I would like to thank these following reviewers: ImagineToTheFullest and Rabidus Rex. I also thank the anonymous reviewers.

Your reviews inspired this chapter. Nevertheless, I present to you the second chapter of Logic, Puzzles, and Hidden Messages: Speculations and Lies. Review again, if you'd like, and for those who had skipped to this chapter instead of reading the first one, please be advised to rate this from one to ten (ten being the highest). The other rules and notes are posted in the first chapter. Thank you and enjoy!

~joaleennicole

Chapter Two

Speculations and Lies

Platform nine and three-quarters was crowded with witches and wizards of all sorts.

Lily Potter, squinting hard to look properly at her godfather, Theodore Lupin, was knocked out of air as Lupin — golden robes and all — tackled her so hard that she almost toppled down to the ground. Teddy's greeting, delivered at full tilt, was more of a football tackle than a hug, and when he did hug her in a vicelike grip, Lily felt all the air in her body knocked clean away.

"If it isn't my little scalawag!" Teddy exclaimed, mussing up her hair. "How are you? It's your first year, I heard."

Lily, suffering from the panicky feeling one has after being knocked out of air, nodded weakly at her godfather, nonetheless trying to smile and look upbeat other than looking like a stranded fish that lay way out of water.

Teddy grinned, probably taking her expression as one of those which shows complete enthusiasm, which is partly true in Lily's case. "You're going to have a great time at Hogwarts. I believe that you have heard about me being your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher? Great isn't it? Oh, hey, Harry." He told Harry. Lily knew that Lupin is her Dad's godchild, like she being Lupin's godchild, too. "How's the Ministry?"

"Bad." Harry replied. "We still have no clues about the ongoing disappearances."

"I've heard about the Muggle issue. How was it?"

"Bad, also." said Harry, and before he even started his conversation with Teddy, Lily, still gasping for air, walked around to look for her cousins Rose and Hugo Weasley, who were sitting at a station bench with their Mum and Dad.

"Rose! Hugo!" Lily called, waving at them. The duo grinned at her from a distance, and ran over to her with their parents — her aunt and uncle, respectively — trailing along after them.

"Lily!" cried Rose, hugging her tightly. "I've never seen you for a while. Where are James and Albus?"

"Over there by the barrier, along with Mum and Dad and Lupin." said Lily. "I don't want to hear about the Ministry again. It makes me kind of sad."

"Why so?"

"Thinking about all those Muggles...oh, hello, Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione." said Lily jauntily.

"Hello, Lily." Ron greeted, grinning widely that his freckles stood out. "Where's Harry?"

"Over there by the barrier. He's talking to Lupin."

Ron shook his head and clucked his tongue. "Oh, of course. Lupin. Cheerful lad, eh, Hermione? Wouldn't stop talking until he's told to."

"That's pretty rude, Ron. You just don't like him because he's marrying Vicky." said Hermione, winking at Lily. Lily's mouth fell. Teddy is marrying Victoire ? She didn't believe it. Victoire is her cousin (from Bill Weasley, Ron's eldest brother) and she didn't know that she and Teddy ever dated.

"Oh, close your mouth, dear."

"But how? I mean, I never knew. Teddy never told us he's getting married."

"I guess he was planning to tell us today." said Ron. "We just found out today, to much my extreme aggravation. He talked to us for two hours, for crying out loud."

Hermione gave him a disapproving look. "That's not very nice, Ron." she said. "Teddy is family."

"Fine. He talked to us for thirty minutes. Happy?" said Ron, sighing and rolling his eyes.

Rose giggled. "Mum and Dad are always like that." she said, tying her shaggy, red hair into a ponytail. "Mum's always contradictory to Dad. Well, none of what Dad says is of any sense, anyway."

Rose's brother Hugo, a skinny, redheaded boy with freckles all around his face and neck, chuckled under his breath. He was what Lily remembered him to be — with the fiery red hair and rectangular spectacles. Hugo doesn't exactly express his opinions much, and he's very sensitive for a boy, but he's fun, in any case. One thing he's renowned for is that he is very brilliant at Wizarding chess, like his dad. Lily also remembered him as the shy boy who trips over his own feet.

"Hi, Hugo." she greeted. "How are you?"

"Great." he replied. "I've been looking forward to Hogwarts lately. I hope we can sit in the same compartment. I'm pretty perked up"

"Me, too."

On the cue, the train whistle sounded, and in the blink of an eye Lily was inside the train, sitting with three boys in one compartment, all of which having the same fate as the other.

"Can I have some of that?" A boy asked Lily. "I've heard that they've got new flavours. Booger and Clam Chowder, I've heard."

Lily, who was taken aback by surprise, quickly offered him the box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans. The boy, who looked about her age, muttered thanks and ate her last bean — Lily's last bean — and she finally regretted that she ever gave it to him. The boy is handsome, she thought, but he is also brimming with averageness that Lily thought was quite impossible. He was of average height, of average skin colour, and of average dirty blond hair. He also has average blue eyes, and his nose was positioned an average distance away from his average eyes, which was framed by his not-so-average eyelashes, and he was dressed averagely — with an average red-coloured sweater and average black Hogwarts robes. He also acted averagely, and ate her last bean in an average manner, yet she found him quite handsome, in an average way.

"Who are you?" asked Lily, not minding her manners.

Their train compartment was shut tight, with Lily, Hugo, and the boy sitting right across from each other. James, Rose, and Albus were at the Gryffindor compartment of the Hogwarts Express, and Lily, taken by surprise, had forgotten to wave goodbye to her parents.

"Lorcan," the boy said. "Lorcan Scamander. What's yours?"

"Lily," Lily answered plainly. "Lily Potter."

"You're dad is Harry Potter." said Lorcan. He said this as a statement, not a question. "Cool. Is it true that he has the…you know?" He rubbed at his forehead to give a hint. Lily nodded. Her dad's scar was as famous as himself.

"I guess so."

"Sweet. So who's that guy sitting right next to you?" asked Lorcan.

Lily shrugged. "Oh, that's Hugo Weasley. He's my cousin."

"He's a Weasley." Again, he said this as a statement, not as a question. "Mum always mentioned the Weasleys. Nice to meet you by the way, Hugo."

Hugo smiled at him, and his freckles stood out. "It's great to meet you, too." he said, then stared pensively out the window. Hugo's not what you would call sociable.

Lorcan, who was clearly content in making new friends, never failed to tell them he had a twin. He said he was raiding the Slytherin compartment at this very moment.

"We ran into a local bully." he said. "One with the name of Scorpius Malfoy. I'd bet you'd know him."

Lily perplexedly shook her head. "No." she said. Whoever this Scorpius Malfoy was, she doesn't really care. But she doesn't want to tell Lorcan that, since she'd hurt his feelings. "Why? Who is he?" she asked.

"Oh, I figured you would know. He's a bully."

"Well, you said that twice already. Why? What did he do?"

"Some stupid thing that pissed my brother off. He's going to be here at exactly five seconds."

Like Lorcan had said, in five seconds, a boy with the same features as the other strode into the compartment door. They were exactly identical, but Lily thought that in some way the other is clearly different from the other. But one thing really caught her interest in particular.

"You can predict when a person will arrive? In seconds?" she asked Lorcan. He just shrugged and grinned at her.

"I also measure things." he said.

"With what?"

"Just by looking at it." He said it as if all people can do that. Lily was open-mouthed. And so was Hugo.

The other boy, Lysander, as what Lorcan had called him, sat beside his brother. He was as average as Lorcan, but they have different smiles. If Lorcan has a calculating, toothy grin, Lysander has a mischievous crescent stuck beneath his average nose. He had that smile now, as if he had just achieved doing something nasty.

"What happened?" Lorcan asked.

"See for yourself." said Lysander, rummaging in his bag to bring out a box of Chocolate Frogs. "There were a lot of them, though. It actually took me a long time to reach him."

"Did they spot you?"

"Well, all of them did. I just fought back. I scraped one in the shins, I tell you. Anyway, who're they?" Lysander asked, pointing a finger at the other two seated in their compartment. He held a look that held anxiety, like he expected them to bite at any moment.

"Oh. That girl's named Lily Potter. The guy's called Hugo Weasley. Call them Lily and Hugo, for short."

"A pleasure to meet your acquaintance." said Lysander. "Call me Lysander. Or Toby, for short."

"Toby?" asked Hugo, raising an eyebrow. "Why do you call yourself Toby?"

"Why? Do you prefer Felix? I've been thinking it's a great name, too. Poncho, will do, but it's too conspicuous." said Lysander, scratching his chin.

"He goes with many names." explained Lorcan to Lily. "He has at least twelve. He prefers to be called by any other name."

"Why does he do that?" Lily asked.

Lorcan shrugged again. "He wants to keep a low profile. He's deathly afraid of spies." he said, as if Lily should know this as an important fact. "Because of that, he has quick reflexes. He can sense whether there's someone sneaking behind him or not. He reads other people's minds like an open book. Sometimes I couldn't stand him."

Lily thought that fact understandable. But in any case, she thought that the twins were quite cool. They just didn't know what great surprise lies in store for them — for all four of them.

And it is not waiting long.

Look out for the next chapter: The Disbelieving Knight

Reviews are extremely welcome! ;)