The moment John walked into the classroom, he was immediately battered with questions. He winced as students stood up at the sight of his entry, waving sheets of parchment with hundreds of shaky lines drawn on (lined paper. Wow.) quills with the feather ripped off, and every loophole you could think of, shooting questions at him like paintballs on his birthday.

Jeez. This was like his first day all over again.

"Okay, okay," he said in a panic, holding up his palms dramatically. "Calm down, kids."

He took his position in the front of the class (the professor had somehow approved of John's teaching methods, and was now happily seated in John's chair. Sherlock looked furious.)

"First of all," he started, "finished works go here." He pointed to a blank spot on the desk, and shook his head slightly as he watched all the students who had completed the homework (not many actually; John suspected the ones who did were all muggleborns) simply float their papers over with a twirl of their wands. Magic sure did make people lazy.

John gathered up the papers with a secret grin. Gods, was reading them going to be fun…

"But for now," he said, "I shall take questions. And I assume there are many."

Hands shot up in the air, students furiously wiggling their fingers, stories to tell and questions to ask.

"You just gave Mycroft a ton of extra problems," said Sherlock.

John soon realised that 1. Sherlock was right, and 2. this would be more difficult than he thought.

Dozens of wizards roaming Staples, wondering what the hell were mechanical pencils and fountain pens and where's the inkwell for my pencil and why would I need eight different types of paper?! and finally (probably after a secret accio) the said paper and pencil was found, then stopping dead in their tracks at the cashier as they looked at pounds and pence and whatnot, pulling out from their pockets shining gold and silver and bronze.

"I asked the cashier if I could pay with these knuts and she threatened to call security."

John made a pffft noise, pressed his lips together, burst out a "HA!" and then started laughing uncontrollably in bouts of hysteria, and when he finally got ahold of himself he looked at the student's confused gaze, imagined the scenario again, and it would start all over.

"Oh ho," he finally gasped out, "that's unfortunate."

"Right," John added, "our next unit is decidedly memes."


This is a projector. A projector, as you can see, is a large rectangular object. This projector is a special off-white colour, and it has a round lens on the front. This projector is a special object that plays an important role in Muggle society. This projector has the ability to, as said, project images and pictures onto a wall. This projector…

John shook his head and laughed. "This," he said, "is terrible."

And it was one of the good ones. He'll admit, the assignment itself, John didn't care about. He was just trying to get them to use pencil and paper, to get them thinking: hey, this is so much easier!

Though it seemed like he had accomplished the opposite. It was obvious none of the student (who weren't muggleborns) had not the faintest idea how a pencil and paper worked. Some people seemed to have tried writing on the paper without sharpening their pencil, instead just pressing really hard with the blunt tip, resulting in a completely unlegible piece of writing. Some gave up and wrote on the lined paper with their quills, which just made the entire work smeared and spattered. As John noticed earlier, some wizards attempted to draw dozens of lines on the parchment itself, as "lined paper". And some didn't even hand anything in.

John sighed. This was going to harder than he thought.

On his next free period, John didn't do any of his homework, nor read any of the Muggle Studies' either.

Instead, he made his way over to the hospital.

"Er, I'm here to see, I mean, check on, Molly Hooper?" John stammered at the stern, slightly-scary-looking nurse.

"Molly! Yes, of course," the nurse chirped out with a bright smile, with helped balance out the scary-looking-ness of her a bit. "Follow me."

John walked alongside her as she expertly walked towards the end of the beds.

"What kind of injuries do you even get around here?" He blurted out.

"Oh, just the usual," she said absentmindedly, strolling down the halls, looking at the patients with a scowl or a "stop moving it, you'll make it worse!", casting an occasional spell to retie bandages or the sort. "Broken bones, potion burns and boils, Quidditch injuries, magical creature attacks, et cetera. Usually magic fixes it, but some people need the extra rest." The nurse winked. "Though the majority of them just don't want to get back to class."

John smiled weakly as he watched a kid with a massive tongue lolling out of his mouth happily slobber all over the pillows as he attempted to speak.

"Stop that, Chad," the nurse scolded gently. "For example, I could usually heal something like this pretty fast, but this hex was a tad too strong. I have to do it a little at a time. Although it does help that he absolutely despises Potions, which there's a test tomorrow."

John gave Chad an amused look and a thumbs up. Chad grinned the best he could, and gave one back. They walked the rest of the path in silence while John looked around some more.

They quickly reached their destination. "Molly, dear," the nurse called out as they walked towards her bed. "Someone's here to see you!"

"Who?" Molly sat, propping herself up with an arm, with bright, hopeful eyes.

John couldn't help but notice them dim slightly upon seeing him, but she quickly put on a smile (which was still not entirely fake.) "Hello, John!" Molly said happily. "Lovely to see you."

"You too," John said with a small smile. "I thought I'd check on you. How are you doing?"

"Um, pretty good, I guess," responded the girl with a shrug. "We had Care of Magical Creatures today. I wanted to go but Donovan said I needed some more time to rest." Molly smiled at the nurse, who shook her head.

"Well, damn right you do." Donovan smiled at the other, and then gave her a nod. "I'm going to go check on the other patients. Just shout if you need me."

"Gotcha, Don," Molly said happily.

"So, uh…" John fidgeted his feet, wanting to sit down but thinking that, with his clumsiness, he might accidentally sit on Molly's feet, "Sherlock found out what happened."

John explained to Molly the best he could, and by the end of it, she seemed to have the majority of her memories back.

"Irene Adler," she mumbled. "She was trying to drug Sherlock. I should've… I tried to stop her."

"I know," John said quietly.

"It's not even fair," Molly muttered. "Even if she succeeded, what I really hate is how… manipulative she is. She didn't even want Sherlock himself, just information. She was just using him for a selfish cause."

John looked at Molly and felt his gut twist slightly. He offered her a weak smile. "Anyways, I think Sherlock's coming to visit you sometime later."

"Oh, OK," Molly said, a bit too fast. "That's nice."

John realised what Sherlock meant now, and felt a pang of sympathy for Molly Hooper.

He decided to stay a bit longer.


John walked into the greenhouse, said a greeting to the professor (who had begun openly dating the Astronomy teacher) and sat down at his usual seat. It was only then that his eyes caught it.

From what he found out about magic thus far, John was used to strange looking objects by now, and so he looked at it quietly, studying it carefully.

It seemed like a mass of tentacles and vines, sitting on a large area of dirt. John was reminded of Medusa's snake hair.

"What's that?" he asked Mike, who was sitting beside him.

"Devil's Snare," Mike replied easily. "I'm sure we'll get a recap from the professor."

John nodded, and resumed his look-over, until the professor began to speak.

"As you will be taking your O.W.L's soon, we will start going over the requirements and review. Today we will be looking at the Devil's Snare, and the fire making charm to protect yourselves from it."

John sighed and rested his head on his arm. Not charms again.

"The Devil's Snare has the ability to wrap themselves around you, eventually choking you, possibly to death." As the professor spoke, she stepped onto the tendrils, which immediately began coiling around her legs. "If such a thing happens to you, the first thing you should do is relax."

She closed her eyes. Her shoulders loosened, and, as it happened, so did the Devil's Snare.

"The next step is to cast a fire charm. It will recoil from fire, and you will be freed."

Drawing out her wand, the professor pointed it at the vines around her legs. "Incendio," she said softly, and a jet of orange fire flew from her wand. John flinched, and then watched as they landed on the vines, which recoiled rapidly, moved away from the professor, and did a fancy roll-over to extinguish the flames.

"The Devil's Snare now has learned a way of stopping the fire," the professor spoke with a tinge of pride, "and therefore keeping its life."

"Now," she continued, "you will review the fire spell by casting it on a small pile of leaves. Anyone who fails to do so, or fools around, will be deducted points. You may begin."

"Shoot," John muttered as everyone stood up and gathered some leaves. He drew his wand from his robe and looked at it with exasperation. "Please work," he pleaded to the cedar wood, and pointed it at a single, shrivelled leaf.

"Incendio," John said forcefully, though quiet.

The leaf glowed slightly, and he swore there was a spark, but no flames.

He tried again. Nope.

And again and again and again. Nada.

He made a noise in his throat and sighed. Looks like more extra practise.


"Oh, right," John added, as they strolled towards their extra practise room. He coughed. "You should go check on Molly some time."

Slowing down slightly, Sherlock gave John a puzzled look. "Why?"

"Um… because she was burned by an ashwinder egg and then shoved into a fire-seed bush?"

"Oh, that case," Sherlock said with realisation. "That was ages ago."

"That… was literally three days ago."

"Exactly."

John rolled his eyes as they entered the room (which had gone from abandoned and empty to full of junk). "Okay, whatever. Still," he prompted, "you should give Molly a visit. She…" John dwindled off as Sherlock turned and stared John down.

"John," he said quietly. "Molly likes me, but I don't. Don't force love? Isn't that what you said to Charles?"

"I, yes, but—"

"I don't like Molly Hooper," Sherlock pressed.

"But," John mumbled.

"But what, John? I should still go see her? To get her hopes up? John, I don't check on people, not even when they're in the same condition as Molly. She knows it. She won't be offended."

"But she's heartbroken," John hissed.

"She'll be even more broken if I did what you're telling me to!" Sherlock was about to say something else, but it caught in his throat—he sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes closed and lips pressed together.

John looked at Sherlock and bit his lip. "Dammit."

"Sorry," John mumbled. "I…"

Sherlock opened his eyes and gave him a small smile. "It's fine. Let's just forget it."

"I—alright."

They walked to the centre of the room, and John took out his wand, tore the title page out of his charms book, crumpled it up, threw it on the floor, and said the spell.

"You're not saying it right," Sherlock said. "It's in-cen-dio."

"That's what I'm saying," John complained moodily, and tried again.

"You're holding your wand too tight."

"Of course I am."

"You're waving your wand much too choppily."

"That's because you're supposed to!"

"No, John, you're not."

John made a loud, drawn-out noise of utter frustration.

Sherlock sighed. "Do it again."
Trying not to hold his wand too tight and trying to keep his motion fluid and smooth and not to stutter or mumble or shout or say it wrong, John glared at the crumpled ball and tried again.

"Oh, would ya look at that," he said softly. The paper ball was now lit up, blackening and crackling.

Sherlock smirked. "I'm beginning to think you're just pretending you can't do it."

"No, I… I'm not sure what," John began, but shortly gave up and gave Sherlock a small swat on his fringe. "Nevermind. My turn."

Sherlock's face morphed from teasing to shock to annoyance. "Nah, I'm good."

Now it was John's turn to smirk. "I really should repay the favour, though."

"No."

"Yes."

"Nope.

"Yes," John insisted, way too cheerful.

Sherlock scowled. "No broom-on-a-string rubbish."

"It's a perfectly efficient method!" John said, but even he couldn't keep from giggling.