Lesson Two: Mouse to Teacup

[Headmaster Dumbledore]

Dumbledore swept into the classroom, his royal purple robes flowing about him as if caught in their own magical breeze. Behind his half-moon spectacles, his blue eyes were shining brightly. Surveying his temporary class, Dumbledore was pleased. He’d had a good lesson last time and felt that it was time for a more difficult one. He hoped that his students had been practicing.

“Hello, class!” he called cheerfully. “I’m not going to bore you with random small-talk today as I wish to give you all more time for your lesson. Today, we will be turning a living mouse into a teacup. This is slightly more difficult than your usual non-living to non-living transfiguration, as one msut transform something that is currently living into something that is, or seems to be, lifeless.” Here, Dumbledore began pacing in front of the class a bit.

“The incantation for this lesson is ‘Testa Mutatio.’ The wand-movement is a light jab at the mouse. And do not worry, class. The mouse, while transformed, will not really die, but rather be transfigured. I assure you, I will turn each and every teacup back into its mouse incarnation. Please begin!”

Dumbledore waved his wand and mice appeared on each desk, seemingly stunned for a moment as they were transferred form their original place and put into a classroom. “And please, class, keep your mice under control. We don’t want any of them running away.”

Grade:
Just an RP grade for this lesson; extra points for anything particularly entertaining or well-written.

[Vince Forrest]

I went into my second lesson. Headmaster Dumbledore sat at the front of the class room again, waiting for everyone to show up. Vince sat down in the seat he sat down in before. The pencil they had to transfigure was a little bit hard but that was the first spell he chase maybe, it wouldn’t be so hard this time.

Dumbledore didn’t waste time show and tell us what we were doing today. Transfiguring mice into tea cup, and we need to keep our mice under control. Mice unlike some girls, didn’t bother him, so he thought is would be another just needs practice.
The mice were passed out to everyone, he got a small white mouse, with big black eye’s that didn’t leave Vince’s face. Vince sat up straight and was about to cast the spell when the mouse grabbed the end of his wand.
“What the-” he shook the mouse trying to shake it off. But it didn’t let go, instead he could have sworn the mouse was laughing at him. Ugh, no it couldn’t be laughing at him, it was rat. he shock it a little harder. It ran up his wand and down his arm. Into robes, he laughed as the little feet mouse feet tickled him and got some weird looks from the other students. He quickly grabbed mouse and sat him back on the table. They are stared at each other before Vince pointed his wand at it again, he went to call out the spell but the mouse jumped onto his robes and climbed up his robes.
“Why you stupid bloody rat” Vince snacked the rat up and sat it down on the desk. Before the mouse could moved.
“Testa Mutatio” He barely missed the mouse. This time it tried to jump off the side of the desk, but Vince was there to grab it. Vince put it on the desk and so it didn’t run off he held it there. This rat is going to get him a bad grade, he thought grimly to himself. Before trying the spell again he calmed his nerves he didn’t want to mess up the spell because a mouse was getting to him. He point his wand at the mouse.
“Testa Mutatio.” with that a small light hit the mouse and transformed into a tea cup. He smiled and picked it up.
“Ack” He almost dropped the cup. It was still furry. He sat there and laughed at the fact he scared himself. He made a tea cup at least, even though it was a fuzzy one.
~*****~
RP: 40/50
Extra: 10 points for the funneh!

[Griffin Sosario]

When Griffin sat down for his second transfiguration lesson, he was dreading the idea of more wand magic. He was pretty bad at it so far. He groaned when the Professor told them that they would be transfiguring mice into teacups, he could barely transfigure a pencil into a quill. How was he supposed to work with something alive? "Oh, well, I'll give it a try."

When the mouse appeared on his desk, he pushed up the sleaves of his robe and held out his wand pointed at the mouse. Just as he was about to attempt the spell, his mouse made a bid for freadom, and tried to jump off his desk. Griffin cought it by the tail and set it back down. He pointed his wand to try again, but the mouse tried to run off again. When no one was looking, he got a piece of duct tape out of his bag(he always carried some with him) and taped the mouses tail to the desk.

The mouse squealed and tried to pull free, but the tape did its job. "Testa Mutatio." He jabbed at the mouse and it turned into a teacup. Griffin was just about to get exited when he noticed that instead of a handle, the teacup had a tail, and it had wiskers coming out of the sides of it. He went to pick it up to get a closer look, but it wouldn't budge, it was stuck to the table. "Maybe duct tape wasn't such a good idea."
~*****~
RP: 44/50
Extra: 10 points for funny

[Dastan Cross]

((OOC: I have permission to use Astin. Also, I'm not exactly sure when this is taking place, so it's going to just be right after the fight and subsequent make-up. Why not? ))

A living thing, a mouse, into a non-living one. Weren't there better ways of doing that? Like, perhaps strangling one? Or maybe stepping on one?

Dastan did not like mice. They weren't quite as bad as rats, but they still had those beady little eyes, and Dastan didn't like the idea of having to keep track of the useless creature for the sake of a spell. Not to mention this lesson was totally pointless; when would he need to turn a mouse into a teacup in the real world?

Still, there was a lot of value in learning how to transform a living, moving thing into something else, even if it was just a mouse now. After all, in the wizarding world, an enemy wasn't likely to hold still and wait patiently while you tried to transfigure him. Having managed to trick himself into believing that this wasn't a useless spell, Dastan clutched his mouse in a hand and pulled his wand out of his boot. He'd practice by letting the thing scurry around. Let it think it was getting somewhere. It would certainly improve his aim, if nothing else.

That decided, he let the mouse go. It scurried to the edge of his desk and Dastan pointed his wand at it. Just as it was planning on jumping, he called, "Testa mutatio!"

The spell missed by a millimeter, and the force of the spell flipped the mouse and it started panicking, dashing madly across the desk. But Dastan wasn't going to let it go so fast. "Testa mutatio!"


Finally, the spell hit and he smirked as a traditional Arabic tea-cup sat docilely on the table. He was going to reach over and grab it when suddenly, it wasn't there anymore, and a sound of shattering glass echoed throughout the classroom. His project was in ruins.

Something had knocked over the teacup. And it was another little mouse. Annoyed, Dastan leveled his wand at the creature.

"Gotcha, you stupid rodent!" a familiar voice called out and then Dastan watched as Astin Descartes dived across the classroom and tried to grab the mouse that had wreaked havoc on his own project. Stifling laughter as the mouse slipped out of Astin's apparently slack grip, Dastan stepped out of the way of the other.

Apparently, not quickly enough, because the next thing he knew, Astin had tripped and fallen on top of him. Irritated, but secretly entertained and trying to hide the fact that he really didn't mind having Astin's body over his own, Dastan grabbed his wand and pointed it at the rodent, calling, "Petrificus Totalas!" The mouse stopped and Dastan gently extracted himself from under Astin, standing and dusting off his robes.

"That's the third time you've ruined my robes,"he said, trying on a sneer, but failing because, quite frankly, he couldn't entirely fight the urge to smile.

"Reparo!" he called then, fixing his own broken teacup. He hoped Astin's murderous mouse hadn't irreparably damaged it. He was sure he'd lose points if Dumbledore transfigured the teacup back and it was dead.

Now that he'd successfully completed his lesson he leaned back against the desk and watched Astin closely to see if he'd be able to do the spell or not; he'd be ready to offer any pointers necessary, but he wanted to see how much the other had improved since their fight.
~*****~
RP: 50/50
Extra: 10

[Astin Descartes]

(OOC: I have permission for my brief use of Dastan.)

"You're a cute little thing, aren't you?" Astin asked the mouse affectionately as he held it between his hands. Mice had never really bothered him. In fact, one summer, they'd had a few in their house, and he'd convinced his mom not to exterminate them forcefully. So he wasn't exactly looking forward to turning a mouse into a teacup. But he did need to improve at magic, and this was his next challenge; one issued by the Headmaster, no less.

The mouse wriggled out of his hands, flopped onto the table with a muted thud, and began scurrying across to freedom.

"Hey, get back here!" Astin snatched it up, holding it a little more firmly this time. "I need you, little guy." He was about to hold it out and attempt to perform the spell, but suddenly he dropped the mouse, hissing in pain. "Little fucker bit me," he mumbled to no one, shaking out his now-injured hand. He scanned his table for the mouse to find it running across the stone floor.

Great. Now he got to make a fool of himself.

As he sped across the classroom after the annoying creature, he bumped into only everyone he passed. It was when he'd half-turned to apologize to someone that he heard a crash. He looked to find a mouse that he was ninety-nine percent sure was his looking dazed, sitting in the remains of a teacup. Taking his chance, he leaped over to it.

"Gotcha, you stupid rodent!" He'd barely grasped the mouse, though, before it had already wound its way out of his hands. He made to go after it, but instead crashed into someone and tumbled to the ground with a grunt. He lifted himself up a little, before catching familiar brown eyes. Well, hey there, gorgeous. Haven't been in this position before, have we?

"Petrificus Totalas!"

It actually took Astin a second to realize that the spell had been aimed at the rodent and not at him. In fact, Dastan was already standing before Astin had noticed that he had control of his limbs.

"That's the third time you've ruined my robes."

Third? Astin only remembered the first time. He shrugged his apology. He doubted this would be the last time he ruined Dastan's robes, and from the looks of the expression on Dastan's face, he wasn't all too angry, no matter what he said.

Astin straightened himself out and picked up the mouse by its tail. Enough screwing around; time to actually get to work.

Alright, what all had they gone over in their tutoring session? Keys to transfiguration. Right. Proper wand movement, proper pronunciation, focus, and effort. Not too hard. He'd accomplished more complex things than turning a mouse to a teacup, after all.

The only thing he would have trouble with was the focus, really. It was hard to focus with Dastan watching him. In fact, he'd trade in some of the effort he knew he was going to put in to impress his friend for the slightest bit of focus. He shook his head. He could do this. It certainly wasn't the hardest thing he'd ever tried.

But gods, it was hard to think about teacups with those brown eyes trained on his every move.

Teacups. Right. He imagined his mom's favorite, a simple white one with a wide rim, sloping sides, and twisting vine around the top where it flared out. Alright, here goes nothing.

"Testa mutatio!" he called, jabbing his wand at the mouse. It twisted and turned into something that at least rather resembled what he'd had in mind, although it was in no way the prettiest or most elegant teacup he'd ever seen. But it was, indubitably, a teacup.

"Congratulations, loser. You're not as hopeless as I thought."

Astin took the compliment for what it was as he used the edge of his robes to discreetly wipe off the loose tuft of fur just inside the rim of his teacup.