It did not go unnoticed, the Aldrich girl's choosing to position herself far away from him. He found her decisions quite intriguing lately. Now, why would she go and do a thing like that? Boyfriend? Jealous boyfriend? Fear of copying his answers?

Oh, right. Halcyon kept to herself.

Cutty put a hand against Whitty's back as the older Slytherin boy took a seat nearest him. Whitty. That was Whitty. Whitty whom he liked to keep close.




"Cutty Mordaunt." He said hitting the name tag with his wand and watching at the name appeared in gold writing beneath the muggle version of the snitch. He allowed himself momentarily to wish that he were real gold they were dealing with. He lifted the name tag between his two fingers, applied a sticking charm and wore it as instructed. Once completed he put his hand up to offer his personal lies on what astronomy meant to him.
"The tehrm astronomy simply means the study of the stars, though it includes studying the univehrse." Obvs. "We study it here becooz it offehz answers outside of magical means that help oos to betteh oondastand how and why our universe wehrks the way it dooz."

Picking up his wand and pulling it out cautiously, he kind of awkwardly looked at his name tag. "Uh..." he started, not really wanting to do this. Oh well, he was going to have to use his wand eventually.

"Leo" he finally said lowly, tapping his tame tag with the wand. And it worked! Nothing exploded! Nothing was flying in random places!

Now... why was astronomy something that they studied?

"In order to learn about the things around us?"

He honestly had no clue, he'd never really done anything to do with astronomy ever before so he just sent a charming smile at his head of house and hoped for the best.

Cutty's hand still remained in the air, his mind abuzz with questions over something he'd just said himself. "Professor Flamsteed? Can astronomy offer answers for the origins of magic as well?" He knew that it had to have originated from the universe as all things did when traced back enough through time, but had they actually found anything conclusive was what he wanted to know. "I mean are science and magic always incompatible? Mutually exclusive like?"


It was too early for questions. Damn him.

Well, she’d gotten a response. It wasn’t half as good as most of the others though, which inwardly made Brooklyn frown a little. Outwardly she’d kept up the polite expression, though, unlike Maggie, who had gotten at least a cursory glance as her fellow firstie snake had arrived, along with Dante and Hady. None of them had said anything to her, so she wasn’t going to bother making the first move. The rest of the class was loud enough, between the greetings and the comments about tribbles and whatever the comic book was. She wasn’t a comic book person, unless someone made Game of Thrones into a comic book. That made her wonder what Tywin was getting up to, since her kitten had been left behind in the dorm since he couldn’t come to classes with her.

What with the lint roller and everything, this professor probably would have had an aneurysm if she’d let Tywin come with her. Of course, it would’ve been worse had she had Maggie’s kitten, and the thought made her smile a little. Another reason Tywin was better, which meant she was better because he was hers. But then, the lesson had started. At least, that’s what she thought when the professor had spoken again, but she wasn’t sure what the whole thing with a delay and house elves was. Plus, the weird introduction made her sort of eye him. Maybe he didn’t like respect. It was something she made note of, to be used later on. She wasn’t about to follow his lead, as nametags appeared on the desks at his word. So he wanted them to wear nametags, and to make sure they didn’t have lint on their robes when they arrived. Weird.

She took her wand out carefully, anyhow, tapping the tip of it on the nametag. “Brooklyn Andrews,” she stated clearly, as if daring the tag to say any different. It got the point, as the name appeared perfectly. No stupid nicknames here.

As she stuck the nametag on her uniform, she raised her hand as well. “Astronomy means studying the stars, but probably everything up there. We do that ‘cause it can tell us things about our world.” She felt like that said everything she wanted to say in her answer. There wasn’t any reason to go on and on just to make it sound better. She wasn’t a stupid Claw like her sister and her aunts were. She knew what she wanted to say, and she’d said it.

Clara watched the Professor -- Professor Airey, yep -- and listened to his words and wrapped up her conversation with Eden. She's grinned at her friends, trying NOT to bounce in her seat. "Class is starting," she whispered excitedly, though unsure of why she was whispering. "And don't worry," she said, watching as Eden played with her hair, "I'll help you with the magic part as much as possible." Not that she really thought she'd need it. She was willing to bet that Eden was just unsure of her own abilities and was actually great.

NOW TO FOCUS ON THE PROFESSOR AND LESSON THINGS.



Judging. He seemed nice enough, despite not picking up on her slight sarcasm about the seating arrangement. She couldn't imagine a worse classroom layout. To be fair to him, though, she hadn't really said it in a sarcastic tone as she'd first intended to. She gave him a warm smile and an indifferent"mhmmm," before waiting for him to get started with the lesson part of the lesson.

That was what she'd come for, after all.

Heh. Name tags.

That seemed fairly straight forward to her. She'd completed much more difficult magic than that while she'd attended Hogwarts, so this was a piece of cake. Grinning over at Eden, she took out her wand and picked up the empty name tag. She did exactly as Professor Airey had instructed, tapping the name tag firmly before saying, "Clara Wilde," loud and clear. It worked and her name appeared on the name tag in golden lettering. Thinking about it for a second, she was actually quite surprised that her surname had been spelt correctly, and curious about why that was. It sounded like 'wild,' so she was pleasantly surprised that it hadn't been spelt that way.

The redhead looked up when Eden nudged her, eyes shining with a pride for her friend that said 'See? I knew you could do it!' It wasn't particularly difficult magic, but every little bit counts where confidence is concerned. With one last little nudge, Clara once again focused her words on the teacher, ignoring the vast amount of other people in the room.

Astronomy. Hm. "Astronomy is a scientific subject. It looks at the physical universe as a whole and often focusses on celestial objects, like planets, stars and things like that," she said after raising her hand. Not exactly the text book answer, but near enough. That was what she understood Astronomy as; the study of things not of Earth. Before she could chime up to give the second part of her answer, she'd frozen ...

.... Suddenly all the people in the room seemed to get infinitely LOUDER ... and much closer to her than before ...

At least, that's what it felt like .....

.. Clara gripped the edge of the desk for support ... shooting a panicked look at Eden, before squeezing her eyes tight shut and trying to focus her breathing. Calm down, calm down, calm down.

....... butshecouldn't ...

More spells. O__O

Thornton was nervous. This was astronomy. He wasn't supposed to have to do magic. Nothing had gone catastrophically wrong in the hallway, but all the same. He trusted Flamsteed though, even if it was perhaps a little irrational to do so, given what he'd observed of the man.

And so with a deep, but shaky breath, Thornton tried to steady himself. "ThorntonBaines," he said hurriedly, as if it were all one word, tapping the name tag.

And that's exactly how it appeared on the tag. Thorntonbaines. No space.

Thornton resisted the urge to put his head down on his desk. He was not putting that on his robe. Flamsteed knew who he was, anyway. And the rest of the class didn't need to know that simple spells were giving him trouble.

Nametag still sitting on the desk, Thornton raised his hand. "Studying astronomy gives us a broader context for our own experiences. It also helps us understand how events beyond Earth can have effects here." Like, solar flares. Or giant asteroids that kill off dinosaurs.

Abby tapped her wand against the nametag and said "Abby Valentine" and was surprised when her name appeared and placed the tag on her robes and raised her hand and said "Astronomy is a subject where we study the stars and planets in a physical universe"

At last Professor Flamsteed began to speak and it was time for class to begin. Upon hearing his congratulations for her, Jasmine said, "Thank you Professor".

When he had finished greeting everyone and giving instructions, Jasmine picked up her NASA nametag. Following directions, she said her name and watched as it magically appeared on the tag. No sooner had she done that, then the first question was posed. Thinking about it for a minute, Jasmine raised her hand.

"Astronomy is the study of he universe and all things in it.......stars, planets, the sun, galaxies.........everything that's out there and how it came to be, how it evolved. We study it because it's fascinating and we have a desire to know what goes on beyond our atmosphere. You know......space, the final frontier?"

You tackle somebody ONE time, and you needed to be babysat. Goodness. Not to mention that Ian totally had the tackle coming to him for putting his lips on her lips. It was a good thing that AJ didn't know any good spells or else Ian would still be in the hospital wing, and then she surely would have a desk all by her lonesome.

Deduct points from Adi for a playful hair pull? That seemed... extreme. AJ gave the boyfriend a look that said "maybe her head of house really IS crazy"... but AJ still really liked him. She did well with crazy. Benny got a smile from her. He really was a hero more than once that night, but if AJ want to go full out Gryffindor, Benny wouldn't be able to stop her.

Anywho, AJ thought about the question, and raised her hand before giving her answer. "Astronomy is pretty much just studying the planets and stars in our universe, and we study it because there might be life on other plants, and IF there is we wanna be the first to know about it." Get them on our side and stuff. Could she have an alien? Unicorns and aliens would get along, she was sure.

Ooooh, her name tag. AJ tapped the tag and said her name clearly. Once Aubrey Valentine appeared all pretty in gold, she placed it on her robes.

Name tags? Why do they need name tags? She didn't have to wear one in her other class. Oh well. Shrugging her shoulders she looked at the name tag checking it out. A NASA name tag was awesome! It was gold and shiny and she really liked it. Now to make her name appear...

Taking her wand into her hand she cleared her throat quietly and with a firm flick she tapped the name tag right in the center stating clearly. "Hadleigh Lynch." She had decided to give her full name for now. Setting down her wand she picked up the name tag making sure it spelled her name correctly before sticking it to her robes.

Slowly after a moments thought she raised her hand into the air. "Astronomy is the study of everything in the universe and we study it to learn about what's out there and how it came to be." Hady responded softly. She wasn't completely sure about her answer but it sounded about right to her.

Maddie wondered why Kyroh was ALL the way over there but considering he'd chosen to sit next to the head girl, she couldn't exactly ask him to move. If he got in good with HER, that'd be beneficial to them all. Smart thinking, Freckles. He got a big smile and a wave in greeting. Hellooo.

What she also didn't get was the whole scene that had taken place with Dot and Dima and the seating thing. She was wondering if she'd be left alone with Little Barrington when Dima arrived 'cause the latter seemed to be looking at Freckles and the red head with interest. But THEN he'd seemed to change his mind and come sit with her. Did that make her second choice? Did it mean he'd rather be over there but he felt BAD for her? Was she going to be replaced this term? LOTS of thoughts were happening. LOTS. She put a stop to them when her f-word took the seat beside her, though. "Hi Dima!" Smile for him too, she guessed.

...

Star dude wanted to know WHY she said that about the comics? Maddie gave him a quizzical look. She'd said it because it was the truth. She wasn't aware of the guy's reading habits and because of THAT, she didn't KNOW he read comic books. DUH. Seemed pretty simple to the brunette but she figured she could explain it to him later. For now she simply shrugged and smiled.

Eyeing the name tag curiously, Maddie wondered if they were meant to be pseudo-astronauts today. That's where all the best ones trained, right? NASA. And if all the BEST ones trained there, it was fitting she was wearing a name tag with a NASA title. *TAP!* "Maddie Cooper." How lovely. The second year placed the tag on her robes and smiled. Now WHAT was the prompt again?

What does the term astronomy mean to you and why do we study it?

"Astronomy is a good excuse to be outside at night and if you study it, you'll have a more convincing story when your older brother comes out to inquire why you're not in bed yet." PAUSE. "But also because the sky is really lovely to look at at night and if you know stuff, you'll be more appreciative of just how much stuff happens to make it so pretty."

GRIN!

Samantha took out her wand and as she tapped the blank name badge, said clearly, "Samantha Montgomery". Now she had a new name tag which she then proceeded to attach top the front of her robes.

Sam thought about the question that Professor Flamsteed had asked. She raised her hand and then answered with, "Astronomy is the study of such bodies as the moon, stars, galaxies and planets and the psychical, chemical and evolutionary aspect of these bodies. It is a subject that has fascinated even ancient cultures like the Babylonians and Mayans. I think we study it because we are curious as to whether or not life exists on other planets or even universes."

Emmylou looked around at everyone and smiled. Astronomy had to be her second favorite class at Hogwarts. Was she able to have more than one favorite class? If she couldn't have two first favorite classes then she was going to have it anyway and she could make it up as her own idea. Emmylou smiled at the thought of it. That would be awesome and then there was History of Magic, that was a fun class to have. The fourth year Gryffindor looked up at Professor Flamsteed started to speak. Eeep! Class was starting. She wondered what they would be doing today.

Emmylou had her wand in her hand and she was ready to try and do this but first she looked around at some of the other students and it seemed some were having issues with getting their names right. GULP. She hoped that she wouldn't get her own name wrong on the name tag. She poked the name tag with her wand first and then rested it on the tag. Loud and clearly, loud and clearly, loud and clearly. This really couldn't be all that hard. She was really just over thinking all of this.

Loud and clearly, loud and clearly, loud and clearly. She could do this. Emmylou cleared her throat. "EMMYLOU DUCHANNES." the fourteen year old said very loudly and somewhat clearly. Her accent wasn't one to be understood all that clearly due to the twang in it. Emmylou watched as the her name appeared in gold but it was wrong her name wasn't Emmywho Dukane. What was she going to do now? "Who is Emmywho Dukane?" she asked aloud. She frowned and then she put the tag on her robes anyway.

Now to the question. What does Astronomy mean to her? She shrugged, she didn't know this and yet it was such an easy question to answer but she knew that she was going to over think this too just like the name tag but she had every right to over think the name take because it didn't just happen to her either. Emmylou raised her hand before she spoke. "To me Astronomy is a great reason to think about the stars and other universes outside of ours and because it can do things like the Northern Lights, I have never seen them before but I have see pictures and it seems like it's very beautiful." Did she do it right? Well that's what she thought about it.

So everything was going just FINE, at least to Eden, who had actually said stuff and whatnot--whether it be right--or wrong--or nothing at all relevant(probably this one) she nonetheless was proud of herself for at least speaking up, yeah? She glanced over at Clara's nametag...she had such a pretty name, Clara did. Wilde. Like the author, Oscar Wilde. She shot her friend a smile and went back to listening to everyone.

And then she felt that.

The tension-next to her--She shot a glance at Clara and noticed her friend had her eyes closed and she was FREAKING OUT. Okay. Stay calm, Eden. Don't make a SCENE, Eden. She just put a hand on Clara's back and scooted closer--ahem. She didn't want to talk--but--MEHHHHHH. She didn't want to lose pooooints--but Clara being okay was waaaay WAY more important. "It's okay Clara--" she whispered quickly.

Adi was not one bit taken aback at Professor Airey's er, telling off. He hadn't tugged on AJ's hair that hard. Plus it was kind of the duo's thing. Anyway...the Astronaut had said no to the hair pulling in his classroom...Adi could live with that. The man got a grin and a nod. "Yes, Professor.'' He also caught AJ's look. He shook his head with a "Don't worry about it'' look on his face. Professor Airey was still cool in his books. Besides, nothing could take away all the happy feeling going on in him at the moment.

Guy bestie had finally made his way to class. Adi threw him a teasing look that said, "Late as usual.'' Oh look. Benny was sitting next to him. Probably only because the seat next to Angel was taken. Oh well.
..............................

Name tags? Why? Airey was good with names wasn't he? Never the less, Adi tapped his tag with his wand. "Aditya Rehman,'' he said clearly. Cool! His name appeared in gold letters. It was spelt right too. Awesome!

As he attached the tag to his robes, he let his brain find answers to the questions. In a few minutes, he found what he was looking for and raised a hand. "To me, Astronomy is studying the universe in order to unlock the mysteries that lie there. And to locate Aliens. We study it because it's really cool and fascinating.'' Yep. Astronomy was super fascinating. Adi always wanted to see an alien, by the way.

Angel smiled at the girl. "Hi I'm Angel." Angel had never seen this girl before and she really wanted to make a few new friends, she gave the girl a friendly smile and look which was her we'll speak after class face and then stopped because the Professor was speaking.

Angel taped her wand on the name badge and said her name "ANGEL VALENTINE!!" making sure she said it loud and clear, it looked awesome when she looked at the name badge again, could she get some of these for home? She thought it would look good on AJ they could put each others name badge on and confused everyone to death.

Angel then placed the badge on her robes.

Angel raised her hand at the question. "It means learning about the stars and the solar system and we learn it because well who knows what is out there, as the people of star trek once said. To boldly go were no one has gone before." Angel smiled. "Which basically means that we have no idea how many galaxies or planets are out there and we won't unless we do extensive research on them." Angel hoped she was right because now she was beginning to doubt her answer.

Marigold smiled at Airey as she took the nametag. NASA? Were they going to be learning about older expeditions or something like that? Her grandfather, the muggle one, used to tell her all about NASA and things like that. Before.. he... y'know, left this earth.

Clearing her throat, she tapped the nametag once and said clearly, "Marigold McAlistor." The tag only messed up a little by having 'Mc' and 'Alistor' as two different words with a space in between, but it was good enough. She stuck it next to her prefect's badge.

"Astronomy is basically taking what we know about the stars and the universe to ask questions and try to answer the mysteries of the unknown."

She could officially relax. The explosions would happen as planned and this class would be epic--not that all other Astronomy classes weren't because HELLO Astronomy and Airey. All you needed right there. "Good to know Professor." She said, flopping down into her seat in time to see Lottie take her usual seat next to her.

"Explosions are gonna be happening, a little heads up for the hearing." See what a considerate best friend she was? Even in her moment of utter excitement, still had to take certain things into consideration.

Speaking of consideration....excellent question!

Lex's hand flew up, even before she thought to fiddle with the name tags (YOU ALREADY KNOW US AIREY). "Astronomy is a logical reprieve from the absurd and it's unbelievably and undeniably important as a study because without it you'd have people who think they can actually prove Astrology to be true and and use the stars and planets aligning for all the great ills in this world without the basic understanding of science and the fact that it's not that serious and it's not likely the star lining up with the moon's fault." After that Divination lesson, it felt good to get that off her chest. Knowledge. She had it. "That's why we study Astronomy, for a firm foot to stand on when we correct those less endowed with knowledge than ourselves." Prove the idiots wrong. Yup.

That being said, Alexa lifted the blank name tag. "Would you be offended if I didn't wear this? Reckon I'd be offended if you didn't remember my name." Juuuust saying.

OOOH fancy nametags. Ok, Caleb could get on board with that. As his classmates started rattling off answers, Caleb took his wand out of his bag and tapped his nametag. "Caleb Newell!" he said sternly, although he wasn't sure WHY he had to do this. Flamsteed should know his name by now, right? If he didn't...Caleb was doing something wrong.

He then raised his hand to answer the question. "Astronomy is the study of all the stuff in space, basically," he explained. Because it wasn't just stars and planets - it was also other galaxies and supernova explosions and solar flares and stuff right? "It's important to study because you never know when space is just going to shoot a meteor your way or swallow up your planet into a black hole, plus it's interesting and kind of scary at the same time because it's so BIG," he added.

Also aliens.

But he wouldn't say that. People wouldn't take him seriously.

............

wait, what? Phoenix was distracted. He was illustrating his name tag (WHICH HAD GOT HIS NAME RIGHT, BY THE WAY... though it was kinda hard to mess up Phoenix) with some cool flames on one side and stars on the other. It was astronomy after all. He doodled to his hearts content, absorbing absolutely no information whatsoever, and finished it with a flourish. Right. There. He pinned the embellished Phoenix tag to the front of his glittered robes and looked around.

...

People were answering a question? He hadn't heard a question... what was going on? Oh no... he was behind already. He looked at each person as they answered the question, his peacock feather quill dangling from between his fingers.

...........

Nope. He had no idea... So for once in his life he stayed quiet.

It was really bizarre being in a classroom with other people. He was a little shellshocked actually.

Not interested in the class at all for he was in no mood for that currently, Gary just idly looked around at other people sometimes simply fixing his gaze on them openly not really caring if they would find it rude to stare like that. Most people were busy with answering the question the professor had asked. What did Astronomy mean to him? To be honest...nothing right now. He was bored and he didn't want to be in class...instead he wished he were out right now doing...stuff.

Rather lazily, he scribbled a name tag for himself just to look like he was following the lesson and placed it on his desk where it could be seen easily not wanting a stupid piece of paper on himself. Then he returned to staring at people..



...until he saw him. Was it his eyes or did this boy really had something on his robe? It looked shiny...or not, Gareth couldn't be sure. Oh...he had such a nice quill. Being a collector of quills, Gary knew he had to steal that one. But the guy was sitting away from him. What to do then? It could be simple.

Tearing a large piece of parchment, the Slytherin boy crumbled it into a kind of hard paper ball and aiming carefully, shot it at the head of the boy with shiny robes.

Phoenix was feeling a little clueless and doodling on the edge of his parchment, considering the classroom, when he felt something hit his mess of hair. "What the..." He looked around and...

"Gary!" Phoenix recognised the guy, obviously, and gave him a thumbs up, totally forgetting he was in a lesson. He pulled the rolled up bit of paper out of his curls, doodled a snake with a smiley face on it, and threw it back at the boy. Then...

WAIT! LESSON!

"Astronomy's super cool, sir. Cause the galaxy is like, totally gorgeous and sparkly and there's all this stuff nobody knows about and you can space travel and all that but like, it has all this extra meaning as well, y'know? Like with magic and stuff and mapping the stars. It's dead awesome and stuff cause it's kinda futuristic and kinda like the past at the same time cause it's always been there so... yeah."

Breathing ... that thing ... wasn't really happening right now.

Clara could FEEL so many faces looking at her that actually weren't ... and could hear too many voices in her head. More than were actually speaking. She could also feel Eden's hand on her back, but when she looked up, she could just see her mouth moving. Her voice was simply lost among everyone else's.

The redhead looked around frantically, trying to avoid eye contact, but trying to look for something ... something to calm her down, but she .... had no idea what. If Eden couldn't do it ... what could? And ... she couldn't just leave ... surely she would get in trouble. That being said, she didn't think she could move ... she felt rooted to her spot and .... her sight was going blurry ........

... Her lungs felt crushed and ... black dots appeared in her vision ......

Class has started! Awesome he was getting excited. He was wondering if the lesson was gonna be something star wars themed seeing he had his vintage comic book. As he heard the professor's comment and I mean Kace would be like that too. If he found a huge collectible he would be protective of it. But as he looked down he noticed there was a name tag from NASA. Huh? Why did they have to have a name tag from a space station. He never been there but he always wanted to go.

He heard the professor's directions and knew he needed to tap with his wand and say his name. He got out his wand from his robes and tapped and spoke clearly, "KACE LECIUM!" then he noticed it was spelled, "CASE Lecium". He gave it a quizzical look. He raised his hand and said, "Erm Professor, my name is spelled with a C and not a K. How do I fix it?" He wasn't surprised his name was unique after all.

Then he thought about the question the professor asked. What does astronomy mean to him. He raised his hand and said, "I think Astronomy is basically summed up as how the planets and moons work in outside our world. They also teach us the practice people had of figuring out the constellations. I mean I wouldn't know any of the stars names without Astronomy.." he shrugged and continued to doodle waiting for others answers.

Dot lit up and wiggled her fingers at Dima when he came in, but he didn't seem to see her. And then he sat with Maddie, when there was a seat by Dot. It was okay, since Maddie was by herself, but Dima. Her Dima. HERS.

She fiddled with the little patch while her classmates shared their thoughts. It wasn't such a boring first question, but everyone was saying the same thing. The thing she'd have said, probably. Stars. Astronomy was about stars. And whatever else was out there in the universe. Astronomy was about the universe.

Finally, she tapped her badge and said, "Charlotte Wojack, Space Cadet." She wanted to say Duchess of Mars or something, but Mars obviously didn't have a peerage and she didn't want to be presumptuous. Should she answer a question? Be involved? Participate?

SIGH. Her hand went up. "We study it 'cause it's there. That's what we do. We see a thing, we want to know about it, we ask a billion questions, we cross another ocean. It's just 'cause it's there and we need to know about it." Simple as.