Before Dueling Club Started

Lockhart sat down in the staffroom opposite of Snape who had his nose buried in homework he was grading. Lockhart leaned back with his left leg crossed on his right and his arms back behind him on top of the couch. Snape sighed and looked at Lockhart who looked like he just won a new Witch-Weekly's Most-Charming-Smile-Award again.

"What?" Snape sneered, going back to his papers.

"How would you like to do me a bit of a favour? I was told you'd be the best man for the position by Dumbledore."

"And what, pray-tell, would that be?"

Lockhart then leaned forward, clapped his hands and rubbed them together. "I am starting a duelling club for the students. Because of these hard times we have fallen under, I think it's important for the students to learn from one such as me ways of defending themselves."

"And you're not teaching this in your classroom because..." Snape droned on.

"This duelling club, obviously is outside of the classroom practice. So, what do you say?" Lockhart asked again. "Want to be my assistant?"

Snape's lip curled at the word. Him, the assistant to this fool? He rolled his eyes and was getting ready to say no when he noticed Flitwick standing in the doorway, holding a mountain of papers that he assumed were grading papers as well. "I think," he huffed, "it's a great idea!" Flitwick slammed his papers on the table, some of them toppling over on top of Snape's. "Oops."

He sat down next to Snape and started cleaning his papers with magic, "It is very educational for the students to learn that sort of thing and by all means you are one of the most accomplished duellists among us."

"Aside from me, of course," Lockhart interjected.

Flitwick forced a smile. "Obviously," sarcasm seeped out of that word like sharp blades.

"Then it is settled! First meeting is tomorrow, Severus down in that big empty room in the dungeons. See you then!" And Lockhart left. It amazed them how easily he would come in, boast and talk a lot then leave, like he was hoping after he left that they would talk about him.

And they did alright, just not in the way Lockhart would want them to.

Snape looked at Flitwick with amazement in his eyes, "Seriously? You seriously did that to me? No offence, but I don't think I've ever done anything to you."

Flitwick laughed, "Not entirely true. Back in the day when were were on different sides, we had a bit of a duel and I lost. Don't worry, I am not holding this against you or anything. I'm just surprised you didn't think about how much fun it would be."

"Fun?" Snape rolled his eyes and started gathering his papers.

"Yeah, I can't imagine the duel club will go smoothly and frankly I would love to have a front row seat watching Lockhart... do what he says he does best in front of the students," he winked at Snape.

He thought about that for a moment. Maybe all Flitwick meant was to just sit back and watch it be a disaster, but, what if he helped make it one. That, indeed, would be fun.