come as you are | sammy

[Theodore Marcus Flint]

a fine young galahad.

march 2029

THE DRONING OF THE POTIONS PROFESSOR offered an almost pleasant background lull to the absolute anarchy at Theo and Sammy's desk. The very worst thing about Professor Big-Head-Many-Feet, was that he never really shut up. Even when he was doing his rounds, checking on the students progress as they brewed their respective potions, he was always bloody talking. They used to make fun of him for it, well they still did, but now it was sort of the perfect buffer for mischief.

Theo leaned down, almost putting his face into the pewter cauldron as he laughed with his lips firmly closed. "I don't think it's supposed to be that colour." He snorted quietly, the acrid scent of charred dittany stinging his nose as he turned his head to look up at where Sammy loomed over him from his side of the desk. "Ain't it supposed to be green, Vector?" His eyes glinted, and he leaned back when the smell started to make him a bit dizzy. Inside the cauldron, the contents of the potion whirled in a dark indistinguishable mass.

"Dare you to try it," Theo posed, grinning maniacally as he turned his head just as Prof Bighead was muttering something about someone he thought was terribly important. The potion was supposed to be a Pomfrey's Pick-Me-Up. But, the boys had lost their heads around the crushing of the beetle eyes and the anti-clockwise stirring. Theo was still picking beetle carapaces out of his hair, shaking it across the table so that Minnie Gooding and Pretty Pendleton screeched like strangled Mandrake's from the table behind them. That earned them a good old tongue lashing from esteemed Professor Bigsby Millepede. "If you do, I bet that vein in Many Feet's neck will finally pop." 

SAMUEL LEONHARD VECTOR

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[SAMUEL LEONHARD VECTOR]

Sammy and Theo looked into their cauldron with similar expressions of disdain. It definitely wasn't supposed to be that dark - or that consistency. Sammy glanced back up at the chalk board, scanning the directions. He frowned. "Did we add two grams of dittany or two and a half?" asked Sammy, eyeing the congealed potion between them. It was starting to give off a stench that made Sammy want to retch. His mouth flooded with saliva and he swiftly moved away, shutting his eyes tight lest he be sick.

"Bollocks, that is foul" said Sammy after he'd managed to get his stomach under control. Narrowing his eyes at Theo, he scoffed. "Reckon we feed it to Tilly's rat and see if it gets more chipper," said Sammy. He had never really been very fond of Tilly's choice of pets, but he never said so to her face. They were just... dirty. They reminded him of the London underground, scuttling about looking for crusts. Sammy knew that Tilly's rat was well kept and loved, but the matter remained the same. "Or maybe we could spike Big-head-many-feet's mead tonight and see if his head blows up like a balloon..." he added in an undertone. On second thought, the idea was tempting.

Sammy shot the girls behind them a shrug at Theo's antics, as if it were to be expected of the pair. Pretty and Minnie were too busy frantically dusting off said beetle carapaces from their robes, and Sammy returned his attention to their potion. "I dunno, as much as I'd love the man to have regulated blood flow, I think I would expire drinking this. And I'm not ready to die," he added, pouting at Theo. "Are you trying to get rid of me so quickly?"

Theodore Marcus Flint

[Theodore Marcus Flint]

a fine young galahad.

march 2029

BLINKING STUPIDLY, THEO MADE A VERY WEAK effort to recall if they had added the appropriate amount of dittany. After a second or two of consideration, he shrugged and cringed a bit. They were a little hopeless, considering the directions where chalked on to the board where they could all openly see. It was just so boring, he thought with a huff. Plus, it was much more fun to just do as they pleased and see how disastrous it was when they finished.

Theo made a valiant effort to laugh under his breath, but it just squeaked instead and he covered his mouth at Sammy's expression of abject disgust. "I don't even think the rat would risk drinking this one, mate." Theo muttered, shaking his head at the sheer genius of their stupidity as the stirrer seemed to stick to the bottom of the cauldron. His aunt was going to have an absolute conniption fit if he had to owl her again during the school year asking for another new cauldron. Maybe he'd ask Ari this time.

"I prefer that idea," Theo nodded eagerly, turning his head to watch as Big-Head bent low over a cauldron at the back of the room. One hand flapping ridiculously as he wafted the steam into his face with a goofy little grin on his face. Yammering on about healing properties, and how he had almost had a potion named after him once, did they know. Yes, they did, because he'd told them half a dozen times since they'd started the bloody lesson.

Flicking a final carapace with thumb and pointer, Theo meant to send it sailing at the girls, but instead misjudged and sent it plopping into their 'potion'. Something sizzled angrily, and Theo's eyes widened as he leaned back slightly. "Pussy," He crowed, grin growing into a daring kind of thing as he pulled his stirrer free from the cauldron with a thick resistance and let it hover over the cauldron as a dangerous black glob fell from the end and plopped back onto the surface like a hideous custard. "I'll mourn you..." He batted his eyes and then made to flick the stirrers final glob at Sammy's head. 

SAMUEL LEONHARD VECTOR

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[SAMUEL LEONHARD VECTOR]

Sammy narrowed his eyes at Theo. "Suppose you're right," he muttered, not all together charitably. The rats still creeped him out. But if Tilly had chosen another type of pet, she wouldn't be Tilly at all. He suggested then that they add their potion to professor many-feet's beverage of choice at dinner, but as Sammy chanced another look into the cauldron, he thought better of it. "Actually, I'm not even sure it would mix properly. He'd know something was off," said Sammy with a frown. Another brilliant idea scuppered.

Unsurprisingly, Sammy paid Big-Head no attention as he craned his neck and tried to gauge their classmates potions. Scottie's was similarly foul, and his twin shot him two finger guns and a cheeky smirk. Sammy couldn't see into Ozzy's cauldron, but he looked similarly disinterested and was fidgeting with something under the table. Sammy turned sharply to Theo as he heard a plop and a sizzle from their potion. He arched a brow in question, but Theo gave no explanation. He just flicked the stirrer at Sammy with a glob of potion clinging haphazardly to the end. Sammy reacted before the globule could make contact with him, vanishing it with a hushed evanesco. "We are so gonna get expelled. And I haven't even gotten to put into action something I've been thinking about for months," Sammy lamented in a hiss.

Big-head many-feet finally approached their cauldron, and Sammy straightened, trying to look the picture of innocence. He elbowed Theo in the side to get his attention. Big-head peered at their concoction and frowned. "Boys, what do you call this?" asked big-head. "Er, a potion, sir," said Sammy flatly, looking between his professor and the potion. "Maybe instead of drinking it you could use it as a salve," he added after a moment.

Theodore Marcus Flint

[Theodore Marcus Flint]

a fine young galahad.

march 2029

PEERING DOWN INTO THE CAULDRON, THEO could only nod in commiseration. Their was something almost solid about the shivering liquid, the type of mysterious element that was neither solid or liquid. Theo didn't presume to understand the sins they had committed to create something so ominous, but he enjoyed the threat of it nonetheless.

Smiling innocently as Sammy shot him a suspicious stare from across the cauldron, he crossed his arms and pretended he hadn't sent another mysterious ingredient into their mixture. Sammy was, of course, unconvinced. Instead, he had reached over, gave the whole thing a stir and decided he might as well give it a test on the side of Sammy's head. Alas, his friend might have been rubbish at Potions, but his defence charms were up to snuff. The bead of black goo was gone before it made contact and Theo's shoulders slumped in defeat.

"Oh, and what's that?" Theo asked with a wide-eyed, mocking stare. "Tell the court." He waved an eager hand. They were always thinking of something, but Sammy looked almost fervent in his declaration. Theo was just about to reach over and pinch Sammy's red-tinged cheek when the looming smell of sweat and dung beetle cologne, paired with a hard elbow in his side and Theo knew they had company. He turned with a slow moving grin, blinking up at the Professor's unimpressed frown.

"We're exercising our creative liberties, sir." Theo drawled confidently. He reached over and gave the potion a stir before crossing his arms and sighing happily. "One day we'd like a potion named after us too." He tilted his chin up and shot their Professor an expectant smile. "Perhaps if you had tried a little bit of experimentation, you'd have actually succeeded." He shrugged his shoulders carelessly, turning his head to catch Sammy's eye and tagging him in. "Right, Vector?" 

SAMUEL LEONHARD VECTOR

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!