21 The Train

After 3 weeks

Cross finally got the element inside him, but it was more than that.

As soon as Cross touched it, a wave of pure power exploded out from his body, encompassing the entire house. Cross roared and his body glowed green, Marcus burst into the room and said "Cross! Are you alright?!" but as he got closer it was harder and harder to breathe.

Cross didn't hear him and Marcus dealt with the pressure that was falling on him, tell him to get to his knees. He got in front of Cross and shook him, yelling "Cross!"

Cross was shaken out of his thoughts and the pressure disappeared as he looked at Marcus in confusion saying "Dad?" Marcus felt much better and said "What were you doing, boy?" Cross told him the truth and raised his hand as he added "I got a new element... It feels like Life?"

Marcus was startled and said "Cross, you are... Truly. I can't even imagine the heights you'll reach in the future..." he looked to be a bit sad as he added with a sigh "By then you'll be long gone from here.."

Cross felt sad as he shook his head saying "No, I won't. You're my family!" Marcus made a small smile and gave him a hug as he said "You're a good boy, Cross." Cross felt warm and Marcus pulled back as he said "Also, what was that pressure?"

Cross was confused and said "Pressure?" Marcus explained what he felt and Cross frowned before going back into his body and touching the energy he felt before. The pressure came back and Marcus coughed as he said through rough breathes "That's it." Cross said "Hold on a second, dad."

Cross wrapped around the energy and squeezed it, the bubble exploded and scattered into his body. He immediately felt that he could use it whenever, controlling it however he saw fit. The pressure disappeared once again and Marcus sighed "Already mastered it.. Just what kind of monster are you?"

Marcus smirked at Cross and said slyly "Looks like taking you in was the right choice. Eh, Cross?" Cross chuckled and joked "You sure do think ahead, old man." Marcus turned green and twisted Cross' ear as he said "Oi! Who's old?!" Cross laughed and Marcus smiled as he shook his head and said "Damn kid.." before walking out of the room.

Cross watched him go before letting out his strings, 5 strings of different colors came out this time. Blue, red, purple, white, and green. Cross smiled to himself and packed his things before slinging his backpack over his shoulder and saying "Dad! I'm leaving!"

Marcus said "Oh?" Cross smiled and said "I want to go out on my own for a bit." Marcus smiled and said "Be careful." Cross smiled warmly and nodded before leaving the house, walking out on the streets.

A while later

It was already night time, Cross was walking and whistling as he journeyed with his beast bag and storage bag. He suddenly heard screaming above him, Cross frowned and mumbled "Which hag is disturbing my nice walk?" he looked up and saw a balloon floating by while screaming.

Cross twitched his ears and waved his hand, clearly annoyed, his invisible strings shot out and shredded the 'balloon' to pieces. Cross smiled and continued on his way, completely missing the explosion of blood and guts raining down from the sky.

When the police got there they were confused, the blood and pieces were near a tall building so they deemed it a suicide. Even the magic police couldn't identify the killer, but they deemed whoever it was to be extremely dangerous.

The extremely dangerous killer walked into the leaky cauldron, paid for a room and went to sleep, in a good mood.

The next morning

Cross brought all his stuff and went downstairs. He sat down at the table and ordered a coffee as he took a newspaper and started reading. The title was 'Sirius Black strikes again?' Cross kept looking at the article and it showed a floating balloon woman then the article detailing what she looked like dead, proclaiming it to be Sirius Black's work.

Cross scratched his cheek and mumbled "Oops." before moving on, not caring at all. Whoever was floating like that wasn't a good person, after all, who floats in the air screaming like that? Only terrible, evil, bad people that's who.

Cross continued reading the paper detailing Sirius Black's escape from Azkaban with a smile as he stirred the coffee with his spoon, when he heard loud shouting "I'm warning you, Hermione. Keep that bloody beast of yours away from Scabbers, or I'll turn it into a tea cozy!"

Cross groaned in annoyance and looked over to see Hermione say "It's a Cat, Ronald. What did you expect? It's in it's nature!" Ron retorted "A cat? Is that what they told you? Looks more like a pig with hair if you ask me." Hermione scoffed "That's rich, coming from the owner of that smelly old shoe brush! It's alright, Crookshanks. Just ignore the mean little boy."

Cross flipped the paper in front of his face, deciding that he didn't want to see these three. not today. Something always happened when they were together. He was just trying to relax!

The two saw Harry and they all sat down at the table, Ron was talking about his trip to Egypt with Harry, while Hermione looked over at Cross and saw a twitching pointed ear from the side of the paper. She said "Cross?" unexpectedly happy.

Ron and Harry looked over and Cross said "No, you have the wrong person." Hermione rolled her eyes and pulled down the newspaper as she smiled "Hey!" Cross grumbled and drank from his coffee, Ron suddenly said "I didn't know you two were so close." he sounded almost jealous.

Hermione said "Were best friends!" Cross spit out his coffee... All over Ron's face. Ron just closed his eyes and took it, Cross coughed and said "Ah." before waving his hand, a rag flew over and wiped Ron's face. The problem was, the rag was already dirty.

Ron spit out as he said "Bloody hell! That rag was even more dirty that your coffee!" Cross ignored him and said "We're best friends? How come I didn't know?" Hermione giggled and didn't answer, Ron was wiping his face with his shirt and Harry was taken away by Ron's father.

Cross looked at 'Scabbers' and narrowed his eyes as he said "Your rat is really ugly." the rat tensed up, feeling extreme danger, it looked up at Cross only to feel like all it's secrets were revealed. Ron said "Oi! It's not your rat! Leave him alone, like your little monster is any better!"

Cross looked away and whistled, Carl jumped out from his backpack and landed on the table, demonstrating his majesty in front of the world. Carl growled at Scabbers and glanced at Crookshanks before giving him the finger.

Crookshanks rolled his eyes and waved as if shooing off a fly. Carl grunted and Cross slapped him in the head before throwing him back in the bag, he looked at Crookshanks and said "Smart cat. Very strange."

Hermione said "What's strange?" Cross said "You're cat is just a normal cat, but it's extremely smart." Hermione laughed and said "Other than you, who doesn't have normal animals?" Cross felt that was extremely ironic, he glanced at Scabbers and said "Well, you'd be surprised..."

Hermione looked at Scabbers in confusion but Cross stopped speaking, deciding to not get involved at all. If this rat was the mastermind behind everything then they were all dead if he made a move.

An older lady with long orange hair came by and said "Ron! Do you have everything?" Ron said "Yes, mum." Ron's mother nodded and looked at the table, she saw Cross and said "Oh? This is your new friend?" Before Ron could say anything, Hermione smiled as she said "This is Cross."

Mrs. Weasley smiled kindly and said "Very nice to meet you, Cross. I'm Ron's mum. You can call me Molly." Cross was stunned and couldn't respond, this woman really went too fast. Molly clicked her tongue and licked her thumb before cleaning Cross' face saying "Sweetheart, you have a bit of dirt here. Have you got all your school supplies? If not Ron and Hermione will help you. Where are your parents? Hmm, you've still got a bit of time before the train, on you go!"

She grabbed Cross, Ron, and Hermione and pushed them out the door saying "Go get your school supplies, Ron help him!" Cross couldn't even get a word in, he just had his mouth wide open as he was dragged out the door to Diagon alley.

Molly went back inside shouting "George, Fred! If you don't sit down this instant, so help me.." before closing the door.

Cross was in a daze, Ron was also stunned, Hermione however laughed. Ron looked at Cross and said "Charming isn't she?" Cross gulped, feeling scared for the first time as he replied "Yeah... scary more like." Ron scratched his neck and said "You should see her when she's angry.."

Cross said "I'd rather not." he then sighed and said "My coffee..." Hermione laughed again and dragged them away saying "School supplies before we miss the train." Cross sighed and let himself be dragged by the over enthusiastic girl.

A while later

Cross got on the train after Molly's urgings, he got all his supplies with Hermione and Ron before going to the train with Harry. Oddly enough, Cross was sitting in the same cart as Ron, Hermione, Harry, and another man, who was sleeping.

Daphne and Astoria went to school another way with Marcus, so he was alone.

Cross sighed and herd Harry say "I didn't do it on purpose, she just blew up!" Ron laughed and said "That's rad!" Hermione chided him "He could have been expelled!" Harry added "Or arrested." Cross tilted his head and said "The balloon woman? You knew her?"

Harry said "She's my aunt." Cross said "Oh. Sorry for your loss." Harry was confused and Cross handed him the newspaper, Harry read it and said "She died?" Cross shrugged and said "That's what it says." Harry said "Oh." before moving on as if nothing happened.

Cross nodded on the inside, seems like she wasn't a good person and he was right!

Harry started talking about Sirius Black for a while. After he was finished, Ron said "Hold on. You mean to say, Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban to come after you?" Harry nodded and said "Yeah." Hermione said worriedly "But they'll catch Black, won't they?"

Cross rolled his eyes and wondered why Hermione was getting dumber. Maybe because she was with Ron all the time? He nodded to himself, that's definitely the reason.

Suddenly the lights when out.

Hermione jumped and grabbed onto Cross like a frightened rabbit. The lights flickered back on and Hermione let go, embarrassed. Ron looked out the window and gulped as he said "There's something moving out there!"

The lights went out again and the glass started freezing over.

Cross exhaled and saw his own breath, he sighed and thought 'Something really does happen every time these three are together.. Why am I so unlucky?' he looked out the train cart into the hallway to see a tall cloaked figure floating at the door.

He tilted his head and looked at the strange creature, who lifted out its hand and pulled slowly, opening the train cart door and floating inside. Cross was surprised and said "Never thought I'd see one of these!"

Hermione, Ron, and Harry were so scared they didn't say a word.

The cloaked creature looked at the 4 of them, Cross twitched his finger and a small white glow appeared, the creature immediately turned to Harry and started feeding off him. Cross' finger returned to normal and he just watched.

Hermione stuttered "W-What is it doing?!" Cross said "It's feeding off his happy memories... He'll be fine, maybe a headache later." Hermione was stunned and said "How can you be so nonchalant!?" Cross said "It's not feeding off me is it? Plus it's just hungry."

The man, who was actually sleeping, woke up from Hermione's yelling and saw the creature. He groaned and pointed his wand at it, a bright white spiral came out and scared the creature, sending it flying away, out of the train.

Harry fainted and slumped to the seat.

The lights came back on and Cross went back to reading his book, completely unbothered by the terrifying creature that just invaded his privacy. He was currently reading 'The monster book of Monsters' Honestly Cross was quite upset with this book, it kept squealing at him, which was quite annoying, but after a few slaps it stopped... Unfortunately it shivered in fear every time Cross touched it now.

Debatably more annoying than before.

The man looked at the three and said "You okay?" Hermione and Ron nodded, while Cross looked at the man and said "Who are you, Mr?" The man smiled and said "Professor Lupin, I'll be your Defense against the Dark arts teacher."

Cross looked at him for a moment before nodding and going back to reading. Lupin wasn't bothered and tended to Harry.