chasing the night ,

[Vinnie Darling]

Another sleepless night. It was a Sunday night, or rather, Monday morning, and it probably wasn't smart to be roaming around way past midnight. Vinnie couldn't help it though. She couldn't get to sleep. She'd been lying in her bed for three sleepless hours and finally she'd decided to just give up on the whole sleeping thing and do something more entertaining. The reason she couldn't sleep was probably because she'd gotten up so late this morning, well... afternoon. She'd spent the whole night studying for her test on Monday that now she'd probably be asleep for. Figures. So in her loose gray sweat pants, bright tank top and a plain blue hoodie over it, the fifth year was wandering the corridors. With the end of his wand lit, she went up and down to each level, keeping her wand low so she wouldn't irriate the paintings. It was that hard since she was already pretty low to the ground in the first place. Ugh, she hated being short.

Whatever. It wasn't like she could do anything about it now. Besides, Vinnie seriously doubted that she'd gain any more height now. She'd just have to stay short forever. After twenty minutes of wandering, she began to feel a bit hungry. Her stomach growled quietly, telling her to get some food. Good idea. So the kitchen was her next destination. You had to tickle the pear, right? Something like that. She would just have to figure it out once she got down there. Quietly and slowly, Vinnie walked down the flight of stairs, not in any rush. Honestly, getting caught had never crossed her mind. She'd done this once or twice and she didn't even spot another person then. The Gryffindor knew that there were those couple students or teachers that were walking around, watching for any stray students, but Vinnie had never had to encounter them so wasn't really being careful or anything.

As she reached the first floor her stomach let out another rumble, this time louder. Immediately, she wrapped her free arm around her stomach as if she was trying to contain it. She bit her lip and stood there for a moment, just to make sure that no one had heard her or caught her. Nothing. Vinnie let out a silent sigh and ran her fingers through her hair. Everything seemed to be going good so far so she kept on strolling down the corridor. Suddenly, she heard a sound. It was the smallest, slightest sound, but it meant that someone, or something, was with her. Vinnie twirled around and pointed her wand out in front of her, moving it from side to side, waiting for someone to appear out of the shadows. She took a step back, unaware of the table behind her. She jumped when she bumped into it, thinking it was something. She twirled around, frightened, and had turned just in time to see a brass vase fall off the table, making a loud clinking sound as it hit the floor. The girl clasped her hand over her mouth, taking another step back, shocked. Crap! Someone was bound to hear that. It would have been smart to run, but for some reason her feet were glued to the floor.

Now she was just waiting for some angry teacher to come running over and give her detention. Great.

connor!

[Connor Manning]

Connor stifled a large yawn, attempting to rid himself of the sleepy feeling he got when he did rounds. He didn't think he'd be much help if some crazy person tried to take over in the middle of the night, he'd probably mistaken them for Nearly Headless Nick and let them on their way, wreaking havoc everywhere. He was positive there was a potion or maybe even a spell he could perform on himself to make him feel more awake... but he was much too tired to actually remember what that potion or spell could be. He would just have to figure it out in the morning... Well, later morning.

" G'night, " He muttered to one of the Prefect's he had been on duty with, bidding them good evening, or morning or whatever time it happened to be, before he started walking down. It felt more like sleep walking down the flights of stairs, which was probably never a good thing when the stair cases had a funny habit of moving. He dreamily hummed a song to himself as he walked down, the torches on the wall lighting themselves as he walked by and extinguishing themselves when he had passed.

Third floor, second floor, first floor, BANG! Connor nearly jumped over the railing of the stairs when he heard the noise, his eyes widened and he instinctively grabbed his wand and held it in position, just in case. Maybe his whole ' crazy person ' idea was coming true after all. He hated to think how that could turn out. " Whosere? " His words became rushed as he slowly walked off of the stairs and onto the first floor. He couldn't tell where the sound had come from, only that it was somewhere in his left vicinity. He turned that direction and carefully started walking forwards, trying to prepare himself for whatever it could be.