Chapter 8

[Vincent Crabbe]

"Come on, Crabbe, Goyle," Malfoy called from in front of them and Vincent had to make a conscious effort not to do or say something he'd regret. Mondays were always bad, but that one? That one might just be the worst Monday he'd had in quite some time.

Why?

Because classes were starting.

To explain further, classes were starting and neither Gregory nor Vincent himself were anywhere near ready. They had barely gotten started. Hell, he had spent a chunk of his time in the Potterverse with a shitty wand bond. It was a wonder that they'd gotten as far as they had in Hogwarts curriculum, really, and that was a sad fact to acknowledge when they had barely scratched the very beginning of it all.

Safe to say that neither of them were ready to start tackling mid-second-year stuff.

He felt like trying to find a way to reach one of the fanfic worlds that he'd read about where the inserted character excelled at shit from the very beginning and smack them. Being an adult didn't really help with subjects that weren't even a thing back in his own world, as it turned out. Hell, half the time he had to try and forget some of the things he did know because they would make learning magic harder. After all, as Gregory could attest to, trying to apply science and logic to magic was a recipe for failure most of the time.

Of course, he had to be the unlucky bastard with the realistically fucking hard learning process.

'At least Herbology is our first class today,' he reassured himself. 'Can't be that hard, can it?'

"Is it just me or are they slower than usual?" Parkinson asked, letting out that high-pitched, fake giggle that did nothing but grate on people's ears. Even some of the other Slytherins grimaced at the sound. The only exceptions were Malfoy, who chuckled, and Bulstrode…

Who let out what was probably the most forced laugh Vincent had ever heard.

"They've been a bit out of it, yeah," Malfoy commented, rolling his eyes. "At least they can still do basic things. I half expected them to drop my things," he added, sending a look back at them as if to check that they hadn't actually done that. Vincent couldn't even find it in himself to be too insulted.

Sure, they were acting as pack mules for the blond little shit, but it could be worse, overall. Wasn't like the things were that heavy. You could say whatever you wanted about the original Vincent Crabbe, but he was no weakling, and he was benefitting from that. Hell, maybe he was that strong from being Malfoy's muscle for who knew how long?

Food for thought.

Speaking of which, he wished he could have gotten some more breakfast. He'd stayed up a little late going over the things Gregory and him had studied, trying to practice some occlumency and all that. It might not have been the best idea, in hindsight. He'd been late for breakfast because of that, and from there, they'd been dragged away by the blond menace before they could finish eating.

"Just when you thought they couldn't get worse, huh?" Bulstrode asked, but it sounded all sorts of off. Vincent took note of Zabini rolling his eyes and Nott sighing. At the same time, both Malfoy and Parkinson seemed a little miffed at the girl's words. Not on Gregory and Vincent's behalf, he was sure. No, it was probably that they found the girl and her very bad attempts at ingratiating herself with them annoying.

He had some ideas about trying to befriend the girl, sure, but she had decided to make an already bad day worse so…

Vincent would let her be for now.

"I wouldn't be so quick to talk, Bulstrode," Greengrass commented, sounding almost bored. "You are no Ravenclaw yourself and we are about to get to class after the break. If you don't get eaten by one of the plants, I'll be impressed."

There were some snickers and giggles following that and Vincent almost felt bad for his thoughts and how embarrassed poor Bulstrode looked. Almost, but not quite. As it was, he just didn't have many fucks to give, really. He had his priorities set and, at that very moment, they were to try and not stir things up too much while they were probably weaker than the first years.

"You can't say I'm dumber than these two. Just look at them!" Bulstrode protested then, almost whining. She really wasn't doing herself any favors. On the other hand, she was drawing attention away from the two of them by being the easier target.

Her sacrifice would be remembered… maybe.

"At least Crabbe and Goyle know how to keep their mouths shut," Malfoy commented and Vincent was actually kind of surprised he said something half decent about them. "Granted, that's because they probably can't think of something to say, but still."

Ah, that made more sense, he supposed.

Vincent held back a sigh, closing his eyes for a moment before opening them again. As he did, he tried to clear his mind, which was… difficult. Turns out Snape wasn't bullshitting Harry in that regard. It was just that he had massively simplified it for whatever reason, to the point where it was incomprehensible.

It was all a matter of reaching a calm state of mind. True calm, that is. Some people cleared their minds by emptying their thoughts as much as possible. He couldn't quite do that, but he tried to do so in one of the other ways mentioned in the books, which was following trains of thought. Instead of trying to get rid of all the garbage that polluted one's mind, he instead tried to make it more organized, as it were.

He was snapped out of his exercise by a hand snapping fingers in front of his face.

"Is he even awake?" Parkinson asked and Vincent could see the next insult forming in her head.

'Why am I still here? Just to suffer?'

[}-o-{]

[Gregory Goyle]

"Now, as you all know, the transfiguration of animals to inanimate objects is not permanent and doesn't remove the need to sleep, eat, or drink from the creature you transformed," Professor McGonagall lectured the quiet class. Only the sound of quills scratching against parchment could be heard around. Well, that and the calls of a dozen tiny critters that lazed on top of the desk of each student that is.

The sound of a croak stood out for Gregory.

He was pulled out of his notation to look at the rather large bullfrog that sat right next to him over the desk. Beady yellow eyes stared at him unblinkingly as the amphibian continued to croak away every few seconds. It was rather distracting, to be honest.

Gregory guessed he couldn't complain too much, either way. All the other lent animals for that class were equally annoying. Only the students who owned their own pets and brought them here seemed to enjoy some small reprieve given that theirs were probably trained and far more domesticated.

Except for Longbottom's toad who croaked far louder and more frequently than all the others. The poor kid had all but given up on taking notes and was just grabbing his head in despondent despair. He had never been so glad to have to be next to Malfoy, which meant that he was on the other side of the room from Longbottom.

"-It is for this reason that the arts of simple transfiguration are better done towards the more… mundane of creatures. Given that the naturally resilient magical beasts will most probably throw the enchanting out of control. This would almost positively end in unexpected results or, more commonly, no results at all," the woman continued, suddenly snapping him out of his musing and forcing him to write as fast as he could to catch up.

It was all interesting stuff after all, even though most of it flew far above his head. Gregory didn't know if the reason for that was because he was far behind with the material – since he had only barely touched the first 3 chapters of the introductory book for first years – or if it was simply another lack of aptitude like with Charms.

He hoped that it was the former because he didn't know if he could deal with another subject as infuriatingly vague as Charms.

"Now, I want you all to try the spell we practiced last semester and transform the animal next to you into an inanimate object of your preference. I hope that all of you have at least kept up with your studies during the winter break," Professor McGonagall said, eliciting a round of quiet groans from the alumni.

He would have joined them, if he hadn't been too occupied sweating bullets. Gregory had absolutely no idea how to do that spell after all. With a quick glance backward, he looked towards his fellow transmigrator, Vincent. The other boy just shook his head at him with a grimace.

'Right, he doesn't know the spell either, this won't be good,' Gregory thought while looking at the class.

Most of them had already taken their wands out and tapped the little critters next to them by incanting "Vera Verto" after the last touch. Without any other clues except what little he could see from others' attempts, Gregory sighed internally. Delaying it would just make things worse at that point, so… 'Here goes nothing.'

His first instinct was to imagine the frog and try to change it to something more simple. Magic, after all, seemed to work like an enzyme. As long as one had a result in mind and the process, magic acted like added energy to make something that should be impossible, possible. It was a crutch to bypass all the steps in between.

There was a logic to it, one that was completely alien and mysterious, but it was there in the end. No matter what Vincent had to say about the matter. It was theoretically possible to change and rearrange all atoms of an object to make another thing, even though it was, practically speaking, incredibly unlikely. Just the amount of energy needed for that was ludicrous.

But that still didn't make it false. Once everything was reduced to their most basic elements. Even a frog, a human, or a cup weren't more than different arrangements of molecular weights and complexity.

Gregory pulled out all he knew about iron. He gave up pretty quickly on something as ludicrous as imagining every atom and their structure. That was just madness after all. Instead, he simplified the process. His mind conjured the image of the frog, weight, and shape made of flesh and organs, changing into a completely different material and structure. He imagined how iron felt. How it tasted. How cold it felt to the touch. He put the thought of equations and math in his head, but simplified to the most basic elements, and then added the ever-wondrous variable that was called magic, trusting it to fill in the blanks that were left over. A big 'x' that allowed one to be equal to two.

One tap. Two taps. Three taps.

"Vera Verto!" he exclaimed.

To his immediate surprise, the spell didn't end up with the frog exploding. The left side of the creature had gained a metallic shade, making it panic and try to move away, but it just couldn't do it while half of its body was immobile.

'Did that actually work?' he asked himself.

"Not quite there yet, but a remarkable improvement from last semester, Mr Goyle, Mr. Crabbe," a voice called from his side startling him. He turned to see the professor right next to him, giving his frog an appreciative nod. Then Gregory turned to see his friend's work. A bird whose feathers had turned into an interesting shade of wood, while the wings seemed to have flattened in an odd way. 'Like a plane's,' he noted to himself.

"It seems that at least you two have kept up with your studies over winter. Well done. A point for Slytherin each," she claimed, which earned them some actually appreciative sounds from their fellow Slytherins and a grumble from their Gryffindor counterparts. Even Malfoy offered both a half-assed nod as he continued working on his own spell. The blond kid had succeeded, it seemed. The bunny he had next to him had now transformed into a golden lamp. Which continued to get slightly more elaborate as Malfoy continued pointing his wand at it. Flower designs and intricate patterns grow from it.

Gregory focused back on his half-metal half-panicking frog, intent on getting this down by the end of the class.

Transfiguration wasn't that bad. He decided in the privacy of his mind.

[}-o-{]

'Someone end me. Please.'

"-Now, I know what you are thinking," the dirty gold-haired man prowled and preened through the entirety of the classroom like the world's most prideful peacock as he continued his monologue. Occasionally he'd flash a smile or wink to one of the far too young female preteens, who sighed and swooned at the attention. "How could I, alone and outnumbered as I was, get out of such a tricky situation, being at the center of the biggest nest of dragons India has ever registered? Well, I will tell you, it wasn't easy, but you should know by now how I am, right? Those herbs were the only cure for the unfortunate madame. And I am a man of gold heart and iron will after all. I couldn't just leave a damsel in distress to their luck when I could do something about it, could I?" Gilderoy said with a wink who made some of the girls giggle between themselves.

The rest of them, the last bastion of sanity in the soul-sucking prison called classroom, just wanted these horrible horrible two hours to end.

Whose idea was to put this quack as the last period of the day?

It had been going so well too…

Herbology was monotonous, but not too bad. Most of it had been spent learning about different fertilizers for their growing Mandrakes. It wasn't exactly the most exciting of times, but it was interesting how some of the ingredients for potions were properly grown and treated.

Transfiguration had ended with a pleasant surprise. While neither Gregory nor Vincent had quite managed to make a proper full transfiguration. The first steps for it were there. Which was far more than Gregory had expected, if he was honest. Granted, other than the both of them and Neville, no other students had much of a problem pulling it off. But different from them who had been practicing this spell for around half a year, this had been their first try at it and they were still more than a year behind when it came to curriculum.

Gregory would take whatever wins he could.

Lunch had come and gone without much fanfare. They were rewarded for their hard-earned points by not getting bothered or insulted for a full hour.

Lucky them.

What wasn't so lucky was what came after. He thought that Charms was probably the most infuriating thing he would ever find in the magic world he now formed part of. After all, it was magic at its worst, as far as he was aware, all vagueness and lack of logic.

Oh, how wrong Gregory had been.

That spot belonged to this… specimen called Gilderoy Lockhart. The most banal and self-absorbed person he had the regretful pleasure of meeting in any of the two worlds he had inhabited. The man had spent the better part of the hour talking about nonsensical stories about himself; ruining, in record time, any expectations he had of them learning anything useful here.

It wasn't until almost the end of the first hour that the man seemed to remember that this was a class and deemed them important enough to learn a new spell.

Ictu Alba.

Which turned out to be just another chance for him to show off, as all the spell did was make something white shine for a second. Something Gilderoy usually used on his teeth – and sometimes clothes and other things – during photoshoots as the man had "confessed" himself in mock whispers to the class.

Now, fifteen minutes into the second hour and just as many headaches growing in his brain, the man had lost himself in another tangent and started sharing with them one of his grand adventures across the magic lands of the world.

Of course, Gregory knew basically nothing about the magic world itself. So he couldn't say with full certainty if what the man was saying was pure bullshit or actual truth, but given the last hour he had gotten to know the man, he was biased towards the former. Certainly gave weight to what Vincent had told him was 'canon', that was for sure.

"Ehem," someone fake coughed from the door, providing a much-needed respite to his rotting brain cells. A small man with a white mustache stood at the front of the door. The professor – For what else could someone dressed like that be? – was just short enough that Gregory would have suspected dwarfism if it wasn't for the odd nose shape and slightly pointy ears, denoting the man as something other than human. "Mr. Lockhart, I just wanted to inform you that you are already half an hour behind schedule. Your booking for the battle arena will run out soon. I know you must be incredibly busy with the lessons you are imparting to our students, but perhaps a more practical approach is also needed?"

"Ah, Professor Flitwick! Of course, of course. I usually lose track of time when it comes to imparting my life lessons to my adoring fans. I am ever so sorry. Well, kids, time to move on and put all that I have taught you to practice. And remember if you want to know more, my books are readily available for sale in any Council official libraries of the country," the man droned out as half of the class just rushed to be the first out of there, while the other half just swooned and giggled like maniacs.

[}-o-{]

[Vincent Crabbe]

'So, there were more duel classes than the one we were shown in canon? Shouldn't there have been more scenes about that? Then again, Alternate Universe shenanigans seem to be a thing here so…' he mused to himself as he watched a batch of duels happening. Beside him, the Slytherins were mocking Gregory for his "duel" against Parvati Patil in hushed whispers so they wouldn't be overheard. The Gryffindors had no such qualms, however, not that it made any difference.

'Unified front?' he wondered, glancing towards his fellow snakes to his side. 'Could be. Gotta remember that if we ever stand up for ourselves, to at least not do it in public.'

Back to the duel, Patil was… very easily beating Gregory. She wasn't absolutely crushing him though, nor was she torturing the poor bastard. She was just… taking her time, maybe practicing spells, so he guessed that was as good a duel as they could be expected to have.

'We stand no chance here. We know a handful of spells and I don't even know if any of them would even do anything here,' he thought, looking at Gregory finally being put out of his misery by a jinx that made him stumble off the dueling field. When the teacher – Flitwick, of course, since Lockhart was useless – helped Gregory out, the boy shuffled his way back to the seats off to the side where the Slytherins were.

Vincent didn't say anything, but he did give his friend a commiserating smile and a pat on the back, getting a grunt in response.

"Vincent Crabbe and Ronald Weasley, if you could please come to the field?!" Lockhart called, with that annoying, chipper, and smarmy voice of his. It made him want to punch a few teeth off of him. He couldn't get his memory erased soon enough. He was just that annoying.

As he stood up, he ignored the whispers behind his back and moved to his side of the dueling field. Gazing towards Weasley, he considered his very limited and inadequate options. Could he even do anything in a duel with the spells he had? He could try to use the Levitation Charm on the redhead's clothes, he supposed, but the thing wasn't very strong, especially when there was a living being around, or at least a wizard. Gregory and him had tried to levitate each other while practicing the spell, after all, and all they'd managed was some tugs here and there.

It wasn't useless, Vincent guessed, but it would be nowhere near enough to beat someone in a duel.

He didn't have anything else that he could reasonably use. 'Unless…' he thought then, some ideas appearing in his mind and he tried to see if they were feasible. While he was at it though, he absently followed all the steps for the duel to get going. Position yourself, take the starting stance, and…

"Start!"

Immediately, Weasley shouted his first spell, which simply sent some sparks Vincent's way. They were fast, but not too fast, so he just stepped to the side. He was still trying to work on a plan, so he'd try and dodge for the moment. It helped that they weren't good enough not to very obviously broadcast every move they made. Or, at least, no one that he'd seen was. The spells were also, obviously, not all that bad. So, all that worked in his favor, at least. He didn't know any spells to defend himself, after all, at least without anything to levitate in front of him.

He could have tried to use the levitation trick, of course, but that'd have been a waste of a perfectly good ace up his sleeve. No, Vincent wanted to try and see if he could actually do something other than grasp at straws. Granted, there was no guarantee of that even being possible, but it wasn't like he was risking much by waiting a bit. Losing spectacularly was probably what was expected of him anyway.

In the meantime, he followed one of his ideas and moved ever so slightly forward while dodging spells. Which was more complicated than one would think. Most of the spells were pretty quick and going closer to the source made the task of avoiding them all the harder. On top of that, Weasley was an absolute wildcard of a caster, mainly because of his broken wand and the randomness of the thing, Vincent would bet. Sometimes a spell would fly weirdly to the side of the aimed direction, or it'd come out with a delay or it'd do something entirely different from what it was supposed to.

The small crater on the rock floor to his side certainly attested to that.

'Close enough,' Vincent decided when he was close enough that Weasley had gotten him with a few sparks to his arm. They didn't do much other than scare and maybe warm up the limb a little but with the redhead? One never knew, he might just burn him alive… ironically enough, considering the fate of the original Crabbe.

'Now, how did it go?' he wondered. 'Ah, right.'

"Ictu Alba," he mumbled, moving his wand like the teacher had demonstrated some time before.

"What?" Weasley asked out loud, visibly confused as he saw Vincent finally go to cast a spell, only to see him aiming at himself. Then, the redhead committed the mistake of following the direction of the wand towards his mouth. Vincent grinned at him then, channeling as much power into the Shine Spell and almost wishing that it'd go slightly wrong for extra effect. So long as it didn't send him to the Infirmary, at least.

He almost laughed when a bright flash came from his teeth of all things as if an old camera had gone off inside his mouth.

"Ah!" Weasley exclaimed, bringing his free hand up to rub his eyes. Vincent wasn't looking at that though, no, he was looking at the other hand. He couldn't be sure since he wasn't that close, but he thought the fingers holding the wand looked a little loose. 'Distracted?'

"Wingardium Leviosa," he chanted, going through the wand motions as sharply as he could and once more putting as much power as he could behind the spell. Sure enough, there was a sharp tug on the wooden stick, which was enough to lodge it off the hand of the redheaded boy. Vincent then ignored the confused sound and went to cast again. "Wingardium Leviosa," he chanted again, and the wand flew off to the side a bit.

There was a moment of silence then and he let his lips pull up into a proud smile.

"... Is that match?" he asked then, seeing as the wand was out of the field.

"... It sure is, Mr. Crabbe," Flitwick said, looking very pleased for whatever reason. "Very good job, I have to say. A Shine Charm and two Levitation Charms. I can't say I've seen that before in all my years, that's for sure. Five points to Slytherin for very creative spell use."

The half-goblin's words were music to his ears.

"I-Ah, exactly Filius, exactly! Well done, my boy. It seems that you had managed to grasp the lesson I tried to impart to you all when I taught you the spell. Very well done, Mr. Crove. Naturally, not as well as I would have done, but that is to be expected," Gilderoy continued, hastily getting on top of the arena and congratulating him with a pat on the back while pushing Vincent out of the proverbial spotlight. "Now, as Mr. Crove has shown you, this was the true use of the spell and one of the many ways to get out of difficult spots against powerful enemies. Of course, not something that I have to use often but-"

The man continued droning on and on about the spell then, but Vincent didn't really care. Neither did he care about the fact that Lockhart kept getting his last name wrong every single time while at it. Honestly, he should be pissed about that, but all he could feel was a sense of accomplishment. Not even Gilderoy would be able to ruin this for him.

That is, until he realized that he now had to go back to the Slytherins… after that small spectacle. Well, they were weak spells, right? There was no reason for anyone to make a fuss about things.

Right?

[} Chapter End {]

Adrian: I'm sure this win won't mean bad things for Crabbe.

Arc: Like I always say, if they didn't want to have a hard time, they should have reincarnated with cheats. Jokes aside, these two had a pretty successful first day, but that comes with its own drawbacks too. They still have a lot to catch up on.

Adrian: Ah, suffering from success. Sounds about right. Well, I hope you guys had fun seeing these two suff- I mean, going about their first day.

Random Arc Question?: What is your favorite Magical Beast?

I really like the Thunderbird since its appearance in the movies. Such a cool, majestic creature.

Adrian: I like the runespoor, personally. I just fell in love with the hydra-like creature as soon as I saw the scene of it on Youtube.

Discord Link: discord .gg/UTDransjJZ