A S'morbid Outing Group PV Reopened

Mentioning/Interacting With: @Leonard Oaksworth, @Alan Vanes, @Akari Kato, @Katherine Labrouder, @Marshal Mozor

English: #6B5076
Welsh: #9E8FB9
Uzbek: #874343

Autumn groaned. Why couldn't she have a moment of peace and quiet for once in her life? She had received a letter from her mother an hour ago. Red envelope; a Howler. She certainly couldn't open it in front of all her dorm mates. She had enough dignity and self respect to at least get to a quiet spot before she opened it. What was it? Had something happened to Naomi? Was Autumn being disowned? Had her father been secretly alive this whole time and wanted to see what they would react like after he died, but he'd fallen to a coma after his trick for 6 years and was now back? Was her mother simply mad about the E she'd gotten for Herbology? Who knew?

Ever since she had received it, the letter had been increasing in temperature. The change was gradual and hard to notice, but Autumn would be lying to herself (wouldn't be the first time) if she said that the letter had not felt cool when it had first arrived, a contrast to its now relatively warm state. From what she knew about Howlers, after they reached a certain temperature, they would explode and deliver the message anyway, so Autumn couldn't even throw it away.

So, she wandered through the corridors of the castle, hoping she could find a quiet spot to open the mystery box. Those two weeks' letter from Naomi had been received and a reply had been sent. Cahira and Dove's monthly letters had been sent and received, and they couldn't send Howlers either, so they were not even a possibility. In the end, the biggest possibility was her mother.

And that was the scariest possibility of all.

She slipped the howler in the back pocket of her jeans and considered her options. The best one probably was the Abandoned Toilets. Nobody would be there, at least not at this hour, and that was exactly what Autumn needed right now. No people. But, as Autumn knew a thing or two about her luck, that had an extremely low chance of happening.

And, as the Morticia boy from a few days ago approached her, her suspicions were proven correct. Before Autumn had a chance to turn around and run away to the best of her ability, he was standing before her. Autumn continued to contemplate running, and wondered how far she could make it before the golden retriever in the body of a boy caught up. These thoughts and wonderings remained at the back of her mind as she noticed his panicked face. She almost forgot about running when he began speaking, with an unexpectedly alarmed tone.

”Autumn! I need you to come with me. It’s Leonard; he needs help. We were taking a walk on the grounds when he tripped and landed on his leg in a bad way. He can’t even move it, let alone walk on it; I think it might be broken.”

What?

No cheesy grin? No hello? No nefarious plot? Just, "my friend is hurt and I need help"?

Well, Autumn did know better to trust the lion with an injured human being, and she wished not to have the death of a classmate on her hands. That was so last week's thing.

”I tried to use that spell on him - Reparo, I think it was - but it just seemed to make everything worse.” 

Yeah, there was no way Autumn was going to trust this idiot with a human being.

 ”I tried to drag him back to the castle, but it was doing more harm than good, so I came to get one more person to help me carry him. You’re the first person I saw.”

Autumn nodded and reluctantly began following him, scanning her mind for any healing spells. She didn't think they had learnt any, or any which she could remember, and her memory was fairly good; she doubted she would forget. What if Leonard had a broken leg? What would they do then? Could they cast Wingardium Leviosa on a human being and pull him as he floated? No, no. Autumn didn't think Wingardium Leviosa could be cast on humans.

Soon, they were outside, in the campgrounds, and Autumn had completely forgot about the Howler. She didn't feel it heating up in her pocket; she felt panic because by now Leonard could be as good as dead, and they weren't moving fast enough, damnit!

”I know he was somewhere around here.”

Somewhere around there? He didn't know where Leonard was?

However horrified, Autumn kept silent and followed, scanning the moon-lit scenery which Autumn would have noted to be extremely aesthetically pleasing, had it not been under the current circumstances.

In a minute or five, Maggie pointed and spoke once again.

"There he is! He must be trying to walk it off. Let’s go get him.”

He had a potentially broken leg and he was trying to walk it off? Autumn thought that he was meant to be the smart one. Maybe she was wrong or maybe, and Autumn scolded herself for how late she had considered the possibility, Michelle had lied to her. And the lying was more likely, because Autumn was never wrong. Still, it was too late to object; the snake had been spotted.

”Leo! You’re leg must be feeling much better. What kind of crazy spell did you cast on it?”

A broken, hard-to-move leg did not just begin feeling much better without help, and according to Melissa, he had had no help. And Leonard was a second year; he took the same classes as Autumn, and they had not learnt any bone mending spells. Unless he had studied ahead, he would not have been able to cast a "crazy spell" on it. Even then, if he had always been able to cast the spell, why had Mickey been looking for her?

So, yep. Autumn had absolutely been lied to, and she had absolutely bought it. Ugh. How had she bought it? She supposed that she hadn't taken the boy for a liar, and she had been distracted when he had approached her, by the... oh no, the Howler! Autumn reached for her back pocket to check the temperature of the letter; still warm, although noticeably hotter now. She would have enough time to reply and make a quick giveaway.

"Yes, Marcus. I too am wondering how your friend somehow learnt a bone-mending spell in the span of about 10 minutes. Of course, that is, unless you, I do not know, lied to me?"

Interacting With: @Marshal Mozor and @Autumn Ivy | Mentioning: @Alan Vanes, @Akari Kato, and @Katherine Labrouder | Hex: #004000

Leonard liked making lists. It was a hobby of his, one of the incredibly few things that calmed his racing mind, muting everything but the subject of said list and the stray thoughts about where the best escape was in case of a zombie apocalypse. His favourite type of listicle, if one could call it that, would be ones recording the given advantages and disadvantages During his first meeting with the one and only Marshal Mozor, it was clear more than a few pages of his mental notebook would be needed to try and write them all down, a constant imbalance of cons and pros, breaking the scale almost entirely with endless quips that were both annoying and wondrously amusing. On that fateful, chaos-filled day, he'd done something that went against all the invisible laws: trusting Marshal, no matter what the scale said in terms of how likely it was he was going to make it out of an encounter with the Gryffindor alive again.

Soon, it was apparent that following his own instincts and not the list was a very, very bad choice.

Another universal truth that was apparent when it came to the other boy was that Marshal plus anything female meant trouble, whether in the form of forcing others to painfully stumble through a trove of cheesy lines or watching him stumble through a trove of cheesy lines himself. Leonard had regrettably forgotten that fact, thinking that females wouldn't be a bother and fully believing that Marshal would forego flirting for a friend. Sadly, when his brain decided to finally remember the fact, the first-year had already ran off in the direction of a silhouette with dark hair, which was enough information for Leonard.

"Marshal! Marshal, where are you going?" He shouted at the blonde, waving his hands in a pitiful attempt to grab the attention of his companion that unsurprisingly failed. "C'mon, if you're going to try and get detention, at least tell me before you go off and try and free the fire worms or whatever they're hiding in those shacks."

"Brilliant," Leonard muttered once the other was far enough that all hope was lost for him to come back. He picked up a stray, dead leaf from the ground and throwing it in the air with a bitterness one would expect to be put into throwing a heavier object. "Just brilliant. I thought golden retrievers were supposed to be loyal, not running off for any girl that comes within their line of sight."

The snake's melancholic monologue was cut short by perhaps something even worse than being betrayed for a girl. That was, having to talk to a girl, a girl who he now recognized as being the one who he'd made an effort to try asking out. Such was the reason the scales did not weigh in favour of Marshal. He tried to focus on the words being exchanged, however, instead of working on a plan to get vengeance for this act. There would be no chance for revenge if he ended up needing to try and flirt with her again.

"Leo! You’re leg must be feeling much better. What kind of crazy spell did you cast on it?"

Leonard just managed to escape the loud, cluttered noise of his mind to pick up Marshal's words, accompanied by the all-too-familiar smile that meant well, but also meant trouble. The Slytherin's expression turned to confusion. What could that possibly mean? The girl unknowingly answered his question, getting Marshal's name wrong in the process but also clearing up the puzzle of the light-haired boy's words, although perhaps it was better when he didn't know what was going on, since now there was quite a lot of potential that those words would end up making sure both of them did have broken legs, and arms, and ribs, and necks, and a whole bunch of other things Leonard did not want to get into.

"Uh, hello, hi, greetings. I did not, in fact, break my leg. Just a little trip, barely hurts at all. False alarm!" He laughed uneasily, slapping the lion in an effort to mimic lighthearted banter, though the gesture was a little too painful to count as lighthearted. "You know Marshal, he gets all silly when he's worried, doing ridiculous things like suggesting I'm good at casting spells and bringing over my not-date to try and heal an injury that I don't have."

He then turned to Marshal, addressing the boy with a smile that looked almost painful. "Thanks for the concern, mate, but it's all good here. There was absolutely no need to call her over here. None at all."

The newly proclaimed prefect was not all too sure what he was doing; whether it was a walk or not. Was this considered a patrol? He was still unfamiliar with this whole situation though he could feel the pride swell in his chest by just thinking back to the moment when Miss Pendrast has given him the prefect badge. To be fair he had been quite confused at first but he thought it would be normal that he could not believe himself at first. He was glad he kept his mouth shut about already having another prefect badge; one that he kind of... borrowed from a previous prefect from Slytherin but he was sure it would not be too much of an issue that he would just... keep it. The Gryffindor shook his head quickly, just following wherever Tiger would lead him. Apparently that meant going off the path to a place that Alan would find a little creepy. It just had a lot of huts that were slowly decaying and withering, the smell was a little foul yet natural and he had no idea why Tiger would be leading him here until he heard a couple of voices.

Alan would narrow his eyes slightly as he approached the scene, seeing a couple of students that had gathered in the old camp grounds. The fourth year was a little confused about what a bunch of - what he assumed were - first years would be doing out here, when he noticed that one of them appeared to be hurt. His thoughts went back to the warning of attacks on the school grounds and a wary worry took over his features as he walked up to the group of students, picking up Tiger carefully as he approached. "Everything alright here?," he wondered out loud, nodding towards @Leonard Oaksworth. It was not directly apparent that he was a prefect, perhaps a student of his own house would know but Alan was not wearing his prefect badge at this moment as it rested deep in the pocket of his winter cloak. The black winter coat would do well to obscure most of his body, the big hood framed with fur was pulled up and would not help much. Yet his face was visible and so was the Gryffindor scarf that wrapped around his neck. As he was breathing puffs of air would escape his mouth; winter was near. His attire made his tell-tale red sneaker stand out more prominently. The fourth year was still awaiting a reply, slipping Tiger below his coat to make sure that the feline as well would stay warm.

@Marshal Mozor & @Autumn Ivy
Next Up: @Akari Kato

Interacting with: @Marshal Mozor @Autumn Ivy @Leonard Oaksworth @Alan Vanes @Katherine Labrouder

A deep inhale could be heard from the little lion as she stepped out into the fresh crisp air of the Scottish hillside. The brisk air sent goosebumps running up her arm, indicating what season was nearing. She even could practically smell winter coming, which excited her to no end. It was by far her favourite season. She’d still have to wait a little while before the season was in its full glory but at least now it was apparent that it was approaching.

Akari then turned her head and with a smile glanced over at Katherine, the girl she had met not more than an hour ago. The two had agreed to go on a walk after lounging around in the common room.
Akari looked around, scanning and contemplating on which direction to go in.
”Let’s head in that general direction, ya?” She eventually piped up with a small nod of her head towards the way she wanted to go.

If the girl agreed they would began their stroll. As far as Akari knew they were without a specific end destination and she honestly preferred it that way. In Akari’s perspective, it was much more interesting to let your feet guild you than to have an actual plan.

Her gaze floated along the lovely landscape and eventually fell upon a little fluffy orange coloured cat that was scampering around. It seemed to be interested in something but she couldn't quite tell what. She watched it with a grin. It was pretty adorable.

"Look, there's a cat over there!" Akari rose her arm and pointed at it enthusiastically.
"Let's follow it! Perhaps it will lead us somewhere interesting" She exclaimed to Katherine. Animals always found fascinating nooks and crannies that are unknown to most folk, so she hoped that this one would bring them somewhere exciting. So, without even giving the girl a chance to respond she before bounded off towards the furry creature.

She jogged after the little cat, but quietly so as to not scare it.
After a short while, she slowed down and shot a look back behind her to check if Katherine was keeping up or even there, but unfortunately in the brief moment that Akari had looked away, the cat had dashed away and was somehow nowhere to be seen.
"Shoot" She muttered under her breath. How did it vanish so quickly?
She then shuffled into a clearing looking around for it, when all of a sudden the sound of numerous voices came out of practically nowhere.

She stopped abruptly and whipped around. Her breath hitched quietly out of surprise as she saw a group of people standing before her. Then coincidentally she saw one of the boys, scoop up the orange cat that she had disappeared just moments ago.
Although it was most likely undetectable, she shifted from foot to foot uneasily.
How come she was frequently getting herself into situations where awkwardness would just consume her? Well there was nothing to be done now, she was already standing there, like a deer caught in the headlights. Scrambling for something to say she looked over to the owner of the cat and blurted out.
"Erm... cute cat"

Graphic by Leonard Oaksworth

[font=Times New Roman]@Leonard Oaksworth, @Akari Kato, @Katherine Labrouder, @Autumn Ivy & @Alan Vanes

If he was being quite honest with himself, Marshal had known that nobody other than him would be pleased about his plan. Forcing an interaction between two people who wanted nothing to do with one another generally resulted in an icy affair. But a social expert such as him knew that the two individuals merely had to break the ice; after that, all would be well, and everyone would be pals.
And if they couldn't do it themselves, then he was entirely prepared to break out his own ice pick.

Autumn was understandably confused to see her knight in distress walking about the area on a perfectly stable leg. That confusion then turned to anger once she grasped what had happened, which left Marshal vaguely wondering how many spells the second-year knew.
Though he had obtained no regrets for his actions, he did still have an interest in self-preservation - despite how literally everything he ever did suggested otherwise.
In that self-preservative spirit, he chose to ignore the fact that the girl had said his name wrong... again. Instead, he spread his arms, presenting an innocent shrug. "I tried to tell you before, Leo's pretty amazing. His knowledge of magic is astounding. In fact, there was this one time-"
Whatever had happened that imaginary 'one time' was interrupted by Leo's smooth greeting. Silver-tongued as ever, that snake.

The Slytherin boy approached them, his apparent attempt at light-hearted speech coming out as loose and relaxed as a petrified tree. Marshal glanced at him, then back to Autumn, only to experience the sudden sting of Leo's friendly gesture on his back. The Gryffindor just managed to suppress a flinch, though the reaction still escaped by way of a slight twitch in his right eye.
He was beginning to grow concerned about how consistently Leo inflicted pain upon him when in Autumn's presence. Perhaps cultivating a relationship between the two wasn't such a great idea after all... Not that it would stop him, of course.
He turned his head to meet Leonard's smile, though it looked more like a grimace than anything. He responded to his friend with only a wink, as if to say he understood, when he most assuredly did not.

At that moment, the tension in the air was sliced by a new voice, asking if everything was quite all right. 'All right' may have been a strong word for how things were progressing.
Messy, blond hair flipped as he whipped his head to see a taller, almost intimidating figure. Few details could be discerned about the newcomer, but he looked quite large, the thick coat adding considerably to his girth.
Marshal tried to make out his face, but the lack of light, combined with the stranger's hood, made it rather difficult to see much. One notable article of clothing stood out among the rest, however, making it easy to pinpoint him as a fellow Gryffindor.

"No, everything is not all right," he replied to the mysterious figure. "Everything is spectacular! Can't you feel the love in the air?" He closed his eyes and lifted his head dramatically, apparently soaking in the palpable aura of love in the area. His trick didn't quite work, luckily enough, for if it had, he would have been absorbing something quite unlike love. The lack thereof may have poisoned him.

Before this new interaction got any chance to continue further, two others burst onto the scene; both female, he noted. One of the new girls awkwardly commented on the cat that the mysterious giant had stuffed into his coat, while the other looked on, her hard gaze suggesting that she would very much like to kill all of them, as punishment for inconveniencing her with their existence.
Meeting that steely gaze, Marshal waggled his eyebrows, hoping only to lighten her expression. There would be no such scorn allowed in his little world.
"Well, this has turned into quite the party!" He exclaimed joyfully, his naked enthusiasm as infectious as ever. "Three boys, three girls. It's like a group date." He rubbed his stomach, as it had chosen a random time to remind him that it was there. "Anyone hungry?"

Mentioning/Interacting With: @Leonard Oaksworth, @Alan Vanes, @Akari Kato, @Katherine Labrouder, @Marshal Mozor

English: #6B5076
Welsh: #9E8FB9
Uzbek: #874343

"Uh, hello, hi, greetings. I did not, in fact, break my leg. Just a little trip, barely hurts at all. False alarm! You know Marshal, he gets all silly when he's worried, doing ridiculous things like suggesting I'm good at casting spells and bringing over my not-date to try and heal an injury that I don't have."

Before Autumn could say "actually, no I don't know this guy apart from that one time when he tried to set me up with you, also a stranger, and you tripped and couldn't walk but then you tried to walk it off, and please stop trying to lie to me, your friend made up a not well thought through lie and why are you even trying to defend him and also the rejecting you thing happened ages ago is that what this is about?" and possibly some other stuff in more colourful terms, more people arrived. Which was absolutely perfect. Just dandy.

4th year. Prefect. Gryffindor.

Older, and probably pretentious as a result. Position of authority, and probably pretentious as a result. Gryffindor, and probably an ass as a result.

Ugh. Autumn was not in the mood for this right now.

And, also, "everything alright here?". Really? To the guy without the broken bone and the one that was not recovering from an almost heart attack because it was now apparently okay for people to pretend that their friends were paralysed and in need of help.

Also, cat! That was the only good thing about this situation. . was good. Autumn liked cat. was the only living creature within the square kilometre that Autumn actually liked. .

Two more people. People were everywhere. People. Ugh. Ew. People. How could she leave. One she recognised from the potions accident, the other was new. They both looked younger. Probably first years, Autumn assumed.

And Mason was trying to connect stuff to "love in the air" or whatever again. Autumn wanted to get out of here desperately. So, so desperately. As in, she'd rather be anywhere but there at that moment.

"Three boys, three girls. It's like a group date."

How was Millie making this into a romance thing? It was so clearly not a romance thing? How did this guy's brain function? Did he even comprehend the fact that the oldest guy was a 4th year and that the oldest girl was a 2nd year? And that with heterosexuality, the smallest age gap would be 2 years? Also, who was he to make three girl and three boys into a romantic thing with the implication that the girls and boys would pair up? If Autumn wanted to be in a romantic thing with a girl, she would. Autumn rolled her eyes.

"Anyone hungry?"

Autumn smiled sweetly at that.

"No."

"You moron," she added in Uzbek.

Interacting With: @Marshal Mozor, @Autumn Ivy, @Alan Vanes, @Akari Kato, and @Katherine Labrouder | Hex: #143314

There was no rest for the wicked, and there was certainly none for one Leonard Wendell “Dear Merlin Please Strike Me Down With an Agonising Blast of Flame Right This Moment” Oaksworth. It was far from a recent revelation that completely revised his relative view on reality and replaced it with a more righteous and rational one, really. He’d known for nearly as long as the fetal mind within that often-stressed noggin of his had started its development, and he was just as obedient to this belief in particular as he was to the other verifiable truths, such as that of never trusting a canine come to a corporal form resembling that of humans. Leonard was never meant to be someone nice, and certainly not someone tactful. There were scarce samples of history that showed a photograph portraying a philanthropic preteen who practiced pleasantries and possessed such pizzazz any person would have envious prejudice against, and yet didn’t have the provoking personal pride one would conclude to be a considerably plentiful possibility. Rather, the novella comprising his tragic time on Earth unveiled an awkward, but acceptably affable academic in its most flattering chapters, and a sadistic, sordid and incomprehensibly sarcastic twit of a child who could only take joy in shooting others with securely set, soaring supplies of severe suffering in roughly every other page. He hadn’t taken any action against his generally unpleasant disposition yet, for even if it was a significant annoyance in the sporadic social situations where he wanted to make a great impression, the other chunk of conversations he’d participated in had the goal of achieving the opposite. With that, his surly sort of subsistence could pass for tolerable. Without regard to any of this information, however, the universe decided to heave around a concrete cube the size of the Meridian Tower to smack him again and again and again and a few hundred more ‘again’s for the fun of it with circumstances in which he had no idea what he was supposed to do.

To be fair to all of space and time and its contents, causing a person with several doctorates in overthinking from international universities of panic wasn’t the most difficult demand around. He had gargantuan quantities of trouble choosing the piece of toast with the most volume based on its estimated length, width, height, and burned edges; there was much less hope for most physical or mental activity. Of course, being in a boarding school with no exit save for short holidays taught him how to work with his unyielding screenplays without having to burn the rubbish bin they’d all been thrown into to some point. Not the best points on the scribbled map that had been crumpled to the point where it was softer than the average pillow costing over a thousand pounds, but points nonetheless. At least then, he could figure out the bare minimum of whether to try and drive away the entity he’d been thrust into verbal exchange with, stomp on it repeatedly as one would with a mutated, winged cockroach using an assorted selection of sharp Welsh and less sharp, but much more furious gibberish, or simply put up with it until the meeting dissolved into semi-believable excuses about ironing cats and feeding their garments. With this jumbling mixture of strangers and exactly one acquaintance his systems had begun to crash and burn, going around and around like a hamster wheel or the bingo ball mixers at the games his grandmother vehemently denied going to, he couldn’t get a clear conclusion as to how much he should’ve covered up his rudeness if his life depended on it. No matter, he’d just go for the baseline of sneaking in some snideness towards the one person he did know and trying not to talk too much to anyone else.

Unfortunately, common etiquette decreed that when a person nodded at you and asked you a question, you were expected to answer, and answer truthfully at that. The Slytherin stammered slightly in his reply to the chestnut-haired newcomer, making note of everything perceivable about the coat-wearing boy to distract from the information that he was very much uncertain about what in the known world this meeting had become. He settled on an unsettled, but, indeed, truthful reply. “I...think so? Perhaps it is, perhaps it isn’t, this is entirely beyond my territory.” He then turned to his exactly one acquaintance, who was now doing a surprisingly convincing imitation of someone soaking in the poisonous gas polluting the air to take one last gasp before their death. “There is no love in the air, Mozor, that’s the smell of dying shrubbery and the lack of blood from my unbroken leg.”

Perhaps that was a tad more than some snideness, but under no circumstances would he let his fellow dragon tamer humiliate himself like whatever that display of head movement was. The snake was just about to half-apologise for the remark when two other disturbances moved in to try and get that concrete a-slapping once more. He sighed, nodding a bit towards the pair as acknowledgement of their infiltrating existence.

“I apologise on his behalf, Marshal here seems to be under the impression that a boy and girl within five feet of each other means instant date. Which it does not, every single time,” he stated, glancing at the blonde with judgement intended, perhaps amplified by the all-too-apparent lack of sleep he’d gotten. Seriously, how did anyone manage to get to ‘group date’ from ‘trying to get your twelve-year-old mate together with a girl you’ve each met once, and then getting joined by a probably older student with a cat, a probably younger student who liked the cat, and another probably younger student who’d likely attempt to impale the cat’?

But then came the overenthusiastic next words. Utter genius. Well, maybe not utter, but he could settle for an escape set up by the person who’d thrown him in this prison in the first place.

“Eating, eating sounds nice. I have a few cracker packets, though I don’t think they’d fill any of us up. But, you know, not talking and being quiet as we don’t speak to each other doesn’t sound too bad.” The ensuing action after the very convincingly unconvincing sentence would likely bring up some bad memories for his un-date, a flimsy finger pistol formed with one hand before returning back to the safety of his trousers pocket. “Or just leaving each other alone entirely, dispersing off to converse with the giant squid or get on some very dangerous brooms or forget this meeting ever happened. Day-to-day activities, yes?”

As he waited for a reply, he scanned the three strangers in case Marshal worked his ridiculous abilities to twist words and make at least one person uncomfortable that would somehow result in nobody going off to start chatting away with an (as far as he presently knew) unintelligent cephalopod. The first arrival was either a Gryffindor, a prankster who thought it would be fun to masquerade as one and started marching around campus to show off the un-house pride, or a wannabe fashionista who thought red made his eyes pop more and complimented his skin tone. Based on his other pieces of attire, Leonard could pencil out the last one for then. Slightly disappointing, since he could’ve used some help figuring out which exact shade of blue for a scarf would do a favour towards a tweed jacket, but that was something better saved for a one-on-one conference anyhow. The feline embraced by black fabric didn’t seem to be a feral creature that could contaminate all people present with some form of fatal illness, so that was a positive amongst all the overwhelming opposites of anything positive. The assumed owner of said feline didn’t look to be an outwardly barbaric beast either, most likely having gained a sense of responsibility and cordiality when along the way to stumbling across this motley meeting. As long as the other didn’t reveal himself to be a much older master of magic on a mission to make a massacre out of everyone, the Slytherin wasn’t too concerned about him.

The two girls who’d arrived were slightly more enigmatic for their lack of much notable clothing that revealed them to be elderly members of an aristocratic pureblood families sent to observe inhabitants of Hogwarts and determine whether or not it was worthy of continuing to exist as a castle instead of turning into a fingernail-sized toad, though he supposed ignorance would be bliss in that outlandish case. The first felt like someone he could relate to in one way or another, with the slightly awkward comment on the cat and all. The second had a gaze that was piercing, one he wasn’t afraid to match for a prolonged moment to show she wasn’t the only one calculating the scenery. One didn’t survive in the common room of endless green and equally endless fighting to get superficially scared easily. He did scare easily, yes, but the important thing was that he could repress it.

“Cachu hwch,” he finally faltered, feeling faint from the findings. This wasn’t how he was supposed to spend his night at all.