Dusted Away Errand PV Group

first post, 344 + second post, 372= 716 total
Mentioning @Bridget Collins @Tyranni Whitethorn @Willow Anderson

After briefing the students, Ruthie had headed to the nearby study room in an attempt to get some work done. The cards had done the trick of passing time in short bursts while she had been waiting for her cohort, but for the hour or so they might to accomplish the task, a book was a better option. And so she'd taken The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1 off the book shelf to review material for her upcoming Charms lesson later that afternoon. It was actually a class she had come to enjoy and look forward to unexpectedly.

Propping the book open, she felt comfortable leaving the students to their own devices. This is what usually happened in errands—the host greeted and explained the rules and then let the students complete the task. And this was an especially easy and clear errand; she did not expect there to be any problems or confusion. The girls were young, around her age for the most part, but they seemed intelligent and capable from how they had listened to her instructions. And she sat down with the cards beside her and the book open in front of her until she heard a loud and jarring clanging noise.

There was no one else in the study room, and nothing had moved in her immediate vision. Propping her ear to the side, she could only assume the noise came from the hallway. What have they done? Standing up from the chair, she abandoned the book, stuffed the cards in her pocket, and walked back into the corridor with a furrowed brow.

As she approached, she heard the questions of concern, including one of the girls asking if another needed to head off to the hospital wing. What could possibly have merited that kind of severe injury? There were no half giants in the corridor trying to kidnap people. She noticed Bridget making good progress where she was while two of the other girls seemed to addressing one brunette Slytherin with concern. "What happened?" Ruthie asked as she walked over. Once she was close enough to examine the injury, there appeared to be some bleeding between the fingers and her skin looked red. There'd be bruising, but it was nothing terrible—nothing that couldn't happen on a morning out at sea. Or perhaps more significantly, nothing like what had happened to others in some of Hogwarts' other events. "Here," Ruthie said as she tossed over a clean rag to the girl, "Apply pressure for five minutes. That will stop the bleeding. Then, you can finish up dusting." It was unlucky and Ruthie had no idea how this had happened, but apparently it had and it was no reason to stop the work. The blonde knew that much from the accidents around the docks in her home town of Arisaig.

Just then, the Ravenclaw looked around the corridor, "This is looking good," Ruthie said to the group, thinking their effort would indeed by noticed and appreciated by Gris, the Gryffindor Prefect. And that was the point after all.

Interacting with @Bridget Collins, @Tyranni Whitethorn, @Mildred Wilson, @Serena Bowen and @Willow Anderson

Interacting with @Willow Anderson, @Mildred Wilson, @Bridget Collins @Ruthie Greer
Since this event is occurring in March, it is post the February Slytherin main event debacle. Date of errand verified with Ruthie.

Two of the girls who she thought had introduced themselves as Willow and Mildred when the cleaning began had asked if Tyranni was okay after hitting the wall.

Embarrassed, Tyranni tried to explain herself. "I'm fine. I think at least. Just a little bruised. I'm really sorry for the mishap. When I was looking at the armor I accidentally knocked over the shield and it startled me. I thought I saw movement out of the corner of my eye after and I guess I just reacted. After last months attack in the Slytherin common room, I think I've just been a little on edge. Before coming to Hogwarts, I had been training in different combat skills sometimes my first instinct is to hit the threat rather than run away." What a stupid thing to do. Everyone else must think she's aggressive, taking her anger out of walls. "Thanks for helping me get the shield back up," she said to Willow. "It's not the lightest. Must have been balancing pretty precariously on the edge for it to fall over when I bumped it."

She took the suggestion of the girls to heart about going to infirmary, but since she could still wiggle her fingers, she decided to tough it out. They were almost done cleaning anyways, and she didn't want her leaving before the task was done to prevent her from getting the house points. That was the only reason she had signed up in the first place. The prefect in charge must have heard the commotion and came out also. She gave another rag to Tyranni and told her to hold pressure for five minutes. "Thanks. Like I was telling the others, I think I'm fine. I got startled and thought I saw a shadow move and my reaction was to hit it. Only there was nothing there except the wall. I'm sorry for the noise." She replaced the original rag she had grabbed with the clean rag she was given and got back to work.

The second year Slytherin girl, Bridget had begun to clean the suits of armor on the other side of of the hall. Tyranni thought about trying to lighten up the situation and get a laugh out of the girl by jokingly warning her to watch for the falling shields, but she figured that it might not be an appropriate time for such joking. Out of everyone here, hopefully the older Slytherin girl would understand her justification for why she had punched the wall, by accident of course. She remembers that the older girl was also present in the common room the night of the *shudder* spider attacks. Normally not scared of spiders, these were something else, and she still had not fully recovered from the trauma. She had heard what happened at the Masquerade and felt lucky that she had made it through most of first year unscathed. At least until February. Well, it was only a matter of time before her good luck turned sour. Appears I have had a string up bad luck recently, she thought.

WC: 495; First post = 278; Second post = 343; Total = 1,116.
Word count complete
Open to additional interactions

With everyone gathering around to make sure Tyranni was ok, Willow took a step back once they were done putting the shield up to make sure she didn't feel crowded at all. A punch like that seemed like it could scare off anyone, even a shadow. "That's so cool that you're trained in combat! I think if anyone were to sneak up on me, I'd be a lost cause. I would have no idea what to do." Maybe there were self-defense courses or an extracurricular for that besides Dueling Club, which she was nowhere near being able to think of joining.

Willow hadn't heard about the situation last month in the Slytherin common room, but she feltl like maybe now wasn't the best time to ask. She stepped back even more as the prefect showed back up, "I guess she was nearby.." she thought to herself. "Don't worry about the noise, I'm just glad you're ok. It sounded like you could've broken it. Remind me not to ever sneak up on you though." She giggled, feeling like a little joke would help break tension. Being with a new group of people, you never knew how people deal with different things, or how they take jokes in moments like this.

With the comment from the prefect, she felt like she should probably get back to work. She went back to her discarded duster, and went back to her section. Her heart was finally starting to calm down. She turned to the group, "There's never a dull day at Hogwarts, is there?" She turned back around, since coming here she felt like it was hard to catch a breath. She was just starting to catch up to the pace compared to the slow relaxed pace that she came from.

Word Count = 725 + 298 = 1,023
Errand Complete, Open to Interaction

Serena smiled. "It's good to see you too! And I know what you mean; meeting a bunch of new people all at once can sometimes be overwhelming." She chuckled. "Yeah, I may or may not be using this as an excuse to put off doing my Transfiguration homework. I'm pretty good; not a whole lot's happening besides classes and Quidditch practice right now. Can't wait for it to start warming up so we won't be freezing during practice all the time."

Serena then walked over to one of the suits of armor and began polishing. She had just finished the helmet when a loud clang sounded throughout the hallway. The badger jumped, almost bumping into the suit she was cleaning.
Quickly turning around, she saw the girl who introduced herself as Tyr. Her hand looked like it was bleeding, and a shield was on the ground.

"Are you alright?" Serena called out to Tyr as Willow picked up the shield and placed it back where it belonged.

Serena looked around to see where the Ravenclaw Prefect had gone. Just as the first-year was about to head out to find her, the prefect appeared. She quickly took charge of the situation handing the injured girl one of the clean rags to stop the bleeding. Serena was glad that she was there to take care of it.

Serena smiled at the prefect's compliment. While it wasn't necessary, it was still nice to be recognized for your work. Speaking of which, the badger needed to get back to doing what she set out here to do. So she turned her attention back to the suit of armor and began polishing its chest plate.

WC: 267 + 287 = 554/1000

Interacting with:@Willow Anderson and @Tyranni Whitethorn

716 + 380 =1096
WC completed! Thanks for the errand everyone! still open to interactions
mentioning: @Tyranni Whitethorn and @Willow Anderson

Interacting with @Mildred Wilson, @Tyranni Whitethorn, @Serena Bowen, @Bridget Collins, @Ruthie Greer

Willow took a step back to admire her work on the section that she had done. She wasn't much of a cleaner, though she did help out around home, but she was proud of what she had completed here. She looked around at the other sections, realizing that they were pretty close to being done. Not that the corridors needed much work in the first place. She put her hands in her robe pockets, remembering what she had brought along! She had become known for these around Hogwarts and took every chance she could to hand them out. Now that the chaos was hopefully done for now, she pulled a handful of bracelets out of her pocket and presented them to the group.

"Does anyone want a friendship bracelet? Serena, I know we made some together but I actually never gave you one." She felt bad about not offering one to her initially, but better late than never! "You can keep it for yourself or give it to someone else, I just like to give them out since people seem to like them. But, also no pressure to take one!" She had started giving people all the options she could think of because she never knew how some people would react.

After the cleaning was done, the girl named Willow asked if anyone wanted a friendship bracelet. She had brought many different kinds. Already wearing the one the Tyranni had made with the girl in the Great Hall, she figured she would take one to give to the only person she really knew fairly well at school, Andrew. She wanted to show him appreciation for taking the time at the Tea Party to get to know her. She spoke more to him in that time about herself that she had to anyone. Plus, he was also bitten by one of the *shudder* magic spiders. May it would help comfort him to know someone else cared. Honestly, this friendship the Hufflepuff girl was so adamant about spreading might just be what the children of House Slytherin needed at this time. Distraction. Someone to listen to their anger, fears, sadness, and whatever else they may have experienced. A distraction. That was why this cleaning errand was so helpful for Tyr. It got her out. Helped her forget about her anger at that blue haired girl who opened the door. Karmic justice was served, as she was kicked off the quidditch team allowing Tyranni the chance to play and meet more of her housemates.

"I'll take one @Willow Anderson ! I'm sorry. I forgot your name after we meet in the Great Hall, and I already got a bracelet from you, but can I take one for a friend? I am not sure what he would like, but do you have anything in the color blue? Boys like that right?" Hopefully he wouldn't laugh at her and think it was too girly. If Willow had the bracelet, she would take that one. If not, maybe she would help Tyranni make one again.

@Willow Anderson @Tyranni Whitethorn

@Ruthie Greer | @Tyranni Whitethorn | @Willow Anderson

People came and went, including Ruthie, who popped in for a minute to bandage Tyr's injured hand. All the while, Bridget scrubbed away at the suits of armor, gentle so as to not dislodge any of the parts yet forceful enough to remove the grime.

Just because she was hanging on the outskirts of the group, silent and working hard, that didn't mean she wasn't listening in on the other girls' conversation. One particular comment hit close to home--Tyr's explanation that she'd thought a shadow move. Bridget shuddered in acknowledge of what had happened that night. Before she could stop them, memories she'd been trying to forget came to the forefront of her mind--spiders, her veins turning black, and pain...

Bridget squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hand against the wall to steady herself. The spider attack was over. She was safe now. She was at an errand. She was cleaning suits of armor. There were no spiders.

Opening her hazel eyes again, she got back to work, glad to have the task to distract her from her own memories. In the background, one of the girls had produced a collection of handmade bracelets, offering them to the other girls. Bridget didn't cross the room to admire them or even pick out one, but she did smile a bit to herself as she drew up a mental comparison of her this time last year versus this girl. The contrast was laughable--this girl was offering friendship bracelets while she had completely alienated herself from everyone. Still, the small grin faded fast as she, like Tyr, spotted something small and black out of the corner of her eye. Unlike the younger Slytherin, she didn't try to hit the thing, but her breathing did quicken, becoming shallower. Gulping, Bridget leaned closer to the black thing, praying it wasn't a spider...

And it wasn't. It was nothing more than a tuft of black fuzz. Her breathing went back to normal, but her face heated up. She couldn't keep doing this, couldn't keep losing it whenever she saw anything vaguely similar to a spider. This wasn't the first time either--there had been an actual spider a few days ago in class which had caused her to completely miss the whole of the lesson. Straightening, she once again busied herself with polishing the armor and reminding herself the spiders were gone.

Total Word Count: 400 + 1106 = 1506/1000