Eliezer Yudkowsky - Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

"Might I ask you to report?" Amelia said, keeping the edge out of her voice.

"First a simple walk from top to bottom," said the old wizard. He was frowning, wrinkling his face even more than usual. "I examined Bellatrix's cell, and found a death doll left in her place. This escape was meant to go unremarked, I think. There is something hidden in the corner beneath a scrap of cloth; I left that undisturbed for your Aurors to examine. On the return trip, I opened each door and looked within the cells. I saw nothing Disillusioned, only the prisoners -"

They were interrupted by a scream from the red-golden phoenix, and all her Aurors flinched from it. Condemnation was in it, and an urgent demand that almost started Amelia running from the corridor on the spot.

"- in rather distressing condition," Dumbledore said quietly. For a moment the blue eyes were very cold beneath the half-moon glasses. "Will any of you speak to me of the consequences of their actions?"

" I did not -" Amelia began.

"I know," said the old wizard. "My apologies, Amelia." He sighed. "Some of the more recent prisoners had scraps of their magic left, when I looked upon them, but I sensed no uneaten power; the strongest had only as much magic left as a first-year child. I heard Fawkes scream in distress many times, but never challenge. It seems you shall have to continue your search; they can hide well enough to escape my mere glance."

When Harry finished his first Transfiguration, he sat up, pulled back the blanket that had covered him, cast a quick Lumos, glanced at his watch, and was shocked to see that nearly an hour and thirty minutes had passed. How much of that time had gone by since someone had opened the door and then closed it again - Harry hadn't been looking in that direction, of course - that, Harry couldn't guess.

"My Lord...?" whispered Bellatrix's voice, soft and very tentative.

"You may speak now," Harry said. He'd told her to remain silent while he worked.

"That was Dumbledore who looked upon us."

Pause.

"Interesting," Harry said neutrally. He was glad he had not noticed this at the time. That sounded like a rather close shave .

Harry said a word to his pouch, and began drawing forth the magical device that he would mate to the product of his hour's labor. Then, when that was drawn forth, another word brought forth a tube of industrial-strength glue; before using it, Harry cast the Bubble-Head Charm on himself and Bellatrix, and had Bellatrix cast the same Charm on the snake, so that the glue fumes in the enclosed cell would not harm them.

When the glue had begun to set, binding technology to magic, Harry laid it down upon the bed, and sat down on the floor, resting his magic and will for a moment before essaying the next Transfiguration.

"My Lord..." Bellatrix said hesitantly.

"Yes?" said the dry voice.

"What is that device you made?"

Harry thought rapidly. It seemed like a good chance to check his plans with her, under the guise of leading questions.

"Consider, my dear Bella," said Harry smoothly. "How difficult is it for a powerful wizard to cut the walls of Azkaban?"

There was a pause, and then Bellatrix's voice came, slow and puzzled, "Not difficult at all, my Lord...?"

"Indeed," said the dry, high voice of Bella's master. "Suppose one were to do this, and fly through the hole on a broomstick, and soar up and away. Rescuing a prisoner from Azkaban would seem easy then, would it not?"

"But my Lord..." said Bella. "The Aurors would - they have their own broomsticks, my Lord, fast ones -"

Harry listened, it was as he had thought. The Dark Lord replied, again in tones of smoothly Socratic inquiry, and Bellatrix asked a further question, which Harry had not expected, but Harry's own counterquestion showed that it should not matter in the end. And in response to Bellatrix's last question, the Dark Lord only smiled, and said that it was time for him to resume his work.

And then Harry got up from the floor of the cell, went to the far end of the cells, and touched his wand to the hard surface of the wall - the wall of Azkaban, the solid metal that separated them from direct exposure to the Dementors' pit.

And Harry began a partial Transfiguration.

This spell would go faster, Harry hoped. He'd spent hours and hours practicing the unique magic, which had made it routine, not much more difficult for him than ordinary Transfiguration. The shape he was changing had not all that much total volume, the Transfigured shape might be tall and wide and long, but it was very thin. Half a millimeter, Harry had thought, would be enough, considering the perfect smoothness...

On the long bench that served as a prison bed, where Harry had set down the Transfigured technological device and the mated magic item for the glue to dry, tiny letters in golden script gleamed on the Muggle artifact. Harry hadn't really planned for them to be there, but they'd kept running through the back of his mind, and so seemed to have become part of the Transfigured form.

There were many different things Harry could have said before using this particular triumph of technological ingenuity. Any number of things that would be, in one sense or another, appropriate. Or at least things that Harry could have said, would have said, if Bellatrix had not been there.

But there was only one thing to say, that Harry would only get the chance to say just this once, and probably never get a better chance to say ever again. (Or think, anyway, if he couldn't say it.) He hadn't seen the actual movie, but he'd seen a preview, and for some reason the phrase had stuck in his mind.

The tiny golden letters upon the Muggle device said,

All right, you primitive screwheads! Listen up!

In darkness absolute, a boy stood holding his wand to the solid metal wall of Azkaban, essaying a magic that only three other people in the world would have believed possible, and that none save he alone could wield.

Of course a powerful wizard could've cut through the wall in seconds, with a gesture and a word.

For an average adult it might have been a matter of a few minutes' work, and afterward they would have been winded.

But to accomplish the same end as a first-year Hogwarts student, you had to be efficient.

Luckily - well, not luckily , luck had nothing to do with it - conscientiously , Harry had practiced Transfiguration for an extra hour every day, to the point where he was ahead of even Hermione in that one class; he'd practiced partial Transfiguration to the point where his thoughts had begun taking the true universe for granted, so that it required only slightly more effort to keep its timeless quantum nature in mind, even as he kept a firm mental separation between the concept of Form and the concept of substance.

And the problem with that art having become so routine...

...was that Harry could think about other things while he was doing it.

Somehow his thoughts had managed to not go there, to not confront the obvious, until he was faced with the prospect of really actually doing it in just a few minutes .

What Harry was about to do...

...was dangerous.

Really dangerous.

Someone-might-actually-genuinely-get-killed dangerous.

Facing down twelve Dementors without a Patronus Charm had been scary, but merely scary. Harry could have cast the Patronus Charm, would have cast it as soon as he thought he was in danger of not being able to do so, as soon as he felt his resistance beginning to fail. And even if that hadn't worked... even so, unless the Dementors had been instructed to Kiss anyone they found, failure shouldn't have been fatal.