Selina and Anon

August 23, 2015 6:49 AM

A staff meeting and a secret by Selina and Anon

When she’d first seen the message on the Crotalus notice board, Selina had been angry and panicked - the thought that a member of her own house had been responsible all along was awful, and was going to lead to shortage of embarrassment for her. She had felt a strange sort of relief as the problem proved to be more widespread. It had also provided a welcome clue, much as with the use of chalk in her own room. Unlike the trees in the garden or the doors to the hall, she’d been able to easily remove the noticeboard for further analysis.

Sadly, the further analysis had yielded little, every spell she knew to trace a perpetrator coming back blank. And so she had called a staff meeting to discuss what they should do next.

“I have reason to no longer believe this is a student - or indeed, any person in this school,” she informed the staff. She had been very relieved that no messages had appeared over Midterm. With only three members of staff present over the holidays - one a long standing and loyal member of the school, one a man from a decent family, and one a young black woman from no kind of money or heritage - she doubted she would have very much liked the conversations that would have followed, had that happened. There were students too, who would be suspected more easily than others, due to circumstances that were no fault of their own. Muggles, over the centuries, had done enough witch-hunting - they didn’t need to start emulating them.

“Firstly, the simultaneous messages in all the common rooms would require either a group of students working together or one having found out all the passwords. Between that, and the amount they seem to know about other people, it’s looking increasingly unlikely. Second of all, when I tested the chalk in my room to see who had last written with it, it said it was me. The analysis of any other messages have been similarly unproductive.

“I’m starting to believe that this incident is magical in nature. It’s happened before here, with the weather charms going awry, and there have been incidents of one sort or another in most magical schools - the combination of imprecise magical control and hormones can lead to strange results, even in the most well-protected environments. I think we need to investigate how well Sonora’s functioning right now. I’ve drawn up a rota,” - words that made one perennially popular - “dividing up the school’s various enchantments. We’ll be working in pairs for safety. I’m sorry to add to your work loads, but I’m sure we’ll all be happier once we’ve got to the bottom of this, and - unless anyone has any other suggestions - this seems the best way to proceed.”

Whilst she talked, someone listened. Someone whose fun was going to be spoilt and who didn’t like that one little bit. It was a shame he didn’t have anything about the Skies woman but The Staff was one body. One, which until now, hadn’t felt anything except a removed sense of annoyance and displeasure at the perceived misbehaviour of their students. Well, if they wanted to get personal, that was fine. Whilst they chatted about the jobs to be done, he set to work. He’d been putting this one off because it would be time-consuming, but whilst they were all busy… He slipped into the Care of Magical Creatures classroom. Making his way to the board, he drew a big stick figure in the middle, and around it a series of smaller ones and little stick animals.

‘How can I be lonely...’ he wrote, ’...if I’m surrounded?

OOC - staff, you do not have to respond to this but you may if you wish. You may also decide amongst yourselves what your pairs/jobs are in order to have some more interactions with your fellow staff members.
13 Selina and Anon A staff meeting and a secret 26 Selina and Anon 1 5

Nathan Xavier

September 03, 2015 9:29 PM

Staffing by Nathan Xavier

When one of his students had reported the words scratched into the Teppenpaw notice board, Nathan's first reaction was disbelief. He had been certain - absolutely convinced beyond all doubt based on his interactions with the students of his House - that the perpetrator had to be from one of the other three Houses. That a new message had appeared in Teppenpaw-Only territory both baffled and disappointed him greatly. His knowledge of tracing and identification spells was perhaps not as advanced as those known by some of the other staff, but even his rudimentary skill was sufficient to identify young Ginger Pierce as the culprit of the secondary kinder graffiti drawn in response to the crueler primary message.

He'd called her into his office where she had promptly burst into tears and confessed and begged not to be expelled. He'd given her a short lecture and a few chores to do around the common room, so he could tell the Headmaster he had enforced discipline if the man found out about it, but he'd removed that part of the defacement before turning the board over to Skies for further examination. The girl had clearly meant well and he felt reasonably sure she wouldn't be carving graffiti into any other school surfaces in the future, and as her name began with a G, she had already been interviewed and cleared by Selina after the second carving, so he saw little reason to report that particular infraction any further up the chain of command.

The other one, though, he'd reported with a heavy heart, and - to be entirely truthful - he had been deeply relieved to hear the Teppenpaw board was not the only one so engraved even if it meant the problem was likely worse than the prankster they had assumed they were dealing with up until this point.

Unsurprisingly, he had been assigned the job of examining the outer wards on the Gardens and Grounds as these were in his normal domain of oversight anyway. Turning to his partner in this task, he said, "Obviously, I'm no Defense expert, but I know where all the school's protective wards are anchored, how to tell if they were triggered, and if they are still active. If something's messing with them or they're misfiring, though, I'm not sure I'd be able to recognize it if it's a subtle change."
1 Nathan Xavier Staffing 28 Nathan Xavier 0 5


Medic Eir

September 08, 2015 10:46 PM

On your feet by Medic Eir

Edda didn't do people. She didn't do meetings, she didn't do brainstorming, and she didn't do partners- but here she was. Circumstances being what they were she couldn't bring herself to actually refuse to work with another person. She didn't know if there was any real possibility for physical danger in searching most of the school but the gardens were a different story. If she were stupid about it she could be in need of a medic herself.

Xavier seemed pleasant but meek- both were traits she had little patience for. Normally she would have replied to his lack of confidence in being able to notice if something was wrong with something along the lines of "Ha! You call yourself a teacher? Pathetic" followed by an abnormally large vote of confidence of her own abilities. What held her back was not a new found sense of compassion for fellow staff members' (or anyone's) feelings but a lack of interest in what he said. In reply to him she simply gave him an appraising look, one that almost screamed of her disapproval.

Luckily, she found the whole ordeal exciting. She didn’t care about the students’ emotional well being. She didn’t particularly care about their physical well being either except when they were in her domain. This was just another way in which Edda didn’t do people. What she did do was the drama, the danger, and the mystery of it all. By the end of the meeting she was raring to go.

She shot straight out of her seat with a “Well!” After brushing her coat, dusting off wrinkles that weren’t there, she looked down at Nathan with gleaming eyes. “Ready?” She didn’t gave a hoot about his classes or his schedule, she could leave the infirmary for a while. Nothing had happened recently, the girl with epilepsy, the boy with asthma, the werewolf freak- none demanded her attention the past few days, they could deal with it themselves if they decided they were overdue for a checkup right now. Not caring about even her own duties she expected the professor to do the same and follow behind her to inspect the gardens when it interested her- which was now.

OOC: I apologize for Edda's total lack of courtesy and political correctness
0 Medic Eir On your feet 0 Medic Eir 0 5