welcome to chimera!

[Edwin Zonko]

Wrapped up in a jacket on the third floor, Eddy only looked just as suspicious as he always did. Having stayed up half the night at his detention (because apparently pretending to be a werewolf in a crowded room and intentionally inciting a panic had been wrong of him), he recalled that he'd promised to meet Eileen after breakfast only halfway through the meal. It was just a good thing, he thought privately, that he rarely slept in. A quick trip back to the tower had supplied him with the jacket and money. He might not have bothered with the latter, but it was already the kind of weather that made breath visible and left the windows frosted in the mornings. Despite his little detour, he wasn't late getting to the meeting place.

He was even early, and it was after a brief glance at his watch that he felt relieved that he could have a seat. Seating himself against the wall, almost jerking away from the feel of cold stone at his back, he remained fairly still and gave it a chance to warm. Hardly as alert as he usually was, but more than aware that he was making himself prone to a joke or a jinx when he shut his eyes, Eddy decided to risk it. As he waited by old Gunhilda, he even drifted off briefly, chin nodding against his chest.

[Eileen Prince]

Eileen finished her breakfast without interruption, which was as she expected. She ate without paying a great deal of attention to her surrounding students except to now and then give a defensive look to anyone she thought was staring at her. There was nothing charming to her morning routine, but Eileen Prince rarely considered herself capable of charming. Finished, she exited the Great Hall with more purpose than she usually found herself to have.

Along with her cloak, she had brought with her the note with instructions and fished it out of her pocket. Without difficulty, she located the hump-backed statue, and then, to the side of it, noticed Zonko, apparently napping. Eileen was interested in Eddy's company perhaps more than most of her peers, and more particularly than many boys, although she was not at all clever enough at social relations to understand what that meant. She was, however, undeniably pleased that he had invited her, and usually happy to be in his company. Not quite displaying this in her expression, Eileen stared down at him for a long moment at the boy and then said, directly, "I'm here." She didn't particularly raise or lower her voice, but she spoke levelly, as usual, standing over him, only a few steps away.

[Edwin Zonko]

This was enough to wake Eddy, who'd only been sleeping very lightly by the time Eileen had arrived at the statue. Somehow managing to look up at her without much of a start, he resisted any urge to rub his face and instead flashed her a broad smile - arguably too broad, really, for someone who'd just woken up from a catnap. "So you are," he replied, lighthearted as ever as he climbed to his feet. With the help of the stone wall behind him, he was upright in only a moment or two, brushing off his clothing and straightening out the lapels on his jacket.

Though he and Eileen had known each other for a few years now, he was only able to remember speaking to her a few times; most of their conversations, predictably, had been centered around the club they'd met in. Though this did not seem like a problem to Eddy or even a point of regret, he couldn't help feeling a bit at a loss as to how to proceed in conversation with her. That, and he was a bit odd when it came to serious conversation - rusty almost, like his skill had fallen out of use. Ever polite, however, even if sometimes sarcastically, he began with a stock question. "Did you have a nice breakfast?" he asked lightly, even as he withdrew his wand from a bag at his side and approached the statue.

[Eileen Prince]

It was really a good thing that Zonko woke quickly, as Eileen would have been hard pressed to imagine ways to wake him from a deeper sleep. She watched as he climbed to his feet, not interfering, and holding her cloak around herself in a subconsciously defensive manner. She was not unfriendly with Zonko - and didn't want to be, but the manner came to her automatically, learned from her experience, and her interpretation of it. She didn't want to dislike him - in fact, it was probably something very opposite, that she had yet to understand - but all the same, it couldn't be said that she looked overly friendly.

She followed him towards the statue, and nodded once in answer to his question, "Yes. It was as nice as always." Pleasantries didn't come incredibly easily to Eileen, so she did not inquire in return, and instead asked a question of her own interest, "Why were you sleeping there?"

[Edwin Zonko]

Not bothered by a lack of reciprocation, at least as far as small talk went, he only glanced at her over his shoulder and grinned crookedly. "Oh, I don't know what you mean," he replied airily, even if he still felt half-asleep. "Where else would I nap?"

"Dissendium," he murmured after a sweeping glance around the corridor, confident as ever and even beginning to smile properly. The witch's hump opened up, and he turned toward his companion again. "Good, you brought a cloak," he commented, looking at her properly again and offering her a hand. The step down was a bit steep, and the gesture was as automatic as any other, even if it was quite gentlemanly. "Here, watch your step there."

[Eileen Prince]

"In your dormitory," Eileen answered, as if this hadn't been a joke, and he was being purposefully dense - though she meant it less sharply than it sounded. She stood aside as he cast the spell, watching with some legitimate interest as the spell worked perfectly as a code, and the witch's hump began a passage-way. She pulled her cloak closed before she took his offered hand - it was a gesture of manners she was not unused to, though she found herself, somewhere private, pleased with it - a thought she found strange, and didn't know how to dwell on. Looking away and straight in front of her, which felt awkward, even if it looked not ou

t of character for her, she followed his advice, stepping down carefully with his assistance. "Thank you," she said, evenly, withdrawing her hand as soon as she was firmly on the ground of the passage, twisting back to make sure he followed - as if she thought he was capable of shutting her in and running away laughing (nothing quite so horrific had ever happened to eileen, who wouldn't have really been a funny enough target for it, but that didn't stop her imagining such things done against her, almost regularly).

[Edwin Zonko]

Laughing outright at her reply, perhaps thinking it a joke and perhaps not, Eddy nodded as though this was a fair answer. Climbing down after her, he did not take his own advice, taking it at more of a jump. Landing in an easy manner that made it obvious that this was a well-practiced little stunt, he peered overhead as he properly gained his footing. Watching as the entrance closed, he wasted little time in the pitch black. "Lumos," he said into the damp, cold, echoing tunnel, and his wand lit up the area around them rather brightly.

"I hope you enjoy long walks, Eileen," he commented brightly, brushing off his coat again - quite needlessly - and glancing ahead. "Come along then," he added, amiable if not his usually boundlessly energetic self quite yet. With that, he began to lead the way, though he walked at a somewhat companionable pace; it couldn't be said that Eddy was completely inconsiderate.

[Eileen Prince]

She did come after him, clutching her cloak around her and staying instinctively very close behind his steps - there was no real way that was apparent that she could get lost, but she didn't really like even the thought of it. Wandering passages of Hogwarts alone was not a possibility she liked to entertain - though it was also not one she had ever even considered, previously. "Lumos," she echoed, lighting the end of her own wand.

However, it was his laughter that stuck with her primarily, and that caused Eileen's lips to set in a thin, rather defensive line, across her pale countenance, in the dark. "Don't laugh at me," she said quite sharply, her voice carrying to him easily, as she didn't bother, or think, to hush it. She took laughter automatically at her expense, and often saw teasing, before it even had a chance to develop, whether or not it would have. Her sensitivity in its way out-stripped her mistreatment, though she never seemed to notice.