Disclaimer: Recognize it? Not mine.

Limitless

"Remember when we crushed you Gryffindors two-thirty to twenty?"

That was Randolph's way to make Basil shut up. He didn't need to hear him say that he was wasting his life. It wasn't his fault, after all, that lost half his right arm. His contract with the Falcons stipulated that he deserved a generous amount of Galleons because he had 'acquired a chronic incapacity' while playing for them, but that meant nothing to him. He was filthy rich either way, and his career was surely ruined.

In another words, as far as he was concerned, Basil could go choke on a cactus.

"It wasn't because of you, mate," Basil answered while rolling his eyes. "You were too busy flirting with Adelaide Siegfried to even notice that there was a game going on!"

"It was because of me that she didn't see the snitch, wasn't it?" Randolph smiled. "Not that it would've made a difference anyway."

Basil realized that he was fighting a losing battle, but not because his opponent was smarter or stronger. Randolph acted like a kid half his age. Basil knew better than to argue with him when he was acting irrationally.

They'd lived together for many years in the first floor of a duplex they'd rented in Falmouth, conveniently close to work. The landlady, a witch that lived in the second floor, had provided them with all of the furniture. She thought that those archaic sofas, the baroque dining table and the decoration in reds and silver were a beautiful sight to go with a lit fireplace and open curtains. Randolph didn't appreciate those aesthetics like Basil and the old witch seemed to. However, as he told himself, it was a temporary arrangement.

"I'm going to bed," Basil said categorically, standing up and walking to his room. "Some of us have an important game to play tomorrow."

The door clicked shut without a 'goodnight' in between.

Randolph took a long sip of Firewhisky. He was upset - more upset than he was letting Basil know. It wasn't like he expected him to stop working because of his arm, but his air of nonchalance bothered him.

They'd been archrivals at Hogwarts. Basil Horton was a burly, brawly Gryffindor. Randolph Keitch was a lean, quiet Slytherin. Even though Randolph was three years older than Basil, the fact that they were Beaters for opposing teams made it all worse. They never thought they could become friends, and maybe they had been right. Even five years of being teammates and four of sharing a flat hadn't made the old rivalry disappear.

Some of us have an important game to play tomorrow. Ha! Since when Basil acted so superior? He was angry, very angry, and before he could think about it, he threw the half-empty glass to Basil's closed door. It crashed and broke with an acute tinkling noise. Randolph observed with a sense of unreality how while the brown liquid was absorbed by the wooden floor.

It made him feel useless.

"FUCK OFF, BASEY!" He bellowed.

The door opened immediately. If Basil was angry, he could not tell - or care less, for that matter. It didn't seem like it, for he calmly waved his wand and the broken shards came together again, as if they'd never been apart.

"Really, Keitch? 'Basey'? That's a new one."

"I bet you're happy, you arse."

"Happy? Yes, I thoroughly enjoy having things thrown at me."

"Well, I thoroughly enjoy throwing things at you. So I guess we're even."

Basil sighed and sat down in the sofa again. He knew that until Randolph passed out, he wouldn't let him sleep.

"You need to keep it together, mate."

"Easy for you to say!" Randolph's words came out slurred. Without the glass, he opted to take a gulp right from the Firewhisky bottle. Basil stared disapprovingly. "Your whole career wasn't ruined by a fucking rookie!"

Basil kept quiet. He knew Randolph wasn't whining about the Puddlemere's Seeker that had flown straight into him two months earlier. He was complaining about the young Healer that had amputated his forearm after the nasty fall that had ensued. It had been unavoidable after it had caught an infection that magic couldn't cure, but Randolph wouldn't hear any of it.

"It's like that bitch ruined them forever," Randolph broke the silence. "It's 1928, for fuck's sake. One might think Healers could get things right by this point in time. I'm taking legal action!"

That was his way of saying that his father was the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and he definitely would hear about that. But it wouldn't help, for he didn't approve of his son playing Quidditch instead of being a lawyer.

"You're not taking legal action and you know it," Basil said in a pacifying tone. "See, this is why you don't have a girlfriend, mate. You need to stop acting like a child."

"And this is why you don't have a girlfriend," Randolph retorted angrily. "Stop acting like my fucking mum."

"All I want to say," Basil started to talk, then breathed in deep to search for patience, "is that there's nothing you can do now, so you need to keep going. You're in a privileged position to take that hard-earned money and invest it..."

Before Basil could complete his sentence, Randolph was laughing uncontrollably. He waited patiently to hear what had set him off, though he suspected that was just the excess of Firewhisky.

"Hard-earned!" Randolph finally articulated.

Yeah, I suppose that if playing Quidditch was hard work, he wouldn't be doing it. Many teams had wanted Randolph in their ranks when he graduated. He was a natural talent, and just as naturally, Basil still hated to admit it.

Now he was the one getting upset, and thought it was a good idea to go to bed after all.

"Randolph, be a good boy and let me sleep."

Randolph rolled his eyes and felt that anger well up inside him again. The Firewhisky bottle flew out of his hands before he could realize what he was doing. Luckily, Basil was ready for his teammate's outburst and was quick enough to stop it mid-air with a flick of his wand.

"Collision and subsequent spill avoided. Good thing I got a Charms NEWT." He placed the bottle over the coffee table with a loud thud. "Have a good night, Randolph. Don't stay up late."

Basil thought it had been drunken stupor that made Randolph say "that's it!" and laugh like a crazy hyena, but that hadn't been it.

Collision avoided.

Randolph pictured his downfall every time he went to sleep, and so, passing out in the couch seemed like the better option. The movie still played out in a muffled corner of his mind - a strong body making him lose balance, lose his grip; he recalled the wind whistling against his ears, and then... nothing.

It baffled him that nobody had stopped his fall, that the Healers had been careless enough to let him contract an infection. It baffled him that they'd amputated his forearm and that his body reacted poorly to the prosthetic arm they'd charmed for him, though those weren't allowed on the Quidditch League.

They told him he'd been lucky to come out of it alive and well.

They told him he was lucky to stand up and walk around. He was lucky he could raise the bottle to his lips. He was lucky he could still fly around and perform most basic tasks. But there he was, lamenting that he wouldn't be able to swing a Beater's bat ever again.

It was my life. It was all I could ever do well.

He had graduated with only two NEWTs and the knowledge that he would go on to play Quidditch professionally. He'd been auctioned to the highest buyer and it had paid off. He didn't think anything could go wrong - no one really did until he'd fallen to his demise.

And so, all he had left from his old life was the alcohol.

Randolph reveled in the liquor that scalded his throat and made his lungs burn. It seemed to give him a warmth that was missing in his life, something that held him and choked him. It didn't have anything to do with his social interactions. His family and friends were all fine, and 'fine' was good enough for him.

As for a girlfriend, well, Basil was wrong about that: if he didn't have a girlfriend, it was because he didn't want one. Girls came and went and twenty-four was too young to settle. He missed the occasional groupie that came his way, but he did good enough without them as well.

"You're right about one thing, mate," he told an imaginary Basil. "I really need to get my shit together. But how the fuck do I do that?"

Then he recalled the idea Basil had inadvertently given him.

Collision avoided.

That's what had taken him to rethink his life in the first place. What if that Seeker hadn't collided with him? What if someone could've just waved their wand like Basil did, to have her stop mid-air?

It would be fantastic if brooms did that. They took a long time to brake - it was widely known that even the most skilled fliers couldn't avoid the occasional collision. We could revolutionize Quidditch! But he thought his words over and laughed. Nah. This idea sounds good because I'm pissed.

"I need to understand," Basil spoke, "why I'm drinking and you aren't."

Randolph was indeed sober, and his idea still seemed good. He had no idea whether it was realistic or not. He only knew one thing - if he was going to do it, he needed Basil. And so, he was sober so he'd be able to manipulate a drunk Basil. It was that simple.

"Because you lost the match and I'm thinking of something important," he chose to say instead.

"You! Thinking! Something important!" Randolph rolled his eyes as Basil made overly exaggerated gestures. "Do tell."

"The first thing I'll tell you is how much of a fucking arse you are when pissed..."

"Now you know how I feel every day of my life, don't you?"

Oh, how much he wanted to insult Basil! He'd felt the need when he'd downed a bottle of Firewhisky, and somehow, the need was bigger when he hadn't. He pretended not to hear him.

"...the next thing I'll tell you is that I can't do this without you, so I need you to really hear me out."

That seemed to make Basil turn off his snarky attitude. Suddenly, all that could be heard in the room were the flames cracking in the fireplace and the wind howling outside.

"You're never this serious."

"No, I'm not." He let silence make more of an effect, to get Basil to pay attention. "Yesterday when I threw that bottle at you, you stopped it... and I was thinking that it may work on brooms, as a permanent charm, so..."

Basil's laughter interrupted him.

"Randolph, did you drink before I came home? That's the stupidest idea I've ever heard."

"Fine, don't help me. I'll do this on my own."

"You sound like a rejected girl. Merlin, you really are serious! Let me tell you something: It's not going to work."

"Why not?"

"Because you can't do fucking Charms to save your life! You can't do anything to save your life! Tell me, when have you worked for anything... ever?"

Randolph leaned in, so as to intimidate his teammate. True, Basil was bigger, but he was taller and his expression could result as menacing as it did back in Hogwarts. He pointed at him with his stump, so as to enhance the sense of danger.

"That was uncalled for, Basey," he said slowly. Basil's eyes looked scared. "We all know you're terribly jealous of my effortless success, but I'm frankly disappointed that you're welcoming my proposal with such pettiness."

Silence could be heard again, and Randolph knew Basil was going to fall for it. He was a Gryffindor and a risk-taker. There was no way he'd let Randolph do this by himself, if only as a matter of pride.

"I really can't believe you're serious!" Basil articulated.

"And why not? It's actually a genius idea."

"For starters, it's not that you need my help. I'd end up doing all the work because, as it was established, you can't do Charms..."

"But I can do Potions, and aren't Potions essential to the permanence of Charms..?"

"You could do Potions when you had a right hand!"

"Again, uncalled for. I'm just as good with my left. Frankly, Basey, it sounds like you're afraid I might actually succeed."

He'd hit on the right spot, and he knew it. Basil's wounded pride was easy to pinpoint.

"You? Didn't you say you needed me?"

"You just say you thought it was foolish. I didn't think you'd collaborate..."

"Oh, I'm collaborating. If only to prevent a disaster. But I still say it won't work and I'll tell you why. Brooms are manufactured and charmed in a way that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to create a Braking Charm compatible to its components. If we're doing this, we're doing it all the way - we need to manufacture our own brooms."

"So what brings you here, if it's not a friendly visit to your old man?"

Randolph didn't like being back in his father's office, in his mansion in Belgravia. He was feeling cranky - batch number three of the Anti-Splinter Potion he was making up from scratch had exploded in his face that morning. But after a month of hard work, some things needed to be done.

"I need legal advice, Father." Things like that one needed to be done.

"I was expecting this would come sooner or later. Are the Falcons giving you trouble because of your injury? Are you seeking to send the Healer that mishandled you to Azkaban?"

Randolph resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

"Would you help me if that was the case?"

"No, not really. Anything else?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. Thanks for asking." His sarcasm went undetected. "I need to know the process to get a patent."

"And what is it that you want to patent?"

He was torn between saying that is none of your business and trying to win him over with smoothness. He'd never been smooth, but it was worth a try.

"My colleague Basil Horton and I are starting a company..."

"So you need money? Why didn't you say so from the get-go?"

Why did everyone in his life have to be so difficult? He'd given up trying to impress or please his father, but his insolence was too much.

"Because the accident made me filthy rich and I actually need to know how to file for a patent. We're working on a Braking Charm and I think we might be succeeding."

"What is wrong with existing Braking Charms?"

"Father, will you help me or not?"

Walter Keitch sighed loudly. Randolph took that as a yes - more like an I give up, but still positive.

"Anything else, son?"

"Yes. I need help redacting an agreement..."

"I don't do that kind of menial little jobs anymore. I'm the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, son. I'm not some petty little lawyer."

Randolph leaned back in his chair, placing his arms on the armrests and an ankle over his knee.

"I'll pay you by the hour, Father. How much do you want?"

Walter Keitch's eyebrows rose up.

"Merlin, you really are serious."

Did you talk to Basey or...?

"I'm glad we've established that."

"Well, son, I enjoy your sense of humor. What you need, then, is a lawyer working full-time for the two of you. I'm going to fire one of the new kids and send him to help you with your stupid little project. How's that?"

It's not stupid, he felt the childish need to say. But again, he understood he needed to keep quiet.

"Must it be a new kid?"

"Well, new kids haven't learned shit from the Ministry, but they have all the shit Magical Law School got in their heads. And you can pay them the bare minimum. I've got just the person for you."

You could do it, Father, if you wanted to. Good to know that, once again, you're being unsupportive.

The problem, he reflected, was that he'd been limitless all his life. He had an easy childhood, he'd gotten absolutely everything he could wish for. Everything he'd wanted to achieve, he'd achieved with ease. He never had any limits, or any unattainable goals.

This goal had come with obstacles, limits and difficulties. It was quite the blow to finally understand why people always told him that obstacles were inevitable, but that people's words were the biggest of them all. Everyone he spoke to about his little project seemed to want him to fail.

Well, I'll show them. I wasn't sorted in Slytherin for nothing.

Randolph was sitting next to the window, even though the blazing sun was making him sweat. He hated to wait for Basil to come home after practice - working alone was no fun.

Ever since he'd gotten that idea four months earlier, their flat didn't look the same. Books were piled up in the coffee table, and the dining room had become their working area. A cauldron was full of batch number thirteen of the Anti-Splinter Potion, and a copy of Advanced Charms for Amateur Broomcrafters was open right next to the actual product. Many rolls of written-on parchment were lying all over the table.

"I'm home, Keitch!"

"Good thing, Basey. I thought you were out with the new Chaser again."

"Not today. Today, we find out if Number Thirteen will explode or not. In about..."

"Thirty minutes, give or take. Either way, I was summarizing the notes we took on the making of the broom. Other than the Potion and the very last Charm, our lovechild is ready to be mass-produced!"

Basil laughed. Randolph had become increasingly emotional. Failure brought him to rage, and success made him chipper. He went off to make himself and Randolph some coffee to wait out for the possible explosion. When he was done, he sat in front of his partner and broke the silence.

"I ran into Miss Comet outside. She told me that we officially own the Horton-Keitch Braking Charm and that she's done with the Partner Agreement already."

They didn't really need such an agreement, but both had agreed that a formality of the kind would help them feel professional. They'd had a good laugh over it.

"That's right. We only need to sign it for official partnership."

"Then why do you have her redact a contract for future employees now?"

Because I can. And because she's hot. He thought it was very ironic that his father, a proud Pureblood wizard, had sent a cute Muggleborn girl to be his lawyer.

"When we succeed, we're going to need to mass-produce these babies, remember?" He patted the unfinished prototype in the handle. "Better think about that now."

"Then we'd need publicity..."

"We'll get all I can pay. Nothing is too big for us now. We could always turn this into a sob story. We could always say that it all started as a way for me to give the world what I didn't have..."

"That is touching indeed, but is it true?"

"Of course not, you twat! I need to make a living somehow!"

"You don't need to make a living, my friend."

Randolph didn't answer. He couldn't bring himself to tell him that their little project was the only thing keeping him sane. Then again, Basil was clever enough to guess.

"Look! It hasn't exploded yet!" Randolph changed the subject. "Nine days brewing under direct sunlight, and it hasn't exploded! I finally added the right amount of sunflower petals!"

He examined the potion closely. It had the color he'd guessed it would have, and that made him jump around in excitement.

"You're acting like a little girl."

"My friend, this means that it's done! I just need to finish it up and apply it to the broomstick and it's done! Oh, and don't forget the Cushioning Charm, please. I don't want my nuts to be crushed."

"I have the utmost respect for your nuts, mate." Basil smiled. Randolph, normally so composed, was more excited than he'd ever seen him.

"I have to get Miss Comet to hurry up and finish that contract within a week."

"You pay her by the hour. There's no way she'll have that contract ready soon enough."

"I'll make a bet with her. If she doesn't finish until Monday, she'll have to test the prototype..."

"And if she does?" Basil asked, and Randolph smiled with a childish malice.

"If she does, we name our little company after her."

"Up! Up!"

Miss Comet's joyous screams filled him with adrenaline. They were using the Falcons' pitch to test the prototype and, as Randolph had lost the bet, he was stuck with being the one to do it.

Not that he had any complaints about it. He felt right in his element. Up he went, and right, and left, and down as well. It needed a little bit of work, but all the magic was right in place and the adjustments needed were minor.

"This is better than the Cleansweep!" He yelled as he zigzagged his way between the hoops. Basil, with his feet on the ground, though that Randolph seemed to be free from all his demons. And he was genuinely happy for him.

It was nice to finally get along after five years. It was nice to call each other 'friend.'

Randolph closed his eyes and envisioned his fall. That thought wasn't intrusive or repetitive anymore. It was a fact of life, that led him to accomplish more than he thought he could.

Baby Comet is just the beginning, he thought. But it's a hell of a beginning.

With his heart beating harder than ever, he did the final test: The Horton-Keitch Braking Charm. He'd insisted Basil used only his own name, but Basil had insisted that it had been Randolph's idea. Randolph couldn't be bothered to insist back, but instead knew he had to be the one to test it.

And so he did. The broomstick stopped smoothly mid-air when commanded, eliciting excited applause from Basil and Miss Comet.

"Our baby is alive!" He yelled while speeding back to ground. Again, he braked swiftly and his ride obeyed his command. "Well, this was fantastic. I'm officially the first person ever to ride a brand new Comet. Ooh, I like the sound of that." He winked at Miss Comet who, far from being offended, let herself blush and laugh.

"Mr. Keitch, you're incorrigible."

"Call me Randolph, Miss Maybelle."

"Oh, shut up, lovebirds!" Basil interrupted. "I don't need this."

"You've got a girlfriend already, Basey. Let the rest of us live!"

"So," the young lawyer rushed to change the subject, "what do you think of Baby Comet, Randolph?"

"Perfect as her namesake, I must say. You have to try this!" He gave Basil the broom. He looked reluctant, but he got the hint and left his partner alone with Miss Comet.

"You know, Randolph, I'm really glad I work for you two," she said as soon as Basil couldn't hear them.

"Nicely profitable, isn't it?"

"Oh, I don't mean it like that. I mean, yes," she giggled, "but it's exciting to see the Comet Trading Company being born. It's exciting to be part of it. You're going to make millions off of that thing."

"You really think so?" It was comforting to hear it from someone other than himself. She nodded enthusiastically.

"I believe in you, Randolph Keitch. You're the single most obstinate person I've ever meet, and obstinate people tend to get their way."

Her words gave him a sense of accomplishment he hadn't felt in his life.

"Miss Maybelle, if I hadn't sexually harassed you enough for one day, I'd ask you to marry me."

She laughed. The echo of her laugh resounded in his ears like a peaceful melody.

"You're a very charming man, Randolph. The fact that you're a story of inspiration and success makes it even better."

"Don't say that. Inspiration? Why? Because I'm missing an arm?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Well, wasn't the fall the thing that inspired you to create Baby Comet?"

"Miss Maybelle, you know me better than that. This story started like all great stories."

"And how's that?" She asked with curiosity. He gave a malicious smile before answering.

"It all began one night that I got drunk out of my mind..."

Notes: This is for the Chocolate Frog Cards Competition. My character was Randolph Keitch and I think it's pretty obvious what he did to deserve a Chocolate Frog Card. As soon as I read his name I pictured a funny, carefree Slytherin, and I knew I had to write about him.

Thanks for reading! Please tell me this sucks less than I thought it does?

-Karyn.