HARRY POTTER AND THE RETURN

It was dark that night despite the full moon hanging overhead. Shadows stabbed deeply into the light shed by Harry's lantern, and it seemed that the darkness carried a certain intensity to it, as if something had emboldened it to entrench itself deeper this night. There was also a certain uneasiness in the air, a heavy heat that could make your stomach curl if you breathed in too deeply. None of these things, however, weighed heavily on Harry's mind; Harry was too busy thinking about the strange events that had occurred at Hogwarts the past few summer nights.

The implication and reality of these events was hard to nail down, considering that there little known among the student body. There was rumors of strange sounds in the night and sightings of mysterious lights in areas of the castle that were supposed to be vacated. One night, Harry had been awoken by blood-chortling scream that he heard from the bowels of the castle. It was not much better during the day, however, as a deep and enduring feeling of resignation and imminent doom loomed over the student body. Students that Harry had known to be gay and cheerful were now pale and lethargic, passively shuffling from class to class without speaking, laughing, or smiling.

By the time that Harry had reached the central courtyard, he had made the decision that he himself was going to get to the bottom of this mysterious curse on Hogwarts. Several times he had gone to see his teachers after class and had asked them about the strange things he had observed. Every time the teachers lips would become pursed and their faces would tighten, and then Harry would have to endure a rehearsed lecture about how everything was fine, that there was nothing to worry about, and that if anything was amiss, the teachers would deal with it.

Well, to hell with that! thought Harry as he took his first few steps into the courtyard.

Looks as though it is up to me again to save Hogwarts.

Harry suddenly realized that his hand had slipped into his pocket, and that he had a tensive grip on his wand.

I'm going to bust this mystery open: wide open, he thought with a steely resolve that surprised him.

“Well, hello, Harry,” a raspy whisper cracked the night's silence just as Harry reached the center of the courtyard. Harry reflexively whirled around to face the source of the unexpected sound, and his lantern revealed a dark, tall looming figure.

“Who are you?” Harry's voice boomed in a commanding tone as he attempted to use his lantern to reveal the man's face. The darkness surrounding the body of the figure seemed to eat away at the light, and Harry realized that he was not dealing with any ordinary wizard.

“Oh, come now, Harry. I knew I had everyone else fooled, but I thought for sure that you would be the one to catch on.” the figure taunted in a faint, familiar voice.

“V-V-Voldemort!” exclaimed Harry, in a sudden realization of the possible identity of the perpetrator.

But the figure only bowed his shoulders and shook his head.

“It appears that you are just as gullible as the rest of these fools,” the figure spoke while motioning with his hand to the classrooms surrounding the courtyard. “Voldemort was just a puppet, a mere tool that I used to keep the students and staff of Hogwarts distracted and in their places.”

“You showed so much promise, Harry. It is a great shame that you were such a disappointment in the end,” the figure added with malice.

And just as he finished, the figure's form and features began to emerge from the darkness.

And suddenly, Harry realized who this mysterious man was.

“Dumbledore! I-I-Is it really you!?” Harry exclaimed with astonished glee.

But just as exhilaration and relief had set in, Harry began to understand that this man was not the Dumbledore that he remembered and befriended. In place of the geriatric, friendly face that Harry had known and loved all of these years was now a sunken, pale shell with a contorted grin. The eyes that always carried a twinkle of mirth were now bug-eyed and piercing red. The plethora of wizard's robing that Dumbledore always carried with such grace were now ragged and uneven. This was not the Dumbledore that he had known.

This cannot be Dumbledore! Harry desperately thought.

And yet it was. And with this realization, Harry's heart grew heavy and faint. Here before him was the man he had loved as a father, now twisted and malicious as a monster.

“Hah! It always becomes so clear, doesn't it Harry? Right at the very end? That's exactly how it was for your parents as well,” Dumbledore spat, opening his mouth to reveal a set of blood-engorged fangs. “Oh yes, .. your parents were meddling peddlers of 'truth' and 'justice,' just as you are. They too came dangerously close to revealing my dark secret.”

“How? ... But! But! But you died!” Harry voice trembled as his eyes came close to the brink of tears.

“You were always an observant one, Harry. Oh yes, I had died. That worthless old fool Snape attempted to destroy me when he learned of my plot to silence you,” Dumbledore explained patronizingly, as he began to inch closer to where Harry was standing. “But do you really think that such a weakling could destroy one such as I?”

Dumbledore stopped for a moment, then began to circle Harry's position.

“Instead, Snape's attempt only served to help me, for it was becoming increasingly difficult to operate in the open after you had foiled several of my plans.”

Harry noticed that Dumbledore's hoary old beard was drenched in blood and that he smelled of death and decay.

“It was a damn shame about that old fool Snape though,” Dumbledore spoke with honest remorse, and then curtly added, “His blood tasted terribly.”

Dumbledore paused for a moment of reflection, then continued to circle Harry.

“And the way that he debased himself in front of me with pleas for mercy was enough to make me lose my appetite,” Dumbledore said with disgust.

Dumbledore's face broke suddenly into a dry grin. “Well, almost.”

Dumbledore began to cackle, letting lose shrill shrieks of maddening laughter.

“And now, .. the game is over. All the moves have been made; all the pawns have been played. And now it is the final turn: my turn.” Dumbledore stopped circling and faced his body towards Harry. “And I have all the time that I need ... All the time that I need ... to know ... your flesh!”

Dumbledore then lunged towards Harry at a supernatural speed with fangs bared and a blood lust in his eyes.

Harry let loose a scream that rang off of the courtyard walls and echoed into endless eternity.

THE END

Chapter One: The Beginning

Reflexively, I turned the wheel of my Chrysler Sebring compensating for both the centripetal acceleration and the friction posed between the wheels and the road. I was driving home through Berry Creek, a route that I have practiced hundreds of times; this time, however, there was a new variable that I had to consider: my friend Perry was there with me in the passenger seat. I could feel my heart rate increase as I worked to determine the possible consequences of my rash decision to allow him to ride in the “shotgun,” as he insensitively referred to the passenger seat. “Mass,” I thought, “The additional mass would increase the turning radius and the amount of energy to accelerate to a given velocity.” I could feel my palms begin to sweat as I began to realize the full implications of my dire situation. My thoughts diverged, however, when I perceived a more urgent emergency: A stop sign thirty yards away. My fists tightened around the steering wheel as I quickly began applying the brakes; I applied them lightly, of course, because a slight, constant deceleration over an extended period of time would minimize the amount of damage to the brake pads. Perry, fully unappreciating the severity of our situation, began to yammer on about some trivial proposition; I smiled weakly in response as I attempted to mitigate a nearly imminent disaster. As we neared the stop sign, I checked the speedometer: Sixteen miles per hour. This implied that I had achieved a fifty percent reduction in speed; however, past statistical data suggested that a sixty-five percent reduction was necessary to stop from the point that we had reached. Perry still was droning on. As we neared the stop sign, my knuckles ran white with desire as I tensively gripped the wheel: I could see that we might just make it. I closed my eyes as hard as I could; all I could sense was Perry’s dull, baritone voice and a bright flash of light. I was helpless; it was all up to fate, now. With my eyes still closed, I felt us come to a complete stop. Almost shaking, I began to open my eyes to see if we had made it: a cool flood of relief washed over me as I saw that we had stopped just short of the sign. I released my grip on the wheels and I relaxed back into my seat. After a moment of quiet reflection, I realized that Perry had stopped talking. I casually looked over in the passenger seat. It was then that I witnessed something terrible. It was then that I realized that the apparent ending of one nightmare only signalled the beginning of a new one: The beginning of something so terrible, so terrifying, that it needs its own chapter just to talk about it.

Daisy Wright Must Die

Much to my disappointment, I recently discovered that Jude Law has publicly apologized to his fiancee, actor Sienna Miller, for cheating with one of his children's nannies. If you guys out there know Jude as well as I do, then you know that he could hardly be capable of such a heinous act; for those of you who don't know the famous Jude Law, he basically starred in some movies and got a nomination for the Pulitzer or something like that. When I first heard the news, I was awestruck and attempted to ignore the claims, but despite my obviously high opinion of Jude, I couldn't shake the damning evidence: An internet source says he did it. Finally accepting the certainty of his guilt, I couldn't help but feel that my world was collapsing around me: If playboy actor Jude Law couldn't remain loyal to his fiancee, by what moral precedence can we as ephemeral observers in an impartial universe exist? The question instantly became too complicated for me, so I decided to save a lot of time and just find a scapegoat for the whole incident; it seemed that only Jude could be the target of my rage, when suddenly I thought of the nanny Jude cheated with, which reminded me of that New Yorker woman on that show called "the Nanny," which only served to make me angrier. The question of blame then was settled in my mind: I would find the nanny and kill her, not because I really care about the whole ordeal, but it probably would be fun and I needed to find a use for that 10-foot pike that I bought at RenFest. Armed with her name, Daisy Wright, from the infallible source known as "the internet," I proceeded forth on my quest of ignorance and revenge. Using my detective intuition, I calculated the best way to find Daisy Wright was to type her name into Google's image search, and then see if any of the pictures were of anyone that I knew. The results were a mixed bag, but they ultimately resolved my quest in an interesting and, frankly, quite stupid way.

Using my mathematical intuition, I can safely eliminate this result at a 15% level of confidence.








Why the heck would google image search put this picture on there for "Daisy Wright"? LOL they are so gay.






Professor Fatso is choreographing his next gluttonous feast.








And there we have it! It seems that the whole ordeal resolved itself with Daisy Wright already being dead and Jude Law being pretty freaking creepy. Disappointed, I put my unused 10-foot pike back into my closet, next to my shrine dedicated to Jessica Alba, the sight of which served to help fill the emptiness inside of me, if only a little.

Top Ten Best Bands

I know pretty much for a fact that everybody out there that reads this thing (myself) values my opinion, and this is why I have decided in my wisdom to clear up some controversary that has been going on about which bands are, in fact, the best. You damned kids with your Metallica and Chuck Mangione records think you've got it all figured out, but, unless you're thinking that you should just stay reclusively in your dorm and not involve yourself in the rather embarassing ordeal known as life, then you are wrong. For those of you who might find yourself disagreeing with my last statement, I calmly refer you to a graphical representation of why I am right, which should clear up any doubts that you may have. So, with that out of the way, we may proceed to the list of top ten bands:

10. Definitely Not Your Favorite Band
Absolutely not. There isn't any way that this one is even close to the best. In fact, I would go as far to say that it sucks: sucks the big one. Christ, I don't even know how it made it on this list. That just comes to show you that they stopped making music in the 1950's, right after Frank Sinatra stopped making records. So, yah, like I said, your favorite band is crap.




9. Mozart
Yah, this is a great band: I heard them on the radio the other day, and I was like, "Wow, man, this is a great band." It's difficult for me to really explain how it is that they can achieve such a great sound, maybe they just have a really great drummer or something. Anyway, listen to 89.5 and see if you can catch them on there, couldn't get them on MTV for some reason though, which is too bad, because they probably have a killer music video.



3. Rubber Band
I've got two words for you: totally, fucking amazing. I mean, do you see that? That guy is like stretching that thing like fifty feet; there was this one time when I was in high school where this one teacher of mine had a rubber band, and then like there was a fly or something buzzing around and then he shot it in the air, and, like, it was the coolest thing I have ever seen.


2. Tom Selleck
For those of you who are going to go all pussy-footing around the details and say that Tom Selleck isn't a band and probably can't even play an instrument, Tom would like to show you that there is one instrument that he can play: a bat the size of your face. After a little trio performance between you, Tom, and his monster bat, which could crush a man's skull as if it were made out of kittens, I'm sure you'll be whistling a different tune.




1. Band playing at Jester

Yah, these guys are definitely the best. I mean, just look at them: they're one of the very few bands which make use of the under-appreciated crocodile-shaped playschool xylophone; they've pretty much got every genre of music covered: country, rock, emo, and whatever fuck else you want; and they pissed the crap out of those assholes who live at jester. So, they've pretty much are the best band in my books; it's just too bad that they didn't have more jam sessions.


So, anyway, now that we got that cleared up, I don't want to hear anything more about the subject of music, bands, or whatever. We should just all agree that I am right and just settle the question there, which works out great for me.

Whoa!

"Whoa" is right, folks! A damn lot has happened since I last updated this stupid thing, not that the last update had any substance, although I would have to say that I still appreciate the picture of Winston. Anyway, I made it out of my first year of UT with a 3.97 GPA, and was able to successfully transfer out of Gayerospace into Electrical Engineering, which I think shall suit me better. I went home for a few days, and during all the packing I had to do, I noticed that I had a ton of gay clothes that I have had for a few years that was just begging to be donated to the Caring Place, so I spent most of the time that I spent at home sorting through mounds and mounds of clothes. As soon as that was done, I had to leave for this Sparklemotion theatre excursion, which involved driving down to Dallas in a white volvo for three hours: an absolute blast. I saw Caitlin's house, which was very quaint and homely, and I got to see Winston, a glorious Boston-Terrier, and this other thing, which I assume was Caitlin's new pug or something. Winston was a great dog; most of the time, he would want to play "ball," which basically consisted of you getting the ball from him and then throwing it. Sometimes, the ball landed in the pool, and poor ol' Winston would just sit there for hours staring at it, whimpering occasionally. After partaking in Caitlin's father's cigars and dos equis, we then bounded down to Callie's place, which was this big, nice place in Granbury, a town much like Georgetown. There we celebrated Lesley's birthday by drinking and sitting in a hot tub; Callie made her a delicious cake that looked like Cory Thorton, the doll not the person. Eventually, we headed back home, which was a quite welcome change; despite the fact that I did enjoy myself immensely, I was ready just to stay home for a few days and relax for my upcoming stay at the University of Texas Summer school program; currently I am waiting in Austin for classes to start and to finalize my transfer from ASE to EE. That about covers it, I hope everybody out there is doing well, and hopefully I will see you soon.

Caitlin's dog, Winston, who apparently only sleeps under covers.

HOT WITCH ON BLAKE ACTION! HAWT! HAWT!

Happy Birthday!

Yes folks, today is a day of all days: a day to be remembered and cherished, for it is my 20th birthday! April the 26th is also the birthday of a few other extraordinary people, such as Jesus, Tom Selleck, Frank Sinatra, and the guy with the world's strongest biceps, and to celebrate this glorious event, the whole theatre troupe decided to go to Austin Park and Pizza last Friday. On a lesser, side note, this was also to celebrate the birth of slightly lesser deities, which may be formally known as Caitlin Overton. I can tell you objectively that it was a lot of fun, and I am happy and appreciative of everyone who came. The following are a few pictures of the event, and they should convey formally that it was an absolute blast.

Austin Park and Pizza!

Too old? .. NAH!

As birthday celebrations usually begin, there was a period of brief confusion and contemplation in front of the Jester dormitory.

Max and I wore the same shirt.

Things somehow ended with Perry posing in front of a cracked-out painting.

Only at the University of Texas ... whether or not that's a good thing is debatable.

What the .. !?