The Sorting, Who needs a bloody talking hat?

OOC:
All students and teachers are required to attend the sorting, even though we're just sorting the first years and transfers right now.

Zaroc VI: Also, those being sorted are sitting beside each other in the front row; Sarah, Zaroc Fortis VII, and Niles Limor.

IC:

Beorn grumbled just outside of the dining hall. Sure, he HAD to be the one to explain the sorting. Traditio his ass. He was willing to bet it was an additional bit of pettiness including him looking for that one damn order form in his office instead of Fortis getting another copy. Socrates hooted at Beorn from his perch on the man's shoulder, seeming to complain about his ride stopping. Beorn looked at Socrates with further irritation and rolled his eyes as he walked into the dining hall, where the cots had been cleared away in favor of the house tables.

The man trudged his way towards the head table and attempted to mentally flip off the headmaster with a look as he walked, but then diverted his attention to the students. All sorts were there, and a few he'd spoken with and talked to already. He spotted the cheeky kid, the headmaster's kid, and the collapsing wonder among others. Yeah, this was going to be an interesting year. Beorn wondered briefly whether he would be buried under all the paper in his office, but stopped as he reached another small table in front of the headmaster's table and looked down at the small table.

Marbles...damn, must have been lost by the first headmaster when he was a kid or something, Beorn thought.

Beorn turned around to face the students. Unlike most of the teachers, Beorn was dressed not in robes, but in rather shabby clothing. He was currently dressed in what looked like it might have once been a set of green sweatpants and a similar sweatshirt, but they had faded through many washings and now had patches of white. Beorn might have been able to blend in with a snow-doted canopy, but definately not in the dining hall at that moment.

"Psst," Beorn muttered, "Socrates, go to my chair. You're going to stay here while I look for that damn form."

"Hoo."

Socrates launched from Beorn's shoulder and flew back around to the seat Beorn would have occupied if he was going to stay. Beorn dug a hand into the pocket of his sweatpants and drew out a sheet of paper with handwriting on it and he looked it over briefly. The man nodded to himself and shoved the paper back into his pocket before addressing the students.

"Well, kids, it's time to find out where you belong in this lovely little establishment," Beorn began as he stepped out of the way of the table with the marbles on it, "We're going to sort you, now some transfers may be familiar with similar ceremonies at other schools, but we do things a bit differently here. All first years and transfers are going to be asked to come up to this table in turn. There are four marbles, each represents a house here at Fortis. For those of you still in the dark, and gathering from the kid drooling in the front, I'd wager there are some of you out there, the four houses are Auxilium, Fides, Gnaritas, and Misericordia. Now as I said, each marble represents a single house, and normally you'll only be able to take one, but if you somehow feel compelled to take two, that's when the fun starts. You see, if the heads of the two house marbles you pick up will then duel for the right you get your sorry little cans into their respective houses, but don't worry, once we get you trained up a bit you'll have been worth the effort, right? Anyway, any such duels will take place in front of all of you so that you can even learn something while waiting to get into your house. Yeah, and that's about it, kids, I've got to go find some request form 234ABQZ27 or something like that, so my owl is sitting in for me. Toodles, kids."

Beorn chuckled to himself as he beat a rapid retreat from anywhere near the headmaster. He probably was going to get chewed out for all this, but it would have been worth it. As he left, he noticed a nervous first year and patted the kid as he passed. He hoped it came off as reassuring, because he was pretty damn sure that the headmaster looked fit to explode behind him...well, he hoped not....if the headmaster exploded how the hell was he going to explain that at his next interview? Beorn left the hall cheerily humming "Another Brick in the Wall."

"Hoot," Socrates said from his position perched on Beorn's chair.

This post has been edited by Zaroc Fortis VI on Aug 22 2006, 03:40 PM

Professor Nicolae Vchejk, or just 'Professor Nic', trundled his way into the dining hall. He peered around at the students around him, most of them being a great bit taller than himself. Professor Vchejk's eyes twinkled with amusement as he observed the younger students, they seemed a bit nervous to be here. A gray squirrel weaved about his feet, then quickly dashed off to mingled with the students. Nicolae grinned somewhat and tugged at his beard a bit, amused by the antics of the squirrel.

Nicolae gave a nod to Socrates who was holding his position on the frontlines at the chair. The stout professor reached into his robes and produced a small flask, and quickly took a sip of it before replacing the cap and sliding it back into his robes. "Ah, alcohol warms the blood an' raises t'spirits anytime 'n' anyday, if I do say so meself." Nicolae said with a laugh, clapping a third year on the shoulder. The Russian wasn't an alcoholic...he just enjoyed plenty of the stuff and pretty frequently, at that. This added to the joke that Nicolae was a bit like a dwarf, in stature and demeanor.

Niles sat in the front row, squirming anxiously beside Zaroc the Seventh. "Please, don't put me in Gnaritas," he said aloud, talking to whatever Powers That Be would listen. "I'm a real dunce, if you put me in Gnaritas I'll die." Niles leaned back ion his chair and adjusted the collar on his shirt. Nervously he leaned forward and ran his hand through his blonde hair. Almost at once he shot to a new nervous gesture, drumming his fingers against his right leg and humming a muggle tune from an anime, thinking the words to the song in his mind at the same time.

READY STEADY GO
READY STEADY CAN'T HOLD ME BACK
READY STEADY GIVE ME GOOD LUCK
READY STEADY NEVER LOOK BACK
LET'S GET STARTED READY STEADY GO
kokoro wa (hashiru) ano sora no shita
karamawari suru kimochi ga sakebi dasu no o tomerarenai
kimi made (todoke) kitto ato sukoshi
atsuku hizashi ga terasu kono michi no mukou


“READY STEADY GO!” He quickly brought his hands to his mouth when he realized he’d practically yelled this aloud.

Zaroc kept turning his head to look at Niles, amused by his antics if not a tinsy bit worried. He was definitely not as nervous as Niles seemed. Zaroc sure didn't want to be in Gnaritas either of course... really, Gnaritas was a house for geniuses... he was not a genius. Zaroc could memorize spells, but he had a horrible time learning anything else. He was excellent with charms, that had been clear at a young age when he began to actually exercize control over his 'accidental' magic, and since it was within the school, the government was unable know about him using his father's wand to practice late at night from spare papers he found laying around the school, much less were they able to do anything about it.

No, Zaroc wasn't all that nervous really... except that when Niles yelled out, "Ready Steady Go," Zaroc jumped from his seat, and only managed to regain some manner of dignity by using greeting the newest arrival as an excuse.

Oldew stalked in once more, this time in robes a shade of yellow like sand. He yawned and stretched, popping his back. He looked toward the men who were hooking up what appeared to be large televisions. He took a moment to think and then slapped his hand to his forehead. Of course, its so everyone in the back could watch the sorting. How interesting. They would only have three sortings...yet they were going all out for it.


As he took off down the front row of chairs, he heard a loud voice, and stopped trying to find the source, but at the same moment, Zaroc the Seventh more or less leapt from his chair to greet him. “Uh, good morning,” he said, trying to sound cheerful instead of a bit perturbed. He wrung his hands idly.

"Are you nervous?” he asked the boy, smirking a bit. “Well, don’t be anyway, I have to get to my seat, of course.” Like the other teachers, Oldew would be sitting at the staff table for the sorting, unless that is, he had to fight. He surely hoped he wouldn’t have to fight to keep a student away from Misericordia. A shudder went through him before he took his leave of the child.

Sean Davison was sitting in the very back, though he was so far in the back that he indeed needed to use the aforementioned large television screens to see the front of the room. But that was alright, because as long as he could sit here against the back wall and the west wall he could cut off two directions from which danger could come. From over the speakers of one of the televisions near him, someone yelled, causing him to not only jump from his seat to his feet but to draw his wand in record time which was hidden up his sleeve.

When he looked at the television he saw Niles, his hands over his mouth, looking red in the face. Judging by the quick way the cameraman had turned and landed the camera on the boy, Sean wasn’t the only one the scream had scared. He flipped the screen a middle finger and sat down, wand still in his hand. Near heart attacks: 1, actual heart attacks:0.

What was sad was that he had experienced an honest-to-God heart attack the prior year.

(ZAROC, I PMed Sarah and asked her to post here for you.)

The moment Beorn had got near him, Jene ducked his head down and brought the collar of his jacket up to hide his face. When he was sure the man was gone he relaxed it. He looked back as Oldew entered the room and examined the large screen television that was showing the front of the room. Mixing muggle technology with the Wizarding world was not unheard of in America… but….


A moment later he twitched his head to the left as the scream rang out “Ready Steady Go!” A perhaps too energetic blonde boy slapped his hands over his mouth a moment later and Jene smirked. The boy next to him had jumped up in shock but was hiding it by greeting Oldew as he got to the front of the room. He liked that blonde kid; anyone who could make such a loud noise over the whole room would be fun and he sincerely hoped the boy would decide to engage in some duels.

Also from the corner of his eye he noticed a boy jump at the very back of the room. He looked angry and had is wand out and was lookiong around. Jene smirked as the boy grew enraged at the television screen.

Moran was sitting beside Jene, and when Jene covered his face as Beorn passed, Moran was truly confused. The yell caught Moran's attention a moment later, and then a moment after that Moran followed Jene's gaze to a very angry looking Sean Davison who had backed himself up into a corner. This was definitely agoraphobia, Moran could tell he was terrified of what could be possibly coming from one direction or another.

This did not set well. Nervously he sat back. He'd seen House Head's injure themselves and others in these duels, he was probably going to be needed.

(OOC: Okay, judging by the fact that several people have made appeals to her, Sarah’s player is either in such a slump that she cannot post, or she just won’t, so we’re going to start the sorting without her.)

Zaroc took a deep breath and stood up from where he sat at the table. He was very very annoyed right now. How dare that Beorn think he can get away with wearing sweats? Jeans were as casual as this school got on weekdays. Beorn was getting on his nerves, but he would be calmer. Beorn was excellent for his given… position. He had to get through this meagerly small excuse for a sorting and get some sleep.

He walked down the dais and to the smaller table in front of it which held the four marbles. “Attention, as Beorn said, we will now call one student forward and he or she will attempt to lift each marble in turn, if you are able to lift more than one, the heads of those houses will duel for you, myself filling in for Misericordia and our Dueling Referee will fill in for Gnaritas as they are to this point in time Headless.”

He pointed toward the table. “You will start with the blue Gnaritas marble on the left, to its right, the black Misericordia marble, to its right, the white Fides marble and to its right, the red Auxilium marble.” He reached down into a small box on the side of the table and drew a small slip of paper.

His son. “Zaroc Salvus Fortis… step up now.”

Zaroc took a deep breath and stood up. He cricked his neck once and walked rhythmically across the cold stone floor stopping directly in front of his father. He looked the man in the eyes, contemplating his new knowledge of how people saw his father and wondering how his father really was, how he really thought. A second deep breath later and he sat down. “I’m ready,” he declared to his father. Without awaiting the man's instruction he reached for the Gnaritas marble.

Almost immediately his arm grew cold as if it was surrounded in ice, and no matter how hard he tugged, the marble wouldn't move. After another second he jerked his hand back, shocked to see that there was indeed a layer of frost on his arm. Next he reached for the black marble to its right. To his shock, the stone practically jumped into his hand. "W-wow..."

Zaroc was momentarily thrown off by the blank, searching stare he had just received from his son. What could that look mean? The determined way his son sat down and grasped the first stone sent a bit of pride through the man. When the second stone came into his son’s hand, Zaroc scowled. “Misericordia. Please continue the sorting ceremony, Mr. Fortis.”

The boy could sense the disappointment in his father’s cold voice. Why was he being so cold? He’d never been a happy person, they’d never had a super-close relationship, but he’d never been quite so cold except for the times when he’d tell the boy to stay in his room for several hours at a time and study spells. That just wasn’t always fun.

Biting the inside of his bottom lip in contemplation, Zaroc moved the black marble into his left hand. He reached next for the Fides marble, but he could tell a moment before he touched it that it would not allow him to pick it up. Just as his hand got near it the white from the marble seemed to extend out until it began to burn Zaroc’s eyes.

He cringed at the light and pulled back. Next he reached forward and took hold of the Auxilium marble. He knew if it rejected him he would receive a burn on the palm of his hand that would be horrible if he didn’t let go, but nothing happened. He pulled up and it came easily.

He shifted it into his left hand, the ebony black marble and a blood red one. He looked up at his father, actually gulping.

He wasn’t the only one who had gulped, for at that moment it registered on Oldew’s mind that he would be soon fighting his boss. He thought briefly about ditching out but didn’t think it was the smart way to go, if someone broke the tradition they could definitely kiss their job goodbye, no matter what it was. He didn’t wait for his boss to call him up; he merely stood and made sure he wasn’t shaking as he walked, though he couldn’t deny that his legs were a little shaky.

Somehow this felt like going to the gallows.

“Clear off Zaroc,” Zaroc the Sixth said to his son. “Referee Jene Heft, please join us here.” Zaroc waved his wand and the marbles shot from his son’s hand back to the table which then rose up into the air and stayed suspended up there near the high ceiling.

He twirled his wand between his fingers twice, and a small flash of white created four walls around that area for a moment, then it became clear. It was a shield that wouldn’t allow spells to hit the students and professors outside of it, which meant that his son better hurry up and get out now.

OOC: (I figure I should tell you all what happens when someone draws a stone that rejects them. Auxilum burn’s the drawer’s hand when it rejects, Fides, grows bright and hurts their eyes violently, Misericordia makes them very sick to their stomach if they hold on for more than ten seconds and Gnaritas freezes the arm of the drawer. If I'm not being clear enough, please visit the What You Need to Know topic which has been updated with this information. )

As soon as the shield went up, Zaroc the Seventh left the area inside the shield quickly and returned to his seat which was in the row closest to the wall of the shield. Almost immediately upon collapsing into his chair he let out the breath he’d been holding in since he pulled Auxilium’s marble up. His stomach flipped twice as he took a deep breath and leaned forward. “Well,” he whispered to Niles, “that was… weird.”

“Good luck.”