Disclaimer: If you recognize it, then it doesn't belong to me.
Three girls sat silently in their compartment as the train rumbled on towards London. They were perhaps fifteen or sixteen and the occasional stilted conversation between them revealed them to be more friends of convenience then of true liking.
The train itself seemed more subdued then was the wont of an enclosed space which held nearly three hundred teenagers for an extended period of time. The loudest noise, for once, was not the bangs and screams of mischievous and rambunctious wizarding youth, but the magically dulled chugging of the wheels beneath them and the occasional piercing scream of the whistle.
The girls in this particular compartment were absorbed in their own thoughts, having already changed out of their blue trimmed robes into muggle clothing of varying quality and fashion. One girl, dressed in comfortably worn jeans and a nice button down blouse stared out the window, her eyes flickering back and forth as she tried to follow the rapidly changing scenery. Another, dressed rather carelessly in a shapeless dress of an indeterminate shade (her shoes on the other hand were quality and well cared for), had taken out a rather large book on the rather stultifying topic of ethics in the field of medicinal potions (the current chapter was on the use of Unicorn parts scavenged or poached. She was dutifully slogging through it before her arrival at Kings Cross and the inevitable questions from her parents about her comprehension of their ever so thoughtful Christmas present).
The third girl was perhaps the most curious. She was not doing anything at all, as far as her companions could tell. She was sitting, perfectly straight, knees together, with her hands folded in her lap and her eyes pointed straight ahead at the compartment wall. Anyone who knew her particularly well would know that this meant her mind was working furiously towards some sort of thesis or conclusion. Unfortunately for her, her companions did not know her nearly well enough and had concluded early on in their acquaintance that she was extraordinarily odd, even for a Ravenclaw (a house which included the likes of Loony Lovegood for Merlin's sake). Fortunately for her, her so called "oddness" was a quiet one and she was intelligent enough that her roommates did not mind being friends with her. They had long since deduced that if they ignored her while she was being extremely odd, then she would eventually snap out of it and be somewhat normal again for a time.
Shortly before the train was due to pull into Kings Cross, she snapped out of it. The first signs were that her breathing returned to normal levels and she resumed blinking. The girl at the window was the first to notice and breathed a sigh of relief, her friend's weirdness had always given her the creepy-crawlys. The next signs were more physical, the slight relaxing of the shoulders, knees coming unclenched, and finally her head would fall from it's rigid, locked position on top of her neck and turn to face her companions.
"Dumbledore got what he deserved." The other two turned to look at her incredulously. The entire school was mourning the death of their beloved headmaster at the hands of the most hated Potions professor Hogwarts had ever seen.
"No, seriously." She continued earnestly. "If he hadn't been so blind to the truth, then he wouldn't have had to die. But he just kept meddling in things that didn't concern him. The wizarding world is starting to take back what is ours and he was stupid enough to get in the way of the inevitable."
"The inevitable?" Asked the first girl as she balled angry fists against the faded legs of her jeans. "What do you mean by that?"
"I mean, the magical community is finally starting to act to protect itself from the invasive species taking over our world. If we don't take action now, the muggles will overrun us like weeds and then where would we be? Our culture and magics lost forever! Far too many muggles know about us. The only way to protect our culture now is to cut the muggle scourge from our lives!" As this speech progressed, her voice climbed from its usual measured tones to passionate heights. The girl leaned forwards towards her companions, a tiny golden cross on a delicate chain falling from within her dress and glinting in the dying sunlight.
"That's crazy." The second girl interjected, nonplussed at this sudden turn of events.
"That's more than crazy!" The first girl exclaimed, far more . "That's bloody insane! Where on earth did you get such nut-job ideas?"
The third girl looked shocked at the attacks coming from people who she had assumed would agree with her. Wasn't that what friends were for, after all?
The compartment fell into a tense silence until the train finally pulled into King's Cross station and all three girls gratefully gathered their belongings and left the compartment without a word to each other.
Outside, the three girls turned to each other.
"I'll see you in September then?"
"I suppose so."
"Bye."
The third girl, whose name was Sophia, watched as her two companions disappeared into the crowd and the smoke. Fools. Obviously she needed friends with clearer vision.
As she turned in search of her mother, her eyes fell on the Parkinson family. She knew just who to turn to.
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