peterverse | summer

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...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She eeps and seeks protection underwater!

Sadde decides that playing fair is for the weak and now her fingers are webbed together and she is splashing much more effectively!

"Cheater!"

That comment earns her some extra splashing!

Which earns Sadde a flying tackle leading to a dunk.

Gah! No fair!

...so she'll play even less fair. Say, what if her skin had a more slippery texture and her feet were shaped in a slightly more hydrodynamic fashion?

Well, then she could certainly escape from her assailant. Who laughs.

Oh, but escape is only the first goal. Doing things for more than one reason is a very good thing!

The other reason for doing this is quickly and surreptitiously reaching the other two, bursting out of the water for an extra splash, then disappearing in the depths again.

Where might she be?

"Bluegh!" She looks around for the underwater shape that is Sadde, who is swimming much too fast.

"Cheatiiiiing," sings Miranda, but she dives underwater and gives chase.

Sadde swims around the little island so that she's hidden from Miranda and quickly slips out of the water, morphing back to fully human shape and waiting for Miranda to have to breathe.

Karen grabs her foot and hauls her back into the pool.

Ack! Her plan has been foiled!

Karen really shouldn't have gotten distracted by that! Her punishment is a tackle-dunk!

Oh nooooo!

Blghghrg!

Now where is Miranda?

Late to the party. But splashing Willow, since Willow was not being splashed enough.

Ooh, Sadde can agree with that! She abandons her pursuit to splash Willow as well!

Edited 2016-01-26 17:42 (UTC)

Oh no! Her foes are banding together against her! Time for a tactical retreat! Blublub!

Karen dives too in case she's next!

Well, the obvious thing for Sadde to do now would be turn against Miranda!

...so she won't do that, and will chase Karen instead, morphing appropriately aquatic features because cheating is great.

Miranda helps chase Karen, although she can't catch up.

When Sadde catches Karen, she pulls her feet to slow her down so Miranda will catch up and then goes after Willow.

Miranda, of course, splashes Karen, gets splashed back, and then leads her back to the other two.

Some more mutual splashing is going on!

It is, predictably, going better for Sadde because of blatant cheating.

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