Chapter Text

Hinata shouldered awkwardly past two bickering boys, mumbles of “excuse me” falling from his lips with irritance. Stumbling into the first train car with an open door, he breathed a sigh of relief, glad to finally have found a small bubble of personal space. He dragged the compartment door shut behind him, the scraping of its bottom against the floor the last clear sound before the swelling chatter of students became muffled by the glass. He leaned heavily against the door for a moment, and then froze as he realized that two other people sat in the car, a girl and a boy.

“Oh,” he said. “I didn’t know there were people here already.”

“Ah--no worries,” said the boy warmly, his voice a little raspy. “You should sit with us.” He smiled and pushed a lock of frizzy white hair out of his face, his eyes twinkling.

“Mhmm,” the girl agreed quietly, not looking up from the gameboard that sat in front of her. Hinata quickly sat beside the boy on the bench, watching as the girl picked up a small black chess piece and set it on a new square, nudging aside a white piece, where--to his fascination and mild horror--it came to life and smashed the opposing piece into a pile of rubble. The girl smiled.

“Oh, no,” the boy said, laughing. “There goes my queen.”

“That’s checkmate,” the girl replied evenly, and spread her hands out as if to say Ta-da!

“Good game, Nanami,” the boy said, and helped her sweep the chess pieces into a soft purple pouch. “How many is that now?”

“Three-zero.”

“And the train hasn’t even started moving yet! What an incredible talent! I’ll get you someday, though.”

“Probably,” she agreed easily, and tucked the board and the pouch away into a school bag. She turned to Hinata. “What’s your name?”

“Um,” he said, blinking in amazement, and feeling a bit out of his depth. “I’m Hajime Hinata.”

“Nice to meet you,” the girl replied. “I’m Chiaki Nanami. Games are my hobby.”

“Nagito Komaeda,” the boy said, and set a hand on Hinata’s shoulder. A freezing pale finger brushed his neck, unprotected as it was by his thick scratchy sweater, and he shrugged Komaeda’s hand off. “Are you a first-year as well?”

“Uh, yeah.” Hinata glanced between them. “So… you’re both new here?”

“New students of Hope's Peak, yes,” Komaeda said.

“Neither of you are in your uniforms yet,” Hinata observed aloud, plucking at his own grey sweater.

“Don’t need to be yet,” Nanami said. “It’s a long train ride.”

“Oh.”

Komaeda leaned against the window of the train compartment, the bustling station visible behind him as the last handful of students scrambled their way onto the train. “Hajime,” he said, “are either of your parents wizards?”

“It’s Hinata,” Hinata replied pointedly. “And, uh. No. Are… are yours?”

“Mine both are,” Nanami said. “Magic is in my bloodline from the very beginning.”

With a piercing whistle, the train began to peel away from the station.

“My parents are dead,” Komaeda said breezily, and let out a dry wheezing chuckle. “But I come from a long line of wizards, too.”

“Oh,” Hinata said uncomfortably. “I’m, uh. Sorry to hear that.”

“Don’t worry about it too much. Hey, they left me a huge inheritance at Gringotts, so.”

“Komaeda’s loaded,” Nanami said, very seriously, and Hinata laughed uneasily. She continued, “So, d’you know what House you’ll be in?”

“...House?”

“I’ll probably be a Hufflepuff, I think,” she said, yawning.

“Sorry, what? I didn’t quite make that out.”

“She said Hufflepuff,” Komaeda said. “She’ll probably be a Hufflepuff.”

“I… don’t know what that is,” Hinata said, trying not to be irritated by the nonsense word. Hufflepuff . What the hell was a Hufflepuff?

“Did nobody explain to you about the Houses?” Komaeda drawled, his voice full of a sort of derision that made Hinata scoot a little further away. “Jeez. They really let you down. How disappointing…”

“I told you--my parents aren’t magic,” Hinata said defensively.

“The Houses,” Nanami began, “are like divisions of the school. There’s four of them. Hufflepuff, Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. When we get to Hope's Peak, we’ll be sorted into one of the four based on our personality.”

“Gryffindor is for the brave and chivalrous,” Komaeda said, and his slow manner of speech picked up a little as he got excited. “That’s where the heroes are sorted. The protagonist-types, you know.”

“Ravenclaw is for people who are creative and intelligent,” Nanami added. “I heard that you have to solve a riddle to get into their dormitories, and any Ravenclaws who can’t solve it have to sleep in the hall… But I’m sure that’s not true. Probably just a rumor, I think.”

“Slytherin is for the ambitious.” Komaeda twirled some of his white hair around a bony finger.

“They tend to be kind of elitist. But that’s just most of them, not all of them.”

“It’s rather rude of them to be so high-and-mighty about a person’s blood status,” Komaeda agreed. “Who cares if someone is muggleborn? As long as they have magic, they’re still a wizard. And it’s not like we have to associate with the muggle parents themselves--they can’t even enter the castle.”

“Muggles?” repeated Hinata.

“Non-magic,” Komaeda sniffed. “Supremely ordinary people. Not worth the time of day, in my opinion…” He shrugged, but before Hinata could argue, Nanami interrupted.

“Don’t be mean, Komaeda. A person’s worth isn’t tied to their ability to perform magic.” Nanami puffed her cheeks out in a pout, and Hinata decided that he liked her far more than he liked Komaeda.

“It rather is,” Komaeda argued. “Muggles just drag everyone else down. The only good thing that they can produce is a witch or wizard. There is no place in the world for talentless people. How a squib like Kirigiri became headmaster is beyond my understanding.”

“I think you’re wrong.”

“Agree to disagree, then,” Komaeda said, his voice scraping like the scales of a snake on gravel.

“The last House is Hufflepuff.” Nanami was clearly still frustrated, but seemed willing to let the issue go for the moment--it wasn’t a fight she’d likely win. “Hufflepuffs value kindness, honesty, hard work…”

“So,” Komaeda said, and turned to Hinata. “Which one sounds most like you?”

“I don’t know,” Hinata said hoarsely. His heart thudded in his chest. What if he didn’t fit into any of the Houses? Would he be kicked out? He couldn’t be. He was important , and the invitation had been proof of that. He was extraordinary, and he deserved to go to Hope's Peak, he knew he did. But somewhere within him, a little voice whispered that maybe the school would be right to send him home. “I don’t know,” he repeated. “Is… is there going to be a test?”

“It’s not really a test,” Komaeda said. “More of an appraisal. There’s a song, and you put on a hat. It’s not difficult.”

“What if I don’t match up with any of the Houses?”

Nanami and Komaeda shared a glance. Komaeda’s eyes suddenly seemed much colder than they previously had, as if the thought of Hinata not belonging disgusted him.

Nanami shrugged, and said, “I don’t know.”

Hinata slouched further into his seat, dreading their arrival at the school.