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Great Hall, Hogwarts
–Harry Potter–
What was I even doing here?
The thought rose unbidden in his mind, and the decision came a second later. Leaving his food, which he was mostly playing with instead of eating it, something that no one noticed around him, he slowly slid his chair back, gave Ron a reassuring smile, and stood up, ready to go….anywhere that was not here.
This felt suffocating to him, and he was not obligated to do anything he did not feel comfortable doing, as he had repeatedly told the faculty when pushed about certain things.
Pointing Hermione towards the laws of Magical Britain had really worked out well, as, every day, she came up to him with something new that would help him, either immediately or when he got older. It was through her that he found out that his immediate guardian was Dumbledore, that he was a ward of the government, technically, and he had a huge fortune but it was all controlled by Dumbledore and would only be handed over when he turned 18 or passed some exams earlier, a feat that had only been performed a couple times a year, with mostly students who were only one year below taking it.
His plan of taking it as soon as possible was dashed when he went through whatever was necessary for that, but that did not dim his hopes in the slightest. One day, he will be treated like an adult, he will get control over what was rightfully his, and he will have his own home, where he would not be treated like a stranger.
He could even invite all his friends, and their families, and have so much…..fun.
His excitement at the thoughts dimmed when he refocused on his surroundings and realised that people were looking at him. Even Ron, with food still in his mouth, was giving him a confused look, something that made him snap out of it, and immediately turn around, ready to head out of this place. Anywhere, that was not in the middle of a celebration. Maybe he could go look for Hermione, steal her hiding place. Yeah, that would be good.
His carefully crafted plan of not making eye contact with anyone, not answering anyone's questions, and just slipping out of the Great Hall without drawing any attention to himself failed when he heard the doors to the Great Hall blast open, creating a loud sound that silenced everyone in the Great Hall.
He inadvertently looked up and found their Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Quirell, sliding across the floor, his eyes bloodshot and sweat all over his face, eyes swiveling wildly across the Great Hall without any rhyme or rhythm.
The eyes locked onto him a second longer than expected, giving him a bad feeling in his heart before the professor turned to the Faculty table and barely got the words out, as if there was physical effort involved in that.
"T-Troll! In the d-dungeons! Thought you ought to know."
There was a moment of pindrop silence in the aftermath of the bizarre declaration, as he remained rooted in his spot, looking at the trembling body of the professor with the students likely processing the abrupt disturbance. All of that culminated in a veritable storm of panic amongst the students as the professor collapsed a moment after delivering the oddly structured warning.
The panicked whispers turned into whispered shouting to them talking over each other, and it looked like a panicked stampede was inevitable, when a loud BANG! reverbed in the entire Great Hall, silencing every single student in the room.
Everyone's gaze slid to the Headmaster whose face was set into a frown as he looked closely at the collapsed body of Quirell.
"Everyone, Calm down. Prefects! Get everyone back into the dorms. Do not leave the dorms until your Head of House deems it so." The Prefects, as if snapping out of a daze and realising that yes, they were prefects with responsibility and authority, scrambled to corral the students into orderly lines and to the dorms.
His gaze hovered around the faculty table, as the Professors sprang into action, with one of them tending to Quirell, while the others hovered around the student tables, ready to make sure nothing went wrong.
From what he had read, panic amongst wizards was a common thing, and so were deaths from the stampede, despite wizards being a fair bit tougher than regular non magicals humans, something that Hermione had told him, which explained how he managed to recover from years of bad eating and exercising within months, something that no child should be able to recover from as the formative years were not something that could just be waved away with some exercise and good food in the later years.
Another thing he knew because he was fortunate enough to meet someone as knowledge hungry as Hermione—
SHIT!
He had stayed back to let the other kids go ahead, as Ron had waved for him to stay, which was fine, but just as Ron was about to put his hand on his shoulder, his entire body jerked forward, with only one thought in his mind.
Hermione.
She was not in the Great Hall and was not in the dorms either. He knew, he had asked some of the girls, not to mention, the prefects had cleared the dorms for the Feast, since it was kind of an important thing, and unless someone was sick and in the Hospital Wing, they were to attend the Feast. It was also because there was no food after this.
"Oi! Harry!" He heard Ron scream his name from behind as someone tried to stop him, but he just shrugged them off with a tiny burst of magic on his shoulder and ran forward, ignoring the surprised grunt that escaped the lips of one of the seniors, based on the height and angle of the grab.
He felt more than heard Ron follow him, as he turned, or at least tried to, colliding with the wall, as he couldn't slow down in time. With yet another well timed burst of magic, he launched himself forward, ignoring Ron's surprised squawk, heading to the part of the castle he knew Hermione loved to explore.
According to her, that part of the castle was always silent, with next to zero activity, from even the prefects, as no one wanted to go to a part of the castle that was not just higher up, but also so far away from everything. If someone wanted some privacy, there were tons of classrooms right next to the dorms.
He did not know if the troll was actually there or if the troll was even real or not, Professor Quirell was not really the most reliable judge of anything really, but he had to make sure she was safe. Just because Ron was a git to her, she did not deserve to be in danger. The isolated nature of that Wing made it even more dangerous during a curfew. Sure, the various ghosts and even Filch were just dangerous and not really dangerous, but he had to make sure she was fine.
Hogwarts, as if sensing his thoughts, somehow reduced the amount of stairs, hallways, and turns he had to take, to reach that Wing. It was a large area, and despite it being completely silent, he could not hear anything that would give him Hermione's location.
Still, he did not remain still, running around desperately to reach her. He was not even sure if what he was doing was right or not. Trolls, from what he had heard from Hermione's ramblings were pretty dangerous, with magic resistant hide and very high strength. They also were pack creatures, as in they never moved alone.
The prospect of meeting even a single Troll was a cause of concern, but if he encountered multiple of them? He did not know what he could—
His feet skidded to a halt as he saw it. The girls' bathroom, situated at the very end of a narrow hallway that he never went into because why would he? The best he had done was wait at the end of the hallway while Hermione went inside.
During one of those runs, she'd told him something he found mildly fascinating at the time.
You know? Hogwarts has energy saving mechanisms in place, even though magic is theoretically infinite, and they don't even have to worry about stuff like the lifespan of the bulbs. It's something like motion sensing bulbs, where in the general areas remain lit all the time, but the inner areas are lit only when Hogwarts or the bulbs detect people. I don't know how they do that, but I am going to ask Professor McGonagall for permission so we can conduct an experiment to figure out the method of detection. Is it heat? Is it motion? Is it magic? Something else? I can't wait to find out!
And then Ron had butt in with…
Yeah? I think Mcgonall will just tell you the answer. No need to go there and sit in those creepy hallways for hours on end. Right, Harry?
He smiled as he rushed towards that specific hallway, with the yellow light shining at the end of that hallway.
"Harry? Where are you going? We are going to lose so many points!"
He ignored Ron's ramblings as he barely stopped himself from crashing into the wall and looked at Hermione, who also looked up at the commotion.
Sighing in relief, his body relaxed, which is why he was not able to stay upright when Ron bumped into him.
Git.
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