Open Portrait of a Lady

[Vex]

There was much to do and so little time. Vex wasn't happy with the current arrangements, as he still didn't have his kettle and had no where to write about his woes and triumphs day to day. The best spot used to be Kingy's office, but since it was no longer Kingy's office, it wasn't available anymore. Boredom was never a good thing for a poltergeist to feel, as they rarely felt it for long. Vex was already coming up with a way to entertain himself when he saw a large portrait of a man on a horse. And then he got an idea.​

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Now dressed in a beret, a long white coat, with a handlebar moustache exaggeratedly curled at the ends and wearing thin, cat-eye spectacles halfway down his nose, Vex had a paint brush in hand and a palette in the other, and was 'painting' slime over the portrait, who protested quite loudly at this mistreatment. Not dissuaded, Vex moved onto @The Blue Lady, applying slime to her frame as if he were painting the Mona Lisa, except rather than wearing an expression of contemplation, the poor portrait was stuck staring into his maniacal grin.​

 

[The Blue Lady]

It was always so quiet in the castle over the winter. Quiet and dark without the students around. Blue was always grateful when winter passed and there was life in the castle again, even if she often did little more than smile at a few passing children between classes. It was quiet in the hallway again for now, but the good quiet before the students rejoined the hallway, and Blue had busied herself watching out the adjacent window, trying to see if she could spot any interesting clouds today.

Her quiet was broken however by a loud complaint from her nearby neighbor and Blue peered down the corridor, horrified to see Vex making his way down with no doubt malicious intent. Blue always struggled with the concept of time, but it had been a blessedly long while since she had last seen the poltergeist and she had almost forgotten what a menace he could be. "You stop right there," She harshly when she noticed the paintbrush he had with him, slime already dripping as he raised it up to her frame. "No, no stop it! Urgh, you brute, have you no respect?" She groused, horrified at the layer of slime being painted on her poor gilt frame. Blue grabbed her sewing, flapping it uselessly at Vex's hand, helpless in her frame. "If you come any closer to my canvas I'll- I'll scream!" She tried, twisting the cloth in her hand.

 

[Vex]

"Wee! I 'ave ab-su-lute-ly noh respect!" Vex sing-songed in a truly awful French accent. No matter what The Blue Lady threatened, the poltergeist knew that there was nothing the portrait could actually do, and it wasn't like Professor Alicastell was going to lock him up because he painted a portrait with slime. She had made it clear that he couldn't hurt the students, and not only was sliming a portrait not actually causing it harm, but The Blue Lady wasn't a student, either.​

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He paused as she threatened to scream, but he didn't appear concerned. Scooping up a glob of slime, he waved it slowly in front of the portrait, his angled eyebrows narrowing and shadowing his large, orange eyes. "So, if I were to do this-" He smeared slime down the left side of her portrait, from top to bottom. "You'd scream?" Oh, please. Please scream.​

 

[The Blue Lady]

Blue scowled as Vex mocked her, his accent atrocious, and he continued none the less. She could hear more complaints from some of her nearby neighbors he'd already slimed and she doubted she would be able to convince him to stop either. She watched, painted eyes wide as he hovered the slime in front of her poor portrait, shuffling unceremoniously away from it as best she could. "Stop it. Stop it right now," She insisted, letting out an outraged, disgusted cry as he proceeded to smear slime down her portrait. "You monster! Get away!" She continued, tucked near the right-hand corner of her frame, swatting uselessly at Vex. "Professor Styx! Professor Summers! Someone stop him!" She called fruitlessly down the hallway, hopeful one of the professors might be in their office. Blue knew she could just leave, but somehow the idea of leaving Vex to vandalize her frame while she was gone seemed so much worse, and it wasn't like she had anywhere really to go, mortified at having to explain the situation to some other painting.

 

[Aeon Summers]

What had began as a muffled murmuring somewhere in the corridor outside of Aeon's office soon escalated to shouting, and the man somewhat reluctantly rose from his desk to check the commotion. It was too early in the year for this, though if the feast had been any indication of what to expect for the rest of the semester, he shouldn't have been surprised. Peering out, the professor was confronted with what at first appeared to be Vex on his own, and it took a moment of watching the scene to realise that the protesting was coming from one of the paintings. It was a relief to see it wasn't a student in trouble, and though he knew that paintings were exactly that - paintings, they were lifelike enough that he felt the need to step in and defend it. "That's enough of that, Vex." He said, whipping out his wand. He gave it a flick toward the brush and palette the poltergeist held, animating them to fly around and smack him upside the head with his own slime. "Go find a blank canvas to paint on." He instructed, though he didn't wholly expect the poltergeist to listen to him. He wasn't able to do whatever his mother had done to get rid of him in the first place, but he hoped he'd be able to drive him off with a taste of his own medicine.​