Anakin stood on the high battlements of the Clock Tower, his arms crossed over his chest. Below, in the damp grey of the Highlands morning, Albus Dumbledore walked beside a figure shrouded in a heavy, magically-bound cloak.
Even from this distance, Anakin could feel the discordant, screeching note of the parasite. Quirrell moved like a puppet with cut strings. A team of Ministry officials waited at the edge of the wards to take the "incapacitated" professor into custody—the official story being a sudden, debilitating magical collapse.
Anakin watched in silence. He didn't speak as the carriage bearing the possessed man crossed the boundary and vanished into the mist. He simply observed the way Dumbledore's shoulders seemed to carry a new weight as the Headmaster turned and walked back toward the castle. The rot was gone from the halls, but the atmosphere remained heavy with the silence of things left unsaid.
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By midday, the Great Hall was being prepared. Dumbledore introduced the last-minute replacement for the Defense Against the Dark Arts position.
"Professor Skywalker, meet Auror Hestia Jones," Dumbledore said, introducing a stern-faced woman with tightly coiled hair and eyes that had seen too many crime scenes. She was nearing retirement, her robes slightly worn, her hand never far from her wand. "She has kindly agreed to leave the DMLE early to assist us this year."
Jones looked Anakin up and down, her professional instincts screaming. She had spent decades hunting Dark Wizards, but she had never sensed anything like the man standing before her. He didn't smell like a Dark Wizard; he smelled like a bonfire—immense, burning, and indifferent.
"Skywalker," she said, her voice gravelly. "I heard you're the one who found the rot in the turban. Bold move. Most wizards would've waited for a warrant."
"I don't wait for permission to stop a killer," Anakin replied flatly.
Jones gave a short, sharp nod. "I think we'll get along just fine. Or we'll kill each other by Halloween."
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The evening brought the distant whistle of the Hogwarts Express. As the sun dipped below the mountains, the Great Hall filled with the warm, golden glow of thousands of candles. Anakin sat at the High Table, a dark, still figure amidst the colorful eccentricities of the other staff.
The massive doors opened, and the first-years filed in. They looked tiny, their faces pale with a mix of awe and terror. Anakin watched them with a detached, tactical eye, but his focus shifted when the Sorting began.
"Granger, Hermione!" A girl with bushy hair and a nervous energy hurried to the stool. The Hat barely touched her head before shouting: "GRYFFINDOR!"
"Malfoy, Draco!" The blond boy moved with an arrogance Anakin had seen in high-born officials across the galaxy. The Hat shouted "SLYTHERIN!" almost before it touched his hair.
"Longbottom, Neville!" ... "GRYFFINDOR!" "Weasley, Ronald!" ... "GRYFFINDOR!"
Then, the Hall went silent as a name was called that carried a strange, heavy resonance.
"Potter, Harry!"
Anakin leaned forward slightly. The boy was small, scrawny, and wore glasses that were held together by tape. But it was the scar on his forehead that drew Anakin's attention. Through the Force, the boy felt like a focal point—a nexus of untapped energy, but also a carrier of a faint, lingering echo of the same necrotic rot he had sensed in Quirrell.
The Hat sat on Harry's head for what felt like an eternity. Anakin watched the boy's knuckles turn white as he gripped the edges of the stool. Finally, the Hat's brim rent open like a mouth:
"GRYFFINDOR!"
The table under the lion banner erupted in cheers. Harry looked up, his green eyes scanning the High Table until they landed on Anakin. For a brief second, the boy winced, rubbing his scar as he felt the sheer, cold intensity of Anakin's gaze. It wasn't the heat of a spell, but the gravity of a man who looked like he could see right through him.
Dumbledore stood, his voice booming with practiced warmth. "Welcome! Welcome to another year at Hogwarts. Before we begin our feast, I have two staff announcements."
He gestured to Hestia Jones. "Firstly, we are pleased to welcome Professor Hestia Jones, who will be taking over the Defense Against the Dark Arts post."
The applause was respectable. Then, Dumbledore's voice shifted, becoming more measured. "And secondly, I have created a new position this year. Professor Anakin Skywalker will be our instructor for Martial and Practical Defense."
Anakin stood. The Hall didn't erupt; it fell into a curious, heavy silence.
"I am not here to teach you theory," Anakin's voice was low but carried to the very back of the room, cutting through the silence. "Your other classes will give you the tools of magic. I am here to teach you how to use them with competence. I am here to ensure that when you face a challenge, you are capable of meeting it."
He looked across the four tables, his eyes like blue ice.
"My class is about survival and practical application. It is about being more than a person with a wand. By the time you finish my course, you will be capable, disciplined, and prepared for the world beyond these walls. If you seek easy answers, you will not find them with me."
He sat down as the food appeared on the golden plates. The chatter began again, but it was hushed, dominated by questions about the new professor.
"He looks scary," Ron whispered, piling potatoes onto his plate. "Did you see his eyes? Like he's looking for a fight."
"He doesn't look like a wizard at all," Hermione noted, glancing up at the High Table with a furrowed brow. "But the way Professor McGonagall looks at him... she looks almost... nervous."
Harry looked back up at Anakin. The new professor wasn't eating; he was simply watching the room with a gaze that felt ancient and unyielding. Harry rubbed his scar again, a cold shiver running down his spine. He didn't know who Anakin Skywalker was, but he knew that for the first time in his life, he was looking at someone who truly understood the weight of the world.
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The third-year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws had expected to be led to a classroom on the upper floors. Instead, they found Professor Skywalker waiting for them in the shadows of the stone archway directly opposite the entrance to the Great Hall.
"In here," was all he said.
He led them through the arch and down. They descended past the familiar levels of the castle, past the warmth of the kitchens and the damp chill of the dungeons, until the walls changed. The masonry of Hogwarts gave way to raw, unhewn bedrock. The air grew still and pressurized, carrying a faint, metallic scent that made the students' hair stand on end.
They reached the dead end where Anakin had first communed with the castle. He placed his hand against the cold granite. To the students' horror, the mountain didn't just open; it vaporized into a silver mist, revealing the passage of smooth, dark glass.
"Leave your wands on the racks," Anakin commanded, pointing to the obsidian-like shelves lining the entrance to the glass tunnel.
"But Professor," a Ravenclaw boy stammered, "the school rules state we should always—"
"In this temple, there is only you and the Force. Leave them."
They emerged into the vast, circular sanctum. It was exactly as Anakin had found it: the translucent crystal dome overhead, the shimmering indigo light, and the massive, white marble floor etched with the primal rune. In the center, the basin of liquid silver—the source of his visions of Revan—pulsed with a slow, rhythmic light.
The students were paralyzed. This wasn't a classroom; it was a cathedral of power. It felt older than the castle, older than the Ministry, and inherently dangerous.
"This is the foundation," Anakin told them. "The man who built this place didn't use incantations. He used his will. He didn't want students; he wanted masters. Today, we see if any can learn even a fraction of his teachings."
With a clench of Anakin's fist, the marble floor shifted. Massive obsidian blocks rose from the ground, and heavy, rotating beams began to sweep across the chamber. Kinetic pulses—invisible but humming with power—began to flicker across the gaps.
"Navigate the course," Anakin said. "If the pulses hit you, you start over. If you fall, the floor will catch you. But you will not reach the end until you stop thinking with your ears and start feeling with your skin. Move."
The results were disastrous. Within ten minutes, the third-years were a mess of bruised pride and frustration. The Ravenclaws tried to calculate the timing of the beams, only to be knocked flat by an unpredictable surge. The Gryffindors tried to rush it, only to be sent sliding back to the start by the kinetic pulses.
"This isn't magic!" Fred Weasley shouted, panting as he wiped sweat from his brow. "It's just... it's just a death trap! We're wizards, Professor! We're supposed to use Immobilus or Aresto Momentum. This is just physical bullying!"
"He's right," the tall Ravenclaw added, stepping forward. "There's no 'practical defense' in jumping over rocks. You're treating us like Muggles. You haven't even shown us that you can do this. For all we know, you're just controlling the room with some hidden mechanism."
The air in the temple suddenly grew heavy—the same crushing weight Anakin had felt when he saw the vision of Revan.
Anakin didn't respond with words. He stepped onto the first shifting block.
He didn't take a stance; he simply blurred.
To the students, it was like watching a ghost. Anakin moved with a lethal, Force-enhanced agility that made their "precision" look like a joke. He didn't just jump; he drifted through the air, his black robes snapping as he twisted around a rotating beam with inches to spare.
When a cluster of kinetic pulses fired, he didn't even look at them. He leaned his body with a liquid grace, the red energy hissing past his chest. He reached the central dais—the one holding the silver basin—and launched himself. It was a twenty-foot vertical leap, aided by a visible ripple in the air. He landed on the highest obsidian pillar, perfectly balanced, looking down at them like a judge.
"The man who stood here before you," Anakin's voice boomed, resonating with the ancient power of the temple, "could shape the mountain with a thought. He didn't need a wand because he was the weapon. You complain that this is 'beneath' you? You are not even worthy of the dust on this floor."
He leaped down, landing soundlessly in the center of the white rune. The indigo light flared brilliant blue in his presence.
"The Ravenclaw speaks of logic. Here is the logic: If you cannot control your own heartbeat, you cannot control energy for your 'spells'. If you cannot move your feet without tripping, you cannot hope to move out of the way of a curse. Now, get back on the course. Or I will turn the lights out and see how well you 'calculate' in the dark."
The skepticism was gone. The third-years scrambled back to the start, moving with a new, frantic focus. They had realized that they weren't being taught by a wizard.