I was talking about some point of Harry Potter errata with people in one of my usual haunts when somebody mentioned how much they’d like to see Ginny Weasley and Amy Pond be ginger and awesome together. Naturally this got me thinking and while it’s no where close to being complete, and I doubt I will bother to flesh it out, I wrote the following snippet at work today.
“Let me just see that for a moment,” the Doctor said, snatching Harry’s wand out of his hand before the young wizard had a chance to react. “Now let’s see what my wand,” he waved his sonic screwdriver around for effect, “has to say about this.” he pointed the screwdriver at the wand and flipped it on.
“What is that thing?” Hermione demanded as she pointed her wand back at the Doctor.
“Calm down, just a screwdriver, it won’t hurt anything.”
“Doesn’t look like any screwdriver I’ve ever seen,” Harry said.
“That’s because it’s sonic,” the Doctor replied in an exasperated voice.
“But electronics don’t work in Hogwarts!” Hermione insisted.
“Mine does,” the Doctor cooly replied. He finished with Harry’s wand and tossed it back. “Here you go, like I said, only took a moment. Now what do we have here…Holly, a feather of some sort inside…is that…” He waved the screwdriver over Harry and stared at it again. “Of course, I should have known. It’s so obvious.”
“What?” Amy asked. “What is so obvious?”
“Rowling Radiation, this whole place is dripping with the stuff, including them.” He lazily pointed at Harry, Hermione, and Ron.
“What’s Rowling Radiation?” Rory asked.
“Very old, very powerful stuff. Nobody uses it any more because it’s tricky and unpredictable. To anyone who doesn’t know any better manipulating it…” the doctor paused to adjust a setting on his screwdriver. “would seem like magic.” With a flick of his wrist a dozen red roses sprouted from the end of the sonic. He handed them to Hermione who grudginly accepted them. “But most importantly, not magic, there’s no such thing.”
“But what about the werewolves?” Ron protested.
“Oh werewolves, they’re nothing more than rubbish aliens.”
“You’ve met werewolves then?” Amy asked.
“Yep, not too far from here either as a matter of fact.”
“But magic breaks all the laws of physics. It can’t just be some form of radiation,” Hermione said.
“That you know. Einstein was very clever, but he left out some of the more fiddily bits I told him about.”
“You talked to Einstein?” Harry asked.
“Of course I have, time traveller remember?”
“Who’s Einstein?” Ron asked.
“A Muggle scientist, but that’s not important right now,” Hermione explained.
“Oh he’s a sharp one, I thought you said this was a school.”
“It’s a wizarding school, and Ron’s from an all wizard family, he’d had limited exposure to the Muggle world.”
“That’s awfully limited,” the Doctor pointed out. “Albert Einstein was one of the most clever humans in all your short history, to not even know he existed…”
“We can talk about the state of wizard educations later,” Harry snapped. “Right now I want to know what you’re doing in the Gryffinder Common Room, and what exactly that box is.”
“Ah, yes, well, we came here in the blue box you see.”
“But why?”
“Why? What a stupid, silly question…no, hang on, it can be a brilliant question, sometimes the best question, everything brilliant ever done anywhere started at why. But in this case, silly and stupid. Why? Why not! I’ve been from one end of time and space to the other, so why not come to this little plot on your silly little planet.”
“It stopped here and the Doctor doesn’t know why,” Amy chimed in.
“Ron, Hermione, stay here, I’ll go get Dumbledore, he can make sense out of this,” Harry told the others.
“No need Harry, I was already made aware of our new guests arrival.” Dumbledore said as he strode into the Common Room. “Good evening Doctor, it is an honor to finally meet a Time Lord,” he said with a bow.
“The pleasure’s all mine,” the Doctor replied. “But I’m afraid I didn’t catch your name, or how you know who I am.”
Dumbledore laughed, “I am Professor Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of this school. And even those of us in the cloistered Wizarding world know about the Oncoming Storm…or at least those of us who care to know such things.”
The doctor made a sour expression, “That’s not me anymore,” he muttered.
“Why don’t we continue this discussion in my office. I am confident I will be able to answer any question you might have.”
“Professor?” Harry asked. “What do we do about his blue box?”
“It’s not harming anything where it is, in fact it makes a lovely addition to the room’s decor I think. Now come along Harry. I’m sure you Ms. Granger and Mr. Weasley would like to hear what the Doctor has to say as well.”
——-
And that’s what I got. For the record this takes place somewhere during the Half-Blood Prince and after the most recent Christmas Special, but before the Impossible Astronaut. Maybe I’ll figure out what this snippet belongs to, maybe not, but it was fun to write just as a thing on it’s own.