Brooklyn and the Boy Who Lived

The Forbidden Forest

Things couldn't have been worse.

When the other Gryffindors discovered that the top people (and gargoyle) had lost them all 150 points, Harry and Brooklyn both began to lose popularity. Even the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws started to hate them.

Brooklyn had the hardest time with it, for every time he passed students not in Slytherin in the hallways, they began to jeer at or blame him for being involved with the Boy Who Lived that lost them house points, even throwing things at him on occasion.

This brought back bad memories for Brooklyn in Manhattan whenever people had discriminated against them. And it didn't help with McGonagall watching him whenever he tried getting alone time.

Well, you are being punished, mocked the voice in his head. He didn't say anything in response to that.

Hermione and Ron had suffered, too. But not as much as Harry and Brooklyn did, for they weren't being spoken to anymore.

Brooklyn and Harry were both walking the hallway together when they heard cheering. It was the Slytherins who always teased them for helping their house gain momentum.

"Here comes the 'great' gargoyle and the 'Boy Who Lived'! How does it feel to be at the bottom, huh?" Sneered Flint. Brooklyn just growled and moved his brother away from the troll.

"They'll forget about it, eventually," He muttered, hating Flint's guts every day when this happens. Harry lowered his head. He wasn't so sure about that.

Brooklyn had finally managed to sneak away from McGonagall's prying eyes as he found a quiet hallway for himself, giving a small sigh of sadness, wondering when this would all blow over. But then he heard a familiar voice from a classroom door.

He cautiously moved towards the door. Something inside Brooklyn's head told him that he didn't want to do anything else to get him into more trouble, but he just couldn't ignore this.

"No! No! Not again! Please!" It was Quirrell. And he sounded terrified. Brooklyn gripped the wood on the door with his talons, tensing at the sound of fear in the strange man's voice. Who was talking to him in there?

"Alright—alright—!" Came Quirrell's choking sobs. Footsteps proceeded towards the door and Brooklyn quickly stepped back into the shadows, watching Quirrell come out, his face pale and shaken as he walked away.

The gargoyle folded his arms, so many questions rattling his brain. Why was Quirrell scared? Who was threatening him?

He was probably talking to himself.

Shaking his head, Brooklyn proceeded back to the common room, hoping that Harry would figure this out.

He returned to the common room, finding his friends doing Astronomy homework. Harry glanced up at his return.

"Hey. What's up?" He asked, his voice still pretty down from all the torment earlier. Brooklyn sat down near them.

"I just heard something interesting," he muttered, looking around to make sure nobody was listening.

He told them about hearing Quirrell, and just as Brooklyn had suspected, it all went down to them thinking it was Snape.

I have a feeling they will all be wrong in the end, even if Snape is sometimes pretty cranky, he thought privately to himself as Ron kept coming up with wild stories about how the conversation with Quirrell went.

"If we just do a bit of poking around," Ron suggested. But Harry shook his head.

"No, we've done enough of that already. And I'm surprised that McGonagall didn't catch you sneaking in on Quirrell, Brooklyn."