Genius (or something close to it) Doesn't Solve Everything

Keith leaned back in his chair, rubbed his eyes, and took a long sip of butterbeer.

Around him, the Three Broomsticks buzzed with activity - people left and entered through the inviting door, others ordered drinks, others stood and mingled, chatting amiably about quidditch, and the weather, and anything else that happened to cross their minds. All in all the place was packed - Keith had been lucky to get here early, when seats had still been open.

Keith took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, glancing back down at the complicated formulas he had jotted down on the papers that currently occupied his table. He hated the theoretical work, hated it with a passion. He was about combining things, and seeing where it went, and improvising. Except he couldn't exactly afford to do that just now so...theoretical work it was.

His problem was Spice. His problem had been Spice for a long time now, and he was fairly sure he was stuck. He took another look at the formulas and groaned, leafing through a large textbook in a vain attempt to find an answer to the question that had been bugging him for months now.

How do you get Spice to work in solid form?

The main issue with Spice, Keith had realized, was that it was liquid. It was difficult to transport, and to buy in bulk, and very very fragile, in the sense that you had to be extremely careful with it. But whenever he tried to "fix" it by changing it into a solid form, it seemed to lose all magical properties.

Keith was just happy nobody had tried looking over his shoulder yet. He'd hate to get kicked out again.

Wally threw a furtive look over her shoulder as she slipped into the Three Broomsticks, having left her mother at Madame Malkin's. Wally simply did not have the motivation to go and look at such petty things as robes, they bored her. She had stopped by the apothecary to treat herself to some ingredients she lacked in her own potions kit. She was not the best brewer- her father was often helping her regrow her eyebrows back- but she specialized in finding new and better ways to make potions.

She bought herself a Butterbeer, holding th mug with both hands, and wandered throughout the pub, looking for something to do. Her mind was thinking of what she could use this agrippa, eel eyes, and lacewing flies for, which potions they could enhance. She strode by someone and glanced over, seeing complex formulas written over the pages. She did not understand the formulas but names of ingredients popped out at her, and she realzied it was the formula for some sort of potion.

The ingredients listed through her mind and began switching with other ingredients that she knew could help more. A few words had popped out at her like 'potency' 'thickness' and 'solid.' She moved around the table, pointing her chin at the papers, saying with a blank expression, "Beetle eyes help a potion spread quicker throughout the body, providing quicker effects."

She sat down across from him, recognizing him from the front. "You're Keith Nicholas. I'm in Ravenclaw too, we have Potions and a few other classes together. How thick are you trying to make the potion? Are you actually trying to solidify it?"

"No, I'm trying to make it explode," Keith said with as much sarcasm as he could muster. Sighing, he rolled his eyes. "Of course I'm trying to make it solid," he said. "The only thing that's confusing me here is how any of this is your buisness."

He remembered this girl from class, albeit vaguely. Her name was some long, confusing word starting with a W, so Keith privately referred to her as "the australian girl" He had never really bothered to get to know her - she stayed out of his way, he stayed out of hers. Simple, easy, hassle-free.

But now she was shaking up the system that had worked so well. Keith scowled. She was right about the beetle eyes however - not many people were aware of that particular fact. "And besides," he said, turning back to his various charts and scribbles. "The point isn't to spread the potion quicker, that just cuts down on the buildup." He waved his hand aimlessly through the air. "Buildup is very important, or so I'm told."

Sarcasm. How original.

"Explosions can do quicker damage than drugs, that's what this looks like," she said, pointing at a few of the ingredients, recognizing those that were supposed to cause euphoria and the like. She knew what you got when certain ingredients were combined, it was apart of her business to know- self proclaimed, naturally, but it still mattered to her.

He continued on and she responded, "Just because it spreads quicker, doesn't mean the effects are released immediately. It can be easily countered, to have a sort of trigger, slowly have the effects takeover, but by then, the drug has already dispersed throughout your body. More efficient, though not necessary."

Wally liked a challenge, that was the only reason she was even bothering. Hmm.. Turn it into a solid. "Knotgrass and leeches would be a start. Thickeners. They are both in the Polyjuice potion. That's why it's so thick." She though for a second. "That's a start. Not it. What you'd really need is to do another small potion, really. Knotgrass and leeches. And I'm thinking powdered root and... Damn. On the tip of my tongue."

Keith's scowl deepened when she mentioned drugs. "I resent that. I am an upstanding Hogwarts student," he said, carefully covering the majority of his formulas. "I have no reason to brew drugs of any sort. You must be mistaken." It was impressive though, that she was able to realize that just by looking through some ingredients. Few people could visualize a potion like Spice in their heads.

He shook his head at her suggestions. "It's not just about thickening though, it's about drying it out. I need dust, not mud," he explained, flipping through his book. "The powdered root would just be a useless addition, unless...he flipped through the book more rapidly, his face quickly shifting from frustration and scorn to excitement. "Unless you combined the Knotgrass and Leeches with Devil's snare extract and let it roast in the sun..." he broke out into a large grin. "That would work. The Devil's Snare extract would make it more susceptible to being dried, but the Knotgrass and Leeches thicken it to a point where it doesn't vanish completely." He scratched a few numbers on a blank sheet of paper, and frowned." That's a lot of wasted liquid though. Do you know anything that would make it dry more effectively?"

Wally raised an eyebrow, her expression unreadable as he claimed to be above such things as drugs. She knew what she had seen, she knew which ingredients he had. and hshe knew what sort of things they could make, and drugs was the most likely of all of them. Besides, Keith was notrious, and not for being a star pupil.

He began to scoff her idea, but he had obviously missed her point about the powdered root- mixed with the thickening ingredients would be a step towards solidfying it. He said Devil's snare extract and her eyes widened, nodding, "Yes, that's it." She could not believe she had not been able to summon those words, Devil's snare extract was so distinct.

She thought for a second and said, "Well Ashwinder eggs heat potions, though I suppose unless done perfectly, that'd just make it boil and lose prgoress. Bicorn horn dissolves human flesh so given it doesn't destroy the other ingredients, it could sort of disintegrate the remaing liquid." For her, it was best to run through a list of ingredients to find the good fit. "Powdered moonstone.. That could work. And nettles. Nettles always help. If you could get yourself crocodile heart, though, that may be the ticket. Blood of a croc might even work. It has an interesting effect."

When she mentioned alligator heart, Keith had to stop. She was just asking for the snark now. No, begging him. With that kind of response, it was nothing less than his public duty to bring the full weight of his sarcasm powers to bear against her.

"Alligator heart?" He asked incredulously. "Only you. Only you would say something like that." He snickered and flipped to the table of contents, scrolling down the list of ingredients. "What's next, Koala fur? Kangaroo ears? Look, Alligator heart isn't even in here!" He said, pointing to the spot on the table of contents where alligator heart should be. "Alligator blood might be but I'm too lazy to look it up...I guess you could just tell me what it's supposed to do."

Wally watched him, sure she had thrown him off, because croc heart was not used too often at Hogwarts and when it was it was in later years. However, Wally found it incredibly useful, even if you had to special ask for it at an apothecary. She had done so three of four times and found that it was very varied in reactions it gave.

"That's because you should be looking for croc hearts. They're not rare, people just think they are. I've bought them before. Thry're tougher that normal organs, they dry quickly if youleave it out. If you don't want it to dry out, you're supposed to keep it saturated. I think it might be what you need." He mentioned blood and she nodded curtly. "Well croc blood has the same properties of croc heart, but you run the risk of making it more liquidy unless brewed correctly."

"Crocodiles, alligators, same thing," Keith said, waving his hand dismissively. "Sorry for not having encyclopedic knowledge of the Australian outback." He flipped to the Crocodile blood page, reading in silence for a few minutes and then turning back to his scribbles.

"This...actually looks like it could work," he said after a moment, a grin stretching over his face. "You're not half bad at this," he said, turning back to Wally and shutting his book. A problem that had been bothering him for weeks, resolved mere minutes into his conversation with this girl. "What did you say your name was again?"

Wally said in a blank sort of voice, "They're actually quite distinctive." Wally often forgot most people did not grow up like her, living like wild women in the Australian outback. She also wanted to point out that, in Potions, alligator and crocodile blood could be drastically different. They were very different as ingredients, but she would just let Keith find it out on his own.

As he read, she went and sat across from him, getting a little tired of standing, knowing she would be active for the rest of her day, and taking advantage of the time to rest. She lifted the mug to her lips and drank some of the golden liquid. At his words, she set down the mug and tipped her head, knowing that it would work, had he given it a chance. He asked her for her name and she blinked. She really was as insignificant as her family treated her then- they had been in the same House and classes for two years after all. "Wally."