Disclaimer is in chapter 1.

Rumors spread fast concerning Xander's explosion in the Great Hall, but since there had been several close witnesses, including Draco Malfoy, pretty much the entire school knew, or thought they knew, the real story behind the explosion. There were twisted versions in which Xander was flat broke now, his money stolen by an evil uncle, and others in which he was rich, the sole heir to an uncle's fortune, but basically everyone knew that an Uncle and Money were involved.

Thanks in part to Daphne they knew it was Money with a capital 'M' as well, but Xander didn't really blame her since she had been trying to curb some of Draco's more ludicrous stories. As a story that approximated the real one began to filter out, Xander found himself the target of various levels of interest from students who had ignored him before.

After barely evading the attentions of a fifth year girl, Xander ducked into the library the next afternoon and was pleased to see both Hermione and Wednesday at their usual table.

"Hey," He said, smiling pleasantly as he sat down.

"Hey."

Hermione smiled back.

"Hello."

Wednesday did not.

That was ok, of course, she never did. Xander rubbed the back of his head, shaking slightly. "Man this is nuts."

"Are you alright?" Hermione asked, frowning, "There are stories all over school about you."

"Yeah, I know." Xander sighed, "The latest ones are closest to the truth, I guess."

"You invented a medical potion and have been paid a fortune for it?" Hermione raised her eyebrows.

"Ah... yeah, those ones." Xander admitted, "Though I wouldn't call it 'medical' exactly."

"What is it?" Hermione perked up, bouncing a little.

"Please," Xander begged, "Don't ask. Please."

"But..." Hermione pouted. "But why?"

"Cause I didn't do it on purpose, Herms," Xander muttered, "And really, it was a humiliating lab accident, that's all."

"What would you call it?" Wednesday asked.

"Huh?" Xander and Hermione both looked at her, confused.

"You said you wouldn't call it medical exactly. What would you call it?"

"Judging by my Uncle?" Xander replied sourly, "Recreational."

Hermione screwed up her face in confusion as even Wednesday looked a little at sea by the comment.

"Please, just don't ask anymore, ok?" Xander begged again, "I can't tell it to you two, it's too embarrassing."

Wednesday raised an eyebrow, looking over at Hermione, "Now I simply HAVE to know."

"Me too." Hermione happily agreed.

Xander moaned, slumping at the table, covering his head with his hands.

"Show us the patent."

"What?" He looked up, peaking at Wednesday from under his arm.

"Of course!" Hermione squealed, "You don't have to tell us, just show us the patent, we should be able to work it out."

"You think?" Xander asked doubtfully. "I don't know, it's pretty complicated."

Wednesday gave him a glare that would melt steel, while Hermione perked up even more at the word complicated. Xander sighed, drawing the papers from under his robe.

Wednesday raised her eyebrow again, "You have it on you?"

"Leave this in *Slytherin* territory?" Xander asked incredulously.

The dark girl tipped her head to acknowledge the point, taking the papers from him as she and Hermione moved closer together to pour over them. Xander sighed, leaving them to it, and opened up the Grimoire to work on some of his other personal projects.

That was what he loved about this school more than anything else, Xander had found. The fact that the subject matter was really only a base for doing your own thing. Magic was all about creativity, working with things only comic book writers ever got to play with in the 'real' world. The classes were important, but they were just prep courses for living day to day in the magical world. It was what students could do when they moved PAST the classes that was utterly and totally cool.

Xander found that he loved the idea of Spell Crafting and it's related spheres of magic, which really meant he had to learn pretty much every sort of magic he could since spell crafting, artificing, and enchanting all required first-hand knowledge of a vast array of spells.

Right now he was working on the arithmantic formulas for charging a rune from a caster's own magical core. He'd been able to lift large sections of the work from the rune and warding work done by Harrow and Jacobs had done for him at the start of the year. Most of it was pretty similar, actually, since he was working on what was, essentially a ward you could draw on your own body.

It wasn't quite as simple as that, though, Xander had found quickly. There was warnings about doing it, actually, since the runes would permanently lower the wearer's magical core. Additionally, wards were 'always on' so to speak and that would make all sorts of daily experiences rather inconvenient. Xander thought that those two things were the reason very little had been done in this area of magic, at least as far as he could tell.

The Dark Mark was a piece of work for much of the same reasons. It actually put a constant drain on anyone who wore it, albeit a very slight drain. Xander rather suspected that the drain was bigger than Evans guessed, though, cause he knew that if he was going to go the evil overlord route he would put a tap into the mark and use the magic drained for himself.

That wasn't what he was working on, of course. Xander just tended to have giggling fits at the thought, and he felt he needed some cheering up. He was trying to put a valve on the charging rune, and create a magical analogue to a battery so that the runes would only draw power when they were charging, and would shut off when full.

The math, however, was a nightmare.

He knew he had to learn it, he desperately WANTED to learn it, but Xander had a sinking sensation that it was just beyond him. Beyond him now, and maybe forever.

"What's wrong?"

Xander looked up, realizing that he had been gnawing on his fingers as he scribbled down another attempt at solving the formula he was working on.

"Nothing." He muttered.

Wednesday merely stared at him until he broke.

"It's the math." He sighed, "I don't get the math."

Hermione looked up from where she was pouring over the patent information, ears perking at the mention of math. "What math? We don't have any classes in arithmancy yet."

"I know, I'm trying to figure it out anyway." Xander muttered.

"Let us see." Wednesday said, reaching out a hand.

He sighed and handed the page over, on one level happy to be distracting them from the patent information, but on the other a little embarrassed that he needed help. The two read his notes for a long moment before saying anything.

"Xander, some of this is incredibly advanced." Hermione blinked, looking up.

"Yeah, I know, I lifted stuff from a warding scheme." Xander replied, "I'm trying to adapt it to create a magical battery."

"This will not work," Wednesday said after a moment, "The warding formulas are not designed to tap a person's magical core."

Xander grimaced, glancing at Hermione, who nodded.

"She's right." Hermione frowned, "The arithmantically important numbers are totally different when dealing with a human. What are you trying to charge?"

"Nothing in particular, yet," Xander sighed, shaking his head. "I just want to be able to charge *something*, and stop after the charge is full."

"Won't that drain off the magical energy when it stops?" Hermione frowned, looking up, "I read that you runes are constantly charging."

"Yeah, but that's when the battery comes in," Xander said, "We should be able to store power, I mean it can't be that hard? Normal folk invented batteries ages ago."

"Over two thousand years ago, actually." Wednesday said, "The original versions were used for limited electroplating on ancient jewelry."

"See?" Xander said, "If normal people can do it, we should be able to."

"It's not the same thing," Hermione complained, "electricity isn't stored, exactly. Batteries store chemical energy and then turn it INTO electricity. You can't just store chemicals that turn metal into magic, Xander."

Xander sighed as Wednesday nodded.

"She is correct," The dark girl replied, "It will not work."

Xander finally gave up, nodding, "Alright. Thanks for the help."

"I'm sorry, Xander," Hermione apologized. "I wish I could tell you what you want to know."

"No, it's ok." Xander forced a grin he really didn't feel. "I needed to know before I wasted more time on it."

"You're trying to work too far ahead," Hermione stated, hesitating.

Xander snorted, "Says the girl who's already read up to, what? Sixth year books? Seventh?"

"Fifth." She corrected, irritated. "I'm working on sixth and seventh this summer."

Xander chuckled, a little more real this time, and grinned at her, "Don't change, Herms. I need my Willow Fix."

She scowled at him, "I don't think I like the sound of that."

He just smirked and took back his papers, incidentally retrieving the patent information at the same time. He glanced longingly at the worthless formulas for a moment then slid the pages into the back of the Grimoire under 'Failed Ideas' and closed the book with a sigh.

Class was buzzing later that day when Xander attended potions, but thankfully he was entirely off the minds of his classmates. No, they were now excited about the upcoming Dueling Club that had been announced. Xander was mildly interested himself, as he knew a couple spells for that sort of thing already, but was still a little down over his failure with the formulas and wasn't paying much attention.

The class progressed as normal until towards the end when Crabbe's cauldron exploded, covering much of the class, Xander included, in an engorgement potion similar to the twins ton tongue toffee, only with none of the precision. Xander found himself with a giant left arm, and ear that was flopping down like something out of Dumbo as much of the class wailed under similar afflictions.

"Everyone calm down!" Snape instantly yelled, using a sonorous charm on his throat. It got their attention and they all stilled, "If you've been splattered with the spell come to the front for a reversal draught."

Everyone filed down, Xander included, and were quickly set right as Snape fumed and stomped up to Crabbe's cauldron. He tipped it up and his eyes almost literally flared when a burned out firecracker fell clear of the pot.

Xander winced, every safety lesson he'd learned while working on his own was just screaming at him that he'd gotten off really lucky. He'd been closer to Crabbe than he really wanted to think about.

"When I find the person who did this," Snape hissed, "I *WILL* see them expelled."

The dark potions master looked around, eyes lighting on where Harry was sitting and resting there for a long moment. Finally, after the moment passed, Snape spun away. "Class dismissed."

Xander glanced at Harry, but shrugged and put it down to Snape's apparent hatred of the guy. He'd never done anything that stupid before, at least not with no sign of heroic sacrifice to be found. Xander glared at the cauldron for a moment and went over the ingredients for the standard engorgement potion in his mind.

Luckily there was nothing flammable or particularly unstable. Xander shuddered at what would have happened if it had been either his, or the twins, specific versions of the same potion. He quietly packed up his stuff and filed out with the rest.