Summer marked a milestone: their first hatemail, yippee! Most of it was the mundane sort, although Dennis had to grab a Howler and lodge it in the loo to muffle the sound. (It didn't work. One of the neighbors left some laxatives by their door.)

There were people who disagreed, quite vehemently, with some of his bolder statements about magical society, about how it was something of a rigged game. Of course, there were others who thought he was talking an awful lot of sense. They saw the same systemic rot that he did.

Among SMU, his arguments were fairly popular. Of course. Someone had even gone as far as recording his speech- it was a little embarrassing, having it played back, but they were talking about it being a moment in history, or some such. It didn't feel that momentous to Dennis, but to everyone else…

Well, they felt good about it. Thankfully, they weren't the sort to just rest on their laurels. One of their bigger operations as summer closed was upscaling food delivery. Passing food out at Diagon was good, but being able to get food anywhere would be better.

Compiling a list of people who need that sort of help wasn't the easiest thing in the world, but the Ministry vaguely smiled on the project, so they got some potential addresses. With that, they could fill a thermos, shrink it, and have an owl deliver food.

That, of course, required owls, and so that was one of SMU's first purchases. They did actually have a fair amount of money- there were a number of employed young adults among their ranks, and if they wanted to save money on rent, Avalon's doors were always open. Well, 'doors' was probably a bit too strong. At the moment, it was tent flaps.

In regards to their non-fiscal resources, there was a lot of work that could be done even by a gaggle of underaged magicians. Cutting stones was simple enough, if tiring, and anyone who had taken Herbology could set up gardens, Transfiguration had practically infinite uses in construction…

But setting up a magical property came with its own patch of problems. Other than magical wildlife, there was the matter of keeping it secret. The old owner had put up some magic- presumably to keep muggles away from their game- and Dennis rather disliked that particular concept. Sure, he wasn't going to shout magic from the rooftops or anything, but there was a minor modification made- if the muggle was, say, on the brink of death, or lost, or fleeing from something… Well, Dennis wouldn't turn them away.

That required fiddling with the magic on the property, which was a whole song and dance that necessitated letters to one of the Weasleys- Bill, he thought?- and calling in Boot. In the process, they also made sure that Avalon was no pushover. Good wards were expensive, but the research team were looking into creative solutions to that particular problem.

Avalon still maintained a bit of a bellicose feel, despite Dennis' hopes. People loved their training duels, but Dennis couldn't help but read it pessimistically. How others might see it.

SMU END OF SUMMER 'ZINE

Thank you, everyone! It's been a tremendously productive summer, I like to think. We bought owls- see the receipts at the back of the zine- and used them to greatly upscale food delivery. We've made arrangements for distribution in Hogsmeade.

You'll find other bits and bobs in the following pages, including plans for the new Hogwarts year, but for now, we're highlighting a contest! Thank you for the many submissions, everyone. I'm sorry that there are no prizes beyond recognition.

Anyways!

Our first-place winner for the Perpetual Motion Machine Contest is Terry Boot! Of all the designs, his required the least maintenance for the most torque.

[Below is a picture of a large, wardrobe-sized device. At the bottom, a reservoir of churning water. At the top, a spout flows endlessly onto a mill, which turns. Magic brings water from the top to the bottom, making the mill turn as long as the spell lasts.]

Lily Moon's work with the mill using weight-altering spells was also really fascinating…

There was a certain period of a few weeks when wizards and witches borne of non-magical parents were introduced to the magical world. The shopkeeps in Diagon were perhaps a bit more showy, just to mark the occasion, so much so that the streets practically exploded with wonder and whimsy…

(By now, the scars of the war were almost completely hidden away, and the world they were being introduced to was a little brighter.)

One of the less impressive sights in the alley was a teen sitting at a table in front of Gringotts, just far away enough to avoid provoking the guards. Beside him was a moderately impressive tower of books, and piles of leaflets. The plan was simple- most muggle-born parents would be guided to Gringotts in order to exchange their pounds for galleons in order to make purchases. Dennis could have set up camp somewhere else, perhaps outside of Ollivander's, but Gringotts seemed a good choice.

The pitch usually went as follows:

"Hello there! You've just been introduced to the magical world, right? I'm Dennis Creevey, and a few years ago, I was just like you!" He was smart enough not to bring his dad to talk about the wonders of being a wizarding parent.

"I'm part of a group called SMU, and we're trying to help new wizards and witches get on their feet."

"It is a bit of a silly name, isn't it? But I've grown fond of it, you know? But more important than the name is how we can help you."

"Yes," he smiled, "We've got quite a few of these old textbooks, and we're giving them away. Unless the curriculum's changed…?"

The least Dennis could do was remove some economic hurdles in the way of truly entering the magical world, but that wasn't all. There were leaflets passed to the parents, and they contained a brief introduction to the wizarding world that, while useful, was significantly less rosy than the sort Hogwarts teachers gave. Dennis believed they had a right to know just what they were getting themselves into. Even with Voldemort out of the picture, the magical world wasn't perfectly safe.

Included within were muggle means of contact. It was possible to send letters to Hogwarts without an owl, but parents deserved more of a look into the wizarding world than what they were given by the school. Hogwarts was great! But it was a narrow window that didn't show a very wide world.

Of course, he knew that SMU wasn't unbiased. They were pitching their own vision of the magical world, shifting the window in just the right way to show the parts that needed change.

Maybe they'd have to look into getting a telephone? Even better would be a place in London. Possibly one in Diagon, possibly one on the non-magical side? The former would make hiding people coming to and fro using the Floo much easier, but having a concrete presence on the other side might be useful as well.

For his sixth year in Hogwarts, Dennis focused on those NEWTs he thought would have the greatest chance of helping his project. Charms and Transfiguration, namely. DADA was alright, he supposed, but his SMU projects had quickly become the center of his life. Flitwick had hinted that good work there might help his NEWT chances…

But his goal wasn't a NEWT, of course. They were a means to an end now.

His main focus was, of course, automation, or whatever the magical analog was. Complex charms to make tools do jobs themselves- one of his favorites was this tricky bit of wandwork that made a knife cut at different thicknesses on command. Slice, dice, whatever… and it only took him six years of schooling to reach it!

The house elves proved tremendous fonts of knowledge on what was needed to keep Hogwarts running- Avalon was probably a bit beyond the average magical household- and while Dennis still felt a little weird, asking slaves how they did their work, they were glad to explain.

One of their favorite problems became replicating muggle machinery. It wasn't always the most efficient way to solve a problem- transfiguration made a laughingstock of almost every form of muggle manufacturing- but it was a good exercise.

Once they built a lathe: one of those things that spun really fast to let you cut away at material. They had thought removing most friction would be a good place to start… it made the machine horribly difficult to stop. It sat in the corner, whirring gently, for weeks.

How could magic make muggle things better? Other than circumventing some things altogether, there were some interesting thoughts. Low friction bearings- in moderation- were an obvious one, and the number of things you could do by magically increasing something's durability beggared belief.

Some joker had gone through the muggle textbooks they thought and changed all mentions of the Laws of Thermodynamics to the Suggestions of Thermodynamics, which did evoke a bit of a chuckle in the moment.

It wasn't really infinite energy- the bottleneck was, as always, magicians- but the multiplication was significant enough that there wasn't much they couldn't attempt to replicate. The matter of magical energy and plain old energy, and whatever relationship they had, was intriguing. Was there a relationship? Was magic incredibly energetic in comparison, but usually threaded through inefficient spells?

Stick a pin in it, Dennis supposed, and come back to it should relations with the Muggles ever get good. (Almost infinite, clean energy, just requiring a wizard's work? Incredible.) It would require some serious bullshitting to circumvent the Statute- people who would want to know how it worked- but it would instill some obvious goodwill. Sure, it wasn't nearly as bad as depriving the muggles of magical cures for the diseases which ailed them, but it could be done.

Well, what Dennis could do was focus on what was within his means. They aggressively worked at their food operations and branched out more cautiously into other necessities. Clothing wasn't the most difficult thing, and Avalon would handle housing… there was, of course, the big one.

Other than raising a fund, Dennis wasn't entirely sure how to approach the matter of wands, though. Maybe they could look into apprenticeships? Somehow, wandmaking didn't feel like a process that could be automated with a wand.

Draco Malfoy wasn't entirely sure what to do with himself, really. The old plan was out the window at this point, considering that the Malfoy properties were all being sold to fund the new Ministry. His chances in serious politics were laughable.

If he really had to, he could find some work, however unimpressive. Granger was many things, but the woman could make a compelling argument, leading to many a product that needed to be remodeled and regulated. Draco could have a middling career as a bottom-rung ministry employee, or as a manufacturer. Wouldn't that be delightful?

At the moment, he was trying to get some of his potions work published under a pseudonym, but experimentation like that wasn't cheap…

Delivering progress reports to his fiancee wasn't exactly how he expected his life to develop, but what could he do, really? The idea of being a total layabout was completely intolerable, but until he made something for himself that meant kowtowing to his fiancee.

Yes, he knew that there was no reason that the modern woman couldn't stand at the head of a household, it just… prickled. He couldn't begrudge a Slytherin for ambition, though.

Astoria had ambitions far beyond funding Draco's potions schemes, although she wasn't always the most open with them. It wasn't as if he could blame her for wanting to have her own affairs, of course, but some part of him always presumed he'd be the one doing those sorts of things, funding… groups.

And what a group Astoria supported! It was called the Society for Magical Utopianism, and it was led by the surviving Creevey. He was not even a man grown, but Astoria believed in his little operation, idealistic though it was. As far as Draco could tell, she was a genuine believer, and with her support, it had grown. (It was doing better than some other parties which had cropped up.)

Her vested interest in the project meant she visited frequently, and on one such visit she invited Draco along. Well, 'invited'. You know how it is sometimes.

Walking through the groves- which were all thick with heavy fruit despite the season- he could see baskets floating over the ground, moving to wherever they were needed before a second enchanted tool sent the produce plummeting into them. Interesting.

All across the property were little touches like that, spells he had just never thought to use in that way. Confounded bugs and pests marched in lockstep away from gardens and plants, while little clouds trundled over the land, watering the plants as they went.

There were fields as well, thick with grains and other vegetables, patrolled by golems and, very rarely, wizards or witches who cast all sorts of spells over the crops. It was a bit reminiscent of herbology, he supposed- there were even some greenhouses, some of which practically glowed with magical light. What plant could possibly need that much sun?

And that wasn't even mentioning their building. In front of it- a half-constructed edifice of rough-hewn stone with wizards and witches casting spells on every block of masonry and dab of mortar- there were dueling fields, flat and expansive. Nice and open, probably defensible…

Someone came up and started chattering to Astoria about what features they were adding to the building. Heated floors for winter, magical dumbwaiter chutes and passages throughout, escape routes, every household convenience you could possibly imagine…

(Draco had spent his entire life in a magical household, so it wasn't abnormal to him, but SMU seemed so oddly insistent. Even if it wasn't efficient, they'd give it a try, just for the sake of it.)

The man himself, Dennis Creevey, was still getting his education at Hogwarts, but SMU did anything but wither without his presence. Despite the state it was in, people were living in and building up Avalon, and there was a certain… excitement they shared. A hope.

They were all damnably excitable, though. Draco couldn't even eat his rabbit pie- which was, admittedly, very good- in peace, because the next table over got into an impassioned discussion about Azkaban. All parties seemed to agree that the place was inhumane- it was a prison, wasn't that kind of the point?- and the arguing was about what would be a better replacement.

On the tamer end, a few argued for divorcing the prison from dementors. Get rid of them, somehow, and make the prison a little less miserable to live in, make it more focused on things like 'reform'. On the more radical end, there was someone arguing against the concept of prisons, at least in "their current form".

You see, Azkaban was just one part of a deeply biased system that brought state power to bear against those least capable of fighting it and-

Draco mostly tuned it out. What sort of loon would think they didn't need prisons anymore? Even their fellows disagreed with them- although Draco had to cringe when the example they usually cited was "keeping bastards like Lucius Malfoy locked up".

While Dennis may not go as far as full-fledged prison abolition, Azkaban is like, wildly inhumane.