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If you asked Tommy Ingram, he'd tell you that his affinity is stealing. Well, not really stealing, he would qualify. He's just very persuasive. He talks to things and they just--usually happen to like him more than their previous owner. Not always. But usually. And that's not his fault, really, if they like him more. And sometimes they would have attacked their previous owner! So, really, he's doing them a favor.
(If you asked his best friend, Toby Underwood, what Tommy's affinity was, he would roll his eyes and say sarcastically, "the power of friendship," and then Tommy would object that that made him sound like he was from a bad cartoon, which he is not, he would only be from good cartoons. If you asked Wilbur Soot, he would pause to consider for a minute, and then probably say that Tommy's affinity is being likable, and then he would make a joke about how Tommy stole himself an older brother.)
He can't take all his things into the scholomance; there are too many. He packs what he can, and he apologizes at length to his lego batman figure that's missing an arm and his piece of dark green sea glass he found on the beach when he was ten and his plastic rabbit and three spray-painted pinecones and a lopsided dreamcatcher he made in primary school for leaving them all behind. He says a longer goodbye to a verifiable army of bugs and a seagull and a raccoon and and one of Phil's crows. (He actually hadn't been trying to steal it, that time. It just... Looked hungry. And he had mana. And then he had another familiar, because it just really liked him, okay, it's not his fault that his affinity is what it is.)
He'll be back, though. He'll be back and he'll tell them all about what it was like--it's probably going to suck, it might be for the best that they're staying behind--but his big brother's in there, you know, Wilbur, and he's going to change the world, so it'll be a cool story. Staying home is like the best of both worlds, because they'll get to hear all the cool stories but they won't have to be in danger. He'll miss them for four years, though, it's a long time and he might not be back. (He'll probably be back. But--you never know, right? So if he doesn't come back, they should be prepared for that, too.)
He takes with him:
- Shroud and Henry, who are the best spiders there are, because Henry was his very first familiar ever and Shroud came up to him and decided to be friends before Tommy even gave him any mana
- his baby blanket, because he can't sleep without it
- a hand-crank music box, with three different cylinders (Over the Rainbow, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and Frère Jacques)
- a screwdriver (to switch out cylinders for the music box)
- Toby's old water bottle that has sharpie drawings from Tommy and Toby and Wilbur almost entirely covering it
- his needle and thread
- an enchanted swiss army knife which used to be Terrence's before deciding it liked him better
- a bead lizard Toby made for him when they were both, like, six (since named Phukkit and declared a good luck charm)
- his notebook, with the cover removed and a promise made to repair it once he's in
- four mana crystals from Phil, with a promise to fill up two of them and give them to Wilbur once he gets in if he's still alive
- bigger clothes for Wilbur (with the promise of exchanging them for Wilbur's current clothes), also from Phil
- an enchanted letter for Wilbur from Phil and Sam and Terrence
- a lightweight backpack, to carry everything
