lucid

Assassin's Creed: Reptizar Invasion II
I am back in Masyaf, though I don't immediately realize where I am, it takes me a short time to become lucid and remember what is going on. I am in Masyaf, there are mostly Assassins around me, the civilians of the city have all taken cover, and there is a group of Assassins with me who are preparing a defense. Nomad is there, he is looking around, then he transforms into his Nomad form… he looks around a bit more before transforming into a peasant… then he transforms into a Assassin. A couple of the Assassins are looking at him strangely, but most of them are too distracted to notice one among them changing forms quickly. They say the enemy is upon us, and as if that is their cue, the gate rattles with a massive impact, it is hit a few more times, then it collapses. Reptizars come in, huge numbers of them, and they literally tear the first couple Assassins they get to limb from limb and throw the mutilated corpses at the others. The other Assassins attack the Reptizars, but there are so many of them… even while we are engaging some of them in battle, others are breaking into the homes and buildings and dragging out civilians… a Reptizar disembowels a civilian woman and throws her at the feet of one of the Assassins, she is still alive and reaching weakly towards the Assassin for help, but all he can do is put her out of her suffering. This seems to piss him off a lot, and he runs his sword through the laughing Reptizar, practically cutting the Reptizar in half.

There are just too many Reptizars… and soon there are many Reptizars that have civilian hostages, they are threatening to kill the hostages slowly and painfully unless the Assassins surrender. One of the Reptizars says these people will make a worthy sacrafice. A voice from nowhere says, "You will be the ones sacraficed," and then I barely see a shadow behind one of the Reptizars before he falls over dead. The others are all too surprised to react, then a couple of the ones with hostages drop dead as well. The Reptizars seem to think there is some kind of ghost attacking them, and are rather freaking out, threatening the hostages, but not actually being able to do anything to them because those holding hostages keep dropping dead. I am trying to see who is attacking the Reptizars, but not having much luck, and before I know it the Reptizars are the ones surrendering. The person who has been killing the Reptizars from being invisible turns out to be some kind of astral Malkus, he is basically an astral ghost, but he is still able to affect the physical plane. With him helping, the Reptizars are quickly chained and incapacitated as prisoners.

I think this problem is over now, but that is before the civilians come from the houses and buildings, they all come out and start stabbing Reptizars all over their bodies and laughing as the injured Reptizar bleeds out on the ground One of the Reptizars says they will not come back, just as long as they can leave in peace now, these people seem to be having too much fun killing them. While the Assassins aren't participating, they also aren't doing anything to stop it. I step forward and tell them to stop doing that, they are not acting any better than their enemies had been, and Malkus says yes, they need to stop. I am glad someone around here is willing to see reason, but then he says don't stab them, do to the Reptizars what the Reptizars had intended to do to the people… bring wood and kindling, build a fire around the prisoners, and let them be roasted alive in the heat of the flames. Everyone seems to love that idea, and they start gathering the materials, this is definitely not right… something must be wrong with Malkus, and with everyone else here… I am sure Malkus needs healing, I am going to do that, Nomad says he will take care of things here. I am going to help Malkus, but the dream fades.

Plans: My plans for today involved visiting Hogwarts again... one Hogwarts with Nomad, a different one with MoSh... but no specific plans, except Nomad wants to take the Hogwarts Express to the pyramids then to the moon. Nomad wants to show the class I have been teaching how to transform. I had lots of dreams in the night, but to keep it from taking me a week to journal and then I end up with a novel for anyone who wants to read my DJ to get through, here are some of the more vivid parts, covering the important points.

Assassin's Creed: Reptizar Invasion
I am in a place that looks familiar to me, but I haven't been there for such a long time that I don't immediately recognize it. After I see a few people dressed in Assassin robes, like those from Assassin's Creed, I realize where I am, I am in Masyaf, the city where the Assassin fortress is. The civilian people are going on about their business, not paying any attention to me at all, I am not even sure why I am there. I go to the Assassin fortress to see if I can find out anything, and I find out that there is an attack force approaching from two different directions, attempting to overpower the city's defenses. The enemy forces are strong, there is no way they can send forces out to prevent them from reaching the city, so they are preparing to make a stand right there at Masyaf. I decide that's not necessary, so I summon Stardust, my winged unicorn which is a white horse with flaming mane and tail, with beautiful white wings… a lot of the people are staring at Stardust, but I pay them no attention as I mount up and head out the main gate of Masyaf. I am heading towards the first of the two approaching armies, I form Witchblade into armor and a sword, charging right into the approaching enemy forces. This seems to take many of them by surprise, their hesitation allows me to cut quite a few of them down as I pass through their ranks for the first time.

Nomad shows up from somewhere, I don't see where, and says he has been journaling a dream while still dreaming, well that isn't helpful, is it? So now he attacks the Reptizars with me, he has someone with him, I don't see who it is, but the two of them transform into dragons and split off to surround the enemies waiting to ambush us from a location hidden in the trees. We circle around Masyaf to intercept the other approaching force, there is a lot of lightning off to the sides of where I am fighting, no doubt Nomad's doing. Stardust is eager to incinerate any Reptizars in the way, I am able to cut down the ones that are left by Stardust. There is a large force of Reptizars almost to the walls of Masyaf, so I use Crush 'Em by Megadeth to alter gravity and pull them all into one spot, and then, well, crush them. Finally the remaining Reptizars turn to a retreat, heading away from Masyaf with their oversized reptilian tails squarely between their legs. Excellent. I am heading into the city of Masyaf with Nomad when this part of the dream fades…

I am outside of the Hogwarts grounds, looking around to see how I had gotten there and where exactly I am. I am not immediately lucid, so I don't remember my goals. I look around to see if I can figure things out, but the idea that I am dreaming never quite occurs to me. So I am wandering down the road leading away from Hogwarts when I hear someone behind me calling me Raven, and sounding a bit impatient, or more than a bit impatient… I turn around to see someone coming towards me who looks exactly like Draco Malfoy, the older Draco from the end of the Harry Potter series rather than the kid from the beginning. He asks what I am doing, he says he thought I was going to get his father out of Azkaban, or was I just bullshitting when I said I could do that? He says he didn't think there was any way I could get anyone out of Azkaban… not with all those dementors around it! Him mentioning my goals makes me think of dreaming, so I do a RC and I discover I am dreaming…

I look over at Draco, who is looking at me with an expression I can't quite read, I figure he had been hoping I would really be able to get Lucius out of Azkaban, but isn't surprised at the idea I can't. I tell him I am going to get Lucius out of Azkaban, but timing is everything. I am not sure why I decide to do it this way, but I don't even look to find a place that is hidden from Draco before going through the whole Sailor Moon transformation… "Cosmic moon power!" Sailor Moon's crescent moon wand forms in my hand as a lot of lights surround me and I change into Sailor Moon, I tell a shocked Draco that the dementors are moon dusted, and then teleport away from the place, focusing on teleporting to a spot close to the prison known as Azkaban.

I appear in the new location and look around to see exactly what the situation is. The area is dark and desolate, though it doesn't look like the area around the Azkaban prison as depicted in the movies. Instead it looks more like one of the fortresses in the world of Oblivion from the video game with the same name. I look over to the dark towers, there are dementors circling the towers, it looks like a flock of demented birds, or a swarm of mutant insects circling their hive. It isn't a small place, I wonder how I am supposed to find Lucius in there when I have no clue where he might be. I'll have to follow my instinct, or maybe… they do allow visitors there, so maybe Sailor Moon wasn't the best form right now… I transform in to Narcissa Malfoy and then continue approaching the prison.

The guards at the entrance to the prison aren't dementors, fortunately, they are actual witches and wizards, they are people. I wonder how they are able to handle being around so many dementors, I would think there would be a very negative effect from that. How they are able to handle the direct exposure to the dementors isn't important, what was important was finding Lucius as quickly as possible. I could feel the cold energy from the dementors, but I just block it with a field of light energy. I speak to one of the wizards there, he wants to know who I am and who I am there to see, he seems about as interested in that information as he is interested in seeing a naked dementor, but I tell him that I am Narcissa Malfoy and I am there to see my husband, Lucius Malfoy. The wizard looks at something he has in his hands, I can't see what it is, but then he says to follow him. He summons a patronus that takes the form of a white Rottweiler and the white dog trots along beside us as I follow the wizard into the prison of Azkaban. There sure are a lot of cells in there, and it would have been very difficult to find a specific person in there, especially with all of the unstable dark energy coming off of the dementors. The guard unlocks a door that looks the same as every other door on the hall and motions me into the room beyond. There is a dim white glow in there, the guard says the shield doesn't keep the effect of the dementors completely out, so if I stay for very long, I should expect the usual reaction to being around dementors. I go into the cell he has unlocked, he shuts the door immediately behind me and locks it again. I wonder how I am supposed to get his attention when I want out… oh, well. That isn't important since I'm not leaving in the same manner I got in.

I look around the small cell, it is definitely no place to spend much time, and Lucius is over in one corner sitting there doing absolutely nothing since there is really nothing to do. He finally looks up at me, and he looks surprised to see me, he says I shouldn't have come here, he told me not to come, not around all the dementors, he says I need to go back and make sure Draco is ok… with the mention of Draco, the field of light gets briefly brighter, but the brightness doesn't last for long. I remember that I am still disguised as Narcissa, I have no desire to play her role any longer, so I tell Lucius I am not who I appear to be… and then I transform back into Sailor Moon. Lucius is staring at me in surprise now, he asks what I have come for, I tell him I am there to stage a prison break, of course. He is looking at me as if he thinks I am crazy, he says no one has ever escaped form Azkaban before… I say then we'll be the first… so are you ready to go, or do you want to hang around here for a bit longer? He says of course he is ready to go, so I use my crescent moon wand to cut through the prison door, then we step out into the hallway. Of course that doesn't go unnoticed. I tell Lucius to stay close to me, there are dementors approaching from both directions in the hallway. I summon my patronus, which takes the form of a large white panther, and the panther stays by our side as I lead Lucius towards what I can sense is the outer wall of the prison.

There is an alarm sounding in the prison now, and there is a lot more resistance now that our escape has been announced to the entire prison. My patronus is still keeping many of the dementors at bay, but now I add blasts of energy from my crescent moon wand to clear the dementors from our path. Lucius is saying something about now there's no way we'll get out, every dementor in the place will be coming down on us, he seems to think I must be completely insane when I say if every dementor in the place wants to attack, bring it on. There is a voice from a cell to my right, someone is saying Lucius' name, Lucius looks in and says it's Bellatrix Lestrange.

She says she wants us to take her with us if we are escaping, Lucius says the dark lord would be pleased to have her by his side again. I use magic to unlock the cell door, then I crack it open just enough to look into the cell, I tell Bellatrix to come a bit closer, so I can see her better, she is instantly in my face trying to push through the crack I have opened. I look at her eyes, for any sign of a spark, but all I am able to see is darkness… is there anything in there at all? She asks what I am doing, move so she can get out, Lucius says we need to get moving. I give one more look at Bellatrix, I am still unable to sense a spark of any kind, so I agree with Lucius that we need to get going, but not with her. I shut the door forcibly on Bellatrix and lock it with magic, leaving it the same way I found it. Bellatrix is now screaming like a banshee, any semblance of sanity is gone completely, Lucius asks what I am doing, the dark lord would want her out. I ask what makes him think I am trying to help Voldemort… he gasps a bit that I have said the name… I lead Lucius down the hall to the end then up some stairs for a few levels, where I use my wand to blast a hole in the ceiling, which is the very top of the tower.

I step out onto the top of the tower with Lucius, and the situation doesn't look good. There are dementors surrounding the tower, so many dementors that they are blocking out the sky, and there are three wizards also waiting on top of the tower. I can tell Lucius thinks my escape plan was ill-conceived, and if I was an ordinary witch from a Harry Potter world, it would have indeed been very ill-conceived. The wizard wants to know who I am, he says if we surrender now, we will both be taken into custody… but if we resist, then it will most certainly be the kiss of the dementors for us. "Kiss a dementor?" I ask, "I'd sooner kiss the south end of a north bound blast-ended skrewt! Or Valdemort! I'd sooner kiss Voldemort!" The guard looks shocked that I spoke the name Voldemort, but then he says we haven't got a chance to escape. Lucius says we will go peacefully, I say the wizard should go fuck himself, Lucius says to not take the chance if receiving the dementors' kiss… I repeat that I'd rather kiss Voldemort… have you seen one of those things without its hood? They do the world a favor to wear those robes… I tell the wizards I can't say it's been a nice visit… it hasn't… but we will be leaving now. I go to the edge of the tower, pulling Lucius along with me, and take out my crescent moon wand. It's a spell I already had planned, though I don't remember seeing it used in Sailor Moon… "Moonlight Illumination!"

My crescent moon wand glows with a blinding light, sending spirals of light outward towards the swarms of dementors… The dementors who are hit are set on fire and disappear in a blinding flash of white flame, the other dementors are scattering in all directions to avoid the light energy. I maintain the flow of energy until the path in front of us is entirely free of dementors.

I decide maybe I have done enough of the impossible right in front of Lucius for right now, at least, so I actually summon a broom to fly on… because right now Lucius is pulling a very good imitation of Homer Simpson, staring out where the dementors had been, he has a blank and dumb look on his face.

The same can be said of the three wizard guards, but that is no matter to me. I actually bop Lucius on the head with the end of the broom to get his attention, you do know how to fly on this, right? He says of course he does, so I give him that one and summon another one for me, tell him to stay right on my tail, then take off, heading through the area I just recently vacated of dementors. Lucius follows me, and once we are far enough away from the prison that I am sure nothing nasty will follow us, I open a portal while focusing on going straight to the Malfoy Manor. I fly right through the portal, Lucius is right behind be, so he couldn't have stopped if he had noticed and wanted to.

Doing the rest of the task I had set out to do in this dream is a simple matter, I stop long enough at Malfoy Manor to pick up Narcissa, I tell them that there isn't much time to get them both to safety. I then open a portal to the edge of Hogsmede, where we are able to walk to the Three Broomsticks and avoid more attention. We find Draco in the back corner of the place, sitting at the table with a butterbeer, and he clearly looks shocked to see the three of us. I know I am about to wake up… I tell them there isn't much time now, I can arrange a longer visit later, but now we have to go. I tell Draco I'll see him back at Hogwarts, then I lead his parents to a back room, actually more of a closet, where Q is waiting for me. I tell Lucius and Narcissa that Q will take them to a safe house, but I am going to be unable to stay right now… and then I wake up.

Note: My goals for tonight included getting into Azkaban to get Lucius Malfoy out, he got sent there after MoSh revealed that Lucius had been interfering with the Tri-School Wizard Tournament by using curses and poisons on MoSh and Asuka, resulting in Asuka losing her memory and MoSh becoming violent… so after that was revealed, Lucius was sent to Azkaban pending a trial. Other plans included whatever is to happen next at both Hogwarts schools. I was successful in slipping into a WILD…

I roll over out of bed and find that I am in my bed in the Slytherin dorm at Hogwarts, so it must be the Hogwarts where I am a student. I remember my goal is to go and get Lucius out of Azkaban so I can go ahead with healing his heart, so that is going to be my first task. I get out of bed and get dressed before going down into the Slytherin common room, where there are a few people there. Some of them are reading books, others are talking to each other, I see my roommates talking amongst themselves. Andie, Shanara, and Marie are talking and then they motion me over to them, so I go over there for a bit. I know I can't stay long, since I need to go get Lucius out of Azkaban, but I do want to know if they want something special. It turns out that they don't, they are just commenting on the fact I really slept in today, they are wondering what plans I have for the day. I realize this is not a school day, so we can go wherever we need to as long as we are back by the end of the day and ready to go to class in the morning. I tell them I have some things to attend to, I will be visiting family. Andie says ok, but if I get back soon enough, she and the other three are going to get a game of Quidditch going, just for practice, and I am welcome to join in if I have a broom. I am thinking I don't actually have a broom, but summoning one is no problem. Shanara stops me as I am leaving, she says Draco has been looking for me, he has been really upset since his father got arrested, and he seemed really desperate to find me. She adds that she can't imagine how she would feel if she had found out her mother or father was doing things like that…

So I look around for Draco, I am not sure where to find him, so I ask a couple people and I find out that Draco has gone out onto the grounds. I head out there, focusing on locating Draco, and then I follow my instinct which guides me straight to him. He is near the castle on the far side, I am not sure what he is doing, but he notices me and comes over to me immediately, he is wanting to know where I have been since I said I had a plan to fix the situation with his father. I tell him I was in bed, I had trouble sleeping, mainly because I was coming up with a plan to get to his father in Azkaban without having anyone know I was involved. He says he didn't sleep much at all, so what do I intend to do about this? He says he hasn't tried to find MoSh, which is what I had wanted, so what about his father? I tell him I have my plan all worked out, his father will be out of Azkaban by noon. Draco looks up at the sky and asks how I intend to get his father out of Azkaban in the next ten minutes… I do a double take, then I say I hadn't realized it was quite that late… so ok, maybe not noon, but it will be very soon.

I spend a short time thinking about my next statement, I want to keep Draco from doing anything stupid, but I don't want it to seem like I am trying to control him… finally I decide on something that might work… I tell Draco I just need him to give me his word on something. He asks what, looking a bit hesitant, I say that I need him to promise he won't be doing anything to get back at MoSh, if he wants to get any payback, save it for the tournament. He asks why I care about that. Here's where I lie… I tell him that I don't really care… any issues between him and MoSh are just between the two of them, and it doesn't involve me. But the fact of the matter is that if Draco goes and gets himself expelled, who is going to help me with the team portions of the tournament? It wouldn't exactly be fair for me to have to participate alone while everyone else had a partner, or as is the case with Gryffindor, two partners… I hesitate there, as if I don't want to straight out admit it, and then I blurt out that I need him to help me with the challenges. He seems to consider that, he says he wouldn't get caught, then. I ask him if he really thinks Lucius had planned on getting caught… he says of course not, that jerk MoSh got him caught… I say that is exactly my point, one never plans on getting caught, but even the best laid plans can fall apart. So promise me you won't do anything to get back at MoSh. Draco seems a bit annoyed, but he finally says that if I can get his father out of Azkaban, he will make sure he doesn't get in any trouble going after MoSh, or even Potter… though he says right now he finds MoSh even more annoying than Potter… I say it's a deal, then, I will bring Lucius by for a visit, then take him somewhere safe. Draco says someone might still go after his mother, what about her? I say she can go to the safe house with Lucius, they will both be safe… and he's at Hogwarts, so he would be safe, too. It was never said, but I'm sure we both know it's not the ministry police that are a threat to Draco's parents… Lucius' attempts to follow Voldemort's orders had met with epic failure, which is not something Voldemort responds well to.

I tell Draco we need a place for him to have the visit with his parents that no one will notice, we finally decide on The Three Broomsticks in Hogsmede, as there aren't likely to be any servants of Voldemort there and the activity of the other patrons will keep attention off of Draco and his parents. I don't know exactly how long it will take me to get Lucius out, but Draco says he will be in the area, though he sounds like he has doubts that I will be able to do what I have said I will do.

I head for the front gate of Hogwarts, there is no rule prohibiting students from leaving the grounds on weekends, especially since the students at this version of Hogwarts are college age instead of high school age. The path I take to the main entrance goes past Hagrid's hut, though I don't see Hagrid outside there.

I do sense something a bit strange… so I look a bit closer at the energy I sense… Walms?! What is Walms doing in a Hogwarts world? I definitely hadn't expected to see him there, it seems he is near or even in Hagrid's hut. I don't have the feeling anything is wrong, maybe Walms and Hagrid are discussing the variety of creatures they would both call cute while everyone else would call them hideous monsters. I chuckle to myself, imagining Hagrid's Care of Magical Creatures class where he introduces the blast-ended skrewts, everyone else found them revolting, but Walms would be right up there saying how cute they are, Hagrid would be agreeing with that entirely. So I continue on my way, passing the guards at the gate… they ask where I'm off to, more out of curiosity than a need to know where I'm going, and I say I am off to visit some family for the afternoon, be back later, take care. I move farther from the gate, figuring I will teleport to Azkaban when I was out of sight… instead of teleporting, however, I wake up.

Note: Today I fell asleep without any definitive plans of what to do in a dream, just a general idea to head back to one of the Harry Potter worlds, either the one where I'm a student or the one where I teach, and see what is happening there next. I think it might have something to do with my vague plans that when I fell asleep, instead of slipping right into a WILD, I went into a dream in a kind of semi-lucid state… I recognized my location and everything, but it took me a few minutes to realize that meant I was dreaming…

I am in the Slytherin dorm common room, sitting in one of the chairs near the fireplace. There are a few other people in the room, none of them look particularly familiar to me, and none of them are paying any attention to me at all, so I do the same to them. I am trying to remember what I am supposed to do now, do I need to go to classes? Do I need to find someone to talk to or help in some way? Is it time for another tournament challenge? None of those sound right, but the strangeness does finally remind me that I am dreaming. I do a quick RC to confirm that it is a dream and then I become lucid.

So now I am lucid and sitting in the Slytherin dorm common room, but I still have no idea what I need to be doing, so I figure maybe I should just go with the flow. I need to find someone in my own year so if they have a class, I will have class, too. I am watching for a familiar face when I hear a voice speaking in my head, someone is contacting me telepathically. The voice is familiar, and I soon realize it is MoSh. He says he needs me to come get him out of the psychiatric ward of the hospital… MoSh is in the loony bin? On the funny farm? In the nut house? In the… MoSh interrupts those thoughts and says yes, but stop making fun of it and come get him out I ask what hospital he is in, he says he is in St. Mungo's, so I figure I should leave right away to go get MoSh. I go up to the room where my bed is, close the curtains around the bed, and then when I am thus hidden I open a portal while focused on finding MoSh and I step through.

I exit the portal into a hospital type setting, it seems no one was looking at me when I appeared, but there is a woman right in front of me that turns around and is shocked to see me there. She says she really wishes people would apparate to the lobby area instead of just popping up wherever they felt like it. I apologize for startling her, saying it's actually my first time to go that far. She looks at me and says she's surprised I can apparate, I don't look old enough. I say I came to visit a friend, I give her MoSh's name, and she recognizes who I am talking about. She points down the hall I am in to a door on the right side, about half way down. She says he is in there, room 348. So I go down the hall to the right door where I knock, someone inside says come in, so I open the door and go inside.

The first thing I see is MoSh sleeping in a bed, then I notice there is a man in green scrubs in the room, he says he had been expecting someone else, who am I? I say I came to see MoSh, what is wrong with him? The doctor says he seems to have had a curse put on him that made him extremely aggressive. The doctor says MoSh is sleeping peacefully now, but considering the number of stunning spells it had taken to knock him out, it's amazing that he is even alive. He said that many stunning spells would knock out a brontosaurus! I tell the man I am a healer, so I will heal MoSh, though he eyes me with doubt. He says they haven't found the counter curse yet, so they called in a specialist, he is expecting her to arrive any moment. I go over to MoSh, ignoring him completely, and I use the song spell Touch My Heart on MoSh. This serves to both stabilize his energy, it had been unstable which would account for the violence, and it restores his energy so he wakes up. He gets up from the bed, clearly wanting to leave St. Mungo's, the doctor says he can't allow that… I tell him MoSh is completely healed, but they still insist on doing a scan with a strange animal… before saying he is completely cured of the curse. Now the doctor is just stunned into silence by the fact I healed MoSh on one try. MoSh says he has things to attend to, and he leaves the room.

I am about to follow MoSh to see what is going to happen when the doctor stops me, he says there are so many people there that could benefit from my healing powers… he asks if I won't consider staying on at St. Mungo's as a healer, he has never seen anything like what I did for MoSh. I tell him I have to go, I don't know what might happen… he interrupts me and asks if I will at least take a look at a couple of their most severe cases, he feels so bad for the boy who comes in religiously to see them even though there is never any improvement, he says usually family stops coming to the long term care ward once enough time goes by with no improvement. But not this one, every weekend he is here, looking for any response from the two of them… every week the Mr. Longbottom would remain completely unresponsive, while Mrs. Longbottom would… The mention of the Longbottoms has finally got my attention, I turn back and ask if he means Alice and Frank Longbottom, being visited by their son Neville? He hesitates, then he says yes, do I know them? I say not well, but I have heard of them. At that point I feel I have to at least take a look at them to see if maybe I can help… so I agree, I figure if MoSh needs me again, he will contact me again.

The doctor seems very grateful that I have agreed to meet the Longbottoms, and he leads me to an elevator which goes to a different level, though I can't quite tell if it is up or down from where I was before… He leads me down a hall to a room labeled 657 and opens it, showing me inside. There are two people in the room, the man, Frank, is sitting in a chair and staring out a window but seeming to see nothing. The woman, Alice, is sitting in a chair beside one of the beds and staring into nothingness. She looks very tense as if she is expecting something to come out of that nothingness and attack her. The doctor says they don't respond at all on their own, they sleep when put to bed, they chew and swallow when fed, they do their… um… business… when led to a toilet… but they are always gazing off into some world only they can see, never even acknowledging the person tending to their needs. He says it is rather chilling the way they seem to look through you even though you're right in front of them. One exception is that Alice responds to her son enough to grab some piece of trash to give him, handing it over as if it was a gift of great treasure…

I approach Alice and look into her eyes, they look blank and empty, except for a spark of light to indicate there is still someone in there. I am just following my instincts, I find I have taken hold of both of her hands in mine, and I am using the song by Evanescence entitled My Last Breath. "Hold on to me, luv, you know I can't stay long… All I wanted to say is I love you and I'm not afraid… Can you hear me? Can you feel me in your heart?" I continue with the song, and as the song went on, I know I saw a change, she was looking at me instead of through me… "I know you hear me, I can see it in your eyes…" My lyrics aren't exactly like the song, changed a bit to fit the situation, the song finishes, and I don't feel that repeating it now will help any more. I move away from her and she is focused on me for a bit longer before zoning back into her own private world again. But that is still enough to make the doctor extremely happy, he says that's the most response anyone other than her son has gotten out of her… He asks me to please try again, I tell him I don't think more than once will help now… he starts to protest, I tell him I'll come back later, when I feel it will help more. I repeat the process on Frank, who seems to only slightly respond… if I hadn't seen Alice respond first, I might not have noticed his response. I have to reassure the doctor several times that I will come back, I tell him it will probably take several sessions to make much progress, but he finally stops trying to prevent me from leaving. I have been away from Hogwarts too long, I want to make sure everything is ok with MoSh…

I go to a hidden area to open a portal back to my bed in the Slytherin dorm, where I open the curtains and leave quickly, hoping nothing happened when I was not there. I focus on where MoSh is, and I see that he is in the great hall down below, so I head there as quickly as I can, it seems I am just a little late for dinner, did I miss the entire day of classes? I sit down at the Slytherin table beside Draco, then I look around for MoSh, figuring now I can do that safely without anyone noticing. There is a fly in the room… I use the insect, looking through its many faceted eyes to try to find MoSh. He's not in the room! I am getting very nervous about that, so much so that Draco asks me what is wrong… I say nothing, he says I look extremely tense, and he hadn't seen me around all day. I tell him I had things to attend to, more looking for MoSh, and then I see him! He is up at the front of the room with Dumbledore, he looks fine, his energy looks stable, I am finally able to relax… no… what about Asuka? I look more through the fly and spot Asuka at the table, she actually looks happy, so maybe things were ok. Now Dumbledore was talking in front of the room, I realize he is giving MoSh an award of some kind… awesome! He says MoSh revealed some kind of corruption right within Hogwarts… I see a reaction from Moody when Dumbledore says that… then Dumbledore continues to say there was someone who had been interfering in the wizard tournament… more reaction from Moody… and that the person behind it had been Lucius Malfoy… Moody relaxed visibly and took a long drink from his flask. Dumbledore says thanks to MoSh, Hogwarts is safe.

Draco is immediately pissed off, he jumps out of his seat and starts yelling all sorts of expletives and insults, but no one apart from those of us right next to him at the Slytherin table notice because the rest of the room is cheering for MoSh, none more than Asuka. Draco says MoSh is going to pay for that, he pulls his wand out, I grab him by his wand arm before he can go and throw a curse or something, I tell him not to do something stupid. Draco says that piece of shit is the reason his father got arrested, his mother had told him Lucius had gotten taken off to Azkaban, but now he knew who was responsible. I wanted to tell Draco that Voldemort was responsible for giving the orders, and then Lucius himself was responsible for going along with it… but I knew that wouldn't help at all. I pull Draco down beside me and tell him I have a plan to get his father out of this mess, one that doesn't involve Draco getting expelled… so give me a chance to put that into action, and don't go doing something stupid that wouldn't help anyone in the end. He is clearly curious about this plan I said I have, so he finally sits down, though he is still seething in anger, I am trying to stabilize his energy, not getting anywhere with that… I would have to use a spell, too obvious here.

After dinner is over, everyone gets up and heads out of the dining hall. MoSh has drawn quite a crowd of admirers now, so much that Asuka is having trouble getting to him, so I help her clear a path so she is standing beside MoSh. He looks to be fine now, I check his energy one more time, and his energy also looks fine, whatever had been wrong with him seems to be cured now. So I head back to the Slytherin dorms, where I find a pissed off Draco pacing in the common room, there are a few broken items on the ground, it seems he has been throwing stuff, and most of the people in the room are keeping their distance. I see no reason to stay away, so I go right over to him with the goal of getting him to calm down. He wants to know what my plan is to get back at that shit who is responsible for sending his dad to Azkaban… I say that's not the plan, the plan is to help his father get out of that place and make sure he's safe. I add that Voldemort is no doubt not pleased at Lucius for getting caught, so the law might not be the only thing Lucius needs to be kept safe from… Draco is staring at me as if I am insane, saying I shouldn't dare speak the dark lord's name… so I repeat it several more times, "Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort! I'll say it as many times as I want!" A few other students heard me saying Voldemort repeatedly, and are staring at me now. I tell Draco I'll figure out the final details of the plan and then see to it in the morning, I need to sleep on it. I go up to my dorm and my bed, and when I get there I wake up.

Note: The plan tonight was to see why Voldemort is so interested in interfering with MoSh and Asuka instead of being focused on Harry, and find a way to stop that. Additionally, planned to go to the world where I am a teacher at Hogwarts, it is the first day of class with Defense Against the Dark Arts. Nomad has said he will show up there, possibly disguised as a desk… that should be interesting… will wait and see. Unfortunately, I was not successful in entering my WILD… even though I was using my light / sound machine, there was something wrong with my leg that I couldn't seem to get it comfortable long enough to get into my WILD, it took a long time to fall asleep at all…

I am in my own bed, but it doesn't feel like my own bed. The first thing I realize is that it isn't a waterbed, so I roll over and open my eyes to see where I am. I know something is strange, but I haven't put it together that I am dreaming yet, just that I am not where I am supposed to be. I sit up and look around the room, I am in a room that looks like a bedroom that might be found in a castle, the window looks like it might be part of a castle… I get up and look around a bit more, I open a closet there and find clothes so I get dressed, then go through a door opposite the window. Now I find myself in a small sitting room, there are a couple comfortable looking chairs and a book case with some really interesting looking books on it, old looking books, they look like antique leather bound books… I take one down and look at it, but I don't have a lot of time to do that. I feel I need to get moving, so I put it back and go through a door opposite the one I entered through. Now I am in an office, there is a large wooden desk there with some pieces of parchment scattered about, another couple of book cases filled with interesting looking books, and a few comfortable looking chairs, one behind the desk, two on the other side of the desk, and one in the corner of the room. There is a stack of books on the desk, I go to take a look at one, it is titled "Out of the Darkness" by Raven Knight. I have written a book? I don't remember writing that book, so where did it come from? I pick it up and look at it, there are many song spells listed in the book, as well as some other spells, and also it tells about how the spells can be used, their primary use and some alternate possibilities… weird.

I still have a feeling of where I need to go. This has finally gotten strange enough for me to do a RC, so I become lucid. I remember what I am there to do, I am there to teach a class on magic, of all the strange things. I can think of so many people who would be better suited to being a teacher than me… but if I am there, I have to do my best, so I use TK to move the books with me and I head through one more door positioned across from the desk, and I enter a classroom. There are numerous desks in the room, it looks like a typical classroom, and there is a larger desk in the front, though it is nowhere near as nice as the one in my office. I set the books down on the desk and look around, wondering what I need to do to prepare for the class, to make sure I don't look like a complete retard. I think for a bit, then a portal opens and Nomad comes flying through, I can hear students coming outside the door, so I tell him to do what he's going to do before they get in, or there will be a lot of questions to answer. He changes into a desk near the front of the room just as the first students start coming in.

They all come in and sit in their usual groups, Harry, Ron, and Hermione are together, Draco, Crabb, and Goyle are together… apparently it's Gryffindor and Slytherin this time, though I am not sure what year they are in. I am looking, I notice that Hermione sits at Nomad, I can't help but chuckle just a bit. So soon everyone is in their seats, many of them are talking amongst themselves, some are looking at me as if they expect me to do something, which I'm sure they do. So finally I get everyone's attention, and introduce myself, and the class, and I figure they books are to pass out to the students, so I use TK to do that. One book to each student, Hermione is wondering where my wand is, I tell her that not all magic requires the use of a wand, and we would be learning magic in this class that can be done without a wand. Someone says he thought that was impossible, I say it is not impossible, and it is important, since there may come a time when one of them is in danger and doesn't have access to a wand. I tell them that if it makes it easier to learn the spell at first, go ahead and use the wands, but by the time they have learned the spell, the wand will be completely unnecessary. Draco is muttering something to Crabb and Goyle, I am assuming it is something rude, but I choose to ignore it for now. I open the book, and I see that the first spells there are elemental spells, fire and ice to be exact. So I start off on Damage, Inc. to produce fireballs, and soon most everyone seems to be able to form a small ball of fire with their wands.

I am getting on to ice, I figure that is a good idea when playing with fire to have something to counter it, and Hermione's desk turns into a student… or Nomad turns into a student… Hermione jumps out of her transforming desk, her book falls on the floor, and she is staring in shock at Nomad, who introduces himself as Jason. Everyone is staring at Nomad, Ron mutters a "Bloody hell! How did you do that?" at Nomad, but Nomad doesn't answer, he just sits down in an empty desk. I summon up an empty desk for Hermione to use, but everyone is still shocked at Nomad's transformation. I finally tell them that Nomad has been in my class before, and that is a more advanced transformation spell we'll get to later in the class, but apparently Jason had felt the need to show off.

I take the class outside to an open field where it will be more safe to practice playing with fire and ice, and everyone starts doing that, I have created some dummies for them to target with the spells. Crabb sets himself on fire, Goyle freezes his friend in ice… which puts out the fire but brings a completely new problem… so I defrost Crabb. Draco is trying to set Harry's robes on fire, Hermione keeps dousing it with ice before it can catch… I tell Draco to aim at the dummies only, he says he is aiming at a dummy, I say he knows what I mean, and add a bit of a telepathic push to get him firing his flames at the target dummies instead of Harry. Neville Longbottom is smoking… quite literally… the tip of his wand is producing a lot of smoke, but no fire. He continues doing that, apparently trying to focus harder, until there is a small explosion at his wand that succeeds in covering his face with soot, but doesn't seem to have done any more. Draco says if Neville did that enough, he might improve the appearance of his face by burning it off, Harry tells Draco to shut up, Draco says Harry should make him, Harry says ok that he will… but I break it up before it becomes an actual fight, I don't need anyone getting set on fire here. Then I am able to give some personal attention to Neville in the form of a bit of a telepathic guide on how to do the spell as well as some positive encouragement, and soon Neville is able to form a small fireball, at which he is thrilled.

Nomad is firing ice bullets at his target, interchanged with fireballs, he is clearly doing just fine with these spells, though I was sure he would… he does something else and comes out with a bunch of candy canes… huh? I wonder where he got those, and he starts passing them out to everyone, then starts eating his own while most of the students are still staring at him. Crabb and Goyle are the only ones to immediately start eating their candy. Nomad now does his best impression of a hydrogen molecule, he is bouncing all around the field and target range like a kid jacked up on so much sugar that he can't see straight. I almost call him Nomad, then I remember he is Jason right now, and I ask him to settle down a bit, there are people trying to learn here. Nomad lands near me, gives me a big hug while thanking me, and then he creates a disc out of ice and gets on it, then proceeds to make it fly into the air and shoot a circle of fire out from the ice disc while he is riding it, it looks quite cool… Then the two opposite elements interacting with each other form a tornado. The tornado picks up a lot of dust and then finally disperses, and when it is gone, so is Nomad. Everyone is staring, getting anyone to focus now would be impossible… or most everyone is staring. Crabb and Goyle are collecting candy canes, a lot of the students dropped their candy canes in shock when they saw Nomad disappear. They return to Draco, both of them holding big hands full of candy canes, licking them enthusiastically, as happy as a kid in a candy store. Harry asks if we will be learning all of that, too… I say it is really just a variation on the spells I showed them today, and yes, we will get into modifying the spells to fit specific needs. Ron utters another "Bloody hell!" I see the class is just about over, so I tell everyone it is time to go, a few minutes early to allow them to reach their next class on time.

Plans: Challenge one of the tournament tonight at the Hogwarts where I am a student with MoSh. It looks like I'll be working with Draco, though, since we're in the same house. MoSh will be working with Harry and Hermione since they're all in Gryffindor. This sucks.

Tour of the Castle
I am in a bedroom at Hogwarts and I'm not lucid. I really need to RC every time I'm in a bedroom that isn't my own... So I leave the bedroom and enter an office of some kind, there is a big ornate wooden desk, there isn't much in the room, it looks like it isn't in use right now. I look around for a bit, not sure what I'm supposed to be doing in there. I was still pondering that when there was a knock at the door, I open the door to reveal Professor McGonagall waiting at the door. I let her inside, she says she has come to help me get acquainted with the castle. So now I follow McGonagall down the hall. I notice there are two exits from the living area / office, one of them leads to the main hallway while the other leads directly to a classroom, it's the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. I follow McGonagall to the main hallway and then we go around the school, meeting an assortment of people. Filched greeted me with a grunt and a glare until I say he has an adorable kitty, after which I pick up a surprised Mrs. Norris and then give her cause to purr, and she purrs very loud indeed! I comment to Filch that I love anything feline, I am a hopeless cat lover. Mrs. Norris clearly likes me, so Filch soon calms down. He had been a bit upset when I had first scooped Mrs. Norris into my arms. McGonagall says we need to keep going, so I set Mrs. Norris down and follow McGonagall. We are seeing where all of the classrooms are, meeting all of the teachers and others that work there, for the most part I get a friendly welcome.

There are a couple people there who seem less than thrilled to see me. And those are actually people I have already met, I am sure of that. Somewhere along this tour I have become lucid, so I am now aware I am dreaming. Snape greets me with a grunt and a dirty look, I know he wanted to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts class. I am figuring he voted me in only because, when choosing between Umbridge and me, I am the obvious choice. Lucius is in the halls, I wonder how much time Lucius is at Hogwarts. As McGonagall is introducing me to people, she is saying the role they play at Hogwarts. It turns out the heads of the houses aren't the same as in the book. In fact, McGonagall introduces Arthur Weasley as the head of Gryffindor, I say I thought that was McGonagall. McGonagall says no, seems surprised, then says there would be far too much room for bias if the heads of the houses were also teachers. She says Snape would never flunk anyone in his house. She says Arthur Weasley is head of Gryffindor, Xenophilius Lovegood is head of Ravenclaw, I have never heard the name of the person who is head of Hufflepuff, and Lucius Malfoy is the head of Slytherin.

Speaking of Lucius Malfoy, McGonagall meet up with him in one of the halls. He doesn't seem too happy to see me, but at least he is making an effort to hide that. He McGonagall has something she needs to attend to, and she needs me to wait. Right there with Lucius? Don't take too long... So there I am in the hallway with Lucius, and it seems a bit awkward, so I just wait there silently while Lucius is giving me a strange look. While I am standing there thinking the situation rather sucks, someone even worse comes along. Dolores Umbridge comes along down the hall. She is still not pleased to see me, but it seems she is currently more angry a Lucius for some reason. She walks right over to Lucius and says she should curse him into next week for that trick. She says it took her hours to find the proper counter-curse to get rid of that obscenity from her forehead. I remember the word BITCH being tattooed on her face, I look to see if it is really gone. Lucius is also looking, he says it's good she cleared up that label... the word BITCH didn't properly describe Umbridge. I look and now the words UGLY BITCH are displayed on her forehead, glowing and changing color constantly. I say Lucius is right on this one, Umbridge's forehead looks much better now, then I turn away quickly because I think I might start laughing. McGonagall comes out of the room where she had gone, she looks at Umbridge and gasps. She is staring, all she can say is, "Dolores! Your face! It's..." I interrupt McGonagall and say her face sure does look a lot better. McGonagall is about to say something else when Umbridge takes a look at me, gives a huff, then says I shouldn't get too comfortable since I won't be at the school for long. She leaves in a huff. McGonagall makes no further attempt to stop her, but she does want to know who put it there. I say I didn't do it, but I think it was Q. Q has a sense of humor and would no doubt find that amusing. From the closed door of a women's restroom a bit farther up the hall comes, "Lucius Malfoy!!!" There are a few other sounds, then Umbridge comes out of the bathroom and storms over to Lucius. I notice that, unfortunately, her forehead is now clear of writing. Damn. She got rid of it. She points at her forehead and tells Lucius that she has countered how curse. As I am watching, however, the words DUMB UGLY BITCH appear on her forehead in neon pink. I snort a bit of laughter, turning it into a cough, though it still gets Umbridge's attention. She heads off in a huff again.

I follow McGonagall through the rest of the tour of the castle, though nothing more worth noting takes place. I am thinking it would be sooooo easy to get lost in there that it isn't even funny. I wonder how the students manage to find their classes at all. I guess it is something they get used to, but it seems the setup would lead to a lot of tardy first years, at least for a while. The tour ends back where we started, back in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. McGonagall says again that everyone, or most everyone, is glad to have me aboard. So don't pay any attention to Umbridge, she is all talk and there really is nothing she can do now that I have been voted in by a majority of the board members at Hogwarts. Speaking of Umbridge, she storms into the room and demands to know where Lucius Malfoy is, I see her forehead now sports only one word, and that is FUCKTARD. Q must have heard Tigress use that word. McGonagall says that is really immature, but she seems to be snickering a bit, too. I wonder what it will say next... I was fortunately able to wait until McGonagall left the room before I woke up.

Concert Shirt Swap
I am in a large room, it is an auditorium, and there are people coming into the room and taking seats, it looks like there is going to be a concert going on soon. I am thinking I somehow got in without a ticket, and I am hoping I don't get caught... because the ticket price is outrageously expensive, there's no way I could afford one. I am trying to remember who is playing, is it even worth that kind of money? Well, no matter, I got in free, so I'm happy. It turns out that they are even giving out free t-shirts, one of the employees gives me one, so I look at the shirt, and it displays the names of the bands to be playing. There are a couple opening acts I don't recognize, but the headlining groups are Metallica and Disturbed, awesome! I take my shirt off right there in front of everyone, not really being concerned about the people who are around me to see. I put on my shirt but then I realize I have a big hole in it! That really pissed me off, so I switched back to my own shirt. I look around and I see that some people have laid their shirts around, I figure I will make a swap. Bit when I try, someone calls me on it, I say I thought it was mine... Sorry. The music starts, it's Metallica playing, I am hoping I haven't missed Disturbed. Of course now the place is darker, so I am able to swap my shirt with another. Then I make my way towards the front of the crowd to get closer to the band. It's Metallica, but I don't recognize the songs.

A River Runs Through It
There is a river running through our yard, across the driveway, blocks the driveway. The water is rancid. Oil in it. Can't get out, worried about dogs... what if they drink this crap??? They can't reach. Not an issue. What if it erodes and grows wider? We need a bridge. Mom talking to my brother, John about the bridge. I follow the river to see where it comes from, can it be diverted? Somehow I become lucid... that's John! I don't want to lose him again... I hug him, I don't want to let him go, he wants to know what brought that on...

I am in my own bedroom, I get up off the bed and go out into the living room. I haven't been sleeping, I have been lying in there relaxing, but now I think it is time to get doing something. I go outside to get a bit of fresh air, but there is something weird about the yard. It takes me a bit to recognize what is wrong with the yard, but I finally see that there is a river running through it! I see my mother out there talking to someone, I go over to see what is going on, because I know there isn't supposed to be a river in the yard. The river flows across the driveway, so it is impossible to get our cars out of the driveway. I find it is my brother John that my mom is talking to, I also get a closer look at the water. The water is disgusting. There is a lot of oil and crap in the water, and it also smells bad. My mother is talking to John about leaving the river there and building a bridge... but why would she want to keep the river stench going through the yard?! I follow the river to the west to see if I can find out where the river is coming from and maybe it can be diverted. Somewhere as I'm following the river I become lucid, though I can't identify exactly where.

Now that I'm lucid I head back to where my mom is talking to John still, but now I realize it's a dream and that as soon as I wake up John will be gone again. This realization makes me sad, I miss my brother. I decide to take advantage of the time I have with him. I run over to John and I throw my arms around him in a great big bear hug. He seems a bit surprised, but he returns the hug. I keep hugging him, I really don't want to let go. It seems almost as if, by holding on to him tightly enough, I can pull him from the dream into waking life. Of course that isn't possible, but I hold on to him tightly just the same. I am still holding him when I wake up, and of course he isn't there.

Note: My plans for today are much the same as on the previous days, and my new light / sound machine is working out great. So with Hogwarts plans in mind, I fell asleep and slipped into a WILD…

I am in bed, but it is not my waking life bed, it is my bed at Hogwarts, in the Slytherin dorms. This time it doesn't seem so odd to me, since I am lucid, so I get up and I am acting like everything is completely normal. The other girls in my dorm room are dragging themselves around the room, it seems they are no more morning people than I am, though Andie looks pretty much awake and happy. In fact, she greets me with a bit too cheerful an attitude, and gets a grunt in return, she says maybe we'll all feel better after some breakfast. So we dress, then we head down in the common room where everyone is hanging out and talking until it is time to go to the great hall to eat. Andie is smiling at me in a strange way, I give her a questioning look back. She had been over near the window, but now she comes back over to me and sits down next to me on the couch, she still has an odd smile on her face. I ask her what's going on in her head, and she says she has seen I have found a boyfriend. My first thought is MoSh, so I tell her he already has a girlfriend, in fact, they're… going to be married. I almost say they're married, but I don't know how old people normally get married there, so I didn't say that. She says not MoSh, silly, and points over at Draco, who is looking at me at the time, but he looks away quickly. I tell her that's Draco Malfoy, she says 'duh' to my statement, and then says any fool can see he likes me… She said she had heard in Potions how I had told him that name calling is immature… and the fact that he not only didn't get mad about that, but he was actually doing as I had asked, must mean he really likes me. She said I'd be crazy to let that one get away, he's kinda cute… and he's a Malfoy, so I know what that means. My first thought is to say that means he is an asshole, but I don't say that, and before I can say anything, we are heading down to breakfast.

It is breakfast time, and I want to see if I can find out where I can find Lucius, because I still need to check Lucius' mind for any information on the spell that was used on Asuka. To do this, I take a seat next to Draco, who gives me a strange look. I see Crabb and Goyle are on his other side, Crabb starts saying, "Draco has a girlfriend, Draco has a girlfriend…" over and over until Draco asks if there isn't a tray full of muffins Crabb should be raiding right now. Draco is pointing at a tray full of assorted muffins a bit farther down the table, Crabb goes over and starts eating them, Goyle says, "Save some for me!" and goes over there as well. I look back to Draco and I see he is actually looking a bit red, though that doesn't last long before he is talking about the tournament again, which he seems obsessed about lately. I am listening to what he is saying in a half-assed manner, and checking his mind for where I can find Lucius Malfoy. It looks like Lucius is most likely at Malfoy Manor, which is a huge mansion in Wiltshire, England. When he is not out on business or doing something else, he is there with his wife, and his son when school is not in session. It seems like an awfully big place for three people, the type of place that the people living there need maps to find their way even after living there for years. Well, I decide I had better go to scan Lucius' mind to see about the spell on Asuka, and from what Draco is thinking, Lucius is home most evenings unless he and Narcissa are going out together. So it would be best to wait until evening.

Classes the rest of the day are uneventful, Snape seems to be giving MoSh and Asuka the evil eye for some strange reason, or maybe it's just because they're from Gryffindor. We pass Snape in the halls a couple times, and he is giving them the evil eye there, too. The only person getting more of the evil eye than MoSh and Asuka is Harry Potter. After dinner, I tell Draco I have to go out for a while, but I will be back later, he wants to know where I am going, but I am not sure what to answer… I am not sure why I mentioned that to Draco in the first place… I tell him I don't have time to explain now, but I will tell him when I get back, I figure that way I have some time to think about it. He says ok, he'll cover for me if I'm not back by dorm check… cool. I thank him, then I head out of the great hall and into a hidden corner of the women's bathroom, the one where Moaning Myrtle hangs out, and I teleport before I even see any sign of Myrtle.

I am now standing outside Malfoy Manor, right in plain sight, and I know I am not supposed to be there, so what is Lucius going to think if he finds me there? Better safe than sorry, so I transform into a swallow and fly up towards the mansion as the light is fading from the western sky. The place is huge, and I have no idea where to start looking for Lucius, so I scan the place for any sign of people inside, I figure there aren't going to be hoards of people there, so Lucius should be easy to find. Sure enough, Lucius and another person, no doubt Narcissa, are in the dining room, most likely having a dinner of their own. I fly in through an open window, staying near the ceiling where I won't be noticed, and the two Malfoys don't look up to see me. They seem to be thoroughly absorbed in a conversation they are having between the two of them. I am thinking maybe a bird wasn't the best choice of disguises, as having a swallow flying around Malfoy Manor might be almost as weird as having a student from Hogwarts showing up randomly there… well, maybe nowhere near as weird, but still far from normal. Now I am perched on a book case behind Lucius, sitting at the end of a large dining table, Narcissa is sitting on the side of the table right beside him, they are whispering. I try to listen in on what they are saying, but Lucius suddenly holds up one hand to silence Narcissa, now they are both silent. Narcissa wants to know what the problem is, Lucius says they are not alone. Oh, shit… this could be a problem…

Narcissa looks up and spots me… I should have transformed to something smaller when I had been thinking of it, damn it… but she doesn't look upset, she looks very pleased. She points me out to Lucius, then says there is a swallow in the house, Lucius asks why that would be in here, Narcissa says I must have gotten in on accident… but swallows are symbols of good luck. She gets up and comes closer to the bookcase, moving slowly as if trying to avoid scaring me, and she holds out her finger towards me, calling me to come down so she can show me the way out, talking in a very soothing voice. I don't sense a threat, so I fly down and actually land on her finger, which very pleasantly surprises her. She says to Lucius, in a hushed voice, that this must foretell some very good luck, indeed, since the bird has actually approached her. Lucius is looking at me strangely, I chirp, he tells Narcissa to put me outside before I shit all over everything. I scan his mind telepathically, and I get what I need, he isn't guarding his thoughts since the only person around is Narcissa. He is the one who cast the memory charm on Asuka, he did it on direct orders from Voldemort, unfortunately Voldemort hadn't bothered explaining himself very well. So Lucius knows Voldemort wanted Asuka's memory wiped, but he does not know why, since the one Voldemort is usually after is Harry potter. As if Narcissa is afraid I might fly off to somewhere else in the house, Narcissa places her other hand gently over me to keep me from flying, then carries me to the window I snuck in through where she tosses me up into the air so I can fly away safely.

I am heading back to Hogwarts, flying as a swallow now, even though I am not entirely sure where Hogwarts is relative to Wiltshire… I am not in a hurry to get back, Draco will still have questions, and I don't have answers. It turns out I never have to deal with that, at least not now, because I wake up.

Note: I had lots of dreams last night, so many that my memories of them have gotten a bit fragmented and hard to separate out. So here are the fragments I remember. My plans included more Harry Potter dreams with both MoSh and Tigress, the wizard tournament with MoSh, Tigress was looking for something that happens beyond the scope of the books. I was able to get into my WILD, my memories are just a bit fragmented…

Search for Lucius
I am at Hogwarts, and I am looking to find out what Lucius might know about the spell that was placed on Asuka that made her lose her memory. I don't really know where to find Lucius, but I remember Draco saying Lucius is on the governing board of Hogwarts, so does that mean he is at Hogwarts? I hope that maybe he is. I am wandering around in the halls, I really don't know where to start looking. I spot Draco in the halls, and I follow Draco for a short time until he notices I am behind him. He stops and turns around, he asks why I am following him. He says maybe I had been looking to find him, well I have now. He says that Snape told him the contestants in the tournament need to make a plan on how to handle the first challenge. He says that generally, at least at the beginning, the contestants from each house would most likely help each other out so their house contestants can both make it. He says we should decide what we're going to do, to make sure the great Harry Potter comes out of the competition looking like the loser he is.

Training to Win
I am on the top of the hill near Hogwarts, it is the same place I was at when we all summoned patronuses. Vegeta is there, as are the other contestants in the tournament, though I don't see Tigress. I wonder if she is sure going to continue this series, I start thinking things may have diverged when Cho Chang shows up, and I remember she is from Ravenclaw, so maybe the divergence has already happened. Vegeta pairs everyone up, switching the pairs around, so everyone will have a chance to train with different partners. In addition to tournament contestants, there are also quite a few other students there who are just interested in what Vegeta has to teach them. I notice Neville Longbottom sitting off to the side, watching everyone training from a distance. Vegeta tries to get him to join in, but instead he turns around and runs away. Vegeta watches him go and then returns to our training.

Inside Information
I am in a small room with Draco, we are sitting at a table discussing ways to proceed through the challenge that will soon be happening. I am really not sure what preparation is possible, since we don't know any of the specifics of what obstacles might be in the way. On the table is an assortment of snacks and a map of the area the challenge will take place in. The course has been laid out for us, so everyone will know where to go, but that is it, no other details are included. There are several possible paths to take through the course, so not everyone will take the same path or meet the same challenges. So now Draco starts placing different things on the map of the course, he places small animated figurines that represent obstacles we will encounter, or maybe just obstacles we might encounter. I think this is strange since I had thought the specific obstacles were secret. I ask Draco about that, and he says his dad knows people… so in other words this is cheating? I comment that if anyone finds out, he will be disqualified, or maybe we would both be disqualified, which would eliminate any chance of Slytherin having the tournament winner. He says no one will find out, unless I am planning on telling someone… I tell him I'm not planning on telling anyone, but that doesn't mean no one will figure it out… well, he already has the information now, so we spend the time figuring out what the best path through the challenge course is.

Congradulations! It's Twins!
I am in my bedroom at home, but there is one main difference, and that is the fact there is a cradle there. It is a single unit, but there is a separator in the middle of it and it is larger than the normal cradle, it is specifically made for two babies at once. On top of that, there is a baby in each side of the cradle, one is a boy, one is a girl, and I know for a fact they are twins… and they are mine! I have no children IWL, so this should be a giveaway that it is a dream, but I do not do a reality check. I have to go to class now, and I know I have to take my babies with me, as there is nowhere else to leave them for the day. I get everything ready to go, then I walk out without them, heading off to school. I get to class before I realize I completely forgot about the babies, I hadn't even checked on them before leaving the house, wow… I am a shitty mother… I am heading to the library at the school, suddenly ITT has a really nice library, and my mother meets me there with the babies. I take the babies, one in each arm, they are sleeping peacefully in my arms, I hope they stay that way. When I get inside the library, they tell us we'll have to move to a new building while the library is being remodeled, so I have to try to pick up both my stuff and the babies to go next door. Tigress meets me there, and she takes one of the babies, and we go next door. There is a large pillow next to the table we set up on, so we lie both babies on the pillow where they play quietly, looking up at us and smiling. I am thinking both of the babies were born on Christmas day, and the strangest thing is I don't remember even having sex, so was I raped? Was it some kind of immaculate conception? Abducted by aliens? My babies don't look like aliens…

Note: My main plan right now is to get consistent with my ability to WILD using my new light /sound machine, which I need to find the settings that work best for me. MoSh wants to continue with more Harry Potter dreams, so that is kind of a plan, so that will be my main goal for my WILD… to meet up with MoSh in a Harry Potter dream. I put on my new light / sound machine and slipped into a WILD… Yay for WILDs!

I am at Hogwarts, I am in the halls, though I am not sure where I need to be going right now. I start walking down the hall, trying to figure out where I need to go, when a woman comes up behind me. I recognize her, it's Andie from my dorm room, my other two roommates are there with her. I look at them and try to remember what their names are, there is a woman with short red hair named Shanara, and there is another woman with long blonde hair named Marie. I am not really sure where I remember their names from, but I am certain of those names. Andie asks what I am doing, she says we had better get to potions quickly before Snape gets mad. Marie says Andie is too worried, Snape never gets mad at Slytherin students. She says we could wander in there half way through class and Snape would just ignore us. Andie says Snape won't overlook something like that for anyone, not even the students from his own house. Whether Snape would let that much tardiness go or not, we hurry to get to the classroom, which is in the dungeons. I sit next to Tigress, who is sitting in a row behind MoSh and Asuka. Harry, Ron, and Hermione sit down behind Tigress and me, Draco sits down to my left (Tigress is on my right). Ron leans forward and whispers something to Tigress, I don't hear exactly what he says, but it is clear Tigress is not pleased by it. She says, much more loudly than Ron, "How about you shut the fuck up and mind your own business?" Hermione is next to Ron, she gives him a disapproving look, but says nothing. Harry isn't paying any attention at all, though he is giving dirty looks to the back of Draco's head. Draco turns around and smirks at Harry, saying he hopes Harry stays in the tournament long enough so that Draco can show everyone what a fraud the great Harry Potter really is. Harry responds with a very unimaginative, "Shut up, Malfoy." It looks like he might say more, but Hermione elbows him in the ribs as Snape walks to the front of the room, apparently to keep Harry from getting himself in trouble.

Snape's lesson goes smoothly apart from Goyle screwing up his potion by adding too much of one ingredient and too little of another, which resulted in a blast of colored smoke from his cauldron that colored his face and hair a hot neon pink. Snape makes fun of Goyle a bit, but says the color will wear off in time. Goyle wants to know how much time, Snape responds it should be long enough for Goyle to figure out the importance of following directions properly. Goyle looks over at Draco as if blaming Draco for not being there to help him with the potion. At the end of the class, everyone leaves, and now it is time for lunch. Draco asks me about preparing for the tournament, I tell him maybe Vegeta will be available after we eat lunch. Draco doesn't seem to care about eating lunch, he says he just wants to make sure he is able to crush Harry Potter like a gnat in the tournament… not just beat him, but completely humiliate him. I roll my eyes at that, but I don't say anything since it seems at least Draco is trying to keep his hatred of Harry confined to the tournament. I tell Draco he won't get very far in training if he is malnourished. We head into the great hall, where there is an informal gathering for lunch, by which I mean people are coming and going as they choose, sitting wherever they want instead of at specific tables… Draco goes and grabs a sandwich, proceeding to wolf it down in record time, but I linger a bit longer to eat my lunch before we leave the great hall.

On the way out of the castle to look for Vegeta, I spot a familiar and much hated face, it is Delores Umbridge. But Professor Lupin is the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, so what is that bitch doing at Hogwarts? I wouldn't have been able to miss her if I had been trying, as she is wearing a bright pink dress that looks a bit like Goyle's face after his potion accident, and one of the ugliest hats I have ever seen, the hat is white with a bunch of pink feathers in it that make Umbridge look like she has a dead flamingo on her head. WTF? I voice my 'WTF' a bit too loud, and Draco seems to think I don't know who Umbridge is, so he fills me in on that. He says that woman is Delores Umbridge, she is one of the tournament judges. He says he doesn't know who in the ministry she has dirt on, but even his father had been unable to persuade them to remove her from the judges' panel. I ask why Lucius wants to get her off the judge's panel, Draco said the woman makes his father sick, with all of her sickly sweet behaviors that are so clearly put on that someone who is both blind and deaf could spot her as a fraud. Draco says that the only thing she and his father agree on is that mudbloods have no place in a school of magic. I shoot Draco a dirty look, but I don't say anything since he isn't actually calling a specific person a nasty name, and I figure if I start contesting every single annoying thing Draco does, he'll just end up getting pissed at me and that could screw up my attempts to get him to behave at all and also my chances of healing him.

Umbridge disappears around a corner, I wonder where she is going, but I figure it doesn't really matter at this time since I have other things going on and I don't really have time to play with Umbridge right now. Draco and I go out onto the grounds to where I have seen Vegeta before, and we find him there now, he is there with MoSh, Hermione, and Cedric, while Ron and Harry are watching, though they don't seem to be speaking to each other, each one is making a clear and deliberate effort not to look at the other. Vegeta smirks in our direction, about as close to a smile as I usually see on him, and says we have two more to add to the class. Ron says if Draco and I are coming, he is leaving, he can't stand the stench. Vegeta glares at him, which results in Ron turning so pale that his freckles look like holes in his sheet-white skin… Vegeta tells Ron that he is obviously too weak to join the martial arts class after all. Ron gets annoyed at that and says he is not weak, but Vegeta says Ron can't even control his tongue. "One must first learn civility before learning the martial arts," Vegeta says, it sounds like he is quoting something from somewhere, "and one must first know good ethics before developing powerful skills. You would do well to remember those words." Ron points at Draco, "But he's always saying Hermione is a mudblood and insulting me and Harry and…" Vegeta interrupts him, saying it doesn't matter what Draco says or does, that is no excuse for Ron losing control. He says anything Draco does will be dealt with, but this time it was Ron, not Draco, who had opened his big mouth. Draco is about to crack up laughing next to me, without even looking in our direction, Vegeta says, "Malfoy! Do you find something about this amusing?" Draco stops laughing instantly and says no, nothing is amusing, since it is clear Vegeta is not pleased by Draco's laughter. Vegeta says then Draco should stop laughing and get ready to take training seriously. Draco looks over at me and asks how it can be that a muggle is putting off such a powerful energy presence… I tell Draco that magic isn't everything, Vegeta has his own type of power, and it is definitely awesome.

Everyone that will be training is now gathered around Vegeta, Harry, Hermione, MoSh… it looks like everyone is there except Tigress, I'm not certain if she is absent on purpose or not. Ron is still lingering off to the side, Vegeta says his class is not limited to tournament participants, so if Ron is ready to man up and behave in an adult manner, he can stay with the class. Ron hesitates, but then he scoffs at the class and walks away towards the castle, making another remark about filthy Slytherins. I can see Vegeta really made an impact on him… NOT! Now the training starts, it isn't a particularly long training session, I think it was just a chance for some of the students to meet up with Vegeta and see the kinds of things they can learn from him. Everyone there is clearly impressed, though Draco tries not to show it, acting like the things Vegeta is doing aren't anything that he hasn't seen before. Vegeta ignores that attitude issue and continues with his lesson. Since the first challenge is to have no magic used, Vegeta is sticking to the physical techniques of martial arts, saying the techniques he is showing here are from the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts. We get to the point where Vegeta has some of the students try some of the simple techniques out, I see more people have gathered around as time goes by, either drawn by the activity or maybe they had planned on coming after they finished eating lunch. After we are done with Vegeta, it is time for classes to start again, so we head off for Transfiguration class. The rest of the classes during the day pass uneventfully, so much so that I have very few memories from them.

Note: This was a three level dream… I was having a dream in a dream in a dream… these can get a bit confusing, but I will do my best to keep things straight.

I am lying in my bed, I am not sure how I got there, just that I am really tired. I feel a soft furry animal curled up beside me, so I reach down to pet the animal I assume to be a cat. Instead, the animal pikas when I touch it. Pika? I sit up and turn on my iPod Touch for the light from the screen, and there is a real live pikachu sitting beside me, looking at me. He is looking at me, and he pikas again, then he curls up right by my chest, where it is really easy to scratch his ears. For some reason, even though I know that means I am dreaming, I am still sleepy and I lie down, soon falling asleep with the pikachu beside me… I slip into a dream.

I am in the Hogwarts castle, I am lucid, and I am playing games with Bellatrix Lestrange. The kind of games that end up with her shitting her pants either with fear or with frustration or anger or something… I am having a hard time remembering the details, but I do remember a couple of fragments… I am in one of the classrooms at Hogwarts, facing Bellatrix Lestrange across several desks, she is acting in her usual insane manner, brandishing her wand around like a complete madwoman and yelling incomprehensible things in between her insane cackling. I telekinetically take her wand right out of her hand, pulling it straight to me. I tell her she needs to stop waving that thing around before she puts out an eye or something. She actually pauses, looking at her empty hand and then at me holding her wand. She demands I give it back to her immediately, I tell her to take it back if she wants it so badly. She does nothing, so I ask her if that's a problem, can't she do a simple summoning charm to take her wand back? Or can she not do magic without a wand? Because if she can't do magic without the aid of a stupid little stick, then she is way more pathetic than I had ever thought possible. She demands her wand back now, I ask her if I really look dumb enough to give it back to her, then I leave the room, yelling at her to come get it if she dares…

I am in the dungeons of Hogwarts, the passages down there are like an endless maze, and I am lucid. I am teleporting all over the place, I am playing games with someone, and I soon find the person I am playing with, it is Bellatrix Lestrange. She is apparently pissed off at me about something, because she fires a curse at me, but I teleport before it can hit me. Instead it makes a hole in the wall. I teleport to a spot right behind Bellatrix and whisper quickly into her left ear, "You missed! Tag, you're dead!" and then I teleport away as she is turning around. She spins around and fires another curse, but I am gone before she even fires the curse this time. I am a disembodied voice before I re-materialize somewhere else, and I let out a hollow sounding laugh that echos through the dungeons, all around Bellatrix, making her look frantically around for the source. She is yelling at me to come out, she is calling me a coward, calling me a whole slew of names I don't recognize but I am sure they are nasty and insulting names. I teleport to a position right in front of her and give her a shove backwards, she fires several quick curses at me, I teleport and reveal the mirror behind me, her curses bounce back and almost hit her except she ducks out of the way quickly. Some more hollow laughter for her benefit. She is yelling again, apparently loud enough that it got Snape's attention. Snape comes down the hall, clearly pissed off, and barely avoids Bellatrix's franticly thrown curse. "Watch what you're doing, woman!" Snape snarls as he comes over closer to Bellatrix and plucks her wand from her hand as she is looking frantically around. I appear behind Snape, in front of Bellatrix, and she starts pointing and yelling, "There she is! There she is!" at Snape. As Snape turns around, I teleport away so there is no one for Snape to see. Snape looks back at Bellatrix with a strange look that is somewhere between disgust and pity.

I wake up from the Bellatrix dream and now I am in my living room with Tigress, it seems I fell asleep while I had been hanging out with Tigress. So now I am not lucid. Now that I am awake, I tell Tigress about the dream I just had, about the fact it seemed so vivid at the time, I tell her I could feel every sensation, every bit of energy, I really need to write down some notes to be sure I don't forget this. I pull out some paper and start writing down some notes, writing them as quickly as I can, trying like crazy not to forget about it. While I am doing this I wake from this dream.

Now I wake up in bed, I roll over and think I had better jot down notes from the dream, the Bellatrix dream and the dream where I was telling Tigress about it, but I hear something out in the other room that makes me stop and listen. My mother is talking to a man, the man's voice sounds sooooo familiar right now… I can't really believe what I am hearing. It's my brother, John, but it can't be… he's been dead for four years now… there is no way he could be back, is there? I listen to them out there, my mom is clearly thrilled that John is back, I hear John ask if mom thinks it is ok for him to wake me up to say 'hi' to me. My mother says that she is certain I won't mind considering the situation. I decide to pretend to be asleep, to not let them know I had been spying on them, so I close my eyes as I hear my bedroom door open. I peek out through one squinted eye, an eye barely open enough to see, certainly not enough for someone else to notice, and I see my brother come into the room. He is speaking to me, he says good morning, it's time to wake up. And I wake up, but unfortunately I wake to my waking life.

Note: Plans for tonight included going to Hogwarts, MoSh wants to train for the tournament and also make sure Asuka is ok, he said she doesn't seem to have her memories completely back. MoSh seemed to have an idea Draco might know something about the memory spell that was used on Asuka. My main goal is just to have another reliable way to become lucid other than using WILDs, maybe I could make a go of using FAs? Not sure right now, but I had the plan in my mind as I fell asleep.

I am in the fields around Hogwarts, I am there with MoSh and Asuka, and even though I am at Hogwarts, I am not lucid. I look over at the castle as if it is the most normal thing in the world, MoSh says he wants to find Vegeta, and this also seems like the most normal thing in the world. So MoSh, Asuka, and I start looking around the grounds, trying to find where Vegeta might be, and we finally meet up with him behind the castle. Vegeta looks over at us and greets us, he asks if we are looking to train for the tournament. MoSh says he is, and Asuka might train some, too, but I say I am looking to see if I can find anything out about the memory spell that was used on Asuka. While it is possible that no one in the castle knows anything about what happened to Asuka, it is also possible that someone does. I intend to start in Slytherin, with Draco, because even if he had nothing to do with it directly, it seems likely Lucius would know something about it and would probably have blabbed about it around his son. Vegeta shakes his head disapprovingly, he says not all of the challenges can be won by pure power, some of them require specific skills, such as martial arts, since no other powers would be allowed in that part. I tell him I know that, but it seems that finding out who is after Asuka is more important than winning some tournament.

MoSh doesn't want me to leave until I make sure Asuka's memory is fully restored, which I'm not sure what he expects me to do about it while I am awake, so I play the Metallica song "The Memory Remains" and focus the energy on Asuka, I say that should have the desired effect. MoSh talks to Asuka a bit, and then says she seems to be remembering everything. So as they go to train with Vegeta, I leave MoSh and Vegeta training and I enter the castle through one of the back entrances, going straight to some stairs that lead down into the dungeon area. Now there is a problem, I can't remember where I am going, I can't think of where I was here before… except in a dream. So far I have been in Hogwarts and seen Vegeta and MoSh and talked about helping Asuka without realizing I was dreaming, but now I guess things are coming together, and I finally do a reality check, at which point I determine I am definitely dreaming.

So now I remember where I need to go to get to the Slytherin dorms, and I head there right away. I make a couple wrong turns, the dungeon hallways all seem to look the same, but I finally stumble on the hidden entrance to the dorms and I go inside. There are a few people there, some of them are studying, others are chatting, I spot Draco kicked back on a couch with Crabb and Goyle sitting in chairs next to him, and they are muttering amongst themselves. Well, the easiest way to get information will be to be friendly with Draco, to get him to talk about what he knows, to share secrets. I know that shouldn't be too hard, if he knows anything, he often likes to brag on what he knows. And really, I just need to get him thinking about the subject to read the rest of it out of his mind. Draco looks over from the couch and sees me at the entryway, so I wave to him in a friendly manner, and Draco smiles, which makes Crabb and Goyle look at each other strangely. I take the smile as an invitation and I go over and say hello to Draco. Draco is looking at me with a strange look on his face now, then he turns to Crabb and Goyle, asking them if there wasn't a homework assignment they needed to get done. Both of them say no at the same time, Draco says yes they do, that is unless they want to flunk out and prove that what people are saying about them is true. Goyle asks what people are saying, Draco says the general believe is that the two of them have a cumulative IQ that is lower than most rocks. It sounds to me like Draco agrees with that thought, though he doesn't say so. He says Crabb and Goyle had better get the homework done if they want to pass. Both of them finally leave, heading down to the boys' dorm, probably to get their stuff.

So now I am sitting in the Slytherin common room with Draco, chatting about random stuff for a bit. It seems all Draco wants to talk about is possible way to make Harry Potter look bad, which bores me rather quickly. I comment that if Potter is such a loser, maybe Draco needs to train so he can kick his ass in the tournament… after all, then three entire schools, will see Harry Potter compete and come out with an epic fail. Draco looks like he is about to say something, but he stops. Draco starts talking about dirty tricks he can pull to ensure Potter loses. I say that if Draco makes Harry look bad by cheating, he will have to keep quiet about who caused it or get in trouble. But if it is done by tournament rules, everyone will see who really is the better wizard when Draco beats Harry without playing dirty. Draco hesitates, I can tell he is thinking what if he doesn't win… I comment that I thought he had the skill to beat Harry. He says of course he can beat Potter without using any tricks! I say that then tricks are a pointless risk, because if he is discovered, he will be disqualified from the tournament and end up being a laughing stalk… which would make Harry look even better. So since Draco has the skills, why take the pointless risk? "And I heard you mention having Crabb and Goyle help you with your plans…" I say, "Is there any other way to ensure that the plan fails and you get caught? If those two were any slower, they'd be going backwards." Draco has to admit that is true, and finds the comment a bit amusing. He asks about me helping in his plans… I say I will help him train, after all, we both want the winner to be from Slytherin… but let's do it on even ground, so no one can dig up dirt to make Draco look bad and Harry look like a victim. Draco says Potter will be revealed as the loser he is… and that Granger girl, too, the stupid mudblood… And it seems like Draco is actually considering beating Harry by playing fair, or at least by the rules.

I figure it is time to find out about Asuka, now that it won't seem I came over to see Draco just for that, which might have made him shut me out. "Speaking of pranks and dirty tricks," I say, "Did you hear about that girl from Gryffindor, Asuka? Someone completely wiped out her memories." Draco replies with, "I hadn't heard," but he doesn't seem interested. I am trying to probe into his mind to find out what he might know about the situation. I ponder for a bit, then, "Who did it?" Draco immediately replies, "How would I know?" I say I didn't expect him to, it was a rhetorical question. I am still probing at Draco's mind about the subject, and now I am seeing that Draco had nothing to do with the situation, but he does know that Lucius had something to do with it. I comment I was just thinking it was strange for something like that to happen right in Hogwarts. Draco says he doesn't think it's a big deal, I comment no one was hurt, and her memories are back now, so not really. Just strange. Draco asks when I'll be able to get to training. I say soon, and Vegeta will help us train, but right now there was something I have to go do… what I want to do is go find Lucius and see about reading his mind for more answers. Though I have no doubt the trail leads to Voldermort, I have no idea why Voldermort would have taken a special interest in Asuka… Of course I don't know why so many enemies take such an interest in Asuka… Draco says not to take too long, he wants to make Potter look REALLY bad in the tournament. I tell him not to worry, I will make sure there is time to train, and besides, I have heard that Harry likes to procrastinate (from book 4 of the series, where he kept putting off getting ready for the challenges of the Tri-Wizard Tournament). As soon as I am out of sight, however, I wake up.

I wake up in a strange bed, though I'm not immediately sure why it seems strange. I roll over, I am comfortable there, and finally my sleepy mind is able to understand what it is about the bed. It's not a waterbed, my bed is a waterbed. My mind is still too hazy with sleep to figure out what that meant. I open my eyes and see I am In a bed surrounded by a privacy curtain. Where did that come from? I pull the curtains aside to look around, I have already noticed there is the sound of someone moving around out there, some other women also sound like they are trying to wake up first thing on the morning. I open the curtains and look out to see there are three other women in the room with me, one is stretching, another is still sitting on her bed, the third one hasn't even gotten out of bed. One of them has long curly dark hair, I somehow think her name is Andie, and she would be very pretty if it wasn't for her case of acne. She sees me looking at her, then she says she will answer right now, her acne cure multiplied her one annoying pimple into a full breakout. I was playing along, "Ouch... epic fail." She nodded in agreement, "You've got that right..." I am thinking I have an answer, I ask if I can try it. She says there is nothing to lose, go for it. I start to make a rhyme, but she says I need a wand first. So then I go to my bag and I find a wand. I point my wand at her face while making the rhyme I think will work. "Let your face be bright and clear, make those pimples disappear." Everyone is staring in shock and amazement as all of her pimples vanish, leaving a perfect complexion. She looks in the closest mirror, gasps, then glomps me. My next though is that I have just made a friend. She says she was dreading showing her face in public, she says I saved her life, well that's clearly exaggerating.

Now the four of us finish dressing and head up the stairs to the common room. There is a lot of general talk going on, none of it seems very interesting. We head up to a large dining hall and sit down to breakfast, there is a variety foods available, I choose waffles. It looks like the entire school is there, and there is someone addressing the crowd. It's Albus Dumbledore! He is addressing he room, and everyone falls silent. He is announcing the tri-school wizard tournament. He says each house will have two participants, one girl and one boy, and we will compete against each other and the over schools' competitors in a series of challenges taking place throughout the year. He explains that anyone not finishing a challenge is eliminated, and the last person to finish is also eliminated. The main part of the announcement is that there is going to be a golden goblet in the main entry hall, all wishing to be considered should write their name and house on a piece of parchment and place that in the goblet. The goblet will choose the best suited pair from each house. Be quick, the participants will be chosen at dinner. He steps down and gathers himself some breakfast before sitting at the staff table beside Vegeta where they begin talking about something, I can't hear what they are saying... Somewhere in all this I realize I have become lucid.

I am pondering my lucidly, the fact I am dreaming, when Andie gets my attention by talking loudly in my ear. "You should totally put your name in the goblet!" I look at her, surprised she said that... I know I can handle it since I am dreaming, but how would she know? I say no, I'd only make a fool of myself. She says that's impossible. If I'm not the best choice, the goblet won't pick me, will it? She says I must be a natural, the way I cured her acne, and Dumbledore said the contestants will receive all the necessary training, all it takes to enter is a sharp mind, strong nerves, an a willingness to try our hardest. She repeats that I should totally put my name in the goblet. I decide she is right, nothing to be lost by doing that. Andie is asking if I'm going to do it, she wants an answer now. Even though that is annoying, I tell her I will enter, but I don't expect to be chosen. She says she thinks I have a great chance.

After breakfast is over, everyone is heading to their classes, I pick up one of the pieces of parchment and write "Raven Knight" on it, there is also a spot for house. I embarrass myself to have to look at my robes to confirm what house I am in, I add the word "Slytherin" under my name. Why am I in Slytherin?! Somehow I am losing my lucidly. By now I'm not even thinking about the fact I am dreaming any longer... I have to say I lost my lucidly. I slide the paper into the goblet and walk away from it. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and MoSh are standing nearby. Ron asks Harry if he's going to enter, Harry says no, he'd rather watch the tournament than be in it. Ron gives me a dirty look and says he doesn't think there should be any Slytherins allowed in the tournament, they will only cheat. He then adds that it doesn't matter since both Slytherins will be knocked out in the first round anyway. At the exact same time, Hermione says, "Grow up, Ron, they're not all Malfoys," and MoSh tells Ron, "No one cares to know your opinion, Ron, not all Slytherins are the same." Ron looks to Harry as if looking for support, but Harry just says he's staying out of it. MoSh says Harry might not want to enter, but he's going to go for it. Harry, Hermione, and I all tell him to go for it, but Ron is clearly annoyed that no one stuck up for him on his anti-Slytherin campaign. MoSh puts his name in the goblet.

So there I was, at Hogwarts and going to classes, and somehow I managed to not be lucid at any point during the day. Our first class was Herbology, which was an uneventful class about some plants... then there was Potions, with Snape... now that was interesting. I am sitting in around the middle of the room, surrounded by MoSh, Tigress, Asuka, and Draco… Crabb and Goyle are sitting in front of Draco even though that put them in the front row, apparently they were suffering from separation anxiety or something from sitting apart from him in the past few classes. Snape was openly rude to Harry, and not too friendly to anyone from Gryffindor, though he seemed to be nice to the Slytherins overall. He didn't seem to pay any attention when Draco turned around to make rude comments to Harry, Ron, or Hermione, but if one of them said something back, he would notice that right away. This was annoying me, so I finally told Draco, "Why don't you grow up and act like an adult? You're making it embarrassing to be in Slytherin…" He started saying that Hermione is the mudblood, Ron is the mudblood lover, Harry is the… I interrupted him, and said my five year old cousin goes around calling people he doesn't like dumb names. My seven year old nephew used to do that, but he seems to have grown out if it sometime during his sixth year. I added that if Draco really wants to be putting off the image that he has the maturity of a five year old, go for it, but I had thought he was a bit beyond that. He looked at me for a bit, then I said it was making him look bad to be calling people names like a child. He said he didn't think I would like mudbloods, either… I said it doesn't matter who he likes or doesn't like, no one likes everyone, but he doesn't have to act out on it in such an immature fashion. If you don't like them, just ignore them. People are talking… about you… with mean, mean words! He looked questioning… I added, words like immature, childish, over-entitled, momma's boy, daddy's girl, poor little rich boy, and making wagers as to how far he would make it once he graduates, or if he will even be able to graduate at all. He asked who, I said I wasn't going to point fingers, he said then those people are the immature ones. I said I had never claimed the people talking were mature… they're passing gossip, also childish, but I just thought Draco might want to give them a bit less gossip that is about him.

During the whole time Draco and I were talking between the tables, Snape didn't say a word, of course we were keeping it down, not yelling or anything, but I would still have expected Snape to say something. Ron pipes up now and says even other Slytherins know Draco is a worthless sack of shit… I look down at him and say he had better cover up, his own immaturity is showing now… then I roll my eyes and say it must be a guy thing, Hermione agrees with that. Snape has stopped his lecture by now, and he is standing to my left, but he is glaring at Ron. He is in a cranky mood, and he sounds it as he says, "WEASLEY! It seems you don't think you have to pay attention in my class! So why don't you come to the front of the room and add the next ingredient to my Mabajuice potion? Ron says Draco started it, he was calling Hermione a… Snape interrupts and says Ron can either go add the next ingredient and get it right, or he will have a week of detention and 10 points from Gryffindor. Hermione was going to say something, Snape said no help from Granger. Something in my mind tells me the next ingredient is powdered Hemilroot… whatever that is… so I grab Ron's arm as he passes, and I whisper the ingredient to him, to add two pinches of Hemilroot, all I can do is hope he'll listen. Ron glares at me and pulls away, I have a bad feeling he won't listen. My feeling proves correct, Ron gets up there and pours in a green fluid, the cauldron overflows with a foul smelling green goop… Snape says that's ten points from Gryffindor and detention for a week, anyone who was paying attention would have known the next ingredient was two pinches of Hemilroot before adding the Jackshire juice… Hermione was shaking her head sadly, she was right beside me and she had heard me tell Ron about the Hemilroot. I shrugged at Ron, indicating that if he won't take help where its offered, there's not much I can do about it. Ron was staring at me, clearly surprised I had told him the right answer after all. Snape tells Ron to return to his seat before he decided to make it 50 points from Gryffindor and two weeks detention. Ron hurries back to his seat, looking thoroughly embarrassed, Draco is making fun of him, I comment that Draco is acting immature again.

There is nothing else worth noting throughout the day, or at least not until we all gather together in the great hall to have dinner and wait for the ceremony where the Goblet of Fire will select the Hogwarts competitors for the Tri-School Wizard Tournament. As I am still not really lucid, I go ahead and eat along with the others, though when I help myself to dessert, it is a much smaller helping than after the first meal I ate at Hogwarts. After the food is gone, it is time for the ceremony to begin. A floating cart is brought into the room, and moved down the center aisle to the front where the cover is removed from it to reveal the golden goblet from the front entry way. Dumbledore comes forward and says the goblet will select the Hogwarts contestants, the other schools will arrive in a short time, and they will have already selected their contestants before they arrive. We wait as the following students are chosen to participate in the tournament…

Gryffindor: MoSh… MoSh seems quite pleased with that as he goes to the front of the room where Dumbledore told them to gather. Hermione Granger… Ron and Harry do a double take to see Hermione has been chosen, it seems they didn't even realize she had put her name in. She joins MoSh at the front.

Hufflepuff: I don't recognize the name of the woman from Hufflepuff… I'm not sure if she is not in the series or if she was just not well known or if I just forgot, but the woman chosen is Rose Zeller. The man chosen is a very familiar name, Cedric Diggory, who I am determined to have survive this version of the tournament.

Ravenclaw: For the woman in Ravenclaw, the goblet spits out the name Tigress, the man named is Eddie Carmichael, who is not someone I am familiar with even though the name sounds familiar.

Slytherin: The final students chosen are the ones from Slytherin… the first name to come out of the goblet is my own, Raven Knight, which doesn't really surprise me since I am a traveler and have abilities beyond the regular students there. I go to the front of the class and stand by MoSh and Tigress, there are actually a few students rude enough to boo at me, but one look from an annoyed Dumbledore silences them. Regarding the people who booed, Tigress says they need to shut the fuck up. The final name from the goblet is Draco Malfoy, which seems to make the Slytherins quite happy. They had cheered for me, but clearly they are more familiar with Draco.

So that should be the last name to come out of the goblet, and everyone is talking and getting ready to go, McGonagall is telling all of us contestants where we should meet to be told what we need to do to prepare for the first challenge. She stops talking in the middle of a sentence when the goblet seems to be getting active again… for the other names it gave, there would be some smoke and fire coming from the goblet, and the parchment with the name would be ejected into the air for Dumbledore to catch. The goblet is active again, which it shouldn't be, but somehow I am figuring it is about to spit out Harry Potter's name. I look over to where Madeye Moody is sitting at the staff table, and I see him watching the goblet with a satisfied smirk while everyone else is clearly perplexed. A piece of parchment is ejected from the goblet, Dumbledore catches it and opens it up to read the name… Harry Potter. The room is filled with talking now, no one seems to know what to think of this, the only people not completely confused are MoSh, Tigress, Moody, and me. Dumbledore has to call the name Harry Potter twice before Harry seems to realize he needs to join the rest of us, I think he might have been considering it a joke of some kind…

All of us gather into a room where there is a lot of talking and arguing about Harry Potter, about whether or not he should compete, it is finally determined that he has to participate because the goblet spat out his name. There are a few more arguments about that, including from Harry, who doesn't really want to participate, but finally it is decided that Harry will be in the tournament. Some people accuse Harry of cheating, but even Snape says that Harry wouldn't have the skill to fool with the goblet. After the arguing about Harry is done, the talk about the first task begins. Draco is mocking Harry, Harry responds by mocking Draco right back… Harry asks Draco what spell Lucius used to make sure Draco was chosen from Slytherin… I don't even bother saying anything this time, apparently they are both equally immature and no one is going to listen to what I have to say. Hermione seems equally resigned to that. The instructors there, and Dumbledore, aren't willing to give us exact details about the challenge that lies ahead, they simply tell us that it would be a good idea to prepare for it by seeking help from Vegeta. Draco says he's not going to go to a muggle for help, there's nothing Vegeta could possibly teach him. I tell him if he wants to say that to Vegeta's face, I'll need contact information for his next of kin. Draco looks at me, not believing, I say I have seen Vegeta fight, and there isn't a witch or wizard anywhere that could beat him. The instructors tell Draco it is up to him if he follows that advice, but it is highly recommended. I tell Draco I am definitely going to do it, and I really think he should come with me at least once to see what Vegeta can do. If he remains unimpressed at that point, then don't come again, but I don't think that will be an issue. Draco doesn't answer, but I am thinking that as long as there is another Slytherin there, he will come.

This is about it for the dream, after that I spend some time talking to MoSh and Tigress, before heading back towards the Slytherin dorms. On the way there, however, I feel like I am waking up… which is the first time I have thought about dreaming since my lucidity slipped away earlier… and now it is too late to become lucid, because I wake up.

Note: Tonight I had plans to meet up with MoSh to place a connection between his inner world to the Hogwarts we have been visiting, but then he told me that someone has been screwing with Asuka's memory and she doesn't even remember him. So the first plan became to restore Asuka's memory. I also had plans to meet up with Kaomea to raise a bit of chaos in a different Hogwarts, specifically one where Professor Umbridge (5th year Defense Against the Dark Arts Instructor) deserves to be the object of some amusement. More specifically, never can these two dreams meet! Unfortunately, I once again have only fragmented memories.

The Memory Remains
I am with MoSh in a strange town, I have no idea where we are, and I am not lucid. MoSh and I are looking for a new age store where he says he will be able to find Asuka, he says I will have to help her remember him. I am wondering how I am supposed to help Asuka remember him if he can't do that himself. We are heading toward the store, MoSh seems to know where he is going, but we reach a spot where there is a barricade and a cop is not letting anyone down the street we need to take. And they are clearly taking this very seriously, there is a large barrier that is about ten feet tall at least and it is topped with razor wire… um… they are taking this way too seriously. MoSh and I take a different street to go around the barricaded area and get to the new age store that way. Now there don't seem to be any streets heading in our direction at all, and the street we are on is curving in the wrong direction. MoSh points out an alley and we go down that, determined to reach the store. There are dogs there now, about seven big dogs that look like Rottweilers, and they are all blocking the alley and snarling menacingly. I go over to a fire escape and jump to reach the ladder, pulling it down. Now MoSh and I are able to use the fire escapes to get past the dogs. We continue using the fire escapes until we finally reach a store called New Life, MoSh says that is where Asuka is working. The fire escape ends on the roof of the place, which seems a bit odd, but we are able to get inside through a trap door. Inside, Asuka doesn't seem to think this is strange at all, and she greets us by asking what she can help with. I tell her I think MoSh is looking for a bit of quality time with her, adding a wink. She looks at me strangely, as if she has no idea what I am talking about… MoSh says I had said I have a song to restore memories, maybe I should try that. I look in my pocket and find I have my iPod, so I take it out and play the song "The Memory Remains" by Metallica while focusing on restoring her memories. The song plays through, and it looks like there is a flicker of recognition in Asuka's eyes.

Haunted Dungeons
I am at Hogwarts, and this time I am spontaneously lucid, or maybe I just don't recall the time when I became lucid. But at the point where my memories start I am with Kaomea, Fred, and George in some dark corner of the dungeons at Hogwarts. We are all talking about making fools out of Umbridge, Snape, Ubridge, some of the Slytherins, Umbridge… oh, and Umbridge! It is unanimous that every there hates Umbridge beyond all others. Something comes into my mind, I am thinking Kaomea and I can use form shifting to make Umbridge look really retarded, and the effect will last even after we are gone. The situation will be set then for Fred and George to have whatever fun they can get out of it, make a plan? They say they will improvise, that is what they do best. So we start off by sending a fake message from Snape that says he needs to meet with Umbridge immediately. Kaomea and I turn into cats… she turns into Hermione's cat, Crookshanks, I turn into Mrs. Norris. Umbridge comes down into the dungeon shortly later. I, as Mrs. Norris, go over and wind around her legs, which results in her kicking me. I hiss at her. That doesn't fit with all her plates and pictures of cats in her office… but it is also not unexpected. I flip back to my feet, arch my back, and I hiss loudly. Umbridge tells me to shut up, so I start mutating. From the form of a cute little kitty cat I start growing, there are bony spines protruding from my back, and my hissing becomes more malevolent… Before long Umbridge is staring, stunned and terrified, at a face that looks something like this.

She stumbles backwards a couple of feet, then trips and falls on her ass before letting out a horrible sounding scream of pure terror. I hear someone behind me, so I quickly transform back to Mrs. Norris and jump on Umbridge's chest and start purring. Snape enters the hall and sees Umbridge on the floor, cowering, pointing at me and saying to get it away from her, please get it away from her, it's a monster… Snape picks me up by the scruff of the neck and looks at me, he states the obvious, "It's… a… kitty… cat…" in his usual mocking tone. He puts me down and looks at Umbridge with disgust. Umbridge is going on about how I had been a monster just second ago, I respond with a questioning, "Meow?" Snape says, "That's Mrs. Norris, Filch's cat… she may be filthy and have fleas, but she is no monster." Umbridge wants to know what Snape wanted to see her for, he says he doesn't and then walks away. Umbridge is visibly shaken, but then she walks down the hall she came from. I see Crookshanks waiting near the end of the hall, Kaomea is going to have some fun with Umbridge. I head down the hall towards them, to see what is going to happen, but this is the last part I remember.

Note: My plans for this night included meeting MoSh to have another dream in a Harry Potter world, and I also had plans to meet up with Tigress and have a dream about fighting zombies. Unfortunately, my recall is just barely on the happy side of CRS (Can't Remember Shit). So after the dreaming, all I have to show for it is these fragments. I was spontaneously lucid in both of these, or maybe I just don't remember becoming lucid.

Hogwarts 2000 Race
I am with MoSh at Hogwarts… we are all outside on the hill that we were at when we practiced our patronuses. MoSh, Asuka, Harry, Ron, and Hermione are there with me. Ron is being really rude, he is saying he doesn't want any filthy Slytherins here, Hermione is telling Ron how immature he is being, so shut up. Ron finally shuts up about me being there, then MoSh is wanting to have some kind of competition with Harry. After a bit of discussion they end up deciding on a race. So we all go into the castle to fetch some brooms, Harry says unless MoSh has his own broom, they can both use school brooms so it would be even. MoSh summons a broom, Harry gets his Nimbus 2000, and we go back to the hill. The course is set, and they both take off. Ron wants to go up on a broom of his own to watch the race from a better view, Hermione is apparently afraid of heights, I decide to see what it feels like to be riding a broom, so I summon one and fly up with Ron to watch Harry and MoSh race. The two of them are racing along the agreed course, and they seem to be pretty close, but then MoSh apparently decides the broom is more of a hindrance than a help. Harry does a double take as he sees MoSh's broom fall, yells out MoSh's name, apparently thinking MoSh is falling, then pulls a very good Homer Simpson (staring with a blank expression on his face) as he sees MoSh continue flying without the aid of the broom. Harry continues the race, but now MoSh is going faster than he was before, and Harry is already behind. So the distance between them only grows until MoSh crossed the finish line. I land next to MoSh and Hermione, Ron is also pulling a very good Homer Simpson, he is still floating in the air on his broom. Hermione is congratulating MoSh on his win, but she stops mid sentence when she sees he has no broom… now she is pulling a very good Homer Simpson with the others.

Resident Evil: The Dark Side
I am with Tigress in an abandoned looking town that reminds me of Silent Hill, though it reminds me of Silent Hill on the lighter side. There is a lot of fog and stuff, but aside from being a bit dark and dreary, it is a normal looking small town. Tigress and I are looking through the town, we both have an array of weapons strapped to us, I know we are looking for zombies. I hear the sound of gunfire and turn to see Tigress has taken out a zombie. I blast a zombie off to my left with my shotgun as it comes out of the space between two of the buildings. Tigress and I continue exploring the place, but then things begin to change… I hear a strange noise, a sort of squishing noise like might be heard when pulling something out of the mud… or maybe the sound that might be heard from a swarm of bugs and maggots in a pile of rotting flesh… I know that is gross, but I don't know how else to describe the sound… Along with the sound, the surroundings are changing. The buildings are actually decaying, the tops of them are getting covered with a gross looking green stuff that looks like mold, which is spreading down the buildings. As the buildings decay, several of them start to collapse. The mold stuff spreads to the ground and across it, leaving a really gross looking surface. And as the decay spreads, so do the zombies. Not just a couple, but lots of them, so many of them. Tigress and I are firing our weapons on rapid fire now, a shot gun is too slow, I choose a different weapon and start cutting them down. We are completely surrounded by zombies, but if we can't hold them off, we will take a shitload of them with us!