A/N: Why, hello there! And I am back with the second chapter!

Introduction: The Journey Begins

With a final heave, Harry pushed his trunk onto the bars and collapsed in the cushioned seat beside Ron. As always, he was bickering with the bushy-haired girl across from them.

"Honestly, Ron, Harry should be happy he wasn't expelled." Hermione shot Harry a pointed look. He rolled his eyes.

"Seriously? I thought I was going to be arrested!"

"Anyway," Ron began, rapidly changing the subject, "who d'you reckon that guy is?" He nodded towards the snoozing professor sitting in the carriage with them.

"Professor R.J. Lupin," Hermione replied without skipping a beat.

"What the—?" Ron spluttered. "You might be smart, Hermione, but there's no way you can know everything!"

"It's on his briefcase, Ron."

They sat in silence for a while, until Harry decided to bring up the subject that had been biting on the back of his mind for a while. "Hey, did you notice the new kids?"

"Huh? Oh yeah! Looks like they're in our year, but I haven't seen them before." Ron furrowed his brows in thought. Harry shrugged.

"I just kind of thought they looked weird."

"They—?" As if on cue, the carriage door burst open.

"I—" the boy panted, "you—wait—!"

He had light skin, with small single-lidded eyes and long hair that was black as slivers of lacquer, which was pulled off his forehead by a rubber band. The strangest thing that Harry noticed, though, was that his eyes also seemed to give off the same aura the green-eyed man had.

"Look. I'm sorry. I didn't realize you were in here," he began in slightly accented English. "I just—You know what, I'll be blunt, aru. There's this guy called Ivan, who's like this tall—" he held his hand a foot above his head "—and wants to crack my skull open with my bare hands. So if you see him looking for me, Yao, can you tell him I went the other way?" without waiting for an answer, the boy called, "Thank you, aru," and left, slamming the compartment door behind him.

"Um... that was... weird...?" The words were barely out of the girl's mouth when the glass pane slid open again.

"Hello there." It was the creepiest guy Harry had ever seen. He was really as tall as the lacquer-haired boy had described, almost two heads more than Harry, Ron, or Hermione. His scarf was wrapped tightly around his neck, and he wore a long coat that was dusty, like he hadn't taken it off it ages. Harry was seriously afraid to cross this person.

"Hello," squeaked Hermione, who looked like a mouse caught by a cat.

"Hello. I am Ivan." He pronounced it the Russian way. "I am looking for my Yao-Yao."

Ron gulped. Hermione stayed silent. Harry carefully parted his dry lips. "Um... we haven't seen him."

Ivan raised one eyebrow. Harry held his breath.

"Da. I understand." Then he was gone.

"Bloody hell," Ron whispered, "that has to be one of the scariest people I've ever met in this entire lifetime..."

Hermione nodded carefully. "Childish terror."

"He really did look like he could smash our skulls with one hand. No wonder that Yao guy was freaked out," Harry said. "Anyway, we should be almost there, right?"

Before Harry could reply, there was a loud shriek. "What's happening?" Hermione cried.

"Get your hands off me, you bastard!"

"But you're so cute..."

"Shut the hell up! You're drunk!"

"You're beautiful, Lovi..."

"DO YOU WANT ME TO MURDER YOU BASTARD—"

"Should we... go investigate?" Hermione asked.

"Let's not."

Silence fell upon them once again.

A/N: Yes, I know it's kind of rushed, but I tried. I'm hoping for some more inspiration, so review with some ideas — if I like them, I will definitely take you up on it hehe XD I don't know if this story will have pairings or anything like that, as I'm a bit of a multishipper lol and the ones that most people like tend to top my list of pairings I will not write, ever. But, that will be decided later. The nations in this story so far will be Japan, China, Russia, England, Austria, Hungary, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, S. Italy and Spain. I will probably add more later, though.

So leave some feedback, or even if you don't have any feedback! Any reviews are appreciated!

- Mikako