Ugly ducks are one thing, moving ugly ducks, is a totally different story. Though those were just toys, Jace could not help but feel his confidence fly out of the window. He hated the feeling of uncertainty...random questions that he can’t figure out on his own during a pseudo battle, and the smell of failure at the end of the class. He was slowly getting tired of the same old thing every time they do the practical portion of the lessons.

On instinct, Jace backed away from the charging ducks, brandishing his wand out in the process. He tightened and loosened his grip as he look to his left...then to his right, and wondered what on earth they are turning them into. “It could be anything.” He thought. Their mission was clear and simple enough to be honest; do those ducks a favour and put an end to their misery.

Having too many attackers in one go, Jace was taught to start with the nearest enemy. Eliminate it swiftly and cleanly, in the hopes to scare away the opposing party. It was the way of the samurai, yes? Locking his brown eyes onto one of the nearest targets, Jace concentrated real hard on the spell and tried his very best to do the flourishing wand movement, “Reverto!”

Merlin. Wand movements were hard when one is pressured, yeah? And...did he get his first target? He can’t tell because another one has apparently decided to attack him.

Oh yeah? Bring it on, ugly duck!

Whoa!

Her aim must have been off a tad for the duckie kept on a comin'. And clearly he was angry at her for he was bringing his friends!

Hady instinctively took a small step backwards trying to give herself some space. Not easy to do when there's an army of oversized rubber ducks coming at you and a bunch of classmates beside or behind you. Taking a small breath she gave another flourish of her wand, "Reverto!" Take that!

"Reverto!" she cast again this time giving a flourish of her wand towards a rather feisty looking blue one. Keep back. Keep back! The ducks were coming from all sides and they seemed to be closing in on her. Where were the rest of the snakes at?!

A little bit of back up would be really nice right about now...

Yeah, she saw what the professor had conjured up.

And yes, she had seen rubber ducks before, she wasn’t that out of touch with something normally considered muggle. However never that large and never with horns. Was that what they were going to return to a more normal existence? Even so, Olivia so wasn’t getting good vibes off of them and any thoughts on the upcoming activity. There had been some more…interesting…almost a little dangerous…lessons this term. Not that the Ravenclaw had any experience to go on for previous terms. Just stories.

All the more reason to have the spell down pat, she reminded herself as she took her wand out. Trying to visualize the wand movement that had been demonstrated, and not the demon ducks, Olivia worked on replicating it. Swish…squish…no more of a flourish. Her wand moved over and over as she practiced getting it right, revert repeating in her minds eye as she did so.

Reverto…ReVERto…Reverto…ReVERto.

Probably due to nerves, she spell managed to miss the rubber duck and hit the ground an inch to it's right.

Oops.

Unfazed, the animated object continued making its advance towards her. She would have thought that the threat of magic would be enough to at least give it pause... but nope. If anything it seemed MORE determined to get her. By all appearances she felt that it would launch itself towards her at any moment."Can't we be friends?" Apparently not. Esme didn't think she wanted to be friends with a grumpy horned duck anyway.

"Reverto!" she cried out at the same moment that a blue duck decided to join the fray.

WHYYYY were the ducks STILL coming? Had nothing hit them yet?! Ariadne was starting to wonder if this was some transfiguration gone wrong, and these ducks would just hunt them until the STUDENTS were caught.

O_O.

Okay, that was a creepy thought, and it MUST be ended NOW. "REVERTO!" Ariadne said, adding some extra effort to her casting. She was on a mission now, and she expected rows upon rows of ducks to fall at her feet and immediately convert back to their original state. She was SURE her last spell had hit at least one of them, too.

"REVERTO!" she shouted again, aiming another wave of the spell at the ducks.

It didn't look like the others were having much luck with this spell so far. Jaemin blinked in surprise at a few of the other first years, then looked at the oncoming ducks.

And then he turned tail and ran.

He was soooooo not getting spiked by a duck. He was gonna take advantage of the fact that magic worked just as well at a distance and keep himself at a distance, thank you very much. The small boy made sure there was ample space between him and the spiky rude duck army before turning back around and squeezing his wand a little tighter. He could... just... cast from here, right? At the group. And if one came toward him he'd aim at that one.

When one bounced its way away from the fray, Jaemin pointed his wand in its direction and, with a gentle flourish, called out the spell. "Reverto!"

The light hit the duck, and it sorta wobbled and fell over before going upright again. Nothing had happened. It still had the spikeys. And now it seemed almost... angry at him. The duck turned very slowly toward him and, like a movie monster, slowly advanced.

"Why does this keep happening?!" the little Slytherin muttered, distressed as he backed up some more.

Oh, no! She had missed altogether. Maybe it was excitement or nervousness but Rachel completely missed her target. The good thing was that there were so many spells flying around that the duck hadn't paid the slightest to her. She would use this to her advantage.

"Reverto.'' A light flourish was done so that another jet of light snaked its way to the mutant duck. This time she had made sure that she steady her aim before she said the incantation. She sincerely hoped that this time she would be successful. If she wasn't, she had a feeling she would be wearing another bloody scratch.

Azura made a bit of a face as she looked at all the ducks coming at them!

Eeek!! For a moment she almost panicked! But she took a deep breath! Nothing it panic about here! Nope! She knew the spell! Surely she would be able to take down a duck easily and Ravenclaw would win!

Right?

Right!

The purple eyed first year stood in front of a quite menacing looking duck who kept bouncing towards her! It was a bit creepy to be honest!

"Reverto!" She said as she pointed her wand at the duck.

Rachel watched as the jet of light hit the pink duck squarely on one of the wings but it didn't have its appearance changed one bit. But it did seem to have noticed her now for it turned towards her, charging shortly after. She tried not to panic as she raised her wand arm again.

"Command the spell,'' a voice in her mind said. Yes, she needed to command it. That almost always seemed to work just like Ilia and Haddie had told her. "ReVERto!'' The first year repeated the wand movement and concentrated as much as she could, the ringing tone that she had just used still resounding in her head.

The spell hit Pretty in Pink mutant duck so that one moment it was baring down towards her and the next it was back to normal and the danger eliminated.

Ariadne jumped up in excitement and gave a good fist-pump in the air. She'd caught one! Or...she THOUGHT she'd caught one! There were still too many of them to tell for sure, but they were definitely thinning out. A quick glance around showed her Hady and Jaemin also trying to tackle the army. That was the only Band of Snakes she could pinpoint right now. At least she knew now that there were others on her side. She should make her way over to them and try to take more for the team.

Ariadne scooted around and ended up closer by Jaemin. HIIII, JAEMIN.

There was a whole new wave of ducks over in this direction. "Reverto!" Ariadne said, pointing her wand toward them. REVERTO to you all! "REVERTO!"

That duck was not getting near him. Jaemin kept on the move, bouncing around hurriedly; the duck kept after him, though he managed to keep some distance between them to keep himself safe...

Grumbling to himself, he turned on his heel and pointed his wand at the duck again. "REVERTO!" he yelped, watching the light hit the duck and knock it over again; why did it still have spikes?! This was so unfair! Why wasn't the spell working for him? He was supposed to be better than this...

Confidence crumbling a little, he watched as the duck sprung back up and started after him again. It seemed like he'd just have to keep running away from it.

And right into Ariadne. Oops.

Uhhhhh..

Why hadn't that worked!!

Excuse me, Mr Scary Blue Ducky Sir, but you were suppose to turn back into a cute little ducky! Why you no do that? Azura thought as the spell bounced off the duck, made it fall over, and then it bounced right up and charged at her!!


EEEEKKKKKKK!!

Azura scrambled backwards as quick as she could, this was something she Never thought would happen! being chased by a duck!

"Reverto! Reverto!!""

Each failed attempt seemed to make the ducky more angry at her, so she turned and was about to dash away when she realized she was too close to two students Jaemin and Ariadne to do any dashing! Sadly, she was already in the middle of a running step!

Eeekkk!! She couldn't stop! And she tumbled right into them!

Just bloody brilliant.

As if one of those mutant ducks wasn't enough, now she had to deal with TWO. Or not because her spell had managed to connect with the red one, rendering it rather harmless. With a sigh of relief she thought that there was one less threat to her and her classmates. The danger wasn't over yet though. Of course the loss of one of its comrades had made the blue one even angrier.

"Well, I suppose you don't want to be friends either..." WHATEVER.

She was going to take care of this one in the same way. There was no question about it because now she knew that she could actually perform the spell successfully; sometimes knowing that made all the difference in the world.

After practising it was time for the main activity. The Head Boy watched for a moment as the ducks waddled passed him for some reason to try and attack the other students . He didn’t lower his wand though which was a good thing because one of the ducks who had waddled past suddenly turned it’s big body around and seemed to glare at him.

He shuddered. These were just rubber ducks transfigurated to look evil but the Professor sure did a good thing on that. The spikes really made the perfect touch. With the practise of the dueling club, Yoongi side stepped and twirled around the duck as it tried to attack. He waved his wand at and pointed it at the ducks back and shouted “Reverto!” a direct hit~

He didn’t stop to celebrate though because another one was waddling closer.

With her new position by her teammates (all two of them she could find), Ariadne felt more and more confident. She had just given a row of ducks a rather FIERCE look, when slammmmm! She was slightly jarred by the feel of someone running right into her, and had she not ended up with really good balance, she'd have face-planted over it.

Eyes wide and thoughts of having been attacked by a duck or two, Ariadne whirled around, wand in hand and pointed straight out. JAEMIN. "Oh, it's you! I thought I'd been attacked by a duck!" she exclaimed. GOOD, GOOD. Jaemin was no duck, and he didn't look like he was going to attack her. "Merlin, am I glad to see you! What are they doing, multiplying?" She gestured toward the ducks.

Then, so as not to miss a beat, she pointed her wand at the actual ducks. "REVERTO!" she said. "REVERTO!"

Chaos.

There was no other way to describe it. This was complete and utter chaos.

And boy, did the Defence Professor love it!

The man was prowling around as stealthily as possible, trying not to disturb the concentration levels amongst the students while still being at hand in case anything went wrong. Not that anything should but you could never quite tell, could you? For all he knew, someone in the class could have an irrational fear of ducks and they were one quack away from wetting themselves.

What? It could happen.

As it was, he didn't notice anything of the sort. Just a group of first years who........ were going to tackle this as if it's a group effort? Interesting. And interesting dynamic, too. He watched them for a while before smiling and piping up a quick, "Keep at it, you're nearly there." But don't break your focus, okay? That was the last thing they needed.

And the people who finished their mission got a smile and a thumbs up from the man. Well done, indeed.

......... Oh, was that the time? Uh. He should probably make an announcement to the class, then.

"You have fifteen minutes left until the end of the activity and the lesson. Remember that you're fighting for your house. And don't give up!"

Shame that the activity had to come to a close at some point. He was rather enjoying this.


OOC: EEEEEE LOOK AT YOU GUYS GO Okay so you have until 10pm GMT to get as many posts as you want in. That's in about 9 hours and 40 minutes. Have fun! And let me, Nicole or Ariana know if you have any questions ^^

Crazy ducks, crazy ducks everywhere...

QUACK QUACK QUACK!!!

Was it weird that Ava found this was amusing? Maybe not... Every class should've been amusing and fun like this. So that would make the students would actively participate and understand the lessons more. Okay, maybe not some students would understand about the crazy ducks and echinokarps and whatever... Carefully the young lioness avoided the duck attack (though they weren't really attacking, she just needed to be careful or she'd be getting hit by the horns) and cast another reverting charm to the duck. "REVERTO!"

Somehow through all the chaos and confusion happening Hady spotted to younger snakes. It was time to gather them up and work together as a team to defeat these insane ducks.

Slowly inching her way towards her house mates (Ariadne and Jaemin) Hady continued to keep her wand at the ready. Movement wasn't as easy anymore when these ducks worked as an army and were much larger then your normal bath toy. "Reverto!" Leave her house mates alone you crazy thing!

"Reverto!," she cast again with another flourish of her wand aimed at an overly large white duck that appeared to be making it's way at them. "Hey you two, let's take care of these things, hmm?" she sent a grin at the younger snakes. Alone they might have had a problem but together they would stand a much better chance.

As a second duck was trying to attack him, Yoongi tried to do the same side stepping trick again. Only this time he wasn’t careful enough and although he managed to avoid one he almost bumped against another duck. He managed to not get hit by the horns and pointed his wand at the duck when it suddenly turned and tried to attack him again.

But before he could say the incantation , the duck was suddenly hit by another student’s spell and he saw Ava pointing her wand at the duck as well. “Nice one, Ava!” he complimented with a grin before using the spell on another duck.

Well ummm.. All right..

Azura might have crashed into the two people.. But apparently no one noticed it? She guessed she was just that invisible? She sighed slightly as she softly apologizes to the two snakes she had run into and slowly moved away...

She turned to the blue ducky that was after her..

At least the DUCKY could see her! And she aimed her wand at it and said "Reverto "

The duck finally went back to normal and Azura flopped dejected onto the ground..

All too soon the end of practice was called and the ducks…the animated ducks…were soon lined up against him. Defend the professors…Attack the students. This was not a nice phase of the lessons, even defense dummies didn’t bite. Ducks did, even transfigured rubber ducks. Olivia strengthened her grasp on her wand as she worked on gathering the focus she needed to actually cast the spell they had been practicing. There was a big difference between thinking one had gotten the hang of the spell and it actually working.

Especially with her wand.

But it wasn’t like she could wait with the impending doom of those ducks. “Reverto!” she cast, taking aim at a nearby transfigured target. No luck the first time around. “ReVERto!!” Olivia cast again, trying with a little more emphasis which resulted in the spell casting but she missed the duck. Seemed he…or she…waddled just a little too fast for her aim.

It was so not his fault that he'd run into Ariadne. In his defense, she had not been right there a minute ago, and he was running from a demon duck so checking where he was going was definitely coming up as second priority. The small boy blinked in shock and automatically grabbed her arm, just in case she was going to fall from the force of him hitting her; however, it seemed she was okay, and he felt his cheeks flush bright red in embarrassment.

"S-sorry!" he managed, before Azura put him off-balance yet again by running into him. From behind, too. He sorta bumped into Ariadne again from the push, but by the time he whirled around, the Ravenclaw was already taking off and... flopping... on the ground... whaaaaaat?

During all of this, the duck that had been following him was stalwartly moving closer. He was still sorta flustered by all the physical contact and for a good moment he'd forgotten, but... Ariadne's talking brought him back around, and he fumbled with his wand before pointing it at the duck and YELLING the spell as forcefully as he could.

"REVERTO!"

...he wasn't sure if the yelling was what did the trick, or if the duck was finally ready to give up, but as the thing bounced toward him all of the spikes disappeared. He flinched back away from it anyway, unsure if it would stay docile, then looked at Ariadne as the thing landed at his feet.

"I got one!"

Now only six bazillion more.

Having successfully vanquished her enemy the yellow duck, Kitty turned her wand on the red duck next. "Prepare to meet your fate! Reverto!" Her spell would have hit him right in the face, but this duck was a jumper. He jumped up and to the side, causing her spell to narrowly avoid hitting one the students and bounce harmlessly into the ground instead.

As the duck continued the pursuit Esme continued backing away while checking over her shoulder periodically to see if there was any chance an ambush could be in waiting. It wasn't and she was probably being paranoid but it really didn't hurt to check.

"REVERTO!" she called out when she finally got her bearings.

AND SHE SAW THAT GREEN DUCK OVER THERE.

"REVERTO!" for you too! If they thought that they could get past a Darcy they had a lot to learn. Her father had been an expert dueler and still was to this very day. Maybe he had passed along some of those skills to her and Juno. Well, Juno definitely got them and maybe Esme had as well. AT ANY RATE SHE WAS KICKING SOME SERIOUS DUCK BUTT HERE.

Just then a scathingly brilliant idea came into her head. Wouldn't this be an epic scene to put in her album? "What a scathingly brilliant idea!" She very quickly took out her camera and snapped several pictures of the scene. She snapped two of the three Professor's, one of the retreating red duck (who was distracted with another student), another of Esme kicking serious duck butt, and another of Ariadne being crashed into. This was awesome! Then she put aside her camera and rejoined the fray - hot on the tail of the red duck.