Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

Harry was sort of okay with that.

It was, he knew, the kind of thing that was supposed to make heroes resentful and bitter.

To heck with that. Harry was very much in favor of everyone else staying out of danger while the Boy-Who-Lived took down the Dark Lord by himself, plus or minus a small number of companions. If the next conflict with the Dark Lord got to the point of a Second Wizarding War that killed lots of people and embroiled a whole country, that would mean Harry had already failed.

And if afterward a war broke out between wizards and Muggles, it didn't matter who won, Harry would have already failed by letting it get that far. Besides, who said the societies couldn't peacefully integrate when the secrecy inevitably broke down? (Though Harry could hear Professor Quirrell's dry voice in his mind, asking him if he was a fool, and saying all the obvious things...) And if mages and Muggles couldn't live in peace, then Harry would combine magic and science and figure out how to evacuate all the wizards to Mars or somewhere, instead of letting a war break out.

Because if it did come down to a war of extermination...

That was the thing Professor Quirrell hadn't realized, the one most important question he'd forgotten to ask his young general.

The real reason why Harry had no intention of being argued into endorsing a Light Mark, no matter how much it would help him in his fight against the Dark Lord.

One Dark Lord and fifty Marked followers had been a peril to all of magical Britain.

If all Britain took the Mark of a strong leader, they would be a peril to the whole magical world.

And if the whole wizarding world took a single Mark, they would be a danger to the rest of humanity.

No one knew quite how many wizards there were in the world. He'd done a few estimates with Hermione and come up with numbers in the rough range of a million.

But there were six billion Muggles.

If it came down to a final war...

Professor Quirrell had forgotten to ask Harry which side he would protect.

A scientific civilization, reaching outward, looking upward, knowing that its destiny was to grasp the stars.

And a magical civilization, slowly fading as knowledge was lost, still governed by a nobility that saw Muggles as not quite human.

It was a terribly sad feeling, but not one that held any hint of doubt.

Aftermath: Blaise Zabini.

Blaise strolled through the hallways with careful, self-imposed slowness, his heart beating wildly as he tried to calm down -

'Ahem,' said a dry, whispering voice from a shadowy alcove as he passed.

Blaise jumped, but he didn't scream.

Slowly, he turned.

In that small, shadowy corner was a black cloak so wide and billowing that it was impossible to determine whether the figure beneath was male or female, and atop the cloak a broad-brimmed black hat, and a black mist seemed to gather beneath it and obscure the face of whoever or whatever might lie beneath.

'Report,' whispered Mr. Hat and Cloak.

'I said just what you told me to,' said Blaise. His voice was a little calmer now that he wasn't lying to anyone. 'And Professor Quirrell reacted just the way you expected.'

The broad black hat tilted and straightened, as though the head below had nodded. 'Excellent,' said the unidentifiable whisper. 'The reward I promised you is already on its way to your mother, by owl.'

Blaise hesitated, but his curiosity was eating him alive. 'Can I ask now why you want to cause trouble between Professor Quirrell and Dumbledore?' The Headmaster hadn't had anything to do with the Gryffindor bullies that Blaise knew about, and besides helping Kimberly, the Headmaster had also offered to make Professor Binns give him excellent marks in History of Magic even if he turned in blank parchments for his homework, though he'd still have to attend class and pretend to hand them in. Actually Blaise would have betrayed all three generals for free, and never mind his cousin either, but he'd seen no need to say that.

The broad black hat cocked to one side, as if to convey a quizzical stare. 'Tell me, friend Blaise, did it occur to you that traitors who betray so many times over often meet with ill ends?'

'Nope,' said Blaise, looking straight into the black mist under the hat. 'Everyone knows that nothing really bad ever happens to students in Hogwarts.'

Mr. Hat and Cloak gave a whispery chuckle. 'Indeed,' said the whisper. 'With the murder of one student five decades ago being the exception that proves the rule, since Salazar Slytherin would have keyed his monster into the ancient wards at a higher level than the Headmaster himself.'

Blaise stared at the black mist, now beginning to feel a little uneasy. But it ought to take a Hogwarts professor to do anything significant to him without setting off alarms. Quirrell and Snape were the only professors who'd do something like this, and Quirrell wouldn't care about fooling himself, and Snape wouldn't hurt one of his own Slytherins... would he?

'No, friend Blaise,' whispered the black mist, 'I only wished to advise you never to try anything like this in your adult life. So many betrayals would certainly lead to at least one vengeance.'

'My mother never got any vengeances,' said Blaise proudly. 'Even though she married seven husbands and every single one of them died mysteriously and left her lots of money.'

'Really?' said the whisper. 'However did she persuade the seventh to marry her after he heard what happened to the first six?'