Imagine, if you will, someone dumping a large pail of ice water on your brain, do that and you have a basic idea of what it felt being hit with that spell. Everything calmed down and suddenly I felt very… together. "Ah, hmm…" I blinked blearily, feeling a bit jittery from the adrenaline. I reached up and rubbed at the side of my head in a effort to clear it up. It was super ineffective! "Well, that's… that just happened... You know, I think I'd be excited, but I'm way to mellow to bother with it, wooh!" This must be what it was like to take drugs.
I blinked my eyes and shook my head a bit to try to knock some of the cobwebs loose again. That turned out to have been a mistake I winced as pain flashed through me again. I needed to sit down. I had a look around and quickly located one of the chars lying on its side some feet from me. Now having a purpose I hobbled over and with some effort righted it and then climbed into it and made myself as comfortable as I could under the current circumstances. My suddenly enormous jacket made it somewhat easier. Meanwhile, the person that could be no other than Dumbledore, the venerable and barmy headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was seemingly dismissing me at the moment in favor of inspecting his office. Bit rude of him, what if I was hurt? Maybe he'd already checked me over? Some sort of magical bullshit. Still though, bad form.
Still, Dumbledore! Impossible! Yet, there he was. Undeniable.
I looked over at Dumbledore again as he slowly moved around his office, repairing, righting and moving various things into place with strange graceful movements of his wand. He didn't say a word, he just waved his wand and shit got fixed. I guess verbalizing your spells wasn't strictly necessary. Good to know.
So what the hell was I to do now? I was likely trapped here, in a world I only knew from fiction. Of course, relying on that sort of information to much would likely get me into trouble since even with that many books it was most likely that I only had a very superficial insight into this place. I suppose the smart thing right now was to use Dumbledore's momentary distraction to take stock and make some sort of short term plan.
So what did I know?
I was in an office. Not immediately useful.
In front of me was a person that is either Merlin or Albus Dumbledore.
The giant orange bird that seemed remarkably unfazed by the ruckus would suggest the latter.
Albus can read minds; don't look him in the eyes!
I'm at Hogwarts. A relevant and important fact to be revisited later!
This should be impossible!
A dream?
No, too much pain for that.
So, it was real? Big problem!
I just trashed the place with magic!
I have magic! Yay!
I'm never seeing my family again! Boo!
I can learn to cast spells! Yay!
I appear to be a prepubescent child. Boo!
Ugh. This situation was highly... inconvenient. What the hell was I to do now? Short term. I would need information. I would have to figure out when I was. Dumbledore was alive, and by the look of his hands, he had yet to find and use the Ring. Good. If I was lucky he had yet to send Harry on his little hunt. If I could get to the ring first and get my hands of the Resurrection Stone things would become somewhat easier. At least as soon as I figured out some good shades to summon.
My chair suddenly gave a little jerk and floated gently up into the air, jogging me out of my thoughts. I noted that the office was once again in pristine condition, with no signs left to indicate my recent magically assisted breakdown. I was floated over and positioned neatly in front of the headmaster's now righted desk. I observed the whole thing with undisguised interest until it was done before giving a sigh, leaning back and closing my eyes. "Well, that happened."
"Are you alright young man?" The venerable old man asked me.
I started to shrug but thought better of it. "Bit banged up, but I don't think I'm leaking anywhere."
"I'm glad to hear it. I trust this must seem very strange and frightening to you, my dear boy. But I can assure you, you are quite safe here." He said reassuringly. I noted with some amusement that his voice was quite a bit deeper and stronger then ether Richard Harris or Michael Gambon. It reminded me a bit of Sean Connery, only without the Scottish accent. "Now, I think some introductions might be in order. I 'am Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, where you currently reside."
"Andreas," I told him shortly. Then after a moment, I added. "Andrew or Andy to you; you English can't say my name without sounding like a poof." Hahah! Look at me, using an English slang! Epic!
"Duly noted. Now then young man, perhaps you can tell me how you managed to arrive so spectacularly in my office just now." Dumbledore began in a grandfatherly tone voice. "Quite a feat, one that should, according to all that I know, be quite impossible."
"Not young," I said, ignoring his question, before looking down at my now very small hands. "At least I didn't use to be," I added. I thought it would be best to get that out straight away. Getting treated like a child wasn't something I had any intentions to put up with. "Things happened, I guess."
"An interesting contention." He noted. "How old would you say you are then?"
I decided not to comment on the benign condescension in his voice. Kids telling tall tales were probably a twice-daily occurrence around here. "37."
"Ah." Yeah, fuck you to man.
Fine, I can logic my way thought this, no problem. "I'm sitting in the office of a sorcerer-"
"Wizard, if you don't mind." Dumbledore interrupted kindly.
"-whatever, you have what might be a legendary phoenix perching on a golden stand, surrounded by all manner of strange twirling magical tig-ma-jigs, which was moments ago so much junk because I now apparently blow up when I'm excited! And you find the thought of someone being reduced in age strange?" I said, sarcasm virtually dripping off my every word.
"Ah, a muggleborn then." He concluded, apparently dismissing my little rant entirely. What a guy, no wonder every evil dude wanted to set his beard on fire. This must be what every Spider-Man villain feels like.
"That sounds faintly insulting," I muttered. Really, what kind off name was "muggleborn" anyway? It's like the word was tailored to be belittling. Made you sound like you were mentally deficient – highly ironic considering that the average wizard had the smarts of a rotten turnip.
I head him sigh faintly before speaking. "I suppose there is some truth in what you say. However, to get back on topic, there is no record of someone being reduced in age, unless under the effects of Polyjuice Potion." He said, and I suddenly saw a faint flash of light through my eyelids followed by a strange sensation, like my insides being tickled. I didn't like it. "Which as it would appear, you are not."
He wasn't buying it. I rolled my eyes behind my closed eyelids and gestured languidly in the general direction I thought my discarded pants were currently located. "I draw your attention to Exhibit A, a pair of pants, ten thousand sizes too big for me. Then there is Exhibit B, leather jacket, also much too big for me, under which is Exhibit C, a shirt, also of a size unfitting to my current form… shoes, socks, and underwear, which fortunately for me is equipped with admirable elastic bands, which is why they haven't fallen of me yet. Not that they are of much use since my tackle is the size of a mosquito bite at the moment. I'm not happy about that." I told him dryly before pointing at my face. "There are also my glasses, which are now both too big and now the wrong prescription as well."
"You don't say." Oh hello, disbelieving condescension.
I would have glared at him, but I was too tired and I didn't want to give him a chance to peek into my noggin, instead I reached into my jacket and rummaged through one of my inner pockets, which happened to be filled with all sundry of things, papers, receipts, at least two pens and most importantly at the moment, a small metal case. I fished it out and opened my eyes long enough to flicked it over unto his desk.
There were several long moments of silence, during which I was listening intently for him to pick off the case. He didn't, or at least I didn't hear anything. I opened one of my eyes a crack and saw him looking down at the case on his desk but making no move to interact with it. Really!? Did he have to make this more difficult than it had to be? If it wasn't for the calming charm I'd probably have said something stupid…er, I settled for sarcasm in lieu of that. "It's a case, you have to open it."
"Ah," Dumbledore responded as if he'd just had a great revelation because of course he did. He carefully picked up the small case with his thin fingers and after a moment of examination, he popped the case open, spilling out its meager content of three plastic cards. One was my MasterCard, the second was my railcard, and finally and most importantly, my ID. Dumbledore spread the cards out and took a moment to give them a cursory examination before picking up my ID and giving it a more thorough look over.
"It would seem you are yet to be born." He said at length.
I was again thankful for the calming charm, or those words would likely have set me off again. As it was several scenarios flashed through my head before settling. I groaned and pinched the bridge of my nose, sinking back further into my jacket. "So not only am I not in my own world, but I'm back in time as well? That's just fucking wonderful." I muttered, injecting as much venom into the last word as I possibly could at the moment. "What year is it?"
"The date is February 26th, 1965. It's a Friday."
"1965?" I asked, feeling faint despite the charm on me. "I'm in the swinging sixties!? Oh, that's just great!" I complained loudly. Welp, there went any use I'd have of my foreknowledge. Gone! I'm flying without a safety net. Wonderful!
"Oh, it is not all that bad. The muggle world seems to be peaceful at the moment."Dumbledore commented lightly.
"Oh please spare me. It's the hippy decade, where the whole world smokes pot and competes to be even more moronic than usual." I muttered irritably. The only good thing that came out of this time was a more accepted view of porn or something. Not that I had any use for it at the moment. Goddamnit!
"If I might ask, exactly what time are you from. And why would you believe you are in another world?"
Whoops! I suppressed a wince and turned it into another sigh. "It was 2019 last I checked, Monday, March 11. And we don't have magic where I come from, and I sure as shit never did anything like what I just did a few moments ago."
"Ah, I see where you might be confused. Truth be told, the Muggle World is largely unaware of the existence of magic and the Wizarding World, and we take great pains to keep it that way." He explained shortly.
I snorted softly. "Unless you happen to exist in some sort of pocket dimension or something then I highly doubt you would be able to keep a lid on stuff. 2019 is a very different world that 1965." I said, and on a whim, I dipped my hand back into my inner pockets and fished out my mobile phone and flicked it on. I was a bit surprised when it worked. Hogwarts' ability to cook electronics was infamous. Still, not one to look a gift horse in the mouth I turned the phone towards Dumbledore and snapped a picture and then I turned it over and showed it to him. "Where I come from cameras are everywhere, on buildings, in building, in cars and everyone has one of these little handy cellphones, that's not just limited to still pictures but can even record…" I stopped a moment thinking about how to explain video recordings. Did they even have TV's right now? "Do you know what a TV is?"
There was a brief pause, where I assumed he was searching his memory before he spoke. "Ah yes, it is a muggle device that can show moving pictures and sounds, much like a wizard painting. Quite the ingenious thing if I do say so myself. I assume your… cellphone, was it? Can it do something similar?"
"It can do it better, faster and with a crystal clear quality," I told him before shutting down the phone again to save on battery life. I did have the charger with me, but I doubted I'd be able to find a socket anywhere in Hogwarts. Additionally, it might keep whatever was frying stuff around here from nuking my phone. It might come in handy later. I might also be able to figure out what was making it happen. "And it can store thousands of different clips for replay at any time the user so desire, and upload it to a sort of information network that quite literally spans the entire world. So basically, you need only fuck up once and everyone would know."
The office fell into a few moments of heavy silence as the venerable headmaster digested this new tidbit of information. I risked another peek and was somewhat gratified by the troubled set of his brow. A bit petty of me I suppose. Still, I wonder how he'd react if I told him about satellites and moon landing and all the other crazy stuff that was coming down the pipe in the next few years. It would blow his mind for sure.
"…I see." Dumbledore said at length.
I could hear slight apprehension in his voice and did a little internal cheer. Yes! I was getting through that thick skull of his. He was starting to believe me. I decided to toss him an olive branch as a reward. "Hey, forewarned is forearmed, yeah? You have, like, forty years to get ahead of this. I think the first mobile with a camera showed up around the turn of the century, two thousand or something like that. I don't know when the CCTV network got up and running around here but it's not up yet. Plenty of time to upgrade your defenses."
There was another poignant pause before Dumbledore decided to speak again. "An uplifting thought, Mr. Ahlgren."
"Aint it just." I commiserated.
I head him chuckle good-naturedly before speaking again. "To continue, there is still the question of how you managed to arrive here at Hogwarts, into my office no less."
I sighed and thought about how to try to explain that before just giving a mental shrug and giving up. No good way to explain it. "Probably a ROB."
"Rob?" The headmaster echoed, clearly asking for an explanation.
"Random Omnipotent Being, sometimes called a BROB, Bastard Random Omnipotent Being," I explained languidly. "Its a god, but more of an asshole on a personal level."
"I see…" He said in that manner that made it clear he thought I might have a screw loose. "And you have had much contact with this… Rob?"
I smiled a little. "Never met the dude. Didn't think one could exist until just now."
There was another pause from the headmaster before he continued. "Then if I might ask; why do you think this Rob is responsible?"
I shrugged. "Because while I can accept that being struck by lightning might have the effect of transporting me elsewhere, and elsewhen, it's an old gimmick, but the reduction in age smells of someone fucking around with my life," I informed him matter-of-factly.
"I… suppose that is one way to look at it," Dumbledore said mildly. "Any particular idea why this divine being would take an interest in you?"
"Nope." I responded, poping the P. "Just a regular guy far as I know."
Dumbledore paused again for a few moments. "I see. And what were you doing before this occurred?"
"Going to the store to pick up some milk and cream." I stopped for a moment as a thought occurred to me. "I wonder if I'm still lactose intolerant?"
"Excuse me?"
"Nothing, random thought," I said dismissively. "It happens sometimes."
"Ah, yes, I too am afflicted by that particular malady." The old berdo said humorously.
"No kidding…" I returned with a mock excited tone.
"I assume you also have no idea as to why you would have been deposited here of all places?" Dumbledore continued, ignoring my mocking. Come on man, give me something!
"Probably a real-life tutorial level," I answered grudgingly.
"I'm not entirely sure of your meaning."
"Easy mode. A place that shows you the ropes without any real risk of getting harmed or killed." I explained simply. "I figure a world full of magic would be dangerous for someone that doesn't know the ins and outs of it.
"Ah. I suppose there is something to that."
I shrugged. "Best guess; don't take my word for it."
"I see little choice in the matter at the moment. I will, of course, investigate matters as I'm able, but for now, I will consider the matter settled. Now the issue turns to what to do with you. As it is obvious that you possess the gift for magic, you have a place here at Hogwarts, should you want it. If you are not amenable I'm prepared to help you in contacting another school, one closer to home perhaps, that you might prefer to go to."
Hah, yeah, that was not happening. "Here is fine, not like I have anything to go home to." I laughed a bit weakly. "I suppose technically I don't have a home, my dad would be, like, four right now, or something?" God, that thought made me feel fucking awful. There wasn't even any assurance that any of my family even existed.
I heard him get up and after a moment I felt his hand on my shoulder. "Come, it is late. I will show you to a room where you might rest. We will speak more tomorrow, is that alright with you?"
It had been midday just a few minutes ago, my time. But I could do with a laydown since I felt like I'd gone through the wringer. "I could sleep."
"Very well then, follow me."