Changing Rooms || Secret Blossom Ball Event Fin

Mentions: @Erin Ryan, @Jake Morris, @Jack Burnett & @Jack Warren Interacting with: @Quinn Healy

Mentions: @Erin Ryan @Jack Burnett @Quinn Healy @Jake Morris

As Oliver cast protego in attempt to shield the firework's blast radius, they lit up and flashed brightly into his eyes. His cast turned into a weak toot as a result of not committing fully to the spell. He held his eyes immediately after, having looked up at the fireworks directly as they exploded. Much like some of the others, such as Quinn, Oliver took a direct hit from the bright flashes. He shut his eyes and waited for the whiteness to fade away. He groaned too at the aching that filled the back of his eyeballs.
Fortunately, Oliver had seen the boy who threw the fireworks outside the changing room. Before Oliver had entered, he had seen someone fidgeting with fireworks in their backpack. He didn't think moments later they'd be thrown over his head. Nonetheless, he'd remember the face.

Oliver mostly listened in to the yapping that was going on between the two sides. He wasn't even sure what side he was on since he didn't know many of these people's names. When he opened his eyes however it all started to making a bit more sense. It seemed to just be Erin and this male friend of hers. She had referred to him earlier as 'Parce' and from the few seconds Oliver had to look at him, he did look like Paracelsus, the guy from their year. He remembered sitting beside him in History of Magic in first year for a few weeks (not confirmed, Paracelsus can cancel this if he ever wants), although he never really knew him. As Oliver watched the whole situation go down, first years machine gunning out words at each other, he quickly realized that this kid strongly resembled Paracelsus in first year but barely anymore. Paracelsus was much further into puberty than this kid. He was also being referred to as Jack, it could possibly be a nickname but Oliver was already heavy in doubt to make excuses for the first year.

"Please, just 'Burnett' is fine."

Isn't Paracelsus' surname Adger? Or Myth? Or maybe both...? It dawned on Oliver at the same time it did Erin that this boy was not who Erin thought he was. He looked over at her and noticed Erin staring at this Paracelsus fake, a moment later her eyes were tearing up and her jaw was shaking. Oliver did not expect to be seeing Erin crying again, he was sure that last time at the International Women's Day was a once in a lifetime event. It punched Oliver right in the heart and he completely froze for a long moment. He was beginning to realize that there really was a soft spongy witch inside the iron shell cased around Erin.

"Fuck... Sorry about dragging you into this bullshit Oliver."

Oliver shook his head as Erin looked over at him. He didn't want her to be aware he had noticed her getting upset. His panic to look casual forced him to choke up, so that nervous head shake was all he could respond with. Oliver lowered his wand, an apology from Erin? This was all beginning to feel severely messed up to Oliver.

"I think I... I am done here."

Oliver nodded weakly,"yeah... me too." It was a bare whisper, the quietest response he could make while audible to Erin but not the rest of the room. He didn't even know why he was here in the first place. If he could follow the conversation in the room, he might have cast alohamora on the bludger case and then relashio on the straps holding the bludgers down. Why Erin was holding down Jake also made no sense to the Ravenclaw. He assumed it was just usual bullying but by the sounds of the room there seemed to be some other motive at hand. It wasn't that Oliver was too goofy to grip the situation, it was more so the heavy distraction of Erin getting upset a few inches in front of him.

"Oliver, can we go?"

Oliver watched as Erin wiped a tear and his heart sank. Erin was meant to be the one making everyone in the room cry. She was brave and rowdy and powerful. If Oliver was a wizard fueled by anger, he'd want to avenge whoever broke his friend's strength. But he wasn't, he was a nurturer and cared deeply about his pals. Although he only had one-ish.
"Sure, let's go." Oliver spoke gently, as though making any loud sounds would frighten Erin. His first instinct was to protect. He didn't know it but he was a shield, not a sword. As much as he desperately wanted to be a sword.

The boy who Oliver finally figured out was called Jack Burnett begun to leave. Before he did, he nodded to Oliver. Was this a thank you? Or was this a let's go buddy! Oliver didn't understand social sign language much since he had very little experience, but he assumed he wanted Oliver to follow him out? He misunderstood if not, but also Oliver only followed Erin. He didn't trust one single other person in Hogwarts other than Erin, even though their friendship barely existed outside small conversations during class time.

"Have a fine dance, Oliver."

What? Leave and dance? He wasn't leaving Erin now, not when she was so upset. He assumed she'd be crying and there was nothing worse than walking back to Hogwarts while crying. Oliver knew from experience, it was severely unpleasant. He noticed she wasn't joining back with Jack B and would do the same as a result. Oliver hurried after Erin.

Leaves topic unless Erin or himself are stopped.

The third year still had spots dancing in front of his eyes making it difficult to see clearly, however there wasn't much to see currently and it was more about focusing on the sounds and voices to know what was going on. The two Jacks had took it upon themselves to talk it out which in itself was weird enough how quick it had been to escalate in the first place. Nonetheless the situation was still quite tense. His eyes narrowed as he focused his gaze on the green Jack and Erin who was still not letting go of Jake, which really bothered the third year. He did not trust her with the frail badger for a second, not with the way she was holding him, clutching him close like a possession.

The girl in the wedding gown was quick to jump to green Jack's assistance, offering to help him go through with whatever plan he had been plotting. Releasing the bludgers, was he serious? What was that danger he was speaking about? All made little sense as scraps of words and sentences reached his ears, spiraling within his mind until they were tangled and had no start or ending point. But then there was Quinn and like he did during the Valentine's Tea Party, he showed a side of himself that Alan would have never assumed he had. His eyes widened slightly as he picked the green Jack up with ease and bringing him onto eye-level raising his voice at the younger student in his grasp. Alan himself clenched his hands into fists as he watched the spectacle, eyes narrowing in confusion as he slowly regained his sense of sight. Quinn spoke his warning and it seemed final; there would be no releasing the bludgers if Quinn was there to avoid it from happening.

When Quinn dropped the snake, he surprisingly managed to land on his feet, but Alan couldn't help but cringe slightly only being able to imagine how much strain it must have put onto the others ankles to drop from this height without any sign or warning. But if the boy was affected, he wouldn't let anyone take notice and claimed he would leave the changing rooms, if no one was willing to work this out. Alan still wasn't sure what dangers they were talking about and hoped they were confused or misunderstood something. What could possibly happen? But some of the words struck; the destruction of the Hufflepuff Common Rooms and the attack on the Slytherins? He glanced round, his eyes searching for answers and slowly he was getting frustrated. How come he was only hearing about this now?

At least George was working alongside him, trying to get the purple haired girl to let go of the little badger in her claws. But still he was confused that George never mentioned something had happened in the Hufflepuff Common Room, but neither did Willow... or Jake for the matter. He would have to ask them later how and when it happened, because clearly it was something big; he couldn't just ignore an attack on his friends! But for now he would need to focus on helping George get Jake back, because this girl seemed scary. Weirdly enough the purple girl began sniffing on Jake, calling him out for smelling delicious and it made Alan scrunch up his face lightly in disgust; nothing against Jake just the fact that she was calling a human delicious. What was that about? A dhampir perhaps? Was she hungry? Pictures of Neculai sinking his teeth into the skin of Aurelia flashed behind his eyes and he paled drastically. "L-Let him go. Now-", he demanded again, worry taking over as he took an unsure step towards the girl, just a small one so he was not in her close vicinity.

A bit more quarrel between the snake Jack and the others passed, when finally purple let go of Jake just stopping the support of the cowering boy, who was about to crumple to the floor. Reacting quick, the third year would step forward and take a hold of him, supporting him by crouching down a bit and wrapping his arm around the boy's upper back while steadying him by grasping under his arms to support his weight. "C-Can you stand, Jake? The row i-is over, you c-can calm down now- Wh-what happened?", he urged the younger kid gently to start talking, while also trying to let him know that everything was alright. He knew that George would probably soon try to get through to Jake as well, George seemed quite protective over the other badger.

Something was still happening, the girl was suddenly crying and talking to Ruka's friend but Alan's focus was on Jake and George for now, since Jake probably needed his attention more. But he did feel quite bad about the purple girl and wondered what Jack had done to her to make this happen. Quinn walked over to George and him, while Alan was holding the young badger on his feet the half giant began to question George, who was probably better at answering these questions anyway. He would leave the talking to George for now, the younger Hufflepuff usually was better with words and talking fast to others. Again he would direct his voice toward the smallest of badgers, "Wh-What happened?" he spoke slowly, as if he was talking to a wild creature that had been chased into a corner; not wanting to scare the poor kid even more.

Reducio

Clothes

Shoes:

Interaction: @Jack Burnett @Quinn Healy @Annie Morgan

Why must everybody talk so much? Jack was keeping up, but there was no way he was able to put his two sense in! This world couldn't survive without Mr. Warren's wonderful commentary! Every time he tried to put in a word edgewise, another person would just start talking again! Words words words, nothing but meaningless words. Of course, Burnett thought had all the answers. Oh, how right Burnett was about how hitting the boy so right about the fact that he wanted that catharsis of smashing his face in. That time would come but right now it was not right. Jack despised the Slytherin kid because Jack knew that Fake Jack thought he was so clever. When Burnett mentioned the lack of harm from a certain freezing charm.

Warren's best friend, George, stepped in to defend his point of how dangerous the spell could have been. A nod approval from the young prefect was directed at his friend. As the conversation continued further Jack only found more animosity towards the boy.

For some reason, the second girl in the boy's locker room spoke out in support of Jack Burnett. He noted Quinn's reaction of pinching the bridge of his nose. The giant prefect had continued speaking sense towards the kid, before directing Jack to keep an eye on the case. Of course, Jack nodded. It was best to keep the case within sight. Jack had the slight hope that Quinn would throw Burnett across the room when he picked him up, but sadly he only dropped him.

More conversation, more talking, more Burnett's incessant talking. He couldn't help but roll his eyes when he called him a delinquent. 'Unrestrained use of violence' blah blah blah- Didn't Burnett see him not smear his face with a fist. The surprising thing is that Jack had finally just decided to leave it! Ha! Persistence wins again! Even if Fake Jack would most likely try to come back later. Wow, Quinn was pretty good at this defusing stuff. He didn't even mind the big kids not so subtle jab that much. Jack was just glad that the two terrible people were trying to leave.

Of course at this point, Annie, another Hufflepuff prefect had found her way into the boy's locker room. "Okay, do girls not know what 'Boy's locker room' means? I'm confused."

Hopefully, all these bad ideas for ending the ball will end soon, and Jack could actually go out to the fun. He glanced around at his compatriots and then back to the door.

Wearing:

Reducio

For all his confidence and talk, no one was more aware of the gaping holes in his flimsy web woven of faulty reasoning and fallacies than Jack himself. His go-to tactic was usually to construct a web big and impressive enough to keep others from looking too closely at the threads that made it up; to be too intimidated by its sheer size and complexity to even imagine they might have a chance to poke holes in it, let alone break trough the fragile tapestry.

Under the pressure of his current stressful situation, however, even the most clueless and delusional of those gathered could tell something - several things - were wrong with the Slytherin boy's explanations. They just weren't adding up and Jack had been so occupied trying to strike back at each attack aimed at him that, in his urgency and stress, he became even more careless with his words than usual.

"I disagree. I was the one that brought up the past. I as the one that tried to grab something. I could have been going for a dirty sock and they would have stopped me. But sure, blame him."

When Erin defended him, Jack was both surprised by her civility in her argument and touched by her attempt to defend him - however untrue he might have thought it to be. After all, he was the one who had asked her to show him the bludgers. It was his fault he had basically asked her to into the boys' locker rooms to do so even though she probably knew better than he did the retaliation she would have to face as a result.

Still, he was too busy talking to the others to express his gratitude at her words or argue against them himself. Even when she mentioned that he wanted to leave the choice of what to do in the hands of 'people who wanted them dead', Jack would have liked to explain why he believed she was overreacting, but right then wasn't the time.

Oops…there was another example of how her theory on the prefects was being fed. Jack didn't dare speak up against her about that, either. He was starting to think he knew the true reason children were going missing, but it was simply a theory of his own and he had no proof yet to back it up, so again, he only focused on his conversation with the Hufflepuffs.

He was glad when Erin backed him up about being harmless (whether or not the others would believe her) but one comment the part-veela made shortly after that one had Jack's brain blanking out for a minute.

"If Jack touches you, Parce, I am touching him back."

Why did that sound…really awkward? He couldn't think of what made it sound so strange, but some peculiar sense of shame caused his face to flush slightly at the idea of it. Well…at least it probably wouldn't come to…whatever it was. He knew the only kind of 'touching' Jackson or Erin had in mind probably involved punches.

Erin's side comments only became more and more troubling to Jack as the conversation went on, however. He was too busy addressing the others to comment on it, but…what did she mean when she said that Jake smelled…'innocent'? That in itself could have potentially just been attributed to the usual, strange Erin, but her later claims of him being 'her thing' and that he 'smelled yummy' began to raise the hackles on the back of Jack's neck. Why did that seem so familiar? Was it because…?

No. He had to focus; he would talk to Erin about all that later. Right then, he just needed to de-escalate whatever potential conflict was about to be unleashed there. As long as she didn't try to take a bite out of Jake, everything would be…fine…until then. Hopefully.

Jack did his best to speak to Quinn with a certain degree of reasoning, confession, and humility - a different set of skills needed altogether from responding to Jackson - but in his intention to reset his way of talking to the half-giant, he forgot something else.

"Never considered popularity to be a factor, Jack…Burnett?"

Erin was listening to every word they were saying. And Erin did not know Jack as Jack Burnett.

Just like at the pitch when she had exhibited such joy upon seeing him and her delight at the offered corsage had enchanted him right until she called him 'Parce', the Slytherin had once again found himself having gotten caught up in her - or was it his? - fantasy. She did not accept him for who he was; she accepted him for who she thought he was. And he had gone right along with that belief without correcting her, taking special advantage that she hardly seemed to know this Parce fellow to begin with.

But names were important. And as much as Jack might have liked to tell himself that he could always just write himself off as being mistaken for the other Jack, who had also been previously mistaken for Parce, he knew deep down that he would not have been able to continue fooling Erin forever. He just hadn't realized it would be due to his own carelessness that she would find out…nor that she would discover something so soon and at such a crucial time.

He was still speaking with the others as he tried to process how much Erin had discovered; how much she knew and how much she was convinced. She was a smart girl, but if she had deluded herself into ignoring so much for so long, could something of that be salvaged? Why was his chest feeling so tight? Was it hurt for her? Or guilt that he had been found out? Shame, perhaps, that he was still frantically trying to think at the back of his mind if he could somehow still convince her he was who she had originally believed him to be?

"I think I…" The sniffling breath she took wasn't something Jack had ever expected to hear from Erin of all people. Was she…about to cry? "I am done here."

She didn't leave immediately, giving Jack still some hope that she would remain to talk with him; to give him a chance to explain. However, she seemed more interested in sticking with the one person left to her that she believed was loyal to her - Oliver, it seemed his name was - and Jack could hardly blame her for that. He himself felt like a sack of bull shit. He couldn't go after her immediately, though; not like before at the Valentine's Day tea party. He had to make sure things were resolved there, first - among the other boys. Still…at least Oliver continued to stick by her, so there was some small comfort he found in that.

He tried to smile at Quinn's laughed, a little unnerved by how quickly the prefect seemed to be able to switch from such intense anger to jolly laughter in so short a time, but perhaps that had something to do with why he was a Hufflepuff. It also concerned him a bit that Quinn hadn't denied the claim about what he had supposedly said to Erin and Jack really, really wanted to know why, but that would have to wait for another time. There were too many more urgent things that needed to be resolved just then.

Jack nodded at the largest Hufflepuff with a sad smile. "I actually don't think the majority of you are needlessly violent. Just that one," he answered, tilting his head towards Jackson; one of the newer prefects if memory served. "I'll trust you to be able to keep him in check, though." After that, he left Quinn to address George and Jackson.

Alan appeared to have caught Jake when Erin had finally released him. The Gryffindor tried to speak to the little badger and Jack turned his head away. Everything seemed settled here more or less. Jackson's comment about girls not knowing what the boys locker room meant caused Jack to turn his head sharply back, however.

"Erin knew," he told the prefect sternly, his eyes narrowed. "She only came in here because I asked her to. I didn't know this was where the bludgers would be. It's not her fault; it's mine."

Irritated at Jackson, but much more so at himself, the green-clad redhead turned to head out the door. He hoped Erin hadn't gone too far in the meantime.

Action: Leaves the Changing Rooms to follow after Erin...who...was heading back to the castle, but maybe took a detour with Oliver along the way to go to the Quidditch Stands.
Interacting with: @Erin Ryan, @Jake Morris, @Oliver Hart, @Jack Warren, @George Henry, @Alan Vanes, & @Quinn Healy

Interacting with: @George Henry @Erin Ryan @Jack Burnett
Mentions: Everyone else (sorry)

Grace watched as Jack Burnett left to change rooms, her hands rolled up into fists as he left, but she let him go.

"Oh, go away oan yer trolley now! You're not even meant to be in the boys' room! What're you gonna do anyway, chase us 'round in your frilly dress? The bludgers'll knock off your pretty head if they come out!" a voice said, it was the boy who was lying about the bludgers, though he didn’t sound like he did before.

Grace growled at him, she may be a nerdy coward but she had a brave dark side somewhere in there.

The Ravenclaw smirked, “I’m flattered, really, you think I’m pretty, but you were still rude” she tossed her hair back.

She wanted to slap him since he was rude, her hands shook and it reached up to his face, she quickly hit him.

“Listen, sorry about hitting you but I don’t like it when boys are rude to me, I might be a girl but it doesn’t mean you have to be rude” her voice was a matter-of-fact tone.

Grace turned away from him, not listening to his apology, she gritted her teeth as the people who were gonna “unleash” the bludgers.

“So your gonna go? I thought we were letting the bludgers go! she said loudly and angrily, she couldn’t believe them.

Macie has left the change rooms and gone to the dance floor.

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Happy RPing and Goodluck!

Koko'd made sure everything was set before she ventured off to the Quidditch Pitch, her outfit in tow. She'd already done her makeup, not much, just a bit of lip gloss and blush. That was all she felt she needed, after all; she hadn't broken out or anything recently.

In the girl's tote bag was a dress and a cardigan to cover her pale shoulders, and she was already wearing her shoes. Pale pink, closer to white than anything, with a six-centimetre heel and a faux rose on the ankle. Koko hoped she didn't look too out of place in them, but she'd figured that her pink heels went okay with her black top and jeans.

In all honesty, a large part of her knew this would end wrong. The professors would find out, and they'd all get in trouble, and she'd probably be fired from her position as Prefect. Goodness, Alexx might kick her off the Headliner, and she might not get to be a part in Quidditch anymore. Koko'd not thought of that before heading out.

She arrived at the Quidditch Pitch, holding herself with an air of confidence she'd never felt before. She didn't feel confident now. Shame was washing over her, threatening to make her drop her belongings and run back to the castle, back to Jax, back to safety. Alas, there had to be some form of authority here, didn't there?

Koko opened her tote bag, biting her lower lip as she ducked into the girls' changing room, full of worry. What if something happened to the other kids? What if something happened to her? Although her cat's near-starvation had made Koko realise caring for others was important, she lacked selflessness.

She started shimmying out of her top, ignoring the people around her as she changed into her dress, smiling at the way it fit. She'd make sure to pay Vienna back; her Tata was so kind to her.

Once Koko had her dress and cardigan on, she decided to make her way to the ball. Best to get it over with, she supposed.