*falling from the clouds

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Terror. Pure, unfiltered terror. And, of all things, guilt. Only someone as compassionate as Luna would feel as awful as she did about having to stun the beast in order to escape. What was happening? Why were there werewolves in Hogwarts? The atmosphere, saturated with uncontrolled panic, swept through the halls and caused everyone to be more on edge. Even Luna, who walked through life on a cloud. Not tonight. Tonight, the edge that fear gave her was keeping her alive. Luna was running for her life, and she knew it well enough. All she could think of was getting down the flights of stairs and losing the wolf she had just escaped from. The stench of dog clung to the tapestries and made it seem like a wolf waited for her around every corner, and Luna hated having to fear their natures. Luna was a pro-werewolf rights activist; this incident was not going to do well to aid her cause . . .

Absently, Luna's mind spun through the logical options able to explain what was happening. Possibly, an attack was being mounted from some unsecured entrance into the castle - - though this seemed somewhat unlikely. How often was it that Hogwarts was found to have an unsecured pathway? Not very. It was possible, though she hated to really have to consider this an option, that Remus Lupin had been infecting people since his return, and this was the outcome. This, though possible, seemed too far fetched. What, then? The fear and emotions swirling through Luna's veins were alien and intoxicating. There, another floor cleared. Eventually, Luna came upon the library entrance. Ducking inside the doors, the small witch placed her back against the wood and held her wand up toward the empty room behind her in defense. The wolves were everywhere, so it was possible they were in here too. But, as minutes went by, it seemed the library was currently vacant, allowing the girl to take a deep breath and straighten from her ready-stance.

Slowly, her wand-arm lowered so that it hung stiffly by her side. "Come now, Luna. It can always be worse," she coaxed herself, her voice slowly calming to meet her emotional state. Taking another deep breath, Luna ducked her head over her shoulder and peaked through the large wooden doors, listening for a sound signaling the approach of another wolf or student. When, from down the hall, footsteps registered, Luna threw open the door and planted her feet firmly, her wand raised to the ready. Whether this be friend or foe, she would be prepared.

Virgil | 433 | haha give me a second to get her together again

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Tag: Luna

Words: 1619

Note: I'm late again XD Tell me if anything need to be changed.

It looked like he had escaped professor Slughorn, probably due to the man’s overweight appearance. Virgil stopped to catch his breath in a dark corner of the third floor corridor, behind a tall suit of armor. That was pretty unlucky, considering he usually got away with sneaking out over curfew. He peeked through the armor’s arm to see the dimly lit hallway to make sure there was no one coming. It seemed quite safe. Hopefully, he could find a place to hide for a while until things ease up.

Just then, there was a strange sound that caught his attention. It sounded like the paws of a dog running on the stone floor. Now, unless it was one of the ground keeper’s wicked house pets, a dog should not have been in the castle. He could be mistaking but there definitely was something out of ordinary going on in the Charm class room right on the other side of where he was hiding. Now he could hear tables being flipped and scratched. “What the bloody hell is – He mumbled to himself, leaning further to see. It was too dark for him to tell what was there, only the sounds were heard. The Slytherin boy decided it was best to leave. He stood up and slowly walked backward, trying his best to avoid making noises. However, there was no arguing his lucky day was anytime but today. Out of a sudden, yell and screams started coming from above and below. Whatever was happening, he apparently was not the only one trapped in it. The sound attracted attention of the thing inside the classroom. He could hear it stop wrecking things up, growled, then started running. Within a few seconds, Virgil found himself face to face with one’s worst nightmare.

The creature was tall and looked almost like a wolf. Yet, its facial features had a more human like sense to them. The werewolf stood on its back legs, breathing strongly, while staring at him. Possibly, the werewolf thought he was the source of what it heard. The boy could feel blood disappearing from his face in terror as he looked back at the wolf’s dangerous eyes. Nothing could be better than being locked on by a werewolf. This was just great. He did not sign up to fight werewolves! He continued to back away shakily to keep his distance. Meanwhile, his hand slipped into his trousers’ pockets slowly for his wand so as not to trigger the creature’s attack. Without a warning, he took out his wand and shouted. “STUPEFY”

A red spark shot rapidly out of the tip of his wand. Due to his shaking hand, the attack went a little far from where he had intended it to. Instead of hitting the creature’s face, the spell stunned its shoulder. It was enough to keep the werewolf distracted, however. The wolf made a painful snarl, obviously wanting to kill him even more than it was before. Virgil knew that, and he preferred it not happening. He took the chance when the werewolf was struggling with the pain he had caused it and run. All those days of training his stamina by jogging around the school yard finally paid off. The sixth year Slytherin ran as quickly as possible. He did not even care if the wolf was behind him or not, he just ran for the sake of his life. From somewhere, he heard screams and voices of other students. Oh no. There had better not be more than one werewolf running loose. Braking himself so fast he created a screeching sound with his shoes, he was relief he found a potential hiding place. An alcove! He went inside and saw a broom closet hidden in there. Pretty close, he heard the snarling of the werewolf approaching. Without a minute to waste, he jumped inside the closet and quietly closed the door, also locking it just in case.

He backed off, back pressing against the solid wall behind, panting. Why the heck was there a werewolf in Hogwarts? It could not be Remus Lupin, could it? Professor Dumbledore had guaranteed there would be very strict security placed after reaccepting the old DADA professor into school, working as a librarian. How come this happened? And the screaming of other students… He hoped what he was thinking of was not real. Was the school under attack of some sort?

His trend of thought was broken by a very chilling sound. It was the heavy breathing of the werewolf, coming from just outside his hiding place. The wolf was sniffing the door and the boy knew he was not going to stay here undetected. Just as he thought, the creature started crawling and hitting hard on the closet doors, vibrating the whole broom storage. He held his only weapon tighter, sweat dropping from his chin in intension. He was getting ready for the worse case, in which that werewolf reached inside. To his surprise, the smacking stopped. Outside his hiding, there was someone’s voice, yelling at the werewolf to distract it. Whoever out there was crazy enough to confront the werewolf. Could be. Hogwarts was full of hero-wannabes. One thing for sure, he would not do the same for anyone. Virgil was not an idiot who liked throwing his life away easily. At that time, he heard a terrifying bark, the wolf’s claws as it lunged at the person, a loud thud, then silence. Did that wolf win? Or did that person defeat it. He stepped a bit closer to the door, focusing all his senses.

“Anyone in here!?” A familiar voice of a woman shouted.

Sighing in relief, he unlocked the door and came out to see his life saver. The first thing he saw was a werewolf lying motionlessly on the floor, still breathing but definitely knocked out. Standing a few feet away from him was professor Sinistra, looking half panicked half relieved. “Are you alright?” She asked the common question.

“No-” He did not get the chance to ask anything about what was going on, for there were more loud screeches echoing through the corridor. The Astronomy professor turned her head to that direction, then - in an unstable voice - commanded. “Go back to your common room. It’s not safe out here.” She quickly ran away to check what was happening after that.

Virgil could not agree more. He had no intention of staying outside for another attack, if anything like that would happen. He wasted no time in rushing after the teacher to the stairs. But then, he was greeted with a rather awful scene. Students, both young and old, were running and fighting throughout the halls and staircases. He could clearly see some had terrible injures that bled out on the floor. The boy froze, looking around for the cause of such chaos. What he saw was shocking. There were more than four werewolves roaming the place, each going after a group of students. What were those fools doing outside of their dormitory at this hour to get caught in such a mess? But Virgil Chapman had no time to worry about that. Some Hufflepuff kids ran pass him so fast he nearly lost his balance dodging them, and tailing right after them was one of the wolves. He barely escaped the creature’s jaws by jumping to the side. It seemed he had become the new target of the beast.

The unplanned jump made him slam his body on the stair’s thick railing. Groaning, he stumbled to his feet. The werewolf was fast. It was already launching another attack at him while he was still affected by the pain. He cast a body-binding spell but missed. It only slowed the beast a little, enough for him to start running, heading for the closest staircase he could see. He just ran two or three steps at a time, yet he could still hear the wolf snapping air and growling so close behind. Suddenly, he heard a loud, painful and furious snarl as if it was hurt by something. Turning around, he saw the werewolf had encountered the self-vanishing steps. It had slipped and was now stuck in the middle of the staircase, struggling in fury. Well, that settled it. Virgil took the one-in-a-million chance to make his escape. But seeing the way down were crowded with frightened children and wolves, he continued running to the fourth floor.

He ran along the large corridor without a certain destination. He slowed down, wand still raising high in preparation for any surprise attack. The hallway seemed quieter, but no one knew whether he was alone or not. Despite knowing that, it was still startling for him when the library door suddenly flew open. He was having his back toward it and nearly jumped. He turned around and shot a stinging hex out of instinct. His poor aiming skill had brought luck to whoever just came out. The hex missed her, and instead ruined a wall light.

“Fu-- Arg! You -!” Now that he realized ‘it’ was a human, he could not describe how mad he was. Whoever she was nearly gave him a heart attack. He thought he was about to be fighting another werewolf. After all what happened earlier, he was now quite paranoid about wolves jumping at him from every corner. ”What the heck did you do that for?” He snapped, nearly shouting. He knew he nearly hurt a girl. But one just could not charge out at someone like that, not at this time.