summer

[peterxy]

Professor Spukhafte doesn't have any more advice than Hermione does, and is not as willing as the Gryffindor to help them if they're still stuck.

Which they are. Sadde's suggestion that they try focusing on shorter parts of memories for a higher happiness-per-second value helps him but not Miranda, so he ends up with a more solid fog. Still just fog, though. They continue reading books about it, and it seems to just be that idiosyncratic. Interestingly enough, some books written by alchemists also have mentions of Dementors, trying to figure out what their symbolic value is and whether it's possible to integrate it. More advanced books are in the Restricted Section, and they won't have access to it until at least Professor Slughorn gives them the go ahead.

The year passes. Willow is consistently good at the theoretical parts of classes and consistently bad at the practical ones, mostly due to being flustered by failures and not quite being able to get over that fact. Sadde and Miranda are exceptional at Potions, and the only reason Sadde isn't also exceptional at Transfiguration is that he doesn't quite care enough about homework when all that's on the line are his grades. That, plus all the time he spends between reading about Dementors, reading about Alchemy, and trying to undo the damage suffered by Slytherins because of the Dark Lord.

That last goal has the most tangible results, for a certain value of "tangible." Slytherin firsties are divided between liking him (Jacob and two of the girls) and grudgingly tolerating him (the other boy and girl). He has thoroughly dispelled the notion that he's "just another Slytherin" firsties from other Houses (except perhaps Gryffindor) might have, but of course that doesn't make the older years all that happy. Well, not that the older Slytherins actually care that much. But he has helped various of them with various things, mostly by acting like a somewhat willful minion, since there's not much more he can do to help older students beyond that, so he's at least on talking terms with most of them (Cole and Astoria have been quite useful there, as well).

Arens is not one of them, but by now he's mostly just ignoring Sadde and hoping he'll just go away.

Summer arrives.

They return home and spend a while with their respective families, but eventually...

Comments

[msmaxwell]

They can stay in the library for as long as they'd like!

[pleating]

Karen reads most of the titles, but does not actually take anything off the shelf to read. Next?

[msmaxwell]

Next is the music room, but the door is closed, which means the twins are rehearsing and are not to be interrupted.

Next next is Willow's room. It is very spacious and has a very large bed and a television and a PlayStation and a computer and lots of movies in VHS and DVD and figurines everywhere, mostly from SF&F stories. There are four differently coloured toy lightsabers hanging on her wall above her bed, and she points at those and reminds Karen of them.

[pleating]

"It doesn't look like it's made of light..."

[msmaxwell]

She giggles. "Well that's because it's just a toy. We can't actually make them, in the movies they're special effects. Look!"

And because she had planned for just such a conversation, she turns her TV on and there's already a Star Wars DVD there paused on a lightsaber duel scene.

[pleating]

Karen is fairly impressed by the TV!

[msmaxwell]

TVs are fun! And because Willow is Willow, she removes her shoes, hops onto her bed, grabs one of the toy light sabers, and starts swinging it around in time with the duel.

[pleating]

Karen giggles.

[chanuphis]

Miranda looks at the movie titles in the collection.

[mswoods]

Sadde decides to stop gaping at everything and join in on Willow's fun. She grabs a lightsaber and says, "Prepare, villain!"

Attaaaaack!

[msmaxwell]

Oh no! A foe appears!

Their duel has both the accompanying sounds from the TV and Willow's own personal sound effects. "Zwwwom! Chk! Bzzzzt!"

There are several movies. All of Disney's movies released so far, all of Star Wars, old movies like Gone With The Wind, a bit less old movies like The Godfather...

[pleating]

Satisfied that this is pretty much a kind of swordfight, Karen goes and gets a lightsaber too and joins the battle.

[mswoods]

This helps distract Sadde from her thoughts!

Now, three-way duels are way harder than just one-versus-one.

[msmaxwell]

Especially on such uneven terrain!

"Zzzzzwammmm! Ptcha!"

[pleating]

"Vwoom," attempts Karen, copying the video.

[msmaxwell]

Willow is overtaken by a fit of giggles when Karen starts doing it, too.

[mswoods]

Sadde uses this moment of distraction to strike!

[pleating]

Karen swats Sadde on the leg while she's attacking Willow.

[mswoods]

Curses! She falls facefirst onto Willow's bed.

"Come on, Miranda, aren't you gonna join us?" she giggles.

[chanuphis]

"Um, no, I would die, remember?"

[mswoods]

"The bed is really fluffy!"

Assess the battlefield before quickly standing up again and charging at Karen!

[chanuphis]

"I wouldn't have any fun because I don't like being terrible at things and I would still die."

[msmaxwell]

"Kyah!" Willow says as she charges at Karen as well.

[mswoods]

"Fffiiine," Sadde says, going two-against-one on Karen.

[chanuphis]

Miranda waits patiently, idly watching Star Wars.