Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN HARRY POTTER! There I said it. So don't sue.

Chapter 7: Platform 9 3/4 or What the hell was that!

Toren watched his sister's eyes dart around the train station. He had figured out a while ago that she didn't like large crowds of people. All the different smells and sounds hurt her overly developed senses. Nemo was perched on her head, over her invisible ears, to help reduce the volume of the noise. But Toren figured it probably wasn't helping much, since Selene kept flinching every now and again. He walked closer to her and leaned against her arm, to help her feel more comfortable. The closer he was, the better she could smell him, and she had said once that it helped to calm her when she knew he was close by and safe.

"Were exactly are we going again?" she asked him in a strained voice. Toren looked around.

"Platform 9 3/4 is what the ticket says. But there's platform nine. And platform ten. I don't see any platform 9 3/4?" He looked very confused. Glancing at his ticket again to make sure he'd read it right, he shook his head then turned back to his sister. "I don't know? Can't you smell it out or something?"

She gave him a very dry look. Then, leaning up against the barrier replied.

"Do I look like a common dog to you? Besides I wouldn't even know what to smell foorrrr!" THUMP.

Toren watched as his sister fell backwards through a wall. He walked over and looked at it, then poked it with his staff. It passed right through. He grinned, turned and grabbed their trolley and walked right on in.

He was met with a giant red something. There were lots of people milling around it, so he had to assume it wasn't particularly dangerous.

"Ow. I really didn't need that." Selene said, standing up and rubbing her, already smarting head. She walked over and picked Nemo up from were he'd rolled into the side of someone's trunk. Cradling the dizzy fox to her chest she too looked at the large red beast.

"What is it?" she questioned, giving it a look of suspicion. A red haired girl, walking by, gave her a funny look and replied.

"It's a train." Then went to unload her trunk.

****

Toren had already loaded theirs, when he saw the girl trying to heave her heavy trunk onto the train, with little success. When no one went to help her, he walked over and gave the trunk a one handed push. The girl turned to him with a surprised look then smiled.

"Thanks. That thing weighs a ton. My names Ginny by the way. What's yours?"

Toren turned red and began tapping his staff nervously against the ground, unknowingly creating a small crater.

"Ah um. My name? Oh .. I know it, just a sec. Not! Like I forgot or anything!" Toren stammered nervously. Ginny giggled and that only seemed to make it worse.

"Toren!" he finally managed to blurt out. Ginny smiled at him again, and Toren looked down at his feet, only now noticing the crater. His eyes widened. Not wanting to get into any trouble, he discreetly covered it with his foot.

"It's nice to meet you Toren. Is it your first year at Hogwarts?" She asked smiling at how cute he looked when he was embarrassed. Toren nodded his head.

Suddenly a great screeching and groaning noise was heard. Ginny's eyes widened in panic and she began running to the front to get on the train, which was apparently leaving. Toren just blinked at her retreating back.

"Ack! Hold the Train!" Ginny yelled.

The train came to an abrupt and noisy stop. Almost like it had hit an invisible brick wall. Ginny stopped just as fast.

"Toren! Let go of the train and get on already!" the girl who had asked her what the train was, yelled, as she hopped on.

Ginny numbly turned her head to see her new friend, calmly holding onto the bars at the back of the train, while the wheels continued to turn and shoot up sparks. He gave her a goofy grin then motioned with his head for her to get on. People were beginning to get annoyed that the train wasn't moving. With her brain frozen in shock, she stepped on. Then watched as he let go and hopped on himself. The train gave a jerk and started moving again.

****

Harry watched as Ron picked himself up off the ground. The sudden stop had taken them all by surprise. Ron most of all. Harry had quick reflexes so he had been able to grab the back of the seat and keep his balance. Hermione was on the other side, so she just jerked back against her seat. The stop had also released Pig, who was flying in circles around the ceiling of their compartment.

"What the bloody hell was that?" Ron asked, rubbing at his head. Hermione just shook hers, indicating that for once she didn't know. Ron then proceeded to try to get Pig back into his cage. When he finally got a hand on the hyper bird, the compartment door slid open. All three looked, expecting the usual confrontation with Malfoy and his goons.

"Hello ickle Ronniekins!" the twins chorused in unison. Ron stuffed Pig back in his cage quickly, then turned to his brothers.

"Hello. We're not hungry. And we're broke. Whad'ya want.?" The twins put on very hammed up wounded expressions.

"Can't we just come to visit with our most favorite baby brother?" George asked.

"Number one, I'm not your baby brother, if you hadn't noticed I've grown quite a bit, I'm fifteen. Number two, you've never done any such thing before, why start now?" Ron asked warily. Fred and George broke out into shit eating grins.

" Right, well we just paid a visit to our dearest little Ginny. And we thought you'd like to know our baby sister was sitting with a.boy!"

Harry winced. Knowing they couldn't have used a better word to get Ron's temper boiling. Any sentence with the words Ginny and Boy in it got Ron in a very aggravated mood.

"I think I'll go and introduce myself." Ron practically ground out from between clenched teeth. Then left to go do just that.

Privately Harry Wished, whoever the boy was, luck in dealing with a pissed off Ron.

****

Ginny sat next to Toren. His sister, Selene, was resting on the seat across from them, napping. They had spent the first few minutes of the trip in polite silence, before Ginny decided to try and start up a conversation.

"So," tried Ginny, "You'revery strong."

Toren smiled, blushed, and looked down at his feet.

"Gee," he said, "You really think so? Thanks."

Ginny smiled back. There was more silence for a while.

Ginny tried again. "So, uh. However did you get so strong?"

"Oh, " Toren replied. "My teacher, Rowan trained me."

"Rowan?" asked Ginny.

"Yeah." Said Toren. "He's all right, for a centaur." He shrugged noncommittally.

Ah. "Ah." Wha? "I see."

The little silver fox, curled up on the small of Selene's back, stirred suddenly and muttered, "S'nagive it back, S'lene, grzz."

Ginny finally exhaled. That's how she knew the silence couldn't have lasted as long as it seemed to; she was still alive when it ended.

Dream, gotta be. She thought, Too weird not to be.

Her expression must have given something away, because Toren gave her a look of concern. "Are you alright?" he asked. The blue falcon, which had been perched on his shoulder, twittered in Toren's ear. Toren turn and flashed the bird a look of annoyance. "She is not."

Ginny was so confused now that she let him get away with it. "I'm not what?" she asked.

Toren shook his head. "Skye say's you look like you going to be sick. You're not, are you?" he asked, looking worried again.

Ginny took the only course left to her. She started giggling. Toren looked at her, confused, then started giggling, too. They were cut off when the door suddenly slid open and Ron stalked in. He looked harassed. His eyes scanned the compartment, paused on Ginny, then rested at last on Toren. Seated next to Ginny.

He smiled evilly, Ginny figured out what he was there for and flinched.

.

"Hello. I'm Ron, Ginny's brother. Who are you?" Ron interrogated. Toren smiled cheerfully at him.

"I'm Toren!" he said. Skye twittered again from his seat on Toren's shoulder, and Toren looked momentarily embarrassed.

"Sorry I forgot." He said to the falcon. "This is Skye." He pointed to the bird. Ron looked momentarily thrown off, but then remembered his original purpose for being there. Sticking out his hand he said.

"Well it was nice meeting you." Giving Toren the most intimidating look he could manage. 'This outta scare the kid away from Ginny.' he thought.

Toren looked at the hand in confusion then slowly stuck his own hand out, next to Ron's. Ron looked at him funny, then grabbed his hand, and began to shake it up and down.

'I get it, it's some type of human greeting.' Toren rationalized, and since he was a human he'd better learn to do these things right. That decided he began to squeeze Ron's hand back, since Ron had been adding more and more pressure while he had been busy thinking.

Joints began popping in Ron's hand.

'What the hell do they feed this kid! Re'em blood*!' Ron thought, trying to keep from grimacing. Finally he had to let go. And from the silly look on the kid's face, he obviously hadn't succeeded in scaring him off.

"Yes, well um, I brought you some chocolate frogs Gin', here" Ron said, throwing the frogs into the compartment, while running out. "gotta go!' floated back to them, as he ran down the hallway.

Toren turned to Ginny and goofy grin still in place, said.

"Wow your brother sure is a nice guy Ginny!"

By now all the weirdness had seeped into Ginny's brain, she just shook her head and patted the seat next to her. Toren happily sat back down and then asked Ginny as many questions as he could about what Hogwarts was like.

****

The rest of the ride was as abnormal as Ginny had come to expect from the two new students. But there was just something about them. No matter how weird they were, she still liked knowing them.

Toren's initial introduction to wizard candy was something that Ginny would chuckle over for the next few days.

She had given him one of the boxes her brother had thrown at her in this hasty exit. But when he opened it and the frog jumped out (Landing on Nemo's head and startling him awake) he'd jumped up and knocked it to the seat, where he'd proceeded to beat it to death with his staff. Ginny laughingly managed to get out that it was candy, and your supposed to eat it not kill it. After his initial disgust at eating something that was alive, to which she explained that it wasn't alive just enchanted, did he calm down. Then he started asking questions about charms and what type of magic could she do? Could she show him?

The defeated chocolate frog lay forgotten on the seat, at least until Nemo found it. Apparently chocolate has a strange effect on him. It gets him drunk. So

Selene woke to the drunken singing of her friend. Ginny and Toren just giggled as they watched Selene try to get the chocolate away from the drunk, but determined, little fox.

****

Once arriving, they all got dressed in their Hogwarts robes. (Selene had to keep the pants she was originally wearing on, since her tail caused the back of her skirt to fly up. She'd have to find some way to fix that.) Ginny left them with the other first years going across the lake in the boats. After telling them she hoped they got sorted into Gryffindor and that they could sit by her if they did. Toren had asked about how they got sorted, but Ginny had just smiled and refused to say.

"Firs' Years! Firs' years over here!" a large man boomed over the noise. Selene winced and tried to cover her ears.

"That's Hagrid. He only looks scary. You guys go with him and I'll meet you inside." Ginny said with a smile, then turned and walked off with the other students.

Selene and Toren just looked at her back in confusion. What was she talking about? Of course that guy wasn't scary, he looked like a teddy bear. They turned and made their way to the group of first years, huddled around the large man.

"C'mon follow me!"

So they all followed Hagrid down to a group of boats. Getting in (only four to a boat) they sailed across the lake.

Selene, Toren, Nemo and Skye watched the big castle come into view in awe. Sudden screaming from the boat behind them caused them to turn and look.

A tentacle was poking up out of the black water. The kids in the boat huddled away from it in fear.

"She's only saying hi." Selene yelled back at them. Another tentacle poked out near her, and she happily shook it.

"It's nice to meet you to!" she said happily. Hagrid smiled from his place in the first boat. This year was definitely going to be interesting with those two around.

****

Authors rant: thanks for reading! I hope you liked this chapter, big surprises for the next one! Review and tell me what ya think. Also I would like to know if you have any ideas of things they could do once they get settled into Hogwarts? I have a few ideas, but I could use some more. Thanks again. Also the little (*) thing indicates that I have an explanation for that word, in case you didn't understand. It shouldn't happen to often, but anyway here's the explanation.

(*) Re'em- an extremely rare giant oxen with golden hides, the Re'em are found in the wilds of North America and the Far East. Re'em blood gives the drinker immense strength, though the difficulty in procuring it means that supplies are negligible and rarely for sale on the open market. -Source- Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them by Newt Scamander.

To Blueberrie: Thanks for reviewing! Selene's not really strong, but when she's mad enough she gets a burst of strength, it's not near Toren's level, but even normal people get slightly stronger given enough rage. Adrenaline does that. Hope that clears things up for ya! Review again.

To Helena the Fair: Your Forgiven. Ha, ha just joking! I hope I didn't sound to harsh or anything. I didn't mean to yell at anyone. Thank you for reviewing the last chapter and I'm glad you like my story!