Day 1: There's Something In The Pumpkin Juice...

[lesmods]

Who: Everyone!
Where: The Great Hall
When: Monday, February 4th, 2013 at Breakfast
Format: Go to town with whatever you'd like
Open/Closed: OPEN

Breakfast time at Hogwarts! The early risers are giddy and fresh with the brisk sunshine of a winter morning. The late risers are just managing to groggily shake out their bed-heads. The long, narrow house tables fill up with an attractive assortment of pastries, breakfast meats, toast, rice, and eggs, with selections ranging from a light continental breakfast to a full English or Asian-style breakfast. The pumpkins juice flows freely during the winter season, the squash in storage plentiful until the approach of spring.

But what's this? Some of the juice goblets taste a little… funny today, especially those belonging to muggle-born witches and wizards. Did pumpkin juice always taste slightly rancid? Have the pumpkins rotted too early? Did the cook or the house-elves go nuts with the spices?

The answer rings loud and clear by the time mid-morning approaches. With any fortune, the hospital wing and our resident Potions Mistress is ready for the onslaught of visitors that day.

((NOTE: Welcome to the first Les Warts Event! As described in the Out-of-Character Event Description, one-by-one, some choice students (and Professors) will succumb to the effects of a poisoned drink. Perhaps you end up with nothing more than a terrible stomach ache and a full day in the loo, the unpleasant and vile effects of a swig of Laxative Potion. Or worse yet, you end up as one of the unlucky few to receive Venomous Tentacula Juice in your morning drink, in which your insides burn irrepressibly and the skin turns a rather plummy shade of purple.

Only one pattern exists, to those characters sharp enough to observe the results of this prank and put two and two together: Only muggle-born witches and wizards have been targeted.

Feel free to play as you like. A mean-spirited prank seems to be the culprit… But who might have done such a thing? Was it an outcast, seeking revenge? Was it your best friend, looking for a quick laugh? Or is it something else completely?

All students will be administered cures by our Healer and Potions Professor by the end of the day. Aside from that, anything goes!))

Comments

SLYTHERIN COMMON ROOM; open

[abaisse]

[Enjolras visit his friends in the hospital wing and discusses matters with the amis before retuning to his common room. Not all of his Slytherin housemates are scumbags. Many of them are pretty decent (if ambitious) people.

But some of them are giggling to themselves in the corner, having amused conversations about today's events.

After living with them for a number of years, Enjolras knows exactly which ones of them have the capability to pull off something like this, and which ones would think it fitting to go after muggleborns in this way. He notes them around the room and makes a note to have a talk with them a little later. It may be that they're entirely innocent in this venture, but even if that's the case, Enjolras can find ways to encourage them to think more kindly of their fellow man.

But in the meantime, he'd like some of the giggling to stop. Enjolras' reputation as one of the best duelists in his year is a great advantage sometimes.]

If any of you think what happened today is funny, I'd like to take that up with you.

[pavement]

[ Éponine, her pockets considerably heavier than when she woke up this morning, slinks into a chair by the corner in time to hear Enjolras address a few more stuck up housemates. Serves them right, she thinks to herself, a hand in her pocket to rub her thumb over a now warm galleon. That's a good feeling.

Best not to. [ She advises cooly. ]

[abaisse]

What was that?

[Enjolras looks over, too distracted to have heard her properly. While he's aware Eponine and her family can be a bit shady, she's Marius' friend and he doubts she would do something like this without any sort of return for herself.]

[pavement]

[ Looking up from examining her winter-dry hands, she replies: ]

I'd just said that it's best not to pursue a fight about it with you. Too much of a mess out there, better not bring more mess in here. [ She twitches her lips and her nose. ] 'Sides, this lot wouldn't be so helpful since it's information you want.

[abaisse]

I'm not expecting them to volunteer anything.

[Whether or not he can get any out of them though- he looks around the room.] This is serious, Thenardier. If someone in our house is responsible, I'm not sitting idly by.

( 'puff table, leading into, well, everywhere )

[veryliterary]

[ It's become increasingly clear to 'Chetta, with more students ending up on the floor than in their seats, that this is some awful, dreadful attack on those - at least those she knows - not born into Wizarding families.

And here she is, standing on a bench, clutching her robes and waiting for the effects of the pumpkin juice to hit her.

Belatedly.

Perhaps.

Isn't that what's happening right now? How did she get out of this scot-free? ]

Hallways - anyone feel free to interrupt him, he's texting his bro

[order_and_light]

[As more and more students fall sick, Gagnon intuits the pattern. It's a family trait, the ability to sense a pattern, a motivation, a secret, even before one can articulate it. This isn't simple food poisoning—this is a crime.]

[He stalks toward the Headmaster's office, Cane trailing him, charm-enhanced mobile out, texting as he stalks.]

a remote second-floor bathroom

[petit_oiseau]

[Most of the bathrooms are pretty full by this point, but about an hour after breakfast, one of the mostly-vacant ones suddenly and mysteriously starts to flood.

It's not occupied at the moment, since it's located in an obscure corner of the castle, but there is a lot of water and some sewage involved. Enough, say, to warrant the attention of the caretaker and any professors who might be in the immediate vicinity, and to keep them occupied for at least a few hours of cleanup.

The timing of it all does seem kind of convenient, considering it gives Les Amis that much more time to conduct their own investigations, but the staff probably have more pressing things to worry about. Besides, it can probably be blamed on all the other bathrooms seeing so much use today. Water pressure...and things.]

[order_and_light]

[The timing of this seems very convenient. With the junior Justice League out there distributing propaganda, half of the school in the infirmary, and student feelings and gossip snapping around the halls like live wires, custodial work is the last thing Gagnon wants to pay attention to.]

Everyone off to class! Or the infirmary. Unless you can contribute anything other than dramatic gagging. [He crosses his arms and waits for the few students rubbernecking in the hallway, watching the water gush out across the floor, to disperse.

As they do, Cane splashes on into the water, stopping at a slight dip near the bathroom door where the water's pooling to lap up a few mouthfuls.]

I'm trading you in.

[inseine]

[Just off to the side and out of reach of the lapping, stinking water stands none other than Gagnon's half-brother. He appears to have been a fresh arrival as well, but whether he showed up moments before or moments after Gagnon is a mystery. He appraises the gushing sewage with a dour grimace and a hand at his temple. His other hand clutches a crinkled-up pile of parchment fliers for Combeferre and Enjolras's fool advertisement.

He tosses a resolutely annoyed look at Gagnon (but not without a brief disgusted twitch of his lip at that vile dog of yours first).]

Apparently my inkling was too slow for this one. What the devil were you messaging me for? Tell me quickly, I shall have to run soon.

[order_and_light]

Students forming impromptu investigative committees. The pacifist's handing those out in the halls to anyone he can reach. [He nods toward the pile of fliers clutched in Javert's hand.] This stinks of distraction.

Cane! [Stop playing in the damned sewage water, dog.]

[inseine]

[Literally stinks. Javert waves Gagnon off with the crumpled fliers.]

So I have gathered, [he mutters through his teeth.] The belligerent and his pacifist will get an earful when I pinch them, I swear it. Plastering targets on their backs! What a method for reconnaissance! They overcomplicate matters.

[He rolls his eyes, then throws another abrupt look to Gagnon.]

When you finish here, check for renegade meetings, [he instructs.] I'll send eyes to the common rooms. Get me or tell the Headmaster if there are any new problems.

This will not be the last of it.

[order_and_light]

If they weren't as simple as they are earnest, I'd imagine they were drumming up sympathy for their cause. But they show all their colors at first glance. No conspirists in that group.

[He sighs and uncrosses his arms. Right. Unto the breach.] Tell the archer to watch the grounds. They may try for secrecy there.

[And he slogs on into the water, mouth set in a hard line of distaste. Cane's long since disappeared into the bathroom, where he can be heard barking occasionally at the toilets.]

[inseine]

Noted, [he calls after Gagnon as he traverses the perils of Mount Crapmore.

Javert shakes his head and wrinkles his nose in disgust, casts a discerning stare down to his crumpled fliers, and turns to sweep back in the direction he came. Perhaps a quick slip-in past the portrait of the Fat Lady to the Gryffindor common room is in order. Something... something tells him that a Gryffindor is at the bottom of this. Too juvenile for the orderly Hufflepuffs and cerebral Ravenclaws; not malicious enough for the Slytherins.

Bound to be a Gryffinder, damn them! And he has just the two most likely suspects in mind. Now if only he can catch one of them red-handed and coax the location of this little powwow out, he can quash this idiocy before it gets out of hand.]

[order_and_light]

[Gagnon, meanwhile, will spend a good hour slogging about in the restroom. Magical plumbing was nowhere on his list of skills before taking this job, but it doesn't take much beyond a few charms that test for the presence of magic and a little observation to determine the cause of the mess: paper and a few spells any first-year might have picked up.

After having sifted through his pockets for the right combination of magical devices to pick the spells apart—working with magic, for him, is like jimmying a lock where everyone else uses a key, a careful process of feeling out and defeating invisible mechanisms with just the right tools—he undoes what he can and delegates the final steps and the majority of the clean-up to two house elves.

Then he goes to change clothes and consider locking Cane up for the rest of the day. Useless animal.]