The next day Ness discovered something, that he could still be surprised and somewhat caught off guard, normally this would be an odd thing to discover since every human being was caught off guard or surprised at some point, but Ness had fought zombies, living piles of barf, signs, Happy-Happy cultist, statues, marshmallows and even magic snails.
So the shock of something unexplained happening had dulled a lot for him, which made the discovery of a secret walk through wall that lead to a steam red train engine with a bunch of the kids carrying trunks, owls and even straw brooms. All Ness did was climb on board the train, focusing on the sinking feeling that he was indeed a wizard despite having PSI powers.
"Fancy." Ness mumbled as he found an empty train car and placed his suitcase on the luggage rack, "I guess everything fancy when you're a wizard though." He realized, "I wonder how they treat heroes…"
Probably not well considering how Mrs. Weasly had referred to him during that argument last night, as a goofy comic strip. Wait, how did they even know about his crazy adventure? He lived in America! And as far as he knew, no one was from Europe, or any different country.
Ness frowned and looked outside the stationary window, watching the good-byes and eager students climb onto the train. Was this what Jeff did every time school started? Only with a jet-pack just to seem cool? Although that was probably normal for his school since it sounded like a private school for geniuses.
Ness sighed and leaned back into the puffy chair, wondering how badly he was going to screw up since he didn't know any magic. "Eh, I'll probably figure something out." Ness decided pushing the problem to the back of his mind and focusing on something more important. Like what to do with the two people who entered his train car.
Or, one person since he knew Ginny who was standing beside a nervous looking boy carrying a toad. He was tempted to ask if the toad knew how to record people's adventures when Ginny said, "Hello again!"
"Hello again for the third time." Ness teased, "Who's your friend?" the boy looked up and said, "Neville Longbottom, 3rd year. And this is my frog, Trevor." Trevor slowly blinked at Ness before resuming staring into space, "Who are you?"
"Ness Earthbound, second year." Ness said, putting air quotation marks around second year, "Apparently I've been a wizard all my life and just learned about it."
"So you were magically delayed?" Nevile asked a hopeful smile on his slightly pudgy face, "Uh… No?" Ness said as Ginny sat down on the other couch and gestured for Nevile to do the same, "What Nevile means is that you didn't discover your magic abilities until last year."
When Ness still didn't get it Neville tried again, "My family though I was a squib until my uncle dropped me down a hill. I bounced the entire way down without a scratch!"
Ness felt his stomach twist at the mental image of Neville bouncing down a hill and tried to change the topic, "What's a squib?"
"A person whose born into a magically family with no magic." Ginny explained, "It's quite rare since their muggles from a Qizarding blood line."
Muggles? Bloodlines? Since when did being a wizard seem so complicated? Ness figured that being magically was a big deal. But to have different species names for a single object? It reminded him of all of Giygas's soldiers!
"Nice to know that Wizards can keep it simple." Ness grumbled, "So, what house are you in?" Neville asked trying to keep the conversation afloat.
Ginny nervously bit her lip as Ness bluntly said, "Gryffindor apparently whatever that is."
Neville's eyes widen for a second as the train lurched to life and pulled out of the station, "Yea, I know it's weird." Ness said once he had recovered from nearly getting thrown out of his seat. Perhaps leaning forward wasn't a good idea…
"But last month I got a letter claiming that I was a wizard."
"You mean… you aren't?" Neville asked while Ginny frowned and said, "But, you are a wizard. Right? I mean, you got into Diagon Alley and no one threw a fit about you being their if you're a muggle."
Ness frowned and adjusted his cap, "But I'm not, I mean, magic is magic right? I was just born with PSI abilities."
"PSI?" Neville questioned then his eyes widen again, "Now I know where I've heard your name before! You were in the side stories of the Daily Prophet!"
Ness rolled his eyes and said, "Yup, I'm the side show known as Ness. Nice to meet you." Neville cringed slightly and hurried to fix his mistake, "Err, sorry. Gran told me not to think too much of it since it seemed to… unbelievable."
"Eh, Don't worry about it." Ness said, "I never believed in wizards. And I still sort of don't, so we're even." He glanced out the window and frowned at the darkening scenery.
"So, you, err.. Poo, Paula and Jeff were all fighting living objects and brainwashed people to defeat the alien?" Ginny asked.
"Yup." Ness said, he leaned back in surprise at the awestruck gazes he was getting from Ginny and Neville, "Wow! So that little village of Mr. Saturns, it exists?"
"Yup, and their super weird." Ness said, remembering the odd conversations he had with the tiny little people. They spent most of the train ride chatting about what to expect from Hogwarts and about Ness's adventure.
It was going great until a witch pushing around an odd cart of food arrived, it wasn't the cart itself that was odd. It was the food on the cart, a packet of mutli colored beans, a pumpkin like cake that reminded Ness of a sponge cake and chocolate frogs which sent a shiver down his spine as he remembered the many helpful frogs he had meet on his adventure.
Ginny bought a pumpkin cake while Neville bought a packet of the multi colored beans. Ness merely stuck to his mini steak sandwich. While they ate Ness payed close attention to the weather feeling a nagging feeling that he was about to get into a fight with some otherworldly being.
And the gloomy storm clouds that were attempting to rain weren't helping Ness ease that feeling. "Wait, you perform PSI with your mind, right?" Ginny questioned once their lunches had been finished, Ness nodded, "Yea. I can perform PSI silently or aloud. Lately it's been aloud since I discovered that it's a good idea to call out what your about to do in case someone's trying to do the same thing."
"But, you had to buy a wand. Right?"
Ness nodded again and pulled out his plain oak wand, "I'm reeeaaaalllly hoping that I don't have to use it to much." Ness admitted, "Since I practically sent the wand store owner into a coma when I tried to use a basic PSI attack."
Neville's eyes widen while Ginny grimaced, "…I'm going to have to use this dumb thing for pretty much everything." Ness deadpanned, they nodded.
"Welp, a lot of people are going to hurt if they decided to let me stay." Ness joked.
"Honestly, compared to last year, that would be a good thing." Ginny muttered, Neville nodded in agreement, "Honestly… I hope we don't have any more secret chambers."
"Secret Chambers?" Ness asked perking up slightly, "Did you guys find treasure?" Ginny opened her mouth to answer when the train slowed to a stop, "Uh… Are we there?" Ness asked, Ginny frowned and looked out the window, "No… We still have another hour to go." Neville said.
"Wait, I think I see some people outside." Ginny said frowning slightly, "Maybe it's the new Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher?" Neville offered.
Ginny shook her head no, "I think he got on-board with us…" she stood up and unpacked her school robe, "Come on, let's try and find Ron, he might know something." Neville nodded in agreement and grabbed his school robe, Ness reluctantly did the same and shivered at the coarse yet surprisingly comfortable fabric.
They stepped outside and walked past the open car doors as other students poked their heads out, trying to figure out what was going on. "So uh… Does anyone know where Ron's car is or—," Ness's question was abruptly cut off as the lights turned off, plunging the entire train into darkness.
"Bother." Neville muttered as they bumped into Ginny. Ness blinked a couple times before he felt his eyes adjust to the darkness, "Come on, I can see again." Ness said grabbing Ginny and Neville's hands and leading them toward the only closed door in the hallway, "Is that one of your PSI powers?" Ginny asked.
"Nah, I'm just used to dark places, so my eyes adjust a bit faster than most." Ness replied he paused and pushed open the closed door, "Yello? Anyone there?" Ginny and Neville stepped inside and quickly tripped over someone who yelped in pain and hissed, "That's my foot!" earning two embarrassed "Sorry!" from Ginny and Neville. Ness carefully stepped inside and closed the door behind him as his new friends stumbled over Harry, Ron and Hermione in the process of finding somewhere to sit.
Ness tried to take a step forward and quickly stepped on someone's foot, "Sorry!" Ness hissed as he changed direction and tripped over his feet, landing on furry object which quickly turned into an angry cat, Ness smothered a yell of pain as he rolled away and said, "Who the heck brings a cat to a private school!?"
"Well, I couldn't just leave the poor thing at home." Hermione, Ness guessed said sounding a bit cross about answering the question, "You mean that furry monster?" Ron asked, Ness stifled a laugh as Hermione swiftly jabbed Ron with her elbow.
"Err, right, d'you know what's going on?" Neville asked.
"No, Ron thinks the train broke down." Harry said, Ness heard squeaking and saw Ron's outline as he approached the window, "Wait, I think people are getting on."
"Are the same people from before? Since Ginny saw some guys when the train first stopped." Ness asked, he tried to approach the window to see for himself but only succeeded in bumping into Ginny and back onto the cat, "Alright seriously?! Who leaves an angry cat on the floor?!" Ness demanded.
"Quiet." A hoarse voice said, causing everyone to jump as the voice was quickly followed by a soft crackling noise before a small light appeared, illuminating a man with a tired gray face and alert eyes.
"Stay where you are." The man ordered as he carefully made his way to the door, but before the man could open the door, it slid open on its own.
Ness felt an old trickle of danger as the faint light revealed a figure wearing a dark cloak with a long hood, hiding its face. It drew a long withering slow breath, as if it was trying to suck the last of a milkshake with a bad straw. Its presence seemed to send the room to fridge temperature as the cold seemed to smoother his lungs.
And judging by the startled gasps behind him, everyone else had felt that thing cold. It reminded him of Giygas only much, much, more depressing.
Was this a monster? Like an actual Monster they had to defeat or did—a soft thud disrupted Ness's train of thought as Harry slipped out of his seat and landed onto the carpeted floor, his eyes were pure white and he seemed to be shivering intently.
"Harry?" Ness said, although the cold made it hard to speak, was this monster doing this? Probably since they all started feeling cold the moment it stepped inside the door-frame.
So the best way to get rid of this cold freak would be with fire, a power he barely knew since Paula could control fire. Sure, she had been showing him how to use the easiest level of fire attacks but Ness couldn't really get it. Paula had said to think of a warmth appearing in his heart and build up from that until it felt ready to explode.
"Well, here goes nothing." Ness thought as he pictured a small flame in his mind, slowly growing bigger and warmer. He barely heard the man say something to the monster, he just focused on the mental image of fire slowly leaving his mind and toward the monster setting it aflame and disrupting whatever spell it had cast on Harry.
"Please work." Ness begged as he finally released the flame and looked up at the monster, in a spilt second, two things happened. The first thing was that the monster stumbled back with a raspy yelp of pain as flames flew past it, the second thing was the man raised his wand and muttered something, sending a wisp of white smoke toward it.
Which sent the monster fleeing, taking its cold presence with him. The man lowered his wand and slowly looked around, "Is everyone okay?"
"I'm good, wide awake actually." Ness feebly joked feeling the cold evaporate from his lungs, allowing him to breath properly, "But, is Harry okay?" Hermione asked, the man looked at Harry before he nodded, "He'll be fine once he wakes up— here, try this." He opened his truck and pulled out chocolate frogs giving them a piece.
"It will warm you up." The man explained when Ness and Ginny gave him questioning looks. Ness put the frog in his pocket and smiled, "Nah, I'm good."
"Are you sure?" the man asked surprised by Ness's casual answer. "Totally, I felt better once that creepo monster left."
"What was that?" Neville asked once he had taken a bite out of his frog, "A Demontor." The man started, "A terrible monster that guards the Prison of Azkaban."
"Azakaban…." Ness repeated, the name sounding vaguely familiar. But he couldn't place where he heard it before. He didn't have long to question it as the train lurched back to life.
"Professor," Hermione started, "Why did you set the Demontor on fire?" So this tired looking man was a teacher? Ness had figured he was just a chaperon.
"I'm not too sure myself Hermione." The Professor admitted although Ness caught a brief glance in his direction, "Perhaps we were just lucky." Ginny shakily nodded in agreement and hugged her knees. Ness frowned and placed a comforter arm on her shoulder, "Hey, it's okay, that demented monster isn't going to come back." He glared at the cat and added, "The only we have to worry about, it monstro the cat over the there."
"Ah-ha! I'm not the only one who thinks that cat is evil!" Ron exclaimed earning a dirty look from Hermione. "Honestly! Crookshanks is an angle!" Hermione argued as the Professor summoned a lantern and lit it, brightening up the car.
"Oh right, an adorable little blood thirsty angle." Ness joked earning a weak chuckle from Ginny and a muffled hoot of laughter from Ron. Hermione threw her hands up and went to pet her demon cat.
The last hour of the train went along smoothly, Ness left the car for a couple minutes to check his luggage, wanting to ensure that he didn't get robbed on the way to this fancy pancy school place (Although, he wasn't sure if he would even like it if they had more freakshows running around.) and came back to find a startled Harry.
He had missed most of the exchange but judging by Harry's light pink cheeks he was thoroughly embarrassed about fainting, and then falling to the ground. Ness decided to be polite and not question why Harry had fainted in the first place.
Exactly ten minutes later Ness found himself outside on a train platform with his luggage and getting shunted toward a long line of horse drawn carriages, "Firs' years this way!" a voice yelled. Ness looked toward the source and blinked in surprise at the small giant waving over first years.
"Huh…" Ness said as he was dragged away from the small giant, "I think I've been caught off guard. Cool…"
"Ness! Over here!" Ginny yelled, "We have a carriage ready!" Ness whistled and walked toward the impressive yet old wooden carriage, "Wow, you wizards really love old fashion tech." Ness noted as he climbed inside and got a whiff of old wood and hay.
"Careful," a dreamy voice with an aura of being in a permanent dream warned, "Their might be woodlie burrowers in your seat." Ness jumped up and looked at girl with practically sliver blond hair and grey eyes, "What are those?" Ness asked.
"Little creatures that eat the wood underneath the carriages." The girl explained.
"Oh, so like tiny termites?"
"I suppose, only there much more dangerous."
Ginny smiled and introduced the girl sitting next to Neville, "This is Luna Lovegood she's in Ravenclaw, her father runs the Quibbiler." Ness nodded hello and opened his mouth to introduce himself but Luna cut him off, "You're Ness Earthbound, one of the four heroes who saved Onett from Giygas, the PSI alien."
"I'm guessing you read about me?" Ness asked, Luna eagerly nodded, "Of course! Your adventure was amazing! Especially when you and Paula were fighting off the Happy cultist."
"Cultist?" Neville questioned, "You fought cultist?" Ness nodded remembering the eerily blue happy people who were under the control of a Mani-Mani statue. "He also fought zombies, living piles of barf and sign posts." Luna interjected.
Neville whistle in amazement while Ginny frowned, as if remembering something, "Ness, did you do anything to that Demontor on the train?" Ginny asked.
"Yea, I wasn't going to let it hurt Harry or anyone else, so I tried to use Fire." Ness explained, Luna oohed in amazement and asked, "I thought only Paula could use Fire?"
"She can, but we've been trying to see if we can learn other PSI attacks, so she showed me fire, and I showed her how to use Flash."
"What does Flash do?" Neville asked.
"It's a huge flash attack that make a monster cry uncontrollable or feel strange." Ness explained, he adjusted his hat and looked around, the carriages were in a single line, marching up a long dirt road at a moderate pace.
"So what I am to except from Hogwarts? Besides wizards and random brooms."
"Well, for second year students we have Defense against the Dark Arts, Potions with Professor Snape, who hates Gryffindors', Transfiguration, History of Magic, Herobology, Astronomy, Charms and Flying." Ginny said rattling off the classes with ease.
Ness sighed in disbelief at all the things he would have to remember. Well, at least Astroamany was one of Ness's core interests. He had started star gazing after he had stopped Giygas and to pay respect to the time traveling bug creature that had came to warn him of the upcoming disasters.
"It's no wonder why you were put in Gryffindor." Ginny said, "I don't think anyone else could handle an adventure like that."
"Speaking of houses, what's the difference between them?" Ness asked.
"Well, Gryffindor's main traits is that everyone is brave and heroic like you, Ravenclaw are smart and creative, Hufflepuff are caring and basically want to be friends with everyone, and Slytherin are cunning purebloods." Neville explained, "No one likes Slytherin, their house has a reputation of having Dark Wizards."
"Dark wizards? Like bad guys? Or people just interested in the dark arts?" Ness questioned, Ginny thought for a moment before she whispered, "Bad guys basically, You-Know-who was from there, and he attempted to do a mass genocide on Muggleborns and muggles."
Ness cringed as Luna casually reassured him with, "But don't worry, he died when he tried to kill Harry Potter. So he's no longer a threat."
"Well that's nice to know." Ness said, "But why is his name You Know Who? Sounds pretty dumb if you ask me."
Ginny and Neville flinched as Luna uneasily clarified, "Well, that's because his real name is Voldemort. Everyone just calls him you know who."
Ness frowned since being afraid of a dead dude's name seemed a bit dumb, "But Voldemort's dead, and has been dead for ages right? So why are you afraid of his dumb name?"
"I dunno." Ginny admitted, "It just feels, odd. I mean, I was born after V-voldemort died but."
"But it still scary knowing that a person like him existed." Ness deadpanned. Luna nodded in agreement saying, "He was a scary person, but now we should really be worried about the Three horned Bervorius." Before anyone could ask what the heck a Three Horned Bervorius was the carriage stopped.
Singling that they had reached the school. Ness climbed out and felt a wave of awe pass over him as he looked up at a giant medieval castle with a stone bridge leading toward a giant wooden door.
"This is Hogwarts?" Ness asked, wondering if he had been magically teleported back to the Cave of Past and transported to the age of knights and wizards. Luna gave a dreamy laugh as Ginny nudged him forward, "I thought it would be a school building not a giant castle!" Ness exclaimed as he clumsily got his legs to work.
"A giant castle with trick stairs, living paintings, ghosts, living suits of armor and a living hat." Neville added.
"Trick stairs? Do you have to answer a riddle to climb up them?"
Ginny shook her head no and tried to explain, "Their fake steps that will get your leg stuck if you aren't careful."
"Isn't that dangerous?!"
"No, the most dangerous thing about this place is the Whomping Willow." Luna explained, "We have a giant squid in the lake but he's mostly harmless."
"Mostly?" Ness repeated, Luna and Ginny nodded and entered the castle which had a marble floor, four huge hourglasses with a gold animal decorating one of the four hourglasses and random suits of armor.
For a school, this place felt weirder than Onett, which Ness found nearly impossible to happen given how weird it was on a daily basis. Although now that he thought about it, Onett was more quirky than weird…
"Excuse me." Ness looked up and jumped at the sight of a man with ginger brown hair pulled into a ponytail wearing a midnight blue robe with sliver stars. He reminded Ness of those cartoon wizards and of Merlin who was depicted wearing a similar outfit.
"You're Ness Earthbound, right?" the man asked. Ness nodded and spotted Ginny and Luna heading toward another grand wooden door with other students in red, purple, yellow and green robes.
"That's my name, don't wear it out." Ness joked, "So uh, could I help you?"
"Err… Yes, I'm supposed to talk to you about something…" the man said, looking really uncomfortable with what he had to say, "Cool… So who are you?" Ness asked a teasing smile slowly forming, "The lord of stars?"
The man chuckled and said, "I suppose so, I'm Professor Kale, I teach Astronomy on the highest tower." He made a follow me gesture and walked up a flight of stairs, "So, are we heading to said tower?" Ness asked as they entered a spiral staircase, "No, we are heading to my office."
"Which is where?"
"On the Astronomy tow—," Professor Kale paused and corrected himself, "We are going to said tower since that is where my office is."
"Wow, nice to you have a place so close to the rest of the castle." Ness joked, Proffessor Kale paused then resumed walking, "That was sarcasm, right?"
"Yup. Sarcasm."
"…One of these days I shall learn that method."
"Okaaay then."
"Here we are!" Professor Kale announced opening a faded wood door that revealed a roof with four colored mats and pillows. It was a pretty big section of roof since the four mats had easily taken up a corner of the roof while still leaving space for telescopes, books and a small section to be roped off.
"Wow…" Ness breathed looking up at the starry sky in awe as he easily saw the Big Dipper and a consulate of a giant bear, "Beautiful… right?" Professor Kale asked.
"Amazing… It feels like I can touch the moon from here." Ness replied half following Professor Kale toward a bean bag and a small wooden table with the solar system carved into it.
"So pretty starry night aside, why did I get called up here?" Ness asked.
"Dumbledore—the headmaster—wanted me to enlighten you on how Hogwarts works/ catch you up to speed since you're our first transfer student to skip a year in about oh… a couple years." Professor Kale explained, "Also to give you this."
Ness carefully took the creamy envelop and opened it, reading the letter inside,
"To Ness Earthbound, as we have mention before, you are a second year student and are in the Gryffindor house due to your heroic actions and courages deeds. As to why you are now a wizard, we believe it is because of your late magic abilities which you have used in your adventure. Young wizards like you require proper training and—,"
Ness stopped reading at point, feeling annoyed at how formal and unhelpful it was. Professor Kale seemed to share the same feeling since he said, "I know, unhelpful as usual. It's a letter from the school board district attempting to give you a proper welcome at Britain's best wizarding school."
"Well their doing a terrible job at it." Ness grumbled sitting down in a comet decorated bean-bag chair and accepting a cup of milk tea, "I just wanna know why I'm here and not a first year. I know nothing about this place or magic!"
Professor Kale raised an eyebrow in surprise but didn't question it, instead he changed the topic, "So any other questions?"
"Well, where were all the students heading too?" Ness asked.
"The Start of Term feast." Professor Kale explained, "It's basically a way to introduce the new teachers, students that are sorted by the Sorting Hat and important announcements for the school year."
"Important announcements?"
"Yes, like the fact that we have Demontors guarding the school in hopes of catching Sirus Black. Be warned, they won't hesitate to try and attack you if they sense that you mean harm."
"Wow, this is the best school ever." Ness said earning a surprised gasp from Professor Kale, "Sarcarm."
"Oh. Right." Professor Kale cleared his throat and looked up into the stars. "The Moon's awfully close the Mars again…" Professor Kale noticed in a dreamy voice.
"Doesn't that mean disaster in some cases?" Ness asked, Professor Kale nodded and sighed, "Looks like we're going to have an eventful year again."
"Again? I'm guessing that eventful isn't normal?"
"Well, it is eventful in some cases, but what I meant is eventfully dangerous, like last year where students were turned into stone by some giant snake."
"That doesn't sound fun."
"It was awful especially since it was going after Muggle Born, I happily hid up here and read the stars for warnings of danger."
"And do they tell you anything?"
"Depends. Sometimes they warn of accidents, other times they give a happy comment and other times there just silent."
"Must be nice up here, with only the stars and mother nature around you."
"It is… Is is…"
They stopped talking and admired the stars which seemed to glow brighter after a while. Of course, their quiet peace was interrupted by a witch with graying hair, "Sol, is Ness Earthbound still with you?" the witch asked, Professor Kale didn't seem to hear her so Ness waved hello.
"Sol, the feast has ended." The witch said loudly jolting Professor Kale back to earth, "Ended— what?!" Professor Kale spluttered, "Ah I uh—we were—,"
"Viewing the stars and losing track of time." The witch deadpanned seeming very annoyed with Professor Kale, "Yes! Exactly! We even spotted Mars in front of the—,"
"Sol, my student."
Professor Kale trailed off and cleared his throat, "Err, right. Ness, this is Professor McGonagall. She's the head of Gryffindor and she teaches Transfiguration."
"Nice to meet you." Ness said. Professor McGonagall nodded in agreement and turned to leave, "See ya later Professor Kale!" Ness yelled as he followed her down the tower, "Right! We have class this Wednesday at—wait, was that a shooting star…?"
Ness stifled a laugh as Professor Kale cut himself off to look for the shooting star, for a teacher, he sure was relaxed about his subject. And passionate.
"So… Anything important to know about Gryffindor?" Ness asked once they reentered the warm stone hallway, "The only thing I can think of is the password," Professor McGonagall said, "Which at the moment is, Fortuna Major."
"Why do we need passwords?" Ness asked as he skipped a couple stairs to catch up, "I mean, it's not like anyone's going to perform any nasty pranks."
"You'd be surprise, after all. All the houses have some secret method of entering so only students of that house can enter."
Ness had nothing to say to that, so he kept his mouth shut as they approached a painting of a sleeping fat lady, the painting seemed out of place since it was the only thing in the wing that was decoration.
"Fortuna Major." Professor McGonagall said, the Fat Lady strried slightly and the painting swung open, revealing a square entrance big enough to allow three people to step inside without any trouble.
"This is your common room." Professor McGonagall said, "Good night, I except you to be up bright and early for class tomorrow."
"Right, good night." Ness said stepping inside and walking into a red and gold decorated room with comfy armchairs next to a fire place.
There were two stairways, probably the rooms for his housemates to sleep in. Housemates… It seemed like such an odd term. And extremely fancy.
Still, he climbed the stairs that had a dark red curtain draped to the side hoping that it was the guys side, inside the small stairway was seven other pathways, with the numbers 1-7 glowing faintly in the door way.
"Well…" Ness muttered, "Looks like I'm number two for a change." He stepped inside second year door which lead to a round room with servel four poster beds with red and gold starred curtains with large wooden trunks in front of the foot of each bed.
Ness was revealed to see his dark blue suitcase at the foot of the very last bed. He thought he had lost it at the train. Which would have been a great way to start of the first day at a new school.
Climbing into bed with his favorite striped pajamas, Ness fell asleep.
"So you're Ness EarthBound?" someone asked sounding amazed by Ness's mere presence as he followed Ginny toward the Great Hall for breakfast, "Yup, that's my name, don't wear it out." Ness said as he jumped over what might have been a fake stair,
"Wow!" a stocky girl with blonde hair exclaim, "So we have two heroes in Gryffindor!" a boy with thick chestnut hair and an Irish accent smirked and exclaimed, "Now we're definitely one up over Slytherin!"
"Err… Great?" Ness said as his small group of fans disappeared to join friends for breakfast. "So where's Luna?" Ness asked once they were seated, "At the RavenClaw table." Ginny explained scooping a small helping of porridge onto her plate, Ness frowned and grabbed some toast and strawberry jam, "And the reason why we aren't sitting with her is because…?"
"Houses." Ginny bluntly said, "Each student says within his or her house for classes, meals and usually other activities that aren't for schoolwork."
"Great, everyone's an isolated island thanks to their house." Ness grumbled. Ginny didn't hear him and glanced at a schedule, "Let's see… First we have Transfigration."
"And where's that?" Ness asked. Ginny pointed at his schedule which has the classroom number beside Transfigration the class after that was Herbology.
"So what exactly happens in Transfigration?" Ness questioned, "We learn how to transform objects into other things." Ginny explained, "It's quite interesting."
"Huh…" was all Ness could say. After breakfast was over he followed Ginny to the 34th classroom and studied the ancient old wooden desks that allowed to people to be seated right next to each other, he quickly chose an empty table near the back while Ginny joined a peppy looking girl.
"Hullo." A tired looking boy with ginger hair greeted as he joined Ness's table, "Hey." Ness replied as Professor McGonagall walked into the classroom, "Good morning class, today we shall be practicing on transforming a beetle, into a button." She paused and looked around the classroom before continuing, "Turn to page 50 of your book and begin reading the chapter."
Ness did as told and blinked at the unfamiliar terms and words. He tried to read past the first few paragraphs but ended up getting a splitting headache, he managed to catch a glimpse of the incantation, "Beetle-marucs-buttonals."
Before Professor McGonagall started to speak, "Now that you have the basics we shall being on transforming the beetle into a button, wand out!" a flurry of shuffling, and squeaks as students pulled out their wands, Ness fumbled for his which he had placed in his right pocket.
He had a sinking feeling that something was going to blow up as students began muttering, yelling and performing the spell needed to turn the beetle into a button.
"Okay." Ness muttered, "A circular motion then, say the spell easy. It's easy." Hoping that his words would crush that feeling in his gut he spun his wand in a slow circle and whispered, "Beetle-marucs-buttonals." And waited. The beetle twitched and resumed walking around the desk.
"Okay… counter clock-wise?" Ness muttered, repeating the action only spinning the opposite way and saying the spell. Still nothing. He glanced at his partner, catching the name Austin Figg as he muttered the spell under his breath and spun it counter clockwise. He glanced around the room to see that everyone was doing it just like he did, but without much success.
Feeling slightly reassured that he wasn't the only one having problems he tried again. "Beetle-marucs-buttonals" his wand sparkled a little, earning a small smile, "Beetle-marucs-buttonals!" And that was when Ness knew, he was not a wizard. The beetle spun in a circle paused then glowed an ominous pink. Ness barely had time to react as he toppled off his chair as the beetle exploded into a wave of thick blue stripes.
Startled screams followed by the loud bangs of chairs being tipped over backward promptly followed the silent explosion.
"Settle down!" Proffessor McGonagall ordered, "Settle down!" she marched over to Ness and Austin's table and gave them both a stern look, or tried to since Austin had passed out.
"What exactly happened here, Earthbound?" Proffessor McGonagall asked, although it seemed less like a question and more like an order, "I'm not sure Professor." Ness said, looking at his wand in surprise, "I was attempting to do the spell when the beetle glowed pink and exploded!"
"Have you ever attempted a spell before?" Professor McGonagall asked, Ness was about to say yes when he realized she meant magic spells. So he shook his head no.
Professor McGonagall pursed her lips then swiftly turned around, "Resume your studies students." Was all she said for the remainder of the class. Ness deiced not to try again and merely sat in silence wondering what the heck had happened.
He hadn't used PSI. He was sure of that, but that didn't seem like magic either, then again he had no clue what magic was like since this was his first day. But that pretty much ended up being his whole day, anything that didn't require magic spells went okay despite Ness having no knowledge on a living flytrap that had two heads or who Sir Cothwell was.
But classes that required a wand, like Charms ended up with something blowing up. Luckily when Ness tried to change the color of a grey mouse he just put everyone to sleep by using Omega Hypnosis. He spent the rest of the class apologizing to Professor Flitwit while helping him wake up other students.
"I'm telling you! I'm not cut out for this!" Ness said as he and Ginny walked toward the Great Hall for dinner, Luna magically joined his side and said, "Well, I managed to turn my mouse invisible if it makes you feel better."
"Thanks, but I think me blowing up a beetle and then putting everyone to sleep in Charms tops an invisible mouse." Ness grumbled, "At least it was a pretty explosion." Ginny offered, trying to cheer him up.
"Which could have hurt someone." Ness reminded her.
"Seems like your being cursed by a Wikletoe." Luna mused, "Terrible little creatures…"
"Hopefully." Ness sighed, Ginny glanced around and spotted Harry, "Well, maybe Harry has some advice!"
"How would Harry help anything?" Ness asked, "Did he somehow evaporate/explode his beetle into nothingness?"
"Well um, no but—oh! Harry!" Harry looked up with a dark frown similar to Ness's and waved hello at them, Ron and Hermione nodded hello as Ness and Ginny joined them.
"Hello Ginny, Ness." Hermione said, sounding emotionally drained, "Have a good day." Ginny nervously glanced at Ness who sarcastically said, "Awesome, I manage to turn a beetle into nothingness and put everyone to sleep in Charms."
"Err… He's having a bit of a bad day." Ginny said, "Aren't we all." Ron muttered sounding like his pet cat had been drowned.
"What happened to you guys?" Ness asked, Harry glared at the Slytherin table and muttered, "It wasn't so much us, it was Malfoy."
"And Professor nutjob." Hermione added. Ness frowned and asked, "Whose Professor nutjob?"
"She means Professor Trelawney, she's our deviation teacher." Harry explained, "She predicts that I shall have a dread death or something."
"Which is false." Hermione said.
"Wow, better watch your back Harry." Ness said, Hermione gave him a look of disbelief while Harry groaned and resumed eating his pudding. Ness deiced to drop the subject and put some steak on his plate.
Hopefully tomorrow would be a better day…
Next Chapter will be a little slow since I'm idea locked (Meaning that I have a clear vision of what I want to happen but unsure if I want to keep pressing a certain subject I.E writing Ness as a relaxed student whose basically going to blow everything off since he can't perform magic and doesn't believe that he belongs in Hogwarts) Also I'm going to be heading to Virginia this week for a late Summer Vacation :)
