Hogwarts Express
Platform 9 and 3 quarters. What a quaint, yet ironic name for the place where students ride me to Hogwarts.
Sometimes I can't believe how ignorant and stupid those Muggles are who wander around the "normal" platforms. Students who are brave, loyal, smart, and cunning go through the magical wall to my platform so often every year, and every Muggle in the area turns two blind eyes to it. And when students and their parents talk about Platform 9 and 3 quarters out in the open, the oblivious Muggles also turn two deaf ears to it. Personally, I think that grouchy old Muggle conductor who works on the Muggle platforms is the sickest individual I've ever heard of, the way he callously insulted Harry Potter's curiosity when he first came to Hogwarts.
But enough of complaining about Muggles. It's my duty, at the beginning and the end of every school year, to shuttle students to Hogwarts for their studies in witchcraft and wizardry. Even with the stupid Muggles back in their world, I couldn't have asked for a better job. I can still remember the day I first awoke, when a Hufflepuff witch enchanted my engine, caboose, and wheels to come to life. Heaven, this is the life, and is it entertaining, listening to students talking to each other about magic, first years becoming acquainted, eating candy confections like Chocolate Frogs and collecting their collector cards. Helga Hufflepuff is my personal favorite; except for Albus Dumbledore, the passengers get more of her cards on board me than anyone else in Hogwarts history. I don't know why; I suppose I just have a thing for Hufflepuffs.
It's a pleasure choo-chooing through the forests separating the wizarding world from the Muggle world, even after it starts to change to the Forbidden Forest. To breathe the fresh air and observe the passing scenery is a joy which would move me to grief if someone denied it to me. And the centaurs are a splendid sight running through the trees, even when they're at their most dangerous (they never attack me, or my passengers).
No other enchanted machine in the wizarding world gets the pure happiness of being a transport for so many eager new minds and bodies, not even the Knight Bus. I get to carry so many at once, they don't get taken for a joy ride, and they have a good view, candy, and company to keep them busy. Nobody ever freaks out within my walls, and it's such a relief that I don't have to put up with any noise besides my own engine. Life is good for the world's only living freight train, Hogwarts Express.
I only hope the Dark wizards never succeed in destroying Hogwarts, because if they do, I'm out of a job, and possibly out of a life, too.