Victory Lap PV: Thomas Baines Closed

Thomas was well acquainted with burns at this point. Between the incident in the Forbidden Forest and countless duels where Incendio (or its more powerful counterpart) was the opposing team's spell of choice, you'd think he would have gotten used to it by now. In a sense, he did, having lost his evolutionary instinct to avoid flames for fear of injury, as such injuries never bore long-term consequences in the wizarding world. However, that didn't make the pain any less strong, and even if the boy's mind did not shy away from fire there was little he could do about the fact that it still hurt quite bad to be burned. Thomas was a relatively well-adjusted boy after all, for all his quirks pain was still quite a bother!

Grumbling fairly incoherently at first as Callie bounded into the room with enough energy to power a metropolitan area, the young wizard blinked a few times as the words his dueling partner spoke finally sunk it. They had won, oddly enough. He was happy that she was able to carry on, though there was a certain grudge he was beginning to develop as a pattern seemed to clearly emerge with his recent duels.

Allowing himself to be poked for Callie's amusement, Thomas sighed languidly before offering the girl a reply. "Good. I sure wish our opponents would stop going for me, though, it's getting to be quite a nuisance when I can't get a single spell off before I'm down and out." He was rather painfully aware that the only spell he actually hit anyone with had been essentially ineffectual, as he heard Willow speak the same incantation only for nothing to emerge from her wand. For the entirety of the duel they had just won, he was essentially a target rather than a player, particularly considering he was blindfolded longer than he was able to see.

"When we go up against the Slytherins, I'm not letting them hit me. It's quite annoying, I'll have you know, to be blasted by spells for the entire duel. Particularly when they come from your teammate," Thomas continued, though there was an ounce of sarcasm in his tone and the ghost of a smile on his face to indicate that it was a tease rather than a genuine jab.

"I'm just happy that we won. Considering how great of a team we make, I think it'd just make a lot of sense if we went undefeated." The declaration was casual, but even his exhausted form could muster up quite the ego, a fact that ought to come as little surprise to Callie.

@Callie Jensen

Callie hadn't escaped the duel unscathed but compared to her partner she was in tip top shape. "Well your cheeks are squishy so maybe that's why you make such a great target." She teased with a wide grin on her features, making sure to jab his cheek again to further emphasise her point. After wards she ceased her mindless jabbing of the poor boy in favour of leaning back on the chair and propping her feet up on the bed.

"Well, not getting hit would certainly be a wonderful idea." She fished a pack of gummy bears from the depths of her pocket and started idly munching away as she chatted to the boy. Occasionally she felt the slightest degree of pity and offered Thomas some which was a rare gesture for someone like Callie. "Hey! That wasn't intentional!" She defended whilst jabbing Thomas in the side with her foot in protest. "No more gummy bears for you!" Callie stuck out her tongue and held the pack of gummy bears defensively, even if it was painfully clear the girl was joking. Some might've painted Thomas as a particularly nasty piece of work but not Callie. For Callie he was simply a friend she occasionally wanted to hit across the head with a cushion, which was a sign of true friendship.

However Callie's defence of her precious gummy bears didn't last very long and within a matter of minutes she was happily offering some to her companion once more. "Those Slytherin's aren't going to know what hit them! Probably." She let out a particularly loud laugh which was rewarded with some similarly loud hushes from others in the ward. "I do think I'll need to give Willow some apology donuts though..I may or may not have been a gremlin with the singing and dancing jinxes. She looked kind of mad.." She pointed her wand accusingly at Thomas for a moment after his bold declaration. "Your head is getting bigger."

Playing along with Callie's antics, though mumbling a quiet thanks in response to finally being offered some sweets, Thomas listened as she spoke. Admittedly, the boy was still fairly fatigued after their duel, and though he was more than happy to have won he was already planning for the next. Thomas knew that the Slytherin dueling team was, by and large, their greatest rival, and though he only vaguely knew Adonis he had seen the other boy in action over the summer. He hadn't yet met Adonis' partner, and quite frankly he had no plans to, as Thomas didn't see a reason to entertain idle conversation when it'd hold little information about her dueling ability.

As Callie proclaimed (not incorrectly) that Thomas's head was getting bigger, his retort was simple and egocentric enough to prove that he was clearly in a good mood. "Of course it's getting bigger, how else would I fit all of the knowledge I have?" He smiled, though the expression wasn't one that betrayed a sense of humility, but instead the self-assured grin of someone likely too confident for their own good. One day, his arrogance would get the best of him. One day, his hubris would be his downfall.

Certainly not today, however. Until that day, Thomas and his pride would remain thoroughly unshaken.

"Why would you need to apologize? All you did was cast a few spells her way. It would've been more embarrassing for her if you just stood there and dodged until that curse knocked her out," Thomas defended. If he had been in Callie's shoes, he would have almost certainly done the same! Perhaps even worse. "Curse of the Bogies should be a war crime or something. Is there a wizard Geneva?" Before Callie could answer, but after a pause, Thomas abruptly blurted out, "Oh! I forgot about um, the Unforgivables for a second. I guess the general consensus is that those are like... Magic war crimes. Wizard naming conventions are so weird, imagine if we called mustard gas the Unforgivable Substance..."

@Callie Jensen

Thomas' cocky grin didn't come as a surprise to Callie who was all too familar with her housemates growing ego. However it didn't concern her too much and most of the time she viewed it instead as a source of entertainment. "What if you become a bobblehead though?" She offered with a light laugh. "Would your head become too heavy for your body? Ah! Your poor spine!" She let out another laugh before tossing another poor gummy bear into her mouth.

Unsurprisingly her thoughts of apologising to Willow weren't exactly welcomed by Thomas. However that didn't entirely murder Callie's lingering desire to make some kind of apology to the girl for bullying her with Cantis. "But still! The singing and dancing jinx? When she was on the verge of passing out anyway? I don't know..feels mean now." Callie leaned back on the chair and tossed a gummy bear at Thomas' head for good measure.

"Personally I think whoever named all this wizardy stuff should be tried for a war crime anyway. Primarily because I really hate latin and all that etymology stuff we have to suffer through in class...but still!" She paused a moment before continuing to avoid choking on a gummy bear. "The Unforgivable Substance sounds like what someone would call a fart, you know." She snickered, like any thirteen year old who found the very act of farting the funniest thing in the world would. "Like someone would say WHO EMITTED THE UNFORGIVABLE SUBSTANCE." She declared before letting out a laugh at her own terrible joke.

"Some people might think of it as cruel. I happen to think it's funny though, and obviously I am the moral authority in this place so you should listen to my verdict." This time, at least there was obvious irony conveyed, but the disdain he held on the word place was clear as day. It wouldn't be the first time Thomas had shared some profoundly anti-Hogwarts sentiments, and it certainly wouldn't be the last, but thankfully for Callie, it seemed he was content to not elaborate on his wild conspiracy theories about the school this time. Goodness knew that it would have been quite an earful.

As he listened to his dueling partner's complaints about etymology, Thomas couldn't help but disagree, but he knew his status as a word-nerd couldn't be helped and was almost certainly a terminal condition. Instead, Thomas just nodded as she complained about Latin, though in his mind he silently debated her beliefs. As Callie made the comment about farts, though the young wizard tried his best to keep his composure, Thomas was still thirteen and was far from immune from the immature humor befitting his age. He tried and failed to stifle a chuckle, ultimately giving in to his laughter. "Shut up! You're so stupid," he declared, though the insult was the endearing sort of teasing rather than a genuine comment on her intelligence.

"... Not wrong, though," he conceded, after a pause. Thomas sat up, snacking on a few of the gummy bears that had been weaponized as projectiles with little hesitation. Pausing for a moment, and collecting his thoughts, the boy ended up settling on an uncharacteristically genuine display of emotion as he spoke, "Honestly though, I'm proud of us. We make a pretty dang good team, and if we keep this win streak going we'll definitely make a name for ourselves."

@Callie Jensen