Seeking What Was Lost (Alice, Open)

[yumeko]

At long last break had come to relieve students of the tiring responsibility of appearing in classrooms. That is, at least for the hour, but that was enough of a relief to please Yume. The weather outside was simply too glorious to be wasting cooped up within old walls and older professors. The air was cool, but not cold enough to deter her. In fact, she quite looked forward to the following month when snow would make an appearance. For the moment, she was simply pleased to be able to wear her skirts without freezing herself half to death.

Books in hand, she stepped toward her favorite grassy hillside with a smile spread across her lips. Her plans for the break were simple. She would reach her favorite spot on the hill, lay down in the shade of her favorite tree, then simply nap away the remaining hour. She could feel the cool thick grass beneath her already. Well, perhaps at this time the grass was a little too cool, but she had her cloak for that. The thought danced about her mind as her heart began to beat ever so slightly slower than before as the waves of comfort it would bring coursed through her. The sheer thought of it was putting her in a trance.

The happy reverie was soon interrupted by the appearance of two other students on the hillside. She had not expected many others to be out here, let alone ones as young as these two. It was clear at first glance what houses they were in. One was a boy from Slytherin and the other a girl from Gryffindor, and naturally…they were in the middle of an apparently heated ‘debate’. Question is, was it heated enough for intervention yet? Well, it certainly was disturbing enough to her peace. She hardly cared what the argument was about, she was going to see to it that it ended.

”How DARE you! Mudbloods like you deserve nothing better than to—“ the boy’s speech was abruptly cut short by a slender but firm hand gripping his wrist tightly. He has raised it in anger, wand in hand and all. Yume hardly knew whether he planned to actually cast a spell or simply wave it in the other student’s direction furiously, but either was dangerous. She recognized him as a new student and knew that new wizards hardly had complete control of their wands. He could have casted a curse at her simply on accident. Or, well… ‘accident’.

The sternest and most infuriated expression came about the girl’s otherwise innocent looking face. Her dark green eyes stared daggers at the boy she now restrained. ”Go,” was all she said to the little girl.

”Hardly, this rat had the gall to—“

”I truly do not care,” she snapped truthfully, her gaze finally lifting to the other student. Her intentions were certainly better than she made her actions seem. While it was both children participating in the argument, it was not simply the Gryffindor child that had her angry. In fact, she was more disappointed with that of her own house who now was staring angrily back at her

In a huff, the girl stomped off back to the castle as Yume turned back to her housemate. ”Are you really defending that scum?”

”I am defending our own house!” she retorted sharply. ”No matter her origins, she is a student in this school and raising your wand against her will only result in us losing points. Do you really want that? Your wand is not your only outlet for causing pain, twit.”

[quof2]

Alice loved days like this. She'd been thinking of doing her homework, but she'd taken one look at the weather and known she was going to spend the time outdoors.

She felt a little uncomfortable being out there by herself, when everyone else was in couples and groups, chatting and laughing.
She'd said hi to a couple of people, hoping to start a conversation, but they'd only say hi back or maybe give her a friendly smile before continuing on their way.

She sighed and her head her hung a little bit, her pace slowed a little bit but she continued walking and tried to smile in spite of herself. She was determined to make something good come of this day after all.

Then she heard the word she loathed so much, mudblood. She spun around and saw two first years, one of whom was a Slytherin. She felt the heat rush to face and stalked off to tell him off. She loved being a prefect for this very reason, she could get involved in this stuff and people couldn't tell her it wasn't any of her business.

But someone else had beat her too it. She stopped. She wasn't completely sure, but she was pretty sure that was the 6th year Slytherin prefect, who's name she couldn't quite reminder but it was something like Yumeo Hekiki...or something close to that anyway.

She was a little apprehensive as to what the Slytherin would do, but was pleasantly surprised when she broke it up and told the boy off. Granted, it hadn't been for calling the other girl a mudblood, which was what she would have done, but it was more than most Slytherins would have done.

She waited until the boy had left, which he did after a moment, muttering under his breath. She tried to get up the courage to approach the girl. She still didn't know much about her, but maybe they could still get along. Or maybe she desperate for someone to talk too.

"Hi." She said shakily, but she needed to say more than that, "Don't you hate how the first years don't seam to care about house points?" She smiled tentatively.

[yumeko]

After her short speech, the Slytherin first year continued to glare up at the prefect for a moment. His eyes darted around, seeing a couple other people easily in eye-shot of them, and finally relaxed his arm that was still being held up. ”I suppose you’re right. Wouldn’t want to give them the advantage. She’d run away and cry about it for ages.” The boy laughed shortly then returned to angered expressions, as if the simple thought of the girl crying was pleasing and he felt he was robbed of it.

Yume found it pointless to argue with the child, but she so desired to. His opinions about other students were preset and it would not have been easy to change him. At least, not in this one hour she would rather be spending relaxing than lecturing. He was so sour about something that was just silly. It was childish and fitting of a child, but she knew far too many adults that acted the same way. It was quite tiresome, truthfully.

The boy, though he eventually agreed, pulled his arm away roughly and walked away in a huff, muttering under his breath things she was sure she did not want to hear. Yume watched him for a yard or two before her attention was stolen by a beautiful girl with hair that glowed in the sunlight. She recognized her immediately as a 6th year prefect, though the name escaped her. All that she could conjure was Prewett. She was pretty certain the girl’s name was Prewett.

As Prewett approached, clearly targeting Yume, she made a comment that was quite unexpected (even though it pertained to the most recent events). Yume chuckled softly before offering the Gryffindor a sweet smile. ”I don’t care as much as you might think,” she admitted. Honestly, she had no worries for points. When Quidditch finally started up, she would make sure that Slytherin won, silly children with silly wands were not going to harm anything.

“If you want to talk someone out of doing something they’re predetermined to do, you have to do so in words they’ll find common ground with,” she muttered through a smirk. “He would never have stopped arguing so quickly if I bothered barking at him for targeting mudbloods.” She put emphasis on the last word, showing that it was not her term, but her speaking from another’s perspective. ”He may live on saying offensive terms, but at least he’ll think twice before threatening another with his wand in hand.”

Yumeko looked around at the grass around them, inspecting it for landing. She still wanted to relax, but so far she did not get the feeling she would want to ditch her sudden conversation partner. Determining it was a decent place to lay down, she looked back up at the other girl and shrugged before taking a seat in the grass. ”How would you have handled it?” She meant her question not as the start of an argument or even a debate, she was only curious.

[quof2]

Alice felt a little crestfallen when she said that. She was never very good at starting conversations and already she'd said something wrong. The girl didn't seam bothered by it though, she was even friendly. Alice smiled shyly in response, an embarrassed red coloring her cheeks.

She nodded, that made sense, though she usually didn't think about things that way. She perked up when she said something about him calling the other girl a mudblood. The way she said it made it sound like, like she didn't care about that stuff. Alice listened to her with renewed interest, eager to have a conversation with a Slytherin who might actually be decent.

She blushed again at her question. "Ummm... exactly the way you said not to handle it." She grinned a little in embarrassment again. "I would have called him out for calling her mudblood and probably started lecturing him and then I would have threatened to take points." She paused, "So it was probably best that you got here first." she said in an attempt to be friendly. "But still, I'm glad that you actually care about the mudblood thing. I've been trying to convince the Grffindor's for ages that not all the Slytherin's are...all like those horrid death eaters, but I can never get any of them to believe me." She cringed a little, wishing she hadn't said that. Just because this girl might not be that way didn't mean that she didn't have friends, or family members, that were.

[yumeko]

How amusing… Yume could not go without noticing the new addition of red to the other girl’s cheeks. It was so adorable how her face glowed with embarrassment, though she was at a loss for why at first. As Prewett began her response to Yume’s question, all she could do at first was to stare – nearly in adoration. She was almost envious of her pearly skin that glowed so brilliantly. Then again, being like her would make her less unlike everyone else at the school. There weren’t many Asians in the school as it was, let alone Japanese.

Yumeko chuckled softly as Prewett admitted it was better that the Slytherin prefect arrived first. After hearing that comment, she was now listening to more intently to her words rather than her face as she spoke. Her final comment was the most amusing of all. Admittedly, there were some truly terrible Slytherins, but there were varying degrees of it. There were the horrible, the mild, and the few that slipped under the radar and hardly acted anything like other Slytherins at all. They were just as complex as any other house.

“You’re right,” she responded in a cool tone. “Just as not every Gryffindor is talented and strong-hearted, not every Slytherin pumps poison through their veins. House selection isn’t that shallow.”

Yume turned her body to face the forbidden forest, but kept her eyes on the golden Gryffindor standing beside her. With two pats to the ground next to hear, indicating an invitation, she leaned back so that her body faced the sky. There had been no offense taken. In fact, Yume did not even catch how it would have been offensive at all. It was not a surprising comment. It was rather normal. ”I highly doubt the Death Eaters would seek out me as a member,” she stated softly, more hopeful than an actual profession of clear truth. Considering she was in Slytherin…a prefect with perfect grades, she quite possibly may appear as a talented candidate. But, unlike most others, she had not yet gotten in trouble for causing a ruckus over something so silly as blood. It simply did not matter.

”In my opinion, if you can control magic… you’re a witch.”

[quof2]

She nodded, perhaps a little too vigorously, but she was just glad that things were starting to move along a little more smoothly. This girl wasn't exactly chipper though, whereas Alice was usually pretty bubbly when it came to conversations. Most of the time that was because she was nervous, except she was bubbly when she wasn't nervous also.

Still, she decided she was going to curb her enthusiasm. She clasped her hands firmly behind her back, pressed her lips together, and starting rolling on the balls of her feet—though that last one wasn't intentional.

"Me neither!" she replied eagerly, before remembering she'd been trying not to be eager. Plus it was a stupid answer, obviously the death eaters didn't want her, they wouldn't even want her dog, if she had a dog. She sighed, closing her eyes for a second before refocusing on the girl, trying to appear cool and detached this way she did, though Alice doubted she was succeeding.

"Oh yes I...I mean yes," She corrected herself. "Some of the top students even come from muggle backgrounds." She couldn't stop herself from smiling a little, "Like do you know Lily Evans?" She began energetically, "She's a year below us and in Gryffindor? She's also a prefect." she added a hopefully it that helped. "Anyway, she's a muggle born but she's a brilliant. She even helps me with my potions homework sometimes." She gritted her teeth again, hoping she didn't think Alice was stupid because she needed help with potions. She wasn't the best student, but she got along okay. Potions was the only thing she really struggled with.

[yumeko]

Yumeko chuckled softly under her breath at the other girl’s initial response to her statements. Her eagerness was simply adorable. Were she able to hear thoughts, she would be agreeing whole-heartedly that the death eaters would want nothing to do with the Gryffindor aside from her own bodily harm. That was not to say that Yume agreed with them, only that she understood how they thought. She was a little too outspoken against the pureblood war against ‘mudblood’. She made herself a threat…Yume, on the other hand, was quite a bit more laid back in her opinion.

Prewitt had clearly ignored her invitation to take a seat next to her and instead stood awkwardly rolling on her heels. Yume mentally shrugged it off and continued staring up into the sky as she listened and watched with her peripheral view. The fact that needing help in potions from Lily Evans was somewhat amusing to her. She knew of the girl, but did not know her personally. Miss Evans was friends with a boy in Slytherin. In fact, that same boy was helping Yume in potions. What a small world…

”I know of Miss Evans. She seems smart, though I cannot say from personal experience.” Yume tilted her head slightly upon the grass, narrowing her eyes as she stared at an oddly shaped cloud. ”I think nearly every Slytherin knows of her…She is, after all, good friends with one of our own. It’s not too common for a Slytherin to be so obviously attached to a Gryffindor, nor a Gryffindor finding a Slytherin so like-able as to spend so much time together.”

Against the ground, she shrugged. ”But, I do not know them well enough to say what is truly going on.” She had veered from the topic without realizing nor truly caring. Talking about the politics surrounding muggles and mudbloods was exhausting.

[quof2]

It was only after a little while that she realized she been invited to sit down...or had she? She wasn't sure, as she only seen it out of the corner of her eye.

Should she go sit down anyway? If she'd been invited and she didn't then that would be rude, but if she hadn't been invited and she just sat down then she might look socially inappropriate. She bit her lip, deciding. She figured she should just ask, but she was a little shy, but she couldn't see any other option. "Umm...mind if I sit next to you?" She gritted her teeth because her voice had trembled a little bit.

The idea that she might know her because of Snape hadn't even occurred to Alice. She kind of viewed Lily Evans as two different people, one who hung out with Snape and one who didn't. She liked Lily, but she didn't really like Snape all that much even though she didn't know him that well. She didn't want to judge Lily, but she had never exactly understood why she was friends with him. She started to say something to that effect but the girl's last comment stole the words from her mouth and made her blush.

She didn't know much about it either, and she felt embarrassed because she had passed judgment anyway. That was twice now that she'd made some sort of logical or even possibly ethical blunder in comparison to her. She pursed her lips together, determined not to make another one.

"I suppose you're right." She said with a sigh. she didn't know what else to say so she looked at the girl hopefully, hoping she would supply some sort of reason to continue the conversation. Even though she was at a loss of what to say she was just so excited about talking to somebody that she didn't want to lose it before it had even begun.

[yumeko]

Yumeko’s mind wandered after her last statement. It was true, she did not really know much about what was going on with Lily Evans, nor did she really care in the end. It was not her business. That is, unless it meant ill happenings upon Severus. She had yet to find a reason he should be labeled as bad like most other Slytherins. Perhaps she was biased, though. He was helping her get A’s in potions after all.

A question had been answered when the girl standing near her spoke up again. In a forced tone, she asked permission to sit next to her, which clarified that she was not ignoring her invitation but simply had not noticed it. Yume sat up and smiled sweetly. “I don’t see any reason why I should mind you sitting with me, Miss Prewett.”

Her smile widened slightly upon hearing an admittance of her being right. It was pleasing being correct and it was even more pleasing to be recognized for it. Not a moment of thought was spent on whether the other girl was wrong or not. “I suppose that’s the thing, though… We live here for seven years of our life and hardly know anything about the majority of our classmates in other houses. For example, you and I… we are both prefects of the same year, and yet this is probably the first time we have ever spoken to one another.”

Her speech paused for a moment as she shifted to the side to fold her legs and slid her feet to her side. “For six years we have studied at Hogwarts, but the simple matter than I am a Slytherin keeps you from me. And, the simple matter than you are a Gryffindor keeps me from you,” she muttered, in a slightly faltering tone, as if it was something she regretted. “I have yet to see any other reason why we shouldn’t already be friends,” she stated with a proud smile.

[quof2]

Alice breathed a deep sigh of relief when she so kindly answered her question and even smiled a true Alice smile, which lit up her entire face. She carefully sat down on the ground next to her, close, but so close that she would be invading the other girl's space.

Alice wasn't really sure what to say to her next comment. She grinned awkwardly and shrugged. "I guess so," She attempted to say lightly. She wasn't exactly sure why she'd never spoken to her before. Prefect meetings weren't exactly the best time to make friends, and she was usually so shy around the other prefects that she didn't contribute much to the conversation. Had she been intimidated by her, or just never felt like she had anything to say to her? Was she the object of her own criticism and had avoided her simply because she was a Slytherin? Yume seemed to indicate that it was something like that, except the way she said it made it seem like it was the age old feud between the two houses, and their classmates, that had kept them apart. Yet Alice couldn't help thinking she was at least to blame for her own part. She wondered if perhaps she'd associated Yume with Granton, who she had never felt comfortable around and certainly seemed to fit into the potentially future death eater mold.

Perhaps she had, or perhaps she hadn't, but she supposed it didn't really matter, as long as she didn't let it happen again.
And Yume had sort of called her a friend! Another pretty smile spread across her lips.

"Me neither!" She said excitedly, then she started blushing again.