Chapter 2 – Rule Breakers Convention
It has already been established that the Potter family heir, young Harry James Potter, could do anything he set his mind to do. So when he went straight to the public library after reading his special letter, he didn't let a silly little thing, like it being closed for the day, get in his way. He closed his eyes tightly, concentrated hard, and phased right through the wall. Opening his eyes, he grinned mischievously as the dark library suddenly lay before him. So much for the rule that said that solid matter was unable to pass through another solid matter without changing the make or inflicting any damage on either. He mentally checked off that rule as broken.
Harry walked past the rows of desks with their individual lamps and stopped in front of the one he usually worked at. He turned on its lamp and a dull light shone in the area. He quickly set off into the numerous numbers of bookshelves only to return to the desk with a large and old tome in his hand.
If anyone were to see the 'Dursley's young criminal ward' bent over such a large book that was easily bigger than his head, they would have found it odd. If they saw the title of the profoundly large and heavy book, they would have been increasingly curious. So as Harry Potter continued to read 'Building London' written in the 1500's, he grinned another very mischievous grin.
'And what was once an open area where the Kings Game roamed; shops were built upon to provide for the families of the soldiers that were called in for war. The families were brought into the land and given an opportunity to begin their lives anew. The shops that were built included the following: a few clothes stores, vegetable and fruit market stands, a meat market, apub, a barbers, an orphanage and a small children's school. Many of the soldiers had left their children behind and most of the new village's population consisted of women and children, which explains the reason as to the lack of many other amenities.'
Needless to say, Harry was a very smart kid. He knew that it was very odd to have a pub built on such a land that was considered royally owned. The royal family must have consented to these shops before allowing them to open and logic stated that where clothes, vegetables, fruit, meat, haircuts, education and a place for the orphaned children to stay in were very essential to the villagers, a pub was very out of place. Especially since mostly children lived in that area.
He went back into the 'bookshelve jungle' and searched for books on Geography and construction. Returning with books that very easily competed with 'Building London's thickness and size, Harry found that not a single pub was ever demolished on the open area since then and no evidence supported that the pub was still there. But Harry also knew that there was a possibility that the books about building demolition and public vending registry did not have information about a pub that existed many years ago.
So Harry returned the books, closed the lamp, and phased out of the library. He had a field trip to attend and, if he got the coordinates right, it went straight to Charring Cross Road.
It didn't take Harry long to go through the rules of the universe listed in his young mind. If he was going to do something against the rules, he wanted to know which rule he broke. But there was a time he remembered when Dudley was chasing after him and he found himself on the school roof. Another rule he found himself breaking was traveling at the speed of light which man hasn't been able to do. It wasn't really a rule. It was just something he found that humans haven't done before so when he found himself on the roof a second after wishing himself away, he knew that there was another unspoken rule to break and this time, he wasn't going to let anyone know about it. The performance card/Dudley incident was still fresh on his mind.
He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. If he was going to travel at the speed of light that was approximately 3 times ten to the eighth power, he was going to make sure he ended up in one piece. He quickly thought of the latitude and longitude of Charring Cross Road, closed his eyes, then he heard a distinct pop.
When he opened his eyes he had to fight off a gasp from escaping his lips. He was able to conclude only one thing: this was not Charring Cross Road.
Everywhere he looked the people on 'Charring Cross Road' were in strange outfits of what looked to be more fitted monk clothes in different colors, matching them with what looked to be Halloween witch's hats, and some were carrying brooms! Harry felt like he just entered a Halloween story book.
"Hey kid! Watch out! Next apparitioners are coming in five!" a toothless old man told him as an archway appeared a little bit away from him.
Harry quickly moved closer to the man and a woman appeared on the spot he was in exactly five seconds earlier.
"Thanks a lot." He turned to the toothless man.
"No problem. Just come to me pub if you need anything. The names Tom." He said and turned away. The archway closed and Harry caught himself staring bug-eyed at the brick wall.
Harry couldn't help but feel he was suddenly warped into the time of King Arthur and Merlin. The buildings all looked like the 'ye olde English' type of buildings and Harry wondered how some of them remained intact. Harry even contemplated checking off 'time travel' from his list but decided against it until he found further evidence. He looked up and found a sign that proclaimed, 'Diagon Alley'.
Harry quickly started roaming the alley and looking at all the sights and sounds it had to offer. One thing was for sure though; he didn't like the smells it offered. Some of the people didn't seem to be as hygienic as the non-magic counterparts. He watched as the people of the busy street kept going up and down looking for one thing or the other. Harry got himself knocked to the ground by a man with platinum blonde hair who was being quickly followed by a small boy but neither of them offered Harry any help.
As Harry rubbed his sore bottom, he spotted a flicker of gold at the corner of his eye. It was a gold coin!
He picked it up and examined it. There was some sort of image of some person on the coin with some kind of series of numbers surrounding the edges of the coin. He watched as people traded silver and bronze coins as well as the gold ones with the shop keepers. That must have been their currency! He picked himself off the ground but kneeled down again and started collecting as many pebbles as he could find. Once he got around twenty of them, he looked at the gold coin very closely. Then he broke one of his favorite rules to break once again.
He broke down the pebbles into its base elements then broke it down even further. He giggled at the thought of all those scientists that would be after him if they knew he could even simplify an element! He took a few particles of oxygen, helium and other gasses surrounding him and focused it into the very basic structure of life. He then put it all back together again. He looked into his hand and smiled as he found twenty one very identical looking coins, although the series of number surrounding the edges were completely different. Harry figured that they worked the same way with the numbers on the non-magic currency. If all the coins he spent had the same serial numbers, he would surely be found out.
Anyone from the Wizarding world could debate that Harry Potter simply made a form of transfiguration. Any normal witch or wizard could accomplish this feat. But when faced in front of a goblin, the transfigured coin will always turn back into whatever it was transfigured from. Harry Potter's coin cannot be turned back. He changed its entire make; it was no longer changeable into a pebble. Unless of course, Harry wanted it to.
Harry read his supplies list for the first time and frowned.
Did they think he was stupid? He was in First year? He was ten years old for Pete's sake! In the non-magical world, he would be entering his Sixth Year at Primary! Did they think that he could not handle the work since he was behind his Wizard peers? Sure they all knew about the lessons already and had a different type of knowledge in their heads but he was not going back to first year! He was already breaking the laws of the universe since he was five, just like them! Harry Potter was not a First Year. He would show them! He would make sure that if he entered another school, another world, he would at least continue his studies at the same level as he left or the next. He knew that in Sixth year at the non-magical world, they would be taking National Curriculum Tests so he had to be ready for the Wizard counterpart.
Of course, he didn't know that Wizard schooling started at eleven years of age. He didn't know that he was already ahead, if only slightly in the theory of it, of all of his age group and he was very blissfully unaware that he was also way past his Sixth year in knowledge in the non-magical world.
He entered the bookstore and approached a nice lady with a small gold tag on her chest that said 'Assistant Manager Kathy'. He prepared himself first: Wide eyes; check, Watery eyes; check, Quivering bottom lip; check, Biting the top lip; check, Batting long, moist, eyelashes; check.
He made himself a teensy bit smaller and tugged on her robe, making sure that he was playing with his feet and looking at the ground a lot.
"Aww, hey there little guy. What can I help you with today?" she asked.
"Umm… Ms. Kathy? I was wondering if you could get me the first to sixth year books for the Hogwarts curriculum?" he said in the most innocent voice that he could muster.
She stared at him then his doe eyes and smiled a bit. "Aren't those a little-" before she could finish, he had already felt that she would say no. If plan A: look cute did not work, plan B: play the victimsurely would.
"You see, I have five brothers and sisters and I got stuck getting the books this year. James is at the apothecary and Lily is at the cauldron shop. The others are with their friends today so I got stuck getting all the books." He whimpered. Oh how he hated doing this, but if it got the job done, then so be it.
"Oh! Well, if that's the case then I will be happy to help you with that." She smiled warmly at him and soon he found himself in the midst of six piles of high stacked books.
"Let me shrink those for you." She told him and he watched happily as the books were suddenly a thousandth of their size. A means of shrinking was already created in this world! That rule was broken! He couldn't wait to try that one out.
"Thank you Ms. Kathy." He smiled warmly at her. "How much do I owe you?"
"Wait, those are only the general class books. But the elective class books are over in that corner if you want." She motioned behind him. "After you pick the rest of the books, come up to the register and I'll ring it all up."
Harry thanked her again and got to the elective books. There were books on Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, Care of Magical Creatures, Divination, Medical Magic, and Mind Magic. Not knowing that the last two subjects were no longer Hogwarts curriculum, he picked out beginner to advance and mastery of all the subjects and made his way to the register. Kathy's eyebrows rose at the titles but didn't say a word. He had to pay all his gold coins, and was left with only one galleon, the original, and thirteen sickles left. He collected another twenty pebbles and was on his way around the ally once more.
Just a walk away however, another bookstore caught his eye. Obscurus Books. He went inside and found that it was not a bookstore, but a publishing company. They proclaimed that they published 'Fantastic Beasts and where to find them', a book Harry had bought only minutes ago. They had a small selection of books that were no longer in circulation and did not do so well at Flourish and Blotts. Those books were still being sold but each was the last non-publisher copy left.
Harry found several very interesting texts such as: Parselmouths: a history and biography, Find the Animal in you: Animagus training, and Metamorphmagi in training: a diary. He picked up a copy of each and found they cost ten galleons altogether. He put them in the shopping bag he got from Flourish and Blotts and left the publishing company. As soon as he was out though, he repeated the memory of Kathy shrinking his other books and just like how he copied Mrs. Robinson and the violin, the books shrunk as he wished them to. Five-hundred pounds of books were now in his pocket at a very leisurely two pounds. Harry grinned like a maniac.
Collecting the rest of his supplies was rather tedious as he had to do give the same excuse of five siblings to the apothecary to get the needed materials for years one through six. He got very bored when Madam Malkin measured him for his uniform and got rather annoyed when she commented on how small he was. He had to collect another twenty coins since once again, his pebble-coins were already spent. He made sure to keep the original galleon with him as a reminder of how it truly looked like. He went to Scribbulus Everchanging Inks for his parchment, quills and inks. He couldn't understand why a normal notebook and pen couldn't do the job, but he promised himself that he would practice writing with a quill since it was harder to use than a pen. He shrunk all of his things before he spotted a few people with what looked to be wooden trunks.
"Excuse me sir," he asked a heavy set man carrying a trunk with him. "Where did you buy your trunk?"
The man huffed a bit at the weight of the trunk but then bobbed his head over a dark alley that said 'Knockturn Alley'. After wondering why the man did not simply shrink the trunk, Harry thanked him and entered the dark alley. The first store he saw was the trunk store and he was very grateful for that. The alley was very dark and he couldn't help but be reminded of his cupboard on nights that his imagination ran away with him and scared him.
Inside the trunk store, a man with a long beard and a bald head was chopping some wood using what seemed like a stick with a blue light. It reminded Harry of a light saber.
"Excuse me sir, but I would like to purchase a trunk." He said in the loudest voice he could muster since he was afraid of not being heard over the sound of the stick.
The man stopped what he was doing and turned to Harry. "O' course! O' course! Right this way!"
Harry saw his fair share of regular trunks with just one compartment but when the man got to those with more than one, he happily agreed on the two compartment trunk. The man offered to show him more but Harry knew that he could just as use the shrinking charm in the opposite manner and make the inside of the trunk bigger. Two compartments were fine as long as the second compartment was a secret one so that the Dursley's couldn't get to his more valuable things. The man put in extra security spells and asked for a drop of blood from Harry. Harry was squeamish at first and looked away as a small dagger cut his finger. The man muttered something then the cut was fully healed. Harry made a mental note to read his books on Medical Magic soon.
Harry left the trunk shop five galleons poorer and was on his way to what he thought was his last buy of the day: a wand.
Harry didn't know what the wand was for of course. He hadn't needed a wand before. He stared at the shabby little shop and sighed before entering.
"Aahh, Mr. Potter. I was wondering when I would get to meet you." A voice spoke as soon as he entered and right before a bell tinkered.
Harry found himself face to face with the oldest man he had ever seen in his life.
"Well, come now. Which is your wand arm?" the man asked.
"Err… I haven't really ever held a wand before." Harry told him.
"Well then, which hand do you use the most? Maybe when writing something?" the man elaborated.
"I trained myself to be ambidextrous by writing with both hands but I do lean on my right hand a bit more with writing… though I use my left hand to do my tasks." Harry answered truthfully.
A tape-measure appeared out of nowhere and started measuring Harry in so many ways that Harry lost count.
"Well then, try this one. Rosewood, Dragon heartstring, thirteen inches. Swishy."
Harry held on to the long stick of wood but it was instantly snatched from his hand. This went on a dozen times before the man got a strange look on his face.
"I wonder…" he muttered. "Try this one Mr. Potter. Holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."
Harry felt a relative warmth spread across his fingers when he held the wand and instantly, red and gold sparks emitted from the end.
"Very good then Mr. Potter, very good! Curious… very curious…" the old man then started to mumble again.
"Excuse me, sir, but it still doesn't feel at all very right." Harry spoke up.
The old man looked at him in surprise. "Not right?"
Harry nodded. "It's warm in my hand and I like it but there seems to be a part missing."
The old man's eyebrows shot up into his hairline. He went over to the wand that lay on the fading purple cushion then handed it to Harry.
Instantly, the feeling of something missing was completely gone as Harry held on to both wands. Gold and blue sparks instantly shot out of the phoenix wand and the old wand respectively.
"Even more curious Mr. Potter!" the old man clapped happily.
"What's curious, sir?" Harry asked.
"I remember every wand I have ever sold Mr. Potter. You're first wand's core came from a phoenix that only gave one other feather… just one other. And that wand, why, that wand gave you that scar." He said as his eyes went straight to Harry's forehead.
Harry filed away the information to look through once he got to Hogwarts. "And the other wand sir? What is it made of?"
The old man grinned so wide that he looked like a Cheshire cat. "Even I do not know its make. The first Ollivander to make wands made that one and it was the last one he made before he died. All that my ancestor passed on, aside from the art, was that wand."
Harry left the shop ten galleons poorer, he thankfully got a discount and instead of seven galleons each, he had paid only three for the phoenix wand as 'an apology for the scar that remains marred on your forehead'.
He patted his pocket that was full of books, a trunk, potion supplies, parchments, quills and inks. Just as he was about to 'light speed travel' as he liked to call it, he heard a distinct hoot from a store near him. He shrunk both his wands and put them in the shrunken trunk. He approached the shop called 'Eyelops Owl Emporium' and entered it. Inside he saw the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. It was a snowy white owl with a dark beak and piercing amber eyes.
"She's a beut, aint she?" the shop keeper asked him. Harry just nodded. "If you want, I'll sell her to you for five galleons. I'll even throw in her cage."
Harry handed the man the last of his made galleons and left the store with the owl in her cage. Harry didn't know whether he could shrink her or not. It was different working with living things and he already promised himself he would never hurt another being. The fly he had toyed with as a child was a painful reminder of that. He had first found it funny but after he made a spider unwind its own web, he realized that he was hurting them. It died shortly after, choking on its own web. He never used animals or insects with his rule breaking again. Unless they consented of course, like how one of Mrs. Figg's cats once allowed him to let the fur which Mrs. Figg had cut off accidentally, grow back faster. Harry sighed and opened the cage. The owl looked at him expectantly.
"I won't be able to keep you until the end of the summer. We won't fit in my cupboard." He told her then he picked up his pre-written reply to Professor M. McGonagall. "Bring this to Hogwarts. I'll be there come September then I'll name you. You do know where Hogwarts is, right?"
The owl merely stared at him.
"The letter did say to owl the reply…" he trailed off but before he could say anymore, the snowy owl leapt out of the cage and grabbed his letter, flying into the sky until Harry couldn't see her anymore. Harry wasn't entirely sure as to what owling a reply meant or how an owl could deliver a letter but he figured that if he didn't receive a reply, he could always just come back to Diagon Ally and ask. Harry shrunk the cage and put it in his pocket as well.
He went back to the spot where he had originally 'light speed traveled' and concentrated on Privet drive, specifically, his cupboard.
In a second he was at his desired destination and he grinned idiotically as he lay down in his cot. He still wasn't sure if he had time traveled but part of him felt that he did not and that rule was to be broken later on in his life. But that did not disappoint him in the slightest.
He had found more rule breakers like him and he had also realized that they all followed a set of their own rules. If he didn't know any better, he could have sworn that he just attended a Rule Breakers Convention. And with that thought, he drifted off into a peaceful nap. It was only three in the afternoon after all.