You've got mail!
It was a small sound, the volume almost completely muted. But it was effective as an alarm clock at six in the morning. Messy, unkempt hair popped up, hazel eyes blinking themselves awake.
Brushing mussed hair out of her eyes, Sara Lowenthal reached for her mouse, fingers already typing away at the keyboard she'd fallen asleep on top of. Her eyes briefly flickered over to the clock; 12:31. Sara had a sickening feeling she knew what the e-mail would say.
It was from Daniel, of course. Sadly, this did not dampen Sara's fears; rather, it practically confirmed them. Why else would Daniel be sending her an e-mail at half-past midnight?
Still, Sara held out hope. Perhaps it had nothing to do with that, perhaps Daniel had simply come up with a great idea for a layout and was sending it to Sara for creation. It was a stretch, but Sara clung to it like a rock.
But the first line, rather, first word of the e-mail crushed this hope. Sara moaned and put a hand to her forehead, wishing it hadn't come to this. She typed a three-worded reply and didn't even bother to turn off her monitor as she rose from her chair and shuffled into bed.
Her reply said "I knew it", and in the subject bar was the word "Re", followed by a colon and the title of the e-mail Sara had been awakened by.
That title was "War!"
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The war began in a very non-warlike way. "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's ("Sorcerer's" in America) Stone" came out. It became a best-seller. The fandom began to build itself up/
For a while, the big question, the topic of the war, was only mentioned in chatrooms and forums, politely and interestedly. It wasn't a common topic yet, but a nevertheless interesting one.
Around the time the second book, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets", came out, the topic had become quite popular. It was not hostile, or anything resembling a war yet, but it was common. And then the third book came out.
When "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" hit the shelves, the Harry Potter fandom began to show pre-war tendencies, noticed by several online fans. The fandom was beginning to break in two.
But when the first movie came out ("Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"), the war exploded. The Harry Potter world split.
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The war, in the eyes of those uninvolved, was insignificant. A waste of time. Foolish.
Dumb.
For you see, the war was very simple. It consisted only of this:
Which relationship was correct; Harry/Hermione or Hermione/Ron?