Disclaimer: All standard disclaimers apply
It had been a strenuous few weeks since they had started classes. The hardest part for them was in defense where they had been blocking and dodging spells. Casting the spells hardly gave them any trouble at all. The extra classes and radar vision were to thank for that. Over all, they were loving school it was like an ongoing adventure that there where no limits to.
The only real problems they seemed to have come from fellow students, namely one Ronald Weasley and his little tagalongs. They just refused to learn not to mess with them. Toph even went as far as sinking the small group waist deep in the middle of the Great Hall. True, they backed off for a little bit, but that was more from embarrassment than fear.
But tonight was Halloween, or Samhain for those who cared to remember the ways of old, a day where one would leave offerings to the spirits of those who have passed as a blessing. But for some odd reason, even though Hadrian did leave his offering of some fruits, pastries, and the sticks of incense, something was still bugging him in the back of his mind.
As he and Toph made their way to the Great Hall they could of sworn that they heard someone crying somewhere nearby. They decided to leave it be knowing that if it was one of them they too would want to be left alone but they did mark the location, never hurts to be cautious.
As they made their way into the Great Hall they joined their housemates and sat at their table. While everyone seemed to be waiting for something, they took the opportunity to ask Patrick, one of the third years, about the crying they heard on the way in. They listened as he explained how the rumor mill was saying that the Giant Gnat (A/N: I thought Weasel was over used and those of you who live or have lived in humid climates know how annoying they can be) as Toph liked to call him had been so rude to some girl in his house that after class she ran to a bathroom and hadn't been seen since.
Before long the feast had begun and everyone was eating, drinking, and over all just having a good time enjoying the festivities. Though try as he might, Hadrian just could not banish the nagging he felt in the back of his head. Every chance it got, it would alert him to its presence. So it was with little surprise when something went wrong.
Toph and Hadrian were finishing up their roast lamb and about to start on their custard when it all started. Professor Quirrell barged into the Great Hall, yelling as he ran towards the head table, "Troll! Troll in the dungeons!" Upon reaching the head table, he finished with, "just thought you'd like to know," before apparently passing out on the floor.
As soon as Quirrell hit the floor all hell broke loose. There were younger students panicking, older students shouting, trying to calm down younger years, and just general mass mayhem. With all the commotion it took several loud shots from Dumbledore's wand to silence everyone. "Prefects take everyone to their dormitories. No one is to leave. That is all."
As they walked out of the Great Hall with the others, Hadrian pulled Toph off to the side. "Hey Toph listen, I think we should go tell that girl about the troll. We both know that that guy was lying about it being in the dungeons."
"Yeah, I know he was, and I do agree with you about warning that girl. But if we happen upon the troll, then it's its' funeral." Toph said with her diminutive smirk.
It didn't take them long to find the girl, seeing as they followed the loud screams and crashing noises. Picking up the pace as the putrid odor got stronger, running into the bathroom, both preteens came to an abrupt stop. Toph, being her normal self couldn't resist stating the obvious, "He's a big one, ain't he Harry?"
Hadrian just chuckled and said, "Well Toph you ready to take this thing down? It looks like it will be fun maybe if we're lucky a challenge."
"Oh, you bet I'm in." And with that said both Toph and Hadrian took up a stance between the troll and the girl, who was curled up in the corner, trying to hide from the thing. The two leaped into action before the troll could get over the confusion of two more targets in its path. Toph stomped on the floor causing a small pillar of stone, which she started slicing off disks towards the troll while Hadrian got behind the thing and hit the wall, sending a boulder straight into the things' back enraging the beast. Quickly dashing around it, Hadrian met up with his partner combining their attack sending one large boulder to the things shoulder, crushing it instantly. The girl who was hiding finally looked around from her corner and saw the two kids fighting off the troll and was amazed at how they were doing it.
The troll was enraged and swung its club wildly about in its good arm. The next thing anyone knew the club was heading for Toph, who at the time was concentrating on sending stone daggers into the trolls eyes, effectively blinding it. A loud shout of "move" caused the defenders to roll to the side, Toph narrowly avoiding the blow, and Hadrian's hand getting crushed from the debris that flew. Getting up the two slammed their feet into the stone floor, shooting a large column of stone to shoot up from beneath the troll and smash the damn thing so hard into the ceiling that no one would recognize it as a troll. It's gritty blood showered down upon everything in the bathroom coating the students in what seemed an extra thick layer.
After a few moments, they slowly lowered the column and went about putting the stone to rights. Once they were done they walked over to the girl that was quickly going into shock and helped her up.
"You alright?" Hadrian asked the girl.
"Um, yes, yes I am thank you..." She stared.
"I'm Toph, and this is Hadrian" Toph supplied, and she pointed to Hadrian.
"Thank you both. My name's Hermione, by the way, Hermione Granger. It was amazing what you two just did. How did you do it? I didn't see you using your wands, what spell did you use?" she took a breath before she went on, "Why didn't you move as soon as the club came towards you? What are you blind or something? You could have been killed."
The two stood for a moment before they started snickering which soon turned into a chuckle and then a full blown laughter complete with the rolling around on the bloody floor. They couldn't help it. After calming down Toph started talking trying to keep an even voice. "Of course we're blind. I was born blind and Hadrian, well, he might tell you sometime."
Hermione looked over at him, "I'm so sorry. I had no idea. I swear I didn't." She stammered trying not to offend the two that had just saved her life.
"It's ok, people forget all the time. Either that or they just don't realize it. Then there is that one boy and his friends who keep trying to make fun of us for it, really annoying. Anyway, as to what we did we'll have to explain it to you later. We have visitors." Hadrian said with a smirk.
Before Hermione could say that there was no one there Professors Snape, McGonagall, Sprout, and Dumbledore stood in the doorway wands at the ready. All wore a look of shock as they registered the scene before them, and at the center of it, three very bloody preteens.
"What on earth is going on in here? Why aren't you three in your common rooms?" Professor McGonagall asked, being as she was the first to get over her shock.
Toph and Hadrian were about to speak but Hermione was quick to start an explanation to defend the two that saved her. "Well you see Professor I was feeling kind of home sick for awhile, and I was having a really bad day today. So, I wasn't in the Great Hall at all. Therefore, I had no idea that a troll had gotten into the school. I swear I didn't know. And if it wasn't for these two, I probably wouldn't be here right now. They came to warn me and ended up having to fight the troll in order to save me."
"And just where exactly is the troll?" asked Professor Sprout sounding suspicious.
As if second nature all three of the children pointed upwards and said in unison "Up there." All of the professors looked up to see the smashed and ruined remains of what vaguely looked like a troll. Promptly, Professor Sprout lost what little dinner she ate, Dumbledore fainted, Snape smirked, and McGonagall gave them a look that clearly said 'explain'.
After a few moments she realized the look she was giving them, which had most grown witches and wizards in fear of her wrath, had no effect on them seeing as they couldn't see it. So with a sigh she asked them to come to her office after breakfast in the morning and then awarded 100 points to Hufflepuff for protecting a fellow student.
Leaving the bathroom, the three children split ways after promising to meet in the morning, Hermione to go to her common room and Toph and Hadrian to Madame Pomfrey so Hadrian could get his hand checked out and fixed. After that they went back to their common room and took a long deserved shower.
As promised, they met up with Hermione outside the Great Hall and went in for breakfast, inviting Hermione to the Hufflepuff table. For Hermione it was a nice change to have people interested in her. Once introduced to some of the people that they normally eat with, the group fell into comfortable conversation, some discussing classes and asking her opinion on some of the teachers, others asking her what her family was like, and some asking for some help in some classes that they were struggling in. All in all Hermione felt like she was welcomed and even wanted at the table filled with badgers.
Finishing up with breakfast Toph and Hadrian stood and asked Hermione if she wanted to come with them. After getting an affirmative they left the Great Hall. Walking up the stairs the three once again started talking, Hermione asking Hadrian if she could call him Harry instead and thanking them both again for saving her. After answering affirmative to the nickname and waving off the second part saying anyone would have done the same. After that they traveled in comfortable silence.
Upon reaching Professor McGonagall's office Hadrian knocked and waited until he heard the reply of enter before opening the door, letting the girls in before himself, and then softly shutting the door behind himself. Walking over to the desk, Hadrian took both the offered seat and tea with a thank you.
When all three where settled Professor McGonagall spoke up. "I take it that you two," she gestured towards Toph and Hadrian, "know why I asked you here today."
Hadrian set his tea aside with a small sigh, "You asked us to come so you could get that more detailed explanation we promised you when you took us to get our school supplies, am I correct? Great tea by the way, not many people can mix in the honey without over powering the jasmine."
"Thank you Mr. Bei Fong, and yes that's the reason I asked you here."
"Ok, well ...um, do you want to explain it Toph or should I?"
"You do it Hadrian, I never paid the tutors any attention. I'll take the questions at the end." Toph said with a smirk.
"Alright then, well, to start off with what Toph and I do is something called bending. Now there are four different styles of bending, Earthbending, Firebending, Waterbending, and Airbending. Each of the bending styles has an animal that is said that bending originated from. Waterbending has a moonfish as a mascot. Dragons are said to have taught humans firebending. The sky bison for airbending, and the badgermoles is where earthbending came from.
"The four bending styles eventually split and formed their own colonies. The firebenders became the Fire Nation, waterbenders became the Water Nation, earthbenders became the Earth Kingdom, and the airbenders became the Air Nomads. Throughout the nations there is an equal mix of people who can bend and those who can't. Our mother and father thought that just because Toph was born blind that she was helpless, while I had a lot of adapting to do after my injuries. Either way they kept us isolated and we grew to resent them for it. Don't take it the wrong way we do love them but we would often sneak away to the mountain range just to get away from the smothering.
"On one of our 'trips' we got lost in one of the many cave systems and came across a group of badgermoles. Like us, the badgermoles are blind and live their lives in darkness, but they used earthbending to sense vibrations in the ground to see and shape their world around them. We befriended them, and by mimicking their movements, we learned how to earthbend. As a result of learning to earthbend from them, we came to learn that we could see by feeling even the smallest of vibrations, whether it be through our feet, hands or any other body part that is touching the surface of the earth."
"Earthbending in and of itself is both offensive and defensive and can easily dominate other styles of bending depending on the amount of earth or earth-based substances in the area. You see earthbending isn't just limited to dirt and rock. We can manipulate crystals, sand, and pretty much anything else earth-based. I'm also fairly certain that with more practice that not even metal will be an issue for us. So, with that I'll leave the floor open for questions," Hadrian said before going back to his tea.
After a few moments of digesting the information, Hermione did what Hermione did best and that was ask questions. She just couldn't help herself. The only questions that she didn't have answered by Hadrian's explanation where: what do badgermoles look like? Can anyone bend? If so can you teach me? And why isn't this stuff taught here?
Professor McGonagall for her part was taking everything she just heard in stride. Most of what she just heard through her for a loop therefore she could only ask a few questions of her own. One being: whether or not they had been wearing their shoes around the castle? Would they need a place to practice? And whether or not they were the ones who sunk Ronald Weasley and co. waist deep into the floor just outside of the Great Hall.
Toph being Toph tried and failed to control her laughing at that, and it took her a few minutes to regain her control before answering. "With all due respect Professor we're not going to say anything that will bring your wrath upon us for harming one of your lion cubs no matter how deserving, but as to your other questions…Hermione we would love to show you what a badgermole looks like, but there two things that are standing in the way of that; one, we're blind all we know is the shape, and two, I don't think Professor McGonagall would appreciate her office being torn up."
"Next up. No, not just anyone can bend, you have to be born with the ability, kind of like the animagus ability, or so we hear. So, no, we cannot teach you. Your just not cut for being an earthbender. As to why this stuff isn't taught here, I have no idea sorry, toots."
"As to your questions Professor; no, we don't wear our shoes anymore. We did try them, but they blurred our vision. So, they had to go. Maybe we'll put them back on if it gets too cold out. Thanks for the offer for a place to practice, but we already found a place. If that is all Professor?" Toph finished.
"Yes that is all, thank you. Have a pleasant day you three." And with that she dismissed the students from her office so she could recover from her shock and they could explore.