Detention: Reese Prichard; Derfael Ashburry-Hawthorne

[Calvin Fletcher]

Having to hurry his dinner along didn’t leave the man in a very good mood, least of all when he had to hurry so he could spend an evening with two of his least preferred students.

Fletcher got to the corridor and got the room ready before moving to stand outside the door. There he would wait for the pair to arrive. The Headmaster would be joining them during the course of the detention and there was quite literally a lot of work to be done before they left. His only hope was that the boys would keep their rotten attitudes to themselves. The night would go smoothly if both boys learned how to conduct themselves and not have their mouths running unnecessarily.

The man wouldn’t be holding his breath.

[Julian Scrimgeour]

The appearance of Noble didn't phase the headmaster. He knew that Fletcher had invited the man to observe what disappointments the two Hufflepuffs were. Well, one of his Hufflepuffs. The younger of the two had brought disgrace to that House and would be leaving the castle in just a handful of hours. Good riddance.

"Do as you wish, Noble. The brat isn't going to be our problem for much longer," Scrimgeour replied after Prichard was far down the corridor.

With a grunt, the old man then turned for the door and magically unlocked it. He passed through the doorway, leaving it open in the event that the Head of House decided to see how his Prefect was fairing, and went to stand beside Fletcher.

"Prichard won't be joining us," he announced, not caring if Ashburry-Hawthorne overheard (in fact, that might have been a good thing if he did — maybe it would give him some valuable insight). "He will be leaving the castle in the morning."

His eyes then gazed at the work that the older Hufflepuff was doing. He seemed to be progressing far better than his ex-peer. The speed that the boy was going, though, seemed a little ... slow, did it not?

[sweetpinkpixie]

The Hufflepuff was not entirely unfamiliar to this kind of work. Having assisted both mum and dad in various cleaning adventures including the restoration of certain herbology texts they had unveiled in yard sales or happened upon in old dusty bookshops. He had even had to help restore some paintings with his dad. Rare treasures his dad had stumbled upon and wanted to surprise his mum with for her birthday or some other occasion. So no one could honestly look at the manner in which he handled any of the objects in this room and not call him methodical and diligent - perhaps to his on detriment but these sorts of things DID take time and a steady hand. And, well, Derf was willing to put in the effort. Especially if there may be something useful to the school to be found in here. Perhaps a forgotten text on creatures?

As it turned out, the tome he had been carefully working the cover with - and was now applying a bit of polish with a sponge as a final touch - was not a tome at all but one a sort of medieval looking grimoire on defensive ritual magic. Runic based if some of the detailing on the cover was of any indication. Which, naturally made the Hufflepuff curious as to its contents....

...but no sooner had he finished applying some polish to the spine when the door to the room flew open and in walked Headmaster Scrimgeour. Blinking a few times, mostly to process, his curious blues drifted to behind the man where he saw Professor Noble standing. Sweet Scamander...this seemed a bit of overkill in supervising the cleaning of school property, didn't it? And if it was meant to shame the 16-year-old, well, it didn't. He was fully committed to the task at hand and the spotless book now in his possession was a testament to that.

And then his heart sunk. Reese Callum had been expelled from Hogwarts. Though, for the briefest of moments, he did wonder if that was the more merciful fate. His mouth twitched to say something, gaze shifting to his Head of House, but any thought he may have wished to voice died in the air as he exhaled.

Instead, with a heavy sigh of disappointment, he walked over to the appropriate shelf and made sure the spot was clean before setting the text there and returning to the pile to sort through some loose leaf pieces of parchment and scrolls - dust and moths clouding the air around him and causing him to cough uncomfortably.

[Calvin Fletcher]

Calvin watched the boy clean while his mind drifted back to the other side of the door. Since the Headmaster pulled Prichard back out, he hadn’t heard another peep. Whether this was a blessing was yet to be seen but anything to keep the boy out of his hair.

In the next moment, they were joined by Scrimgeour and....oh? The slight raise of his brow was all the reaction the man gave to the Headmaster’s words. He couldn’t say he was surprised, in the same vein he couldn’t say he was particularly saddened either. Prichard had been steadily working toward that expulsion since he first day of school. The fact it all culminated tonight was one of those matters of time. If not tonight in this detention, it would’ve been another night with a different detention.

”Make yourself comfortable, we’ve got a while in here.” He said instead as he conjured a second chair.

The Divination Professor watched the Hufflepuff place the artefact down, watched him turn to find another and watched the item return to its original spot on the ground, once again covered with dust and grim as if the boy had never touched it.

Strange how that worked.

[sweetpinkpixie]

He did not notice what had become of the grimoire he had been diligently working on, not yet at least. Instead the sixth year was sorting through a stack of parchment that was achingly out of order. He had page one...but then the next page was page 50 followed by two and three but then all the way back up to 30. His eyes did not stop to read just WHAT he was sorting, not yet, and honed on on arranging the pages just right. It took a few minutes, but thankfully whoever the author had been was assiduous in their numbering and labeling.

Blowing and wiping off some lingering dust, Derf searched around the nearby pile for something - anything - that he could use to fasten the papers together...which he thankfully did find in a dusty box of paper clip clamps hidden beneath tattered heavy fabrics. Cleaning the clip as well, Derf gave the papers one more flip through just to be sure that everything was in order and then moved back over to the shelf....and nearly tripped over the book he had been working on before.

Only he didn't recognize it as such just yet - seeing as the cover had reverted and the title indistinguishable once more. The only thing that registered in the Hufflepuff's mind was that this book had not been there before. Tilting his head curiously and wondering which pile it had tumbled off from, the sixth year moved to the shelf to place the unpublished manuscript when he saw the book he had placed her not five minutes ago was.......missing?

"What? Where did it go?" Had it sprouted legs and run off? It wouldn't surprise him seeing how The Monster Book of Monsters behaved. Spinning around and looking for footprints, his usually bright blued muddied a bit as looked around...and eyes fell on the book on the floor. Cautiously, and tucking the clipped papers under his arm, Derf picked up the book and removed the cloth he had used to clean its leather covered from his shoulder and wiped firmly across the cover. He had to reapply some cleaning solutions again and even more elbow grease...but soon the title revealed itself again.

........it was the same book and all that time spent cleaning it until it all but sparkled had been for not.

So...even following instructions, without protest, and giving the task assigned to you your wholehearted effort meant...absolutely nothing? More punishment since he had to clean it all over again? It all seemed quite contradictory to what was expected and a waste of everyone's time.

Confusion practically tattooed across his forehead, he looked over at the now trio of men for some sort of explanation.

"Was....the level of cleanliness unsatisfactory, professor?" Holding his tongue to keep the rest of his opinions to himself.

[Julian Scrimgeour]

The eyebrow raise from Fletcher was to be expected. Scrimgeour assumed that the man was rather pleased at the expulsion of the Prichard boy. Quite frankly, the headmaster was too. Now there was one less problem that they would have to deal with.

The old man gladly accepted the chair that Fletcher conjured for him. A nod of appreciation was given to the professor as he sat down.

Cold blue eyes then shifted over to Ashburry-Hawthorne. Truth be told, the ex-Auror was almost impressed at how well he was holding his tongue. Surely there was a comment about Prichard and the decision that had been made somewhere in that mind of his. But thankfully one didn't sound. A valuable lesson was being learned, he noted.

The boy's sudden confusion prompted a smirk to play on the man's lips, but he had to force himself to stifle it. Was the cleaning unsatisfactory? Probably not. But this was what detention was for. The headmaster turned toward Fletcher, waiting to see what his response would be.

[Calvin Fletcher]

“Not at all, Mr. Ashbury-Hawthorne.” The man said with an airy sort of undertone to his voice. He had been waiting for the boy to realize, and was equally keen to see his reaction. Satisfactory, as was his cleaning.

While he was quite aware of the Headmaster’s gaze, Fletcher kept his attention on the boy. “I think you’ve done a superb job. One you can do again, and again....and again until I decide I’ve had enough and would like to be somewhere else.” This was detention. It was punishment. Whatever punishment he decided. The Hufflepuff would scrub and waste his time and see his efforts amount to nothing until the Divination Professor got bored.

They had already established that the boy had learned his lesson, didn’t mean there wouldn’t still be punishment. Real punishment. Not this rag and dusting foolishness. Anyone could do that. No. Derfael would truly be wasting his time here tonight, incentive perhaps to not get detention again.

Surely the boy could think of several things he could be doing that didn’t involve repetitive cleaning that would meet no end goal.

[sweetpinkpixie]

Okay...but given the state of this room and the sheer volume of items to be sorted and cleaned he WOULD be doing this again and again and again regardless. So Derf saw no logic in this process as it was literally a waste of all three men's time - which was still surreal, by the way, to have his Head of House, the Headmaster, and Divination professor ALL in here now wasting everyone's time until the Professor Fletcher became bored - as he put it.

But he did not stop his efforts and set the stack of parchments clipped together on the shelf despite knowing the consequences of doing so. Did this also mean there was never any real intention of making use of this room and all of the wonders contained within? That was perhaps the only true punishment Derf felt right now: all this wasted potential. Which once again seemed incredibly contradictory to what this new era at Hogwarts was supposedly aiming to establish. ".....and what is to become of all of this?" he asked as he once again began to diligently clean the cover once again with the rag and cleaning solution. "....since no matter the diligence of my efforts, it will all amount to nothing."

He was now looking sadly at the grimoire balance on his arm. It was just...going to stay this dusty old forgotten book in this room?

But no, there was no protest nor any real outward indication in his facial expressions how he felt about this. Yes, there were loads of things he would rather be doing right now...but he was sure that held true for the the men as well. As monotonous as his own manual labor was, they were just sitting and.....watching. Derf would get bored himself after about ten minutes, though he reckoned that would not be the case when it came to the Divination professor. Short a fuse and impatient as the man seemed to be, the Hufflepuff felt it a fair assumption that he would be sure to drag this out for as long as he could. Still, Derf could keep himself entertained. Like right now he was trying to recall the order in which the runes had been embroidered and engraved in the cover...so it was a sort of memory quiz as each slowly revealed itself.

[Calvin Fletcher]

Waste of his own time? Merlin no. As always, the man had some work to be graded. Detention, as it turned out, was an excellent place to get things done once the monotony of the exercise kicked in. Outside of that, he had Scrimgeour—an entertaining man in his own right. He was a simple man and could, indeed, have this dragging for as long as he needed.

Calvin reached into his extended pocket for the parchments and his quill. He got through making check marks on the first before looking back to the boy. “They’ll ultimately remain as they are, unless you’d like to come back after your week of tedium to properly get things set in order.”

It was all the same to him.

The point of this right here was there were better things you could be doing when you don’t do things to land yourself in detention. It would remain intentionally pointless and he would go back to his grading while the boy worked.