A/N: Another chapter for you guys even if I thought the response to chapter eight was underwhelming, haha. You should expect another update sometime next week, though iit might get delayed since I have exams this coming week. XD

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Chapter 9: Summer and That Book

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The whole train ride back had been a little disappointing as he had realized that magic wasn't allowed to be performed by people under seventeen even if technically he was older than seventeen when they weren't at whatever magic school they decided to go to. He had slept on the train mostly while trying to fit in as much practical magical practice as he could until he was restricted by the laws that wizards decided was good.

Ed had made sure that his trunk was as light as could be with a Feather Light Charm that Fred and George had taught him sometime after the whole Stone debacle. Ed almost dreaded going back to the University dorms as Havoc, in one of his letters had let slip that they—who they were, it wasn't really explicitly or implicitly stated—prepared a surprise for him when he got back from his 'boarding school in Scotland'. Mustang had been mighty suspicious about the whole thing as he'd never really heard of a school prestigious enough for Ed to need to go there for a whole seven years especially if said school wanted eleven year olds and Ed fully aware of the secrecy that surrounded Magic and its Ministry, had decided that this Mustang was trustworthy enough to be told of the magic all the while managing to keep the whole thing low key. Mustang had been sworn to secrecy and the moment that Ed would catch wind that Mustang had told anyone, even Havoc (maybe not Hughes since that guy somehow just knows much like his intelligence savvy counterpart in Amestris) Mustang would be defamed greatly by Ed posting rather undignified (read: frilly pink apron) pictures in the University website and Mustang knew that Ed was much more adept at the whole programming thing than he was and would never be able to take it down without Ed taking it down for him. The whole situation was mild but Mustang knew the weight of the secret. Ed just knew that Mustang was already reconsidering the whole political career that he had forgone just so that he would be able to interact with the magic world as a whole.

His trunk was filled to the brim with as much books as he could fit into it without scrambling its contents and taking clear advantage of the wizardspace that Ed could only explain as folding the fabric of reality so that he would be able to store more than what said space was already holding. It was actually quite a lot if Ed said so himself. The person selling trunks in Diagon Alley had been kind enough to teach him the spells but was the one to cast it first as the whole magic restriction thing had him unable to wield his wand. Tapping the trunks with your wand—as he had learned—wasn't considered big enough to get the attention of the authorities that dealt with Underage magic

Trekking through the roads (he hadn't wanted to take a cab as it would be good exercise) Ed wondered what he would do with his time in the summer. The classes he had taught apparently became Seasonal—meaning only offered in a specific time of the year—as he had his own studies to worry about. Being a full time professor seemed nice and all but Ed knew that there was more to Magic than what was offered in Hogwarts and he couldn't wait to be old enough and qualified enough to be able to access the more obscure texts that undoubtedly existed.

Maybe he could visit Sacha before going back to the University dorms. Eh. Nah. She was probably busy at this time of day. It was lunchtime after all and he didn't want to intrude and eat more than the orphanage could afford. Speakking of money, Ed thought that it was about time that he leave another gold bar or gold coins in the orphanage for them to be able to eat properly. He remembered how happy Sacha had been at the donations so Ed would do everything he could to help.

The University dorms were already in sight and Ed could only wonder why there were a crowd of people by the gates. But he shrugged. Eh. What students and the other teachers did in their free time was none of his business and really needed to get back to his reading. There was still a lot he hadn't covered and he still needed to relearn Chinese because apparently, Xingese had a lot of differences with the far eastern language. Approaching the gates with not a care in the world, Ed was suddenly the subject of at least a hundred pairs of eyes and Ed could only raise a brow.

"WELCOME BACK, PROFESSOR ELRIC!" They said in unison and Ed's face met his palm.

"What the hell are you doing here, you idiots?" Ed said in a raised voice.

"We thought it would be nice if we welcomed you back, Professor!" One of his most active student grinned.

"You were gone for a whole year!"

"We actually missed you and your terribly exciting lectures."

Ed sighed. "I get that and all. Where did you here about my return from? I'm sure that I never specified what date I was going to come back."

"Professor Havoc told us!"

"Ah. So this was the surprise he was talking about." Ed muttered. "I'll be teaching summer courses so don't even think that you're getting out of this scot-free."

"We never expected to!"

Ed was assaulted with a lot of hugs and hair ruffling that he almost screamed in frustration. He had a book to read damn it! But he did miss his student so he stayed with them for at most two hours before he separated and waved them goodbyes. He pointedly ignored the warmth in his chest that he felt when they had greeted him a welcome back. Ed didn't think he had a home in this school but apparently these teens and young adults thought otherwise.

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The whole summer consisted of him teaching lectures, terrorizing his student assistants, terrorizing his students, grading papers and reading books. Marking exams were easy enough as that was what the assistants were for but the essays he assigned were something that he needed to read himself if he wanted to know how well the students understood that lessons that he was imparting to them. There were several new uppity firsties that he had had to put in their places but all in all his summer was brilliant.

He visited Harry a couple of times and was surprised that he hadn't been receiving any letters. Ed himself had sent a letter or two to Harry but thought that the Dursleys had just been preventing Hedwig from flying off or something but apparently some barmy house-elf warned Harry about something and was greatly convinced that having Harry go back to Hogwarts for his second year was suicide. Ed thought that it was a load of bull. So he told the house-elf to go away or free him—he had heard several of the Slytherins bragging about threatening the house-elves with freedom and that they nearly piss themselves so that they could get back to their master's good graces and Ed thought that this was the perfect time to test the truth of that statement. And he was rewarded with Dobby—the house-elf apparently—looking absolutely horrified and profuse apologies streaming out of him in equal amounts with self-depreciating comments and punishments that he carried out himself. Ed thought that the begging was a little hilarious but Harry, the bleeding heart that he was, had decided to calm the elf with promises of non-freedom. Harry didn't really look like he understood the whole point of freeing house-elves but Edward had explained to him succinctly that house elves liked chores and that bonding themselves to a family of wizards was the same as granting them their paradise as they loved serving and such. Which Ed thought was absolutely mad like the whole Wizarding World in general.

Thankfully, Harry had been outside when Dobby had decided to appear spontaneously and not somewhere where the Dursleys could see. Edward could only imagine what kind of ugly things that those walruses would do to Harry.

It had been two months already and Ed could feel the summer already ending. The summer finals was already in progress and the stress of the barmy house elf coupled with his research (which Mustang had helpfully assisted him with) and the whole examination rush that he had to do. He'd already received his Hogwart's letter again and sent the reply letter. He'd need to go buy the supplies right after he finished grading and encoding the exam papers to be submitted to the College Secretaries. Gah. He shouldn't have taken up the offer of teaching again! Even if he was only going to teach in the summer. He badly needed a vacation but knew that when he arrived at Hogwarts, all he had to do was nothing. Just the boring classwork that he could probably do in his sleep due to his excessive reading habits. The first few weeks would probably be a good reprieve from waking up at seven everyday to talk his voice hoarse just to get his point across the several slow people in his classes. It was infuriating, really, that such a high standard University was housing students so slow.

"You know, you standards are just ridiculously high. Those students are brilliant you know." Mustang had said dryly.

But that was his point. Where was the challenge? He wanted to prompt his students to be the best in their respective fields! Maybe he'd just teach an appreciation course next summer. The University certainly has nothing to complain about, they had another teacher to offer courses and if they refused to let him teach an appreciation course then they can kiss his sorry ass goodbye. He'd much rather spend his whole summer in Diagon Alley's bookstore than watching students flounder in Chemistry labs. He'd certainly have enough money to spend his seven years not working. The whole superconductor thing had been bought by the government and was already being used in a lot of power plants and even several weaponry. It had been a large price as Ed knew just how much money he would be able to spare the government if they managed to use his newly created materials. Because it really just wasn't the superconductor that he had submitted. It was also anti-bacterial ceramics and several plans to dispose of wastes, both radioactive and non-biodegradable. Edward also aided one of the best microbiologists that managed to breed a super-eating bacteria that would devour anything that was larger than itself. It had a great tolerance to radiation and could probably withstand a thousand times the amount that would kill a normal human being.

Anyway, enough about the techy things.

After the whole after-examinations rush and filing, Ed finally had time to himself—disregarding the weekends because weekends for professors just really wasn't vacation—so he took this opportunity to go to Diagon Alley for his school supplies. He also visited Harry again, the House elf was still being persistent and Ed had to shoo him away somehow, and they went to the Alley for their shopping. There was apparently a book signing by the new Defense teacher and Ed had skimmed the books—novels, really—and declared the whole series as false non-fiction pretending to be fiction that it wasn't even really funny anymore. Ed decided that the whole thing was fake and not without voicing it rather loudly. Lockhart had taken offense to that and Ed prepared himself for several months of dealing with another incompetent professor. Ed really didn't understand how the whole system worked but apparently, some professor that had been rejected had placed a rather Dark curse that wouldn't let a Defense Professor stay more than a year or so. And if they did come back a second year, they would most probably be too traumatized to even think about teaching ever again—well, according to the Twins. Ed knew that they were a pretty reliable source of information but they also had their flaws, but Ed believed most of the nonsense they spout if only because several people vouched for the truth of the matter. Ed really didn't see Jordan Lee as the trolling type, even if he managed to stay in the Twins' prolonged presences.

Later, in another world, they would catch Arthur Weasley and Lucius Malfoy squabbling near the bookshop. Lucius Malfoy would slip the Diary in the confusion and Ginny Weasley would open the Chamber of Secrets due to Tom Riddle's soul nearly devouring hers.

However, in this world, Lucius Malfoy had dropped the Diary before it could have made it into the Ginny Weasley's Cauldron and was picked up by a curious Ed. Noticing that the leatherbound book was empty, he took it and decided that it would make a good research journal to add in his other piles of research journals. Ed felt that the journal had some kind of secret to it and he could feel a faint amount of soul energy—the energy that a Philosopher's Stone was made of (not the Sorceror's Stone, which was apparently just a really very very advanced potion made via the native alchemy of this world. No lives were taken in the making of the Stone and all that as Dumbledore had assured him)—ambient in the Diary and it made Ed even more curious. How did soul energy manage to embed itself into an inorganic object? As far as Ed knew, soul energy wasn't something that could be kept anchored in the world unless some sacrifice had been made so that it can stay, usually in the form of a red stone in Amestris but there was also a foreboding feeling coming from the diary that Ed absolutely felt was familiar for some reason.

He'd written down one of his theories, calculations, really about Mundane science and the whole shebang about his most recent research that had nothing to do with magic when the writing he hadn't even finished yet suddenly bled into non-existence and was replaced with a looping and elegant writing that said:

Fascinating.

It was the beginning of a wonderful friendship.

What so fascinating about math? Ed wrote in his slightly geometric handwriting, easily deducing that there was probably some sort of entity that was housed by the soul energy that would be able to be talked to while the writer wrote. It should have alarmed him that there was a sentient journal lying around somewhere but Ed knew himself that the energy couldn't hurt anyone so long as he was careful. It looked like the whole purpose of the journal was for someone to find it and spill all their secrets while talking to the sentient entity while the entity turned the soul of the writer into dust all thee while trying to take over the body, but too bad for the Diary that Ed knew how to manage his soul enough for the whole setup to be nulled and stay unaffected.

I hadn't known that Muggle math had become that advanced through the years. There was a slightly curious feeling to the words and Ed could only grin.

It has been quite advance for quite a while now. Almost a few hundred years now. Ed replied.

Is that so… Well, it was quite rude of me to talk without introducing myself first. My name is Tom Marvolo Riddle and it seems that I have been stuck in this Diary for quite a while.

I'm Edward Elric. Twelve years old and going to Hogwarts for my second year now. Ed wrote. He'd always been tamer in his wording when writing down letters than when talking as the whole writing reports thing had trained out of him the verbal ticks that usually made their way into reports and letting it stay entirely clinical while having an amount of underlying compassion that Ed was pretty sure was fake when it came from him.

Hogwarts?

Yep. Hogwarts.

What house were you Sorted in? I myself was sorted into the Slytherin House.

Gryffindor. Ed shrugged. It couldn't decide where to put me but said that I was much too tactless to be in Ravenclaw even if I could devour text like candy. That, and I threatened to turn it into a pink and frilly piece of clothing if it took longer than it already had.

Interesting. Can you tell me more about the equations that you had written down? It has made me quite curious and being stuck in a book makes for a very dull existence.

Edward hummed, feeling the book grasping at his soul energy. It was minute and would probably take at least a year of continuous use if Ed didn't know how to cut it off. He should probably try to destroy the thing but felt that the book was actually quite a good conversationalist.

Well, that's just really quantum physics. It's the—

Ed couldn't really remember the whole conversation as he had gone on his tirade that he usually reserved for teaching, the cilinical coldness seeping out of his writing (he was careful with the soul energy and so long as he was the only one who wrote in the thing, nobody would probably be harmed anyway). Tom was actually quite smart and probably more brilliant than half his students combined. He absorbed the topics fast and when comparing this ones progress to the other people that Ed taught was like comparing a wind chime to a cannon. Severely out of the other's leagues.

Ed slept after that, making sure to seal the book into an alchemically altered box so as to prevent something from leaking out without the aid of magic. Tom was probably unaware of everything when it had the covers closed but he should be at least partially safe. Truth wouldn't stand for his soul to be devoured after all that effort to send him here to fix something. Whatever that was. Or was it to prevent something? Ed couldn't really remember what they'd talked about since he'd never had perfect recall but instead an intuitive grasp of any theory that he could get his hand on.

Maybe things would be so bad after all.

Chapter 9 end