Salutations, Calico!

I must say that this is a most excellent and intriguing story, so thank you for entertaining me! However, there is one nitpick that I feel I must bring to your attention.

Unless using a magic train that can transcend the barriers of air, land, and sea, it is impossible for a train to go from Vienna to London, since Britain is an island – well, in 1945 at least, since the Channel Tunnel wasn’t built until 1994, but I digress. Assuming that Tateh took a Muggle train full of Muggles, the best way to get to England from Austria would be to take the train to the coast of the English Channel, at say, Calais in northern France or some port in Belgium or the Netherlands.

From Calais, it’s a simple matter of taking a boat across the Channel to Dover, where Tateh could take another train north to London. If he had taken a ship from the Low Countries, he probably would have entered Britain from the East, landing at the Port of London. Bristol is located near the (appropriately named) Bristol Channel in southwest England, some 170 kilometres west of London. Since it is quite out of the way of the journey from Vienna to London, I couldn’t help but wonder why passengers from Austria would take a long detour by sailing around Cape Cornwall to get to Bristol to get to London!

So, that concludes my rant on transportation and geography. I do like your story very much, so aside from that little issue, good work!

Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: Wow, you have a very good point. I didn't even look at a map before I wrote that part of the epilogue (which just goes to show how lazy I got about researching towards the end) and I'm very sorry for the impossiblity of that scene. I'd change it, but I feel like altering any part of this story now would do more damage than good - my muse has gone on a well-earned vacation, so I think I'll just let any reader who, like you, finds this hole in the plot make up a reasonable explanation for his or herself.

Finally! A story that appeals to someone like me! It’s good to know that I’m not the only gun-crazed Harry Potter fan!

Personally, I’d go with the CETME Ameli LMG as opposed to the M249E4 and an IMI CTAR 21 instead of an M4A1, but that’s just me. Also, what calibre is Arch’s USP CT in? .45 ACP, I presume? Also also, what is Arch’s primary weapon (unless it’s the USP…), because I don’t think you mentioned it.

Incidentally, I happen to be writing a story that features magically enhanced L85A1 assault rifles charmed to be lighter, have more ammunition capacity, less recoil, etc.

But enough of the guns! This story was a thoroughly entertaining read, and I look forward to reading the next chapters. Good job!

Tim the Enchanter

P.S. Avtomat Kalashnikova obraztsa 1947 goda!

I submitted this review with the above name in Cyrillic letters, but this site doesn’t seem to be able to read them. Sorry if I caused any confusion by deleting this review twice and rewriting it!

Author's Response: Thanks for the review!\r\nI chose the firearms based on the armory utilized by DEVGRU and the like. MM used to operate in the Colonies, after all.\r\nAs for Arch, you\'re right, he\'s slinging around .45 ACP cartridges. His primary\'ll get introduced later on, probably when he\'s up against something more substantial than Snatchers.\r\nAgain, thank you for reading, and I\'ll be sure to check out your story!

Hello Schmergo,

Well, I just saw the movie Sweeny Todd for the first time a few days ago. I really enjoyed it, though I thought Johnny Depp slitting people’s throats with great gore and violence was just disturbing, especially since he does so in graphic detail about twenty or so times in the movie. On a slightly more cheerful note, I couldn’t help but notice that many of the actors play Death Eaters in the Potter films.

With that in mind, I decided to read this musical spoof a second time. Though I have forgotten the tune of some of the songs, I enjoyed this story more the second time reading it, since I at least had some idea of how most of the songs were supposed to go. Speaking of which, I’m curious to know what the differences are between the songs in the movie and the Broadway version.

On a very unrelated note, I sent you another picture on Monday, but I was wondering if you got it or not. Currently, I’m trying to think of what to draw for yet another Potter’s Pentagon art submission, and I’ll probably send you my next entry within a few days.

But I digress. Once again, this was an entertaining and fascinating read, and I look forward to your next musical spoof, hopefully of Spamalot!

Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: Welll, hello there! Yeah, one of the bigest appeals of Sweeney Todd for me was seeing Harry Potter characters singing... especially Snape, which was hilarious. The throat-slitting for me was actually less scary than I thought it would be because it vaguely reminded me of the Black Knight from Monty Python... the blood was so fake and spurt-y that it seemed funny, though the Judge\'s death was disturbing for me. I did get your email... I\'m sorry I didn\'t respond! I\'ve been so busy with SOLs (Horrible standardized tests that everyone has to take) and end-of-the-year projects, such as French Revolution Puppet Pals. (Hey guys, I found the source of the bloodshed! It\'s a guillotine! YAAAY! *Shing*) Glad you liked this!

Interesting buildup you have going, Sheena. I like how you gradually reveal details so that I, the reader, wants to keep turning the page, if there were indeed any pages to turn.

Though I must commend you for your intriguing plot and interesting cast of characters, I have some several issues with this chapter pertaining to historical accuracy and realism.

First, there is a problem with timing. You wrote that Jean and Marius joined the army after the beginning of the war: that would be September first, 1939. However, you said that it was a year before Jean got his first mission, but France was already occupied by September 1940. Also, you describe Marius doing espionage in Germany for months and months on end before returning to France, and again, this would be impossible because France surrendered in June 1940. Also pertaining to timing, you appear to have overlooked the fact that it takes time to train a good spy. Marius and Jean would have precious little time to do any spying at all, between the end of their training and the fall of France.

Second is the way you portray spying. You describe Jean and Marius as soldiers and spies, but these terms are not synonymous. Also, (ignoring the timing issue mentioned above) I have trouble believing that Marius and Jean could have ever gotten to Russia by walking overland through Germany. Considering Marius' reckless actions (how did he ever become a spy if he couldn't control himself?), there is no way they would have made it - a secret police system as good as the Gestapo would have picked up their trail and found them. Also, the majority of Germans were patriotic Nazis, and I find it hard to believe that Marius and Jean would be able subsist off "generous hands" - how would they know where to find people sympathetic to them? Lastly, why did Jean and Marius walk overland to Russia anyway? The Soviet Union was neutral at the time, so the two could have just taken a ship flying the flag of a neutral nation and not have to worry about the Germans torpedoing it, or the Soviets sending it back. They could have even just taken a train from France, through Italy (which was neutral until 10 June 1940), east across the Balkans, and into the Soviet Union, which would probably be the simplest and easiest option.

Thirdly and lastly, is the Krum manor house. Aren't the Krums wizards? If they are indeed wizards, having them live in plain sight of a Muggle village makes little Harry Potter sense. But why do the Krum family servants use guns? But, wizards or not, there is no way an aristocratic, bourgeois family would be allowed to exist in the Soviet Union. Such elitism is diametrically opposed to everything that Bolshevism stood for, and there is no doubt that the CPSU would have evicted the Krums (or worse), seized the estate, and redistributed the land. Even assuming that the Krums are wizards who could Obliviate any Muggle they want, the communists would not leave them alone and they would be a constant topic of investigation. If such a family of bourgeois aristocrats were mysteriously able to resist every attempt to arrest them, I suspect that troops and/or police would have been sent to simply kill them. Seeing that Jean was easily able to blow up large parts of the manor with Muggle explosives, the Red Army would have assuredly wiped them out.

I like this story, but unfortunately there are some serious historical inaccuracies and logical problems.

~ Tim the Enchanter

Greetings, Schmerg_The_Impaler!

This story is simply magnificent. It is an expertly written blend of drama, wild science-fiction speculation, and sheer lunacy – I was hooked while reading this story, and I can’t really articulate all the reasons I can think of to explain how good it is. I’ll simply say “GOOD JOB” and wish you the best of luck in the Gauntlet challenge!

I loved the eccentricity of this story: quite top-notch. For instance:

“…the figure swept out of the room theatrically, cape billowing behind him, and random bursts of electricity welcoming him onto the street beyond.”

That sentence was just a brilliant introduction to the raining electric eels. I was quite confused at first, but then there was the dawning comprehension in the next paragraph – I couldn’t stop laughing. To put it simply, I admire and am a bit jealous of your skills of narration.

Then there is the ending – being so ambiguous, everyone who reads the story can come up with their own unique conclusions (or plain confusion!). My own personal understanding was that Arthur had unwittingly removed himself from existence. Since his destiny is written on the document, destroying it would inadvertently destroy him too – which reminds me of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Oh yes, I have a question. What does MNFF stand for? I don’t recall you identifying the acronym.

All right, moving on…

“Well, we had Harry Potter do it in most of them,” Charlton reminded him. “Though I think a cement mixer flattened Voldemort in at least one…”

For obvious reasons, that was my absolute favourite part. I really cannot ask for higher praise for my own literary exercise in absurdity. Now I feel obligated to include allusions to some of your stories in my own fics, Schmergo! Anyway, thank you for making my week!

Once again, I must commend you for writing this amazing story. I must confess that I have never read anything of Neville’s Girl, but I suddenly find myself with a need to remedy that. With that said, cheerio!

Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: Tim, dahhhling! I remember telling you about this story before it was posted, so I\'m very glad that you think it lived up to expectations. Oh Godric, I forgot I did this for a challenge... this\'ll certainly confuse the judges. Anyway, Luna wrote the part about the random bursts of electricity-- she had the clever foresight to edit that back into the story when we were revising at the end (because I was very adamant about putting electric eels in the story-- one title I thought of for the story was \"On A Dark And Eel-Splattered Evening.\")

\r\nAs for the ending, I don\'t think Arthur would kill himself. The idea was hopefully that Arthur ripped up the paper AFTER he got to our universe, where he\'s a real person and not a fictional character, so I don\'t think he\'d kill himself by ripping the paper. Ripping the paper just broke the connection between him and the sinister MNFF, of which we are all members, so we don\'t get to read his story anymore. The idea I was going for was when the convict Jean Valjean in Les Miserables vows to take on a new identity and sings, \"JEAN VALJEAN IS NOTHING NOW, ANOTHER STORY MUST BEGIIIIIIIN!\" and dramatically rips up his passport to swelling and very high-pitched music. Yeah, no one else got that, either.

\r\nMNFF is never identified-- Charlton says that it\'s strictly confidential what it stands for, but yes, it\'s \"MuggleNet Fan Fiction.\" I thought mentioning the website by name might be going a teensy-weensy bit too far. I never really thought up what it could mean in their universe, honestly, because I was too dazzled by my own cleverness to really put any thought into the world I was creating. I\'m sure you could come up with a really good name for the organization, though. At the moment, I can\'t think of anything other than \"My Nasty French Father,\" which I don\'t think is a good name at all.

\r\nYes, I edited in the \"Out of the Darkness\" reference shortly before submitting based on a throwaway comment you made in one of your emails. And I\'m really glad I did! It seems a bunch of reviewers are getting the reference-- hooray! (And if anyone doesn\'t, I\'ll direct them toward your story.)

Salutations, Schmergo!

Of course – I knew “ENJYCORN” would win! Who could resist the awesome Belgian fiery lead firepower of a FNP-9 wielding unicorn? I can’t, certainly…

But I digress. It is an honour to have won the OFFICIAL SCHMERG_THE_IMPALER READER ART CHALLENGE. It was really quite fun drawing scenes from this magnificent series, and just having my artwork enjoyed by others is a good enough reward… but I’m not complaining, not by a long shot!

Jordan playing his (acoustic!) guitar was really entertaining and surprisingly easy to draw… except for his feet! Anyway, I’m glad that you think my representation was faithful, and even attractive. Thank you for liking it so much!

Now, on to the actual chapter…

Well, thank you for teaching me something new about medicine today, Schmergo. Debilitating diseases is a subject that completely fails to capture my imagination, but in this chapter you had me hanging on to every word. Only until something horrible happens to you, someone close, or even a fanfiction character in this case, do you come to realise how we take being healthy for granted.

But to move on to other things in the chapter, I have to admit that I was quite disappointed in Haley. She steals chocolate from Professor Lupin while delivering the news that his son has just collapsed, unconscious – I think that’s quite bad taste on her part. But enough of that.

This is a splendid, captivating chapter. I look forward to seeing how events unfold!

Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: Why, it's Tim! (Are you honestly surprised that you won the contest? You entered about ninety-eight pictures...) I'm imagining you drawing the picture of Jordan and then some teacher or something coming up behind you and being like "... mmm... o-kay...." I am very glad you liked this chapter because it went under very, very, very intense revision to get it to be less melodramatic...

As for Haley, I kind of got the idea that she was goofing off to lighten the mood, so Professor Lupin wouldn't be TOO worried. I think Haley was more concerned than she let on. But then again... there WAS chocolate. Maybe she wasn't.

Well Schmergo, this is an unexpected surprise – Quick update! It appears that the queue length has gone down from a month to about a week. I was expecting the modding my own story to drag on into April next year at that rate, so I’m glad the submission process has returned to some semblance of normalcy! However, I’m still wondering when the 2008 QSQs will be announced…

But I digress. I’m here to leave a review for this chapter, and I shall! Once again, Schmergo, your writing never ceases to amaze me and make me wish I had more free time to write myself. Your characterisation is, as always, superb – you bring to life your chaotic cluster of characters with clear, concise, and comedic clarity. Ted is still adorable (and amazingly, not in a sickening, cliché way), Ivy is starting to become an excellent heroine, and Pansy is just deliciously evil. Excellent chapter.

However, I spotted I typo that I think you should fix, since it distracts from an otherwise dramatic scene, causing me to wonder what the original sentence was, rather than admiring Ivy’s resistance to her mother:

“You want me to spend time him?” she said in a deceptively tiny voice.

There should be a “with” in there, if my assumption is correct…

Anyway, moving on, I particularly enjoyed the Christmas scene at the Potter house. For one wild moment, I thought the little box Ted gave to Ivy was going to be an engagement ring. Now, that would have been interesting!

So, once again, this was a highly enjoyable read, and I eagerly await the next update.

Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: WHOA, Tim! THIS is indeed an unexpected surprise. I seem to get reviews in... clumps... The queue really is outrageously fast, even if the QSQ's.... aren't... at all... I really am biting my nails about those QSQ's.

In all seriousness, getting compliments from you means a lot to me, because I really envy your fantastic writing style and originality in your writing. And I'm really glad that a BOY no less feels that Ted is adorable and non-irritating. Thank you for pointing out the typo, seriously. There are SO MANY in here.

Yeah, my sister thought it was an engagement ring, too! (My sister is my first audience for absolutely everything I write. She's the best listener in the universe, and she got to read this story in its roughest draft about a year ago.)

Hello Sainyn Swiftfoot!

I was scrolling through the recently updated/posted stories, and I recognised your name from those reviews you left me. It looks like you’ll have to update your profile now – your story hasn’t been rejected this time! That’s how I was able to read it, incidentally…

And speaking of which, I would like to say “BRAVO!” at annoyingly loud volume. Congratulations on writing and successfully submitting a funny and very promising story. I imagine Mr. Malfoy will get a bit of a shock, and he will have his revenge by giving the insulting map to his worst enemy. I wonder who that could be...?

That’s just my theory, at any rate. Keep up the good work!

Tim the Enchanter

P.S. After months of procrastinating, I am finally finishing up Out of the Darkness. Sorry to have kept you waiting, especially considering that I responded to one of your reviews with a very erroneous update estimate.

Author's Response: Tim!

I've changed the profile already! You could read it because it was validated!!?? ZOMG, I thought you had superpowers!

Oh, I've had plenty of experience with annoyingly loud volumes, with my best friend's normal voice betraying the fact that he seemed to have swallowed a loud-speaker when he was younger... But about giving it to his worst enemy, read on, and you'll see!

Do you know that I HATE you for your P.S? Not that you're going to update it, but you're finishing it? *sobs* Yellow Yeti.. Yelling whatever, your other humour story, I kind of like it less than Out of the Darkness... Banana Llama King Kong Kitchen!!!!! (And that was the absurdity intervening)

Thanks for the review!

~BB

Hello, James. Is this really your only story? I thought you had written more, being de facto leader of the men of Ravenclaw house, on the forums.

Anyway, on to reviewing this story!

The first thought that went through my head upon seeing the name ‘Luna Sol’ was that Xenophilius was commenting on his daughter Luna, with ‘Sol’ being her middle name. Of course, it became apparent that this Luna was Luna’s mother, and Sol is an interesting choice for a surname. Though her astronomical name does give her a sort of spacey feeling, her name of the moon and sun also made me think that her personality should be one of opposites. For a moment, I briefly entertained the thought that she was bipolar…

But enough with name analysis! The Dementor attack was an interesting way to introduce flashbacks of Xenophilius’ and Luna’s early relationship, in order to have the proper arsenal of happy memories to conjure a Patronus. However, having a bunch of Dementors descend upon their wedding seemed to be rather random. I understand this was probably during the first Voldemort war, but I had to remind myself of that fact when I was trying to figure out what Dementors were doing at their wedding. Also concerning the Dementors, it is implied that they just don’t run amok and go where they’re ordered to, which suggests that the Dementors were deliberately sent to interrupt Xenophilius’ wedding. From what we’ve seen in Deathly Hallows, the Death Eaters thought Xenophilius as something of a fool and easy to push around (which he was), and not a serious threat.

I think ‘Xenny’ is an odd choice for a diminutive of Xenophilius. Personally, I would have gone with ‘Xeno’, but Xenny is quite odd. But I suppose that is appropriate, considering that Luna as you portrayed her is quite an odd woman to begin with.

The memories were rather short and choppy, and could have been more developed, I think. Their professions of love seem very spontaneous and just jump at you without much buildup. On the other hand, the Lovegoods are pretty weird people, so I suppose that could just be normal behaviour for them.

I like the idea of a platypus being Xenophilius’ Patronus. However, I don’t think a Hippogriff Patronus really works for a Luna-ish character like Luna Sol. The Hippogriff is a rather serious, proud creature, and I would have picked something odder or more playful. Maybe a hummingbird or something like that.

The ending was good. I’d think Xenophilius would just go on with the wedding as if nothing had happened. However, about the pastor, religion is pretty much completely absent in the Harry Potter books, and even Fleur and Bill’s wedding is simply presided by a “tufty-haired wizard.”

But I nitpick. Overall, this was a nice little story, offering an interesting look into a seldom seen character, and his wife that we know nothing about. I think this story could have been longer, but considering that it primarily concerned a single incident, the length was adequate enough. Do you intend to write any more fanfics? I can see that Xenophilius and Luna Sol is a pairing you might enjoy pursuing further.

~ Tim the Enchanter

Snape is hilariously in-character here. It seems just like him to scare off students who are unaware of his reputation. I am intrigued to see what repercussions Mr Richard Cameron faces.

On to earlier chapters, I love Snape's cover story for his scar. Snape fighting in the Vietnam War is a very funny image. The mental image that immediately cropped up after reading that line was Alan Rickman in Robert Duvall's role as Lt. Colonel Kilgore in Apocalypse Now, saying "I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

“NO!” the older boy answered a little bit louder than was probably necessary. “You’re just going to feed them to the pigeons so you can watch them explode again!”

I spy Nate and his older brother. Nice little cameo you have there.

I like your description of Salem Witches Institute. As you know, I enjoy reading fanfics set in locations apart from Britain, and I am interested in seeing how the school evolves over the course of the story.

But back to the present, I wonder what will happen to Severus now... personally, I'm hoping he doesn't change his teaching style one bit.

~ Tim the Enchanter

Author's Response: Well, Chante' has been nagging me, and I promise that I am working my hardest on the next chapter. Snape is fighting me every step of the way, though.