Harry Potter
"What do you think he'll be like?" Ron asked as we headed to our first Defense class of the semester. Not only was it our first Defense class, but it would be the first of the year with our new professor. With Durmstrang and Beauxbatons here this year the scheduling for classes had to be shifted to accommodate everyone.
"My Ma was there at the Dueler's Cup." Seamus said as our group neared the doors. "She said she was glad we'd be learning from him because he beat everyone in less than ten seconds!"
"That's ridiculous." Hermione said as the doors to the room opened and we all filed in. "The papers say he defeated everyone soundly, but ten seconds is such a short time for a wizarding duel."
"That is where you're wrong, young lady." a voice said from the front of the room, causing us all to freeze. "Ten seconds is an eternity in combat. If your previous teachers had any idea what they were doing you would all know that already."
I swallowed my nerves as I got my first real glimpse of Professor Xarion. He wore a simple black shirt and pants, but no robe as his brown eyes stared through each and every one of us as if he was evaluating everything we were.
"I don't bite, you know? You can take your seats. We've got a few minutes yet before we're supposed to start anyway." He turned around and fell into a rather comfortable looking sofa chair and started looking over a paper. I had no idea where he'd gotten it, and I didn't feel comfortable asking. Something about the professor was just….weird.
We all took our seats, but no one said anything else - we were all too scared of inciting the professor's wrath.
Soon, almost all of the desks were filled and it was almost time for class to start.
"Well if it isn't Potter and his little friends." an arrogant voice said from behind me.
Turning to glare at the speaker, I said, "What do you want, Malfoy?"
"My seat for starters. Did you not realize you were sitting in it?" the boy said with a sneer as his two goons walked up to flank him. "In fact, I think you should-"
"And class has started!" Professor Xarion declared into the tense atmosphere of the room as he leapt to his feet. He frowned at Malfoy and said, "Would you please take your seat?"
"I will just as soon as Potter gets out of it. He and the mudblood think they can-"
"Okay, yeah, no." Professor Xarion said as he flicked his wrist towards Malfoy. A disk-shaped glowing array of symbols appeared before his hand, and everyone in the room felt the presence of magic.
Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle all squawked in surprise as they were enveloped in three bubbles of green energy and started to drift towards the ceiling.
"Now then!" the professor said. "My name is Xarion. Feel free to call me-"
"Ha! Take that, Malfoy, you sniveling-" whatever else Ron was going to say was cut off as he, too, was enveloped in a green bubble as he started to drift towards the ceiling.
Professor Xarion lowered his hand, the faintest trace of magical energy still present and said, "As I was saying; my name is Xarion. Feel free to call me Professor Xarion or Professor. Just my name is a little too informal, or so I've been told anyway." He walked up to the first row of desks as he continued to speak. "I am here to teach you all how to not die in the very dangerous world that exists beyond these walls, and while I don't have any formal qualifications to speak of, blame Dumbledore for that bit, I am exceptionally good at keeping myself from becoming dead. That is what I will teach you. This?" he said as he held up the paper he had been reading; it was a copy of the syllabus we'd all received for Defense. "This is garbage. We are not following this, so feel free to burn it. Like this!" The paper in his hand suddenly caught fire and burned to ash in a matter of moments.
Everyone reacted to this display in a different way. A lot of students smiled as the workload they would have had to do was reduced to ash, but others like Hermione stared on in absolute horror as their neatly planned out semester literally went up in flames.
Clapping his hands together to clean the ash off of them, Xarion continued by saying, "Now I'm going to set some ground rules right at the outset here. I will not be like any teacher you've ever had before purely because they were all trained to teach you in a school setting. I think that is entirely stupid because the best way to prepare you against the forces of darkness is to give you a small taste of what you'll be facing. More on that in a bit." He turned his gaze up to the four floating bubbles in the air. "As I'm sure you have no doubt noticed, four of your classmates are learning what it's like to be inside a floating hamster ball. The school has a system of points to punish you as a whole for being 'bad' which is all well and good, but it encourages people who don't care about others to do whatever they want. To combat this issue, I will punish individually and unilaterally. Fifty points from Gryffindor. One-hundred-and-fifty points from Slytherin."
There were several startled gasps at the truly absurd point deductions. That was more than most people earned all year.
"Do I have your attention, yet? Good." Professor Xarion said as his eyes grew serious. "I will not tolerate disruptions in this class because the things I will be teaching you are inherently dangerous and if you screw around they have the potential to get any number of you killed. Not an annoying but ultimately harmless trip to the hospital wing. Death. So long as what you are saying contributes to the topic in some way - be it through a question, comment or observation - feel free to just shout it out without raising your hand even if I'm in the middle of saying something else. But pointless dick-measuring, squabbling and posturing will not be tolerated. If you have issues, settle them outside of class. You stop being my responsibility once you walk out that door, so save it for later. Questions?"
Hesitantly, Daphne Greengrass raised her hand.
"What's your name?" Xarion asked.
"Greengrass, professor. Daphne Greengrass." she said quickly.
"Don't raise your hand, Miss Greengrass. It just wastes time that could be spent on other things. Now what was your question?"
"Are….We won't really be doing things that could kill us, are we?"
"You will be." Xarion said cooly, holding her gaze. "It's all well and good to sit in a classroom and talk about the things that go bump in the night, but it is another thing entirely to actually face them. That is what you will be doing in this class. I will create as controlled an environment as I possibly can to protect you, and then, after supplying you with the tools you need, I will put you into a situation where you will be forced to apply the knowledge I've given you."
"That's barbaric!" Parvati cried in outrage as she stormed to her feet. "You don't have the authority to-"
"Wrong." Xarion denied, cutting her off. "Let me get something clear here, I was quite literally forced into this position, but I don't do things by halves. If I'm going to teach you, I'm going to teach you. I read over my duties and powers as your professor, and I am able to do, and I quote, 'Whatever is necessary to prepare my students to protect themselves against the many dangers associated with magic.' I deem this necessary, so I will do it.
"I am not here to make friends, I am here to make sure none of you die when you happen across an enraged Nereid. If you have a problem with my teaching style, take it up with Dumbledore. If he fires me I'll go quietly, but I will not alter my lesson plans because you are all too scared to face them. If anything, that will only convince me to make them worse. I did not get where I am by having my teacher lovingly hold my hand. Every day was a trial, and it made me good. Without the training I received, or if I had received the training you want me to give you, I would have died a dozen times over by this point. It is literally in my job description to quote, 'Prepare students to defend themselves from any and all threats they may encounter in association with magic.' I would not be doing my job, if I coddled you. So I will not coddle you. If you have a problem with it, again, take it up with Dumbledore or your heads of house. Now." With a flick of his wrist, the four green bubbles drifted back to the ground and popped.
Malfoy, who had fallen into a heap on the stone floor the moment the bubble popped, stood up in a rage and pointed his finger at Professor Xarion. "Do you have any idea who I am! My father will hear of this! And when he does, you will be-" he was cut off as another bubble appeared around him.
"Fifty more points from Slitherin." Xarion said in a bored voice. He walked up to the bubble and leaned forward. "Kid, I have been threatened by beings that make your father look like a cuddly little golden retriever pup. Either get with the program and become a devastatingly powerful wizard, or get out of the way. By 'get out of the way', I of course mean remain in the bubble for the duration of your time in my class." He turned to look at Grabbe and Goyle who backed away in fear. "What's it gonna be, boys?"
Crabbe and Goyle threw one look at Malfoy in the bubble, then meekly walked to their seats, Ron slinking to his own behind them.
"Smart kids." Xarion commented as Malfoy floated up and away from him, banging on the inside of his spherical prison. "Now after that grand speech about impending death and how I don't care about any worldly authority, I'm sure you're expecting me to drop you into a den of werewolves or something equally evil, but I'm not going to do that."
I felt the entire classroom relax in the wake of that statement.
"What I am going to do is teach you all a few spells that will be vital to your survival in the next class." Xarion continued, causing the tense atmosphere to return immediately. "I will walk each of you through how to perform them and different applications for them. I am giving you these three specifically and not overloading you at any one time because creativity with a single spell is as important as having a library of thousands. A one of the greatest martial artists to ever live once said, 'I fear not the man who has practiced ten-thousand kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick ten-thousand times.' To make that more digestible in wizard language, it essentially means that a man who has mastered the stunning spell will be able to soundly defeat a man who knows every curse used to kill a man but has only ever cast them once. I will teach you three spells every other class, and we will spend that entire period doing nothing but working on those three spells. The following period you will run through a test I specifically designed to allow you to use those spells in a way that will let you assure victory. Then we'll do the whole thing again."
Daphne raised her hand again once Xarion finished talking.
"Don't raise your hand, Miss Greengrass. Just say what you want to say."
Daphne stood, confidently holding the professor's gaze. "What makes you qualified to teach us any of this? You said yourself that you are not a teacher and lack any qualifications of any kind. Why should we trust you with our well-being when you have openly stated you are unfit to teach in this school? Especially now that you have told us every other class will contain a life-or-death struggle that you, a man with no qualifications, will determine?"
Xarion smirked at her. "One-hundred points to Slitherin."
There were several gasps as the professor rewarded Daphne for doubting him, and Daphne herself staggered as her challenging stare turned to confusion.
"Here's a little nugget of wisdom for all of you." Xarion said, addressing the whole class. "Never trust an authority figure on the sole grounds that they have authority. Just because someone is in charge, does not mean they have even a semblance of an idea what they're doing, and more often than not, people in positions of power got there by being leechy, sleezy, conniving little gremlins who climbed over the bodies of others who were much more qualified, or were just put in power by their friends. So, Miss Greengrass," Xarion said as he turned his attention back to Daphne. "Let me tell you my qualifications.
"I am one of the single most powerful mages on this entire planet. I have been using wandless magic since I learned how to walk. I have fought creatures so powerful you are incapable of comprehending their power, and while I did not defeat them, I also didn't die. I know more about magic than anyone in this entire country with the possible exception of Dumbledore. I have fought demons, dragons, spirits, undead, angels and more that I don't care to name. I know how to teach you to survive the darkness because I know what it took for me to survive it. I doubt any of you will look back on any of your interactions with me fondly, but you will look back and thank me for what I taught you."
Xarion held her gaze a moment longer, then stepped back and said, "Now I understand these are some bold claims, and I have no way to prove any of them to you. So instead, let us try a group activity. I want every single one of you to stand up, right now, and launch every spell at your disposal at me." Silence followed his statement.
"Come on." he said, motioning for us to stand up. "If I have to say it again I'm taking two-hundred points from all four houses, now stand up and throw some spells at-" A red bolt of energy hit him right in the head as Daphne pulled her wand and cast a stunner.
"There ya go!" Xarion said with a wide smile on his face, surprising everyone in the room. He'd taken a stunner directly to the face and didn't seem at all fazed. "Again! Again!"
Daphne threw another stunner at him, and he just smiled through this one, too.
As if a damn had been broken, everyone in the class stood from their seats and pulled out their wands. A torrent of red, yellow, orange and blue bolts of magical energy were launched towards the front of the class. Any that hit Professor Xarion did the same amount of nothing that Daphne's first two did.
I realized rather quickly that very few people in the class had ever had dueling training because the majority of their spells either missed the professor entirely, or headed straight for another student. But before any of these bolts hit, a shimmering blue circle just like the ones that appear before Professor Xarion's hands when he casts would appear and absorb the spell, protecting the student in the spell's path.
After almost a minute of non-stop spell flinging, everyone in the room was panting with exertion and some had even fallen to their knees to catch their breath.
Professor Xarion just stood in the same spot he was at the start picking at his tooth with a nail.
"Have I made my point yet?" he asked the room, and we all grumbled out a yes. "Good! Considering very few of you look like you're in good enough shape to stand up let alone cast, we'll postpone today's lesson for next time, and the test for the time after that. Make sure to get lots of rest and eat a good breakfast! Class dismissed." Without another word, he turned around and walked up the small staircase to his office, closing the door behind him as he walked inside.
A moment later, he poked his head back out and flicked his wrist, bringing Malfoy's bubble to the ground before popping it and freeing the insufferable twit. With a pleased nod, he closed the door again, leaving us alone.
"Bloody….hell." Ron said between breaths. "What…. How...?"
"That's not possible." Hermione said, her eyes frantic as she tore through the vast supply of books she brought to every class, flipping pages faster than a hummingbird flapped its wings. "It's not possible! There is no spell that would let him do any of that!"
"Well, Granger, if I had been down here instead of you incompetent loats, then there is no way he'd-"
"Fifty points from Slitherin!" Professor Xarion called as he poked his head out of his office once more. "I don't care what you do when you're not in my class, but while you're in my class there will be no dick measuring. Didn't I say that already? Oh, yeah. I did. Another fifty points from Slitherin for making me repeat myself. Now if you want to swing your microphallus around, get out of my classroom." The door shut behind him with a resounding thunk.
Malfoy's face went red with rage as he stormed from the classroom, stopping only to grab hold of Crabbe and Goyle's collars to drag them behind him.
"Take that, Malfoy!" Ron called at his retreating form. "Not so tough when the professor-"
"And that's one-hundred-fifty from Gryffindor!" Professor Xarion called, again sticking his head out the door. "Fifty for the dick measuring and one-hundred for making me repeat myself for a third time. Do I hear lucky number two-hundred?" He looked around the room, daring anyone to say anything. "Good! Now scram!" The door shut for a fourth time.
"At this point we may as well keep taunting Malfoy." Finnigan said, wiping some sweat from his forehead left over from our assault of Professor Xarion. "I can't imagine the school has anywhere near as many points as he's taking away. Why not keep at it if we're already at zero?"
"Because negative numbers exist as you would know if you studied anything beyond second grade math. That, and I know how to mess around with the school's point-allotment enchantment to allow for negative scores in the point totals. If you don't believe me, go check. Now seriously, why are you still here?" The door shut for a fifth time.
"This is a sham of a class." Susan Bones declared in a huff as she gathered her things and headed for the door. "I'm going to write my aunt and get that fool arrested!"
There was a grumbling of agreement as the majority of the class followed her out the door. It seemed that Professor Xarion didn't have many fans.
"Come on. Let's get out of here." Ron said, staring loathingly at the Professor's office door.
As we crossed into the hall, Hermione said, "He's mental! Absolutely mental! He can't really believe Dumbledore will let him get away with what he has planned, can he?"
"I think he's just another Lockhart." Ron said, sulking as we walked. "All he knows how to do is boast. Could you believe the things he was saying? Most powerful wizard in the world? Fighting dragons? He's full of it! Right, Harry?"
I didn't answer right away. While it was hard to believe that he was anything other than a fraud, could he actually be telling the truth?
I'd been fighting for my life for the last three years with no manual. Was it really so much to ask that someone finally show me how to do it before I end up facing another basilisk.
"Harry?" Hermione said, pulling me from my stupor.
"I don't know what to think, but you're right that it's hard to believe a word he said."
"Absolutely. We need to talk to McGonagall or Dumbledore and get this loon out!" Ron said, determined.
The three of us walked towards our next class, Professor Xarion had let us out early but we had nowhere else to be.
All the while, I couldn't help the small spark of hope shining in my chest.