[a.n. there are two fairly obscure references in this chapter. whoever reviews first with a correct reference get a poem about the pairing of their choosing. farsideoftheroom is not allowed to compete, since i told her. and silverlastsforever probably shouldn't either, because i know she'll get at least one of them. but anyone else is welcome. and i'll write them a beautiful poem. because i'm nice like that]
One day in the ever so slightly above average life of the ever so slightly above average Cedric Diggory, he woke and decided to put in his name for a chance to be Hogwarts Champion in the Triwizard Tournament, that just so happened to have been resurrected just in time for him to be of age to compete. And lo and behold, the golden boy of Hufflepuff (seriously though, what the hell is a Hufflepuff and why is their pride and glory only slightly above average?) was chosen to be champion. But Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived and Won't Stop Living, was chosen as well. What an extraordinary twist of fate it was turning out to be.
Months passed, and Cedric was doing well in the Tasks. He was only slightly burned by a dragon, slightly humiliated at the dance, and slightly drowned by the merfolk. But the Third Task was approaching and not even the band-wagon-fan-girl love of his ChineseJapaneseScottish girlfriend could calm his stormy (to match his eyes of course) nerves.
As the Task began his father was screaming embarrassingly and generally making Cedric want to go into the dark scary maze of magical shrubbery just to get away. He slowly walked forward, gripping his wand in a completely sexual innuendo-less way.
The silence was oppressive. And the blast-ended skrewt wasn't overly pleasant either. He swiftly and expertly dealt with the frankenstienian creation, for he was slightly above average in all things, including animal husbandry.
Then, from ahead, came the terrifying sound of a skinny spoiled French girl being chased by a duck-footed spoiled Bulgarian boy. Running towards the noise and wondering why he hadn't been sorted into Gryffindor what with all this courage, he stumbled across Krum the Bulgarian with Strangely Northern European Attributes. Krum began to lumber towards him, a mad gleam looking something like cheep white contacts in his eyes. Cedric agilely leapt away, only to be snarled in the devilishly sentient vines. Just then, Harry Potter burst onto the scene, shouting in his cracking prepubescent voice about possession being 9/10s of the law or some such. Together they subdued Krum and ritualistically fed him to the horrifyingly hungry plant, although they had so many strong reservations. Together they began an epic running bitch fight to the cup, which had appeared suddenly directly ahead of them. Another blasted blast-ended skrewt stood in their way and Cedric was waylaid. Harry, however freakishly tiny and unable to formulate coherent thoughts without Hermione, realized it would be a very bad P.R. move to leave Cedric, a member of his own prestigious school, to be eaten by a strange lobster cockroach thing and turned back to help him. Together they fought off the skrewt and turned to face the glittering cup. After a pointlessly courteous argument, they decided to take the cup together.
With a tug deep in his stomach, Cedric realized that he was attached by the hand to the cup and whirling through space. He landed with a somehow graceful thump in a dark spooky cliché cemetery, Harry beside him in a gangly heap. Not everyone can be as slightly above average as Cedric 'Hot Diggory Damn' Diggory. The two boys rose, had a disturbing and enlightening moment where they stared into each others' eyes and realized that they had always been in love and they wanted to bang right then and there against a tombstone, and were walking toward each other with that exact purpose when they were interrupted by the plotline.
"Kill the spare!" said a hissy raspy icky voice. And Cedric Diggory, the slightly above average golden boy of Hufflepuff, dropped dead in a flash of green light.
