Ending of a Fool's Paradise
)(obviously feel free to reply how you'd like to)
OOC note: Reducio1) While everything written is true for Dido, much is intentionally incorrect (eg: Dido is not in Ravenclaw)
2) As the riddles are supposed to be able to have many answers with just logic being needed, I chose the below riddle as it seemed to have loads of possible responses. Specifically, holes, light (to make the box lighter), helium (to make it lighter) or fire (to burn the box).
Dido Bleaklane was a Ravenclaw.
Dido Bleaklane was a Ravenclaw. A Ravenclaw. Dido was a Ravenclaw.
Waves of these thoughts washed through Dido’s head, crashing viciously against the small part of her that was hoping, begging her to stop, to turn around, to go back. To be fair to Dido, the niggling little voice did hold its own for a couple of moments, in which Dido stood absolutely still, the most lucidity and understanding of the situation she had had in weeks taking centre-stage in her head. Unfortunately, the panic caused by seeing Mikaela travel further away was too much for the sweet creature that was trying to be helpful to Dido and, swiftly, the doubts were shifted. The waves drowned that final inhibition, sending any hint of hesitation plunging down to where it would not be able to impact the following minutes, and, when the fear was at last gone, or at least, disguised, Dido’s determination came back stronger than ever, echoing with every click of her hard shoes on the stone flooring.
Not even a pretence of stealth remained as Dido walked behind the girl, the previously meticulously maintained distance between her and Mikaela decreasing by the second. Click, clack. Click, clack. The metronome somehow reminded Dido of the torturous piano lessons she had once taken at her mother’s behest, flashes of sitting before the white and black keys, flinching at the teacher’s sighs and sharp, “Again, Dido!”s. The memories were fortunately timed. She was going to need the resilience that had developed from hours of fumbled notes in just a few moments.
Mikaela drew nearer to the spiral staircase. Whether it was from a residual aversion to being spotted as the stairs winded round or a desperation to finish whatever this was, Dido sped up, now only a couple metres behind the Ravenclaw. Click, clack, click, clack, went the metronome as Dido marched up the stairs, still only taking one step at a time. She would have been close enough to notice the dark waves in Mikaela’s perfect braid, had she not been so focused. Or, perhaps, unfocused. Dido herself couldn’t tell her level of concentration, nor could any invisible spectator who wasn’t privy to her inner-most thoughts.
The tower was tall and the spiralling steps, which may have once acted as a perfect metaphor for Dido’s crumbling mental state, only added to the distance, allowing Dido’s increased speed to eventually catch up with Mikaela. At three feet, Dido’s heart began to race even faster. At two, the thudding sound originating from her chest became indistinguishable from the ongoing beat of her shoes against the stairs. When she was only one foot behind Mikaela, almost falling into the girl, Dido shuffled closer to the centre of the circular route and started taking the steps two at a time. Soon enough, she was in front of the girl, with whom she had been so obsessed over the previous months, and, without as much as a second glance behind her, Dido continued and even gained speed, rushing up towards the oak door that was finally visible. At the final few steps, Dido seemingly reverted to a younger version of herself, bending slightly and letting her hands touch the cold steps before finally straightening up and standing before the imposing wood.
With a shaking hand, Dido reached out to the knocker before jolting backwards as the cast-bronze eagle began to speak, its metal features stretching and contorting as a voice, better suited for a wizened old man than a majestic eagle, poured out from the beak.
“What can you fill a box with to make it lighter?”
“What?” Dido stuttered, horrified at the question and at the rather shocking surprise at a seemingly inanimate object could talk (of course, having spent the best part of the school year at Hogwarts, this really ought not to have surprised her all that much). Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately given what was soon to transpire, Dido quickly recovered, shaking her head, and said, “Oh- I do know this one! A lighter. Right?”
To her chagrin, the door neither deigned to respond nor elected to swing open. Perhaps it was because of Dido’s prefacing statement that she “knew this one” already that the door decided against her answer. Perhaps the answer Dido’s mother classically gave to the popular riddle was only a joke amongst the Bleaklane family. Perhaps she was simply wrong. Or, probably more likely, perhaps the door didn’t welcome Dido into the Ravenclaw common room with open arms because Dido was not actually a Ravenclaw.
Dido repeated herself, attempting the time-honoured and classically unhelpful approach when dealing with technology of just trying again and expecting a different response. The door, again, remained silent. Dido was livid in the way children often become when someone, or in this case, something, refuses to listen to them. This unwillingness to acknowledge a child can, of course, hurt them more deeply than simply stating a simple, “No”, so, true to life, the silence scorched Dido, mocking her. At this, her eyes began to prickle and the very inside of her nose started to burn and baulk within her, the pain forcing itself from her tight and winding feelings into actual physical sensations.
Voice slightly hoarser and more tearful that before, Dido hissed, “You put a lighter in the box! To make it a lighter!”, into the wood, ears burning.
They do say that the earliest marker of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result, though this will, of course, bear no relation nor act as foreshadowing to any of Dido’s soon-to-occur actions.
Certainly emotionful, though she wasn’t entirely sure with which, at the door’s impassivity, Dido knocked on the wood three times. Harder each time. On the second try, the pain shot through her knuckles and up her arm, an ice-cold flash of something. Whatever it was, most likely pain and unprocessed guilt, it managed to take precedence over the fearful gnawing building in her head so, obviously, it was hugely preferable. So Dido repeated the forceful knock, almost-but-not-quite savouring the reprieve from the dread growing within. The fourth time, she raised both hands and smacked the door forcefully, the slam echoing and ricocheting down the cylindrical staircase but, still, it was to no avail as the door stayed resolutely unmoving.
Assuming Mikaela was by now near Dido, Dido caught a glimpse of the Ravenclaw from the corner of her eye and immediately rounded on her, smiling slightly too intensely for a normal school afternoon.
“Mikaela!” she said, rather angrily, “Why won’t this stupid, bloody door open?!”
-Dido Bleaklane |
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
Late June
@Dido Bleaklane
515 words
All descriptions were previously approved via owls
Coded by Melissa BlakeThis was... Unexpected.
I wasn't in the mood. I hadn't been in the mood for weeks, and after a long study session, all I wanted to do was go and take a deserved nap before the dinner.
To be honest, I had no idea what was happening. I never realized someone was behind me. Not today or... Ever.
I was just walking up the stairs of the tower, silently hoping that today's riddle wasn't so hard. Last week there was one so difficult that at the end, there were five students, me included, waiting for a seventh year to come and open the door. A nightmare.
And while I thought of it, someone walked by my side, rushing towards the room. I wouldn't have cared if I hadn't seen the robes.
I just saw the hoodie, but it was enough. Green. Green. Not Ravenclaw's royal blue. Slytherin's green.
It was a mistake. It had to. My mind was messing with me after all those sleepless nights of studying. I gave a few more steps and then I saw her.
The girl of my charms class on Thursdays. I don't remember the name, but I'd recognize that shape anywhere.
Lido? Linda?
Dido. Yes.
But what was she doing here?
I followed her up until we made it to the door. She didn't seem to notice I was beside her. The door gave the riddle, and she solved it. It was easy this time, at least. I solved it last month, too.
But it didn't open. And the answer was obvious. Because she was not a Ravenclaw. She was a Slytherin.
What the hell was she doing here, of all places? It wasn't a mistake. The Slytherin dungeons were at the other side of the castle.
She began knocking the door, as if it was a mistake. It wasn't.
When she finally turned around, I was there, standing next to the stairs like an idiot.
“Mikaela! Why won’t this stupid, bloody door open?!”
And then I realized. This wasn't Dido. This could not be the same sweet girl who talked to me on charms. It couldn't be.
I took a time to analyze her. A poorly sewed Ravenclaw badge was over her Slytherin one on the chest of her robe, almost falling. Her fists were curled at her sides. Her hair was on a braid, some strand of it hanging loosingly over her cheeks.
It was her. But it wasn't.
"Dido, what are you doing here?" I hated the way my voice dropped shakingly, alalmost scared.
Maybe she was stressed. Or confused. It happened. What if she drank a mental potion? One of the ones we first learned?Stamina: 6 | Evasion: 6 | Strength: 4 | Wisdom: 7 | Arc Power: 6 | Accuracy: 6
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
OOC note: Reducio1) While everything written is true for Dido, much is intentionally incorrect (eg: Dido is not in Ravenclaw)
2) Should they start to make their way down the stairs soonish?
Mikaela wasn’t utterly perfect. That was the first thing that Dido noticed when the girl responded: a shaky voice questioning Dido’s very purpose as it quivered, actively defying Dido’s imaginations. The slight tremor struck Dido, hitting her harder than any screamed statement or physical blow ever could. She was scared. Mikaela, Dido’s utter hero, obsession and almost her new-self, was scared. Of what?
While the thought was indeed the first thing to cross her mind, the burning question didn’t plague her for long, the active warzone in Dido’s head proving itself as inhospitable terrain for such trival yet potentially life-altering ideas. Instead, the blunt force of her realisation was left unacknowledged and was buried under the pain and anger which itself covered the building dread that so desperately needed to remain hidden, especially from Dido. Dido clenched her fist tighter, the tips of her chewed-down nails searing into the palm of her hand and helping distract the girl from said growing fear.
And what did Mikaela mean? Of course Dido was there. Dido had been with Mikaela for weeks, months. Mikaela and Dido were always together, right? Surely the Ravenclaw knew- how could she not? Unless- No, of course Dido was there. After all, Dido was a Ravenclaw. An eagle-sporting, always kind, clever Ravenclaw. It would have been odd had Dido not been at the Ravenclaw common room. Though, as Dido somehow managed to dismiss Mikaela’s confusion, she did acknowledge that she was only very rarely actually inside her own common room, much preferring the library. Because of course she loved the library. And reading. And writing in perfect calligraphic handwriting, no matter how greatly it hurt her hand. But Dido could easily picture the room: a perfect blue tower with shelves and shelves of books, sunlight pouring in from the huge glass windows, so unlike the Slytherin dungeons- No. Dido knew the Ravenclaw rooms, right? Right? She did, of course she did. She did. Really. Did- No. She did. She-She-Dido did- Dido-
“I do!” she cried out at last as she threw her hands up, desperately attempting to stifle the voice that spoke honestly to her. She looked at Mikaela, forcing herself to actually see the girl before her rather than retreating into the destructive danger of her mind. Had she actually been able to process the raging emotions battling inside her, tears would certainly have been running down her cheeks, the much needed catharsis that could have stopped her in her tracks. Unfortunately for Dido, those tears only succeeded in gathering behind her eyes, helplessly blocked by the layers of conviction she had built.
Finally able to speak, or, at the very least, finally managing to force herself to utter a few sentences, Dido looked away from Mikaela before answering, “I’m trying to get into my common room.” She then turned back to the offending door and raised her voice even further, almost shouting, “Into my common room!” while pounding on the wood in time to each syllable.
Each slammed hand grew louder, more forceful and violent, paining Dido more and more sweetly and providing the blessed relief she so desperately sought. Perhaps it was the noise that was so alleviating, pulling her mind from its twisting corridors of fear and filling it with cleansing loudness. Perhaps it was the impact, a force so great that it allowed her to feel control over something, giving her brain a responsibility. It could have even been the utter violence of it all, physically letting Dido express the fear without noticing it. No matter how it worked, it was working. The thoughts were becoming quieter, or so Dido believed. Slam! The wall echoed against her fist.
Tears of pain were filling her eyes, pushing past the potential alleviating ones and instead adding to the crazed jumble of what was going on within Dido; They streaked down her cheeks. She glanced at Mikaela, several important minutes past thinking how strange of a sight she must have looked. She gripped her stinging knuckles tightly with the other hand, somehow simultaneously cradling it as a babe while clutching it with all the power of a drowning man pulling down another person in his efforts to stay afloat.
“I’m a Ravenclaw!” she hissed, approaching the girl with all the anger of a predator and all the wild, reckless and desperate fear of a cornered animal of prey. Her face screwed up, twisting itself into what could only have been described as grief, even if the expression didn’t quite match any single emotion in the tempest inside her.
“I am a Ravenclaw!” she repeated, almost wailing in fury.
The girl continued to advance on the Ravenclaw, shaking her head desperately while periodically clutching her face in her hands. Lurching to the side, she crashed her hands into the wall again with the grace of a fleeing rabbit. Her body followed in quick succession, leaving her laying her shoulder and face against the cold stone as her nails scraped against it. Contrasting with her occasional bursts of motion, she weakly tilted her head back towards Mikaela, bitter resentment now etched across her features. Almost whispering, she breathed, “I… hate you.”
-Dido Bleaklane |
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
Late June
@Dido Bleaklane
534 words
Coded by Melissa BlakeNo. No, no, no, this couldn't be happening right now. Dido must have been under the control of a mind-altering potion. It was the only explanation. Cause, if not, then why would she be saying all this stuff?
She kept slamming the door, over and over and over again, as if she believed that, if she slammed it hard enough, it'd open for her. But it was basic knowledge that the doors of the houses only open for people of the house.
And Dido Bleaklane was not a Ravenclaw.
I swallowed, hard, as my mind raced, thinking on what I could do to help her. Or, at least, to take her out of the Ravenclaw tower. She did not belong here, and I... I liked her. She had always been nice to me, always with her easy smile and pretty handwriting. Who could have been so cruel to give her a potion like that?
But just as soon as I decided to reach for her and try to calm her down, she began approaching me.
Saying she was a Ravenclaw.
And the look in her eyes, the deseperation, the...
It was not a potion. It couldn't be. How, if so, could her eyes hold such hatred? Such anger? Such despair? If it was a potion, her eyes would be different.
And as she approached me, I noticed some other tiny details. Details that I missed when we met, or the weird occasions where we interacted in class. The Ravenclaw badge. Since she was getting closer and closer, I noticed how it was sewn. Like it had been like that for a long time, and she sewed it almost in a hurry, or in the dark. Her hair, a badly done braid where her hair used to hang free at her shoulders.
But it had to be a coincidence, right? I mean, a braid is very common at Hogwarts, I, myself, have seen almost a hundred girls with braids daily. It was nothing special.
I didn't notice I was backing off until my foot suddenly didn't touch the ground. Instead, it fell just a few inches, finally landing on the last step of the stairs.
I froze as I stared at her, taking a deep breath. I couldn't move, it was almost like my whole body wasn't able to keep moving. Maybe it was for the better. One fake move and it could all go down.
"Dido..." What? What could I say to her? "Dido, I need you to calm down. I can help you, just let me..."
My voice cracked a bit in the second half of the sentence. Let me what? With her state, I should call an adult to take her out of here. But there was no one around, and anyway, they'd take too long coming up the stairs.Stamina: 6 | Evasion: 6 | Strength: 4 | Wisdom: 7 | Arc Power: 6 | Accuracy: 6
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
OOC note: Reducio1) While everything written is true for Dido, much is intentionally incorrect (eg: Dido is not in Ravenclaw)
2) feel free to just say dido managed to grab her, unless you want to roll to dodge. also feel free to just say mika managed to dodge!
The stone wall was cold against Dido’s cheek.
She couldn’t tell if it was the stone itself that was cool or whether the chilling sensation came more from the contrast to the red heat of her face. Either way, as she leant against it, nails gripping into the cracks and scratches, the held-back tears finally began to seep from her eyes and shallow breaths at last broke past the deep gulps of air she had been taking. Dido must have looked a pathetic sight: eyes red and narrowed, nose running, her scarlet face tear-stained and puffy.
As Mikaela stared at the weak girl, Dido gazed back; the water clouded her eyes, leaving Mikaela as a blur of blue and black against the plain backdrop. Her lip quivered. No noise came out apart from the shaky sound of Dido’s breaths. Eyes closing, her legs began to give way, gently lowering her towards the wall into an almost seated position- reminiscent of her very first meeting with the Ravenclaw girl. As her hands moved to rub the hair and salt from her face, the now-serrated edges of her nails bit against her cheek, stretching the damp skin for just a moment. It hurt. Dido didn’t really notice.
She had tried. She was trying. It wasn’t fair.
Opening her eyes again, Dido scanned Mikaela’s face, searching for a sign of something she knew she deserved. Pity? Guilt? Her own dark eyes found Mikaela’s own and, still, Dido managed to find superiority in them, seeing the deep richness rather than noticing any emotions they held. Even then, at her most vulnerable, all Dido could see was Mikaela’s perfec- There was something else. Something more… real. It was different to anything Dido had envisioned when she remembered, or even looked at, the Ravenclaw. The sight of this… difference hit Dido, staking her to the stone as her fingers dug deeper into its faults.
Looking at the girl, it almost seemed like she was shrinking slightly- becoming less right there in front of her. Dido turned her head to fully face her and- Clack. The sound of Mikaela’s shoe hitting the floor echoed through the stairwell. Dido frowned and then blinked, pushing more tears from her eyes with the palm of her hand while she used the other, still gripping the wall, to push herself back up into a standing position. What was Mikaela doing? Was she… scared?
“Dido…”
The sound of her own name struck Dido, almost as deeply as the prior noise of Mikaela’s foot against the floor.
“Please…” she whispered back, still helplessly clutching the support of the wall.
“Dido, I need you to calm down.”
Calm down?
“I can help you.”
Help her?
“Just let me-”
“Let you what?!” Dido shouted, interrupting the girl and, in a flash, pushing off from the wall towards the Ravenclaw.
“Let you help me? Let you tell me what to do? Tell me what I am? You don’t get to do that. You don’t get to be better than me. Okay? You-“
Dido spun away from the girl, charging from wall to wall as she moved, almost like one of those spinning tops. She clutched the sides of her head with her hands while she spoke, bitten-down nails gripping the dark hair which was unwinding itself faster and faster as her own speed increased. Along side the increase in movement, her voice shifted too, gaining speed and volume and fury. From stone to stone she bounced until, at last, she ended up in front of the offending door. With a shout, she slapped her hands against the door before finally turning back to Mikaela, breathing heavily.
For a second, she stood still, glaring at the girl and looking her up and down, noticing the girl’s almost nervous posture. The Ravenclaw was standing identically to how Dido herself did when she was scared, shocked into freezing, too tense to move even one finger. Momentarily, she saw herself from a few months before, standing in fear beneath the stars, unable to face approaching a girl she had hurt. Of course, the situation was a little different here but, seeing Mikaela’s dark eyes and tense hands and fingers, it stilled Dido. Mikaela was like her. Dido slowed her breathing. She stopped moving. Her eyes softened.
Dido caught a glimpse of a strand of hair which hadn’t quite fit into her braid out of the corner of her eye. Mikaela’s was unaffected, still perfect.
She lunged towards the fearful girl, reaching out to grab her wrist, sharp nails digging into the Ravenclaw’s arm. (rolled [d20: 18] + 7 = 25)
“You aren’t perfect! You aren’t better than me, ok?!”
Reducio
I have decided to pass the blame to Lear entirely for any of Dido’s questionable behaviour and thoughts.
-Dido Bleaklane |
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
Late June
@Dido Bleaklane
432 words
Coded by Melissa BlakeDido was crazy. There's no way of softening it now. She was insane, out of her own mind, acting like a complete psycho.
"What is your problem!?" I asked, scared, going down one more step.
Scared of the sweet girl in front of me. The girl that used to discuss common rooms with me after Charms class. The girl I swore would never break a cup. The girl that now was trying to break into my house, use our symbol and take our life. And that was no going to happen.
If she's a slytherin, there's a reason for that. And if I'm a ravenclaw, there's a reason for that. She just got sorted into the wrong house and she's making it everyone's problem now.
'You don’t get to be better than me. Okay? You-'
Oh, so that was her problem. That I was better than her. I didn't think so. I always thought I was... pretty average, being honest. But why did she think I was better than her? That didn't make any sense at all!
Two seconds later, her nails were digging into my wrist. I gasped in pain, but did not make a single move.
I may be slow, but I'm not stupid. I know making a move right now could make things progressively worse. And she needed to calm down.
"Let go." I asked as calmly as I could, taking another step back. "Dido, listen, I understand you're frustrated, you're stressed, you're not in your right mind and- and that's okay, I just need you to calm down and-"
No, shut up, you're just going to make it worse. Dido was going through a really bad identity crisis and here I am, telling her to calm down. Try again.
"Just... please, let go." My voice squealed. And it terrified me to identify a certain feeling in my throat. I felt like I was about to cry. Her nails were marking my wrist and still, I didn't even try to pull away from her. I could change her. I knew it.
My breathing was uneven, from both fear and anticipation. I felt my eyes itching and my vision went blurry. The first tear fell.
"Please." I begged.Stamina: 8 | Evasion: 7 | Strength: 4 | Wisdom: 7 | Arc Power: 6 | Accuracy: 8
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
OOC note: Reducio1) While everything written is true for Dido, much is intentionally incorrect (eg: Dido is not in Ravenclaw)
2) (:
Mikaela did not move.
Her wrist was still in Dido’s grasp and Dido stared down at the hand that had reached to grab Mikaela’s. Around the Ravenclaw’s hand, her knuckles were white, the outline of bones visible under the tense skin. She hung on tight, as through she were trying to transfer her pain to Mikaela through contact alone, desperate for the girl to take a share. Fingers gripping something so unmoving once again, Dido was back against that cold stone wall, pressing her hands into its fissures for any minute sense of support. Her eyes bored into the clenched fist, pure thought alone driving it further from being her hand encircling Mikaela’s wrist and more something forcing them together. At first, it grounded her, pulling her down firmly. Then, as Mikaela began to speak, the force became more violent, staking through Dido’s palm and pinning it down. For a moment, she forgot that she could take her hand away, so convinced that the fingers had been stuck down.
Finally dragging her gaze, tearstained as it was, away from the hands, Dido instead fixed her eyes on Mikaela. The girl was speaking, saying something about how… Dido was stressed? She tried to interject, frothing words forming in her throat of all colours and styles, each as eloquent as the last but, as each phrase fought for utterance in the warzone of her head, they came out garbled, formed without thought or intellect.
“I’m not- I- I need you to listen! You- I’m fine! Okay?”
That was wrong! She didn’t mean any of those- they weren’t what she mean! Dido opened her mouth to continue, to repeat herself, to clarify, but each time, the flow was unleashed and more came out, as unrefined as the day Dido was sorted. She was meant to be a Ravenclaw- she was meant to be clever! Dido-
Dido glanced back into Mikaela’s eyes with a start as she heard the girl let out a tearful choke of breath. She was crying.
“What? Why are you crying?” she hissed, contempt clouding her confusion with a venomous hint to her tone.
Mikaela had nothing to cry about.
“You’ve nothing to- “
Dido hadn’t done anything to make the girl cry.
“You can’t just do- Stop crying!” Dido finally shouted, eyes narrowing at the tears running down Mikaela’s cheeks. Crying was such an ugly thing. Whenever people-
Clack. Dido’s foot fell through the thick air for just a second before it hit the first step down. Dido looked down at her feet, now firmly planted on the stone yet still separated by a few centimetres of height. When had they started walking? She glanced back up at Mikaela, who was still taking slow steps away. Dido noticed the girl’s hand, distinctly uncovered by her own. Instead, her fist was balled out in the air before her, seemingly pulled away for balance. Now Dido’s nails dug into her own palm once again, biting their coldness into the building heat within her. It hurt. Once again, Dido looked at Mikaela’s hand, wrist now red. The watery fuzz at the edges of her vision grew as she stared, fixated as she counted each of the five small white indents where her nails must have been. That wasn’t right. That wasn’t Dido. That…
Without thinking, she closed the distance, catching up with and following the backing-away girl, a far closer version of their previous arrangement. Adamantly staring straight ahead, anywhere but Mikaela’s hand or watery eyes, pretty even then, Dido screwed up her face, holding back her own tears and continued, “I don’t get you! What did I ever do to you? Nothing!”
Dido laughed, a painful sound, absolutely foreign to that soft tinkling noise which had punctuated their first meeting, “And you just- Why? “
She looked around wildly, taking in the staircase, the blue portraits, Mikaela’s robes while her own bitter smile widened with each new piece of proof she found. Finally, she caught a glimpse of the impression on Mikaela’s wrist, her words catching as she tried so hard to avoid it. “It-It’s not my fault. I didn’t do anything. I-i-i promise! I wouldn’t do anything ever!” her voice shuddered, almost pleading, eyes flashing back towards the hand at Mikaela’s side every moment as the stairs continued to move around them.
“I’m not like that!” she promised finally, desperately, hysteria now one of the only distinguishable parts of her tone.
-Dido Bleaklane |
Ending of a Fool's Paradise
STATS. sta 8; eva 7; str 4; wis 7; arc 6; acc 8x───────────────────────────────────
's grace; Evasive Maneuvers; ability three; ability four; ability five; ability six; ability seven
────────────────────x❝I was good. I was really good.❞x────────────────────
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date; Last days of July ──────xABILITIES.There are certain moments in a girl's life when you just know you have to run. Like being chased by your classmates, trying to find a place to hide before they lock you in another restroom. Like crawling back during a weird attack where the supposed adults were not being responsible. Like hiding behind a tree with a broken arm in said detention. Or like, right now, being intimidated by the one you thought was your friend.
That's when it clocked me. The braids. The Ravenclaw badge. All those coincidential times where we crossed paths at the hallways. Maybe it was never a coincidence. But why? Why would a girl as nice as Dido want to be something like me?
Fight or flight. Fist or fear. My mind always chose to fight, but my body, stubborn as it was, always kept my feet sticked to the ground. Happened with the spider. Happened at the restroom. And right now, almost happened with the slytherin in front of me.
Almost. Because this time, it was the other way around. While my mind begged me to freeze, my body kept walking back. one stair after the other.
“What? Why are you crying? You’ve nothing to- You can’t just do- Stop crying!”
Why? I don't know, maybe because I'm being hunted down by the girl I thought was my friend! She wanted to be me. Dido wanted to be me.
Once, when I was still a kid, I saw the show "Criminal Minds". A morbid show for a kid, but somehow, perfect for a prodigy. I learned how to recognize patterns. The doctors even clapped it. They said that maybe my vocation was about it. What a joke.
But something sticked to me. I learned how to recognize a psychopath. A copycat.
Something like Dido.
The second her hand finally let go of mine, I pulled my own wrist against my chest, quietly massaging the red marks. Five small, yet deep prints mocked me back. How had we come to this? How had we come from talking about our common rooms at the Charms' hallway... to her fingerprints on my wrist?
But sometimes, you have to face it. Sometimes, you have to force your body to fight. Sometimes, you just can't freeze in fear and flight.
We were already halfway through the stairs of the tower. The distant sounds of the other students just a few minutes, barely seconds away were just white noise against the storm in my head and, in a second, I knew exactly what to do.
In a single movement, my hand shot out and grabbed the poorly sewed Ravenclaw badge of her robes. Not with the force to rip it away, but at least for a few stitches to torn apart, revealing the original snake badge of her clothes.
"Wake up, Bleaklane! You are not a Ravenclaw! You never were! You are not me!"
I should've stopped there. I know I should've. But once my mouth opened, it couldn't close again. I lifted up the badge, with all and her robe in my fist, and placed it right into her camp of view.
"You are a Slytherin! You always were! Nothing more! Trust me, you don't want to be me. You don't want to be us. Accept it. Deal with it. It's your problem if you were sorted into the wrong house."
Now, I accept it was cruel. But it was the only way she'd probably get into her senses.
's grace; Evasive Maneuvers; ability three; ability four; ability five; ability six; ability seven[coded by lauren vanes]