Entry for the QLFC – Semifinals; Wigtown Wanderers vs Falmouth Falcons

Task: You must make sure your object is portrayed as sentient.

Object: The Sorting Hat

Thanks a lot to Heather, who betaed this for me! :)

(1400 Words)

I Quit

Minerva McGonagall had certainly experienced a myriad of whimsical situations and seen countless downright weird magical objects – but right now she was surprised. It was a situation that she'd never thought to be possible, as it was absolutely crazy, and she was sure that none of her colleagues would believe her if she told them about this.

She was standing in the middle of the round Headmaster's office, knowing this year's opening banquet to be prepared in the Great Hall, but every rational thought seemed to slip from her mind for a moment. Minerva rarely was flabbergasted, but today she was, this condition caused by a few words from the Sorting Hat when she'd picked it up from its shelf.

"I'm quitting."

At first, she'd thought that she'd imagined this statement that had sounded rather matter of factly, but then the tear along the brim of the dirty, old hat had opened again to repeat the words, more stubbornly this time.

Minerva blinked in confusion, staring at the hat in her hand, and she was convinced that the hat was scowling at her. After what seemed like an eternity, she finally found her voice back and tried to get back to her usual stern expression, but she knew that her voice was shaking as she asked: "What do you mean, you're quitting?"

"Do you need a dictionary, Professor? What do you think it means when someone says 'I quit'?" the hat snarled, slightly impatiently, and Minerva frowned. Maybe this was a very bad prank her colleagues had prepared for her for the start of the new term? To her, it was the only logical explanation to what was currently happening.

"I don't find this funny," she replied sternly, her lips the usual thin line she used to signal her students that she wouldn't accept any more of their shit. "Now we really need to go; we don't want to delay the banquet any further."

However, before she could take the first step towards the exit, the hat spoke up, anger swinging in his voice. "I'm serious here, Professor!"

"You're the Sorting Hat, you don't have any other purpose than to sort the children that come to Hogwarts. You can't quit!"

Minerva couldn't believe that she was seriously wasting her time arguing with a hat. Magic had a lot of advantages and made every day life a lot easier sometimes, but suddenly she felt strongly opposed to the advanced enchantment of objects. True, most of the time it definitely didn't go as far as it did with the Sorting Hat, who was an excellent Legilimens and matched human beings in intelligence and humour. The mirrors in the private bathrooms sometimes commented on the appearance of the person looking into it – she often was very curious what the one in Severus' room was saying – but in the end, their enchantments weren't strong enough to give them true personalities.

But what the Sorting Hat was doing right now was testing her patience with sentient objects, and she really wished that any of the other Founders would have smacked Godric Gryffindor when he came up with the idea to use his hat to sort students. Back then, it may have sounded like a great plan, and well, she supposed that from Godric's point of view, it must have been genius. But now she had to deal with the downsides of this totally practical idea.

"I can and I will!"

OoO

He didn't understand how a witch as intelligent as Minerva McGonagall needed so much time to understand that he was being serious. From his perspective, he'd made it rather clear over the centuries that he was always serious about the things he said or sung about.

But then, he really didn't expect her or Dumbledore to understand him – they weren't a hat, they were human beings, free to go wherever they pleased. He, on the other side, was doomed to spend his days in this office, lying on a dusty shelf with nothing to occupy him but his own thoughts. Well, the portraits of the old Headmasters and Headmistresses sometimes had interesting conversations, but most of the time, the old crackpots were snoozing anyway. And at some point, one was destined to run out of things to think about, especially when nothing dramatic happened at Hogwarts and thus no interesting bits of information were shared in the office.

Additionally, he didn't think that getting out of the office once a year to be put on the heads of new students – highly unhygienic, in his opinion – and singing a song he texted in a matter of minutes was fulfilling.

Thus, he'd decided that he'd had enough of this. He wasn't getting any younger, and who knew when his seams would disperse – he wanted to do something that he liked in his last days.

"Let's say – highly hypothetic, of course – we let you resign from sorting the students: What would you do? You're a hat!" McGonagall exclaimed, her expression openly showing that she couldn't believe that she was seriously discussing with a hat.

The hat sighed inwardly, annoyed about how small the dimensions were that wizards and witches thought in. "Just because I am a hat doesn't mean I have to reduce myself to what people associate with a hat. You are a woman, Professor, do I reduce you to..."

Her murderous glare with the hidden threat to set him on fire – at least he interpreted it like that – caused him to skip his explanation to that point. "You may have noticed that I'm exceptionally intelligent for a hat."

"I also noticed that you're exceptionally arrogant for a hat," McGonagall grumbled under her breath, but he simply ignored her – he'd learned a long time ago that it was easier not to care what people thought about him.

"Well, I have decided that I want to become a writer and poet. There are many things the wizarding world could learn from me, and I would be so generous to share my knowledge."

He couldn't keep himself from lacing his tone with a little bit of pride, but his mood immediately dropped as McGonagall turned towards the door with him and started walking.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"We're going to the banquet. You're going to sing your stupid song, sort the new students, and then I will place you back on that shelf where you will be quiet for the next year!" Her voice was full with anger, and he tried to thrash to get out of her grip, even though he had no idea what he would do then. But at least he wouldn't go down without a fight – he didn't want to go back to his boring everyday life...

"You can't make me! Help! Someone help me!"

His voice echoed in the staircase of the Headmaster's office, but McGonagall ignored him until they'd stepped past the gargoyle and stood in the corridor. "Listen, how about we make a deal?"

He stopped screaming, hope filling him, but he kept his voice level as he replied: "You have my full attention, Professor."

"How about you sort the students tonight, and tomorrow morning I'll explain your wishes to Professor Dumbledore?"

It didn't sound very great to him, but then, it was probably better than nothing. Also, she was giving him a finger – he would make sure to take her whole hand.

"Promise?"

"Yes," McGonagall said with a sigh, and he let the tear that was his mouth curl into a grin.

"Fabulous. But don't you dare to do the same thing as last year when you said you would make sure the kids wouldn't have greasy hair, and I ended up sitting on a lot of yucky heads. I really wish you would be able to walk a mile in my shoes. Well, figuratively, of course," he babbled while McGonagall fastened her pace towards the Great Hall. He could feel a wave of optimism inside of him as the fulfillment of all of his plans seemed to come into reach. The end of his dull days as a hat were near, he knew it.

A rough day later, he learned about the concept of betrayal.