Sound of Silence chapter I

Sound of Silence chapter I

                                                                                Hello Darkness my old friend,

I've come to talk with you again.

Because a vision softly creeping,

Left it's seeds while I was sleeping.

And the vision that was  planted in my brain

Still remains...

Within sounds...of silence.

                                    -Simon & Garfunkel "Sound of Silence"

The boy that walked into the Great Hall was either unknown to her, or her sense of observation was gone.  Lily cocked her head to the side.  She scanned him over.  Tall, dark haired, pale skinned, with light eyes...and bandaged around both wrists.  Aïe, if that means what I think it does...But, no, she reasoned, that's a muggle thing.  A wizard would probably find a more reliable way of committing suicide.  The boy walked off and seated himself at the far end of the Gryffindor table.  A loner.  Well that's strange, I thought loners went to Slytherin. 

"Earth to Fire!"  Remus planted himself in front of her and waved his hand under her nose.  Then, imitating a very annoying stuardess voice, "Houston, we have a problem.  Your circuits are dead."

Lily put her hand up in irritation.  "That guy over there, is he new or something?"

"Hu?  Oh him.  Yeah, Dumbledore told the prefects this morning.  He's been home schooled his whole life.  He's in our grade."

She turned, and sat down.  "Did Dumbledore tell you..." her voice shrank to a whisper "...what happened to his wrists?"

Remus shrugged.  "No idea...Some mashed potatoes?"

"No.  Where's Sirius?"

Remus made a face.  "Don't know, don't care.  Look, if you're not going to have any mashed potatoes..."  Lily handed him the bowl.  She looked over to where the new boy was sitting.  "There's something strange about him..."

"Oh for God's sake Lily!  Are you sure you don't want any mashed potatoes?  They're really good."  Lily sighed in exasperation.  "Fuck the mashed potatoes, Remus!"  Remus stared at the bowl.  Lily grinned.  "Not literally."  Remus mumbled something unintelligible under his breath. 

"Have I been missing anything?" said a genial voice from behind.

"Well Moony, here, was just about to mess up that bowl of potatoes."  Lily collapsed on her plate, laughing.

"Is that so?"  Sirius was eyeing Remus in a particular way.  "Do you have an attraction towards mashed potatoes, old friend?"

Lily caught motion put of the corner of her eye.  The boy was leaving the hall.  She left a stuttering Remus and a grossed out Sirius to sort things out, and left in pursuit of him.

She caught him by the sleeve right outside the Hall.  "Hi, I'm Lily Evans, my nickname's fire.  I was curious, I've never seen you here."  She smiled, but the boy didn't return it.  He looked her up and down before replying "I'm James Potter."

"So, hum...Where you been before now."

"Home."

Ah.  An antisocial freak.  Wonderful.  "And..."

"And what?"  The boy frowned, looking vaguely annoyed.

"Well..." Lily spluttered "nice meeting you!"  She grabbed his hand and shook it, only realising her mistake when he winced and withdrew it.

"Oh, euh, sorry.  Accident?"

He smiled darkly.  "What do you think?"

"Right.  I'd better go, hum, classes, you know."  She walked away, embarrassed.

***

"So, who was that guy?" said Sirius as he plopped down next to Lily in potions, their first subject after lunch.

"Bleugh."

"Was he, uh, nice?"

"Bleugh."

"Er...Fire?"

"Bleugh."

"Oh, I get it!"  He put his finger in the air, and grinned.  "You've decided the only thing you would respond to any question was 'bleugh'!  Very amusing."  He chuckled to himself.

"Your intellect is dazzling."  Remus sat down behind them.  "So now what do you want, a hug or a dog biscuit?"

"From a guy who's attracted to potatoes, neither."

"Oh for Christ's sake!"  Remus buried his head in his hands.

Lily let her mind wander away from the squabbling boys.  She scanned the room for the boy, and found him sitting in one of the dark corners of the room.  Oh dear.  a REAL antisocial freak. 

"Evans!"  Lily looked up, bewildered.  Professor Teamhair (pronounced T'yower) had apparently started class.  "So," he said, shooting Lily a dark look, "Miss Evans will show us how to get started on our experiment.  How, miss Evans, would you alter lead to make gold."

"But, isn't that impossible?"  There was a dangerous glare in Teamhair's eyes.  "I mean," she faltered on "when the alchemists tried it, they ended up messing all this stuff u--"

"We will forgive miss Evans from coming from a close-minded muggle community," Teamhair cut in, "but not for failing to listen in class.  Detention, Evans.  See me after class."  Lily sat back down, cursing herself.

After she had arranged to meet with Professor Teamhair, Lily ran down the hallway to catch up with her friends.  Their next subject was Divination, and as much as Lily hated it, she wouldn't have missed today for the world.  they were going to experiment with clairvoyance, something Lily had been interested in for a long time.

She sat at her accustomed pouf, with some of her other friend, Taryn, Alpha and Omega.  Taryn was café-au-lait coloured, with blue-green eyes, and long wavy black hair.  Alpha and Omega (whose parents had a weird sense of humour) were identical twins.  They both had sand-blond hair, and large brown eyes. 

Professor Trelawney began in a drawling voice: "My dears, the moon has just aligned with Saturn, making it safe for me to transfer this knowledge to you.  My crystal ball has assured me that no horrible things will be happening to you this week, so you will be obliged to hand in all your homework in time.  I am sure no manticores will attack you tomorrow, or the day after, so I'll be assigning something to each and everyone of you at the end of class."  At this, she stared hard at Remus and Sirius, who had a knack for coming up with life-threatening episodes which would happen to them the minute they laid foot out of Divination to get out of homework.  And it usually succeeded, too, except that Prof. Trelawney had seen right through the last one, and was now watching the two boys, and indeed anyone who thought of imitating them, very carefully.

"Clairvoyance, or Necromancy," she started again, "is the art of predicting the future.  You must have a very good aura in order to do this--"  several snorts resounded in the dungeon "--and you must listen to me carefully."  she swivelled around, in what was apparently a desperate attempt to look mystic, but ended up on her rear in the middle of the room.  laughter echoed throughout the room, making her flush bright red.  She got up and went on with the lesson, however.

"We will start with natural prediction.  For this you must connect with the earth.  only if you and mother nature are one will she divulge her secrets to you.  This is called a 'connection'.  You will know when you have connected, but supreme concentration is needed to accomplish it."  She sat on one of the poufs, in the Buddha position, and stayed absolutely still for the rest of the class, while the students goofed off.  Near the end though, they were interrupted when James Potter stood up and said:  "I'm sorry to disagree with you, professor, but that's not how it's done."  Trelawney looked up and blinked at him.  "I beg you r pardon, dear?" 

"That's not how it's done." repeated the boy.  Then, more cautiously, "you know who I am, don't you?"

"Can't fathom that, dearie."

"And she call's herself a psychic." whispered Remus.

"I'm the Potter boy."

Prof. Trelawney's lips moved, but no sound came out.

"She said 'The Necromancer'."  Remus turned on his chair to face Sirius.  "You lip read?  I never knew that!", but Sirius motioned him to shut up.

Trelawney stared at the boy some more, and whispered, "Well, my boy, you're more adept than me at this.  You're excused from class."

"Thank you." and James rounded up his things and left.

***

Lily fell on her bed and drew the curtains closed.  She did not wish to participated in the fourth year gossip her friends staged each night, before going to bed.  The needed time to sort the weird things that had happened today.  She was still curious about the boy, and is wrists, and while she was thinking about it, she became very dizzy .  She lay down a bit, wondering what had just come over her, and feeling considerably more light-headed than was comfortable, when she heard a voice in her head.

Anyone getting this?

Good lord.  What's happening to me?

Hey.  Who are you?

Lily Evans, who wants to know, and how the hell did you get into my thoughts?

Lily...Oh, right.  You're that redhead.

Who are you?

Why is that important?

Why is tha--Bloody hell, you've infiltrated my brain, wonder how you did it, too, and you're asking my why your identity is important!

Whoa!  Don't get mad.  It's James.

How are you--

Communicating with you?  Telepathy.

Eh?

You know, mind to mind liaisons.  I'm a Necromancer, you know, a psychic.  I do those things.

Oh...and you can do that to anybody?

Anyone with a brain.

That's hum...comforting.  Can you hear all my thoughts?

No, just the main one--that's your replies.

Wew.

I'm laughing.

...

And you are to.

How d'you know?

I hear your main thoughts, remember.

Why d'you pick me?

I didn't.  You just responded to the call.  Maybe you're important to me somehow.  Okay, I need to leave now.  Goodnight.

Goodnight.

****************************************************************

End of part one.  Let me explain for this weird version of the Lily/James saga:  I still haven't found anywhere in the book a passage saying that James, or Lily, for that matter came to Hogwarts in their first year.  Rowling implies it, but she does not state it.  The only rule that I had to follow in this was that he and his friends managed to become Animagi at the end of their fifth year.  Therefore, I had to leave time for James to make friends, and to start in the Animagi busyness.  I know it's weird, but I decided that this Lily and James fic would have nothing to do with the classical love/hate version.  Review this, please, and tell me what you think.  Suggestions more than welcome.  This will hopefully be the first in a series.

Dependably yours,

              -Mordor