The two teens silently followed a few paces behind Naoko through the castle up to the Headmaster's office. Shinji mentally ran through the things that Rei had told him about the hat. It's as old as the castle, it was enchanted by the same mages who founded the original school, it sings a song every year that's apparently awesome, and it's never wrong about where it puts you. All I have to do is let them put the magical talking hat on my head. That's it. So why do I feel so nervous? What could possibly happen?

At long last they came to Kozo's office. He looked up from his desk as they entered unannounced, and Shinji saw that he was not alone. Rei's sister was there, as well as the purple haired woman from the hallway, and three others; a tall, severe looking man, completely bald but who had a long, deep red beard, a short and squat woman with graying hair, and a man wearing a suit of dusty gray, and a somewhat forlorn expression.

Kozo, rising up from his chair, beckoned Shinji to his side. "Ah, there you all are. Now, Mr. Ikari, before we begin, I would like to introduce you to the House Heads. They are each responsible for one of the Houses here at GEHIRN, and each answers directly to me." One hand on Shinji's shoulder, with the other he motioned to the bald man. "This is Alexander Haversham, of Gryffindor. He is a Warlock of no small skill, being exceptionally skilled in the use of fire spells."

The large man wrapped a meaty hand around Shinji's. "A pleasure to meet you lad. I can't say that I liked your father much, but he stood against the Dark Lord and that's good enough for me."

Shinji could only swallow and nod as Kozo moved on.

"This is Victoria Belova. A very skilled Sorceress, she leads Hufflepuff. What class are you teaching this year Viky?"

The short lady smiled warmly while shaking Shinji's hand. "Oh, I'm covering Transmutations this year."

"Ah, that's right. Transmutations. A most interesting school of magic, that. Over here is Randolph Carter, the head of Slytherin. A master of prognostication he is, and he is an accomplished alchemist. He is the school's Potion's Master.

He shook Shinji's hand in silence, but nodded gravely to him. Professor Haversham scowled, but when he spoke his tone was light. "He's a quiet one, boy, but don't let him fool you, he knows more than he says." Shinji was unsure if it was a complement or a complaint.

"And my esteemed colleague from Gryffindor often speaks before he thinks, and leaps before looking. However", he said with the slightest of sneers, but in a good natured tone, "he has a tendency to land on his feet."

Are all these people this weird?Are they friends or not? Suddenly recalling Hoja's words about magic and the toll it took on people, he swallowed. Maybe magic does make you crazy.

"Moving on," Kozo said with a look at the two men, "You've already meet the head of Ravenclaw. Naoko Akagi, our instructor of Thaumaturgry."

Naoko only nodded at Shinji, opting not to shake his hand, as they already knew each other.

"And I understand that you meet Miss Katsuragi earlier today."

The purple haired woman waved to him from her seat.

"Umm... Yes, sir."

"Good, good! Then we'll move on to the reason we called you here. This," he said, letting go of Shinji and picking up a very worn and battered looking hat, "this is the Sorting Hat. It has been passed down throughout the years from one headmaster to the next. Originally the hat of Godric Gryffindor, enchanted by the founders to flawlessly sort any and all potential students into the houses where they might excel in their studies. Please, sit down."

Swallowing hard, Shinji sat down in the offered chair, all to aware of the fact that he was the center of attention. It was unpleasant, to say the least. Rei, standing next to her sister, locked eyes with him as the Headmaster slowly lowered the hat down on his head. As he felt the brim connect, he shut his eyes.

A low, smooth voice filled Shinji's ears. "Soo... the son of Ikari comes home to GEHIRN at last. Hmmmm... Difficult to place you. A keen mind, yes, but not dedicated to your studies. You'll do what you have to in order to get by, but... there is no fire within your heart, but rage, yes. Hmmm... Vast... vast power... lies within you, but you lack the ambition to take it... the red right hand... and a spear, held sinister. You, the Minstrel Boy. So... I see what it is what you need, Ikari. Control, and practice. Much, much potential, but you must master it, lest it masters you. It will not come easy, Shinji Ikari, but you will do well in RAVENCLAW!", booming the final word, that it seemed to echo in his head. Suddenly, the hat was removed.

"Umm... what did it mean by all that?"

Kozo raised an eyebrow. "By all what, Shinji? The hat sorted you into Ravenclaw."

"Well, not that bit, I understood that, sir, but the other stuff."

Professor Carter spoke up, tenting his hands in front of him as he leaned back in his chair. "The hat often speaks to the candidate when sorting. How much it says to you varies, but it's all related to how and why it's placing you into your house. Why? Did it say something unusual?"

Naoko snorted. "Please, Randolph, the boy's only been newly exposed to this world of ours. Everything the hat said was probably strange. Rei. Take him to the dormitories and show him the layout." She pointed a finger at Shinji. "Mr. Ikari. Ravenclaw has a history of academic excellence. Now, I now know that your past education has been lacking, but that is no excuse here. You will be placed in a specific academic plan to help make up for that, and to take into account the fact that you are starting late. We will be discussing this later."

Shinji almost swallowed his tongue in fear as Rei hauled him out of the chair.

Once outside the large office, Shinji collapsed to the floor, hyperventilating.

Rei poked his shoulder. "Are you going to be OK? This is great news!"

"How... is...this... great... news?"

"Aww, my mom's not so bad. I mean, yeah, cause she knows you knows you, she'll probably be all over you to excel at your studies and stuff, but we're in the same house! That's a good thing." Shinji watched as her face screwed up in concentration. "I'm not sure what all will be incorporated into your school plan, but it can't be all that bad. OK, so let's go visit the dormitory and I'll show you the layout of it, alright? You lead me there. I want to see how much you were paying attention."

As they moved off down the corridor, a heated conversation was being held in the Headmaster's office.

Randolph threw his hands up. "Naoko, calm down. Your daughter was going to be somewhat involved with him no matter what house he was going to be sorted into. This is not the end of the world."

"Easy enough for you to say Carter! It's not like Ikari's spawn is going to be hanging around your daughter! I lost Yui to that man, and I'll not lose Rei to his son."

"Merlin's beard, woman! The man was a celebrated hero. Even if you didn't like him as a person, it's no reason to take it out on the man's son, who's never even known his father."

"ENOUGH." Kozo did not shout, but at the same time his voice was akin to thunder in the space of his office. "The hat has sorted him into Ravenclaw, and that is final. The boy won't be part of the general population, yes, but he is still a student here, and thus he needs a house. He'll be alienated enough because of his course load, and I'll not have him be further alienated for not having a house."

Carter shrugged. "If Naoko does not wish to deal with the boy for personnel reasons, which I am sure that we all understand," he said as he looked around the room, as if daring someone to speak up, "I will act as his studies adviser."

Naoko shook her head. "He's in my house, he's my responsibility."

Alexander stroked his beard, a habit of his when he was deep in thought. "It'd be fine, Naoko. You had history with the boy's father, and while you'd not hold it against him, you might let it slip out to him, and you'd feel terrible. Carter knew the boy's father, hell, he was his father's house head. Let him take the boy under his wing if he's up to it."

Victoria sat in silence sipping her tea. She wished the boy no ill will, but he made her uneasy. She wished for nothing more than he be set up with a home and some minor job in the town, and kept as far away from magic as possible. The sort of power that would so cleanly and utterly kill the Dark Lord... that sort of power came with a price. He was lucky he only had no memories of that time. He should be a gibbering wreck, his mind permanently scrambled, or physically deformed from channeling such power. To see him, to talk to him, it was not right. She had brought this up before, but the Headmaster had overruled her objections.

Her eyes flashing, Naoko hissed at Alexander. "I said I'd do it. End of discussion."

Kozo held up his hand, which was currently encased in fire. "Now that I've got your attention, let us get back to the matter at hand." He extinguished his hand, and poured himself some tea. "Now, Naoko, you will be responsible for his education. But, Carter, you tell the boy that if he ever needs to talk to someone, he can go to you. This isn't and ideal situation by any measure, but we will need to deal with it."

Carter nodded. Naoko glared at both men before sighing and nodding as well.

Smiling, Kozo looked to the youngest two faculty members present. "Now, as for you two. Misato, you'll be running him through the battle-mage exercises in addition to cultural instruction. Get him ready, and get started tomorrow. He's got a lot of catching up to do on how things work in our world, and not a whole lot of time before classes begin. If Naoko allows it" he said, looking at the still fuming woman, "you can have Rei help you. I understand that's she's already started doing so. Ritsuko, I want you finish preparations on the device. If it's really reacting psychically to him, I want to know what it's doing."

He looked at his watch, and sighed. "I guess it's time to let the rest of the staff know about our newest addition to the castle."

Eins, Zwei, Drei, Vier!

"So, this is our common room. Up to the left is the girl's dormitories, and the boy's are on the right."

Shinji interrupted Rei, holding up a hand to forestall the rest of her riveting descriptions of the dormitory. "Rei, how much do you know about the hat? How does it work? It said some... really strange things to me."

Rei stopped in the middle of her tour. "Um... well, I don't know all that much about it. It's a sapient artifact, and it's really old."

"It called me the minstrel boy, what ever that means. It said something about a sinister spear, and a red hand."

Rei's brow furrowed in concentration. "Um... OK. I guess that we can go look in the library and see what we find out about that. We've got a huge section on symbolism, for both arcane and mundane things, and stuff."

"Like dream interpretations? My old teacher said that that was all bunk."

"Well, it's used more with trying to figure out visions, foretelling and prophecies. It's kinda an inexact field, and sometimes you have to do a lot of research. No two visions are the same, even from the same person, and once a prophecy has been recorded, either by sound or being written, it can't be copied exactly the same way. It'll say something different, even if you try to say the words, you'll end up saying something else. So, naturally, there are a lot of books that compile all sorts of different things, phrases and imagery that seems to crop up a lot in these things, so people can try to figure out what's going on."

"Did the hat say anything to you when you wore it?"

Rei turned red. "Ahhh... it did... but I-I don't really want t-to t-talk about it."

"It's OK! I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked-"

"Well, it's not like you knew anything about it. It sometimes tells the student things, and some people like to talk about it, and others don't."

"Ah."

"Sooooooo... Let's go to the library!"

Shinji smiled softly as they left the Ravenclaw dorms. At least I'll have one friend to start off with when everyone gets here. I wonder what sort of 'academic plan' Professor Akagi was talking about.

"Rei, what was your mom talking about when she said mentioned that 'academic plan'?"

"Oh. Well, umm... you're starting late you know."

"Right, I've heard people mention that."

"See, while a person with magical talent can start learning at any point in their life, most of the accredited schools like GEHIRN tend to start teaching students off when they are around nine to ten. You learn more than just magic and stuff here, I mean, the school is a real school. You learn math, science, literature and history. You'll get a general understanding of magical theory at least, and the basis for further education. The school also is a magical college on top of a private boarding school, where those so inclined can further train and specialize in a variety of magical fields. GEHIRN is noted for it's superior Alchemy and Transmutation courses, and we've been awarded several times as an Institute of Excellence by the International Magical Schools Accreditation Board."

"Nine or ten? But I'm sixteen."

"Yeah... so you're probably going to be taking a lot remedial courses. I don't know why they would wait this long to bring you here. I mean, it's not like they didn't know about you." She shrugged. "It's strange. They never even mentioned you to me before, either. I mean, we learn about you, of course, in history," she said matter of factly, mentally squealing in delight at how he turned red and looked shocked at that fact, "but they never mentioned anything about bringing you here or anything."

"Y-you learn about me in history?"

"Well, not you specifically. We learn that the Ikari's had a son who killed He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named as an infant. It is kind of a big deal for us, I mean, he's possibly the greatest mass-murder in the history of the world. We never learned your name, or what happened afterwards, just that you were taken into protective custody. So, you're famous, but also anonymous. I mean, I didn't even learn your name until..." She trailed off suddenly, clamping her mouth shut, blushing as furiously as he had been a few moments ago.

"Rei? Is something the matter?" Shinji asked, even more confused.

"N-no! N-nothing!"

Luckily for the embarrassed girl, they arrived at the library, forestalling further discussion. Creeping past the main desk, where Mr. Abelii sat slumped over, snoring deeply as he slept, Rei guided them through the maze of stacks to where the reference books they sought were kept.

The thing about the Library at the Academy was that, like all libraries, it was a place of great power. This was more than doubly so here, because most of the books and knowledge contained therein were, for the most part magical or related to magic in some way. While the upper levels of the library was comprised of 'normal' books(inasmuch that any book could be said to be normal and non-magical), both fiction and non-fiction, and arranged as one might expect, with the Dewey Decimal System and whatnot, that simply did not do for the really magical tomes. When kept in a neat and orderly environment as that, they had a tendency to try to escape.

There is a saying, that knowledge wants to be free. Some people agree with this saying, and others don't. What so many people don't stop to think to ask is what does the knowledge want to be free to do? The wise know that knowledge brings fear. Some things are unknowable for a reason.

Thus, the magical section of the library was arranged in three separate sections, each one an ever shifting maze of book-cases and tables (and in the case of a few tomes that didn't get along with the other books, pedestals), all in order to keep the magical knowledge confused and unable to get out improperly.

Rei, long acquainted with the library, never got lost or turned around. She always could find what she wanted, if it was there. She was still barred from the Restricted section, and the Massively Restricted Section.

Shinji, of course, was lost three seconds into the maze.

Rei pulled down a few books and handed them to Shinji. "Here, take these." She grabbed some more for herself, and then walked back to a set of chairs around a table, all sitting within a circular ward inlaid on the stone floor in what Shinji guessed was iron, due to the dull red rust covering the patterns.

"OK, so, the older ones won't have an index, so we'll save those for later, since it'll take longer to look through them. The newest ones will follow proper formatting, so we can check them faster."

Shinji looked at the first book he pulled off his stack. Piercing the Veil of the Veil: Unwrapping the Mystery of Visions, a thick book bound in leather. In-fact, he noted that all the books were bound in leather, with the titles written in gold leaf. Rei noticed him studying the books.

"Mr. Abelii rebinds the books himself."

Nodding, he flipped the book open the index in the rear, looking for anything that looked useful.

After an hour of fruitless searching through the books, Rei closed her current tome with a sigh. "I wish Hikari was here."

Shinji looked up from his book. "Who?"

"Hikari. She's really good at research and stuff. She gets the best grades out of our year almost every time. I just can't help but think that she'd have found something in all this." Rei explained, waving a hand at the pile of books they had.

Shinji yawned suddenly. Rubbing his neck he sighed. "Isn't there some spell we can use to magic the information out of the books into our heads?"

"We're not supposed to do that. Also, no casting magic in the library. It upsets the books." Rei looked at her watch, her eyes widening when she saw the time. "We should get something to eat."

As if on cue, Shinji's stomach growled. "OK..." Rei stood, and piled their books into a neat stack on the table. Shinji looked at her as she turned to leave. ""Um... shouldn't we put the books back where we got them?"

"Oh, no! We're not allowed to re-shelve magical texts, because people are always forgetting to ground themselves first. The elves will take care of it."

Shinji bit his lip as he followed her out of the library. Ground themselves? What, does the magic act like electricity? He opened his mouth to ask her about that when a new voice called down the hall to them.

"Ah! There you two are! Wait up!"

Rei turned to the purple haired woman. "Hello Miss Katsuragi. Can we help you?"

Misato Katsuragi grinned. "Yep! It's my job to whip Shinji here into shape before this year starts. We're supposed to get started today, but I think it'll be alright if we start tomorrow." She pointed to Rei. "You'll be helping me, Rei, since you've already started working on him."

Whip me into shape? What shape? I've got a broken arm! Alarm bells began ringing in Shinji's head. "Umm... Miss Katsuragi, what shape?"

"Why, getting you caught up with the basics of life as a mage, of course! We've also got to get your cover story down pat, and get you a firm grasp on magical theory."

"Cover story?" both teenagers spoke in unison, both confused.

Misato rolled her eyes. "Well, duh... I don't think that you'll want to go an be drawing all sorts of attention to yourself with that last name of yours, now do you? It'll make things really complicated for you." Shinji found himself nodding as the trio walked down the hall. "So, you'll be going by the name of Shinji Sato. They won't tell the school why you're here, just that you're going to be staying with us for the foreseeable future. If anyone asks, you don't want to talk about it, but even if you did, you're not allowed to. If anyone really presses you for info, you're here as part of a research project in another part of the Geo-Front, and you're here because your guardian doesn't want you just hanging out.

"OK..."

Rei nodded. "That makes sense. It's not like this would be the first time something like that has happened."

"Exactly so! Anyways, enjoy the rest of today, because we're getting down to brass tacks tomorrow."

"Miss Katsuragi, what will we do for his supplies? He doesn't have a wand yet, or anything."

Misato smiled cheerfully, and waved her hand as if Rei's concern was a physical object that could be brushed aside. "He won't be getting a wand. No wand for him until the Headmaster says so."

Shinji furrowed his brow in confusion. "But I thought you needed a wand to act as a focus for the spell?"

"Right! You're only going to be getting theory and abstracts. No practicals or applied magics for the time being. Now get on out of here! We'll meet up at the library at seven tomorrow morning."

With another cheerful wave, Misato split off from them and headed off down the hall humming a tune that Shinji didn't recognize.

"So, who is she? I mean, is she a teacher here? I noticed everyone just called her miss, and not professor or anything."

Rei shook her head. "No, she's not a professor. Mot all of the instructors here are actual professors. She's not even a regular teacher, she's here on assignment from the Imperial Battlemage Division to help scout and recruit new battlemages, and help lay a good foundation for the actual battlemage training. It's normally a posting for colonels, but even though she's just a captain, they gave her this post because she's really good as a battlemage, and she and her father are both alumni here."

"Her father was James Katsuragi, right? The one who attacked SEELE at the South Pole?"

"Correct."

"Wait, you said she's an Imperial Battlemage? Does that mean the King knows about all this?"

Rei gave him an amused look. "Of course. He's the king, isn't he? We're still citizens of the Empire. We just have a different set of duties and responsibilities. We make sure that extra-normal things don't harm his interests." She shrugged. "I guess we're a secret world, but we're not completely independent of the nations we live in. I mean, there are some elements that want to rule over the muggle world, and so we fight those who threaten His Majesty's realm. It's pretty simple."

"So the Americans have their own battle mages too?"

"Just about every major county has some sort of magical military. International treaties restrict magical usage to only other magical forces and extra-normal entities, like the Migo incursions. The U.N. also has it's own troops."

Shinji laughed. "What about the Vatican?"

Rei nodded. "They have their Inquisition. They say that it's not magic, but rather divine intervention. It's all the same in the end though."

"Oh."

Eins, Zwei, Drei, Vier!

Shinji stared at his ceiling, unable to sleep. No matter how hard he tried, the elusive realm of blissful slumber seemed to be perpetually just beyond his grasp. His arm also itched like no other.

You know, with all the crazy stuff Misato has me doing you'd think that sleeping would be easy. I'm so worn out I can't even count right. But the knowledge... it's like it's keeping me awake.

This was true. The mental exercises that he had to do to sharpen his mind to some unknown standard, the likes of which was never explained to him, coupled with the vast amounts of information on magical history and theory being drilled into him left him mentally drained at the end of the day. Then, because Professor Akagi was not satisfied with the hodge-podge education that his previous teacher had given him, he also had to do loads of regular coursework as well. He counted himself lucky that his teacher had been a native English and Russian speaker, so his grasp on the official languages of the Empire was better than the school's standard. Unfortunately, when she had found that out, Dr. Akagi forced him to also help Rei with her Russian, saying that her daughter was terrible at it. So, despite the fact that he longed for sleep, his mind kept calling up the things that he had learned, over and over and over.

There was no doubt about it, these past two weeks had taken a toll on him. Rolling over onto his side, he scratched irritably at the edge of the cast. He had been told that they would be taking it off soon, and he could not wait at all.

Ugh... maybe I should go for a walk. It helped last night.

After putting up with insomnia for three days by just lying in bed, the night prior he had thrown on his shoes and went for a walk around the castle. No one had mentioned a curfew to him at all, and he reasoned that as long as he didn't go poking around in other people's business, it would be OK. And so last night he had walked the corridors of the castle from the ground floor (he didn't feel up to exploring the dungeons on his own, in the middle of the night) up to the highest floor of the main tower. After making his way back down to the floor with his room on it (three floors down from Rei's place, he unconsciously noted), he had collapsed into his bed and promptly fell asleep.

Unbenownst to him, he had been shadowed on this night's little excursion. As he had rounded on one corner in the great hallway, a man had entered the vast castle, in time to see the boy disappear round the corner. Now, the fact that the man had only now just arrived to the castle, in the dead of night, was no coincidence. He meant to pay a visit to someone, and it was of utmost importance that this visit go unnoticed by anyone. So, having seen someone up and about when there should be no one, and on top of that, it being someone he did not recognize, he felt it prudent to follow and observe this night time stroller.

Ryoji Kaji, groundskeeper's assistant to the castle, trailed just out of sight of the young man for the duration of the boy's walk, never revealing himself in any way to the wandering insomniac. When he came up to the door of the room that the boy had disappeared into, he noted a lack of nameplate on the door, signifying that either this apartment was meant to be empty, or that the occupant was important enough to have no nameplate. Of course, the maintenance people just might not have made one for the occupant. (They hadn't.)

Being a master of knowing his environment, Kaji was only a little surprised when the head of Slytherin suddenly came into view from the far end of the hall.

Smiling easily, knowing that his easy going and care free demeanor irritated Professor Carter intensely, Kaji lifted a hand in greeting.

"Yo."

Carter sighed. "What are you doing, Ryoji? Was your trip so boring that you felt the need to follow a student throughout the halls at night?"

"So he is a student. A bit early for them to be showing up, yes? Also, what's he doing in the private suites and not the dormitories? A younger relative of one of our faculty, perhaps? Besides, what matter brings you up from your cavernous dungeons?"

"Duty, Ryoji. Duty. I am to watch over our young man here for a portion of the night. You should go and talk to the Headmaster, as he wishes to speak to you and I do not." Carter sniffed slightly as his tone grew colder. The two of them had never really ever seen eye to eye, and would never be friends. This was not to say that there was no respect between them, despite one being a (almost) tenured professor, strong and skilled in the various arts of magic, while the other being a groundskeeper's assistant, with only a little skill in magic, but who was also forbidden to employ such magic.

"If you're keeping watch, then they think he's a Dreamer. Does he have it? Does he have the Key, Randolph?" Kaji's voice was almost sick with a desperate interest as he asked his second question, seeming to just barely keep himself from grabbing ahold of the mage's jacket. (Randolph Carter viewed the widespread mage's robes as 'quaint' and 'rustic'. Traditional or not, he wore them only when absolutely needed. His opinions on the similarly traditional pointed hat of the mage, well, let it suffice to say that they were not aired in mixed company)

Carter sighed again. "They think he is, but I haven't seen him Dream just yet. And no, I haven't even seen around him a hint of the Key, so don't even pester the child about it. And for Merlin's sake, don't mention it around the boy, or the Headmaster."

Kaji smirked, switching emotions almost automatically. "I'll be sure to take that suggestion, Ran-dolph." he said, deliberately stressing the last syllable in his name, knowing that he hated it.

Carter, not in the mood to play games with him tonight, shook his head and seemed to melt from view. It wasn't true invisibility, because if you already knew where he was, and if you squinted just right, you could pick up a shadowed shape hiding in the dark. It was hard, as you couldn't look right at him or focus on his outline. The magic made one's eyes slide off and away from him like water off a duck's back.

Chuckling to himself, the spy made his way to the Headmaster's office, entering without knocking, not because he was allowed to do so, but because his churlish behavior was part of a carefully crafted image. He pushed the boundaries of the rules just to see how far he could go.

It had been a long time since this behavior cost him license to practice magic, and it was only through the actions of Headmaster Fuyutsuki that he was not sitting in Azkaban, or worse, Arkham. Some (Carter included) speculated that this same behavior would end up costing him his life. (He agreed whole-heartedly and cheerfully with this sentiment)

He grinned at the Headmaster, as the older man looked up from behind his desk, looking not at all surprised at the man's presence.

"Well Old Boy, I think we're in a bit of a bind. Someone knocked over Gringott's, and buggered off with the stone."

Kozo gently put down his tea cup, and folded his hands in front of his face. "Someone broke into a bank that's impossible to break into, selected our vault, out of all other vaults, and stole the Philosophers' Stone. The Key to Immortality. The Aether Made Solid. The Supernus Solenoid."

Kaji gave a chuckle, hiding his hands in his pockets, slouching slightly. "Yeah, that would be the long and short of it."

Leaning back in his chair, Kozo stared at the ceiling. There was only one thing that he could say that he felt was appropriate in this situation.

"Well, fuck."