Woodgreen Academy Archive

 Summary: Pansy is hyperventilating. Hermione is undermined. Ron sleeps on a table. Draco does the impossible. There are people in love with gods.

North Wing, 7:45pm

For the seventh time in the last hour the door swung open without a warning and a stranger poked a head in, asking about this or that. Things Pansy Parkinson would normally not care about but all prefects have the open door policy and so she must, at least, reply even if it was simply to dismiss. Besides, the faster she could give the answer to whatever it was, the shorter time she would have to see the strange head hovering by her door.

“Do we have curfew tonight?” Asked the boy with a slight frown; Richard Grayson, if Pansy remembered it correctly.

“Lights out by ten, but I don’t care. Just don’t wake anyone up while sneaking in,” she answered in a heartbeat. Briefly, she wondered why people still had to ask — returning students at that. If they were hoping that the schedule would change, they would have to wait until their eyes dried white.

“Just making sure. Okay, thanks.” And then he left and she would have a few moments of blissful peace until the next idiot.

Pansy had long lost the ability to be surprised as her door once again opened without preamble. This time it was someone who wanted to switch floors because hers was too loud. If switching rooms were possible, Pansy would have been the first one to leave and take the top floor and the last room, farthest from the staircase so these Neanderthals would have to think twice before asking another stupid question.

“No.”

“Crap.” The girl left, long blond hair swishing irritatingly with each step.

“Pansy Parkinson! Tomorrow’s the first day of school so can we work on the Wing’s bulletin board tonight? I have a few ideas.”

‘Luna Lovegood and breathless. Not good,’ Pansy noted as she closed her closet door to frown at her new visitor. “Knock yourself out. Who else will work on it?”

“Oh, me and Myrtle and Parvati and I think Hannah. You?”

“No.”

Luna stopped and blinked, then shrugged. “It’ll be ready tomorrow.” She beamed one last time before closing the door.

Pansy sighed, silently hoping that was the last assault for the night. She was the first one to move in, considering her position and all the preps for the week-long grace period of moving in for her housemates. Yet, looking around her room with still unpacked suitcases and disarranged books, one would think she just moved in this morning.

Other than having the biggest room in the house, everything about the glorified prefect was building a misery in her grand plan of enjoying the senior year. She should be out tonight and enjoying the last free day before school. Instead, here she was, taking her clothes out of her suitcases and wincing at the crumpled fabric of her dresses.

Again, the door opened and Pansy was ready to throw the pest out of her room if it was another simple question that could be answered if they had read the handbook. Strangely enough, there was just silence so Pansy looked up from her activity and scowled darkly at the crouching idiot behind her now closed door.

“Crabbe! What do you think you’re doing?”

“Oh, we’re playing hide and seek.” Vincent Crabbe chuckled and opened the door with a crack, peeking out cautiously. “The loser has to do the laundry for the first week.”

She buried her face in the cotton dress she had in her hands to muffle what would have been loud shrieks of frustration. It had only been seven days (and nights), and her once proud bearing of the ice queen was threatening to regress back into a seven-year-old child with a tantrum.

Breathing slowly, she tried to compose herself and counted the little blessings she could think of. At least Gregory wasn’t in her wing. If the buffoon was together with Vincent, her frustrations would mount to disastrous heights.

‘I will not lose my cool. I will not lose my cool. I will not…‘ Her silent mantra was abruptly cut off as Vincent sprang up from his crouch and made a mad dash outside. She could hear people shouting from the hallway, cheering Vincent to outrun the ‘It’.

This was her life for the next full school year, including the summer before they march and move on. She could feel the bile rise in her throat at the thought of the previous week multiplied by forty.

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West Wing, 8:15pm

“{Why is Marcus Flint here?}” Gabrielle Delacour whined in French as soon as she opened the door to the room, not bothering to knock.

“Please knock next time.”

“{Oh, pardon.}” The petite girl had the grace to blush in embarrassment, eyeing the sign on the door’s corkboard — ‘KNOCK FIRST’ in big bold black letters against a blinding yellow background.

Hermione Granger had had it with her housemates after forty-eight hours of random barges in her room. The open door policy for prefects was something she could understand and tolerate, but people taking it too literally grated her insides with an ugly itch. She looked up from her book and smiled patiently at Delacour, “No harm done but please be reminded next time. Now what is it about Flint?”

As if the name itself was a switch, Delacour’s demeanor returned to that red-faced fuming little woman who barged in earlier. “{What is that foul man doing here? Shouldn’t he be in South where he won’t be a disturbance to every one of us here trying to do something productive? He has brought his little gang of college idiots and is having a party in his room!}”

The onslaught of French made Hermione’s head ring. She may be decent in the language but she wasn’t that good. It took a while until Delacour’s rant came together and translated properly. And when it did, Hermione was out of her room and marching straight to Marcus Flint’s floor.

Meanwhile, Flint and company were playing poker with beers on the side. This was what Hermione walked in on and she had to calm herself down and remember that there were about six full grown men in the room — all of which she couldn’t literally throw out by herself. Her eyes swept through the faces of Flint’s visitors and recognized them as Woodgreen Alumni; all from the previous batch, Flint’s batch.

“What is the meaning of this?”

“Oh, hey.” Flint had the gall to give her a cheeky grin. “It’s a last hoorah before tomorrow’s first day of hell. Want something to drink?”

“No, thank you,” she snapped then caught herself before she entered a full rant. She needed to be diplomatic. Violence would only lead her into a lot of pain. “You’re not allowed to party in these rooms. There are suites downstairs and there is the dining room for all these food and you are not allowed alcohol. And no outsiders.”

“Oooooh…” Flint’s visitors parroted each other in mimicking tumbleweeds, much to Hermione’s further chagrin. They were obviously drunk, or getting there.

“I’m not a minor, Granger. And this is my room so stay out.”

“No. I’m the authority in this place so show your friends out of this compound or I’ll call security.”

“Hey! They’re Woodgreen students, too. What’s up your knickers?” At this, Marcus Flint stood up and towered over Hermione by a head. Unfortunately for him, Hermione was not one to be intimidated by heights.

“If you want to stay with your friends then go outside as well. Curfew isn’t until ten. And clean up here. If you check the housing regulations, we are not allowed to bring in people from other departments. Your friends are not in Woodgreen High anymore.” She bit down the following insult. She didn’t want to go that low even if Flint was already testing her last reserves.

It looked like he was about to make a scene but another figure came up from behind Hermione, someone much taller than Flint. Even if the newcomer was on the slim side, his silent demeanor had always been an intimidating factor. It did help also that he was a cadet officer.

Flint’s eyes shifted to glare at the tall lanky figure hovering by Hermione. “What do you want, Barton?”

Trowa Barton’s brunette hair fell over half of his face, but he didn’t need two eyes to glare down Marcus Flint. “I’ll show your friends out.”

Perhaps Hermione had hoped too much that a lone officer could make a difference. From her peripheral, she noticed that Delacour had already called Wufei Chang from the fourth floor. Now, she was worried if she didn’t get a control of this situation, things would turn violent. It did not help matters that the chauvinistic Chinese would later blame her for this.

It didn’t need any explanation. The moment the Chinese stopped by the doorway and took in the sight, he pointed at the five drunken boys on the floor and told them to get out. Apparently, they knew each other.

“Bah, Chang’s still a prick.”

“You should be thankful he wasn’t chosen as prefect,” one of them slurred and patted Flint’s leg then rolled on the floor laughing.

“Alright boys, just get your stuff and leave this floor. You’ve had your fun.” Hermione sighed, suddenly tired. She turned to Flint and scowled, if she needed to be condescending to get her point across, then so be it, “And you, if this is your form of exerting your seniority over all of us, it’s not working. Staying for an extra year does not give you any dominance over anybody especially not to the house regulations.”

“If anything, you should be embarrassed that you have to repeat your year,” Chang jibed in and Hermione wished the Chinese boy had just kept his mouth shut.

“I’ll take the lecture from her because she’s in the position but not from you, Chang. She’s higher in rank and I bet that just tickles.” Flint sneered, leaning closer to the now red-faced Chinese.

“Okay, okay, stop this!” Hermione stepped in between the two boys and crossed her arms. “It’s late and everyone would like to go back to what they were doing, especially me. Flint, clean up here and Barton can show your friends out.” She took a quick glance at the silent boy and smiled gratefully when he nodded.

All the while, Delacour simply stood in the back as an observer. Upon seeing that the situation had been resolved, she smiled at Hermione and went inside her room, right across Marcus Flint’s.

When it was just Hermione and Chang outside Flint’s closed door, she turned to look at the Chinese. “Look, I know you don’t like women—“

“I haven’t even said anything yet.” Chang snorted then glared. “I have nothing against Mr. Onizuka even though I personally do not approve of his choice of prefects. But as long as you do your job, I’m the least of your problems.”

She watched him as he scowled at Flint’s closed door. “Well then… that’s good to know. Thanks.”

He gave her a nod then walked off to the staircase, and back to his room she assumed. On her way back to her floor (which was the second floor), she couldn’t help but consider having floor managers to help maintain some peace just in case there would be a repeat scenario. There hadn’t been a need of floor managers the previous years of her stay in this Wing but then again, there had been no Marcus Flint or anything of his sort before either. The West Wing had always been considered as the most docile of all wings and the residents, more or less, independent.

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Prefect HQ at the clubhouse, 12:45am

The doorknob rattled a couple of times followed by a very hard and determined push before the door finally opened. Draco squinted in the dark and tried to decipher what it was that made the door difficult to open. Stepping inside, he almost tripped and came across the offending object. A box from when they moved in, full of last year’s junk. Muttering a curse at the box, Draco stepped over it and looked around the office. It took him a full minute before the scene finally registered in his sleep-deprived mind. Ronald Weasley was sprawled on top of the table they use for meetings. Sleeping. It didn’t look comfortable.

He slammed the door shut, hoping it would wake the occupant of their supposed office. Unfortunately, the redhead slept like the dead.

“Weasley!” He shook the comatose boy with no success. A few more tries did no better. Fed up with being ignored, Draco pinched Ron’s nose and covered the mouth with his free hand.

At first, Ron merely shifted and tried to swat the hands away but said hands remained resolute. His dreamless sleep promptly shifted into that of a horrifying nightmare of wooden planks and pirates and drowning. He struggled for air, flapping his arms and legs to remain afloat.

One arm flew and smacked Draco’s forehead, forcing the blond to stagger back and release his hold over the gasping redhead. By the time Draco looked up, Ron was already on him, fisting his shirt and raising him off the floor with a growl.

“You bastard! You just tried to kill me!” Ron punctuated every word with a firm shake.

“That woke you up, didn’t it?” Draco tried to break free but couldn’t pry off the long fingers from his shirt. So he settled with something more barbaric but effective— he slammed his forehead against Ron’s.

Ron did let go but just one hand to rub the sore spot. The other, he kept a good grip on the shirt until he can start seeing straight again.

“God… can’t anyone get some sleep here. Damn it.” Ron eventually shoved Draco off, still rubbing his sore head. He took the time to check his watch then resumed glaring at the blond. “It’s past midnight, what are you doing here?”

“I should ask you the same. What, you finally got thrown out by your own house?” Draco snorted and pushed some chairs together near the wall and sat down, propping his feet on one with a tired grunt. East Wing wasn’t normally a loud house but a certain American named Duo Maxwell decided seniors of the house should throw a party before the final year began and on their final night by the end of the year before the marching day. This meant there would be two planned obnoxiously loud house parties inside the suite which just happened to be below his room. Sleep was futile and he had to be up early the following day to attend a meeting with the school director and the rest of the student staff before 7:30am.

Silence met Draco’s dig, which was a surprise to him. He turned to look at where he knew the redhead was earlier and frowned to see empty space. His eyes searched the dark room and realized that Ron had left.

‘Good riddance.’

He made his way to the table, grudgingly accepting the fact that sleeping on the table was better than bridged chairs any day. He was about to stretch on it when the door opened and something soft smacked his face. He recognized the designs as varsity jackets, probably from the supply room.

“Wha—?”

Draco had barely gotten any word out when he found himself being pushed off the table and dumped with a few more wrapped jackets.

“Off the table, Malfoy. I got here first. Slept on the chairs a few days ago and I’m not masochistic enough to do that again. Just put those back in the supply room tomorrow.” Once the table was free, Ron went back on the table and dumped his stack of wrapped uniforms to serve as his pillow for the night. “Should’ve thought of this earlier,” he continued to mutter to himself until he settled down and fell back asleep just like that.

For a while, Draco entertained the thought that the redhead actually sleepwalked and that their whole bout earlier was nothing more than a simple dream. He would have thought that amusing if his addled brain hadn’t wanted to get some sleep of his own as well. Trudging his way back to his set up camp spot, he dropped the jackets and tried to find a comfortable position for sleep. Tomorrow he would complain about the squishy sounds of plastic but for tonight, he was grateful that there was an actual pillow.

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Administration Building, 7:15am

All four of them were standing outside the director’s office. The meeting was set at seven but there had been a series of meetings they weren’t informed of. The first batch was the student council of the university. They were next, but were instructed to go in only if the cadet officers were already present.

“Hmm… first agenda of the year: we need a couch in that office.” Ron murmured, rubbing his neck.

Hermione raised an eyebrow, “That would cost a lot and we still have the budget to consider. We don’t even have a budget yet.”

“Just a couch? Let’s have a complete set, with a coffee table.” Pansy nodded, delighted at the very idea of new furniture. “There’s enough space once we get rid of the boxes and –“

“Don’t encourage him.” Hermione narrowed her eyes.

“I’ll agree on the couch bit.”

Three sets of eyes turned to stare at Draco. He was wont to disagree to anything Ron said, if only for the principle of it but he still had bruises from sleeping on that chair and falling off half the time. “What?”

“Three against one, Hermione.” Ron grinned.

Before Hermione could argue her point, the door to the office opened and out walked the director himself, Treize Kushrenada. If it was in her character to do so, she would swoon. But it wasn’t, so she simply smiled and greeted their superior a good morning.

“Ah, you’re all here. Good.” Treize looked at them and Ron felt that the director was sizing them up and it was unnerving. The director’s face then broke into a smile and gestured for all four to follow him. He walked out followed by the student council representatives from the university counterpart of Woodgreen: Lex Luthor, Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent and Diana Prince. All of them were handpicked by the university dean. By the records, they were akin to gods. But by reputation, the four had issues of exaggerated heights. People either loved them or hated them.

Draco wanted to be the next Lex Luthor. Pansy still harbored the infatuation for Bruce Wayne. Hermione thought Clark Kent to be the perfect man. And Ron believed he was in love with Diana Prince.

The group came across the senior and junior officers on their way out of the building: Roy Mustang and his band of officers from the university ROTC, and Usagi Tsukino with hers from Woodgreen High. How the blond girl with her 4’11” height outmaneuvered the dubbed ‘Perfect Soldier’ in the position of commander would remain a mystery. Some said the Perfect Soldier declined the offer and settled to be this girl’s executive officer instead.

Once they were all outside of the main campus gate, the director stopped walking and turned to face them. It was a strange parade to have witnessed, one that only happened during the first day of the school year.

“First of all, good morning,” Treize Kushrenada began in all his suave calm. Many thought that it should be illegal to be proper and presentable at such an ungodly hour of the morning. “Though this ritual is nothing new to some of you, you will have to bear with me as I explain this briefly.”

He gave a sweeping look to all the young leaders lined up then nodded, as if finding everything to be in its place. “First, we will have a photo op by batch to be kept in the school records. First up would be the university reps, then the high school prefects, then the ROTC officers and then the junior officers. The last one would include me with everyone.” He stopped and waited if there would be indignant squeaks like the previous year and was glad that there were none. “We will begin an informal meeting through breakfast to better reacquaint ourselves with each other together with the faculty of all the departments from the primary to the tertiary levels.”

Treize observed each of his student staff carefully, considering the range of reactions from nonexistent to exuberant; he could already tell the height of activity in the coming year. “If everything goes well, this will be our first of the only two official gathering. The last one would be held at the end of the year for your commendations of a job well done. If I were to see you again as a group like this in between those two events, there had better be a good explanation. Other than that, I will be kept informed by your moderators and only by them unless deemed necessary. Understood?”

Various nods and voices of assent followed. The director may be lax and amiable but everyone knew the thinly veiled threat not to royally fuck up. The next time they come together in complete attendance with the director meant something seriously went wrong as a whole that he himself had to have a direct hand in the situation. But on a daily basis, they were all independent governing bodies.

“I see the photographer now. Shall we?”

TBC