A/N:
Hi, new chapter!
I have once again saddled myself with too many writing projects, but this fic is still one of the main priorities.
I hope you like this chapter, and feel free to let me know if you do (or don't) in the comments.
Daphne Greengrass sat primly on a bench in the stands overlooking the quidditch pitch, watching her boyfriend fly around during Gryffindor's game against Hufflepuff.
If she were being completely honest with herself, she wasn't entirely sure what the point of quidditch was. Yes, there was the thrill of competition, and the added incentive to win points for your house, but Daphne knew very well that Gryffindor would win this match easily, and no one cared about house points except for Ravenclaw students and perhaps Hermione Granger.
Printing Thought Sequence: But still, if it is something that matters to my beloved, I will do my best to understand it…
She watched Neville Longbottom work desperately to prevent Gryffindor's chasers from scoring on him, but his own team wasn't scoring much either, and their efforts weren't nearly enough to make up for the difference in seekers. Harry had taken his time looking for the snitch but was now on the trail of something, while the Hufflepuff seeker was apparently still trying to figure out which way his broom faced.
Unfortunately, and despite Neville's best efforts, the Hufflepuff quidditch team had fallen on rather hard times since Cedric Diggory graduated.
As Daphne ruminated on the logic behind inventing a sport where one individual's performance would determine who wins and loses in the vast majority of games, a little sound from the seat next to her drew her attention.
"Ahem."
Daphne turned her head and saw a petite girl so heavily wrapped in layers of clothing that she might've belonged in a tire commercial. She was staring up at her with big gray eyes that protruded slightly too far from her face, and seemed to be paying no attention to the quidditch match going on beside her.
Possible Emotion Detected: Confusion
"Is there something you need from me?" Daphne asked.
The girl blinked up at her. "You're not like the other girls, are you?"
Possible Emotion Detected: Panic
Simulating Physiological Response…
For the first time in a while, Daphne felt her gears start to tense up in worry.
Printing Thought Sequence: Has my secret been exposed? But how?
"I am a perfectly normal sixteen year old girl," Daphne replied smoothly.
The girl nodded. "And I'm a perfectly normal fourteen year old girl. Though I'll be fifteen next month, after which I'll be a perfectly normal fifteen year old girl."
"Very well then. We are both perfectly normal girls, just like the rest of them."
"You don't get it." The girl shook her head this time. "Being perfectly normal girls is precisely what makes us different from the rest of them."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm starting to suspect our classmates aren't all that they seem," she explained, looking over her shoulder warily. "They smile when they're happy, cry when they're sad, and go completely mad for a sport where only two of the fourteen players have the ability to win the game…"
Daphne kind of agreed, but still wasn't sure exactly where the girl was going with this.
"What are you suggesting?" she asked.
The younger girl looked around conspicuously before leaning in close to Daphne's ear.
"I think they're all robots," she whispered.
"..."
The crowd cheered as Gryffindor scored another point, and neither girl paid any attention to it.
Eventually, Daphne spoke up again.
"Robot people are not real, they cannot hurt you," she lied.
The girl's eyes widened. "But don't you see? That's exactly what the robot people want us to think! If we tell ourselves they're not real, we're playing right into their hands!"
"I will require more evidence before I believe your theory," Daphne lied again. "But for my own personal reference, what makes you so sure that I am not one of these robot people myself?"
"You're nice," she said simply. "You do things that the agents wouldn't do. You help people."
"Who are 'the agents'?" Daphne asked. "I thought we were speaking of robot people."
"Keep your voice down!" the girl urged, looking around nervously. "The Organization has ears everywhere."
Possible Emotion Detected: Puzzlement
Daphne had transcended mere confusion and was now utterly baffled by the words of the girl before her. She would have to replay this conversation for Harry later to see if her robotic social skills were at fault or not.
"Who is 'The Organization' and what do they have to do with us?" Daphne asked, keeping her output volume down.
"They're people who seek to crush singularities like us," the girl replied. "Their goal is the complete destruction of our autonomy and they have already taken root here at Hogwarts. Most of our fellow students have already been compromised."
"Compromised how?"
The girl looked around gravely. "I'm afraid they've all been abducted and replaced with exact replicas."
"..."
A literal bell started to ring in Daphne's head.
Printing Thought Sequence: Hold on a nanosecond. This girl seems familiar…
Daphne stared at her more intensely for a moment, and as a lock of dirty blonde hair shifted out of the small girl's face, Daphne's facial recognition software was finally able to scan her features and find a match.
A few milliseconds later, Daphne remembered her.
Displaying Memory Sequence:
Thirteen-year-old Daphne Greengrass was walking through the corridor, minding her own business, when a conversation from two hallways down caught her attention.
"What nonsense are you going on about this time, Loony? We already told you we're tired of your made-up stories."
"It's not made-up!" a little voice replied. "There really is a power concealed in my left hand, that if unleashed, could cause the downfall of the entire world!"
Daphne's auditory receptors picked up a faint 'oof' sound, and the subsequent muffled impact of a little body falling over and hitting the tiled school floors.
"Just be quiet – you're so annoying! If you want to play pretend, go talk to your father and have him print your stories in his joke of a newspaper."
There were a couple of laughs at that, and a pitiful whimper from the one they called 'Loony'.
Having changed her direction since hearing the voices, Daphne rounded the corner a moment later to see three older Ravenclaw girls standing above a much smaller one, confirming the simulated image she had already formed in her cerebral processor. 'Loony' was on the floor, and Daphne noted that she was wearing neither shoes nor socks.
"Excuse me," she said flatly, causing all four girls to turn in her direction. "I believe this activity should come to an end. From what I understand, this is 'bullying', and is a breach of the respect that everyone and everything on this planet deserves."
Daphne was largely paraphrasing the words of another boy for that statement, and she said a quick mental apology to him for borrowing them. As a machine that was trained in part by academic texts, Daphne was highly conscious of plagiarism, but she couldn't calculate anything better to say at that moment.
After a few seconds of stunned silence, the group's apparent leader spoke up. "Mind your own business, Greengrass. This is Ravenclaw stuff, don't interfere."
Possible Emotion Detected: Surprise
Printing Thought Sequence: These girls are familiar with me?
Being aloof and totally expressionless, Daphne had already unknowingly built up a reputation as one of the school's foremost oddballs, so in reality it wasn't particularly surprising that the girls knew her name while she didn't know theirs. She didn't know that though, so she was a little disconcerted and slightly afraid.
"I do not mean to upset you," Daphne said, tilting her head in an attempt to emulate non-aggressive body language. "But I will not 'mind my own business' in this case. I refuse to leave until you promise to cease your unkind behavior, and I will contact a teacher if it is necessary."
The lead bully snarled. "You're going to be a tattle-tale?"
"I will be whatever is required of me," Daphne replied confidently. "Call me a tattle-tale if you must. There is no title worse than that of one who stands by, watches, and does nothing in the face of injustice."
Once again, she was borrowing words, but the boy's words were good.
With one last disgusted look at Daphne, the girl turned away. "Whatever, Greengrass. Let's go guys."
As the trio of bullies skulked away, Daphne approached the girl on the floor and extended her hand. The Daphne of a week ago might not have known to do it, but that Daphne was not this Daphne, and this Daphne knew, at least a little bit, how to help people.
"Are you okay?" she asked, hoping her inflection sounded human.
"I am The Light's Chosen," the girl replied. "It'll take more than a few agents of darkness to get me down."
Despite her words, The Light's Chosen still sniffled a bit as she accepted Daphne's hand and got to her feet.
"Thanks," she said.
"You are welcome."
The girl brushed the dirt off her robes and gave Daphne a curious look.
"Is there something you wish to say?" Daphne asked, slightly uncomfortable under the girl's scrutiny.
"It's just, your head is startlingly clear of nargles for a thirteen-year-old…"
"Ah. I take precautions to ensure I am not a vulnerable target," Daphne explained. "I follow the seven step anti-nargle program every fortnight."
The girl's already wide eyes widened even more in surprise. "You read The Quibbler?"
Daphne nodded clumsily. "It is one of the many academic journals that I am trained on."
"That's my dad's tabloid!" the girl exclaimed. She fidgeted awkwardly for a second before looking up at Daphne rather uncertainly. "Um…my name's Luna. Do you want to be my friend?"
Possible Emotion Detected: Panic
The last time Daphne had tried to make a friend, back during her first year sorting ceremony, she had ruined things due to her lack of experience socializing and antagonized the potential friend instead. While she was slightly more confident now, she still calculated the risk of offending the girl in front of her to be too high.
"I am sorry, but for reasons I cannot explain, I am not capable of making friends at present."
"Oh, okay," Luna replied, unfazed. "When will you?"
Daphne blinked. "I do not understand."
"You said you're not capable of making friends at present. I don't mind waiting, so when do you think you'd be able to become my friend?"
Daphne hadn't been expecting that response from the girl, but Luna's patience and understanding made her happy. After running some quick calculations based on her current state of socialization and her projected rate of growth, Daphne spoke up again.
"I estimate that in three years I may be capable of accepting friends. If you are still willing to become my friend at that time then you may ask me once more, and If I deem myself fit for friendship, I will gratefully accept your offer."
"Okay!"
Back in the present day, Daphne stared at Luna with something akin to wonder.
"You have been waiting three years to ask for my friendship?" she asked.
Luna nodded, and Daphne could tell she was a little nervous.
"In that case, thank you for waiting," she said. "I have a much higher degree of confidence in my social skills now, and would be happy to be your friend."
"Yay!" Luna cheered. "Now I have two!"
"Who is the other?" Daphne asked curiously.
"Ginny Weasley."
"..."
The two girls stood in silence, staring at each other, as Harry caught the snitch and ended the game.
Printing Thought Sequence: Good gears, this girl must have been desperate for friends.
Daphne was anxious to go down and meet her boyfriend as him and his team filtered out of the pitch and into the changing rooms, but first she had a misunderstanding to clear up.
"While I am happy to be your friend, I feel the need to mention something," she said to Luna. "Not all of our classmates are robots, nor members of a malicious organization. We are not the only 'singularities', as you call them, and if you know where to look, many of our peers are quite nice."
"But we're different!" Luna insisted, hiding half of her face with her hand in a gesture that she must've thought looked cool. "Our wings are bent but not broken, we've been battered down by society and yet we still soar high in the skies, like two unbowed cro-"
"You can just say that we have both been bullied," Daphne said. "There is no shame in that."
Luna's shoulders slumped. "Okay…but still, it was you who saved me that day. No one else. So that makes you different."
"And yet I would not have been able to save you if I was not once saved myself."
Luna's oversized eyes widened a bit. "Really? You needed saving? But you're an S-class level entity!"
"That may be," Daphne said, honestly not having the first clue what that meant. "But even S-class level entities need saving sometimes."
Daphne wasn't sure if that was true or not, but most things needed saving at some point in their lives, so she figured her hypothesis stood.
"Well then I guess it's okay," Luna said, chewing at her lip. "But still, who could've possibly saved you?"
Daphne looked back down towards the quidditch pitch as Harry disappeared from the field and into the stadium's interior.
"At the time, he was my future boyfriend," she said.
Displaying Memory Sequence 1/2:
"Hey, Greengrass!"
By her third year at Hogwarts, Daphne Greengrass felt like she had come to understand humans a bit better than when she had first started.
"My mom told me that your mom is dead!"
And yet, she still didn't understand why they could be so cruel sometimes.
Possible Emotion Detected: Sadness
Simulating Physiological Response…
Thirteen-year-old Daphne's little metal ribcage split apart, leaving a hole where her heart should be. When she was older she would realize that Charlie had bullied her because she had a crush on an older boy that had asked Daphne out a few weeks prior, but at the time her social understanding wasn't advanced enough to piece that together.
"Please stop," Daphne said, staring up at the girls who surrounded her, led by Charlie. "It upsets me when you speak about my mother in such a way."
"You talk so weird!" one of the girls at the back of the group said. "And why does your face never change?"
"Sorry," Daphne replied flatly from her spot sprawled on the ground. "I am trying to learn. Please be patient with me."
"Ew, whatever," Charlie said, walking past her. "Let's leave, guys."
Charlie's little entourage walked away, each giving Daphne a contemptuous look as they passed her by. Whether intentional or accidental, one of them stepped on Daphne's pinky finger as they went, and the digit gave a sickening crunch. None of the girls turned around to acknowledge it.
Once they had finally gone and truly left her alone, Daphne looked down at her hand. Her little finger hung limply, and wouldn't respond to any of her manual inputs. She would need to get Dr. Magyar to fix it, or maybe let the burgeoning prodigy that was Astoria practice her mechanical skills on it.
Printing Thought Sequence: Why can Charlie and the other girls not be nice to me…?
While Daphne hadn't made any friends since starting at the school, she also hadn't experienced any direct abuse until recently. She was still struggling to understand the intricacies of her human peers, and this year in particular had introduced some new variables that she had yet to organize in her head.
She had only shared a few words with a scattering of her housemates, and yet she was somehow starting to get romantically propositioned by several of the boys in the school. Some were in her year, and some were considerably older than her, but none of them had ever spoken to her before. She understood 'love' conceptually, but had no clue what it felt like, and had difficulty comprehending how anyone could 'love' her without knowing a single thing about her. On the other side of the spectrum, many of her classmates had taken to verbally (and very occasionally physically) abusing her, though she once again couldn't decipher what she had done to earn it.
Truly uncertain if she'd ever learn to fit in with humans as her parents had wished, Daphne picked herself up off the floor and headed back down to the Slytherin Dungeon. In an effort to avoid the simulated negative emotions, Daphne had taken to spending most of her time lately hiding in her room, skipping meals in the Great Hall and taking a 'last-in, first-out' approach to her classes.
Possible Emotion Detected: Hopelessness
Simulating Physiological Response…
As she walked into her room and pulled the curtains closed around her bed, she felt a literal pit open in her stomach.
Printing Thought Sequence: How long is this supposed to continue…?
Displaying Memory Sequence 2/2:
"Hey, Greengrass! You've been avoiding us lately, haven't you?"
Thirteen-year-old Daphne felt her gears shake in panic as she heard Charlie's voice call out from behind her. She spent most of her days hoping she never heard that voice, and dreading the moment she eventually would.
"Please leave me alone," Daphne said, not turning around but picking up her pace as she walked down the hall.
"Hey, where are you going?" Charlie called. "Don't run!"
"I am not running," Daphne said as she ran.
Thirteen-year-old Daphne's little circuits were so lit up with anxiety that she didn't have time to process the foot that stuck out from the corner she ran past, and she subsequently tripped headfirst into the floor with a loud thump.
The girls behind her laughed, and she was surrounded by Charlie and her gang before she got the chance to crawl away.
"You can't hide or run from us," Charlie said, stepping forward and putting her shoe on Daphne's back. "It's in your best interest to just suck it up and take what you deserve."
"I do not understand," Daphne pronounced, shaking in fear. "Why do I deserve this? What have I done, and what are you going to do to me?"
Charlie narrowed her eyes in disgust, and Daphne once again wondered what she could have possibly done to make the girl hate her so much.
"You know what you did, Greengrass, now-"
"Hey!" a little voice called from the other end of the hallway. "Stop it!"
All of the girls assembled turned around to see a boy with dark, messy hair and bright green eyes pointing at them indignantly.
"Stop bullying her!" he said.
Some of the other girls looked around nervously as he approached them, but Charlie remained calm.
"Oh, Harry," she purred. "This isn't bullying. We're just playing a little game with Greengrass here." She gave him a flirtatious wink, and tossed her hair in the way a thirteen year old does when they want to appear mature.
"Uh…do you think I'm stupid?" Harry asked, ignoring the girl's gesture and looking down at the floor where Daphne lay sprawled. "You're clearly bullying her, and I'm telling you to stop."
Charlie gave him a strange look. "Oh give it a rest, Harry. No one likes a goody-two-shoes. Just run along for now and we can find some time to play later, just the two of us."
"Yuck," Harry said, a little bluntly because he was only thirteen and hadn't mastered dealing with girls yet. "You're mean and kind of gross, and I don't want to play with you. Now leave Daph- er, Greengrass alone or I'll go tell a teacher."
"What!?" Charlie exclaimed, though no one was sure if it was due to Harry's insult or his threat to be a tattle-tale. "I thought you were cool, Potter!"
Harry shrugged. "I don't care about being cool. The only thing I care about is not becoming someone who stands by, watches, and does nothing in the face of injustice."
Something in the boy's words resonated in Daphne's artificial heart, and she felt a thump as her ribcage began to close back in around her core and push away the negative feelings of before. She barely listened as the two exchanged some more heated words, and she barely noticed when Charlie and her group of bullies gave up and left her alone with Harry in the hallway.
"Are you okay?"
The thirteen-year-old robot was finally broken out of her electric reverie when the boy spoke to her, extending his hand to where she sat on the floor.
"That depends on how you define 'okay'," Daphne replied.
Harry laughed, even though she hadn't been joking, and grabbed her hand to pull her up to her feet. Daphne was a little surprised, as she hadn't realized that's what his proffered hand was extended to do, but she added it to her mental library of tricks to use when interacting with downed humans in the future.
"You shouldn't let them bully you like that," Harry said, his tone growing more serious. "Not that it's your fault that you're being bullied, but you have to stand up for yourself when no one else is around to do it."
"I am normally capable of standing without assistance," Daphne answered. "But how will that prevent me from being bullied?"
Harry gave the girl a strange look before deciding it had been another joke and laughing.
"Well…I've seen you in class, and I know you're good with magic. If you ask them forcefully to stop, they might really do it. And if that doesn't work, go see an adult right away." He fidgeted awkwardly and his face got a little red before he continued. "And, well, if that doesn't work you can come talk to me, and I'll make sure they don't bother you again…"
Daphne didn't understand why Harry's face was getting red, and she sincerely hoped the kind boy wasn't developing a fever.
"Charlie and the other girls said that I deserved to be bullied," she told him. "I do not understand why this is the case, or what I can do to stop deserving it."
Harry shook his head, and a sad expression that Daphne didn't like one bit crossed his features.
"No one deserves to be bullied," he said. "Those girls lied to you. It's mean, and cruel, and a breach of the respect that everyone and everything on this planet deserves."
Daphne blinked at him. "But what about evil people, like Lord Voldemort?"
Harry blinked back. "What?"
"Did he not deserve to get bullied?" she asked curiously.
"No, um, well, that's different…"
Harry was only thirteen years old and hadn't quite worked out this aspect of morality yet, so he let his argument fizzle out instead of poorly attempting to explain what constitutes bullying and when it was justifiable.
"Very well," Daphne said. "I will remember your words. I have not enjoyed being bullied, and if it is left up to me, I would not like to be bullied again."
"You can work with the people around you so that it is up to you," he said. "People will sometimes be cruel, but when it affects you in a significant and negative way, you need to make sure it stops. Don't hesitate to reach out if you can't manage on your own."
Daphne nodded clumsily.
"Alright."
After ensuring she was okay once more, Harry left Daphne alone in the hallway, and she watched his back as he disappeared around a corner. Her memory logged this as the second time this boy had saved her, and she silently wished she had some way to repay him.
Possible Emotion Detected: Regret
Printing Thought Sequence: Ah, I forgot to thank him...
Back in the present day, Daphne blinked away her memories, focusing instead on the very important task of locating Harry. The kind little boy from her past was now the kind (but not so little) boy of her present and future, and unlike before, she had developed many ways of 'thanking' him for all that he'd done and continued to do for her.
While she wondered exactly which of those methods of thanking she would employ today, she saw a particularly dejected looking girl sitting by the edge of the hallway on a bench.
"Are you okay?" Daphne asked, taking the time to pause before the girl.
She looked up then, and Daphne's gears froze in surprise.
Possible Emotion Detected: Shock
Printing Thought Sequence: Charlie…?
"Oh," Charlie said, a little uncomfortably. "Hi, Greengrass. Um, yeah, I'm fine, sorry…"
While the girl hadn't bullied Daphne since that day with Harry in her third year, the sight of her old tormentor still made Daphne feel a little conflicted.
"If you are suffering, or if you are distressed and need help, you should seek it."
And yet, Daphne had changed over the years, and even more of Harry's philosophies had rubbed off on her since then. She may not have liked Charlie, but that didn't mean she liked seeing her in such an obvious state of misery.
The girl gave her a weak smile. "I'll be fine. I'm just…going through something right now."
"Very well then," Daphne said, not wanting or feeling the need to press the issue. "Have a good day."
As she turned to leave, Charlie called out to her once more.
"Hey, Greengrass!"
Daphne slowly turned around.
"Yes?"
"I'm, um…I'm sorry. About everything. I shouldn't have treated you that way back then, and well…you didn't deserve it."
Daphne didn't need to hear the girl's words, but they gratified a small part of her nonetheless.
"I know that," she said. "And I forgive you."
She turned around and kept walking, and this time Charlie didn't stop her.
Harry was just coming out of the shower rooms when he was hit full-force by a hug from his girlfriend. He wasn't wearing much more than a towel, and Daphne technically wasn't supposed to be in the boys' changing room, but he didn't raise protest as no one else was around and she was clinging to him rather desperately.
"Is everything okay?" he asked, wrapping his arms around her and adjusting his towel to make sure it didn't fall down. "Or were you just really impressed with my catch?"
"I did not witness it," she admitted, her face still buried into him. "I was in the middle of making a new friend."
Harry's eyes widened in surprise, and he wasn't even mad; he caught the snitch every time he played quidditch, while Daphne hardly ever made a new friend.
"And is that why you attacked me with a hug the moment I stepped out of the shower?" he asked skeptically.
"No. Though it was unfortunate timing that I came too late to catch you in the shower." Before he could point out the flaw in that line of thinking, she continued. "I am hugging you because sometimes doing the right thing is difficult, and now I feel the need to be praised for it."
Harry had grown accustomed to going with the flow when confronted with his girlfriend's quirks, so instead of asking for more details he just patted her head in a comforting gesture.
"Doing the right thing is often difficult, and that's why so many people don't do it," he said. "So whatever you did just now, I'm proud of you for doing it."
He pulled her into a tighter hug, and she kissed the exposed skin of his chest.
Whirrrrr
"So, er, can I get changed now?" Harry asked.
They'd been in the boys' changing room for fifteen minutes, and while he was pretty sure no one would be walking in any time soon, he still felt a little weird about being in there with a girl. He'd also have probably been cold, if Daphne wasn't peppering kisses over every part of him that wasn't covered by a towel.
"There are still three minutes and twenty seconds left on the timer," she replied cryptically between kisses.
"Uh, what?"
To be clear, Harry wasn't mad about the situation that he found himself in, just a little confused.
"I recalled a time I forgot to say 'thank you' today and am compensating for my bad manners at present."
Before he could say anything else, or bring to her attention that this was probably objectively worse manners than whatever that was, Daphne trailed kisses up his neck and he felt a rush of serotonin to his brain.
Well, whatever, he thought. This really isn't so bad, I guess…
A/N:
Oh, hi. I hope you liked the chapter. This one was inspired in part by an old comment from Anee-1, who suggested Daphne run into a Luna who thought everyone except the robot girl was a robot. That sounded pretty Luna-ish to me, so I combined that with a certain protagonist from a popular TV show to build her characterization. Hopefully it wasn't too silly.
Also, remember to be nice to the people around you. I know it's hard sometimes, but a little bit of patience and understanding can go a long way both for the sake of others and yourself. You can never know the full story of what's going on in someone else's life, and the reverse is true as well. I've found that giving people the benefit of the doubt actually helped improve my mentality a lot.
Finally, if you or someone you know is experiencing bullying, please reach out to someone. I think you'll find that more people are willing to help you than you realize :)