Chapter Seventeen: But How Can Muggles be Harnessed for Good?
"Well Harry, now what should we do?" Ron asked Harry, who was literally his favorite person right now.
"I don't know Ron," Harry responded, who felt slightly uncomfortable since Ron was probably only his fourth favorite person, after both Professor Dementor and Dudley Dursley. On the other hand, both of those people were dead, so maybe if Ron died too, he'd bump up a few slots. That thought cheered Harry immensely.
"I have an idea!" Hermione said, gleefully standing on a pile of books to better address the boys to their face, as normally she stands below eye-height and is easily forgotten.
"What?" Harry asked, startled at Hermione's increase in height.
"I'm on a book Harry," Hermione said, clarifying by stepping off the book, reducing her height to barely noticeable –levels, and then standing on it again, which increased her height. Harry stared at her puzzledly.
"This is a strange magic Hermione," Ron said, wishing that Hermione would go back to not being in his eye-vision. She kept trying to use words and books at him, and Ron was raised in a house that didn't hold to any of that new-fangled nonsense.
Hermione nodded, and realizing that this plot thread was getting derailed, cast a reparo charm on the story, bringing it back to focus.
"What was your idea, totally normal-height Hermione?" Harry asked.
"We should audit some classes!" Hermione said brightly.
"Sorry Hermione, but I grew up in Muggle society, so I'm not as up-to-date with wizarding terminology as you," Harry said sorrowfully. "What does that mean?"
"It's when we go to a class, but we don't get credit and don't have to do any work," Ron answered, as he was quite familiar with the term, having grown up with the Weasley's. Most of their education was done through auditing, as they didn't have enough money to pay for good grades like most of the students.
"Like Draco?" Harry asked, unknowingly making a joke that both applied to what Ron had said and to the narration following. Ron and Hermione nodded, while Neville looked nervous, as if fearing that the mere mention of his name would summon his most ardent adversary. It did not though, which was good.
"What class should we cast audit on?" Harry asked, to the muffled snicker-chuckles of his closest friends.
"There is no point in us attending a class that we normally can," Susan Bones said, rudely acting like she had been part of this scene from the beginning. "As First-Years, we should attend something unusual!"
"Like Muggle Studies!" Hermione said excitedly, thrusting the textbook Muggles, like wizards but worse through Harry's face.
"Sounds good to me," Harry said, excitedly interested in the prospect of learning about the mysterious Muggles.
"But Harry, you were raised by Muggles, why are you so excited to learn about them?" Hermione asked.
"Just because I was raised by them, doesn't mean I understand them," Harry said. "For example, they don't make sense to me."
Everyone nodded and agreed.
"Well, enough lollygagging," Ron said. "Let's get this over with!"
With that, everyone adventured to the Muggle Studies class. The professor there was a young man, wearing weird muggle-shaped clothes and a nametag that seemed most unmagical in nature.
"Hello students," the man said brightly. "I am Tim the Muggle, professor of muggle studies!"
The Slytherins snickered at that, doubting a mere muggle could teach them anything. Frowning, Tim removed a can of pepper spray from one of the many pockets afforded to him by his muggle garb and sprayed some of the children with it. They started gasping and suffering from the effects of Muggle Pepper Spray.
"Not so unimpressive now, is it children?" Tim said, smirking at the prone students.
"We have learned our lesson sir," Neville said, truly humbled.
Tim accioed away the Pepper Spray, much to the relief of several of the students. "Now unfortunately, that was not intended to be the lesson today. Now, normally I would consider you good for the day and let you leave early, having learned a lesson-"
Everyone clapped and cheered, despite the fact that there was a "but" coming so obvious that Trelawney wouldn't have seen it.
"But as I am a Muggle, I will not be satisfied until you have learned the lesson I put in your syllabus!"
"But professor," Tracey Davis whimpered. "We're auditing your class, we didn't get magicked a syllabus."
"Ah ha!" Tim said, winking salaciously. "But Muggles don't have magic! They use staples!"
With that, Tim stapled the syllabus to everyone. Upon perusing through it, Harry noticed that the lesson for today was determining the difference between a muggle and a wizard. There was a footnote, explaining that sometimes Muggle was capitalized and sometimes it wasn't, depending on the phases of the moon. Harry was not the only one to notice something suspicious about the syllabus though.
"Professor!" Hermione said, raising one hand, while using the other hand to reapply a staple that had fallen out when she raised her hand. "Why is there no lesson plan for the two weeks following this class?"
"Ignore that," Tim said. "That's just foreshadowing."
"So," Tim then interrupted, "Let's get to the real lesson. Can anyone tell one of the 8 differences between muggles and wizards?"
"Muggles are significantly worse at magic!" Draco said, as he hated muggles.
"A common misconception!" Tim said. "But actually, muggles don't have ANY magic!"
"BWA?!" Draco gasped. "Then why does my father care about them? They are no more dangerous than a house-elf!"
"That's not true Draco," Tim said, spraying him in the face with some more pepper spray. "See, I am a muggle and you are now incapacitated."
"Gah!" Draco wheezed. "Muggle! Begone!"
The command failed, leaving everyone full of gasps.
"Muggles can't be teleported away with a command?" Harry wondered. "So they are not identical to house-elves!"
"I think only Draco thought that, mate," Ron said.
"I actually don't know what a house-elf is," Harry admitted. "I was raised by muggles."
Tim seemed extremely frightened when Harry said that, but managed to pass it off as him looking interested, relying on the wizard's inability to accurately ascertain muggle emotions.
"Hey, Tim, why'd you look so frightened when I said that?" Harry asked. Tim cursed the inaccurate narration.
"Time for a Muggle test!" Tim said, hoping to distract Harry. Unfortunately, while the phrase "Muggle Test" filled the rest of the children with supernatural dread, having spent several years in the muggle school system, doing both his and Dudley's tests, Harry felt pretty confident he could do whatever was entailed with a Muggle Test.
"What spell is required?" Hermione asked, frantically waving her wand about.
"Ah, point from Gryffindor," Tim said, to Hermione's shrieks of dismay. "You failed the oral part of the test- remembering that muggles don't use magic."
"He did say that earlier," Dean Thomas's friend said. Hermione nodded, flustered and beaten by the strange ways of the muggles.
"Now for the written!"
Several students gasp-wheezed at that, as wizards were often not taught how to write, because magic. With a flourish of his hand, several sheets of lined paper were flung onto the students desk, as if by magic. But, since Tim was a muggle, it was merely very accurate sleight of hand.
"What is wrong with this parchment?" Hannah Abbott inquired, peering blearily at the mysterious substance.
"It is muggle-lined paper," Tim said.
"How does one use this device?" Ron asked.
"You must use it to answer these questions!" Tim said, showing them questions.
Unfortunately, their wizarding quills were large and unwieldy, and unsuited for the precise task of writing in organized lines. Some students tried to charm their quills to write within the lines, but the complex task proved too challenging for the 1st year spells and their wands exploded. Hermione was nearly clever, when she transfigured her quill to a pen, but she foolishly forgot to keep her ink-pot out and the pen was empty. If only she had used a pencil!
"Ah, you poor wizards," Tim said, chuckling slightly as he wandered past their fumbling forms. He held a yardstick in his hand and used it to poke the failing students in the eyes with each wrong answer they wrote down.
Their cries of pain and distress jolted Harry down into a remembory and he drifted off into sad reminiscence. "This is so much like my last class with Professor Dementor," Harry mumbled as Tim sauntered by. "He made everyone so terrified. He was my favorite teacher."
"What?" Tim said, hearing only part of Harry's words. "A Dementor! Where?"
"Professor Dementor, sir," Blaise Zabini said.
Tim looked around frantically for this aforementioned Dementor, much like a squirrel would look around frantically for a cat, only to be pleased upon not seeing a cat, when suddenly instead of a cat, a dog would appear and snarl at the squirrel, which would frighten the squirrel into climbing a tree. Atop its perch of the elm, which had both branches and leaves, the squirrel would chitter with glee at the barking dog, only to chitter with terror when a cat erupted from the dog's mouth, catapulted as if from a catapult that flings cats, but in this case was merely a dog hiding a cat inside of it, and the cat would dash up the tree with a ferocious speed that the squirrel would be unable to match and it would try to jump down, but the dog would fling out it's mighty dog tongue and slurp the squirrel up in one smooth gulp. That is how Tim felt, but he didn't know it yet.
"I see no Professor Dementor. He is not here and probably does not exist," Tim said confidently.
"Wait," Harry said. "Something's not holding up here. Either you are a plot hole…or you're lying?"
"Impossible!" Professor Tim the Muggle said. "I am not a lying, or plot hole!"
"I think I get it Harry," Hermione said, brushing spilled ink out of her fingers. "Tim is a professor and should know about Professor Dementor! He's trying to pull something."
"No Hermione, that's not it," Ron said angrily.
"What do you mean Ronald?"
"Harry figured out something that really proves Tim is not on the up-and-up. What you're saying could be explained away."
"How?" Hermione demanded, furious that she didn't have a book to correct Ron's stupid face with.
"Tim just said he does not exist. That is a way of looking at things, since he's no longer alive. If Tim said he had NEVER existed, than maybe you would have a leg to stand on, but you are currently legless."
"Darn," Hermione said, fluttering her fury fiercely.
"No, the mistake Tim made was being confident," Harry said. "You cannot be a Muggle."
"A common misconception," Tim said weakly. "Muggles are occasionally confident, when the situation presents itself."
"But Muggles are never confident when it comes to being sure Dementors aren't around. Only wizards can see Dementors!"
"Gah!" Tim said, with an argh-like sound.
"Tim the Muggle…you are secretly a wizard!"
The entire classroom gasped and Tim had to pull out his wand and silencio the room until it was silent, causing the students in the room to gasp with the revelation.
"Wizard curse, Harry," Tim said. "Yes Harry. I am a wizard."
This was quite a surprising turn of events.