A/N So... it's been five (maybeatuallysix) years in the real world, but we finally get Wood's accompanying POV. What's everyone been up to? Me, you ask? Well, I wrote this: BAM. (There are no words to say how sorry I am it's taken so long to update, but I've tried. In 3,100 words. With more to come.)

Name: Oliver Wood, Super Geek
Age: 8 minutes until I'm 18
Hair: I'm trying a new look: Geek Chic. It's less messy and more…uh…tame. 'Flat' would be a more critical term for it. But I'll bring it in; just watch me. Oliver Wood, trend setter…. …(I know, I know: it's not me. I promise I'll borrow some product off the Weasleys tomorrow).
Current Mood: Study mode
Current Location: Studying, in the Library - will wonders never cease?

Uh. What a way to be spending the night of my birthday. Studying. It's not technically my birthday until after midnight, but the Weasleys believe in celebrating every minute of a 24-hour birth day. They had a party already raging in the common room. I ducked out, telling Fred and George I'd be in the Library trying to find something to counter-act their count-down timer. I wasn't really that concerned about it to be honest. Hermione probably would have been able to defuse it in a second if I asked her to anyway. No, I was at the Library studying for my NEWTS, which had been ridiculously overlooked thanks to that deranged Puddlemere triallee psycho. And don't even mention Puddlemere trials – the finals are tomorrow morning, which is the cruellest birthday present of all. So instead of practising that, or celebrating my birthday, I was here, at the Library. Studying.

So if the five carries over to the other column….
Q 397: List three uses for this Muggle contraption (picture of a rubber ducky) …I'm not going to dignify that question with an answer…
When Jupiter is courting Venus, what happens to Saturn?...Well, it feels left out, doesn't it? …
Q 398: To date, what has been the best Muggle invention? Bread. Explain your answer. Well, they're always going on about it. And comparing everything to it. It's like the high water mark of Muggle endeavour: sliced bread. This is better than sliced bread, that's better than sliced bread.
Q 399: What is Gilderoy Lockhart's favourite colour? Who is he and why should I care?Wait: déjà vu over that question. I feel like I should know.
Q400:Name the Supreme Muga-gumut, Highest Wizardgammon in 1245? Sir... You know what, probably Dumbledore. He pops up everywhere, that man. Chocolate frog cards, history lessons, random portraits, all get photobombed by His Beardedness. When in doubt, I always answer Dumbledore.
Q401:There are many spells that require the natural light from a full moon, but what spell should never be attempted under the light of a Gibbous moon? ...um, a Dumbledore?

I ran my fingers through my hair, tugging at the ends of it, trying to pull some answers out of my brain. This was about the only time I could do that without worrying about messing up my hairstyle. I shot a furtive glance at the only other occupant of the Library. They were buried under a book fort so I couldn't tell who it was, but I was betting it was Hermione Granger. Hermione was almost a permanent fixture in the Library. Maybe I should get her to take a look at the Weasley's birthday timer, since she's here…

Nevertheless, I was determined to out-study and out-stay her, Hogwart's most successful bookworm. Oliver Wood, obsessively competitive, that's me. It'll come down to who wants it more: her, or me.

Ten minutes later there came odd muffled thumps from the other table. After several puzzled seconds, I recognised the sound as someone repeating hitting their head against the desk. I'd tried that several hours ago, in an attempt to physically knock some answers into my head, and then later as a revised plan to knock myself out, but the desk had been too well-padded by reams of parchment. Hmm, perhaps it wasn't Hermione over there after all.

Ten minutes later there was movement from the other desk. Papers were reshuffled and books were gathered up. Ha. I win. Last man studying.

Unfortunately all the noise, as muffled as it was, attracted the attention of Madam Pince, who must have ears of a snake. I don't think snakes have ears, on second thoughts, and I don't really care to know, especially as they're the mascot of Slytherin, but I do remembering hearing snakes feel vibrations. Pince must have felt her precious books being head-thumped. I heard her bowling down the aisle like she was running a gauntlet, before I caught flashes of her through the spaces in the bookshelves. She emerged from one of the aisles like something that had crawled up out of the bowels of hell, and I kid you not screamed at the other person.

"DESECRATION! BEFOULMENT! DEFILMENT! MOST UNCLEAN!"

And in a fit of crazy the woman picked up one of her sacred books and threw it at the other student, who, to their credit, ducked it with remarkable ease and belted out the Library door, leaving their notes, quill, pencil-box and wand behind. They knew what was important. Several younger, uninformed or slow-reflexed students had been prepared to leave behind friends and even limbs to escape Pince's clutches. The book Pince threw started flapping like an oversized vulture and flew out of the Library after the fleeing student, followed by several more of Pince's charmed hell-books.

Pince turned to me, nostrils flaring, to see if I was a conspirator. I ducked my head and hurriedly concentrated on my parchment notes. Slowly she walked several paces backwards and retreated to the end of an aisle. Her books hovered over my head, rustling ominously. They hung there like a guillotine blade, waiting for the judgement from Pince. Nervous and fearing for my life, I carefully turned the next page of a Library encyclopaedia.

And the brittle page tore a little near the spine.

Mandrake mucus.

Pince let out another shriek of rage. I slammed the book shut and threw myself off my seat just as one of the flying books dive-bombed me. I dove under my desk as the book face-planted into the desk, rattling it so much it almost fell over from the after shock. I, who was taking cover under it, felt my teeth rattle. So I turned my page between the tips of my fingers and broke a book accidently: Pince bloody pile-drives them into me andI'm classed as the guilty one damaging school property? How is that fair?

Several sheets of paper drifted loose from the book binding and paper-cut me. Ducking out from underneath the desk, I grabbed my wand and tore out the hell out of there. As I passed the other empty desk I recognised the writing from the notes still there. Bell's handwriting.

Bell had been here? At the Library? Was she lost?

One of Madame Pince's books slapped me on the ear and it must have jogged a few neurons together. They sparked and fizzled and reconnected an old memory. Also, the book's blow made my ears ring, just like Bell's mother's Howler had at the start of the year. So I finally remembered: Bell has to get her grades up. Otherwise she wasn't allowed to play Quidditch. And another outcome of that might be, much less importantly on the grand scale of things, that Bell might possibly fail tests and not learn stuff and have to repeat classes. But let's get our priorities straight here: Quidditch first. Education after that.

The book hit me again, and it was a little like the other shoe dropping. I'd personally promised to help Bell pass her classes. I'd done up 20-step plans and priority charts and timetables. I'd plotted out Bell's study success the same way I planned out Quidditch plays: Success Was The Only Option. And then Quidditch and Puddlemere and Cally and other things got in the way. And now it was approaching exam week and I hadn't done anything.

God, I was a horrible Captain.

The book hit me again with so much force that shock-wave blasted most of my hair across my head. I had two choices: stand here and beat myself up (or let a book do it for me). Or I could apologise to Bell. At the very least.

Madame Pince's book dove at me for the fourth time. Well Wood, now was the time to man up. Less thinking, more action. So I acted.

I ran away.

Technically, I was running to find Bell and apologise. The books were just following me.

I ran until I ran into some couple sucking face in the shadows.

"Yeah, look, sorry," I apologised.

Then I realised who I'd run into. Flint. I narrowed my eyes at him. He cracked his knuckles at me, in full musical scale. And then I widened my eyes again. Flint found someone to make out with him? Willingly?

I stopped and gaped.

Whoever he was kissing slid down the wall in some kind of swoon. A flare from the lit torches caught her face and I saw a look of pain and disgust on her face. On Bell's face. Bell's. Face.

How-dare-eucorach-Flint-dare-touch-deireas-

While my brain had stopped to process how best to inflict injuries on Flint, Madame Pince's swarm of books caught up with me. For the fifth time one dove at my head.

So I went with it.

I caught it on instinct, my fingers crimping over the binding to hold the cover together. Then I just went with it's momentum, adjusting the angle slightly.

I clocked Flint's chin so hard I impacted some of his back molars. The clack his teeth made actually echoed across the corridor. He stumbled back up against the wall as he got his bearings. His eyes finally cleared when it clicked he hadn't actually been hit by the Knight bus. Just me.

"Back for some more, Wood?" he sneered.

I should probably explain that comment.

Last time we'd squared up had been one year ago, after the first match we'd just won in the Quidditch season. Fair enough, Harry had been set upon by two determined and sabotaged Bludgers which had broken his arm, but he'd caught the Snitch for us, so I chalked that down to a win overall.

After the match I'd then blamed Flint for tampering with the Bludgers. Flint in return had released the Bludgers on me. Without any Quidditch gear for me, or even a Beater's bat or wand to defend myself. I don't remember exactly what Flint said – or rather, jeered – as I dodged and blocked the Bludgers, but it was something to the effect that he was going to set the Bludgers on my Chasers next. The Bludgers, or the monster from the Chamber of Secrets.

That's when the Weasley caped crusaders rode in on their broomsticks, aimed their wands at the definitely tampered-with Bludgers currently bouncing off my ribs, and with great pomp and ceremony, blew them up.

"Always wanted to do that," George said with great satisfaction as he watched the ashes of the Bludgers rain down on the pitch. "Hey Oliver, is that a defensive option for the next game?"

"Never mind us, Oliver," Fred sang out from the sky.

"We're just trialling some dung bombs," George explained. "And McGonagall made us promise last time to take it outside."

"And then we thought: the Quidditch Pitch is outside."

Fred tossed me a spare broomstick. "Come up and enjoy the view."

George made a show of raising his hands to shield his face as he scanned the Pitch he hovered over. "Nice to see it so empty. We wouldn't want to accidentally hit anyone, would we Fred?"

Fred took careful aim and dropped a dung bomb right over Flint's head. "Certainly not."

Flint dove madly to the left and the bomb itself missed him by scant inches. The blast radius from the bomb, however, rained clods of earth and dung on him. The dung-bombs had never exploded with that much ferocity before, which made me suspect the twins had supercharged the explosion element. The ripe manure smell wafted up to us. And the stink element.

"I see we're going to have to improve our aim, George," Fred decided.

"Especially as I've heard Slytherin wants to disable our Chasers."

I frowned. Flint had literally just said that, and I was certain I'd been alone on the Quidditch Pitch when he told me. Those Weasleys had ears everywhere.

"Well, I suppose we'll have to practice our aim in case we have to step in if our team members somehow get themselves injured."

George pitched another dung-bomb at Flint. This time it caught him square on the calf.

They'd pelted Flint with dung-bombs all the way back to the castle. The ones that missed left small craters in the soil. The ones that made contact with him – well, they stuck. Snape had to brew up special potions to try to neutralise the smell. While it was brewing, Flint had to sleep in a dorm to himself, and when he stunk that out he got moved out near Hagrid's cabin. I'd had to spend the night at the Sick Ward mending broken bones, but I still think Flint came off worse.

So that was what happened the last time Flint and I had a serious clash. This time though, I was better prepared. I didn't have the Weasleys with their dung-bombs. But I did have Knowledge on my side. A whole army of it.

Another Bewitched Library book made a dive for the back of my head. I ducked it and it smashed into the wall. Or rather, Flint's face.

The book made virtually no impact against Flint's bloody thick-headed thickitty thickness. But let's be honest: us and every other Hogwarts Professor already knew that no amount of book learning would ever permeate into Flint's brain. Not through constant exposure. Not through subliminal osmosis. Not organically or academically or visually or aurally. And now, evidentially, I'd just proven he didn't learn through sheer violent physical contact either.

Still, the book made a very satisfying walloping THUD sound as it connected to his jaw, even if there was no accompanying crack of bones breaking.

Flint shook the blow off like a dog shaking off water. He narrowed his eyes, still trying to process who I was and what had just happened – not much of a thinker, that one. I, on the other hand, had my weight on the balls of my feet, trying to read his next play. Would he go for a traditional hay-maker punch, or would he go the whole hog and barrel into me in a crash tackle? I tensed, waiting to react. It all depended on how mad I'd made him. I thought to the arsenal of moves he'd shown before. A head-butt perhaps. He wasn't particularly creative, but he was effective.

At that moment, my robes buzzed. Huh. Unexpected development in play. Flint froze. I almost ducked, expecting some sort of hovering insect. Then I remember my countdown timer and pulled it out.

The little pager had digital numbers flashing red. Those bloody Weasleys – as tinkering and obsessed with Muggle devices as their father. The alarm began shuddering in my hand. I have a feeling the Weasley twins' devices were more deadly. That's not to say Arthur Weasley's inventions weren't: his flying Ford Angelina had taken a fair dent out of the Whomping Willow and it's pride, but Fred and George consciously set out to weaponify their Muggle artefacts. I swear, the amount of things they brought into Muggle Studies proudly, like it was show and share at a Kindergarten – it absolutely horrified Professor Burbage. I was still working out if she was aghast because of the Weasley's deviousness, or because they'd molested a pristine Muggle artefact.

When smoke rose from the timer's LED display I promptly did what any sportsman with well-honed reflexes would do – I passed it on to Flint like it was a hot potato. Flint held it between his mitts for a split second.

Then the alarm grew in size. Or rather, Flint shrunk. Just when I thought he was in danger of disappearing, he stopped.

I stood staring, mouth agape.

"Best. Invention. Ever." Bell said from the ground where she'd slid down beside the wall. Or fallen from her shoes. It was a bit of a blur. And a high-heeled shoe seemed to be several feet away.

"What the fuck?" Flint squeaked in a pre-pubescent five-year-old-voice.

I turned to Bell. "That was my birthday present? A time machine?"

"That was Fred and George's pay-back for how you treated me when I was five."

"Turn me into a five-year-old and see how I liked it? That's..."

"Inspired."

"Cruel."

"Karma." She picked up the little count-down timer and pocketed it. "It's a Table-Turner. Sort of like a Time-Turner Hermione has that she thinks no-one knows about. Except the Weasley's Table-Turner hands out just deserts. Only between Flint and you, I guess Flint deserved it more." She narrowed her eyes at me. "Must have been close competition though."

"Turn me back," Flint demanded and kicked at my shins petulantly.

I grabbed his oversized robes by the scruff and hauled him up so he dangled in front of Bell. "Well," I asked, "what pay-back do you want?"

Katie stepped forward, a giant smile lighting up her face.

Flint struggled and twisted so he spun around several times. When he slowed down his spinning, he looked a little whiter than normal.

Then she stepped back, sighing. "I can't hit a five-year-old." Bell, not enacting violence? I was floored. "Even Flint didn't try anything when I was five," she explained. "Still, he does need to learn a lesson." She held out her hand, palm open.

"Accio wand."

She stepped closer to Flint. "I never realised this when you're all grown up and ugly, but your little button nose is just so cute." Then she tapped him on his cute little button nose.

Flint disappeared.

I was left with a hand clenching open air. "Where did you send him?"

Katie considered her abandoned high-heel shoe with her nose wrinkled up, then pitched the shoe out the corridor window with a casual lob. "Somewhere they'll teach him to keep his slimy hands to himself."

A/N Where oh where could Flint be? Suggestions?