Monday 18 April 1998 St. Grogory's Primary School
Springtime was upon the students of St. Grogory's and Harry was taking full advantage of it. With the help of Miss Honeybloom, he and his classmates discovered the wondrous bounty of flowers and shrubbery that grew in the school's garden and grounds. They had learned to identify the names and characteristics of each plant and used the knowledge to play the game of I Spy. The students used crayons (or for those who had them, colored pencils) to draw out the different plants they found. Harry was in his element as he led his team to victory in finding the most number of flowers before lunchtime. His cousin Dudley had been transferred to a different teacher and therefore no longer caused trouble for Harry in class. Once at lunchtime, however…
"Hey, runt! Get over here!" Harry heard Dudley yelling and took off running towards the school's cafeteria. He was halfway between the building and the fence when he suddenly felt a crushing pressure and for a moment, everything went black.
Dudley and his gang gave chase but eventually called it off, as they couldn't find him anymore. Harry in the meantime had come to; he opened his eyes and looked around in surprise as he was now on the roof of the cafeteria!
How in the world did I get up here? Is this part of the magic Miss Honeybloom has mentioned? Harry eventually figured out how to get down off the roof without anyone spotting him and went in search of his teacher.
"Miss Honeybloom? Something weird just happened to me," he began, "I was being chased by Dudley and his gang over by the cafeteria when I suddenly found myself on the roof! Do you have any idea how that happened?"
"Hmmm…sounds like a bout of accidental apparition, Harry. It happens sometimes especially when a child is stressed. You said that Dudley and his gang were chasing you? Why?"
"Dunno, not like they need a reason to hate me or anything," he grumbled.
"Ok, Harry. Why don't you get washed up and just stay here in class. Lunchtime is almost over anyway. I'll just go speak to the Headmaster about Dudley." Belinda replied.
Belinda went down to the Headmaster's office to complain about another incident regarding Harry and Dudley. She 'suggested', through the subtle use of magic, that Dudley should be suspended for a couple of days for fighting with another student and for a disciplinary mark to be put in his school record. The Headmaster complied and left to have Vernon and Petunia called in to discuss the problem.
Later in the week, Harry was lying on the grass at the neighborhood park reading his Potions journal. He wished there was a way to take the ingredients listed within and "create" a potion within the pages without the need to buy and use any actual ingredients. He figured it would save time, money and be a heck of a lot safer if in case the ingredients or the potion itself was dangerous in any way. Shrugging, he made an entry on the pages to research his idea further at some point in the future.
"Harry? What are you doing here?" came a familiar voice. He looked up from his journal to see Mrs. Figg, his neighbor and occasional babysitter walking up the hill towards him, dragging her ever-present wire cart.
"Oh, hello Mrs. Figg. I was just enjoying the spring air and sunshine. I like being outside as there's always something I can draw and write about to put in my journal," he said happily.
"That's nice, dear. What sort of things do you put in your journal, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Mostly descriptions and drawing of plants and flowers I come across. I also put down my ideas on various things."
"Hmm-mmm. That's good, dear. I'm glad to hear that. Just make sure you get home on time." She responded with a slightly distracted air before leaving.
Harry watched her leave briefly before shrugging and returning to his musings.
Saturday 25 June 1988 Dursley Residence
It was the start of summer vacation and Harry had already been loaded down with all the chores in and around the house; he had to cook the meals and wash the dishes then go outside and complete an impossible list of yard work. At the end of each night, he entered his tiny cupboard under the stairs exhausted by the day's efforts.
Before going to sleep one night, he perused through his potion's textbooks as well as his journal. He wanted to find out if there was a potion that would confuse his relatives into thinking that he had already completed his list of chores so he could have some time to himself. He found the Confusing Concoction as well as a Forgetfulness Potion, both seemed fairly complicated to make. He made it a point to remember to go over to Miss Honeybloom's house to make these recipes.
The next morning, he trekked over to Belinda's house and asked her if she could help with both potions.
"Why do you need to learn those potions, Harry? Has something happened?" she asked worriedly.
Harry scuffed the ground with his shoe, "My aunt and uncle always give me a lot of chores to do and never give any to Dudley. I was hoping to give them a dose of one of these potions to make them forget to give me so much work to do. I'm always so exhausted at the end of the day."
Belinda hummed in agreement, "Then let's get started, shall we? I think it was a good idea you had there." Harry gave her a small smile in return.
By the time summer had ended, Harry had perfected both recipes as well as figuring out how to target specific memories that he wanted his aunt and uncle to either forget or be confused about. He even got Dudley to forget about being such a bully and to assist in the chores around the house.
Thursday 1 September 1988 St. Grogory's Primary School
It was the start of another year of primary school. Harry was saddened by the thought that Miss Honeybloom was no longer his teacher and confided in her that he was going to miss being in her class. She assured him that even though she was no longer his teacher; she would still like to meet with him to discuss his latest works and thoughts. She asked him about his summer vacation and listened in amusement as Harry described the results of the Confusing Concoctions and Forgetfulness Potion and the trial study on his relatives. She warned him about using the potions too often as they could be poisoned and he'd be in trouble.
Harry related some of the more amusing situations and events of the experiments such as spiking some candy and giving it to Dudley so he'd forget that he wasn't wearing any trousers before going outside to meet up with his friends, or the time when he successfully confused his uncle into thinking that he and his sister were actually married to each other by mixing the potion into their food. Belinda thought both events were hilarious.
Harry mentioned to her about his idea of turning his journal into an interactive device that would allow him to copy all the information of his Potions and Herbology texts into his journal and allow him to "create" potions without the need of handling any actual ingredients. She didn't know how to do anything like that but she did know that Robert Cody, who was one of the two Primary Five teachers for the school, came from a magical family and might be persuaded to help with the more advanced topics.
The next week, Belinda and Harry met up with Mr. Cody to discuss Harry's predicament and ideas. It turned out that Robert Cody was a Squib, a non-magical person born to an all-magical family. He couldn't perform the usual 'wand-waving type of magic' but his family was sympathetic enough to find a tutor that would teach him Arithmancy and Ancient Runes as well as the Theory of Charms and some muggle subjects in the hopes of giving their son a better shot of surviving out in the world.
"Well, let's see what you have here, Mr. Potter. Yes, I see that you've laid out the basic ideas for this interactive journal. Clever idea too, I must say." Mr. Cody said.
"Is my idea possible sir?" Harry asked hopefully.
"I dare say so. We will start with a brand new journal so that, if it fails, it doesn't destroy all of your hard work with this one. I can see that there's a lot of work and detail in this one. Miss Honeybloom has told me that she taught your class some basics in Arithmancy and Runes?" Harry nodded, "That's good, it'll make it easier for me to explain and assist."
Robert said he would like to take a bit of time to think about how to implement Harry's ideas and would get back with by at least the end of the month. Harry and Belinda agreed. Harry asked Miss Honeybloom if she could take a look around Diagon Alley to pick up some new ingredients and to see if there were any new potion books. She promised to take a look the next time she was there.
Friday 28 October 1988 Robert Cody's classroom, St. Grogory's Primary School
The three had met up again at the start of October to discuss Harry's idea about making an interactive Potions journal. Mr. Cody said that the best way to go about this was to emulate a system that was already available. He introduced them to the computer and a database program. He explained how each worked and why it was so important for the future.
Mr. Cody had then consulted with some of his muggleborn and squib friends who worked in the computer manufacturing industry and together they figured out how to shrink the computer core down to the size and thickness of a matchbook. He helped Harry use his basic knowledge of Runes, Arithmancy and Charms to create a simple protective shield around the miniaturized computer loaded with a database program. The reason for this was that magic had the tendency to fry the electronics of any electrical device.
Harry, Mr. Cody and his friends then took the new journal; inscribed the protection runes around the computer core to create a "null-space;" tied it into a power rune that would absorb the ambient magic and reroute it to the core in a suitable format. Then they used a specialized runic array similar to the Protean Charm to transfer the data from the program to the pages of the journal and back again. It took nearly a month of diligent work before they were able to get the journal to copy a previously written piece of paper containing Harry's description of a daisy and transfer it to a page within the book. From there, they proceeded to fill the journal with more of Harry's writings and potion recipes.
With a bit of tweaking of the runic arrays and Arithmancy, they were able to copy pictures of the various plants and tie them into their proper locations and descriptions. Next, the two of them figured out how to use the database to "create" a potion. They used the Arithmancy to assign a value to each ingredient or technique rather than try to have the journal use the actual description of the item. They developed a safety feature that highlighted the incorrect or dangerous combination of values and give a reason why.
Belinda had a brilliant idea while helping develop the journal. It took a bit of time to figure out how to do it but in the end, it was a stroke of genius. Since they were living in the muggle world with all of their advances in medicine and technology, it would be beneficial to find a muggle alternative to the potions that the magical world knew. Not only would it be faster to procure but also a heck of a lot cheaper!
One of the final projects was to incorporate an index for quick searching within the pages and pages of documentation. This cut down on the time it took to find the proper ingredient or technique. Throughout all the stages, Harry and Miss Honeybloom worked on creating a user's manual to describe and teach the operations of the journal. Belinda also floated the idea that maybe Harry ought to use a fake name to publish under, as he would want the journal to be taken seriously. By the start of the Christmas holidays, everything had been completed.
"Thank you so much, Mr. Cody and Miss Honeybloom!" Harry gushed as he flipped through the book, which had been dubbed "The Potioneer's Assistant."
"It was our pleasure, Harry. It's been wonderful working with a student who enjoys learning and experimentation. It should be of great help when you go to Hogwarts. Have you thought more about the idea to publish this idea so others could benefit?" Mr. Cody asked.
"Yes, and I think that would be a great idea. I do have one concern though. If I publish, wouldn't that just allow others to steal my idea and claim it as their own?" Harry said.
"Hmm…the more unscrupulous potioneers maybe, but I think that the methods we used to create it would be too difficult to reproduce unless you're familiar with the concept of computers and databases. Oh, have you thought about which fake name you want to use?" Mr. Cody mused.
"Uh-huh. I want to use 'Harold Talbot' as my fake name. The first name is the proper version of mine and the last name is in reference to a famous wizard of the sixteenth century. I've also want to tie it in with my real name into the 'Assistant' so there's no question later." Harry replied.
"Good lad. Okay then, I'll do the typing so you don't have to and then we'll send it in to get published."
By February, Harry, Miss Honeybloom and Mr. Cody had fine-tuned the article as well as make a few adjustments to the 'Assistant.' Robert then used his family contacts to publish the article to the review board of "Potioneer's Monthly."