"(English) Who is Gilderoy Lockhart?"
"(French) Qui est Gilderoy Lockhart?"
"(Russian) КтотакойДжидроЛохарт?"
"…"
This year's August was destined to be insane. This year's August belonged to one man—one wizard: Gilderoy Lockhart.
BBC, ABC, CBS, TF1, Ostankino Television and Radio Company, TV Tokyo… the scripts handed to anchors across the world's news networks were uncannily identical. On behalf of baffled people everywhere, they asked one crucial question:
Who the hell is Gilderoy Lockhart?!
People turned on the TV—Lockhart's photo was on the news. People walked into bookshops—shelves were crammed with Lockhart's autobiographies. People visited museums—every ancient manuscript and stele was covered in Lockhart's life story. The nameplates under famous statues had all been swapped to Gilderoy Lockhart, from Napoleon to Confucius, from Marie Curie to Mozart—every single one replaced.
His headshot and his "life deeds" appeared on practically every physical medium that could carry information.
In The Creation of Adam, the finger touching Adam's wasn't God's anymore—it was Lockhart's, blond hair, blue eyes, grinning like an idiot. Beethoven's Für Elise became For Gilderoy. In the classic film The Great Dictator, Chaplin's target of satire shifted from the Führer to the wizard Lockhart. A message in a bottle washed up on a Hawaiian beach contained a child's doodle—chibi Lockhart. Voodoo dolls made by African shamans all turned into the shape of a white man. Ocean plastic trash had Lockhart endorsement stickers slapped on it. In a moon-landing documentary, the astronaut didn't plant the Stars and Stripes—he planted a Lockhart poster. From the air, crop circles could be seen forming Lockhart's half-body portrait. Lightning scorch-marks on trees formed his initials (GL). Even the black pattern on burnt toast looked like Lockhart. In laboratories, fungal mycelium networks braided themselves into Lockhart's radiant little face.
Every medium, every language—people were forced into a 360-degree, no-dead-angle introduction to Mr. Gilderoy Lockhart. And from the omnipresent biographies, they learned that he was a wizard, born January 26, 1964, vain from childhood, lazy and unambitious, fond of taking crooked shortcuts. Even at school he tried every possible way to get attention: he once carved his own name in twenty-foot letters across a Quidditch pitch; once projected his own portrait into the sky like a Dark Mark; once mailed himself eight hundred Valentine's cards. After graduation, he plagiarized other witches' and wizards' experiences and published them as biographical novels.
His "glorious achievements," his entire life, were laid bare in front of the whole world in exhausting detail. Even island natives in the Pacific could read, from their knotted cords, exactly how many times Lockhart wet the bed as a child. When he lost his baby teeth. How old he was when he first had a crush. How many times he went to the toilet without paper and had to clean himself with his wand. How many times he paused in front of shop windows to admire his reflection…
It was, frankly, far too thorough.
Gilderoy Lockhart truly had become the most famous person on Earth—only he quickly discovered he hadn't prepared for fame at all.
The moment he appeared in public, everyone stared and laughed. Managers of every public service refused to serve him. He wasn't allowed on the Knight Bus. Nobody would sell him Floo Powder. Restaurants wouldn't bring him food. If he entered a pub, drunkards would throw him out.
Hiding was useless too, because the news media were like a swarm of honeybees—catching a scent and swarming in. Where was the biggest headline in the world now? On Lockhart. Wherever Lockhart went, news followed. Every move he made could be turned into a report, guaranteed to be the top story, guaranteed to sell.
He had to change his appearance and disguise himself, wandering the streets, surviving by rummaging through bins and fighting stray cats for food.
Less than three days of that and Lockhart was on the verge of losing his mind.
But even more unhinged were the administrative bodies of the global wizarding world. Lockhart's story was everywhere. Every Muggle knew he was a wizard, and from his biographies they learned the wizarding world existed.
In the face of this sudden impact, the International Statute of Secrecy became a joke. The old men of the Wizengamot argued until they were foaming at the mouth. Minister for Magic Fudge received eight hundred demands for answers from all over the world in a single day. The poor man was so worried he tore at his hair—his hairline "receded" overnight all the way to the back of his head.
In the Magical Congress of the United States of America, there was a massive clock in the main hall used to monitor the likelihood of wizardkind being exposed. The dial was divided into seven levels, from Level Zero to Level Six. If the hand pointed to Level Six, it meant things had reached the most severe stage—wizardkind could be exposed to Muggle eyes at any moment.
The last time it hit a Level Six alarm was 1926.
The current Congress President, Samuel, walked into the hall and was met by a violent gust, sending papers flying everywhere. He shouted, "Who installed a fan in the main hall?!"
A staff member hurriedly explained, "Sir, it's not a fan. It's that clock's hands."
The clock's hands were spinning faster than a five-speed electric fan. Total chaos. The three rapidly rotating hands went whizzing off like projectiles—thunking into the floor and walls, trembling like swords. Inside the clock, the machinery still roared, belching thick smoke; springs popped out. Then, with one final violent convulsion, the clock completely broke down, and all seven marks on the dial were replaced with a single label:
Gilderoy Lockhart!
Samuel's vision went dark. He fainted.
Everyone's life was violently altered. The ones blacking out weren't just wizarding bureaucrats, and not just Muggle bureaucrats either—scholars everywhere felt helpless as their research materials were all tampered with by some unknown force. The foundation was yanked out from under modern civilization in an instant. The load-bearing pillars snapped. Something had to be done to patch it, or World War III would be right around the corner—and this time it would be about humanity's survival.
The crisis was too sudden, too immense, and for a short time human society kept running on inertia: people still went to work, still ate three meals a day.
They just had to do it with Gilderoy Lockhart, everywhere, all the time.
Housewives buying groceries quickly got used to Lockhart on packaging, even judging his outfits and facial expressions. Highway drivers drank soda and flipped off Lockhart's giant face on billboards. Schools opened special "Lockhart Studies" classes. Physics word problems stopped using little balls and blocks and started using Lockhart's head as the "particle." History students were overjoyed, because you could get points on any historical question just by writing Lockhart's name—what, you say the leader of the American Revolution was Washington? That's not what the textbook says!
Amid everyone's exasperated, aching groans, calendar pages were torn away one by one, and September 1 finally arrived. Hogwarts students still had to go to school, and Platform 9¾ once again overflowed with crowds.
Marika drove Skyl to King's Cross Station. She handed him a stainless-steel lunch tin—its lid stamped with Lockhart's steel-pressed portrait—and inside was Skyl's lunch.
"Here." Marika shoved the tin into Skyl's hands. "Are you coming home for Christmas this year?"
"I'll probably be staying at school."
"Then this is the last time you'll get to eat my sandwiches this year," Marika said, blinking at him affectionately. "Safe travels."
"Drive back carefully," Skyl said, shrugging at her in return.
//Check out my P@tre0n for 20 extra chapters on all my fanfics //[email protected]/Razeil0810.