Attack of the Bulbs PV Edwin Westbridge Finished

Herbology often wasn't a subject that excited Edwin much. He had, on occasion, found himself mildly interested when the teacher showed off various plants that were slightly more active, in particular the bouncing bulbs that they'd covered earlier in the year, but they hadn't the chance to even see matured versions of the plants. He did, however, expect that in later years the subject would likely sky rocket towards the more interesting lessons, when they were finally allowed into the other greenhouses, and allowed to see some of the more dangerous plants, as well as how to deal with them. Not allowing them to have seen mature bulbs had never made much sense to Edwin, it wasn't as if Incendio was some overly complex spell, so surely the first years were more than equipped to deal with the bulbs, and yet they hadn't been given the opportunity to even see them from a distance. It was frustrating, but there was nothing that Edwin could do about it.

After his dinner, Edwin began his aimless wandering, as he so often did. The walk was slightly later than his usual walk would be, but it painted a different scene outside of the castle, one that he was surprisingly enjoying. He rubbed his gloved hands together, deeply exhaling, watching as his breath curled up into the darkening sky. It wouldn't be long before the days started to get longer, and longer, but for the time being, he enjoyed walking about in the dark, even if it wasn't particularly late. Even if he had mixed feelings towards the school, he could admit the castles beauty when it was lit against the sky, as he glanced briefly back towards it.

During his walk, he hadn't expected to really run into anyone else, especially not somebody who was suspiciously trying to peer into one of the greenhouses, wiping away at the fogged glass panels. Typically, he would have just continued onwards and ignored her, but she was clearly there with a purpose, which was enough to tempt his curiosity. Instead, he wandered over towards her, his shoes crunching through the frost with each step. When he finally got closer, he stepped into the space that she had just occupied before moving back, peering through the peep hole that she had previously cleared of any fog or frost. "What are you even looking for?" He drawled, his eyes darting about the greenhouse, before eventually falling onto the boxes. He couldn't be one hundred percent certain, but given how they'd been given to mature, it didn't seem impossible that the boxes contained matured bouncing bulbs, packed and ready to move into one of the older year groups greenhouses.

"Seems a shame if they're right there." He muttered, mainly to himself, but likely just loud enough so that Avis could of heard him. He took a step back, his gaze flicking about the greenhouses exterior for a moment, before eventually letting out a dramatic sigh.

"How are you with locks?" He spoke directly to Avis, now turning to face her. "I reckon we were both looking at the same thing, and seems a shame not to get a closer look if they're right there." He hadn't checked to see if the greenhouses were locked, but given that classes had long since finished, he assumed there was no chance that they were still unlocked, and breaking a to sneak in hardly seemed worth the potential punishment.

Avis was only a few steps away from her previous position when the sudden crunch of footsteps behind her had her whirling around, wand drawn and at the ready.

A boy stood peering through her handmade peephole, looking… quite bored actually. She watched as he repeated her previous actions, scanning the interior of the greenhouse, drawling out a question as he looked. Her reply came out in a stream of stutters as her nerves still stood on end from the surprise of his presence. Maybe she hadn’t been as careful as she’d thought.

“Y-you.. I…” she started, wand still drawn. She sighed, forcing her arm back down by her side. “Merlin’s Beard, you scared the dementor shite out of me,” Avis muttered. She barely caught his next words but she made an educated guess that he was talking about the Bulb boxes as well. The boy stepped back and sighed to which the Ravenclaw cocked her head curiously.

“Yes. It is a shame,” she replied, narrowing her eyes. Was he some sort of prefect in disguise? Was this a trap? What in the blazes was he doing out here anyway?

His next question banished her suspicions as quickly as they’d come. It seemed the two had the same goal in mind. Avis shrugged, meeting his disconcerting yet bored gaze with her own quizzical expression. Right to business then.

“Got myself out of an enchanted broom closet once. How hard can a greenhouse be?” she replied and turned to continue towards the double glass door entrance. She studied it carefully, wondering what sort of spells might be keeping the thing closed off to overly curious students like herself and her new companion. Maybe Aberto would do the trick? Without another thought and as impulsive as ever, Avis pulled out her wand and repeated the incantation, pointing her wand directly at the doors. They shuddered in a promising manner but remained as deceivingly stalwart as ever. In fact now that she thought about it, Avis was glad her arm hadn’t been turned into a tree branch or something. She straightened. Without breaking and entering, the girl was at a loss, unless…

“Is it too much to hope that there might be another less protected entrance somewhere? Maybe for the House Elves to go in for weeding and such?” she called back towards the boy. She turned to see where he’d ended up and hoped he had found some sort of solution where she had not. Avis raised an eyebrow. “Are you any good with locks?” she added as an afterthought.

Edwin snorted at her stammered response, whilst he hadn't intended to make her jump, the result was amusing regardless. He had half a mind to mock the stutter, but there was a greater task at hand, getting to those bulbs. "Sorry about that." He said, though his tone was insincere, if anything there was a trace of amusement in his tone.

As she agreed with his sentiment about it being a shame, his eyes were drawn down a large pebble just besides the greenhouses. That would certainly create a way in for them, but the punishment on the other side would hardly be worth the trouble, so after only a moment, he ripped his gaze away from the pebble. "Piece of cake comparatively, I'm sure." He said with a grin, as she described her experience with locks. He followed after her, washing intently as she withdrew her wand, and pointed it at the locks. "Well?" His question was answered by the doors shake, not being forced opened by the spell. "Turns out greenhouses are harder than broom cupboards, then." He drawled, stepping back away, once more looking about the greenhouse.

"Not a bad idea, actually.." He muttered, beginning to slowly circle around the greenhouse. "Dunno if we'd fit in a House elf door though, they are rather small, and I'm not keen on crawling about." He was beginning to curse his lack of awareness in classes. Someone who paid more attention to their surroundings likely would of noticed any second doors whilst in classes, but Edwin rarely looked away from his plant pot, or area which he was working in.

"I'm awful with locks, haven't really bothered practicing any of those charms." He admitted. "Guess we've got to just hope that was a lock thing, not an issue with your spell." It sound harsh, but given the initial failure to unlock the doors, they were seemingly left with only a couple of options. Some backdoor that he hadn't yet gotten around to discovering, or quite literally breaking it, and he was far from keen for the latter. No amount of bouncing bulbs would be worth the amount of detentions, or worst, they'd receive for vandalising a greenhouse.

"Oh, here." He called, as he rounded another corner, greeted with the greenhouses backdoor. He reached out quickly, trying to pull open the doors,, which immediately resisted, locked as the front doors had been. "Come try these doors." He called once more, stepping back and waiting for her to arrive. Whilst the spell hadn't worked on the front doors, he was confident that it would work now, or at the very least, he was hopeful they'd work now. If the spell once again failed to open the door, they'd be left with very few options for entry, none of which he wanted to explore.

Avis made a face at his blunt comment about her earlier spell, but he had a point. Aberto wasn’t exactly the strongest unlocking spell in the books but she’d hoped for it to at least do something. Apparently the Herbology professor was a bit more cautious with her plants than it seemed. The Ravenclaw sighed. Maybe the issue was her spell power. But she certainly wasn’t going to admit that to someone she’d just met, especially this rather straightforward and not overly nice boy. Avis drew herself up and looked back at Edwin only to discover that he’d already begun searching again.

His voice echoed around the corner at the other end of the greenhouse and Avis made her way over, trying to hurry but looking rather ridiculous attempting to run in the icy snow.

When she reached the doors he’d referred to, Avis wrinkled her nose at the sight. They were overgrown with vines and weeds and looked as though they hadn’t been touched in years… well, before Edwin had tried to open them moments ago. Avis pulled out her wand once again.

“I’ll snap you in half if this doesn’t work,” she muttered to her wand. The girl closed her eyes, not caring if she looked like a ninny for a moment, and visualized the door bursting open and the vines ripping away. She gathered up her strength and set her jaw. Merlin this was going to be humiliating if it didn’t work.

“Aberto!” she cried, her eyes flying open as she jabbed her wand forward with a violent thrust of her skinny arm. A whoosh of blue light flared in front of the them for a moment and the rusty old doors flew open with a loud bang. Avis lowered her wand and stared through the opening, her hair ruffled and standing up in strange places from the energy she’d just procured.

“Bit loud,” she said frankly,” But we’re in.”

Avis took a cautious step forward to peer through the gloom of the magical jungle in front of them. Strange vines lay limp in a large pot to their left, as if they were sleeping almost, and a couple baby mandrakes were stuffed safely into the dirt beyond the vines. A few leaves rustled in the background every so often and Avis’ head swiveled back and forth as she scanned the room. She hated Herbology, so much so that she’d been assigned a tutor every week just to keep up in the class. Whatever the opposite of a green thumb was, Avis had it but luckily, she’d always been skilled at killing plants. In fact, it was the only part of the class she excelled at. And it seemed the two vigilantes might need that skill sooner or (hopefully) later.

@Edwin Westbridge

Edwin snorted as Avis threatened her own wand, taking a step back so that she had plenty of room to work with. "Please work," He said, his voice barley above a whisper, watching expectantly. Whilst she composed herself, he waited impatiently, wiping his hand clean against his robes, as it had been covered in dust when he had attempted to pull open the door.

Edwin grinned appreciatively as the doors flung open, offering a small nod of agreement to her assessment. "Bit loud, indeed." He muttered, following her into the greenhouse. "I'll have to learn that spell at some point, I'd of had to throw a stone at the wall or something if you hadn't known that."

Whilst none of the plants seemed overly interesting during the day, he suddenly found himself incredibly interested in anything and everything in the greenhouse, given that there was no professor to restrict his access. Ultimately, the main target of his interest lay in the large, sealed boxes at the end of the greenhouse, and he was incredibly tempted to march right over to them, and unseal them. "What do you reckon the adult ones are like?" He asked, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the boxes. "Will they just fly out when we open the box, or do you think we need to prod them first?" He was sure that'd been mentioned in the class, but since the moment he'd been shown the baby ones, his mind had already wandered off, imaging what the larger ones would be like.

Whilst he wandered down towards the end of the greenhouse, he briefly came to a halt besides a batch of potted baby mandrakes. Some part of him was desperately tempted to rip the mandrake free from it's pot, but he stopped himself, realising that would be an incredibly stupid thing to do, and given it's shriek, almost guarantee they would be caught. However, having the ability to do so without a professor there to stop him was an exciting possibility regardless.

As he grew closer to the sealed boxes, he did draw his wand from his pocket, holding it idly by his side. He couldn't quite remember whether it was incendio or flipendo that the mature bulbs required, not that he was sure he would need either. In an ideal world, he wouldn't have to cast either, as he only wished to look at the matured bulbs, not fight them. Though, some part of him, some part he previously wasn't entirely aware of, was somewhat excited by the prospect.

"Let's just look at one each, I guess." He said, as he finally reached the piled boxes. The bulbs likely weren't fully matured yet, given that they were said to grow to the size of doors when fully grown, but they had simply outgrown the first years capabilities at their current sizes. He lifted the top box, letting out a surprised grunt from the weight as he did so, before settling to down in front of him. Thankfully, the books didn't seem magically sealed, just layers of ropes tangled around the outside of the box, which Edwin set to unwrapping.

Even when he had finally freed the box of its bindings, and slid the lid off, the bulb was tied down with restraints, which it seemed to be straining against. "What do you think?" He asked, his hand lurking near a clip which, presumably, would undo the restraints.

“Well you’re welcome for keeping us out of detention for the moment,” she replied in a lighthearted tone. Of course, their adventuring wasn’t exactly over yet but Avis sincerely hoped the two could continue to avoid any broken glass… or pots… or bones for that matter.

As Edwin wandered towards the Mandrake pots, Avis found herself captivated by a dead Fire Seed Bush and wondered for a moment if there was any way to relight the poor thing. She remembered the lesson in class and the way the seed of the bush had scorched Professor Toussaint’s leather gloves and at that thought she carefully backed away. She turned as Edwin said something from across the room.

“Hmm? Oh I dunno. I’ve only ever seen the baby ones but my sister said she saw an older one in our garden at home that shot vines at her… unprovoked I believe,” Avis rambled distractedly, carefully inching around a plant with razor sharp thorns and a peculiar smell.

After her partner paused to observe the potted (and fortunately silent) Mandrakes, he moved forward towards the Bulb boxes and Avis hurried after him, taking care not to brush any passing plants in her path. The girl was beginning to realize there was no telling as to what was being housed in here after hours.

As they reached the boxes, Avis nodded at his suggestion. One at a time seemed quite manageable. Besides, how dangerous could a single Bouncing Bulb be when two capable first years had their wands drawn and at the ready?

Avis watched with nervous anticipation as he rid the box of its ropes and slid the lid off. She leaned forward, hardly containing her excitement. Inside the box was a large lumpy purple bulb, straining desperately against its restraints. Avis grinned.

“What do you think?” Edwin asked, his hand floating above the clip. The Ravenclaw could feel the wisdom disappearing from her head as curiosity instantly took its place. The bulb was just a bit over waist height on her it looked like and from what she could remember, the things only attacked when threatened… or maybe they attacked regardless? Either way, she wanted to see it bounce around and maybe brag about it later to her older brother Will. He’d be thoroughly impressed with this adventure and at that thought, Avis made her decision.

“I say we let it out. Just don’t make any sudden movements… I guess?” Avis replied, question creeping into tone. A wicked grin suddenly flickered onto her face at another thought. She moved towards another box. “Right never mind my last idea. What if we had one for each of us and we try to ride them? We could be bulb wranglers!” she laughed, tearing away the ropes from her own box. These bulbs weren’t nearly big enough to cause too many problems and there was enough space in the aisles to possibly maneuver one around. Her hand settled onto the bulb’s clip, its movements jerking the box.

Without waiting for a response from Edwin, Avis’ impulsiveness took over.

“On three!” she chirped and took a breath. All she had to do was grab the vines and leap on top of the bulb, just like mounting a broom really. A moving, round, purple broom with shooting vines. Avis shook her head. She would do it and she would tell Will all about it afterwards. Seeing as Edwin had taken the initiative to open the box in the first place, she didn’t doubt his adventuring capabilities either.

“Three!” she shouted and unlatched the clip. The bulb leapt out of the box and Avis barely managed to grasp onto a vine before it dragged her small form down the aisle with a violent tug forward and chaos ensued.

@Edwin Westbridge

"Sounds good with me," He nodded, his fingers inching ever closer to the bulbs clips. "Just want a look after all." He muttered beneath his breath, his fingers eventually settling on the clips, glancing briefly over towards her as she spoke of her new plan. The idea seemed comical, if not stupid to Edwin, unsure of how he logistics of that would even work. However, he could admit, the image that had been formed in his mind was quite amusing. "Reckon I'll leave that to you, I'm just wanting to see them when they're grown, not get flung about by one."

"Yup," He said to her count, his fingers itching to pull open the clips, and free the bulb. His mind raced between spells as he waited, desperately trying to remember which spell it was that was useful for matured bulbs, and which was useful for the babies. "Incendio." He concluded quietly, his mind now set on a singular spell that he would employ, should the bulb bounce too far out of his control.

On her count, he released the clips, leaning forward ever so slightly as to see how the bulb would react to its new found freedom. The Gryffindor displayed an impressive lack of survival instincts, remaining completely still as the bulb flung itself upwards, only narrowly missing his face by a matter of millimetres. "Woah," was all that he said, peering over the now empty box. After a moment of stunned silence, he glanced to the now empty space besides him, which had been occupied by Avis only moments prior. "How's your bu- Oh my." He looked back over his shoulder, watching as she was abducted by the bulb. "Suppose your plan to fly does work then."

It was as Edwin was turned around, no longer keeping an eye on the bulb he had freed, that the free bouncing bulb fell quickly back towards the floor, smashing through another one of the stacked boxes, freeing it's fellow bouncing bulb. This was an unfortunate domino effect caused by Edwins momentary lapse in concentration. The more bulbs that bounced about freely, the more of the boxes that were smashed through by the increasingly out of control bouncing bulbs.

In a moment that could only be described as brilliant, Edwin took to action. He rose from his crouching point, directing his wand in the direction of the bulbs with a dramatic flair. His deeply routed admiration for theatrics, paired with a rather embarrassing grip on his wand was ultimately his undoing, his attempt at a dramatic brandishing of his wand resulting in him accidentally tossing his wand across the greenhouse, before he had even managed to think about casting a spell. "Oh no," He watched in horror, as his wand landed in the corner of the greenhouse.

A wiser man would have likely felt some kind of fear without a wand, whilst in such close proximity with bouncing bulbs. Edwin, however, was not a wise man, and held a naive sense of invincibility, certain that something would come to his rescue if he wasn't able to retrieve his wand. Without any hesitation, Edwin began to pace over towards where his wand had replied, only making it a few steps before letting out a yell of shock. "Bastard things!" He yelled out, a bulb having flew downwards directly onto his foot, forcing him to continue his stride in a hobble, muttering angrily beneath his breath with each step, shooting the bouncing bulbs a glare.

Obviously, to have reached this particular point, not many thoughts had been going through Avis’ head during this escapade to the first year greenhouse and now the only thoughts that seemed to be appearing at the moment were a few choice swear words that Mam would have simply fainted away at hearing them come out of her 11 year old daughter’s mouth. Avis decided however to just repeat her favorite one.

“Bollocks. Bollocks. Bollocks,” she swore under her breath as she struggled to get a hold of the bulb bouncing widely through the exotic shrubbery of the Herbology classroom. The easy choice was to simply let go of the vine she had managed to snatch when she released the bulb in the first place but to Avis’ bitter surprise, the vines seemed to have minds of their own and one of them was currently wrapped tightly around her wrist and forearm, her other arm flailing wildly behind her, wand in an iron grip.

As she and the bulb bounced dangerously close to the Mandrake pots, a crash from the other side of the room drew Avis’ unsteady gaze to her partner in crime, who seemed to now be facing his own predicament. Luckily it looked like he was about to handle the situation and Avis was actually quite impressed that he was maintaining his regular dull expression as chaos erupted around him. Losing sight of him briefly as Avis was whipped to the side, smashing her already bruised bottom into the ground, the girl managed to flip over and using all the strength in her stick-like form, she hoisted herself onto the bulb and held on for dear life. Both hands were clutching vines now, her left one still trapped in the tangle of green and purple. She looked up again, vision bouncing wildly, to see Edwin dramatically tossing his wand across the greenhouse. What in seven hells was going on?

Amongst the chaos of crashing boxes and shattering pots, Avis managed to hear him mutter a strangely calm ‘oh, no’ and she couldn’t help but let out a sharp laugh at their situation.

Her humor was short lived, however, when Edwin let out an exclamation of pain, also words her mother would kill her for, and began hobbling about ridiculously on his surely throbbing foot.

“Oi, you alright?” she yelled, her voice uneven from the wild movement of the bulb beneath her.

Before she could listen for a response, however, the bulb took a sharp turn… directly towards the grumpy limping Gryffindor. Great Merlin’s Beard.

“Edwin?!” she managed to call out. “I would suggest perhaps moving a bit more quickly, you know, if you can!” she announced loudly as she and her bulb thundered toward him.

A chorus of thumps soon followed their wake and Avis turned to see three more bulbs gathered behind her, all heading directly for Edwin. Her wand was clutched uselessly in her hand, trapped by more vines as her right arm had been encircled as well. She gulped. Maybe attempting to ride the blasted thing hadn’t been the smartest thing she’d ever done…

Hearing a laugh somewhere behind him was almost enough to make him whirl around, wanting to see what exactly was so humorous about his partners situations. His current predicament, after all, wasn't particularly funny, at least not in this moment. He could, however, see how it would be funny to look back on once the bouncing bulbs weren't threatening to crush his foot once again. This brief moment of hesitation, where he had wanted to turn around, was enough so that a bulb once again smashed down onto the floor, only a matter of centimetres away from his unharmed foot. "When I fetch my wand," He muttered beneath his breath, continuing his hobbling.

"Fine!" He called back to the girl, still not sparing any glances back to check on her, as he grew closer and closer to where he had thrown his wand. He couldn't be entirely sure where it had landed, some clutter having blocked the path, but it surely wouldn't take him long to find it. How many foot long sticks could there be in one room? He thought with a scowl, realising that this was one of the few rooms in a castle where it was possible that there would be a good number of wand-like sticks.

Just as he finally closed in on the corner, the clutter that his wand was surely discarded on just a few steps away, he heard yet another scream coming from his fellow trespasser. This time, having managed to somewhat escape the larger grouping of bulbs that had began to bounce around their initial boxes, Edwin felt safe enough to whirl around, about to plead with Avis to allow him to concentrate, and not distract him from his search efforts. Instead, however, as he turned he was greeted by a number of bulbs rather aggressively bouncing off the ceiling and ground, growing ever closer and closer to him.

"This is not ideal." He muttered calmly, coming to a complete halt, staring ahead at the bulbs, which were drawing even nearer to the Gryffindor. "What should I.." He wondered aloud, his eyes glancing around for any option of cover for evasion, deciding that there was no chance he would reach his wand in time. After a moment of hard thinking and strategising, Edwin dove forward, as if he was diving into a swimming pool, flopping against the concrete ground with an uncomfortable groan. Despite the apparent stupidity of his plan, there had been a fair amount of timing involved, having dove forward so that he would avoid getting clobbered by of the approaching bulbs. A larger part of him than he would care to admit was very tempted to simply remain there, dramatically playing dead in the middle of the greenhouse, and simply wait to be rescued, at which point he would be miraculously revived.

That was not an option, unfortunately. With a disgruntled sigh, Edwin dragged himself back to his feet, finally able to hobble over into the corner where he had lost his wand, immediately setting to sifting through the clutter. "These things are only meant to be aggressive when threatened," He spoke loud enough so that Avis could here, wherever she had been dragged off by the bulbs. "I guess maybe the boxes made them feel threatened."

"Oh, got it!" He called excitably, his fingers curling around his wand at last. This time, he tightened his grip as he whirled around, his eyes flicking between potential bulbs that he could aim at, immediately deciding he shouldn't aim at any around Avis, that would make for an unfortunate trip to the hospital wing, and likely land him in even more trouble. Eventually, he steadied his wand onto one of the bulbs that was still bouncing around the original area, slowly raising and lowering his wand, syncing it to the bulbs bounces, which had slowed, likely feeling no intimidation or reason to bounce erratically any longer.

"Flipendo!" He called, a jet of red light shooting from his wand into the bulb, striking it's target true. It, however, unfortunately achieved nothing, besides from once again provoking the bulb, it's bounces growing erratic, and wild once more. "Flipendo!" Once again, the Gryffindor struck a bulb with his spell, achieving nothing but adding to the chaotic situation within the greenhouse. "Flipendo! Flipendo! Flipendo!"

After a moment of manic casting, Edwin glanced down at his wand with a frown. "Flipendo doesn't work!" He concluded, calling out to Avis. "Do you want me to use Incendio on them? We'll be in tons of trouble if we're setting plants on fire, and I'd rather not.." He began from the relative safety of his corner, no bulbs beginning to intrude into his area quite yet. "Having said that though.. I'd also rather not sneak out, this doesn't look great for someone to randomly walk in on."