Similarities and Mirrors

[Dante Vittori]

Dante had neglected to write home for some time. He rarely wrote home as he did not have much to say. Writing was just another form of communication that he did not appreciate. However he had a quill and ink with him. He knew that he was getting a letter today because of the time that it generally took to flap from New Zealand to Italy. He had his next letter in the pocket of his robes. He had yet to have a reply to his previous, but that was to Amanda. This one was for his father. Since she had moved, it was harder to write to her. He was not sure why he bothered much anymore. His father at least remained in one area. Amanda often on the move. His poor owl must have flown enough to encase the entire planet. How it managed he was not sure - but she had yet to fail to deliver his letters to his family and their letters to him. So until such a time that she did fail, he was happy to walk up to the North Tower with some owl treats and give her a few for her next flight. Hopefully soon his father and Amanda would invest in buying and using their own owls for this, just o save his own from having to travel all the time by herself.

Dante focused on the window as a small figure in the sky appeared. Upon further examination, he realised that it was an owl of similar shape and colour to his own. He was confident that this was his owl, as he knew not of anyone else's and there appeared to be no one here to accept or send a letter. He was fortunate that they had chances to come here and collect letters and other gifts. He was happy to miss out on breakfast if it meant that he did not have to open things in the company of other students. The only person he could stand doing that with was Raziel - and he had only really learn his name a while back. They spoke very, very little. He was not even sure of the older boy's last name. The owl approached and he outstretched his right arm as a perch and his left offering the treat. The owl took it greedily, something that confused Dante. His own owl was skittish and quiet. She would timidly take treats from his hand and not munch them down as if she had never been fed. He retracted his left arm and looked at the owl curiously. This was not his owl. The owl began to flap and took off towards its true owners, who now had his own owl. He looked at the person expectantly. He wanted his owl.
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[Rebecca Koshiba]

It had been a very long day. Something Rebecca Koshiba disliked with a passion. There were very few things that Bex liked, long days were most certainly not one of them. Writing home was one of the things Bex did like, writing home and not talking. Her two most favourite past times. Truth be told, Bex didn't necessarily like not talking, but she had made a promise, one that she had broken when absolutely necessary, but at no other time. Paige was one, for example, who would not try to force the young blonde to talk and she rather liked that about the girl. The new one, Andrea, was much the same. Bex made her way up the many stairs, on her way to the Owlery. She had seen her owl making its way here and she was expecting a letter from Haruhi or possibly Eden. Eden and Haruhi were both so busy now, but they were happy to see her doing so well in Slytherin. Bex liked it well enough, but the houses meant very little to her really. She just didn't care. What was the point of separating people by personality and then expecting them not to dislike other people in other houses on Principle. Bex didn't dislike houses for any specific reason, it wasn't even something she terribly cared about. She was more the kind of person who preferred to pick apart a person's personality. The one thing she disliked among all others were people believing they were better then anyone else because of their house. Bex had always been raised to believe that she was special, but Eden had always told her that everyone had their uses. Everyone had some ability in something that Bex did not. Paige was one example. She had he uncanny ability to not shut up. Bex admired her, in some degree, but it failed to make her want to speak any more.

Bex walked into the Owlery in time to see her owl approach. She held out her arm and the Owl stopped, looking at her. That was odd, usually her owl, Fukuro, would come directly to her for its mouse treats. She tilted her head and placed the mouse treat on her arm, allowing the owl to see it. When it did, it finally made its way over to her arm, but took its time to peck away at the treat. What was wrong with her? Was she sick? Inwardly Bex began to panic, she had no idea what to do if her owl was sick. Who did she tell? Her head of house? Would he care? She stopped suddenly when she saw a boy looking at her. She was not alone. The owl of the other boy flapped furiously to her and she held out her arm, recognising Fukuro. It seemed the other owl was not her own. She shook her arm slightly, gesturing for the owl to vacate her arm before turning her attention to her own owl and allowing it to nuzzle her lightly. Yes, this was indeed her owl. She petted her and placed her on one of the many perches, retrieving the letter from her leg. It was from Haruhi. How nice.
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[Dante Vittori]

For a moment, Dante had worried that he had just initiated some sort of unfortunate verbal communication - however, he had been fortunate enough to not have such a thing occur. The girl simply flapped her arm and allowed his owl to leave her. At least someone had manners. He was sick of having to speak to people. That Hufflepuff, whose name had managed to escape him again. He did not care enough to recall his name on a daily basis, but he did not forget what the older boy had done. He accepted his owl onto his arm, and fed her the remainder of the treats. A large majority had been eaten by the girl's owl, but there was enough to make the trip worthwhile for his own owl. She was skittish and volatile, two things Dante did not always appreciate. However, these traits lived within his owl, and he rather liked his owl. She did not squawk, she did not bite him and she was quite fast. She only had problems with others. Also, she did not have a name and did not apparently need one. She always eventually made her way to him. His older siblings had ravens of various names, but Dante wanted nothing to do with those birds. They were too loud. An owl was definitely for him, and he was pleased to have her.

He briefly looked at the girl, relieved to find that he was not being pressured to verbally communicate with her. He nodded his thanks to her, and collected his letter from his owl. It was written by Amanda - as he had expected. With another treat leaving his hand, he tied his next letter to her leg and waved his arm out gently. She go the picture and flew off through the window. He would have to remember that there was a second owl that looked strikingly similar to his own. He had not realised that someone else would be using this time to send and receive letters, the possibility of a mistaken identity had escaped him. He then began to leave, but stopped. He couldn't just leave the other girl here. He was raised better than to just leave the company of a 'signora' as his mother would say. Usually Dante would not dream of seeing any girl here as something like that. They were all too loud, too boisterous and too nosey and pathetic to be considered something like that. He was not supposed to leave a signore either, but there were only about two of them here - his brother barely making the mark. Naturally, none of this applied to professors, as it was their decision to ask him to leave or not. But unfortunately, his current reaction was a habit that he would retain. If he neglected this, he would be shaming his mother and he respected the woman too much for that. He stood beside the door silently, with his letter in his hands. He would simply wait for her to leave and then return to the Ravenclaw common room once they had left here. It was that simple, really.
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[Rebecca Koshiba]

Bex was glad that the boy had his owl back. She was much happier having her own owl as well. Fukuro, may not have been the most well behaved owl, quite the opposite actually, but she had many qualities that Bex, herself, lacked, namely the ability to express her self in a variety of ways. Bex was not much of a sharer at the best of times, but she was even less likely to be emotional, in any sense of the word. She tended to bottle her emotions up and pretend that they didn't exist. If she allowed them to develop, she would be in danger of losing all her self control, something she dreaded above most other things. She did not, in the least, believe that emotions were needed for interaction of any sort. Nor did she believe that she needed to talk. If she wanted someone to know something, surely they would have known it already. She she need to speak to some one, which was rare, it would not be for idle gossip. For the most part, Andrea, her room mate and Paige, one whom she considered a friend, seem to have figured this out rather quickly. She was glad for that, for many reasons. One, they didn't expect her to opt into their idle conversations about boys, class work, or professors. Two, they did not ask her about her lack of expression and three, they seemed to not care that she was overly formal. Some people were suspicious, but many others knew that her father was in Azkaban, that usually stopped them from making a comment or taking any action against her. The name Koshiba seemed to hold a lot of weight in this area. More so in Japan, but definitely here. She handed the last of the owl treats to Fukuro and turned the letter over to open it. It mostly spoke about how much Haruhi missed having her around and how she was having a lovely time doing Merlin knew what. Bex nodded, she was glad her mother was happy. She hadn't been for such a long time after all.

Bex folded the letter and stuffed in into her pocket, giving Fukuro one last pet before turning around to leave. She had expected to not find anyone in the Owlery with her, considering the only boy who had been here with her, had left a matter of minutes ago. At least, that was what she has thought. Apparently she was wrong, there he was, standing by the door. Why on earth was he there? Had he left something behind? She tilted her head curiously. This was odd. She had never encountered someone who did not talk. She walked over to him and gestured to the door. Her eyes inveritably closed off. This boy seemed to be rather observant however. Perhaps he would still understand her question. If he didn't well, maybe she would just have to speak after all.
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[Dante Vittori]

Dante remained motionless as the girl went about her business. He liked waited. Patience came easily to him and he found himself to feel rather tranquil. He was assured that his owl was delivering a letter to his father, talking of the proceedings had occurred a few days prior that included receiving a bruise to his face, and just his general outlook of the school before it began properly. His notes would determine whether Julian came here, just as Jeremiah's accounts had influences his attendance here, and Grace before him. He was sure Julian would enjoy coming here, since there was a certain amount of freedom they did not get back home, and that the blonde enjoyed spending time with people and would get a kick out of attending a foreign school, speaking a foreign language and all of the things Dante could happily live without having to do. He was tempted to read the letter that sat in his hands, but thought better of it. He was not going to read his letter out here like that, with a strange girl in the room. He would wait until the seclusion of his dorms. Letters were for private areas, not the Owlery or the Great Hall. His bed would be a fine place to open the letter and see its contains. Amanda was a predictable woman, however. He was not sure why he bothered writing to her. He knew most of the time what she would reply with. She was easy to predict. Whether that was a fortunate trait or not, Dante was not sure. But he would never voice this opinion to her face. He was not a fool.

His thoughts escaped him when he found himself under the eye of the girl. She had tilted her head and walked over to him quizzically. Dante simply placed the unopened letter into his robes and waited for her to speak. That was what most people did in a situation like this - talk. Dante could never stop them. However, much to his surprise, it had seemed he found another Raziel, except this girl was a healthy distance from him. She gestured to the door and Dante nodded his head, before turning around and opening the door for her, standing to the side so she could walk past. There was not particularly special reason why he was doing this, other than the fact that he respected the girl. Just as he had Raziel once he realised that they shared a particularly important common trait. Appreciation of silence. Dante could not bring himself to quickly distain anyone that remained silent when in his presence.
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[Rebecca Koshiba]

Rebecca was becoming increasingly curious about this boy. She had never been an overtly inquisitive person by nature, not in the least, but this boy, this strange anomaly before her, had captured her curiosity quite well. She blinked at him. Still he had spoken no words to her. It was a strange sensation. She was used to people at least trying to talk to her. It wasn't that Bex couldn't talk, it was that she didn't want to and she didn't appreciate people that tried to force her into talking. For a start, Bex had made a promise on the night of her parents death. She had promised that she would never speak of what happened. That she would never make a sound. She had done her best to keep such a promise but when she was in a place where talking seemed to be a major part of social interaction, which Bex didn't much care for anyway, she had been finding it increasingly harder to actually keep her promise. The second reason she didn't talk was because her voice was croaky and weird and she hated the sound of it. Truthfully, she was a little self conscious about it. She didn't like people to hear it. The last reason was because her throat hurt when she spoke. She supposed it was because she had not used it in such a long time. The doctors had all said that the pain would stop the more she spoke, but she figured why speak at all. She was perfectly capable of communicating in other ways, so why bother. If she wanted someone to know something, they would know it and she would not have to communicate with them at all. This boy however was different. He was not speaking to her. She had been prepared for him to speak and yet he was not, simply standing there, waiting for her. She raised and eyebrow, but shrugged and continued on out the door.

Bex walked out the door and stopped looking over her shoulder to see him behind her. Was he seriously escorting her? Was that what he was doing? That was quite a surprise. Bex, remembering her manners, turned to face him and performed a deep bow. One of respect, from a younger to an elder and then a wave of accompaniment and thanks. She was rather pleased to see that manners had not been entirely lost at this school. She waited dutifully for him to catch her up. She wasn't sure how serious he was about this, but she would wait for him. If he took a step before her, so that she was following along behind him, she would be most surprised and most appeased. She was used to such formality's from her boarding school, but she had never expected to encounter such knowledge in this school. She had been learning to forgo her behaviour, but it seemed that this boy, whom ever he was, either recognised her training, or simply used these manners himself. He obviously came from an older wizarding family. She had never met a muggle with manners such as these. Bex continued on along the corridor, glancing at her escort from time to time. She did not know him, that much was true. He was silent like herself. Perhaps he was deaf? Bex hurried up and increased her step to fall in beside him. She must know. Are you de- Before she could finish the sentence she was constructing, she began to wobble as she was standing on the edge of a set of stairs, how could she not have seen this. Where normally she had a vacant expression on her face, a hint of worry and confusion made its way on to her face. It was eventually followed by realisation as she looked down at the stairs. She was going to fall and it was going to hurt.
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[Dante Vittori]

A small draft was beginning to gather in the tower, so Dante was relieved to find that she was leaving. The tower was rather nice, but a little drafty. Standing around too long would most likely result in a cold - and that was certainly something the Ravenclaw did not want. While he was sure the Hospital Wing was capable of making a potion, going there and asking for something was not something he was prepared to do. He would just have to suffer through it, but being sick was something he was sure he couldn't handle for an extended period of time. Dante allowed the door to close behind them and began to walk. There was no need to spoil the silence, the howling wind was doing enough of that. It twisted through the windows and doors, running through the corridors. It had taken him some time get used to. The wind would cause havoc to his reading whilst walking. Pages would fly everywhere - it was rather distracting. Sometimes he would bump into things, or worse, people. Then they would be annoyed, like that Hufflepuff boy. Fortunately, not every person at the school was a Neanderthal, some did have at least mild intelligence. It was not completely hopeless.

Something that surprised Dante, and caused him to pause, was when the girl turned and bowed at him. What in Merlin's name was she doing? Why was he being bowed at? The Ravenclaw had never been bowed at before - and he was not sure he liked it at all. It was such a directed gesture of respect that it was a little too directed for him. He nodded back to her wave, since bowing was not something he was going to do to anything, let alone some girl he decided he respected enough to share company with, but not enough to exchange names. Dante continued to walk - the girl at a far enough distance to not cause him discomfort, but close enough for them to be considered travelling together. Dante began to walk towards the spiralling stairs and began his descent, noticing that his companion had decided to follow somewhat along with him. He slowed when he heard the pitter-patter of feet quicken behind him. It was the blonde girl, hurrying herself to catch up to him. Oh Merlin, she wasn't going to speak to him, was she? He was just being respectful, he was not intending to be inviting or anything. She began some sort of (seemingly) organised motion with her hands. Dante knew nothing of sign language, for he knew no-one personally that was deaf - there fore he had never seen it used. He paused when she began wobbling. Was that part of whatever it was she was doing? He figured she was trying to communicate in some weird, unique way, but the wobbling confused him. He face showed worry and Dante realised that she was going to fall down he stairs. He awkwardly grabbed at her robes, but only managed to lose balance himself. In the end, he failed to stop the girl from falling, caused himself to fall, and had fallen down an unknown amount of steps. The day was not getting better.
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[Rebecca Koshiba]

Rebecca squeaked rather childishly as she felt a tug on her robes. However it had done very little to stop her from falling, in fact, if Rebecca were to be so bold, she would have even suggested that the hand on her robes, which had been grabbed rather awkwardly, were to be the purpose of her fall. However, Bex would never suggest something such as that to the boy in question, being that he had tried to help her at least. However, as they bounced and rolled down the hard stone stairs, Bex couldn't help but to grunt and groan with every new piece of flesh that hit the hard surface. She eventually lost count, as there were so many stairs and she could see the sky above her as they came to rest somewhere between the Owlery and the beginning of the North tower. She could almost count the bruises she was developing as she lay looking up at the sky, which was somehow helping to ease the stiffness she was beginning to feel in her joints and her neck. This was not to be a pleasant day as it seemed and Bex mentally admonished herself for having been so careless as to have forgotten where the stairs had been placed.

Bex went to sit up, the stiffness feeling like it was going to encroach on all other parts of her body. She couldn't feel her right arm at all and she was almost certain that the lower half of her body was not receiving enough oxygen, just by the way it seemed to be throbbing. She couldn't be entirely positive, but she was sure that she would have cuts and scrapes along the exposed bits of skin on her body. Namely, her wrists, neck, face and legs. However, as she went to move, the sight of an arm on her chest caught her attention. However, that sleeve of the arm contained a blue line instead of the green line she was customarily used to seeing. She blinked at it, as if the very sight of the arm brought her displeasure. She opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again as the feeling suddenly came back to her right arm and she could feel it beneath her. The arm on her chest was not her own, it had no business being there. She picked it up in her left hand as she tried to shuffle her right arm out from underneath her; however she was making no progress and was only making her arm feel more pain. She winced and looked at the blue sleeve again. "This is not my sleeve." She managed to murmur, looking around for its owner, discovering him lying across her bottom half. She did not appreciate the added pressure of his body on hers. She wanted it gone, she wanted it gone, right now.

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[Dante Vittori]

Dante squeezed his eyes shut as he heard the high-pitched squeal originate from the young girl. However, the Ravenclaw remained silent, except one, sharp gasp at the beginning to he felt his head make contact with the strong steps. The pure-blood was not made for such battery. He was pale and bruised like most elderly fruit. It was bad form to be falling like this. It was similar to a wheel on those massive muggle contraptions. They were falling 'round and 'round. Head, feet, head, feet. The world was a blur of stairs, robes and blue and green. So much so that the Ravenclaw decided to close his eyes as they were beginning to hurt. From then on, the only two ways he knew he was not alone was by the sounds of the girl, and by feeting her limbs jab into him at different intervals of the fall. He would have preferred this be a solitary fall. Everything was easier when by ones self. He would not have had half the bruises he was going to receive if this was from his own clumsiness. The girl had pointed shoes, and they often found themselves against Dante's chest and hips. It was incredibly painful. And as the stairs came to a stop, Dante found himself thrown from the stairs - as if swallowed and spat by the inanimate staircase - and thrown along the floor with his female companion. His landing was abrupt, and strange, but he was in too much pain to completely comprehend the situation. He had to remain silent, still and recharge so he could get away from here effectively.

Dante felt sore all over. However, the ground under most of his body was rather soft and squishy. Far softer than it should be. He was not an expert on flooring, but the ground were rather harsh, and his feet felt the appropriate amount of sturdy ground. His head was throbbing, and he could barely find it within himself to lift up his head. He remember finding the stairs in a rather unsightly manner, so that must have played a part. He felt the ground shift under him, and soon came to the horrifying realisation that he was lying upon that young girl. How terrible! He was actually in contact with the girl. He heard the girl speak, and his blue eyes held contact with her own. "No..." he responded, retracting his hand from her chest. The only fortunate thing from all of this was that the girl was not several years older, or it would have been by far more disturbing to be touching her in such a fashion. Weakly, the Ravenclaw rolled off of the Slytherin, and slowly sat up. He briefly looked at the Slytherin, wondering if she were badly injured. He was not sure, but he believed that he caught the brunt of that fall, being bigger and on the outside of the fall. He felt his head - behind his right ears specifically - as it was in exceptional pain. He pulled his hand in front of him to look at it, and frowned curiously. He was bleeding? No wonder he had a headache. He attempted to stand, but he found that he would most likely need assistance to stand and walk. Brilliant, more unnecessary physical contact with a stranger he had just flattened.
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[Rebecca Koshiba]

Rebecca was beyond sore. It felt like someone had completely torn her arm off. She had to move it out from behind her back in order to be entirely sure that her arm was in fact still attached. Despite the unimaginable pain from her arm, which she was concerned, was also broken at the wrist judging from the swelling and ugly bruising on her wrist. It was extremely difficult to keep from screaming at every instance that she moved her fingers or her arm even partially. She felt sore all over her body. Her hips she knew were definitely bruised. She didn't know who this boy that was rolling off of her was, but they had just shared a rather bad experience with stairs. Bex was not a clumsy girl, she was rather well balanced normally, but at this instant she wouldn't have cared if she was the clumsiest person in the world, because she was over life. Life was no friend of hers if it was going to treat her in this manner. It had no right. How dared life to treat a Koshiba in this way. She glared up at the sky from her position lying along the ground and raised her hand to flip off whatever higher power existed to make her life unbearable. As it was, she had at least learned that the boy she had taken a tumble with was not deaf. However, it seemed he was also not the taking type, which didn't really bother Bex all that much as she was not much of a talker herself anyway. So the silence did very little to bother her in anyway.

Rebecca used her uninjured arm, to push herself up and lean against the closest wall. She was likely going to need to push herself up. She could do absolutely nothing with her right arm in its current state. She gritted her teeth in pain at the slightest movement of her dislocated arm and winced when she knocked her wrist against her knee. The boy she had fallen down the stairs with, seemed to be in bad shape, looked as if he had hurt his head or something. She was unsure if she was bleeding, she didn't think so, but it seemed as if he was. She leaned slightly forward, attempting to discern if her companion was okay, or if he needed help. As it was, they both needed help, but there was little she could do and they were far from being found by another student or a professor. Bex gritted her teeth for what felt like the zillionth time in the past ten minutes and slowly raised herself, with the help of the wall. She carefully walked over to her companion and reached out her good hand to him. They were barely three feet away from each other, so it had taken her less than two seconds to reach him. She had made a decision that she was going to try and walk them both to the hospital wing. Not much else she could do really.

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[Dante Vittori]

Dante was rather irritated by this turn of events. Raven's did not fall down stairs. They were a simplistic things that had been used by people for thousands of years, the Ravenclaw was sure he should be quite capable of descending them safely without breaking a limb or crushing some stranger at the bottom. His only saving grace was that he had not died. That would have been unacceptable. He appeared to avoid any serious injury, but the hospital wing would be his first destination whether the girl liked it or not. She too appeared sore, and having a third year fall on her after falling down stairs, he was not surprised. The dark haired boy examined the hand extended to him and nodded his acceptance, before carefully taking the offered hand and pushed himself from the ground in order to avoid placing much of his weight onto the smaller girl. And, while he hated to even fathom the situation, the pure blood knew that he had to us the assistance from this girl to get himself, and her to the hospital wing. With a begrudged sigh, Dante allowed the girl to help him to the hospital wing.
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-FIN-​