Okay, first of all, I forgot to add some parts in the whole story. Can you guess what it is? Yes, it's quidditch. And that is what this chapter is mostly about. Yes, yes, quidditch. Now, I warn you that this chapter is very difficult to write, since I don't really know how to write quidditch things. So, yeah, now, thanks for my reviewers…Sweet Tooth (I think you already know what I'm going to say), blah (indeed, I will), miss ice (here it is), and Lily Evans(thank you, me too, sort of). Okay, here it is!
Chapter 10: Quidditch
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It's been precisely a week since school started and already Harry was getting piles and piles of homework. He has been so caught up with his schoolwork that he didn't even remember about quidditch, his most favorite game in the entire wizarding world. He was only reminded by it when Professor Mcgonagall called him back after their Transfiguration lesson.
"Potter, can I see you for a moment please. You too, Weasley and Finnigan," said Professor Mcgonagall, as they were heading out the door. Ron and Harry looked at each other. They and Seamus approached her desk.
"Are we in trouble?" asked Seamus.
"No, I just wanted to remind all of you that quidditch tryouts for the Gryffindor team would be held this week. Since you three are the only team players, I do hope that you won't forget that. It will start on Thursday night at 6 o'clock. Don't be late. Most especially you, Potter, after all, you are the captain," added Professor Mcgonagall, threateningly. They exited out of the classroom quietly after that. As soon as they were outside, Ron slapped his forehead with his hand and exclaimed,
"I can't believe I forgot all about quidditch!"
"Me too. But hey, it's our turn to pick the new team, isn't it?" said Seamus. Harry walked silently beside them. Ron was right, he thought. I completely forgot about quidditch. Many things have been brewing in his mind lately. Aside from his frequent visions of circles of fire, which he's being really paranoid over, there's that hooded man creeping around Hogwarts. He seems to know where and when to show up every time Harry's around. It's as if he was following Harry. All seems to think so.
"Harry? Are you listening to us? I said what do you think we should do on Thursday? Seamus thinks we should make a grand intro and fly inside the field," said Ron, waving his hand in front of Harry.
"Huh? I'll think about it."
He left the stunned Ron and Seamus behind as he headed up to the Gryffindor Tower. For some reason, he felt very tired and sleepy. He also did not notice everyone around him. It was as if he was living in his own world. Man, do I feel tired.
"Hey, I thought it was dinner time?" muttered Seamus to Ron. "Where's Harry going?"
"I don't know," he muttered back. They stood there for a moment and Ron said, "Come on, I don't think he feels like eating dinner. Maybe he's just really nervous about the whole quidditch deal."
They walked the opposite way of the corridor to the entrance hall. Meanwhile, Professor Sullivan came up to see Professor Mcgonagall. She was fumbling something in her pocket when she caught a glimpse of some weird light at the end of the corridor. It was like many tongues of orange and red flames were shaping themselves into a human. Professor Sullivan couldn't believe her eyes. Well, there's something you don't see everyday, she thought. She stared after it glowing farther and farther away, as if it was walking away. She rubbed her eyes. I must hang around that bloody dungeon too much. She turned to knock on the door and was surprised to see Professor Mcgonagall standing next to her.
"Oh, Minerva, you scared me," she said, chuckling nervously. Professor Mcgonagall surveyed her and raised her eyebrows at her.
"You were always such a weird child," she commented. Professor Sullivan looked back at the corridor only to find out that the flames were gone. She turned back to her colleague.
"You mean you didn't see that-that thing at the end of the corridor?" she sputtered, pointed to the way the flames were going.
"What flames, dear? I have not seen any flames," Professor Mcgonagall answered back, giving her another quizzical look.
"Oh, er, never mind. Uncle wanted me to give you this key. He said that it's the key to the hidden chamber up at the you-know-what tower. As deputy headmistress, he urges you to do your job, as he knows you will," she added, giving Professor Mcgonagall a very rusty and old-fashioned gold key. She marveled at it and looked at Professor Sullivan.
"Does this mean I have to keep it? Why not you? You are an auror, are you not?"
"Well, he obviously trusts you. If it were to be left at my care, I would only lose it. God knows, I have too much to do already," sighed Professor Sullivan, remembering quickly about her friends and what to do with them. "Well, I must leave now. I have detentions with certain Hufflepuff second years that I must tend to. Goodbye, Minerva."
With that she gave one last curious look at the empty corridor and turned to leave back to the dungeons, still thinking as to what those flames were.
Harry pushed the door of his dormitory rather weakly. He seemed to have used all of his energy into walking up there. He put his things down on his bed and sat on the edge of this bed. He sat there for a minute and stood up again to get something out of his drawer next to his bed. He took out a leather notebook. It was the notebook at Angelina gave him after their last quidditch game. She somehow knew that he would be the next captain and gave it to him. It was all the plays of the Gryffindors, all made by past captains including Oliver Wood and Angelina. He decided to look over it at the common room to see what he had to explain on the tryouts on Thursday night. He went down and settled himself on a very comfortable chair next to the fire. He began to look through it and yawned. The next things that he did were very blurry to him because he had nodded off to sleep.
He was sitting on a dead tree stump on a vast grassy area. It looked like a small meadow. The sun was shining brightly when, out of nowhere, a girl with a long, silvery dress stood in front of him. She smiled and started to say something but Harry couldn't hear her. It was as if he couldn't hear at all. He tried to talk to her but found his voice lost. She continued to smile at him.
The scenes now changed. Harry couldn't even remember many of them today because they seemed to flash in and out of his mind like patterns of visions. In one moment, he would be in a dark room with a large cauldron in front of him and then he would be outside in the meadow again. But what really caught his eyes was the one vision of him in a tall tower. He looked down and saw himself in a rather tall tower far from the grounds. He turned around and saw a huge bonfire of green flames. On his hand was a torch, and as if knowing what to do, he reached over and…
"He's gone nuts!" exclaimed a voice.
"Quick, wake him up!" echoed another voice.
"Harry, Harry, wake up! Wake up or you'll catch on fire!"
Two pairs of hand tried to shake Harry awake. He opened his eyes only to find them with blurred vision. He was on the floor near the fireplace with his right hand stretched out. He sat up and rubbed his eyes.
"Wha's going on?" he asked thickly. Hermione, Ginny, and Ron were standing right in front of him and looked at each other.
"Who wants to tell him?" asked Ron, folding his arms on his chest.
"Oh, for goodness sake, I'll do it," said Hermione. She turned to Harry and continued, "We had just got here. We saw you sitting on this chair. You were muttering to yourself in your sleep. I thought that this was quite normal but then you got up and started towards the fireplace."
"That's when we knew we had to wake you," finished Ginny. Harry stared at them, who stare uneasily back. He ran the events though his head but this made him feel nauseous.
"Are you all right?" asked Ron, after a whole minute.
"Yeah, I am. I think," he added, more to himself. " I reckoned I should do my homework now."
He started upstairs to the dormitory leaving the very confused three behind.
Finally the try-outs for the quidditch team came. An hour after they ate dinner, Harry, followed by Seamus and Ron, went out to the grounds towards the quidditch pitch. Armed with their broomsticks, they entered the pitch, which was already crowded with eager students wishing to try-out. Professor Mcgonagall was already there holding a long piece of parchment. They approached her. She had a stern look in her face.
"You're all late," she said, locking at her watch.
"Er, we had to get our broomsticks," answered Harry.
"All right, all right, just get going. It's rather cold out here and I would not wish to stay a minute longer. Here's the list, Potter. You do know what to do?"
Harry nodded and, taking the parchment, approached the stands where the students sat. He cleared his throat and said loudly and clearly,
"Er, my name is Harry Potter and, as you all know, I'm the new Gryffindor quidditch captain. That's Ron Weasley, one of the chasers." Ron gave a little wave. "And that's Seamus Finnigan, our keeper." Seamus half-bowed. "You are all here to try-out for the positions of the two beaters and two chasers. If it's all right, I would like to start with the positions of beaters. So if I call your name, please come down. Let's see…Noah Whorton?"
"Aye," answered a burly fifth-year with sandy hair. "That's me."
"All right, Ron's going to give you a bat and Seamus will bring out the bludger," said Harry. They brought a large wooden chest that contained the four balls of quidditch. Seamus released the bludger and Ron handed Noah a small bat.
He mounted his broom and shot up just as the bludger did. There was a huge crack and the bludger came swooshing back at them. They ducked and Seamus checked his stopwatch.
"Wow, that was 10.7 seconds. Nice little record since Fred and George," said Seamus to Ron and Harry. Harry looked up as Noah landed in front of them. He looked tall and menacing.
"Er, thank you," said Harry, put a mark next to Noah's name on the parchment. "Er, next."
A few more people tried out of the position of beater, but none of them capture Harry's attention like Noah did, except for the next one.
"All right, the last one, Lana Cohen," called out Harry. A tall, scrawny girl with a long dark braid came down the stands.
"Chaser?" asked Seamus.
"Nope, beater," answered Lana.
"Are you sure?"
"No, I want to prance around wearing a frilly dress," said Lana, rolling her eyes.
"All right, go ahead," said Harry. She mounted her broom and shot up through the air just as the bludger did. Within seconds, there was a loud crack noise and the bludger shot towards Harry, Seamus, and Ron very speedily. They ducked just in time.
"Whoa, 6.3!" exclaimed Ron, checking Seamus's stopwatch. "That's a new record, I think."
"Okay, the chasers' positions are next. Here's how we're going to do it. I will call two at a time and both of you will have to past Seamus to make a point. Is that clear? All right, let me call out the first two, Marcus Pickett and John Levitt."
The two fourth years approached and did what Harry instructed. Harry then called out the next two and another and so on.
"All right, the last couple, Juliana Mcgreery and Nathan Meyers," called out Harry. The girl was another fourth year and the boy was a third year. They both looked nervous as they mounted their brooms and passed the quaffle to each other. They both scored perfectly. After they had finished, Harry again spoke to the students.
"Everyone, you all did a great job and now it's time to decide you will make it. Ron, Seamus?" He beckoned them to follow him at the each of the pitch.
"Come on, we all know that Noah will be a beater, and so is that Lana girl. Man, could she hit that bludger or what?" exclaimed Ron.
"All right, but what about the chasers?" asked Harry.
"What about them? You have to pick Marcus and Juliana. They're pretty good," said Seamus.
"I think Nathan could do better," said Ron. "What do you think, Harry?"
"Hmm…I think I'll pick Nathan and Juliana," said Harry. "Nathan has a good hand coordination. We could really use that against the Ravenclaw."
"All right, we have our team," said Seamus. They all nodded and went back to the stands.
"We have decided who are the new players. For the beaters, Noah Whorton and Lana Cohen," said Harry. A few scattered applause when through the stands. "And for the chasers, we chose Juliana Mcgreery and Nathan Meyers. As for the rest of you, thank you for coming and try-out. I hope you all will still support Gryffindor and try again next year. As for the four of you, come with us."
The four new players followed Harry, Ron, and Seamus. They arrived at the locker rooms. Harry beckoned them to sit down. He didn't notice that Professor Mcgonagall followed them there, carrying the scarlet robes for the new team players.
"I think it's time for that famous speech things Fred told you about, Harry," smirked Ron.
"Oh, right, er, here it goes: welcome to our team. I hope you will be an asset to the team. Our up-coming game will be against the Slytherins. Until then, we will practice three times a week to train for that game. Any questions you would like to ask me?"
The team was silent.
"Great. So I guess that's it. Our first practice will be held on Saturday morning. I already have permission from Professor Mcgonagall to use the field, right, professor?"-The professor nodded-"Oh, yeah, I almost forgot. Here are your new quidditch robes," he added as he gave them their scarlet quidditch robes. "All right, that's all. See you on Saturday."
The teamed cleaned up after the tryouts and went up to the castle.
Okay! At last right? Heh, yup, pretty long time since I uploaded a chapter. Reasons, so many reasons, are coz I have been busy with homework and such. Another reason is because this chapter is most especially hard to write, really, really hard. So, yeah, anyway, I need to thank a couple more reviewers, Laura Hermione Potter (thank you, I am so honored you took time to find me), sportbabe (well, like, before, cant tell you all the details becoz it would just ruin everything!), and the Archangel (he would, pretty soon). As for the next chapter, all I can say is Halloween. That's all! Please review! I would really love that! Look at the purple rectangle, look at the purple rectangle…
