Date(s) of Mention:
May 19th, 2023
July 3rd, 2023
August 2nd, 2023
August 26th, 2023

As early as his first year, Piérre Marchonné had been enthralled with the idea of becoming an animagus someday. Of course he had first come into contact with the concept of one thanks to his interactions with Miss Cy, his very first Transfiguration teacher who claimed to have been a cat animagus. Although the boy had not been lucky enough to convince his blind teacher to transform into her animal shape, he had had the chance to learn a little bit more about the process and the things that came with the ritual than the usual first year did. Late his third year brought much of the same, as the Animagus process was taught to that year of student. It was one of few classes that Piérre actively took notes in, one of the few lessons that he paid deep and undivided attention to so that he could make sure that everything was perfect for when he attempted to take on his own animal form. Though unsure if his current professor of Transfiguration at the time (an Atticus Wade) knew anything about the boy's ambitions, Piérre was busy as a bee trying to ask as many clarifying questions as he could and endeavoring to ensure that when he did try this on his own that nothing--absolutely nothing--could go wrong.

And, you know, he would have tried to perform the ritual sooner were it not for the fact that life had an odd and unfortunate way of getting in the way of many of his desires. Between family drama and simply not having time to set aside a monthlong period to endure the chore of holding a mandrake leaf in his mouth (a practice that would effectively render the boy mute in the meanwhile, Piérre had had to bide his time. Yet, unfortunately, patience was not the Britalian's strong suit. It never had been, as it was.

But now... aha... now he had the chance, and now he had the ingredients. Each had taken at least some notable time to collect, but he had spread them out over time (particularly during his third and fourth year whenever he had free periods) and had been careful to keep them nice and preserved in his dark trunk where nobody (not even he himself) touched them.

The easiest of these that he had managed to get his hands on had, oddly enough, been the morning dew. Though likely to be considered the hardest among the required ingredients to collect, he had collected it over the course of his fourth year summer when he had awoken early before the sun rose in the coolness of the nice July weather. This had been stored in one of the vials that the boy had thanks to having smuggled it away from Mathilda when she had locked everything magical that the twins had away in the attic. The phial was still sitting in his trunk inside a black velvet bag; Piérre very much believed that it had thoroughly achieved its requisite of existing for at least a week without the exposure of natural light or to human feet. This, of course, would mean that it was just right for use in the concoction that he had to imbibe whenever it was that the next clear night full moon rolled around.

It was, as a matter of fact, the matter of finding and collecting the Death's Head Hawkmoth's chrysalis that proved itself more of a hassle. This was the ingredient that he had spent more free hours throughout his third and fourth year searching for both on the castle grounds and nearby the Forbidden Forest than he would have liked to admit. Combing the grounds and checking as far into the Forbidden Forest as he dared to wander (for he had certainly heard more than a few rumors about that dark place and he usually liked to make sure that his skin wasn’t at too much risk of being flayed by the similarly rumored 'hags' there at any given moment in time), the boy had drug his feet through the long grass and had gently brushed branches and reeds aside, looking for the ground-located cocoon. This continued throughout a lot of September… until the boy had had the good luck of stumbling across an adult Death’s Head Hawk Moth beginning to emerge from its cement-like enclosure near the roots of a hawthorn in the middle months of October. With wings still slightly shriveled, it was trying to pump the fluids necessary into those delicately scaled wings so that it would eventually be able to take flight on its own volition. After watching it for around ten minutes or so, Piérre observed it take its first taste of the open air and go off to do whatever it was that those rather large moths of their size tended to do. Directly following, Piérre took into both hands that cement-like mud shelter that the rejected cocoon was inside, and gently broke it open until he uncovered the remains of that brownish chitinous matter. Besides, it wasn't as if the little guy needed it anymore; he had his own wings and he certainly didn't have time to waste stuck on the ground like the lot of humans that plodded about the face of the earth. Just like Piérre himself, bugs themselves had things to do and places to see; and Piérre himself wasn't going to waste any more time here just like they.

Well… that made both of the ingredients that he simply needed to have on hand… Little did the boy know that the most difficult challenge that awaited him was in fact what he would have to do in order to add those two previous ingredients to the potion that he needed for that full moon drink. Ah yes, the notorious one month of having a mandrake leaf in his mouth without altering its state or losing it in some unfortunate fashion.

Man, wouldn't it be funny if somehow the most talkative and energetic kid known to his year of classmen suddenly went completely mute for about the span of a month? Or, at least, he spoke not in relatively coherent words but rather in rather extreme forms of interpretive sign language with a little bit of native Italian sign language thrown in because it was one of the few methods of communications that Piérre had a relatively good handle on? Because that's exactly what happened, kiddos! That is exactly what happened. And this was where everything went to heck in a handbasket in the realm of testing the boy's mental--and physical, mind you--fortitude. Fortitude that would in fact last the entirety of the last month of his fourth year and would span for the entire month afterwards.

Eating became a brand new challenge for the Britalian, and because of this he was finding that the best way to ensure that the (quickly becoming mushy) mandrake leaf was to do something not terribly unakin to those who liked to work with tobacco; in the end he ended up packing it into his cheek. This prevented the worst of the mandrake leaf's disintegration, and it also allowed the boy to imbibe foods like soup and soft meals that didn't require much chewing. Brushing his teeth was a similar, careful manner, but he still managed to keep himself without cavities and immense yellowing. In his classes, Piérre simply tried to stay out of sight and out of mind. He didn't want to tip too much of his hand, didn't want anyone to get in his way of trying to become that ever tabooed 'illegal animagus' that could... well...

Why was it so illegal, again?

Piérre would discover the several reasons and the punishments that would come with it in the form of his current Transfiguration professor Gregor Aarden. Lovingly referred to as "Professor Aardvark" by the boy himself, Piérre thought that he had been so clever holding his cheek in his hand to pretend that there wasn't a wad of gross mandrake leaf there and yet still having this faraway look in his eye as he kept getting distracted by the unusual tactile feeling on the side of his tongue whenever he idly rolled it around his mouth. It either looked like he was sucking on a toffee or chewing a collection of gum. Well, no matter what it had happened to look like, Piérre did end up getting called out on his bluff in the middle of May, right smack dab in the middle of the first half of the Animagus ritual.

Expecting the worst, Piérre prepared himself to be shamed and chewed out for being the fool that he was. Which he very promptly was. Well... at least Professor Aardvark's presence was soothing enough; the Transfiguration classroom was one of the more relaxing areas in the school if only because of Mr. Aardvark's presence alone. The music only added to the atmosphere, and it was between observing the jumps between the notes of the song playing and hearing the criticisms of Aardvark himself that the boy only nodded numbly and hummed to himself with his brows creased in worry of what was to come. Off to the side on, his pristine pedestal, sat the professor's beloved goldfish; but one of the reasons that Piérre did not bring his own familiar Figaro into the classroom (the other reason was because he was worried that his sweet familiar would be used as a guinea pig by some other student practicing their transfigurations).

"... not to mention the sentence to Azkaban that would be coming down on your head when you are discovered." Impatient, perhaps, but not really fully severe in the ears of Piérre, to be honest were the words that came as Phillip's scales gleamed like sunlight on gold. "And a young boy like you shouldn't be having to deal with jail time before you graduate. Ruins the rest of your life."

Sulking slightly with the mandrake leaf in his mouth, Piérre hummed to himself and turned his eyes towards the ceiling as he grappled with the pros and cons of his situation. Sucking a bit, the boy shrugged and then ashamedly turned his eyes to the ground and tried to speak through the potion ingredient. "Then I wouldn't get caught. Nobody has to know I'm an animagus unless it's an emergency..." A little bit garbled was his speech, but the sentiment was there. Piérre had lived so much of his life without particular notice or being tracked, both by his own classmates... and sometimes even by the professors themselves. Indeed, were it not for the Trace, it was a good argument to say that the boy had been totally without interest to the wider magical world. He was one person, after all, and he was one person that was insignificant in comparison to the larger movement and the ones who held the power. What was one animagus compared to the others that were registered?

Sure, records say that only one wizard in one thousand is likely to be an animagus... but those were records and statistics based solely on the registered Animagi alone and not from a wider-cast net. "I don't suppose that you think that the statistics of animagi are flawed?" His eyes sparkled with amusement as he looked Mr. Aardvark in the eyes again with all the joy of a child simply delighted by the prospect of life and sheer curiosity; he loved asking silly questions like these that would make him far too cheeky for a typical starch-collared individual. "What if there are hundreds of unregistered animagi?" Was it a real question that the boy was asking or was it simply a theoretical question? That would be a question that Gregor would have likely have to answer for himself, as the boy elaborated no further. Yet, he had still been busted. His game was up, and if the professor was at all worth his salt, this activity would be reported if Piérre gave an indication that he still intended to continue with the process of becoming an Animagus without explicit support.

"Multiple wrongs would not make a right, even if those statistics are false." Ah, the well-rounded answer. "Don't do it just because someone else did it." It was a classic argument even if it held its water-weight in salt. "The punishment would not be the action itself, but what comes when convicted of it."

"You probably think I'm ignorant." Piérre felt a smile snake across his face in amusement. It felt like this was always what it came down to whenever he spoke with adults. HE was young comparitively, after all, even to the professors who were only a few years out of school and who had decided to return in an attempt to corral the feline-esque students into learning and being willing to accept their attempts at education. His voice was filled with the tremolo of consideration, the more that his mind turned, so do did the accents of his voice. "I probably am. I'm a big idiot too, big fool." He nodded emphatically in emphasis of his words. "But a life lived without risk, without life exposure, is so boring. Even jail is an experience, and I think we both know that if I did become an illegal animagus it would not make me an evil person. I would simply be a felon." It was so strange just how uptight the law was over seemingly silly things. "I am not a villain. I'm certainly a good deal more harmless than aspiring dark wizards or dark lords. I'm more harmless that most of the things that creep in the underbelly of this very school. Certainly I don't have to remind of the most curious Slytherin curse, or a certain unfortunate incident that had happened in the same house's common room as recently as this early January?" Wasn't that a strange thought... that Hogwarts was indeed such a very dangerous place at the worst of times and the idea of going to Azkaban just for the ability to say that he had done it. Did they have dementors there anymore? What an experience that would be...

Green eyes fixated intently on the professor. "And I'm smart enough to know when I'm in a fight I can't win. So... if I can't beat them, I'll join 'em; or find some other way to negotiate the trial, as the case may be. Apparently I'm supposed to get an instructor to help me through the process. You wanna help me so that I don't end up going to jail someday?" And there was the fool once more. Twisting the situation away from being serious and potentially taboo and into something more fun-loving and unusually playful so quickly that it could give a listener whiplash.

There was a pregnant pause, a moment of consideration that only remotely caused Piérre to worry that his request would be turned down. He had come so far right now, and he was so close. It would be such a waste to simply throw it all away just because of a total accident, a situation that should not have occurred if he had just taken means to be a little more careful and a little more cautious of where he had been holding his cards. One slip, one moment when they were not pressed against his chest, and someone had glimpsed his five aces and called him out as the cheat that he was. Still, he had politely requested assistance. How polite would the response be?

"Some experiences are better off unexperienced. As much as I enjoy speaking of breaking of laws in the sense of magic and physics, I will not allow a student to break any ministry laws or rules." The Professor actually seemed stern and serious at this point of speaking with Piérre, but swiftly after a small bubble rose from his pet's fish tank; "What do you mean... well... I suppose that is only fair Phillip, rules are meant to be bent not broken." The Britalian's keen emerald eyes tracked to the tank as well, curious of what crazy nonsense the Professor heard from his disillusion of a talking fish. I mean, Piérre wasn't a stranger to talking to animals; on the contrary he talked to his cat all the time. He was fairly certain that Figaro understood just about everything that he said to him, or at least acted like it. "Yet, if it prevents you from going off on this foolish errand and landing you in more trouble than having a simple conversation with me, I will teach you the right and wrong way to continue your process. I observed the mandrake leaf, I assume that you began it on May's full moon on the fifth?" Queried the silvery Transfiguration professor.

A smile flicked across Piérre's face once as he tore his gaze from the splendid little fishbowl and met the eyes of the man, before his brow furrowed as he tried to remember for sure that his calendar had been right... and he replied with a tad of uncertainty. "Nnnnnno... I think I did it on the 6th... I was too busy on Friday, I had homework to do and I fell asleep. I was sort of... well... I was sort of hoping that it was close enough, the moon looked pretty full that day." Piérre stammered a bit as he tried to do some damage control. "B-but I've been meticulous other than that! I already have everything that I need. This has been one of the few things that I've been taking seriously in the past few years." As if to try and prove his point, the kid tried to rifle around in his bag, looking for the phials that held the hawk's head cocoon as if it was substantial enough proof that his words corresponded with his intentions.

As it turned out, starting the Mandrake leaf even as little as one day late was not good enough; it would most certainly be enough to cause the ritual backfire, as the boy was schooled by the wiser Transfiguration professor and then informed that they would have to wait until the next full moon in at least June to try again. But... of course there were more complications, as since those were the 'final weeks' Piérre would need to make sure that he could incant and speak properly for the purposes of his practical exams. In the end, the date decided would be the summer month of July; this would be the month that Piérre would attempt to do the mandrake process, and then with some further instructions on the night of the potion-making and then notification to Piérre's guardian Mathilda that the young Britalian was attempting to attempt this process and that she should at least hold his hand as he tried to perform the incantation part of the ritual during the time it took for a proper thunderstorm to roll by.

Though the boy had not won exactly what he wanted--the freedom of being unregistered unless he attempted to somehow elongate the already long process required to so much as attempt to become an Animagus--he had still won and had arguably won more than if he had tried to do this all alone. He had the wisdom of the Transfiguration professor himself. That would be more than enough for the purposes of being able to ensure that no backfires occurred, and though begrudging of accepting the help simply because it did take away that freedom to attempt these things on his own, Piérre was cheerful and polite for the rest of the time that he took with Professor Aardvark and Phillip the Goldfish (not before rambling on and on about his own experiences with Philipe the Mosp, of course) preparing for the full moon and trying his best to take the advice that was bequeathed to him. Every time he met with his "Animagus Sponsor", Piérre couldn't help but giggle whenever the professor kept his goldfish close either in the bowl in the classroom or in the 'fishpack' as Piérre had taken to calling the portable fishbowl that could be easily carried for the means of mobility.

Before he knew it, as he graduated his classes as he always seemed to do by some good fortune or by just barely being able to remember the things that were most important to remember in that year's classes, July third did roll around and Piérre did begin the first day of trying to re-soak the leaf. With prior practice, the methodology of the way he held it in a 'cheek pouch' was well-refined; enough so that even if he wasn't trying the kid was able to manipulate the soggy leaf and ensure that the thing never got away from him or even got in the way of his speech (or at least... it made him somewhat intelligible). Sure, the kid didn't really get the luxury of 'being able to eat whatever he wanted' with the camp's selected foodstuffs that were provided to the kids... but at least that same handicap was forcing Piérre to busy himself with prepping for next year's classes; a strange and rare sight that would have been cause for alarm if anyone knew anything about the crazy Britalian and his pranking/matchmaking tendencies.

Sooner than he knew it, the events of the summer camp were over and everyone went home for the remainder of the summer during the month of August. The second of August was the day that marked the full moon that Piérre would have to pray would be unclouded. Staying up all night in the hopes that the clinging mists that had been swirling around London for the past few days, Piérre anxiously watched the clouds, willing them to break apart at some time while the moon was still up so that he would be able to properly do this potion and would not have to suffer though trying to do the whole Mandrake leaf thing all over again. The next for the next full moon would be on the 30th (which seemed entirely too far away for his taste), so the boy wavered back and forth as he sat in the front yard, looking for his moment of opportunity. It only had to be a few seconds, just long enough to get all the ingredients into one bottle and to then squirrel it away to its dark and quiet place.

Lo and behold, there was the moon in her full-bosomed glory, her silvery rays blessing the ground. He had such a small window of opportunity with all the thin and wimpy clouds whistling by. Perhaps only a minute or two in order to make his act of potioneering count. With a larger phial in hand, the Death's Head Hawk Moth cocoon and the phial of dew in the other, and the mandrake leaf in mouth (as well as hair from himself, duh), Piérre grinned up at the moon and stars. Marveling up at them shortly despite his tiny and shrinking window of opportunity, the boy then took a deep breath as he carefully concocted the potion there in the light of the moon. Rushed a little he was, perhaps, but he had to be quick unless he wanted to do this ALL over again. Nobody could call him a coward for not taking this chance instead of waiting for another.

First the mandrake leaf, the tobacco-like chew-looking object which dripped from his lips in the mess of a month's duress in the boy's mouth and plopped heavily into the empty phial in the full view of Luna. Second was one of his hairs, which with a small grimace Piérre plucked from his nape and then sprinkled into the potion. Short duckfluff that it was, it floated delicately on the saliva pre-existing. Now there was the dew, which seemed to sparkle as it went into the phial along with its previous counterparts. Finally the cocoon, which was the most chitinous of them all and had admittedly been a little crushed up from being held so tightly in the boy's hand in the anxious hope that tonight would not disappoint him by being overcast. Not that it being slightly crunched up was a bad thing, per say. It would make the concoction easier to swallow. Because that was what he would have to do, of course, when an electrical storm would come to swirl over London and the Mathilda household... whenever it was that that force of nature decided to come by. It had been a shame, at least in Piérre's mind, that so many thunder and lightning storms had swirled by over the course of the past few weeks. It sure would have been nice to have one now.

From that point on until the lightning storm was due to occur, the potion lived in Piérre's clothes-lined drawers inside of a t-shirt in the dark and soundproof (via use of the t-shirt itself) quiet. It was instead the need to awaken right when the sun started to crest the horizon that would become the more pressing matter of the boy. Piérre was not really an early riser and he really liked hitting the snooze button if he could help it. In addition, he was VERY bad at maintaining a schedule and tended to... well... forget when he had to do things, such as say, wake up in the morning in order to recite a ritual that sounded not terribly unlike a tongue-twister--the boy already had a hard enough time speaking English let alone such a mind-boggling incantation that needed to be precise unless he wanted to end up a botched animagus. Furthermore, his history of missing a variety assignments during the school year proved his absentmindedness explicitly, even if he still managed to turn them in the next day at the very latest. Historically, most of the time he simply accientally left things in his room and had to run down to the classroom with it following that class. He wasn't a deviant, mind you, at least not an academic one. No, in order to make sure that he wouldn't forget to recite the incantation, he had requested the help of old veteran to early mornings Mathilda Wendigo herself to wake him up at the crack of dawn and help to keep him responsible.

So, while Romeo went off and had a fun time up north with his "friends", Piérre was forced to stay home at both the behest of Mathilda herself and for the purposes of making sure that this ritual would go right. That, however, hadn't stopped him from sharing with Romeo his intentions with excitement and with pride of what he had done so far for the purposes of the ritual before his brother had left... but admittedly Piérre didn't really get the reaction from him that he had been hoping for. It was obvious that the things that he had done to Romeo and Valentin Schnell were still very fresh and pressing in Romeo's mind... Piérre suspected that that injury would be one that Romeo would not forget or forgive quickly, just like how Piérre rarely forgot a slight against him and had a nasty habit of becoming vengeful whenever someone thought it a good idea to pull one over on him. Tit for tat, he supposed.

But, juuuuuuuuuust in case Maddie did happen to forget to wake Piérre up on one day or another, the kid did the only thing that was rational and had trained his cat Figaro to wake him up every morning whenever that familiar noticed the sun beginning to rise. Being crepuscular, Figaro was perfectly suited for the job and most certainly did his catlike do diligence to ensure that his human brother was awoken exactly five minutes before the sun would fully flood the grounds and the interior rooms of the London household. With incessant meowing, paws in the boy's eyes, and at the worst case a lick on the nose or a nip on the earlobe, the loyal feline ensured that there was no way for Piérre to miss the coming dawn unless he was begging to start the entire process all over again.

Every morning at the crack of dawn, it quickly became a tedious ritual; swiping his wand from its place on the bedstand beside him (this was indeed the very first summer in which Mathilda had actually permitted one of the boys to keep their magical implement for magical purposes) reciting that very specific incantation that he had learned in his third year and that he had kept on a shred of paper that he had laminated and had never let leave his possession (so that he wouldn't forget which words went where or what they were; at least there was one way that he could ensure he wouldn't botch the final parts of this process).

"Amato Amino Animato Animagus!" He would whisper to the quiet outdoors before replacing the wand and then going back to sleep for a few more hours of shuteye if he could manage it. Doing the same at nighttime right before the moon came up from the east (or when the sun finally let its light flicker away from what was visible from the window in the west as the case may be) was much easier, and it was only whenever time got cut close that Figaro would have to bump Piérre and leap up on the windowsill to remind the boy that he had to continue incanting the spell until the time would come for him to finally complete everything once and for all. Fortunately such an event only happened once or twice; other than that Piérre had a sort of hyperawareness about the time in which he would have to recite the incantation for the evening.

After nearly a month of waiting after concocting the potion the he would have to imbibe--after watching so many hazy clouds roll by with disappointing rain yet no thunder and lightning--that magical time of thunder and lightning finally came in late August after Romeo had returned from his venture north and had shared his findings with his younger brother (a story that in and of itself will have to be regaled at a different time and in a different way from the series of events documented here). It was on the 26th of that eighth month in the late afternoon almost at dinnertime that would be the day in which Piérre would shed the coil of humanity for the first time and take on his animal form, the cacophonous cry of thunder and lightning marking the baptism of that moment. Like many great storms that always seemed to be much less than they would eventually become, it started small and with the same foggy and misty skies of London growing dark and heavy with the telltale signs of rain and the smell of ozone. Except now they began to darken ever so slightly and unveiled dark nimbus clouds that streaked the grey skies and began to rumble softly with consternation and turbulation.

Stubbornly, no light permitted itself to be revealed: it was nearing five o'clock. After around ten more minutes there was finally a flash of forked white light that leapt from one cloud to the other in a bolt of blue as heavier rain began to fall with the first cacophonous blast of thunder. Looking up from his schoolbooks (specifically a text about Muggle history that the boy couldn't help but feel a little confused on the longer he read on though the eyes of biased wizard authors), Piérre's eyes widened in awe as the clouds began to rumble louder and the house vibrated once from the sound of thunder that concussed the very air about him and caused Romeo's head to twitch ever slightly in the direction of the noise as he fervently tried to solve a Rubik's cube. The house had weathered worse, Piérre knew this firsthand, but this thunderstorm was special. Special enough that he had to get to somewhere just isolated enough to finish this ritual.

Running over to his brother and almost knocking him down in his fervor, Piérre shouted as loud as he could so that he could gather the attention of everyone who called the Wendigo household home. "ROMEO! MADDIE! IT'S HERE! IT'S FINALLY HERE!" He cried out with the joy of a young child experiencing the joys of Christmastime for the very first time. "MADEIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

"For the love of Merlin, boy! Quiet down! I'm not deaf, but you'll make me deaf if you keep screeching like a banshee!" Mathilda emerged from the kitchen, wiping her hands and drying her silvery alder wand on a kitchen towel. Her brows were furrowed as they always were, a look that when combined with here severe and sharp features and brilliant grey mane of hair made her appear very much like a hawk indeed. "Romeo, go out there and help your brother; we don't know what animal he'll become, if he becomes and animal at all, and if he botched the ritual I'll need your help either carrying him inside or so that we can prepare him to go to Saint Mungos if it's bad enough." Her voice was deep and serious; obviously the Marchonné's guardian was not considering this a laughing matter in the slightest. "I hope you did everything right, Piérre; I'm not at fault if that full moon was not clear enough. You decided to proceed with the ritual, not me."

Even with Romeo trying to usher Piérre outside and into the storm, Piérre was yanking on his brother's arm as an excited smile spread from ear to ear. This was it! This was really, really it! "Come on, come on, come on, Romeo!" He was almost dragging the boy that easily weighed at least eighty pounds more and was over a foot taller than himself. They were on a ticking clock, after all! Piérre had no way of knowing just how long this storm would last, if it would last at all. "ROMEOOOOOOOOO! COME OOOOOOOOOOOONNNNN!" He complained as Romeo began to fluster and rebut the amount of maddened pulling that his younger twin was exerting on him. What else was the taller, athletic kid supposed to expect from his younger sibling, huh?! This was a super important moment for Piérre! This had to be done now! Nothing could go wrong, he had to make sure he had everything...

"Oh I need to grab the potion, wait here!" Piérre panicked a little bit more as he abandoned Romeo literally right next to the front door of the house and sprinted full tilt towards their shared bedroom with his fingers tangled in his own hair in a stance of sheer young stress. Almost sliding into the doorframe as he scampered in a mad dash to crash into the room, Piérre dug around viciously in his drawers in a search for the potion that was tangled up in his t-shirt. After dumping the article of clothing it out on his bed and shaking the shirt a few times to try and force the potion phial out of the shoulder of the t-shirt; Piérre snatched the tightly corked phial. He hardly noticed that by now it had become a violent red color that seemed to swirl with all the same powers of the stormclouds that were brushing by overhead, he was instead trying to 'parkour' though the house in order to make it back to his brother and into the storm outside as quickly as could be managed.

Sliding down the hallway in only his socks at what felt to be Mach speed, Piérre threw all safeties to the wind. Only the safety of the potion that he held in his left hand was most paramount, only that potion was the thing that needed to be protected most. At this point, he was more focused on speed. Who knew how long this storm would last, after all? Who knew? Who knew?! He had to do this now or not at all, just like when he had first brewed the potion underneath the light of the moon that had been patchy and had only showed itself for just long enough for Piérre to complete the potion and just barely longer.

Ah and there was Romeo just standing there in front of the front door! What in the world was he doing just standing there for no reason?! "Come on, come on, come on! MOVE, Romeo! MOVE!" Piérre urged with all the seeming madness of a crazy man foretelling the apocalypse to the well-to-do. Gracelessly he slammed into the Romeo brick wall and nearly lost his breath from the impact before recovering quickly with a quick shake of his head and then rushing outside still in stocking-feet.

Rain immediately doused the boy from head to toe, and his socks were soaked and sponged with the puddle water from the hydrated earth that was by now overhydrated and was trying to suck down as much of the rain as possible to very little effect. Almost immediately the boy shivered with a mixture of chill and anticipation, feeling his skin immediately turn clammy from the cold humidity that surrounded him on all sides. Being out in these elements was the boy's element, and now was no different. A faint breeze came across the way, causing a rustling in the trees yet not managing to cause the boy's quickly-soaked chestnut hair to sway in the same way. Emerald eyes looked to the skies, allowing rainwater to douse his face and on his exposed teeth in their persistent grin. Unconsciously, the boy raised his hands to the skies, spinning slowly and reveling in the joys that came from the experience of the wildness of it all; compared to the storm overhead this small person was nothing, nothing at all whatsoever.

Closing his eyes briefly, he listened to the sounds; the sounds of thunder and lightning that would notoriously help him to sleep even on the most troubled of nights. There was a pop of light; that would be the lightning, wouldn't it be? Good, the storm was still strong, strong enough to be utilized for the purposes of this transformation. His heart fluttered with excited nervousness as he came to terms with the fact that this was the moment, this was the instant that he would finally reap the fruits of his labor and experience the handiwork of his hard-earned efforts.

Hair whipping into his mouth and splaying across his cheeks as he snapped his gaze back to look back at his brother (who was crossing his arms and was standing similarly soaked to the bone and mimicking a wet cat with his titan hair now dark brown and hanging similar to Piérre's own), Piérre grinned one more time and then laughed in a way that carried his voice away into the thunder and lightning. He was silent compared to nature's fury. Fondly he looked upon the phial and turned it in both hands as the the scarlet liquid within that would be his path into taking on an animal form swirled with pent-up aggravation. Looking back now, just mere seconds from becoming a fulfilled animagus, he had considered for a long while what kind of creature he would be yet had never quite managed to figure it out on his own. In the League of Aspirant Animagi, he had always suspected or hoped that he would be some kind of animal that would reflect his need for energy and perpetual motion. Something that could keep up with him and never get tired so long as it had energy to move. Something swift, something eye-catching. Birds of Paradise, perhaps, or maybe a small rodent like the stoats that were native to Italy. Ultimately it was something that was a locked box to him, almost like a Schrödinger's Animagus Form problem or something.

Well... he would find out now, wouldn't he? Perhaps a bird, perhaps a rodent or a mammalian. Looking away from his brother, Piérre refocused on the potion in his hand. With a chuckle, Piérre shouted over the thunder towards his brother. "What a night for a thunderstorm, huh?!"

With a giddy grin, Piérre uncorked the phial and pressed the tip of his leaf-crowned yew wand to his heart for the last time, the last time before he would have to imbibe the concoction that he had made. With a deep and shuddering breath to prepare him for what was going to come (the process and feelings of transformation that had been explained to him inside and out by Professor Aardvark during their counsellings), Piérre screamed into the wind. "Amato Amino Animato Animagus!"

A final trembling breath, a moment of apprehension, a small look to Romeo with concerned green eyes that seemed to beg 'You're looking out for me, right? and then to Mathilda leaning in the doorway with severely furrowed brows and crossed arms, and then the boy pressed the phial to his lips, ignored the tiniest niggling thought to turn back (a panic that would be crushed by the need for adventure to be had), and threw his head back to slug back and consume the draught in its entirety. Trying to ignore the taste (to be honest, Piérre couldn't tell if there was any to be had in it), now all that there was to do was to pray that everything had gone right, that everything had gone right and that there was an animal form that Piérre would become.

Noise and light were everywhere; the sound of the boy's heart in both ears pounding and only just barely cutting through the sound of thunder and rain slamming itself against him, swirling about him on all sides, and lightning by now splitting the skies in half as the storm rose to its zenith of force. Deep breaths echoed in his ears as the boy lowered the phial and then stood there expectantly in the midst of chaos and the wet and the cold. Wand in his left, bottle in his right, his stance wide as he looked out to the storm over London city proper. He didn't know how long it would take for it to act, how long it would take for the potion to take effect...

If he had done the ritual correctly to begin with.

... had he done the ritual correctly to begin with?

Another shiver of thunder that caused the boy himself to shiver as the rain began to cut through and make itself known to the mind of the boy, and Piérre began to feel the cold, sinking feeling that perhaps he had done something wrong and that he would have to do all of this all over again. If that was true... Oh it would take so much time to collect all of these ingredients all over again... What disaster would come from this, if the potion worked at all? How long would he be laid-up in Saint Mungo's hospital if he did end up as some horrific half-animal half-human hybrid that would have to be un-transfigured for days or weeks through some long and agonizing process?

He would miss so much school if that happened, though. That was a plus.

Lips parting a bit to lick his lips as he waited a few seconds longer, Piérre hoped that wasn't true. He hoped that this wasn't true. He had done everything right, right? Surely the sensations of change would be coming at any second now, even as his brother started to slowly come up at his side to probably comfort him or to drag him inside when everything started to go wrong...

Right?

The more he thought about this, the more a screaming arc of shame flashed through his chest and caused him to double over as his heartbeat began to double in his ears. Feeling his temperature suddenly spike as disappointment burned deep within him, Piérre sank to his knees in order to remedy the headache and the spinning that he began to feel all around. Even as he covered his ears to drown out the sounds of the thunder and the strange double-beating that he heard on all sides and within his own mind, the boy wildly looked up to Romeo, who appeared to be towering over him far more than usual. He seemed so high in the skies, like a castle parapet that was tall enough to mountaineer. In the throes of the spinning and the rising temperature and the double-heartbeat that Piérre was feeling, he hadn't realized that instead of the world was swiftly becoming bigger and bigger around him, it was in fact that he was shrinking smaller and smaller (in fact, that had been the reason that Romeo had come up at Piérre's side in the first place). At first Piérre had believed it was likely a projection of his psyche, you know the way that the walls appear to close in around you whenever the world suddenly throws something at you that you don't expect. But... no... he was...

He was actually shrinking!

Panicked, the boy let go of both things in his hands, causing his yew wand to stick to the muddied ground and the phial to tumble into a puddle and fill with the dirty rainwater located therein. The boy's eyes widened as the world gained slightly more saturation... no.. not just saturation... what was... what in the world? What in the world was that color that he was seeing around his brother? It was a hue he couldn't describe; like a hot fuchsia pink but it wasn't quite pink, and good lord that lightning was BRIGHT. Shielding his eyes with his hands revealed to the boy that instead of arms there were multi-colored feathers that were attached to wings that were flailing and trapped as the boy was falling and falling into a dark, if warm, place. In the darkness, there were blurred flashes of beautiful color too quick to catch, flying here and there like shooting stars (with their tails trailing behind like twin strands) soaring through the subliminal night in the back of his mind blooming with vibrant flowers that caught these little meteorites and made them almost able to distinguished as he fell and fell and fell... After what felt like far too long to be a natural, survivable fall, the boy felt a soft and cushioned landing.

Completely in the total dark even after he removed his hands from his face and tried to get his bearings once again, Piérre tried to thrash around in the soft and slightly moist environment, but only seemed to succeed in getting more and more snarled up in whatever it was that he had landed in. He was in complete pitch darkness, but at there was warmth, a lot of warmth like that of body heat... it was also a little wet, like he was in something like a non-foggy sauna with that strange mixture of warm and hydrating heat. It was almost stifling if it weren't for the fact that it smelled like his own clothes and that he seemed to vaguely remember that he had previously been out in the middle of a rainstorm.

After a few more seconds of struggling, Piérre became aware of the sensation of movement overhead, vibrations in the ground as if a giant was coming in his direction. Oh my gosh was he so small!? He was going to be crushed! Struggling a little bit more (for he just knew for a fact that he would have to get away from this place as soon as he could possibly manage), Piérre thrashed harder and tried to wiggle as best he could, trying to get all these feathers out of the way; particularly this long string that seemed to be snarled around his feet and arm. Light came from overhead and Piérre blinked quickly as the enormous face of his own brother Romeo came slowly into focus in an extremely oversaturated and strange-looking fashion. Sight was so strange, the way that Piérre was all snarled up was so strange. What was happening? Trying to speak in order to ask these very questions, only a high-pitched clicking came from his mouth, and as he tried to move to escape from whatever confines he had found himself in, he instead only wobbled and fell forwards gracelessly thanks to the weird string thing that had managed to snarl him up as Romeo's other hand carefully cupped over the top of Piérre's head like some sort of human hand-cave.

"I'm never going to believe just how much trouble you get yourself into, Gemellino... Little twin..." Came the voice of his much taller and stronger brother. Even the voice itself carried such strange variations in pitch despite the boy knowing exactly what his brother's tones and vibratos sounded like, these variants of sounds and pitches that Piérre had not been able to hear earlier and variations that seemed magical all over again; music that had not previously existed to the boy before this very moment. Both his sights and his hearing were completely strewed... what in the world? Why in the world was this?

"You almost waterboarded yourself in your own clothes; why did you think it was a good idea to do this when standing in the biggest puddle in the yard?!" Still a bit even and muttering to self even through his confinements in his twin's huge hands, but what colorful variations! If sounds had color, even the simple action of speaking on the behalf of Romeo was creating a multi-layered harmony in the senses of the confused and distracted Piérre. He barely registered the implications of the words themselves, instead taken aback by how much was going on around him at this very moment even in the total darkness. The movement, the sounds, the temporary (and yet even in the darkness) the still confusing sights... And now he was in the hands of his brother as they were moving, with himself stuck in the former's hands like he was some kind of strange bug about to be put outside.

For some reason, and indeed for good reason, Piérre hoped that he wasn't going to get put somewhere outside right now; he was freezing cold and he just wanted to be inside and in a warm place that was warmer than his brother's damp (if body-heated) hands. Despite himself, as the string continued to tangle as he shivered, Piérre kept flicking his sights around him and cowered in the little space where the meat of Romeo's palm connected with his thumb like a wallflower trying to find a suitable corner to remain unobtrusive within. His heart was racing at what he felt like was hundreds of beats per second; was it because he was scared? Was it because he didn't know what was going on and was simply humming with excitement over what was going on all around him? He couldn't seem to hold still; he was either shivering or he was simply trying to somehow waver back and forth as he kept looking around him as if something was going to change when he least expected it.

The footsteps of his brother rumbled through the earth, the sounds of the thunderstorm gradually started to fade away. Mathilda's voice began to chime in in similarly strange and almost distorted fashion like his brother's had. Piérre thought that maybe she was saying to get inside as quickly as possible so that she could quote: 'Get a better look at him.'

Get a better look at him? Was he that messed up? Did he mess up the ritual that badly that he would need to be observed and assessed? Was he just a tiny malformed looking human now? Did he at least have some animal features? Had he done anything right at all? Was it reversible? Was he going to be alright? How much school was he gonna miss for this? Oh man... would Professor Aardvark be disappointed in him for doing so badly and trying to rush the process despite the risks?

The door slammed behind them with a noise that caused Piérre to jump and flutter for a second, fleeing to the side of Romeo cavern-hands that had his downwards fingers farthest away from the origin of the sound. Shivering a little bit more as Piérre was finally brought down to immobility via that tightening string now starting to tangle around his throat, the boy figured that the best thing for him to do now was to stand still, lest his further struggles become less of a small irritation and more of a strangling hazard. His heart was beating so quickly that he felt that he was almost buzzing with adrenaline and anticipation of what was going to happen next. What was going to happen next? What was going to happen next?!

Piérre's head snapped upwards as light flooded the area again, a bright light that once again revealed all of those oversaturated colors and hues that he had not been able to see hardly moments before. There was Romeo and there was Maddie across from him; they were looking down at him in Romeo's hands as he shivered and shook and looked between them while blinking rapidly to rid himself of the spots that were gleaming in his eyes. Trying to speak again, trying to ask what was wrong with him, only the high pitched trilling left him again, a fast vibration that echoed in the deep of his throat and yet rang so differently than what his voice was supposed to sound like. Unable to talk, Piérre blinked slowly, almost feeling like he was going to start crying. What could he possibly do to get them to tell him what was happening if he wasn't able to speak for himself.

Fortunately, Romeo was the first one to break the silence, regaling what had happened just a few moments before everything had gone sideways. "He just started shrinking a few seconds after he drank the potion. I had to nearly shake him into the puddle when I was trying to find him in his own clothes. He could have almost drowned." He said carefully, simply. "I don't... I don't think there's anything wrong with him that I can see. He looks like a full animal..." Came the musing as those hyacinth blue eyes fixed him with intrigue. Strange how they almost seemed to glow with un-nameable colors! Piérre never took time to notice just how gorgeous his own brother's eyes were...

Mathilda only 'hmph'ed under her breath ever so slightly, and Piérre's gaze snapped back to her, noting how the lily-silver seemed to glisten as her nectarine-hued hands moved close and began to pick at Piérre ever so slightly. As Piérre tried to thrash again, Mathilda's other hand pinched him by the shoulders. "Hold still, boy. You've got your own tail wrapped around your throat and you'll choke yourself to death if I don't unloop this right now."

As she said so much, Piérre felt his guardian's sharply maintained and lacquered fingernails gently tug at and begin to unwind the string that had been caught around his legs, shoulders, and body in its entirety. Except, now that he could see better in the extensive light in the inside of the house, Piérre was coming to the realization that that string was not a thread of fabric or twine or the like like he had originally suspected it to be, but actually a part of Piérre's new body. Reflexively, Piérre twitched, causing the now-freed little extension with a disc at the end of it to flick in the same direction as he had requested it. Oh how fun! He could control it!

Shaking quickly as the boy tried to rid himself of the crushing feeling of being trapped--in his own clothes was it?-- and relishing his newfound freedom from the feather-string-thing that had once tried to choke him out Piérre kept looking about him in awe and wonder between his brother, Mathilda, and the house... "Well, you're an animal for sure. Looks to me like a hummingbird." Came Mathilda's words once again, blunt and exact.

Hummingbird? Was that what he was? That was the reason he was so tiny? Then he had wings, surely. His tail, this was a long and flamboyant tail. Mathilda continued to speak as Romeo lifted Piérre to his eye-level to get a better look at him. "I think you'll be just fine. I don't think you got botched at all, and you seem to be acting far too sentient to be a wild hummingbird, so I think it's safe to say that you kept your human mind."

Similarly, Romeo made his own remarks. "I'm never going to hear the end of this once you turn back into a human, am I." He said softly as he shook his head and then lowered Piérre again after his appraisal. A look of his signature tiredness was on his face, but Piérre just couldn't stop noting the hyacinth brightness of his eyes and the cranberry hues of his hair that dared to ever so slightly edge towards a tiger-lily orange. "Well... uh... I guess that you did it. Congrats, gemellino. Little twin" The tiniest smile crossed Romeo's lips, the sparkle in his eyes increasing ever so slightly. Awwwwww.... so Romeo was proud of him... that was a good thought. That was something that made Piérre very very happy indeed.

He had done it. He had actually done it!

Mathilda was still issuing commands as she went to a different room; "Romeo, try to help him back into a human form until I find that paperwork that we need to do to get him officially registered as an Animagus. Put him in the bathroom somewhere where he won't fall down the plumbing or will get stepped on and get him some fresh clothes; he's going to need them!" Papers continued to rustle as Mathilda was no doubt searching for the documentation that she was speaking of.

Piérre watched as Romeo's face slowly turned slightly red with the obvious being clear. Well screw the clothes and laugh at his brother for the circumstance! This was so cool!

"And keep his cat away from him in the meanwhile!" Maddie commanded as Romeo and the tiny hummingbird Piérre made their way to the bathroom. That was indeed a thought that Piérre did suddenly have dawn upon him... it was only now that he was just realizing that it would be a whole other level of training that he would have to go through with his feline. Man, wouldn't it be an embarrassing way to go; eaten by your own pet because you're a tempting-looking tiny bird? It would be a funny way to go for sure... but man that would also kind of suck...

And the clothes... Piérre was about to find out very quickly how difficult it would be to master the art of keeping his clothes...

But that story is better told in a different place. To conclude this one, we will say that it took the better part of about an hour for Piérre to finally manage to revert back into his human form and go tumbling into Romeo's arms entirely buck naked after falling off the sink that he had been put on to avoid quote 'falling into the plumbing' or 'getting stepped on'. Aside from this prior remark, this one part of the story is finished, and it will end by saying that Piérre Marchonné, Hogwart's local Britalian and eccentric, became an accomplished hummingbird animagus on August 26th of 2023, only a week before the start of the next school year.