Chapter 2
Inchoate
08:12 pm 1st September 1991, Great Hall, Hogwarts.
He stood there with his black wild hair that went slightly past his shoulders and flew in every direction, not unlike a raven's nest, amongst his peers in the great hall of Hogwarts, his face gave away no emotion, as if carved in stone, his jade eyes looking ahead of him as if in defiance to reality and not even wasting a moment to blink, but at the same time not giving away anything, like a void which kept everything it had in itself and nothing was destined to escape it, had anyone really paid him any attention they would have noticed that his facial expressions or the lack thereof was a constant from the time he had come onto the platform 9 ¾, he watched as others in his years were sorted, the Deputy Headmistress, one Professor Minerva Mcgonagall calling out the names of the students, starting from, Abbot Hannah, who went to be a Hufflepuff, to Longbottom Neville, the-boy-who-lived, who of course went to Gryffindor, the cheer that followed had to be brought to a halt by Dumbledore himself.
And then it continued once again, till Perks Sally-Anne, who went into Hufflepuff, then Professor Mcgonagall called out, "Potter Harry", He mechanically strode to sit down on the 3 legged chair that had been provided to them, and then the sorting hat was placed upon his head, and its verdict was awaited, some of the staff which had anticipated a quick sorting, not unlike the Malfoy heir's, were in for a surprise as the minutes began to tick in, soon 3 minutes had passed away, the boy was well on his way to become a Hatstall, a prospect which excited some of the staff, especially Professor Mcgonagall and Professor Filius Flitwick, the diminutive Charms professor of who had both been hatstalls, and knew that usually hatstall students were interesting to teach because they had an interesting perspective of things, and when the timer for the potter boy struck down to 5 minutes they were giddy at the prospect of promise they expected from this boy, after all his parents were some of their best students, Lily a Charms Prodigy and would have very well became a Charms Mistress, had she not stopped when she had gotten pregnant with her son, and had she been alive, James had gone and became an Auror instead of pursuing the promise he showed in Transfiguration because he wanted to help with the war and protect his small family of two, he too had his life cut short, now their son, a hatstall, definitely held prospect of prodigious promise, one greasy haired Potions Professor on the other hand was nor amused nor excited, he was fuming believing the son of his former nemesis and the woman he loved, to be vying for attention.
Soon the clock started to tick up to 10 minutes, the earlier feeling of the teacher's were replaced by worry for it was taking too long, of course, with the exception of the potions professor, it was not an un-precedent event, for the longest record of a hatstall was held by one, Mary Poppins in 1818, a whole 12 minutes and 50 seconds, but the reasoning behind that was simple the animated discussion she had with the hat was famous, also a story that was told to the young Magic born children as a bed time story, but here not a peep had been heard by either one of them, the teachers and students were beginning to become restless with curiosity so as to what was happening, Professor Mcgonagall watched the proceedings with bewilderment as there were no set guidelines for these kind of events, and usually when they occurred, which was rare, they were simply waited out, by the time it had ticked up to 12 minutes, everyone waited with baited breath to see whether they'd see a new record being formed, and their expectations paid put, when at the new record time of 13 minutes and 13 seconds the hat bellowed, Gryffindor!
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Well, the hat, had not bellowed so much as it had announced in the same manner it did for others but the silence that had seized the great hall had made his voice boom like a cannon. Suddenly everyone started claping not unlike when Longbottom got sorted, in fact this time it was even louder as even those who hadn't applauded back then simply because they were indifferent to the boy who lived or were against him clapped, for different reasons, sure, but clapped none the less, the ones who were indifferent earlier had jumped the band wagon simply because it was a truly exciting event, while those who were against the boy who lived believed themselves to be traditionalists, the majority of them didn't like the fact that he got sorted into Gryffindor but breaking such a legendary record was something that had to be held in high esteem.
While all this was happening Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts, The Chief Warlock Of Wizengamot, The Supreme Mugwump of the International Confideration of Wizards, and bearer of many other titles, had been going through many trains of thoughts, at first when he had seen the boy just after his Deputy and Friend of many years, not to mention former student, called out his name for a second he had seen his two Dearly Departed, Students, and Friends, while the young boy was very much splitting image of his father with the exception of his long hair, lack of glasses, and not to mention jade eyes that resembled his mother, he suddenly felt really guilty for not having visited him for the past 10 years, bust he squashed that guilt under the belief that he probably grew up happily under the tender loving care of his aunt, who he believed was probably willing to turn a blind eye to his magical heritage, something which wouldn't be helped by his involvement in the boy's life, after all family was family no matter what, right? He knew he hadn't been the best of the brothers to Ariana and still wasn't what he'd call a good one to Aberforth but he definitely liked to believe that others wouldn't make the same mistakes as him.
When the boy turned out to be a hatstall he too was excited, he could simply imagine the shenanigans the boy would get into given who his parents were, and were he to team up with the Weasley twins, it would be quite a spectacle to watch, of course, Minerva would disagree, and most probably spend what little time she had free to herself by giving him detentions, when the timer reached to 10 minutes he too got worried for the boy, worried that maybe he was too scared for the hat to properly sort him in any house, and could only hope that the had had been trying to help the boy calm down, and slowly when the time came where he was slowly but steadily beginning to contend for the new title for the longest hatstall he leaned forward to look at the boy more intently as if trying to figure out a particularly difficult arithmatical problem, when at 13 minutes and 13 seconds he actually broke the record, albus was flabbergasted, not because of the record being broken, he had done that the moments he had crossed the 12:50 mark, but what shocked him was the timing of it 13 Minutes and 13 Seconds, 13 being the arithamatic number representing death, he wondered if this was a mere coincidence of was something greater at work here?
The boy in question was after all the other candidate for the prophecy, he recalled another 11 year old orphan who had been a hat stall though certainly not for as long as this one, but there were parallels, not to mention the string of words and fate that put these two on similar tangents, one the worst Dark lord seen in centuries, the other a contemporary to the one who vanquished the said dark lord.
He quashed all these thoughts with a vehemence and concentrated back on the eleven year old, he didn't want to be reading too much between the lines, after all one of them never knew his family never knew their love, and simply wasn't capable of loving anything or anyone aside of himself. Oh that didn't meant he wouldn't keep an eye open, after all he had lost the love of his life to the greed of power, and nearly lost his own way, except he found himself back at the right path, though certainly at a terrible price, once again shaking off these ghosts of his past he decided that he would simply speaking give the young boy a chance, and should he slip off the path he'd do everything in his power to help him find his way back, one that didn't had him paying the same toll as himself.
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Harry Potter's face was still as expressionless as it was at the beginning as he moved forth to sit amongst his new housemates in midst of being congratulated and applauded, nor his face nor his eyes betrayed any emotion of thoughts that were whirling away in his mind, he simply sat there with his peers, to others it seemed like he was in shock, something they believed they could understand after all he did broke a prestigious record not something someone does everyday. One Hermione Granger was trying hard not to be envious of Harry Potter the new enigma, though a part of this effort came from her ruthless curiosity which wanted to have her interrogate him on the details of his sorting about things like, what was he talking about with the hat for so long? Had he even known that he was being applauded for breaking such a prestigious record? Did this mean that he wanted to learn magic as much as she did? But it for all for naught as not only was he sitting on the other end of the house table but he also didn't look fit to be answering any of her questions for tonight. Well there was always tomorrow.
Neville Longbottom was looking at his fellow Gryffindor with undisguised awe, he had been taught and made aware about these kind of situations by his grandmother ever since he could remember, he recalled that people holding such great records were held in high esteem because it had been tried and tested time and again that these people were great at magic, and he had heard stories about his godmother and her husband who had fought along his parents in the war, he sincerely wanted to get along with harry and possibly make friends with him.
Meanwhile Ronald Weasely was busy trying to stuff asmuch food as he could in his mouth ever since the sorting had ended and the feast began.
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On a darker note, on Tom Marvolo Riddle also known as Lord Voldemort, was seething from inside the turban he was hiding on the top of the young defense teacher, attached to him like a leech, having seen the boy who was as he believed to be the reason for his current situation break such a prestigious record was certainly not doing his moods any favors thus he vowed to kill him mercilessly as sooon as he got his body back.
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The night had ended on a weird note for some of the students, they couldn't understand the ban from going on the 3rd floor, but they all unanimously decided to avoid the said floor, of course Fred and George weren't a part of that group.
Soon it came to the bed night for all and they had ended their first day new and back at Hogwarts and prepared for the days to come bt promptly falling asleep in their respective beds. Truly a new beginning had just started to unfold itself and gears of fate were beginning to grind against one another to form one Story filled with lots of Blood, Tears and Wisdom.
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A/n: that's it for now folks, I know a slow and probably a disappointing update, to put it in short been busy with life, not to mention I had to redo it thrice already so that I could get a good feel out of it, I promise I'll strive to get out bi weekly if not weekly updates from now on. Oh and on another note the title of this chapter is in reference to both the soon to come developments of this story and the story as a whole from my point of view, it has only began and is unorganized as of yet but soon I'll try to get all my ducks in order.
