Standing on the staircase, Aimée turned to the red haired girl behind her and giggled. "Can you believe this is it?" she said, pointing up to the expanse of the castle and it's many floors above them. They were here, at Hogwarts, and now it was time for a little 'exploration', a look around. And Aimée prayed so hard that they wouldn't get lost, because she had a feeling they would just end up wandering aimlessly around the Castle until they found something vaguely familiar - the list of which, right then, went as far as the Great Hall, and each girls Common Rooms.

Halfway up, the staircase began to move and Aimée stood still, not knowing what to do. "'Arley?" she questioned, her voice barely more than a whisper for no apparent reason. "Is zis meant to 'appen? Are ze meant to move?" Or was someone stood watching, playing a horrible prank on the new people?

Harley peered over the banister, holding on so she didn't fall because falling would be bad, very bad. "Nope. I didnt expect it to be this big, but it looks MAJORLY fun to explore." she said looking back to Aimée and smiling. The redhead looked back over the banister one last time before questioning, "Aimée, think it'd be safe to fly off these stairs ? Like over the banister ?" It would just be the same as flying from a window right, only wearing a cape would be more dangerous because it could get stuck on the banister.

Harley shrieked as the staircase moved, her staircase at home had never moved maybe they had special staircases in school. "Yes ?" she said looking paniced. Okay that was not the question she was looking for. "I DUNNO. Ive never BEEN to school before! Did this happen at your last school ?" Hopefully she said yes, hopefully she said yes.

Fun to explore? Of course it would be, it was enormous! Maybe they should go right to the top, then make their way to the bottom, and then explore the Grounds? "It does, doesn't et," the blonde agreed with a giggle. It was so much bigger than Beauxbatons had been, and so far so much better, too - it just seemed a whole lot more magical, which was probably a weird thing to think, seeing as they were both Magic schools, but still, it was true to Aimée.

Fly? Off the stairs? "Like, on a broomstick?" she asked uncertainly. Because if Harley just planned to jump off and hope she would float then Aimées answer was a firm 'no'. She was not having her friend in the Hospital Wing during the first week Or worse, dead. But Aimée wouldn't think about thought's like that.

"At Beauxbatons? No, it didn't! Aww, crap I 'ope eet es meant to 'appen!" Aimée said softly, he face panic stricken. She hadn't read the whole of Hogwarts: A History yet to know whether it was normal or not, and she didn't have the book on her.

Harley looked back at Aimée, trying to get her mind off the whole flying thing after she'd kinda sorta injured herself last time she'd jumped out of the tree, and yeah these stairs; much higher. "Yep. We totally have to explore like EVERY floor." and find out what fun magical stuff there was like...everywhere. There was bound to be tons of magical stuff, maybe some stuff to do with superhero's cus like...superhero's were super magical.

Harley shook her head, giggling slightly. She'd never flown on a broom before. "Nope, of course not silly. Fly like a superhero as in I jump off and I flyyyyy. Ive tried it before. You should try it." Kaia had said there was good tree's in the grounds to fly off, hmm, she'd have to go test those out soon enough, maybe Aimée would wanna go with her.

"Oh dear, that...that didnt fill me with confidence." She gulped, biting her lip. "Well, we didnt do anything wrong so it must have to happen." Or they couldve done something wrong accidently and that would've been bad.

Braeden made his way up the stairs at a sluggish pace. After spending most part of the day outside on the grounds, he was ready to plop down onto his bed and take a nice, long, much needed nap. Any homework would have to wait until tomorrow; he didn't feel like pulling an all-nighter either.

Tired as he was, though, the boy was not oblivious to the voices of two girls standing somewhere further up on the stairs, their words climbing down the steps to his ears. He didn't mean to eavesdrop, of course not - okay maybe a little - but he couldn't help overhearing their panic-filled words.

His dark eyebrows furrowed. What, they weren't used to the stairs moving? Were they new or something? Well, they certainly looked worried by the fact that the ground was moving beneath them. That was totally normal, of course.... if you were a first year. But these girls looked far too old to be firsties (well, not old old... Er, he'd best not mention anything about their appearance, last time he told a girl she looked older she nearly hexed his head off).

This was Braeden's opportunity to come off as the wise, all-knowing, brave upperclassman! The poor boy had a bad habit of always making a fool of himself, ever the goof, so even the younger students couldn't take him seriously. But this time? This time he'd be a hero.

But first, he'd have some fun.

"Merlin! What have you done?!" asked a wide-eyed Braeden, faking worry and concern in his tone. Hehe, before saving the day he'd make them think they had broken the stairs or something. "We can't get off if the stairs keep moving, we're trapped!"

"Do not forget ze grounds," Aimée chimed in her French accent as Harley mentioned exploring every floor. "Zere's a Lake, and a football field, and a Forest, alzough apparently we are not allowed in zere. And ozer stuff, too," she said, thinking of the things she'd heard about, along with the stuff she could see from her Common Room. And of course, everything in this school should be magical, so she wanted to find some Magical stuff on their exploration.

'Of course not'? But how else would you - ah, of course, like a Superhero. "I am not going to try et of of 'ere," Aimée exclaimed in disbelief. Was Harley utterly and truly mad? "I will fall, and probably break my neck. And I do not fancy going to ze 'Ospital Wing zis early in the term." Although breaking her neck would probably kill her, so the Hospital Wing couldn't do much. She shook her head.

"You zink?" Aimée murmured uncertainly, her panic beginning to rise. Although if Harley was right, and they hadn't done anything wrong, it was meant to happen. That flooded her with a feeling of relief, a feeling that was dampened slightly by the thought that maybe they did something by accident.

Ahh, an older student, who looked like he knew where he was going! They could ask him about this, and if he responded by saying it was normal, they knew that they hadn't done anything wrong, that they were safe and [i]would not[i] be in any danger and or trouble.

Aimée spotted the boy standing a few stairs below her and Harley, but when she turned towards him fully she noticed the look of concern on his face as he hurried towards them, and her relief vanished. TRAPPED?! Trapped on a moving staircase that may or may not stop?! Aimée couldn't believe this was happening on her first week here!

"So, zis is not normal?!" she asked the boy, her tone and expression both full of panic. "We're stuck! Et was an accident, I swear," she said, gripping the banister next to her. She didn't know what was an accident, what the were supposed to have done to make the stairs behave this way, but she did know that they where stuck on them and that they'd somehow managed to get this other boy stuck too.

Oh dear.

Braeden had to try really, really hard not to: one - laugh; and two - feel horribly guilty. This wasn't a very nice trick, was it... ? Oh, but it was so amusing too! Braeden decided to continue along with it. Just one more tease. One more and he was done, he'd tell them the truth.

"No, it's not normal at all; we could die here!" And then, just to push it a little father, he added in a gloomy, secretive tone: "We wouldn't be the first." He glanced down at the distance between their spot on the stairs and the floor of the Entrance Hall and shuddered.

As the girl with the fancy accent added that this had all been an accident, Braeden shook his head. "I'm afraid that's not a good enough excuse; I'm gonna have to report you two to the headmaster," he said with a tone of impending doom.

Oh Merlin, this was cruel. He'll tell them the truth in a second. When the stairs come to a halt and it's safe for him to run for his life; he doubted these girls would take it lightly when he confessed the truth. But it was worth the laugh.

Aimée's face was now adopting a look of utter horror and despair. This wasn't right! All of her excitement to come to this school, and she'd damaged it this quickly. What would her father say? What would her mother- right, she wouldn't say anything because they didn't talk. Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Aimée looked back at the older boy.

They could die?! "B-b-but I'm only fourteen! I'm too young to die," she squeaked. Following the boys gaze, her eyes widened in shock. Not the first? "So p-p-people have died before?" she couldn't help but ask.

At least that informed her of one thing though - she hadn't done too mch damage; if people had died before because of the same accident, and the stairs where still there then she hadn't damaged it too much. Maybe it'd fix itself, and they could just walk away and pretend it never happened? Or was that just wishful thinking?

Headmaster? "Well... if you - if we, die 'ere, zen you can't report us to ze 'Eadmaster," she said, biting her lip. "But ef et es a choice between dying and being reported, I will take ze latter option, please." Of course, being reported to the Headmaster was bad, but it had to be a lot better than dying, right?

...right?

The corners of Braeden's lips twitched slightly as he tried his best to hold back a lopsided smile and a hearty laugh. Perhaps he just wasn't cruel enough, but for some reason he couldn't help feeling terribly bad for tricking this girl like this. She seemed so... naive. Bad Braeden.

"Well..." Braeden stalled for a second, his dark brown eyes studying the movements of the other staircases for a moment, predicting when this specific one would become still and allow them off. Just as this staircase was about to come to a halt, he continued, "I think I can fix this." Closing his eyes, Braeden lifted his chin and raised his arms slowly, dramatically. Oh, what a goof. Any other student would have kicked him down the stairs and continued on with their lives; but these poor girls didn't know any better, so Brae felt confident his ridiculous act was looking pretty convincing. "Stairs, I order you to... stop!"

Ta-dah! Right at that second, the staircase came to a halt, leading the small group on to the third floor.

Looking quite smug, Braeden opened his eyes and gave a lopsided grin, continuing up the stairs and landing safely onto the third floor. "Well, will you look at that? Seems my all-powerful secret magic powers worked after all," he said, dark eyebrows raised slightly. "Not everyone can do that, y'know. I'm one of the few."

At this point, Braeden opted it was best to let the girls find out the truth on their own. He was enjoying the fantasy of being a hero a little too much to ruin it now. He just hoped they weren't able to find him when they find out the truth about the stairs; he was too young to have his head hexed off.

Harley smiled as Aimee mentioned the grounds, the grounds sounded like fun, she liked being outside there was MUCH more rooms to jump and dance around, inside there was walls and floors and ceilings and stuff that she fell into and stuffs so it sucked. "Mhmm. We can explore EVERYWHERE!" except the places they weren't aloud, she didnt wanna get in trouble for going somewhere she was supposed too, not yet atleast. Hehe, this was gonna be fun, there must've been tons and tons of magical places that they were aloud to go.

The fourth year shook her head as Aimee said she'd hurt herself if she jumped off now. "No you wont. You'll be fine, Ive done it before. Not off here, obviously but i...actually I guess it wasn't as high as this, maybe we should start off from somewhere not as high." she said with a small smile. "Im not sure, I guess we could've trod on something maybe theres a certain step that makes it move that we're not supposed to step on." Surely there'd be some sort of warning if that was the case.

Harley eyed the boy that approached them as he spoke. Stuck ?! They were stuck ?! She couldn't be stuck, how was she meant to fly anywhere if they were STUCK. She flailed a little, panic shown on her face. She looked from Aimee to the boy who's name she didn't know as quickly as she could, listening to them talk. DIE. First they were stuck now they were gonna DIE. This was OBVIOUSLY not her day. Sigh. She remained silent as they continued to talk and then suddenly he stopped the stairs.

"WOW." She exclaimed beaming at the boy.

"Your like...amazing, and SUPER magical, like a SPECIAL Superhero or something. Do you have anymore awesome super powers ?!" she said flailing a little bit, she wanted awesome super powers.

Salander was just leaving class when he approaches the moving staircase. He had to smirk, he's gotten a little used to them now, compared to how much trouble he had trying to climb them last term and getting completely lost. As he descended down the steps, it begun to move. "Your days are numbered buddy." he snickered at the stairs "Once the Headmaster installs the elevator nobody would want to use you anymore... put you in an empty silo and forget about you."

Oh yeah and Salander was just the man to franchise such an elevator uhuh.

Lexi adjusted her robes a bit and hitched her bag up higher on her shoulder. Was it end of term yet? Ugh. Hearing a voice talking she hopped onto the end of the staircase right before it moved. Teetering to catch her balance she cursed under breath and finally lifted her gaze.

Gulp.

At the opposite end of the stairs stood Salander. Man. She felt like they were going to have a showdown. One that would rival the O.K Corral. She tried to smile but it mangled on her face. "S-s-sal. How have you been?" she asked lamely as she shifted foot to foot. She had been terrible. Utterly terrible. She was heartbroken and confused and felt like the world's worst person for hurting people she cared about.

His eyes drifted further down the stairs and nearly choked on his own snickering. The treacherous magical things-- it heard him he was sure of it. And this is its payback.

By trapping him in the stairs with Lexi.

He shifted back turning-- and realized that there is nothing to land on. Stop moving and just pick a floor! he cursed quietly at the stairs. Then Lexi spoke up behind him.

He turned slowly. "I'm fine..." he replied shrugging casually. Yeah totally just chillin. Except for the fact that the turmoil was clearly etched on his face.

Lexi chewed on her bottom lip and blinked several times. She wasn't fine. Not by a long shot. How could he be? The look on his face said otherwise. "Salander... I really am..." she cleared the lump out of her throat and tried to continue, "... I should have told you. I was just so bloody confused about it all." That was sufficient? No?

She gripped the railing tightly and took a few steps closer to him. "Will you talk to me about this? I don't want to lose you," she said in a really small, really raw voice. Her emotions were there in her eyes.

Braeden was looking quite smug as he stepped off the stairs and the friend of the girl with the fancy french accent began to flail, praising his 'skills'. Amazing? Super magical? Special superhero? Braeden gave her a bright, lopsided grin, the goofiest he owned. He liked this girl already. Maybe eventually she'll even ask him for his autograph.

Best not get his hopes up too high, though; Braeden was sure they were going to find out the truth eventually, soon. So he'd best make the best of it while the chance still presented itself.

"I suppose you could say that," said Braeden in response, brushing his shoulders off smugly. Heh. He liked being all... hero-esque and stuff. It made him feel all... wise and important. "I can also predict the future and ward off scary forest creatures," he added, being the little show-off he never really got the chance to be. This superhero stuff was fun, mwaha.

Isobel was walking around, exploring the castle when-OMIGOD THE STAIRCASES WERE MOVING. [insert hyperventilation here] When she calmed down enough she moved closer to them and just looked down in awe. *stare*

Salander looked away when Lexi started to speak, trying to distract himself with the chattering portraits exchanging the latest gossip. Yeah she should have told him. Should not have led him like that. He was struggling with trying to just shake it off and tell her not to worry about it and feeling the rage of being made like a fool.

He was just about ready to open his heart to her that night. Maybe it was a good thing that those birds came when they did.

His eyes shot back at her when he could sense she was walking closer. He started backing up unconsciously until the next words caused him to just freeze.

Lose him? He winced. Just what did she mean by that?

"We're already talking Lexi." he replied quietly. If thats what she wants... well she's got it already.

And suddenly at the back of his mind, the small voice he has not heard since his first summer at Diagon Alley began to whisper....

She was never yours to keep. Never did.

UGH.

Ellie stood at the bottom of the magnificent, ever moving staircase. So. Many. Stairs. She knew that by the end of the term, she wouldn't mind this odyssey to the common room, but as it was the beginning of the term, and her house didn't have NEARLY as many stairs, the thought of climbing up there was a MAJOR bummer.

UGH.

Maybe one day she'd try to count the stairs. It would make it interesting, at least. Maybe.

Lexi sighed and her lip wibbled a little bit as he stepped away from her. Then his eyes met hers and she smiled softly. Trying to reassure him that she was still the same person... just things had changed.

Without a moment's hesitation she plopped herself down on the steps and hung her head. "Look, Sal. I am really sorry. I told... I told him that I needed time to figure everything out. You see... I wasn't dating Ivan when we kissed on Diagon Alley, Sal... I never meant to lead you on. I was going to tell you, on the train, that Ivan and I had started dating, but... well you know what happened. I am just... so confused by the whole thing," she said in a low voice.

Boys were probably going to be the death of her. She had no voices in her head... anymore... so it was just her thoughts up there churning around, replaying events. Sighs. She finally turned her tear brimmed eyes up to meet SAlanders and said, "Can you forgive me?"

Maybelle looked at the stairs. She thought they were epic, she saw Isobel then. She sneaked up behind her......and....wait for it......wait for it........WAIT FOR IT!!!!!!!!!!!! "HEY ISOBEL, WHAT'S YOUR BIGGEST FEAR?!?!?!?!? Maybelle yelled. She was DEFINITELY going to get a reaction from that!

"AH!" Isobel let out a started gasp of surprise. She was very startled by Maybelle. In retrospect, she probably shouldn't have been standing so close to the staircase. When she got startled she tumbled down, down, down and Crack! That didn't sound good.

Uhhhh Ohhh! That wasn't very smart of Maybelle. "What hurts the most!?!?" Maybelle yelled, almost singing the song. She ran down to be next to her. "SOMEONE HELP ME GET HER TO THE HOSPITAL WING!!!!" Maybelle yelled.

Isobel was startled by Maybelle's question. Well, in her state anything would startle her. She assessed her body, thinking about the question. Nothing really hurt, everything was kind of numb, like it should hurt but it didn't. "My chest," she muttered, having to give herself a small half-smile. When Maybelle yelled Isobel moved her hands to her ears. The movement sent sharp pain through her body and Isobel cried out. "OOOOOOOWOWOWOWOW!" Ow.

Maybelle looked at her she was in a lot of pain. And it looked like it was more than her chest that hurt. "Let me see your wrist." Maybelle said. She had a theory about it. WOULD SOMEONE HELP ME PLEASE!?" Maybelle was already annoyed. She couldn't carry Isobel all by herself. She was too heavy.