompany me to Hogsmeade. You will buy me sweets and crap out of your own money. You will be my boyfriend-"
"What, no! Kinga, you're insane!" Jonah protested. "I'm not gonna do any of that! Now please let me pee!"
"YOU WILL PEE WHEN I SAY YOU CAN PEE!" Kinga erupted in anger, causing Max to cower back in fear and Jonah to pee his pants right on the spot.
Upon seeing Jonah's wet trousers, Kinga simply balled her fists and growled, steadily getting louder.
"Uh, Kinga-"It was too late, however, as Kinga had already aimed her wand at Jonah. "Leviocorpus!" She shouted.
There was a green light and suddenly, Jonah was hanging upside down in midair by his ankle, as if someone were holding it.
"Oh god." Max pulled out his wand, pointed it at Jonah and flicked it upwards, and Jonah fell into a heap on the floor.
Kinga turned around and growled at Max, pointing her wand at him. "Petrificus Totalus!"
Max froze where he stood, his wand dropping from his hand and his eyes watching what Kinga was going to do next.
Kinga pointed her wand at Jonah and opened her mouth as if to say something.
Jonah, however, got there faster. "Expelliarmus!" He shouted. A bright red light shot out of Jonah's wand, throwing Kinga's wand across the room.
"Oh you'll pay for that, Heston!" Kinga scrambled for her wand and when she recovered it, she pointed it at Jonah once again.
Jonah had his wand pointed at Kinga.
"Conf-"
"Anteoculatia!" Jonah shouted. A red light hit Kinga and horns starred sprouting from her head.
Jonah refrained from making a joke about her exterior matching her exterior as he immediately realised how much trouble he would be in.
Kinga put her hand to her head and growled, that growl turning into a full on scream.
Jonah grabbed his wand and scrambled out of the Room of Requirement.
Jonah ran to the Ravenclaw common room and only paused for breath to answer the riddle. His long legs probably helped him to get there quicker. He adjusted his glasses and walked straight inside to the common room. He hadn't noticed that it was dark outside, then again, it was November so it would be dark early. He was more focused on the Ravenclaws that had swarmed around him.
"Jonah, oh my god where have you been?"
"You've been missing for almost nine hours-"
"Everyone was getting so worried about you-"
"You have detention from all your teachers for not turning up though."
Jonah ignored his classmate's concern for him and he pushed past them, walking into his dormitory.
"Whoa, Jonah Heston. Jesus, people are looking for you."
"Get out, Dan. I'm not going to say it again." Jonah said. His voice was shaking. He knelt down at his trunk and rummaged around for some dry trousers and clean underwear.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine." Jonah stood up and pulled the curtain around his bed and changed out of his soiled clothes and into his dry ones. He put on his scarf and robe and opened his curtain, again to find his classmate Dan in front of his bed.
"I told you to get out." Jonah said.
"Yeah and I went down to the common room. Only there's someone there who wants to see you."
"Who?" Jonah asked, expecting it to be one of Kinga's lackeys.
"Jonah... you're in trouble."
"I know I am, that's why-"
"Not trouble. But trouble. With the school."
Jonah sat inside the classroom of one of his least favourite teachers-also his head of house-bouncing his leg impatiently and worriedly. He hadn't tried to get himself into trouble, trouble always seemed to find him, just as it did in the form of Kinga Forrester and Max. He hadn't meant to do what he had. No, actually, he had. They really deserved it for the crap they'd put him through this past year, including the Max trying to murder him in Care Of Magical Creatures part-he was still having nightmares from that alone.
Kinga, the stupid brat. Why couldn't she just leave him alone? Maybe then he wouldn't have hexed her. She deserved it. Definitely deserved it.
He began to bounce his other leg, deeply feeling the anxiety that he was going to get expelled, have to surrender his wand to the Ministry of Magic and then he'd have to live out the remainder of his days in Azkaban with Dementors sucking out his happy memories and his soul and he's never see his Muggle family again. And it would all be Kinga's fault. He shuddered at the thought.
"Ah. Mr Heston."
Jonah snapped from his thoughts and looked over to the sleepy eyed, grey haired teacher now entering the room. With another teacher. Oh no. Oh no no no.
"So you hexed Kinga Forrester and cursed Max." He said calmly, in his usual slow drawl. "Why?""Um, sir, with all due respect, she started it." Jonah said.
"How so?"
"She locked me in the Room of Requirement every Sunday and forced me to watch terrible Muggle B movies, sir. Movies like The Beast Of Hollow Mountain, Yongary, Wizards of the Lost Kingdom and it's sequel, Cry Wilderness, Reptilicus-Max tried to kill me in Care of Magical Creatures by setting a Hippogriff on me. I literally almost died. Then, as if that wasn't enough, Kinga kidnapped me for eight hours and forced me to watch really awful movies like-like Mac and Me and Atlantic Rim-that Pacific Rim knock off. It was horrible."
Jonah paused for breath. "She tied me up. But I broke free. She wouldn't let me pee. Then she shouted and I um... I wet myself. We kinda duelled a bit. She cursed Max and tried to kill me. And that's when I hexed her, sir. Sirs."
"Well, you'll be happy to know that Miss Forrester's in the Hospital Wing, having her horns removed and-"
"Wait, what?" The second teacher asked.
Jonah was certain he'd seen him before, but couldn't remember the name. Or what he thought. But he was sure it was Muggle Studies. Or something like that. He was definitely more forward and aggressive.
"Kinga tied me up and forced me to watch terrible movies." Jonah repeated. I'm sure she used the Imperius curse-"
"Dammit, we should have known that a young Forrester would be capable of something like this." The second teacher said.
"Kinga is not her father, how were we to know?"
"The last name 'Forrester' for a start-Joel, we should have kept a closer eye on her."
"Well, I don't dispute that, Mike, it's just-"
"I'm sorry," Jonah interrupted after watching their back and forth, "but what do you mean by that? What did Kinga's father do?"
"What Miss Forrester's father and grandmother did is none of your business, Mr Heston." Professor Mike something-or-other said.
An awkward silence fell over the room.
"Professor Robinson?" Jonah asked. "Will you tell me?"
Joel sighed. "When I was in Hogwarts, some thirty years ago, a man called Clayton Forrester used to force me to watch terrible movies in the Room of Requirement. It started in our second year."
"Clayton Forrester-you mean... Kinga's... dad?" Jonah frowned. That would mean he had tortured Professor Robinson for two hundred and fourteen hours.
Joel nodded in confirmation.
"I started at Hogwarts in 1993." Mike continued. "I was forced to watch the same awful movies alongside Jo-Professor Robinson. When Professor Robinson and Mr Forrester left Hogwarts, I thought I was free. Only Mr Forrester's mother was a teacher here. And she made me watch terrible movies until I graduated."
"Wow." Jonah blinked, trying to make sense of it.
"Mr Forrester, when he was torturing me all those years, had an assistant-actually, he had two, and the first one was absolutely not taken away by the giant spider in the Forbidden Forest, nope. No."
"Incidentally, don't go into the Forbidden Forest." Mike added.
"Anyway the second assistant, Frank, insisted on being called TV's Frank, for some reason-"
"Max calls himself TV's Son of TV's Frank!" Jonah blurted out. "Wait-"
"It's our fault, Jonah." Mike said. "We should have watched out for Kinga."
"Well there's no point worrying about it now." Joel said. "Now if you'll excuse me, I just need to go to my office." He walked to the back of the room towards his office and disappeared into the room.
Jonah held his breath while Professor... He still couldn't remember his last name, was watching over him with his arms folded.
After some time, probably only five minutes or so, but felt like forever, Joel popped his head out of the door. "Mr Heston, Professor Nelson, would you please join me in my office?"
Professor Nelson! That was his name! Jonah slid off his chair, expecting to be called up to the headteacher's office to be expelled, have his wand taken from him and snapped in half and then the aurors would come and take him to Azkaban. He walked slowly to the office and slowly opened the door.
If he was most expecting to be expelled, then he was least expecting what he saw-to the point where he hadn't even entertained the idea.
"Mike, oh Mike, it's good to see you!"
"Yeah, how long's it been? Nineteen years?"
"It hasn't been that long. We saw him just the weekend."
"Hey, settle down." Joel said. "Mr Heston, Jonah, these are my... robot friends."
Jonah simply blinked. "Okay. One of Kinga's spells sent me crazy. It's the only logical explanation."
Joel sat down at his desk and Mike sat on it. Jonah simply looked around the office, as if expecting everything to go away.
"Mmm. If they look crudely built, it's because I built these guys when I was only twelve." Joel chuckled. "I snuck into the restricted section of the library, snuck into the Muggle Studies classroom and enchanted some of the objects in there."
"Wait, you broke the rules?" Jonah asked. He'd never heard a teacher willingly admit they broke the rules before.
"Professor Dumbledore allowed me to keep the robots, provided they didn't leave school grounds. He didn't dare risk the Ministry of Magic learning about what I'd done." Joel explained. "But for years, they were my companions while Mr Forrester carried out his experiments on me."
"Then they became my companions." Mike said. "While Professor Forrester carried out her punishments on me."
"During the Battle Of Hogwarts, I duelled some Death Eaters to save my bots. And they came to live with me."
"The Room of Requirement was destroyed." Mike said. "I graduated in 1999."
"I started working here in the early 2000s, replacing one of the teachers who was killed by a Death Eater. Moved to Hogsmeade and took my bots with me."
"Later on, Professor Forrester resigned. And I took her job." Mike explained.
"Wow." Jonah said. He nodded, figuring he got all the information.
"We wouldn't tell anyone else this, Jonah. But you're part of an experiment called-"
"Mystery Science Theatre 3000." Jonah finished.
"Exactly."
"So how do I leave it?" Jonah asked.
"You don't." One of the robots said. The red gum ball machine one.
"You're in this for the long haul." The other one said. The gold one with the beak and the netting on its head.
"But we'll look after you and keep you company." The final one said. This one was big and purple and reminded Jonah of a Muggle vacuum cleaner.
"Exactly." Joel said. "Which is why, Jonah, I'd like for you to meet my robots. The gold one is Crow-"
"Crow T. Robot." Crow corrected.
"What's the T stand for?" Jonah asked.
Crow paused for a second. "The." He replied.
"Crow... The Robot?"
"Correct."
"Alright. The gum ball one, that's Tom Servo." Mike said.
"And the purple one with the Hoover suction tube thing?" Jonah asked.
"Gypsum." Joel said.
"Why Gypsum?" Jonah asked.
Joel shrugged. "Guess I was just reading about it and I thought it'd make a pretty name for a robot. I was only twelve after all."
Jonah nodded. The names did sound like they'd been made up by a pre teen. Now that he'd known it was possible to make robots real in the Wizarding World... maybe he could sneak into the restricted section sometime and make one of his own. He'd created a robot character, M Waverly, when he was in Muggle school for an exercise. Maybe he could bring M Waverly to life here-
"Don't even think about it, Jonah." Joel said. "I know that look when I see it. That's why I introduced my own robots to you. So you wouldn't have to make your own."
"No, no. I was just wondering about Kinga." Jonah lied.
"Well... she won't stop her torment of you." Mike said. "Her grandma Pearl is an authority figure at the Ministry of Magic so if I know her, which I do, she'll use that authority to get Kinga out of trouble and allow her to carry on her experiments on you."
"Oh god." Jonah exclaimed.
"But Crow, Servo and Gypsum should make that time easier for you." Joel added. "Professor Nelson and I will also be looking out for you. Also, I'll have to give you detentions for hexing Ms Forrester, so how about I set them on Sundays until Christmastime?"
"That sounds... tedious, "Jonah admitted, "but at least I'll be missing out on Kinga's experiments."
"Excellent. You'll start with me on Sunday evening at 6pm." Joel said.
"Fair, sir. Will Kinga and Max be punished?" Jonah asked.
"Oh yes, they'll be punished by their heads of year too. Or at least Max will. Don't worry about that." Joel said. "Alright. You may leave, Mr Heston."
Jonah stood up to leave and made his way to the door."Bye, Jonah!" Crow said. "I look forward to riffing movies with you."
"We're not riffing movies with him." Servo said.
"No, we are, that's why Joel made us meet him, remember?"
"Hey, Crow, Servo, stop intimidating the teenage boy." Gypsum said. "Act like you're thirty, not three." Jonah blinked, still in disbelief about the whole situation.
"Before you leave, can I just ask, how long have you been tortured by being forced to watch bad movies? How many hours?" Mike asked.
"Um, eight hours today and nineteen hours last year." Jonah said. "Twenty-seven."
"Jeez." Mike mumbled.
"Okay. Well. I will see you at five on Sunday, Mr Heston. Dismissed."
Jonah opened the door and went through it, leaving the two professors and three robots in the room alone.
"I like him, Joel." Gypsum said.
"Eh, I was hoping for more of a combination between you and Mike." Crow said.
"I don't like him. I think he's dumb looking and annoying and... smelly." Servo said. "Total waste of space."
"You're robots." Mike said. "You don't have noses. You can't smell."
"Come on, Crow, Servo. Give him a chance. For me." Joel said.
Crow grunted. "Alright."
"For you, Joel." Servo said.
"Good. Because without Cambot, you're going to have to keep an eye on Jonah so that we can get Kinga in trouble." Mike said.
"There he goes, trying to get the Mads in trouble again." Servo said.
"Is this girl really a Mad though?" Crow asked.
"I don't know." Joel admitted. "But I'm counting on you guys to help me find out.""Don't worry, Joel, you can count on us." Gypsum headbutted Crow and Servo.
"Oh yeah, for sure, Joel." Crow said.
"Absolutely. Whatever." Servo said.
A/N: Is it wrong that I see so much of myself in Kinga?
Both Joel and Jonah are Ravenclaws. Kinga is a Slytherin. Max is a Hufflepuff. If you were wondering, Mike is a Gryffindor.
The Hippogriff is supposed to be Reptilicus Metalicus from s11. So basically Jonah's gone all of the events of s11 and s12 without the bots.
In thinking about the characters' ages, I went for the birthdays of their actors. So Kinga and Jonah have summer birthdays and Max has a winter birthday, making him older than everyone else.
No mentions of Gizmonic Institute, the Satellite Of Love or Moon 13 because I couldn't figure out how to do that in this fic. Just assume Jonah and Kinga had an Invention Exchange.
Kinga's lackeys are implied to be the Skeleton Crew/Boneheads.
I tried to show the differences between Joel and Mike as teachers.
Jonah is indeed a muggleborn. Kinga's a halfblood, same as Max. I hadn't thought about Joel or Mike's blood status. But they're probably halfbloods too.
What happened to Cambot? I think he got damaged in the Battle of Hogwarts and was unsalvageable.
The bots are magically enchanted.
Everyone is British in this for obvious reasons.
Repeat to yourself 'it's just a fic, I should really just relax'