Even though they'd just returned back to school, one of Dylan's first stops was the Potions Laboratory...There was something he needed to work on. The messes...were so irksome that he was having trouble sleeping. Everything was bothering him.

...And by that, he meant EVERYTHING.

Entering the familiar room, he quickly moved to a workstation and laid his bag on the counter surface...when he began pulling out materials. Yes, Dylan was STILL carrying all his belongings around with him in his bag...Sorry, NOT sorry.

Pulling his cauldron, potions kit, potions books (plural), and a leaflet of parchments, he set about enlarging everything back to their normal sizes...

The Common Room was different from the last terms. The classrooms too. Everything seemed to have changed around Hogwarts. And Gwen didn’t like it. She was still curious to find out WHAT had happened here over the summer. Why the place looked well… not that good. And why the house elves left. In the hope that one of her favourite places at Hogwarts hadn’t changed, the seventh year made her way to the Potions Laboratory.

Opening the door to the lab, the Ravenclaw made her way in and gave a quick look around. Well, the place looked just like she remembered.

Erm. And there was someone already there. ‘Hi’, she greeted the person, not minding to see who it actually was. Mehh. Just saying hello. She wasn’t in the mood to have a conversation anyway. So Gwen just headed to the station where she usually brewed the potions and placed the books she had brought with her on the desk.

Messenger bag strap slung over his shoulder and cauldron in hand, Ethan headed down through the dungeons, turning into the Potions Laboratory. A few of the potions he generally liked to keep in his own personal stock were running low, so he figured it would be a good idea to do some brewing today while he had the time. Plus it would be a good way to get some practice for the practical part of his NEWTs at the end of the year.. two birds, one stone sort of thing. And since he wanted to spend some guy time with Harvey, especially being worried about him lately, he asked his housemate to join him and assist.

Once he stepped inside, Ethan made his way over to an empty work station. Setting up his cauldron on the table, he opened up his bag and pulled out all his supplies and ingredients necessary for his desired potions - or at least what he had with him. The rest he could get from the storage cabinet. Glancing at the door, he didn't see Harvey just yet so he decided to get started, knowing the other Ravenclaw would be along shortly. He absentmindedly flipped to a certain potion in his journal though he had made it nearly enough times that his notes were merely a reminder.

Harvey had received a note from Ethan to come down to the Potions Laboratory to hangout with his friend. As much as he wanted to be alone he felt it would be good to at least hang out for a tiny bit, it would be a bit rude to ignore his invitation plus he knew that Minnie would come after him if he didn't turn up here. At the moment he wasn't sure he wanted to argue with Minnie over him hanging out with them or not, so he decided that it was best that he at least make an appearance so that they had nothing to complain about.

He walked into the Laboratory and saw that the other claw was already there and getting down to the work that he had come here for. He walked over to Ethan and stood next to him at his station. "Hey Ethan, here I am ready to assist in whatever you want me to assist with" he said as he looked at everything that Ethan had laid out wondering what they were brewing. "So what are we brewing today?" he asked wondering if Mins would turn up since this was her favourite place to be, she was a really good potion maker from what he remembered, since he hadn't asked if she had made any in recent times.

Mika made her way into the potions laboratory and found a seat near the back of the room, her textbook and recipe book sat in front of her. Of course she had the ingredients with her – but those were for another day. Today she was making something else entirely.

Placing her cauldron on the table she carefully looked it over to make sure it was in tip-top shape. It was, it just needed a little dose of cleaning. “Scourgify” she cleaned the cauldron and gave it another look over before she quickly filled it with water.

The nice thing was it didn’t take long for the water to boil – or maybe it had, she had been organizing her ingredient in order and getting all of the minor steps set ahead of time. There would be no chopping needed right before throwing the ingredients in – nope, she was going to make this be a wonderfully beautiful potion.

Ethan had scourgified his cauldron and set it up on the burner. He walked over to the storage cabinet in search of a block of beeswax, finding none. Muttering under his breath about the budget cuts, he walked back to his workstation. Thankfully he had his own, just would rather use what was here first. He dropped four squares of wax into his cauldron and cast Incendio at the burner to set the flame and melt the wax.

As he waited, he glanced up at the sound of a voice, giving a smile to his housemate as he approached. "Hey, Harvey.. You're just in time," he said as the other Ravenclaw made to stand next to him. "Oh.. I though we'd start off with some bruise paste," he said as he peered into the cauldron. Still not melted.. "Comes in pretty handy around Quidditch season," he chuckled, turning back to him. "Ever make any?" He wasn't sure how experienced Harvey was with potions, but he didn't want to assume one way or the other.

Harvey noticed that Ethan had done quite a bit of the preparation already as he neared the boy. Harvey looked into the cauldron as Ethan looked in, bruise paste? *brows* He had never heard of that before! He chuckled a little as Ethan did and nodded "[blYeah I guess it does come in handy with all those erm...bludgers flying around and hitting people[/b]" he said as Ethan asked if hr had madr any before. He shook his head he hadnt made any since he had never heard of it before. "Never heard of the stuff" he said as he looked inside the cauldron "Probably some stinky stuff that paste Im sure" he said knowing that no paste was never not stinky! He stood there watching Ethan make his paste for bruises

Nashville walked into a random room. Was this for Potions? Yes? No? Maybe so? Confusion was written all over his tan face. What was this place? Nashville took a look around. He saw all sorts of things like a cauldron, so he was in Potions. Maybe he would make something...but what? Nashville looked around the laboratory. MIIIIKA! There she was! His little blondie friend. So was that her nickname now? Blondie? Or maybe he could think of something Doctor Who related to call her....like...Rose? No...maybe...River Song? Nashville shook his head...he would have to think of something else...at another time.

"Miiiika! Blondie!" he let out a man giggle. "'Ello. Need any help?"

Quote:

Originally Posted by ImaBRE!

Nashville walked into a random room. Was this for Potions? Yes? No? Maybe so? Confusion was written all over his tan face. What was this place? Nashville took a look around. He saw all sorts of things like a cauldron, so he was in Potions. Maybe he would make something...but what? Nashville looked around the laboratory. MIIIIKA! There she was! His little blondie friend. So was that her nickname now? Blondie? Or maybe he could think of something Doctor Who related to call her....like...Rose? No...maybe...River Song? Nashville shook his head...he would have to think of something else...at another time.

"Miiiika! Blondie!" he let out a man giggle. "'Ello. Need any help?"

Mika was about to start mixing the potion when she heard someone calling her name – and practically yelling blondie! She just hoped that Professor Lafay didn’t hear the poor soul, as she glanced up she just smiled when she saw the hugger. “Hey Nash” she smiled to him and then glanced from him to the potion.

“Well…I’m making some magical fireworks if you want to join me?” She asked in a hushed tone, because well, she was excited and these were so that the school could be all colorful and cheery. She pointed her wand to the burner below the cauldron and lit it. “Incendio” there, it would start boiling soon.

“Er – do you want to dice the jalapeno?” she asked with a glint of mischief in her eye. As she was about to speak the water began to boil “I’m going to ad the dried salamander skin flakes” she frowned at the ingredient skin flakes. That was truly disgusting. Still she added them in.

Ethan nodded in agreement. He used quite a bit of bruise paste last term during Quidditch season and he liked keeping it around for bruises in general. Chuckling, he thought back to last summer when he had a minor accident on one of those quads and had to wait a few days before he could use any. "Hopefully we keep the bludgers to a minimum though," he said, peering in to the cauldron again. He still hated those things but he was getting more used to them, he thought.

He saw that the wax was almost melted and he looked up at Harvey with a hint of surprise. "Never even heard of it?" How was that possible? This was one of his favorite concoctions to keep on hand and it got quite a bit of use. And Harvey had played Quidditch in the past, yeah? Had no one shared or made him aware then? "Well, you will love this stuff," he grinned. "I'm making a double batch so we'll have plenty that you can take some with you when we're done."

Ethan gave his cauldron a stir now that the wax was melted and measured out a cup of flobberworm mucous. As he added that into his potion, he shook his head. "Nah, it's not too smelly," he said as he stirred it again clockwise. "At least not how I make it.. that's where the lilacs come in," he grinned, then slid the jar of porcupine quills towards Harvey. "Would you grind up six of these with the mortar and pestle?"

Harvey nodded as Ethan mentioned keeping the bludgers to a minimum "Yeah hopefully, wouldn’t want anyone getting too badly hurt in those matches" he said thinking of Ella but then he decided to think about Mins and Ethan instead it was better that way. He didn’t want them getting hurt at all either, cause they were his friends and they all had to look out for their friends. "I remember getting hurt by those things a lot! It was like they were coming after just me and not everyone else. This bruise paste would have come in handy at that time, either that or something to get rid of all the soreness that I felt after one of those had struck me really hard." he said to Ethan as he watched him look into the cauldron.

Harvey shook his head as Ethan seemed surprised that he hadn’t even heard of this paste that seemed to be a good thing for bruises. He looked into the cauldron "I will?" he asked Ethan wondering what he could use the bruise paste for when Ethan said he was making double so that Harvey could take some with him if he wanted. Harvey smiled as he remembered something that he might need it for, but he didn’t want to mention too much of it in front of Ethan so he decided to vaguely mention it "Yeah I guess there are some needs for that when someone decides that you need to have some sense put into you." he said remembering the summer that got him some small bruises but not too much.

Harvey watched Ethan continue with the paste making handling some of that flobberworm mucous that could be a little smelly he couldnt remember since he hadn’t handled any in so long. He looked at Ethan as he said it wasn’t too smelly, it wasn’t? he wondered how that could be. When his question was answered with Ethan next comment "Oh ok I was wondering how it could not be too smelly" he said playing around with the mortar and pestle that were in front of him. He then looked at Ethan as he told him to grind up some porcupine quills. Harvey nodded, well might as well help out right? "Yeah sure" he said to Ethan as he reached in for a quill and instantly got pricked "Ow!!" he said as he rubbed the spot where he got pricked. "Wasn’t too careful, sorry" he said this time taking out a couple of quills and grinding them, before taking out a few more and grinding those when in the end he had grinded up 6 quills and ended up with more sore spots than the quills he had grinded. He obviously wasn’t as careful as he thought he could be.

Glancing down at his journal to make sure he was following the steps correctly, Ethan stirred his potion twice more clockwise and removed the stirrer. "They are pretty terrible," Ethan said with a laugh, "But they do keep the game interesting, I suppose." He started to added dried nettles, one by one, giving the cauldron a counterclockwise stir after each one and glanced over at Harvey. "You got hit with bludgers often?" It had been a rare event for Ethan, though it did happen from time to time. "Yeah, it would have come in handy.. though it doesn't really help a whole lot with the soreness.. it's more for the discoloration." Depending on how bad the bruise was anyway.

There.. now he had eight dried nettles stirred into the potion. What was next? Ethan glanced down at his journal again before looking back up at Harvey. "Oh.. right.." he nodded as the other boy a comment about sense getting knocked into him. He picked up his mallow leaves and began chopping them up finely with his silver knife. "In that person's defense, it was felt to be necessary," he said plainly. He glanced back to the boy again. "Did it work?"

Raising a brow, he eyed Harvey as he attempted to crush the quills. Merlin, he had never seen anyone prick themselves so badly. But it would do the boy some good to learn how to do it without his help so he didn't offer it just merely stood by and let him do it on his own. He added the leaves, then said, "Alright.. add the crushed quills and stir the mixture clockwise five times." He could handle that, right? Not too hard..

delete please

Harvey nodded in agreement "Yeah they are! and boy do they hurt!" he said rubbing his shoulder where he had been hit by the most painful bludger he could remember, he was just glad that he was still not in pain. Harvey watched as Ethan got on with stirring the stuff that he was adding in, which looked like some kind of leaves. He recognised those.. hadnt he used them in a potion before? he was sure he had but couldnt be sure "What are those?" he asked curiously not able to hold back. He nodded "Yeah.. almost every game I played in I got hit...so I kinda got used to the bruises and soreness there on after" he said nodding to Ethan, he wondered if Ethan ever attended any games he may have played or had he transferred here from another school since he hadnt seen him before. His thoughts were then interrupted by Ethan "So I would still have the pain of the bruise but not the color?" well Harvey was more interested in the pain part of the bruise but he would take this one too in case he needed to hide a bruise from people.

Harvey watched as Ethan looked into his book before looking back at Harvey and he seemed to understand what Harvey had been implying by that comment. Wait! hold up! it was necessary? man these two were on the same team it seemed! He watched as Ethan started chopping some leaves up as well as asking him if it had worked. Harvey looked down at the leaves "I guess it did in a way, I see what I did wrong but the reasons for it were valid! Anyways.. things have changed alot since then, I dont know yet whether for the good or the bad" he said saying more that he intended to "But.. I guess we will see soon enough whether its been for the good or the bad" he said wanting to end that subject. He wondered how they would feel knowing what he knew now, he was sure that Mins wouldnt be too pleased and would try to change him, but he knew that the dislike would stay for a while yet.

He felt eyes on him so he looked at Ethan and saw him looking at him "What? I never handled their quills before!" he said trying to defend himself regarding the pricking of the quills. Once he was done and he rubbed the parts where he got pricked he heard Ethan ask him another job to do "Oh..ok I will" and with that he picked up the mortar and pestle, and he added the crushed quills to the cauldron and started stirring clockwise "Clockwise 1...clockwise 2...clockwise 3...clockwise 4...clockwise 5" he said stirring as he was told. He was done now and waited for his next instructions thats if they were going to be given to him now or later.

Having that conversation with Cassia by the treehouse only brought her into relapse. This was so the snake's fault. Lex had gotten over it at first, even got all indifferent and everything but that whole nearly being shoved from a treehouse thing had really caused her to do some serious thinking where her friend and more importantly SHE was concerned.

It didn't help that Mika was telling her all this stuff that she would have rathered she keep to herself. All it told her was that the last potion was a dud and to think she almost drank it!!!

She looked behind her to make sure Alice was keeping up then headed right to a work desk. This seemed like the least dirty. This would be theirs.

"You can help me get the ingredients or you can start cleaning the things we'll be using." And she set off toward the cupboards. Half this stuff was kinda neat. Rats eyes...skinkroots...good stuff.

"Um." Lex was clearly hyped up on ice cream- ice cream! She wanted some, as usual, 'cause that stuff was really GOOD- because the third year was walking way too quickly and not giving her a chance to rapid fire her usual questions. Alice had to wait until they got to the lab to interrogate her. "Why're we here? What potion are we making with that stuff? What do you even need it for?"

It wasn't like she could tell just by looking at the ingredients.

But she helped walk to and from the cabinet with the ingredients and stuff, gathering it all while she waited for Lex answers to clear up all the confusion. No brewing until explanations, okay? She was waiting for them.

Alice was a lot more curious today. Maybe she should have stopped by the kitchen on the way down here and gotten them both a bowl of ice-cream. That might have kept her mouth occupied while they worked but she hadn't thought of it then. Actually, she never thought Alice would be asking so many questions.

With the last of the ingredients secured she headed back to the table where she could somewhat answer her question.

Couldn't tell her too much now because she was like Lottie and even Cassia at this point. Speaking of...how would she get the girl to drink it??? Cassia would probably ask a bunch of questions too.

"We're down here to make a potion, it's that Anti-love one I'd asked the Professor about last term but thought I didn't need--until Mika happened." and Lottie and Cassia. "We tried making one over the summer but that failed epic-ly and now she's running around kissing people," and crushing on other people she wasn't kissing or were they kissing too? She didn't know, "so I'm doing this thing for my own good because clearly it's contagious." Or, not that contagious because Vivi said it wasn't.

"I'll probably be trying it out on Mika. She's been asking me to give it another go for her and if it works this time around I'm downing a vial as well." But only after monitoring Mika for a few days and seeing that she was still very much breathing...just saying.

Anti-love? "You gonna use it on Lottie, too?" She knew that was one person Lex did not like being interested in boys. "Just her and Mika and you? Anyone else? Could I take it?" .. could she? Alice briefly considered it as she gathered the rest of the ingredients, but that was probably a bad idea, given things, so she didn't take it too seriously. "Try it out on Mika first and make sure we brewed it right. And that it won't kill anyone important."

Because she definitely wasn't drinking it first, and she knew Lex and Lottie weren't either.

Pulling Lex's notes closer to herself, she got to work right away. The first thing Alice added in the cauldron was the water, all 500 milliliters of it, and brought it to a boil. Next, the five drops of essence of violet went in, but she didn't do anything further. "You want to do the stirring? Five times.. um.. clockwise."

Ummmmmmm.....No." She didn't think Lottie would have appreciated such a potion, or any potion for that matter, being used on her. It was tempting, REALLY tempting but not worth having Lottie calling her Alexa so the girl was being left out of this experiment. "I was planning to slip some to Cassia though because I know she won't be willing to take it." There was a pause as she rolled her eyes. The poor girl was infected, she just didn't know it yet. "We'll have enough when we're done so you can have some." She doubted Alice would be using it on herself but she was curious. Did she have someone in mind who's drink she wanted to spike?

Lex nodded at her suggestion. They were thinking along the same lines. "Of course! I'm not gonna taste this until I'm sure I haven't brewed poison. Professor Lafay said it was a possibility." Which meant they needed a guinea pig.

The cleaning of the stuff happened right before Alice got started and she was checking things off as the girl did them until the stirring time came around. "Sure!!" Lex picked up the stirring rod and stirred until she hit the five mark. What was next...? Oh right, the essence of rose thorn. She added 7 drops of that then began stirring again, this time it got 7 stirs and they were counterclockwise. "The last potion we brewed, gave off an explosion but Mika was still happy enough to test it. Apparently it made her real sick...but she's trying to get rid of certain stuff so she'll be happy to try again." Hopefully.

"Cassia likes a boy, too?" Wasn't she like eleven or something? Wait, no, she was in Blue's year. Alice watched Lex add the essence of rose thorn and continue the stirring silently, mulling over the news of all these girls suddenly head over heels for Merlin knew who. ".. I'll think about it." Maybe. Probably not. But it was always nice to have an extra vial in case something ever came up, and she was sure Dora would maybe like one just for experimental purposes.

Poison? "Wait a couple of days after she drinks it, too, make sure she doesn't like drop dead or something."

As soon as Lex was done with her own stirring, she reduced the heat to a simmer instead of a boil. "Leave it like this for ten minutes and keep stirring twice every two minutes. Counterclockwise," she offered helpfully, sitting back and waiting for the third year to finish that part before doing anything else. "You already tested one out on her?"

JKGDKGFDKUFKU!!!

NO. No. No. No. There was no Cassia liking a boy, mm-mm, not even. It was bad enough the girl had that business of hers going, but getting any closer to infection would have sent Lex running. "She doesn't, not that I know of anyway." Come to think about it, Lex would/should have been the last person Cassia shared that kind of news with simply for the fact that Lex was good at overreacting. It was her specialty.

O_O Merlin. "Very good point. I hope it works though. I can't have her dropping dead, she's cool and we'd probably get sent to Azkaban. I don't know about you but I can't go there. They don't have chocolate." Besides, she needed it to work for reasons.

She nodded at the instructions but now she wished they'd brought food. This was going to take a bit longer than she thought. "Yeah, last summer. We didn't know what we were doing really and we used a lot of regular muggle stuff from the fridge so that was our mistake." She gave it the first two stirs in a counterclockwise direction. "She seemed fine when she left my house but then she went and kissed Kaiden so I'm guessing not." And more stirring at intervals.

Was the time up yet?

"Oh. So the potion for Cassia would just be like a prevention thing? Does it only stop people from loving significant others, or friends and family too?" Alice didn't know too much about this particular potion, so there were still a couple of questions bouncing around inside her skull, and everything she considered just seemed like another reason not to take it. It was still fun getting to test on Mika though, kind of like an experiment.

She liked testing on real people. Willing ones, too, so it was still legal and stuff, see?

Wait, what? "I don't want to go to Azkaban. They don't have jelly slugs. Or things for me to examine." Or kisses, other than dementor ones, which Alice wasn't too keen on receiving. "As long as you don't test on yourself first. Never do that. It's stupid and will likely get you incapacitated before a Quidditch match." Nodded seriously, she gave the potion the next two stirs.

How many minutes had it been? Four? She waited another two minutes and stirred twice counterclockwise. After another two, she repeated the process. "Two more stirs, you can do 'em. And then stick in a couple of raven feathers."

More questions. Questions she never thought to ask before now. Lex turned to her with a curious look. "I don't actually know so I guess it's good we're trying it out on Mika first. She wants to stop having feelings and I think that's what this does. If it goes horribly I guess we can always brew an antidote." Which she didn't know so let's all hope it didn't extend to family and friends on this feeling train.

Things were so much more technical because of that question. She thought it over while she watched her stirring. Time wasn't moving as slow as she thought it would.

"They don't have any kind of candy there. It sucks for everyone already stuck there." She took the stirring rod and waited for the two minutes to run off before stirring another two times. That should have been it. Now the raven feathers. "You think it'd be so bad the healer couldn't fix me before the day of the match?" Just a curious question and no it didn't mean she would be trying anything first.

Lex added the raven feathers and began stirring again in a counterclockwise motion. "Lemme know when it's been 5 minutes so I can stop stirring this thing--or you could take over halfway." Either worked.

"I don't think we have much to worry about. So far we haven't run into any problems brewing this thing." This was a good thing.

Unusually for Gwendolyn Greene, the girl arrived earlier than she was supposed to. No running like mad in the last minute this time. No rushing out of the Common Room. No. For once, she wasn’t running late. Ehh. It was quite odd, actually. For a person who is rather organized to be usually this bad at time management.

Anyway, as she opened the door to the potions lab, she looked around, searching for her friend. Hmm. The Slytherin hadn’t arrived yet. Looks like she really had arrived a bit too early.

Well then.

The seventh year made her way to her usual working station and made sure the most important utensils were all set in order. Mhm. She placed the notebook on the desk, next to the mortar. All she had to do now was wait for the Slytherin.

She took a seat on one of the stools next to the working station and grabbed the notebook in her hand, starting to read about the potion they had planned on brewing.