Skewing The System.

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry had been a hustle and bustle with all kinds of rumors and innuendo, as any school full of preteen to teenage type people would be. Deadpool made his way to the floor with a stick. Pieces of paper dropped to the ground. He stuck the stick through the piece of paper and pulled it up off of the ground. The Mercenary could hear the mutterings of the people around him.

"Hey, did you see him?"

Deadpool perked up. They must have been talking about him.

"Did you see him? He's over there?"

The Mercenary responded with a smile. He obviously made an impression no matter wherever he went. Several students were pointing to a spot which was distinctively behind him. Deadpool turned around and saw the one and only Harry Potter making his way up the stairs followed by some tall ginger-kid. Deadpool shook his head when observing the entirely canonical scene which appeared before him.

"It's almost amusing how they react to a celebrity," Deadpool said. "If this was the non-magical world and about twenty years from now, the kid would have his own reality show by the time he was thirteen. It's insane I tell you the type of things they put on…."

Deadpool almost ran into Nearly Headless Nick or rather ran through them. Ghosts were very transparent people. Deadpool shivered when it felt like he had been dunked into the icy cold water. He dove into ice water just once on a dare naked, but that was beside the point.

"Hey, Nick!" Deadpool called. "Head still hanging in there."

"Unfortunately," Nick said.

"You know, it's a shame you couldn't find the ghost of the guy that did this," Deadpool said. "And the ghost of the ax that he used to do this. Because, if you did, I would haunt that sloppy son of a bitch until he finishes the job. What kind of person can't decapitate a person in that many swings?"

Nick looked sardonic. "Yes, unfortunately, he appears to have gone beyond."

"Gone beyond," Deadpool said. "Oh, he's not a ghost. You're just hanging out there, not quite dead, not quite alive. You're like that guy from the Peanuts who also had a cat in the box who was both alive or dead at the same time, depending on whether or not the box was opened or not."

Sir Nicholas really wished he knew what that peculiar gentleman talked about half of the time. It was a good thing he was already dead because otherwise he would have been frustrated to death by the oddness of that particular mercenary.

"You sure you can't use some kind of ghost dagger or something to take off that extra half-an-inch?" Deadpool asked.

"Don't think I've not tried to look," Nick said. "Unfortunately, it would need to be a magical blade. And given those are almost impervious to destruction."

"But, almost is not completely impervious right," Deadpool said.

"Yes, but you would need a potent magical element to destroy it," Nick said. "And good luck with that. I suppose you could find the Elder Wand to remove my head, but the chances of it just being in Hogwarts….well it's quite frankly absurd."

"Elder Wand?" Deadpool asked. "Sounds like a magical MacGuffin to me."

"Yes, the Deathstick, one of the most fabled mystical artifacts," Nick said. "It can break even the most stringent laws of magic. It has said to be unbeatable. Numerous wizards throughout history have been known to have held it as it can only change hands by defeating the previous holder of the wand."

"Hold it," Deadpool said. "It can only change hands by defeating the previous holder of the wand. But yet, the wand is unbeatable…how in the name of Stan does that work?"

"Magic is how it works, Mr. Wilson," Nick replied.

With that completely logical and airtight explanation, Deadpool really could not argue with Nick's assessment. He began to notice people got extremely defensive when you questioned them about magic.

Deadpool continued his rounds around Hogwarts, mopping pretty much everywhere he could and cleaning up. He noticed one of the windows had a particular nasty smudge on it. The Mercenary gave a tut and moved over to clean the window.

"Magic castle would just clean itself magically using magic, and it would be very magical," Deadpool said. "Okay, repetitive statement is very repetitive at being extremely repetitive in its repetitive nature of being repetitive at being a repetitive thing that's repetitive in all of its repetitive stuff at being all repetitive and stuff with how repetitive it…"

Deadpool's honest attempt to break both the world record for the longest running sentence and the most repetitive uses of the world repetitive would have to wait. The Mercenary heard a couple of first years who had lost the way home.

"I swear, it should be around here somewhere!"

Deadpool noticed Harry Potter walking behind a tall ginger-haired kid with freckles. They were making their way up the stairs and to the corridor of doom on the third floor.

"NO, STOP!"

Deadpool jumped into the air, his mop brandished, and he nailed Ginger McGee in the face to knock him directly down on the ground. The Mercenary stopped at the corridor standing in front of Harry and that other kid.

"YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" Deadpool yelled.

"Are you okay?" Harry Potter asked.

"Dudes, didn't you listen to Dumbledore?" Deadpool asked. "He said that if you went up to the Third Floor Corridor, you would have suffered a most painful death. Which is pretty bad, and trust me, you don't want to know what's in there. I ran afoul of it on the first day of the job."

"What's in here?" Harry asked.

"Oh, I'm sure you'll find out in a week or two, or about a month, but it's way too soon for you to find these things out," Deadpool said. "I think you don't realize how these things work. Where you slowly learn things throughout the year, and then everything reaches a climax sometime in June. You don't want to blow your load too soon."

Harry turned to that other kid he was with who responded with a shrug.

"The point is, try not to accidentally go into a Forbidden Corridor," Deadpool said. "You don't want to go in there. Trust me on this Harry Potter."

Deadpool slapped a post-it note over Harry's scar which read "third-floor corridor: no go."

"Oh, and here's something a little for your trouble, you might want to read this," Deadpool said.

A thick sheet of paper slipped into Harry's hand and Deadpool turned around.

"Um, thanks," Harry said. The moment he thought the assistant caretaker was out of earshot, he turned to the canonical friend next to him. "Does he seem a bit off to you?"

"Just a bit?" Deadpool asked stopping short. "I must be losing my touch in my rapidly advancing age if you think I'm just a bit off. I'm very off. I'm so off center I would give someone with OCD a fit…and oh, Harry Potter, I know you're excited about making friends…but you can do better."

Deadpool patted Freckles on the top of the head.

"And you…well keep trying kid," Deadpool said.

A sound of a loud siren echoed through the hall of Hogwarts. Deadpool turned around and motioned for Harry and that other guy to head off to their classes before they were late. Four men dressed in jumpsuits descended down from the ceiling to face off against Deadpool. They dressed like police officers. The leader of the men had his hair shaved very finely.

"Wade Winston Wilson," the leader of the pack said.

"That's my name," Deadpool said. "Please don't wear it out. The price for buying a new one is so insane you wouldn't even believe it if I told you."

"You have been issued a citation," the leader said. "You have committed malicious character assassination due to your comments in this hallway today."

"Wait, what are you talking about…."

"You have performed the act of bashing," the leader said, not even bothering to response. "We do not tolerate such behavior regarding any human being. Every character in this wide multiverse should be treated with the utmost respect regardless of any personal opinions you have of the character. Such negative behavior will not be tolerated."

"We are here to stop the malicious bullying of these characters," another member of the strike force said. "We will ensure each fandom is a happy and safe place for all fans of all characters, no matter how polarizing their actions may be. Any statement given against a character, will not be tolerated in this current environment we are in."

Deadpool raised an eyebrow.

"We will not allow your toxic behavior," the strike force member said. "No one is allowed to dislike another character, no one is allowed to say anything even slightly negative towards another character. We must not offend the sensibilities of anyone who may be a fan of that character."

The citation slapped against Deadpool's hand by the character.

"We hope to have a pleasant day, Mr. Wilson, and be mindful how such behavior could be negative and could lead to hurt feelings," the leader said. "We wish everyone to feel safe and secure, and untriggered when they read fan fiction. And to see a character they like being treated in a negative way is potentially triggering to people who do like that character."

Deadpool held the bashing citation in his hand. He could not believe a little light hearted fun got him nailed by these people.

"Well, if they like the character, and they don't like the negative portrayal, can't they just find another piece of fiction or maybe grow a pair or something?"

Another citation slapped in Deadpool's hand before they went on their merry way.

'These people are going to be a pain in my rear view.'

Wade Wilson could not wait to attend Potions Class along with the first year Gryffindor and Slytherin. He opened the door where several first years. One blonde boy, in particular, no prizes to who looked at Wade with a sneer when he showed up.

'Man, he looks like a twat.'

One of the gentlemen who accosted Deadpool in the hallway appeared a few inches behind him and slapped him with another citation.

"To be fair, I said he looks like a twat. I didn't say he is a twat."

Another citation had been slapped onto Deadpool before the man disappeared into the shadows. Snape looked at Deadpool with slightly narrowed eyes.

"May I help you, Wilson?" Snape asked.

"Yes, there's some…particularly hazardous magical mildew rotting from the ceiling above your head," Wade said. "If I could just take a look at it, maybe scrub some of it off, that would be great, wouldn't it?"

Snape followed the progress of Deadpool and looked at the spot on the ceiling. The gaze of Snape moved from the spot of the ceiling to Deadpool a number of times. The Potions Master's lip curled into the ever-present sneer, the type which needed years of practice to performed. Snape mastered his sneer about as well as he mastered his potions, perhaps even better. Deadpool envisioned the man spending most of his days looking in the mirror to show the contempt for the fellow human being.

"I don't see any mildew."

"You see, this could be a problem," Deadpool said. "You can't see the mildew. Do you know about magical mildew? You wouldn't know if it was there because it magically appears just like magic. It rots away at your floor boards much like a politician's speech. I won't pester you, I swear."

"You swear?" Snape asked.

"Well, in general, I've been trying to cut back on my seven words," Deadpool said. "But, yes, I promise, cross my heart, hope to die, until a cosmic retcon brings me back. I won't bother you. Scot's honor."

The Potions Master did not look that convinced.

"Isn't it supposed to be Scout's Honor?" one of the nameless faceless students in the classroom asked.

Deadpool looked at the student, let's say Seamus Finnegan for purposes of identification, and gave him a sidelong look.

"Are you trying to accuse Scotsmen of being dishonorable?" Deadpool asked. "Man, old Minnie McGee would bust a cap in your ass."

"You're holding up my lesson," Snape said. "You either clean this supposed magical mildew or leave to pester somewhere else."

"You wouldn't want your classroom ruined. Would you? Would you like that? I bet you wouldn't."

Snape lifted an arm to wave his hand in an indifferent motion. He would have liked nothing better than to slap Deadpool so hard on the face that it would render him completely silly. Snape withdrew his hand from the attempted slap. He would remain professional despite every thought possible making him think to slap Deadpool around.

"You don't do anything. You don't touch anything that has nothing to do with your cleaning. If I find one of these priceless potion ingredients out of place, you will suffer."

Deadpool raised his hands up in the air and smiled across the room. Snape kept his beady little eyes on Deadpool for the longest time before he turned his attention back to the students. Deadpool moved on his merry way to do the cleaning which was necessary.

"There will be no foolish wand-waving or silly incantations in this class. I do not expect you to follow the intricacies of the fine art of potion making. The sweet simmering of magically created fluids, as they bubble through a cauldron. But, some you may learn in the next five years what the subtle science of brewing potions is all about. I can teach you many things. I can teach you many things, how to ensnare the senses and bewitch the mind…"

"So, wait, you're making magical roofies?" Deadpool asked.

Snape turned around glared and Deadpool returned to cleaning the ceiling and the walls of Snape's lab.

"I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even stopper death…providing, by some miracle, you aren't the same load of dunderheads I normally have the misfortune of having to teach."

The Potions Professor decided to lay eyes on his prey, and it was going to be a good one.

"POTTER! What do get if I add a Powdered Root Asphodel to an infusion of Wormwood?" Snape asked.

"I believe you get a potion known as the Draught of the Living Dead," Harry said.

Snape's eyebrows raised and the Slytherins in the classroom all gasped, as did the Gryffindors. Deadpool gave Harry one thumbs up.

"Well, a broken clock is right twice a day, Potter," Snape said. "Tell me, where would you go if I tell you to find a Bezoar?"

The brunette girl raised her hand, almost knocking her neighbor to the right in the face.

"It's a stone, which can be found in a stomach of a goat," Harry said. "It can help save you from most poisons."

The girl lifting her hand in the air next to that Potter kid looked very disappointment she did not get to advertise all of the books she read and all of the knowledge. Snape looked very sour when looking at the young man in front of him.

"Fine, anyone can get a remedial answer correct," Snape said. "But, Potter, tell me the difference between Monkshood and Wolfsbane."

"There is none, sir," Harry said. "They come from the same plant which is called Aconite."

The entire room dropped several degrees thanks to Snape's rather cold and sullen looking stare. The Potions Master's eyes went around the room for a second. He came face to face with Deadpool who showed he was cleaning. Several moments passed before Snape turned back to Harry.

"Five points from Gryffindor," Snape said. "I hope that teaches you a lesson not to accept help from the Custodial staff."

He personally hoped that Potter would not be corrupted by Wilson's influence. That was the last thing any of them needed.

"Hey, I'm the Deputy Caretaker of Magical Sanitation," Deadpool said. "And I'm promoting high learning and broadening the mind. Is this is all about? Broadening the minds? Making people less dunderhead?"

Snape turned his attention away from Deadpool without a single word of retort. The most obvious thing to do was to block everything this man was saying.

"Today, you will begin your first potion. Ingredients are on the board. You should have all of the ingredients in your supply kits. If you do not have a completely stocked supply kit, then you will receive a T for the day for not being adequately prepared for class. There are no excuses for such laziness."

"Cut the kids some slack, Snapey-bear," Deadpool said. "It's their first day."

Snape extended one finger towards the door and pointed towards it. Deadpool decided to take up and leave. He knew when he was not wanted. The Deputy Caretaker of Magical Sanitation decided to head off where there was floor to scrub, toilets to clean, and portraits make all shiny.

A magical sanitation deputy's work is never done.'