Has anyone noticed how once I reached Katie's second year.. time just kind of stood still and that was the main focus of my story? Maybe because I have to make this whole gradual transition from non playing Quidditch smart girl to Quidditch smart-- smart girl...

Or something wierd like that..

Keep the reviews coming and enjoy chapter 8 of

wierd theme music plays

QTTA!!

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Chapter Eight

"This is the quaffle, this is what we chasers have to get through one of those hoops over there," it was early in the evening, and Alicia explained everything Katie needed to know. In her hands she held the awkward shaped red ball. When she mentioned the three hoops, she pointed to the far end of the field. "For every goal we get, that's ten point."

Katie nodded her head, but Angelina cut it before she able to even open her mouth. Angelina pointed at the trunk from which the quaffle had come from, "Those two things are bludgers. Just avoid those at all costs, or you'll be bloodied up quite a bit."

Once again, Katie nodded, then spoke more to herself than the two girls with her, "And whenever a seeker catches the golden snitch, that is when the game is over, and that team gets one hundred fifty points." She wiped her sweaty palms on her robes and nodded to herself, "Ok, so," She looked at her two friends, vervous energy coursing throughout her entire body, "I assume we're going to practice for a bit?"

"You assume right," Angelina mounted on her broom, quaffle placed firmly under her arm. Alicia followed suit, minus the quaffle. With a sigh, Katie did the same. Angelina and Alicia kicked off into the air, Katie tried to calm herself down before she did the same.

How do I get myself into the wierdest things, she thought as she rose higher and higher into the air.

Angelina tossed the quaffle to Alicia, who tossed to Katie, who had both hands on the broom and didn't even attempt to catch it. Angelina dived to catch it, then once again rose into the air until she was level with Katie. "The object is to catch the quaffle," she said very slowly, as if Katie were stupid. "Pick your dominant hand up off of the broom. You won't fall I promise, just keep your balance."

Katie shook her head, "I can't do this, Angie! I'm gonna die at the match. There's no magic in the world that can help me!"

Alicia patted her gently on the back, and spoke comforting words, while Angelina showed little to no sympathy what-so-ever. "Don't be a baby, Katie! You won't be able to do anything with that attitude! Now come on, catch the quaffle and let's fly." She tossed the quaffled to Katie and when she caught it, never mind she handled it awkwardly, she grinned. "Great! Now, let's pass it around some, yeah?"

Katie somehow managed to pass it off to Alicia, and as time passed, Katie became more and more comfortable with how to pass, catch and handle the quaffle. After a while, they finally decided to retire to the Grffyndor Common Room where they could finish up the day's homework, and hopefully get to the Great Hall in time to get some food.

The evening faded into night, and it found most of the Gryffindor students seated in the common room, studying their little hearts out.

"Percy!" A very disgruntled, Oliver called out as he enetered the common room. "Mind if I borrow your notes? Just so I can copy them down and everything?"

The red haired fourteen year old looked up at Oliver with consideration, then shook his head with a short, "No," then once again returned to his studies, his head bent low, nose practically touching the parchment he worked on.

"How can you be related to him?" Angelina asked, as she set her quill down and worked a cramp out of her hand. "He's nothing like you two, and to be honest, he's a bit of a prat."

George nodded solemly, then nudged Fred, who had fallen asleep, in the side, a bit of drool clinging to his cheek, and threatening to drop to his potions essay. He quickly stirred and sat up, speaking before he was fully awake, "I'm up, I'm up."

Alicia sat down next to Angelina, and the two girls quickly exchanged work. "And then after this, all we have is herbology, right?" Alicia looked at Angelina's large writing, and began to copy down the text, rephrasing a few sentences here and there, as well as using words in place of others.

"Yeah, and Katie's doing that now," Angelina said, busying herself, with copying the information she had recieved.

Fred had gone back to sleep causing George to give up all hope on his twin. The conscious twin glanced toward the couch where Lee and Katie were seated, as she reviewed with him on anything and everything that had to deal with herbology. He smirked.

"What are you grinning at?" Alicia eyed the boy suspiciously, one brow raised slightly.

George nodded his head in the direction of the two studying freinds. Alicia looked back at them, then turned back around to scold George for being utterly ridiculous. "That's impossible."

"And why is it so impossible?"

"Because, George, she likes--" but she was quickly silenced when Angelina elbowed her. "I mean, she just doesn't--" Angelina elbowed her once more, a sign that Alicia should probably just keep her mouth shut. "I mean, never mind, George."

But Alicia had defaintely stepped in it this time, and George was intrigued, "No really, what were you going to say before Angelina Johnson, there, so painfully thrust her elbow into your oh so delicate side?"

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Fred slammed a large book infront of Katie at lunch with a serious look on his freckled face. Or was it George? Ah, who cares? Katie peered at the book curiously, she cocked her head to one side as she read the title aloud, "Quidditch Throughtout the Ages?"

"Yes, this is your holy book. You will eat, sleep, breathe and--"

Angelina held her hand up, and informed Fred that he had better stop before she heard anything that would cause her to throw her lunch up.

"You get the point," Fred said off-handedly. "Anyway," he continued, "you're our new chaser, right? You don't know much about Quidditch, right? Then this book will be your guide!"

Alicia and Angelina traded snorts of laughter. Lee decided that it would be better if he didn't say anything. Katie just continued to look at the book curiously, turning each page carefully, and absorbing anything she thought might be useful. She nodded at him, then looked up at him, "If I didn't know any better, Fred, I would say you lacked confidence in my skills."

"You have them?" Angelina joked.

They all laughed at this, then conversation resumed. "Quidditch," Fred spoke once again, "is not only physical stregnth, but it's also a game of whitt and inteelectual stregnth and--"

George whacked his twin over the head with the back of his hand, and rolled his eyes, "You memorized that bit from that Quidditch magazine, didn't you?" He shook his head at his twin, "You're pathetic, Fred. It's quite obvious that I'm the smarter twin." A smug grinned crossed his face.

"Cheh," was Fred's reply as he turned his focus back to Katie. "Anyway, just read it, it might give you some good tips, or ideas. I'm only concerned for the well being of our new chaser."

"And, of course, the team," Angelina finished for him, looking at Katie and Fred oddly, almost reproachfully. She then quickly returned her attention to her lunch, which began to cool down a bit.

Katie grinned up at Fred, "Good looking out, Fred."

With a nod, Fred seated himself across from Lee, and the two boys, along with George, pulled their heads together, whispering fairly loudly, but their words were uncomprehendable. The girls simply chose to ignore the whispering boys, and busied themselves in their own affairs.

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"Put your work in this basket here," Professor Sprout held up a basket where her students' work was to be placed, and put it down where they all could see, as she spoke. "and then seat yourself at the tables, there will be four to a seat, and we will be ready to begin." She clapped her gloved hands together.

The students began to chose their groups rather loudly. Angelina had gone to work with the guys, leaving Alicia and Katie being partnered with two Ravenclaw boys. The first was Stewart Ackerly. He was a twirpy looking boy; extremely thin and wore glasses that were several sizes too small for his face. Little pimple rested all about the boy's face, and he large front teeth. Stewart was defaintely a true dork.

The second was Roger Davies. He was rather popular for Ravenclaw. He wasn't the best looking boy in the world, but there again, he was no Stewart. Katie and Alicia both admitted that they would go out with him, but their opinions changed as the class progressed.

Davies made no attempts to be mosdest when it came to how much he knew. And he knew a lot, which made the two Gryffindor girls feel uncomfortable and oddly inferior in his wake. Throuhgout the entire class, Katie and Alicia had deicded to keep to themselves, while allowing the genious to work.

Stewart was much nicer to them the Davies. He too was extremely smart, like any other Ravenclaw, but rather than be smug about it, he helped the girls with the assignment in understandable detail. It was mainly Alicia who didn't understand the assignment since it had been she that copied down the homework than actually do it herself.

"--and so you see," Stewart concluded, pointing to his drawing of the wormsweed infront of him, "you can see the differences between the wormsweed and the wormswood. In all truth if you didn't know anything about them, you would probably mix them up." He began to laugh, it was an awkward laugh, and he sounded more like he were squealing in pain rather than laughing, but the girls simply nodded their heads and smiled politely.

Stewart even helped Alicia finish her drawing the magical plant placed infront of them, and pointed out where all the important things were to be. In a matter of minutes, Alicia was done and thanking Stewart repeatedly. The girls decided to start up a light conversation with Stewart until the end of class.

Every now and then, Katie would allow her gaze to drift a few tables over to where Angelina and the guys were seated. Angelina wore an annoyed expression on her face as the boys spoke to each other in hushed, excited voices. Something told Katie that the weren't exactly talking about wormsweed.

"So the two of you are on your house team? I think that's quite cool really, being that you're only in our second year." Stewart pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose, and smiled. Despite his unattractiveness, the dorky Ravenclaw boy had quite a nice smile. It was very kind and welcoming.

Alicia nodded, "We're both chasers. Angelina, over there," she pointed to where Angelina was seated, so he would know who she spoke about, "is our third chaser. I think we're a pretty decent team."

"But I haven't played with the team yet," Katie cut in.

"I didn't think I saw you playing at the Hufflepuff match. So what happened?"

The two girls took turns in telling Stewart the story of what happened that one fateful day. They recounted everything they could remember, filling in with any and all un-needed details. By the time they finished their retelling of events that passed, Stewart was laughing. "As crazy as that is, it's very cool."

For a pretty uneventful class, herbology was pretty fun. Well, for Alicia and Katie it was. Angelina on the other hand wasn't able to get any work done. She would be swamped in homework because of it. Fred, George and Lee had busied themselves with 'guy stuff,' as they had formally titled it. No girls were allowed to listen in.

When the second year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws went trooping out of one of the many greenhouses, Angelina managed to elbow her way through the thick crowd until she reach Alicia and Katie. The company they kept suprised her. "Stewart Ackerly, right?"

The Ravenclaw boy smiled and grinned, "That's right. And you're Angelina Johnson. I've seen you play Quidditch. You have exquisite talents on the field."

Angelina was mildly impressed with the boy. He did know talent when he saw it, and as they conversed longer, she discovered his knowledge of Quidditch was pretty accurate. As soon as they parted ways, Angelina concluded to her two friends that she did not like him.

"Angelina!" Katie was shocked her friend had come to such a quick judgement. The walk from the greenhouse to the castle wasn't even a three minutes walk!

The girl shrugged as she climbed up the stairs with the rest of the Gryffindor students who clampered up the stairs, trying to be the first to reach Gryffindor tower. "He's one of those types who come off as nice. Then uses his looks and unpopularness to manipulate you, and get whatever he wants from you," she nodded as though this were pure knowledge.

The fact that someone would even think to do that shocked Katie, and made her rather cross with the other girl. "That's not a very nice thing to say, Angelina. You just met him!"

"You're talking as though you've known the bloody prat for ages! You've only known his for one class." Angelina made a short grunting sound before stomping off ahead of the two girls, so she could hurry to the common room, and from there, the dormitory.

Alicia wasn't exactly sure what to say. Angelina did get a measure of people pretty quickly, could it be that she was right about Stewart? Then again, Katie always gave people a fair chance while Angelina didn't give much considerationg to them in the lest. When Katie looked at her, expecting her to say how out of line Angelina was for making those harsh accusations, Alicia could only bring herself to shrug.

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unpopularness is one of the words I have decidedly just made up.. like, right now. at exactly this moment.. yup.. I may add more and more of them as the fic prgresses.

Another chapter done!

-sigh-

Though typing them up is no problem.. it just takes me a day to type it up.. it takes me a few hours to actually think out what should happen so the characters seem a little more human so everyone can somehow relate to them.. I always thought that made good stories.

crystalviolinist - I'm funny AND sweet!!! I mean.. the fic is.. Heh.. I knew that. Really I did. But I really aprriciate your reviews and tell your friends about me!! And just between us, I started reading your fic.. IT'S BRILLIANT!! I wouldn have never really thought to do a K/O fic that way.. Anyway.. Thank you! And I look to future reviews (and future fics from you)

Kathy - DUH!! Oliver is ALWAYS cool! lol I appriciate the review and your on-going support (Oliver Rocks!)

Lia06 - Did this update come fast enough for you? And the whole puncuatition.. If I don't put it in there the first time.. it will never get in there. What is puncuation for anyway? Why does it matter? How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop? The world may never know..

Well, kiddies, I will be off now, I'm currently typing up chapter nine and ten.. (Yeah.. at the same time) so forgive me if it's a bit disoriented..

Later

-Richi Sama-