Chapter 13 the First Game
************************Quiddich Pitch*******************************
October 1, 2005.
The day had fallen gray and raining. Much like another Quiddich match in their 3rd year. The wind blew hard, cutting though one's very bones like a knife. Harry and Hermione stood together, talking low. With a low grin, he leaned down slightly, she was reasonably tall for a girl at only an inch shorter than he, and kissed her deeply. As they pulled away, with a happy little smile Hermione touched her wand to Harry's glasses and performed a charm to keep them free of rain.
Ron watching, trying desperately not to laugh flashed back for a second to a much younger Harry and Hermione, but the same charm on the same pitch. Some things never change. He observed with a wry chuckle, though as Harry leaned down for a final kiss and pulled her hood up against the rain, he corrected his thought. Some things do though.
He walked over to the two, a grin on his face. "Come on, mate, we have a victory party to get to." With a wave, Ron led Harry to the center of the pitch. Madame Hooch was waiting with the Hufflepuff captain, waiting for them to show to begin this game. Everyone on the pitch was already soaked to the bone and the girls, anyway, were already shivering. McGonagall hadn't known last year whom to pick as Captain, so she had made them Co-Captains, and except for the Slytherin games they went out to the center pitch together. Madame Hooch had placed specific orders before last year's Slytherin game however, that the captains, namely Harry and Draco, be kept away as far as possible, she had had enough attempted murders in that series of games, thank you, over the last six years.
"Ok boys" Madame Hooch began as she looked meaningfully at both team's captains, "I expect this will be a clean game. Are there any questions from either side? Okay Ronald, call it in the air." Pulling a galleon from her pocket, she flipped it in the air. It landed in her hand with a splash.
"Heads" Ron said at the top of its arc.
"Heads it is," Hooch responded with a nod, "which goal will you defend?"
Turing to the north goal Ron pointed, and picked his favorite goal, "the north one." Not that the choice was in doubt in any way, no team's keeper wanted to try to defend the goal nearest the Gryffindor stands. Slytherin keepers had even been turned to toads over the years for trying.
Hooch gave a wry half-smile, "You heard him, to the air."
The teams mounted their brooms and took off, Harry and the Hufflepuff seeker, Thomas Payne a fifth year, hovered directly over the center of the pitch. Seekers used to start flying around until last year, when right in front of Thomas' eyes, Harry had ended a game fifteen seconds after it started by snatching the snitch out of the air before it had almost escaped the box, resulting in the fastest game in Hogwarts history, notwithstanding he fact that Harry had been distracted by other thoughts at the time, of course.
The whistle blew, and right away it was certain that this game, unlike last year's match between the two teams, would not be a quick one. The Snitch took off directly away from both seekers and dove into the trench surrounding the pitch were it vanished in the rain. Both seekers groaned and headed for altitude to look for signs of the Snitch. Meanwhile....
Ginny Weasley snatched the Quaffle off of the release, and with a move worthy of Harry, scored the first goal. She drove the entire length of the pitch and pulled up hard in front of the Hufflepuff keeper, literally sliding though the air to a stop in front of the right-most goal, flinging water everywhere, and fired a cross-court shot to the left-most goal, totally misleading the Hufflepuff keeper, Steve Farris. At the same time she was taking a shot, Neville flashed by, slamming a bludger away from her back. She never even flinched as if she knew he would be there all along.
"WEASLEY SCORES WITH AN AWSOME SHOT, AND WHAT A HIT BY THE GRYFFINDOR BEATER" yelled Leslie Jordan, sister of the infamous Lee Jordan and the Hogwarts game commentator since Lee left school.
"Impartiality Leslie" McGonagall growled.
Harry dodged the other bludger, as usual he had the beaters primarily looking out for the chasers; he could easily take care of himself as long as Dobby wasn't controlling the bludger. Seeing the snitch he dove for it, only to be cut off by a Hufflepuff chaser trying to score on Ron. Cutting around the girl he lost sight of the snitch "Shit" but to his delight, he did catch sight of Hermione in her normal seat on the sidelines.
"Go Harry!" She yelled, her face alight. She was now soaked as least as much as Harry was as she had knocked her hood back in her excitement and hadn't bothered to notice.
Harry smiled and gave her a nod, but unfortunately he didn't have time for anything else. Pulling up hard, he flashed to a high orbit above the pitch and once again started looking for the snitch.
Meanwhile, the game went on. The Hufflepuffs, now had the quaffle, and in a flying V formation, like a flock of black and yellow geese, beat their way through the Gryffindor players and the lead player took a shot at the leftmost goal. In a brilliant piece of goalkeeping, Ron dove his broom over to the goal, and spun it in place at the last minute.... to knock the quaffle to Pavarti...who took at long shot on goal...which went in with a DONG.
"OH MY GOD WHAT A SAVE BY THE KING AND SHOT BY PATIL..." Jordan's amplified voice screamed. "20-0 Gryffindor"
"Leslie..." McGonagall muttered for the record, more than anything else.
"Some year we have to get a non-Gryffindor announcer" a Hufflepuff 5th year commented to a 4th year Ravenclaw girl, who nodded forcefully in agreement.
Up above, the snitch was proving particularly elusive; Harry had chased it about five times now, each time loosing it in the overcast conditions before he could catch it. Tom Payne had only tried to stay with Harry on two of the runs, for the last three he seemed scared for his life. Out of the corner of his eye Harry saw the bludger, and dodged it instinctively, only to have it come back the other way a second later as one of the Hufflepuff beaters connected. Neville swooped in and the opposing beaters started to have a flying tennis match with the bludger as the ball.
"Gryffindor 60-0" was heard echoing over the crowd. Nice cushion guys now I just need to catch the damn snitch. Harry muttered to himself as he looked around. A sudden grin blossomed as he saw the snitch sitting right behind Madame Hooch's back. She was huddling on her broom in the middle of the pitch trying to stay under her umbrella charm. In a flash, Harry dove hard for it. Payne, who was closer, started off after a second also, but he was up against Harry Potter, on an old cleansweep he probably loose, with Harry on a Firebolt it wasn't a contest. But he tried anyway. As the two dove on Madame Hooch, she detected the two incoming seekers out of the corner of her eye, and with a muttered "oh bugger" dove out of the way at the last second. Harry executed a perfect feint, grasped the snitch and pulled up at the last second; literally close enough to the ground to step off. Which he did as he held up the snitch triumphantly. Payne for his part was in pain. His feint didn't quite work, and he had augured into the ground with a great splash. As Harry looked over guiltily, Madame Pomfrey was already levitating him to the infirmary.
Ron flew in and jumping off his broom before it had even stopped, he ran over to congratulate Harry, "Bloody brilliant snag mate, Payne won't try that shit again against us."
"I doubt it" Harry agreed with a great smile, all the while grimacing inside you've obviously never crashed into the ground like that Ron, it ain't fun. "That was a hell of a save and knock to Pavarti, mate."
"Yeah, it was wasn't it" Ron replied with a grin as the rest of the team landed and settled around their Co-Captains. As Harry turned to where Neville and Ginny were "discussing" the match, a loud Roar was heard echoing over the stands.
"Aw shit, she has that damn hat...." Ron muttered under his breath to Harry who grinned at him in return.
"She's your girlfriend, mate...by the way Mione says she has the snake eating part working for the Slytherin game, it supposedly spits out the pieces. She helped her." Harry replied to his fire-haired friend, trying really hard not to laugh at his expression.
"Remind me to thank her." Then in a louder voice "Hi hon...." Ron managed to get out before Luna grabbed the front of his robes and pulled him into a kiss, incidentally knocking off her hat, which proceeded to....
"ROAR"
From behind Harry heard, "hello dear," and turned around to find Hermione slightly flushed from the run out to the pitch.
Her hair was plastered to her face from the rain, and for the millionth time his stomach lurched at he sight of her, God, she's beautiful, Harry though as he glanced in her eyes.
Hermione smiled brightly, lighting up the cloudy day, "I can't very well let those two outdo us, Ginny would never let me live it down. And you know how I hate to loose." And with that blinding smile, she pulled Harry down on her lips, determined to outdo Ron and Luna's example.
"ROAR"
'****************
Meanwhile in the stands, a blond haired boy wearing Slytherin robes saw the celebrating Gryffindors on the pitch. With
a slight headshake, he spat on the ground, and turned away. "Your day will come Potter and your mudblood too. The
Dark Lord is coming."
A/N Ok that was an incredibly short chapter...sorry. I guess I'll just have to post another one right away...