Chapter 20: Slytherin v. Gryffindor Pt. 2

Al was recovering back to defense when his attention was torn away from the approaching Gryffindor Chasers by a roar of the crowd that could mean only one thing, the Seekers had spotted the Snitch. The on Quaffle play didn't stop as Hodges and James made for the Snitch, but it was clearly distracted. All four Beaters were trying to see if they could make a difference in the play despite the distance between the Bludgers and the two Seekers and the movement of the Quaffle slowed as the Gryffindor Captain, Croft, approached the Slytherin side of the field.

"They've spotted the Snitch! Hodges is close but it's heading towards Potter, if he can get to the side of the field fast enough, it's his!" James and Hodges streaked down the field, Hodges flying only a meter or two above the stands and James leading the Snitch from the middle of the field, aiming to intercept it at an angle. The unpredictable nature of the Snitch made it impossible to determine who would get there first. The two Seekers had crossed the field in seconds and closed in on the Snitch and now the Gryffindor Chasers weren't even pretending to continue their play; once the Snitch was caught the game would be stopped anyways.

"It's a neck on neck race! Potter coming from the side, he could check Hodges off here!"

For a moment it looked like the announcer was right, Potter had the angle and position to check Hodges from the side and force him off the Snitch, slowing himself down and losing the chance to catch it himself but denying it from Slytherin. But Potter pivoted hard into his turn toward the Snitch, only meters away from the tiny golden ball, sending him careening into Hodges, who was flying directly above the stands.

They collided above the stands, a blur of robes smashing into each other in a cacophony of screams and shouts through which the thud of their colliding bodies could barely be heard. The blur of green was pushed down and failed to pull up in time to avoid crashing into the rows of spectators too slow to get out of his way. The red blur, however, barely slowed as it flew on.

"Potter flew right into him!" Alex's voice exclaimed over the stadium. "That can't be legal!"

"Look at that!" Kent shouted with enthusiasm. "Potter's got the Snitch! He's done it! He wasn't blocking Hodges, he was making a play on the Snitch! That makes it a legal play ladies and gentlemen!"

Al and the rest of the Slytherin team sped over to the stands that Hodges had crashed into. He didn't blame his brother for the play, Quidditch was a rough game and crashes were inevitable, but he was surprised by the lack of hesitation he'd shown in making contact with Hodges; the Gryffindor team must've been coaching him to be more physical with his flying.

Professor Sewell and Madam Pomfrey and a few of her upper year assistants were already there, managing the chaos of panicked students and identifying if any of them were seriously hurt. Hodges was in the center of it all, laying face down and moaning into the stands. Madam Pomfrey, a wizened old woman who had retired from her position at Hogwarts a decade ago only to return a few years later, was leaning over him, wand in hand.

"Can he play?" Lament's deep voice asked her as he landed by Hodges.

"No." Madam Pomfrey's dismissive glare made even the indomitable Lament pause. "Steele, Tumbler, Sallow, any major injuries?"

"Broken arm!"

"Twisted ankle!"

"Concussion!"

Pomfrey's three assistants called back, each listing a few minor injuries. The matron responded with a nod, "Tumbler and Sallow, take the injured here to the Quidditch clinic. Mrs. Steele, help me levitate young Mr. Hodges to the infirmary. Professor Sewell, notify me if, when, this childish game has injured more students."

"Potter!" Lament's gruff voice called. The giant of a Beater was staring at Al with intimidating dark eyes and an even darker expression. "You're Seeking."

The Slytherin team left the stands, leaving Hodges in the care of Madam Pomfrey, each of them patting a shocked Al roughly on the back as they passed. Lament slowed as he approached Al, gripping Al's small shoulder with his bear sized hand.

"One Snitch… If you can't get me one Snitch…" Lament trailed off, his threatening voice at a volume, that, while loud, passed as a whisper coming from the Slytherin Captain. "And give your brother hell. Slytherin doesn't let plays like that slide."

Al swallowed, his heart pounding in his chest. He'd just started to get used to the roaring crowd and the intensity of a real game. Al's role wasn't to score, his throwing arm wasn't strong enough to be a consistent threat, but to create a diversion for Vain and Driscoll by opening lanes and drawing the Keeper's attention. Gryffindor had a similar strategy, though they'd also used Lyla to threaten the posts while the other Chasers skirted the edges of the scoring box. He'd fumbled his role the first time, but after a couple successful plays he was starting to get in the groove of it. But now he had to Seek on top of his Chaser play, with the fate of the game on the line. Slytherin was down 10 points now, having outscored Gryffindor five to one and having lost the first Snitch. Lament was confident that Slytherin would win as long as Slytherin caught one of the three Snitches and he had good reason to be, Lament, Sid, and Vace were a defensive force to be reckoned with.

"Potter!" Vain called out to him, a grin on his face. "Show your brother the dirt! Now, come on! We've got to get Dramon up to speed. I'll signal you when I want you to peel off Chasing."

Al, torn from his reverie, flew over to the Slytherin locker room, where the team was meeting while the mess in the stands was being cleared up. Lament was at the chalkboard, refreshing Dramon on the gameplan and making adjustments for their new lineup. While Lament was a man of few, but very intimidating words, he transformed in front of the chalkboard. He lectured with passion, sending animated Chasers, Bludgers, and Beaters, flying around the chalkboard to demonstrate. Everyone on the team knew the gameplan, even the backups, but Lament was making adjustments for the roster change and the state of the game.

"And we're back!" Kent called out to the stadium. "Gryffindor leads 70-50, we've got a game here!"

The game resumed with the tossed ball and a marked increase in aggression in an already physical game. More by luck than skill, Gryffindor ended up with the Quaffle and it led to a breakaway from Dominique to Lyla to Croft and, in a play that had clearly been practiced: Croft veered out of the scoring box, where only one Chaser was allowed to be at a time for legal scoring, and Lyla swooped in and caught the Quaffle and took Vace off-guard from too close to the rings for him to react.

"Gryffindor! 80-50!" Alex called. "The lions are threatening to upset the snakes!"

Slytherin, however, fought back with a vengeance that stopped the Gryffindor momentum in their tracks. They scored one, two, three, and then four goals while the lions failed to score a single one, their plays disrupted by the power and skill of the Slytherin Beater duo and their off balance shots on the goals caught easily by Vace.

"Slyherin in the lead now, 90-80! They're on a run! If they keep this up it won't matter who catches the Snitch." Alex commentated after the fourth goal in a row.

Lament waved at Al and he nearly missed the signal amongst the raucous cheers.

"But the Snitch will be catchable soon, we'll have to see who the Slytherin Seeker will be." Kent announced, anticipation in his voice. Will it be Vain, the star of the Chaser trio here today? Or Driscoll, the veteran? And… it looks like it'll be Potter! The first year will face off against hiss brother! The game couldn't get more exciting!"

Al tried to ignore the crowd's attention, his cheeks flushing in response. He looked towards his opponents instead, and caught his brother's gaze locked on him. Their eyes met, James's gaze angry and challenging and Al's, formerly flitting and timid of the crowd, matched it resolutely, with a feeling that was both satisfied and anticipatory; he knew how his brother flew and he couldn't wait to snatch the Snitch out from under his brother's nose.

The Slytherin team maintained their dominant play as Al and James scanned the sky for the elusive golden ball. With the game changes over the years, the Snitch had become far faster and far harder when it was released, but gradually became slower, though once you caught sight of it and gave chase it would suddenly speed up again, and more and more visible as the game went on. It was still early in clock to catch the Snitch, but late enough it was possible.

A few minutes in, Al spotted the Snitch flying low to the ground and dove for it. James reacted only a moment later, flying to cut him off. Unlike against Hodges, James was truly making a defensive play here. Al was the only one with a chance of grabbing the Snitch, but judging by it's speed and James's incoming defense, it was a slim one. He double checked the Beaters and the Bludgers to see if they could change the scenario and then made up his mind when he saw James would reach him before any Bludgers came into play.

James came in hard from the side and checked him. Al let it happen, banking to the side to reduce the force of the collision but making no effort to counter his play. James's play had reduced their momentum against the Snitch and it flew away, quickly fading as it left a visible distance. James smiled with superiority as he flew away and Al hid is own. He could've rolled around his brother or tried any of a dozen of tricks against him but he would've lost sight and speed on the Snitch regardless; it was better to lull James into a false sense of security.

James spotted the Snitch first the next time, or at least he pretended too. Al had pulled in the direction of James's dive but Bludgers swarmed at James, Lament and Sid hitting the two Bludgers back to back and then Lament dove to hit the Bludger that Sid had beamed at James back at the Gryffindor Seeker. James frantically dipped, dove, and dodged, avoiding all the Bludgers but ending up turned the opposite direction of the Snitch by the end of it.

A few minutes later, Al and James were flying near each other when a glint of gold flew out of the stadium's shadow and they spotted it simultaneously. Both of them broke for it, pushing their brooms to the limit as they accelerated at the Snitch. Al had the lead, but just barely. James was flying directly behind him, so close that the front of his broomstick nearly brushed the bristles of Al's. James was flying in Al's slipstream and steadily gaining because of it, but Al was confident that he would reach the Snitch first.

One moment all he was worried about was James intentionally fouling him by nudging the front of his broomstick against the back of his own, drawing the harsh penalty of four penalty shots but making sure that Al didn't get the Snitch, and the next a Bludger was beaming at him. He dipped confidently and with the thinnest of margins, letting the Bludger graze his robes so that he didn't lose out on the race to the Snitch. As it was, James only gained a couple of inches from it. But then another Bludger approached, and somehow a Gryffindor Beater was returning the first he'd dodged - the same play Lament and Sid had just made and where were his Beaters and why weren't they helping.

Al's mind raced faster than even his broom. Both of the Bludgers were on track to hit him on his course, but one was aimed slightly low and the other slightly high. If he dove below or rose above both of them James would win the race towards the Snitch. He could attempt to draw the foul, turning so that his bristles bumped against James's broom and hope that it was called impediment on Gryffindor's side, but he idea was dismissed before he thought it through; Al wanted to catch the Snitch. Instead, with a rush of adrenaline and a very Gryffindor yell that cracked into a scream, he rose only slightly, directly in the middle of the highest Bludger's path but out of the lower Bludger's trajectory and stood on his hands and feet such that his belly rose up from broomstick and opened up a space for the Bludger to pass harmlessly through.

He head was buzzing with adrenaline and ecstasy as he reached out to grab the Snitch, and couldn't believe it when someone else's hand got there first.

"Gryffindor grabs the Snitch! They lead by twenty!" Kent exclaimed excitedly. "One more Snitch to go!"

"But what flying from the Slytherin Potter! He let the Bludger pass between his broom and body, when's the last time you've seen that?" Alex replied, equally engaged in the match.

Al flew around the stadium in a daze, letting his broom decelerate to a normal pace. His heart was pounding in his chest, harder and faster than it ever had before, and it felt like all the blood had poured into his head. The deafening noise of the stadium, cheers peppered by roars from lion mascots and magically enhanced shouts, wasn't helping him return to normal.

Lament's cold expression, however, did. Al worried about what the Slytherin Captain would say or do as he flew up next to him, he'd failed to catch the Snitch after all, but the bear of a Beater only nodded at him. It was a hard nod, and the tension in Lament's face didn't ease at all, but Al got the message. It was Lament's style, to put as much meaning in as few words and gestures as possible.

Lament's nod gave his respect to Al's flying, to his attempt on Snitch. The tension on his face acknowledged that the blame was on him and Sid, the Slytherin Beaters. And the hardness in the gesture was a promise that it wouldn't happen again, that the Gryffindor Beaters would be lucky to touch another Bludger, much less send one at Al.

The match resumed with a fervor and intensity fueled by Gryffindor's momentum built by their small but tangible lead and by Slytherin's refusal to lose. Gryffindor was pulling out all the tricks in their playbook now and they needed every single one to have a chance to score against the Slytherin defense, which was playing with an intensity and ability rarely seen at the school lever.

By the time Al was sent to Seek, the Slytherin team had recovered it's lead and was up 160-140. Now, all he had to do was catch the Snitch or stall James out until Slytherin took the lead. Based on the way the last few offensive plays from the Gryffindor team had been shut down by the Beaters and Vace, it was only a matter of time.

Al played a defensive strategy, it wasn't what how he would have preferred to Seek but it was the smart play given the game state. James was playing around that, feinting at Snitches that weren't there and leading Al around the field, diving and straight-lining up and pivoting at a moment's notice. Al let it happen, maintaining the best defensive positioning he could and trying to scan for the Snitch while keeping an eye on his brother.

When James dove yet again, it was only the look on his eyes that made Al suspect it was for real. If it hadn't been his brother flying next to him, whose facial expressions he'd learned his whole life, he wouldn't have guessed it. As it was, though, Al was neck and neck with his brother, looking ahead for the Snitch while checking his brother, who matched him shoulder against shoulder. Al, being smaller, had a harder time securing position and defending against his older brother.

He spotted the Snitch they were diving at now, flying along the stadium wall. It was bad news for Al, because he'd taken the inside position on James, which gave him better positioning to defend against the rest of the field but poor positioning to defend against a Snitch spotted on the section of field in between James and the stadium wall. Still, there was nothing to be done about it now.

Al saw the one of the Gryffindor Beaters approaching from the side, saw the bat rear back and hit the Bludger that flew in from out of view. The Bludger didn't aim straight at his line of flight; from that angle it would've only struck James had Al dodged. Instead, the Bludger was passed above Al, to where he couldn't see. He could only assume that the other Gryffindor Beater was there, their bat ready to send the Bludger plummeting down at him.

Al didn't budge, even as the Bludger hurtled down at him in his mind's eye. With the game on the Snitch, there was no chance Lament and Sid would leave their Seeker unguarded. Al held his course, butting shoulders with James as they wrestled for position. James must've seen the passed Bludger too, because he lobbied for position less aggressively, changing from trying to push Al away to keeping him in place and in line of the Bludger.

They were close to the Snitch now, less than ten meters away, and Al's back was tensed in anticipation of a Bludger that could come at any moment. He flinched when the iron ball came down only a few inches away from him, to his right side. Al could hear the crack of James's shoulder as it was dislocated under the Bludger's force. But he didn't stop, the Snitch was only meters away and his hand rushed to grab it, ending the game: 190 Slytherin, 160 Gryffindor.

"Slytherin wins!" The announcers chorused together amongst the roars of the crowd.

"Do you see that Beater play?" Kent cried out. "They were waiting for the Gryffindor Beaters to make that play. Perfect execution!"

Al looked at the golden ball in his hands, it's wings still flapping gently in the air. He turned to look around. He saw the satisfaction on Lament's face, saw the pain and anger on James's as he flew one-handed to the locker room, saw the rest of his teammates celebrating, diving, and spiraling, and hugging, and he saw and felt the crowd cheer. It was too much all at once, he couldn't even begin to feel how he felt, and it was perfect.