Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv

@Jo Morgan @River Dewlight
Who doesn't love relay races? Katrina Walker, that's who.

Sure, Katrina was born into a muggle home and didn't even know about magic until her acceptance letter. As you would think, that would mean a lot of elementary school PE classes playing relay races. The class would enter a gym filled with hula hoops to jump to, basketballs to throw in hoops, tunnels to crawl through, and an assortment of similar trials. Katrina disliked them as the only active thing she was remotely decent at was jogging endurance.

However, that being said, Katrina found herself waiting for a relay race competition to start. Admittedly, she was excited. Not for the actual race, but for reliving the motions of a relay race and hopefully becoming friends with two girls she had met. Friendship was a word that she didn't really understand. her closest friend in muggle school had been her brother and when she had lost even that, friend became a nonexistent word in her vocabulary. It was only after way too much internal searching did she realize that she needed friends and it wasn't even such a crazy thing.

Jo Morgan and River Dewlight were the two people Katrina was waiting for.

Katrina looked over and saw the set up for the race. There was what seemed to be a short hurdle race that you had to jump over. The next obstacle looked like a set of monkey bars not too dissimilar to the ones hosted at her muggle school playground. And the final set would most likely be Katrina's forte. It had been a lie that jogging was the only active thing she was good at; set was great at climbing trees and that would aid her in the last obstacle. The last thing was nothing less than a robe net to climb over.

Katrina looked up as two figures turned a far corner. "Jo, River, is that you!" Katrina jumped up and waved her hands over her head.

Katrina had found both of them on different occasions and had been able to invite them. It only just now occurred to her that they may never have met. All the more exciting. Katrina was in an unshakably happy mood, something that she couldn't quite understand. There was no reason for her to be happy, but the emotion seemed to be stuck.

Hopefully by the end of this race, they would have begun the longer marathon of friendships.
WC:409

>Stats: Sta 9, Evas 8, Str 3, Wis 11, ArcP 9, Acc 6<
>Healing Sage | Perfectionist | Charmer || Leader of SHC| Owner of The Kat Shop<
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@Katrina Walker @River Dewlight
Image posted by the member

”Katrina! Long time no see!"

Jo hurried over to her fellow Gryffindor, accompanied by a girl to whom she had not yet spoken, although according to Katrina's greeting they were approaching a shared destination.

"You must be River, then." She gave the unfamiliar girl a light but cordial bow. "I don't think we've had the pleasure of meeting yet. I'm Jo. Jo Morgan."

It was then that she noticed a queer array of bars and ropes behind her. Turning once more to the girl who had invited her, she cleared her throat.

"I never knew sports was your forte. It certainly isn't mine; I'm more of a stationary type. Or the type to use stationary - either works." She giggled at the half-hearted joke. "But, well, I'm up for the challenge. I'm not very fast and I'm not very strong, but hopefully clambering through the portrait-hole every single day has helped limber me up a bit."

Here, she took some time to examine the obstacle course itself. It was divided cleanly into three sections. The first was a regular running race, with bars in some places - perhaps they were meant to be jumped over, in which case they were terrifyingly tall. The second part, no less intimidating, consisted of a simple set of monkey bars. It would take a ridiculous amount of upper body (and grip) strength to fling one's torso forwards bar by bar until they reached the end. Being neither strong and bulky not an absolute masochist, this "exercise" would have gotten a hard, hard pass from Jo had she been placed in any other circumstance. Even in this one, she was starting to get doubts about the profound effect that her inevitable failure to win the relay would have on her reputation. Still, she had given her word that she would compete, and so she would, come hell or high water or, Merlin forbid, a broken leg. The last section was a rope net - unforgiving and grueling on both the upper and lower body. An involuntary grimace spread across Jo's face as she ran her eyes over the full course, wondering what she had done wrong to earn such a physically taxing punishment.

"Wow. That looks... er...challenging." she stuttered, dropping her amicable demeanor for a moment. "Does anybody have an idea of which section they want to do?"
WC: 393
Image posted by the member

"Out here, the wild ones are taming the fear within me.
Scared to call them my friends and be broken again; Is this hope just a mystical dream?"
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
[font=book antique]
@Katrina Walker || @Jo Morgan
Hexcode: #BF8000
River had not entirely known what she’d agreed to joining when she said yes to Katrina previously. She figured whatever it was, it would kill her. Perhaps she was wrong.
Walking up to the agreed upon spot on the pitch, she realized it probably would kill her. Or at least kill her pride. Now, River wasn’t bad at being active. Her endurance was quite alright, and her strength… well it might have been a little pathetic for a Dhampir. Other than that though, she actually quite enjoyed being active. That’s the whole reason she’d joined the SWAG club, well that and the fact she wanted to get to know some more people.

Seeing the obstacles placed out about the pitch, River already began making notes of which ones she might have a chance at, and which ones would probably ruin her self-esteem.
A smile appeared on her unnaturally pale face, and she waved as she approached the well known face of Katrina. As she passed the slytherin head of house and Professor Kibitzer the redhead send a quick wave in their direction, “Good morning Professors” .

The other girl who she was doing the course with, River had never met before. Though she had caught quick glimpses of her in the corridors before.
The ravenclaw gave the girl a nod and a careful smile in response to her polite bow, “Indeed that’s me, it’s really nice to meet you Jo”.
Looking around the pitch, she thought of how she’d ended up there. It wasn’t that she regretted the decision, and her group was all good. It was just strange how she’d gone from waking up that morning, intent on spending the day finishing her homework, and then dropping out on that plan to go out and do a race instead. It almost blew her mind a little, moving away from plans was not usually something you’d catch River in doing.
A chuckle left her lungs as she heard Jo talking about her non-preference to what they were about to do. “Yeah, same here. I’ll usually spend my time next to a desk or something”, she said and looked at Jo for a quick second before looking back out over the pitch. “Also, those portrait holes are way too complicated to get through”, she said and chuckled once more. There had been countless nights where she’d laid awake wondering how getting through the portrait hole during an emergency would go down.

The little speck of competitive instinct in River was slowly creeping up on her. She didn’t think much of it though, today her largest goal was just to get some fresh air while doing some good ol’ muggle-style physical activity. Though, she wouldn’t mind being part of the fastest team too. “Well, I assume we’ll be doing the whole course right?, she responded to Jo’s question of which section to go for. “From start to finish”, she added and turned to her two teammates. She didn’t actually know if they were to split the obstacles among them or help get each other through the whole bloody thing.

She wondered how they’d all do through the race. Would they be a good team to work together or would this end up being more, each to themselves type thing? “So, are we going into this with some sort of strategy, or are we improvising?”, she asked the two of them and glanced back over to the professors, keeping an eye out for any signals of the race beginning. It was nerve racking enough that Jensen and Kibitzer would be looking over the whole thing as the students struggled.
WC || 607 / 1000
[/font]

Curiosity Killed the Cat
| STA: 7 | EVA: 6 | STR: 4 | WIS: 10 | ARC: 6 | ACC: 7 | Dhampir & Perfectionist
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@Jo Morgan @River Dewlight
Katrina smiled brightly as the duo joined up with her. She took a few steps toward them so they could make a little group. Katrina pulled her hair up into a loose braid with a hair elastic from her pocket. She was wearing a red Gryffindor hoodie and black leggings with a pair of black athletic shoes on her feet. It didn't seem like much of an 'athletic' outfit, but it would do for now.

"Hey Jo!" Katrina replied before turning to River, "River,," They quickly introduced themselves, both seeming quite content to be together. That was always a good sign when introducing friends.

Jo mentioned that she didn't realize Katrina was a big sports person and Katrina smiled wryly. When Jo commented about the portrait hole Katrina laughed alongside River.

"Well, I'm not a super big athletics person to be honest. I do jog some," Katrina emphasized the word some as if to really say 'not really ever', "And I climb trees," At this she smiled, "I really just wanted the excuse to be outside so I recruited you two thinking you would most likely go along with me." Another smile found it's way onto her face.

If there was one thing that Katrina found in common between the both of them, it was the adventurous aura. Not necessarily all the time, but she had the feeling that both of them would be up for a challenge. River seemed to Katrina to be more outgoing and determined. Jo portrayed herself more as flexible and ready for anything. Katrina fell into all of that by being a surprise in and of herself, she was always up for a challenge but wasn't too crazy competitive. They certainly made up quite the team.

After a moment of silence River and Jo both began to talk about strategy and planning. "Well, if this is what I think it is like, then I believe we each tackle an obstacle. Then when we finish it, we tag the next person, then the next person goes through their obstacle to tag the next person and so on," Katrina paused to look over at the course, "Or at least I think that's what it's like," She gave a small shrug.

"Not sure about you, but I think the last one would be my forte," Katrina thought about her comment about tree climbing from before. She let them respond before offering one last suggestion.

"Think I should ask a professor to start us off?"
Total WC: 409+418= 827

>Stats: Sta 9, Evas 8, Str 3, Wis 11, ArcP 9, Acc 6<
>Healing Sage | Perfectionist | Charmer || Leader of SHC| Owner of The Kat Shop<
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@Katrina Walker @Jo Morgan
[font=book antique]Listening to what Katrina was saying, River’s shoulders dropped with a sigh of relief. If it was correct that they were only doing one obstacle each, then this thing would be no issue. Thinking about whichever one of the parts River would manage the best, she had an eye out for the monkey bars. Upper strength was perhaps not River’s strong suit, but she had climbed many trees in her past, so she believed she must have some skill. Unless the fact that she hadn’t actually climbed a tree in months would have caused all her abilities to falter. That was, in reality, probably the case.
Because of her years of ballet training, she had a lot of control over her limbs, and keeping in sync with herself was no issue. Hopefully she could manage the monkey bars no issue, but something told her it wouldn’t be as easy as the ones she’d gone across on the playground before when she was in a muggle school. Since then, her monkey-abilities have probably gotten a bit worse.

Katrina stepped up to the challenge of the last obstacle. She too, had mentioned climbing, which was sure to help make it easier. Hoping that Jo would feel up for the task of the first one, River answered «I’ll take the monkey bars if that’s alright», she looked over to the bars and back to the two girls.
If anything was to go wrong, at least all River would go through was a little drop to the ground, most likely she’d get through that without any injuries. She couldn’t afford to get hurt as she had her ballet to continue with later.
Of course, what everyone wanted was to get through this course without anyone getting hurt or falling. Accidents happen though, that was the harsh truth.
Katrina asked if she should head over to the two professors for them to start the race. «Sure, Whenever you’re both ready», she answered and smiled as she sent a glance back over to the professors standing to watch over the race as it was all about to go down. [/font]
WC || 607 + 353 = 960

Curiosity Killed the Cat
| STA: 7 | EVA: 6 | STR: 4 | WIS: 10 | ARC: 6 | ACC: 7 | Dhampir & Perfectionist
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@Katrina Walker @River Dewlight
Image posted by the member
Indeed that’s me, it’s really nice to meet you Jo
River seemed an affable enough girl - Jo wondered if she ought to invite the pair to tea or something in order to get to know them better. Grueling physical work was certainly not the worst idea for an icebreaker, but the personal questions could ask each other through in between grunts and pants would be limited at best.

She smiled at the girl's response about the portraits, knowing all too well that Hogwarts placed too much emphasis on tradition to ever consider making the poor little Gryffindors' way of entering and leaving their common room a little bit easier. Imagine the rage that would ensue should some Muggle-born student propose swapping their quills for ballpoint pens!
Well, I'm not a super big athletics person to be honest. I do jog some. And I climb trees. I really just wanted the excuse to be outside so I recruited you two thinking you would most likely go along with me.
Hmm. Jo did neither of those things. Prior to coming to England her only physical talent had been swimming, and that was forbidden here for safety purposes, although pen-and-paper rules and the threat of detention were certainly not sufficient to dissuade the girl from taking her occasional dip. Was it time she took up a physical sport, such as (ugh) soccer or (ew) baseball or (Merlin forbid!) Quidditch?

After Katrina explained the rules, she offered to tackle the rope net for the group, and River jumped in with her offer to handle the monkey bars. That left Jo with...

"Alright, so I've got the hurdle race, then." Oh dear. The group certainly be hoping for a bonding exercise instead of any sort of victory, because if they had any prospects for success in this race they definitely should not have invited Jo.

She had to admire the courage of the two, who without hesitation were able to select the areas most suited to their physical strengths. Jo was the kind of strange little girl who liked to calculate survival rates for herself and others in different situations (A particular popular Muggle dystopian young adult fiction book about a teenage girl and her baker boyfriend in a moderated "battle to the death" had taken her three months to finish since she kept trying to analyze, deduce, and calculate each unnecessary character's chance of victory), and she hoped that one day she would be able to look at an obstacle course and, like Katrina or River, be able to point to one of the areas and say with a smile and a firm look in her eye, don't worry about that part, I've got it. Of course, this was no more than a fleeting power fantasy, but it was one of the first times she had realized just how utterly out-of-shape she was. I mean, what even was her physical advantage?

Er...Strength, no. Speed, absolutely not. Stamina, maybe? No, probably not that, either. She'd have to think about it later.

"Well, I'm ready whenever you guys are," Jo lied blatantly as she bounced her thumb against her blue jeans.
Word Count: 393+476=869

Image posted by the member

"Out here, the wild ones are taming the fear within me.
Scared to call them my friends and be broken again; Is this hope just a mystical dream?"
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@River Dewlight @Jo Morgan
Sorry for the late and poorly written responce
Gladly, Katrina still held the status of rope net climber. Both Jo and River seemed to be content with the other two obstacles. Katrina gave another glance at the course, she didn't really expect them to win, but at least they would have fun. It was hard to read either of their expressions, but Katrina got the faintest hint that neither of them were particularly keen to athletic activities. That will only make it more interesting.

Katrina nodded as both agreed that they were ready to start. She started off toward the two professors the smile that refused to fade still plastered on her face. "Hello Professor Jensen and Professor..." Katrina drew an embarrassed blank as she realized that she actually didn't know the other Professor standing beside her. She continued on hoping inwardly that she wouldn't take offense.

"We are ready to begin! How do we do that exactly?" The words sounded much better in her head and Katrina wished that she had elected either of the other two, much less socially awkward to confront the Professors instead of her. Katrina's overly-eager demeanor dimmed to purely anticipation.

Since she had spontaneously set up this group without knowing all of the rules, she felt like a unprepared leader. (Which she was if she was being honest.) Katrina found herself rubbing the sleeve of her sweatshirt resisting the urge to tuck her hair behind her ear again. She didn't want to seem cowardly after all.
Inviting @Rosalind Kibitzer and/or @Hjørdis Jensen to join
Total WC: 1072 || Errand Complete, Continuing for RP Reasons

>Stats: Sta 9, Evas 8, Str 3, Wis 11, ArcP 9, Acc 6<
>Healing Sage | Perfectionist | Charmer || Leader of SHC| Owner of The Kat Shop<
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
Rosalind stepped up as Katrina addressed her - or tried to, anyway. "Kibitzer," the Professor offered, with a little smile. Her American accent was already showing in her words - not exactly exotic, but certainly unusual at a British school for magic. The professor had a small watch in her hand for timing the students, her thumb at the ready to start the timer as Katrina announced that her group was ready to begin. Her question perplexed the new Divination professor, however. How do you start?

"It's a race, kiddo, you run it," she said, gesturing to each obstacle as if the process was self-evident. She did realize it was unlikely anyone had ever made kids run hurdles before, but that was the best part about being a wizard. You could be unconventional. The kids would have to learn that somehow - better they got some exercise while they did it. "She'll run hers, tag in the monkey bar girl, and she'll tag in you and you'll climb over the rope net. Easy peasy."

Professor Kibitzer made her way down the line, inspecting Katrina, then River, then Jo, in order. Her smile had turned into a hard line as she examined the students. They looked impressively ready compared to some of the sad sacks she had seen running this race earlier in the day.

"Well, if you're ready..." She pulled a whistle from her pocket, blowing hard into it and starting the timer in her other hand. "GO!"
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
@Katrina Walker @River Dewlight
Image posted by the member
"When you're ready...GO!"
Jo was not ready - no, she was far from it. And yet she ran. She ran as fast as she could, releasing her breath in short, uncontrolled bursts. It didn't help that "as fast as she could" was not a very impressive speed, but all she could hope for was that Professor Kibitzer and her peers would understand that she was just doing her best. After a while her body naturally fell into a sort of agreeable rhythm, although her lungs seemed intent on halting her progress. The wind tore at the red tartan ribbon around her braid, tossing it to and fro like a whip. Just like the embroidery errand, it was hard work - hard work that stopped her from thinking. That must be why there were so many errands lately; the professors were desperate to give any kind of physically taxing work to the kids lest they begin to suspect that all was not well at Hogwarts.

The girl's poor heart nearly stopped when she grazed the first hurdle as she jumped over it. Her temporary brush with failure left her a little frazzled, but it allowed her improved calculation of distance. 2/3 of a step before the hurdle was when she needed to jump, according to her hastily-constructed hypothesis.

A step, a leap, and Jo soared over the hurdle.

How wonderful! How freeing! How exhilarating and cathartic! Who knew? Maybe exercise wouldn't be so...

With a deafening crack, Jo's foot slammed into last hurdle as she tumbled over it. She slammed into the ground, barely aware of the pain shooting across her body. The embarrassment was far more excruciating.

"Sorry", she whispered as she tagged River, giving Professor Kibitzer an apologetic, sheepish smile.
Word Count: 393+476+288=1157
Image posted by the member
Last edited by Jo Morgan on 9 Jun 2020, 12:06, edited 1 time in total.

"Out here, the wild ones are taming the fear within me.
Scared to call them my friends and be broken again; Is this hope just a mystical dream?"
Ending a Race; Beginning Friendships Errand Pv
[font=book antique]
@Katrina Walker @Jo Morgan
There must have been some suppressed feeling of terror embedded within the deepest parts of River’s shallow soul, connected to the sound of the whistle. Her heart skipped a beat or two as the professor blew, and called for them to begin. The dhampir was more than ready to get this thing over with, but the shiver that ran down her spine was quite noticeable nonetheless. Must have been all those classes from muggle school.

River got into position as quickly as possible, and watched expectantly as Jo began her run towards the daunting looking obstacles ahead. Perhaps that was the main reason she signed up for the monkey bars to begin with. She just did not like the look of those hurdles, and jumping was for sure not a skill she had developed. Not that swinging across a set of monkey-bars was either, but she’d done more of those in her childhood, so she figured the little bit of experience might help her in this endeavour.

The ravenclaw couldn’t help but be impressed as Jo practically soared over the jumps. She was quite good at them, she thought, right as a Crack, was heard from her teammates direction. A quiet «Oof», made it out of River’s lips as she saw the girl hit the ground below.
Nonetheless Jo continued to impress by getting right back up and headed for River, who now had her arm slightly outstretched in the girls direction. «Don’t worry», she quickly said as she spun around and began heading for the set of monkey-bars that would be her challenge for the day.
She quickly reached the bars, she was actually quite speedy when she needed to. River did a little hop, to reach the first bar «Damn it», she hissed through a clenched jaw as her fingers slipped off the bar and her feet hit the ground once more before attempting another grab. This time her small hands gripped the bar just right, and she dangled for a moment before quickly reaching for bar after bar. Swiftly she made her way across, but at the last three, a little gust of wind blew a bunch of hair right into her face. «Ugh, this bloody hair!», she exclaimed as her right hand let go of the bar to push the strand of red curls out of her sight.

Quickly finishing up the bars, she swung off, stuck the landing alright and headed as fast as her legs could possibly carry her to Katrina. Reaching her hand out to tag her, she tapped the redheads shoulder. «Go Katrina!», River called out with the last bit of breath she had and stopped abruptly in her tracks as she watched the gryffindor run toward the last obstacle of the race.
|| Total WC ||
1426 Errand Completed
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Curiosity Killed the Cat
| STA: 7 | EVA: 6 | STR: 4 | WIS: 10 | ARC: 6 | ACC: 7 | Dhampir & Perfectionist