Entry for the Quidditch Fanfiction League Competition, Season 6, Round 13 – Wigtown Wanderers vs Kenmare Kestrels

Position: Captain

Prompt: Boggart - Write about someone who is a nightmare to be around/work with

Word Count: 1,814

Beta: brokenbottleaurora

Captain's Crisis

The chants of fans echoed through the catacombs of the Quidditch stadium built in the marshes near Wigtown, and the stomping of thousands of feet on the stands above vibrated through the players gathering nervously around their Captain, Marcus Flint. An expression of grim determination was on his face, glittering intimidatingly in his green eyes as he let his gaze wander over every single one of his players.

Some faces were ashen with nervousness, others contorted with tension; his seeker actually looked like he was about to throw up. Nobody actually met Marcus' eye, as if they feared that it could make the weight of their Captain's expectations grow even more — he wanted a win, and he had expressed several times that he would even let them sacrifice limbs to achieve his goal.

Only Katie Bell, one of the Chasers, stared back at him defiantly, her head held high. A scowl passed over Marcus' face when she said over the rising noise of the crowds above: "Good luck, guys. Stay in one piece."

"You know what you have to do," Marcus growled intimidatingly, and Katie felt like some of the players had gotten even smaller from his words. Marcus had been named the Captain at the beginning of the season, only a few weeks ago. So far, it had been very rocky at best — which, of course, hadn't improved the way Marcus treated his players. The training only had gotten harder and stricter, and Katie didn't understand why Marcus couldn't see how much his methods were wearing everyone down instead of building them up.

She wouldn't ever have thought it, but Oliver Wood officially wasn't the strictest and most competitive Quidditch Captain she'd ever worked with. And after all, Oliver had been more than obsessed with winning the game.

Katie tried to give her teammates encouraging words and smiles as they walked out into the stadium, but the terror wouldn't leave their eyes. And despite not feeling particularly intimidated by Marcus — she'd been exposed to him long enough during school to have built up an armour against his rough and insulting way to criticise — Katie was rather uneasy as well. Everyone was terrified to find out what would happen if this game didn't bring the results that he expected.

All Katie could do was hope that the luck would be with them today.

OoO

The changing room was as quiet as a grave, none of the six sweaty and exhausted Quidditch players saying a word. Maybe they all hoped that the defeat they'd just experienced would go unnoticed if they didn't talk about it, despite knowing that being confronted and most likely blamed was inevitable. When they'd left the Quidditch pitch some time ago, Katie had seen that Marcus was fuming, and she'd been genuinely surprised that he hadn't started yelling right away. Instead he'd stomped away, slamming the door of his Captain's office so loudly that a picture had fallen off the wall, its inhabitants, the 1920-1921 Wanderers, cursing at him loudly.

Everyone was certain that in the time since he'd vanished, his rage had only gotten worse.

"We should all take our showers and leave. I don't know about you, but I won't wait until that moron is done plotting out all the punishments he wants to subject us to. We shouldn't continue to be willing targets," Katie ultimately said, her strong, confident words breaking the heavy silence in the room and turning heads. In moments like these, Katie seriously missed Alicia and Angelina — they would have stood with her, encouraging everyone else to listen to her.

But they weren't here with her, and so she had no leverage against the resignation that seemed to have everyone around her in its clutches.

Before she could even think of trying to think of some uplifting speech like the hero in the Muggle moving pictures her grandmother had showed her as a child, she heard steps coming closer. Heads raised, worried glances were exchanged — there was only one person these heavy, loud steps could belong to.

A second later, the door to the changing room was pushed open and banged against the wall, making some people jump; Katie's face darkened as she once again thought about how Flint was seriously exaggerating. Slytherins were all so full of drama.

Marcus towered over them, his expression as dark as a black hole — somehow Katie liked that metaphor, since Flint's attitude sucked all light from the surrounding space, too — and everyone knew that he was seconds away from exploding.

"What you delivered out there was the worst performance I've ever seen! Even a bunch of Hogwarts students play better Quidditch than you! You seem to have forgotten everything I taught you about our tactics! And some of you are considered some of the best players of the league? I call bullshit on that!"

He stopped, his gaze passing over all the players, as if he dared them to say anything in their defense, and once again, it was only Katie who stared back him, her brown eyes gleaming with anger.

"I asked the managers to sack all of you, but in a moment of pathetic pity for your arses, they refused to do that. Which means I have to continue to work with you incompetent idiots. I won't tolerate any more of this bullshit! If you thought I was being harsh in the last weeks, just wait until you really get to know me."

The Seeker actually had tears in his eyes and the third Chaser was shaking like the rabbit cowering in front of a predator, knowing its last minutes on this beautiful earth had come. Katie had finally had enough.

Crossing her arms in front of her chest, she looked Marcus directly into the eyes and asked loudly: "Are you done now?"

Gasps echoed through the room, and Marcus lost control of his expression for a few seconds, his eyes widening and jaw dropping in pure disbelief. Katie stood up from the bench, her back straight, and continued to stare at him, determined not to give in, not even when his surprise slowly but surely morphed into fury.

"What did you say, Bell?"

His voice was so calm that it sent a shiver down her spine; Katie knew him well enough to be able to tell that this controlled way of speaking was even more dangerous than when he was loud. It was the kind of cold calculation she'd seen him use so often while plotting against the Gryffindors, or, during their shared years with the Wanderers, to come up with fouls that would have the desired effect but couldn't lead to a penalty since it was in a grey area.

"I asked you if you were done with your pathetic tirade, Flint. Get your ears checked," she replied as calmly as she could, and then she made a split-second decision, continuing to speak before he had the time to come up with something. "I know you're not the brightest candle on the cake, but please, use your remaining brain cells and ask yourself if it's really the best idea to continue your methods despite them obviously not working at all! All you're achieving is that everyone here is a nervous wreck! They're so scared of making mistakes that they just can't possibly execute your plans the way you want them to.

"And if you can't accept that you're the problem here, that it's you who has to change, then you're the worst Captain I've ever encountered. You're unsupportive and incapable of self-criticism, you don't reflect on what you're doing and how it influences the team. If you're not willing to make any adjustments, then please, just quit. You were a good teammate, but you're not being a good Captain."

Slightly out of breath from her monologue, Katie turned to her colleagues, her heart racing. Everyone looked shocked, and nobody dared to move until Katie cocked her head towards the door. "Guys, it's time for us to go home. Get some sleep, do something that's not about Quidditch and relax. We got enough time on Monday to talk about all of this. You don't have to let him scream you down."

After a long moment of hesitation — during which they'd obviously feared that Marcus would explode, since their worried gazes jumped over his frozen form — the five players jumped from the benches and hurried out the door. With her colleagues out of the line of fire, Katie grabbed her bag, but just as she pushed it onto her shoulder, the door was slammed shut. Turning around, she saw Marcus glaring down at her, looking as if he was ready for murder. His hands were clenched into tight fists, his knuckles white, and Katie knew that she would already be floating through the room as a ghost if his gaze could kill.

"Are you serious?! You're undermining my authority with the team! I thought we were…" he hissed, his voice shaky and low, and he slowly stepped closer to her so she had to raise her head to hold the eye contact.

"What, Marcus? Just because we work well together on the pitch and you've been in my panties doesn't mean I have to blindly say yes and amen to everything that you do! And you're very capable on your own to undermine yourself. Looks like the power of being the Captain has got into your head."

She couldn't keep herself from jabbing her finger into his chest a few times, and it was a bit as if she'd poked a balloon with a needle — all the anger seemed to be coming out of him and disappeared. For a second, Katie worried that she'd been too harsh, but then she told herself that he needed such a blow to open his eyes and realise what a huge ass he'd been. Drastic times called for drastic measures.

And yet, she could feel a part of herself softening — probably the part of her brain that remembered that he'd been a rather decent shag. It felt wrong to her to slam the hard truth at him without mercy and then leave him alone.

"I'll go home now. Think about what I told you, Marcus. If you've realised what's going on and want my help to start a change, you know where to find me," she offered quietly, looking up into his eyes to express how sincere she meant her words, then she walked over to the door.

From the traces of fear and worry she'd seen on his face, she deduced that he surely would pay her a visit soon, maybe even tonight. All she had to do was curl up in her favourite armchair with a glass of wine and a book and wait.