Amelia nodded. "Right, examine this before it wakes up," she repeated back, thinking it would be a good idea. Creatures weren't really her specialty, but the difference between this and herbology was that with creatures, she could pretend.

She followed Rhiannon's lead and stroked the skin of the grindylow with two fingers. It felt weird. Running her fingers along its spine, she jumped back slightly as she hit one of its spiky horns. "Ow!" she exclaimed, but quietly, pulling her finger away to see a small bead of blood from where she'd been pricked. Mental note: do not touch sharp spiky things.

Carefully, she sucked on her finger as she took notes of what it felt like and some of its characteristics. "Uh, I think I'm done with the examination part of this creature," she said, looking over to Rhiannon.

Rhiannon looked over as Amelia cried out, and saw the tiny drop of blood. "Does it look that bad?", she whispered as the hufflepuff started sucking on her finger. When the girl said she was done, the Ravenclaw nodded, but spent a little more time doing her own examination of the grindylow. She was careful to avoid the horns, though. Once she felt she had sufficiently noted its characteristics, she jotted several notes down before taking her wand out and using it to float the grindylow back to the tank. Before she placed it back underwater, she remembered to revive it, and felt glad she was as far away as she was when it started glaring at the two girls and thrashing around.

Looking back at Amelia, she asks, "Do you want to wait a bit before we start with the kappa?"

Taylie walked over to the aquariums cautiously while pulling on her gloves and peered inside quickly. She saw a Grindlow that appeared to be smaller than the others and decided that it looked like the easiest to catch. She pulled out her wand and stupefied it. The creature froze in place and Taylie reached in and grasped it. She carried it over to her desk and tried to decide what to do from there. She saw other students measuring there creatures so she decided that it was probably the best starting point.

"Hmmm" she said quietly. Her grindlow was about 10 1/2 inches long and about 7 inches around. It was a pale green on color and it had long thin fingers. The looked as if they could be easily broken so Taylie decided not to touch them. On the top of its' head it has sharp little horns, and its teeth were very green.

As Taylie wrote down her observations she noticed that the grindlow was beginning to wake up. She quickly pulled a piece of chocolate out of her bag and gave it to the animal. While it was distracted she quickly rushed it to the front of the class and dropped it back into the water. Taylie returned to her desk and finished writing about her encounter.

Amelia was trying very hard not to wince excessively; it was just a small prick but the pain felt about ten times worse than the bludgers she'd been hit with during quidditch. She bit her lower lip, when she noticed Rhiannon looking at her, and shook her head. "I'll be fine," as it was the typical quidditch player response.

She watched Rhiannon taking some more notes and then place it back in the water. She thought she caught a glimpse of it glaring at them, but shook it off, figuring it must have been her imagination. She shook her head, when asked if she wanted to wait. "No, let's just get this over with," she told her friend, removing her finger to inspect it casually. It was a bit red and sore, but at least the bleeding stopped.

Rhiannon raised an eyebrow as Amelia said she was fine. She could tell that the Huffie was trying hard not to look like she was in serious pain, but wasn't going to question her statement. She figured if it got worse, Amelia would say something.

As Amelia said they should keep going, Rhiannon giggled. "That sounds enthusiastic." She stood up and glanced over at the tanks with the kappas in them. It would be so much easier to control one of them if there was a legal spell to make them bow from across the room, she thought.

Since the bleeding had stopped, despite the throbbing in her finger she ought to at least pretend like she wanted to be there. She smiled back at her friend. "Sorry. not sure how enthusiastic I should be about a dangerous creature," she said giggling, as she stood up and followed the Ravenclaw over the tank.

"I'm already injured, i could just reach in there," she said quietly, more to herself although loud enough for Rhiannon to hear.

Rhiannon shook her head as she looked into the tank. Speaking in a low voice, she said, "I don't really see how anyone could be enthusiastic about dealing with dangerous creatures." She tried to think of a way to weaken the kappa. If she got it to bow inside the water, the liquid in its head would dissipate in the water, and she wasn't that cruel. But she also wasn't going to reach in and try to grab one when it was at full strength.

She also didn't want Amelia to have to get more injured. Coming up with a strange idea, she slipped her wand out of her bag and surreptitiously pointed it at a small kappa who wasn't really paying attention to them. Accio kappa head liquid, she thought, and was partially shocked when the liquid in the kappa she had indicated's head started to lazily float out of the hollow.

Gwen approached one of the tanks that held a kappa. Why not work with a kappa? They're supposed to be more dangerous and anyhow, I'm a Gryffindor. I laugh in the face of danger. Ha ha ha.

She looked around for Emma, hoping to work with her and chat undisturbed about Pierce.

Amelia giggled as she said she didn't see how anyone could be enthusiastic with working with dangerous creatures. The thing was, she wasn't scared of the danger necessarily, but she just wasn't much a creatures person. But she was sure that Fabian wouldn't complain about working with such creatures.

She smiled as the Ravenclaw was actually thinking through how to best obtain the creature. There was a reason Rhiannon was sorted into Ravenclaw; clearly. The girl was absolutely brilliant and actually thought through the logic in everything, unlike herself who was a hardworker but very rash and quick in decision-making. "Absolutely brilliant," she said in a low voice and rushed over to obtain a vial from her bag. "Here you go. For the collection of the liquid," she said, realizing that quick thinking did come in handy sometimes.

"Hey Gwen!" Emma said, coming up to the Gryffindor from across the room. "Wanna work together?" she asked, looking in one of the tanks at the Kappa that was nearby.

"Sure," Gwen said cheerily. She flipped quickly through her textbook.

"It says kappas feed on-eurgh, human blood, but can be mollified with a cucumber with the person's name carved on it." She paused. "You haven't got a cucumber, have you?"

"No, I don't," Emma laughed, jokingly feeling around her pockets. "A cucumber with a person's name? That's weird."

"Ok, so, are we actually supposed to interact with it?" she asked, consulting the assignment again. That was what it said, but she certainly was not going to just stick her hand in the tank and hope that the Kappa didn't take a few of her fingers.

"How about we do the physical description first," she said, pulling out a quill and parchment to take notes.

"Okay," Gwen said, relieved. She did not wish to lose any blood today. She had so far managed to avoid being in the hospital wing, and she wanted it to stay that way.

"Hmm," she said. "Looks like a monkey crossed with a fish. All scaly and stuff. With a great bowl for a head. What d'you suppose that's for? Has it got a brain?"

Rhiannon watched the liquid float toward them, and was glad when Amelia ran and got a vial. She hadn't really thought about that. Evidently, there had been at least one flaw in her plan. And she was still surprised that the kappa hadn't seemed to notice the fact that its strength was literally floating away. But then, as the last little bit of liquid starts to leave its head, the kappa swings its head around and glares at the girls.

However, shortly afterward, the liquid is entirely airborne and the kappa faints. She collects the liquid in Amelia's vial and then goes over to the unconscious creature, fishing it out of the water before it drowns. Carrying it over to the Hufflepuff, she places it on a desk and stupefies it, just to be careful.

Rapunzel stood up from her seat as class was dismissed and hesitated for a moment, debating between studying grindylows or kappas. She sighed, and finally went for a kappa tank.

She approached a scaley-looking-monkeyish thing and wondered how to get it out. Or get it to bow and spill the water from its head...

Punz tapped the glass of the tank, curious to see how the kappa would react. The ugly creature blinked at her for a moment and then tapped back, the same spot Rapunzel had touched.

Interesting, she thought with a raised eyebrow. Maybe the monkey wants to play.....

She smiled crookedly and then scratched her blonde head, rather melodramatically, while making a face.

Amazingly, the kappa followed suit, even spilling some of the water out of the hollow on the top of his head. It smiled evilly at her, showing an abundance of sharp teeth.

Punz couldn't help but shudder a little at the sight, but she continued with her version of Simon Says. Next, she jumped up once, just a little bunny hop, to see if the kappa would do it too.

And it did. The scaley monkey thing, still showing all its teeth, bounced up and down, effectively spilling about half of the water on its head. When the kappa landed, it weaved a little on its funky feet, clearing getting weak from the loss of water.

Punz beamed at her handiwork and went in for the last bit....she did a little twil, holding her robes like they were a dainty dress, and curstied to the kappa.

The monkey-like-monster was all too eager to follow suit, as it watched her antics with hungry eyes. The kappa twirled around and around, the water in its head hollow sloshing out like no other. And then the monkey bowed - aha, not a cursty, but a bow, because obviously male kappas mcmonkeys don't cursty!

And all the water tipped out with a final splash! into the tank. The little kappa lost its source of strength and with one last glare at Rapunzel on the other side, it passed out.

Amelia watched as the last bit of liquid left the kappa's head and floated into the vial that she brought over. She then gasped and took a step back as the kappa swung around and glared at them. It was for some reason, frightening to her.

Then Rhiannon retrieved the limp kappa from the tank and carried it over to her, placing it on the desk. "I-is it d-d-dead?" the hufflepuff managed to ask, forgetting all about kappas and the liquid in their heads. She jotted down a few notes on its color and the apparent texture, while waiting for her friend.

Rhiannon shook her head. "No, it's not dead. It fainted, and then I stunned it." She followed Amelia's suit and took down some notes on its appearance, carefully raising its lip to look at the kappa's teeth. Glad I somehow managed to avoid those, she thought, looking at the sharp little pointy teeth.

Finishing her examination, she glances at the Hufflepuff. "Can you think of anything else we need to do?"

Rapunzel was absolutely tickled to see the kappa tip over, having fainted from lack of strength in the form of water. She swished her wand and levitated it out of the tank and over to her desk for study.

She smiled at Rhiannon and Amelia as she passed, noticing that they too were studying a kappa.

Having reached her table, Rapunzel carefully lowered the kappa onto the ground and hastily jotted some notes down about the creature. Now that she could see it up close, it didn't look so....menacing. Sure, the teeth were still bared in one last stroke of defiance, but otherwise, the kappa looked even more like a scaley monkey than ever. She shrugged and started sketching the monkey, her purple quill moving rapidly over the parchment, with special attention to the hollow on top of the kappa's head. The source of power, Punz thought with a smirk, is also its source of weakness. That, and the fact that it likes to play games with its potential victims....

Amelia breathed a sigh of relief as Rhiannon told her it wasn't dead. She was hoping the creature wasn't. She eyed its webbed hands and noting the scaly skin on the kappa. Then gazing towards its mouth, she quickly jotted down a couple words to describe its teeth.

Finally done with her observations, she shook her head. "Nope. Just the homework," she said, with a wink.

Ryder watched on looking into his book and then back around the room. He pulled out a little container from his bag and began munching on some chicken wings from the great hall. He was starving, he sat there tearing into the chicken wings pieces of chicken falling to the table he was sitting at.

"I knew I should have put a butterbeer in my bag as well." he said picking a piece of chicken off the table and throwing it into the air and catching it in his mouth. He stood up and bowed as if expecting an applause for that show. "Thank you, Thank you." he said pulling out his wand. "And now for my next act I will turn this chicken bone into a piece of broccoli."

And with a swish and flick the chicken bone had become a piece of broccoli, "Professor do any of these dark creatures like broccoli?" Ryder said holding the piece in the air and swishing it back and forth.

Rhiannon nodded. "Well, then I guess we need to get this guy back to his tank. Do you think we should revive him first, or give the head liquid back first?" She figured either way they should get it back to the tank first, then do whatever they chose. And if they returned the liquid first, hopefully they could get far enough away before reviving the creature.

Rapunzel finished her notes on the kappa and rolled up her scroll, deciding that it was about time to put the little creature back into its tank. She didn't know how long a kappa could go without its "power source", or without any type of water, for that matter.

Carefully, she levitated the kappa again and gently strolled to the tanks, slowly dumping it back into a container of its own. Punz clapped her hands, happy to have survived a lesson regarding dangerous magical creatures unscathed.

She beamed and headed pack to her desk, picking up her items. Now, she just had to finish the homework....and maybe Hufflepuff could pick up a few points to get ahead of the Gryffindors...

"Hmmm...." Emma began to flip through the pages of her Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (her Monster Book of Monsters was misbehaving at the moment) and found the page on Kappas. "It says the bowl...thing on the top of their heads holds water, which carries water. The water gives it it's strength. SO..." she pushed the book to the edge of the desk so she had more room to take notes, "We should try and get it to bow and dump all the water out of it's head, and then we can take it out of the tank and examine it."

"Wait!" Amelia said rather spontaneously when the Ravenclaw mentioned about the head liquid. "Do we uh... need to do anything with the liquid?" She was rather sure that they needed to do something with the liquid, if they were even supposed to add it back in.

Gwen glanced warily at the kappa in its tank. It bobbed near the surface, leering at them.

"I suppose we ought to bow first," she said. "Like with a hippogriff, I guess."

She retreated several paces away from the tank and made a short bow. The kappa stared at her.

Gwen took a new tack. "What if we tricked it into bending over? Like if we offered it food or something."