Making a quick trip to the kitchens and loading up her bag with mugs and a few other necessary things, Kurumi returned to the Great Hall before the rest of her housemates and wandered over to the Gryffindor area immediately. Her eyes did dart over to the Hufflepuff area briefly, but now was not the time to be thinking about Lewis and sleeping arrangements. She needed to focus on keeping her Gryffindors calm and comfortable and not freaking out. She decided not to claim any sleeping bag at the moment and instead moved towards the wall where she opened up her bag - again, charmed with an Undetectable Extension Charm. First thing out was a collapsible table that she had borrowed from the kitchens, and she pushed it against the wall before setting out enough mugs for, hopefully, everyone in her house to grab should they desire something hot to drink - which is what came next.

A humble assortment of teas and cocoa were laid out next along with some snacks from the kitchen. Nothing calmed down a pride of lions like hot drinks and food, right? Or maybe that was just Selina? This wasn't exactly the tea part she had envisioned having, but it would have to do. Once this was all set up Kurumi's violet eyes looked over the sea of sleeping bags and she sighed. The floor didn't look like it would be very comfortable...but it was better than nothing.

Her thoughts wandered to Walnut, still up in the dorms and no doubt peeing on just about everything. She was going to have a lot of people to apologize for by the end of all this - which would hopefully be soon.

So basically, Selina was furious. The dorms were closed, which MEANT that she did not get to sleep in her bed, which MEANT that she could not go to bed even though she was tired, which MEANT that she had to sleep down in the Great Hall, which MEANT she would have a horrible night's rest, which MEANT that whichever first year she ended up sleeping next to would need to seriously make sure she did NOT wake up on the WRONG side of the floor. The likely hood of her waking up happy and chipper though at this point was slim to none SO all first years best be looking out for an angry lioness. Because the storm of Selina was a-coming.

When she walked into the Great Hall Selina groaned very loudly so that everyone could hear her. She was not five years old, she didn't want to be herrrrreeeeuhh! The only thing she wanted to do was crawl up with her pillow, go to sleep in her own bed and snuggle with a poster of Mortimer since she couldn't actually sleep with her missing bat. But NOOOO silly Hogwarts and its bloody properties took away that right. Now she was subjected to sleeping in the same room as the Puffers. WHAT IF SHE CAUGHT PUFFERS? Ugh... only Kurumi wanted that.

Speaking of Kurumi, her best friend was already making like a house elf and making sure that all of the Gryffindors were settled and comfortable with tea and such. She was such an awesome prefect. In fact, Selina always kind of figured she would have been. After all, she was like everyone's Mom. Always making sure that she took care of them. So she walked over to the Gryffindor "Mom" and plopped down. With a pout, she groaned, "I don't wanna be here, Rumi."

Well, at least they had some place to stay and sleep. Would be different sleeping in the same room as the rest of the students in the school instead of just the relatively small group of Gryffindor girls, but it would be interesting too, Penelope supposed. It...would also seemed it would be kinda like those times before Hogwarts and the wizarding world, what with the sleeping bags and the way the Great Hall ceiling was charmed to look like the sky...

The only thing missing was Spot, but at least she knew the cat would be pretty comfortable, having the common room and doors to herself...or at least human free. She'd probably enjoy it.

Walking down the line of sleeping bags where the Gryffindor table usually was, Penelope stopped when she reached the place Kurumi was already waiting. "You got down here quickly," she commented. And...was that table of mugs already there or had Kurumi managed to get all that AND still make it here first? Speedy prefect.

Oh, and then Selina was here too. Where'd she come from? "It won't be too bad." By some miracle, Penelope managed to retain a tiny bit of optimism even after the past few weeks.

Before Kurumi even answered Selina she had grabbed a mug, cast Aguamenti to fill it with watered followed by the Heating Charm they had learned in Herbology to warm the water, and filled it with some hot cocoa with marshmallows on top and handed it to her best friend. "Here, drink this, it'll help." Chocolate and all. Magical properties. Yep.

Patting her best friend on the shoulder, she glanced around the Great Hall and at the steady flow of students trickling in from their own common room entrances. "Selina, I don't think anyone wants to be here under these circumstances," she replied. Sure, a planned sleep over would have been a different story...but this was anything but planned. They had all been either kicked out of their common rooms or hadn't been allowed back in.

And Walnut was unsupervised in Gryffindor tower....Merlin help them all.

"It isn't so bad...I mean...we can do something fun and it certainly will be a night no one will forget, right?" See, the mug was half full, not half empty.

Even if Kurumi was freaking out about Walnut peeing on EVERYTHING.

"You learn a shortcut or two after seven terms," Kurumi replied with a wink as she offered a mug to Penelope. Kurumi was quick to note that she too was without her feline companion. "Spot get stuck in the common room too?"

Did spot have peeing habits as well? Clawing? Chewing? Anything that anyone should be concerned about?

"Hey, do you think the ghosts can get into the common rooms?" she asked to no one in particular. "I just...I'm worried about Walnut..." And the cleanliness of the common room. "If they can...they could just float through the walls and check on things. Make sure that nothing bad or sinister was happening IN the common rooms." They were already dead after all. Not like anything bad could happen to them again.

Seren was a number of things, confused, concerned and down right anxious. All she knew at this point was that the students had been locked out of the common room. But what troubled her, was what where her lions doing NOW?...

Upon arriving at the castle, she heard noises in the Great Hall, and decided to duck her head in. Instantly, she felt a wave of relief. Students. Lion students.
"Is everyone accounted for?" she asked striding into their midst, eyes scanning faces as she went.

Sarah made her way into the great hall, her narrow feet sticking out. Thankfully Alexa had lent her the robe.. much nicer then walking around in a nightgown.
She first spotted Kurumi, who had seemed to have beaten her downstair and was preparing midnight feast for them "Hey Kurumi Mind if I have some cocoa?" Sarah asked, feeling rather guilty as she had two of Kurumi's cookies in her robes already. She greeted Selina and the she noticed Penelope. "Hey P!" Sarah had just made up a nickname for her friend, actually it was rather spur of the moment. "This is like a sleepover! Alexa and I are planning on telling spooky stories and having an awesome sleepover partay" Said Sarah, rather excited, her book forgotten. She swung her bag around and looked into it. Everyting she needed for the night was there everythere.
Sarah smiled a smile of relief when her beloved head of house entered. "Hello Professor Bentley! That adventure was awesome, I felt like a maronette!" Sarah demonstrated being moved by an unknown force. "Hogwarts has been interesting this year! Like the other day the moving staircases gave me an amusementpark worthy ride!"

ooc:assuming that Sarah took Alexa's robe and wearing it over her nightgown

An adventure? A maronette? ... was that a muggle sport? And why in the blazing buttons are the staircases giving rides?!?!
WAS THE CASTLE LOSING IT'S NON EXISTING MIND?!

After taking a deep breath, she smiled, placing an arm loosely around the girls shoulders. "Well, I'm just glad you're alright... Hogwarts is always interesting, but should it jeopardise your safety here, then we have a problem."
But... that wouldn't happen. Right?.. Right!

Melanie sighed. She missed her bed already. Slowly she walked into the great hall, wishing she could just hug her teddy bears. Or just Mister Bear. She missed them and was fairly certain that they missed her just as much. Were the common rooms even supposed to be locked? Melanie looked around the Great Hall. Yup, she definitely needed her teddy bear. How was she going to sleep without it? With a slight pout on her face, she walked over to where the long table for Gryffindor used to be. Would they be sleeping in sleeping bags...? No teddy bears? Melanie didn't like that.

"Hello," Melanie said waving her hand at the people there, looking at the sleeping bags. She wanted her teddy bear.

So this was what they had to resort to...sleeping in the Great Hall...wow...just wow.

She dragged herself into the Great Hall feeling completely dejected. Her candy was still inside and no one seemed to care. Didn't anyone care whether she was happy or not? Losing candy wasn't the easiest thing to deal with you know.

Walking up to the other Gryffindors she saw that they didn't look very happy either. Did she blame them? Nope. This was a crappy situation and it meant she couldn't bundle with Seri and make more plans. Still...it would have been good to make the most of the situation and Sarah did say they would be telling stories and having fun so....

"I'm here and present too, Professor." She said, walking up behind the woman and throwing herself down. She then turned to the other lions. "Okay guys, I say we make the most of this sooooo, what should we do first???" She would have given suggestions but she had a feeling that between the Professor and Kurumi they would have all been shot down with fierce scowls. Yeah...best to let the others do the thinking for now...

Ronnie made her way to the great hall, carrying Oliver in her arms. She glanced around the large room that was covered with sleeping bags, and spotted her fellow lions over where the house table used to be. She looked at all the sleeping bags and grinned. This was actually pretty exciting! It was like....some awesome adventure!

She made her way over to where all the Gryffindors were, making sure not to step on people. Once she found a free sleeping bag, she set Oliver down and got into her sleeping bag. Oliver curled up by her side and closed his eyes, beginning to purr. Ronnie stroked him, looking around the room. This was so weird...she was real curious about how everyone got locked out. What was going on? She had to know...

Well this was close to one of the most bizarre things to happen during her time at Hogwarts... but thankfully the students seemed to be handling it pretty well.

Hearing a voice coming from behind her, Seren spun on her heal only to see Alexa throw herself at the floor. Ouch? "Good... I don't think we've lost anyone," she replied, still scanning the students faces.

What were they going to do?... Wasn't sleep the most obvious answer? "What about bed time stories?"... or were they too 'mature' for that kind of thing?

BEDTIME STORIES???

Merlin there was hope for this school yet!!

A wide grin spread across the 11 year old's face at the suggestion as she began bouncing in her spot. "Those can work!!" Ah bedtime stories, it'd been a while since she'd heard one of those because her father seemed to think that she was under the impression that they were for babies. Seriously? Grown ups shouldn't have been allowed to assume.

"Are you gonna be telling it Professor?? Can we have candy while we listen??" Lots of candy. "Do we have to go to bed afterwards--what's the story aboooout?" By now she'd already eaten the cookies from Kurumi and the chocolate frog from Sarah...there would be no sleeping for her.

Ira stumbled in, still sleepy from the kitchen, after a delicious snack of cookies and ice cream. And now that she had heard about the sleeping areas in the great hall, she wandered in just as Professor Bentley was taking a rain check it seemed.

"I'm here too, Professor" she said. Had Professor forgotten her? "I was down in the kitchen"

Bedtime stories?? Nope, the idea didn't appeal much. Or.. How about pillow fight?" she asked smirking. But wait, were there any pillows around? And if not, then bedtime stories was fine

Kurumi couldn't help but breathe a small sigh of relief when Professor Bentley had arrived. After all, hot cocoa and tea with some sweet snacks could only keep people calm for so long. Stepping around a few sleeping bags - she still had to select one for herself actually - and approached her Head of House. "And unharmed," Kurumi nodded as she summoned a mug from the table she had set up. "Tea, professor?"

Best to act sort of casual in this sort of situation, right?

"Um...professor...my cat, Walnut, he is locked IN the common room and, um...I'm a little worried what might happen in there..." Like him peeing on EVERYTHING.
"Of course," Kurumi smiled as she summoned a mug and repeated the process she had earlier for Selina and Penelope. "I don't mind us having some fun if Professor Bentley doesn't mind...just until people start wanting to go to sleep that is." Because then they should all be quiet and all. But, since there were no classes or homework to worry about...Kurumi didn't see the harm in it.

Here and Selina were known to have the occasional pillow fight in their dorm after all....

Oh dear...Melanie wasn't looking like her usual self. Not that Kurumi could blame her really. Kurumi was feeling stressed and worrying about what all this implied. "Melanie, hey," Kurumi chirped with a small wave. "I know this isn't the tea party we had in mind...but no time like the present?" Kurumi then gestured towards all the mugs and teas and small cookies on the table and then back at the younger Gryffindor.

Sorry...no fancy dresses either.
Again. WHY did Alexa always give Kurumi looks like she was out to get her? Kurumi had just pulled the girl off the Hogwarts Express and warned her that if she kept her actions up she could be expelled. Oh, and what had happened?

Yep, that's what we thought.

"Well, there is tea, hot cocoa, and some snacks over on the table if you want any," Kurumi said with a small nod towards the set up. When conversation turned to stories hopefully not ghost stories, she turned her attention back to Professor Bentley with a somewhat expectant look in her eyes.
Kurumi was instantly jealous of Ronnie. SHE had managed to get her familiar out before the lock out. Kurumi had been too busy at the prefect event to have been able to have ducked back into the common room for a few minutes to get her things and Walnut before it became impossible to even approach it. SIGH.

"Hey Ronnie, you want something hot to drink?"
At the mention of pillow fight, Kurumi shot Selina a slight smirk before looking back at Ira. "How about we start with something small before going in to something big," Kurumi suggested with a wink. She had the feeling that a pillow fight starting NOW could snowball a bit too much and the Heads of House from all four houses were trying to make sure everyone was alright. Maybe once people had settled in though?

Lex's head flashed to the next lion to show up. They were slowly trickling in, weren't they? The fact that the girl showed up wasn't important. Nah. They all had to show up at some point. What did interest her was the suggestion she made.

"Ooooo, I'd be up for a pillow fight!!" She said, enthusiastically bouncing again. "It'd be a lot of fun!" Not that she was giving up on the story idea because she still wanted it. It was just...she had a lot of energy to burn at the moment...

Not. A. Good. Thing.

Awww but Kurumi was saying no. Her bouncing slowed to a stop. She knew that Kurumi had a lot of say at the moment which meant her saying no put an end to the matter. Darn it.

Well...she could always start pacing if she got too restless...that usually worked...

At Kurumi's suggestion she started smiling again. Hope was alive again, if only a little. "I'll have some hot chocolate I guess...--but do you have any candy???"

That was really all she was interested in and as she was sure the prefect remembered, all her candy was locked inside the common room and she was starting to go into withdrawl. Well maybe not yet BUT she would soon enough if she never got the required amount of sugar before bed. It was so mean of the thing to not throw out her candy as well. Wasn't it thinking clearly?!

"I mean, if you have cookies then those will do--but sugar cookies...or just extra sugary stuff in the hot chocolate. You know what, scratch that; do you have any sugar??" That could work tooo. "I still want the hot chocolate but sugar's the main focus right now."

"Yeah, it is nice to be safe, but adventure is awesome!" Sarah said, quite enjoying having Bentley's hand around her shoulder.

Yay, Alexa had come. "Well I second story telling... perhaps eve SPOOKY story telling. OR we can blindfold a person and play spooky in the dark. Basically the blindfolded person has to try and catch everyone else, who cxan see and to make it even more fun had a Marco Polo element". She hoped they knew what Marco Polo was in the pool. Yet incase they did not Sarah explained. "Basically whenever the blindfolded person wants they can call 'Marco' and everyone else HAS to call 'polo, this will give the blindfolded person an idea through sound where everyone is!". That game was an almagamation of lots of games that the Edwards family had made up together with their muggle cousins.

Sarah was glad, she had an appetite at like ALL times you see. She took the mug and brought it to her lips, some cocoa dribbling down a bit, yet she clean it up quickly with a cleaning spell.
People wanted to go to sleep? Well stuff them, sleep was for like babies and old people.

"Hi Melanie" Sarah said. And Ronnie was there as well. "Hi Ronny" she said. Why were people so glum, this was like AWESOME!
And Ira was there too, with like an awesome idea. "Hi Ira, we so MUST have a pillow fight"

Ronnie sat up at the word 'bed time stories'. *gasp* "PLEASE! BED TIME STORIES! PLEEEEEASE!" she said, bouncing a little where she sat. That would be soooo cool! Eeek! She so hoped for some bed time stories. She LOVED them, her dad used to always tell them to her and make up awesome things.

Pillow fight?! "Oooo! A pillow fight! That'd be wicked!" Ronnie exclaimed, bouncing some more. Tonight was just getting awesomer and awesomer! This was so exciting...sleeping in the great hall and all! Although she was still pretty curious about WHAT caused this whole thing...everyone being locked out of their common rooms and stuff. It was real weird...

Ronnie looked up as Kurumi asked if she wanted something to drink. She smiled. "Sure, that'd be nice." she said.


Ronnie grinned. "Hiya, Sarah!" she said. "This is pretty exciting, isn't it?" she asked with a giggle.

Melanie poked a star on her sleeping bag. She was clearly not satisfied or happy with this situation but then she heard her voice. Oh, it was Miss Kurumi. She struggled to put a smile on her face as she gave a slight wave back to the prefect. "Hello, Miss Kurumi," Melanie greeted. Ah.

Tea party.

Melanie had forgotten about that! Melanie looked at the tea and cookies that they had there. The prefect had a very good point. A grin spreading across her face, Melanie nodded. "Oh yes, please," she said, nodding her head. She definitely wanted a tea party. Maybe Mister Bear couldn't attend this one... nor were there any pretty dresses and decorative stuff everywhere, but Melanie was definitely up for a tea party. It would take her mind off of things. She scooted over closer to the older Gryffindor and smiled.

"What do people do at tea parties?"

Because all Melanie knew was that they drank tea and ate food. hehe... and that was what appealed to her. Oh. And everyone there was classy. That was something else she knew.

Melanie glanced over at the person who had addressed her. Smiling, she waved. "Hello Sarah." And she was only smiling because... tea party.

Seren smiled warmly at Kurumi, of course she had it all under control, Merlin... she was going to miss this girl. "Wonderful... there wasn't any trouble was there?" Because toes out of line in an 'emergency' situation was not acceptable, for anybody. Ever.

"Thank you," she added, a little too quickly as she took the tea. She'd been waiting for this all day... and finally...

After taking a few sips of the warm liquid, Seren listened as the students made suggestions. "Spooky stories are fine by me," she started, nodding in approval, "...though don't expect me to be telling any, I'm not very imaginative." There was no way she was about to let Alexa, Ronnie or Sarah talk her into it. Perhaps Sir Nicholas had some good spooky stories, she thought, scanning the Great Hall to see if the Ghost had shown... apparently not.

The pillow fight clearly wouldn't be happening any time soon but she was glad to see that it had so many people willing to participate in it. Pillow fights didn't play themselves and it wasn't a fight if you were playing alone...well...actuaaaaally...that was a rather interesting thought that she'd have to try out one day.

She got pulled from her thoughts when Melanie started asking about tea parties. Lex had to think long and hard on this one. They were giving up pillow fights and spooky stories for teat parties???

Merlin...

At least Sarah was still thinking sensibly. Spooky stories were pure gold--Oh? Alexa sat up straight when she heard the girl's next suggestion, shifting Felix just a little so he wouldn't get uncomfortable.

"Neat! I wanna do that first!!" Because she still wanted to do everything else but this was best done before the others. "Sounds like some good fun to me!" Blindfolded and catching people? Now that was a productive way to spend the night. Now the question was, were her prefect and HoH opposed to that? Afterall, it was far better than anything she could have thought of. Yup. Fun was Lex's thing but the kind of fun was another story completely.

"Since it's your idea will you be going first?" It was only fair...then again she still didn't know if anyone else wanted to play...Mmm.

"Oh...okay..." Lex didn't try to hide the disappointment in her voice. She was really looking forward to a bedtime story... from...from her Head of Hou--Didn't those mean you had to go to bed right afterwards?!!? Hoooold on. Um...that wasn't really going to work. Sleeping anytime soon was a big no no. What if something terrible happened or the force came after them or something?? She didn't want to be asleep and miss the whole thing--she'd never forgive herself!!

All the cool things happened when people sent younger kids to bed but she was determined to stay awake until the last person in the hall was knocked out cold.

"So then...will you participate in the pillow fight...?" There was no way she'd give the woman a chance to sleep either. Nope. She was in charge of them and if she fell asleep they could DIE.

Dylan snuck in while his Head of House was talking and acted like he had been there the whole time, didnt need anyone knowing that he had been on a small walk about after curfew cause it just felt cool to be around the school after curfew. The castle was so quiet with people in their sleeping area including the professors, so it had felt cool to actually be around the castle with no-one around and actually for once sneaking around and having a bit of a walk.

He then without meaning to spoke up "Yeah!! spooky stories!!" he blurted out before clapping a hand to his mouth, before acting like he had meant to say that cause he had been here the whole time right! so he sat there as he looked all excited at having spooky stories to tell them. Cause he loved those, even though some were real scary, dad had told off his friends for telling really scary stories to a young guy.. NOT kid.. GUY!!

"This is like awesome is it not? Sleepover party!" Said Sarah eagerly

"Yeah it is, there is so much we can do"
Sarah gushed
"Sure I will go first!" Said Sarah, "All I need is to be blindfolded and tadaa" this was going to be awesome! "Unless a spooky story or pillow fight is preferred. If you want I can tell a spooky story!" She just needed to think of one...

With the plan set in motion Sir Nicholas floated into the Great Hall to check on the well being of his beloved lions. He was so anxious and worried for all of them.

He didn't realize where he was floating before he had floated right through Professor Bentley. Spinning around so fast his head rolled off to hang on his right shoulder Sir Nicholas blurted out ashamed. "So....sorry...Professor Bentley. I didn't see you standing there."

Refastening his head Sir Nicholas with some effort he looked around at the assembled lions. "Is everyone all right? I heard about the lockout from the Fat Lady."

Would she participate in a pillow fight?........... She so badly wanted to say yes. But... it probably wasn't the wisest idea in the Great Hall will ... Oh what the heck. "Sure... BUT..." she paused, making sure Alexa didn't just take the yes and run with it. "I have conditions..." very very serious ones. "We'll do the spooky story first, and THEN, we can have a pillow fight, but no longer than ten minutes, because then it's bed time."

Ten minutes was enough to tire them out right? She sure hoped so.


Well it looked like spooky stories was a-go! "Wonderful! Thank you Sarah for volunteering, I can't wait to hear it."
Now... she needed somewhere to sit with her tea.

"Spooky story time folks! Gather round!" she announced.

"Aaarrrgghhhhhh!" she yelled, jumping so quickly it wouldn't have surprised her if she left her skin behind. The icy sensation was not unfamiliar, but it was very much unwelcome.
"Nicholas!" she blurted out, still shocked.

After catching her breath, she gave the House Ghost a nod, it was true, obviously. Though, she hadn't heard anything other than that there was a lockout. "Did the Fat Lady say why?"