If you have not already, please go read Eliezer S. Yudkowsky's Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. This is a continuation of their work, but with a greater focus on the story than the effort of introducing rationality to new thinkers.
I will still attempt to continue the style and some of that message here: if you have any notes please contact me at themerlinianhypothesis and barrage me with my failings as not just an author, a grammarian, or a rationalist, but as a human being.
Genuinely, I am always happy to take criticism and notes on how to improve this writing and my understanding of rationalism: all I know is that I know nothing. It is more of a passion project than a serious work of fiction, so please keep that in mind. :)
The story will continue to change, simply because that is the way I work. I may even move entire chapters around or add new ones to make better arcs. Apologies for the inconvenience.
Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and give to Rowling what is Rowling's.
Chapter 1: Veni, Vidi, Vici
A wall of runes. Smooth grey marble. Perfectly cut shapes that have lost All Meaning.
In one of the indents, light begins to form. Sparks grow in strength. It glows. A single Rune glows among an uncountable number of others.
An eye watches, a hand records, etching on a tablet.
It shouldn't be able to do this.
Luna Lovegood had been looking forward to this day for a very, very, very, incredibly long time. And still, she did not want to go.
Every alarm bell her head could muster was telling her to AVOID AT ALL COSTS. And she wasn't about to tell herself to be quiet. On top of that, pleading to her father was working about as well as inviting a nopellius reximus to tea and not going limp from the fumes.
"We have already packed all your things!"
"Then I will personally unpack them. That's called a sunk cost fallacy. It's not a valid reason to go. Your logic is flawed and I'm not as easily swayed as humbders can be."
"Why shouldn't you go, Luna?!"
"No, tell me why I should go: you need to provide reasoning for my change in action. Why I shouldn't isn't my problem." She spoke as if discussing what to have for brunch, though her hands fidgeted under the table. She absolutely could not want to show her father how worried she was: he would just turn it into another headline. Luna had expected this sort of reaction from her father and had planned ahead. He was unfortunately utterly predictable and the Dream from last night had meant she was taking 'ALL COSTS' to an abnormal extreme.
Her eyes spiralled around the circular room. Bright golden yellows, cyans and sky blues, and silver-painted clouds that seemed to blow around the room and shift in shape slowly; Luna had vague memories of painting it as a child. A paintbrush too big for her in hand, as she was held up by the armpits giggling. The walls matched the sky outside as viewed by the windows, slightly green-tinted with age. They were a pain to open because of layers of paint that had dried on the latch and for that reason stayed shut, keeping the wind from the hillside on the preferred side of the glass. Every spare space was covered in small thingamabobs, doo-das, things that ticked, pots and pans covered in strange substances, often with a plant growing out of them. Opposite the cooker — where her father currently sat next to waiting for the eggs to boil — there were two large bookcases.
As far as Luna knew they came with the house, as they fit the curve perfectly while still allowing as many books as possible to be stored. They were colourfully clashing with the rest of the room. Many had a silver inscription on the spines that matched the bright, blue-tinted metal staircase set on a rail. Luna thought of her mother holding it steady as small hands and feet pulled themselves upwards. It was just as Luna liked: she had read every single one of those books, even including those that were her fathers which she could sometimes neither understand nor find herself interested in. She had read them nonetheless. From one of the higher shelves, a grey Persian, contrasting against the multitude of colours, hopped down gracefully and strode across the tiled floor and settled itself in Luna's lap. Its face was one of distaste but to Luna, it seemed to be pondering something. She'd ask about it later.
The man with the long blonde and messy hair sighed, "You are going, Luna." His robes twirled around him, the same off-white as the eggs he stood up to finish cooking. There were strange stains down his clothes: some identifiable as paint, others not so. Wand in hand he tapped the cooker, waved the two eggs into an egg cup each as bread tore itself into strips crawling out of the bread bin. The plates were rimmed with the same golden yellow on the walls and he served them each a plate, a spoon in the blue-silver colour that was common all around the room, and two glasses. Her glass was pale green and tall. Her father's had a small crack in the bottom, and was wide with a small stem; he placed it onto a coaster. Waving his wand a final time, before tucking it into his beige robes, the glasses filled with orange juice. "Eat and then we're going to get your trunk and leave. There's no reason for you to not go so you must go."
"That's the problem with parents." The Cat purred as Luna petted her, only looking at her uncracked egg, "Parents…" (Can cats sigh?) "They never do listen. Repeating the same illogicalities over and over…and over…" It coaxed with a voice smooth as its silky fur.
"If I didn't know better I would have expected you to be sleeping near slumpsill-vine! You never listen! And when you do you get it wrong. "
"Is this about the headline about Draco's-"
"No! It is not about the Headline! It's never about that!" It was uncharacteristic for Luna to raise her voice. This outburst was not the usual wistful tone, but a serious, cold, hard tone of someone ordering a coffee rather tentatively. The chair legs squeaked across the tiles as she stood up suddenly. The Cat left her lap but curled around her legs, "Let's go, Luna…"
"I will be in my room. Father."
"Luna, please, listen to reason."
"I have been." Her brow furrowed to a disgruntled look. Unused to frowning it looked like a squint but the intention was obvious. The words were sharp as a spoon, but Xenohilius' eyes widened. His mouth opened a fraction and closed. It was not a mysterious look of whimsy. The Cat slunk away towards the stairs. Luna carefully picked up the sunny yellow plate and orange juice and followed behind. Once up the stairs she calmly placed the two on her drawers, and gently slammed the door of her room. She then allowed her hands to shake: every particle of her body was screaming. Her brain had specifically outsourced work for alarm ringing and built new alarms specifically for this. She felt like her ribs were pulling in too close and her heart was trying to push back. A little weak she fell onto her bed and sat there. The Cat joined her.
"I suppose we are going to have to rearrange the rules. Rewrite even."
"Is this what puberty is like?" Luna looked at her shaking hands, eyes not completely focussed.
"That question is unrelated to the current problem, but we will assign it for later consideration." The Cat's answer was sufficient.
Her room, at the very top of the tower, had less energy than the main floor. The walls were painted a deep matte blue of the sky on a winter's evening. If you look closely you may even see the early shimmering light of stars on the wall. She had covered the space in storage and spaces: drawers, a large cupboard, a long curved desk of dark stained wood that looked like it smelt of libraries. It was the colour of wood worn with use but it only accepted dignified marks like spilt champagne. Up in the rafters, there had been constructed a magical planetarium, that Luna would watch as she went to sleep if she didn't collapse into unconsciousness halfway through the line of one of the many, many books kept here. Every inch available was covered. Every spare scrap of paper as a bookmark. Every book she had finished she was midway through re-reading. As she was always buying more, just to read whatever she fancied. She'd miss it at Hogwarts; she knew they would have everything she had here, but her method of organisation wouldn't be…appreciated. It was like a bunklehops nest, looking at all the leaning piles.
Quickly finishing her orange juice, Luna weaved herself through her leaning towers of books with a practised grace to her window. She waded through the glittering dust from the mid-morning sun and pulled at the latch of her window, throwing it open allowing the wind to whirl across the room picking up loose sheets of notes and parchment and flicking through the first few pages of any books not held down by various items being used as paperweights. Out, down the hill, she could see the small houses that made up Ottery St Catchpole: the Weasley's Burrow, the Post Office, and the smaller other buildings with thatched roofs. None of those cottages stood at the same height as the Lovegood Tower, nor caught the wind in the same way. Luna could happily sit there until the train was gone, and school didn't matter. Thinking of Hogwarts, as she looked again at the Weasley's tilting burrow knowing she'd meet a few of them this year, she took a few deep breaths of the cool air before she turned back to her slightly-less-musty room and closed the window before she lost anything important.
Then with a shock of memory, she swirled back to her desk and the burned-out candle to check she had not lost what was currently one of The Most Important items in the room. The letter addressed to Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Potter was untouched. It had been held down by 4 small coin-shaped weights to stop the parchment from rolling. The pot of midnight blue ink had not tipped or leaked and was still plugged with its respective topper. (Luna was proud of that fact. She usually lost everything stationery related, but for the fancy inks she kept track.) The writing was amazingly unsmudged, though as tradition she was writing by hand. She hoped he would see some sort of importance in that fact. "You should finish that." purred the cat.
"Maybe, I could wait until I'm at-"
"If something should be done, and can be done, do it now." it quoted, not moving from its comfortable ball. "And you should do it now while the memory is fresh."
Maybe fresh wasn't the right word. It was more like raw.
Typically, Harry was reading. Even more typically, it was science fiction. One he had brought from home that he usually kept in a special compartment of his trunk with other books that had been his father's first copy. The book was worn, dog-eared, the spine was broken (twice), and as much as it caused Hermione to cringe in terror it was treasured dearly. That copy of Ender's Game was loved and that was why Harry read it now. Knowing the whole thing off by heart, he had skipped to Chapter 11. Ender had just been assigned his first army:
"You can't be serious about this schedule of battles."
"Yes I can."
"He's only had his army three and a half weeks."
He needed something familiar to comfort him, and not another textbook. If, Merlin forbid, he tried to answer one more charms question he might snap his wand in two and be done with the whole thing. He never thought he'd feel like this but he couldn't even open a physics book willingly. Even the-Girl-Who-Revived was beginning to turn the pages of her own textbook slower across the table from him, as she continued restlessly to study for their O.W.L.s. It was tiring.
Even now, she still surprised him: she was practising occlumency herself at the same time they were preparing. And the way she handled her parents was spectacular! Harry had insisted on having healers on hand in case the shock caused anyone to faint, but in the end, the only trouble was only tears of absolute joy. Hermione marked her success down to her peaceful aura (which they still had not found a way to combat), but Harry suspected the-Girl-Who-Revived had some part to play herself.
"I thought we'd give him two years as commander. We usually give them a battle every two weeks, starting after three months. This is a little extreme."
"Do we have two years to spare?"
"I know. I just have this picture of Ender a year from now. Completely useless, worn out, because he was pushed farther than he or any living person could go."
They had spent almost all of their summer studying already; thankfully the Headmistress was on hand to guide them when she was not preparing for her first year as Headmistress, or Acting-Headmistress as she preferred to be called. Though often, because of her mountain of work they were still left to their own devices. Minerva would curtly remark 'the safeguarding dealing with student resurrections was even worse than student fatalities'. He read on.
All he was sure of was that he was eager for battle. Most armies needed three months because they had to memorise dozens of elaboration formations. We're ready now. Get us into battle.
The exhaustion was beginning to wear off as his brain function returned. What about his own army? With all the set-up for his exams and the new year, he forgot about seeing his friends. Is Draco coming back? What about the Bayesian Conspiracy? Would Neville continue to grow? Would Chaos legion reform? Would they keep going now that Voldemort is gone? He slumped more into his chair and a content smile spread across his face; uncertainty was never the preferred option but it certainly could be fun. 'Full of possibility' some adults might say, and though Harry was always cautious to agree to any saying, he felt he could agree to that.
Ender sized up the shape of the battle room. The familiar open grid of most early games, like the monkey bars at the park,
The duo had become quite familiar with Hogwarts at this point, or much more so than most students do, having free reign of the halls while studying. And after Hermione had befriended some of the house-elves (she continually blamed her aura) they often found themselves stumbling upon what seemed like gifts, and in return, they left offerings of trinkets and small games. They had ventured far up into the castle often but were yet to find a true entrance to the dungeons, frustratingly. Harry was slowly constructing a rudimentary floorplan in case they ever needed a specific room of a specific size, of a specific distance away from most populated halls and classes. Unfortunately, that task had become quite overbearing when he realised he was going to need at least a different map for every Tuesday, and Thursday, along with any day that included a digit with a multiple of 3, and an entirely separate map for one week and a half during July.
In a moment he was leading them down against the south wall. They rebounded in near-perfect unison and came up behind the two stars that Carn Carby's soldiers were defending. It was like cutting butter with a hot knife. Rabbit Army was gone, just a little cleanup left to do.
He turned slightly in the red, cushioned seat onto one side, getting himself more comfortable as he focussed on Ender's swift victory. That didn't stop him from using this as a rare chance to reflect. A rare chance of peace, free from worrying about which action may yank him out of the narrow key-hole of time, was still a good time to think about the lesser consequences of his actions. What he has gained, and is yet to gain, rather than what he could lose. He was glad to neither be answering exam questions nor pondering about which children's pet rocks he would have to kill.
They may curse us and lie about us, but they'll remember that we destroyed them, and no matter what they say other soldiers and other commanders will see that in their eyes; in those Rabbit eyes, they'll see us in neat formation, victorious and almost undamaged in our first battle.
He wasn't looking forward to dealing with the public opinion of Hogwarts, and worse helping Hermione with it. He remembered his first time in Diagon Alley being…eventful. He rolled onto his other side. His chair was similar in build to Hermione's though where his was wider, her's was taller and in replace of the muted red she had a cyan green that reminded him of the sea. He took a second to watch her eyes flick over the pages in concentration, before returning to the book.
"Good first battle, Dragon Army did all right against the Rabbits. But the enemy isn't always going to be that bad. If that had been a good army, C toon, your approach was so slow they would have had you from the flanks before you got into a good position."
Thinking of his O.W.L.s, he felt ready. That was what was important. He was reading now to steady his nerves before the storm. Being able to think is a much greater asset than having a collection of knowledge. He knew Hermione would be more than ready too, even though nothing on Earth could calm her. Not even another Sparkling Unicorn Princess to promise it was going to be all right.
"Gentlemen, I hope you learned something yesterday because today we're doing it again."
It took a moment for them to realise that he meant a battle, not a practice. It had to be a mistake, they said. Nobody ever had battles two days in a row.
He handed the paper to Fly Molo, the leader of A toon, who immediately shouted "Flash suits" and started changing clothes.
Harry was in the middle of a line when Professor Flitwick pushed open the large wooden doors of the library and stepped in, with as much purpose as his small stature could manage. His shadow was much taller than himself from the large windows behind him that let the mid-morning light stream in. Hermione's eyes flicked up, white and wide, lips thin, face pale. Fight or flight. Harry had a controlled face of apprehension.
"Is it…time?" she wasn't going to allow her voice to tremble.
"It is, young raven. Are you prepared for the formalities?" the professor's moustache twitched as he spoke, and though his voice was a tone higher than usual with tension his eyes sparkled with pride only rivalled by that of Dumbledore.
The duo nodded, and Flitwick began,
"I, Fillius Flitwick, Charms master and Professor of Hogwarts, Head of House Ravenclaw, ask you Hermione Jean Granger of the Most Noble House of Granger, student of Hogwarts, of Ravenclaw, and you Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Potter, student of Hogwarts, of Ravenclaw are you prepared to take your final exams?"
Hermione's face hardened, she had faced not just near death but death itself and still had to take a second to prepare herself for a test. "I, Hermione Jean Granger, am ready." Harry watching her, steeled himself, placing down his book. But before closing it his eyes fell on the chapter title: 'Vidi Vici Veni'. Harry took little notice of the familiar words, but any wizard worth a knut would call that a good omen.
The knot of time was twisting. The pressure was building. Everything hinted that something rather spectacular was about to begin.