The Intelligent Potter

*** Great Hall

Hermione.

Without sparing Quirrellmort another glance, Harry sprinted to the bathroom that he'd seen Hermione in.

He ran in, "Hermione, there's a troll in the castle, you need to get out of here!"

Hermione opened the door, sniffling with red eyes, "Harry, what are you doing in the girls' bathroom?"

"There's a troll loose in the castle, we have to go."

At that very moment, the acrid smell of troll filled their noses.

Harry cursed some not so polite words and rolled out of the troll's club's way.

He quickly formulated a plan.

Harry transfigured a wrecked toilet into a really bad humanoid-ish mess and depulso-d the mess into the opposite wall, the dumb creature looked the other way and started lumbering towards the humanoid toilet transfiguration.

Panting with the exertion from his previous 3rd year spells, with sweat rolling down his forehead, Harry levitated the troll's club and dropped it on the stupid creature's head.

The troll dropped dead, with a cracked skull.

Harry fell onto one knee from magical exertion, that transfiguration, while not extremely impressive had severely drained his core.

At that point, Snape, Dumbledore and McGonagall sprang into the room, Snape's wand already glowing with several dark curses, Dumbledore's already shooting a deep cutting curse.

The cutting curse flew over the fallen troll, and Snape managed to stop his spell in time to stop it from firing.

McGonagall was the first to notice the two kids, "Mr. Potter, Ms. Granger! What are you doing looking for the troll!"

Snape looked severely annoyed, mistaking Harry for James, "Obviously they were looking for the troll for the fame it would get them! 50 points from Gryffindor, each and a week of detention, with me."

McGonagall looked startled at the amount of punishment but stayed silent as she felt it was deserved, "Still, first years beating a mountain troll, you were really lucky. What do you have to say for yourself?"

Hermione opened her mouth to lie but Harry spoke first.

"Hermione was using the facilities when Professor Quirrell told us about the troll, I remembered she was in the toilet, when we passed this corridor, there were no professors to tell and I thought it would just be a minute and we could run and catch up, also the troll was said to be in the dungeons so why would we be in any danger, a mountain troll isn't supposed to be able to move from the dungeons to the 5th floor in a minute, so if we were looking for the troll, we wouldn't be here." Harry finished his explanation.

McGonagall listened and understood, "Very well, take 80 points to Gryffindor, so you've had only 10 taken each for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, 15 points to Gryffindor for good luck in handling the troll situation. You will not serve the detentions with Professor Snape either, as they were given in… bad judgement, she looked sternly at Snape.

Harry looked a little contrite and scared, like he was supposed to, and nodded and thanked their Professor.

*** Later

Hermione was looking at Harry with awe, she had resigned herself to the 100 points and detentions but instead they had got off with only losing 5 points and no detention.

"You had the Professors wrapped around your finger, Harry! How did you manage that, you basically just bent the truth a little and got us out of all punishment." Hermione said excitedly.

Harry smiled, "You don't have to lie to get out of trouble, you just have to say the right things."

From under James Potter's invisibility cloak, Dumbledore smiled in amus.e.m.e.nt, slightly impressed at Harry's fast-talking skills.

*** Later

Harry had gained a level of infamy that he hadn't wanted from the troll incident. He was really annoyed by the claps on the back from the Gryffindors, as he walked to his first flying class.

Hermione was really nervous at the idea of flying because it couldn't be learned from books, Harry's influence had given her some confidence outside of her books, but flying was way out of her comfort zone.

"I'm not sure I can do this, I mean, I've read all about it but reading isn't everything so I have no idea what will happen, I calculated how much push you need to have but I'm not sure I can pull it off!" Hermione started to babble.

"Calm down Hermione, you can do this." Harry said, speaking more calmly than he felt, he too was kinda scared about how he would do at flying, he knew his father was the Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team in his day, but he wasn't sure that he wanted to put all his trust in his Potter genes.

"Stand over your brooms, stick out your hands and say 'UP!"." Barked Madam Hooch, the flying teacher, whose only job seemed to be taking first year flying lessons, all 2 of them, and officiating all the Quidditch matches, all 6 of them, all in all, she was a really busy teacher, Harry thought sarcastically.

He put out his hand, he had read that confidence was key, "Up." He said calmly, trying to make himself believe that the broom was definitely going to come up to his hand.

It did, Harry was one of the few people who managed to make their broom rise, Hermione's barely budged next to him.

"Believe it will come up, that's was does it." Harry whispered.

Hermione gritted her teeth and tried to believe, before she even started to say 'up', the broom shot into her hand, Harry grinned.

After another minute of that, in which about a fourth of the class had gotten their brooms, Hooch sighed, and just let them pick up the brooms.

"Mount your brooms and let me judge your stance."

She did, correcting several muggle-borns, and Draco Malfoy.

"You may now gently kick off and hover a few feet off the ground." Hooch gently coached.

Neville Longbottom, a chubby pureblood started hyperventilating, his broom starting to rise faster and faster before flipping and dropping Neville off his broom, Hooch seemed shocked and stuck to the place.

Harry thought fast and cast his best cushioning charm under Neville, who still landed with a painful "OOMPH!"

Hooch went up to Neville, noticed his broken arm and started to take him up to the Hospital wing.

"And not a single broom off the ground, or you'll be out of this school before you can say 'Quidditch'." She warned.

After Hooch had gone, Malfoy picked up a glass ball that Neville had dropped.

"Oh look, Longbottom's remembrall." Malfoy sneered, "Let me hide this somewhere for him to find." Draco made to mount his broom.

"Wow, I didn't know you and Neville were such pals, what with playing hide and seek with personal property." Harry commented casually.

"I'm not friends with that blood traitor!" Drack screeched, as a large part of the class, including some Slytherins started to snicker.

"Well then, I'm sure you'll be happy to return his possession as formal pureblood culture requires." Harry stated, effectively cutting off Draco's legs, as he couldn't publicly break pureblood tradition.

Finally, he grunted and threw the ball at Harry, who caught it, before it fell, and pocketed it.

"Please return Heir Longbottom's possession on my behalf, Heir Potter." Malfoy said gruffly.

Harry nodded, "It will be done, Heir Malfoy."

After 15 minutes of waiting, in which Hermione started quizzing him on pureblood traditions, Hooch returned with a perfectly sorted Neville.

"Now, we may continue our flying class." Hooch said sternly.

They hovered, then started moving and doing l.a.p.s of the court, Harry was a natural at flying and within minutes, he was doing loop-de-loops and out-flying everyone by much, Hooch was extremely excited by his natural skills.

After that, she made them work with Quaffles, and try and shoot them at hoops, which Harry did reasonably well, and definitely better than most of his peers, though he couldn't get enough power behind most of his shots to out-shoot a halfway decent chaser, after that she had them work with beater's bats, which Harry could barely hold, and he could see her disappointment, as she surveyed his lack of skill as a beater. Then she had them try to block shots, which he excelled at, moving fast and flipping to block shots, he out-flied all his peers in keeping.

Finally, she had them chase tennis balls that she threw through the air, and finally, his true potential was shown, as he far outflew his peers, zigzagging and catching all 10 of his balls that he had thrown his way, the second best was Draco Malfoy's 4.

Hooch went off for a moment and came back with McGonagall, who was the head of Gryffindor.

"Potter, come with me." McGonagall said.

*** Outside Quirrell's classroom

"Professor, may I borrow Wood for a second?" McGonagall asked.

'Oliver Wood, captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, in his OWL year.' Harry thought curiously.

"I have found you your new seeker!" McGonagall said proudly.

Wood's eyes widened and a manic smile spread across his face.

"Practise, today, 8:00"

*** End of chapter.