New World Order (Harry Potter/Cyberpunk: Edgerunners) (Patreon)

“David,” his mom started, catching David’s attention as he sat on the couch, doing his homework on the holoscreen to qualify for Arasaka’s middle school. He didn’t have any schooling prior because Mom couldn’t afford to put him in one, and he was more than a little cross that she suddenly decided that he would be going to school. The rest of his friends were in Feral Gangs -- gangs of kids that learned all that they needed to know.

How to survive on the streets of Night City.

“Hm?” David looked up, glad for the distraction. His brain felt overstuffed with useless junk -- fractions, long division, and even more worthless stuff like history. Mom was looking out the window, her yellow EMT jacket hanging off her shoulders, having just returned from work. Her expression was odd, filled with an uncertainty that he didn’t recognize on her. “Come look. Be quiet, though, or you’ll startle it,” Mom said, and that just confused him even more.

All the same, he obeyed, cautiously getting up from the couch and crossing their apartment and looking out the window. They lived in a Megabuilding, and they were plenty high up. But almost in a mockery of the Megabuildings, Arasaka tower stood taller than them all. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be seeing -- he just saw the usual sights of Night City in the mid-afternoon-

Then he saw it as it perched itself on the window. A bird. “What is that thing?” David blurted, taking a step back, weirded out by the most fucked up looking bird he had ever seen in his life. It was way too big for one. And its head was flipped upside down as it looked into their apartment. The face was completely white but the rest of it was covered in dark brown feathers. Weirder, it wasn’t sporting any bald patches from chemical burns or sickness.

Mom chuckled, “It’s an owl. I thought they were all gone in North America. I’m guessing some corpo lost an expensive pet.”

An owl, huh? Through David’s port behind his ear, he tapped into the Net, searching for what an owl was. True enough, he saw some pictures scrolling on his contacts since he didn’t have optic implants. Yet. He had been begging Mom for one, and she promised that she would consider getting him one when he finished growing. Which was hopefully soon. Not that he wanted to stay short for forever. It’d just be really nice if he could do all of his growing all at once.

“Can we eat it?” David questioned, not tearing his gaze from the creature. He never had real meat before. Just locus or kibble-based meat. He always wondered what the real thing would taste like, and the bird just offered itself up.

Mom snorted, placing a hand on his head and messing up his hair -- it would take him forever to get it just right again. “I don’t think so. Pretty sure a corpo would make the meat poisonous just to spite whoever shot their bird. And we don’t own a gun,” she added, telling David that if they did, then they’d try cooking the poison out. As if it understood them, the owl started to tap its beak against the window, taunting them.

“Come over here and help me with this. David, you open the window and I’m going to grab it. We probably can’t eat it, but I could find a buyer for it. An extinct animal for a pet? Someone would pay eddies out the nose for one,” Mom instructed, and he rushed to obey, grabbing onto the latch. They traded a nod and David ripped the window open, his Mom lunging to grab the bird’s feet, only for the bird to leap off the ledge and threw something in Mom’s face.

She sputtered, a squeak escaping her that he never heard before, frantically wiping her face to clear it, but what it threw fell to the floor. Curious, David picked it up while Mom was making sure that there was nothing in her dark red hair. It was paper, he marveled, flipping it over in his hands. “It’s for me?” He muttered, looking at the weird looking text on the front of a… letter, he thought. It was basically like text, but physical. And old.

David Martinez

Makeshift bedroom

Megabuilding 07, Apartment 777

The Glenn, Night City

“Mom, it’s for me,” David said, showing her the letter, and that brought her up short. His eye darted to the small bedroom that was sectioned off by a bunch of curtains. How did they know about his makeshift bedroom? Were they watching him? If they wanted to get in touch, then why not send him an email, like a normal person? “Can I open it?”

“No,” Mom said, snatching it out of his hands. “Let me. It could have something on it. Go get my gloves, David,” she said, her tone serious. The only kind of seriousness that he heard when she gave a warning that he might get a couple of smacks with a slipper if he didn’t start behaving. Out of pure instinct, he rushed to obey, grabbing his mom’s gloves and rushing them to her while she was staring at the paper. Her optics flickered, inspecting the letter for toxins -- they were part of her job, a medic. Part of the reason why he was stuck in a makeshift bedroom was because the state made her pay off the optics by taking it out of her check.

His mom wordlessly put them on and started tearing open the letter, using the edge of one of her nails. They were wicked sharp. Taking out the actual letter, David watched his mom’s face to see her brow furrow in confusion. “David, did you sign up for some school called Hogwarts?” She passed him the letter. It was weird. It didn’t look typed out at all.

He tried to read the rest of the letter, but he zeroed in on one thing. “Witchcraft and Wizardry?” He questioned, a snort of a laugh escaping him.

Dear Mr. Marteniz,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.

Directions to arrive in London, please proceed to the nearest available dockyard and ring a bell thrice. A ship shall arrive at your convenience, but please do so no later than 25 August. There, a guide can show you the way to Diagon Alley.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress

“A boat ride? To London?” Mom added, a frown in her voice. She was taking the letter way too seriously. David had to admit, he had no idea how someone managed to rig up an automaton bird to deliver a letter, but it was a preem prank. Absolutely Nova. He felt a little honored, really, that someone would waste all that time just to mess with him a little. “They want you to go to Arasaka docks? Are they trying to get you killed?!” She snapped, that look in her eye that told David that someone was getting smacked with a slipper.

He was just glad that it wasn’t him.

“Don’t bother with it, Mom. Pretty sure one of my friends sent it,” he said with confidence, puffing out his chest. Maybe they could teach him a thing or two while they were at it? You could never have enough eddies in your pocket.

However, when the second letter arrived… that confidence faltered.

…

The letters kept arriving. In droves, too. David ended up setting up a biz for it. The letters would arrive and he’d soak the ink out of the paper. Let them dry, and boom. Paper. Or parchment. Whatever. Point is, people were stupid and were willing to pay for the stuff. Even as more letters arrived, flooding through the windows, getting stuffed under the door -- David even had a couple drop on him as he was strolling the streets. The owls were practically delivering free money to him as far as David was concerned, and he was willing to milk it for all of its worth.

“Where are you getting this stuff?” One of the older kids said, taking a stack of paper and thumbed through the contents, counting the pages. “This stuff is made of trees. Had it checked,” the boy said. He ran with a feral gang and he wore his flag hanging out of one pocket -- black and white. David didn’t know what they were called, or if they were called anything at all. But when he asked around for a buyer, he had been pointed in their direction.

“Delivery,” David answered and almost as if to prove it, David caught a flash of movement. The same owl that first arrived dropped another letter directly at him. Almost determined to bombard him. David flinched with the sound of a loud pop when the boy in front of him took out a gun -- a Slauter-o-manic, the kind you got from vending machines -- and tsked to himself when the bird banked, flying out of sight around the building.

“Fuck! Almost got him -- there was some meat on that bird,” he muttered, tucking the plastic gun in his waistband. “Thirty eddies,” he said, passing him a thin stack of bills. Fives. All of them crinkled beyond belief and David greedily snatched them out of his hand. Thirty eddies wasn’t a whole lot. Not really. But thirty eddies every other day? That helped things along.

“Where are you even selling this stuff?” David was compelled to ask, earning a scoff from the boy. David didn’t see the point of it. Why write on paper when you could text? He didn’t think he had ever written anything down in his entire life. Well -- not counting that time he graffitied some corpo’s car. That had been totally nova.

“Corpos will buy the dumbest shit,” the boy said with a smirk. “If ya’ got more volume, send it my way. An eddie for every two pieces of paper. That's the rate,” he reminded David, sending him on his way. It seemed wild, but people were willing to buy it because it was made out of a tree. There weren’t many left in the world. The only ones that David had ever seen were the palm trees that lined the roads in the nicer borrows. David was sure that there were more trees somewhere in the world, but they weren’t used in paper mills.

All of the cardboard came from plant matter. He never thought about what kind, but it didn’t really matter. Paper made out of the good stuff went for a mint and he had the only supply. Megacorporations made a lot more sense now, David decided, thirty eddies richer than he had been this morning. Having a monopoly was pretty great.

He was all smiles as he made his way through the Glenn. It was a safe burrough if you were a native-like he was. Less so if you weren’t. He knew how to navigate the streets like they were the back of his hands -- he saw the tagging for the Valentinos and made sure to stick to those streets. They were a gang, but they weren’t the dangerous kind. Not like Maelstrom or the Tyger Claws. The Valentinos weren’t perfect, but they protected people. People like him.

His gaze slid over a low rider car decked out in sterling silver and gold, and he forced himself to look away. Just as he did when he saw an advert for chrome. His cyberdeck was straight trash, and he wanted the really cool implants. Like a rocket arm. That be so nova! It was tempting beyond words to pinch the bills for himself, build up a fund, so he could buy some chrome and get chipped.

Instead, after he made his way into the megabuilding -- an utterly massive skyscraper that was a self contained city where some people were born inside and went their entire lives without stepping out the front door. He entered his apartment to see his mom crashing on the couch again, her EMT jacked on the floor. There were bags under her eyes, and he knew that was a sign that not even the company-issued stimulants were able to keep her going.

Sneaking up to her, he took out the wad of cash and slipped it into her pocket. That way she’d think she just forgot some money in there. It happened all the time with David. The sheer number of times he found some change between the couch cushions… it was like the sofa generated loose change. It was always just enough to get a snack from the vending machine too.

Plus, this way… if Mom saw that she had enough money, she wouldn’t need to work so much. She could stay home.

Grabbing the EMT jacket, he draped it over her shoulders since he wasn’t big enough to carry her to bed. She hummed in her sleep and David smiled softly. Turning away from her, his gaze slid to the screen that had his studies… and he promptly looked further beyond them to far more interesting things -- video games. If he turned the volume down, he could play Crusher: Blood Feast 12 without his mom knowing. He was only allowed to play video games for like, two hours a day and never the actually fun ones. Thats why he had them hidden under his bed.

Right as he was about to hit the power button, there was a sharp three knocks at the door. David’s attention snapped to it, his eyes narrowing into slits. Who could that be? Rent was paid -- he made sure of that… had he been followed? Were they here for the paper? The money? A lump formed in David’s throat, frozen in indecision. Should… should he open it? They weren’t likely to go away just because he ignored the knocking. But…

Swallowing the lump in his throat, David went to his super secret hiding spot. The one that he knew his mom didn’t know about because he wasn’t dead because what he had hidden there. A gun. A slaughter-o-manic that he bought from a vending machine for ten eddies. He thought he would need it when he first delivered the paper, but that illusion quickly wore off. He only kept it because… it was cool. It was a gun. And he had one.

Approaching the door, even as he opened it, he leveled the gun at whoever was behind it. “Whatcha want?” He barked before blinking, looking up at the single oddest person he had ever seen. She was wearing some really weird clothing -- long flowing robes and a pointed hat. In her hands was a stick with a handle, and her face was pinched when she looked down at him.

“I am Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts,” She began, glancing at something in the corner of her eye. That was probably Charlie the Bum. He lived outside of their apartment and, by the smell of it, he soiled himself again. Because not even the Megabuilding could house everyone that lived within it. “ And you must be David Martinez. Perhaps one of the single most stubborn boys I’ve come across in my eighty years of teaching.”

Every single thing that David was going to say flew right out of his head. “What?” He blurted, not able to stop himself, lowering his gun, absolutely floored.

She cocked an eyebrow at him, “Indeed. The letters all reached you -- despite numerous… difficulties navigating this city-” she started, and almost on cue, David heard the sounds of gunshots. Sounded to be about three floors down. David didn’t flinch but Minerva did. Her lips thinned and she cleared her throat, “But for the letters to be marked delivered, you must believe in magic. And you have stubbornly refused to, so I have taken it upon myself to prove it to you.”

David shifted from foot to foot, still not entirely convinced that this wasn’t some elaborate prank, Even if it was stupidly convoluted and unlikely. “It’s not that I don’t believe in magic? I just… kinda didn’t care?” David tried, feeling bad. He made her come all this way and she looked like she felt uncomfortable and out of place. And she had to cross an ocean. Those were filled with nanite mines from the last corpo war. “I mean… whats magic have to do with me?”

Minerva seemed distinctly unimpressed with him. “It has a great deal to do with you on account that you are a wizard, Mr. Martinez. By Wizarding law, you must attend schooling for a minimum of five years.”

She was saying the words, and David heard them, they just didn’t register. It didn’t make sense. Magic? That sounded amazing. Great. And entirely too good to be true, so he didn’t believe it for a second. “Uhuh,” David replied, a picture of skepticism. “Sure. But why do I have to go to London? Is it the only ‘Wizard’ school in the world?” To that, Minerva winced and closed her eyes briefly.

“Hardly. Under more… ideal circumstances, you would be attending the Wizarding school in America. However, as of eleven years ago, they have… elected to only to allow select individuals into their halls. As such, it is falls to Hogwarts and other magical schools to take in the students that Ilvermorny has passed over,” she explained and that sounded almost reasonable.

“Corpos?” David questioned, making her lips thin.

“In a matter of speaking, yes,” she decided to answer, inclining her head to him. Hm. Figured. Corpos make everything worse. Everyone said so. It was because of them the world was what it was. But, fact of the matter was that if you didn’t want to be a cog -- a pencil pusher and deskjocky -- or try to make it as an edgerunner, then you had to become a corpo. Sign away forty to eighty years of your life with a loyalty contract, and you could be someone. That's the life that Mom wanted for him.

Even if it wasn’t the one he wanted.

“You say you're a wizard-”

“A witch, Mr. Martinez,” Minerva interjected, her tone one of infinite patience.

“Witch. Right. So… prove it,” David demanded, not willing to believe anything until he saw it with his own eyes. The letters were weird, but they could be explained. Not very well, but they could be explained. He never felt like a wizard. He never felt like he had some awesome power like magic at his disposal. David just felt like himself. And if magic was half as wondrous as the Net made it sound then three times too good to be real, much less that someone like him would have it.

There was a spark of amusement in her eyes at the demand, “As you wish, Mr. Martinez. Wingardium leviosa,” she intoned, and with a swish and a flick of the stick she carried, David felt something happening. His body was rising.

“W-whoa!” David exclaimed, trying to stand on his tippy toes but he rose higher until he was floating in midair. He tried to correct his balance, only to overcorrect, leaving him helplessly spinning in his doorway. Using it to stabilize himself, though he was left upside down, he saw the faintest hints of a smirk on Minerva’s face.

“Proof enough for you, Mr. Mariteinz?” Minerva questioned, her tone as even as it ever was but she still sounded amused to David.

Before he could answer, David heard Mom stirring to life at the sound of his shout. He flipped himself around to see her sitting up on the couch, her eyes bleary. “Mom! Mom! Look, I’m floating!” He exclaimed, and she blinked in his direction. Then her eyes flew wide as she stumbled to her feet.

“David-What-,” she started, her jaw going slack for but a moment before her eyes narrowed into slits. “Is that a gun?! Get your feet on the ground right now young man!” His mom barked at him, making his blood freeze in his veins, the fact he was defying gravity with magic completely secondary at the moment.

He was a wizard. He could use magic.

And if his mom didn’t kill him in the next five minutes… he was going to become a wizard at Hogwarts.

…

Played Hogwarts Legacy and it gave me the HP itch that so many others are feeling. I went with Cyberpunk Edgerunners mostly because I was rewatching Edgerunners, but I think the crossover has potential. Exploring how implants could play around with magic -- provided that I pull out enough bullshitium to explain why they could still work -- would be a lot of fun.

But, it’s mostly because I think it would be interesting to explore how Cyberpunk muggles would interact with the wizarding world. HP muggles are generally normal people with normal families. Cyberpunk… not so much. CP muggles would see how utterly shit the world is and understand what an incredible opportunity they have, which could completely change the trajectory of their lives. So, naturally, they wouldn’t take too kindly to the idea of Purebloods trying to give them the boot.

In short, there are a lot of fun ripples to explore by dumping what amounts to bloodthirsty sharks in a pond.