‘Freedom Isn’t Free’
14/11/2015
Case Number: 67859290
Case Officer: Potter, Harry J
Secondary: Longbottom, Neville
Incident Description: Unknown Magical Effects
Note on Effects:
Sudden removal of clothing
Location:
Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Victims:
Not to be named, due to status as students
Circumstances:
About 7:35am on Friday 13 November 2015, first instance of unknown effect occurred/recorded. Victim, a male 6th year Hufflepuff student eating breakfast in Great Hall. No outward suspicion or hint of magical instances occurred. No light, sounds, or magical energy observed by witnesses, or detected in post-incident investigation.
Victim observed eating breakfast as usual. Victim’s robes, jumper, uniform shirt and tie all disappeared.
First instance, suspected prank. No further action taken as perpetrator not identified.
About 7:47am, on Saturday 14 November 2015, second instance occurred. Same circumstances. Victim, female 6th year Ravenclaw student. Undergarments undisturbed. Great embarrassment caused.
Headmistresses McGonagall allocated DADA Professor, and former Auror, Professor Harry Potter as the Case Officer in the investigation due to significant previous history in magical investigation and law enforcement. (Neville’s note: You sure it didn’t have anything to do with the fact that you couldn’t stop laughing at the ‘prank’?) (HJP: It was purely based on my extensive history of investigations. I did not laugh. This is a highly serious matter.) (HJG: No one bought your coughing fit, Harry. No one. The Headmistress least of all.) (HJP: How did you get access to my case files?)
Professor Longbottom of Herbology allocated as Secondary. Professor Hermione Granger-Potter of Transfiguration not allocated to assist, save in a research capacity. (HJG: Try and stop me, Potter.) (HJP: I am.)
Case Officer compiled list of avenues of enquiry for follow up:
Victims,
Nearby witnesses,
Hogwarts attending Weasley’s (NL: This will be good.)
Hogwarts attending Potter’s (NL: This will be even better.)
Follow up report:
Victims only known to each other in passing. No direct links, no jilted ex-lovers. No involvement with any troublemaking. Both students pure-blooded. Neither student known to have any family with direct links to extremist views. Both student’s excellent students with outstanding records. (HJG: Lily could be next!) (HJP: Seriously, how do you keep getting access to my case files? And I noticed you didn’t mention Sirius.) (HJG: You are terrible at keeping your office locked. Besides, we live together. I have access. It’s literally a spell we learnt in first year. And Sirius would do well to be a comprehensive student with an outstanding record, thank you very much. Takes after his father. And his namesake.) (HJP: You married the father. And you okayed the name!) (NL: I’m so glad I agreed to help. Ron will love this.) (HJP & HJG: NEVILLE!)
Nearby witnesses: Entire school. Canvassed, but nothing seen. Nothing to report.
Weasley’s all claimed innocence, Checked catalogue, no evidence of any WWW products that could reproduce the effects. (HJG: If only the minority owner of the company had access to the R&D department…) (HJP: If only…)
Potters would never do such a thing. (HJG: Do it properly, Harry.) (HJP: I did.) (NL: No. I did. Both claimed innocence. Nothing found to incriminate.)
Update 15/11/2015:
About 12:13pm on Sunday 15 November 2015, third instance occurred. Three students. One a 6th-year male Slytherin amongst the victims. Child is a blonde haired, blue eyed, son of a ferret (HJG: HARRY!) (NL: Priceless.) Father of victim has threatened school with legal action. Threat not taken seriously. New safety protocol, teachers are to run diagnostic magical tests on all food at mealtimes, before it can be consumed.
Panic beginning to set in amongst student population. Bets observed being taken, spearheaded by Finnegan, assisted by Georgina Weasley and Felina Weasley. (HJG: You can name them as suspects, you know?) (HJP: I am a trained Auror, Hermione. I know how to do my work. I know how to run an investigation.) (NL: Didn’t you ask me how to differentiate the twin children of your best mate?) (HJP: Someone should have let Luna name his kids. AND I can always appoint another Secondary.) (NL: No, you can’t, the Headmistress appointed me. And Luna DID name them.) (HJG: How did you not know that, Harry?)
Certain students have food owled to them to avoid the situation. The school owls have been seen fleeing the school to avoid the arduous journey of having to bring entire meals with them.
Howlers arriving from angry parents.
Headmistress had first meeting with investigation team. Disappointed in evidence gleaned so far.
Investigative Assistant Granger:
Current research has revealed no spell that would cause the removal of clothing, and leave no magical signature of it occurring. While likely that the issue is the food, current safety protocols are having no effect. Zero magical profile on any of the food that can be detected.
Update 16/11/2015:
About 6:15pm on Sunday 16 November, 2015, Fourth instance occurred. Four separate students, all Sixth years, one from each house affected. Students in panic. Several Ravenclaws in hunger strike. Hufflepuffs in a competition to see who can have it happen to them next. Gryffindors placing bets. Slytherins thus far are strategically trying to poison each other, to make sure others suffer the ‘Suddenly Shirtless Soup’.
CO and Secondary to approach the House Elves. (HJG: They are NOT to blame for this Potter.) (HJP: Could be. Might be the House Elf uprising.)
Meeting with Hogwarts House Elves occurred about 9:15am on Monday 17 November 2015. Persons present:
House Elves of Hogwarts
Freed House Elves of Hogwarts
Headmistress McGonagall
Harry J Potter
Neville Longbottom (HJP: Can you get a middle name, Neville?) (NL: I have a middle name.) (HJP: Really? What is it?) (NL: What’s what?)
Hermione Jean Granger-Potter
Winky, the Hogwarts Representative of the Together Helping Realise Elfish Welfare - Union Participants (HJP: I still CANNOT believe we went from SPEW to THREW UP). (HJG: Even I’ll admit that this one is a bit much.)
Meeting was highly interesting. ( NL: That’s putting it mildly.) (HJP: It was a fiasco.) (HJG Unconventional, but amazing.)
House Elves have a 55 percent freedom rate at Hogwarts. Largest collection of freed elves in Magical Britain.
This number has gone up quickly since the start of the school year. In following, no less than nine having ‘accepted’ freedom and having joined the Union since the commencement of the school year. All nine newly freed members unhappy with freedom. Noted wearing school student uniforms, noted to be shirts, robes and ties of all four houses.
Appearances made that clothing that has gone missing from student body, has appeared on numerous Elves, setting them free. (HJG: Oh noooo…). Elves in uproar. Remaining Elves still in state of servitude threatening a general strike until the incidents cease. Headmistress McGonagall has assuaged their fears that the perpetrator will soon be caught. (HJG: Hopefully not too soon…)
Investigative Assistant Granger:
Research dictates that the spell has somehow crossed over into incredibly powerful Elvish Magic. For this reason, it cannot be detected by human magic users. Highly clever. It also means that whoever cast the spell may not have realised that Elvish Magic does not follow Diochlatic's First Principle. (HJP: Of course. His first. I remember that. Who wouldn’t?) (HJG: For someone so incredibly bright and talented, you would do well to learn theory.) (HJP: I do well having NOT learnt theory.) When weaving a spell, one must be careful to apply the correct procedures. If failure to do so occurs, then matter will be transferred, NOT created.
Line of enquiry:
Students with sympathies to House Elf freedom movements. (HJG: I don’t know any. I promise.)
THREW UP member Winky assures investigators that they remain peaceful in their efforts to recruit elves to freedom. (HJG: Recruit is such a weird word for that.)
Update 17/11/2015:
About 12:13pm on Tuesday 17 November 2015, fifth instance occurred. (HJP: And it was a doozy.) (NL: You can say that again.) (HJG: I agree.)
Victims were basically everyone in the great hall. The genius was in that the spell waited until most people had consumed some food, but then it went live. Most of the student body, and some of the teachers, were affected. (HJP: It was bedlam.) (NL: It was. That said, it has put to bed the rumour about your dragon tattoo. It was a broomstick and a book! You’re a softie, Harry.) (HJP: Shut it Nev! Can’t wait to hear about all the talk about the Devils Snare you have tattooed on your chest.) (HJG: You can both shut it. I’m the one who now has to deal with all the fresh doe-eyed looks from all the students at Harry. As if that wasn’t occurring enough already.) (HJP: Easy for you to say. Your clothes stayed on. I’ll be honest, I may have suspected you at that moment.) (NL: Same.) (HJG: I’m perfectly innocent thank you very much! Though, I might have indirectly had something to do with it.)
At that time, a Fifth Year Gryffindor, who will be grounded for a year, Lily POTTER, stepped up and claimed credit for the entire situation. (HJG: I’m impressed. Terrified. But impressed.) (HJP: She’s your daughter, I thought you would be proud.) (HJG I never said I wasn’t proud.) (HJP: I’ve never been more proud of anything in my life, though I thought you might send her the way of Voldemort when she stood up.)
After giving a brief, but impassioned speech about the right of House Elves, and other anti slavery rhetoric, she was taken to the Headmisstresses office for discussion. (HJG: Namely, HOW did she managed to do it.)
All Hogwarts House Elves have now been freed, wittingly or unwittingly. Negotiations occurring between the School Administration and THREW UP in regards to working conditions moving forwards.
Perpetrator:
Lily POTTER (HJP: Lily GRANGER.) (HJG: Lily Granger-Potter. Can’t blame this entirely on me. That’s both of us.) (HJP: She’s definitely our kid.) (HJG: She is.) (HJP: Should we have stopped at two?) (HJG: Don’t…)
Punishment:
Appropriate punishment in this instance has been handed to POTTER’s Head of House. Head of Gryffindor, Professor Potter, after serious deliberation, has decided that it would be in the student’s best interest to be handed to her mother for punishment. (HJG: Oh, you did not, Potter.) (HJP: I just did.) (HJG: Why do I always have to be the bad guy?) (HJP: Because she looks up at me with those big doe eyes and I fall to pieces. Every. Single. Time.) (HJG: We will punish her together.) (HJP: Nope! McGonagall gave me discretion! This one is on you! Love you! Bye!) (HJG: You are so dead, Potter.) (NL: I’m actually scared for you, Harry.)
Job Complete.
(NL: Now that I've investigated with big name former Auror Harry Potter, I must put my name forward to handle your incoming murder at the hands of... a freak accident. Not calling you a freak, Hermione. I promise.)
Fin