I-I
It was a gentle winter in England.
Having just returned from her first year at Hogwarts, Luna Lovegood spent her holiday touring the country with her father, on the hunt for multiple creatures Newt Scamander's Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them seemed to have overlooked by mistake. Today, the determined duo was following an interesting lead received in an anonymous letter to The Quibbler's editor: rumour had it a particularly mischievous flock of Blargnits settled into a few buildings in Winchester and made an entire estate of muggle orphans forget their names.
Terrible creatures, Blargnits were.
The easiest way to isolate one was for an unaffected witch or wizard to properly introduce themselves to the afflicted individual and have them feel enough at ease to return the gesture; the Blargnit would be forced to leave the moment their host's name was called for, and when you got rid of one, others in the colony had the habit of following.
So while her father was posing to the caretakers as an interested parent, Luna was instructed to explore the area and see if she could speak with any of the poor unwells there. Although she succeeded in inching her way outside the designated visitor boundaries and into the main sleeping quarters, it appeared as if all the children were busy playing outside in the freshly fallen blanket of snow.
Luna was searching the second floor of dormitories when she saw it: a hint of light spilling through an entrance left slightly ajar, located on the right-hand end of a long hallway lined with closed doors.
As she reached the room and raised a hand to knock, a pair of older children whipped around a corner and began dashing down from the opposite side of the hall. From the split-second glance she had, Luna managed to distinguish a blonde young man with a chocolate bar sticking out from his mouth and another boy tagging closely behind him, the latter wearing a striped shirt and...goggles?
Could he have been a Quidditch player?
Without a second look, the sweets addict bumped Luna aside during his charge down the hallway.
"Damn it, hurry up!" he scowled, paying little attention to the stranger. "Roger said grades are supposed to be posted today!"
"I'm hurrying, I'm hurrying..." the second one replied, listless. He glanced behind him as he ran. "Oi, new girl. Don't bother inviting that guy outside. He won't come no matter what you say to him."
Before Luna could explain her purpose (let alone ask for their names), the two turned another corner and disappeared from sight.
She sighed inwardly before turning back around, thankful she didn't need to persuade the resident to leave his room altogether. She just needed him to tell her his name.
How hard could it be?
Luna tapped a light fist against the door, waiting for a short 'come in' before letting herself enter.
It was a blessing she decided to watch where she stepped.
The hardwood floors were covered in thick lines of dark, polished plastic, all part of a highly intricate track layout which spanned to reach every obscure crevice of the room. The toy railroads Luna was accustomed to seeing were almost always enchanted (seeing as a wave of a parent's wand was all it took to get them running), but this bizarre contraption appeared to be one of those 'motorized' counterparts that muggles used something called 'electricity' to operate.
It was amazing how so many people managed to cope without magic.
Fumbling with a complicated mess of wires extracted from a small, hollow box not meant to be reopened, the lone occupant of the room was found sitting in a far corner still wearing his pyjamas, resting his cheek boredly upon a folded knee.
