Madara could hear the sounds of thousands of people moving around him, shouts and laughter, snatches of singing. The atmosphere of feverish excitement was highly infectious; Madara couldn't contain his elation at having his Sharingan back. All he required now was to awaken it. Madara, Hermione and the Weasley entourage consisting of Ron, Arthur, Fred, George, Ginny, Bill, Percy and Charlie walked through the wood for twenty minutes, talking and joking loudly besides from Madara, until at last they emerged on the other side and found themselves in the shadow of a gigantic stadium. Though Madara could see only a fraction of the immense gold walls surrounding the field, he could tell that ten cathedrals would fit comfortably inside it.
"Seats a hundred thousand," said Mr. Weasley, spotting the awestruck look on his children's faces. "Ministry task force of five hundred have been working on it all year. Muggle Repelling Charms on every inch of it. Every time Muggles have got anywhere near here all year, they've suddenly remembered urgent appointments and had to dash away again, bless them," he added fondly, leading the way toward the nearest entrance, which was already surrounded by a swarm of shouting witches and wizards.
"Prime seats!" said the Ministry witch at the entrance when she checked their tickets. "Top Box! Straight upstairs, Arthur, and as high as you can go."
The stairs into the stadium were carpeted in rich purple. They clambered upward with the rest of the crowd, which slowly filtered away through doors into the stands to their left and right. Madara's party kept climbing, and at last they reached the top of the staircase and found themselves in a small box, set at the highest point of the stadium and situated exactly halfway between the golden goal posts. About twenty purple-and-gilt chairs stood in two rows here, and Madara, filing into the front seats with the Weasleys, looked down upon a scene the likes of which he could never have imagined.
A hundred thousand witches and wizards were taking their places in the seats, which rose in levels around the long oval field. Everything was suffused with a mysterious golden light, which seemed to come from the stadium itself. The field looked smooth as velvet from their lofty position. At either end of the field stood three goal hoops, fifty feet high; right opposite them, almost at the top box level, was a gigantic blackboard. Gold writing kept dashing across it as though an invisible giant's hand were scrawling upon the blackboard and then wiping it off again; watching it, Madara saw that it was flashing advertisements across the field.
Madara tore his eyes away from the sign and looked over his shoulder to see who else was sharing the box with them. So far it was empty, except for a tiny creature sitting in the second from last seat at the end of the row behind them. The creature, whose legs were so short they stuck out in front of it on the chair, was wearing a tea towel draped like a toga, and it had its face hidden in its hands. Yet those long, bat like ears were oddly familiar. Deep within Madara's mind, something stirred and before he could contain himself a cry of "Dobby?" escaped his lips.
The tiny creature looked up and stretched its fingers, revealing enormous brown eyes and a nose the exact size and shape of a large tomato. It wasn't Dobby — it was, however, unmistakably a house elf.
"Did sir just call me Dobby?" squeaked the elf curiously from between its fingers. Its voice was higher even than Dobby's had been, a teeny, quivering squeak of a voice, and Madara suspected — though it was very hard to tell with a house-elf — that this one might just be female. Ron and Hermione spun around in their seats to look. Their very demeanour's seemingly interested in his conversation with the diminutive being. Too interested.
"Sorry," Madara told the elf, "I just thought you were someone I knew." Inwardly he cursed. `Potter is still in there somewhere.`
"But I knows Dobby too, sir!" squeaked the elf. She was shielding her face, as though blinded by light, though the Top Box was not brightly lit. "My name is Winky, sir and you, sir —" Her dark brown eyes widened to the size of side plates as they rested upon Harry's scar.
"You is surely Harry Potter!"
"Yeah, I am," said Madara curtly, not wanting to engage in conversation with the elf anymore.
***Project tsuki no me***
The box filled gradually around them over the next half hour.
Mr. Weasley kept shaking hands with people who were obviously very important wizards. Percy jumped to his feet so often that he looked as though he were trying to sit on a hedgehog. When Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic himself, arrived, Percy bowed so low that his glasses fell off and shattered. Highly embarrassed, he repaired them with his wand and thereafter remained in his seat, throwing jealous looks at Harry, whom Cornelius Fudge had greeted like an old friend. They had met before, and Fudge shook Harry's hand in a fatherly fashion, asked how he was, and introduced him to the wizards on either side of him.
"Harry Potter, you know," he told the Bulgarian minister loudly, who was wearing splendid robes of black velvet trimmed with gold and didn't seem to understand a word of English. "Harry Potter, oh come on now, you know who he is, the boy who survived You-Know-Who, you do know who he is"
The Bulgarian wizard suddenly spotted Harry's scar and started gabbling loudly and excitedly, pointing at it. Madara resisted the urge to kill him, he wondered how Potter coped before with all this fan like notoriety.
"Knew we'd get there in the end," said Fudge wearily to Harry. "I'm no great shakes at languages; I need Barty Crouch for this sort of thing. Ah, I see his house-elf's saving him a seat. Good job too, these Bulgarian blighters have been trying to cadge all the best places, ah, and here's Lucius!"
Madara, Ron, and Hermione turned quickly. Edging along the second row to three still-empty seats right behind Mr. Weasley were none other than Dobby the house-elf's former owners: Lucius Malfoy, he was tall and poised, with long blond hair, aristocratic features and holding a silver topped cane.; his son, Draco; and a woman Harry supposed must be Draco's mother.
Madara from what he surmised from Harry's memories was he and Draco Malfoy had been enemies ever since their very first journey to Hogwarts. A pale boy with a pointed face and white-blond hair, Draco greatly resembled his father. His mother was blonde too; tall and slim, she would have been nice-looking if she hadn't been wearing a look that suggested there was a nasty smell under her nose.
"Ah, Fudge," said Mr. Malfoy, holding out his hand as he reached the Minister of Magic. "How are you? I don't think you've met my wife, Narcissa? Or our son, Draco?"
"How do you do, how do you do?" said Fudge, smiling and bowing to Mrs. Malfoy. "And allow me to introduce you to Mr. Oblansk — Obalonsk — Mr. — well, he's the Bulgarian Minister of Magic, and he can't understand a word I'm saying anyway, so never mind. And let's see who else — you know Arthur Weasley, I daresay?"
It was a tense moment. Mr. Weasley and Mr. Malfoy looked at each other and Madara vividly recalled the last time they had come face-to-face: It had been in Flourish and Blotts' bookshop, and they had had a fight. Mr. Malfoy's cold gray eyes swept over Mr. Weasley, and then up and down the row.
"Good lord, Arthur," he said softly. "What did you have to sell to get seats in the Top Box? Surely your house wouldn't have fetched this much?"
Madara barely contained his smirk, here was a perfect opportunity to distance himself from people who were firmly entranced in Dumbledore's ideologies.
Fudge, who wasn't listening, said, "Lucius has just given a very generous contribution to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, Arthur. He's here as my guest."
"How — how nice," said Mr. Weasley, with a very strained smile.
Mr. Malfoy's eyes had returned to Hermione, who went slightly pink, but stared determinedly back at him. Madara knew exactly what was making Mr. Malfoy's lip curl like that. And he sympathised to a degree. The Uchiha after all wanted to keep the Sharingan blood line inside the clan rather than let some foreigner access or worse a Senju! The Malfoys prided themselves on being purebloods; in other words, they considered anyone of Muggle descent, like Hermione, second-class. However, under the gaze of the Minister of Magic, Mr. Malfoy didn't dare say anything. He nodded sneeringly to Mr. Weasley and continued down the line to his seats. Draco shot Harry, Ron, and Hermione one contemptuous look, then settled himself between his mother and father.
"Slimy gits," Ron muttered as he, Madara, and Hermione turned to face the field again. Next moment, Ludo Bagman charged into the box.
"Minister,ready to go?" He said, his round face gleaming with excitement.
"Ready when you are, Ludo," said Fudge comfortably
Ludo whipped out his wand, directed it at his own throat, and said "Sonorus!" and then spoke over the roar of sound that was now filling the packed stadium; his voice echoed over them, booming into every corner of the stands.
"Ladies and gentlemen... Welcome! Welcome to the final of the four hundred and twenty-second Quidditch World Cup!"
***Project tsuki no me***
It was Quidditch as Madara had never seen it played before, Harry's memories not even beginning to match this level of play style. Even Hermione, who had always been solemn in relation to Quidditch was consumed by the sheer adrenaline of the hundred-thousand strong crowd.
The players were just blurs. Invisible to the naked eye.
"Volkov-Vulchanov-Dimitri…Oh I Say!", shouted Ludo Bagman, the procurer of tickets for the Weasley family.
The Weasleys were on the edge of their seats, Ron and the twins were practically dancing on theirs. Rooting for Bulgaria one moment and Ireland the other.
They needed omnioculars to follow the game. But Madara did not. He sat stoically, not sharing in the adulation of the crowd. The Weasleys did not even look at his oddity, drinking in the high of the game.
The game itself mattered little to Madara, who instead channeled chakra to his eyes and registered the way the players flew. Especially Krum and Lynch. He could not believe the grace and speed with which they used the Firebolt.
`Krum is an international Quidditch star and adored by many. I wonder if I can use that fame` The wheels turning in Madara's head.
"Krum is diving!" roared Ludo Bagman. Madara was broken from his thoughts, he didn't want to miss Krum's extraordinary flying.
Madara stared up at Krum with his chakra enhanced vision,predicting his moves clearly. He could easily anticipate Krum now, after observing him for this much time.
Krum was feinting, and lynch was taking the bait.
"They are going to fall!" shouted Hermione. Ron and the twins shouted in denial. Bill, Charlie and Arthur just watched from the edge of their seats.
As Madara had expected, Krum expertly barrelled upwards inches shy of the ground but Lynch crashed.
"Wronski Feint!" shouted the crowd and Bagman. Ron was dancing in his seat as were Fred and George.
Bill shook his head with Charlie. "Idiot, Krum was feinting…"
As Madara was immersed in the game, suddenly he felt something dip into his back pocket.
He turned and saw an outline of a figure weave through the crowd. His enhanced vision picked up traces of his wand with the figure. He had to follow before he lost that wand. It was not needed, but he could not reveal that he did not need wands yet. One of the pro's apparently of having large quantities of magic, mixed with chakra.
He made to follow the figure which was trying to make its way out of the stadium with his wand held at its side.
Invisibility cloak. It had an invisibility cloak. He could see that the man possessed strong magic, but his details were shrouded even to his eyes.
They got out of the stadium after a lot of jostling, coming out into the empty campsite.
The figure made his way into the woods, and Harry followed, intrigued. He tailed some distance behind the thief, using the trees as his cover.
After twenty minutes of ambling through the woods, he suddenly heard an explosion of cheers through the stadium.
The Weasleys would be on edge, looking for him. He could not draw attention to himself yet, not in this way.
He raised his hand, racked Potter's memories and pointed it at the retreating figure. Madara decided to use Harry's signature spell.
"Expelliarmus!"
A jet of scarlet light blasted from his raised hand towards the cloaked figure. Suddenly, what appeared to be a house-elf materialised in front of the now rapidly fleeing cloaked figure.
And slapped his spell away.
"You shall not hurt master!" shouted the clearly female house-elf.
Madara was furious. That stupid elf had caused him to lose his wand!
"Incendio!" he roared the strongest fire spell he knew Potter to know.
A huge ball of fire blasted out of his hand towards the former location of the thief, much larger than the normal effect of the spell.
The elf's eyes widened in fear before it disapparated with a loud crack.
Unbeknownst to Madara, house elf magic worked in mysterious ways. In her desire to protect her master, as Winky disapparated, she caused the fire to dissipate.
"MORSMORDRE!"
A huge shining green skull, with a serpent coming out of its mouth materialised in the sky. There was dead silence from the campsite for a moment, before Madara broke it.
He pointed his hand toward the thief.
"Expelliarmus!"
"Protego!" the thief countered and Madara neatly dodged his own spell sent back at him. He observed closely how his opponent cast that shielding spell.
The thief now attempting to get on the offensive, pointed the stolen wand at roughly where he thought Madara's position to be.
Madara could see large amounts of magic twisting into shape at the tip of his wand, bathing it in emerald green light. Little ethereal skulls of green light orbiting the wand's tip, chasing each other and snapping their jaws. With a cry the thief released the curse.
"Avada Kedavra!"
Unfortunately for the thief, he didn't know what he'd just released. Madara smirked darkly as his eyes now contained tomoe…
That's a wrap!
AN:
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Uzunami 669 signing out.