Lesson Two (First Years)

Richard yawned a little as he sat down behind his desk and put his feet up on the desktop. Pausing, he picked up a piece of parchment and transfigured it into a hat that he then pulled part way over his face to let him take a little nap.

J. J. smiled to herself as she walked into another class only to find it aqain empty, and the Professor asleep. Shrugging she took a seat, set up and pulled a book out of her bag. Might as well occupy herself for now. Who knew when something would happen?

(OOC: Ah-ha! You're Professor Smith, too!! )


Damian made his way into Transfiguration. Again, J.J. was the only one to arrive before he did. He took a seat beside his classmate, wondering what they would be learning in this class. Whatever it was, it would be brilliant. The boy's eyes swept over to the professor, and he once more felt a sense of awe of the man as he recalled his apprenticeship lesson with him.

He sat happily at his desk, quietly waiting for the rest of their classmates to arrive.

Flora walked into the class, 'Hello...' she trailed off seeing the professor was taking a nap. 'Well, never mind' she mumbled and took a seat.

Seth arrived a few moments after some of the other students. When he walked in he noticed a new girl he hadn't seen before and Damian and JJ. He walked up and said hi to both of them before sitting at the table beside them.

((OOC: I am Cobalt Smith as well What gave me away? ))

Richard yawned as he threw the hat away into the corner of the room. Rubbing at his tired eyes a little, he glanced out over his class before frowning a little,

"You're here already?" he asked jokingly before standing up, "Well I'd best get to teaching."

He walked over to a cuboard and pulled out about a box with hundreds of needles in it. Setting the box down on his desk he gestured at it,

"Come up and collect about a dozen needles." he told his class before smiling, "Now who can tell me what I'm going to have you do with these needles?"

J. J. coplied wiht the request and grabbed a hand ful of needles, skimming them to make sure that it was about twelve and then sat back in her seat.
She honestly had no idea what they were going to do with needles. Change them to matches? That seemed tooo much like last weeks lesson, and to foolish to even suggest.
She dropped her handful on the table and waited.

((OOC: Oh, just a lucky guess. ))

Damian counted out twelve needles, then grabbed another for good measure. "Are we going to use them to make one single object, sir?" the boy guessed. It should be possible, he thought.

Richard smiled a little,

"Five points to hufflepuff Mr Gray." he replied before nodding, "Yes, the purpose of today's lesson is for you to transfigure these needles together into a shape."

Picking up a pile of needles, Richard arranged them into the shape of a house before concentrating and tapping them with his wand. The places where the needles were touching melted and the metal needles join together as a solid outline of a basic house,

"Give it a shot guys. Focus on the melting and reattachment of the joints."

J. J. watched in aw as the Professor turned his needles into a basic house structure and then looked down at her own needles.
Not only was she unsure whether she could do the spell, she had no idea what to turn the needles into!
Well, she thought holding two up, might as well start with the basics.
She pushed the two needles together, and then after a moment tapped them with her wand.
Nothing happened.
She wasn't focusing enough.
Taking a deep breath she tried to center her thoughts. What was it they had said last class? You had to visualize each step.
Ok, I can do that.
She closed her eyes. She wanted to see two seperate needles, and then she needed to see the metal melting, molding together, and then solid once more, together.
It was a lot like welding... only of course with magic... and she had never welded in her life so...
Shrugging she pushed that thought away, and focused on her visualizing.
Once she was sure she go it, she took a deep breath and tapped her wand.
For a moment it looked like they would go together, but instead the metal just dried in an odd melted mass... two seprate melted masses.
"Perfect," J. J. grumpily told the metal, "Exactly what I wanted."
She shook her head, pushing her failure out of her head.
Third times the charm.
She tapped her wand.
She let out a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding.
It wasn't a perfect meld, but the two needles were indeed stuck together.
J. J. allowed herself to smile. It was a start.
She grabbed another needle and started the process again, not really paying attention to what shape she was making.

Flora grabbed what she approximated to be a dozen needdles, but they turned out to be fourteen. Well good for me, it isn't as if I'll succeed in my first try anyway.
She watched with rapt attention as the professor demonstrated. Then she concentrated and copied the movement. At first nothing happened, she focused some more, this time the needdle got melted. Oops! She arranged her needles in an abstruct fashion and tried again. This time she succeeded. But... She raised her hand, 'Sir, how do we know if we are tranfiguring them, or just welding them together?'

Damian watched in fascinated as his mentor worked the spell on his own matches. One would never be able to tell that the outline of the house had once been a small pile of needles.

The boy first quandary was what to make. Professor Romain hadn't said the needles had to be attached end to end, just that they needed to make a shape. Damian decided on a tree. Placing his needles in the appropriate pattern, with the trunk up the middle and the branches slanting off of it, the boy examined his work. Then, he pointed his wand at the needles.

Envision the whole process, they'd been told the previous lesson. Damian imagined it would work this time, as well. He focused intently.

Nothing. Hmm...

Damian tried again with a bit better luck - the needles seemed to have softened momentarily. A few attempts later and Damian's tree was wholly attached to itself. He grinned in triumph and reached out to pick it up...

... only to find that not only were the needles melded together, but they were also melded right onto his desk!

Sheepishly, Damian raised his hand. "Erm, professor..?"

Richard smirked a little bit as he waved his wand to free Damian's little structure from the wood of his desk. Moving on, he looked at the Ravenclaw that had asked the question with an amused smile,

"I believe welding uses sparks and heat to melt the metal." he commented lightly, "What you are doing is visualising the two parts of metal combining together to form a longer strip of metal. Therefore it is the redistribution of atoms, weight, and is, therefore, transfiguration."

Yawning a little, Richard rolled his neck,

"Alright..." he paused a little, "Someone tell me what metal your working with here."

"I thought we're working with stainless steel? But its an alloy, isn't it?" Flora asked again.

Richard smiled slightly,

"No, but nice guess." he replied before shrugging, "You're working with plain old iron."

He smirked,

"Now I want you to try and change the metal from Iron to steel." he paused, "You all know what the difference is right? Well what you do is you focus on the iron in the needle as your start point, the difference between iron and steel as the middle step and then steel as your end point. Just focus really hard on the whole process and flick your wand at the needle."

Damian turned his attention to his needle. Steel, he remembered, had always seemed lighter in color - more silver than gray. Not that the needle didn't appear plenty shiny. The boy frowned thoughtfully.

But they weren't the same. What had his muggle professor said? Iron could be iron by itself, but steel had something added to it, or something.

He decided to focus on making his needle change into something lighter in color. Blue eyes closed to allow the boy to envision the process in his head. In his mind, at least, it looked lesson complicated than changing a matchstick into a needle. At least they were both metals, in this case.

Satisfied that he'd imagined it out to the best of his ability, Damian opened his eyes and poked at his needle, murmuring the spell with confidence.

Well, it appeared to be a different color... but did that mean he'd succeeded? Or just changed the color of his needle? Damian couldn't tell.

Flo focused on the iron of the needle, a shiny grey color, a pure metal, prone to rust... steel on the other hand, a mixture, an alloy of iron with, what was it? Nickel maybe? Or was it Chromium? An alloy nonetheless, shiny silver, free from rust. She tapped her needle with the slow transformation in mind.

J. J. sighed and looked at her needle.

What was the difference between iron and steel? Well there was stainless steel, the once that don't rust... so obviously there was something different to make that.

She thought back to her muggle lessons, and was quite certain that Steel was a mixed metal not a pure element... so that left the question 'What is it mixed with?"

J. J. unconsciously started tapping her wand on the desk as she thought about it.

For some reason she thought there might be some carbon in steel. It sounded crazy to her head and yet... and maybe some other metals; Manganese?

Sighing she decided to just run with it.

Closing her eyes she pictured the metals in her head. She pictured the plain old iron, and then she saw the others being added to it, and then she saw what she hoped was steel.

Rolling her shoulders she let these images constantly run through her head and tapped the needle with her wand.

She cracked open an eye and looked at the new needle on her desk.

At least she hoped it was new... it didn't look all that different. It might have been a different shade but really... she couldn't tell at all.

Had she failed or was this just what steel looked like?

"How do we know if we changed it Professor?" she asked slowly, unsure of herself, "Does steel really look all that different from iron?"

Great, Aquila thought grumpily as he hovered outside of the charms room, another class I'm extra late for.

He didn't know if this was all worth it. He was definitely not getting off on the right foot, but... well now was a better time than to show up later.

"Professor?" he asked not exactly timidly but not forcibly either, "I'm sorry to interupt. I was wondering if it was too late to sign up for this class. My parents have owled the school to explain my late arrivel. I understand that this class is already started but I would like to try to catch up as quickly as possible."

Sophie ran in, late for the millionth time! Why was she so late every single time there was a class on? She was sick of this!

"Professor, I'm so sorry that I missed lesson 1 and that I'm late for this lesson! I promise I'll catch up!" She was told what to do and collected her needle, then walked to an empty desk, blinking back tears. Concentrating, she thought of iron turning into steel and flicked her wand. Nothing. She tried again but blew up her needle. Trying to ignore the stares of everyone, she concentrated so fiercely on her second needle that she saw iron shift into steel and smiled in satisfaction.

"Miss Tierra, could I see you for a moment?" Professor Romain asked. She walked up nervously and waited for the professor to say what he needed to say.

(OOC Sophie you cannot put:

'"Miss Tierra, could I see you for a moment?" Professor Romain asked. She walked up nervously and waited for the professor to say what he needed to say.'

You're taking away Richards options which isn't fair. You can only say what your character is doing not what someone elses is doing.)

Richard waved Aquila's comment with a dismissive motion,

"Just sit down Mr Turrow." he told the young ravenclaw, "I was made aware of your situation and the reasons behind your late entry. You will have to catch up."

Richard paused a little and looked around the class,

"Can I have a person who's been here all year to help Mr Turrow get up to speed?" he asked before raising an eyebrow, "I will choose volunteers if I need to."

He blinked a little at the thoroughly rushing Sophia Tierra before shrugging,

"And someone pair up with Miss Tierra to help her." he rolled his eyes at her apparently 'transfiguration', "Preferably someone who can tell her the difference between a transfiguration lesson and a charms lesson."

Richard waved his wand to cast a detection spell. He paused,

"Only Miss Jones has succeeded in turning her iron needle into a steel needle." he told the class, "The rest of you have done a charm to change it's colour to that of steel. Focus on the internal changes and the differences between the two metals."

"Thank you professor," Aquila smiled greatfully, and slipped into a seat.

He looked around the room, wondering who was going to end up helping him catch up.

Damian frowned thoughtfully. He didn't know what was added to iron to make it into steel, stainless or otherwise. Could just thinking 'change from iron to steel' actually work? The boy was skeptical. He had to figure out how to get it done, however - he was the man's apprentice. It'd be embarrassing if he failed.

He waved the Ravenclaw boy over to the seat beside him. "Last class," he explained quietly, "we learned how to turn a matchstick into and needle and back. Twitheto." Damian turned his not-steel-but-very-much-iron needle into a matchstick, then back again with a poke of his wand.

"Today," the boy continued. "We need to turn our iron needles into steel." Damian jabbed at said needle with his wand once more. It appeared unchanged.

"I don't think I'm doing so great at it," he grumbled discontentedly, then hissed at the needle. "Turn into steel!" As if that would do any good. Damian sighed.

Aquila glanced at the Hufflepuff boy who had waved him over, and sat in the seat with an easy smile.

He nodded as the other boy explained what he missed in the other class, "Twithero - got it." Seeing as the class was nearing it's end and he didn't have needle or a match anyways, he would have to remember to do that one on his own time.

He watched as the other boy tried to turn his needle into to steal. He was getting more and more frusterated as it didn't do what he wanted. Aquila wanted to help, but he wasn't entirely sure how...

"Well... I don't know much about metels... but I do think Steel is just Iron with some other...." he paused trying to remember the word his brother had told him once when he was talking about muggle metel stuff, "elements; though I honestly don't know which ones, so I'm not sure if that's going to be much of a help to you now." He smiled apologetically before taking out a peice of parchment and jotting down what he had missed. He was going to have a lot of catching up to do.