Heyyy i procrastinated (again)
(Edited May 12)
Harry's POV
"How are we getting to the platform?" Percy whines, for what must have been the thousandth time. The whole car trip he had been whining and just kept asking me. In response everyone had laughed and told him that he would get to know when we got there. Now everyone would just groan from the sheer amount of times he had asked.
"We'll be there in a minute, you can know then" I grumbled. Who knows why we weren't telling him. The joke was dead. Oh well. He mumbled angrily and continued walking beside me. Then we reached the wall.
"Here we are!" I announced dramatically, and Percy stared around for a second.
"I don't see it." he said flatly, after thoroughly scanning the area around us. Mrs. Weasley sends Ron though as an example and Percy gasps when he runs straight through the wall. "How did he?- what?" he stuttered and I gently pushed him in a teasing manner. He turned, wide eyed, to me. Then he smiled and looked at Mrs. Weasly for approval. She nodded, and he ran, pushing the cart holding his new trunk and fishbowl towards the wall. Everything was going smoothly, and I breathed out a sigh of relief before the air caught in my throat.
He had hit a muggle.
Thankfully, his trunk and fishtank were upright, and he turned to help the woman up, but froze before grabbing his trunk and shoving it and himself through the wall. I watched the wall engulf his desaturated cobalt shirt. I rushed through the wall after him.
He stood, next to Ron, eyes wide with fear and surprise. He smiles at me, but anxiously looks back at the doorway a half second later. He seems to relax a little when everyone else filters through. Mrs. Weasley orders us into the train, and we file on. Ginny, Fred, George, and Percy (Weasley) head in the opposite direction to presumably find their friends. As the train pulls out of the station we start to look for an empty compartment to sit in.
There isn't one, but we find a compartment with a lone middle aged man with tawny hair sleeping in the corner. We squeeze into the remaining space, trying not to disturb him too much. That all seems to go out the window when Crookshanks starts to chase around Ron's rat, named Scabbers.
Thankfully, the man slept on.
Once the compartment settled into peace I began to reprimand Percy for not apologising or helping the muggle he had hit.
"I didn't want her to recognise me so I panicked and ran" he said simply, and I stared at him, waiting for a further explanation. "She- she was my math teacher in the sixth grade. She… I- I'm not really supposed to be in England right now" he finally finished, and his look told me not to pursue the matter any further. I respected that and let it drop.
"So er-" he paused, as if trying to find a good distracting topic "What's Hogwarts like?" That, of course, launched Hermione into a full-fledged explanation, with me interjecting occasionally when I had something to say. Percy asked questions frequently, like 'why are there four houses?' and 'How do they sort us?', to which Ron responded quickly 'It's a secret to students joining the school. Percy obviously complained, but once again, couldn't get an answer out of us. Eventually, he left the compartment to find a restroom, that for some odd reason, seemed to always be in a different spot on the train.
Of course, that's when Malfloy has to show up. Nearly ten minutes after he and his cronies leave Percy returns. As he walks through the doorway he starts to share, presumably, the story of him trying to find the toilet, but notices that I'm in a funk and stops to sit next to me.
"Hey, what's wrong?" he asks caringly.
I sigh and respond "nothing. Malfloy's a git. He just- he's so- ungh" my incoherent grumblings turn into an angry groan.
He rubs comforting circles on my back and says "It's ok. Um… Who's Malfoy though?" he questions. I can tell he's hesitant to push the subject.
"He's this slytherin… basically an evil racist bully." I respond angrily.
Protectively, Percy responds "I'll keep an eye out for him… We don't have to talk about this if you don't want to, but, why do you hate him so much.. I mean, yeah, being a racist is like really really bad, but he… there might be other circumstances. Like, his family could have raised him that way or…" he trails off, searching for words.
"He… He was really rude when I first met him, and he was rude to Ron too. Then he tried to suck up to me once he realised I was famous, but I shut him down" Percy hummed in response, signaling me to keep going "It really went from there, I guess. We were just kinda rude to each other."
He nods contemplatively and after a minute he mutters "Yeah. Those are all bad, but um… I don't know. I've never met him, but everyone deserves a second chance, right?" I mumble in dissent, but we drop the topic. A comfortable silence settled over the train car and Percy drifted off to sleep, joining Ron in his slumber. I grabbed a book to join Hermione in homework, but a cold presence overtook the compartment. The train stops suddenly, screeching to a stop. Percy startled awake and Hermione looked up from her book. Frost starts to creep over the windows and a dark presence overtakes the clouded glass of the door.
It creaks and swings ominously open. A floating creature slunk through the door, sadness dragging behind it in dark tendrils. The presence seemed to wrap itself around my throat and press upon my lungs. Out of the corner of my eye I say both Percy and the man jump up. The edges of my vision darken. It's hopeless. I droop, and the blackness overtakes my vision. Nothing-
Percy's POV (I'm sorry, I hate changing POVs but it's kind of necessary, again I'm sorry)
"Expecto Patronum!" the man yelled, projecting a silvery mist at the creature hovering over Harry. I was barely holding onto consciousness, my knuckles were loosely grabbing onto the edge of the seat. I- I gotta protect Harry… the mysterious man forced out the creature, and I fell to my knees next to Harry. He's breathing, and hope flickers to life in my chest. The man, Hermione, and Ron all kneel next to me.
"He's breathing," I say. Everyone sighs, relieved.
"Here." the man says, breaking off a square of chocolate. I look at him questioningly. "I'm a professional" I snatch the chocolate out of his hand, preferring to do something over nothing. I choke it down and each other person in the car does the same. Blearily, Harry opens his eyes.
"Wha- what happened?" he mutters, blinking hard and hyperventilating.
"Eat this" the man gently hands Harry a piece of the chocolate, and Harry seems to recover slightly. I breathe slowly, trying to calm him down. He sticks the chocolate into his mouth and chews slowly. His eyes were wet, and his usually large shining pupils were dilated and full of fear.
Everyone retires to their seats and I sit next to him, rubbing circles on his back. He leans heavily on me and everyone in the compartment breathes slowly. Slowly, everyone relaxes and a quiet conversation resumes. The rest of the train ride is spent in a tentative quiet.
When we reach the platform, we all stumble out into the starlight. Somehow, all of our baggage had disappeared during the ride, but Harry had reassured me that it was going to be delivered to our rooms. I stare around the lantern-lit platform. The students seem to be gravitating towards a large group of carriages, attached to skeletal horses, with vein-filled, paper thin bat wings. There is a large man, definitely a giant, calling to the first year students. He's gesturing towards a group of boats. I note his presence, but decide not to attack him unless he attacks me first. Attacking an employee on the first day might be a bit of a bad idea.
I follow Harry and his friends towards the carriages. The horses regard me with wide, empty, eyes. I watch them as well, and follow my brother and his friends into one of the carriages. We climb in and I ask about the horses.
Everyone stares at me, confused. "There aren't any horses" Harry says "the carriages pull themselves" Well… I'm going crazy.
We approach a castle, and enter through the wide doorway. I'm pulled aside by a stern woman in a pointy hat. Harry looks back at me before he is shooed off by the woman. He complies, and wanders away with the rest of the crowd. "Percy Potter?" she questions, and I nod. "You'll need to go stand over there to be sorted with the first years." I follow her instructions and stand. Eventually, I'm crowded by a group of wide-eyed eleven year olds. We're herding a large dining room, and wow. It's- just wow. I watch through the beginning of the sorting and startle, as I had kinda spaced out, when I hear my name.
Whooooo it's actually on time. WOW. very cool. MMMMKAY cool. BYe