"Oh. That's not good! You need to work on that" Because well being scared wasn't that good. So hopefully he wouldn't get scared all the time. "Oh. I like your name!" It was unusual and she'd not heard it before. It was like her name. Nice and unique.

"Oh. That's good then. I bet you'll look good with muscles" Because well muscles wre good right? "Oh. That's not good!"

"Maybe i should invest in some weights..... they should have a gym here." A gym with WEIGHTS! "Or maybe i can lift small children..." he did have a brother at home, he can just carry him around everywhere. "You can clumb on up here if you'd like... don't let me less than par muscles scare you off."

"How old are you?" Because she wasn't worried about weights and stuff. So maybe he was older than her. "Are you that worried about getting muscles? Because that does seem like a lot of effort" And it was way too much effort for Hattie. "Oh yes yes" She nodded, before she climbed up next to him. "Ooh. The air is thinner up here" She pretended, with a little giggle.

"Just eleven." he nodded as his straight red hair stood up on end from him being upside down and his face turned shades of red. He looked over at her and nodded, "If i start now i'll have them by 13 then i wont have to work so hard." then it'll just be keeping in shape and it wont be so hard. "do the hard work now and get it over with.. then i can have fun later." with his muscles!! Did'n't she see his point here?

SNORT.

Sometimes it was hard for Esme to tell her father and sister apart. Not really, obviously. But their personalities were THAT similar. It was funny how they looked identical but had a lot of differences but she wouldn't have it any other way; she loved her sister more than anyone else in the world.

Giggling, she made her way back to the swing. "Thanks!" Juno had righted herself and was already swinging away. "Okay, let's see if you can beat me then." Because that was clearly what her twin was trying to do now. Taking a seat on the swing, she watched her sister.

Little Miss Glitter Lion, aka Olivia Phillips, had once again found her way out to the grounds on a lovely October afternoon. Shocking? Definitely not. See, it was already getting so stuffy in the castle and Liv CRAVED fresh air. Fresh air and some tree climbing, perhaps. It'd been a while since she'd added to her personal collection of scraps and bruises. The slightly less smol blonde was disappointed in herself.

In fact, she'd been heading that way.....towards her favorite beech tree...when she caught sight of someone so much much important than all the tree climbing in the universe.

Roo.

Rooney in a hat, too. That......that was confusing.

Being as Gryffindor as Olivia was, she made a bee line towards the playground where he was currently swinging at drastic heights. She was watching him in completely AWE, in fact. She'd never dared to go THAT HIGH....but her daring side.....wanted to now. She felt oddly challenged by Roo's display.

And his hat.

Yep, she was just watching him....until he noticed her.

Roooooooooooney was having the best best time swinging and swinging and swinging and EEEEEEEE. As he took his latest forward swing, he belted something out and decided that he needed to be HIGHER for it to sound at it's best. For HIM to sound at his best. He didn't sound it right now and it was generally a sad point if he couldn't sound WONDERFUL.

ESPECIALLY WHEN HE HAD AN AUDIENCE. OH HAY LIV.

Rooney tried to wave, taking one hand off the swing rope, but had to put it back straight away when he wobbled uncertainly and almost not even almost, but he would always say almost for the drama of it all fell from such a height that he may have got a bruise DIED. "MISS OLIIIIiIiiVIIIIAAAAA!!!!!!!!!" Had she seen him seeing her? Would she wave? OH. OH. "LOOK HOW HIGH I AM!" Could she also tell that he was getting higher each time he gave his legs the right flick to drive him upwards?

Could she also tell that his shoe had flown off in the last flick and was maybe heading her way..?

"TIMBERRRRRRRRRRRR"

"Oh, sister...you know I will." Juno called out and giggled as she did so. The only person that could make her laugh was Esme. She pumped her legs harder and harder, and the harder she pumped the higher she got. It was almost unsafe how high Juno was getting. Their mother would definitely be yelling at her, and their dad would be egging her on. She grinned at the thought. She missed them terribly when they were at school, but she loved school.

It was time. She had gotten at the best altitude she could possibly be at to surpass her sister's jump. She gave her Self 3 counts, "1......2...........3!" On three, she flung her self into the air, not only surpassing her sister, but landing so perfectly on her toes you would have thought she was a gymnast.

She grinned hugely and turned to her sister. "Think you can beat that?" She would for sure be in trouble if Esme broke a bone because of her.

Sniff, sniff, sniff!!

Long, pointed noses sniffed the air in search of shiniieeeeessssssssss.

Where were the shinies? The small herd of her-black snifflers nudged and shoved their companions in their hurried scampered search. They crawled, wiggled and made way into the playground filled with kiddies.

Kiddies always had shinies. One Niffler, a bit slimmer and faster than it's fellows, walked up to two females kiddies making quite a bit of noise. The Niffler sniffed at one of the girl's (Esme's) ankles before it's long nose reached up and into the girl's pocket to rummage through it's contents.

SHINIES??????

PFFT.

What a show off.

Esme rolled her eyes in amusement as her sister endeavored to outdo her... and proceeded to do so. "You really ARE dad's daughter." Giggle. It was all good though; actually Esme thought it was funny. "Way to go." Next time she WOULD manage to beat Juno but for now she was happy sitting on the swing and enjoying the nice breeze. Maybe they could have some fun with the monkey bars later.

"Don't be too sure of yourself because you're still going down." Evil grin because this wasn't over yet.

OH.

WHAT WAS THIS???

Esme felt something going at her pockets, and upon looking down she saw that it was a Niffler. "Hello, little guy." Or was it a girl? She had no idea how to tell. Smiling, she bent down to pick the creature up. Hopefully it wouldn't struggle because she wanted to give it a snuggle.

Was the human speaking to them? None of the nifflers noticed. The one sniffing the girls' pocket suddenly bit a hole in it, attempting to procure any gold that might be in there. Shinies. They needed shinies. It was why they had been herded from the forest.

Another niffler pawed at the ground, sticking its nose in the dirt, while the others in the herd began sniffing everything in the area vigorously. They were in full search mode, not interested in being pet or snuggled.

Where were the shiiiiiiiiinies?

Juno was just about to respond to her sister when she turned around to face her, and noticed all the nifflers. She looked like a guppy, her mouth hanging open and her eyes as wide as possible.

She knew this was not a good thing. Especially when one particular niffler started chewing at her sister's pocket. But she didn't want to hurt the animals, so she just stood there staring for a moment, not knowing what to do.

"Es, what do we do?" She called out to her sister calmly but a little fear rising in her voice. She was worried for her sister.

Right. Vivian mentally noted the whomping willow as one of the places she shouldn't go near, unless she wanted a quick reason to end up in the hospital wing. Maybe not now, at least. It seemed dead fun for her to mess with it a liiil bit. "What's your favourite portrait, personally? Like... is there one that is such a big sass or something?" Imagine having a sass battle with a PORTRAIT. Merlin, Vivi could imagine it in her head. Maybe her daddy used to pull on a joke there before. LOL. "I'll consider paying a visit to those places soon, Sir Oliver!"

She did agree with his statement but she sort of squinted at him because HAG reason. But Vivi understood that he was just kidding and so she grinned right back at him. "Oh... wow. Hogwarts sounds like a ridiculously crazy place." PROVEN ALREADY, with facts to support as well. She'd heard so much. Vivi wiggled on her seat.

Okay. This was getting more than a little crazy.

The Niffler had managed to make a hole in her pocket, and Esme tisked as she gently picked it up and set it on the ground near her. That was when she saw its buddies approaching. Right. There was a small herd of Nifflers. This could be quite bad because despite being rather adorable, they could be destructive. Look at what had happened to her pockets. They could tear the grounds apart on their search for shiny things.

Esme turned her attention back to her sister. "I'm going to tell Professor Draper about this." Since he was the Care of Magical Creatures Professor, obviously. "Be careful and stay here until I get back, okay." Juno was more than capable of taking care of herself but nothing had better happen to her. She was slightly worried, but Draper needed to be told about it and neither of them could cast Patronuses since they were only Fourth Years.

With that, she ran off. She'd be back with the Professor as soon as possible.

A few holes had been dug, and the nifflers still hadn't procured their precious shinies. As one of the studentsies ran off, the one of the nifflers sniffed at the remaining girl once more before they took off for the castle.

The search for the shiiiiiiiiinies continued on!

"Ok!" Juno called out to her sister as she ran to go get the professor. Then all of the sudden....the nifflers started running away. It was probably because they couldn't find anything shiny.

Juno watched as the little hoard of creatures scurried off towards the castle. She hoped Esme wasn't to far out of earshot, she called out "ESME THEY ARE LEAVING!" She didn't know if her sister would hear her or not...but she figured even if she didn't hear her...she'd be back soon.

Juno decided to sit back down on a swing and wait until her sister and possibly the professor came back.

Darn those nifflers for ruining their fun sister time!

Oh dear.

Esme shook her head as she headed outside of the office before Professor Draper. "Hopefully that won't happen this time since we spotted them before they could get to the castle." There she was being the ever optimistic Hufflepuff, but it was important to stay calm. Hopefully things would be sorted before they could get inside the castle and cause real damage.

Or not.

Frowning, she looked around the playground. The Nifflers were gone and there were holes in the ground. Yeah, the groundskeeper was not going to be happy, but what could they do? At least Juno was okay. "They didn't try to swarm you, did they?" she asked with concern. Her sister looked to be okay, but still. They went crazy for shiny things.

"Looks like they headed for the castle." Frown.

"Hopefully," he repeated, knowing better than to think that optimistically. Unfortunately despite each Professor's greatest efforts, the students here were still going to act out of stupidity. Meaning that doors would be left open and nifflers would be let in. And if there was any question about it, James already knew who they most likely culprits would be. Some of these kids just didn't think before doing. And despite that trait being common to Gryffindor House, James wouldn't point fingers at them first. 1) He was biased. 2) He was biased.

Reaching the playground didn't take long, but when they did James had to look around the place twice just to be sure that he was right about what he was seeing: aka nothing. Maybe they decided to turn around and head back for the forrest? James knew better than to be optimistic about this matter too.

He too was interested in hearing what Juno had to say. "What exactly happened while Esme came to find me?" Because had the Nifflers been reeled in chasing down a particular student's shinies... They may have a lead. And if not, well then... It was Castle!Professors' problem now. #SorryNotSorry

"I'll send a message out to the other Professors, but it won't do us well to try to hunt them down," like James had said earlier, they were cunning creatures. And they could be anywhere by now. "We'll just have to catch them right when they're spotted." Or something like that.

Honestly, as long as they weren't his nifflers (the ones in the barn), James wasn't all too concerned. They couldn't live in the castle for all that long... They'd return home soon enough. And they weren't any serious harm to the students. Not like they had let dragons loose.

Sure, it was winter, but that didn't mean she couldn't go outside on the playground. Just put on a few layers of clothes, cast a warming charm for good measure, and you were good to go. It wasn't as bad as Durmstrang anyway, which was probably also one of the reasons she liked Hogwarts so much.

Rula reached the playground and, pleased to see that the swings weren't all taken, she seated herself in the first one. Not that that many people wanted to swing when it was cold outside. But hopefully someone would stop by! The more the merrier.

Finally after having waited awhile her sister and the professor came back. But unfortunately all the Nifflers had run towards the castle.

Juno crossed her arms, it was still a little chilly out, "No the didn't swarm me. I'm fine." She said to her sister, who was sometimes a worry wart but she was the same way about Esme. She was always worried about her.

She turned to the professor at the point, "Well, after Esme left they continued to dig and sniff around for a few moments, and even sniffed at me before running off towards the castle. I tried to call after you Es, but I figured you were to far away to hear me at that point. So I decided to wait till you both came. I'm sorry professor should I have followed them?" She hoped they weren't in trouble or anything...not that they had done anything wrong.

Torie managed to find his way to the playground and was mumbling about gold as he staggered around. His face was blank as his eyes searched for something shiny that looked like gold. He needed his shiny. A necklace, maybe a ring or bracelet. Anything shiny! Must find gold... he mumbled again as he stumbled forward.

The most pressing concern for Esme was whether or not her sister was okay, so it was a huge relief to know that nothing had happened other than the Nifflers digging holes before moving on. Yeah, the groundskeeper really wasn't going to be happy about that but what could they do? Seemed that the most destruction could be done outside since there was dirt everywhere. Stone wasn't exactly the easiest thing to dig into... Obviously.

She nodded as Professor Draper said that he was going to send a Patronus off for the other Professors. "What should we do if we find any?" That seemed like a valid question in Esme's opinion. She had no idea what to do if she came across a small (or large) number of them causing chaos. It would be so much easier of she or Juno could cast Patronuses but it was what it was. It would be harder to get to Professor Draper if he was far away from them at the time.

"Good," he commented in regards to her state. She wasn't hurt, that was a relief. He hated sending kids to the hospital wing. The healer was almost as bad as Poncho Paul. In an entirely different way, but still not pleasant company. In James' not-so-humble opinion. Any interaction avoided with Murdoch was a success story.

Honestly, it was strange that the nifflers were loose again. The same thing had happened last term, though he decided to keep this information to himself. It meant something had to have been off. Perhaps something was not in balance in the forrest? He ought to consult the groundskeeper on this one. "For now, do the same thing you did this time. Contact a member of staff," he nodded, thinking deeply about the situation. "The nifflers won't cause any real harm, they'll just cause some chaos." Not dangerous creatures, really.

"Thank you for notifying me, girls," he nodded making a mental note to go talk to the groundskeeper. "Is there anything else I can help with?"

Juno gave the professor a small smile. He really was a great teacher and was always concerned for their well-being. She also felt good about doing the right thing and telling the professor about the nifflers. It wasn't normal for them to be running around free like that.

Juno looked over to Esme, she didn't think there was anything else they needed. "I don't think so professor. Esme, is there anything else?" She asked her sister.

Right. Do the same thing that they had done before. Sounded good. Esme could do that easily. She nodded her head to show that she understood what Professor Draper was saying. It never hurt to cover all bases and make sure of things. Hopefully the Nifflers would be rounded up before they could cause TOO much damage to Hogwarts since it appeared that they had managed to make their way inside.

Sigh.

Her attention turned to Juno as her sister said that there wasn't anything else that they needed. "I don't think so. Nothing is coming to mind at least." Since she had already asked what to do in case they spotted more... "Thank you, Professor." And now he knew that there were Nifflers on the loose and the other Staff knew as well so they would be at least somewhat prepared for things. Better than nothing, right?