"Move! Move! Lighter on your feet!"
Harry and a fellow Red fountain Sophomore were currently engrossed in a practice fight (sans weapons) for one of their classes, the pair being watched by the other Sophomores in the class as well as their instructor Cordatorta.
Harry dodged a kick from the other student (one with shaggy, vivid orange hair, dark blue eyes and a tan), dropped to the ground and rolled, ending up behind the other student, who narrowly managed to dodge a kick of Harry's own as soon as he'd gotten to his feet seconds later.
Aki, Darian and Lucas, who were (naturally) in the front of the crowd of students, made whispered comments between themselves about the fight they were currently watching.
"So, who do you think is going to win? Harry or Tony the Terrible?" Darian asked casually.
Lucas, Aki and even a few of their other classmates nearby looked at the blond teen with odd looks on their faces.
"Oh, wait. My mistake. Our Harry is bound to win..." Darian said after noticing the odd looks he was getting from their classmates.
"I sure hope so," one classmate commented. "Tony is an ass. He deserves to be knocked down a peg or two."
"Or twenty..." another classmate murmured.
Tony ran towards Harry and was about to throw a punch, but Harry dropped to the ground and did a low spin kick that resulted in Tony being thrown off his feet and landing rather painfully on his rear end.
"And Harry wins this one!" Aki exclaimed as their teacher did indeed confirm the results.
"Better luck next time, Tony." Harry offered him a hand to help him up, but Tony growled and slapped it away, preferring to get up on his own.
"What a sore loser..." Darian rolled his eyes.
"That was only one fight you won. Don't think you'll win them all!" Tony exclaimed angrily.
"Enough, Tony." Cordatorta's voice was firm and not a little threatening. "Poor sportsmanship has no place in this class- or indeed anywhere at Red Fountain at all..."
Some of the other students began to snicker at the reprimand, but those snickers were immediately cut off by Cordatorta levelling a glare at them.
"Class is dismissed. Don't forget that we'll be having an in-class discussion next week. Please come prepared for it. Just because you don't have to write a paper doesn't mean that there is not actual work involved..." the burly instructor reminded them as they began packing up their things at the signal of a bell.
As they left the classroom, Harry and his friends began talking.
"Well, that class was immensely satisfying..." Aki noted with a smile on his face.
"Is this because you got to watch Tony get his ass kicked?" Lucas raised an eyebrow.
"That, plus it was Harry who did it! The only thing that could have made it even better was me doing it!" Aki exclaimed.
The other three rolled their eyes.
"As if you could beat me, Sparky..." Tony brushed past them, bumping Aki's shoulder. "Your little friend's triumph was because of mere luck..."
"And not a little skill!" Aki called out after him. "Good grief, what a grouch."
"Seems like he'd be perfect for a certain Alfea student that our girlfriends know well, huh, Aki?" Harry asked him.
"Could you imagine what it would be like if the two of them hooked up?" Aki asked.
All four of the shuddered at the horrible thought.
"Somehow, they might come somewhere in the region of run-of-the-mill Death Eater. As unpleasant as they are, they could never hold a candle to Voldemort and Bellatrix..." Harry mused as they made their way up to their dorm. "Or maybe they would just be Junior Death Eaters like Draco Malfoy and his ilk..."
In the Alfea courtyard, an obstacle course had been set up for the Sophomore fairies to fly through and they all stood in separate clusters, all transformed, talking about the exercise they were about to do.
"Alright, ladies. Are we ready for this?" Rainer flew slightly above the ground in front of her group, as if she were pacing in mid air.
"Yes." Roxy said.
"Yes!" Athena exclaimed.
"I certainly am!" Krystal smiled.
"Absolutely not!" Anahita exclaimed.
The other four turned to look at her, her twin donning an incredulous expression and Rainer stopping her in-flight pacing to actually stand on the ground proper and raise an eyebrow at her.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that? You all should be concerned as well!" Anahita exclaimed, showing more emotion than she usually did. "Look at all those twists and turns and moving parts in that obstacle course we have to fly through! I can fly straight and move in mid air if I have to, but with these contraptions in my... our way?"
"Stop fussing, Ana. This is nothing." Athena waved a hand dismissively. "We can totally ace this!"
"Yeah, this is actually pretty tame compared to some other obstacle courses I've heard of them setting up. " Roxy said. "The Winx told me about some that they had to do when they attended here. There were even a few after they had achieved Enchantix where they had to fly through flaming hoops and even more moving parts than this one has!"
Anahita's eyes widened- and so did Athena's; albeit the twins had different reasons for reacting to that news the way they did, even if they'd had similar facial expressions.
"That sounds like so much fun..." Athena murmured. "I wish I could try that one..."
"That sounds like a rather horrifying experience." Anahita murmured. "Aren't there laws against this sort of thing?"
Roxy, Krystal and Rainer looked at one another.
"Alright, ladies! Settle down!" Griselda, Palladium and WizGiz stepped in front of them, Griselda being the one who had spoken.
They all immediately quieted down.
"We decided the create this obstacle course to test your flight skills. Flying is an innate ability for a fairy, a skill that comes naturally. However, sometimes when you're flying, certain... difficulties may get in your way..." Palladium spoke.
"I am sure that those difficulties do not include obstacles such as this..." Anahita folded her arms and began tapping her foot nervously.
"If you reach Enchantix level while in attendance here at Alfea, you will undergo new training for handling your newer, stronger, larger wings, But for now, you'll just be doing this." WizGiz added.
Glancing around them, Roxy saw that some other non-Sophomore students had gathered in the stands now surrounding the courtyard to watch.
"This isn't a marked test. This isn't going towards your grade. This doesn't make it any less important, however. If you're are flying and fighting at the same time, this sort of assessment will benefit you, especially for those of you who plan to go into law enforcement or become Guardian Fairies." Griselda said. "Plus, just because it isn't marked doesn't mean that you can go and 'goof off' on this test. Is that understood?" the brown haired professor glared down her students.
"Yes, ma'am!" the Sophomores chorused, most of them terrified by the woman's glare.
"Good. Now let's get started, shall we?" Griselda snapped her fingers and a clipboard and pen appeared in her hands.
"Let's see... We will be calling you up in random order, so..." Griselda skimmed the list with the tip of her pen. "Right! Idelle, you'll start us off today."
Roxy and her friends glanced over to where Idelle was standing a few feet away, in her sparkly neon blue fairy outfit and her hair pinned up in a beehive.
She glanced in their direction and once she noticed that they were looking at her, smirked briefly at them before taking off and beginning her flight through the obstacle course.
Rainer's mood in particular, grew more and more sour as she watched the other fairy fly through the obstacle course with no problems whatsoever.
At least, until Idelle came upon a section with a giant, spinning fan, its white blades reflecting the sunlight.
The light reflected into her eyes as she flew between the blades and it offset her, causing her to get caught in it.
The fan blades ended up hitting her as she flew through and it threw her to the ground so hard, that her fairy form flickered on and off as she tried sitting up, dazed from the rough impact.
Rainer cackled as if she were possessed, causing a few of the other fairies around them to back away from her, uneasy.
Griselda glared at the Androsian fairy, but Rainer simply looked back at her, looking completely unapologetic as she folded her arms across her chest.
"You're terrible, Rainer." Roxy giggled after Griselda turned away to chastise another group of fairies.
"Don't I know that already?" Rainer had stopped cackling, but she still looked amused.
"We all know that you can be terrible, sometimes." Athena said. "Trust me, we know. Like the time you ate all those 'gummy bear' things that Roxy brought back from Earth. For me."
"Oops!" Rainer exclaimed, not looking sorry at all.
Anahita rolled her eyes and Krystal giggled.
The first of their group to be called up some time later was Rainer and she flew forward confidently.
Rainer flew through the obstacle course with no difficulty whatsoever.
"I knew I could do it." Rainer spoke with an air of slight arrogance as she walked back over to them after briefly discussing her performance with the teachers.
Anahita went next and despite her earlier reservations about it, performed reasonably well, only stumbling a few times through it, but not a colossal failure as Idelle's (and a few other unfortunate students') had been.
"Roxy! You are next!" Griselda called her name and Roxy flew upwards a few inches, moved forward and studied the obstacle course briefly before starting it.
There were a series of twisted and straight tunnels- both narrow and wide to fly through; a series of hoops of various sizes, moving fans, some platforms of varying sizes that she'd have to land on briefly before moving onto another obstacle and moving objects floating in mid-air that she'd have to tag with an energy blast.
"Not exactly for beginners, but not undoable for me, I think..." Roxy thought.
She flew off.
Roxy passed through a straight tunnel that narrowed out as she flew and came out the other side, the tips of her wings just barely grazing the top of the tunnel.
"Come on now, Roxy. You can do this. It's just a little obstacle course..." she said to herself as she flew through a hoop and then shot a blast of energy at a moving object, said object making a ding sound when it was hit.
She landed on a small platform, standing on the tips of her toes before somersaulting through a particularly small hoop that she narrowly managed to fit through, drawing some cheers from the other fairies below her.
"With the training I got from my relatives, my practice with Harry and my real world missions, handling a course like this should be child's play..."
Roxy came upon the section with the fans that had tripped Idelle up.
She studied it for a few brief moments, her hand brushing her chin as she thought.
"Okay, girl. Pure concentration when flying through moving obstacles..."
A determined look appeared on her face as she flew forward.
She made it through that section with no incidents, unlike many of the other fairies, many of whom continued to cheer her on below.
Twirling vertically in mid-air, she tagged three more floating targets, somersaulted over a particularly large ball, landed on the smallest platform there, then flew down to stand on the last platform on the course- set on ground level.
She did a little bow as the other fairies clapped and cheered for her.
"Good job, Roxy and not just on completing the course in record time." Griselda consulted her clipboard. "You've made remarkable progress in all your studies here, considering that you only came to know of your powers and the existence of magic less than three years ago..."
"Thank you, Griselda," Roxy said. "but I couldn't have done it on my own. My dorm mates and I study and practice together a lot, not to mention the rigorous training that my family likes to put me through whenever I go home..."
"Then keep that up, Roxy. At your current rate, you'll graduate with first class honours. Our first Earthling graduate!" WizGiz exclaimed as he came up to join the pair.
"I know that Earth wasn't particularly close to the other magical planets even when magic was thriving there, but no Earthling fairy ever attended Alfea?" Roxy raised an eyebrow.
"He didn't say that, Roxy." Palladium addressed her next. "What he said was that no Earthling fairy ever graduated. Not that they never attended. The Wizards of the Black Circle and the threat they posed to Earth at the time..."
Roxy nodded. "I never really new about that..."
"You can learn about it another time." Griselda said. "As I said earlier, you did well on this obstacle course, Roxy. You'll get a full report on that performance at another time."
With that, the female professor dismissed the animal fairy and she returned to stand with her dorm mates.
"Well?" Rainer asked, seemingly impatient. "What did they say?"
"A lot of things. I did really well on the course, I'm improving overall... General stuff..." Roxy shrugged. "They gave me some food for thought too..."
She was, of course, proud of herself for the progress she had made, but that bit about being on track to being the first Earthling fairy to graduate from Alfea had really gotten her attention.
The war that the Wizards of the Black Circle had wreaked on her kind had all but destroyed them, but they'd managed to beat them and flourish again, thanks to the Winx Club's help.
It made her think of Harry's war with Lord Voldemort.
Sure, she had helped where she could, but she hadn't seen the true brutality of it yet, in her opinion.
The mission against the Carrows had been a victory for her side, but she had not been allowed to go on the mission where Voldemort had been present... Had she truly ever been in as much danger as Harry had been? Is currently in?
As her kind had been in the Black Circle's prime? Or when they had crawled out of the cesspit they'd been in a few years ago- the catalyst for her discovering her magic and magic in general in the first place?
She was doing well, but she needed to step up her game.
She fully intended to be by Harry's side, along with his friends, in the final battle against the dark wizard who was threatening his world and had marked him for death, along with everyone else he loved and cared for.