Chapter 40 - Flipping the Script (Patreon)

When I was writing the HP scenes, I had an errant thought to this famous video from some outdoor show at Disney.  This little kid was probably the 100,000th like her who was invited up on the stage and 100,000 kids before her yelled "No, I won't join you, Lord Vader!" and they fight, which follows the expected script.  Then this wonderful little outlier of human being comes on stage and she flips the fucking script and bows before Lord Vader and asks to join him.  God bless her little heart!  

That made me go 'Oh shit, what if someone playing my holonovel wants to join Voldemort??'  Could I see myself doing that, I asked myself?  And the answer was unequivocally 'YES!' which inspired the change at the end.

If a holodeck actually existed, be honest, how many of you are letting your darkest impulses out?

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I was pleased with the work I had managed to accomplish in the time I was traveling towards my target, but I had a striking realization. Some of my players, especially an adult one, might want to say ‘fuck it’ and go murder hobo on everybody and join Voldemort, which, admittedly, was something I might do after playing it through straight a time or two. That was the tricky part of writing a holonovel in which your players could do or say anything. You had to anticipate some unusual choices or make the narrative parameters adaptable enough to handle it. Some might even try to AK Voldemort, which I fully supported, but the primary narrative should be able to handle that choice, assuming I didn’t make it impossible for a first year Hogwarts student to successfully cast an AK. It was an action in furtherance of good, or rejecting Voldemort’s offer.

“Computer, open alternate narrative path and extrapolate based on the Harry player accepting Voldemort’s offer. Go back to Voldemort’s offer, adjust dialog accordingly,” I ordered, curious to see what the computer came up with based on all the other material I had provided.

It was over 3 minutes later that the computer’s processing finished and a new alternate narrative path was extrapolated, which made sense given the limited processing power that my armor systems possessed in comparison to my ship or the ship with my island’s processing power buttressing it.

“Resume.”

The program reset and Quirrell/Voldemort and Harry were back again in front of the Mirror of Erised.

“That's it, Harry. There is no good and evil. There is only power, and those too weak to seek it. Together, we'll do extraordinary things. Just give me the Stone!” he commanded, Mirror James and Lily fading from the reflection.

“Can you really give me back my parents?” Harry asked quietly, the longing in his voice clear to hear.

“I can.”

“Then you can have the stone, my Lord,” Harry replied, outstretching his hand to give Quirrell/Voldemort the stone as Harry fell to his knees in front of his new Dark Lord.