Violet sighed. She was terrible at art and therefore didn't like to do arts and crafts, and right now she didn't feel like doing anything much, but she supposed this assignment was easier than some, and she might as well try to keep some of her grades up. Not that it mattered much any more.

She reached over and randomly grabbed some kind of marker, then noticed that she'd gotten a black one. She chuckled grimly to herself--good, that pretty much summed up her mood. She ought to make a hat that was just one big, black, depressing cloud over her head. But she supposed that would not do for Recard, who she felt she could never impress.

After attempting to concentrate for a while and try to get some sort of idea, the hat she wound up with was shaped like an alchemical retort, like the one her governess used to have: retort. She had painted the hat black all over, and used some metallic strands of something that looked like streamers to make it look like green and red smoke was coming out of the end of it.

Then at the bottom she wrote, This hat is shaped like an alchemical retort, because I have become a notorious famous alchemist and potion-maker. The red and green fumes represent the active and passive stages of the working, joined together in the final operation.

There, that would have to be good enough. Rising, she walked up to Recard's desk and tried to muster up enough energy to greet her as she turned it in. "Here, Professor Recard, that's the best I could do." But the smile didn't quite reach Violet's eyes, so she quickly turned away from her teacher, not wanting her to see Violet looking weak or anything.