Chapter 16: No Name For The Chapter.
The day before Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was to start the latest school year brought everyone's favorite mercenary janitor who was currently getting the Great Hall into shape. He moved back and forth while playing the theme from the 1966 Batman television show and humming a merry tune whilst dancing around. The mercenary gained some momentum when bobbing back and forth. He cracked his neck back, pumped the mop into the air, and swept it down across the ground. The mop splashed against the floor with Deadpool's actions continuing. He moved back with a wicked grin on his face.
"Da, da, da, mopping! Da, da, da, mopping! Da, da, da, mopping! Mopping! Mopping! Da, da, da, da, mopping!"
Deadpool swung around and waffled Argus Filch in the face when he came around the corner. Filch staggered back a few inches to feel the cleaning products burn into his face. Filch gargled a few seconds later when staggering back.
"What in the devil are you doing?" Filch demanded.
The mercenary bobbed his head and swept across the ground. He rocked to the music which had now since long stopped.
"I'm cleaning the room, and paying tribute the recently departed Adam West. QUICK, TO THE BAT CAVE, OLD CHUM!'
Filch really had no idea what this man was talking about. Deadpool started to bop up and down.
"We must fight as deputized agents of the law against the forces of grime and corrosion," Deadpool said. "There's a particularly nasty spot on the wall."
The main Hogwarts caretaker just swallowed the lump in his throat. "I don't see what you're so happy about. These little tyrants are about on their way to the Hogwarts Express. They're going to track all sorts of rubbish into the castle. And bring their little prank items where they end up blowing up half of the school."
Deadpool climbed on top of a stool and started to dust the wall. A loud cloud of dust rose up the wall and resulted in Deadpool coughing.
"Don't see why you haven't retired yet. I mean, after all of these years, you must have a pension coming to you."
Filch let out a loud "ha" and continued to escalate his loud belly laughter to the point of genuine absurdity.
"Oh, where the hell else do I have to go, anyway?" Filch asked. "My old man, he was a mean bastard. He told me that Muggles were less than animals. The moment I didn't get my letter, boom, I went out the street on my ass. Tossed out like rubbish I was."
"Wow, that's oddly tragic," Deadpool said.
"Yeah, well, the old bastard drunk himself to death, so I guess we're even, we are," Filch said. "Anyway, those two twin tyrants are returning this year. Guess their Mum doesn't want them underfoot. She's keeping the youngest Ginger male at home, and she's not letting the girl come either."
"Wait, the Weasley girl isn't coming?" Deadpool asked.
"Yeah, well if she's anything like her mother, she will be in a couple of years, if you know what I mean."
Deadpool did know what Filch meant and wondered if he had spent his time inhaling cleaning products. Still, the two youngest Weasleys would be attending Hogwarts and instead would be homeschooled. Deadpool could not put his finger on why this was going to be so interesting. Both Ginny Weasley not attending Hogwarts during this year in particular and Lucius Malfoy being in trouble, both felt like they caused shifts in the matrix.
"BOO!"
Peeves caused Deadpool to topple over from the stool he stood on. He landed into a pan of soap and cleaning products. Deadpool pulled himself up and started to slip and slide.
"Damn it, Peeves!" Deadpool snapped.
One of these days, one of these days, he was going to punch that Poltergeist all the way to the mood. Sure, Peeves saved him from the spirit of Voldemort. It didn't give him a right to abuse or to pelt balloons full of a substance of what Deadpool hoped was mayonnaise.
The newest batch of students had been sorted.
'You know something, I'm disappointed the Hogwarts school hat didn't rap like we suggested.'
'Yeah, maybe, but if the hat would have rapped, the author would have had to write the rap. And he's the whitest man who ever lived and he should not be writing a rap. How white is he? He's so white, he makes Casper look street.'
The Mercenary noticed something moving around the corner. He saw an eleven-year-old girl standing in the hallway. She dressed in the Hogwarts robes which was the most normal part of her. She had her hair clipped back with what appeared to be bread ties, and had a pair of goggles on her head. The girl stared across the hallway at Deadpool for a few seconds.
"You've been sent here to fix things," she commented calmly.
"What?" Deadpool asked.
"You've been sent here by a higher power to fix things," she repeated calmly.
"Who, Stan Lee?" Deadpool asked.
"No," she answered. "We are merely just players in a wider game. And someone has seen the past. Already, I see something has changed. Harry Potter is friends with several more people than he might have been had it not been for your intervention. There's a calm and a peace in Hogwarts which should not have been here. You are…they are here, in the air, aren't they?"
Deadpool found himself flummoxed by this peculiar blonde first-year student.
"Well, yeah, they're here, always here," Deadpool said. "I mean, look over there…well you can't really see them unless you really are able to open your mind."
"Oh, I believe I can open my mind a little bit," the blonde said.
The blonde stared at the fourth wall which Deadpool pointed at.
"But, perhaps they are shy," she said. "You say there are people there. There are people there, and people who are from the beyond. Or maybe they are in the beyond?"
Deadpool bobbed his head up and down. He did not know what to make of her still. She was one of the students sorted into Ravenclaw. Lady Rowena may have had her eccentrics in life, but this girl really embodied the more creative spirit of Rowena's legacy.
"They're always there. Some of them are watching. Some of them might be watching us without any pants. They are beyond the fourth wall. They are observers and to us, our life is fiction."
"I figured as much," the girl said with a smile. "Mother always said there were beings of a different plane watching us from beyond. They can watch our every move. They see us when we are terrified. They watch us when we are scared. They just watch us period."
"Right," Deadpool said.
"But, now that they know the game is afoot, they may try and silence you," she said. "Oh, and my name is Luna Lovegood. I'll be seeing you around, Mr. Wilson."
Luna turned her heel and walked into the shadows. Deadpool turned around from the corner and noticed a knife flying out of the corner. The knife rammed into the wall from behind him.
The mercenary rushed as fast as his legs could carry him to the other side of the wall. He checked out the hallway. He moved to the left, and to the right. He opened the door to the broom closet, saw two teenagers do what teenagers normally do in a broom closet.
The mysterious person who tossed the knife did not show his face. Or her face. Or it's face.
"Today is going to be big! I can feel it. They're all going to see how brilliant I am!"
Gilderoy Lockhart took a couple of steps forward and walked side by side with Deadpool. The celebrity smiled at the mercenary. Deadpool averted his eyes not to be blinded by the glare of Lockhart's teeth.
"So, wish me luck?" Lockhart asked.
"Go, break a leg," Deadpool said.
"Here, have a copy of my autobiography," Lockhart said. "It's ranked number one on the Witch Weekly's Best Selling List Books list over the past twenty-three weeks."
Lockhart autographed the book for Deadpool and put it in his hands. Deadpool took the book in his hand and flipped through the first few pages.
'Wow, this book would be more compelling if someone just masturbated all over the pages. Hell, I'm not sure if this book isn't Lockhart doing that. If this was number one, I'd really hate to see what number to was. Or there are a lot more bored housewives with disposable income.'
Deadpool walked over to a rubbish bin. He lifted the book and put it in the bin.
The bin spat up the copy of Lockhart's book and slammed it into the back of Deadpool's head. Deadpool staggered a couple of feet.
"Oh, a wise guy hey."
Deadpool tried to bin the book a second time. The bin coughed up the book and smacked him in the face. Deadpool staggered back and landed on the ground.
"And what are you up to now?"
Snape appeared at Deadpool's shoulder. Deadpool smiled and handed him a book.
"Happy Birthday, Severus! Sorry, I forgot to wrap it."
"First, it's not my birthday," Snape said. "And I already have a copy of Lockhart's bile, thank you very much. He insisted on giving the book to all of the staff members. I would hate to deprive you of the honor of having a couple of the book yourself."
Deadpool wondered how he could get rid of a copy of Lockhart's autobiography. It might damage his reputation.
The Mercenary decided drastic time came for drastic measures. He moved to the school bathroom. Deadpool stepped over the bathroom and opened up the stall. He threw the book into the toilet.
A loud scream echoed from the toilet and the book shot out of the toilet. A squat girl with glasses and an angry glare in her eyes burst out of the toilet. She burst into tears.
"I'm so sick and tired of everyone trying to flush Lockhart books down my toilet!" Moaning Myrtle howled at the top of his lungs.
Deadpool blasted through the door of the bathroom through the sheer voice of Myrtle's tears. The Mercenary tried to swim out of the loud puddle of tears. He could almost hear Filch screaming from several floors above as Deadpool tried to pull himself up out of the toilet water.
"Anyone want a slightly wet copy of Lockhart's autobiography!" Deadpool yelled.
All of the students who passed by ran in terror as Deadpool waved the copy of Gilderoy Lockhart's best-selling autobiography back and forth in the air. They wanted to get as far away from the book.
"Come on!" Deadpool yelled. "You want a free copy of one of the best-selling books in the entire history of magic! You have to pay five galleons for this book in the stories. I'm giving it away for free here?"
The students grumbled. They all had to read Lockhart's books for his class. They did not want to get saddled with reading his autobiography.
"Anyone want to have this book?" Deadpool asked. "Anyone! Anyone at all! I'll give you Ten Galleons! Twenty galleons! Thirty galleons!"
"We'll take it off your hands if you give us a hundred galleons."
Fred and George Weasley popped up with a pair of grins. The two twin terrors looked at Deadpool with a wide smile on their faces.
"What do you need with a hundred galleons?" Deadpool asked. He could not help, but be a bit suspicious in spite his eagerness to get this blasted book off of his hands.
"Well, we need it for product research," either Fred or George said. Deadpool didn't know, and he doubted the twins knew either.
"So, give us a hundred galleons and the password for the Slytherin common room and we'll take Lockhart's book off of your hands," the other twin said. "It would take care of Mum's Christmas present as well to get her a signed copy."
"Plus, it might buy us some credit when we don't become Prefects next year," the other twin said.
"Oh, you never know, I could put in the good word for you, and you might be surprised," Deadpool said.
The twins looked at Deadpool with mock sorrow at his threat. "Why do you hate us so much to get us the prefect position?"
"So, how about it mate?" a twin asked. "Give us a hundred galleons and the password for the Slytherin common room, and we'll take that book off your hands?"
Deadpool held the book in his hand and pondered.
"Give me a moment."
Deadpool stepped into the crowd and came face to face with Draco Malfoy. Crabbe and Goyle stood in front of Malfoy, their arms folded.
"Hey, Draco, remember those incriminating photos I took of you last year, that I said I was hanging on to for leverage."
"You better not have shown those to anyone!" The Malfoy heir snapped.
Given Deadpool tattooed the words "I Heart Muggles" on Malfoy's head when he was unconscious when snapping the picture, Malfoy remembered. He remembered the horrific time it spent and the nasty potion Snape had to use to remove the taboo tattoo.
Deadpool held out the envelope in front of Malfoy's face and beckoned him over. "Hey, relax….I'm willing to sell you those photos for a hundred and fifty galleons and the password of the Slytherin?"
Malfoy snapped his fingers and another one of the Malfoy family house elves appeared. Because why would they only have just Dobby? He held out a satchel and Malfoy rifled through it, putting some gold in Deadpool's hand. He jotted down the password to the Slytherin common rude.
"Pureblood?" Deadpool asked. "Why don't you change the house symbol from a snake to a swastika while you're at it?"
"Give me the pictures, Wilson," Malfoy said.
Deadpool put the envelope into Malfoy's hand. "I'm a man of my word, Malfoy."
That pompous prince bought the pictures back, but he did not bother to ask for the negatives, which Deadpool kept in his back pocket. Deadpool moved across the hallway to Fred and George and presented them with the money involved.
"It's been a pleasure doing business with you, sir."
They took the book, the Slytherin password, and the money off of his hands which lead Deadpool with a cool fifty galleons.
'Well, you're never a success in life if you don't make a profit.'
He stepped back and heard a loud scream. Hermione Granger rushed down the hallway and almost smacked headlong into Deadpool.
"Please, you need to help us! Professor Lockhart's class has gotten out of control!"
"He's forced you read his books?" Deadpool asked.
"Oh, his books are quite brilliant," Hermione gushed.
Deadpool did a double take at the supposed smart girl gushing over a complete charlatan.
'Girl, you supposed to be smart,' Deadpool though with a tragic shake of his head.
"There are freshly caught Cornish pixies in the school! And they are trashing the classroom and some of them might have escaped. We could really use a hand….and I figured going for a responsible adult is the best thing."
Deadpool cottoned on to her quickly. "And since you couldn't find one, you went for me."
Hermione nodded and Deadpool just allowed her to lead the way. He stepped back and pulled back a section of the wall to grab the package he smuggled into Hogwarts. A very high tech laser cannon came into picture with Hermione's eyes widening.
"Isn't that a bit dangerous?"
The Mercenary Janitor with a laser cannon just smiled. "Well, in the words of a certain cartoon duck, Let's Get Dangerous!"
He had pixies to stomp, and by no means did he mean the mutant either.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone