Vindictus started chuckling at the two Slytherin girls. "You've got to be kidding me!" he burst out and pointed at the old-fashioned device one of the girls had. "What in Merlin's Beard has possessed you to carry around that old Muggle artifact? My grandfather had one of those! He said it never worked at school because of all of the spells and enchantments."

Clear...clear...clearr...oh crap! Max...

Constantine skidded to a halt and walked semi-normal; his mind was telling him to be calm and to not draw attention to himself. Be silent...don't make eye contact..don't even look... But why shouldn't he look? He liked Max; Max was cool and...semi..sane. Just don't look...don't look.. With baited breath, Neo continued to walk forward, his eyes focused STRAIGHT ahead of him, trying with all his might to not look at Max.

"Neo! You won't believe what these two girls have!" Vindictus called out in a loud, boisterous voice.

Oh no...he's speaking...

Constantine stopped and closed his eyes tightly, debating about what to do. Finally, he settled for a "Oh yeah? You'll have to tell me about it later...I...er, need to go pet the pandas." Yes. Yes, that would work.

And with that, Constantine walked down the hallway and out of sight, not looking at Max ONCE the whole time.

Eh? Cam looked around to see the professor that was laughing, at them. Either he was laughing at Reese or maybe it was him, he really didn't know. But laughing at people was meaaan, was this professor mean? Soon he recognized it was the flying teacher, Professor Vindi-something. And then he looked back at Reese when the professor said that the "iPod" didn't work at school because of all the spells and enchantments.

Then there was that groundskeeper walking by, the reaally awesome groundskeeper. He was the one that did stuff to that green witch in her lesson! And then--GASSSP.

Professor Vindi-something called out to Mr. Masterson. NU. NU. NU. Was the flying-professor teacher-person going to humiliate him in front of his hero-professor?!

OOH, he was luckeh! Mr. Masterson left right in time as though Cam secretly talked to him telepathically to flee. Fleeee away from Vindi-something!

"What pandas?" Max called out at Neo's retreating back and then shrugged his shoulders when the man disappeared from sight. "That man gets stranger each year." Then he saw the sleeping dragon portait. "Oh, wow. LOOK! I SEE THE HANDLE!" Vindictus completely forgot about the two Slytherins and Dominic, and pulled the handle to reveal the room.

"Well,it's nice to meet you,Cam.Oh,nothing.I'm just hanging about.What have you been up to?"Reese asked.

Reese heard someone laugh and looked over at Professor Vindictus. "Oh,it wasn't really on.I just like to pretend I'm listening to music on it.You know...imagination." Gah.She sounded so insane right now.

Reese noticed Professor Masterson walked by. "Did he just say something about...pandas?" Okay.Maybe she wasn't the only insane person around.

The Vindi-something ran away to the portrait, it was the portrait of the sleeping dragon. Uninterested to find the Mirror of Erised, it was a fake, torturing him like that last time by making him see chocolate and candies. He wasn't sure what the professor would see in the mirror, and decided to drop off the subject and pay his attention back to Reese.

"Yeaaah, I think so... I remember he brought a panda in the Charms classroom," he said and remembered when the fat professor was in the water and the groundskeeper there to watch over him. "Oh and I'm currently looking ant-sized trolls in Hogwarts. Wanna help?"

"A panda?You mean those big animals that are black and white and eat bamboo?Wow.Professor Masterson...is acting weird,"Reese said."Where did he get a panda,anyways?"She looked at Cam when he started talking about trolls.Has everyone lost there marbles this term."Trolls?Why?"

"Yeah, that panda. I bet there's tons of them in the Bamboo Forest!" he said and then started twiddling with his fingers out of boredom. Cam sat down on the floor and rummaged through his bag to find everything he needed. There was a broken magnifying glass and the handle was extremely rusty. It was originally for Herbology but as seeing that it was basically a useless tool because of it's... oldness.

"Since I wanna keep them as a pet, duh! So you wanna help?" he said with everything ready. Searchiiin', searchin' for ant-sized trolls were fun.

Pandas?That was still just unbelieveable.Reese decided to just drop the panda subject.She didn't want to know why Professor Masterson had a panda.It was just too weird.

"You want trolls...as a pet?"Reese raised her eyebrow at Cam.This boy was strange.But,she HAD to admit it.He was right down her alley.She loved strange people."I guess I'll help.It beats doing homework."She slightly nodded.

Cam nodded about fifty times when she asked if he wanted trolls as a pet. Well of course he did, he wanted more pets. So he held his broken and rusty magnifying glass in the air and then quickly put it back down, going down on the floor and crawling everywhere with his magnifying glass held firm. "Trolls the size of ants," he corrected and then continued crawling on the floor, looking into the magnifying tool with his eye.

Did ant-sized trolls have a scent or anything? Just to be careful he started to sniff the ground too but not too much to suck dirt into his nose. "You do the same!"

This was fun.

Reese stpped back a few steps when Cam took his broken magnifying glass and started scanning the floor....for trolls?Yeah.Her eyes got eide when he started sniffing the ground.They almost popped out of her head when he asked her to do the same.Uh-She looked around the corridor then back at Cam.

"No."She plainly stated.This was crazy.Too crazy for words.

Wha?! Cam looked up and frowned at Reese when she flat out rejected what he wanted for her to do. The floor smelled fine, one part smelled like rubber shoes and the other just smelled ... inhuman but if he could do it, why not her? He continued with the sniffing and the crawling though and looked back every few seconds to see if he was squishing a troll or not.

After a few minutes, he finally answered. "Nooo? Fiiine, then you could just watch over me. People are blind these days and might step on me or something. Or, you could just... sit on the floor and try looking around."

Reese felt bad that she rejected him,but they're was NO way she was going to smell the floor.That would make her look like and idiot.Not,that Cam looked like an idiot.He was a first year.Firsties always did idiotic things.It was in their blood.But for a fourth year to do that?That would make her an idiot.

Reese nodded. "I'll watch you from over there..."She point towards the wall that was to the left of her.She walked over there and leaned against it and watched Cam.To make sure nobody would step on him.

Walking into the corridor, with her arm still through Copernicus's. Liz not sure what he had in mind. For locking something up that is...or did he want to talk, or just walk...she wasn't sure.

"Ah, so..." Copernicus thought he really should let her arm go, but that seemed a bit rude. He patted her hand absently on his arm as he looked for a place to put his lock. "Do you suppose we're allowed to keep these locks after the homework is through?"

"I'm not sure..." she stammers, warm tingles going through her hand, when he patted it.

"I hope so," smiling continues "there's a few things that I would like a few of the firsties to keep out of."

He raised his eyebrows. "Secrets, Miss Liz? I would not have expected it of you." With a chuckle, he let go of her arm and moved over to wrap his hand around the armored arm piece of a suit of armor. "I think I'll lock his helmet shut."

Wrapping her arms around herself, she gives him a smile. "Doesn't everyone?"

With a tinkling laugh, "I think Professor Ashby might enjoy that one. Now the knight won't be able to sing his aweful Christmas Carols."

"Exactly my point," Copernicus swung up on the pedastal by bracing his weight on the arm of the suit until he could reach around to snap the lock through the grid in the face mask. It took the suit just a moment too long to realize what was going on, and it jerked its helmet around to the back just as the lock snapped closed.

"Too slow," Copernicus hopped down and came back to stand next to Liz. "Now, now, good sir. If you present your face to me, I'll remove the lock and my lovely friend and I shall soon be gone." After a long moment, in which the armor seemed to be thinking it over, the helmet squealed back around so the grid was facing them again.

Perfect. Copernicus raised his wand. "Alohamora!" The lock might have popped open, but the suit of armor moved. The spell hit its shoulder, and the arm Copernicus had propped himself up on promptly fell off. "Well, now... that's your own fault," he scolded before lifting his wand again. "Alohamora!" This time, the lock popped open.

With a giggle, "I don't think he quite appreciated that one." picking up the arm off the floor, Liz tries to figure how to replace the arm that had fallen off.

"I wonder if there ever was an undo spell. It sure would be handy." Thinking a moment "I don't think episky would work on armor..."

He climbed up on the other side of the suit of armor and pulled the lock free. "Hmm... you're right. We ought to fix it, but..." But he didn't break suits of armor very often and so had never bothered to find out the spell to repair it. "How about Reparo?"

"That may be an idea. I mean it is an object not a person, creature or plant..."

Reparo she says tapping the arm. Instantly it seals it self back onto the knight.

"I suppose your assignment, is done now." Liz ventured. "Did you want to head directly back, or...?" she stammers, embarrassed slightly by her question and hope thereof.

"Or...?" He rocked on his heels and raised an eyebrow expectantly. "Is there somewhere else you want to show me? Did I waste my lock on the least exciting suit of armor in the castle?"