A/N: JK owns them. Although I've arranged to borrow George on alternate Tuesdays.
Previously: Twins. Chasers. Wacky hijinx. No Harry. Quidditch-happy Oliver (is there any other kind of Oliver?). The new seeker is… Lee Jordan!
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"Lee? Lee? Oliver, what in Merlin's name were you thinking? He doesn't play quidditch!" Katie shook her head. "You have to go back and tell the witch that we aren't using Lee, we're using someone else."
"Too late for that!" Grinning brightly, Oliver passed out campsite maps and schedules to the rest of the team. "She wrote down his name, and registration ended a few minutes ago. He's magically bound to play. Now, you all go set up our tents, and I'll go and fetch Lee!"
"Wait, Oliver." George grabbed onto Oliver's arm. "Fred and I are coming with you."
Fred frowned. "We are?"
"Yes," replied George, glaring at Fred. "Fred and I have a better chance of convincing Lee than you do, Oliver."
"Why would he need convincing?" Oliver asked, looking genuinely puzzled.
"Er – we'll explain on the way," said Fred.
"Right then. You three girls take all of our trunks and get the tents pitched, will you? And try to scout out our opponents!" Oliver was forced to shout the last few words over his shoulder as Fred and George dragged him away. The girls regarded their retreating captain.
"Bloody."
"Stupid."
"Git."
Angelina was the first to break up the trio of glares. "We might as well get on with it. Got the map, Al? Where's our campsite?"
Alicia squinted at the map. "In the middle of a pond? That can't be right." She handed the map to Katie. "You find it."
Katie stared at the map for a moment. "Ok. We have to walk all the way across this field, through that clearing of woods, and then, Al, we go around the pond, and our site is next to the group of orange tents." She smiled triumphantly.
Angelina sighed and stared at the six trunks in front of them. "We each grab two, I guess?" Katie and Alicia nodded, and the three began dragging the trunks through the crowds of people and tents.
"This is impossible," muttered Alicia, a few minutes later. "How are underage wizards supposed to move trunks?"
"We're supposed to use those," panted Angelina, gesturing with her head towards a pair of boys who were pushing a luggage cart loaded with trunks that was floating about a foot above the ground. "But there weren't any free carts around. Hence, we do this the Muggle way."
"Stupid Muggles," grunted Alicia, tugging Fred's trunk through a particularly stubborn patch of crab grass.
"I heard that!" Katie yelled, looking over her shoulder to glare at Alicia. "And the actual Muggle way, for your information, would be to use a car and drive to the campsite, which makes much more sense than this nonsense."
Alicia rolled her eyes. "And where would you plug in the cars in the middle of the woods, Katie?"
Katie dropped her trunks and groaned. "For the millionth time, Alicia, cars don't run on electricity. They run on gasoline."
Alicia shook her head. "You're telling me that Muggles run stoves on ekeltricity but cars on gasoline? Sure, Katie. Whatever you say. Next you'll be telling me that fires can be made with ekeltricity, too."
Katie snorted. "How on earth did you pass Muggle Studies?"
"Ok, hold up." Angelina stepped between her friends. "How about we solve this problem in a way which unites wizard and Muggle cultures?" Alicia and Katie followed Angelina's gaze. About twenty meters away, three tall, athletic looking boys were standing and chatting amongst themselves.
Alicia nodded. "Right then. Who's going to be the emissary? Not it."
"Not it."
"Not it."
Alicia sighed. "Fine. We'll solve this the old fashioned way."
A few quick rounds of Bludger, Parchment, Wand determined that Katie was performing the task. She took a deep breath and began to walk.
"Wait," called Angelina, jogging up beside her. She reached over and yanked Katie's track pants down to her hips and pulled the neck of her jogging top a little lower. "Now you're set."
Katie nodded, and continued her walk. As she got closer, she adapted an expression of wide-eyed innocence, and moved her hips in a way that suggested otherwise. The boys' conversation drew to a halt as she approached.
"Hello," Katie smiled, batting her eyelashes. "I'm Katie." The boys immediately offered their hands.
"Phil."
'Tim."
"John."
"Nice to meet you boys." Katie batted her eyelashes. "I was wondering… well, I feel kind of stupid asking but…" Katie pointed. "See my friends over there?"
The boys stared at Angelina, who was bent over at a sharp angle fiddling with a trunk, and Alicia, who was sucking on a lollipop that had appeared out of nowhere.
Phil gulped. "I see them."
Katie giggled. "Well, see, our trunks are so heavy, and we were wondering if you could help us carry them…" Katie twirled a strand of hair around her finger and went in for the kill. "The heaviest thing I ever handle is a pair of quaffles."
Phil started coughing, and Tim began to hit him on the back.
"We –" John's voice squeaked. He cleared his throat. "Uh, we can help you carry things. Tim and I are beaters. Phil's a seeker, but –"
"I can still carry stuff!" Phil had stopped coughing, but his face was still tinged with purple. "I'm a seeker, but I'm strong. And I'm agile, too. I know how to handle a broom."
Katie smiled and began walking back towards Angelina and Alicia, the boys tagging behind her. "I bet you do."
Tim was staring at Alicia, who was still working on her lollipop, with a slightly glazed look in his eyes. "What are your friends names?"
Katie shot a quick wink at her friends before turning to smile at Tim. "Well, the one with the brown hair is Alicia, and next to her, with the braids, that's Angelina…"
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"Five knuts for a one way Floo? This is criminal!" Fred glared at the bored looking Floo attendant. George grabbed Fred's hand and forced him to hand the coins over to the wizard.
"Thank you!" Oliver said, smiling, as the boys approached the bank of fireplaces, Floo powder in hand. "Aren't we lucky they put up a temporary Floo station at the tournament?"
"Yeah. So lucky. Going to Lee's house to convince him to play in a tournament for a sport he's never played. Lucky, lucky me!" Fred stomped into the fireplace. "Jordan residence, Marigold Lane, Essex!"
Oliver cast a nervous look at George as green flames briefly surrounded Fred. "Why don't you go next?"
George shrugged and stepped into the fireplace. Oliver waited until George had vanished, and then entered the fireplace himself.
"Lee Jordan, here we come." Oliver grinned, and tossed his powder into the air.
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"And there must've been ten bludgers on each side of me! I was escaping them by millimeters. All I could do was hang on to my broom for dear life."
Katie frowned. "But there are only two bludgers in a quidditch game."
Phil blinked. "Right. But I told you; this was a street quidditch game. No rules. No refs. Just you and your broom, and destiny."
"And your teammates."
Phil's forehead twitched. "What?"
Katie shrugged. "Well, you said it was just you, but even in street quidditch, you have teammates, right? And do they really light the snitch on fire? Because it seems kind of dangerous and – "
"Let's see if your friends are settled in their tents, shall we?" Phil ducked into the girls' tent before Katie cold respond. Smirking, she followed him inside.
As she entered the tent, she saw John sprawled out on the couch. Tim was precariously balanced on a kitchen chair, attempting to hang a poster over the fireplace. Alicia stood below, giving helpful directions.
"A little further left. Yes, yes… No. Too far. No, now you're tilting it. Ok, just a little right, good, good… stop. See, but now it's too low. Ok. Up, up… perfect!" Alicia beamed as Tim climbed down from the chair and attempted to work out the crick in his neck.
"You know, you could've hung the poster by your – " Alicia cut off Tim's sentence by leaning over and kissing him on the cheek.
"What were you saying?" Alicia asked, smiling angelically.
Tim blushed, but smiled back. "Er… I was just wondering if you wanted to meet up at dinner tonight, over in the main tent.
Alicia grinned. "We'll see you there."
"Ok. Bye then." Tim waved, and managed to exit the tent without tripping over his own feet. Phil and John waved as well. As soon as the boys had left, Alicia flopped down on the couch.
"So." Katie sat down across from Alicia, folding her arms over her chest. "You and Tim. Spill."
Alicia rolled over. "There's nothing to spill. So he's hot, and nice, and sweet, and has great arms, and I just want to rip every stitch of clothing off of his body. Nothing's going to come of it."
Angelina snorted. "Well, seems Tim will be the alternative to George…"
Alicia blushed. "I don't know what you're talking about. I mean, maybe I have a little crush on George, but it's not like I need to randomly snog a hot quidditch player all week just to rid my mind of Weasley-related thoughts…"
Angelina and Katie exchanged glances before looking back at Alicia.
"A little crush, you say?"
"Isn't the word you're looking for, oh, I don't know, obsession?"
"I am not obsessed with George," snapped Alicia.
"So it was a mysterious disembodied voice that filled our three hour Knight Bus ride analyzing ever hair on his head and freckle on his body."
"And it was someone else who's been owling me all summer rehashing every conversation she had with George all last year, looking for analysis of whether or not he was flirting?"
Alicia shot both of her friends dirty looks. "Fine. So maybe I like George. What about you, Ang? You'd need a pretty strong Severing Charm to cut the sexual tension between you and Fred."
Angelina stared pointedly at the ceiling. "I have no clue what you're talking about. Fred and I are merely close friends."
"Who are perpetually one insult away from a good snog," added Alicia.
Katie shook her head. "See, I escaped the clutches of the Weasley machine. I am a free woman."
Alicia propped herself up on her elbows. "Neither John nor Phil appealed to you, then?"
Katie shrugged. "John was too quiet. And if I had to hear one more of Phil's quidditch stories in which he retrieved the snitch from the mouth of a Hungarian Horntail, I'm going to go ballistic."
"Poor Katie," said Angelina, reaching over to pat Katie on the shoulder. "We'll just have to find you some more suitable material."
"Suitable wouldn't happen to translate as shirtless, would it?" Katie looked hopefully from Alicia to Angelina. Alicia shrugged.
"Well, I did see a sign that said the pond was safe for swimming in…"
Angelina stood up. "Oliver did tell us to check out the competition."
Katie nodded, standing up as well. "I've always felt that abdominal muscles are a very good way to measure the strength of one's opponent."
Alicia practically hopped to her feet. "And if we were to engage our opponents in… conversation, perhaps they might let some clues slip to their respective strategies."
Angelina grinned. "And with your new bikini, Al, that's not all they'd let slip."
"Well, let's get changed then!" Alicia exclaimed, heading towards her trunk. "Oliver better be grateful. We're enduring so many hardships, all for the sake of the team."
Angelina paused from the task of looking for sunscreen to glance at Alicia. "Do you want my pun about hardships now, or later?"
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Ah, pushing the boundaries of PG-13. Woo hoo!
I'll be leaving over the weekend for a week long vacation; my best friend is getting married and I will be fulfilling my maid of honor duties. To compensate for my lack of updating during that time, I'll try to put out chapter 3 before Saturday.
Thanks to all who reviewed. Glad to see I still have people who will read my stuff, despite my spastic updating skills. I've posted the statuses of all my fics in my profile; check it out if you're curious. I also updated my favorites list recently, if anyone is looking for some good reads.
Review please!