Hp

IV - Trouble Bound

Gathering Information​

With two long, sharp whistles, the train started moving, slowly at first, but quickly picking up speed. I shifted in the compartment's bench, scratching Sirius like Amy was petting her owl. She had given me a lot to think about. It probably went both ways.

Why was her background so different? To the point where she actually got a scar out of it, from nowhere. Despite my parents' change in professions, they were still the same people. There was no Emma in my life that I could identify, no obvious replacement that linked with my own history, but I was still just a girl with a normal life. Amy came from a different, far more colorful background, true. A super-villain's daughter adopted into a family of super-heroes that unmasked themselves? You could write books based on that. Somebody probably already had. It could be that this was how it manifested in this world, powers being replaced by magic, parahumans by wizards. But then, what about the rest of New Wave? Again, I had more questions than answers.

The train's aisles were emptying, people finding compartments for the trip. Only some stragglers still roamed. I figured this was a good time as any.

I cleared my throat, bringing her attention back to me. "Anyway, about all of this…" I gestured to outside the train and back to us, looking like kids. "What do you think?"

Amy let her head drop against the bench behind her and sighed explosively. "I don't know. Nothing makes sense…. How did we get here, and where is 'here' anyway?"

"I don't know either." Those were the same questions I kept plaguing me. "But that doesn't mean we can't figure it out. First, I think we should consolidate our information. Build a timeline of what happened, see if any patterns emerge, if any of us noticed anything the other didn't."

"Sounds reasonable."

"Right. What is the last thing you remember before waking up here? I know we were chasing the Siberian, but then it gets fuzzy. I think we were blown back because I remember flying." Of a sort.

Amy blinked at me. "You don't remember her turning around?"

"No." I didn't and that was worrying.

She licked her lips and I noticed her clenching her right hand tightly. "The last thing I remember is her turning around and jumping at us. Then it's just… a big black ball."

A black ball? But it was interesting. It seemed like the Siberian was responsible for this, though I couldn't tell how. It also looked more and more like the three of us were here because we'd been touching, or at least close together, at the time it happened. Unless we were all missing memories. Still, if proximity counted, maybe Brian was here too. Should I start searching the train for him? Considering how we all were connected one way or another to this magical world, it was likely he'd be on the train too.

No. There was a chance he wasn't, and there was no way for me to identify him as I had Amy, which had been by pure chance. I restrained myself. I could look for him later.

"We'll think about that later. For now, let's stick with the facts." Brian might not be in this world at all. "I woke up the twenty-third of June. I'm living with... a version parents. Mostly they're the same but some things changed."

"Like living in the U.K., twenty years ago?"

And a few other things, but Amy didn't need to know about that. "Basically. Then I got told I had magic by a Professor McGonagall and invited to Hogwarts. A couple of days later we went shopping for school supplies at Diagon Alley and I met Sirius." I reached forward and scratched him behind his ears. "Apparently, he'd been found abandoned in the middle of the street. My powers returned after I got my wand and that was it. After that, nothing happened of note. I spent a whole month pretending I was eleven again."

Amy frowned, playing with her fingers. "Yeah. That's about the same thing as me. I woke up at my aunt's, apparently, Hagrid told me I had magic and then nothing during the whole of August. I think I woke up the same day, but I wasn't really keeping count." She looked up at me. "Your powers came back when you bought your wand?"

"Yes." I let a large spider fall from the ceiling and on to my hand. "Wasn't it the same for you?"

"Yeah, but…" She quieted and thought for a while. "But I accessed them for a little while before getting my wand."

"Really? How?"

She shook her head. "I think I did some accidental magic and for a couple of seconds they were back, but then they just faded out."

I remembered trying out wands at Ollivander's. "Maybe our powers are somehow connected to this magic?" I proposed. "And a wand is something like a key that unlocks them?"

"A conduit? Some-" Amy started, but I interrupted her by raising a finger to my lips, signaling for silence. "What?" She whispered.

"There's a kid looking for a compartment right next to us. Let's wait until he passes."

She nodded and sat back. It was just a kid, but we didn't want anybody to overhear us. Even supposing this place acted more or less like the real world, with magic and all of that, we should keep our powers and origin, as it was, secret. At best, we would be labelled crazy. At worst, who knew.

The kid, probably a first year too, actually came to our compartment. He opened the door and peeked in, revealing another fiery red-head full of freckles. "Sorry. Do you…" The words died in his mouth and his face paled rapidly, his hands shaking as he looked at us. No, at me. "Nevermind." And he slammed the door and ran off, collapsing against the wall at the end of the carriage.

I looked down at my hand, observing the orb weaver on my palm. Yes, it was big for their usual size, I had been breeding them for it after all. But it wasn't that scary.

Connecting Theory​

"Anyway, moving on," I deadpanned. Amy was still smiling. "It looks like the Siberian was probably responsible for this, or at least partially. I think we can safely say that whatever she did knocked us out." Previously forgotten, the sensation of flying, falling, came to my mind. "And then we woke up in younger bodies, our lives transplanted into 1991 England of a world like Aleph, except magic exists, hidden from the normal populace."

"Yeah. That kind of sums up the major points." Amy sighed. Her altered history was the one thing that really jumped out as being out of place. Otherwise, we had been seamlessly introduced into this world.

"The way I see it, there are basically two options. Either this is all real" I gestured to our surroundings, "and we're in another world. Or it's fake."

"Fake? Like a dream? A mass hallucination?" Questioned Amy.

"An illusion." I specified, returning to my initial theory. Despite everything, it still seemed like the most likely to me. It also implied that I was asleep somewhere, probably captured, at the complete and total mercy of whoever had done this to me. The Nine. Someone else. I couldn't really trust my memories in this situation. Or everything that had happened up to now was my senses being tricked, and I was really sitting somewhere, thinking I was in a train bound for a magical boarding school.

"No. It feels too real," said Amy. "If this was an illusion, shouldn't there be some flaws? And why all of this… magic stuff? If this illusion is that realistic, why bother with all of this urban fantasy bullshit instead of just making us think we had never left our world? Plus, how do you explain us both being here?"

She brought up a few good points, but I had already thought about them myself. "Well, for one, I'm sure it's possible for an illusion power to affect several people at once. And an illusion could trick our senses, or even our mind into believing this was real. As for the magic, it could be a requirement of the power, some of them get strange like that." Genesis, for example, had a limited time to build the form she wanted and hers was a fairly good example of a power that came from the imagination. Labyrinth too, came to mind, and she didn't seem to have a proper control over her powers when I saw her. "The other option implies that not only did we jump dimensions, but that our current lives were also carefully constructed to fit this world and our powers temporarily suppressed. All of that effort for apparently no reason at all. If somebody wanted us out of the way, why not just dump us here and be done with it?" I turned her argument against her.

"Well, it could be a power that moved or switched us with our dimensional alternates," Amy pointed out. "Professor Haywire himself supposedly existed in several dimensions at once."

That was something I hadn't known. How much more did Amy know about parahumans and capes in general, as part of New Wave? "It would mean that magic is real, though."

"It could be another form of parahuman powers. A prototype, or something like that. It's not because Myrddin says he has magic that he actually has magic," she countered.

We were getting nowhere and I told her so. The passage of a student in the aisle by our compartment provided a brief lull and allowed me to collect my thoughts. Facts were, if this was really an illusion, I had no certainty that Sirius and Amy weren't fake either, constructs of a puppet master's mind. Or my own. Was this how it felt to be inside the matrix? "In the end, we're arguing semantics. We don't really have a way to know for sure." Amy nodded. "Still, we've established the most likely options as to what happened. We're missing the why… and the solution to all of this."

"Does the why even matter? We're stuck here."

"It does. Let's assume this is an illusion. If our capturers have even the slightest control over what happens in here, knowing their intentions is crucial." And considering who our captors were most likely to be…

I saw the realization dawn on Amy's face as she paled. "You think they're waiting for our guard to lower so they can spring something?"

"Maybe. Maybe not and our paranoia will screw us over. Maybe it's both."

"Shit!" She cursed. "It's like… like with the Simurgh." Yes, it was, and we were in the same situation as the people stuck in the quarantines. Helpless. We contemplated this in silence for a minute. I could almost see the gears grinding inside Amy's head, her eyes boring holes into her lap. "What do we do then?"

"We find a way out." I said simply. "If this is an illusion, we'll break it. If it's another world, we'll return to our own."

"You're pretty confident."

"There's no other choice."

She averted her eyes. "Right." A pause. "But that doesn't tell me what the plan is."

The plan. My plan left a sour taste in my mouth. I straightened my back, pulling myself to my full seated height. I was at least head taller than Amy. "Well, the easiest way to test these theories would be to act against this world. Little things don't seem to do anything, but something more drastic might…"

"Except, what if it hurts you on the real world? What if it is real?" Amy completed my reasoning with a sigh. "Yeah, I thought so. We're screwed."

"For now, it's best to just play along." The risks were too great and the chances of success minuscule. This wasn't a wild gamble, a maneuver I knew that if it worked, it would mean victory. We've be operating on blind faith, not even on half-way reasonable assumptions. The worse, in a way, was the illusion of choice. Whenever I had taken great risks before, bet on something without a safety net of any sort, I'd done it out of desperation. The second time I'd faced Lung, Mannequin more recently…. I'd had to do it, otherwise I would die, people would die. Here, there was no such urgent need. Not in a way I could feel. Every choice seemed much more charged, heavy. There was time to doubt. And I couldn't tell if that was a bad thing, or a good one. "We'll pretend to be who they expect us to be and we'll look for a way out on the side. Try to pin-point any flaws in the world, research dimensional travel…"

Amy snorted. "Great. So I just have to go through school again. And puberty."

Not if I had any say on the matter. "We'll be back to Brockton Bay before that becomes an issue. Even if highschool is hell."

"Puberty starts now. We'll be having our first period, again, by the end of the year." She pointed at me reproachfully and continued. "And middleschool is hell. Highschool is just pathetic."

I blinked, surprised and a bit offended. My middleschool years had been marred by my mother's death, true, but it was in later that the bullying had happened. Maybe Amy had had some bad experiences in middleschool, but I'd had the trio in highschool. "Right. In the meanwhile, we should stop talking about this. There are three kids coming our way and they seem to be looking for something. They're stopping at every compartment."

Amy formerly-Dallon, now-Potter touched Applying Experiences​

The compartment's door opened to let in three boys of our apparent age. Unlike us, all three wore robes, like most other wizards I'd met so far.

At the head of their little trio was a very pale, blond boy. He was going to grow up like me, all thin and spindly, his chin pointy and face narrow, but he held himself with easy arrogance, leaving no doubt that he was the leader. The other two flanked him like bodyguards, half a step behind, and were both well-built for their age. In time, I could easily see them as linebackers. To complete the jock look, they didn't strike me as the brightest lights in the harbour.

The setup was familiar. Were they looking for trouble?

The one in charge of their little band immediately took notice of Sirius and made a little sound, before his eyes darted to look between me and Amy, immediately jumping to the scar on Amy's forehead. "So it's true," he said. "They were saying that Amy Potter was in this compartment. Let me introduce myself. My name is Malfoy. Draco Malfoy." He stood straighter, drawing his right arm across his chest like the salutes some gangs did. No, he dipped his chin in a quick movement and I recognized it as the vainest, least deferential bow I'd ever seen.

Amy smiled wrily, her thoughts obviously along the same wavelength as mine. "Amy Potter." There was a very well disguised hint of scorn in her tone. Like you didn't know that already, it seemed to say. She shot a glance at me in a silent cue.

"Taylor Granger." I spoke up, drawing the attention of the boys, who had seemingly already forgotten I existed. In fact, Draco seemed outright astonished, like I had somehow butted into a private conversation.

"Granger?" He drawled to himself. "I don't recognize that name. Your parents, they're of our sort, right? Or at least, one of them?" I couldn't tell if he was being condescending or actually concerned. Not by his tone. I had his sort pegged down myself.

Honestly, I hadn't expected to deal with prejudice this soon. Oh, I'd read between the lines of my history book. Not that there weren't parts of history explicit enough on the anti-muggle sentiments and witch-hunts. Grindelwald and much more recently this Voldemort were just another example proving that bigots would always exist and gather together to perform atrocities, even in magical urban fantasies. Amy's earlier words about Empire 88 knockoffs rang in my ears. This kid wasn't quite the typical young gang recruit, with his quality silver-embroidered robes and aristocratic airs, but he fit right in my mental image of what Kaiser's son would look like.

I looked him in the eyes and answered. "No. I'm a muggleborn."

Draco scowled briefly, raising his chin to look down on me, disgust and smugness on his face. His two companions shared a look themselves, one of them even sniggering. Then the blond addressed Amy again, purposefully talking like I wasn't there. "She" The affected inflexion on the pronoun was clear as day. "wouldn't happen to be your... friend, would she?"

"No." Amy answered plainly. "Merely acquaintances."

It was nothing less than the truth. I wasn't surprised Amy didn't consider me a friend. I wouldn't call her my friend either. Still, hadn't we just agreed to keep our heads down and stick together to find a way home?

Draco was clearly pleased. He glanced over his shoulder at me. "You should leave. I'd like to have a conversation with Amy Potter that's not for your ears." The two brutes behind him straightened their spines and crossed their arms, emphasizing the implied physical threat.

Even without my bugs, I could dispatch them with relative ease. Assuming they were normal kids, they didn't have any martial arts training I could see and it was too cramped in here for them to make use of their bigger weight. And then, I had Sirius on my side, who already had his hackles raised, even if he wasn't growling yet.

It was like a pair of children were trying to intimidate me. In fact, that was exactly what it was.

"Just because we're not friends doesn't mean we don't have an understanding," Amy interjected. "Malfoy, right? I don't mind Taylor."

Amy's careless, nonchalant tone made Draco flush, almost luminescently on his pale skin. Still, he rallied himself. "Well, it's a private matter!"

Amy made a noise and slightly furrowed her brow. "I'm not sure if I'm interested in what have to say, if it's such a private matter."

The boy shot me a glare as he recognized that Amy wouldn't listen to him if he continued to try to get me to leave. Instead of giving up or pressing the point, he decided to ignore my presence completely. "I came to offer my help."

"Oh, really?" Amy leaned forward, the interest in her tone subtly mocking. I chose to sit back for now and see how she handled it.

"Yes." Draco nodded and launched into a rehearsed speech. "You're Amy Potter, the Girl-Who-Lived. You're famous. There are going to be all sorts of people coming to you, trying to get into your good graces and use you, like they do with my father. And some kind of wizards and witches you shouldn't associate with." Like me, it seemed. "But there are also good, upstanding wizarding families. It'd benefit you to know the right people, who can be trusted, and I can help you with that. I know people."

"Wow, thanks!" Amy smiled too brightly. "So, let me see if I got this right. You're saying I should be careful with a certain type of people?"

"That's right."

"Namely, people I don't know who randomly approach me just because of who I am."

"Yes."

"Then try to get into my social circle." Draco nodded hesitantly sensing, like I did, that the conversation was slipping from his grasp. "And try to mold my opinions and chose who should be my friend. Or offer me help that I don't need…" Her smile dropped from her face. "For someone who came here to warn me, you're checking pretty much all the boxes on the list of people who I shouldn't associate with, Malfoy." She dragged his name.

A rosy blush crept onto the blond's cheeks but still, he persisted. "I'm not like that… that rabble. Trust me Potter, I just-"

"Want to use me to get ahead of your little social group." Amy finished for him.

"What? No!"

"Oh, so you want to ride my coattails to fame and glory then." Draco sputtered denials, eyes wide in outrage, and Amy clucked her tongue derisively. "Well, I suppose I have an empty spot for a sycophant."

Draco finally managed to recover some mental ground and stomped his foot down, startling Sirius. I wove a hand into his raised fur and continued to watch the byplay. I found myself smiling at the way she was turning the tables on the little racist. "Are you mocking me, Potter!?"

"Yep." Popping the 'p', Amy leaned back in her seat. "I'm pretty sure bootlicking is considered part of ingratiating yourself with your betters, so you still make the list of people I shouldn't associate with. And I don't want an ass-kisser following me around."

The blond had gone completely red, knuckles white with the force he was clenching his fists at his side. His two followers, until now helplessly watching their leader being verbally beaten around, loomed behind him menacingly. He sneered viciously. "Looks like you want to follow your parents' footsteps. They got on the bad side of the wrong people too, and they're dead."

Amy very deliberately raised one eyebrow at him and smirked. "Sure."

The dismissal was the final straw. With a roar, Draco pulled out his wand and pointed it at Amy. Crabbe and Goyle went for their own, seconds behind him. I was already getting up and drawing my own wand, releasing Sirius. Amy herself reacted lightning quick, grasping his wrist and shoving it to the side in what I recognized as the beginning of a self-defense technique against knives and guns. Not that she needed to finalize it. But Draco and his companions didn't know that, and what stopped them in their tracks was Sirius. The big labrador was huge from a kid's perspective, but he was the least dangerous thing they faced. His growling filled the compartment, masking the buzzing my insects were making, hidden around us. Amy had skin contact and so Draco was at her mercy.

Hand caught in Amy's grip, the blond quickly assessed the situation around him. I could see him visibly deflate at the sight of Sirius' bared teeth and my wand pressTrain Wreck​

Another freckled red-head stood on the compartment's threshold, livid. He had to be related to the last three gingers. The family resemblance was too strong. But this one had glasses and held himself with the pompous self-importance and puffed out chest of a teenager recently given some authority. The shiny badge on his wizard dress just made it obvious.

I knew what to do.

Quickly, but without forcing it, I let go of Malfoy's wrist and glanced meaningfully at Skitter. Hoping she would follow my lead, I spoke up, meeting the older guy's eyes. "Malfoy attacked us. He was harassing us." Belatedly, I hoped he was not on this weasel's side.

Ginger switched his attention to Blondie. "Is this true?" In the background, Skitter, Taylor, had lowered her wand, though she kept it ready, and calmed down her dog, a hand on the scruff of his neck. The silence actually sounded that much louder without the rumbling from the dog.

Malfoy still looked angry at me, but even he had enough brains not to continue the fight in front of an older student. "It was just… a misunderstanding." Not very convincing, but I supposed not every blond could be Victoria, eleven or not.

"Oh, I understand what happened alright, Malfoy." I couldn't help a brief smile. Looked like Malfoy did know some people after all. "You're lucky you aren't at Hogwarts yet, but I will be having words with Professor Snape about this." He turned on the two gorillas that followed Malfoy around. "I will be speaking with your heads of house too. Now get back to your own compartment."

"Whatever, Weasly." Malfoy spat, disdain dripping from every word, and shouldered past him and into the aisle. "Let's go." He barked at his bodyguards.

The tension slowly drained away as the trio got further away from us, and with it all the anger that had fueled me. I collapsed bonelessly on my seat, feeling like I'd run a marathon. Had that been worth it? Draco Malfoy was going to be a pain in the ass for the rest of the year, and that was without counting all the trouble his supposed connections could make.

I snorted. Yeah, totally worth it.

Taylor sat down herself, putting away her wand away in her jacket and petting the dog for a job well done. It was so strange to see her like this.

The teen that had helped us out cleared his throat. "Very well, glad to see that's solved. Fighting is not tolerated at Hogwarts, so make sure this won't happen again. If there's trouble come to a Prefect or a Professor." We both gave obligatory nods of agreement. So this guy was a prefect then. Actually, looking at his badge, it seemed kind of obvious. It made sense that they would appoint a straight-laced honours student type to the position. But Hogwarts was a british boarding school. In the nineties. I was pretty sure that things behind the scenes would be quite different. "Now," he turned to Taylor, "I'd like to have a word with you."

Wait, what had Skitter done while I wasn't looking?

"Is something the matter?" The dark-haired girl looked perfectly composed as she spoke, calm and politely confused.

"Your animal." He gave the dog a side-glance brimming with displeasure. "Hogwarts only allows owls, cats and toads. Dogs are not permitted."

Seriously!? What was he expecting her to do? Throw the dog offboard? Ship him back?

But she riposted quickly, speaking over whatever next nitpicking he had prepared. "I have permission from Professor McGonagall about Sirius. Arrangements were made. He'll be staying with the groundskeeper, not at the castle itself."

"Hmph." He huffed. "I will verify that. For now, just make sure he doesn't disturb anybody." The prefect closed the door behind him, leaving us in silence.

I watched Taylor and after a few seconds, time enough for him to get out of hearing range, she finally let her shoulders slump. Should I say anything? Ginger Weasel sure has a wand up his ass, something like that? I didn't usually mind the silence, but this one didn't exactly feel comfortable. Probably something to do with who I was sharing it.

She took the choice out of my hands, straightening up and staring me in the eyes. "What was that all about?"

Oh, she was not going to lecture me on this. Not her. And not now. "Told you. Middleschool is hell." I shrugged.

"I thought the plan was to not make waves. Blend in and keep our heads down." She insisted.

"Well, I don't know if you've noticed or anything, but I'm the latest national hero. The Girl Who Fucking Lived, etcetera? Just… Urgh." I didn't even have enough steam to snark at Skitter. I sighed and reached up to massage my temples. "Look, low profile is just not in the options. Trust me, I tried but even if I don't do anything people will come looking for me."

She crossed her arms, but still had to get the last word in. "You still didn't have to handle the situation like that."

I could help but scoff. "Yes I did. What? You think he'd just leave? He's a bully. He wouldn't stop because I said: thank you but no, please leave me alone. He'd just get worse."

"You were provoking him!" She hissed.

"As opposed to what? Ignoring him?" I felt my temper rise up again, twice already in quick succession. "Newsflash: that doesn't work! I might as well be giving them carte blanche. The only way to make bullies back off is to fight back."

Taylor eyed me disbelievingly. She looked like she wanted to say something, but she clenched her jaw and stared out of the window. I copied her. It was a nice view. We stayed like that for a few minutes. Ignoring each other's presence.

Finally she spoke, getting up from her seat. "I'm going to explore the train, see if tDisconnect

​

I already knew where everything was on the train. I had it bugged. I knew its layout, where the passengers were, what they were doing. I had no need to explore the train. But I needed to get out of that compartment and put some distance between us.

Panacea didn't know anything. And I...

I was not trying to map both the train and its outside, closing my perception to the invertebrates there. I'd already figured out that there was some sort of spatial warping in this train. I was sure it was bigger on the inside, and that carriages had been added somewhen along the line. It wasn't anything like what I'd felt Vista doing. I could feel and understand what Vista did with space, pieces of distance slotting together inside my head to form a coherent whole. Here, it was like things were in two places at once, or moving in relative directions that made no sense. I couldn't map it in my head. Just trying to do it made me dizzy, nauseous, like how I imagined feeling seasick would be like. And then the headache started. Actually, it felt remarkably similar to what Amy had done to me at the bank.

Amy... at the bank… The bank job had been what had really started my criminal career. The job that had delivered Dinah into Coil's dirty hands. Despite all that, the only thing that I could think about that job now was that the next day, I had stood up to Emma and won. Effortlessly, just like how Amy had just beaten Draco. That made me angry. I knew my anger was baseless, but that did not make me any less mad. But having less bugs on-hand kept me, somehow, less busy mentally, and the strain of holding back the full range of my powers only compounded my irritation.

I hadn't put mental walls up like this since Winslow. Then, I'd close off the buzzing, afraid of what would happen if I slipped. I hadn't even tagged people to get an idea of where they were. I just pretended I didn't have powers, turning them off the best I could. I had to protect my identity, I had to hide. I had to make sure my control didn't clip when they surrounded me. When they bullied me. Now I was going back to school after months of absence and those habits, those attitudes, that position, they all came rushing back. It wasn't the same, I knew. I wasn't going back to Winslow, there was no trio waiting for me, I restricted my powers by true necessity.... But damn if it didn't feel like it.

I refrained from punching the wall, taking deep breaths to calm down. I'd let it get to me. Draco, Amy, what Amy had said.... I wasn't going back to Winslow. I had no idea where the train was headed, but it wasn't there. And Even if it was, I refused to go through that again.

That determination crystallized, sharpening my focus. I had to think about all of this rationally. Unbiasedly. I was going to Hogwarts, a boarding school that taught magic. Effectively, a school for parahumans of some sort. There would be bullies, inevitably. Every school had those, regardless of any discouragements. I supposed that the only difference between Winslow and Arcadia was that the better school had an administration that actually cared and acted. From what I'd seen, Hogwarts was more like Arcadia. That was good. There would still be racists like Draco though and, this time, I was a target. Could I handle that? I had much more going for me here than I'd ever had at Winslow. Aside from what I could do, I had Amy on my side on this issue. Her reputation and the prefects and teachers that cared about the rules would be more help than any I had received at Winslow. What kind of power would they need, Draco and any other enemies I find, that would allow them to attack me without repercussions?

I wasn't sure, but I knew who I could ask.

I had tagged Cedric before he actually got onto the train, when we'd both been on Platform Nine and Three Quarters. I quickly located his bug again and took off to a carriage further back on the train. His compartment was full, another four with him, three boys and a girl. They were playing board games. One looked like chess but the other I couldn't identify. Maybe it was a wizard game. It involved stones.

I hesitated at the door. I could barely hear them on the other side, talking, friends. I'd never been good at social interaction. The prospect of knocking and interrupting their conversation, becoming the center of attention, made me more nervous than any of the times I'd had to talk to large numbers of people while I was taking care of my territory. But then I'd been Skitter, not Taylor, and I had a mask, my swarm-voice and people respected that. Respected me, unlike here. Maybe I could borrow Cedric for a while, play the shy younger kid with a problem? It wouldn't be that off from the truth.

I must have stood too long outside the compartment because Cedric's voice called out to me. "Hello, is something wrong? Want to come in? It's crowded in here though."

"No. It's fine." I almost didn't remember to use my british accent after talking with Amy for so long. Why she wasn't even trying to disguise her obvious american accent I didn't know, but it was another thing I'd have to insist on with her. I opened the door a little, peeked in. "Hi."

"Taylor!" Cedric beamed. "Come on in. Everybody, this is Taylor," he hesitated, then added sheepishly "whose last name I actually don't remember anymore, sorry. We met at Diagon Alley. She's starting Hogwarts this year." An incomprehensible chorus of various greetings and questions followed his proclamation. Cedric winced and mouthed an apology to me.

I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring smile and cleared my throat. "Hi, nice to meet you. I'm Taylor Granger." I did put a little emphasis on my new last name.

"You already know me," started Cedric, "but this chap here is Roger Davies, Ravenclaw." A guy his age, brown hair topping a chubby face, waved at me. I noticed he had a pretty good arm definition with the t-shirt he was wearing. He sat on the other side of the chessboard, playing against Cedric himself. "That's Duncan Inglebee, also Ravenclaw, and Tamsin Applebee who's in Hufflepuff with me." He indicated the players of the other game, with stones. Tamsin was a short brunette with a thick accent but a friendly visage, while Duncan was a very tall, well-built dark-skinned boy that just gave me a quiet hello. "And brooding in the corner is Kenneth Towler. He's from Gryffindor." He pointed the last person in the compartment, who had been peacefully reading a book nestled against Tamsin.

"And the only person here that isn't a Quidditch fanatic." The Gryffindor commented offhandedly, setting his book down on his knees and adjusting his glasses.

The five were looking at me patiently. Waiting for me to say whatever I had to say and leave. Of course it was like that. To me, they were the younger ones, but I was just a kid to them. Younger, from a different culture and ignorant of the happenings and dynamics of Hogwarts. An outsider, in too many senses. I found myself unable to speak. If I opened my mouth...

"So, have you decided which house you want to be in yet?" Roger jumped in.

I was grateful for the starting point despite myself. "Not really. They all seem to have their good points. Maybe Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff?" Those seemed like the safe choices.

"I hope you're a Hufflepuff," said Tamsin, bouncing up and down in her seat, smiling. "You're always welcome with us badgers, okay?"

"She looks more like a Ravenclaw, though." Roger countered and turned to me. "You look smart."

Kenneth snickered. "You only say that because she wears glasses, Davies. She could always be a Gryffindor, brave and stuff!"

"You mean the house that was last place last year?" Roger raised a finger, as if in warning. "Don't be a Gryffindor."

"Well," I chanced to poke at the big secret, "that would be easier if I had a clue to how I'm going to be sorted."

The group shared a conspiratory look, smiles. Tamsin giggled.

They probably weren't laughing at me. I knew it wasn't like that. It was just an inside joke, and everybody who hadn't been sorted yet, however that happened, couldn't get it. Or was the punchline. They didn't mean to hurt me, I knew that, intellectually. But it still felt that way. They couldn't have any idea of how much I hated this. Being laughed at. I was tired, done for with the feeling of humiliation that filled me now. I'd been the punchline far too many times already. This had been a mistake. I was an idiot sometimes.

"Right. Big secret." That just sounded bad. I needed to get out. I wasn't in the right state to handle this. I remembered Amy's words again. "I…. I have to go back to my place." And I turned on my heel and walked away.

I should have just keep quiet. Stuck to the plan and kept my head down. But I'd just gone and made it all worse, trying to chat up people subjectively older than me and make friends after letting a comment about bullies rile me up. It sounded so desperate and had all the hallmarks of bad planning. Cedric probably thought I was a weirdo. Well, he wouldn't be that wrong. I couldn't even keep up a normal conversation with kids younger than me for more than five minutes. It didn't really matter anyway. I was aiming at leaving this place as soon as I could. I didn't need to make friends. But if rumours started spreading, it would cause a chain reaction, and I had no intention of being the weird kid everybody knew about in a goddamn boarding school. Of course, I'd just given people the ammunition to do just that.

I felt Cedric get up, heard him call after me. Asking me to wait, apologizing. He didn't sound angry. But I could still outrun him if I wanted to.

I didn't need friends.

I wanted them though.

Fuck, I hoped this wouldn't come back to bite me in the ass. I stopped walking away, and waited.

Last edited: Mahere's anything interesting. Sirius, guard."

I nodded.

ing against the temple of one of his friends.

"What's going on here?!"her forehead reflexively and sighed deeply. "Wonderful."Amy sniggered. "Your reputation precedes you."

I groaned.