Hi, everyone! This is my first time writing anything Bleach or Harry Potter related, so I hope it's ok. Once again, there are spoilers for all the HP books and up till the "Fake Karakura Town Arc" for Bleach. There will be various Bleach and HP characters involved, and various pairings too, and at least one slash pairing.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Bleach, and I'm writing this purely for entertainment purposes. No harm intended, no profit made.
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Chapter 1: Daphne Greengrass
Daphne Greengrass rather disliked the new Slytherin girl, at first. New Girl was strange and scowled a lot. Everything about her was odd and off-putting, including the way she walked and the company she kept.
New Girl wore her hair strangely: short except for two thin braids that were wrapped up in cloth and ended in brass rings. New Girl didn't talk much, but she watched everyone, scrutinizing them with big gray eyes that often narrowed in annoyance or anger.
Daphne remembered when Professor Snape had first led New Girl and her companions into the Slytherin dungeon. Earlier that night, at the Welcoming Feast, the Headmaster had announced that the recent insurgences of Dark Wizards have pressured Wizarding schools throughout Europe and Asia to close down. Hogwarts had decided to open its doors to students who had been turned away, and Hogwarts students like Daphne Greengrass were now expected to make these newcomers feel welcome.
"And that's all there is to it!" Dumbledore had announced cheerfully, and in marched a group of strange-looking people. New Girl walked in at the head of the procession, as if she was their leader, and she and two others had been sorted into Slytherin House.
At the time, Daphne had twirled a lock of pale hair around her finger and thought it odd that a bunch of new students could be accepted into Hogwarts, just like that. She certainly never heard of any foreign schools closing because of the recent activity in Britain, or that Hogwarts ever had the policy of allowing new students in other than First Years. But "that's all there is to it," was what Dumbledore had said, and that was that.
Pansy and the twins had whispered and twittered behind their hands when New Girl, a rather fat fellow with beady eyes, and a strange-looking young man were sorted into Slytherin.
Professor Snape had personally seen them to the Slytherin Common Room that night and introduced them to the rest of the students in a monotone voice.
"I don't expect any rule-breaking from students in my House," said Snape, "and all of you will be sure to act accordingly in my class."
At the end of his speech, New Girl hadn't joined in the chorus of "Yes, Professor," but nodded curtly at him, as if she was dismissing him. Snape had scowled at her and left.
That first night, New Girl had sat up late on one of the Common Room sofas, talking softly with the large fellow until most of the other Slytherins had gone to bed. Daphne had been reading half-heartedly from across the room, and noticed that New Girl's voice was high and sharp, while her companion's was low and lazy. New Girl sat stiffly and even while her hands were resting by her side, they were curled into half-fists. Her skin was tinted green by the light of the lamps and Daphne thought that she looked rather mysterious.
When the clock struck midnight, the large one had heaved himself up and stretched, yawning loudly. Daphne snuck a peek at him from over the top of her book, and saw the glint of jewels on his expensive-looking watch.
"Well, I'm turning in," he rumbled, straightening his robes. "Good night, Captain."
"I told you not to call me that here," New Girl had snapped, glaring up at him. Her eyes glowed fiercely in the dim light, tinted green like her skin. She shifted on the sofa, and Daphne could see that her wand was tucked into her belt, near the back of her waist like a hidden dagger.
"Ah, right, right!" he stuttered in response, seemingly intimidated by New Girl though she was half his size. "I'm sorry. Well, um… goodnight, then… Soifon. Ahem."
Over the next few days, Daphne learned that the fat fellow was Marechiyo Omaeda, the other strange-looking one was named Yumichika Ayasegawa, and that New Girl called herself Soifon.
Daphne disliked Soifon, partly because she found the New Girl a bit frightening. In the hallways, Soifon walked with her back ramrod-straight and her hands curled into fists. Though her eyes stared straight ahead, it was as if she knew exactly who was around her and where they were.
"Greengrass," Soifon said, while they were on their way to class one day, and Daphne jumped because she was walking more than a few steps behind Soifon and there were two Ravenclaw girls walking in between them. Yet somehow, Soifon had known who and where she was, though Daphne couldn't recall when Soifon had ever turned her face around to see.
"Greengrass. Could you tell me where the Ancient Runes classroom is? I've forgotten."
"Um, I-I was going there myself, actually," Daphne stammered. "You can walk with me if you like." And Soifon shortened her steps so that she and Daphne were walking side-by-side.
Then, to hide the fact that she trembled slightly, Daphne tossed her head haughtily and said, "You shouldn't be so forgetful. People will think you're stupid if you keep getting lost."
But what perturbed her was the fact that Soifon always seemed to appear unexpectedly. Oftentimes, Daphne would walk into an empty room, then find out a few minutes later that it wasn't empty after all: Soifon had been there the whole time, watching her with those big gray eyes. Or, as she sat in the library doing her Charms homework, Soifon would be bent over a book two tables away. But if Daphne lifted her head after a minute or two, Soifon was now rummaging through books right next to her, though Daphne never heard her approach. Eyes down to read, then lift head again, and Soifon had disappeared from the library completely, though Daphne never even heard the door open.
It was creepier at nighttime. One minute, the New Girl was sleeping peacefully in her bed across the room, the next, the bed was completely empty and Daphne wondered if Soifon had been there at all, or if her eyes were playing tricks on her. It turned out that Soifon was often gone from bed, even into the late hours of the night. Yet, she was always there when Daphne woke up in the morning, though she never heard Soifon come in during the night.
Then, there was the dream, a very odd nightmare. A white-faced monster had somehow entered the girls' dormitory and was howling. Daphne remembered the New Girl appearing out of nowhere and leaping onto the thing's back, stabbing down into it with a needle-sharp weapon. The last thing Daphne saw was those glittering, gray eyes looking into hers before she woke up. Every time she tried to remember the dream, the details grew fuzzy and it slipped away from her again and again as dreams tend to do.
During the day, Daphne noticed that Omaeda and Soifon spent a lot of time together. They walked to classes and meals together, he always following behind her. They talked in hushed voices whenever they found a spot to sit in the Common Room. Yet, they didn't seem like they were friends. Daphne was sure that friends smiled at each other more.
Later, Daphne found out that Soifon had a cat, though she only saw it occasionally. It was a small black thing with yellow eyes, and Daphne thought it odd that Soifon seemed to like it so much, yet didn't have it around very often. The cat slipped away almost as often as Soifon did, and the New Girl always seemed sad when it was gone.
At the same time, Daphne also discovered that Soifon, though normally cold and strange, grew flustered very quickly if she got angry.
"That's quite a large rat you've got," scorned Flora, the more vindictive of the Carrow twins, when she saw Soifon cuddling the animal. "What's its name?"
"Her name is Lady Y-… I mean, Fluffy! Her name is Fluffy!" Soifon snapped back, an angry flush starting to appear on her cheeks.
"Lady Fluffy!" said Pansy, shrieking in laughter. "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard!"
Hestia Carrow pinched her nose, as if there was a stench. "It smells like a sewer. Make sure it doesn't get on any of our things."
"Why, you… Shut up!" squawked Soifon, fingers twitching as if she was itching to draw her wand. "You're not fit to clean up her droppings!" Her nostrils flared as if she were a bull being baited, but when she couldn't find a better comeback after struggling for a while, Soifon stood, hefted Lady Fluffy onto her shoulder, and stormed out of the dormitory.
Next morning, Pansy and the twins found all of their stockings shredded and hairballs in their shoes.
Soifon wasn't the only one of the newcomers who got picked on. In Slytherin House, there was never a shortage of people who loved to insult and bully. In fact, Daphne was surprised that Malfoy wasn't more malicious towards the first years or the new students this year, but the blond boy had been looking quite sickly and anxious, and didn't seem to be up to his usual mischief.
Crabbe and Goyle, however, were more than happy to make up for their leader's slack. They bullied, they intimidated, and they threatened, even without Malfoy's guiding hand.
But one day, Goyle received a rather big dent in his pride and Daphne's respect for Soifon went up a few notches. She was playing cards in the Common Room when she say Goyle push Tracey Davis so that she dropped her books.
Daphne sighed and wondered if she should call for Professor Snape, when she saw Soifon moving silently towards them from the other side of the Common Room. Soifon, who usually never bothered to talk to anyone besides Omaeda, was stalking purposefully towards Goyle, righteous anger in her cold gray eyes.
"What've you got there, Mudblood?" Goyle was saying, waving around a copy of the Quibbler that he had ripped from her bag. "This stupid garbage's only for stupid idiots like-"
Neither Daphne nor Goyle saw Soifon move, but the bully's voice cut off with a yell when he found himself prone on the floor, arm twisted painfully behind him, the New Girl's small foot planted firmly in his back.
"Why don't you pick on someone your own size?" Soifon growled, and Daphne thought it was funny she should say that, since the New Girl was hardly Goyle's size.
"You're breaking his arm," Daphne warned, and was ignored.
"Geroff me, you bitch!" Goyle yelped, thrashing about on the carpet like a fish. "I'll tell Professor Snape! I'll tell Dumbledore and he'll expel the whole lot of you weirdoes!"
"You should be ashamed of yourself, attacking people from your own House," said Soifon. "You're the one who should be expelled."
She yanked on his arm, making the joints pop and Goyle yell even louder, then let him go.
"Now, get out of my sight."
"You'll pay for that!" Goyle sputtered, scrambling ungracefully to his feet. He pulled out his wand to hex her, but with a short, sharp movement, she made him drop it and clutch his wrist, howling in pain.
"Don't break it!" he cried, when she positioned her heel over his fallen wand, as if to crush it.
"Hardly be a loss, seeing as how you have no talent for Magic," she said coolly. But instead of breaking it, she tossed it far across the room, where it landed on a sofa and sparked a few times. As Goyle dove after it, Soifon helped Tracey Davis up from the floor and gathered her books for her.
Daphne wasn't surprised when Tracey started hanging around the New Girl after that, and she herself found that she liked Soifon a bit better.
But that particular incident didn't stop both Crabbe and Goyle from ganging up on Ayasegawa the next day. Daphne didn't hear about it until afterwards, but if she had to guess, Crabbe and Goyle probably started it out of a twisted sense of revenge for Goyle's humiliation the other day.
She heard later from Malcolm Baddock that Crabbe and Goyle had cornered the feathered Slytherin in the lavatory, threatening to pound him for being a friend of "that freaky New Girl," a ponce, and a pretty-boy weirdo. According to Baddock, Ayasegawa had simply finished powdering his face, turned to him, smiled, and told the 2nd year boy to close the door on his way out.
Later that night, Ayasegawa returned to the Slytherin dormitory without so much as a scratch on his face and Crabbe and Goyle were missing until the next morning. They were found tied to the tallest spire of the Astronomy Tower wearing nothing but their underpants and comically drawn mustaches on their faces.
Madam Hooch had to retrieve them from the air, but not before Colin Creevey got a few snapshots with his camera.
Snape only gave Ayasegawa a week of detention, and Daphne suspected it wasn't so much that he claimed self-defense, but that Snape grudgingly respected the new Slytherin for single-handedly taking on and humiliating the hulking bullies.
Not surprisingly, most Hogwarts students stayed away from both Soifon and Ayasegawa after that. Although, a chortling Ron Weasely did come up to slap Ayasegawa on the back, saying "well, I suppose you lot aren't all bad," and offered to buy him a Butterbeer on the next Hogsmeade weekend.
In fact, it was Omaeda who became most popular with the Slytherin House, after many of them found out that he came from quite a rich family and was quite generous with his money. He made fast friends when he treated the Slytherins to drinks and sweets during the weekend, and once Professor Slughorn found out about his student's affluence, Omaeda was also invited to one of Slughorn's supper parties, along with Blaise Zabini.
And though Daphne did warm up to the New Girl eventually, and even decided that the loud, boorish Omaeda wasn't so bad when he bought her a Butterbeer last weekend, she always thought there was something quite suspicious about the new "transfer" students. Headmaster Dumbledore had said they were all from different schools from across Europe and Asia, but they all acted as if they already knew each other, and well. Not to mention that Omaeda still occasionally slipped up and called the New Girl "Captain," for some reason. And once, Daphne was sure she caught Soifon actually talking to Lady Fluffy.
Her suspicions were confirmed one day, when she was returning to the Slytherin Common Room and saw Soifon, Ayasegawa, and the tall, bald-headed new Gryffindor student talking heatedly near the entrance.
"I can't believe you two!" Soifon was fuming. She was red-faced and had her fists clenched tight, as if ready to punch a hole in the wall. None of them had noticed Daphne yet. "You idiots are completely out of control! Have you forgotten that we're supposed to be on a mission here? With all the trouble you're causing, you'll be sure to blow my cover!"
"Oh, come on, Captain," whined the bald one. "Cut me some slack! It wasn't like I did it on your turf so you had to cover for me or anything."
"I don't care where you cause trouble, it's still my responsibility! The Head Captain put me in charge and you will obey orders, or I'll report you for insubordination. That means no starting fights with Kurosaki, no threatening the teachers, and no challenging students to duels! Do you have any idea how much damage you two caused with that fight?"
"But they called me Baldy!" Baldy cried out in indignation. "That's unforgivable! And besides, I didn't ask you to butt in, Yumichika. I had it under control and you honed in on my action."
"Psh," said Ayasegawa, looking at his nails. "There were three of them. Don't be selfish, Ikkaku."
"And don't think I forgot about that stunt you pulled last week, Ayasegawa," snapped Soifon. "Argh, I knew I could have handled this whole thing better on my own. I'm reporting both of you to the Headmaster and the Head Captain for this. Honestly, if you two were in my squad, I'd have you locked up, stripped of your ranks, and maybe even flogged-"
"Um, excuse me?" said Ayasegawa, poking her with one delicate finger, having been the first to notice that Daphne was staring at them with mouth wide open.
"Don't do that!" Soifon yelled, slapping his hand away.
"But I think we've been found out."
All three of them turned to stare at her.
"What "mission" are you all talking about?" Daphne said, eyes narrowed suspiciously. "I knew there was something strange going on with you-"
"The mission of education!" Ayasegawa interrupted shrilly, and faking a laugh. "Our sole purpose here is to continue the noble enterprise of learning Magic, feeding our knowledge-starved minds, hoarding the information we learn from these hallowed halls, prevailing on our never-ending quest to become Wizarding scholars! Right, Captain?"
Soifon glared.
"Uhh, I mean… Captain of the Gobstones Team?"
"She's not the captain of the Gobstones Team," said Daphne. "I'm getting Professor Snape."
Soifon heaved a sigh and took out a strange-looking device from her pocket. "I'm sorry to do this, Greengrass, but I have no other choice."
She pressed a button. A duck's head popped out on a spring and there was a puff of smoke.
The next thing she knew, Daphne was waking up in bed, having no memory of what happened the past few hours. That night, she had a very odd dream of baby ducks playing gobstones.
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Thank you so much for reading! The next chapters will feature the other Houses and their new members. Please feedback and tell me what you think!