The rest of the week went by similarly to the first day. Herbology with the Ravenclaws, then another Transfiguration. History of Magic. Another Charms. Thursday featured an empty slot where Defense should have happened, but didn't, because "Quirrell" had fallen ill that day.

And, of course, Dirk made failed attempt after failed attempt to corner Dave for conversation.

Finally, on Friday, the morning was set to start with a grueling Double Potions with the mysterious Professor Snape. She hadn't actually managed to catch a single glimpse of the man in the week she spent in the dorm. Leijon (no relation, as she found out; his family was from Sweden and not actually related to alien cat-people) had been able to handle the questions and concerns that she had assumed Snape would be handling, but it was just odd that she never even coincidentally ran into the man.

Oh, well.

Ron filed in next to her. "I heard Snape favors Slytherin," he said. "Might be nice."

"Might be," agreed Rose, absently. The kid from the train with the toad sat in the row behind them.

Professor Snape finally entered the classroom. With a flick of his wang (Rose needed to stop doing that, it was childish, really) he summoned the roll call to his hand. He went down the list efficiently, only pausing right when he was about to name Rose.

"Ah," he said. "Rose Potter. Yes, of course."

Whatever seemed to have possessed Snape left him after a moment, and he continued down the list.

"Today, Houses Gryffindor and Slytherin, you here to learn the exact science of potion making. It is not a game. It is not fun. It is gruelling, it is challenging, but it is oh-so-very rewarding. And once you climb the echelons of craftsmanship, you will gain the ability to do nearly anything. Poisons, boons, and everything in-between the two are possible through this art. My art. Potter!"

Rose glanced at Snape, her chin on her hand. So far this whole "potions" thing sounded like alchemy but without the punchcards.

"What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Rose took a moment to think. If she were to use alchemy to combine the two... "Perhaps, Powdered Infusion of Wormsphodel?"

A few of the braver Gryffindors snickered.

"I do not approve of this kind of humor, Miss Potter," snapped Snape, "and this was certainly the wrong time to try it. Five points from Slytherin."

Damn.

"Anyone else?" asked Snape. Silence. "Draught of the Living Death. A point from Gryffindor for not even trying."

Groans from the back of the room. Snape sneered.

"This class is intensely hands-on. I expect all of you to become familiar, by next week's class, with the potions laboratory safety procedures." With a flick of his wand, a sheet of parchment appeared floating above everyone's desk, one for each person. "This is a laboratory safety contract. It is not magically binding, but it is important. On this sheet you will find a list of what you must do in the event of emergencies. Next week, you will be quizzed on this. If you fail the quiz, you will not be able to participate in future lessons until you pass. Is that understood?"

A few scattered nods. One mumbled "yes" from behind Rose.

"I said is that understood?" Snape hissed.

"Yes," said the class.

"Good," said Snape. "I don't expect children to have memorized the textbook, but I do expect you to know the single most important safety procedure. Alohomora! Accio bezoar!"

A glass-fronted cabinet behind Snape unlocked itself and opened, before a small, stone-like object began to float up and out from its place, finally landing in Snape's open hand.

"This," said Snape, "is a bezoar. Who knows where you can find these?"

"The cabinet behind you," said Tracey. Rose couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic.

"Yes," said Snape. "Where are they found naturally?"

Nobody wanted to respond, until the toad boy shakily raised his hand.

"The s-stomach of a goat, Professor."

"Very good," said Snape, seeming pleased. "Longbottom, correct?"

"Yes, Professor."

"One point for Gryffindor."

Neville fell back in his seat, having melted from the praise.

"The bezoar is," explained Snape, "your ticket away from anything that can possibly go wrong. In the event that something goes wrong in class, if you have ingested a potion that was made improperly, you take a bezoar, and shove it down your throat. This will potentially save your life. Now," he said, and the bezoar vanished from his hand, reappearing within the cabinet, "for this class, we will be focusing entirely on laboratory safety. It reflects poorly on both you and me if you end up in the Hospital Wing, and I am not fond of spending my evenings brewing healing pastes instead of advancing this field by decades at a time."

He smirked. "Take out your cauldrons. Let us begin."

"I've been meaning to ask," said Ron, after the lesson was over and done with, as they walked towards the Great Hall. "Why do you have two wands?"

"I like it that way," replied Rose.

"Okay," said Ron. "Can I ask more?"

"Sure," said Rose. "No harm in it."

"Why are they so long?"

Rose shrugged. "The wand chooses the wizard. Honestly, I had barely any involvement in it aside from standing and holding the wands while in the shop."

Ron nodded. "Yes, but how do you do that trick where you make them appear in your hands?"

"What trick?"

"You know, they're in your hands one second, and then they suddenly disappear."

"What?"

It was at this moment they fortuitously crossed the pair of Grangers heading in the opposite direction.

"Rose, you have that trick you do! Every time you take out your wands, they just appear in your hands." Ron seemed to be getting frustrated.

"What're you guys talking about?" asked Dave.

Ron sighed. "Okay, you know that thing that Rose does? Where her wands just appear in her hands?"

Hermione's eyes widened. "I thought I was imagining it!"

"Huh?" Dave looked equally as confused as Rose felt.

"I swear this happens," said Ron. "Your wands just appear from thin air."

"No, they don't," said Rose. "They're stored in my Strife Deck, alongside the rest of my needlekind weapons."

"That's not nowhere," said Dave.

"What does that even mean!" griped Ron. "Rose, take out your wands for demonstration."

Rose readied her strife weapon.

"See!" said Ron. "They just appeared from nowhere!"

"No, they didn't," said Rose.

"I couldn't see where you took them from," said Hermione. "It looked like you just shifted your body and then they were there."

"I readied my strife weapon, the wands were in my Sylladex," said Rose, defensively. "Gods. What, do you not have a Sylladex or something?"

Ron and Hermione shared a glance.

"No," said Hermione. "I think I speak for the rest of us when I say we do not have a Sylladex."

"What?" The group turned to look at Dave. Dave's eyebrows, visible over his shades, scrunched in consternation. "What do you guys mean you don't have Sylladexes?"

"We don't have silly-decks," said Ron. "Is this a Muggleborn thing?"

Hermione shook her head. "I have no idea what they're talking about."

"You don't have, like, any modus at all?" asked Dave. "Hash map, stack, tree, not even a fucking joke modus like Pictionary?"

"Sometimes," said Hermione, "those words make sense. Usually when you put them next to other words to give them context. For example, I know what a tree is. But I don't know what it means in the context of this sentence."

"Then how do you... pick things up?" asked Rose.

Ron looked directly at Rose and dropped his books. Then, keeping eye contact with Rose the whole time, he knelt down, and picked them up.

"Like that," he said. "With my hands."

"Weird," was all Dave said.

"Do you not pick things up with your hands?"

"No?" said Rose. "I wasn't completely aware that you could."

Hermione struggled to come up with a response. "You... weren't aware... that you could use your hands to pick things up?" choked out Hermione. "Dave, were you at least aware that you could use your hands to pick things up?"

"Uh," said Dave. "I gotta be real. When I saw you picking stuff up at home I thought it was a weird-ass fetch modus that I never heard of."

If facepalming could deal psychic damage, Rose was certain Hermione could have just killed all four of them.

"Then what the heck do you use to pick things up!" cried Hermione.

Dave removed his books from his sylladex, then captchalogged them.

"They just appeared and disappeared!" Hermione was on the verge of tearing her hair out.

"No, look," said Dave. "I put them in my sylladex, see?"

Then he took out the card and showed it to Hermione.

"See, 'Mione, the books are in there."

"What the hell," whispered Hermione. "Conservation of mass, how is that possible?"

Dave shrugged.

"So you- you and Rose, just- have used these magic cards to pick things up your entire lives?"

Rose glanced at Dave. "Pretty much," said Rose.

"How did I miss you doing this?" Now Hermione just seemed dazed.

"How did you miss any magic you did when you were younger?" asked Rose. "Assuming that Flitwick is correct and accidental magic is a documented phenomenon-" "It is," interrupted Ron, "-you probably did some yourself. So seeing some of Dave's things disappear is likely something you rationalized away."

"Who else has these cards?" asked Ron. "And can I get ahold of them? These books are kind of heavy, mate."

"Yeah, uh," said Dave. "You don't need this to use the cards, but I think I got a spare blank Strife Specibus around here somewhere. Once you use a card, a sylladex - that's what you use to store the cards - will be, uh. I'm not actually sure how it works. But you get one. Anyway, take the freaking Specibus."

Dave handed the Strife Specibus over to Ron.

"Just turn it over, and there's a list to choose from."

Ron did so, and began to read through his options. "Yo-yo Kind? Book Kind? Fincys Nta Kind? What are all these?"

"That last one was fncystnakind, for Fancy Santas. They're disturbing, really. But yeah, you select it and it gives you a permanent skill boost for your item of choice," said Dave. "Be careful, you can't undo it."

"Uh, okay," said Ron. "I'll worry about this later, I think."

"Could I try Book Kind?" asked Hermione.

"Sure," said Rose. "I've got an extra too."

She handed it to Hermione, who quickly allocated her Strife Specibus to bookkind.

"Well?" asked Rose.

"I don't feel any different," said Hermione.

"You're not supposed to," said Rose. "Put a book in your Strife Deck to use as a weapon."

"What?!"

"Just any book you don't care about," said Rose.

"I don't think you've met my sister yet, Rose," said Dave.

Hermione glared at Dave. "I'm putting in Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts," she announced.

"You just have that on you?" said Ron.

"Not anymore," said Hermione, and the book disappeared. "Now, how do I make it reappear?"

"Ready your strife weapon," said Rose.

Hermione's stance shifted, and suddenly, the book was back in her hand.

"Fast learner," said Rose. "Nice job."

"Thank you," said Hermione, sheepishly.

Ron glanced at the card in his hand.

"You can captchalogue things without having a strife specibus allocated," said Dave. "It just gives you the ability to use it as a weapon at a moment's notice."

"Oh," said Ron. "How do I do that?"

Dave handed Ron a couple of blank cards.

"Just try captchalouging your books," said Dave. "Like anything else. Just do it naturally, don't think too hard about it. Put the books in the card."

Ron put the books in the card.

"I... I did it!" Ron laughed, surprised at his own success. "I can't believe I did it! How do I take them out?"

"Same way," said Dave. "But backwards."

The books appeared at Ron's feet.

"Merlin's beard," breathed Ron. "You can just give anyone these cards and they can do this? What are the size limits? How many cards are there?"

Rose shrugged. "No real limits? And you can have as many cards as you want. I assume Dave has more than enough, himself."

"I do, yeah," said Dave. "And you can use a fetch modus to store the cards, if you want."

"I don't know what that is," said Ron. "And I'm afraid to find out."

"Better brush up on your data structures-"

"What Dave wants to say is, here, take this, and it'll let you retrieve any card at any time, without physically holding any," interrupted Rose. She gave Ron and Hermione each an array modus.

"Blimey," said Ron, as all the cards in his hands disappeared into his new sylladex. "And I can just..."

The books in Ron's hand disappeared, appeared, and disappeared again.

"Wow," he finished.

"Hey!"

The four of them turned towards the voice. A scowling old man limped towards them, a cat a few feet ahead of him. "What do you kids think you're doing, practicing magic in the halls? That's against the rules, you know!"

"What magic?" asked Rose.

"I just saw the boy's books disappear!" said the man. "What do you call that?"

"Technology?" she said. "These cards are manufactured by Muggles."

The old man barked a laugh. "Everyone knows Muggle technology doesn't work in the castle, girlie. What's your name?"

"Rose Lalonde," she said unthinkingly, taken aback by his words. Then what the hell was she doing texting Roxy?

"Lalonde, eh? Don't remember seeing you around here... first year Slytherin, are you?"

"Yes, but-"

"No ifs or buts about it! We'll be going straight to Professor Snape with all four of you!" He grinned. Rose resisted the urge to groan. Some power-tripping old man was going to stop them from meeting up with Roxy this weekend?

The four of them followed Filch back the way Ron and Rose had come. "Do you think we should tell him we're, uh, not under Snape's jurisdiction?" said Dave. Hermione shushed him.

Filch grinned at the first-years, and knocked three times on Snape's door.

"What is the meaning of this-" said Snape, before noticing who exactly was in front of him. "Miss Potter," he said. "And Weasley. And Granger and Granger."

"Potter?" frowned Filch. "You told me you were Lalonde! Lying to old Mr. Filch, that should be an extension on your detention."

Rose just sighed.

"Severus, I caught these troublemakers waffling around with magic cards in the hall. I told Dumbledore to stop these kids from using magic in the halls, but do they listen? No. Nobody ever listens to old Mr. Filch."

"You're barely older than me, Argus, stop pitying yourself," sneered Snape. "Leave me alone. I'll deal with these miscreants myself."

Filch returned Snape's sneer, and walked away, murmuring to his cat.

"Well, then," said Snape. "Only minutes after what I thought was a successful class do I have two of my students cause trouble with some Hufflepuffs."

"We weren't using magic in the halls, Professor," said Hermione. "Filch is lying."

"Then what were you doing, Miss Granger?"

"We were using new Muggle storage devices that can instantly transport things between the physical world and the inside of these cards.

"Muggle technology?" asked Snape. Hermione nodded. "Show me."

Hermione readied her strife weapon. Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts appeared in her hand. Snape's eyebrows lifted.

"Do it again," he said. Hermione returned her strife weapon to her strife deck.

"Fascinating," he muttered. "Like that Skaianet device that Lily..." His eyes widened. "Potter, did you give this to the Grangers?"

"Yes," said Rose.

"Fascinating," repeated Snape. "Yes, these are Muggle technologies indeed, though without seeing for myself I would have said it was the result of magic..."

Snape sat down in his desk chair, and stared into the distance, lost in thought.

"Can we go?" asked Rose. "I don't want to miss lunch."

Snape blinked, as if he had forgotten the four of them were still there. "Yes, of course. No detention, just leave my office."

The four of them filed out.

"That was weird," said Dave. "Guy mentions a girl named Lily and goes catatonic."

"Perhaps..." said Hermione, biting her lip. "Perhaps he means Lily Potter?"

"Who?"

Ron and Hermione stared at her. "Your mother?"

"Oh," said Rose. "Oh! The one that my aunt hated. Yes. I remember now. It's been a long week."

"You worry me sometimes, Rose," said Ron. "But at least we managed to avoid detention."

Rose's phone vibrated. She pulled it out, and her eyes widened.

"So, Hermione," said Rose, almost too casually. "You're familiar with Hogwarts's rules about leaving campus, correct?"

"Students are only allowed to leave the castle grounds when accompanied by a teacher or prefect on an approved Hogsmeade trip," said Hermione. "Why do you ask?"

"Do you think a family emergency would count?" said Rose, and she showed Hermione the screen of her phone.

"What am I supposed to be seeing?" asked Hermione.

Rose turned the phone back around. The stupid thing auto-locked itself. She re-entered her password and showed Hermione the following messages:

TG: ay guess what bitch

TG: YOUR MOM IS AT HOGSMEADE

TG: heh. ur mom

TG: the mom is me

TG: janey n i are staying at this inn rn

TG: lmk when you can come and see us!

"Your mom calls you a bitch?" exclaimed Hermione.

"It's ironic and fun to playfully insult your relatives," said Rose. "Anyhow. This is my and Dave's biological mother, who I don't think either of us have met in person, certainly not in this lifetime."

Dave seemed impassive behind his shades.

"Dave," said Rose. "Are you interested in accompanying me to Hogsmeade this weekend?"

Dave hesitated. Then: "Fuck it, sure. Yeah. Yeah, fuck. Let's do it. Let's meet Roxy Lalonde."

"Let's meet Roxy Lalonde," grinned Rose.

"Am I invited along?" asked Hermione. Ron glanced at her, then at Rose, asking the same question with his body.

TT: Can I bring some friends along?

TG: i was under the impression u were gonna bring as many teen wizzrds as you could :P

TG: bring all your friends! i wanna meet them

"Seems so," said Rose. "And I think I might have an idea of who can accompany us."

Dave's eyes widened behind his shades.

"Oh, no," he said. "No. Not that fucking guy. No, man. Come on."

"Dave, who else is going to bring us?"

"I dunno! That fucking Leijon guy, maybe? Or a Puff prefect? Maybe a teacher? Man, you can choose anyone."

"He's been looking forward to meeting her just as much as you and I have," said Rose. "Listen, Dave. You know he's going to come no matter what, but this way we don't need to bring along an extra person. You don't need to interact with him at all!"

"God. No," said Dave. "No. No, no, no. I'm not being dragged to Hogsmeade by-"

"We'll figure something else out, then," conceded Rose.