Despite the variety of classes Terry had been attending here at Hogwarts, Care of Magical Creatures was still considered his favourite class out of them all and it wasn't too hard to tell why. The boy not only had a talent with creatures, he also loved working with them and it was all down to his mother's previous career. This assignment sounded fun and rewarding, so the Slytherin entered the sanctuary with a grin on his face and his head held high.

He started by heading towards his crap and giving him a little wave. “Well before I can address you, I'd better find out whether you're a boy or a girl” he spoke to the crab even if it did just stare straight back at him like it knew nothing of what he was saying, which of course it didn't.

He studied the tail intensely and referred back to his notes on the task. “You're clearly a female” he chuckled. Why were most of the animals he got girls? Brie, his rat which he had brought with him since going to Hogwarts, his new Snowy owl hope which he had named after Bliss and now this crab! Not that he minded of course, fire crabs were just that, crabs. Very cool heat producing crabs. Anyway, back to the task at hand, Terry wrote on his parchment so that he could easily refer back to it should he ever need to it. His notes detailed the short length of the crabs tail, the sure sign that it was a girl.

Satisfied the boy recalled what his next task would be. This was turning out to be not too strenuous for his first ever final.

Logan honestly wasn't too sure how he felt about this final. Fire Crabs... What exactly were they? Going off of the name, he only knew that they shot out fire. And were possibly crabs. Who would want to take care of a fire shooting crab? o__O

His feelings of trepidation only increased when he stepped inside the building and saw that there were no windows. It was dark and gloomy. How fitting for the mood he was experiencing right now what with his impending doom.

When he finally approached the door on the other side, he gulped and took a moment to calm himself before opening the door... and seeing stalls. Huh. This was a lot better than the room full of fire shooting crabs that he had expected to come in on. Maybe the Professor had been smart enough to protect the students and place the fire shooting crabs into stalls. Yes, this was a smart Professor indeed.

Stepping inside, he cautiously approached one of the stalls, and curiously looked inside.

"A tortoise with gems on its shell?" He had honestly been dreading this final when he just had to look after a tortoise? Wow, he felt dumb now...

Oh well, better to be dumb than to have to deal with evil creatures that shoot flames at you. "What a big tortoise you are," he added upon closer inspection. And this would be his tortoise for now, because he didn't really want to walk around anymore unless he had to.

Now that he was sure he had gotten rid of all those flakes, Jory began to rinse Crabby. Rinse, rinse, rinse. And all the while he did this, he was examining closely to see if he would find anything wrong with the shell.

The Puff soon came across a small crack on his crab's back and there was some discharge coming from it. Poor Crabby. He put Crabby back into his cage- who needed him to scuttle away again?- and went off to find the necessary materials to fix the shell.

Her eyes and physical attention was on Peanut's shell but Louisa's real focus was on Vivi's words. She laughed, "That wasn't a serious comment. He doesn't get offended easily, I believe. I was around when he came to Hogwarts but we didn't really get familiar with each other until we became Prefects last year." And Louisa was grateful they did because Spike was one heck of an interesting Ravenclaw. "And I don't think he cares about girlfriends." She didn't say anything about Spike & Bee's awkwardness that seemed to surface and fade.

She put the brush away and grabbed a washcloth. Vivi was right and Louisa didn't think she was being judged - or well, she didn't really care. Much. Peanut was still trying to fart, it squirmed and tried to get out of the bucket reaching the conclusion that as long as he was in this trap, his powerful rear won't work. Louisa kept pushing him back and focused on his shell again, wiping it with the washcloth to get more of soil and dirt out. "You're interested in all of the subjects you're taking? I envy you." Louisa frowned at the solemn fire crab in her bucket and started massaging the shell.

"Charms. Basically because I never had any difficulty producing magic from my wand in my first year." Louisa's hands moved down to massage the grumpy fire crab's limbs. "And I like Divination. The idea of trying to analyze and rationalize the connection between one's questions and fate with earthly material is intriguing." She leaned closer into the fire crab so she could see where the edge of his shell met his butt and avoid it, and a lock of her hair slipped over her shoulder into the fire crab's face. So he bit on it. "What do you like? Not just care about but really like."

Louisa was straightening up again when she saw the creature's mouth on her long hair. "Not. The. Hair." She growled, her cheeks turning a deep shade of red as her hands shakily pried Peanut off the red hair. She left the bucket and the creature for a while, staring down at the bitten strand and... trying not to recall any relevant oppressed memories attached to hairs and locks of hair.

Staaaaaare..

Ella skipped her way to the Fire Crab Sanctuary, a small smile on her face. She was going to visit Taco! BEAM. And that was quite exciting. The little guy was really a pretty neat creature, as far as fire crabs went, and she knew he was probably really hungry. Her mission today? To help him get some food. Particularly, the third year was going to do some digging for worms.

Entering Taco's stall quietly, the small blonde looked for the little guy and located him in the far corner. "Hey Taco, how are you today?" Blink. Blink. "Good? Cool...well I hope you're hungry." And if he was anything like Ella, he was always hungry. "I know there's meant to be some fruit on these plants but I figured you might want something a little different...so I'm going to find you some worms." Yup! Mama Ella was going to do some digging! And she came prepared too, wearing old clothes and some gloves that she didn't mind getting dirty.

Plopping down on the ground in a spot where the dirt didn't seem as tightly packed, Ella slowly started to dig a hole. She scooped the dirt off to the side in a little pile, that way she could put it back when she was finished. "You know, I like worms too..." Ells said quietly, continuing to work. "I mean the ones I eat are gummy worms but still...that makes us kind of alike." BEAM. "Now where are these worms anyway?..." Because she was getting pretty deep into the ground and still there were no worms to be found. Meh.

...

With the small issue of actually choosing a Fire Crab out of the way, Logan thought that it would be a good idea to actually name the thing. He had a name, so why shouldn't the creature he would be working with for the rest of Term?

He studied the Fire Crabcarefully, and tried to think of a name that would fit it. Well, it had pretty jewels on its shell... some of which were red. And it also seemed like a feisty animal - and would probably be so if it could shoot out flames.

"I shall call you Ness!" After his girlfriend.

Grabbing the name tag that was attached to the Fire Crab's stall, he filled it out:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Name Tag

Student's Name: Logan MacKenzie
House: Hufflepuff
Year: Fifth
Fire Crab's Name: Ness

Once he was done, he placed the tag back in its place before carefully going to extract the Fire Crab from its enclosure. He gently held the creature and started inspecting it curiously. It was then that he noticed that the animal had a longer and wider tail than some of the others people were caring for.

...

"I'm not changing your name."

Making sure her notebook was handy Sarah began to do the next step... um, what gender?

This was easier to genderize a fire crab. Her muggle cousin once got two hamsters who were supposed to be two females (her uncle did not want babies you see). Yet one morning they found 2 pink babies so it was obvious that that was not so.

Sarah checked the tail, yes indeed it was okay, yet she would have to compare it to the other animals. Sure enough, it was shorter then most of the other fire crabs there.. so that meant it was female -right?

So it was female, awesome

After a rather eventful first day with his Fire Crab, where he had named it and determined its gender, Logan was back again to see what Ness would like to eat.

Not really sure about the exact diet Fire Crabs had, he had heard that they like worms. Which was gross, but hopefully they were easy to gather. The prospect of digging in dirt for a whole afternoon wasn't exactly appealing.

Opening the door to Ness' stall, Logan looked around curiously at the rainforest surroundings. This was very neat, and the fruit that was sprinkled around the place looked rather appetizing. Maybe if the worms didn't work, he would try the fruit. Animals liked fruit, right? Well, not the carnivorous ones...

Finding a nice spot in the dirt that seemed to be looser, he crouched down and started digging through with his fingers. Ideally he would prefer some tool to do so, but he didn't want to accidentally hurt any worms. Which made no sense, since Ness would be eating them anyway.

Vivi tipped the bucket so that Bob and Bob's suds could spill out on the ground, her eyes tracking the ecstatic movements of her fire crab. She was so glad to be freeeeee, wasn't she? Before the creature could escape, she grabbed her towel and began to buff away the water and any remaining dirt.

"Charms and Divination. That's you in a nutshell, is it?" Vivi raised an eyebrow briefly at Louisa before turning her attention back to Bob. What did she like? Aside from everything, of course? "Potions, obviously. I like Defense when we're doing something physical or puzzling stuff out. Ancient Runes, but really the linguistic aspects and spellwork and not the divination." Because Divination was stupid, but it wouldn't do to say that in present company. "I like learning things that are complex. I like having to work for it. And I like keeping busy. So any class, really, if it's done well."

She tossed the towel into the empty bucket and turned Bob so that her rear faced away from Peanut and the two Ravenclaw girls, and then Vivi leaned over to look her fire crab in the face. "They don't eat hair. Don't worry about it."

... enough staring. Louisa twisted her hair into a tight bun and used her wand to keep it up. Her fire crab was trying to tip the bucket off by bumping the walls regularly making the girl give an exasperated sigh and hold the bucket down with her hands. "We're almost done, stop trying to fart and let me do my job!" See that, she was talking to creatures. Fascinating improvement. She dragged the bucket with soapy water and dumped it on her fire crab, avoiding his head and making sure he doesn't drown.

Potions and Defense against dark arts was Vivi then. Oh and Ancient Runes. And anything that's complex. "I see why you belong with us. I was starting to question the sorting hat for the hundredth time. You hit me as a Gryffindor." She tilted Peanut's bucket, getting rid of most of the water but keeping his butt drowned, and started massaging his shell with the washcloth too. "It must feel really assuring to know what you're doing after Hogwarts for sure." It must've helped her to choose her NEWTs more wisely too. "Do you have to do some kind of arrangements now to get into the YATI program? Interview? Application?"

Peanut was clean enough for now, she took him out of the bucket and left him sulk on the ground while she cleaned the buckets, taking the wand out of her hair.

That was sort of insulting, considering Louisa had previously called Vivi something like Queen of the Nerds. How could she be most Ravenclaw of all the Ravenclaws and yet be missorted? How could she be interested in everything, constantly sniffing around what interested her, and yet be less Ravenclaw than Louisa? "I'm an eagle, through and through," she finally responded, rather stiffly.

Vivi rose without comment to return her bucket and other materials, leaving Bob to meander around the yard and sniff at things under Louisa's supervision. When she returned, she brought more food with her, bits of carrot and banana that she used to tempt Bob back to her side.

"YATI applications are due in June, so there isn't much I can do until then, aside from study for NEWTs. I submitted an application to Wizarding University too.. pre-Healer in Edinburgh and potions in Salem."

With Felix still at the front of her mind she vigorously dipped Kevin in the water over and over until she felt she was thoroughly washed. "Okie dokes, there you go! All cleeaaaan!" BEAM. She felt so proud knowing she'd bathed her all by herself--without a single burn too! Now that was a success!

And since that was out of the way she could start looking for anything that might have been wrong with her ickle baby Fire Crab.

She turned her over onto her back, spun her in all directions, held her up towards the light then put her down in the dark so she could see better...hmmm...what wasn't supposed to be on her...? "Hmmmmmmmmm...Kevin, what exactly am I supposed to be looking for here? Is it something in that crack you have on your back? If so then I think it'd hurt if I tried taking it out..." She stared at her, waiting for a reply. "Oooohhh, yeah, you're right. That gem doooes look a bit discoloured doesn't it...?" Mmm. This just meant more work, didn't it?

"Well I'll tell you what. You sleep tight and I'll be back to fix you up in the morning m'kay?" Every second she stayed with her was another second her kneazle could be off causing problems. She placed her back in her stall then cover it up. Afterwards she got the supplies all nicely washed out and just as she was bolting out she yelled a goodbye to her cozy little Fire Crab. She'd see her tomorrow, then she could take care of her.

Mhhmmm, she was offended. Louisa wanted to point out that being half a Gryffindor wasn't so bad, she was still the geekiest of the geeks. But Vivi got up and went to the cupboard across the room to get something so the head girl shurgged to herself and watched Bob being all happy and wandering around while her fire crab being all sulky and still trying to fart. Or well, that's what she supposed he was doing since he seemed so concentrated and grumpy. Hmmm. Maybe he should wait until his butt was dry enough? Heh heh.

"Oh." Louisa wasn't sure that Vivi mentioned the pre-Healer course before. That was interesting. "Good luck then." She wanted to say that her mom must have enough connections to get her anywhere she wants but seeing as being a part Gryffindor made her upset, this would probably make her use her wand on Louisa. So the latter shut up and summoned lettuce, too lazy to leave her spot.

Problem was... Peanut refused to feed off Louisa's hand, he simply moved to where Bob was with Vivi. Now that was offending. "Immature." she grumbled and dragged him over again, this time cutting pieces of lettuce and placing them on the ground. He ate those. She got up on her feet and made a trail of lettuce all the way back to his stall.

Hannah walked into the Fire Crab Sanctuary and looked around at everybody doing various things to their fire crabs. Ugh! Just when she thought that she was through with taking care of them. Although to be honest it really wasn't that bad. They weren't so bad to look at and if she managed not to get burned then it would still be a good day.

She walked over to the cages and tried to peek in to make sure that she got a good one. Not that it really mattered she just wanted to do what was needed and be done with the whole thing.

She wanted one that looked to have to best looking jewels and not be too banged up. She didn't want to do a lot of work here you know! She finally decided on one that looked to be the best out of what was left so she picked him up with her gloves on of course and took the crab back to where she was working.

She decided that first she should probably find out what gender he/she was. She remembered asking the professor in class about how you could tell. The boys had longer tails and the girls had shorter, stubbier tails. That should be easy enough to determine. She looked her crab's tail over and it was obvious that she had a boy crab with his long tail. Good if they were anything like humans they wouldn't be as hard to care for.

poke ... poke poke poke poke poke poke

Mimicking Professor Newlin's movements from class, Kurumi continued to poke around in the dirt for the worms that were being rather elusive at the moment. Okay, so she wasn't having much luck at the moment. She needed a better plan of attack. Wand out, Kurumi cast a silent Aguamenti on the ground, soaking it fully, and then sat back for a moment to see if the worms would take the bait.

Sure enough after just a few moments several worms came wiggling out of the ground and Kurumi swiftly picked up a few of them and held them in her hands before turning towards her fire crab. "Open up," she said while dangling it in front of the creature's mouth. Akeboshi eagerly snapped at the worm until he caught it in his mouth and then sort of sucked it into his mouth as though it were a piece of pasta. "That good, huh?" Kurumi offered the creature another worm, which he once again eagerly swallowed, and then paused to pat him on the head. "You shouldn't have too much protein though...balance is important..."

Did that apply to fire crabs? Kurumi assumed that it did, so she reached for some of the surrounding vegetation and pulled off some leaves and berries which she then fed to Akeboshi. That was probably enough for today.

Returning Akeboshi to his cage, Kurumi gave him one last pat on the head. "I'll come back tomorrow." And with that the Gryffindor left and returned to the castle. She had NEWT studies that she needed to attend to for now.

Jory returned to Crabby's cage with the antiseptic cream and tape. He once again took the crab out of its cage and set him on the ground. "We'll have you fixed up in no time, Crabby,'' he said reassuringly. Surely the Crab must know something was wrong with it. "I wonder if they get as scared as humans,'' me mused. He was scared of going to hospitals when anything was wrong with him when he was younger. And he still felt scared of something being wrong with him. It made him feel so helpless.

The Puffer began to clean the crack, carefully and gently as he could. "You'll be good as new soon,'' he said. He spent a good time on this as he wanted to make sure all the discharge was all gone. Now that he was done, he took the antiseptic cream and smeared a generous portion over the crack and then taking the tape, he ripped a piece and placed it over the cream. "There,'' Jory commented.[B''You'll be all right.''[/B]

She picked up the crab, careful to point the firey end away from herself. “Let’s get you some fruit ok?” She walked with Cilla over to some of the plants near the entrance. She had seen some on her way in the had fruit dangling from them. She wondered if Cilla would want to eat the blooms off of some of the plants as well. She didn’t think it would hurt her if she did, so she set Cilla down and let her go to town on some grub.

She watched Cilla gobble up some fruit, which was strange to see. The crab’s claws were dripping with juice from the foreign fruits, making lines of shiny sugar. Eliza smile as she watched Cilla eat. She was glad the crab had been ready to eat when she got there. She might have been a bit bored if Cilla had refused the fruit. Then what would they have done? She leaned down with a damp towel and carefully wiped the juice from Cilla’s claws. “Is that ok if I clean your claws up some?” Seeing no objection from the crab, she continued.

The Crab was still wet despite the fact Jory had been patching it up all this while. "Time to get you back into the cage, Crabby,'' he said as he picked up back the crab.”You'll get all better from that crack of yours.'' Hopefully, it would be soon.

The Puff gently placed Crabby back into the his cage. "It was great working with you, Crabby,'' he said.”I'll make a check on you in a few days, probably.'' He retrieved the dark cloth and covered the cage. Really, fire crabs weren't bad.

He began to clean up his surrounding, picking up pieces of scrap tape and cleaning up a bit of the anti septic cream that had fallen onto the ground. Making sure he had returned everything to the right place- he had already returned the bucket and brush-, he left the Sanctuary.

Once Cilla’s claws were cleaned and dried, she looked around as if she were still hungry. “Need a little more to fill your stomach?” Eliza asked her crab. Eliza thought back to what her professor had said about the crabs’ diet. I think they like worms…right? She looked to Cilla again and crouched lower for consultation. “So fruit is good, but we all know you want something more substantial, right? How about some worms?”

Eliza knelt down and fingered through some patches of soil until she found a wriggling pink worm. She felt a little sorry for the poor thing, but it was the circle of life after all. She held it up in the air and looked at her colorfully jeweled crab friend. She was growing fond of the crustacean. Something she never saw herself caring much for. She smiled at Cilla and the crab’s quick claws snatched the worm from her fingers before she even had a chance to flinch. Right, still a fast and potentially pain inducing animal. She watched the crab curiously as is munched on the worm. But I don’t think she wants to hurt me. That, or I’m imagining things.

Oichi felt very nervous about the taking care of a fire crab. She was shaking as she entered the sancuary and quickly grabbed a bucket and filled it with water. She then slowly inched toward the cages. She lifted one of the veil of one of the cages and saw the creature. She breathed a sigh of relief seeing that it was sleeping. She opened the cage and poured the water on all over it's backside. The creature awoke with a jolt and snarled loudly. Oichi jumped backward in fright. She saw the creatures backside convulse and started to quiver more but soon realized nothing was happening. She walked closer and the creature still shaking a bit and it backed away. She then realized the creature was as scared of her as she was of it. She calmed down and inched toward the fire crab and noticed it was a girl by it's short tail and sofly touched it's shell and sofly ran her fingers over it. The crab calmed a bit untill Oichi hit a crack and the crab yelped. Oichi removed her finger from thst area rubbed the the little girls shell reasuringly, "It'll be okay, little one. Wait, you need a name. How about Polly", the crab cooed hearing that name and Oichi took that as a sign that she liked it.

It was official. Lex was NOT an afternoon person. She'd just stuffed herself with food she'd taken from the Great Hall, now all she wanted was a nap. It wasn't until she'd walked all the way up to her Common Room entrance that she remembered that she was locked out and in that same breath she remembered that she'd promised to give Kevin a little fixer upper.

"Keeeeeeevin." She called lazily as she dragged herself in the sanctuary she's come to know so well. Alexa walked over to her stall and picked her up, giving her a sleepy grin. "I told you I'd be back today." But not with Felix; when she was sleepy it was even harder for her to balance her affection and she didn't want him running away again; if he did she wouldn't go looking. Nope.

"Right so let's get you fixed up." She said, making her way over to the cupboard. She picked up the anitseptic then flopped to the floor and placed Kevin in her lap. "Starting with the cracks 'cause they look uncomfortable." Then she began dropping clumps of the stuff all over. When she thought she'd gotten everything she took the tape and covered it over quite nicely. By now her eyes were starting to close. "Now we get you some...calcium bones...?" she never did understand that part. "Yeah, some of those then we can take a nap." Yup.

Reaching into the cupboard again from where she sat she picked up a few then placed them next to her on the floor. "Enjoy." She said with a yawn before placing Kevin next to them then leaning against the cupboard. "When you're done you can curl up with me and we can sleep."

The poor girl fell asleep shortly after that.

____________

Blink. Blink.

"Well that was refreshing, huh Kevin?" Lex said, giving a lazy stretch and easing off the cupboard. The nap did her some good; she felt great now!! Hunger, but great! Her eyes drifted to the floor as she waited on the fire crab's response but they grew wide when she found both the bones and her ickle lovey GONE.

"NOOO!!! K-Kevin? Kevin?! Dear Merlin she'd lost the Fire crab!!!

CoMC final. With the fire crabs. Ira had been putting it off for days, but now, she felt it was time to do it. Better to finish off the assignment than let it remain hanging. So fire crab sanctuary, here we come!

Fire crab. The name itself sounded pretty dangerous. And they had to bathe and patch up wounds. That seemed risky, didn't it? But others were doing it it seemed pretty good, so it surely shouldn't be a problem for her. Shrugging with these thoughts in mind, Ira proceeded to the fire crab sanctuary to complete her assignment.

There were many in here, and by looks of it, many had almost finished their assignment. Ira walked in, admiring almost in awe at those creatures, and passed their stalls one by one. Woot! This was going to be fun.

Looking into her parchment, she checked to see the instructions. So first she had to select one and name them. Name them? Huh? Lightly shaking her head, Ira moved ahead to find one for herself. Ah! There it was. In the stall next to the one she was standing in front of. All bright Orangish Red!

Oh my! They did look much more dangerous now. But that only made them more likable! Pickling it up delicately, as though it might shoot fire at her any moment, which actually it could, Ira looked closer. "Hey... You, dangerous looking thing.." she said, grinning. Oh yes, she had to name it. But before that, determine her gender. A boy's name for a female fire crab wouldn't do!

Now that she had determined the gender of her crab she could move on to the step of naming him. Normally Hannah really wouldn't care about the name. She would just slap a name of him and move on about her life. However Hannah did care about her school work and she knew if she just rished through it then her marks would reflect that and she just didn't want to come home with marks like last year. Before she went down that road again Hannah just shook her head as if she were clearing her mind of all thoughts.

She looked back at her fire crab and wondered what she should name him. It had to be good. This was her fire crab. What were some good manly names? Because obviously her crab would be manly. It had to be a stong name. She wanted people to know that the fire crab belonged to Hannah...just by hearing it's name. Hmmm...she thought this would be the easiest step for her. "What do you think crab?" Merlin, now she was asking the crab as if he was really going to answer. She needed to get it together and fast. Finally it hit her. "Your name will be Benjamin." Yup! That was a perfect name for a fire crab. She could totally tell that Benjamin liked his name too.

Alex really needed to go check up on his fire crab. Yep. He hadn't visited the poor thing since the first class! EEP! He really hoped the crab hadn't died...what would he do then? Would have just have to get a new crab? Or take a fail for the course? Ohhhh please don't be dead!

As he approached the sanctuary, he tried to remember which one was his from the lesson. When he got there however, he knew he had absolutely no idea which one was his. WELL, he had a TINY idea, but his crab (or the one he thought was his) had been taken by someone else. Ok, time to get a new one!

He went over to the crabs that had not been claimed and picked one of the BIG ones. "Hey little guy," he said with a grin, even though he wasn't little, but he was PROBABLY a guy. Time to check!

He got down on his hands and knees and looked at the tail. He had a really long, wide tail, so his suspicions had been correct. Good boy!

"Hmm, let's give you a name, shall we?" he asked as he lightly patted his head. He seemed to like it. In fact, he was really kind and gentle for a fire crab, he didn't seem to mind him at all. "I think I'll call you...Softy. Because you seem like a big softy," Alex said with a grin.

Okaaaay. The important thing to remember in a situation like this was to NOT panic. Panicking was bad and it made things worse than they already were, Kevin was probably just asleep by her stall. Lex was confident she knew her way back...it wasn't so far away.

"KEVIN?" She called again. Her eyes remained glued to the ground as she walked. If the Fire Crab was somewhere down there then she didn't want to miss her. "Come on, this isn't funny." Just in case she thought this was all one big funny joke that would make her laugh. No Kevin. She wouldn't laugh.

Lex shouted for the creature again, hoping she would pop out at any minute with some kind of mischievous smile--yeah, Fire Crabs smiled and no amount of convincing would make her believe otherwise.

While she searched she tried to think of what the Professor might have done if she told her she'd lost her Fire Crab...

O___O

The thought alone wasn't very pretty. She'd have to find Kevin--fast.