As the second-year students shuffled towards the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom in excitement, Jenna looked down at her most prized Chocolate-Frog card, where a young messy-haired man yawned and gave her a wink.
Harry Potter (Order of Merlin, First Class)
Famous for his defeat of the Dark Lord Voldemort in 1998, as well as finding the Chamber of Secrets and slaying the basilisk within, being the first wizard to ever survive the Killing Curse, and inventing the Dementor-to-Dim-Sum spell, Potter enjoys Surf Rock, Tiki bars, and drinking Screwdrivers.
She couldn't stop from shaking. Her class would be the first to be taught by the legendary wizard.
He was already there when they entered the classroom, leaning back in his chair and plopping his feet up on his desk, which was bare except for a wand, and a tall, narrow glass of cloudy pumpkin juice. He stared ahead in boredom without meeting their curious gazes. They sat for a few minutes, whispering to each other, waiting for the rest to arrive.
Eventually, Professor Potter raised his hand and took a look at his wristwatch. To Jenna's bewilderment, he kept at it for a few seconds. A faint smile crossed his face, and the bell rang.
Just then, the door slammed shut with a bang, making them all jump up in their seats, and a flock of Cornish pixies descended upon the students from the ceiling, in a flurry of purple and black wings.
It was anarchy. Several girls screamed as the pixies grabbed their hair, and fought back by trying to poke the pests with their wands. A few of the creatures banded together to lift a chair and threw it down into the center of the classroom. Students scattered out of the way, knocking each other and nearby chairs down. Jenna dived under her desk.
The sound of clanging metal, screams, and buzzing wings was soon joined by panicked shouts, as the children threw the first spells they could think of at the pixies: tripping jinxes, levitation charms, matchstick-to-needle transfiguration spells, and in the case of one Hufflepuff, a Lumos.
None of those did much to stop the pixies from wreaking havoc on the classroom. Fawley, the kid voted "most likely to shoot up the school", was the only one with the sense to cast an Incendio, cackling gleefully as he did so. The flying pests paused for a moment in confusion, as a scorched member of their pack fell down to the floor, the stench of burning hair emanating out of its corpse.
The students quickly picked up on the idea, and each threw around his own stream of fire. A few of the pixies squealed when they were caught by the flames, and darted away to the ceiling. The students cheered and flipped their fists towards the creatures, but their exaltation was short lived; chubby Alan Huckerby started running towards the door with cries of horror as his clothes caught fire, as did several of the tables. The flames leapt higher, and other students tried to join him with a chorus of shrieks, but couldn't manage to open the door.
By then fire had already started spreading to the rest of the tables. "Aguamenti!" Jenna shouted, sending out a jet of water that hit several of her friends, and did little to quench the inferno. Some of her wet friends attempted the same, to varying results. Another student rushed towards the exit only to slip on the wet floor and fly into the group of kids who were trying to burn down the door, making them all stumble and fall down like a set of bowling pins.
Suddenly, it all stopped. The fires were extinguished, the water disappeared, and the pixies froze in place above their heads. The fallen chairs returned to their initial positions, their broken legs repaired, any scorch marks fading away. The bruised, scorched, and wet students slowly got back to their feet, massaging their injuries, coughing and groaning.
"Mediocre," said a dispassionate voice at the front of the class. Professor Potter was still sitting with his feet on the desk, just as he did when they entered, but now he had his wand and drink in his hands. The students glared at him in varying amounts of anger and disbelief.
"You gave us no warning!" a girl shouted.
"So?" he said lazily. "You think the pack of Acromantulas gave me a warning before they tried to eat me alive? You think a cursed book gave my friend a warning before it tried to possess her? You think my aunt gave me any warning before she tried to hit me in the head with a sauce pan?" he quirked an eyebrow, his face apathetic at the sight of the kids with their mouth gaped open.
"Well, no, but—"
"No buts. This is Defense Against the Dark Arts, and the dark will not bow to you politely before it will try to rip out your souls, or choke you to death. You need to be prepared."
"You didn't teach us any spells to deal with—"
"I don't need to teach you spells. Use whatever you can. When the manticore I fought proved resistant to spells, I levitated a boulder on its head. When I didn't have a wand, I used a sword to kill a giant snake. When I lost the sword, I used a basilisk fang. Be creative. Now," he interjected, before the students could argue. "Your application of the fire charm was a step in the right direction, but it had a flaw. Can anyone tell me what it was?"
Jenna slowly raised her hand.
"Yes, you, Granger."
"T-That's not my name, sir—"
"Don't care. Go on."
"Well, uh, the fire charm... back-fired?"
"Correct!" Professor Potter smiled. "Fifty points to Gryffindor!"
"...I'm a Ravenclaw, sir."
"Never mind. Lesson number one: watch your surroundings! I once cast a blasting spell on the floor of a skyscraper so the troll in front of me would fall down the hole. Do you know what happened next?"
The students shook their heads in a daze.
"Well, it was a terrible mess. The muggles call it nine-eleven, I was told."
A few muggleborns cringed, and the rest turned their heads to their friends in confusion. They all looked quite miserable.
"Now, when faced with magical beasts, they all have their unique weaknesses, but some soft spots are more common than others. In flying creatures, the wings are often the most delicate part," the Professor flicked his wand and summoned one of the frozen creatures to him, grabbing it in both hands. "Sometimes you don't even have to use your wand, just grab their wings and..."
The class collectively shuddered as he tore the pixie's wings apart in one stretch, and threw it in the garbage can behind him. They stared motionless as he beamed at them.
"Well? Why aren't you all writing this down?"
Very slowly, they broke out of their stupor and picked parchment and quills from their bags. The professor hummed a Beach Boys tune to himself while they jutted down notes. The bell chimed before Jenna put down her quill.
"Alright, now, homework," Professor Potter took a sip from his glass, his eyes traveling back and forth as he was contemplating in silence for a few moments. "I want each one of you to enter the Forbidden Forest at night, and kill the first thing that attacks you. Bring the corpses back to me for inspection and grading."
"WHAT?!"
"That's insane!"
"You can't possibly expect us to manage something like—"
"Oh, shut it," the professor slashed his wand through the air and Jenna felt her lips tightening together. She looked at her friends in horror to see their mouths all sealed themselves shut.
They stared at the professor in dumbfounded silence. "Honestly, kids these days," he murmured. "Back in my day, we had to fight a troll in our first year."
He looked at them disapprovingly for a minute before he finally remembered that they couldn't talk, and waved his wand to cancel the spell.
A girl with scorched blond hair in the back stood up. "My father will hear about thi—"
"Your father pissed himself in fear when I caught him crying in the girl's bathroom with Moaning Myrtle," the professor said. That shut down her whining, and made Jenna giggle. "Now, why are you all so eager to be late to Professor McGonagall's class?"
Professor Potter waved his wand and the unfrozen pack of Cornish pixies descended on the class again, as the students made a run for the door.