Patrolling

If this was a prank, Liesl was going to be so annoyed. Especially since she had decided it was best to play it safe and take the Head Girl thing seriously. Walking up and down the train's main corridor, she was on patrol.

However, all was quiet for once on the Hogwart's Express. A lesser woman would have taken it to mean everything was okay. Liesl knew better. All was never quiet on the Express. There were always kids packed in the halls, looking for the sweets trolley or running from between compartments when there were too many of their friends to fit into only one.

That was kinda why prefects existed, right?

At the end of the corridor, another student tried to slip from their compartment into the next carriage without Liesl noticing. Or maybe they just didn't care if she noticed. It hadn't really got out about her new position, yet.

"Hey! You!" she called.

Teddy froze and whipped around. She had finally gotten into her compartment with Scott when she had heard more shouting from the next compartment. It hadn't taken her long, with Scott's help, to disguise herself. Her hair had been tucked into her hat, large glasses put on her face, and dark makeup patted onto her face and neck to make her look like a tan girl with short hair.

But it looked like she had already been caught by one of the goodies, striking dread into her. However, she was not currently Teddy Crewe. She pulled one of her aliases from her head and became Isabella Schulz.

She beamed. "Oh, hi! Sorry, are we not supposed to switch compartments? I had no idea!" She laughed lightly.

Liesl waved away the girl's fears. She didn't care about people switching compartments; she had more important concerns.

"What? No, that's fine," she said. "Creeping away from people just looks suspicious, though. I'm going to have to ask where you were going."

Teddy paused, gauging the danger of the situation. If all this girl wanted was casual conversation, Teddy wanted to bail as soon as possible. But if this girl had real authority, she could not be rude.

Teddy decided on a half-lie. "I heard shouting from this compartment right here." She pointed at it. "I was going to see if I could help solve the problem."

Liesl glanced at the compartment, then eyed the girl. Did she believe it? She didn't know. She was trying to be a nice Head Girl, she was...

"There's no yelling now," she stated, "maybe you'd better double check just to be sure."

She leant forward and slid the door aside so that her new friend would be able to precede her into the compartment. Liesl wasn't drunk with power, not at all.

Teddy wet her lips and said, "Oh, well... You just missed them. They were rowing about something or other..." Teddy was nosy, but she didn't want to rat out the people to a prefect either.

The girl pushed right in and Teddy jumped up, mouthing 'STOP' and then halted all suspicious behavior herself, smiling sweetly at the prefect. The couple stared and Teddy quickly said, "Well all seems in order here. My fault!"

((It occurs to me that our characters are in the same year, and should know each other))

"It looks like they kissed and made up," Liesl commented.

"Don't mind us," she added to the startled snoggers, as she left them to what they were doing.

She peered at Crazy Crewe suspiciously, then flicked the badge pinned to her lapel.

"I'm thinking maybe we could help each other this year..." she proposed.

((that totally escaped my notice.))

Teddy watched Liesl from the corner of her, trying to figure out the girl's next move. Teddy knew her, sure, but had never been too interested by her before. But prefects knew things, and now she might know too much.

She seemed to drop the issue and Teddy quickly closed the door after they left the compartment, starting to head for her own. Liesl's proposition stopped her in her tracks. So she had recognized her beneath the disguise- it wasn't much of one, she admitted. She slowly turned, looking Liesl up and down. "How so?"

Liesl rolled her eyes. Why did everyone treat her like she was nine?

"Um, how do I put this? You know how some people say you always know everything?" Liesl started. "I might overlook how you find out if you tell me all the good bits."

"Unless Ravenclaw gets ahead of us in points, that is, but you knew that already."

She smiled at the crazy girl. She was doing a lot of smiling today and it felt totally unnatural. In fact, it probably made her look crazier than Teddy. Teddy looked like a smiling kind of person.

"So, wha'd'ya think?"

Teddy did not know there were rumors about her. Funny, the girl in charge of hearing all, and she had not heard anything of herself. Naturally, it had been four years of snooping. She was proud it had caught on so quickly.

She listened to Leisl's words, showing nothing on her face. She was very guarded, and to so easily accept Leisl's offer would be far too trusting a move. But it was so tempting. "I think... we can definitely make that work." Teddy would test out the waters first. "Can we split any recognition from professors?" Teddy had an odd need to impress the teachers of Hogwarts. She wouldn't want Leisl to be the favorite for Teddy's information.