Adrienne entered the Astrophysics Lab as quietly as she could, almost feeling like every footstep she made was echoing throughout. She knew this was going to be a long-term assignment, but she wanted to get started on in early, partially to be on top of things and partially because she wanted her pick of the telescopes, which she headed directly towards as soon as she noticed them.

She went for the least rusty-looking one, which still seemed pretty dirty but would probably require less effort to clean. She placed it on the wooden table in front of her and grabbed a cloth to go with it. Then she had to find the cleaning solution. Cleaning solution, cleaning solution, where was the cleaning solution? It took her a moment, but Adrienne noticed a small, dusty bottle of a yellowy liquid next to the lined-up telescopes. That must be it.

The cleaning itself was tedious, and it seemed to be forever later that Adrienne was tapping her fingers against the table, waiting for it to dry, and then (ugh) starting all over again. The grime was just moving around on the scope, and there was no way she’d be able to see through a lens that dusty.

It was just like Professor Airey to want everything to be spick span, squeaky clean. And so Tora was smiling when she walked into the Astrophysics Lab. Until she saw just how dirty the telescope she was expected to clean really was. Billywig rot. She sighed and trudged over to where the grime mountain was waiting for her.

Even the cloth she was was supposed to be cleaning with had already acquired a certain amount of dust where it lay on a stool next to the telescope. Ugh. "Scorgify" she said pointing at the towel. Once it was clean, and once she had located the cleaning solution by Adrienne (not forgetting to give a friendly "Hello" in her direction), she started to work at the filth.

She had written the specific instructions on how to clean the scope on a spare scrap of parchment which she now pulled, a bit rumpled, from her pocket. Rub in clockwise circles.... She read after she had left the light layer of cleaning solution to air dry for a minute. She scorgified the towel again, just because it was disgusting after just one go and got to work scrubbing clockwise all over the telescope.

Adrienne nodded her friendly greeting to Tora, grabbing another towel to try to get rid of some of the dust and rust she’d just been moving around. To her surprise, it was fairly easy, although a glance at the towel showed her just how dirty her telescope had been (it was practically black, she had to get a new one to finish it off.) She frowned at the scope- it was still not as shiny-clean as she’d been hoping, and she was a little bit wary as to whether or not Flamsteed would be checking to see if their telescopes were clean or not.

She supposed she could do the whole thing over again with a fresh towel and a bunch more cleaning fluid, but... well, she’d done the whole thing through once... There was no reason for her to do it all again, she decided. Adrienne pulled out her wand and waved it at the telescope.

“Scourgify!” She smiled, satisfied. Much better. Next was... er, what? She took out her notebook and checked really quickly- that was it, holding cream. She grabbed the small spray bottle and misted her telescope, leaning to get the spots that were against the table without actually picking it up. Now she needed to leave it, right? So she could just clean up and go.

Adrienne pushed the holding cream over towards Tora, so that she could use it when she was done, and picked up both cloths she’d used. She sidled over towards the pile of filthy telescopes and surreptitiously stuffed the cloths underneath a bunch of them and left the room quickly, with a wave goodbye at her friend.

Finally she was done scrubbing down the scope and now she was onto drying. Tora grabbed a clean towel (because she was tired of scourgifying the one she already had) and then rubbed it down, still moving in a clockwise circular fashion. Once that was all dry, she stepped back a bit to admire her work.

There were still little bits of dust in the nooks and crannies. She looked down at the rag in her hand then at the dirt specks. This really just needs a cleaning spell....
"Teregeo" she said, pulling up all grime.

She grabbed the holding cream where Adrienne had left if for her and gave her scope a light spritz. Not that she was completely finished, she left it to dry. She'll come back later to pick it up.

But she had been taught to leave everything in better condition than when she found it, so she scourgified the cloths and folded them neatly, placing them next to the cleaning supplies which she replaced. She was just about to turn away when she saw what Adrienne did with her cloths. Rude. Tora walked over, cleaned and folded them as well, and hurried out the door to catch up with Adrienne. She wanted to give her an earful for not cleaning up properly!

Asher entered the lab and prepared to clean his telescope. He sat his telescope down and pulled out his parchment with cleaning instructions.



He went over and picked up a soft cotton towel and applied some of the cleaning solution to it. Carefully, he applied the towel to the telescope, allowing a light layer to form over it. This took some time since he wanted to make sure every bit of it was cleaned properly. After the solution was allowed to dry for a minute, he started to apply the second coat.

After the second coat was finished, Asher grabbed a clean towel and began rubbing in a circular, clockwise motion until the entire telescope was dry. After he was finished, he noticed that there was still some dirty spots left. Not wanting to leave the job half finished, he took another clean towel, dipped it in cleaning solution and started the process for the second time. Rubbing all over the telescope in a clockwise, circular motion.

Finishing up with a clean towel, he kept working until the telescope was completely dry and free of even the smallest bits of debris.

Nerida entered the lab prepared to clean her telescope. She sat her telescope down and pulled out her parchment where she had wrote her cleaning instructions.

Okay she had do to go pick up a soft cotton towel. After retrieving the cotton towel she applied some of the cleaning solution to it. She put the towel on the telescope. She cleaned it properly making sure to get every side, part of the telescope before moving on to a next part of the cleansing. After the solution was allowed to dry for a couple minutes, she started to apply the second coat.

After she had finished with the second coat, Nerida grabbed a clean towel and began to rub in a circular, clockwise motion until the entire telescope was dry. After she had finished, she double checked her telescope to make sure there were no dirty spots.

After he had a chance to look over the cleaning job on his telescope, and deciding he was satisfied with the outcome, Asher picked up his parchment to see the next step. He saw that he needed to spray a thin layer of holding cream over the entire telescope.

He rose out of his chair and headed over to where the supplies were. Glancing all around the table, his eyes finally landed on the holding cream. He reached out his left hand and picked up the product then headed back to his workstation. After one last look for debris, Asher sprayed a thin layer of the cream all over the telescope.

Once again, he looked over his notes on the cleaning steps and noticed he would need to wait a good twenty four hours before the telescope would be ready to be used.

Fern arrived at the laboratory looking rather frazzled. Even after Forrest's tour and following the other Hufflepuffs to the last Astronomy class, she still struggled to navigate the castle's many floors. It had taken her nearly half an hour to find the correct tower.

But now it was time to get down to business. Pushing up the sleeves on her work shirt (she wasn't going to get grime all over her school clothes), the 11-year-old set her shoulders and went over to the pile of used telescopes. She stared at the collection for a while, before finally picking the rustiest, scummiest one of the lot, along with several towels and the two cleaning solutions.

The telescope flaked all the way over to the table and left an orange stain where it had rested against her shirt, but Fern paid it no mind. She scrambled up onto a stool, and after applying the initial layer of cleaning solution and fanning it dry, set into rubbing on the second application with extra fervor.

She was going to do those clock-work circles until her right arm fell off.

And then she would use her left arm.

The best part of homework was that it wasn't technically class. So... technically the rule about not holding hands didn't count. Soooo... there she was... heading to the lab with her boyfriend in hand.

Boyfriends were awesome. They kept hands and lips from being cold.

When they arrived she looked around. "I'll grab the towels and solution if you get the telescopes." she said. Teamwork. It made things easier.

... and this would have to pass for a date given she was making Jake study Jake was busy getting ready for NEWTS and they both had Quidditch now.

Another year-long Astronomy project. Was it weird that Jake was looking forward to it? Well, he was. And it also didn't hurt that he could work with Anya. That made anything better.

He nodded to her suggestion and let go of her hand. With a quick look around the room he found the telescopes and went to get them. He found a table and set them up while he waited for Anya to come over. Professor Flamsteed hadn't been kidding... the telescopes were sort of filthy. Jake didn't mind cleaning, though.

Besides... maybe he could get Anya to just do it. She liked stuff like that.

Immediately after receiving permission from Professor Flamsteed, Adi headed over to the Astrophysics Lab. It was his first time in there and he had to admit, it was quite a fascinating place with all the microscopes and the other equipment.

He located the telescopes and cleaning supplies. Gosh, were they dirty! The firstie selected one of the grimy telescopes and began his cleaning. He didn't mind cleaning without magic. For one thing, he didn't know much about cleaning spells and two, he had a lot of practice at home because his room always seemed to need cleaning.

Using the cotton towel, Adi poured a bit onto it and began to apply it all around equipment (minus the looking glass), making sure to get rid of much dirt and grime as possible. After allowing it to dry naturally for a minute and a couple of extra seconds, he applied another layer of the solution, this time cleaning the looking glass as well in the clockwise circular motion as was instructed.

With a new towel, the little Puffer now slowly and carefully began to dry the telescope, still rubbing in the clockwise circular motion.

Anya brought two towels and a bottle of cleaning solution over to their workstation. Anya perched herself at the edge of the table. She handed one of the towels over to him before getting her towel wet with solution.

Then she kind of flung the towel over the telescope for a few seconds before removing it. Yeah. That totally caused the telescope to be covered with a light layer. Yup. And she didn't even get her hands dirty.

Despite the cleaning, the telescope was still dusty. But from what he had seen on the notice board, Adi knew he had to repeat the previous steps until it was all clean. Also, common sense dictated that.

So he did just that! Agi repeated the process twice before the telescope had gotten back its shine! Awesome! He had done it! Just one more thing to do! He grabbed the holding cream and placed a time layer of it over the scope. Now he was done! All that was left now was to leave it to dry. ''So I guess, I'll see you tomorrow then,'' the eleven year old told the scope. As if it were alive. He replaced the supplies he had used before leaving.

She had gotten permission from Professor Flamsteed to clean old mangy telescopes in the Astrophysics Lab, YAY! She still didn't know why they just didn't magically clean them all in one quick wand movement. Why did they have to so things the hard and muggle way? This wasn't even Muggle Studies. She decided to go ahead and get the job done so she wouldn't have to be here the entire day doing the tedious task.

She grabbed a telescope and applied a layer of cleaning solution on it while the cotton towel that was provided. Merlin, that was a soft towel. She decided to let the cleaning solution dry a bit before doing anything else because it sure looked like it could use a good set it. She hummed to herself while waiting for the solution to do its thing.

Hum, Huuuum, HUM!

Deciding that enough time had passed the sixth year applied another coat of the cleaning solution to every single inch of the telescope. She scrubbed the solution in with her super soft towel in a clockwise circular motion. She made sure to get every little inch because she was not going to use a dirty piece of equipment. Nope, not gunna happen. Her towel was getting dirty quickly so she grabbed her a fresh one and continued the scrub down using the same motion and direction.

This was so stupid. Why did CALEB need to clean the telescope?! Wasn't it Flamsteed's JOB to do that for them? As a full grown wizard, he hardly thought it would be difficult for him to clean them quickly with a few waves of his wand. Ugh. So annoying. So, despite his complaints, he found himself entering the astrophysics lab on a Saturday afternoon, ready to clean - after all, this was worth POINTS.

He took his time selecting one of the telescopes and then pick it up out of the pile, bringing it over to his station. He got a bottle of the cleaning solution that Flamsteed had set aside for them, poured some on a washcloth, and got to work. He knew he had to apply a LIGHT layer otherwise it would never dry and he'd be here forever, so he quickly ran the washcloth over the whole telescope once. There. One layer down.

After about five minutes, the layer had dried, and now he had to do it AGAIN. There was a spell or something that he could use to do this faster, right? Why hadn't they learned THAT in Charms? So much more useful than Arresto Momentum! He made sure that he was doing it in a circular motion as instructed, and that he got that looking glass NICE and clean. That was the important part, after all!

And of course, the part that his EYE went on. He wasn't going to stick his eye on a dirty lens or whatever it was. Gross.

Now that he'd gotten it REALLY clean, he grabbed a towel and wiped it off - only to find that it wasn't TOTALLY clean just yet. It was definitely improved compared to how it was when he first started - but still, it needed at least another layer.

GAH HE HATED CLEANING.

Sigh. Sigh. SIGH.

Lucian took his lovely time going up the stairs to the Astronomy tower. Once in a while he'd take a break, look out of the windows, then pick up his pace again. He wasn't eager to play the part of an elf. He was a student. A GUEST at the school, but no, he had to help and clean. Clean a mess that wasn't even his. He'd understand it if it were HIS mess. But it wasn't.

But house points.

A grumpy-and-in-need-of-a-nap Lucian walked into the Astrophysics lab. Hey. Maybe it wouldn't be that bad. Caleb was here!

"Hey," he said, waving at his friend. "On cleaning duty, too, huh." He didn't think Caleb was here because he WANTED to. Who would enjoy cleaning? Pfft.

Choosing a less filthy telescope - they were all the same, but he liked to think his wasn't - he went to grab some cleaning solution and a towel. If it was up to him, Lucian would totes use magic, but since he couldn't do that, he would just dump the solution on it with a quick pass over of the towel, BUT...there were instructions to follow. Darn it, Airey, he thought you were cool.

Time to get down to it. Pouring some solution into the towel the first year applied a light layer. All the mean time he was considering having his mom offer Airey an elf. Wait. No. That could back fire. She's waited years for him to clean his room. Nope. Bad idea. She'd probably have Airey make Lucian clean the entire castle.

After he waited a minute - he counted - Lucian applied another coat, making sure to get the glass part and everything else. "This sucks, I feel like an elf," he muttered. He wasn't even getting PAID for it. Still. House points. That was worth it.

Holly hippogriffs in formation!

He was rubbing the towel the wrong way. Quickly he changed the direction to clockwise and acted as if everything was cool.

She felt like she had been rubbing forever and as she looked down she could tell that her telescope was still dirty. UGH! Could she please just use the handy dandy spell scourgify? It would make so much simpler. Start over, she would just have to start over. She applied a coat a cleaning solution to it once more with her towel. Air dry time. La, la, la, la. Has is been a minute yet?


Tap, tap, tap. Hannah was not a very patient person. All nice and air dried. Ok, now it was time for another layer so she more while rubbing it in all over. She made sure to go clockwise with her movements. Fresh towel time. She grabbed another towel and dried her scope off. Ah! That was looking much better.

She thought is was safe to go ahead and spray the holding cream. She grabbed the can and gave the scope a good spray. It was looking pretty nice. Now she just needed for everything to sit all nicely. She would come back for her precious later.

Normally she wouldn’t do any extra projects, but she needed all the information she could get because she had just decided that she would become one of the smartest students EVER, so she needed to learn more and to do better her best! So now she was here, again, in the laboratory to do some work and she was ready for it! But before she would start with working she looked around her with a sneaky look in her eyes, she had again hide her two rats inside her pocket, they were so good hidden that nobody could see them, even if you were looking right at her pocket and at the place where her two rats were sleeping. She always had her two rats with her so there was today nothing different.

When she had checked if her rats were still asleep she walked further and saw that there were already a few students inside the laboratory. “Hello” greeted Sonea in general and walked toward one of the tables where she could work and placed her schoolbag next to her chair. Next she looked around her and found the telescopes and… Bah! They were really dirty! Now she understood why professor Flamsteed wanted them to be cleaned! But… she was prepared! She had her pink plastic cloves with her so that she wouldn’t get her hands dirty!

She grabbed a random telescope and took it with her and started to clean. She used one of the cotton towels she had found and started to remove the dust first before she used the cleaning solution, and all the time she wore her pink plastic cloves, afraid to get dirty and that she not only needed to clean the telescopes but also herself afterwards! And when she had cleaned the whole telescope with the first cleaning solution she placed the telescope back on the table and waited until the telescope was dry again, but… waiting was SOOOOO boring! She didn’t liked it to wait and to just sit, so she looked around her to see who were also working here and maybe she was seeing something funny!

But, sadly, nobody was doing something funny so it was again boring to wait so when the telescope was finally dry she was more than happy to start with working! She rubbed again with the towel and the cleaning solution on the telescope and made all the time clockwise circular motions while she was busy with her cleaning task. So, after a few minutes, when she was also done with this she stopped for a few minutes, too lazy to work hard so taking a short break was not a bad idea!

Caleb looked up when someone walked up to him, and he chuckled when he saw it was Lucian. "Tell me about it. It would have taken him what, five minutes to clean all these with magic?" he said, rolling his eyes. Professors had extra powerful magic or something that made simple cleaning spells and stuff SUPER powerful and fast, right? Caleb could only assume so.

Still, nothing he could do about it now, so he grabbed some more cleaning solution and applied another light layer. He waited a few minutes for it to dry once more, and then rubbed it off until all the solution was gone. Thankfully, it looked like that had done the trick this time! THANK MERLIN. If Caleb had had to do it again or use a cleaning spell he probably would have chucked the telescope off the tower roof.

Alright, onto the holding cream stuff. He grabbed the holding cream and made sure he applied a nice layer to the whole telescope. He could see right away that, just like Flamsteed said, this would take a LONG time to dry.

"Well, good luck. See ya Lucian!" Caleb said with a grin to his friend as he walked over to the storage area, put his telescope away and labeled it with his name, and then made a mental note to come back in 24 hours or so once it had dried.

Taking a new towel because the one she just had used was now dirty, and because the professor had instructed them to do it, and started to work again after her short break. She dried the whole telescope and... she she was proud of her work, the telescope was already cleaner than a few minutes ago, so she had done it good right? Next she looked at the instructions and saw that she needed to repeat some things, but that wasn't so difficult, she already knew what to do so she would be ready in a few minutes with the next step. She added some cleaning solution to the towel and rubbed the telescope clean with it, and indeed, that wasn't difficult!

"What do i need to do now..." muttered Sonea while she looked at the instructions and found the holding cream a few seconds later. She sprayed the now cleaner telescope with it until she was sure that she had sprayed enough and stopped. When she looked at the last few instructions she saw that she was almost done with this! Ha, this was really easy! She wished that all the extra projects were so easy! Now she only needed to dry the telescope and that was all!

So she cleaned her working space and put all the stuff she had used back where she had found them and left the laboratory.

24 hours later she returned to look if she was now really done and took her telescope with her!

Despite the cleaning, the telescope was still dusty. So now Nerida had to repeat the steps that she had just done.

So she did just that! Nerida repeated the process twice before the telescope had gotten back to its nice sparkling shine! Just one more thing to do now... She grabbed the holding cream and sprayed a thin layer of it over the scope. And..Now she was done! All that was left now was to leave it to dry. Finishing she placed the supplies she had took back to where they belonged and then put her telescope back into its spot.

Adelaide made her way into the Astrophysics lab, humming to herself. It had become quite a habit since she wasn't able to use her muggle music listening device in the castle. It was a hard adjustment, but one she had to make. It would just take some time (and a few more months) to get completely used to the lack of constant music around her.

She entered the room and gave a quick smile to anyone who had looked up at her. She made a beeline for somewhere near the corner, feeling most comfortable to work in peace there. She set her bag down before wandering over to grab a telescope.

When Flamsteed said they were dirty, he wasn't lying. She made sure not to hold the thing to close to her clothes, not wanting to ruin them with whatever icky gunk happened to be on the old telescopes. And the fact that they were to clean things the muggle way kind of gave her an advantage. It was the only way she knew how to clean so what else was she supposed to do?

Once the telescope was by her things, Adelaide grabbed some cleaning solution and a couple of towels and set to work. She poured some of the solution on the towel and lightly ran it over the very dirty telescope. Once that was done, she waited a moment before repeating the step. As she rubbed in circular motion, she made a disgusted face at the gunk that was starting to come off. She was definitely going to be showering after doing this. Not that she was a germaphobe, but this was just gross.

She continued as such until she'd rubbed over the whole telescope. She grabbed a fresh towel and wiped down the scope like she was supposed to. Addi looked at the scope. It was still incredibly dirty. She sighed, looking down at the practically soiled towels. This was going to take longer than she thought...and require a lot more towels.

Benzi was sweating.

With a huff, he FINALLY made it to the Astronomy Tower and all but collapsed in the astrolab, breathing heavily. He had been down by the lake, soaking up what little sun he could when RAIN happened and he was forced to go inside. Once he made it inside, the little Ravenclaw suddenly remembered about the telescope assignment and since he had nothing better to do and wasn't in the mood for written homework he'd began racing up to the tower.

IT WAS SUCH A MASSIVE CLIMB. How come he never got so tired going to the common room?!

His heart rate returned to its normal speed and he picked himself up off the wall and towards the pile of really gross looking telescopes. Mummy usually did the cleaning, but she always put Benzi to work when she was mad at him or when he did something wrong, so the eleven year old was no stranger to the fine art of scrubbing. Loosening his already loose tie, he shoved his sleeves up past his elbows and grabbed a random telescope from the pile.

He walked over to an available table and put down his things, then went to grab all the necessary cleaning equipment from the shelves. RIGHT. To work. ... How was he supposed to do this again?

Rummaging in his back, he took out a badly scrunched up piece of parchment on which he'd written the project. Benzi smoothed it out as best as he could onto the table and squinted, reading what appeared to be a jumble of lines quite easily. It was HIS handwriting, after all.

Text Cut: Steps

1. Use the cleaning solution provided and apply with a soft cotton towel a light layer.
2. Allow to air dry for a minute, before applying another coat of cleaning solution and rubbing it onto the looking glass and all over the telescope. Keep the rubbing to clockwise circular motions and continue until you've done all over the scope.
3. Take a fresh towel and rub in the same direction to towel dry the scope.
4. Repeat steps 1-3 as necessary until dust and debris is gone
5. Once the scope is clean, spray a thin layer of holding cream over the scope to help prevent future dust outbreaks.
6. Allow the solution to dry fully before operating the telescope. This may take up to 24 hours, so leave your telescope and come back to pick it up.

CLEANING SOLUTION. He popped the cork and took a handful, lathering it on the moldy telescope with his cotton towel. Seriously, did the Astronomy Professor make these super dirty on PURPOSE?! He hummed to himself one of the cheers of the Chelsea Football Club as he waited a minute for it to dry, scratching his nose and getting the solution all over his face. Now... another layer. This time specifically to the looking glass, then all over.

He briefly wondered if he should go anticlockwise just for kicks, but decided against it. Really, it might explode or something. Putting down the dirty towel, he wiped his hands on the table before grabbing a clean towel and clearing away the solution. Then he inspected the telescope and to his wonder found very little rust and mold left. He repeated the step one more time, and grinned proudly at his SHINY telescope.

Looking at some of the other kids, he saw that they were using spells to clean and bit his lip. Should he have used magic? He didn't know those spells! How was he supposed to clean with magic without having learned the spell? Or was it like sparks when it just came naturally?

The only homework Tobias had left to start now was his Astronomy work. He figured the best idea would be to start it as soon as possible, because then he would have more nights to search for the planets ans constellations, and wouldn't be in an anxious rush at the end of term. Plus, there was probably a limit to what nights he'd be able to see certain things. Tobias' plan was to research to best nights to see certain items on the list so he could use his time wisely. It was a really fun sounding assignment, and Toby was gonna put his all into it.

FIRST though, he of course needed to ready the sails equipment, and that required obtaining a telescope and cleaning it all up so it was bright and shiny and new.

After stashing his school bag under the table and retrieving a telescope which he set in front of him on the desk, Tobias pushed the sleeves of his school sweater up and over his elbows. Outer robes got in the way of cleaning, so Toby had gladly ditched them in his dormitory before heading up here. The Hufflepuff pulled out a list from his pockets, which detailed the steps he needed to take and the things he needed to gather to complete those steps.

Cleaning solution, soft cotton towel (or rather, a few of these, because it would probably take a few applications, going by the state of the telescope before him) and holding spray. Right. Easy. Tobias picked those up and returned to his desk with his arms full of the appropriate things and carefully dropped them onto the table. He could just return the cloths he didn't use, so Tobias felt no shame in having picked up about 10.

RIGHT. FIRST UP.

Grabbing one towel and the cleaning solution, Tobias sat and pulled the telescope a little closer, wincing slightly at the feeling of rust under his fingers. He put some cleaning solution on the towel and then started wiping it all over the telescope, making sure he covered the entire thing. Tobias knew that you weren't supposed to put it on too thickly, because it only took a certain amount for the solution to start working. Too much would be a waste of solution. But then too little or too thinly spread and it straight up wouldn't be enough to work.

Once he'd applied it to the entire telescope, Tobias looked over the instrument once more to check that it was all evenly coated and that he hadn't missed a spot. After touching up a couple of areas and spreading more solution after a place that he'd completely missed before, Toby set the cloth down and pulled his list towards him. Using a self inking quill, he paused for a moment before crossing off the first item, the one he'd just completed. Then Tobias set the quill down and sat back, taking a minute for the cleaning solution to do its thaaaaaaaang and watching others work while he waited.