Wood and Stone
"The Arrival of the New Captain"
It was easy to find the apartment building just a few blocks from the stadium. To the passer-by, the building looked a lot like the stadium, as if it wasn't even there. It was part of the charm placed upon the buildings. To a witch or wizard, they stood there in all of their glory to impress upon each the power and respectability of the sport and the life style of the players.
"Whoa, nice," whispered Oliver as he looked up at the building. It was taller than the dorms he had stayed in when he was on the Puddlemere United Reserve Team. There, they had been in barracks that reminded him vaguely of prison. That had been about ten years ago.
"Move it, grandpa!" A voice called as a whirl of brown hair whipped past him at lightening speed, through the double pane glass doors, and out of sight.
"Grandpa?" Oliver shouted indignantly. Oliver shook his head, frowning, as he headed up the steps into the building. He stopped immediately to take in the sights of the building. As handsome and stately as the building had been from the outside, it was nothing compared to the inside of the building.
Pictures of the greatest Quidditch players spanned the walls, illuminated invisibly by some charm of sorts. Oliver could only stare at the way the chasers, beaters, keepers, and seekers kept flying in and out of each other's frames. He was focused on his hero, Artugo Palmini, a fellow keeper for the Italian Quidditch team. He had died a year before in a horrible Quidditch accident.
"Oliver? Oliver Wood?" A woman's voice called from the top of the stairs. Oliver looked up to see a familiar face looking down at him. She was smiling, her white teeth sparkling in contrast to her warm, chocolaty skin.
"Angelina?" Oliver asked hesitantly. She smiled bigger and rushed down the stairs. Even now, Oliver found her height to be a bit intimidating. She was as tall as he was, and he wasn't a short man. Angelina hugged him hard, her arms wrapping around his neck playfully. Oliver dropped his bags and hugged her back, careful not to crush her with his un-human-like strength. She laughed.
"You would think it was a life time ago since I last saw you," Angelina teased as she pulled back. She grinned again. "It's been long enough, though, Wood."
"Wow, it has been a long while," Oliver said as he reached to pick up his bags. "Lee's party, right?"
"That's right, Wood," Angelina smiled nodding. "You remember. It was when he got that award from the WWN. Of all people, who would have thought that he would be successful to the point of fame?"
"Didn't you guys date back in school?" Oliver asked curiously. He swore he thought that she blushed.
"Ah, old news, Oliver," Angelina laughed. "So, tell me what my ex-Quidditch captain is doing turning up at the dormitories for the players of the Hedwig Ham Hocks?"
"God, is that what your team is called?" Oliver asked, rolling his eyes. Angelina shrugged.
"You tell me," she replied mischievously winking as she saw the owner of the team, Albador Westall coming toward them. She made a little wave at Oliver and headed past him out the doors.
Albador Westall was a small man, possible part dwarf; with a white beard so long he nearly tripped over it. He was stocky, with stubby arms and legs. Oliver had to fight the urge to laugh when the man approached him, trying to puff himself up to his full height of four feet even.
"Ah, Mr. Wood, thank you for coming," Mr. Westall said as he reached up to shake Oliver's hand. Oliver shook it and nodded.
"The opportunity to be captain in the professional league doesn't come every day," Oliver said. Mr. Westall laughed.
"No, it doesn't," Mr. Westall agreed. He led Oliver up the stairs and to the first door on the right. A small, simple room with a bed, dresser, and a desk with a chair was in the otherwise plain room. "This would be your room, my boy. Toss you stuff down and I will show you around the rest of the building."
Oliver followed Mr. Westall, seeing the dorms that slept two per each, as well as the wash rooms, as well as other things. Oliver watched amused as a house-elf wobbled by, carrying a dirty load of clothes that practically consumed the small creature. The tour of the building ended in the common room, complete with a huge board that was meant to represent the Quidditch pitch.
"Ok, so that is it then," Mr. Westall said finally. "I hope that you can do something with the team of misfits and the lovely back up players. And watch out for Stone. Sent the last captain home crying, thus this is why I need you. I heard that you could be a real hard ass and you did so great with your team back at Hogwarts."
"You know of my days at Hogwarts?" Oliver said grinning. Mr. Westall nodded.
"I was never fortunate enough to go there, not magically talented enough, I suppose, but yes, I heard how wonderful you did. I am hoping you can do the same here with The Fawkess," Mr. Westall said. He shook Oliver's hand again; Oliver nodded, thankful Angelina had been joking about the team's name. "The players should be down at the pitch. You can apparate once you are just outside the front door. You will land in the lockers. Good luck, Mr. Wood."
The pitch was the perfect shade of green. Oliver could appreciate a grass of this caliber, his fingers reaching down and caressing the blades of grass as if each individual one was a lover. Half a dozen players were in the air, a few were laying about her and there on the grass, talking. Thirteen players in total, his first string team and the reserves. Oliver pointed his wand at himself and muttered the word: Sonorus.
"If everyone will please line up along the field," Oliver's voice boomed out over the pitch unnaturally loud. He silently cast the counter spell, Quietus, before he walked over to the line of Quidditch players. Each one stood, holding their broom and looking at him. "So, ok, maybe we should all get to know one another. I am Oliver Wood, keeper, and I am the new captain of The Fawkes. So, let's see… I already know Angelina Johnson." Oliver muttered as he looked over his roster. In fact a few faces were familiar to him from over the years.
"El Captain, perhaps we should split up Reserves versus First string," a voice called out loudly, shattering the silence that had overcome the pitch. Oliver looked up warily at the faces.
"Who said that?" Oliver asked quickly. All of the players looked down to the end of the line uneasily to where a girl stood. He nearly laughed. She was short, even by girl standards, reaching at barely five feet two inches tall. She had her brown hair pulled back tight; a smudge of dirt was on her face near her jaw line.
"I did," she said as she crossed her arms defiantly. She had piercing gray eyes, like two pieces of dulled tin foil set in place of irises.
"And you are?" Oliver asked as his face turned back to the roster.
"Gigi Stone," Angelina said laughing. The girl shot Angelina a scathing, which silenced Angelina's laughter.
"I am Gabrielle Stone, first string keeper," Stone said as she stepped apart from her other players.
"Not any more," Oliver said as he looked back at the roster.
"What?" Stone exploded as she practically ran up to him. Oliver frowned as he looked down at her from his empowering height of six foot three. She didn't seem intimidated.
"We only need one first string keeper, and one reserve. I am keeper, you are reserve," Oliver said as he looked down at her. Her eyes flamed.
"That's crap. I have been on the team as keeper since it's initiation into the professional ranks three years ago. I am the best keeper this team has ever seen," Stone defended hotly.
"Well, not any more. Sorry, but you are reserves," Oliver said as he turned back to the roster. He waited then looked down at her, seeing that she hadn't returned to the line. "Yes, Ms. Stone?"
"It's just Stone, and I think this is crap," Stone huffed at him, her arms still crossed.
"Opinion noted, now get back in line," Oliver said forcefully. Stone hesitated before she turned on her heels and headed back to the line. He looked back at the roster thinking that perhaps he should have them broken up by reserves versus first string. Damn that infuriating girl for being right. "Ok, first strings to the left, reserves to the right. No, Stone, get on the right. No, the right. C'mon, Stone, don't make this harder than it has to be."
"I am not reserve material," Stone barked at him. She glanced at the reserves. "No offence reservist, because you are important."
"Whatever, Stone," a brown-haired boy muttered.
"Shut up, Justin Finch-Fletchley," Stone snapped.
"Why don't you make me, Gabrielle Stone," Justin teased. Oliver looked down at the list. He knew that boy, vaguely, from his days at school. He had been a third year during Oliver's last year at Hogwarts. He didn't remember him ever playing Quidditch, so perhaps it was good that Justin was on the reserves team.
"You two knock it off," Oliver barked at them. "Stone, you get your can over to the reserves side or you will get off my field and off my team. Forever."
Grumbling, Gabrielle "Gigi" Stone walked painfully slow toward the reserve part of the field. Oliver only caught snippets of what she was saying, but phrases like "if I were captain" and "damn reserves" floated back to Oliver's ears. He shook his head and went back to looking at the roster, matching up the names and faces. There was a girl from his old team, Alicia Spinnet, was there along with the surviving Weasley twin, George, minus his ear, of course.
"Weasley, Spinnet, good to have you on the team," Oliver said quietly while Stone continued to grumble from the reserves side. He glanced over at her, frowning before looking at the wispy little blond-haired girl with enormous blue eyes. "You are Luna Lovegood?"
"Sometimes," Luna said as she glanced around nervously. She wasn't nearly as spacey as she had been in school. Fighting in a war had taken a bit of that childlike innocence from her.
"And you are our seeker?" Oliver asked incredulously.
"Mostly," Luna said nodded. She tried to smile but it came off a bit twisted. He raised his eyebrows, but decided to wait and pass judgment until he saw her in action. A boy stepped forward.
"I am Jimmy Peaks, and I was on the Gryffindor team as a beater," the boy said eagerly. Wood nodded, though he wasn't familiar with the boy. It must have been during someone else's reign as captain, because the young man didn't look like he could be as good as George Weasley as a beater.
"Ok, nice to meet you," Oliver muttered. He looked at the final girl on the first string. He found her name on the list and then looked back at her. She was cute, but not in the traditional sense. She looked like she might be part vela or something. "You are Tabitha MacMillan?"
"Yes," she said. "I didn't go to Hogwarts, but my husband did. He was a Hufflepuff. Ernie MacMillan."
"Ah, yeah," Oliver said nodding. He scratched the back of his head. "He was a few years behind me, but I think I remember him."
"Shouldn't we be practicing or something, captain?" Stone shouted from her place on the reserves side. Oliver cringed, thinking how nice it might be to slap her with a silencing charm. That Stone was really getting on his last nerve.
"Yes, of course, Stone, thank you for reminding me," Oliver said curtly as he looked over the list. He looked over the reserves, secretly thinking that they were the rejects. Too good to let other teams snatch them up, but not actually good enough to play first string. "Ok, teams, lets play a little one on one. First string versus the reserves. It'll let me get an idea where work needs to be done."
Within ten minutes, Oliver was flying around the goal posts, watching the other players. He had to admit, for reserves they were decent players, and with the right kind of coaching, they might be good enough for first string. The seekers were lazily flying around matching each other's duck and swerves, having not actually released a snitch to seek. Stone was at her goal posts, barking commands at Justin, who was hell bent on doing the opposite.
"Time out!" Oliver shouted loudly as he took off toward Stone's end of the field. He pulled himself up to her, inches from her. "What the hell do you think you are doing? You are not captain, I am. If a player needs guidance, then I will guide them. I do not want you shouting anything to the other players. Your job is to protect your goal posts, and not to tell the other players what they should be doing. Are you even listening to me?"
Oliver's face was red from shouting like a drill sergeant, and yet Stone's face remained unchanged. He squinted his eyes at her and saw the tiny wires to a muggle head set thing running from the tiny things in her ears to a little player attached to her upper arm. He jerked the thing off her arm and chucked it, wires and all, across the field. She was fuming mad.
"What the hell do you think you are doing?" Stone demanded. She didn't have the disadvantage of height when she was on a broom this far from the ground.
"You can remove yourself from my pitch right this instance, Stone," Oliver snapped as he pointed to the ground. "I will speak to you later about your future on this team."
Stone hesitated a moment before she shot off toward the ground, pulling up just a breath's width from the ground. Oliver had visible cringed, certain that she was going to crash, but no, she had pulled out of it and landed smoothly on her feet. She was grumbling loudly as she headed back toward the locker room, carrying her broom, with out looking back at the rest of the team.
"You have your hands full with that one," Angelina said as she pulled up next to Oliver.
"Yes, I can see that," Oliver snapped. Angelina made a face.
"Hey, don't get all snappy with me because you can't control one sassy little twenty-year old keeper," Angelina snapped back before she rejoined the ranks of her other team mates. Oliver shook his head and rejoined the players to do some more practice before calling it a day.