Closed Peculiarity Percolating (ft. Sweater Vests) PV Seven Corigault-Seto Finished

w/ @Leonard Oaksworth

The London Stadium was. Crowded. The babble of wizards’ voices, the bright-white sun beating down on the grass, the nodding heads, the distant bleachers. The mingling of scents, too: sweat, lilac perfume, mothballs from robes only now seeing fresh air since being stowed away in the summer. Seven’s mother had given him a brisk pat on the cheeks and a long, firm hug before bidding him goodbye. He held his duffel bag on one shoulder as she took a photo on her cell, of him, awkwardly standing under the overhang at the entrance: half-sun, half-shade.

“Be good,” she said, and smiled. Her smile: brilliant, familiar, home. Crooked bottom row of teeth, incisors clean and white and handsome.

He missed her very much, then. Tears welled in his eyes and he blinked them away furiously. Why did she have to leave? A sick jolt behind his stomach: his first full moon away from his parents in… forever, maybe?

“Bye,” he said, and waved, and didn’t stop until she was down past the long concrete stretch, just a small figure getting into her compact car. She waved back the entire way, and even from behind the tinted window, until she dropped her hand to the gear shift.

Now: panic. He blinked away the sun in his eyes, clutched the strap of his duffel bag tighter. The sign-up sheet at the tent table had said he needed to find a tent to room with. But there was no single-riders-only. A puff of smoke, the acrid tang of magic: a tall woman in lurid professorial robes swept past him.

But he didn’t know anyone! He hadn’t even been sorted yet!

Tears threatened to crest again. He dug the toe of one sneaker into the turf and dropped to the ground, to his duffel. He unzipped it and threw his hands inside with really false and enthusiastic vigor, like he was hunting for a smoking bomb. Hopefully no one was looking at him and thinking, wow, that kid looks like he’s deliberately avoiding eye contact with everyone, or, worse, I hate his vest. He was maybe ten feet back from the tent table; he wished he was ten feet underground, like the earth swallowed him up, so then at least no one would see him, panicking, like, a schoolkid or, like, something—

The waft of bread, books, grass. A thud on the turf near his ear—a flash of a stylish dress-shoe— “Oh, pardon me!”

Seven shot up. Something clipped the top of his head, just barely—he swung around, it was a chin, oh god, he’d nearly headbutted someone in the underchin—and he was staring at someone’s nose. Oh. They were taller. Then he took a step back—

The wind out of his lungs. Hot dull ache. The sky.

He’d tripped over his duffle.

The boy with the underchin, flash impression: older, curly-haired, scrutinizing eyes, dark-eyebrow-ed, knowing set to his mouth. British from his accent to Seven's American.

They were both wearing green sweater vests.

It took a moment for Seven to realize: the boy had said something, right before the back of Seven’s head had eaten dirt.

“Have you lost anything?” or something like that.

The stadium swam, and Seven struggled his head up, propped himself up on one elbow like his legs weren’t still draped gracelessly over his poor concussed duffle bag. Squinted the sun out of his eyes, because it had, so unfortunately, made an appearance from behind some clouds to watch him too. Tried to keep his focus on the older-year just, towering over him, were older-years allowed to be so… towery?

And in the back of his brain: were-wolf, were-wolf, were-wolf…

Seven smiled. Tried for a broad one that said, I’m completely fine. His lungs hurt. His back ached.

Then he said: “I uh! Lost um. Uh. No I didn’t lose anything I was just. Um. Checking to see if I brought my deodorant! Like anti-perserperse… perspirant because it’s uh, it’s… camp!”

Oh, he was not going to come back from this.

Fumbling for some save, any save, he added, weakly: "What's your name?"

Interacting With: @Seven Corigault-Seto | Mentioning: @Marshal Mozor (like, copiously—this boy has issues) | Dialogue Hex: #143314

Among dress shirts that made snow seem grey and pleated trousers that made rulers look like twisted tornadoes of inches and centimetres, a perpetual accessory to Leonard Oaksworth’s wardrobe were thorn-rimmed glasses that saw every situation in his life from the angle of an overpriced gravestone, accepting no atom of happiness within his field of vision. This would normally become something of a snag in his supposed scientific career, a place of employment wherein rosy lenses and bristling borders would obviously have to be traded in for clear, objective safety goggles, but he could ring around those rosies all he wanted when he wanted it, letting his morals fall all the way down for a good excuse. He was just being realistic, you see, for anything could happen with just the right incantation. He was being right and in the right for being uptight, really, since it wasn’t the wizards who exploded into sparkly bits or the witches who teleported themselves into a deadly desert who got to tell their stories. With all that justified, he would wear the pair of spectacles with pride, able to spectate

When it came to the predicament in front of him, the sour little pickle he couldn’t quite open the jar of, Leonard was unsure as to what he was supposed to be seeing. He knew what his eyes were seeing, naturally, with photoreceptors and signals being buzzed off to his brain and its perception of colour and distance and shapes and sizes. Nothing about the sight was remarkable, as far as comparisons to vaguely necromantic peers and the spectral felines of glorified proms past. It was extramundane only in the fact that it was extra mundane: a normal, albeit clumsy, which Leonard had to figure was a perfectly normal response to seeing the gangly ghost he looked like in the sun, kid, tripping over his bag because someone came a tad too close for his reflexes’ liking. The sky was still a blasé blue watching the initial commotion of camp, the students of several schools hadn’t yet taken to setting each other aflame. Still, what was Leonard Oaksworth, the person who nearly destroyed a sweater vest of his clothing’s kin by dirtying it with the sole of his shoe to do? To think? Was he to think about their surroundings, about bolting for the Scottish highlands to shirk all his responsibilities for the next generation of neurotic narcissists? Was he to think of, pray for guidance from an ancient pantheon he knew nothing of?

He could start by thinking about the boy who was wearing the sweater vest first, obviously. He was thinking about the boy who was wearing the sweater vest first, obviously.

Well, the tripping stripling was talking, which partially crossed off the possibilities of him being a mute shapeshifter among the likes of his Defense Against the Dark Arts curriculum. Never could know, with these professors, and certain media made him inclined to believe that anyone from Ohio or New Jersey were demons nonetheless. What he was talking about seemed to change on a whim, a screenplay being messed with by indecisive executives and meddling writers. The technical fourth year, the one who was supposed to be mature and responsible and not be the origin of a child’s first panic attack, could relate to an embarrassing extent, which would be evident if said child could take a peek in said fourth year’s mental monologue and count the commas one by one. Yes, it was embarrassing, but it was also something he’d have to use to his advantage. It was like social advice from a cheesy teen film Marshal would love: be nice but not too nice, be conversational but not overly so–Marshal would fail at that, not that he or Leonard would notice or care–and don’t point out each other’s flaws even if they were casting a larger shadow than the person themselves. It wasn’t as though jorts created much of a silhouette anyhow.

“I’m Leonard Wendell Oaksworth, though I’m Leonard to most, Leo if you’re a casual sort or a Mozor. Who would you be, then, if not someone who lost something? Hopefully not someone with any kind of head injury, yes?” His lacklustre attempt at a quip incited some degree of panic to start flaring in the back of his own head, but he shoved it away in hopes of making civil conversation. It wasn’t as though he tripped the assumed American on purpose, and even with his identity revealed, his physical description wasn’t exactly a rarity among dungeon-dwelling ophidians of his own house. “A student from Ilvermorny, perhaps?”

“It is great, by the way, that you’re so involved with your personal hygiene. Merlin knows I’m saving my aromatic astringent for the moment my best mate gets into a bunk with me. I mean, he is the kindest, funniest person on the planet, but he’s also a preteen he who’s trying to attract girls.” It wasn’t without a hint of bewilderment that he said the last word, as if the concept of trying in any capacity to attract the opposite gender was foreign to his tongue. It was, but he wasn’t keen on letting that information out just yet.

“You’ll especially need it if you’re signing up for any of the more physical activities or playing Quidditch.” He gestured slightly to somewhere around the two of them, possibly in hopes that a member of any schools’ team would come flying by. No such thing happened, so he put his hands right back in his pockets and cleared his throat. “I won’t be signing up for any of those, obviously, but I’ve heard that they can be fun, help you make more friends and all that. If there’s a betting ring, I’d be watching out for the half-giant folks. Not that we should bet, at our respective ages.”

“I’m fourteen, by the way,” he blurted out, as if that was any better than seven, which could very possibly be the age of his partner in non-betting in half-pixie years.

w/ @Leonard Oaksworth

Seven blinked. His thoughts ping-ponged around all the person—Leonard—had said—what was a Mozor? Was this a magical term he didn’t know yet? Or an occupation? Dad had attended Mahoutokoro so maybe that was the case—did Leonard just admit that he was in love with his best friend? And wanted to get in a bunk with him? Is that what being fourteen was like? And he just said it, just like that? Should Seven say that he isn’t into anyone to commiserate, like that wasn’t a very surprising overshare? Was it an overshare? Or was that just what being fourteen at Howarts was like? So that was coming out, right? Leonard just came out to him? Also his best friend was like, not interested? Should Seven offer his condolences?

In the time the person—Leonard—had been introducing himself, the ache in Seven’s back and head had abated somewhat. Seven clambered up onto his feet and brushed the back of his jorts quickly, then reached down for his duffel and slung it over his shoulder again. “Nice to meet you, Leonard,” he said with more confidence than he felt. “I'm Seven. Uh, I’m sorry to hear that your friend, um, isn’t interested.” And about Quidditch—Seven did think Bludgers were kind of interesting… “And I don’t have a head injury, I don’t think,” he added quickly. The back of his head smarted, but the turf was more springy then he anticipated. “I’m going to be a first year. And, um, I don’t know a whole lot about… um… some magical terms—” please let Hogwarts be the kind of place where stupid questions were okay—“but what is a... Mozor?”

Interacting With: @Seven Corigault-Seto | Dialogue Hex: #143314

At the crux of every matter within his ever-expanding mess of an existence, Leonard Oaksworth was much better off in his current state, a student rather than a teacher and a quiet observer in the Flavian Amphitheatre rather than one of the gladiators fighting for his very life. One day, as many a gaudily inspirational Public Service Announcement attempted to announce to muggle schoolmates more invested in observing hangnails and discussing the deep secrets of Pokemon, he would learn how to help others learn and somehow emotionally learn from that experience, metamorphosising from a puddle of hair gel and to a handsome, confident, mentally stable young man ready to take on the wizarding world and taxes. As of now, however, he had yet to shed any significant portion of his cocoon and remained a disgusting little larva totally unfit for carrying a conversation.

“He’s interested in many things, Seven,” Leonard interjected between the other's uh-sprinkled condolences for no discernible reason. There could be his unwillingness to let Seven (was that a nickname? That had to be a nickname, a moniker for some quality of the boy’s that related to the number, hadn’t it? Or had his parents gotten the most misspelt marker creation on their Starbucks cup and called it a name? Was that an American ritual? Eh, his parents had named him Leonard in the 21st century, he was far from the best fit for an arbitrator of appropriate names) think that Marshal Mozor was indifferent towards anything, but that didn’t seem to be a peg that fit snugly in the confounding hole he dug for himself. In any case, he listened forth without further chime-ins for fear of beginning the cycle all over again, dumping a junkyard’s worth of questions and answers on the child and flattening his already unflattering haircut.

With some fairly coherent bits of information about the bobblehead, Leonard felt as though it would be a good time to reassess the situation. It hadn’t changed much, obviously, but he now knew the alias by which he went and the fact that he was school-aged. It also seemed that of everything from his digressive accounts of his own aliases and skincare products and brief discussion of illegal gambling, the thing that confused Seven enough to be asked about was the surname of his generously aforementioned best mate. Frankly, he didn’t trust himself to not fashion up another meandering monologue about the whims and woes of the wonderful but incredibly weird Marshal Mozor, but perhaps it was a good time to see the lengths to which Seven’s jorts would jump to in order to make sense of whatever nonsense he was about to spew. Might as well be entertaining nonsense, no?

“It’s a species of magical slug-dragon, an oft-forgotten portion of Celtic folklore taught only to the most elite third-year alchemists in Hogwarts, and that group is divided even further by those willing to take the Aldousian Oath of Secrecy. Those who take the Aldousian Oath will hereafter be held to it, bound to each other and will be expected to explode into golden glitter within the hour they break it.” If his explanation were any holier, it would be Yom Kippur, and while he did believe he’d be atoning for this nonsense for the rest of his life, he couldn’t stop now. “Mozor is the colloquial term, with its scientific name being draíochti mozorus, and it’s terribly sought after for its creation of the most potent love potions. The only reason I’m telling you any of this, why I trust you to carry on the, Seven the future first year who doesn’t think that he has a head injury, is because, er…”

Well, he’d had his fun, summarily stretching out the truth so far it could’ve been the distance between him and a good sense of humour by yanking an utterly absurd Wizardpedia article on magical slug-dragons. It was a tad pathetic, in the retrospective granted by a millisecond of thought, that his idea of fun had somehow evolved to be messing with a proto-first-year, but it was better than tying him up and letting a dormmate set his clothing on fire before throwing him in the Great Lake. Not that he had the resources or the craving to do so right near the sign-up tables and a legion of authority figures, but Seven didn’t seem deserving of it. Yet, at least.

“It–it’s all fake, if you couldn’t tell. As in, literally none of those are real things really taught or really real,” he clarified with the extreme eloquence of someone who was really deserving of a duffel bag to the skull. “Mozor’s just my best mate’s surname. You’ll probably be seeing him around if you want to cheer for Gryffindor in any of the games, or if you’re staying near the Eyepatch tents. In my humble opinion, though, you should be rooting for Slytherin all the way.”

w/ @Leonard Oaksworth

The dragon that Leonard invented in place of his best friend's name involved glitter and love potions? Oh, man.

And why was that long explanation about the slug-dragon like, really convincing? Leonard could speak really confidently, fast, and authoritatively while completely making it up. Could he maybe do improv? Was there an improv troupe at Hogwarts? Seven admittedly kind of still had an old-timey image of the giant honking castle… I mean it was surrounded by a lake for petesake… and they didn’t have any drama classes. Did they? Oh no—did Hogwarts have good wifi?

Seven said, weakly, “I, uh, totally didn’t believe what you were saying about the uh, Aldoo-san oath and the uh, daichoytee mozorus…”

And wait—he’d mentioned a tent. A tent! Seven still didn’t have a tent, he’d been loitering in the hot sun hoping that the buzz of voices around him would clear and he’d be magically handed an invitation to a—tent—of hopefully nice people—

“I’m not staying in any tent,” he said, and consciously kept his eyebrows still, because if he didn’t, they would have both raised in an undoubtable ‘please get my hint.’ Then he said, very confidently and forthrightly, in his opinion, “I don’t know anyone to sign up with.”

Interacting With: @Seven Corigault-Seto | Dialogue Hex: #143314

Children as a collective unit of grubby arms and gangly legs were similar to magical slug-dragons (and specifically magical slug-dragons because mundane slug-dragons were very simply inferior to all beings) in a multitude of respects. One of these respects was that they were prone to lacking respect, spitting out the most sickening slander in their worryingly developed vocabularies at the tiniest provoking. Forget almost stamping the sole of one’s shoe onto their cranial space, going anywhere near their peeling pile of stickers spelled the gravest sentence out there.

Seven was a child, and Seven was an exceptional exception he felt a slowly emerging sense of responsibility for. Whether such foreign feelings of responsibility for others were the results of his guilt or their shared chambre couture was unclear, but so was a lot about how he was supposed to go about the day when the day was filled with other talkative, hysterical, uncontrollable children. Seven, who was neither seven in spite of his looks nor particularly correlated with any of the deadly sins aside from being a practicer of profound awkwardness that came comorbidly with Leonard as a person, was alright. More alright than the Irish ignoramus whom he’d so willingly accepted as part of a package deal with the girl he’d actually desired to get to know better, and more alright than expected for someone he’d nearly stepped on. This was a window of opportunity wide open, one Leonard hadn’t known he needed until then and one he’d defenestrate himself out anyhow if he managed to mess it up.

He nodded at Seven’s rather feeble assertion that nothing about his Wizardpedia article would earn a citation. He could believe that, yes, but the way the other stumbled through his chimerical scientific name was suspicious to say the very least. American accents, the greatest shame of all European tourist traps. Well, there couldn’t be too much harm in coaching him through Celtic circumflexes and the, as even more childish children said, overt flexing of purebloods, yes?

“You know me,” he stated pointedly, so graciously giving this shocking, novel information to the other boy. “That could work. I’m staying with, as previously mentioned, my best mate and Quidditch extraordinaire Marshal Mozor, and a good number of other people. Let’s see…”

The boy made use of his pasty hands to count off all of the Eyebatch Pwnies’ members, silently surprising himself with just how many individuals had. He was undecided on the matter of which pipeline boded more social sewerage for him: getting to know an array of peculiar acquaintances better for the most definite worse, or distancing himself from all their antics and missing out on ninety-nine per cent of the summer fun. “There’s, erm, Evelynn Decipio, who’s a prefect in my year and Gryffindor’s Quidditch Captain. There’s Ivy Bellamy, another Quidditch player and excellent cards player. There’s Nicholas McCowan, who’s a broom racer and probably shares your hairstylist; I reckon Marshal invited him. There’s June Selwyn, who’s one of the nicest people I’ve ever met, and her friend Maggie Hawkins, who is the exact opposite and a person you should definitely stay away from if you want your cereal to stay clean.”

To warn a neonate pushing eleven and one-fourth at most of Hawkins’ tinkling habits would make stomping on his skull the better fate, and so did his word choice change at the last moment. “Then there’s this other girl Ivy invited, Haven? Don’t know much about her, but she does seem nice.”

“I’m sure you’ll fit in fine, and it ought to give you a nice reference for the extensive pool of personalities in wizard schools.” Quickly, he made for a rambling verbal recovery that Seven would likely be proud of if they weren’t stuck in a vicious cycle of self-consciousness. “If you want, of course. I mean, I know you said that you didn’t know anyone to sign up with, but if you want to keep your options open until the end of the day or would rather, then that is also fine. Fines all around. Except in the monetary sense, because Hogwarts doesn’t have tuition and you seem like a law-abiding future first year.”

w/ @Leonard Oaksworth

Seven wanted to hug Leonard. A little. A lot. But he could tell that Leonard maybe was not the person who was the most receptive to hugs, so Seven just vibrated in his shoes from the joy and relief and gave him a really, really wide smile. Oh, gosh. Seven would no longer be. Tentless! Life was amazing! The sun was shining down warmly now instead of harshly and the grass stain on the butt of his pants was worth it. Super worth it. And Leonard listed a whole bunch of other people—and these people seemed older and cooler, and they also seemed… popular. Quidditch players? Broom racers? His best friend wanted to be a dragon tamer? And this was, like, co-ed? So there were boys and girls sleeping in the same room? Without supervision? Which was kind of wild?? Was that allowed? It was probably allowed if Leonard was cool with it. Unless Leonard was a bad boy. But what kind of bad boy owned sweater vests?

And smelled like books?

Seven clutched his duffel strap tighter to his shoulder. The stadium and the green around them was bustling and alive. He was no longer alone. He had made a friend. He knew someone now.

A frission of nerves, head to toe. He shivered with it, pressed his feet tightly together. Smiled as Leonard apologized a little (a lot) for inviting Seven by sliding a bunch of qualifiers into his invitation at the end. (What kind of bad boy apologizes? Leonard was, Seven made up his mind right then, a popular nerd.)

And after Leonard finished, Seven said, with his big old grin grinning: “Oh gosh yeah. I’d love to.”

Interacting With: @Seven Corigault-Seto | Dialogue Hex: #143314

It was a very probable possibility that Leonard should have considered the future’s probable possibilities that could potentially lead to Seven Surnamehere’s agonising death before inviting Seven Surnamehere to the Eyebatch Pwnies. He’d considered them in passing, obviously, filling up sanguinary sketchbooks with incoherent illustrations only tied together by the recurring use of vermillion on the scribbles meant to be his body after a hag went through with it. You know, literally through with it. He was always thinking about what could go wrong, about what could happen to him and Merlin and Marshal in various orders, but there was a rapidly forming crowd of pitchforks and torches about what could happen to Seven and how wrong all of that could go. Seven was tiny, meaning he or his duffel bag could get lost in the ampitheatre with as much as a tiny step towards the other students. Seven said gosh in lieu of any of the other indelicacies that his mouth would definitely be introduced to during his stint in London and Scotland, of all goshing places. Seven would love to be a part of his tent.

He considered the very probable possibility that snatching away an invitation of social safety a second after he’d offered it, in the same breath that the invitee had accepted it, would be considered rude. Leonard Oaksworth of still-holds-a-grudge-about-a-girl-saying-someone-pissed-in-his-cereal-once infamy was rude, there was no way around that concrete dam that kept him from ever being a proper, decent human being. Perhaps, however, Leonard Oaksworth of helpfulness, hopefulness, and impulsively-inviting-a-literal-child-to-a-mostly-upperclasspeople-tent-in-order-to-cover-up-his-attempted-but-accidental-assault-of-the-aforementioned-child fame would be nice for a change.

Leonard Oaksworth, no matter the day of the week or the amount of angst he was making up for himself in an ill-fated attempt to be interesting for once, did not like change, but since when did life care about what he liked, wanted, needed? Oh, he wasn’t supposed to be angsting now, da–gosh darn it. Not with the kid beaming at him like he was some beardless, black-haired, backstoried-with-extreme-trauma Jewish Santa Claus. It was starting to burn his retinas a little, actually. SPF 1,000 didn’t have much protection against genuine happiness, which he most certainly hadn’t been expecting to encounter when he’d started all this with his bloodthirsty Oxford boot.

“Alright, great,” he, in very specific definitions, also grinned a big old grin to match Seven's. Leonard's grin was only big in that he was making a conscious effort to keep it there, trading off sincerity for the extended wingspan of his molars, and old in that it accentuated the substantial bags under his eyes, but it was still a big old grin being grinned. “You’ll want to head down there until you reach the red tent with the cat wearing an eyepatch. If you’ve got trouble with that, you can ask around for the Eyebatch Pwnies. The ‘o’ in ‘ponies’ is a ‘w’ for reasons I do not know and almost do not want to know.”

His reflection on the comically illiterate nature of youth slang and the evolution of modern terminology was interrupted by his lizard. Namely, his lizard’s reverence of the widely celebrated wizard who’d become his eponym and the fact he’d been wise enough to figure that he couldn’t apparate but not wise enough to figure that he shouldn’t take any of the alternatives to apparition without his owner in tow. Namely, the alternative of running away into the clamoring crowds of other, more normally named but much less kind children.

“I’ll meet you there!” He yelled in Seven’s general direction, running off to find the speckled little silhouette scampering through the stadium’s turf. He could only pray to Merlin himself that he’d be able to follow his own directions, to avoid making the twenty-four hours in the first of August a humiliation conga line starting with slight tardiness to the unpacking ceremony and ending with his disgraceful eviction from the Eyebatch Pwnies.

He would fail, as evident to the outside observer who may or may not have already observed the true events of the Eyebatch Tent, but he tried his very best, and in his humble opinion, that was very much enough. It was the Summer of Relentless Hormonal Idiocy, after all, and he had the entire month to make so, so many more mistakes. Strangely, he felt that Seven becoming a pwny of their misspelled ranks didn’t feel to be too much of a mistake. He just had to pray to Merlin again that he wouldn’t be proven so, so wrong about that…

Leonard has left the thread.

interacting with @Leonard Oaksworth

Seven had never seen Leonard grin, and he didn't realize he hadn't expected to until Leonard grinned and it was. Lovely. Perhaps a bit nervous around the edges, and my, did he have a lot of teeth, like Seven could even see some of his molars, but it reached his eyes and wow did his eyes look warm and lovely when he was smiling! The name Eyebatch Pwnies was rather incredible, too--the way Leonard pronounced it was elegant but no one could say it without seeming a little silly-- it definitely didn't seem befitting of a tent full of upperclassmen Cool Kids but what did Seven know?

There was a subtle shift in movement out of the corner of his eye--Leonard seemed to have caught it too, and Seven turned to look at the crowds of people surrounding them and the little dash of a-- small creature weaving between feet-- a lizard?

Leonard's lizard, by the looks of it.

Leonard said something, but Seven had missed it, and then Leonard was running into the crowd, longer legs taking panicked strides, and then half a dozen people were already between them and Seven kicked himself into motion, helplessly, to try and tail Leonard, to be some kind of help in finding the poor lizard... if he could catch up.

And in the back of his brain he was grateful, to have met Leonard, but even more than that, he hoped, he hoped, that meeting Leonard was a good tiding for the summer ahead.

Seven has left the thread.