And yet, it's far less hot in here than it was on Care of Magical Creatures

Professor Lawrence Marsh

April 09, 2019 12:19 PM

Putting the Fire Back into Those Studying by Professor Lawrence Marsh

The mantras sat on his brain, wanting to be said as he sat behind his desk. He knew he should say one, before the students entered. They were a reminder of how far he’d come. Lawrence had found comfort in them since he’d started treatment. And those mantras and treatment had led him here. To Sonora.

Lawrence looked around the classroom and then said under his breath, “Nothing changes if nothing changes.” He took a deep breath in and let it out.

His first class would be with older students. He was thankful for that. He could treat them closer to equals. Like when he’d managed people in the field. He knew that many people coming off of studies were book focused, and that could sometimes prove difficult to overcome, so he'd decided on a small change in the curriculum for these advanced students, that would help.

Lawrence had thought through long and hard what would excite a bunch of teenagers. He had not been one too long ago, though long enough he guessed. He’d used many of his old contacts to get these animals here legally and he was excited to introduce them to these students. Something this rare was hard to get and also he hoped, would bring back the excitement of Magizoology.

He got up from his desk and wrote on the chalkboard, Professor Marsh. Today's Lesson: Caring for that which is difficult, putting books into practice.

As the students came in he smiled at each and welcomed them into class trying to pronounce each name as correctly as he could. Lawrence wanted to make sure they were not afraid of a sudden new face in their classroom, nor that the new face might not know their names. Though he might simply be projecting his fear of a sudden change onto these teenagers.

“Hello Everyone. My name is Professor Marsh, like a place you might one day find yourself in as a Magizoologist. I am sorry to be joining you so late in your studies, but I hope to be a help to you and hope to ensure that your love of animals and learning continue onwards after this class. Today I am going to depart from the curriculum you got at the beginning of the year and ask you to put away your preparation studies for just a bit. Some of you have tests coming up, and yet I know as I once took them, that you are taking your tests in Care for a reason. That reason is not just because the books have pretty pictures or that you just love books so much you wanted to spend every day with them. So today I’d like to introduce you each to your semester long project that I’d like you to do while also studying and preparing. The project is to remind you why you decided to do Advanced Care of Magical Creatures in the first place, and rekindle that fire maybe.”

Lawrence let a grin show through his trimmed beard at his small joke before waving his wand. The boxes from the back of the room started to move up to the front. Some flames lept from some of the boxes, though not very high, as they floated the forward above the students heads.

“After I finish talking, each of you will come up to the front of the class and choose a Fire Crab. I am sure you’ve read about Fire Crabs before but you may have never experienced one. That being said, part of what Magizoologists do is take what we’ve learned in books and put it into practice. So once you’ve chosen your Fire Crab I am going to ask you to first figure out what variant you have chosen and then how to feed it and clean out it’s cage without catching on fire.”

Lawrence peaked over the top of the closest box and a small burst of flame shot out and he pulled his face back fast enough to ensure that his beard didn’t catch on fire. He looked back at the class and laughed in surprise.

“Ok. Once you’ve finished with that, I would like you to write a short paper no more than three pages, on why a difficult or dangerous animal, one that isn't Fire Crabs, should be protected,” Lawrence looked around the room he felt that might be a bit prescribed, and what he’d write about. He didn’t want to force his ideas on these students, “I guess if you do not think the animal should be protected you can write a short paper on that as well. Just make sure you think outside the book and explain to me why. Now, back to the Crabs, as these are protected animals, I can not let you take them back to your rooms, so your crabs will stay in the classroom, but you’ll be responsible for feeding and cleaning their cages for the rest of the semester."

He turned around and began walking towards the table with the boxes of Crabs before turning back to the class.

“Oh I almost forgot, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask. Now if the first row will come up to the front and pick up your crab.”

He smiled to himself as another mantra floated into his head: “I am making progress.”

OOC: You can learn more about Fire Crab’s here: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Fire_Crab. Usual class rules apply, in that posts should be 200 words minimum and factors such as creativity, length, and realism will be taken into consideration when marking. Tag Professor Marsh in the subject if you wish to ask him a question. By advanced level they should have studied most creatures.

Subthreads:

And yet, it's far less hot in here than it was by Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw with Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw

It's definitely been rekindled by Juniper Brockert, Teppenpaw

41 Professor Lawrence Marsh Putting the Fire Back into Those Studying 1462 Professor Lawrence Marsh 1 5

Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw

April 19, 2019 10:21 AM

And yet, it's far less hot in here than it was by Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw

Georgia greeted the new professor with a friendly smile and a calm external demeanour. Inside, she was kind of suspicious and more than a little annoyed. She had less than six months left. Less than six months until she sat major exams and then left. First off, what if this professor turned out to suck, or she just didn’t get on with his teaching style? He could wreck… um, well, if she had a plan for her life, it would possibly be in danger right now. If she needed this grade. Which she wasn’t totally sure she really did as she’d mainly taken this class as filler. But well, also, what if he turned out to be really excellent? What was the use of that, as there was scarcely any time to benefit from it. She decided not to question her own logic that she was annoyed both at the possibility that he might be terrible or too good, and just settled for being grumpy that it was a change and change right now just seemed bleugh whatever way you looked at it.

Also, Professor Taransay had been really hot.

Maybe that was a really bad way to judge your professors but it was undeniably true, and it had meant that suffering through an hour with even the dullest or grossest creatures hadn’t been so bad.

Georgia was not quite sure what to make of Not Professor Taransay suggesting they might have chosen the subject for its pretty pictures. That was surely a bit patronising given that they were all like… over sixteen years old. The fact that it was slightly true only made it all the more annoying. All in all, the man had got off to a bad start and had already been skating on some pretty thin ice by not being Professor Taransay and she really thought he ought to be careful.

In spite of her bad mood, she was mildly intrigued when he brought forward a crate that breathed fire. Were they getting baby dragons? Dragons and unicorns were two of the reasons she had kept this subject, along with the fact that it was a lot easier than Transfiguration. She was psyched if this was a class on baby dragons, and was totally willing to forgive the new professor and his weird beard if that was a baby dragon.

It wasn’t. It was a…. Thing. A weird turtle thing that was admittedly really nice for being shiny but had way too many legs. Georgia had a rule about Care of Magical Creatures - anything with more than four legs or less than two meant it was going to be a really bad or really gross day. Not that four legged animals were all cuddles and fun. There were the evil biting hedgehog things. But there were kneazles and crups and - hopefully, one day, unless she had been lied to - her goshdarn unicorns. Most of the bird things they’d encountered were also pretty okay, hence two being the lower limit. She supposed her rule technically implied three legs would be fine too. She wasn’t sure if there were any naturally three legged animals in the wizarding world. It seemed like a weird enough thing to be a possibility but she suspected it mostly meant that you had got your project very, very wrong and were in a lot of trouble…

If he had wanted to rekindle their- wait, had he said ‘fire’ or was she just imagining that now because of what he’d revealed? Had he said ‘interest’ or maybe ‘passion’ or had he actually gone and dad joked them right off the bat? She couldn’t be sure but she thought he might have. Anyway, if he wanted to do rekindling, she thought he’d have been better off with baby dragons or unicorns, not with getting them to clean cages of angry turtle things with too many legs without getting set on fire. The only part of that that Georgia was on board with that last part, as ‘not on fire’ was a state she very much enjoyed, but a good way to achieve it seemed to be continuing her life without going near one of those things.

Then they had to write a paper about saving scary bity danger things. Admittedly, he’d said they could argue the opposite but she doubted that it would be possible to do that and get a good grade/not come off as an animal hating psychopath. Though ‘most of them look they can take care of themselves, and I am far, far squishier than they are’ sounded like solid reasoning to her.

“Right,” she sighed, to the nearest person, “How do we do this and not die? And is it me, or is starting to feel like every class begins with that question?”

13 Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw And yet, it's far less hot in here than it was 346 Georgia Kirkly, Teppenpaw 0 5

Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw

April 24, 2019 4:10 PM

Can I help Spark the fire? by Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw

Jozua would probably rank Care of Magical Creatures as his third favorite class. DADA had a solid bid on favorite, it being basically everything he was interested in doing for the rest of his life. Potions was a distant second place because of its early opportunities for explosions and his continuing talent in the subject that resulted from learning how to mix ingredients to get just the right explosive effects he was looking for while still remaining safe for himself and those nearby.

CoMC took third for one single and simple reason: dragons. No class that studied dragons could be bad. Plus there was some small amount of overlap with the DADA creature units, so that made it even better. Though, truthfully, Jozua had much more interest in fighting dangerous creatures than caring for them.

He arrived to Professor Marsh’s first class eager to see what beast might be today’s topic. He was a new teacher, so there was no guarantee he’d keep to Professor Tarnasay’s curriculum. A fact that immediately proved true. Awesome.

Less awesome was the idea of a semester long project, but this was a RATS level course, so it didn’t come as too much of a surprise for him. He doubted a paper on ‘I took this class so I could learn how to take care of any creature that might attack me in a jungle’ would go over particularly well, but obviously this new guy had an appreciation for puns so maybe he would give a bonus point for that clever wordplay after he took off a bajillion for having decidedly uncaring intentions in taking this class.

But it wasn’t a paper, in spite of the comment about books and their pretty pictures. They’d be taking care of Fire crabs instead, which didn’t seem too bad. Dangerous, possibly, but more in an inherent way than an intentional one. They just set things on fire just by merely existing, or when threatened. Jozua actually felt a bit of kinship toward them. Though Jozua himself, by his own metric, was a much worse kind of creature, since he set fires and blew things up on purpose and for fun, rather than just to defend himself like the crabs did.

But Sparks and Fire Crabs were both affiliated with fire, and that made the prospect of caring for one all semester tolerable, even if it mostly mean cage cleaning. Not as good as, say, taking care of a fire-breathing dragon, for example, but definitely more interesting than something ordinary and relatively safe like a crup or a kneazle.

As he waited for his turn to go fetch one, he grinned at Georgia as she questioned the survivability of their current assignment. He hoped he didn’t look too eagerly excited about the crabs, but suspected he might. “It’s great, isn’t it?” he laughed, perhaps a bit too gleefully at how lethal their classes seemed to be getting.

This time, though, he did have some practical advice. “But this one we can live through,” he promised. “Step one,” he began, sounding like he knew what he was talking about because he kind of did. The crabs were fire, and he was fire, and this was not the first time he’d come across Fire Crabs in his readings. “Do not approach from behind. Unlike dragons, Fire Crabs shoot fire out of their back end, not their front end.”

“Step two, take your robe off,” Jozua did likewise, draping the school uniform robe over the back of his chair, leaving him dressed in grey trousers and a white button down shirt. “When dealing with fire, the less loose fabric you have, the better. Hair, too; if you’ve got a hairband, you should always tie it back.” His own was short enough that he didn’t need to worry about that part too much.

“Step three, gloves.” He pulled out and put on his dragon hide ones. He had dropped Herbology after the CATS, but there was enough dung involved in CoMC that a new pair continued to be an item on his back to school list each year. “Your hands will be closest, so don’t have any more exposed skin than you have to. Skin burns faster than leather or hide, and is less easily replaced.”

“And step four,” he grinned again, standing as their row was invited to go forward and get a crab. “Have fun!”

He went up to the front, looking over the available crabs. The jeweled shells shimmered, and he went for one with red rubies. Jozua figured that if he was going to have a fire crab he may as well have one that sparkled like fire. Besides, some of his readings suggested the variant with rubies was a bit more fiery than other variations of the crab, and he figured he might be a bit better suited to dealing with that than most of his classmates.

He got the crab in its box back to his desk without getting flambéed (though there had been one very near miss when he first picked the box up), which he figured was a good and auspicious start to the semester.

He beamed at Georgia once they were both back in their seats. “See, no death!”

1 Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw Can I help Spark the fire? 348 Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw 0 5

Georgia Kirkly

May 02, 2019 10:48 PM

I was alluding to teacher attractiveness, so let's hope not by Georgia Kirkly

OOC - contains homophobic microaggressions

IC
Georgia used her best Teppenpaw tact to not tell Jozua that he was mental when he declared how great this all was. Her face pretty well said it for her though. Still, he at least had some decently practical advice. She pulled a hairtie from round her wrist, reluctantly drawing her shoulder length brown locks into a ponytail. She always carried a hair tie because it was necessary in a lot of classes, but she did not like tying her hair back because it made her face look chubby. Well, no, that wasn't accurate - the fact that she was chubby was what made her face look chubby, but tying back her hair definitely accentuated that. That was also an issue with taking her robes off. Whilst the loose fitting green sack wasn't exactly flattering, it did hide a multitude of issues. It did not, by any means, make her look good, but it also didn't showcase the bad. The long t-shirt and leggings she had on underneath certainly did. She hadn't exactly expected them to get an audience.

"I'll just role my sleeves up," she decided with all the brilliant teenage logic that getting set on fire was on a roughly equal par with not having people laugh at her butt or her clothes That was good enough for potions, so hopefully it was good enough here too.

"Is step four mandatory?" she mumbled, as she followed Jozua up to the front to choose a crab. She went for one with shiny yellow stones, hoping that meant it had Teppish tendancies and was less likely to set people on fire. Jozua had a Crotalus crab, which... Well, technically it should be rule abiding and whatever, but Georgia couldn't help but think of Crotali as bit-ter mean people who would absolutely set you on fire if they could get away with it. Jozua's crab gave him a blast as he picked up its cage, which made her fumble slightly with hers, causing it to also flame. She managed not to drop it and everyone got back to their work area in one piece.

"Still plenty of time," she assured Jozua, when he pointed out there was no death yet, although she found herself doing so with a smile. She still didn't feel super enthused about a semester long challenge to clean poop and not end up on fire but it was sort of hard not to be amused by Jozua's take on things.

"I don't know that she likes me though," she added. It was sort of hard to tell with something that had a turtle face, as those had a tendency to look sort of grumpy. "Or he..." she added, both because nature tended to have the males be more flashy and because she'd been spending way too much time with Kir and could practically hear him saying she shouldn't assume.

"If they are guys though, they are like... super gay looking," she observed. In reality, the word she needed was probably 'camp' but she had a complete lack of awareness as to how that was not synonymous and why it might matter to mark the difference. "Oh, speaking of which, are you like... friends with Kir?" she asked. Admittedly, if Jozua was, then she probably could have chosen her segue a little more tactfully . Even if he wasn't, she arguably still should have, though it was debatable whether she was calling Kir gay-looking or just... being reminded about him by all things gay, the latter of which was somewhat fairer and less mean. Her tone suggested she found this possibility hard to believe,in spite of having seen them studying together on more than one occasion.

13 Georgia Kirkly I was alluding to teacher attractiveness, so let's hope not 346 Georgia Kirkly 0 5

Jozua Sparks

May 03, 2019 10:06 PM

Yeah, I was referencing back to Prof Marsh's original intent by Jozua Sparks

Jozua had given Georgia a very dubious look when she decided to only roll up her sleeves rather than remove the robe entirely, but Professor Marsh hadn't required it, and most of their classmates weren't taking the precaution either, so he didn't insist. He was merely offering sage advice. If she chose not to take it, that was her choice. At least she tied up her hair. Burnt hair smelled awful.

And she did return without catching on fire, so there was that. And she cracked a smile at his assertion that no death had occurred. Yet, as she pointed out, which drew and answering grin back from him.

"You haven't fed it yet, just jostled it around. Of course it doesn't like you yet," Jozua pointed out.

He peeked in at his crab, quickly and cautiously. His did not like him yet either, but no fire-spurt seemed immediately forthcoming now that the box wasn't getting moved around. "I don't know," he disagreed. "Red's a pretty masculine color, and, historically, kings and rich guys used to wear some pretty large jewels." It wasn't so much in fashion now, but any history book with portraits would quickly confirm that hadn't always been the case. "I think mine could pretty easily be a guy." He wasn't putting his face anywhere close to the crab's back end to check though. If you could even tell by visual inspection on a crab, which Jozua was by no means convinced you could.

He wasn't sure if it was the mention of gayness or history that made her ask about Kir, but the juxtaposition and doubt in her voice did make Jozua glance over at her with a raised eyebrow. "I mean, he's not my best friend or anything," he admitted, but that position had been claimed by Lily the first day they met, so Kir had never stood a chance. And while he wasn't Finn or Joe either, Kir had probably climbed up into that next third tier that wasn't quite friends but was definitely more than just a mere acquaintance. "But we get along pretty good now." Like gems in men's fashion, that hadn't always been the case either, but their misunderstands were coming less frequently, they had discovered some similar interests and activities, and Jozua no longer feel personally attacked every time Kir suggested he might be socially brainwashed. Well, only a little attacked. But too often Kir had a point and was drawing attention to a blind spot Jozua hadn't realized he had. "He brings . . . an interesting perspective to history. My mom likes him."

"Why?" he asked, just a little suspiciously. Georgia and Zevalyn were friends. There might have been an implication about gayness. Surely, Georgia didn't think Jozua was trying to get between Zevalyn and her boyfriend, did she? And not by going after Zev, either. Which was fair. Jozua had no interest in that direction. But there was no interest the other direction either. And wasn't it pretty well known by now that he and Lily were dating as well as best friends? So surely Georgia wasn't suggesting that.

1 Jozua Sparks Yeah, I was referencing back to Prof Marsh's original intent 348 Jozua Sparks 0 5

Georgia

May 08, 2019 9:21 PM

Hm. You think that's relevant/important? by Georgia

"That's true. Food is definitely a good bribe if you want to be in my good graces," she agreed. There was a pile of salad leaves at the front and she summoned some over, handing some to Jozua too. "Though lettuce, not really a winner in my book." Normally, she might have felt self-conscious admitting such a thing because people would be all over that - of course the fat girl liked cake, of course she ate too much, and if she just cared more or tried harder she too could be a delicate little pixie. And ok, it seemed true that the Pureblood girls did watch their weight and diet obsessively, but she had seen Zevalyn eat pancakes for breakfast or take seconds at dinner with no one whatsoever judging her. Maybe, overall, Georgia did eat more, or ate a less healthy diet, but the point was any time she made an unhealthy choice, she stood to get judged for it in a way that a skinny person eating the exact same thing would not. However, Jozua was also amongst the small percentage of the school's population that did not look like he might snap in a stiff breeze, so she felt safe joking about this with him.

"But hey, whatever floats your boat, Sparkle-Butt" she addressed the firecrab, poking some lettuce into the cage. It seemed to notice this more than its new nickname and began to munch away happily.

"Because he's driving me crazy," she answered, regarding Kir. "And it's not like I can go to Zevalyn about it." She weighed up Jozua's comments and decided that getting on okay and describing Kir as having an 'interesting' perspective was lukewarm enough that she probably could complain a bit to Jozua. Anyway, she'd started now. If he was the kind to go reporting back to Kir, it was already too late. She may as well get it off her chest. And Jozua didn't strike her as super gossipy anyway. "For the concert. I don't think he even cares about it. Not the way I do. But it's like... He's been told to organise, so he'll stick his nose into every single element anyway. Like he'll fight for things he doesn't even care about just because he thinks it needs considering. Sometimes, we do not need to consider every last element that no one has even raised. Sometimes, we just need to make a choice. Sometimes a song is just a nice song and not reflective of the indoctrinations of a heteronormative patriarchy or whatever - half of his complaints aren't even in English. So, how do you deal with Kir and his 'interesting perspectives' and not want to punch him in the face?" she asked hotly.

13 Georgia Hm. You think that's relevant/important? 346 Georgia 0 5

Juniper Brockert, Teppenpaw

May 18, 2019 9:54 PM

It's definitely been rekindled by Juniper Brockert, Teppenpaw

Care of Magical Creatures was, without a doubt, Juniper's favorite class. There wasn't a single animal that she didn't love, from the tiniest insect to the largest blue whale. She loved the furry ones, the scaly ones and the feathery ones, the cute ones and the ugly ones and the ones so ugly that they were cute.

What she didn't love was new situations, especially those involving new people. While a new COMC professor wasn't quite as bad as meeting people at parties, it still terrified her. Obviously, a professor wouldn't single her out for poor treatment the way her peers might and her mother wouldn't care nearly as much if Juniper didn't impress her professors as she would if Juniper didn't impress members of society. Which, she was sure she didn't.

But the Teppenpaw cared. She never wanted anyone's disapproval. Hence why she didn't spend time around most others if she could avoid it. It was better to keep to herself than risk being rejected-or worse-by others and getting hurt.

And since COMC was her favorite class, Juniper really wanted to impress whomever taught it. She took pride in her knowledge of and ability to care for animals, even though she obviously never bragged about it to others. She was too afraid that if she tried to say anything positive about herself out loud, people would laugh at her and tell her she was wrong.

So Juniper listened with trepidation as Professor Marsh began to speak. However, once he mentioned that they would be picking out a fire crab to feed and take care of all semester, she allowed a grin to find it's way to her face. Yes, they weren't the cuddliest things out there, but that didn't matter. Once her row, which was the last row, was called, Juniper walked up to the front of the room and picked one of the remaining crabs, who had a shell decorated with sapphires. "Aren't you a beautiful little guy?" She cooed.

Then she felt someone behind her and turned around, her face burning. "Um, hi" Juniper greeted the person.

11 Juniper Brockert, Teppenpaw It's definitely been rekindled 345 Juniper Brockert, Teppenpaw 0 5