[Cardiff, Wales. January 2000]
Being transmigrated twenty-two years in the past into the body of a seven-year-old may seem like a massive inconvenience. Still, in all honesty, all I see is opportunity.
The mechanics of my arrival at this point and place in the timestream was and would likely remain a mystery to me till my dying day.
My last memory of my past (technically the defunct future) life was an overwhelming impulse to sneeze - an impulse I readily capitulated to and suddenly found myself in a younger world, occupying a more youthful body. No amount of sneezing again launched me elsewhere or returned me, so the only option was to roll with it. No moral dilemma is required or wanted.
When I arrived here two years ago, all I had on me was a wad of cash and a student ID that thankfully provided my new name, Bas Rhys. Eight-years-old, 1998 class of primary four, Cardiff Public School, Wales.
Acclimating into this new environment was incredibly easy, being an orphan in boarding meant my life was fairly regimented and handled by my dorm master, Mrs Stephens. And life went on for the next two years.
One thing I failed to mention, however, is my little goldfinger that typically came with transmigration. It wasn't a system, but the very next best thing - my smartphone with access to the internet from the future. Fortuitously, this sleek black piece of glass appears as an old Nokia brick to everyone else.
I am unaware whether this acquisition was from happenstance, a gift from the divine, or something I sold my soul for. What I do know is that I plan to exploit it for all it's worth.
"Bas! Bas!" And as an excited knocking, thundered at my bedroom door, I'd be seeing the first of my I'll gotten gains.
I opened the door just as anxiously, letting in my guardian, Mrs Stephens, "is it my O-levels results?" She hurriedly thrust the already opened letter containing my transcripts into my hands.
I didn't need to read them all the way through to know I'd gotten all eleven A*, but decided to humour my over eager guardian.
We celebrated my success; Mrs Stephens practically gushed in pride at my prodigious accomplishment. And while, yes, my educational background would have made any studying a breeze, it was in fact my phone that enabled this result. Past papers for 2000 GCSE exams were readily available on 2020's Internet. Past-papers that just so happened to be the very exams I'd given.
"Oh! But this is such wonderful, wonderful news!" I reached over and grabbed her trembling hands.
"It is Mrs Stephens, and I couldn't possibly have done it without you."
She glomped on me after that, barely holding back her tears. "Oh you dear sweet boy. We must think about your next steps carefully now. No doubt 6th form colleges and perhaps even universities will be lining up to grab you!"
They certainly would be. Unfortunately I wasn't actually a wunderkind, merely someone with an accessible cheat code. There wasn't any way I'd be able to carry this level of performance into advanced academia, best nip that in the bud here and now. More importantly, I had no intention of wasting away this chance at a new life by relegating myself into becoming a faceless cog for a multinational conglomerate. I desired money, power, and fame - not to mention the ass that would come along as a fringe benefit.
These were the precise facets for either a celebrity or political career. I wasn't totally morally bankrupt, so a political career was very far from my mind. And as the saying goes, there's no business like show business.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
"If they reach out, I'd be delighted to contact them. But we both know the admission's cycle won't begin for another six months." I wriggled out of her grasp, hurried over to my work desk, and pulled out a bulky envelope from the drawer. "In the meantime, I'd like your help posting this for me please."
She inspected the package curiously, turning it over in her hand to feel for what was inside the package. "This feels like a disc, who are you sending a DVD to?"
"Hopefully, my future employers." I showed her the printed advert for the casting call, put out to the World only a handful of days ago. [Wanted: young British Muggle with a lightning-bolt scar.]
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[Los Angeles, California. January 2000]
Chris Columbus sat irritated on his chair at the Warner Brothers offices. It was going to be another long, slog-fest, of a day pouring over mediocre video submissions for the Harry Potter movie casting.
Mercifully, the adult casting was done months ago, it was just the child actors they had to fill out. The studio couldn't afford anymore delays past filming commencing this July, or the project - or maybe just his position in it, just might be scrapped.
Truthfully, he didn't see the point of coming in to review the tapes today. He'd got his Hermione locked, the young Watson girl had been discovered on their school tours across the UK, and they also had a good pile to choose from for Ron Weasley - he especially liked the ginger kid who rapped in his audition video. What a dopey character, pretty spot on for his vision of Ron.
The problem that was plaguing him though, was that of Harry.
After all, you can't exactly make a movie without the titular character - no matter how much Steve Kloves, their screenwriter, would have preferred the movie to be titled {'the adventures of Hermione Granger'.}
The shoot was only a handful of months away and he had yet to get a concrete script, or their protagonist. What a mess.
Chris sighed and rubbed his head. "Alright, that's enough." Chris turned over to the casting director, and David Heyman the producer of the film. "Thoughts?"
The casting director gave a firm no, David made a so-so hand gesture. "I think let's work from the shortlist we already have. I know we've got that Felton kid as well as Maggie Smith's recommendation - the Radcliffe boy. He's even acted before in Copperfield."
Chris nodded in agreement. "Sounds good to me. Let's make this the last one so we can finally move on to the next step." He gestured to his assistant to swap out the CD for the next and last one.
At this point most had checked out of the process. Chris himself rested his face on his hand idly watching the grainy film on the CRT come to life.
["Hi! My name is Bas Rhys, age ten, from Cardiff, Wales."] Chris eyebrow rose minutely - the boy was fairly decent to look at and fit the part. A little more latte than vanilla shake, but still acceptable; deep black hair was a nest and absolutely on point, but most striking were his green green eyes. Not a bad start.
["I'd also like to introduce my audition partner,"] the boy bent over and lifted a cardboard cutout of the Michelin Man. ["We don't have a lot of chubsters at the orphanage, so the michelin man seems like an appropriate stand-in for the Dursleys I feel."] David Heyman started chuckling, and sat a little straighter in his chair. Even his ever erstwhile casting director had a small smile on her lips. The boy was funny - clever too, mentioning his orphan status. Promising. More so when he's so far been able to follow the simple instructions they'd sent out with the casting call - state your name, age, tell a joke, and read a paragraph from the books. Kids he could forgive, but their parents less so for failing to follow simple guidelines.
The kid - Bas Rhys - Chris committed to memory proceeded to enact a scene from the first book; of a dialogue between Dudley and Harry. ["No thanks, the toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it - it might be sick."] Oh this guy had the sass down.
He thought back to the other candidates he had in mind for Harry; Radcliffe had a certain damaged intensity that he loved, but this kid had a chip on his shoulder that he'd not really seen from anyone else yet - must be a quality real orphans shared. Not quite what Klove's script was asking for - but if Chris was honest with himself, did more justice to the book character than the screenplay currently did.
Given his colleagues' conspiratorial glances between each other, they were thinking the same thing. Bas Rhys was looking like a promising prospect. But, Chris himself, didn't really see a USP quite yet - that 'It factor'.
Then the boy did something borderline insane.
The screen cut to black, before quickly shifting to a top down view of a public swimming pool with a diving board at the bottom of the view. They were clearly very up high on a diving platform. Young Mr Rhys crouched down and waved a squeegee at the screen, ["This isn't exactly a Nimbus 2000, but I thought I'd provide a quick flight test to show you how I might look during the quidditch scen-"] an off-screen voice suddenly interrupted with a shout. ["Oi! Get down from there you absolute nutter! That's for adults only!"] Bas Rhys turned to the camera one final time and looked determined, nodded and walked off-screen. ["Well, better get on with it before the pool rozzers catch me."]
Chris leaned forward and glued his eyes to the monitor - surely he wasn't going to- Bas ran back in view, squeegee between his legs as he took a flying leap off the board. The camera was positioned perfectly to demonstrate the fall all the way down till he crashed head (and broom) first into the water with a huge splash.
The DVD ejected. David was full on laughing as Chris himself just remained shocked at the asinine antics of the ten-year-old. This was it, this was 'IT'. The movie had a lot of scenes where Harry does stupidly reckless things, and this was the first and only audition that precisely provided the sensation that watching someone undertake death-defying stunts should give.
"Yesterday." Chris voiced to the room. "Send this kid a ticket and book his hotel. I want him to formally audition in front of me Yesterday!"