Once again, the group of friends/revolutionaries were gathered at their usual spot at the Gryffindor table. They couldn’t concentrate on eating; they had few precious morsels to nibble on as they anxiously looked around, waiting for some kind of response from the author. Wat was chewing the same sausage for several minutes, staring into space. Meagan failed to notice that her food had been knocked to the floor, and John was absent-mindedly stabbing a piece of toast with his fork. The others were doing similar things, but the author was too lazy to go into detail.
However, the seven friends weren’t the only nervous ones in the Great Hall that morning. All the students and teachers had seen the posters on the wall. Previously in the story, they had just gone along with Tim the Enchanter’s eccentricities, since they were simply background characters that contributed nothing to the plot “ besides, they had no minds anyway. Now that the protagonists of the story had essentially declared war on the author, no one was safe.
“Looks like you got us into a right bloody mess,” Professor Lupin had said very attractively to the seven rebels earlier before breakfast.
Some took that painful fact badly, and were positively terrified. They hid underneath the table, hoping beyond hope that they would be spared from Tim the Enchanter’s wrath. Others were unbelievably thick and gittish, and were convinced that the author would give in to their demands.
But most of the assorted students and teachers of Hogwarts were like-minded with The Absurd Fanfic Revolution “ they knew that Tim the Enchanter was crazy, but highly unlikely to give up easily. If they were to win against the author, it would only be after a very long, desperate struggle.
“Get Hammered and Sickled…” Meagan muttered softly, reading the heading at the top of this chapter. “I don’t like that title at all. Makes me worry…”
“So, any ideas as to what Tim’s next move is?” inquired Wat in order to drag out whatever moments of peace they had left.
“I don’t know,” answered Harriet, “probably the usual absurdity with a lot of explosions and random things like that.”
There was murmured agreement, but Meagan interjected, “There probably will, but I think Tim will try to negotiate or demand that we step down first. Striking immediately sounds a bit rushed, and there won’t be any kind of suspense if he does tha“”
Just then, the huge doors to the Great Hall burst open with a crash and a terrified student came running in, shouting at the top of his lungs:
“THE RED ARMY’S HERE! THE RED ARMY’S ATTACKING HOGWARTS!”
Some people screamed, but others were evidently confused: “What’s the Red Army?”
“THE SOVIETS! THE EFFING SOVIETS ARE“”
BOOM!
There was a huge explosion and part of the Great Hall’s ceiling collapsed, showering everyone with crumbled bits of stone and roof tiles. The sky outside was the exact same tranquil blue as the enchanted ceiling, but through the hole they saw a massive helicopter with rotor blades buzzing like some huge satanic bumblebee that was in no mood to pollinate flowers. There was a series of bright flashes“
“EVERYONE, DOWN!” Wat Tyler screamed just as the rockets and bullets from the Mi-24 Hind helicopter gunship started raining down. There was a chain of cataclysmic explosions as the rocket warheads hit the floor and tables, blasting apart chunks of marble and vicious splinters of wood. A few machine gun rounds pounded into flesh, making sick, wet, slapping sounds.
Barely a moment later, the helicopter was gone. A few braver students got up from under their tables with their wands drawn, but one look at that small bit of devastation removed any fantasies of valiant combat from their minds. If what the explosives and bullets did to the tables and floor was bad, then the effect on the few unlucky people hit was much, much worse. For emphasis, a bloodied, severed arm was hanging in midair, suspended by a bunch of floating candles that had melted together in the heat. But why had the helicopter gone?
An answer was provided in the form of an artillery barrage. Within seconds, hundreds of shells descended upon Hogwarts castle, blasting apart battlements, wrecking roofs, and pulverising parapets. It was an intense, furious orgy of explosive bangs that made the very ground shake and the walls of the castle writhe in pain.
The rebel students, teachers, and all their fellows were huddled under whatever cover they could find “ the ones who had gotten up tactfully retreated under the ruined tables. The Great Hall was filled with frantic, terrified screams, but none could be heard over the echoing, deafening din of the artillery.
After what seemed like an eternity of chaos but was only two short paragraphs in actuality, the rain of explosions ceased “ the castle had gone eerily quiet, as if setting the stage for some inspiring speech.
Wat Tyler did not miss a beat “ he got up out from under the Gryffindor table and stood on top of its bullet-ridden surface. In the loudest, carrying voice he could muster, he pointed his finger at the gaping hole in the ceiling and shouted, “IS THAT THE BEST YOU CAN DO, TIM? YOU COWARD!”
Inspired by his example, The Absurd Fanfic Revolution and other students and teachers came out from hiding to stand erect and proud in the devastated Great Hall. “Come on, everyone! STAND UP! We’re fighting!” Wat called to his fellow characters.
Soon enough, everyone assembled to hear his inspiring speech “ even the Slytherins. And they were not disappointed.
“Students! Teachers! My fellow fanfiction characters! My friends… The time has come for us to fight, and fight we will! If we want to live in peace as characters with depth and integrity, we have to earn that right! We will fight and defeat whatever armies our psychotic author throws at us, and that’s NOT going to happen if we squander our few remaining precious paragraphs of existence, cowering like some pathetic Frenchmen! TO BATTLE! Let’s show those commies our BRITISH SPUNK!”
“HURRAH!” everyone shouted in a resonating chorus of cheers. Hundreds of wands were unsheathed to war cries of “Down with Tim!” and “Let’s go!”
“To the towers, doors, and walls, everyone!” Wat cried as the wave of students charged down the length of the Great Hall to man the castle’s defences. For the first time in several decades, Headmistress McGonagall shouted “Piertotum locomotor!” Hundreds of suits of armour in the corridors thundered to the floors from their plinths, and at her order, they ran off clanking and banging to combat.
“Do we stick together or split up?” John yelled over the crescendo of cheers, rushing footsteps, and distant explosions.
“NO!” shouted Meagan in response. “We have to stick together as a collective perspective for the battle! If we split up, we’ll increase the number of viewpoints, and this battle will be paragraphs longer, and we’ll suffer more casualties that way!”
“Right! What she said!” ordered Wat, “But let’s get going! No time to waste!”
The seven Absurd Fanfic Revolutionaries stayed together as they headed to the entrance hall. The hundreds of other fighters with them thinned out as they went their separate ways to other floors and towers.
The entrance hall had seen better days “ the artillery bombardment had wreaked terrible havoc. Every single window had shattered into a million pieces, statues and gargoyles had toppled to the ground, and the massive doors creaked ominously. Wat ran up to one of the destroyed windows and looked outside.
Immediately, he wished he hadn’t.
The school grounds were crawling with Soviet armour: T-72 and T-80 main battle tanks with long guns, squat BMP-3 infantry combat vehicles, and a plethora of steel-plated cousins on wheels and treads. Amongst the mechanised wave was a horde of Russian soldiers waving red flags and armed to the teeth. The skies above were abuzz with swarms of Hind helicopters, and transport planes flew high overhead, disgorging throngs of paratroopers.
Even the lake was scary to look at: several destroyers and cruisers had somehow appeared in the middle of the waters and were shelling the castle with their large guns and guided missiles. Landing craft and ekronoplans beached themselves on the lake’s shore and unloaded soldiers and vehicles “ the giant squid’s dead carcass lay rotting on the sand.
After barely looking for one second, a volley of assault rifle and machine gun fire came pelting in, aimed directly at Wat’s face. He ducked just in time, for the hail of lead pummelled into the wall behind him, pulverising the fronts of the stone.
“THIS IS IT!” he cried out, braver than he felt. What could his thin little wand do against that much firepower arrayed against him?
He was about to find out. The crescendo of explosions grew louder, and the walls shook ever more violently. Bullets streamed in through the windows, and no one dared go near them. Then came grenades…
“Grenades!” someone shouted unnecessarily. One fighter who kept his cool banished them out the window again with a swish of his wand. Others conjured shield charms that deflected bursts of shrapnel as some of the explosives detonated.
More 125mm high-explosive shells from T-72 tanks slammed into the castle, and 12.7mm machine gun bullets careened through the destroyed windows, chipping stone and ricocheting“
“Where’s all of this technical stuff coming from?” John yelled, perplexed at the downpour of deadly data. “Is our author some weapons-crazed freak?”
CRASH! The great doors to the castle were torn asunder, splintered to pieces and ripped from their hinges. A long, thick snout emerged through the cloud of dust and smoke, and there was a clattering of steel treads on stone“
“TANK!”
Its main gun spat fire in an echoing bang that flayed everyone’s eardrums. The cannon shell crashed into a wall and tore it down, blasting fragmented bits of stone about the hall and creating a rain of loosened masonry.
The Absurd Fanfic Revolution and their nameless followers screamed like the pathetic teenagers they were. The author degraded them further by making some of them break down and cry for their mummies. HA HA! BUT MUMMY DOESN’T EXIST, BECAUSE TIM THE ENCHANTER HASN’T WRITTEN HER INTO THE DAMN STORY, YOU LITTLE WEEDS!
“Wingardium Leviosa!” somebody said stupidly, as if levitating things would win a duel against a tank. But hey, it worked for Ron against that troll in Philosopher’s Stone, so why not?
But remarkably, the tank soared up into the air “ WOW! FREAKY! Its gun roared again and the force of the recoil blasted it out of the entrance hall, through the destroyed doors, and the tank gouged a deep hole in the grass where it landed.
However, that tank shell it fired had hit a wall and knocked out some big pieces of rubble which fell down on top of the disposable character who did that spell’s head. He/she/it died after shouting, “OUCHIE!”
“Oh Merlin!” cried out Alice. “Things are getting weird!”
Meagan suddenly had a Hermione moment. She grabbed Wat and yelled into his ear over the cacophonic crazy chaos of the battle, “I HAVE AN IDEA! JUST HOLD THEM OFF FOR A FEW PARAGRAPHS WHILE I GO TO THE LIBRARY!”
“WHAT?” he yelled back in complete terror, but she had already disappeared.
Soviet soldiers then flooded into the entrance hall, Kalashnikovs blazing and throwing bullets here and there and everywhere. “GET HAMMERED AND SICKLED!” was their war cry, which was in English for some reason. “Γο Προλεταριάτ, Βαβη!” others chanted, also in neither the correct language nor alphabet. It would have at least been in Cyrillic letters, but this website couldn’t read Russian, so Greek had to be used instead as a substitute.
Shouts of “PROTEGO!” rippled through the chaotic, cavernous room. A few dozen transparent shields were erected, and the communist bullets bounced off them with a ping!ping!ping!ping! ping! noise.
But some bullets didn’t bounce off, and instead found a gap in the wall of conjured shields. One nameless student’s head exploded in a thoroughly charming fashion.
“GALOPING GARGOYLES! GROSS!” Chris screamed in revulsion at the sight.
“Get Hammered and Sickled!” Bangbangbangbang! “Proletarii vsekh stran, soyedinyaytes!”
The Absurd Fanfic Revolution and their followers only managed to retaliate with a few stunners, which did nothing to stem the flood of incoming Soviets. Their entire, desperate defence was concentrated on maintaining the phalanx of shield charms, which was constantly being whittled away by the endless hail of lead.
There was another source of the ping!ping!ping!ping!ping! noises “ the animated suits of medieval armour made that exact sound as they were riddled with hundreds of bullet holes. A few armoured statues almost got close enough to swing their swords or maces, but they were ultimately blown to pieces by Soviet RPG-7s.
There was nothing left to it. “FALL BACK!” Wat ordered. Slowly, the revolutionaries and their comrades in arms gave up ground, covering their retreat with layer upon layer of shield charms, which were blasted away with volley upon volley of gunfire and explosives. Occasionally, a few bullets wormed their way through the protective enchantments and struck the walls or people “ another nameless student was wounded and another was killed, just to accentuate how desperate their situation was. Conditions elsewhere throughout the castle were equally grim.
The knot of defenders were battered back again and again, down the corridors and retreating ever closer to the Great Hall. They managed to create some barricades out of desks and chairs in the narrower sections of their route, but they were predictably blown apart with more rocket propelled grenades.
“Damn it! Where’s Herm “ I mean, Meagan? Where’s Meagan?” Wat swore as he frantically conjured more shields to prevent his untimely demise.
“Here I am!” she yelled out of breath, holding a thick book and having appeared out of nowhere like some kind of witch or something.
“ABOUT BLOODY TIME!” he shouted over the banging of gunfire and the shouts of “PROTEGO!” and “GET HAMMERED AND SICKLED!”
“WHERE’VE YOU BEEN? WE’VE BEEN FIGHTING FOR MORE THAN FOUR HUNDRED WORDS “ THAT’S A LOT LONGER THAN ‘A FEW PARAGRAPHS!’”
“Well, I got it,” she explained, still panting slightly, “the book!”
She was holding a thick, weathered, red book with a faint gold title that read: Stupid Sorcery for Senseless Socialists.
“GREAT. JUST GREAT!” Wat screamed sarcastically.
Meagan ignored him and flipped through the pages until she found her desired chapter. “Got it!” she shouted when she found the right page. Following the book’s instructions, she waved her wand in a sharp lopsided semi-circle and bisected it with a diagonal slash, and yelled the incantation:
“PROLETARIUS EXPLODIKKUS!”
Amazingly, it worked! The closest row of Soviet soldiers just EXPLODED! Cool!
Her wand slashed again and again, drawing faux hammers and sickles in the air and causing more commies to blow up for no reason at all. Soon enough, some defenders mimicked her newly discovered spell and contributed to the exciting pyro detonation party.
“I’ll go spread the word!” Meagan said in farewell as she ran down a corridor and disappeared to aid the other combatants scattered about Hogwarts castle.
“COME ON EVERYONE! WE’RE PUSHING THEM BACK!” exclaimed Wat Tyler elatedly.
“Proletarius Explodikkus!”
“PROLETARIUS EXPLODIKKUS!”
Bit by bit, chunk by chunk, the revolutionaries exploded throngs of Soviet soldiers. It didn’t take long for them to realise that their bullets couldn’t (mostly) penetrate the shield charms, and it would only be a matter of time before they were all blown up by the Bolshevik-Blasting curses. They turned tail and ran.
Unfortunately (for the good guys, that is), The Absurd Fanfic Revolution’s pursuit was hampered by their own shield charms they had conjured to defend themselves. The students gave chase once they were taken down, but the Russians had a good head start and were desperately fleeing the scene.
“Hurry! Or else none of them will be left!” the AFR leader called to his fellow fighters. “HURRAH!” they replied in jubilant harmony.
After some long fast and furious moments of running down corridors and throwing spells at retreating Soviet backsides, the hundreds of the surviving revolutionaries from all the different corridors and towers converged in the entrance hall for some reason. The advance halted for a brief pause so Wat Tyler could make another inspiring speech:
“LET’S FINISH THEM! WE’LL PUSH THEM RIGHT INTO THE LAKE!”
There was a huge, resounding cheer. With renewed vigour, they charged out the smashed doors as one resurgent wave, bellowing cries of “HURRAH“”
Pow!Pow!Pow!Pow“
BOOM!
BAM! BAM!
Pow!Pow!Pow“
WHAM! WHAM!
KAPOW!
Streams of 30mm automatic cannon fire from armoured vehicles tore into them. Swarms of anti-personnel rockets from helicopters rained down, and 125mm tank shells ripped great holes in the line. Also, a couple of MiGs flew by overhead, jet engines screaming, and dropped some 500kg bombs for good measure.
Obviously, the shield charms couldn’t cope. They failed under the ridiculously large amount of firepower and butchered revolutionaries left and right. A few tried to fight back, but they discovered to their horror that the Bolshevik-Blasting curse didn’t work on tanks… or helicopters or jets or destroyers…
Quick as a flash, Wat conjured a white flag out of nowhere, aimed his wand at his throat, and after casting a sonorous spell on himself, he shouted to the Soviets, “PLEASE! FOR GOODNESS SAKE, CEASE FIRE!”
Remarkably, the shooting stopped. A Soviet general with wild crop of fiery black hair, a moustache, and pointy goatee presented himself, with his right arm raised, elbow at a ninety degree angle “ if that arm went down, the massacre would begin anew.
“What are your conditions of surrender, enemies of the Motherland?” asked Trotsky 2 the Avenger. The fruit salad of medals on his uniformed chest glistened in the sunlight. So too did the hammer and sickle in his left hand, itching to bash and slice.
With despair, Wat looked back at his battered followers, who stared back with defeated expressions. He sighed, but… enemies of the Motherland? he thought. That gave him an idea…
Well, it actually wasn’t well thought out. He simply blurted, “But there is no Motherland! The Soviet Union collapsed almost thirty years ago in 1991! You’re not even supposed to be here!”
That didn’t have the desired effect. They did not all suddenly disappear, like Wat had hoped “ instead, that just made them angry. “Lying capitalist pig!” some Soviet soldiers shouted. “GET HAMMERED AND SICKLED!” others yelled. Wat found himself staring down the barrels of hundreds of AK-74s, not to mention tanks and other pleasant bits of modern military equipment.
He “ no… They were in for it now…
Trotsky 2's arm came down“
“TALLY, BALLY HO!” projected an impossibly loud but mercifully British voice.
BOOM!
The deus ex machina exploded, but not amongst The Absurd Fanfic Revolution's ranks. Royal Air Force jets swooped down from behind the sun, blasting away with cannon fire, bombs, and missiles. Swinging into position from behind the Forbidden Forest, the British Army came to the rescue “ Challenger 2 tanks rumbled across the grass, shooting shells into the Soviet armour’s exposed posteriors. Warrior infantry carriers rolled in with automatic cannon chattering, and dumped soldiers into the ambush.
The student’s saviours weren’t only Muggles, however. A formation of scarlet-robed Aurors on brooms descended into the battlefield, firing spells down into the shocked mass of communist enemies below.
“PROLETARIUS EXPLODIKKUS!” roared Wat Tyler, and meanwhile the white flag of surrender in his hand magically transformed into a Union Jack, proudly flapping in the wind. The surviving revolutionaries eagerly joined into the battle after yet another miraculous change of fortune.
Under attack from all sides and caught by surprise, the Soviets faltered. After some fifteen seconds of hellish combat, they broke completely and would have routed, but they had no Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to run away to. With unimaginable bitterness etched on their faces, they surrendered.
They had done it. They had won, though it had been a desperate struggle, and the cost in lives was terrible.
Yet the revolutionaries had survived the army Tim the Enchanter had sent against them “ they were one step closer to victory! One step closer to their ultimate character development and expulsion of the author, once and for all!
But…
If that was Tim’s first act of retaliation, I hate to imagine what comes next, Wat contemplated grimly, looking at the bloody aftermath of the great battle. One bloody step towards victory, indeed.
The Absurd Fanfic Revolution would have to walk many more.