Want my definition or the dictionary's? on Transfiguration

Professor Lilac Crosby

September 17, 2010 5:15 PM

Define "Roadkill"... [Third, fourth, and fifth years!] by Professor Lilac Crosby

Lilac found herself particularly excited for this lesson. However boring the lesson could have been, the preparation in itself was fun for the twenty-six year old. She’d gotten to run out and catch the ~~unfortunate~~ specimens for the transfiguring. Unfortunate would have been such a nasty word, yet possibly completely true. It would all depend on the thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen year olds in the class.

On each of the desks sat a cage. Covering the cages were multi-colored scarves, just barely large enough to do their jobs. Lilac smiled at the scarves; they were hideous, really, but her mother had made them for her as a present, so she felt she should use them somehow. Inside the cages were the fuzzy things Lilac had such fun capturing. Of course, the capturing was undamaging and humane. Stirring quietly beneath their multi-colored coverings were small animals. Some cages had small rabbits, others squirrels, a few songbirds, even a few rats. One lucky student would find a toucan. Lilac had a plan for this student.

Calmly, Lilac sat in her cozy, soft chair, her feet up on the desk. She had recently discovered the wonders of jeans and not wearing darn skirts or dresses all the time; this was much better for the brunette. Hearing the approaching footsteps of students, Lilac chose not to stand up, just smiling at the doorway from her seat. When she saw a few bright smiling faces, she said, “Please wait for everyone to get here.” As more piled in, she added, “Take a seat, but please don’t look under the scarves!”

Once she was pretty sure everyone who was coming was there and seated, Lilac forced herself to stand up, tugging her shirt down anxiously. The young woman pulled out her wand. “Today, we will be playing with animals!” she grinned. “First, before the lesson, let me explain the cages. Underneath those scarves are little animals. Most of them are run-of-the-mill, typical, road-kill-of-life animals. One contains something vibrant, brilliant; a toucan! Ha! The student whose got the toucan will receive a prize!”

“Today’s lesson is, you guessed it, transfiguring!” A small smile creped onto Lilac’s plump lips, playing into her strengths. “You will tap your creature three times with your wand, say the incantation --Fera Verto-- and point your wand at it. If done correctly, the animal will turn into a water goblet.”

“No homework except for practicing the spell in front of a mirror,” Lilac smiled, wrapping things up. “I hate grading papers as much as you all hate writing them. All right, whoever gets the toucan, I’ll be right there in a jiffy! Anyone has any questions, I’ll be walking around. And… reveal!”

OOC: First author to post their kid gets the toucan! However, that person will most likely have to post with Lilac. Hooray! All standard rules apply, blah, blah, blah, nag, nag. Post quickly and write thoroughly!

Subthreads:

*Saves definition for Quentin's title* by Alessa Hinckley, Aladren with Professor Crosby, Prof. C

Sadness by Pippa Brockert, Teppenpaw

Want my definition or the dictionary's? by Quentin Melcher, Aladren with Charlotte Abbott (Crotalus)

0 Professor Lilac Crosby Define "Roadkill"... [Third, fourth, and fifth years!] 0 Professor Lilac Crosby 1 5

Alessa Hinckley, Aladren

September 17, 2010 6:17 PM

Saves definition for Quentin's title by Alessa Hinckley, Aladren

Now that there was no more History of Magic-something that still irked Alessa-Transfiguration was one of the better classes. And even it bothered her a little. What was wrong with the way things were naturally? Why bother changing something into something else? Alessa personally hated being changed into something that wasn't her own natural state of being, but that was pureblood society.

Of course, in Transfiguration, they were mostly changing inanimate objects, which didn't have feelings. Though she expected they would be starting animal transfiguration eventually.

At least though, this subject didn't require any athleticism like Defense or (usually) touching something gross like in Potions. Nor was there the potential to get dirty for the most part like in COMC. Not to mention that while Alessa would hate to be anything that was unnatural, she liked being the one in charge of changing things even if the professor was the one who told them what they would be doing.

The thing was, while not a total control freak, Alessa felt the need to have some over something at some point in her life. As a pureblood from an important family, she didn't really have much. Alessa didn't even get to choose who she would marry.

She was luckier than a lot of pureblood girls though. Unlike many, the Aladren was allowed some input and her parents would never marry her off to someone she hated. Granted, that might be make it harder to marry her off in general but she was her parents' baby girl, their princess-even though Alessa wasn't the most princessy girl ever-and they wanted her to be happy.

Alessa sat listening to the new Transfiguration professor. So they would be playing with animals? Wasn't that what they did in COMC? And that was the least interesting class to Alessa, though not least favorite. The Aladren sighed inwardly.

But at least they weren't really learning about the animals themselves, they'd be changing them into something else. She pulled the scarf-a lovely scarf by the way, that happened to be Alessa's favorite shade of blue-green-off the cage, only to reveal that she'd gotten the toucan!

Alessa raised her hand and waited for Professor Crosby to come by. She had to admit, she was curious about the prize. Maybe she'd even be allowed to keep the toucan. That would be neat. Alessa didn't hate animals, she merely didn't care to learn that much about them.

11 Alessa Hinckley, Aladren *Saves definition for Quentin's title* 150 Alessa Hinckley, Aladren 0 5

Professor Crosby

September 17, 2010 9:14 PM

Our lucky winner! by Professor Crosby

Lilac was circling her students like a shark watching the probable attempts, successes, and failures, when she saw a girl’s hand go up across the room. She wanted to say the girl’s name was Hinckley, but she didn’t remember for sure. The half-Russian shuffled over as quickly as her averagely sized legs could carry her over, and she squealed girlishly when she noticed this girl had the toucan.

“Ah, ha!” Lilac grinned, her vocals loud enough to hopefully be heard all over the classroom. “Ladies and gents, we have a winner!” she announced thereafter. “Miss Hinckley” --she was sure that was the girl’s last name-- “has found the toucan! A round of applause, if you would!” Without the hesitance of waiting to see if the students actually did clap, Lilac herself applauded as loudly as she could, hoping to encourage the others to follow.

“Miss Hinckley,” Lilac continued, finishing her clapping and now addressing the winner, the luckiest of the class. “If you would be so kind as to follow me to the front of the class, I’ll explain to you your prize. Oh,” she added quickly, “Bring the toucan with you.”

Once Lilac arrived back at her desk, she collapsed down with a sigh, smiling at the girl who hopefully had followed her. “All right, Miss Hinckley,” said the brunette professor happily. “You’ve won my little game; congratulations! Fate placed you in the right seat today! Whatever told you to take that seat, it was a good thing, wasn’t it?” A rhetorical question, of course. In fact, it really was more of a statement.

“Did you bring the toucan?” Lilac asked calmly. If she hadn’t, Lilac would either send her back to get it or, more than likely, go get it herself. “I can’t elaborate without it.” When she thought the girl was looking away, Lilac quickly moved papers around to find her students list. Hinckley was what she was looking for; she needed the first name. nonchalantly scanning the list, Lilac found the H section: Hinckley, Alessa. Perfect!

When she thought Alessa was ready, Lilac opened her mouth to begin going into detail. “Are you ready to have your mind blown by this pure awesomeness of your prize?” she asked, purposely beating around the bush to build suspense in the eyes of Alessa. Lilac found herself rather excited, and her Russian accent slightly poking through the plain English her father had tried to hard to get her speaking after the move to America a few years before. “Do you think you can handle this?”

0 Professor Crosby Our lucky winner! 0 Professor Crosby 0 5

Alessa

September 21, 2010 1:04 AM

The suspense is killing me. by Alessa

Wow, other than Brad, Professor Crosby had to be the most excitable emotional person Alessa had ever seen. She didn't necessarily hold that against either, it was merely a statement of fact and something the pureblood girl was not used to. Pureblood society was about keeping that to yourself and the type of people Alessa was used to were much more proper, which was how she herself was taught to be, and was supposed to act more now that she was getting to be a woman.

Still, the Aladren was actually feeling pretty happy and began to smile herself as she followed the teacher to the front of the room. She knew that what she'd just won had been due to luck rather than skill, but Alessa didn't mind. She was still getting a prize either way.

Besides, while it was great to win due to some skill she had, it was much more humiliating to lose due to lack of one she didn't possess and very few of the competitions were anything academic. Thanks to DADA, Alessa probably wouldn't even have the highest GPA in her class. While she was as smart as Rachel and Theo, she was not as good at anything athletic which was required for Defense. (Which was why it wouldn't be Veronica either. The other Aladren was smart too but Alessa had the distinct idea that her roommate was of the belief that sports were not for women.)

That was okay though. She wouldn't need it. Alessa expected to be betrothed any day now, as she'd "become a woman". Her greatest hope was just that she'd be married off to someone that she didn't hate and maybe that would let her go to college. Alessa had a feeling Rachel wanted it more than herself.

"Oh, I'm ready." The third year told Professor Crosby. In fact, Alessa was just dying to know what she was going to get. Given that she'd had to bring the toucan with her in order to understand, Alessa couldn't help but assume it had something to do with the bird, but short of the bird itself, the Aladren couldn't imagine what. "And I brought it." Of course she had, she'd been instructed to. Why would she just leave the bird at her seat?

11 Alessa The suspense is killing me. 150 Alessa 0 5

Prof. C

September 21, 2010 5:59 PM

But if you died, I'd need a new winner! by Prof. C

Lilac beamed when Alessa stated that she was indeed ready, and the grin only grew when the student told her that she had brought the toucan. “Wonderful! What a good student you are, my little winner!” she exclaimed. So far, Lilac really liked teaching. Most of these kids were astonishingly amazing, and she was glad to have so many awesome students to teach. Teaching, Lilac really felt like she affected the world; she was training the next generation, the ones who might one day grow up to be Healers, or Aurors, or take her job after she retired. Who knew what these kids were capable of?! ...I should, probably...

“Alessa,” she began with a serious tone and a grave face, trying to calm herself down, “first, just let me congratulate you once again. Luck was definitely on your side today!” Okay, calming not working. Lilac paused to take a deep breath. Being so excited, as she now realized, had almost completely eliminated the cover she mentally placed on her Russian accent. Growing up in Russia hadn’t done her English very much good, and when she and her parents had moved to America, her father’s home country, he took on the task of teaching her to speak proper English. That had only been about nine years before, so Lilac still slipped up occasionally. Plus, it was hard to balance, what with her own home now as an adult being in Russia. It was almost like there was two of her, but she reasoned that the world, both Muggle and magical, would not be able to handle that.

“Your prize comes in multiple parts, Miss Hinckley,” the Transfiguration professor smiled smugly. “First and foremost is the one you probably expect: you get to keep the toucan!” So, since she had asked Alessa to bring the bird with her, it probably wasn’t much of a surprise, but it would still please the girl, Lilac hoped. “I call him Tico, but he’s not trained to respond to it, so you can change it if you want,” she went on. “Oh, and my best guess is that he’s masculine, which I can only assume by the fact that he squawks up a storm every time I’ve called him ‘woman’.”

“Secondly,” the brunette woman went on, “You get nothing! As in, do nothing! You can just goof off for the rest of the class, talk to your friends, terrorize your enemies, and I won’t do anything about it as long as it doesn’t get violent.” That probably wasn’t the smartest plan, but this girl looked so sweet, and Lilac could hardly imagine her having any enemies! “If that occurs, I’ll revoke the third prize.”

“The third and final prize,” she began to finish, but paused. After scribbling something down on a piece of paper that read, when finished, ONE FREE HOMEWORK PASS, she quickly held the paper up and smiled. “This is it! Behold its glory! Now, as long as there’s a concept or spell you understand, you can get an automatic O on the assignment without having to do it! I’d keep that in mind when I give out homework soon, and I will give out homework soon.”

“Now, you lucky, lucky child,” Lilac concluded, tucking the pass into Alessa’s hand. Making that little “shoo, shoo” hand motion, Lilac finished the conversation. “Go have fun now, Alessa! Heck, actually, you can just leave if you want to, as long as you can do the spell. Maybe try it a couple times, get the hang of it, and then take the class off!”

0 Prof. C But if you died, I'd need a new winner! 0 Prof. C 0 5

Pippa Brockert, Teppenpaw

September 25, 2010 5:56 AM

Sadness by Pippa Brockert, Teppenpaw

Pippa was one of the first people to enter class that day, she often was aside from some of the Aladrens. She might have been a Teppenpaw rather than a Crotalus but she always tried to follow the rules and keep out of trouble. Besides, she was sort of a people pleaser and wanted to make the teacher happy with her, as well as her parents. Pippa often felt it was necessary to do her best.

Furthermore, Transfiguration was one of her better classes and one she was probably going to keep taking after CATS. It was often considered a more masculine class but not as bad as Potions or DADA, so it was okay with Pippa's family if she kept taking it. She was not sure, however, whether she wanted to take Transfig or Divination or both, while she was definitely going to take COMC and Charms. Charms was the one class that would be indispensible to Pippa, as it was to any young witch or wizard.

As more people filtered in and the fifth year was allowed to take her seat, Pippa found herself growing more curious about what was underneath the lovely scarves. She had a sinking feeling she knew what it would be, more animals. It was an intermediate lesson, after all and they had moved into living transfiguration.

She was soon proven right. Normally the idea of playing with animals would have thrilled her, but Transfiguring animals was not quite the same thing. At least though they wouldn't have to do anything that would harm an animal. If they were turning them into water goblets, she would know where they were at least, unlike last year where they'd worked on vanishing birds and she'd opted to use a book instead.

Pippa removed the scarf from her cage, only to find the cutest bunny. She really didn't want to change it into some dull water goblet because it was so adorable. It would be a shame to turn it into something else.

Before Pippa was able to do anything with it though, her attention was drawn to Alessa finding the toucan. She clapped for her cousin and turned back to her work. Pippa was sitting close enough that she could hear what the third year had won. Apparently, the Aladren girl got to keep her toucan. Pippa looked back at the bunny. Maybe she could ask Professor Crosby for the same thing. Not the toucan of course or the other prizes that Alessa had won but to keep her bunny after she was done transfiguring it.

That was when she remembered and sighed. Of course Pippa shouldn't keep it. Merlin only knew what Tawny would do with it. It was enough that Pippa had a puffskien that she had to protect from her sister. She already had to keep the poor creature locked up when she was at home.

She looked sadly back at the bunny and rose her wand " Fera Verto " Pippa said unenthusiastically.

It was too bad her sister had to ruin everything for her.

11 Pippa Brockert, Teppenpaw Sadness 132 Pippa Brockert, Teppenpaw 0 5

Quentin Melcher, Aladren

September 26, 2010 5:40 AM

Want my definition or the dictionary's? by Quentin Melcher, Aladren

As usual, Quentin was looking forward to Transfiguration. He immensely enjoyed all his classes and did well in them. He'd also heard they had a new teacher. Of course, whether or not she was an actual professor would remain to be seen but Kirstenna had told him that she had at least taught them the spell.

Of course, his cousin also had mentioned something about the professor raising an army of beetles and possibly being the same person as last year's professor, polyjuiced into someone else. Quentin really was growing increasingly worried about the young Teppenpaw. Either Kirstenna was delusional or she would make a very good writer of fiction. Quentin sincerely hoped it was the latter.

Though even that wouldn't please their grandparents. Felix Melcher did not approve of fiction, thinking it frivolous. It did, however, rank above non-intellectual pursuits such as acting or dancing or singing. Quentin knew Kirstenna liked to sing, but if she wanted acceptance from their family, she was far better off as a writer than as performer.

Personally, Quentin wanted to fix this. Someday, he would have children-something he'd thought of just slightly more since the news that his father and probably grandfather and great-grandfather were looking to betroth him, which much like when he began thinking about taking Marissa to that dance meant he was thinking about it at all, since he hadn't been previously. Fifteen year old boys didn't naturally think of such things, even ones like Quentin who thought of just about everything. He wanted those kids to feel loved and accepted, that their dad would care about them no matter what they pursued.

Unfortunately, it would be several years before Quentin was the Melcher in charge and in the meantime, Kirstenna was likely not going to be truly accepted. Just that her mother was a muggle, making her from only a partial magical background meant they wouldn't. But someday that would all be different. Quentin just didn't know when that day was yet.

The fifth year listened as Professor-indeed, she was a professor-Crosby gave her lesson and removed the scarf from his cage to reveal a squirrel. Quentin waved his wand in the proper motion and said the correct spell. The result was a fuzzy goblet with a furry squirrel tail.

He briefly paused to clap as Alessa had gotten the toucan. Not that he wouldn't have clapped for anyone else. He would have for anyone. Quentin then turned back to his work, thinking that while Alessa looked happy, if slightly weirded out, Professor Crosby seemed even more excited than his cousin did.

Quentin tried once more. This time there was no tail, but the goblet was still covered with a nice layer of fur. "How are you doing on this?" The fifth year asked his neighbor.

11 Quentin Melcher, Aladren Want my definition or the dictionary's? 129 Quentin Melcher, Aladren 0 5

Charlotte Abbott (Crotalus)

October 01, 2010 3:57 PM

I'd like yours, please by Charlotte Abbott (Crotalus)

Sat at a desk chosen simply because it was one of the few empty seats by the time she made it to class, Charlie sat barely paying attention to the class, staring vacantly at the bracelet on her wrist. She'd worn it every day since Dmitry gave it to her, and by now it was just a part of her. Except Dmitry wasn't, really. The summer had been fun, but since coming back to school Charlie had barely spoken to him, despite being in the same House, classes, and on the Quidditch team together. They'd done a little bit of catching up and making out, fair enough, but it wasn't the exciting fun that it had been in their first few months together. It was sad, but Charlie thought she knew what the problem was. She and Dmitry were the same - they'd both appreciated lots of people, and had ended up dating each other. Which was great, but actually Charlotte sort of missed datng other people, and she had a sneaking suspision Dmitry felt the same. She almost thought she should bring it up with him, but then he would probably suspect that she felt that way, even if he didn't, and they would break up. That was problematic, because even though she missed dating other people and missed the excitement she'd had with Dmitry, Charlie wasn't sure she actually wanted to break up - she still liked Dmitry, she just didn't like that they'd become bored with each other.

Sighing, Charlie sat up straight and decided to contemplate the lesson. Her long, dark brown hair was left loose today, apart from a cromson colored ribbon tied round her head with an understated bow to one side, so Charlie brushed it back off her shoulders before picking up her wand and pulling off the scarf, as instructed. There was a cute gray squirrel inside, and the fifth year thought it would be much nicer to set the thing free and watch it frolick rather than turn it into a water goblet. Never mind.

Raising her wand, Charlie cast the spell to produce a ston-looking squirrel that still twitched. Raising her eyebrows at it, she cast the spell again, with more determination, rendering an object that did look quite a lot like a stone goblet, but was sort-of squirrel-shaped, if one used their imagination. "How are you doing on this?" came a voice to her side. Charlie turned to see Quentin, who also had a squirrel, judging by the fur on his goblet.

"Um," Charlie looked at her own creation. "Not so well, considering that I was aiming for a gold goblet," she admitted. Quentin was one of the few people in her year Charlotte didn't know all that well. there wasn't any particular reason for this - she quite liked the Aladren. True enough, he did sometimes ask odd questions, but he didn't ask pointless questions, which would have been irritating. "You seem to have managed a good goblet shape," she commented on his own attempt.

0 Charlotte Abbott (Crotalus) I'd like yours, please 0 Charlotte Abbott (Crotalus) 0 5

Quentin

October 10, 2010 4:33 PM

You...would? by Quentin

The person sitting next to Quentin turned out to be Charlie Abbott. He couldn't remember actually speaking to her before though his general impression was that she wasn't very academically inclined and that she was very friendly, especially to the guys. He knew she had had a thing with two of his roommates and was now dating that transfer, Dmitry.

Truthfully, Quentin had never really thought Charlie liked him that much. Not that that would have bothered him. Quentin didn't really care what others thought of him. He was who he was and didn't care if most others liked him or not. He couldn't be someone else, he could only be Quentin. Whether his classmates or his family liked it or not.

In particular, he was starting to care less and less what his family thought. They weren't especially critical of him-no more so than they were of most people since Quentin didn't give them much to complain about-but he couldn't stand how they talked about Kirstenna or her parents or some of the students in their school. They were his family and Quentin loved them but he hated these traits, hated their snobbishness and their bigotry, especially when it was directed towards people he cared about like Kirstenna or Marissa.

He looked over Charlie's object. "That's not too bad. It might be stone, but it's an appropriate-ish shape. You seem to be doing better than you think." Quentin said encouragingly. He was not going to say she was on the right track, as they were not on a track, they were in a classroom. Which was a far more appropriate place to be for learning transfiguration. Tracks were, from what he understood, racing, an activity Quentin had no interest in.

"Thanks." Quentin responded. "I wish I could get rid of the fur though." He tried again and managed to change part of it to the material he had chosen, which was silver. The cup part was now fine but the handle was still furry. "Well, that kind of worked."

11 Quentin You...would? 129 Quentin 0 5