Professor Levy

April 23, 2010 10:26 AM
Coming back to a new school year was hard. It meant leaving Torra behind, but it was a good career and between their careers they were able to make the best of the time they did get together. Like this summer, they had gone to the Dominica, which had been absolutely breathtaking. They had opted to stay at the Calibishie Hotel one of the most luxurious hotels available. Just waking up every morning to the smells had been like Heaven. Then, there was the entirety of what to do each and every day from festivals to diving to relaxing on the beach.

Unfortunately, in the beginning fair skin turned out to be no match for the sun and they had both ended up with sunburns. Thankfully, by the end of the trip, she was finally tanning and she was sure that the returning students were probably going to be surprised by how radiant their Defense Against the Dark Arts professor looked today. To compensate for her tanned skin, she had opted for ivory robes, which probably seemed odd on her since she normally wore black.

Of course, a change in robes and skin tone didn’t affect her stern attitude. Defense Against the Dark Arts was a class that had no room for tomfoolery. She nodded to each student coming in. She stood in front of her desk. It was a good day, because she was able to get by without her cane. Last year, she had been practically dependent on it. Now, she only needed it about half the time. She had hopes that one day she wouldn’t need it at all, but doubted she would ever be back in top form, not enough to return to being an Auror.

The lesson today would involve one of her favorite areas. Illusions. Once everyone was seated and ready to go, Erika began, “Welcome back, students. I expect this year to go just as smoothly as it did last year.” Of course, she intentionally left out any actual problems they did have. Each year was a fresh start in her mind. “As most of you know, but for those that don’t, I am Professor Levy and this is Defense Against the Dark Arts. The rules are simple. I only ask that you follow instructions so no one gets seriously injured. All right, that said, let’s begin with role call.” She picked a sheet of paper up from her desk.

“When I call your name, I want you to say ‘Here’ and then tell me something about yourself. We learned a bit about each other last year so I want to know something new like what you did over summer, what you expect to learn in this class, and the like,” she finished with a wave of her hand. She normally wouldn’t have asked the intermediate class to do this since she had asked it of them last year, but she wanted to learn about the newcomers without putting them directly on the spot. This seemed the most appropriate way to do so.

Once they finished, Erika continued on with her lesson plans, “Today, we’ll be starting off the year with Disillusionment Charms.” With a wave of the wand, the following appeared on the board.

Disillusionment Charms

Acclaro Prastigiae – reveal an illusion

Creo Prastigiae – create an illusion


“As the name obviously suggests, they are used to create or reveal illusions. For now, we’ll be working with objects, but if the magic is advanced enough, they can be used on a person as well. Sometimes, they are used to allow the person to blend into the environment, and sometimes, derivatives can be used like glamour. The spells aren’t the best to use given other options like polyjuice potion, but can be used in a pinch. All of this you will learn in more detail if you choose to go into a Defense Against the Arts field such as Auror or Investigations.” She had learned most of this at Sapienti University of Magic, which had a strong Auror program.

“Creo Prastigiae works by casting an illusion over the object, which makes it blend in with its surroundings. To perform the charm, wave your wand as so,” she said, as she flourished her wand towards her desk, “and state firmly Creo Prastigiae. With this, her desk seemingly seemed disappeared. “Now a limitation to the spell is that the object is obviously still there so even though it can’t be seen, it can still be found.” As an example, she took a book from one of her shelves and placed it on her desk. It seemed as though it were just floating in air.

“To reverse the effects, wave your wand like so,” she did another complicated wand movement, “and state firmly Acclaro Prastigiae.” With this, the desk reappeared, the book still on top. “Ta-da!” She smiled at the class. “All right, then, I want everyone to divide up into groups of two. Each person will cast Creo Prastigiae on the given item. Once both people have successfully accomplished this, I want you to switch items with your partner and attempt to reveal the object using Acclaro Prastigiae. If you have questions, raise your hand, and I’ll be around. Otherwise, you may begin.”

Her finger to her lip, she bit her nail. Erika felt like she was forgetting something. “Oh, yes! Before you leave, don’t forget to take the homework sheet from my desk,” she called out over the scraping of the desks as the students rearranged themselves.

OOC: Please remember that standard posting rules apply. Points will be rewarded based on detail, creativity, etc. Have fun!
Subthreads:
0 Professor Levy Lesson I: Intermediate Level (Third and Fourth Years) 0 Professor Levy 1 5

Marissa Stephenson

April 27, 2010 1:03 PM
“I want to know something new like what you did over summer.”

Most of what Marissa had done over the summer had involved battling for tribal supremacy with the evilest Survivor ever to infiltrate the Heroes’ alliance, but she had a feeling that announcing that in class would not earn her any points with Professor Levy. Plus, most of her classmates had never heard of Survivor. So when the near-end of the alphabet rolled around and she replied to her name, Marissa said, “I hung out with my friends from home a lot and brushed up on my tennis skills.”

It occurred to her that they might not know what tennis was, either, but she’d already said it by then. Besides, she was an open Muggleborn in Crotalus. She had gone for long enough without realizing she should for the idea of pretending to be a pureblood to be viable, so she imagined a certain number of comments many of the other students couldn’t piece together the meaning of was expected from her. With that thought in mind, she listened politely to what the rest of her classmates had to say and then took out her class supplies.

Defense Against the Dark Arts was…odd, she supposed the word would be, as far as her magic-based classes went. On the one hand, it was a magic-based class, so she spent an unhealthy amount of time making each and every written assignment perfect to make up for her lackluster to terrible practical performances. On the other hand, though, her performances in Defense usually fell a lot closer to ‘lackluster’ than ‘terrible’ than they did in any other class. She had finally put it together so her instincts toward self-preservation were overriding her resistance to magic in the face of a world so dangerous it apparently had to teach every single member of it the essentials of self-defense. Deep down, beneath the niceness and politeness and perfectionism, Marissa was at least a mild pragmatist. She wanted to be able to look out for herself, especially in the magical world, where her family couldn’t help her much.

She took careful notes during the lecture, doing her best to imprint every single world that came out of Professor Levy’s mouth onto her brain, and skimmed the notes she’d taken from the textbook on the subject. That was a system she’d worked out over the summer that she was especially proud of. Since there wasn’t really time in class for her to read the text when doing so wasn’t part of the assignment, she’d instead noted the essentials of as much of it as she could finish between when she’d gotten it and when school had started and intended to finish the rest as soon as she could. Once she felt sufficiently aware of the concepts involved for a start – the real work would come later, in private, after she no doubt made a fool of herself here; words couldn’t express her gratitude over no transfers landing in third year Crotalus – Marissa took out her wand and said, “Creo Prastigiae,” over the green coffee mug in front of her.

More than one spark came out, which was nice, but in essence, nothing happened.

“It’s going to take me forever to get it to do anything,” she told her partner, her tone self-deprecating but slightly tinged with humor. Marissa fancied she was well-known, now, for being the girl who answered questions in class and used to blow things up but these days just couldn’t make them work until the day of the exam, when they worked to an extent but seldom exactly as intended. “You don’t have to work with me if you don’t want to.”
16 Marissa Stephenson Slow and steady wins the race...allegedly. 147 Marissa Stephenson 0 5


Jose Hernandez

April 28, 2010 5:19 PM
Hernandez put Jose toward the beginning of the list of students in most of his classes, especially since both his class and the fourth years seemed to be weighted toward the middle and end of the alphabet (it wasn't even entirely the fault of the Smythes, either), so he was one of the first ten people to call out "Here!" and tell everyone what he did over the summer.

"I spent entirely too long drawing up my Quidditch Sign-up sheet." Which was as subtle a way as he knew how to tell everyone in his class who didn't already know that he was Pecari's new Captain. "And I worked at a Rennfaire," he added, though that was more afterthought than anything else. That could be pretty much taken for granted most summers, but maybe some people didn't know the California Pierces (or that he was one of them) well enough to have figured that out yet.

Eventually, everyone else finished going as well, and Jose even managed to listen to all of the brief summaries. Afterwards, he honestly couldn't say if it was Daniel Nash II or Juri Dahlgreen whose parents' marriage earned him a trio of evil step-sisters, but he really had been paying attention.

Marissa, who he was sitting next to and whose name he wouldn't have known if he hadn't been paying attention to role call, had played tennis with her friends. Or something like that. As a magic-muggle mongrel, Jose at least knew what Tennis was and had even played it a few times during various gym classes, though he couldn't claim any expertise in the sport. His skill varied between hitting the tennis ball into the net and into (and sometimes over) the fence, and rarely landed in between those extremes.

When she proved not to be much better at casting illusions, he gave her a grin and assured her, "Don't worry about it. I can wait as long as I have to."

He pointed his own wand at the bright yellow comb that was in front of him, and cast, "Creo Prastigiae," with a wave of his wand. The comb sort of shimmered and turned translucent but did not vanish entirely. "I've still got some work to do on mine anyway," he added.
1 Jose Hernandez So if you're the tortoise, I'll be the hare. 149 Jose Hernandez 0 5

Marissa Stephenson

April 29, 2010 2:51 PM
Marissa remembered who Jose was for three reasons. One was that there weren't many more people in their year than in a standard Muggle classroom, so she was used to knowing about twenty-odd faces she wasn't especially close to on sight. Another was that his father had once mentioned Sonora was a really good school, which had made her and her parents feel better when, not long after that, Paige had gotten accepted to the same prep school Marissa and Addison had planned to attend together. The third was that he was on the Pecari Quidditch team, and had brought the fact up in his opening comments.

She had not told her mother about it, because Alice wouldn't have been pleased with her lack of sportsmanship, but Marissa had never found an opportunity to politely congratulate him on his performance in the Crotalue-Pecari game the year before. She had thought she was doing pretty well to have only cried a little about it, and that bit not in front of people. Sometimes she faked it better than at others, but Marissa wasn't a very good loser outside of the semi-informal world of academics. It was somehow easier to say fair was fair when someone beat her on a test than when they beat her at a sport, even if she did know that was a stupid way to think about it.

Luckily, the sting had dulled a little since June, so she smiled as Jose succeeded in making his comb change a bit. "Good start, though," she said, trying the spell on her mug again with predictable results. Then, to make up for her lapse in courtesy in their second year, she added, "By the way, congratulations on being the Pecari captain. I hope it works out well for you."
16 Marissa Stephenson Looks like the Aesop's going to be disproven. 147 Marissa Stephenson 0 5


Jose Hernandez (Pecari)

May 17, 2010 4:48 PM
As Marissa began speaking, Jose recognized her voice and remembered she was the one who'd sat with him and his parents at that thing at the hotel way back in first year. Feeling simultaneously bad for forgetting who she was and better for realizing he hadn't completely ignored her for two whole years, Jose grinned back at her as she offered her congratulations on his captaincy. "Thanks! I hope it works out, too!" He was a little worried actually; he was beginning to notice two of his players hated each other.

Or, more accurately, he was beginning to notice that Starbuck hated Demelza. Demelza seemed somewhat oblivious to the whole thing, though she also seemed to be twigging to the fact that something wasn't quite right anymore. Jose had no idea what had caused the rift, and suspected Mel didn't either. He should maybe talk to Starbuck about it at some point.

But that was neither here nor there. Now, he was supposed to be getting a yellow comb to look like it wasn't there anymore. And maybe trying to help Marissa who seemed to be having even more trouble.

He supposed he should have a working illusion first, though, before he tried to offer unsolicited advice. "Creo Prastigiae," he cast for the second time on his comb, and once more it shimmered and turned a little more invisible. It wasn't entirely gone, but if you weren't looking for it, he thought it would blend into the desk fairly well. Only the outlines of it stood out a little bit, catching the light differently than the rest of the desk did.

He pushed it over in front of Marissa and decided that was as close as he was going to get. "Maybe it'll be easier to dispel an poorly cast illusion than to make one of your own?" he suggested, hoping that if she could bust his spell, she'd have the confidence to get hers up.
0 Jose Hernandez (Pecari) Nah, see? I just took a nap in front of the finish line. 0 Jose Hernandez (Pecari) 0 5

Marissa

May 20, 2010 9:42 PM
Oblivious to the issues between the Pecari Quidditch girls, Marissa smiled. "I'm sure it will," she said. "Coach Pierce doesn't seem like the type to pick someone incompetent."

It occurred to her that, if she squinted just so at it, her statement might backfire a little as a compliment, but that was the best she thought she could do. She didn't know Jose well enough to make statements about his perceived virtues unless he started beating himself up right in front of her. Besides, Coach Pierce was Marissa's own Head of House, and wasn't it assumed that she'd think more highly of what her Head of House thought than she did of most teachers? So it should work as a compliment.

Jose was more successful on his second attempt at the spell she was, predictably enough, still failing; even looking at it as it disappeared, she had to look around for what still showed up. "Very nice," she said, trying hers again without much conviction. It was a betrayal of everything she'd been raised to believe, but it was far easier than she'd thought it would be to expect failure and find the expectation kind of comforting.

The corners of her mouth twitched upward at his suggestion about performing the spells in reverse, even as she blushed slightly at the acknowledgment of her failure. Somehow, it was different when she admitted she was no good and when someone else did so. "It's not that bad," she objected as she pushed her own work aside. "You just started this. It's probably as good as I'll be able to do in the end." She concentrated very hard on the comb, trying to picture it in her head the way it had looked when it hadn't been enchanted. "Acclaro Prastigiae."

It didn't revert to yellow, but she thought - thought that she hoped - she had seen it flicker, just a bit. Crossing the fingers of her free hand, she tried again, and got a definite sight of yellow for a second. "Did you see that?" she asked Jose, excited. "It almost worked! Hold on for just one second - "

It did, in the end, take more than one second, but she finally got it more or less consistently yellow. Marissa was beaming as she slid it back across the dress. "That's the second spell I've gotten to work during class this year," she said. "If I keep this up, I might actually do well on a practical exam this year." She had only ever actually failed once, but only because she had learned to function on much less than a doctor-recommended amount of sleep so she could both turn out really good written work and stay up for extra spell practice. If her parents ever found out how much tea and sugar she ingested in an average week here, they'd probably seek an audience with the Headmistress to complain about it. "I'm not getting my hopes up too much, though."

She looked back at her work, trying to hold on to her good mood. She could do this. Sure. Of course. Naturally. It was no problem. Hit by sudden inspiration, she picked it up and studied the desk it was supposed to blend in with, trying to memorize the pattern of the wood so she could picture it while casting the spell. "Trying this again," she said. "Creo prastigiae."

It didn't vanish, but a little bit of the handle was wiped away, the illusion spreading like she had spilled a very small amount of liquid. She smiled, pleased. "This is definitely progress," she said.
16 Marissa Kind of you to give me a fighting chance. 147 Marissa 0 5