From the Ashes

Who: Bob and Brendon
When: Tuesday morning, December 1st
Where: Mysterious warded room and various works of art.
What: Lost! Lost in lala painting (and tapestry) land!

Having spent the majority the the past two weeks cooped up in the hospital wing and avoiding the wrath of Lazzara (though honestly, Bob didn't know why the man had been so upset about Bob's solution to get him out of Bob's hair), Bob had decided that it was high time to venture out into the world. Also, Betsy had gone out wandering the day before and had yet to return and, alright, Bob worried a bit too much about his cat sometimes. He felt completely justified about this, however—there weren't many cats that could play chess quite so well as Betsy, and she was especially nice company on cold winter nights, such as the sort that were fast approaching.

Still, Bob wasn't about to let on to anyone know just how attached he was to his cat. Thus the reason why he was doing his searching at a time when everyone should either be in class or, well, in class. Ah, the advantages of being a member of the support staff.

Bob started checking the rooms in the hall he was in, opening doors and quickly poking his head in to do a quick search. While he didn't expect to find Betsy in any of these, since clever as she was, she had yet to acquire opposable thumbs, but there was still the possibility that she'd accidentally been trapped after following someone in. He was about to declare this hall a wash when a flash of color in an otherwise dark room caught his eye. Hesitating slightly, Bob cautiously entered, raising his wand and lighting it with a weak Lumos.

At first he couldn't figure out what in the room had caught his attention in the first place, but as he went further in, he noticed a large painting on the wall opposite the door. The subject was, oddly enough, of a dairy maid pouring milk from a pail into a canister, while a cat danced around her feet, no doubt trying to trip her up and cause her to spill some milk for it. A somewhat odd subject for a painting in Hogwarts, but not unheard of. The thing that caught Bob's attention and caused him to freeze up with dread, was that the cat looked just like Betsy from its tortoiseshell markings to its tufted tail and ears. Could Betsy have gotten caught in the painting? This was Hogwarts, after all, and stranger things had happened in the past.

Feeling sick, Bob moved closer, examining the painting with a keener eye, now, noticing other details now. A discarded shoe under a stack of hay, a pink ribbon caught on a splintered post, a man in the distance on the verge of entering the forest. It was the man that drew Bob's attention now, looking vaguely familiar in a way that worried and niggled at his mind. Moving closer still, Bob saw that the man was glancing back over his shoulder, back and straight out through the frame of the painting, with a worried look and a gaze so intense Bob would have glanced over his own, had he not at that moment finally recognized and placed the face. It was his own.

And suddenly there were trees all around him and he was stumbling backwards in shock and dismay.

Who: Brendon and William
When: Friday night, reverse-aging week
Where: A hallway near Hufflepuff
What: Kids these days

William didn't usually take to wandering the halls late at night, but then his face didn't usually look like a war zone for clogged pores, either. Apparently regressing in age meant oily skin all over again, in addition to the other more obvious and annoying physical problems.

He hadn't needed to keep Clear Countenance potion on hand since his first year out of school. He couldn't very well ask a student for some, either, it wouldn't be fitting. If there was one thing he was relatively sure about, however, it was that students embarrassed about their acne didn't always keep skin-care potions in their rooms where nosy classmates could find them. They found out-of-the-way lavatories and stashed them there instead.

Not that William was speaking from experience or anything.

There were two lavatories tucked into a side hallway near Hufflepuff, as he recalled. With the House so close and nothing else nearby to encourage foot traffic, they weren't used very often. William was in the right vicinity, he was fairly certain. Now he supposed he ought to just start opening doors and keeping his fingers crossed.

[sent to Pete Wentz, Brendon Urie, Gabe Saporta, and William Beckett, identical contents of note + supplies]

Hoping you don't need any of this, but just in case. Sorry it took so long to get out, had trouble tracking down an owl. List of contents & uses below. SS.

-- Dreamvine -- to prevent & clean infections, apply it to open wound
-- Whomping Willow leaves, dried -- chew on them, they're a painkiller
-- Bottle of distilled dittany essence -- good for healing wounds, causes skin to stretch over & avoid scarring
-- Powdered hellebore -- sedative purposes if added to water
-- Bandages

Who: Shane and Brendon
When: Friday night
Where: Hufflepuff
What: Reassurances, awkwardness, and possibly zombies


Shane called out "Be safe!" to William and Patrick, then turned to the painting of Bellamus the Bard and tapped on the bottom left corner three times with his wand. The painting swung open, and Shane climbed in, quickly casting Lumos.

The passage was short and blessedly empty, but Shane still felt like it was taking forever to get through. He knew Brendon could take care of himself--he'd fought next to him in the war, he knew Brendon was competent--but that didn't keep him from worrying or wanting to be there with Brendon, just in case.

Finally, the passage ended and he carefully peeked out from behind the tapestry that hid the passage from this side. The coast was clear, for the moment at least, and he covered the distance to the Hufflepuff entrance in a matter of seconds.

"Brendon!" he called, knocking on the door. "Brendon, it's Shane, let me in."

Who: Gabe and Brendon
When: Friday evening
Where: Hufflepuff house and environs
What: Little puffs, little puffs, let me in? (It's cold, and there are midget zombies after me)

When he'd turned a corner and unexpectedly run into a half-dozen knee-high threats, the Lash (well, that's what the crazy Russian who'd taught it to Gabe had called it, and it'd do) was the first thing that sprang to mind, an easy flick of his wrist and an ozone-blue spark. There were a couple of things he hadn't fully appreciated, though. One, just how much damage a house-elf could take without appearing to notice it; all of them went tumbling end over end down the corridor, thudding into the far wall at varying heights, but they all got up again. And two, just how much noice the Lash made; the crack of it seemed to ricochet off the stone walls and even set a nearby suit of armour to ringing faintly. As it faded away, something snarled down a side corridor. A few somethings.

Well. Shit. Gabe had been taking the long way about the long way 'round to Hufflepuff, but fuck that for a lark. He jumped over the lashed elf-zombies, paused to kick one off the ankle of his pants, and legged it. Took two corners at a dead sprint, jumped down the last half of the flight of stairs, and almost overshot the entrance to Hufflepuff. He snagged a hand against the frame, brought the other one back to thump on it and gasped, "Professor Saporta, let me in!" As he dragged himself back to upright and steady, he added, "Please!"

Who: Brendon and Spencer
When: Saturday morning
Where: Ravenclaw Common Room
What: Evil things.

Spencer was probably going to have to buy Gerard a new broom or something as a thank you present. He hung off it awkwardly as he clambered in through the Observatory entrance (which looked like it had already been battered down at some point, to Spencer's mild astonishment). He was mostly just grateful that the Ravenclaws hadn't changed the way to get in from the outside since he had been in school.

The room was mostly deserted, and Spencer figured that any students left in here were probably in their dorms or down in the Common Room. He pushed himself up beside the sink, propping Gerard's broom beside him and tapping his fingers nervously on the counter. He'd sent an owl to Brendon a little while ago, after deciding that the bindrune really did need to be approached by the person who'd probably been under its control, giving him directions to the Observatory for help with "something", but he knew Brendon was probably rounding up Hufflepuffs and might be a while.

He felt itchy and on edge, even though he knew the bindrune couldn't be affecting him from this far away, probably wouldn't have the same effect as the one targeted towards him did. Still, the knowledge of its presence made him uncomfortable. Ravenclaw Tower, he thought, and stared at himself grimly in the mirror. What the fuck, Ryan?

B,

Where are you?? I know you can handle yourself, but I'm worried. I'm coming to find you. If you get this before I get to you, send an owl or your patronus to tell me where you are.

Shane

Who: All, sundry and their furry soulmates
When: Dinner on Wednesday
Where: Great Hall, whether the teachers' high table or elsewhere as needed
What: Soul manifestation mayhem, duh

The Great Hall was barely half-full for dinner when Gabe stalked in, his feline companion almost matching his gait half a step behind him. And she was gorgeous, ok? She was the most beautiful Iberian Lynx he'd ever seen, possibly because she was the first one who'd ever been inclined to sit still to be admired.

So hanging out with her all day had not precisely been hard. Sure, classes had been a little more full of distraction than usual, and his lynx seemed to spent half of every class padding quietly between the benches and cuffing other tumbling animals, but whatever, it wasn't like a little light relief wasn't totally welcome this week.

Threading his way up to the end of the hall, Gabe climbed up to the high table - from where the Hall really did look like a menagerie gone beserk. He paused for a moment just to admire it before his lynx butted at his thigh and he moved on to find his seat.

Who: Everyone!
Where: The mysteriously-acquired floating pavilion on the lake.
When: Sunday night, 11 PM, after the kiddies are in bed.
What: The 'virus is cured, we have all slept for a full day, and everyone is alive!' party.

You can get to the white pavilion on the lake via magical means, or there are the first-year rowboats tucked up on the bank available for use. It's hard to miss; there are dozens of candles lighting up the night sky, and the pavilion itself is the size of a small house. There are bottles of champagne and trays of hors d'œuvre lining the walls. There are also over-sized cushions everywhere, so if anyone chooses to spend the night under the stars, that's totally an option. It's been a stressful week; the party might go until dawn.

[Owl to Shane]

I'm sorry aboutI'm having a bit of difficulty sleeping. Um. Worse than after, you know. Can we sleepWill you try sleeping in bed with me? I promise I won't try anythingIt's just that it worked so well before, and I'm desperate Shane. I need some sleep. I promise I won't even touch you.

[Owl to William]

There's a book I'm after, The Wakeful Dead, by Xavier Bloch. It's in the restricted section. Would that be available to me?

Are you suffering any side effects ofEverything is good with you, right?

[Owl to Pete]

You know that sleeping medicine that muggles take? How would I get my hands on some?

Who: Brendon and Spencer
Where: The Kitchens
When: Midnight, Thursday night/Friday morning
What: Manly moping

If Spencer was doomed to go through the night without any sleep whatsoever, he decided, he was going to do it with style. Which translated as skulking through the sleeping castle, waving briefly at the shadowy figure of an auror on patrol down the hall -- he hadn't been able to tell whether it was Patrick or Gerard, from the distance -- and heading down to the kitchens to try and convince the few house elves left since the war to make him a midnight feast.

Spencer had never been so good at that. Mostly, when he'd been at school, the role had fallen to Ryan, who was infinitely more persuasive when he wanted to be. Spencer relied mostly on widening his eyes as much as possible and playing off the fact that he looked like shit, face ashen and eyes red-rimmed. Tomorrow, he resolved, he would go and see Gabe, for sure, for sure. He'd meant to today, only time either moved at a slow, dragging pace or impossibly fast, and today had most definitely been the latter.

Eventually, begrudgingly, Silla produced a large jug of hot chocolate, raisin toast with butter melting just nicely on it, and a bowl of vanilla ice cream. Spencer grinned tiredly at her, and said, "Thanks a bunch," and her beady expression softened a little, as she patted him on the head before she scurried off to get back to work with the other elves. Spencer started to pour himself a mug of hot chocolate, only to be interrupted by someone appearing suddenly in the doorway.

"Hey," he said, startled. "What are you doing here?"

Who: Brendon, William, Gerard
When: Tuesday night after dinner
Where: The South Wing
What: More adventure than was originally planned

With the advent of Gabe's theory that the curses on the castle were being renewed by a power source somewhere on the grounds, Headmaster Schechter had redoubled efforts to clear out the quarantined areas. No one was to work alone and most of the spells were complicated enough to require a second set of eyes, which was how William found himself being relieved of evening library duties to assist Brendon with one of the most intricate charm-webs he'd ever seen up in the South Wing. Also affectionately known as the Nightmare Room.

William flipped a page in the enormous charms text he'd brought up with him, noting a few similarities in the diagram but just as many differences. "It's set up like a chain reaction, that's all I can tell," he informed Brendon, pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. He'd use the vision charm for the rest of the day, but tonight promised many hours of poring over crabbed, handwritten explanations that had faded over hundreds of years in poor lighting, and for that he was giving up and reverting to the mechanical. He looked up at the web again, spelled temporarily into shimmering visibility. "It's all interlinked. If we try to trigger or disable one, we'll end up setting them all off."

Hi

Sha

Look,

Valdés,

In his infinite wisdom, the headmaster has appointed us coheads me head of Hufflepuff, with your help, so we should sit down and discuss what this will entail. Of course, if you are unwilling to take the position with me alongside me, I am sure the headmaster would not object in the slightest.

Sincerly yours,

Professor Urie.

Who Anyone and everyone
What Staff party
When Eleven and any time after on Friday
Where Pete and Brendon's Magical Muggle Pool Ballroom

For the evening, they've given up on the dream of muggle accuracy and the whole thing is decked out magically; the pool is full, but the water glows for no apparent reason. Brendon has decked shit out with trees, there are portraits of jungle animals hung on the walls in various parts of the ~forest that make their applicable noises, and there's even a "beach" of pure white sand. The ceiling is charmed to look like the night sky, complete with a moon about half-full (just in case there are any werewolves in attendance whose biology might get confused), and there is a "cabana" of sorts with food and more alcohol than you can shake a stick at.

It's a casual affair and, despite Pete's careful wording on the invitation, the point, plain and simple, is to get wasted.

[OOC: basically a free for all where time is fluid and threads can be started all willy nilly!]

Who: Brendon and Billiam (now with bonus Jon!)
When: Sunday evening. Kiddies ahoy!
Where: Outside the castle
What: Unicorns.

Having levitated and transfigured more spare doors into feasibly operational boats than had possibly been seen since the Spanish Armada, William had left the others to the duties of chaperoning first-years across the lake and gone to find Brendon with the carriages. As a pastime, fishing eleven-year-olds out of murky water at night left a certain something to be desired.

He had a reasonable amount of faith in Jon, but the grimaces Schechter had displayed during his earlier offer of mermaids left William feeling that perhaps reinforcements might be welcome. If not, he could always head back inside to double-check the master list of arriving students and have a chat with the Sorting Hat about organizational charms. Also possibly nick a pumpkin pasty.

"Brendon?" he called, keeping his voice down so as to not startle any unicorns. "Are you...?" Ah. There he was. And there were the unicorns, waiting silent and resplendent only a few meters away. Brendon was standing more still than William suspected he'd ever been, staring at them with hearts almost palpably visible in his eyes.

"Brendon?"

Who: Pete and Brendon.
What: PRANKS!
When: Lunch time, shortly after school has resumed.
Where: Teacher's table, Great Hall.


With everything that had been going on lately, Brendon had completely forgotten about his devious plan, formulated one afternoon in the depths of cleaning and boredom. Pete, Brendon was nearly certain, was the kind of guy who would take a prank or two in stride, maybe retaliate with one of his own. Over the summer, Brendon and Pete had formed a connection—not in a gay way, but in the sort of dude way, where Brendon could count on Pete to high five him after a good "that's what she said" joke.

Brendon had planned this prank as a first day back surprise, but avoiding Shane had gotten in the way. It was harder to prank someone when he ran out of the room every time Shane walked in. But still, now. The potion took six hours to set in, so he'd instructed the house elves to slip it into Pete's dinner the night before. Crafty, clever little things that they were, they'd succeeded, and now Brendon had gotten up bright and early to sit at the teacher's table and wait, excited to see how Pete was taking his newly grown and abundant facial hair.

Who: Brendon and Shane.
What: Old friends meet again.
When: Sometime in the afternoon of Shane's arrival.
Where: In a classroom, in the deep, dark heart of the castle.


Sometimes when they were sent to fix a problem that had cropped up somewhere in the castle, things ended up a little less straightforward than they had initially expected. What Brendon first expected to take him an hour or two of easy charm work, had taken four, five hours of exhausting, intricate work, and what's more, he was beginning to suspect there was a boggart in the teacher's desk at the front of the room.

He sighed, collapsing onto a student's desk, a safe distance from the boggart. He'd ask the DADA professor if they had any use for it before he went forth and started dredging up deepest fears. Yes. He rubbed his elbow where he had earlier slipped and jarred it against the wall, frowning. Some things were better left buried.

Who: Brendon and Pete.
Where: The pool room. Yes. There is/will be a swimming pool room.
When: Middle of the day, some time.


There were fewer things in life more satisfying than doing something and having it turn out spectacularly. This was the excuse Brendon was giving for spending so much time and effort with Pete trying to build this infuriatingly epic muggle swimming pool, though secretly, he was looking forward to the day they could open this baby up and christen it The Wentz-Urie Swimming Pool, complete with a wall plaque that heralded the blood, sweat and triumph that went into creating it. They had spent a week alone on determining what shape it should be in the ground, and had moved past the trivial lining issue (Brendon wanted turquoise tiles that sparkled gold in the sunlight, and had not gotten his way) which meant they were now free to focus their all together brilliant ideas on the crowning glory. The slide, they had decided on, looking wistfully at pictures from pamphlets.

The only issue was, being a slide, it had to be made from plastic, which was entirely a mysterious muggle invention. Where would they get it from in the first place? What was it made from? Preordering a slide from a muggle manufacturer seemed entirely like cheating, but otherwise, they were stumped.

"I don't know, dude," Brendon said, sitting on the edge of the pool, kicking his heels against the tile. The pool sat empty, because water sanitation seemed way too scary for them to attempt yet. "Unless we like, make a stone slide and charm it to stay permanently slippery, I am out of ideas."

Who: Brendon & Ryan
What, When and Where: Mr. Ryan Ross, sometime in the late evening, arriving via Apparition at the edge of the grounds on the other side of the forest.



At the edge of the grounds on the other side of the forest was not exactly the most descriptive nor precise location to wait for a new arrival, thank you Headmaster Schecter. Hogwarts had changed in countless ways since he had last been an adolescent, but one thing that remained the same was the way the forest stretched on in front of him, seeming to reach to each end of the horizon. And this was where he was supposed to meet his assigned professor--well not his, but like, the professor he was assigned to show around--a colleague, and be all professional and shit. For someone who had to grow up and strike out on his own pretty damn fast, professionalism was something that came to Brendon in fits and starts. The teachers he had in his time as a student seemed so much more equipped for this, so much more grown up. Brendon still had a hard time remembering that he was the Professor Urie he'd hear people addressing, and just this morning he had been warned by Headmaster Schecter for charming a portrait to strike an obscene pose any time someone said a specific phrase when walking by. Still, Brendon reflected, he'd managed not to laugh til the Headmaster was out of earshot, so that had to count for something.

Brendon scanned the treeline again before checking his watch. Eight thirty was late evening, right? The lumos he was casting was the only bright spot between here and Hogsmeade. He figured he'd be pretty right. All he had to do was settle back against the rock wall and wait.

Who: Summer staff and early arrivals
Where: The Great Hall
When: Dinnertime
What: The last evening before new arrivals


William understood the need to move from the staff lounge into the Great Hall for meals now that their numbers were increasing, but it was still strange (and slightly creepy) to eat dinner in a vast room so empty that it echoed whenever his fork tapped his plate. Maybe they should have Chinese next time; chopsticks would make less noise.

It was sirloin tonight, it looked like. Most likely the house elves wanted to enjoy themselves cooking fancy meals for a just a few before they had to start preparing food in bulk. The high table was set up with all chairs facing the hall, which made sense during the year when there were children to supervise, but made conversation difficult right now. William hooked his wand beneath the decorative filigree on the back and cast enough of a lightening charm to pull the chair around behind him to the opposite side of the table. It was a little close to the edge of the dais, but it would do.

"It's weird in here," he commented, settling in across from the others and summoning a place setting from the abandoned corner of the table. "Nice, but still weird."