The Hogwarts Express

Malek saw the interesting mix from the redhead of strength and fragility. It was an interesting juxtaposition that she had somehow survived while having. However, as strong as she wanted to be inwardly, she just wasn't. Clearly. Her inner spirit was crumbling into dust without those delusions of happiness and all those other nonsensical things that she craved.

She was all poured out, seeming to be in a heap of sorts on the floor, and it seemed that even though her body was in one relative piece, the rest of her was not. Hm. Well, should he finish her off, then? He had always done that before. This time, though, he was reconsidering. Actually thinking of doing something different.

An icy laugh escaped him, and it had enough cold and evil behind it that it would have made an iceberg shudder. He truly enjoyed his work. And right now, he enjoyed these little beings. Well, he enjoyed the game. At some point, he might have to get serious, but why should he get serious when all this studying and experimenting was so much more worthwhile?

He continued to spin around the redhead for a moment more to draw off some of that physical strength that she had. That might take some time for her to figure out how to regain herself--inwardly and outwardly both.

Then he turned his attention to the new young woman who had come in, throwing an Imperius curse at him. Well, in order to do that effectively, she had to be fully cognizant of her positive and negative emotions and had to be able to use them in some rather controlled manner. That seemed to be one of the primary issues with the young ones of any species--they had not developed full control of their minds. And this one had made a noble attempt to try to protect the redhead. Hm.. That was quite interesting. He was curious about that. A being that would honestly put themselves in harm's way for another? Very interesting indeed.

He decided he had toyed enough with the redheaded young one. There didn't seem to be much left of her except biological bodily functions, and even those appeared to be in distress. He left her. He turned to the new young female. He smiled at her for just one moment. Perhaps a new experiment was in order.

He swirled around her and removed all the gravity that was affecting her. That would surely cause her to be sucked up the the ceiling and stuck there. In time, that would make her sufficiently frustrated, he guessed. Young beings did appear to need to constantly be doing something. He wanted to see what would happen if she was stuck up there awhile.

And then another young one entered. A young male. He seemed to be attacking without rhyme or reason, it seemed to Malek. He didn't seem to even know what he was attacking or why. Malek wasted no time. He swirled around the young male and began to strip away every emotion the young man had experienced, and while he was at it, he began to strip away the young man's sense of logic, his memories, those things that made him think and act independently from the others of his kind. This would only take a matter of a moment or so. As these beings phrased it, a minute or two. Malek never allowed stupidity. Never tolerated it, and this appeared to be just stupid on the young male's part, or at least Malek thought so.

Jaquellene "Jack" Dyllan wrote:Blood spilled from a gash on his face and Jack felt the fleeting swish of victory until the wound healed over. The tickling spell hit him and again she felt as though she had won for the split second that the spell seemed to have an effect on him, until it seemed he had overcome it. A fireball whooshed by her and she pressed herself against the compartment, looking back to see what had caused it.

She turned back to her demon to see a jet of fire coming towards her. She should have expected it, and yet here she was. She turned and rolled out of the way, though her hair momentarily caught on fire. It was extinguished as she rolled and she glared up at the creature, yanking her arm from under her and firing a tripping jinx at him before yelling "Augumenti! Lumos!"

She assumed that these things had a weakness, and since she saw that they liked fire and darkness, she hoped water or light may do something more productive than the spells she had already tried.

The Demon frowned as his jet of fire missed and even more so when he saw the water and the light he shielded his eyes from the light and before the water could hit him he had moved down the corridor "You win for now girl but your species will lose in the end" he said as he gave her a small dark smile. With a flash of purple light he disappeared leaving her with the smell of the smoke from the fire his jet of fire had started behind her.

Jack raised her arm to shield her eyes from the violent flash of purple light and then slowly lowered it as she stared at the spot he had disappeared from. She stayed at the ready, her arm raised and her wand held aloft as though she thought he was about to reappear. When he did not she pointed her wand at the compartment door and firmly locked it.

She turned and hurried down the corridor towards Angelique and Brienne. She saw they had casted Patronuses and she stopped in her tracks. A happy thought. C'mon... there had to be something in her life that she could think of. No. Better go for hopes then...

Vito, asking for help, admitting she had been right... Andrew and Chase and Jack, eating brownies as though nothing had ever happened...

"Expecto Patronum!" Jack called. A small jackal burst from her wand and loped easily towards the other demon, beginning to circle it. Feeling empowered, Jack hurried forward and stood alongside Angelique and stared at the demon holding up her wand. "It's time for you to leave," she said fiercely.

The red headed girl that Hidama was apparently "saving", even if this was more just her own adventurous nature and the anger of perhaps that demon having hurt her sister, had crumbled down to the ground after having ducked from the curse Hidama had sent towards the mass that was attacking her. The Imperio curse didn't seem to be doing it's good though, and Hidama swallowed hard as she realized that she had just pissed off a very big, strong and sadistic being. Pull yourself together, you don't have to be afraid of anything. That was a little harder to actually do than just to think about, when the demon came closer to her, swirled around her, and then it smiled at her. It was a smile that made Hidama stop breathing for a few seconds before she found herself in the air, for the second time that day. However she didn't crash down to the floor as she had expected, but instead she was somehow stuck to the ceiling in a rather humiliating way. She felt like a fly that was stuck in a fly-trap, and that -really- pissed the Keikan girl off.

"What the heck? Let me down!" As usually, she didn't really care who or what it was which she was mouthing off to. Her voice got a little louder from suppressed fright which she refused to let out as she was pretty sure that would only amuse the demon more. Just then, a young looking boy ran into the same cabin and had thrown a very random attack at the demon which Hidama was trying to strangle in her mind. Well that wont go well... damn it! I can't stay stuck here! If something happens to Hinode.. While the demon was busy with his new "prey", Hidama turned her dark eyes towards the other girl that was still on the floor. "HEY! Get up! You can rest later! I don't care what that pile of stupidity did to you, but you better get up!" Right now, she wanted to facepalm over the situation she was stuck in.

A stream of curses followed that as Hidama squirmed and wriggled around, not being able to move the least from her spot on the ceiling. Calm down this is not getting you anywhere.. if you keep getting angry then you are just playing his game. Drawing in a deep breath while talking to herself in her mind, Hidama relaxed her muscles and looked down at what was happening below her. Again she saw that thing start to swirl around the new person, the pale-ness of the boy's face indicating that the demon was most probably, as Hidama had suspected after seeing the girl, sucking his existence out. Or well, maybe he was just focusing on something else. This reminds me of... That's it! In her hand she still had her wand, which kind of pissed her off since the demon didn't seem to think of her as any threat at all clearly. She tightened her grip around the wand, before thinking about the magic she was about to use while trying to remember all the basics for it.

Alright, think happy thoughts.. think happy thoughts. "Hey you, boy! Think about the most happy stuff that has ever happened to you! Don't get drawn in by that thing! You are stronger than that!" Well if this wont work now, then I'm pretty sure I will get my loud mouth shut soon. But I just have to get them both to help me... God damn it.. Why couldn't she have gotten into a fight with a bunch of 7th year Slytherins that wouldn't have gotten as much in her way?" You! Girl! Get UP! Both of you, use your bloody Patronus magic!" She was half-flailing up there while yelling out, trying to wake them both out of their stupor, as she was filling her mind with every single happy memory and feeling she could think of. Her twin sister's face appeared in her mind, making Hidama smile slightly out as she shouted out the magic. "Expecto Patronum!" A silvery light burst from the tip of her black wand, and out from the light jumped a medium sized fox which landed on the ground. It snarled at the demon, while Hidama closed her eyes and kept focusing on the good things, letting her guardian fox get all the strength it needed.

Aaron fell to his knees, scrabbling furiously at his head, a number of cuts and scratches being caused by his nails, the feeling inside him, it was terrible, almost like an un reachable itch, ever constant, and ever ripping a small part of your sanity up. Dropping his wand he felt the presence disappear, momentarily, and fell forward, a wave of exhaustion and emotion washing over him at once. Shaking his head he looked up and saw another girl jump into the fray, she seemed to be yelling alot, it wasn't a bad thing, but it did irritate him a little.

Rising up on one knee, shaking violently as he tried, unsuccessfully, to steady himself. What the hell was that? he thought, looking hazily at the demon in front of him. "Incendio," he shouted, shooting a ball of flame at it, hoping the slightly more physical magic would have greater effect

Although the girl who had entered the room was near enough to Amelia that her yelling should have been totally comprehensible, it seemed as though Amelia was listening to it while underwater. She had closed her eyes upon falling to the ground, trying to block out the sensations that were making her weak, but it was to no avail; the problem came from within, not without, and shutting her eyes had only made it worse.

In the darkness, the emotions that had been let loose on Amelia seemed to multiply and develop into more than what they had been. Fear turned into terror, loss into crippling loneliness. The situations Amelia had tried to hide and ignore for so long came flooding into her mind, and even her strength of self seemed to be leaving her. When she was in control, Amelia knew who she was and how to handle just about any situation; when exposed to her own emotions, she had crumbled. It was like being attacked by a foreign part of herself, and it was both frustrating and humiliating.

Amelia could hear continued yelling from what she assumed to be the girl who had entered the room, for she had not heard the black smoke speak and doubted very much that if it had a voice at all, that it would have taken on a pitch quite as high as the shrieking that was reaching her ears.

Wanting to get out of the stupor she had fallen into, Amelia attempted to focus on something concrete: the words which were being shouted at her. At first it seemed an impossible task, for her mind was so clouded with emotion that nothing seemed to make sense. After a few minutes of intense effort, however, Amelia began to process cohesive sentences, and the first words she heard were ‘patronus magic.’

Although Amelia was strengthened by the idea of having some kind of plan, she was also deterred by the fact that a patronus seemed impossible at this point. She was still on the ground, her eyes just barely open and still unable to see anything given the dense blackness around her. Although her mind was still moving like sludge, she was able to process fast enough the effort it would require to produce a patronus in this state. Logically, it just didn’t seem possible.

But logic, it seemed, would leave her no escape from her current predicament. Logically, Amelia felt as though she should already have been dead. Logically, she should never have gone into this cabin at all. Logically, no one should have been able to survive the onslaught of whatever it was that had decided to attack her. So maybe it was time to look beyond logic.

Think of something happy… Amelia thought slowly, her mind processing at a much slower rate than she was accustomed to, which only added to her frustration. But being frustrated wouldn’t get her anywhere, so she forced herself to work with what she had. Slowly, she pulled herself into a sitting position and opened her eyes, though even the strength it took to do these two simple tasks seemed to drain her of most of her energy. Placing two fingers on her temples, Amelia closed her eyes again, though this time in concentration rather than defeat, and tried her best to focus.

Raoul is coming to visit. He is coming to see me. He wants to be in my life again. He doesn’t want to stay hidden. He will be there for me.

The situation was completely hypothetical, a figment of her imagination. But with all her happy memories and positive experiences drained from her, Amelia was relying on her ability make herself believe in something that wasn’t real, a talent she had never been all that good at. Perhaps adrenaline would be the magic ingredient.

“Expecto Patronum,” Amelia tried, her voice weak and the resulting charm proportionately disappointing.

Although it was tempting to be completely dissuaded by this feeble attempt, Amelia could see now why the girl had been shouting so much, because she seemed to be stuck to the ceiling. It was still foggy in the dining car, and her vision was blurred as a result, but she also thought she could see another student from where she was sitting, also being entwined in the dark, smoky fingers of their attacker.

Think of Raoul. Think of Christmas, the last Christmas he was home. Think of peppermint.

“Expecto Patronum!” Amelia shouted, her voice bolstered this time by the memory of her brother, a memory she buried so deeply that perhaps whatever had stolen her reminiscences earlier had missed this one. As she let the memory fill her, the redhead even thought she could smell peppermint, and from her wand burst a hawk, which this time did not flicker or fail, but instead went to soar protectively around the student she could not identify, dissipating at least some of the black smoke which had surrounded the individual. This task accomplished, the hawk moved upward toward the girl with the loud voice, gliding around her and removing the effects of the spell which had brought her to the ceiling. Realizing that the girl probably didn’t want to come crashing to the ground either, Amelia forced her patronus to hover beneath the brunette to provide the support she would need to get to the floor safely.

Ensuring this charm would last long enough to be effective was nearly a crippling effort, but Amelia was dedicating all that was left of her energy to the task, unwilling to be as useless as she had been for the past few minutes. Uselessness just didn’t suit the Ravenclaw very well, even if it meant being a danger to her own well-being.

[OOC: I have decided to make a post for Chase's feelings towards the fight, but besides this.. I won't have time, lucky I woke up early today eh?]

Chase cowered Jack had left her alone, and she knew there was something wrong. A horrible stink was seeping from under the door, getting closer and closer, her mind started to imagine things. Rain splattering the windows, and she could almost hear her dog yapping at the door, alerting her to his presence. "No!" He wasn't here. He wasn't coming for her family. He wasn't back! But there was his shadow, and then she heard a shout. The rain disappeared, as did the yapping dog, and she realized she was sitting in the corner of the compartment, her hands over her ears, tears falling down her face.

It was like he had been stopping the tears. Stopping the misery of that night as it washed over her like giant waves. Sorrow, grief, tragedy flew over her like the wings of night, and more then once, Chase lost consciousness. Often, she would awake to find she could smell something burning, something on fire, but there was always a water smell that presided over it. Water.. She shuddered and winced hard when her mind recoiled against the smell.

Chassy! The room is full of water!"He cried out. At that moment the doors burst, water flowed into the room, Max was thrown forward, and Chase felt her concentration slide, the ropes came loose on the man, and she was thrown into the front door at the force of the water.

Chase cried out in distress, and then heard a soft click. She jumped to her feet, her hand in her wand, ready to fight whatever was coming through the door. But then realized nothing was, because the door had been locked from the outside. She looked around and was startled to find herself on her knees, not knowing when she had fallen. Had she been there the entire time? Or only when she stood up and her legs had given out. But she knew, that no matter what was happening outside that door. There was nothing she could do against it. She crawled back into the seat, and sat.

Her tears were spent, her mind kept running over the scenes of the night her family had died. Every so often, an image of Andrew, his face angry and shouting at her, would break through the images. Causing her to put her hands over her head again.

"I didn't do it for fun!" he said, his voice almost sounding like he had snapped "I did it for you! I almost killed the mutant bear because it had almost killed you! I don't want to see you hurt and it drove me crazy Chase! It drove me crazy to see you hurt! I love you too much to let it slide by!" He hugged her heavily, wrapping his arms around her. "Please forgive me..." he said softly.

It was like a weight, something she could hold onto, a small ray of sunshine on a rainy day. He had to still love her, he wouldn't have left her if he didn't. She knew there was nothing for her there anymore. Her tears were spent, and her heart ached, an odd empty feeling in her chest like something had been torn out. Hollow and painful. Chase put her hands over her head and let her gaze drift across the compartment. Staring, unseeingly, at the cushion on the seat. It may be her fault, but crying did nothing to help it. The ache, it would always be there. He was right, he was a dangerous man, he wrecked havoc wherever he went. She could hear screaming from beyond the compartment, and some part of her took savage pleasure in thinking he may have had something to do with it.

Chase sat there for who knew how long, until finally she stood and opened the window, her owl flying out as though it had been waiting for that finally. The tears were gone now, but the mask was in place. An odd veil that was never normally there. Her smile was gone, the sparkle in her eyes had diminished. Leaving her an empty shell with no purpose. But she did have a purpose. She was put here to help other people, so that those people wouldn't end up like her. Hurt, confused, lost. She knew what she wanted to do right then and there. She would continue her healer course, and learn everything she could. Then she would go off on a year trip, taking in the world, learning about everything there was to know about healing. And then she would specialize in healing heartache. Healing this horrible empty feeling in her chest. Filling it for people. giving them a meaning to live.

Even if people looked down on her, that is what she would do, she would do it, and be a bit happier. A small spark appeared in her eyes. As though something had been rekindled. A small burning hope, the fire wasn't completely out, but she would never look like her same old bubbly self again. Because as much as she liked to try and convince herself otherwise, Andrew was done with her, and she had her own life to live.

[PS: Please don't attack her, I won't be able to respond this coming week]

Malek looked at the three young ones. Their patronuses did seem to make them feel as if they were doing something. It seemed to give them courage, so Malek decided not to inform them any different at the moment. If they thought it worked, then they could cast them until Armageddon if they liked. He looked at his first plaything of the day--the little redhead. There wasn't much left of the one on the floor. She was a bit like water poured out on the ground. Useless and spent, pretty much. He was a bit intrigued that she could yet find a bit of herself enough to try to rebel. He didn't like that she still believed in a lot of things that simply did not exist, but that was her problem. He did like the fact that she had enough rebellion to try to rally herself despite how futile it was.

He looked the the little female he'd stuck on the wall. Well, she was a mouthy little thing, now, wasn't she? He narrowed his eyes at her. Not because she was giving worthwhile advice. She wasn't. She was just too chatty for his likings. He preferred his toys to be a bit less noisy. She wasn't even causing him to want to study her much at the moment. He just wanted her to shut up. He considered fusing her lips together, but then she wouldn't be any fun at all. Instead he caused just a small wisp of his dark form to flow across her face so that it made it impossible for her to make noise much above what was a soft volume level for human speech. She would not be doing anymore yelling.

Ah, and then there was the young male. Now, he was Malek's chief form of amusement at the moment. The spirit filled male had sent a ball of flame towards Malek. How nice! Malek liked fire. He simply absorbed it into his dark foggy form and consumed the energy much like the humans consumed their nourishment. The flame had been tasty. A bit small, but a nice tidbit, nevertheless.

He blew a breeze through the train compartment strong enough to rob the male of his wand. Just exactly what were humans made of without their wands? Would he defend himself or just give up? He had picked up enough of their language since he had been in this realm to speak. His voice so dark and deep and resonant with evil that the temperature of the room plummetted and ice formed instantly and thickly on the windows with every syllalble he spoke to the male.

"Why do you want to live, Human?" Malek asked in his dark, deep echoing monotone.

The red headed girl below her finally started to stir and seemed to be trying to shake off her stupor. She'd at least stay alive a little longer to help Hidama out, hopefully. Every second inside of this cabin was starting to feel like long minutes. But instead of torturing herself mentally over thinking that while still stuck up there, Hidama was now looking at her patronus, while scowling slightly as she saw that the magic wasn't doing anything that could be called helping out. Surely the fox was snarling and taunting the demon, but the demon didn't show any sign of feeling threatened at all nor did he show any sign of backing off. Well that's just -great-. What does he want anyways? Why not just kill us and get it over with? She hated the thought of being toyed with, treated like some sort of a lab rat for a crazy demon that had nothing better to do with his time. The red head didn't seem to notice what Hidama was noticing now, as she kept trying to move.

The girl started to get up on her knees, now seemingly having a little bit more of a color in her face as she wielded her wand and was trying to concentrate. She even blinked in slow motion, which gave Hidama a small hint of just how bad her state was. I can't have her faint.. me and that boy are already too vulnerable as it is. Now the red head's patronus came out, a hawk that was just as beautifully silver-colored as Hidama's fox was. To the Keikan girl's relief, the hawk came to her direction and with not that much effort started to release Hidama from her prisoned state against the ceiling. While using the animal as a leverage, Hidama managed to get down to the floor again without breaking her neck as she kept her eyes cast towards the enemy. She nodded quickly towards the other girl without breaking her gaze, not interested nor having any time in expressing more graditute than that for the help. As she opened her mouth, about to ask just what that demon was doing there, she took a step back with a startled look as there seemed to come a shadow towards her face.

What had he done? Hidama's hand flew up to her mouth, her fingers running over her lips. She could feel like something was stuck in front of her mouth, not allowing her to raise her voice above what would be called whispering. What is that thing? How can he be this strong and have all this knowledge of magic? It was quite alarming to know that she wasn't even able to lift a little finger against her opponent. What other spells could she use? Probably none, nothing seemed to be working. Hidama worried her lower lip with her teeth as she shifted slightly. She nullified the patronus spell with a soft whisper, knowing now that it wouldn't help at all. Glancing at the girl at her side, she wondered if she'd now simply give up or keep fighting. There was no hope out there for them, nothing really that they could cling to.

But then to her surprise, the demon spoke, and Hidama couldn't help but shiver slightly at the sound and feel of his raspy voice. It felt like she was listening to someone scraping their fingernails against a chalkboard, so unpleasant was this feeling. His whole attention seemed fixed on the boy, as he spoke to him. Now being half-way muted, and not wanting to be muted for good, Hidama did most of her talking and cursing inside of her mind as she quickly scrolled over the list of magic she knew. But she just couldn't think of anything that could do the slightest damage against that being. If a Patronus wasn't strong enough, then what was? Will the teachers get here in time and save us, or are we all doomed? And most importantly... where was her sister?

Going down to her knees, leaning closer to the other girl, Hidama spoke softly out, not that she had any choice in that matter anyways. "Has he said anything before? Do you know why they are here?" While waiting for an answer, her pocket started moving all of the sudden, making Hidama quickly put her hand in there to calm her ferret down. Luckily he didn't seem hurt, but only frightened. Speaking out again, partly to herself, she murmured. "We have to at least keep him busy until help comes... keep that idiot amused so he wont decide we are more fun as a pile of meat on the floor." Her fingers stroked softly over the fur of her beloved pet, making it stop moving.

(rejoining)

there was a bright flash of purple light as Neqa'el appeared next to Malek. Neqa'el appeared this time wearing his hood over his face so it would appear as a black void. He floated slightly he would look like a dementor but instead of the torn robes they wore his were nicely pressed and clean. He gave the smoke form a small bow before he faced the humans. He waited for his presence to be fully comprehended by all in the room he was fully healed from his small encounter with one of the small humans on the train. He could hear fighting throughout the train he knew they were winning though.