An American at Hogwarts: Book Two

Chapter Twenty

"Do jumping jacks." The voice came again, with new instruction. I started to shift, to start doing my jumping jacks, but this time it didn't make as much sense as it had the first time. Why would I just start doing jumping jacks in the middle of the Astronomy Tower, at the drop of a hat? That would look and be stupid.

I tried to stop my arms moving, but I couldn't all the way. I was still fighting with the voice, on repeat in my head, when the haze suddenly lifted and I was back to normal.

Jackson was doubled over laughing in front of me.

"What?" I demanded, hands on my hips. I certainly hadn't managed to resist, so there was no reason for him to be stopping.

"You— you looked— so ridiculous," he managed between wheezing breaths and big bursts of laughter.

"You're kidding me."

"No! You should've seen yourself." He regained his composure enough to start doing some weird flailing movements that sort of looked like jumping jacks if you squinted, and then he broke down laughing again.

"Jackson, the whole point of this is learning to resist the Imperius Curse. The entire point is defeated if you can't hold your own spell!"

"Alright Stark, point taken," he said, finally straightening up as he wiped a tear from his eye. "Just wait though, when it's your turn you're gonna be even worse at keeping it together than me."

I rolled my eyes and shook out my arms, mentally preparing to resist the spell again. I didn't do very well that round, but it seemed like it was easier to resist when you were being asked to do a more ridiculous task. Obviously we wanted to be able to resist any request, but if my theory held, it might work better if we built up our strength with something easier to say no to.

Jackson cast the curse again, and the waves of peacefulness and relaxation immediately returned.

"Activate the Iron Man armor."

Now this one I immediately knew I didn't want to do. Sure, right now it was just Jackson, but I never wanted to be in the position where someone successfully forced me to activate the armor.

Jackson's quiet voice was persuasive, but a very big part of me knew that I couldn't listen. I couldn't activate my armor. I couldn't.

"ACTIVATE THE IRON MAN ARMOR."

The voice was so loud I couldn't block it out anymore. My left hand went to push the arc reactor that always sat on my chest to turn it on, and my right hand came up to deflect it. Unfortunately for me, my right hand shoved my left hand up as hard as it could, but my left hand kept going with the usual force I used to activate my armor. Long story short, I ended up smacking myself in the face.

I felt the spell lift again as Jackson was consumed by laughter. I swore and rubbed my cheek, just watching Jackson try to keep from falling to the floor.

"Alright, yeah, laugh it up. I looked stupid. But I resisted, which proves my theory."

I expected Jackson to calm down a little and ask what my theory was, but he didn't. He kept wheezing laughing, and talking between breaths about how "he wished he had that on video". Eventually, when it was clear he was gonna be a while, I decided to just explain anyway.

"What theory? Well, I'm so glad you asked Jackson," I said sarcastically. This only made him laugh harder. "Basically, I'm pretty sure some things are easier to resist than others. I don't have any particular issues with rubbing my head and patting my stomach, so I did it without much resistance. Jumping jacks are a little weirder and more stupid-looking, at least to me, so I was more able to resist. And then the armor... well, obviously I don't want anybody having power over that besides me, so it was the easiest to resist."