History in the Making
Garrick Septimus, Gary Seven, Harry Potter, Marek Ilumian, the being with more names than Dumbledore had titles, had a smile on his face as he made his way to breakfast at Hogwarts.
He had just seen the Marauders, Evans sisters, Snape family, and guest off to the Ministry for their portkey to Geneva, Switzerland.
It not actually being a Hogsmeade weekend, there were more students than usual on a Saturday moving around the castle. As one of the Professors on watch (there was a rotation) he moved around the castle, providing a visible presence to ensure that students who might get ideas of going out of control might change their minds.
Gary thought with amusement that the parties most likely to trigger chaos were already out of the castle.
Still, he made his way with a desultory walk around the castle, greeting students, answering the odd question here and there, and generally making his presence obvious.
As he was walking down one corridor, he heard a droning voice and went to investigate. And, there in the History classroom, was the ghost of Cuthbert Binns lecturing in front of an empty room about the Goblin Rebellion of 1752.
After watching Binns talk for quite a few minutes, Gary couldn't help himself. "Professor?" he said at one point, interrupting the flow of speech.
The Professor, regardless of myths to the contrary, would actually interact with others if they got his attention. And, for some reason, this one word got his attention. The Professor turned. "Yes?" And then, with more curiosity than expected, Binns asked, "Who are you?"
"I am Garrick Septimus, this year's Defense Professor," Gary replied.
Binns looked confused for a moment. "But the Defense Professor is Aleric Warren."
Gary chuckled. "Actually… no. What year is this?"
Binns considered that question. "1923."
Gary sighed. "I'm sorry to have to tell you – but this is 1975."
Binns was confused. "How can that be? I remember it being 1923 quite clearly."
"Well, perhaps that was when you were alive. You are aware that you currently exist as a ghost, right?" Gary asked curiously.
Binns looked very confused now. "How can that be? I remember just yesterday having tea in the staffroom. When it was time for class, I came directly here. And then …."
Gary sighed. While in most universes Binns was quite aware that he was dead, apparently in this one such was not the case. "I'm sorry, Cuthbert Binns. But that was in 1923. You have been dead for fifty years."
Binns asked, "Then why am I still teaching? History is a living thing. I have received no replacement which would allow me to stop teaching."
Gary replied, "Actually, as long as you teach, they will not replace you. It is cheaper to allow you to teach than to pay a living witch or wizard a wage."
Binns was actually outraged at that. "Are you saying that I am not being paid for my services?"
Gary shrugged. "I don't think so – I would have to ask the Headmaster."
"Well, get Dippet down here then."
"Actually, it's Albus Dumbledore that is the Headmaster now."
Binns looked at Gary for a long moment. "Then send for this Dumbledore."
Gary cast a Patronus and, having encoded his voice, a white stag was then seen traveling at speed through the castle.
Shortly thereafter Albus Dumbledore made his way into the History classroom. "Garrick. You requested I come?"
Gary pointed to the History professor. Albus turned and was a little surprised to see the ghost aware of him. Immediately Binns asked, "You are the Headmaster?"
Albus replied, "I am."
"I must ask: What wage am I currently being paid and to whom is it being sent?"
Albus was taken aback for a moment by the question. "Actually, your wage was paid, from what I understand, to your grandson and then to your great-granddaughter after your passing. When she married in 1967 and no longer held the Binns name, the Board decided that she was no longer entitled and therefore ordered it discontinued."
At that, Binns threw down his ghostly chalk (it disappeared as it was a construct of his own body) and crossed his arms. "If those spendthrifts think that they can get away with stealing the rightful amount due for my services, then I find that I have no reason to maintain my position as History professor at Hogwarts. I quit!"
Binns turned and started stalking out. Before he got to the door, however, Binns had disappeared into swirling lights. To Gary, he sensed that Binns had been send to his reward. He could only comment, "Well, Albus. I guess you need to find a History professor and quick."
Albus looked at Gary and asked, "What happened?"
Gary recalled what he had seen and then the conversation he had with the ghost. When he was done, Albus sighed. "Well, we need an emergency meeting with the staff."
And so at 11:15 the entire staff, sans the Caretaker and the Gamekeeper, were in the Headmaster's office. Minerva finally asked, "What is this all about?"
Albus looked at Gary and asked, "Do you want to explain?"
Gary looked amused and mildly affronted all at once. "What? It's not my fault!"
Albus chuckled and replied, "I choose to believe otherwise. Why don't you tell them what happened?"
Gary sighed. "Fine. We need to find a new Professor." His answer was short and to the point.
Horace was the first to voice his concern. "Certainly you're not leaving us already? Defense has been much better this year from all reports from my students." There were several echoing sentiments.
Gary shook his head. "No. I'm here through the end of the year. Albus knows that and is already looking for the next Defense professor – I can't stay any longer. But it's not Defense that's the problem. It's History."
Vector asked with some surprise, "History? What happened to Professor Binns?"
Albus motioned Gary to answer. "I may or may not have gotten into a conversation with him as he was teaching to an empty room and I might or might not have alerted him that he was actually dead. But that's not why he quit."
Chattering, the Runes professor asked, "And why did he quit?"
Gary motioned to Albus and said, "Oh, no. This one is not on me. He didn't decide to quit because he found out he was dead."
Albus sighed. "I have to admit that this is true. During the talk a few things came to light and Cuthbert took offense that the Board had discontinued paying his salary to his descendents he took offense and started walking out. It was then that he seemed to disappear onto his next great adventure."
The staff was taken aback. "Why would they do that?" Minerva asked. "As long as he was employed as a Professor, the salary should have been paid. Ghost or not."
Albus shrugged. "The Board saw it otherwise. I will have to inform them that the History position must immediately be filled and the salary for such is required. But now we need to find a candidate. Does anyone have any ideas?"
Several names were floated out in the next few minutes and each one was rejected for one reason or another. Bagshot was too blind, Lovegood was too eccentric, others were too involved with their current jobs. And, unfortunately, no one in recent years had received a History NEWT. The Board's lack of action was coming back to bite them.
Gary, as he sat in back of the meeting, knowing the fewest people in Magical Britain, chuckled. Everyone turned to him. "What is so amusing?" Minerva asked acerbically.
"It's too bad that Fortescue has started that ice cream shoppe. From what I understand he is quite the history aficionado and loves the subject almost as much as he loves ice cream."
Everyone paused at that observation. Albus and Minerva looked at each other. Albus commented thoughtfully, "He would be almost the perfect candidate."
Minerva replied, "We could work around a schedule – he sells most of his wares in summer. And if we don't require him to work the full schedule he could still run his shoppe at lunch and dinner times."
Albus considered that. "Yes." He turned to Gary. "For being unfamiliar with Magical Britain, I believe you have hit upon the perfect candidate. After I have sent the missives off to the board, you and I are going to Diagon to convince him to come work for Hogwarts."
Gary replied, "Me? He doesn't know me. And I'm just the Defense professor."
"But it's partially your fault I lost my Professor – you're going to make up for that by helping me hire the replacement." Albus' answer was set with serene certainty; and Gary saw that nothing he said would change the man's mind.
"Fine," Gary huffed. "I'll come and help convince him. We're going to have to rework the entire staff's schedules to accommodate his working, perhaps, only half the schedule of most Professors."
Minerva nodded. "We'll stay in the great Hall after lunch and rework the schedules and plan to have them ready by Monday morning. There are only a limited number of weeks, however, until Yule. Perhaps it will be better to wait until then?"
Albus considered that. "It will depend on Florentine and what he says."
Gary shot the Headmaster a look. "Florentine? I thought it was Florean."
Albus shrugged. "You must have misheard. His name is Florentine Fortescue."
Gary shrugged. "Anyway, as far as the rest of the year, how about we arrange for the various Ghosts to speak about different historical eras to cover the remainder of the year? Give them the same authority as any Hogwarts Professor to give or take points or to assign detentions. I know that quite a few were familiar with different times that they lived. The hardest to sell might be the Bloody Baron or the Grey Lady but, from what I understand, these talk the least of all the ghosts within the castle. Oh – and the girl Myrtle, who mostly likes creating a ruckus for attention."
The staff considered that. Albus said, "I will convene the Ghosts of Hogwarts after we interview Florentine." He nodded to himself. "Good! Good," the Headmaster has his twinkle on high as he smiled at his Defense Professor. "We'll go right after lunch. I'll begin writing to the Board immediately. We'll meet back here at 1:15. Now," he motioned the staff as a whole, "toddle off. I have letters to write and not much time."
The staff, for the most part, was not offended by being dismissed so casually. Only Gary, who was the only one who needed to go anywhere, was upset. The rest were more than happy to have nothing to do with anything other than schedules, thus leaving the rest to the two wizards.
The staff ate lunch and very soon Albus and Gary were in his office. Opening the Floo to Diagon Alley, the two were off.
Saturday, 1:20 PM, saw a very well known figure strolling down Diagon Alley, another, lesser-known, wizard walking beside him. Albus took the time to greet the various witches and wizards by name – having been at Hogwarts for so long virtually the entirety of Magical Britain had met the man at one point or another. Gary could see that most were pleased to be so easily remembered.
Finally, they arrived at their destination. Florentine Fortescue greeted the arrivals cheerfully. "Ah, Albus! So good of you to stop by. And who is this with you?"
Gary answered for himself. "Garrick Septimus, this year's Defense Professor. I assume you are Mr. Fortescue."
The cheerful man grinned and nodded. "Florentine Fortescue of Fortescue's Ice Cream Shoppe, at your service. What can I get you gentlemen today?"
Gary asked, "Do you have tart lemon? The Headmaster here seems addicted to the taste."
Fortescue laughed. "No. But I can see what I can do for later."
The Headmaster said, "I'll take a Cherry."
"And I'll take whatever you want to serve. Surprise me," Gary added.
Florentine brought back a cup of cherry and then he placed the second. "Try this one. It's treacle tart flavored."
Gary looked at Florentine. "Oh, you're good. Really good. Few know that was my favorite flavor when I was younger."
Fortescue shrugged with a smile. "It just came to me."
"Why don't you come and sit with us?" Gary said. "We can all enjoy some ice cream."
Fortescue agreed and soon the three wizards were sitting there eating their ice cream.
Florentine, between bites, asked, "What brings you to Diagon Alley today?" He addressed the Headmaster.
"Funny you should ask." With a smile and a twinkle Albus added, "We came specifically to see you. We could use your help." The Headmaster then took another bite.
The man looked surprised for a moment. "Me? What help do you possibly need from me?"
Gary answered, "Although I am not from British society, I have heard rumours that you are, perhaps, the most familiar with magical history as a whole, of any wizard that currently lives in England."
Fortescue blushed a little. "I will admit, History was always one of my fascinations. The ebb and flow of History informs the society that we have. What part of history are you interested in?"
Gary ignored the question and asked curiously, "Have you ever thought of writing a history book?"
Fortescue shrugged. "It might be interesting. But most of my time is taken with running my ice cream shoppe – my second love."
Gary nodded as he swallowed the bite he had taken. "I can understand that. To be perfectly honest with you, it is not once particular area of history that we came to speak to you about."
Florentine asked curiously, "Then what do you need?"
Gary looked at Albus, who calmly took another bite, letting Gary handle it. He sighed. "To be perfectly frank? Hogwarts needs a new History Professor." Gary then took a large bite in the face of Florentine's shock.
He looked back and forth between the two wizard that sat calmly eating their ice cream as they watched him try to get around that statement. "What happened to Binns? He's been there for … a century!"
Gary sighed. "Well, it was NOT my fault. But I might have accidentally begun the process which caused him to move on to the next grand adventure." Florentine could see the pout behind the words as the man averred it wasn't his fault.
Really curious now Florentine asked. "What did you do?"
Albus smirked at Gary and said, "Yes, Garrick. Tell the man what you did?" Gary gave the man a dirty look. This really stirred the curiosity of Florentine Fortescue.
Gary sighed. "Fine. Anyway, I was out patrolling the castle, ensuring that the students didn't become wild hellions without classes as they are on the weekends. I heard Binns droning on in his classroom teaching a class which wasn't there. At an opportune moment, I interrupted him." Gary went on to describe what happened until the Headmaster was called.
Gary then smiled. "And then Binns asked if he was getting paid. About 8 years ago, the last Great-Granddaugther married and no longer held the name, and they decided that they would stop paying the salary because the family name was effectively dead. Cuthbert took offense when Albus informed him and quit. He then disappeared into a bunch of lights – likely to go off to wherever teachers go when they pass on."
Fortescue looked at the Headmaster and asked, "They stopped paying his salary?"
Albus sighed. "Yes. They thought it a waste to continue paying for a ghost's services."
Gary smirked. "So – not my fault! Binns would have continued teaching if his pay hadn't been cut. So now the board has to pony up for a wage sufficient for a professor now and not from 100 years ago."
Albus considered this. "True. Anyway, Gary had heard of you and your love of History. Needing a new professor, we decided we wanted the best. What do you say?"
Fortescue was hesitant. "I don't know. I have a going business which I love."
Gary nodded. "Yes. Almost as much as History. But we have a possible solution." The man looked at him. "What are you busiest times and what are your slowest times?"
Florentine considered that. "Well, I don't open until 11:00 normally. No one eats ice cream for breakfast. And between 3:00 and 5:00 things are quite slow as well. 2:00 is when it starts tapering off."
"Okay. Here's what we propose: Considering Binns currently has no duties outside of teaching, including supervising detentions or anything like that, you can have the same setup, at least for this year starting after Yule. We'll have the ghosts teaching until then. You teach first period, skip second, lunch, and third period, and teach fourth and fifth period. You skip sixth period which are mostly OWL and NEWT students – and there are no current NEWT level history students.
"First and second and fifth years are the only ones who need more than one period a week right now. First and second years because their cores aren't strong enough for a schedule of solid magic use all day and 5th years because they have OWLs to prepare for. So, that's four classes of first years, four classes of second years, four for 5th years, and four total for third and fourth years. What is your slowest day?"
Fortescue replied, "Tuesdays. No one buys ice cream on Tuesdays."
"Okay. So you have five period 1s; one period two on Tuesday; five period three's and five period fours. During lunch and dinner and on Saturday you do ice cream. And during the summer, you work your ice cream shoppe everyday. By next year, you can have a more solid plan in place for a schedule that works for you and Hogwarts."
Florentine and Albus looked at Gary in amazement. Albus asked, "How long did it take you to work that out?"
Gary shrugged. "Remember I just went through all that crap at the beginning of the year. It wasn't fun – let me tell you. So I immediately saw the need for quick planning. I will adjust my schedule, as will the other professors, as needed to accommodate your limited schedule. And for next year, hire a cute younger witch to serve ice-cream during the day. Be done at Hogwarts by 3:30 everyday. This allows you to add back two classes for fourth years and give two classes for a NEWT level History class."
Florentine considered that. "I can do that, I suppose. I would love to teach History –help children to become as interested in History as I am." He looked at the two wizards. "So where will I find a newly graduated witch to help next year? I don't know of many teenagers that have the love of ice cream that I do either."
Gary shrugged. "Most Muggle ice cream shoppes employ teenagers during summer. Most are just looking for the job." Gary paused and then got a sudden grin. "I have an idea."
Albus looked at his Defense professor and sighed. He commented to Florentine, "This is usually where the boy starts challenging everything one previously considered."
"How about a late-blooming witch who, while of age, is being tutured by her sister and a boyfriend who happen to be two years younger? She'll probably not want to make long term-plans until he leaves school." Gary had a wide grin.
Florentine, curious, asked Albus, "Do you know who he's talking about?"
Albus sighed but gave a small smile. "Yes. My cousin's great-granddaughter. She found out she was a late-blooming witch rather than a muggle or squib just this last August." Thinking a long moment Albus then said, "And I can't imagine a better fit for you. While coming into her own, she's not ready for a magically intensive job but one with some magic and otherwise normal labor? She would do well. While she used to envy her younger sister Lily greatly, who received an invitation when she was eleven while Petunia did not, she has become quite the delightful girl since she began studying magic."
Florentine considered that a moment and gave a nodding agreement. "Well, I'll give it a try. Worst case it doesn't work and I go back to ice cream full time."
And thus, the return of the visitors from the ICW saw Gary Septimus waiting for Petunia Evans to offer her a possible job.