A/N: This fic is dedicated to Bonnie, who I have been torturing for the past couple of months with another story that I am kinda writing (stopped for the moment due to severe case of writers block/lack of inspiration).
Disclaimers: Bonnie (is or) belongs to my friend (and Beta) Bonnie. Miss Congeniality belongs to Warner Bros. Anything else you recognise belongs to JK Rowling or people who she has sold it to (like Warner Brothers and Bloomsbury). Anything you don't recognise belongs to me. I lay no claims to the idea of Wizarding TV. If you've written something like this and think that I've nicked your idea, then sorry, I haven't seen it before (or can't remember it).
Quidditch on Muggle TV
It was 10.30pm. The storm was ending, the almost constant lightning had died down to a bolt roughly every half hour and Bonnie was sure that some place that didn't really have good drainage would be flooded like it was around this time every year.
She switched on the TV and flicked through the channels finally settling on a film starring Sandra Bullock. She had seen the film a couple of times before but the lightning had her a little spooked and she wanted something that would comfort her a little.
She got up and made herself a cup of hot chocolate, then settled down on the comfiest chair in her house, setting the drink down on the coffee table and drawing the quilt (that she had brought down at the beginning of the storm) around her neck and started to watch the film while the hot chocolate cooled enough for her to drink.
Around 11pm when Bonnie had finished her drink and Sandra Bullock had been pulled into the pool by the (in her opinion) hot FBI agent, another lightning bolt sounded, this time very close, so close in fact that she could have sworn that it had hit her house.
Suddenly the screen went blue like it did when it wasn't tuned in or there was a really bad reception. Darn she cursed and tried a few more channels, 106 – Sky was out, so were all the other movie channels and the terrestrial TV. Well, she thought, at least the electricity ain't out.
She moved to the TV so that she could get to the control panel to see if trying to tune the channels again. Luckily this thing has auto tuning, she thought and pressed a couple of buttons and waited for the TV to find a channel.
Moments later it found one, she set the channel so that it wouldn't disappear once she tried to change channels and then stepped back to see what she had found.
Some people flying around on broomsticks. That's weird, Harry Potter isn't supposed to be on TV yet, and that's when she realised that it didn't look like her DVD edition of the film, and the characters looked a lot older than the maximum age of 17 of the ages of any of the students on the film.
Oh my god, she thought to herself, oh my god, this is a real live Quidditch match, these people are actually flying, oh my god. The Harry Potter stories are real? she thought scarcely believing the thoughts she was having. She stood there bewildered for a few moments and then stepped back till she reached the chair that she had been sitting on previously. Her eyes transfixed to the screen, she listened to the commentary.
"And Quinn, passes to Crusher, Crusher to James, James streaking through Puddlemere Uniteds' defences, can she do it? Or is Wood too good a Keeper? And James aims for the goal post, and throws the Quaffle, Wood tries to catch it, but narrowly misses. GOAL for the Wimbourne Wasps. 230 – 200 to the Wasps. What's this? It looks like Harry Potter has seen the Snitch, he's speeding to the other end of the snitch he dives, Masters for the Wasps in hot pursuit… who will make it first…" Bonnie almost screamed at Potter to get the Snitch, and suddenly Potter pulled up, but it was too late for Masters who went crashing into the ground. "Wow, that was one of the best Wronski Feints that I have ever seen! What a great match we're having, the first one to ever be televised on Wizard TV! Now Quinn has the Quaffle, she narrowly misses a Bludger sent by the PU Beater Daniels and passes it to James. Daniels hits a Bludger at James and it hits him. James drops the Quaffle and it is caught by Ryan who does a U turn and heads for the Wasp goalposts. She shoots and it is save… no it goes in… 230-210 to the Wasps. Now, the Wasp Chaser Crusher has the Quaffle, he slides between two of the Puddlemere Chasers and he's diving, no now he's shooting upwards, I have never seen these kinds of tactics before, and he takes a shot, is it in? No a magnificent save by Wood, Wood is doing an excellent job of replacing Natasha Kent who retired as Puddlemere's Keeper three months ago."
Bonnie was on the edge of her seat, she was actually watching a Quidditch game, she'd read about them in Harry Potter books and they had always seemed exciting to her, but this, this was even more amazing than she thought it could ever be.
Suddenly a whistle sounded. "Now it's time to give all the players a break, we're going to be back with you for commentary from the world famous Quidditch player, Jonas Jackson of the England team. We'll be back with you, a few minutes, after a word from just a few of our sponsors."
Usually at this point in a programme Bonnie would go and make herself a cup of tea or something, but this time she stayed transfixed to the TV, not willing to miss a moment, and to see the interesting ads of the wizarding world.
Soon the Quidditch match was back on, and Bonnie tried to get even more comfy on the couch.
"The referee throws the Quaffle in to the air and Ryan catches, immediately flying to avoid a Bludger, he throws it to Behr but it is intercepted by Quinn who darts to the other end of the pitch, she tries to shoot but it is intercepted by Ryan, who passes it to Behr, who shoots to the other end of the pitch. What's this? The Snitch is out again, and this time its Masters who has seen it. She dives for the Snitch, Potter quickly going for the Snitch too. He's catching up with Masters, is he too late?"
Bonnie was back on the edge of her seat again. "Go Potter!!!" she shouted, rooting for the hero of the books that she loved.
"Masters makes a grab for the snitch but she misses, and another, Potter is now level with her, he makes grab, but his hand is swatted away by Masters and he swerves away to avoid a Bludger aimed at him, but will it get Masters? No Kale gets there just in time and hits it at Appleby. MASTERS HAS THE SNITCH!!! THE WIMBOURNE WASPS HAVE WON THE GAME!!! 380-210 TO THE WASPS!!!!!" (A/N: Well Harry can't win every match).
The groan from the Puddlemere United stands was almost drowned out from the cheer of the Wimbourne Wasps fans.
A few minutes later there were highlights of the game, all the goals scored were aired and all the spectacular moves of the match were shown in slow motion. Then the commentary, soon all the match stuff was over and like many witches and wizards all over the world, Bonnie the Muggle had enjoyed it immensely. She decided to try to find another channel.
She changed the channel and started tuning again, the next channel she found she saved before even looking at it.
It was a cartoon. There was a young person waving a wand around. It looked like she was in time for the opening credits. The Great Adventures of Harry Potter. Harry Potter had his own TV show. It looked pretty simple. Probably a kiddie show.
She was tempted to stay on this channel for a little but when Harry took out a bad guy with a tickling charm she was tempted to throw up and started channel surfing again.
This time she found a shopping channel, there was a man advertising a set of books. He looked rather handsome, but he had a superior look on his face. In the bottom right hand corner of the screen there was a logo… WSN (Wizard Shopping Network). The pompous man was holding up one of his books, Year with a Yeti, and gleaming with pride. Gilderoy Lockhart? she thought. If Rowling's books happened in real life, then too bad his memory couldn't have stayed lost. The sales figures for the book appeared on the screen he'd only sold 40 books out of the nine hundred books on offer and a 50% discount. Next up was wizard jewellery… cool.
* * *
"We have a problem!" shouted Myra Summers.
"What?" shouted back one of her co-workers.
"Three unauthorised Muggle television sets in Edgware are receiving Wizard TV," she said. "Two of them are off but one of them is active and tuned into WSN!"
"Cut them off and notify the Ministry, they'll send out someone over there."
"Yes sir," said Myra
* * *
Suddenly the power in Bonnie's street went out.
* * *
It was twelve o'clock when Ron Weasley got an owl. It was supposed to be his day off, but they called him in, saying that they were overloaded and offered him overtime pay.
Damn it he thought, why didn't I stay home today!!!
Hermione, that's why. Her birthday was coming up and he wanted to get her something really special for it, it was her 21st after all.
Oh well, he thought and resigned himself to opening the green owl letter. It was urgent after all. Green for urgent, blue for semi-urgent, and white for all others.
Ron,
Somehow three Muggle television sets have accessed our networks and are now able to view wizarding television shows. Normally this would not be a problem, but one household has been able to tune in some of the channels and is watching our channels. Please go and modify the memories of the people in the household. Please could you also go and modify the televisions so that they do not receive the magical shows. Take someone if you need to.
Darius
A list of three addresses followed
Ugh, this'll take me ages, he thought, banishing all thoughts of spending a nice long, romantic lunch with Hermione to the back of his mind.
As he grabbed his coat Hermione entered the room. "So you ready?"
He held up the urgent owl, "Sorry Hermione, I can't, got this a few seconds ago. It needs to be taken care of A.S.A.P. Want to come? I need someone who can work a Muggle TV set."
"Oooooooh, how romantic," she joked batting her eyelids theatrically.
"C'mon, let's go, the sooner we do this, the sooner we can go home," said Ron.
* * *
The doorbell rang at twelve-thirty. Bonnie got up, walked through to the hall and looked through the peephole. The people on the other side looked normal, well as normal as a person could through one of those things,
"Who are you?" she asked, still looking through the hole.
"We're here to repair your TV," said the woman.
After the black out last night everything had come on, except for her TV, so she had called a repair shop. Bonnie opened the door slightly and put it on the latch. "Can you show me some I.D?"
The woman muttered something and pulled a card out of her wallet. It was a badge showing her picture (well actually it was a charmed Blockbuster membership card).
"Come in," said Bonnie, taking the door off the latch.
The man stepped through the door, "where is your television?" he asked looking around.
"In the living room," Bonnie replied.
The man left giving the woman a look.
"So can you tell me what happened?" she asked.
"After the storm last night I was watching TV and there was a power cut then this morning when I noticed that the power was back, but the TV still wasn't working."
"Hermione, I'm done, want to set the channels?"
"Okay Ron."
"You're done that quick?"
"Yep."
"How?"
"Well I did this," said Ron taking some thing out of his sleeve. "Obliviate."
Two minutes later Hermione returned. "Done, can we go to lunch now?"
"Right, that's it Miss Lane, we're done here. We'll send you the bill in the post this afternoon, ring us if you have any queries," said Ron. And they left.
And Bonnie went and made herself a small lunch as if nothing had happened.
Well nothing has happened, she thought to herself.
Had it?
THE END… YUP IT REALLY IS…