Amidst the background chatter of the Fort Augustus train station, Aida looked around for her friends. In theory a number of people were to be dropped off today to journey to Aida's Secret Base. It was still very early in the morning in order to accommodate a full day of adventure. Her friends had been warned to wear rugged, flexible clothing and boots as well as to be ready to take some sun. They had also been asked to bring their own lunch and the most powerful torches they could find.

The moment had been prepared for and the group's driver, Tòry, had already arrived.

“Tòraidh, you said you have five?"

The man nodded. Apparently of Scottish descent by the sound of his accent, Tòry was a man of few words and a cold demeanor. "Three geldings, a mare, and the old bitch."

Aida nodded back.

Over the course of the year Aida's hair had grown long and was now constantly getting in her eyes. She had stashed most of her belongings in a station locker aside from a daypack which carried a little extra food and water just in case. Tòry grunted as he fell into a chair grumpily.

@Dealla Prince @Alexander Varellion @Ileen Knight @Sylvain Indarys
OOC: You get to invent the personality and physical characteristics of your horse when you are given one. You can bring whatever inventory you want.

Hexcode= #507091

Sylvain woke up extra early to pack. Aida had so kindly warned him that a torch would be necessary, so he made sure to grab one and some spare batteries. After picking out denim jeans and a pair of hiking shoes, he grabbed a ballcap from his closet to keep the sun from his eyes. Sylvain also grabbed a couple other essentials from his experiences hiking around Inverie. Sunscreen, bug repellant and extra water bottles were musts. Two apples was a treat for later, and a box of band-aids was best when it went totally unused, but preparedness was his new motto. Ritually, he felt bravest being prepared.

Catching the Ferry from his hometown of Inverie to the docks of Mallaigvaig, then catching an orange bus from Mallaig to Fort Williams, Sylvain’s changing course then changed from Glasgow bound to Inverness bound fair. Sleepishly, Sylvain had already spent the first four and a half hours of the day in the wee dark of warm summer morning travelling to meet his friends. Optimistically daydreaming of exploration and reunions. After dozing off on the bus to Fort Williams only to be woken by the kind and warm words of a complete stranger who saw the ticket hanging out of his pocket, Sylvain’s mind wondered if they would all have had a more interesting summer than him. All he did so far was read a lot about poisons.

Unsure of whether or not he was in the right place, Sylvain spent a minute or so searching for his snow-white friend, Aida. The last few months previous school year at Hogwarts had been particularly gloomy. Especially with the announcement of hags in the Dark and Perilous Wood, he had grown concerned for what returning to Hogwarts would be like. Predictably, he was also concerned for where Aida might be. Not too long and he decided to call out and divine her location by voice. “Aida!?! Are you around here somewhere?” His expression would lighten as he saw her pallid complexion. “Your hair grew out, and you look taller.” He looked around for the others and saw the driver, whom he respectfully gave a polite wave and nod. “What’s the path ahead look like?”

@Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood @Alexander Varellion @Dealla Prince @Ileen Knight

Interacting with | @Ileen Knight
Looking forward to seeing | @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood | @Sylvain Indarys
Mentioning | @Alexander Varellion

Dealla was nearly bouncing as she stepped off the train and onto the platform, as usual a few steps ahead of her companion, as she had be almost during the entire train ride, likely driving everyone seated near her mad with her fidgeting. Her father had taken her and Ileen to Inverness via floo powder and then made sure that they boarded the right train for the just over an hour long train ride to Fort Augustus, where they were going to meet Aida, Sylvain, and Alexander who Dee had seen but not yet talked to.
There was a small Muggle cellphone nestled into her backpack alongside her water bottle, some food, a light jacket and her mother's home made potion for sun protection. Her parents had made her promise to call when they were on the train back to Inverness tonight so someone could come pick them up, although Dee was quite sure that she and Ileen would have managed to get back by themselves just fine.

For now, however, all of that was forgotten, and the soon-to-be second year Ravenclaw was just excited to see her friends and find out what the day had in store for all of them. And maybe, just maybe, she was a little worried about the horse riding part, although Ileen had assured her that she didn't need to be. Still. She'd never been closer than five meters to any horse in her life, and she hadn't felt the need to. Those things were huge, what was to stop them from just throwing her off their backs and trampling her if they felt like it?

But that was a risk she was willing to take if it meant having an adventure with her friends and exploring Aida's fabled cave. Ileen had grown up with two horses and was fine, so she should know what she was talking about, right?

For now, Dee just spun around to face her friend, excitement shining from her eyes and energy rolling off her in waves. "Excited?" she asked, grinning. "Let's go look for the others, yeah?" Without waiting for a reply Dee was already off.
She was wearing sensible clothes, jeans and hiking boots and a shirt. Ileen had used some of the time on the train to braid Dealla's long brown locks back, and now Dee felt perfectly prepared for anything the trip might throw at her - even if it might include falling off a horse at some point.

Mentions: @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood
Interacts with: @Sylvain Indarys

Alexander would walk out of the train, arriving just after Aida. Carrying with him more of the group's supply, after a bit of it got stuck under one of the seats. His eyes squinted, trying to adjust to the bright light. Then he would walk towards where Aida was. Talking to what seemed to be a quite morose man, who he could not help but be cautious off. In his recent experience, adults and people in general were not that reliable.

This added onto the already present tension. Of meeting new people and riding a horse. Because he had certainly not done the latter before. Though he supposed it shouldn't be too hard. He then saw how a brown haired, boy approaching Aida and talking to her. Seemed harmless and nice enough. As he looked at him he thought he had seen the person before. Wondering if it was another recollection from the past, only to realize he had seen the boy before in something more recent.

In a flash of recollection, he remembered that the boy had been there in the all-consuming chaos of the woods. Where all the Ravenclaws had decided to go in there, to chase Vladimir for some reason. And where he had followed Aida. As the boy talked to Aida, Alexander had a small focused frown. He then walked closer and a small smile appeared on Alexander's face. As he spoke out in a cheerful tone. Waving his hand a little. "Hi, I don't think we've met before. I'm Alexander, nice to meet you." Alexander would extend his right hand. His left one going through the front of his hair.

Alexander loooked to be quite eager, a little spring in his step and a spontaneous smile. Looking forward to the sensation of cave dwelling and horse riding.

Inventory:
-Flashlight
-10ft of Rope
-Swiss army knife
-Basic food and water rations.
-Small lighter

Ileen followed her as always overexcited friend with a slight shake of her head and a crooked smile. In truth she was certainly just as excited to see her friends again and to finally ride again.
She had missed Aida and Syl and couldn’t wait to see them again, especially on such an adventurous trip. Also, the young Slytherin wars curious to finally meet Alexander, a guy Aida had talked about, but Ileen didn’t know so far – at least she wasn’t sure.

All in all, it had been the best decision in her life to stay at Dee’s during the summer vacations. Her parents were the kindest people she had ever met before and they had a cat!
In addition to that, Dee had been with her all the time distracting her from her own parents in New Zealand. So, the young Slytherin was now in a better mood than she had been for a long time. Whitehaven as a safe haven had helped her, and hopefully Dee, to forget the terrible events that had happened at Hogwarts and the summer camp, at least for a while.

With a grin she pulled the straps of her backpack tighter and stroked a strand of hair from her eyes that had come loose from her high ponytail. She felt perfectly prepared with her hiking pants and the soft blue cotton shirt with fringed sleeves. In her backpack she had stored two extra flashlights, provisions and a warm jacket. She also had a towel and a blanket stuffed in it, just in case. The second flashlight was a precautionary measure because, knowing her best friend, Dee had probably forgotten her own.

“Sure!” With a few big steps Ileen caught up with Dee, who once again had simply stormed off. She made a long neck and looked around. When she spotted a familiar silhouette and an unmistakable brown shock of hair, she gently nudged Dee in that direction and waved. "Hey, Syl!"

Interacting with | @Dealla Prince | @Sylvain Indarys
Mentions | @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood | @Alexander Varellion

Tòry did not bother to examine the children as they arrived and instead sat in his chair looking irritable.

Aida, on the other hand, looked happy to see her friends when they arrived. Noticing Sylvain’s arrival she began to wave him over. Sylvain did not immediately see her, so she called softly, “Ey!” until he found her. The boy's observations were correct: Aida had noticeably aged since last they met. Eyes hidden behind her unruly hair, Aida’s hypersensitive nose was still visible as it crinkled in recognition of the bug spray and sunscreen in Sylvain’s bag. The scent of apples reminded her of the Bertie’s Beans incident from earlier that summer.

“What’s the path ahead look like?” asked Sylvain.

“Just a moment,” replied Aida, noticing the arrival of Dee and Ileen in the distance and wanting to address everyone at the same time. Of course Aida would never neglect a friend’s question.

Alexander had arrived together with Aida on the same train, but due to some stuck luggage he was a bit later getting out onto the platform. Luckily their host was a local and knew exactly where the party would arrive, so Aida was not far. On seeing the blonde boy looking at him Tòry scowled back at Alexander. Looking to Sylvain’s side, Aida saw Alexander hauling the other bag. Realizing that Alexander had lagged behind, Aida felt guilty for failing to notice that he had needed help and that she had exited too fast.

Reading Alexander’s face to see if he was upset, Aida noticed instead a smile. The Slytherin boy cordially greeted Sylvain.

[Aida observation check: [d20+10 : 11+10=21] Pass]

However, Aida was not only an observant person, but she had a sixth sense about people and other creatures. Furthermore, she knew Alexander, probably better than anyone else currently at Hogwarts. His smile was too wide, not toothy enough– not his natural soft smile. A dissonant feeling shivered through the albino as she felt the falseness of the gesture. Looking into his eyes she saw that they were attentive but blank. There was something wrong here. Aida cocked her head and looked concerned; what was going through Alexander’s mind? On the other hand, Aida was not a creature that concealed her feelings, unable to lie to a giant spider even to save her own life, but she could recognize a fake when she saw it. Alexander extended one hand to Sylvain while running the other through his own blonde hair.

Just then Ileen and Dealla arrived, so Aida gave a small wave. With the party gathered, Aida took a minute to introduce Alexander to Ileen, Dealla, and Sylvain by name. Then, looking over the general demeanor of the party, Aida decided that people were nervous but excited. They all appeared to be in good health and well-provisioned.

“Everyone, this is Tòraidh, our host. ‘Tòry’ is fine,” said Aida. Apparently if she had not said anything he probably would not have introduced himself. “We’ll go by car to the horse ranch. After that we will ride for 3 hours to Ben Nevis. From there it will take an hour to reach the cave where we should have about two or three hours before returning the same way. We should arrive at this station before sundown.”

With the brigade mustered, Aida waved to indicate for the group to follow Tòry to his vehicle, a battered and rusted van. One tire looks a little flatter than the others. Perhaps its riders would feel fortunate that it did in fact have seats lining its interior.


Despite whatever concerns the group may have had, if anyone showed reluctance Aida would patiently try to convince them that it would be okay. Meanwhile Tòry got in the driver's seat and chugged the engine until it started with a ka-thunk and the battering sound of old pistons. When Aida's friends got inside the vehicle they would find long continuous seats lining the van walls instead of being stacked piecewise in forward-facing rows. This made it so that all seated would be able to see and speak to each other without having to turn around. As Tòry struggled to roll down the driver's side window, Aida glanced over everyone to ensure their seatbelts were working before the van got moving. She shunted herself into the corner behind the driver's seat in order to be able to interact with Tòry regardless of how much the racket the rickety van made.

With a lurch the van rolled forward and Tòry pulled out into the main road. The ride to the ranch would be long and loud as every dip in the road made the van rattle. Its seat belts were clunky but appeared functional. The van's interior was just as weathered as the exterior, and chunks of yellow foam upholstery were falling out of cracks in the seats.

OOC: At this point, your character can decide not to get in the van and go home instead. It would mean that you could not participate in the rest of the journey, however.

If you choose to continue, when you arrive at the ranch please treat this adventure as a moderated event and declare major actions as attempts; I will roll for outcomes. For things involving the finer points of your character, I may ask you to determine a DC in order to determine if Aida's actions succeed. Of course, basic things like “Sylvain tries to take out his lunch to eat it” are not necessary to write as attempts, but I reserve the right to put bugs in your food if it has sat outside all day, etc. I will automatically roll for the functionality of your inventory in more major circumstances.

After one round of posts I will have us arrive at the horse ranch. Embellish the van however you want. Have fun with it.

@Ileen Knight @Dealla Prince @Sylvain Indarys @Alexander Varellion

Interacting with | @Alexander Varellion | @Aida Mòrsgor-Ama Ellwood
Mentioning | @Sylvain Indarys | @Ileen Knight

When she and Ileen reached the group, Dee spared a tight hug for Aida and Syl, and then chirped a perky greeting at Alexander. She was already turning away to grace 'Tòry' with another, just as chipper greeting, when she took a second glance at the blond boy and her blue eyes narrowed in thought.

He seemed familiar, it just eluded her where she'd seen him before... until her eyes wandered over to her white-haired friend, and the connection snapped into place. "Oh! Now I remember - you were in the forest with us, weren't you? You helped Aida with the dolls!" It was something akin to a miracle that she recognized him, most of that particular adventure was a blur in her memory, of being dragged across the forest floor, of extinguishing fires and fighting dolls. Alexander stuck out only for the reason that for a moment, they had fought side by side to save Aida from the attacks from her creepy murderous doppelganger dolls. It was, however, already enough to extend some small sense of comradeship towards him - having fought the same battles and all.

When shown to the somewhat less than trust inspiring van, Dee spared it a very skeptical look, particularly snagging on the missing headlights and the almost-flat tire, but climbed into it without a second of hesitation or moment of thought. It would be fine - right?

She flopped onto the sideways facing bench opposite of the door, then poked the yellow foam material coming out of a rip in the fabric of her seat with interest. "Where did you find this piece of junk?" she asked Aida, amusement colouring her voice. "Straight off a scrapyard? Are we sure it can move?"

At least it seemed to work to some degree, as was demonstrated rather clearly to her when Tòry started the engine which proceeded to produce infernal noise and caused the young Ravenclaw to jump in surprise. She blinked, resisting the urge to cover her ears and shield them from the racket. "How long are we going to be on this?" she questioned, wincing when the engine let out a particularly loud bang.

But through it all, there was a grin on her face, a spark of excitement that didn't fade even when they started rattling along the road, every road hole making the entire van jolt. At the very least, she'd have an interesting story to tell her parents.

Interacting with: @Dealla Prince

As Dealla talked to Alexander, he tried to recall if he had seen her before in the forest. He had seen flashes of a brown-haired girl but couldn't remember any specific sights. He guessed that she was right, especially in the context. But he could not know for sure. So he responded. "Yeah I was there. I think I remember seeing you, but I can't remembers specifically. And the dolls were not even the worst of it, there was this giant flaming spider." Alexander said, exaggerating the flaming spider part by spreading his hands upwards. In a similar motion to an exploding object.

"But luckily professor Equinox came and scared the thing off. After that dealing with the spiders was far less scary, though there were a few scare moments there as well." Alexander smiled a little, this one part-fake, part-true. He then frowned a little as they were led to the car.
If he had not been told they were going to be driven in this car, he would have said the car would have been more fitting in a junk yard. Fit only to be turned into scrap and not safe for human use.

A fact which most Slytherins would probably have kept quiet on. Or at least talked about in a lower tone. Though the Ravenclaw quickly showed that she wasn't most Slytherins and said so out loud. Alexander frowned a little once more and said. Though in a quieter tone. Hushed was not really necessary with the sound of the engine dominating everything. "I am fairly sure that this should not legally be allowed to be driven consi-" Just to emphasize that the car rattled. Probaply going over some pebble road. Which would not have been bad if the springs hadn't been rusted a bit and were almost useless. Which resulted in the entire car shaking.

"Excuse me. But considering the age of this thing and the general condition.I can't imagine this car can legally be on the road. Though as long as we don't go through any busy roads it shouldn't be too bad."

Aida listened to Dealla and Alexander as they spoke about the Forbidden Forest, absorbing as much as she could about what had happened after she blacked out. She had not even known that Alaric had come into the woods, let alone that she had received help with the dolls. The last thing she saw was Alexander facing off against the flaming acromantula. Since Aida had never received a satisfying explanation of how they had gotten out of there alive this conversation was very interesting indeed.

Then when Dealla spoke derisively about the frankly terrible state of the party’s jalopy, Aida laughed, then laughed more as Alexander questioned its street legality. She had no defense for the van’s condition, let alone excuses for the poverty that necessitated the dead van being unnaturally kept alive. Indeed, if this van could be described in a word it would be “zombie,” or if two words, then "Frankenstein's monster."

When they were inside and driving off, Tòry of course had nothing to say, but Aida had found a pen stabbed into a hole in the seat cushion. Pulling out her train ticket stub, the girl began to draw while she listened to her friends. Of all the places to draw, the worst probable option was surely the inside of this van as it bumped and chugged along the road. However, her brows knit fiercely as if her new task was of great importance.

@Dealla Prince @Alexander Varellion

Hopefully interacting with everyone

Hexcode= #507091

"Pleasure to meet you," Sylvain said, a little wary of Alexander since their time meeting in the forest wasn't exactly the best first impression. "I'm Sylvain, you can just call me Syl on account that the others will too." He found a small smile to give back to Alex. Any deception of feelings was lost on him in that moment. Eager as an eagle, Alex looked ready to get going from Sylvain's perspective. Anxious anticipation was a sentiment they both shared in that moment. Today was a new day, a chance for better feelings to take root and hopefully bloom into something more beautiful. Sylvain decided he would toss aside his reservations for once and just let himself be among friends for the excursion.

As he asked about their path ahead, Aida stopped him, listening for the others. Sylvain also heard a familiar voice call out his name. After hearing the pair, Syl released his hold on Alexander's firm and polite handshake to see none other than Ileen and Dealla. Ileen one of the group's pair of knights, and Dealla was walking just ahead of her as usual. Overjoyed to be reunited with his friends, Sylvain could barely keep himself together. Filled with a sudden burst of energy, he wanted to jump at the mere sight of them. So he did. "Ileen. Dee!" Sylvain called out to them excitedly.

Introductions having been made, Sylvain listened closely to the directions in case someone needed to remember them later. Syl had no intention to make the mistake of getting lost more than once in his lifetime. Not that it was entirely preventable, but someone had to try. Content with Aida's explanation, Sylvain looked at the van that would usher them to the ranch. It was a beat up old jalopy, with very little left to indicate how much care and effort had been sunken into keeping it running properly. Seeing the rest of his friends climb in after a little bit of protest, he climbed into the decrepit vehicle as well. No sense in arguing they take another method anyways. The wizards and witches were twelve, with no licenses, no money, and no cars of their own after all.

Scanning the interior of the van, Sylvain focused upon the faces of his friends first in an attempt to "read the room." Noting the sparkling excitement in Dealla's smile, Alexander's brow of stern deliberation, and Aida's concentrated drawing, Sylvain himself slumped back in his seat. Relaxing as much as possible, the lad unzipped his windbreaker and checked his possessions again to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything important. Retrieving the snack from his inside his pack, Sylvain produced a bright, neon green granny smith apple. With the verdant piece of fruit in his hand, Sylvain continued to rummage for a knife, or something else to separate it into pieces so he might share.

Eventually the lad came back unsuccessful in his search. Sylvain was lacking the proper tools to divide a treat to share. "Anyone of you want to share this apple with me?" Sylvain said quietly, attempting not to interrupt anyone's conversations. "I need to borrow a knife either way."

Action: Requesting a knife. From Alexander, but not directly. Syl will cut and distribute a tart green apple if given the chance.