Who says the seventh time isn't a charm? (Open)

[Isabella Huntington]

Several weeks had gone by since Izzy first began her search for "The Room". The first year had made her way from floor to floor, in search of a room she had been told about by an older student back in September. She had no idea why the girl had mentioned it to her... what was so special about a room? Of course it had crossed her mind that the girl had been messing with her, but she had seemed so genuine, too. So what if Izzy was just gullible? She still loved to explore, so why not see if she could find this room while checking out the castle? If it turns out that there is no Room of... whatever the girl had said, then there was no Room. No biggie. There were tons of other rooms, and even a few secret passages that the red head had stumbled upon so far. What did it matter whether she didn't find one more room?

Yet she didn't completely give up the idea of finding it. She still had the entire seventh floor to check, as well as the dungeons... She didn't think that the girl had mentioned "The Room" being in the dark, dreary dungeons, but then again, Izzy didn't have the best memory in the world.

So the Gryffindor made her way down the seventh floor, tapping pictures, statues, and suits of armor with her wand. For every door she reached, she opened it up and stepped inside to check out what was behind it. Several of the doors she had gone up to were locked, like the current one she was now pointing her wand at. "Alohomora," she announced, but got no result. This wasn't too rare. While some locked doors had opened for her, others didn't, peeking her curiosity about what could be behind them. "Damn," she muttered, and continued along the corridor, but not before going into a coughing fit.

Izzy covered her mouth for the full twenty seconds and groaned when it was over. She'd been having coughing fits for the last week, and it left her sore after, as well as sometimes dizzy. It was winter now, so she assumed that she just had a cold... Which didn't usually add up for her, though. The symptoms her her colds in the past weren't all present this time. Not to mention, Izzy also felt dizzy quite often and found herself needing to sit down a lot. She hoped that her cold, or whatever it was, would be over soon, because being ill was keeping her back from a lot of things she wanted to do... like check out this Forbidden Forest. She knew that it wasn't the best idea to go outside in her state, so she'd have to wait. Damn.

[Christian Nagle]

Crouched behind an opened but abandoned classroom door, Chris jumped when he heard coughs echoing from down the other end of the hallway. He was trying to get away from his ill fate, of late. It was his guilt complex... seeing someone so miserable and wanting to help them, having the power to help them but by helping them (i.e. doing something they asked of him) ignoring or denying his immediate disliking to that thing he was to do to help. Sound complicated? Of course it was. In plain terms, Chris wasn't a free man anymore, thanks to a guilty conscience. It had happened at lunch... no matter. He was hiding from that other part of him now. It was the part that very desperately wanted to go tell her to suck it up and stop stalking him... the ugly part. Was he in too deep?

The coughing stopped. Chris wondered who it was that had coughed. Deciding to take the chance, Chris stood up, groaning as the muscles in his legs screamed from sudden activity, the release of tension followed by further tension. His head spun several times, or was it the room that spun? Thinking was a very dizzying affair of late. Stepping around the door, once he'd regained his sense of surroundings, Chris looked around the door frame. A red head in Gryffindor robes stood some metres away looking lost. He immediately identified her as his colleague, Izzy! Breathing something akin to a sigh of relief... which turned into a coughing fit of his own... Chris slid his back against the door and bent his head down, allowing the hallway to dance a dizzying victory lap or four around him before the merry-go-round came to a halt. He looked up, trying to identify his fellow Gryff.

[Isabella Huntington]

Right before she was to resume her exploration of the seventh floor, Izzy heard a sound all too familiar. The red head turned in the direction which the coughing was coming from to see who it was who also happened to have the same misfortune as she did. It didn't take very long to spot Chris, her fellow first year Gryffindor, leaning against a wall at the other end of the corridor. She wasn't sure whether to smile because he was a familiar face that she enjoyed, or frown because he appeared to not be doing too well. Her face instead remained neutral as she made her way toward the fatigued boy, scratching at one of several red patches of skin that had popped up on her within the last few days. When she reached Chris, she finally spoke.

"So you're sick too, eh?" she asked, no surprise in her voice. She had noticed that a lot of students were becoming ill lately. There were rumors of Dragon Pox going around, but Izzy was sure everyone just had colds. The timing was right. Not to mention... Dragon Pox? Surely there was no such thing. She knew of Chicken Pox and Smallpox, but Dragon Pox seemed... not real. It was probably something that the older students had made up to scare the first and second years, but it wasn't going to work on Izzy.

She resumed scratching the same red spot on her elbow that she had moments ago as she continued to watch Chris. "It seems like everyone has a cold, doesn't it?"

[Christian Nagle]

Drowsily, the boy nodded his head. Yeah, everyone seemed to be getting sick alright. Colds here and there, runny noses, snot all over the place. Colds ruined everything. Especially Quidditch. Chris hadn't set his bottom on a broom in a very long time. He'd been sidelined during practices because he was ill and during flying class, which he'd not been able to (or allowed to) attend recently, he'd coughed himself out of the air. What a mistake it had been to stay up late and play with the tome from history. He blamed his cold on that.

Then he spotted the red mark on Izzy's elbow. That was puzzling. He looked up at the girl and tried to stand. Bad idea. The merry-go-round merrily got 'round twice before Chris was able to stand up straight. "Heh, yeah. Everyone is sick," he sniffled and was tempted to wipe his nose across his sleeve, except Izzy was there and that would be gross. So, instead, he asked, "Got a tissue or something? Me nose is running away." He hoped she did.

While he'd been cowering in the empty classroom, Chris had thought up a brilliant idea. The Owlery was secluded enough of a place to run off to. He'd meant to go and try out one of the school owls, see if he couldn't send some stupid little "love note" to piss off Eston or Jerome. He'd meant, also, to send a genuine letter to Caleb, just to remind his closest, sanest stepbrother that he was still alive and still loved him, step-brotherly love of course. Maybe Izzy would be going there too? Actually...

"So what brings you to the seventh floor, Izz?"

[Isabella Huntington]

Izzy's immediate response to her classmate's first question was a frown. Rarely did the red head ever carry around tissues unless she really needed them, and this wasn't one of those times. In fact, a runny nose was one symptom that her cold was missing, which was something she found extremely odd. In the past when she had colds, her nose was a faucet. She either went through tissues at the speed of light or simply used her sleeve to wipe away the snot. The latter was something she'd never tell anyone though, because so many people considered it disgusting and she didn't want to gross anyone out. Especially not Chris, who had come to be a pretty good friend of hers over the last several months. They were the only Gryffindor first years, which had automatically given them a bond, whether they liked it or not. Fortunately, neither seemed to have a problem with it.

"Sorry," she said, shaking her head. "I only carry them if I need them." She felt slightly guilty that she had no tissues to give to her friend... he looked like he could definitely use some, and Izzy honestly felt bad that she couldn't help him out.

It was at that moment that she remembered seeing tissues. "But I actually think I saw some in a few rooms back," she said, looking over her shoulder toward the direction of the corridor she had been at before coming over to see Chris. "I was doing some exploring, and I could've sworn there were a few rooms that had tissues in them." With that statement, Izzy had partially answered Chris' next question. "I guess that's one of the only good things I've found on my search for this one room." Now that she had mentioned it, Izzy realized that she couldn't keep her friend in the dark, wondering what the room was.

"The girl prefect told me about it at the beginning of the year. It's some kind of special room, I think. She didn't really give me too much information about it, but it definitely sounded like something to check out," she said. Then, her expression turned thoughtful. "You don't think she was playing a joke on me, do you? Because I've been all over the majority of this castle and I have yet to find it. Other than the dungeons and the towers, I've looked everywhere else and... nothing."

[Christian Nagle]

Tissues!? In another classroom.... Bummer. That required movement, and Chris felt like he was going to pass out if he had to move an arm or leg involuntarily (or voluntarily). He supposed he could try to muster his seemingly waning strength and go find tissues... or he could use his sleeve. Well that wouldn't be too sanitary and very disgusting in front of a lady. The snot oozed down his upper lip. It was humiliating.

Then Izzy said something about a girl prefect and a special room? Was it a special room? Was it the tissue room? That would be special. Chris felt kind of special thinking about special things at this oh so special time. Short bus. But a special, possibly secret, room sounded like a really cool thing to go looking for.

"Which prefect told you about this? Ours or some other prefect?" If it was Felicity, she'd do well to trust the girl that there was a special room somewhere here. It might even have tissues! "I think if it was a Slytherin prefect than you'd probably be out of luck looking for a room of speciality up here. Most of these rooms are abandoned... trust me." He relied on it. "But if it was OUR prefect, Felicity, she's probably not trying to trick you. In which case I'm up for trying to find this room." Maybe tissues first?

Chris staggered to his feet, surprised at the relative ease he had at getting up. He paused, waiting for the room to spin, but it didn't to his surprise. He realized he was using the wall as a support, mostly, and with that support he might had been better able to get up...? He pushed off and stumbled. Bad idea, I guess.

[Isabella Huntington]

No, it hadn't been Felicity. Izzy wasn't known for having the best memory, but she knew for a fact that the Gryffindor prefect was not the one whom she had talked to at Platform 9 3/4. This girl had darker hair and looked to be a couple years younger than her house's fearless seventh year. Her name was Tianne Webster-Barrett, Ravenclaw's female prefect. The older girl hadn't been in her robes at the time so there had been no blue accent to show what house she had been in, but Izzy had seen the girl since and had come to learn that she was a student of Ravenclaw.

"It wasn't Felicity," Izzy replied, shaking her head. "It was the Ravenclaw prefect - Tianne." She considered what Chris had said about whom she probably could and couldn't trust. She agreed with what he had said - a Slytherin was most likely out of the question, while Gryffindor was okay. But Ravenclaw... she wasn't a hundred percent sure. The girl had been very helpful and didn't give any indication that she was messing with her, but... you never know.

Biting her lip, Izzy sighed. "D'ya think a Ravenclaw prefect would lie?"

[Christian Nagle]

A Ravenclaw? That was like taking the best qualities of a Slytherin and mixing them with the worst qualities of a Hufflepuff. Well that's what Chris thought at least. His bias was rather strong as it was. Thinking hurt his head. He kept thinking about his stepbro, Caleb. He wanted to get to the owlery and send an owl out to his bro, but it seemed he wasn't going to make it very far.

Would a Ravenclaw prefect lie?
"Probably not intentionally. I've never really met Ravenclaw prefects, unless the dude Drew is one such. And I only know him through that chick Sharivah Mehra." Shoot. Was she still hunting him down, Chris wondered. In his immediate fear that she was, he pushed off from the wall and faced the consequences ((OOC: Sorry Izzy, but this had to happen sooner or later )). The hall took a nasty turn and flipped upside down, the edges becoming hazy, blurred as if a fog had settled in. Chris looked up, feeling himself floating, then falling, and hitting the stone floor rather hard. The last thing he could remember was thinking: I've got to get to the owlery and find out if Caleb is okay.

((OOC: Chris just fainted and is unconscious for the most part.))

[Isabella Huntington]

Not intentionally... Izzy supposed that her classmate was probably correct. Ravenclaws weren't known for being cruel. Perhaps there were a few jokers in the house of Rowena Ravenclaw, but the girl at Platform 9 3/4 didn't fit the description of one. In fact, the more Izzy thought about it, the more she believed that Tianne had been true with her. After all, the older Ravenclaw had confided in the red head something that could've cost her the prefect title. Then again, no Hogwarts staff had been around to overhear Tianne telling Izzy that some rules are meant to be broken. But Izzy now had her mind up. She had occasionally seen Tianne in the hallways, and the girl appeared to be trustworthy. If she said there was some kind of special room, there probably was.

Not only did Izzy have that settled, but she now also had a buddy to help her search. ...Or so she thought. Before the lioness could get one word out of her mouth, she watched her fellow Gryffindor collapse. Her green eyes widened as she stood in shock for a moment or two, trying to process what had just happen. "Wha--are you kidding me?" she finally said, directing her question toward the unconscious Chris. Her attention left him for a few seconds as she looked around the corridor, hoping to find someone. No one. Damn.

Izzy turned back to Chris and crouched down beside him. Grabbing onto his shoulder, she shook him. "Chris?" No response. "Chris." Still no response. "Chris!" The hospital wing was on the first floor... they were on the seventh. It wasn't like she could run a few yards to fetch the nurse. She didn't want to leave him, either. Maybe he'd wake up, and then she could help him down to the first floor. "Chris!"