DISCLAIMER: I do not own Negima or Harry Potter. Negima is the property of Ken Akamatsu, and Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling.

Italics text = character thinking to themselves.

Underline+Italics = character communicating with telepathy

Bold text = shouting

Bold+Italcs = Casting Spell/Ability

Chapter Twenty-one

The Practice Match

"What the hell are you doing here?" Harry yelled at Malfoy, but the Slytherin remained silent.

"Are you mute or something?" Ron asked annoyed after a minute.

"Yes, they are. Making my golems talk is something I haven't learned yet." Haruna said.

"Golems? Aren't those the statue-like things that are made of stone or something?" Harry asked.

"Well, you can say that it depends on the talent of the designer." Haruna said with pride.

"Yeah, especially if you have Asakura's photos to draw from." Chisame said with a grin.

"Details! Besides, it's not like I could have sneaked in the stadium when they were practicing and have them pose for me. Anyway, even the best need some source of inspiration." the manga artist said.

"True, some of the techniques I created are inspired from Eva's." Negi retorted.

"So I was your muse, huh" Eva said amused.

"Well..." Negi began.

"Wait a sec! You mean these seven" Angelina gestured towards the Slytherin team "Are all golems?"

"Well, duh!" Asuna rolled her eyes.

"But…that's not something that can be made in the almost two weeks we've been training!"

"Yeah, it takes a month to make just one!" Hermione said.

"Don't tell me you went back in time seven months to make these!" Ron said outraged.

"Don't be stupid, you dumb brat! This is a game, not a battle for the fate of the world!" Eva said annoyed.

"Yeah, my way of making them is a LOT faster. But I admit there was some time travel involved" Haruna said with a grin.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"The last Slytherin practice was three days ago. And since no one was there to take pictures…"

"You went back in time to get them." Harry finished amused. "But, you know there will be another practice today, right?"

"It was canceled because of the storm." Negi informed them.

"Storm?"

"Well, since you came here, thirteen hours have passed, so you couldn't possibly know. Rather then a storm, it's more like a Hurricane. The wind is so strong that flying normally would prove quite a challenge." he explained.

"When you say normally…"

"Yes, I mean like you used to before the training."

"But wouldn't it be kind of unfair? Since we can control our wind element and they can't?" Angelina said with guilt.

"Since when did you care about the Slytherins?" Fred said surprised.

"I know, but…"

"It wouldn't have mattered if they went through the same training as you. Their wind affinity is ranked fifth to seventh. They wouldn't even get past the conjuring part." Negi assured them.

"And besides, since when do they have the right to complain about playing fair. Your usual Seeker is suspended, remember?" Eva reminded them the Harry won't be playing, even though he trained with them.

"Back to the mater at hand: We'll have a sparing match with these golems." Negi said revealing his staff.

"But against mindless pieces of rock…" George said doubtfully.

"They're designed to have the same physical skills as the originals. Also, I had Chao add an A.I. processor and the recordings of the practice. They will be as good as the originals." Haruna explained.

"But since when can your golems fly brooms, Paru?" Asuna said curious.

"Since sensei and Eva-chan added a few wind spells on them"

"They might be slightly faster then they should, but they should do just fine." Negi said.

"Let's get this over with." Yue said getting on her broom.

"Wait, you're playing too?"

"No, I'll be the referee." she answered sowing the whistle that was hanging around her neck. "Get into positions!"

After the two teams took their places, the match began at Yue's whistle.

The Gryffindors took off each with a whirlwind and instantly took control of the match. They were faster, had more control and used the wind around them at maximum.

The moment the Chasers touched the quaffle, the massacre began. They scored goal after goal, not even leaving the Slytherin half of the field. They avoided their opponents easily and took the ball again and again, avoiding the bludgers that were wildly sent at them by the Crabe and Goyle golems. Fred and George sent them at Slytherin keeper easily and with huge force, as the bludgers themselves were being infused with wind energy at contact with their bats.

In a mere thirty minutes, the score was 360 points to none, at which point they decided Ron needed practice as well and allowed the golems to go past them and straight for him. After the long wait, Ron was slightly surprised to have two bludgers aimed at his head, but he dodged them with minimal movement and prepared himself to block the quaffle. He had some doubts of his skill as a Keeper, but after the training he went through his body reacted nearly on instinct. He caught the ball with one hand, and after a moment of surprise he passed it to Katie who scored another goal. This continued for about twenty minutes, period during which he gave up on actually catching the ball and resorted to hitting it towards his teammates. The power of his hits got higher and higher, to the point that he was actually aiming for the Slytherin goal. And since he had three circles to chose from, each of the Gryffindor Chasers stood beside them, waiting for a ball that became more and more precise, to the point that Ron was actually scoring!

At this point, Negi decided it was about time he ended the match. Of course, he had found the Snitch in the first minutes of the game, but it wasn't his skill that needed testing. It was rather easy to prevent the Draco golem to catch it, feigning a few dives to the ground when he got too close or blocking his vision when he actually saw it. And it wasn't easy because the golem was weaker the original. Quite the opposite: it had a five times better eyesight and twice the speed. The reason wasn't because he wanted to test himself. No, he wanted to test Harry. After he caught the Snitch, he released it and asked Harry to take his place. Glad he was finally getting some action, Harry took off almost instantly.

As the golem had better eyesight then Harry, one would expect it to see the Snitch first. That would be normally true, but Harry had a trick up his sleeve. During practice with his eyes closed, he realized that he could detect the wind not only in his close vicinity, but also the one further away, up to ten meters. And relying on this skill, he closed his eyes, as the bludgers were constantly aimed at Ron, and concentrated. In the first five minutes, he detected nothing as small as the snitch, but then he noticed it. As he opened his eyes towards it, he saw the snitch flying above Draco's head. Deciding he should take the risk, he flew towards it, but the sudden change in speed and direction made the golem aware of the location of the small winged ball, and he headed towards it.

At this point, judging from the difference in distances, Negi thought that Malfoy would catch it despite Harry's greater speed. But he was in for a big surprise. A few seconds after the golem flew at the snitch, the wind behind Harry formed a vortex that propelled him with more then twice the speed he previously had. Needless to say, he caught the snitch. But after that he had a little trouble stopping. Luckily for him, Negi put up a barrier between him and the tree he was heading at, so he was only slightly shaken by the sudden stop.

"That was impressive! You just used the "Acceleret" spell, unconsciously no less!" Negi congratulated him.

"The what?" Harry asked confused.

"It's Latin for Acceleration." Hermione told them.

"It does sound similar." Harry admitted.

"If you manage to pull of something like that more often, you'll be a great flyer." Negi assured him.

"He needs to control his emotions first. This time it happened because he didn't want to lose to the Malfoy golem. You must really hate that guy, huh!" Eva smirked.

"I'm surprised there are people who don't hate him" Harry responded coldly.

"I kinda see your point. Anyway, play like this and they're done for." Asuna said.

"Yes, your performance was impressive." Setsuna added.

"Yeah, way to go!" some other voices were heard.

"When did you all get here?" Ron asked looking at the whole Ala Alba.

"Just after you began the practice." Mana answered.

"Not bad at all, de gozaru."

"You'll have them begging for mercy" Kotarou added.

"Can't wait for the real thing, aru!"

After receiving all the compliments and encouragements, the players headed for the hot springs, shortly after the golems were reduced to nothing. They had a long, pleasant bath, during which they were joined by the others, and chatted all the way to diner. The next morning, they left to attend the Friday classes that seemed rather out of place after a two week long training regiment.

************************************************************************

A.N. Some of the reviewers drew my attention to some grammatical mistakes I made over the chapters. While it's true that I had a few slips, most of the mistakes made in the dialogues are intentional. Let's not forget these are some of the Baka-Rangers we're talking about, and a translation spell couldn't correct one's own stupidity. As for most of the mistakes in the dialogues of the Hogwarts students, let's keep in mind that wizards or not, they only went through Elementary School at most.

At any rate, thank you for telling me about them. Don't hesitate to mention something of this sort in your reviews!