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Old 07-26-2019, 03:41 PM   #50 (permalink)
MadMadamMalfoy
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Hogwarts RPG Name:
Norman A. Carton
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A pink flush rose to Tina's cheeks as Professor Barlow said she hit the nail on the head. She didn't expect her answer to be correct - at least not in the sense of guessing the person's subject anyway! She was just trying to think of something to do with a wide assortment of objects that wasn't vanishing. Oh, okay, so they were swapping out characteristics, not the whole objects themselves. That made perfect sense. She listened intently to Barlow's explanation, taking a few notes, and prepared for the activity.

She picked up her broken beater bat, feeling its weight and hardness as she laid it across her desk. She turned it over a couple of times, closely examining from all angles. Her fingers ran along its smooth surface, stopping short of the broken top part. Now she felt she had enough information to write down some characteristics. She gently scooted the bat toward the edge of her desk to make room to write and picked up her quill. She jotted down:

Text Cut: characteristics

Tina Dantes
6th year Ravenclaw

Object: broken beater bat

1. The bat is made of wood, dark brown in color. It is heavy and solid.

2. It has a sort of oblong shape and is about half the length of my arm.

3. Its surface is smooth and solid, with the exception of the top. The broken top is rough and splintery


Tina finished writing just as Professor Barlow started speaking again. The more she heard about the next activity, the more pleasantly surprised she was. When she heard they were doing switching spells. she thought for sure the activity would involve partnering off and switching a characteristic of one's object with someone else's. She was so glad that turned out not to be the case! There was too much uncertainty involved with group work, and besides, she got things done faster on her own. Tina paid careful attention to the spell demonstration, copying down the incantation written on the board, then set to work practicing the individual components of the spell before combining them. The wand movement was pretty straightforward, but the pronunciation would take a bit of work. "Mutatis Mutandi," she mumbled under her breath to practice the spell's pronunciation. "Mutatis Mutandi…"

Okay, that was enough practicing. Time to try actually casting the spell! She picked up her beater bat and headed to the first station: feathers. She eyed the feathers for a moment, debating which characteristic she should swap with her bat. Then it came to her! The feathers were light, and her bat was heavy. She'd try making her bat as light as a feather. Focusing her attention on the cleanest looking feather she saw, she visualized that feather becoming heavier and heavier while her bat became lighter. "Mutatis Mutandi!" she said, making the upward motion and sideways flick with her wand. The bat felt like air in her hand, but had the spell worked on the feather too? There was only one way to find out. She gingerly picked up the feather between two fingers, but the change in weight caught her off guard and she nearly dropped it. Merlin, that was weird! But at least she knew her spell had worked.

Pleased with her success so far, Tina moved on to the next station, the stuffed animals. Her dark eyes landed on a little black cat that strangely reminded her of a matagot, and she knew instantly that was the animal she wanted to use. At first, she thought she'd switch the color of the plush with her bat, but the dark brown shade of her bat wasn't much lighter than the cat. It would be too hard to see a change in color. She had a better idea. What if she made her bat furry? That might work! Visualizing her bat covered in plush fur, she cast, "Mutatis Mutandi!" She felt the change in texture almost immediately. the bat felt and looked like a big wooly caterpillar in her hand, and when she looked back at the cat, she saw it had turned hard and wooden.

Two down, just one more station to go, and this one looked a lot harder than the others. For the first two stations, Tina had a pretty clear idea of which attributes to switch with her bat, but this time she had no idea! Her eyes raked up and down the mannequin, closely examining it as she waited her turn to use it. She'd already done weight and texture. What else could she try? As she caught sight of the mannequin's fingers, it came to her. Length! She could try switching the bat's length with the length of one of the fingers. It'd be weird, but it was worth a try. "Mutatis Mutandi!" she said, visualizing the length of the mannequin's thumb as she made the wand movement, and… nothing happened.

Tina gave a quiet sigh of frustration. What went wrong? She had the incantation and the wand movement right; maybe her concentration was off. That was the only thing she could think of. Okay, let's try that again! Concentrating with all her might, she imagined her bat becoming shorter until it was the length of the mannequin's thumb. "Mutatis Mutandi!" When she looked down, the bat was now resting in the palm of her hand, and the mannequin had a freakishly long thumb the exact length that her bat had once been. She smiled to herself, biting back a laugh. That looked pretty funny!

Tina had been so absorbed in the task that she nearly missed Professor Barlow's question. A scenario where switching spells could be useful… was that what he said? She thought for a minute. Several scenarios came to mind, but everything she thought of could be solved more easily with another spell. What if you had to get dressed in a hurry and noticed on your way out the door that your socks don't match? Colorvaria would be a simpler fix for that. What if you were moving heavy furniture? A switching spell could be used to make it lighter… but so could a feather-light charm. Hmm… maybe if you were falling, you could soften the landing by switching the ground with a pillow or something? No, that was what a cushioning charm was for! She remained silent for now, still trying to come up with a situation where a switching spell would be the best option, but she had nothing. She supposed she shouldn't be surprised. Both of her parental figures were former charms professors, after all, and it seemed their knowledge had rubbed off in her!
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