Mister Stu
Chapter 5: Crossover Chaos
Author's Note: This was supposed to be one final chapter, but it went far too long. So it's been split, even though I'm posting them both at the same time.
Harry walked into the Great Hall for breakfast the next morning and immediately stopped, mouth agape. Not only were there the normal students sitting at their tables eating breakfast, but a large assortment of... riff-raff littered the place. In front of the Hufflepuff table was a yellow Volkswagon Bug. Sitting two thirds the way down Slytherin was a man dressed in a black metal suit with apparent breathing difficulties. To his right was a grizzled roughneck instructing first years on how to perform roundhouse kicks. To his left was what appeared to be a half-man, half-fox creature eying the room with a weird gun attached to his tunic. But the biggest eye-catcher was a large cartoonish orange dragon that had apparently crushed a quarter of the Gryffindor table and was breathing fire at the ceiling while a geeky looking guy in a cap cheered it on.
"Oy, Harry, over here," Ron called out from the other end of the Gryffindor benches - which made sense, since their usual seats were now broken shambles.
"What on earth?" he asked as he sat down, but before Ron could answer, McGonagall held up her hand.
"We seem to have a bit of a crossover problem," McGonagall announced.
At this, the collective student body groaned.
"Not another crossover fic," Ron groused. "I always hate those things."
After the crowd quieted down, McGonagall continued, "After we finish the Gary Stu competition, we will be figuring out how to get our... visitors... back to where they came from. Until then, please try to ignore the interruptions and focus on your schoolwork."
"Schoolwork?" a few confused students voiced.
"Right," McGonagall muttered. "Stupid fanfiction - nobody is actually ever in class."
Harry turned to Ginny. "Something's wrong."
"Of course something's wrong - we're in some crossoveraholic author's demented story."
"No, it's something more serious - I have a bad feeling that we're abo..."
"Agh!" Ginny softly shrieked. "The... what date is it?!"
Taken aback, Harry answered her.
"Seven months and three days."
"Huh?"
Ginny swallowed. "Harry, don't you remember? Somntoe? She threatened that she'd open something or other 'Seven Months and Three Days' later..."
A horrifying look of dawning comprehension lit Harry's face. "... and she said that seven months and three days ago?"
"Awful big coincidence, don't you think?"
Harry grimaced. "You're right - let's go try to find the portal and shut it down."
"Shouldn't we get help?" Ginny asked.
"You really are new to fanfiction, aren't you?"
"Hmm?"
"Ginny, it's never freak chance that two shipped characters go off into some dark and dangerous setting with each other. There's always a gratuitous snogging scene somewhere along the way."
"Sounds good! Let's go."
Ron watched as Harry and Ginny left the Great Hall, wondering what they were up to - but he couldn't do much about it. After all, the fourth and final contest was about to begin and he had to get out to the quidditch stands.
"Oh, you again," Ron said, shaking his head as Yoda climbed on Luna's shoulders. The three of them began the short walk out to the pitch.
"Yes, me it is."
Luna looked over at Ron expectantly.
"What?" Ron asked.
"I'm just waiting."
"Waiting for what?" Ron was obviously bewildered.
"We've gone the whole story so far and you still haven't brought up anagrams."
"Oh!" Ron said, suddenly understanding. "Well, I guess I just figured it was kind of silly."
"Anagrams silly are not," Yoda butted in.
"Normal english, speak," Ron sighed.
"Much about a person anagrams will tell. Very powerful they are."
"Really?" Luna asked. While Ron was rolling his eyes, there wasn't an outlandish claim invented yet that Luna wouldn't buy into.
"Yeah, right," Ron said. "And I suppose my name will tell you all sorts of information about me."
Yoda nodded sagely, and stretched out his arm. Somehow, a sheaf of parchment and a quill flew into his hand and the green creature began to scribble onto it.
Ron shook his head as he took his seat and leaned into the microphone. "Welcome to the fourth and final challenge. The contest has come down to our final two Gary Stus: Garith Chu and Sirius Black. The final event will be... oh, you've got to be flipping kidding me!"
"... you've got to be flipping kidding me!"
"So at least you're talking to me again," Remus said, rolling his eyes.
"I wouldn't know the slightest thing about how to use either of these," Sirius said, holding a thin short sword in one hand and a nunchuck in the other. "What is the fascination fanfic writers have with fencing and martial arts?"
"I don't know, but you've got to be simply astounding with every form of close quarters combat if you want to win this Stu competition."
Sirius groaned. "Here, let me show you something." He handed Remus the sword and then backed away a few steps. "Now, come at me."
Remus raised an eyebrow and took a charging step at his friend.
"Petrificus," Sirius said lazily. "See that. I mean, what's the point of trying to use a sword when a sane wizard will simply hex you? It's even dumber than the stupid black leather fetish."
"Sirius, the readers don't care. They want to see you go out there and beat down some dark wizards with sword play."
Sirius groaned again. "Fine. But at least I'm not going to be an idiot about it." He turned to the two weapons and began muttering incantations at them.
"Uh... what are you doing?"
"Animation spells on them. The sword will automatically swing itself to block any blows coming my way and the nunchuck will whip around to hit anyone that comes close to me."
"Sirius..."
"Hey, all I have to do is hold on to them and put on some theatrics. Make it look good for the crowd."
"But... there's one little thing you're missing..."
"Nonsense. It's foolproof. Now, I can't stay and chat - the fourth event is starting."
"Mister Weasley, please announce the fourth task so we can be done with this competition."
Ron shook his head in disgust. "The fourth and final event will be... close quarters combat with a sword and a nunchuck."
"What? More fencing?" Luna said, surprised.
"And, let's begin," Ron said, bored.
Nothing happened.
"I said, let's begin."
Flitwick ran up to the announcer's booth. "There's a small problem. The, er, assistants for this task didn't arrive."
"Assistants?" Ron asked, curious.
"Beat-up fodder from hollywood ninja films."
McGonagall frowned. "Well, I guess there's always one option."
Flitwick looked surprised. "And what would that be?"
"Well, we've got all sorts of crossover characters emerging from somewhere in the castle. We could simply find a group of low-level henchmen from some other universe and use them instead. I'm sure they'd be used to getting the snot beat out of them."
"I'll get right on it," Flitwick assured her. "Could you move everyone into the hall while I look for them?"
"Harry, do you have any idea of what you're doing?"
Harry bit back a retort - the two of them were getting a bit on each other's nerves. After all, every several seconds an odd person or creature would wind its way through the corridors, and while most of them were harmless or benevolent, every so often they found themselves in a pitched battle with some arch-villain. It wasn't the most relaxed atmosphere to spend time with your girlfriend.
"I think the portal that Somntoe opened up would be down in the dungeons somewhere," Harry replied.
"Well, hopefully w..." Ginny trailed off, squinting down the corridor.
"What did you see."
"A... a monster made out of a mirror, I think."
"What?"
"Well, it had to be - I saw a glimmer of something that looked just like you."
The two stood for a few seconds before a beam of light flew at them, as if a dark wizard cast a spell at them.
Ginny pulled Harry behind a corner and they heard the most surreal sound.
"Whoever you are, let my friend go, and I won't hurt you." Oddest thing was, it sounded just like Harry.
Trusting his instincts, Harry put up his hands in and slowly walked around the corner. "What the..."
Sure enough, it was Harry. Or at least it sure looked like it, though a few details were a bit off. The duplicate didn't have black hair, but brown, and instead of green eyes, the doppleganger had blue ones. And it looked like the new arrival was a year or two younger.
"Oh..." Ginny said, putting it all together. "You're... you're Movie Harry!"
Ron sighed, waiting impatiently from the staff table of the Great Hall for Flitwick to finish rounding up evil but clueless minions for the task.
"Geez. I hope he hurries up. This is getting boring."
"Luna?"
Ron and Luna both looked over at Yoda.
"The fattest in his family, Ronald Weasley is?"
Luna frowned thoughtfully. "I think so. He used to be thin, but he gained a bit of weight the last few years."
"Hey!" Ron protested.
"Yells a lot does he?"
Luna nodded.
"Sick minded, is he? Not good with friends, is he?"
Luna shrugged. "He's always fighting with them, and he is a bit perverted."
"At the future, badly forecasts, does he?"
"Telling the future?" Luna asked, ignoring Ron's building fury. "Yes, he failed Divination, so I guess that means he's bad at forecasting the future."
Yoda handed Ron, who looked three different shades of purplish red, the slip of paper he'd been scribbling on:
WEASLEY ON LARD
NOW A SAD YELLER
NAY, A LEWD LOSER
AND A LOWLY SEER
Before Ron could finish, Yoda hopped off Luna's shoulder and hobbled out of the Hall - obviously using his ability to forecast the future as Ron looked absolutely murderous.
"Lewd loser," Ron fumed. "Wait 'til I find that hopped-up green lint-ball."
Flitwick burst through the entrance, bringing along what appeared to be a horde of grey spandex wearing men.
"They don't talk," Flitwick said, "but someone said they came from some universe involving morphing ranger powers, or something along those lines."
"Are they disposable?" McGonagall asked.
"Imminently."
"Very well, let the fourth event begin."
"Movie Harry?" Movie Harry asked.
"Yeah, don't you see," Ginny said excitedly. "You're the Harry Potter from the movies, while my companion here is Fanfiction Harry."
Movie Harry shuddered heavily.
"No, no," Ginny quickly said. "It's all right. It's not a fluff fic or anything. We're actually somewhat close to book characters this go around."
"Listen," Harry said to himself, "we don't have time for this. What year are you?"
"Fifth," Harry answered himself.
"Okay, can you take us to the headmaster? Is he here as well?"
"Of course."
Harry, or some Harry at least, began leading the trio through the corridors towards the not-dead-yet Dumbledore.
"You know," Ginny joked, grinning, "it's probably a good thing the author doesn't write much fluff. Can you imagine what things would devolve into with me, Harry, and a clone of Harry, all alone in the dark dungeons...?"
Both Harry's rolled their eyes.
"I do believe, Harry, that you owe a bit of an explanation..."
All three stopped when they heard the voice. "Dumbledore," Harry said in wonder.
Ginny quickly burst out, telling everything from start to finish. Afterwards, Dumbledore stood silently for a bit, mulling everything over. "Clearly," he finally said, "we must find the portal which these strange characters, myself and my student included, are coming from."
"But how?" Harry asked.
Dumbledore didn't answer him, and instead, closed his eyes. His fingers snaked around his wand, which he clenched in front of him. The old man tentatively walked forward as if being guided by a divining rod.
Shrugging, the trio of students followed him.
