Vipers & Chocolate frogs

Slytherin & Hufflepuff August 29th

"Well?" Remqui asked, dragging a perfectly manicured nail through the remnants of whip cream on the rim of her mug, "What do you think?"

Cicero took a long sip from his identically ugly mug and set it down on the little coaster. A brief moment of silence passed, Cicero staring into the mug with a dissatisfied look, and finally he stood up with a clap of his hands. "Well, I think I need something to eat, because I'm hungry and I have to go in like fifteen minutes."

"What?" Remqui stared dumbfounded as the younger teen left their booth in the back of the small cafe. Dumbfound she hesitates before jumping right into action and angrily follows Cicero to the counter. "Can you take something seriously, for just a second."

Clearly frustrated, Cicero snatches something from a wicker basket beside the cash register and slams it down in front of a wide eyed cashier. Remqui silently sent the poor witch an apology for the dramatics unfolding in front of her. "What do you want me to say? We obviously have to enforce the rules, I don't think either of us are allowed opinions on the matter." Digging a few coins out of his pocket, Cicero shot Remqui a glare and handed the money to the still wide eyed girl. Remqui wasn't sure she'd ever seen anyone furiously throw coins into a tip jar. "We just need to push through this, that's all there is to it, okay?"

Huffing, Remqui kept on Cicero's heels as he marched back to their booth, pointedly ignoring the stares burning into her head from the other patrons.

"That's your opinion?"

"Yup." Cicero threw himself into the booth seat, Remqui crossed her arms and slid much more gracefully into hers.

Remqui raised a penciled eyebrow, "Even about the increased hall patrols and the absurd curfew?"

A shrug. "Gorgon told me it'd last for about a month, just until things calm down."

While she wasn't saying it out loud, Remqui seriously doubted this would calm down. Not with the way wizards from all over were just eating up the death of a student. She wouldn't put it past the Hufflepuff professor to try and sugar coat the truth. Shaking her head, she fixed Cicero with a hard stare.

"What about the searches? You seriously think it's okay for raids to be conducted on common rooms and for students to be questioned?"

She should've known that would've gotten her nothing but a half smirk and a, "You got something to hide Oberon?"

Heat rising to her cheeks, Remqui decided the sickeningly lovey dovey couple by the exit out to Diagon Alley were much more interesting to pay attention to. "No, I just find it odd."

"It'll be back to normal in like a few months. Just be patient." It really sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than anything, but Remqui decided it was probably for the best if she didn't point it out.

But maybe Cicero was right. It was quite possible everything would blow over in a handful of weeks. The idea that Gideon would be forgotten just like that though, it made her feel ill. Of course whoever was responsible could be caught and things could finally get back to normal once Gideon and his family found justice.

"Quit brooding." Before she could even turn, something hit her in the chest.

"Hey!" Remqui grabbed whatever Cicero had thrown at her and glared down at it, ready to launch it back at his face. "Chocolate frogs?" She questioned, recognizing the packaging instantly, "How old are you?"

Cicero frowned around the piece of chocolate now sticking out of his mouth. Breaking the head of the frog off, he twirled the card in his fingers.

"I crave chocolate when I'm mad." He defensively countered, Remqui affectionately rolled her eyes. She'd known Cicero for far too long to know exactly how to push his buttons.

Content with just watching the far too many patrons of The Bards Brew, Remqui happily distracted herself from Cicero's far too loud chewing. Poppy would be here soon, the Slytherin prefect could save her from whatever this mess of a Hufflepuff could be considered. About ready to snap at the head boy for not having any sembalance of manners, Remqui swung back only to pause. Cicero was looking from his Chocolate frog card to the entrance of the Bard's Brew, eyebrows drawn together and a startled looked on his face.

"What's wrong?" She tried to follow his gaze, but couldn't see anyone in particular of note.

"What?" Cicero dropped the card onto the table, looking from somewhere over her shoulder to back at her, his brown eyes full of confusion.

Intrigued now, Remqui teased, "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Cicero mock gagged, a repulsed expression quickly replacing his confusion, "Ew, no." Just like that he was back to staring intensely over her shoulder. Casting another glance that yielded no results, Remqui went back to trying to pester the answer out of him.

"What do you mean ew no?" She indignantly shot back, "Weren't you into a ghost in our 4th year?"

Cicero sat bolt upright, his hands slamming flat down on the table, eyes clearly drawn to something. "Shut up."

Remqui made a face, "Uh no, because I'm ri-"

"Shut up." Cicero hissed, shushing her with a lot of aggressive hand motions. Remqui couldn't tell if she was more annoyed or curious as to what gained Cicero's attention, but thankfully with a couple of exaggerated head motions and eye movement on his part, Remqui turned around to look to the front of the cafe.

Two new patrons had just entered. A sharply dressed woman holding a padded journal and a very scruffy, sloppily dressed man, both appeared to be in their fifties. Remqui recognized the woman instantly, she had been reading her articles these past few days after all. Journalist Tayla Sharpe, but her companion took her by surprise.

Twirling back to a shocked Cicero, Remqui suddenly understood why he was freaking out.

"Is that Headmaster McQuillan?" Remqui quietly whispered at the same time Cicero shrunk back into his seat and whispered,

"Oh my god he's coming over."

Before she even had time to try and decipher what Cicero had said, a loud voice boomed, slowly approaching their table.

"Cicero! Remqui!" Remqui pinched the inside of her wrist to make sure this wasn't some fever dream. Headmaster McQuillan approached their table, baggy tank top bearing some stains, jodhpurs a colourful disaster, and so many scarves it looked like a closet threw up on him. "Tayla grab us a seat will you?" He called back to the journalist, all the while Remqui and Cicero gawked up at the older man. "Well, what are you crazy kids up to?" His salt and pepper scruff accented his smile. That was new, Remqui noted, McQuillan was eccentric to say the least, but this, everything about this was new.

"Professor McQuillan, it's a pleasure to see you sir." Cicero formally greeted, wiping away any of the remaining chocolate off his face. Remqui hastily fixed her hair and smoothed out her skirt. "Yes, it's a pleasant surprise indeed." She chirped in.

"Of course, of course. It's always great to see my Heads of the prefects. Catching that last bit of relaxation before school starts are you?"

"Nope." Remqui managed a smile, "We just finished going over what we'll be telling the prefects on Monday." Cicero nodded solemnly in agreement.

It wasn't that McQuillan was so strange - to put it bluntly - that had Remqui grasping at her composure. But the fact no one had ever reported seeing McQuillan outside of school and out of his robes was certainly giving her some whiplash. If it wasn't for jagged scar that ran up his cheek, Remqui would've sworn this was some homeless person that had stumbled in.

McQuillan frowned, "Well don't work too hard, it's your last year, have a good time!" Internally Remqui groaned, she could practically hear the gears in Cicero's head turning. For good measure she kicked his shin under the table. The teen flinched and barely stifled a yelp, but McQuillan's stormy gray eyes were drawn to him nonetheless.

"Pardon? Did you say something?"

Cicero jerked back to his perfect posture, teeth gritted, he forced a smile, "I asked if that's a snake?" He gestured to the scarves that draped around the Headmaster's shoulders. Now that he mentioned it, Remqui squinted at the assault of colours to see what appeared to be a light brown rope, that tapered off into what had to be a tail.

McQuillan beamed, gently reaching up to touch his hand to part of the light brown scales. "Ah yes, she's sleeping right now, picked her up in Thailand. Muggles and their creatures are quite fascinating, wouldn't you agree?"

Remqui wasn't all too sure how she was supposed to answer that. Muggles were just that, muggles, she felt rather indifferent about them. Thankfully Cicero smoothly interjected, "Of course Headmaster, did you have a good time among the muggles?"

"Oh yes, they're very interesting, quite different from us wizards- in a good way that is." Remqui hummed her agreement, shooting Cicero a look. Thankfully she didn't appear alone in thinking this whole ordeal was quite strange, stranger then normal that is. "Oh hey," leaning over, the headmaster plucked the card Cicero had in front of him up off the table "is that my card?" A throaty laugh escaped him. "Always enjoyed that picture of me."

There were a million questions Remqui wanted to ask him, but none of them seemed appropriate for this wild situation she and Cicero found themselves in. Talking to the Headmaster about his chocolate frog card and muggles was definitely not the place to start interrogating him about Gideon and the school's actions to keep everyone safe. Safe from what?

"McQuillan?" All three of them turned to look at Tayla who was brandishing her quill like some sort of weapon.

Sheepishly, the card was returned back to Cicero. "I'll see you kids at school. Have a safe ride over." Just like that, as quickly as he had appeared, McQuillan was walking away in a swirl of scarves to join Tayla at a table just a ways off. It still felt unreal. The rational part of Remqui argued that of course McQuillan goes out, because he obviously would have a life outside of Hogwarts, but another part of her was screaming because he actually had a life outside of Hogwarts.

"Man, I swear he just keeps getting weirder and weirder." Cicero shook his head in bemusement. Remqui was inclined to agree, what little they knew about McQuillan was weird enough, but here he was, apparently dressing dreadfully in the process.

"Did we just have a shared hallucination? Because that seems increasingly likely." Remqui had to look back to Tayla and McQuillan just to confirm that he hadn't disappeared. The very strange, and contrasting duo was certainly a sight.

"I'm losing my mind, did you see what he was wearing." Cicero seemed more in awe than outright making fun of the older man, which made a lot of sense. Remqui wasn't sure she had ever seen so many silk scarves on one person, let alone the Headmaster, and what were those pants? "I have to tell them!" Just like that, Cicero jumped up from his seat. This time, Remqui could see what caught his attention. Peering in through the window, was what Remqui liked to call an incoming headache.

Sighing, she found herself once again following behind Cicero - something she desperately hoped wouldn't become a habit. With a parting glance back to the Headmaster, who did appear serious as he conversed with Tayla, Remqui let herself out onto Diagon Alley.

"Was that the Headmaster?" Aries Black yelled the moment they stepped foot outside. The bubblegum coloured haired girl ran to Cicero's side instantly. Remqui used to think they made an odd pair, with Aries being not even 5ft and Cicero easily being 6, but now that he'd dyed part of his hair, they sort of matched in their own strange way. Simon Alagrave was in rare form today - quiet - as he pressed his face to the glass to get a better look. If it wasn't for his signature slicked back black hair and muggle band Tshirt, she wouldn't have known it was him.

"Simon stop spying, it's rude." Poppy Caswell huffed, marching over and practically dragging the 5th year Slytherin away by the collar of his shirt. Remqui was hit with a sudden wave of appreciation for the prefect, she definitely needed backup when it came to dealing with the Trouble Trio as she had dubbed them. If three people could practically run Hogwarts on their own, there was no telling what they could do outside of the school. "I see why you asked me to meet you here." Poppy stated as though she could read Remqui's mind, tucking her shoulder length brown hair behind an ear, watching apprehensively as Simon loudly bounded back to Cicero and Aries.

"That." Remqui agreed, "Plus you're my right hand and I need to catch you up to speed." She didn't quite have the chance to go more into detail, not that she particularly wanted to with Aries and Simon so close, but Cicero seemed to be getting dragged off down the alley. Breaking free with some shoves to his companions he spun around to face her.

"Anyways, Remi, we're quite busy, lots of stocking up to do before school starts."

"So much shopping, I don't know what we're going to do." Simon solemnly agreed, dramatically flopping on top of Aries who not so lightly shoved him off.

"What sort of shopping." Poppy interjected, crossing her arms as she walked up to Remqui's side, staring down the chaos in front of them.

"Me and the lads-"

"Hey!" Aries elbowed Cicero's side.

"The ladies is what I was going to say if you just let me speak." The venom in his voice was obviously false, especially with how he tossed his arms around the shoulders of his equally chaotic friends. "Are just stocking up on school supplies, don't you ladies worry about a thing. Ciao!"

Just like that, the trio was making their way, quite loudly for that matter, down the street. Annoyed at Cicero once more, Remqui cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled after them, "Cicero, I swear, if I smell so much as an ounce of butter beer on you this year, I'm not covering for you."

"So rum's okay?" Aries.

"How spooky!" Simon.

"See you on the train!" Cicero.

It was too early to be wanting to bash her head into a wall. Glancing down at Poppy, Remqui noticed the twitch in her lips as she tried to hide a smile.

"They're all dolts." The brunette said, almost in awe as though she couldn't believe they were real. Remqui laughed, loud and bright because damn was it true.

"You can say that again." Shaking her head as she watched the trio vanish in the crowd of people. Casting a final look at the Headmaster still talking to Tayla, Remqui moved away from the cafe, "Let's get out of here."

They made sure to head in the opposite direction of the chaos.

Search 'we're the rats' on YouTube for the soundtrack that accompanies the chaotic trio

The previously mentioned characters were submitted by:

Tayla Sharpe by Rokebuto, Aries Black by the-sweater-sloth, Poppy Caswell by ZodiacPanic, and Simon Alagrave by Alucard Deathsinger

Well babes, hopefully this is the last long author's note. Let's jump right into it, picking the main cast was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. To preface things, just because your character is a side character does not mean they are getting like one scene, side characters will be very prominent and have their own sub plots as well as chapters. The 'main cast' is simply the protagonists who I thought would make a diverse cast to follow. A big reason certain characters ended up as sides though is because OF PLOT, there were so many characters I initially wanted to be mains but then I thought of how much more exciting things could be if they were mysterious side characters. Some ocs had secrets I thought would be more fun to solve as the main cast then outright state, while others I thought would serve as very fun plot points to discover. So don't be disheartened if your oc was not picked, it could (and most likely is because) I got very excited about using them as part of the plot and part of the mystery itself. Now onto our lovely protagonists! Yes there's a lot, but I swear I'm going to make this work, I HAVE A PLAN (plus there was no way I could make the list smaller so whoops, I'm an ambitious bimbo what can I say)

MAIN CAST:

Christopher Oldcastle by Dogtimus

Thomasin Lynn-Marten by Miss Trillian

Chandra Sinha by Firealis

Callum Bell by SunlightSlayer

Leviticus MacAllister by BellaRosa17

Aurelia Cretu by Crusading Seraph

Ace Sharpe by Rokebuto

Poppy Caswell by ZodiacPanic

I'm pulling a song of fire and ice by having a billion protagonists so let's see how this goes.

I want to give a shout out to The-Sweater-Sloth, Crusading Seraph, herec0mesthesun, SpringLilyBell, Miss Trillian, REMSleepEngage, BellaRosa17, Firealis, Dogtimus and TheStormHunter for the lovely reviews! Seriously you guys are so sweet and reading what you all thought means a lot to me! So thank you all!

The next chapter will be out in less than a week's time and be much longer than the previous chapters.

Cheers babes!