Hunger Games and Herpetology
Maybe cramming for a History of Magic test in the library during lunch break had been a bad idea. The second bad idea of the day, in fact. The first one made itself manifest earlier that morning via Paris' back from trying to carry every single book she'd need that day, schoolwork or otherwise. And both of these lovely bad ideas backfired when A History of Magic was at the bottom of Paris' bag, resulting in the unloading of all seven books just to be able to start studying.
The library tables were already cluttered with books that students had evidently been too lazy to put away, and the volumes Paris unloaded didn't help matters in the organization department. This was the second test Paris had in the last two days, and yesterday her last minute library study session was semi-productive, so she decided to try it again today. Maybe she would glean a little more in here, surrounded by towers of wisdom and learning than she might when studying in the Hufflepuff common room.
With the end of lunch nearing, Paris felt her concentration drifting. This was so. Boring. Why would anyone ever need to know in-depth history of the founding of the Ministry of Magic? History of Magic would be worth skipping less if they got to learn about the 14th century 'Beast vs Being' Burdock Muldoon failure or the 1709 Warlocks' Convention and its breeding bans, instead of this stupid, useless, impractical, pointless, inapplicable, waste of time.
Coming to the conclusion that she would never be able to keep studying no matter how long she remained, Paris slowly and guiltily shifted her stacks of books to find the new herpetology book her mom had sent her.
As a lawyer, Paris' mother spent a lot of her time preparing for cases by reading, and she had grown to love it. She had done her best to pass that trait on to her children, finding little success with Paris. Recently, however, Beatrice Soliel had taken to sending Paris books by owl--animal and magizoology books. Paris had been surprised by her new love of reading--encyclopedias, that is. This most recent volume Paris found particularly fascinating; being a textbook on reptiles, she greatly enjoyed finding evolutionary similarities between them and dragons.
Paris felt bad for not being able to focus on her schoolwork, but it was just so hard to resist reading the next chapter of The Age of Reptiles, especially knowing that
Ophiophagus hannah was coming up.
As Paris checked book number six of seven, she bacame slightly uncertain.. Where did it go? She was fairly positive that she had packed the herpetology book this morning, though it wasn't unlike her to forget things.
Lifting her Transfiguration textbook to view the final book, a small frown appeared on her face. Wait. The Hunger Games?? Where the heck did that come from? Paris had never once finished a novel in her life, let alone a dystopian of all things. They were so hard to understand! And they always started so slow!
Paris glanced briefly around the library. She hadn't seen anyone, but it was very possible that she could have missed noticing someone during her not-very-effective studying. Had someone stolen her book? Did Paris accidentally steal someone else's?
@Avery Gray wow that was a lot longer than i thought. 559 words. sorry bout that. im sure that wont be an always thing so i apologise for my writing inconsistency
The library tables were already cluttered with books that students had evidently been too lazy to put away, and the volumes Paris unloaded didn't help matters in the organization department. This was the second test Paris had in the last two days, and yesterday her last minute library study session was semi-productive, so she decided to try it again today. Maybe she would glean a little more in here, surrounded by towers of wisdom and learning than she might when studying in the Hufflepuff common room.
With the end of lunch nearing, Paris felt her concentration drifting. This was so. Boring. Why would anyone ever need to know in-depth history of the founding of the Ministry of Magic? History of Magic would be worth skipping less if they got to learn about the 14th century 'Beast vs Being' Burdock Muldoon failure or the 1709 Warlocks' Convention and its breeding bans, instead of this stupid, useless, impractical, pointless, inapplicable, waste of time.
Coming to the conclusion that she would never be able to keep studying no matter how long she remained, Paris slowly and guiltily shifted her stacks of books to find the new herpetology book her mom had sent her.
As a lawyer, Paris' mother spent a lot of her time preparing for cases by reading, and she had grown to love it. She had done her best to pass that trait on to her children, finding little success with Paris. Recently, however, Beatrice Soliel had taken to sending Paris books by owl--animal and magizoology books. Paris had been surprised by her new love of reading--encyclopedias, that is. This most recent volume Paris found particularly fascinating; being a textbook on reptiles, she greatly enjoyed finding evolutionary similarities between them and dragons.
Paris felt bad for not being able to focus on her schoolwork, but it was just so hard to resist reading the next chapter of The Age of Reptiles, especially knowing that
Ophiophagus hannah was coming up.
As Paris checked book number six of seven, she bacame slightly uncertain.. Where did it go? She was fairly positive that she had packed the herpetology book this morning, though it wasn't unlike her to forget things.
Lifting her Transfiguration textbook to view the final book, a small frown appeared on her face. Wait. The Hunger Games?? Where the heck did that come from? Paris had never once finished a novel in her life, let alone a dystopian of all things. They were so hard to understand! And they always started so slow!
Paris glanced briefly around the library. She hadn't seen anyone, but it was very possible that she could have missed noticing someone during her not-very-effective studying. Had someone stolen her book? Did Paris accidentally steal someone else's?
@Avery Gray wow that was a lot longer than i thought. 559 words. sorry bout that. im sure that wont be an always thing so i apologise for my writing inconsistency
It simply isn’t an adventure worth telling if there aren’t any dragons.
-JRR Tolkien
Hunger Games and Herpetology
❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂
Interacting with: @Paris Soliel
Mentioning: N/A
Date: N/AWord Count: 344
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽Avery walked into the library in a daze. Exhausted from the already long lectures and just ready for a break and to enjoy her new book her aunt had sent her from America. Apparently her aunt had found the book at some muggle bookstore she had been visiting in New York, and had thought of her one and only niece. Avery wasn't complaining. So far the book had been amazing. She had never actually read a dystopian novel before, so reading The Hunger Games was going to be her first impression of the genre.
At first glance, Avery was immediately hooked. The cover art, the style the author had written in for the first chapter, and even the back cover that gave a brief summary of the story had Avery interested right away.
It was that day that she messed up. The tables were crowded with books as she walked into the library. The old scent of books and the sound of old pages being turned filled her. Though the sight of all the books on the tables were intimidating. How was anyone supposed to find anything in the mess?
Avery had set down her book at a nearby table. Attempting to mark her spot without much thought. Then she walked over to a nearby shelf of books that had caught her attention. She ran her fingers gently across the spines of the old volumes. Nothing standing out too much for her.
That's when she remembered that she'd left her book on one of the tables. Absentmindedly, she picked up a book of about the same size around the table that she'd thought she had set her book down at.
Then she walked over to a table nearby and collapsed into the chair. Pulling out the book and looking at the cover, Avery was confused. This wasn't her book. It wasn't her book at all. It was some kind of Herpetology book. Whatever that meant, Avery guessed it was about plants. As interesting as plants were, Avery needed to find the owner. And fast.
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
Credit: Mylo Atkins
OOC Note: No worries about your writing consistency or about how long it is! I, too, have a very large writing inconsistency, so I don't mind at all!
Be the change you wish to see |
||
in the world. |
Hunger Games and Herpetology
Paris brushed her fingers over the embossed cover of the book. The bird on the cover appeared to be a member of the Mimus genus, but it was hard to be sure. It didn't really match any real mockingbird descriptions, but that was the thing about artistic liberties. Paris rolled her eyes at the scientific inaccuracies of the bird.
But the questionable avian cover was not the most pressing thing. More pertinent was finding her herp book and returning this work of fiction to its owner. Paris flipped through to get to the back cover of the book, looking for a name.
Blah blah blah, excerpt for the next book in the series (with another inaccurate mockingbird on the cover), blah blah, interview with author--wait. Was that the word minotaur? Paris flipped back a couple pages. In the author interview, the interviewer mentions how the author dispensed with the use of the minotaur and instead went for a gladiator vs gladiator challenge.
What did that mean? Was this book like Greek mythology? Even though it technically was fiction, Paris particularly enjoyed the myths. Especially the ones about beasts and beings. Paris looked over her shoulder, like what she was about to do was scandalous, before opening the book to a random page. (it was the beginning of chapter 25)
Paris read a single paragraph. She gasped, putting her hand over her mouth. What? Genetically modified wolf-like animals, chasing the characters and rallying with human intelligence??
Paris read on as fast as she possibly can. What other menacing attributes do the dogs have? Are any of the characters killed? What odious person came up with these creatures? Paris gasped again, more audibly this time (someone shoots her a look from a couple tables away), when she read about the human eyes in the mutated wolves.
Paris shut the book before she could read on. What was that? Dystopians aren't meant to be interesting like that! They're political and preachy! Aren't they? To be fair, she hadn't ever read a dystopian, but based on the genre description, Paris had made what seemed like an accurate judgement. But noooo. That wasn't preachy at all.
Paris had the sudden urge to keep the book. Finish it and see if dystopians were actually worth a shot. She sighed, knowing she shouldn't. Checking the inside of the front cover this time, Paris came across the name of Avery.
Not very helpful. There were probably a lot of Averys at Hogwarts (not that paris would know; she was usually too in her own world to pay attention to very many people's names). The name sounded familiar... not from a Hufflepuff, certainly. Paris was not so for gone as to not be able to know the members of her own house. A Ravenclaw or Gryffindor perhaps. This seemed like the kind of book an eagle or lion might enjoy.
Paris groaned and put her head down on the table. Why did Avery sound so familiar?? Avery avery avery avery avery..... Paris jerked her head up again. The same person who shot her a look for being noisy is now more intently watching Paris' strange behaviour. Herbology! Paris could vaguely remember the name Avery being mentioned during a lesson on Abyssinian Shrivelfigs about a month ago. So Avery must be a Gryffindor! This was progress!
Should she go to the great hall to find this Avery? No, lunch was almost over. She was probably back in her common room or something. Well. It would be scary, but what if there were a Gryffindor in here she could ask?
Paris fretted as she looked around the library, almost hoping no Gryffindors would be in sight. There were three older Hufflepuffs, a very absorbed-in-a-book Ravenclaw sinking down in his chair, and... one Gryffindor. A girl. Across the library.
Paris took four deep breaths before packing up her bag and picking up Avery's book. She slowly walked towards the Gryffindor.
@Avery Gray wow. 660 words this time. go me
But the questionable avian cover was not the most pressing thing. More pertinent was finding her herp book and returning this work of fiction to its owner. Paris flipped through to get to the back cover of the book, looking for a name.
Blah blah blah, excerpt for the next book in the series (with another inaccurate mockingbird on the cover), blah blah, interview with author--wait. Was that the word minotaur? Paris flipped back a couple pages. In the author interview, the interviewer mentions how the author dispensed with the use of the minotaur and instead went for a gladiator vs gladiator challenge.
What did that mean? Was this book like Greek mythology? Even though it technically was fiction, Paris particularly enjoyed the myths. Especially the ones about beasts and beings. Paris looked over her shoulder, like what she was about to do was scandalous, before opening the book to a random page. (it was the beginning of chapter 25)
Paris read a single paragraph. She gasped, putting her hand over her mouth. What? Genetically modified wolf-like animals, chasing the characters and rallying with human intelligence??
Paris read on as fast as she possibly can. What other menacing attributes do the dogs have? Are any of the characters killed? What odious person came up with these creatures? Paris gasped again, more audibly this time (someone shoots her a look from a couple tables away), when she read about the human eyes in the mutated wolves.
Paris shut the book before she could read on. What was that? Dystopians aren't meant to be interesting like that! They're political and preachy! Aren't they? To be fair, she hadn't ever read a dystopian, but based on the genre description, Paris had made what seemed like an accurate judgement. But noooo. That wasn't preachy at all.
Paris had the sudden urge to keep the book. Finish it and see if dystopians were actually worth a shot. She sighed, knowing she shouldn't. Checking the inside of the front cover this time, Paris came across the name of Avery.
Not very helpful. There were probably a lot of Averys at Hogwarts (not that paris would know; she was usually too in her own world to pay attention to very many people's names). The name sounded familiar... not from a Hufflepuff, certainly. Paris was not so for gone as to not be able to know the members of her own house. A Ravenclaw or Gryffindor perhaps. This seemed like the kind of book an eagle or lion might enjoy.
Paris groaned and put her head down on the table. Why did Avery sound so familiar?? Avery avery avery avery avery..... Paris jerked her head up again. The same person who shot her a look for being noisy is now more intently watching Paris' strange behaviour. Herbology! Paris could vaguely remember the name Avery being mentioned during a lesson on Abyssinian Shrivelfigs about a month ago. So Avery must be a Gryffindor! This was progress!
Should she go to the great hall to find this Avery? No, lunch was almost over. She was probably back in her common room or something. Well. It would be scary, but what if there were a Gryffindor in here she could ask?
Paris fretted as she looked around the library, almost hoping no Gryffindors would be in sight. There were three older Hufflepuffs, a very absorbed-in-a-book Ravenclaw sinking down in his chair, and... one Gryffindor. A girl. Across the library.
Paris took four deep breaths before packing up her bag and picking up Avery's book. She slowly walked towards the Gryffindor.
@Avery Gray wow. 660 words this time. go me
It simply isn’t an adventure worth telling if there aren’t any dragons.
-JRR Tolkien
Hunger Games and Herpetology
❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂━━━━━❂
Interacting with: @Paris Soliel
Mentioning: N/A
Date: N/AWord Count: 418
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽Avery's curiosity got the better of her. Upon opening the book, she quickly learned that her initial guess of the book being about plants was far from correct. Snakes. She recognized that creature. The rest? Well, she wasn't so sure. Some she had heard of before such as frogs and lizards. Then there were others like salamanders that she didn't know.
Then she skipped to a random page. It was about the mysterious salamanders she hadn't heard of before. Upon reading, she was immediately entranced in what she was reading. Who knew that a small lizard-like creature was so interesting and so intricate. How had she never heard of the creature before? Her grandfather had been a mazoologist that had taught her about plants and animals.
Apparently salamanders were something called "amphibians". Avery cocked her head at that word. She had never heard of it before. What did it mean? She read down further. Learning that amphibians were creatures that lived on both land and water. She also learned that frogs, a creature she knew well, were also amphibians! How fascinating! There was no turning back now. Avery would continue reading until she realized who the owner was, or possibly the owner would recognize the book she was reading and find her.
Avery continued to read about the fascinating salamanders. Apparently they lived in moist, cool, and shady habitats and were found in North America mainly, but they could also be found in parts of the Northern Hemisphere. Avery had never visited the Northern Hemisphere. Maybe that was why she had never heard of the creature before! Then she remembered her cousin, Dylan. He lived in New York City, New York in the United States! Maybe he had seen the mysterious salamander that almost looked like a colorful lizard? Avery made a mental note to ask him in her next owl.
Avery hadn't noticed at first that a Hufflepuff girl was walking towards her. A familiar book in her hands. It was when Avery glanced up upon hearing footsteps that her eyes widened in surprise. That book. She knew that book. That was the book she had been planning on reading, but somehow had lost! How had the girl found her book? Was she the owner of this interesting book on Herpetology? Avery had to get to the bottom of this. It was a confusing mess.
"Is this your book?" She asked with a slight smile on her face as she lifted it for the girl to see.
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
✽
Credit: Mylo Atkins
OOC Note: So sorry how late this is!
Be the change you wish to see |
||
in the world. |