The Prefect Compartment PV Prefects

September. September first, to be more precise. Anatole had been ambivalent ever since the date approached him, creeping up and jumping out from behind him like a predator on the hunt. The day was somewhat predatory, bringing up laborious packing and re-packing weeks in advance; thinking and re-thinking and eventually reflecting on his first year had consumed him until his mind's gears could no longer generate whatever thoughts he had left.

Despite whatever happened last year, Anatole swore this year would be better.

The glass outside seemed distant since the boy managed to snatch a middle seat. Even though it was a big compartment, he liked to spread out...for now. There was something hilarious about the huge seek-and-find game on Platform 9 3/4, aka the hustle and bustle of the crazy thought of "sending your wizard child off to magical boarding school". It should've been simple to let go for some of the parents. After all, Anatole had faith that his parents would be there, smiling, waving, and sighing with relief when the train chugged back into the station. That's what had happened after the excursion...and after those other strange wizard journeys that had occurred over the painful, quick pinch of the summer months.

Breath fogging up the glass, Anatole gripped onto the padded seat and pushed his small head towards the vacant window, hoping to catch a glimpse of his parents.

Explaining to them had been...challenging, really. It was like baking from scratch (something Patricia loved to try and fail at, but that's besides the point), piling all the ingredients of the Wizarding World together and attempting to make out a logical recipe for it. They could have easily faked understanding and just nodded along. His father bombarded him with questions about the classes and the magic, while his mother seemed on the social side of it all, asking about his friends (What? Anatole had friends?) and who he had met. A common argument was whether friends or classes should matter more, and knowing his mother's argumentative nature as a lawyer, she took the summer to insist that Anatole found himself a good set of friends, and could he say he had found his niche in the school? Sure, if it made his mother happy. He could've talked about some of the people he'd met for years if he could.

And with such a busy summer, here Anatole was, wishing he'd use it more wisely. Summer was for relaxation, something he hadn't achieved much, even as he was travelling from place to place. Sleep was for the weak...wasn't it?

Slowly slumping back into his seat, Anatole kicked his feet onto the trunk. He hoped no one took impressive mind to him, hopefully noticing that he was not alone in the struggle for sleep and sanity. Most of Anatole's friends hadn't arrived yet, anyways.

He got on his knees, acknowledging the only other face he noticed in the compartment: Serena Towers. That one girl from the snowball fight. That one Hufflepuff Prefect he really met knitted between the shelves with that other Slytherin. That one girl from that one place. Her eyes scanned over some note, hence she was distracted from the slowly growing ruckus of children. Smiling at her, Anatole waved, not expecting her to even notice. She probably had things that were loads more important than a silly Gryffindor boy waving at her.

Oh, darn it. Speaking of things that were loads more important than Anatole waving at the girl, he had assumed yet another higher duty come this sparkling September morning. Head Boy. Head Boy. Whoa. In a matter of months, this honestly pathetic Gryffindor was the king of the school, pretty much. It was all just like he had hoped before. And with Serena already on the Prefect team, things couldn't go wrong. Indefinitely, Adam would be in an outrage once he saw his adversary's face at the head of the meeting in twenty minutes, but just considering the crazy looks he would get made the boy chuckle.

He snapped out of it, reverting to his earlier silent state of contemplation.

With great power comes great responsibility. If he slipped up one bit, he was sure they would have his head dignity badge. That was one thing he couldn't lose, because with that badge came pride. Pride he couldn't explain to his mother or father, pride he couldn't even fathom and translate into words, pride he couldn't even elaborate on to Patricia in a letter. Being Head Boy was much more than a glimmering pin, despite how cliche it sounded.

And it was just twenty more minutes until the ride of it all began.

Interacting with Anatole Evans

From the corner of her eye, she noticed another figure enter and sit down whilst she was reading through her notes one last time. Serena looked up and spotted the familiar face of a boy that she had met a few times during first year - and probably scared the living daylights out of once, when she cursed in front of him, disgusted by the people who would joke about students almost dying. Cringing slightly at the memory, she pushed past the incidents and decided to start afresh. Hopefully he was no longer scared of her. She was really not that scary! She was actually kind of a nice person, for the most part...

"Hey," Serena greeted him with a smile on her face, "Congratulations on your elevation to Head Boy." The young girl was easily influenced and picked up the words of others quite easily. Her Head of House had said something along those lines in the letter that she had been reading only a few minutes prior and it sounded very elegant and smart - so she repeated them to the newly appointed Head Boy in front of her. 

"How's it going? How was your summer?" She asked him, bringing out a bit of herself as attempted to engage in conversation with the silent boy. Serena figured that if they would be working together, they should attempt to get along or get to know each other a little better, at the very least. 

Opening up her bag, Serena pulled out a handful of envelopes that were unsealed. She placed the rest of her paperwork down to the side, move over to him with the letters in hand and held them out for the Gryffindor in front of her. "These are for each of the Prefects. They are unsealed so please do sign your name onto the end of them. They are just letters to welcome the new Prefects to the role and give them a bit of basic information about it like how to find the Prefects' Room or Bathroom. It covers the basics so they don't have to worry about trying to remember everything, I guess. Add anything you wish to add." Serena explained as she handed him the whole wad of envelopes. Some of the team had also been Prefects last year and knew all of it already, which helped a lot. It was more to serve as a reminder for them if they forgot and to highlight some of the changes - such as the new passwords. For the newer Prefects, it would give them a chance to read over all of the notes at their own leisure as their first day of school would probably be quite a hectic one with plenty to do and remember anyway!

After handing him the letters, Serena returned to her seat to give him the chance to read over them and sign his name onto the ends of them. She looked down at her checklist for a moment, placing a tick by the 'letters' instruction with her quill and ink before looking out of the window. Students were running around everywhere, saying last minute goodbyes and loading their luggage onto the trains. She had no doubt that the team would be here shortly, "Did you have any ideas or things you wanted to do in the meeting today?" She asked him, wondering if they should have put together an agenda beforehand - but hey, better late than never, right?

Amadea had been waiting for this day in anticipation for the entirety of the last month. Sure, she had done some exciting things during the summer, but it all paled in comparison to the adventures she had took part in during her first year at Hogwarts. If she was being completely honest with herself, she still hadn't digested the fact that she was a witch and at Hogwarts. It was a dream come true (though one she didn't realize she had until she arrived). Amadea couldn't be more thankful for the last year of her life. It had really changed in into the person she was now.

Of course, she still held some doubts about entering her second year. Her first year was hard enough, but imagining even more homework than she was already receiving made her sweat just thinking about it. When she actually had to sit down and do it, Amadea knew she would need some sort of magic spell that could calm her down. As she stepped onto the Hogwarts Express, Amadea glanced around, taking in all of the elaborate details of the train. She wheeled her trunk through the compartments, searching for a friendly face or an empty space.

She peeked into a compartment at random to find the Prefect compartment. Amadea had been debating whether or not she should sit in the Prefect compartment. While she had some lovely friends and acquaintances who were Prefects, two of her closest friends weren't and Amadea wanted to catch up with them. Now that she was here, however, she figured she might as well put her things down.

As she entered the compartment, she looked around, reveling in the  sheer size of the compartment. It was easily double the size of most other compartments with plenty of room for lots of people and luggage. There were even some tables set up with food on them. While Amadea appreciated the special treatment, it made her feel a bit uncomfortable as well. She felt as though she didn't deserve it, or that at least all of the other students should be offered the same luxuries.

She easily found an empty spot to put her trunk in considering there were not many people yet in the compartment. Amadea finally turned to acknowledge the other students in the room. Thankfully, she already knew both of them, albeit not that well. This would be an excellent time for them to all get to know each other a little better, she thought to herself, trying to keep things positive. She found a seat that was close enough for her to make friendly conversation with the two students, but far away enough to give them all lots of personal space. 

"Hi Serena and Anatole," Amadea said with a smile once she had settled in her seat. "How were your summers? Oh, and I believe I owe you both congratulations!" She was referring to their elevation to Head Girl/Boy. Amadea was proud of them both; no one fit the role more perfectly then they did. She knew they would do a wonderful job. Thinking about it just made her even more exciting for the upcoming year.

Kaegen hated trains, he hated them with a passion big enough to bring him close to tears. Sure, you moved fast. Sure, there was candy on little carts that smelled really nice but how was one supposed to enjoy that when the floor ceiling and roof was vibrating and shaking around you like some monster demon metal dragon snake. At any second the entire car could lurch, sending the boy out one of the not very secured looking windows and outside at insane speeds. Although that wasn’t an entirely unwelcome thought, considering it would at least get him out of the train, the prefect decided he prefered to not possibly die by the side of this creature’s iron hunting trail.

So unbalanced was he on this rumbling contraption that he had given up walking altogether in favor of a army crawl. While it did mean that he wouldn’t lose his footing, it also meant that he felt every bump and jolt far more than those with just their shoes touching the floor. His usually tired eyes were as wide as they would go, pupils racing from one side to the next, desperate to at least make it to his destination. He had been tasked to arrive at a car for prefects, for a meeting or a talk or just a friendly discussion on the weather. The subject didn’t matter. What did matter was that he was supposed to make it, and the way things were going he might just die before he arrived.

What if the monster’s stomach acid was released, melting his flesh from his bones? He had seen the pits in the fens, the ones that appeared to be safe places to sleep, but every hour they would fill with the acid that subsided as fast as it had appeared. If it hadn’t been for the meeting of prefects he probably would have attempted to walk back to the school rather than suffer the torments of the metal demon dragon snake of moderately complete despair.

It was some time before he arrived at the appointed car, still dragging himself along in the army crawl he had been using for the past half hour or so. The handles one used to push aside the door were too far for him to reach from the floor, and the boy wasn’t brave enough to stand. He didn’t have a trunk, not owning enough to warrant it’s purchase, but did have a bag strapped to his back under his robe. Strapped most everywhere else were the knives he collected. Long and Short, full tang, rat tang, half tang, no tang, dual edged, one edge, half edge. Even one that was just an ice pick he carried to be able to say he had a knife without a blade. Shakily selecting one of the blades, he began using it to pry open the doors, which lazily slid open without any struggle to accommodate his unorthodox entry.

Peering up through his now horrendous head of black hair, obviously burned and torn in places, and even more obviously not washed, lent him some more information. Primarily on the people already assembled in the car. Tower, random girl and Corridor kid. He had forgotten Corridor kid was even a prefect, assuming that he was one, and hadn’t just dropped by to hang out with Tower. With a name as nondescript and lame as Corridor kid, who would pick him for a position of any importance anyway? Tower made more sense, her name was strong, powerful. Trustworthy. All qualities that made up a good leader. Although her nurse was the antithesis of all the aforementioned things, and had caused some amount of trouble last time they met it was still good to see her.

His quiet voice came up from the floor, sounding a bit coarser than it had last year, the odd rustling sound of leaves it reminded some of had, perhaps, dried out a bit. The boy had forgotten what his voice had sounded like a few days ago and, to remind himself, had launched in an admittedly quiet monologue that had rendered his voice rather hoarse. Or at least as hoarse as a whisper could get.

”Hello Tower, Honor to your name and position. Hi Corridor Kid, Random Girl.”

The voice may have had a slight quaver to it, but hardly anything. A stark contrast to his obviously panicked eyes that darted back and forth, seeking something to relieve whatever danger they feared at this particular moment, which happened to be the fact that if a dragon swooped down and grabbed the train, it would by extension grab everyone on board, including Kaegen.

Making his way beneath the window, the boy that had been elected prefect over an entire house sat against the wall with his knees tucked as close to himself as he could manage, a tight ball of anxiety. The only thing that consoled him was that he had managed a perfect greeting. If there was one resolution he was going to try to keep, at least when it came to people with names of any significance, it was to be more polite.

John's very first year in the magical realm was quite fruitful. At first it was hard absorbing all that information, but John was slowly taking it in. After all, it was great having a new surprise every day. The year continued with an underground adventure with the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs. There, he out-rhymed a dancing ghost and she blessed him with a healing wand. The whole year culminated with an encounter with the villainous Masked Man, who turned out to be a boy. With the combined force of other students, they managed to fend him off. John even did so with his bare hands! He reckoned he wouldn't be showing up around school anytime soon, not after the butt-whooping they delivered.

This year would hopefully be no different in terms of excitement. However, John was not quite ready for school to start. They weren't at Hogwarts yet and John fully intended to enjoy his vacation up to the last minute.

As the sliding door opened, the occupants would find John in full beach attire. He wore a white tanktop, complete with an old ketchup stain from a previous adventure. For reasons currently unknown, John was wearing swimming trunks with a yellow Hawaiian floral print. Flip-flops rounded out the outfit. He lifted up his yellow-rimmed sunglasses (they were still sitting on his head) to see all his fellow prefects.

"Choo Choo, magic lovers," John exclaimed to the group of prefects. "Are you ready for the most anticipated sequel of the year?! Year 2: Twice the magic, twice the John!"

Before he entered, John took a fistful of sherbet lemons from the passing trolley cart, exchanging an appropriate amount of money for the sweets. Then he entered the compartment proper, raining candy upon the table like a boss.

"This batch's on me," John declared, taking one piece for himself. He tossed his duffel bag of clothes on the ground and made his way to Amadea and Anatole. They looked just as he left them before vacation. He took a seat next to Amadea and began unwrapping his piece of candy.

"My Huffrindors!" John called out to them. "How are we at the dawn of Year 2?"

His eyes then caught the grungy-looking Kaegen hunched against the wall, seemingly waiting for Death to take him away.

"What's up with 'Darkness my old friend' over here?" John commented. Seems like he wasn't the only one not quite ready to start school.

The last few weeks of her summer vacation had been a blessing. No homeworks, no crazy students attacking her out of nowhere, nothing to be afraid of. Just her, the garden and some wonderful hours of solitude. She didn't hate school, in fact some classes were quite entertaining, but during her time home she realized how tiring a school like Hogwarts was.

It only would become worse. Her brother had been burnt out after his school year and slept for most of the time, very much to the annoyance of their father. It was their mother who had defended his laziness by saying he had to work hard to get his OWLs the past months. His results proofed her right. As expected he had excelled in all of them, making Marcia flinch the moment he had read them out loud. She hadn't been all to bad, but she still felt she could have done more.

That's what she had thought until she herself got an owl from Hogwarts, informing her in just one sentence that she had been chosen to be the new prefect. She honestly couldn't explain why her head of house decided to make her of all people a prefect. She hadn't done anything special, hadn't beenall too bright or talented. Granted, she had met the masked boy and had lived, but so had others. 

Her parents were proud and happy for her. Finally she had something on her owl and it was a chance to step out of her brothers shadow. Well, that was what her Nana had told her when Marcia had been reading her the letter. 

The moment the letter arrived her holidays were over. For days she thought about what she would do, now that she had responibilities. She thought about what she would say to the first years, how she would dress. As prefect she now was a role model and as such she had to act as one. Her Nana had been a great help, since she had given her tips how she could change her demeanor, but it was easier to tell than to do. 

She outright became frightend when only days before departure another owl arrived, telling her she would be expected to attend a meeting in the prefect compartment of the Hogwarts-Express. It would get real the moment she would enter the compartment.

Her parents both brought her and her brother to the station, but Marcia barely said any words of farewell, nodding and hugging them back when she had to. While they stood at the platform she avoided to look at the train and instead counted the tiles on the floor. As the minutes passed her nauseousness grew worse, making her mouth dry. She watched as her brother took both their trunks and followed him, with a short last wave at her parents. 

"You ok?" her brother asked when she still hadn't said any word. 

"Mh", was everything she could bring herself to answer, although she now tried to find her way. A cold shiver ran down her back and she had the feeling Nana was watching her. Of course she was nowhere to be seen, but this didn't mean she wasn't there.  She reached into the pocket of her trousers for the prefect badge and pinned it onto her shirt. "I-I think I need to go." 

"Sure. Don't worry, you will do great. Have fun."

Fun, she thought with a slight huff as she passed him and went to find the compartment. How she should have fun was a mystery to her. She rather would now search for a seat and stay there till they would arrive. Of course this wasn't possible. 

A few students greeted her as she passed them, which was completely new to her. Usually students ignored each other, at least that's what she'd done. Ignoring was no option anymore, so she nodded to them and remembered what Nana had said: Keep your head up. She lifted her chin and gave her best impression of a person who actually wanted to be here. 

When she found the compartment she hesitated a few seconds, collecting her thought and swallowing her fear, before she entered. 

A few of her colleagues where already present, some sitting on the various tables. She closed the door behind her and waved at the others. "Hey." It was a short greeting, but she didn't know what else to say. She tried her best to appear cheerful, but as she let her gaze wander, her smile froze in place. It took all her willpower to not turn on her heels and leave. 

"Oh, you. Hello," she said stiff to the Hufflepuff boy whom she immediately recognized She couldn't say it was a pleasure to see him again. "John."  His sight gave her a headach and remembered her of events she wanted to forget, so she quickly tried to look at something else. All the candys laying infront of him were fitting. 

She saw a boy crouching beneath a window, his knees firmly tucked together, and felt a connection. Marcia would love to just be somewhere else. Me too, boy. Me too. 

If she had to choose to sit at one candy filled table with John or crouch beside a strange kid, her decision was easy. It took her only a few steps till she reached the wall, where she leaned against the cold window. She thought about sitting on the floor as well, but the feeling of the window behind her was comforting. As she stood there she realized that she hadn't said anything to the boy. "Hey," she said again, repeating herself.  Wow, what a great start. 

"You can't always use me as a crutch, boy. Normal children can defeat a singular gytrash by the time they're your age. Now go get wood. And no, you may not take the torch."
-Grandfather

The world around him was twisting, shaking and moving in ways that weren’t right or natural. He did not have the comforting peat beneath his feet that shifted with each step, nor even the solid confounding stone of Hogwarts. Just a thin floor keeping him from death. It was a humbling thought, that he was completely powerless here. Humbling, or perhaps just terrifying. He could hear the voices of others in the car, but he had trouble deciphering exactly what they were saying. The loud rumbling was uncomfortable, his sensitive ears protesting the unholy racket. A bizarre student, clearly prefect and presumably a girl, if Kaegen was any judge at all of human voices, came bursting into the room. But the train must have hit a bump, because the terrified bioy under the window was almost positive she had said


What the heck did choo choo even mean? Was that a different language? Did that mean something like “Time to die, magic lovers?” it did make sense, considering the position they were in. He had heard of black magic, of evil necromancers and muggles with wands that could only cast one spell, a spell of thunder and death. But that was all nothing compared to this train and the girl coming in probably proclaiming all their dooms in another language at the hand of the devil machine dragon train from the 13th dark place. And then she started talking about a much anticipated sequel to some play Kaegen had never heard of, dropping some small hard things on a table with a declaration of “this batch’s on me.” He didn’t know what they were, but he was too scared to look at them. However, not looking at them only increased the level of fear, the fear of the unknown. But it wasn’t quite enough to make him actually look at the girl and her small hard objects. So he just sat there in greater misery than before, completely pathetic.

He was a bit lost in scared pondering about what on earth the small things could have been, so it was perhaps no surprise that he didn’t hear the next few things the female newcomer said, up until she asked what was up with “darkness my old friend.” Who the heck was that? Corridor kid, Tower and the other girl, plus the new girl that had just come in talking about death and throwing small objects everywhere. So who had he missed? Who was the new girl talking about? If Kaegen wasn’t having a panic attack before, he certainly was now. Even the inside of his eyelids, usually a comforting eigengrau were now a swimming black mass that seemed to look back at the boy. A splinter of the dark places still remaining on this earth. Closed eyes couldn’t stop the darkness, nothing could. And the train was not helping.

He didn’t hear the next person come in, but figured it out pretty quick when he heard her say “Hey.” Another girl. Were there no boys? Did all the boys die? Was he next? He probably was, that was why that other girl had said choo choo, a warning of death to boys only. Which means he was being targeted by a creature from the 13th dark place, a homicidal dragon train of death and a group of people who hated his entire gender. That also meant, however, that corridor kid was a girl. He had always thought the prefect a boy, but that didn’t matter so much, he could have easily been mistaken. And none of that was as pressing as the fact that he was about to die, and there was nothing he could do about it, no action he could force his paralyzed body to take. The voice of the newest girl greeted “john” whoever that was. It wasn’t an especially pretty name for a girl to have, but that wasn’t john’s fault.

The next voice he heard was from the newest newcomer, and it was close. Very close, in fact some might say the same distance one would be from someone you were about to slaughter. He wasn’t expecting her to say anything, he was expecting something like a knife in the back, and was in enough misery to accept that fate, if only barely. He didn’t like it, but there was nothing he could do. Just accept his wretched fate in the stomach of a killer metal demon death train. He was surprised to hear her say something, a small greeting to be sure, but still something.


He wasn’t sure what to do next, and a horrible feeling was creeping around inside his stomach. He was getting infected by some horrible disease at an alarming rate. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to respond to the girl. The boy decided that his only option was to go down attempting to fight. In this case, fighting would be a weak groan, protesting his demise, but it was still technically fighting. And maybe that was enough to ward her off. He knew that the train would eventually stop at hogsmeade station. If he could make it there alive he had a small sliver of a chance, a tiny ray of hope in a sea of despair. But as he opened his mouth to say that he could still fight he gave up, and instead just responded to the assassin’s greeting in a tiny, pathetic voice.

Amadea smiled at all of the new people that suddenly streamed into the compartment. While she didn't know many of them and wasn't friends with many people, she was a Prefect and she had to be polite. Plus, these people could be potential friends. 

The first person to walk through the door was Kaegen Deathmote, who Amadea had met only once. If Amadea was being completely honest, Kaegen kind of scared her. He seemed as though he was constantly brooding and Amadea was scared she would say something that might make him angry.

"Hello," she said to him, dipping her head in a slight greeting. Before she could say anything else, another student entered the compartment, this time someone whom Amadea recognized. It was her fellow Hufflepuff Prefect and Huffrindor, John Johns. 

"Hi John!" Amadea greeted her friend with a smile, watching as he dropped a bunch of sherbet lemon drops onto a table and took a seat next to her. She stood quickly to go grab one of the other lemons and then sat back down.

"How was your summer?" she asked, trying to make some small talk. "I'm very excited for our second year. How about you?" It was true, Amadea was quite excited for the beginning of their second year at Hogwarts. She couldn't wait to learn more and have more adventures with her friends, and hopefully make some new ones as well!

As another girl walked into the compartment, joining John, Amadea sat back, becoing slightly overwhelmed by the amount of people. She wasn't the best at socializing and being around this many people that she didn't know very well made her uncomfortable. She sat back, chewing on her lemon candy, wishing that she had chosen a slightly smaller compartment for her ride to Hogwarts. There was nothing she could do it about it now, she reminded herself, and she would need to talk to her fellow Prefects sometime, so why not now? She didn't want to be the one Prefect left out that wasn't friends with any of the others.

Thankfully, the next person to enter the compartment was a familiar face. It was Rosie Parker, her other fellow Prefect and Hufflepuff. While the two girls had not spent much time together during their first year at Hogwarts, Amadea knew that Rosie was a really nice girl and Amadea hoped that working together this year as Prefects would give them a chance to get to know each other better.

"Hi Rosie! I'm looking forward to working with you too!" Amadea said with a smile. Gosh, she was smiling so much it was beginning to make her cheek hurts. "I'm glad Serena got promoted though, she definitely deserves it! So does Anatole," she added, making sure not to leave any of them out. She wondered if anyone was actually listening to what she was saying to them; it seemed as though they were all talking to each other and the chatter just seemed to get louder and louder until Amadea couldn't focus on anything. Taking a deep breath, she tried to clear her mind. 

Maybe all this time away from being around a bunch of people constantly was not a good thing for her; she would have to reacquaint with herself with socializing.