“Wait, let me see if I got this… You say
Hogwarts, the mystical and whimsical magical school of Nevada,” For a moment I
had to stop and roll my eyes, “…has an entire house dedicated to nurture the
worst sociopaths in the wizarding world into future dark lords and
death-eaters, and everyone is okay with that?”
“Pretty much, yes,” Nodded Ron as our small
group caught up with the rest of the first year students en route to the
castle.
“Isn’t that really, really dangerous? And
stupid?”
He shrugged his shoulders in response and just
said, “Tradition.”
“It still doesn’t seem right… I mean…” I
stopped on my track and glanced back. “Did you hear that?”
“What?” Asked Harry incredulously. “The scream?
“Of course I mean the scream!” I said as I
tried to catch a gap between the horde of students marching around us. “I think
it’s getting closer. Let me check.”
“Hey! Don’t get out of the line, you will get
lost again!” Protested Hermione. She was still following after me though.
I squeezed my way through the torrent of robed
kids and teenagers and finally managed to get to the side of the road. By then
the scream sounded like it came from right next to me…
“Uwooooooooooooo!!!”
As I
stopped and thought about it for a second, I had to conclude that it actually
sounded more like a battle cry than anything. “I wonder what’s going on…” I
mused as I raised my head in the direction of the sound and my eyes immediately
met with… the sole of a shoe…
…
That didn’t seem right. I looked a bit closer,
and by that I mean a bit farther and behind the shoe, and I found a leg, followed
by a strategically placed skirt-flap in the perfect position to blot out the
possible panty-shot. My eyes moved further up and thus I finally met with the
beet-red face of a ponytailed girl. She seemed familiar…
“… Ah, I remember now!” I said as I took a step
to the left, allowing the flying kick to safely sail past me.
“Wha…?” That was all she managed to say before
she planted herself face-first into the grass by the roadside. A few of the
students walking by seemed to be curious about the spectacle but they moved on
nevertheless. Ah, collective responsibility syndrome in action. As peculiar as
depressing…
“Ptooo-ptooo!” The girl spit out the grass
blades trapped between her lips and jumped to her feet with a face still red as
a lobster. “You monster! Why did you dodge that?! I could have broken my neck!”
“Says the girl whose idea of greeting is a
flying dragon kick. How could you even do that in a robe?”
She straightened herself with arms akimbo and
grinned at me. “Practice,” She said with childish glee.
I gave her a sagely nod. “I see. Very
impressive.”
“I know! It’s actually a lot harder than the
movies would make you believe, but as long as you…” She suddenly stopped and
the childish grin on her face quickly gave way to her previous scowl. “Don’t
try to change the subject you bastard! You completely forgot about me!”
“Really?” I stopped for a moment and carefully
scratched my chin. “… Now that I think about it, I might have.”
“Not ‘might have’! You totally have! You locked
me up and forgot about me! Monster! Demon! Fiend!”
It was around this point when the rest of the
gang managed to make their way through the stream of students and arrived at
the scene as well. Ron was still eating some beans, though I would have sworn
he already threw away at least two empty boxes. Hermione seemed to be flustered
as usual while Harry looked more awkward than anything,
“A friend of yours?” He asked somewhat meekly.
“No,” I answered immediately. It surprised even
me how quick it was. Aaah, it’s good to know my better judgment is still
running perfectly fine even after the amnesia.
“What? How can you say that with a straight
face?!” Protested Mary with a face like an abandoned kitten. Wait, are kittens made of pure annoying? No?
Sorry then, wrong analogy.
“Why, are we?” I asked with a stoic visage.
She fell silent for a moment than mumbled, “No,
but it still hurts if you deny it like that… Jerk…” She appeared gloomy but a
moment later she perked up again like nothing happened. She gave a cutesy wave
to the group and said, “Hello, I am Mary Celeste Sakura Thunderbird Freya Sue
Smith! Nice to meet you!”
Harry and Ron exchanged a few incongruous
glances while Hermione just said, “Well, that’s most certainly…” She paused for
a moment, “…a name.”
“Also a mouthful.” Added Ron, snickering. Mary
didn’t seem to mind; instead she focused her attention on me again. I had a bad
feeling about it, so I cleared my throat and gave the group a cheerful smile.
“Well then, now that you have met her we should
move on, shouldn’t we? Let’s go!”
I couldn’t even take the first step before I
was stopped on my track by a needlessly high-pitched voice. “Oh no you don’t! I
haven’t finished with you, JD!”
That last bit caught me off-guard. I slowly
tilted my head to the side and repeated the word, “JD?”
“Yes!” Chirped Mary, still uselessly hyper and
for some reason apparently very proud of herself.
“Who is that?”
“You, of course!” I proceeded to slowly tilt my
head the other way but it still made no sense. Mary stomped her feet and
pointed at me in response. “John Doe sounds lame and boring, so I am going to
call you JD from now on! It’s much better!”
“No it’s not.”
“Yes it is!”
“… Okay,” I crossed my arms, “Then from now on
I will call you MCSTFFS.”
“… That sounds stupid.” Said MCSTFFS with a
sour expression.
“That just means it fits well.”
“Agh! I try to make your stupid name sound
better and that’s how you thank me! Idiot! Oaf! Dunderhead”
“Is this what a lovers’ quarrel looks like?”
Asked Hermione under her breath, but it was obvious she made it just loud
enough for us to hear.
“No,” I replied hastily. “Also, you are like
twelve. You shouldn’t even know what that means.”
“…” She shook her head in exhaustion and turned
heel. “We should get going or we’ll be left behind.”
I was not going to argue with that. I followed
after her… or at least I would have, if my robes weren’t yanked back as I took
the first step.
“Ouch! Hey, what are you doing!?” I looked back
and, surprise-surprise, Mary was pulling me towards the train station.
“You are not going anywhere until you help me
with my luggage!”
“… Wait, what? Am I the only one who can’t
follow this?”
“My luggage!” She repeated angrily as she was
still pulling on my robes. Actually she looked kind of adorable while tugging
on me like that, like a dumb puppy pulling on its leash and thinking that it’s
the reason why its owner is moving forward. Except she wasn’t really. Adorable,
I mean. The dumb puppy part was more or less accurate though.
“Wait, let me get this straight. You rushed
after me only to get me to carry your luggage?”
“Yup!” She nodded enthusiastically.
“Why?”
“Because you owe me one?”
“For what?”
“For locking me up in that cabin and forgetting
me?”
“Actually, how did you get out?” I asked in an
attempt to change the topic, but her response actually piqued my interest. She
suddenly went pale and shuddered.
“I was shouting for help for a while, and then
this really dark guy opened the door…”
“Dark guy?”
“REALLY dark guy! Like, villain-dark! With
black robes and sunken eyes and everything!”
“… You mean Professor Snape?”
She glared at me like I just said something
really weird. “Ha-ha. Very funny.”
“What? He fits the description.”
“No he doesn’t! Snape is totally handsome and a
lot younger, and he is just a tortured soul waiting for that special girl to-”
“Nope,” I interrupted, “I am pretty sure we are
not talking about the same man.”
“Damn straight we aren’t! My Snape wouldn’t
scare me like that!”
“… You were
scared of Snape!”
“No I wasn’t!” She protested. “I was scared of
that weird dark guy!”
“And now you want me to go back there to get
your luggage because you are afraid of him.”
“Yes.
I mean, NO! … I mean… maybe a
little.”
I let out a big sigh and glanced back at the
others. “Sorry guys, it seems like I…”
…
Correction: I glanced back at the empty space where
the others used to be about two minutes ago. “What the hell guys?! What the
actual hell!?” I dropped my shoulders in exasperation and turned back to Mary
with a groan. “All right, I help you get your luggage miss MCSTFFS.”
“… Are you seriously going to call me th-?“ It
is exactly this far she got in her sentence before we were both startled by a
new voice.
“Stop right there!”
It was a deep baritone marred by exhaustion and
came from the lofty man rushing at us from the side. I was honestly too baffled
to react to this development but Mary apparently had no problem with defending
herself, at least as far as getting behind me and using me as a shield could be
considered ‘self defense’. Reeeeeeally classy.
Well, at least now she wasn’t in my way so I
could take a good look at the man running towards us. He was tall, as I already
mentioned, but not too heavily built. At first glance I thought he was wearing
a robe but once he got closer I realized that he was actually dressed in a
heavy trench coat with some sort of uniform underneath it. He also wore a
wide-brimmed hat that cast a shadow over his face, so all I could make out in
the evening light was a stubbed chin.
By the time he reached us Mary came out of
hiding from behind me with a relieved expression. “Oh, it isn’t the dark guy.
It’s all right then,” She said. I wagged my head a little. Just what did Snape
do to her to scare her so much? Then I remembered the guy’s face and realized
that, under the right conditions, I would have been scared witless by him as
well. But back to the current situation…
The man stopped from a good five steps away
from us and glared at me. Or at least I presume he glared at me. As I said, I
couldn’t really see his face that well. “I’ve got him.” He said while touching
his ear. “No, my narrative override still doesn’t work, but I can deal with
him.” He seemed quite agitated.
“Hey, do you know this guy?” I asked the girl
cautiously tugging on my sleeve.
“Nope. I don’t even have a clue.”
After he finished talking into his ear the man
took a step closer while pulling on his leather gloves. “I am Colonel Troy
Winfred, Canon Enforcement Bureau, Special Enforcement Division. We need to
talk.”
I peeked at Mary but she seemed to be just as
confused as I was. Oh well, here goes nothing. “Good evening sir. I’m John
Doe…”
“And I am Mary Celeste Sakura Thunderbird Freya
Sue Smith.” Butted in Mary.
“Would you stop shoving your name down people’s
throats? It’s annoying.” I said accompanied by a whack on the top of her head.
“Owowowowoooooooow! You did it again! You are
even horribler that I thought! You are the horriblest!”
“… I am pretty sure that is not a word.” I
brushed her off and faced the man again. “Can I help you?”
Colonel Wilfred Troy seemed to be quite
confused. I didn’t blame him. Being confused is the mildest symptom of being
around this natural disaster rubbing her head at my side. He collected himself
pretty quickly though and extended his arm towards us, his stretched index
finger pointing right at me.
“I don’t know what kind of game you are playing
or how you disabled my narrative override, but it all ends here! I am
authorized to use lethal force if necessary, so…”
“Excuse me, but what are you talking about?” I
interrupted.
“It means that I am going to take you in,
whether you like it or not. Get ready.” As per his words he took up a stance
that one would expect from a fighting-game character. Ugh. This was going to be
a pain in the neck, won’t it?
“Hey-hey-hey!” I raised my hands in defense. “I
really don’t understand what’s going on here, but…”
“I’ve got this!” Came the declaration from the
one person I really, really didn’t need to get herself involved.
“What are you doing?” I hissed through my teeth
as Mary stepped forward and stood forth in a straddle, arms akimbo.
“Don’t worry JD, I know exactly how to deal with
a guy like this!”
The man didn’t say a word but he seemed to
change his stance according, dividing his focus on both Mary and me. She
smirked, then pointed at the guy, took an extremely deep breath and shouted…
“Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaape!!!!!!”
…
For a second I couldn’t do anything besides
blinking in complete and utter bewilderment; and I wasn’t the only one, with
the colonel also completely dropping his guard.
“What?!”
“Bad touch! Bad touch!” Mary kept yelling from
the top of her lungs completely disregarding our confusion. “This suspicious
stranger said he will take us by force! We need an adult! Bad touch! Bad
touch!”
“No, I didn’t mean…!”
“What seems to be the problem?” For a moment I
was afraid that we just invited another weird character into our midst and at
first glance I was almost sure that was the case. The large man appearing out
of the woods almost dwarfed the good colonel in overall size, although there
wasn’t much of a different between their heights. The girth, on the other hand…
This man was big and his size was made even
more intimidating by his huge, bushy beard and long curly hair. His eyes on the
other hand seemed surprisingly gentle as he looked over us. In the end his gaze
settled on Mary and he spoke with a voice almost too soft for a man of that
size. “Did you call for help? Are you all right?”
“Yes sir!” She nodded enthusiastically. “Please
help! This pervert tried to molest us!”
The giant man blinked at her uncomprehendingly
“Excuse me?”
“She means she threatened and tried to attack
us,” I sprang to the rescue.
“Is that true?” Asked the man while glaring at
the colonel. Now his eyes suddenly were fitting for a giant like that, and I
was honestly happy his attention wasn’t focused on me. The man in the trench
coat on the other hand visibly gulped and took a step backwards. It seemed like
he was conflicted for a moment but in the end he just cursed under his breath
and glared at me.
“This is not over yet!” He hissed at me and
immediately broke into a dash along the road.
“Stop right there!” Shouted the bearded man and
rushed after the colonel, albeit his large legs seemed to be more efficient at
getting in his way than propelling him forwards. In the meantime Mary whirled
around and grinned at me with childish glee.
“You see, I told you I got it!”
“… Sure.” I said while rubbing my temple.
“I was cool, wasn’t I? I totally stood up
against that guy and won!”
“…… Sure.”
“Do you know what this means? Now you owe me
twice! Once for locking me up and now for me saving you!”
“……… Sure, but…” I gestured towards her. “Would
you come a little closer please?”
She immediately came over although somewhat
suspiciously. “Why? What’s the problem?” She asked innocently. I looked at her,
deep in her eye, and then…
*whack*
