Cootie Infection Open Closed

The hit subject at school at the moment was having a relationship with a boy and kissing and doing all of that weird adult stuff. The year 4's were talking about it a lot and pictures of coupled kissing were going around the school. It was gross and Peach didn't see the need. And plus, they talked about cooties, that apparently sere an infection that happens when a boy touches a girl or a girl touches a boy and it makes you itchy and you can die! That wasn't really cool, to die that way, so Peach tried to not touch boys.

Peach had forgotten a book in a classroom on the fifth floor. She needed to get it for her homework and so she left the Great Hall early to get there before classes. She was walking up the stairs when she saw a girl zoom past her and then she heard a loud bang resonate a little everywhere. It wasn't unusual to see students running, usually from ghosts, but it was a little funny. 

The young girl succeeded to get to the fifth floor and she tried to remember which classroom she had left her book in. She opened the door of a first classroom and observed, but nothing was there. So she looked at a second classroom, then third, and finally a fourth. When she tried to open the door, she found it locked. She knocked at the door and looked into the window where she saw a young girl who seemed extremely anxious. Peach smiled and waved and pointed to the door as to ask if she could unlock it. 

Eris absent-mindlessly sat on the desk, wondering how safe it would be if she made a bee-line to the hospital wing and asked the nurse for a vaccine. Maybe then she would finally be safe from the deadly disease that all the other kids in school seemed to have. There was a book lying on a desk near the one Eris was perched upon. On a normal occasion, Eris would of loved to read it or see what it was about, but honestly, she was too worried and lost in racing thoughts about cooties to go to the book.

Eris was interrupted from her terrifying thoughts, by the face of a girl looking through the window. Eris's heart raced in her chest, as she slowly walked to the door and cracked it open, just enough to speak through it and hear the girl talk. The girl was in hufflepuff, and looked a little scared herself. Maybe she was also trying to hide from the cooties..or maybe she was infected as well.

"Are you infected with cooties?" Eris asked, frowning at the other girl. She quickly searched the girl's body for red marks from scratching. Apparently a sign of cooties was being itchy, and when you were itchy you scratched at your skin. You could never be too careful. Eris didn't want die, and maybe the other girl had touched a boy before knowing about the virus and was infected. Eris was pretty sure after someone was infected they could infect everybody around them, regardless of what gender they were. She didn't want to take any risks.

Peach saw the young girl shakily walk to the door. This one barely opened it and she spoke so quietly that Peach nearly didn't hear. It seemed that she had asked her if she had cooties. Peach nodded negatively and shower her pale arms, providing proof that she was not itchy and she hadn't touched a boy. She then smiled and waited to the other girl to open the door.

" Hi, I'm looking for a book that I forgot somewhere around here so I'd like to check please. " She said, looking around the room through the window. She had probably put it with the other books in one of the closets so she'd have to look a little further. 

The young girl in front of her seemed extremely anxious, probably about the cooties going around the school. Apparently, there were two different sorts. The one where a girl touches a boy and the one where a boy touches a girl. When a boy touches a girl it's itchy and you get heaps of red and purple dots everywhere and you can never get rid of them. Peach was wondering if there was a vaccine against that sickness because it was kind of severe, especially if it touched even half of the population of the castle. And the sick bay wasn't big enough to look after hundreds of student! Such complications...

Eris opened the door fully, staring warily at the other young girl. She couldn't of been that much older than Eris, but she was certainly taller than Eris. Everybody was taller than her, Eris thought with an irritated scowl at the floor ."There's a book on the desk over there." Eris said, pointing to the book she had momentarily looked over, while panicking over cooties. When the girl was fully in the room, Eris closed the door again and let out a sigh, back pressed up against the door.

"Gosh, these cooties are really scary." She said out loud, batting a piece of red hair away from her face, as she turned to look at the hufflepuff girl. Thank god the other girl wasn't infected. Eris really didn't want to be infected. This whole thing felt like something out of the show her dad used to watch. What was it called? The Walking Dead. Eris hadn't ever watched it, although her dad had told her about it. He had said a virus had gotten all over the world and turned everybody who got it crazy, and when the crazy people touched normal people, they turned crazy too. Maybe the virus in the show was cooties! But in the show, there was no vaccine. Hopefully cooties had a vaccine. Eris didn't want to die at eleven years old.

Eris stared at the window near the door, keeping watch for any new students coming by. She didn't want to risk anybody with cooties getting her infected, and the other girl infected. Eris didn't want anybody else to die. That wouldn't be good. They might have to leave school if everybody died of cooties!

Peach nodded when the young Gryffindor told her that there was a book on a desk near the end of the classroom. She realized that she was taller than the young girl as she walked past. Once she had picked up the book, she looked out the window that offered a nice view of one the indoor park type things they had put up so that students could get some doses of green and fresh oxygen. She turned around to face the young unknown girl when this one said that cooties were really scary. Peach silently nodded and leaned against the desk. 

" They're like super dangerous. What if everyone got it and we all died? Or what if there was some kind of vaccine? If it existed maybe they should give the vaccine to every kid in the world so that cooties died? " she said, looking around. She didn't want to get it but the chances that she would have it were really high as there were so many boys in the school. Maybe the professors had them too, but it's okay because they never touch students. Maybe the government had the vaccine, or maybe the school's headmaster. " Do you think the headmaster has like a spell that protects you from it? " she asked the young Gryffindor. 

They could become the persuaders who saved the whole world from the cooties and that would honestly be so cool and fun and everyone would be so happy and no one would be sad or itchy and such. 

Eris nodded her head so vigorously, that her hair shook away from her face. She totally agreed with the hufflepuff girl. Everybody was going to die of cooties if they didn't do something. "I know, we need to find a cure of some sort." Eris also had wondered if the headmaster had a cure, but she figured that they shouldn't bother him, unless people started dying. Then they would have to tell the headmaster, but until then, there were other people to ask for help.

"Maybe we should go the hospital wing. They might already have a vaccine already."

Eris said, thinking about how the headmaster was most likely busy, and how the hospital wing nurse was good at curing sick children. Maybe she could heal the cooties, unless it was too complex a virus. Eris hadn't seen anybody die of cooties yet, but she knew the threat was real. It seemed the other girl knew the danger as well. Eris wished that every one in the castle knew about the danger of cooties, so that the virus wouldn't spread. Eris imagined telling everybody about cooties, and keeping them safe from the dangers of infected people and gross boys. Maybe Eris could start a club of some sort to keep people safe from cooties, but first, they needed to find a cure.

Her newly cooties fighting partner proposed to go to the hospital wing to see if they had any vaccine against cooties. Peach nodded. 

" We should, and if they do we have to ask them to distribute it to the whole school for a starter, "  she said. The young girl tied her hair in a high ponytail as if they were on a mission and she was scared to be bothered by it. Her fringe was still covering her forehead and she looked dead serious. " But we need to be careful. Extra careful, not to be touched by anyone! Because anyone could give us the highly dangerous disease and we could die!". She looked over at her partner in crime and smiled. " We'll get them! " she said, excitedly. She walked to the door and opened it a little to look outside. Students were roaming the corridors and she closed the door immediately and locked it. " It's too busy outside, we should wait for the start of class... " .  

She sat down on a chair and looked at a clock on the wall. The bell was going to ring in about ten minutes, so they'd just have to wait till then. Peach tried to remember if she ever knew someone who had cooties. She didn't think so, but she did remember her aunt dying from an unknown disease that made her very sick. so sick that she didn't talk nor walk nor function until she died in her home. She remembered that her mother had felt horrible about not taking care of her sister more. The funeral was horrible and so many people cried but Peach didn't remember crying herself; she had never met her aunt. Maybe this one died of cooties. 

Eris was ready to go to the door, and run to the hospital wing. The sooner the better. They were going to be heroes of Hogwarts, immortalized in legends of years to come. The two girls that single-handedly stopped the wide-spread outbreak of the most dangerous disease ever known to wizard-kind. Eris could just imagine writing a letter home to his father, telling him about how she had saved the world from a dangerous infection. Maybe then he'd finally respond to her owls. Eris would go down in history as one of the girls that had stopped the cootie infection, and then even her family would be proud of her.

" But we need to be careful. Extra careful, not to be touched by anyone! Because anyone could give us the highly dangerous disease and we could die!"

Eris nodded her head in agreement, face scrunched up in concentration. It was obviously worth it to miss a class or two to save the whole school from cooties, but Eris still felt uneasy as she watched the stream of kids pour into their respective classrooms. What if somebody told on the two girls and they had to deal with a scolding? Eris didn't want to go out into the hallways until most of the kids were gone. She couldn't risk getting infected, and didn't want her new partner getting infected either.

"What's the game plan?" The tiny girl asked, swinging her body around on the desk to face away from the window and fully towards Peach. "I mean, we need to get to the hospital wing without being noticed or touched by any other people." Being noticed meant answering questions and Eris wasn't in the mood for any of that nonsense. She and Peach had a world to save. Eris smiled at the other girl, the thrill of adventure already making her giddy. She felt like a character out of a book, out to safe the world from something deadly. But this was real life, and cooties were the most dangerous disease ever known to kid-kind. Eris just prayed that nobody had died yet, and that nobody would die before her and Peach found the cure.

Even though it was a very serious situation, Eris couldn't help but smile. Something about saving the world just made for a lot of smiles. Especially from eleven year old girls. Eris knew that people would die if they didn't save the world, but she also knew that they were going to have a quest. Just the thought of going on a quest to save Hogwarts filled Eris with so much joy that she could face down any cootie-carrying boy. Well, with a large stick between her and the boy, and a giant bubble around Eris to protect her.

Peach nodded at her friend's question. They needed a game plan, and quick. She knew that the hospital wing was on the third floor, which meant that they would have to go down two-floors incognito, walking before countless classrooms. If only they had that invisibility cloak that everyone talked about, it would be so much easier! She tried to remember if she knew any spells that could hide them from people's eyes but nothing came up. She looked down at her book and suddenly, she remembered that it was a charms book. They could try to learn a new spell, quickly, if there was one but chances were low. She opened it and put it on the table so that it would be easy to look at for both of the girls. 

" We might be able to find something in there! Something to hide us from others! " she said, skipping through to the useful charms section. She slid her finger down the page, skim and scanning the descriptions but nothing was useful. They could use A Silencio spell so that their footsteps wouldn't be heard while descending the stairs, but that was all. She pointed to it and looked over at her friend, questioning this one. she then realized that since they had met, they had not once exchanged names and that she had been referring to her as the Gryffindor girl. " I'm Peach, by the way, " she said before smiling.

They were going to become the great saviors of Hogwarts, and of the world, and that, honestly, was really exciting. But also incredibly scary because if they failed and got infected themselves, they could die, which wasn't very good. Peach closed her robes and rolled up her sleeves. She then made sure that nothing on her could get caught anywhere because if it did, it would slow them down. She pulled out her wand and looked out of the window. The corridors were empty and she could not see anyone on the horizon. She smiled. she was fairly happy to be helpful to the world, because she knew that they would save lots and lots of people by putting themselves in danger like that. It was thrilling and she could feel the adrenaline levels go up in her body. 

She then turned around to her friend again and quietly said: " If we get caught, we can just say that we were asked to pick something up from the hospital wing or to check on someone there. But the goal is to get there fast and to get the vaccine! We can do it! "