Closed How Bad Could You Possibly Be? pv R. Drake

@Astra Norrick

Reginald Drake always had a thirst for adrenaline and so knew that his legs would soon take him to this field, broom in hand, and a mind set on mastering the art of being 300 feet in the air on a stick. Today, after his classes, he had decided he'd get this over with. Whether he was capable of flight or not, it sounded far too entertaining of a prospect for him not to give it a shot.

He had dressed himself in a black compression shirt and comfortable grey jogger pants for convenience and exuded confidence that he had in everything he had done in this school. He knew he had his strong points from fighting to making friends, but flying was a challenge he could enjoy without the ease of talent or prodigious ability that had colored his stay so far.

With a deep breath, he positioned himself atop the broom, ignoring standard etiquette, and ran his magic across its surface just like he did with his wand when he had wanted to cast a spell. His magic responded, as it always did. It was his. It was the one thing that couldn't leave him even if he tried to drive it away.

As the magic finally coursed through the broom, Reginald prepared to take off, and to the boy's dismay, nothing happened.

"What am I missing? Shouldn't it just feel like casting a spell when I use my magic for this?" He muttered under his breath as he kept trying over and over, frustration coloring his features. Okay, maybe not being good at something wasn't as fun as he thought it'd be. Nowhere near.

Word count: 271
Notes: Woooooo. New thread.

astra
date : november 11, 2023
time : 10:02 a.m.

Astra noted the dark-haired boy's presence early on, kind of, and had been watching him slightly out of the corner of her eye. She was interested in the fellow flier and his ability. He reeked of pride, even from so far away. Good sign for competence, she thought.

But his ability was absent. Astra bit back a laugh as the boy muttered to himself and became visibly exasperated. Leaning her head on her hand, arm balanced by the elbow on her broomstick, Astra lazily glided over to the lad.

"Bit of trouble there, mate?" she asked, letting a cheeky smirk creep onto her face. She hopped off her broom and spun it before assuming a relaxed stance in which she appeared to be leaning on the broom. It was an opportunity to show off her flying, which she didn't get often, and Astra was going to revel in it. "Weren't paying attention in flying class?

"It's like this, see." She gently laid the broom on her ground. "First things first, you tell it to come up. Can't just stick it between your legs and expect it to work. Brooms don't like that lack of communication, at least that's how I see it. So tell it what you want. Like this. Up!" The broom obeyed, zooming into her hand. It seemed to like Astra, since she gave it lots on fly time. "Then you just hop on and go. They love flying, so they'll usually oblige you happily. Lest you've got one of the cheeky ones. But those are quick to get the hang of if you treat them right." She quickly mounted and with little effort pushed off the ground. With a bit of adjustment, Astra hovered at the boy's eye level, one eyebrow raised. "Got it?"

@Reginald Drake
notes : impatient smh

@Astra Norrick

"Plenty of trouble to go around." He said with an exasperated sigh, still moving the broom from side to side, trying to get some semblance of a reaction out of this piece of magical wood. "Oh, we had a flying class?" He said with a small smirk, half-joking, since he had been busy talking to the person next to him instead of paying attention to the teacher trying to teach him how to not die.

He placed his broom on the ground, flat stare on his face as the girl went on and on about pieces of stick having personality and feeling, though, considering his wand, he really shouldn't be this hypocritical. "Alright, I'll try it your way, then!" He said with a smile as he saw it fly straight up into her hand, before trailing his palm 3 feet above the wand and closing his eyes.

"Up," he whispered. The broom shook but stayed firmly planted on the floor. "Up!" He shouted as he saw the futility of feeling embarrassed when someone was already coaching him, finally, the broom shot up into his waiting palm, pushing his arm high into the air from the unexpected force.

"Woah! It's alive!" He said, a wide smile on his face as he finally felt a connection to this cheap school broom, before he positioned himself atop it once more "Merlin, if this doesn't work, I'm never getting on a br-" and before the young man could even complete his sentence, he was soaring through the sky like a cannonball fired from the nastiest of vessels, as if the broom was shutting him up with actions rather than words.

"Okay! Okay! I'm sorry, no threats!" He said quickly, holding back a small smile that would have seemed weird in this situation, one hand holding onto the only piece of wood separating him and a very solid ground "You're cool!" He said with a smile towards his coach, as he struggled to float down, simply staying far up in the sky after his broom's vicious show of love, before pulling back at the sleeve of his right arm, the arm responsible for his safety. "I hate this! It's awesome. Oh, I'm so rude! Name's Reggie." He said with sweat dripping down his face, confusing, did he hate this or like it?

Word count: 368
Notes: N/A

astra
date : november 11, 2023
time : 10:03 a.m.

A grin etched her features as the boy's confusion turned to success and he zoomed upward. His broom was eager to please, Astra could tell, it wanted to fly. Perhaps it had not been flown in a while: perhaps it was greedy.

A steep incline and then rolling out of the inversed dive beside her pupil. "Wonderful job! Quick learner, aren't you?" A pause as he introduced himself. The redheaded girl tilted her head. "Reggie, aye?" Last time she'd heard that name, it had been on a schnauzer. "I'm Astra. Well met."

She noticed his... well... franticness? Wasn't quite a panic, no. At least she didn't think it was that bad. "Right. So, you want to steer, you just point and lean if that makes any sense. Sort of like a bicycle, sans handlebars." She zigzagged slowly as demonstration, then tilted up and down.

Another pause. Then her blue eyes widened and she took both hands off the broomstick to nab her wand. "Oh, and don't worry about falling. I can likely catch you, plus spells." She waggled the implement and stuck it back in her pocket. No need to drop the precious thing.

Clouds moved with little haste across the cobalt sky, close enough to touch. The age old desire to scoop a handful of fluffy condensation came over her still, though she'd done so countless times. She tilted up, nearing a particularly low hanging nimbus inch by inch.

Slender fingers reached up and brushed the ceiling of the earth, shining with cold droplets as they returned.

"Clouds are rather disappointing, don't you think?" Astra mused aloud, returning to Reggie's side. "All your life you wonder what they feel like, long to scoop one up and hold it. But what do you get for your trouble? Just a wet hand." The small, bright, distinct droplets glistened on her fingertips as she held her hand out for Reggie to see. "Wild, right?"

@Reginald Drake
notes : speedy like the flash

@Astra Norrick

"You know...Maybe you're 'alive' after all." He said while petting the brush of the broom, a small smile engrained on his lips as he flew a few feet above the ground, talking to his mentor and new friend, Astra. "Astra's a nice name. Nice to meet you!" He said with a grin as he flew next to the girl, not sure where exactly she intended to go at first, just up. Up and away from everything annoying on the ground, until, of course, they finally neared the closest cloud.

"Hey, aren't we a little high-" Reginald's words stopped in their tracks. He had never flown a broom before. He had never flown at all. Now, for the first time in his life, Reginald saw the true beauty of everything he took for granted. As much as people always told him to never look down when you're high up, he looked down. He kept looking down.

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry unfurled beneath Reginald like a beautiful tapestry meant to sway all who saw it. "Is this what you...always see, Astra?" The castle itself appeared both grand and complex to his eyes, while the magic that students used around them was barely visible, but felt in the aesthetic of the school.

Surrounding the castle, the grounds were a patch of Green lawns, a dense forest, and shimmering, glowing bodies of water that looked more fake than real without a second glance.

The forbidden forest, however; the main source of the trees referenced beforehand, brought a sense of unease to Reginald's very core. His eyes looked through the trees and, from this far away, could see nothing but the darkness that enveloped the inner parts of that forest said to be haunted by magical beasts that would eat you alive and use your bones as a toothpick. Those were the stories he grew up on with a magical parent. This Hogwarts, from as far up as he could see now, was truly the magical castle he had dreamt of since he was a kid. He had taken magic for granted. This castle itself was magic, and only they got to use it. Learn in it. Touch it. Feel it. Only the ones blessed by fate to hold magic in their soul were allowed to see this. He was thankfully one of them. Right?

He then heard what the girl just said. Clouds...Disappointing? Laughable. "They just exist, Astra. They have no reason to impress us or live up to our expectations. They don't have parents forcing them to be something. They don't have friends asking them to do something. They don't have douchebags hoping they were something. They just...float up there, ignoring everything else. I think I like them. I like them a lot." He said with a minute tilt of his head towards the girl and a small smile as they were slowly descending, hands filled with water from the impromptu visit to Mrs. Cloud up there.

Word count: Above 200
Notes: This took way longer than it should.

astra
date : november 11, 2023
time : 10:04 a.m.

"Course it's alive," Astra said with a small laugh. "Everything here is, to a degree. The wands, the woods, the castle, the brooms. Latent function of so much magic I'd reckon." The urge to explore that avenue of though further tugged at her mind, but Reggie didn't quite seem the scientific type. No, this would be a conversation for @Mahlioz Evethisawe or Morella, Astra's mum.

Astra looked over at Reggie, a gust of cold, cold wind whipping her hair into her face. The expression of awe, the hushed reverence of his voice, it was glorious. Rewarding. A flush of pride warmed her from head to toe, fingertip to core, despite her shivers. Blue irises swept the landscape together, one set dark as night and the other bright and clear like the noontime sky. "No. It's always different," she answered. "But always just as breath-taking." She pointed towards the Forbidden Forest. "If you come out earlier, after a rain especially, you see the mist ten times more clearly." She redirected their gaze to the courtyard and most trafficked area of the grounds. "At lunchtime, you can see a lot of students from all the houses. Sometimes you see fights. On the weekends, it looks like a rainbow exploded with all the different colors people wear." She then pointed at the owlery as a barn owl swooped in to make a delivery. "Sometimes you see crows or hawks or ravens try to get it, but the owls don't usually let them." The lake... she tried not to look at the lake.

Silence stretched between them for a good while. Astra kept an eye on her pupil, to gauge his balance and relative safety. He seemed to be having a profound moment. If you concentrated really hard, you could hear the inspirational piano music in the background.

Clouds were a hot topic of debate, it seemed. Reggie's point made sense, she supposed. Expectation-free and happy they were, he said. Astra couldn't quite believe this though. If not to meet, nay, surpass expectation, then why try very hard at all? What drove you, if not expectation? Expecting greatness allowed you to achieve greatness. Mediocrity was failure and defeat never an option.

Defeat is never an option.

"No expectations, aye? That'd be nice, I think." She did not share the rest for fear of opening the Vault, opening her failures for all the world to see. For now, this was a success. For now, she was doing fine on the outside. And that was what mattered. That was the expectation. Wasn't it?

Astra rubbed her fingertips together and looked up at Reggie, as she'd dipped down below him. That same mild cheerfulness radiated from her face, only momentarily lost as she wandered in her thoughts. "Any place in particular you'd like to fly over? Moves you want to learn? Chats you want to have? Flying tends to bring out the philosopher in people, if you couldn't tell."

@Reginald Drake
notes : i decided not to be petty, get better soon or else