After her name was called out, Hermione walked over to the stool as Professor McGonagall put the hat over her head. For a few seconds, nothing really happened, and Hermione thought that the hat might be broken. Everyone before her had placed the hat on their head and had immediately been sorted, though maybe there was something more that she should worry about this. As she continued to think, she noticed that the top of her head was getting rather warm.
*Pant* *Pant*
Then she heard the sounds of something panting next to her ear. She looked around to see if she could find the source of the panting, but when she looked next to her all she saw was Professor McGonagall staring off into space. In fact, the whole room had suddenly gone silent for some reason, they were just staring at her with cold eyes.
*Sluuurp*
Suddenly drool began to pool on her hair and she recoiled in disgust. She tried to pull the hat off her head, but it seemed as if it was stuck.
"That won't work on me little missy," The hat began to speak, "I've got myself stuck real tight on your head."
"Wh-who, what are you doing, get off me!" Hermione shouted as she tugged even harder at the hat.
"I've already told you, that doesn't work, kids these days rarely listen." The hat sighed as it enjoyed watching her struggle. "Besides why would I get off such a tasty treat?"
"A tasty treat?"
"Why yes dear Hermione, you see I'm after the thing that's inside your skull," the hat said, "I find that childrens' brains are an excellent delicacy."
"You can't just eat my brain!" Hermione shouted.
"Why not?" The hat asked, "I've already made the hard work to get to this point, might as welll get my compensation."
"Oh and don't worry, this will only hurt for a few minutes."
A sharp force plunged its way into her skull, and pain racked every bit of her body.
"Ahhhghhh!" Hermione screamed out in pain, tears pooling down her eyes as the hat pushed its teeth further down her skull. After minutes of agonizing pain, the hat lifted the top of her skull up and spat it out from the mouth in the front of the hat.
"And now time for the desert..." The hat said before breaking out into insane laughter...
"…well you certainly have an... unique imagination." the sorting hat said as it seemed to be at a loss for words, "But I assure you I would never harm a student, that goes against what I was designed for."
Hermione snapped out of her simulation and cleared her mind. All those horror movies her uncle had showed her when she was growing up must have attributed to the failure of her simulation. It seemed to come straight out of a bad horror movie which focused on gore and cheesy effects.
"Ahem...so to get back on track," The hat said, "I think the house that's right for you is..."
"GRYFFINDOR!"
Hermione tried not to let disappointment show on her face, she had wanted to end up in Ravenclaw, but before she could protest the hat was taken off her head. After that she vaguely paid attention to the other students who were sorted, though her interest was raised when Harry Potter was sorted into Gryffindor, and then the headmaster gave some rather weird speech about how the forbidden forest was forbidden and the third corridor floor was forbidden on cause of death. He topped it off by saying random things before the feast began, and after that she went straight to the girl's dormitory and fell asleep.
After a few months of theory classes, Hermione woke up and went to her first class that would allow them to actually practice magic, Transfiguration. She really liked Professor McGonagall after the demonstration she had showed her at her home. The demonstration she gave today, transfiguring a desk into a pig and transforming herself into a cat had piqued her interests. Then they were told to transform a matchstick into a needle, which Hermione felt like was a good challenge for her. Unlike the rest of the idiots here, she had actually practiced non-stop after she had been told she was a witch, she'd even practically memorized her transfiguration book.
It should be easy for her to do it, but maybe she should run a simulation just to be sure things will work out...or not.
It turned out that transforming a matchstick into a needle and then back again was rather easy. In fact, she hardly had to try at all, and the approving look she got from Professor McGonagall made things feel pretty good for her. The fact that she was the first one to manage to do it also helped to improve her mood, especially when she saw how they struggled with managing to manipulate the piece of wood at all. Really, it was kind of pathetic, did they even open one of their books before they got to class? Class ended soon after that, and about half of the class had managed to turn their matchsticks into needles and the other half hadn't even come close to that.
After that she had gone to her other classes for the day before heading up to the common room She said the password to the painting and sighed as she heard a few girls giggling to themselves as they looked down at a magazine.
"Isn't he so cute Parvati?" One of the girls asked the other one who was apparently named Padma, "I loved his book, Werewolves and me, so much."
"Yeah I loved it too Lavender!" Parvati said, "Especially at that one part where he wrestled with the werewolf with his bare hands!"
"Isn't Lockheart the best?!"
Hermione scoffed as she went up to her room, they were talking about the cuteness of some author while they could be studying. She never got the appeal of that kind of stuff, though if you were a moron she could tell that you would enjoy that kind of stuff. Apparently, Paravti heard Hermione scoff at them and lowered her voice to whisper something to Lavender who laughed. Hermione then went to her bed and looked around to see if anyone was looking before sliding out a thick book from underneath her pillow. Its cover showed a red haired girl drawn in a pastel style standing in front of a giant robot that loomed over her.
The name of the book was, New Age Fundum Wing, it was about a girl who was fighting against the earth who oppressed those who lived out in space colonies, with her robot, Fundum Wing. Many people had called it some pretty girl mecha anime that went against the original Fundum Wing's ideals, but those people clearly didn't understand the complex politics and themes that were included in the manga. To Hermione, unlike the other trashy manga out there, the Fundum series was a well thought out work created by genius minds. All you had to do was look past the art style to see something truly wondrous in the manga.
Hermione read the book well into the night...
.
.
.
Cold...the cold was all they could feel nowadays. The warmth that they had once had was gone, replaced by something entirely different. They squinted their eyes as they shuffled along Diagon Alley, ignoring the looks they got from the people that past them. Flies buzzed angerly at them was they idly swat them away from their body. People wrinkled their nose at them as they walked by, they were put off by the stench that followed them as they continued to walk. They had to drag their left leg on the ground, they couldn't even feel if it was there or not anymore, but still they continued to push forward. They were determined not to let anything distract them, all of their efforts would be put towards reaching their goal.
A woman saw their face and recoiled in shock, backing away into a worker who was fixing tiles on a roof. The man ended up dropping the tile on the ground, causing it to shatter into red pieces that stuck into his foot. As the man screamed out in pain, and the people began to panic, they ignored all of it.
And just kept walking...
