<font color=silver>Coach Pierce</font>
October 06, 2012 3:26 PM
Game One: Aladren vs Teppenpaw by <font color=silver>Coach Pierce</font>
Having gone over her notes of past seasons, Amelia Pierce noticed that Aladren had not played against Teppenpaw at all in the last three years and decided this should be rectified. Plus, it amused her that both teams had a Pierce & Stratford Beater line-up and felt the two sets of relatives should get to play against each other. There were also Thorntons on both teams, though the Aladren one was still a reserve since Aladren had not felt the need to make any change to their previous year's starting line-up.As they were returning Champions once again and had not suffered any graduations or drop-outs, Amelia could not fault Captain Wilkes for this decision. Though they hadn't graduated anyone either, Teppenpaw's team had seen a small change to their roster with the new influx of first years. Mr. Davies was back on the bench as Teppenpaw's emergency Keeper (the position, as Amelia understood it, that he preferred) and his unwanted Chaser position had been claimed by newcomer Carter Browning. Otherwise, Teppenpaw's starting team remained unchanged as well.
However, since they had not played each other last year, or the year before, or the year before that, both teams would be relatively new to each other at least, if not to the spectators watching.
"Welcome," she announced, once the time for the match to begin had arrived. The stands were filled with those who wanted to watch, and the two teams were gathered on the ground in the middle of the Pitch with her. The two captains had finished with the speeches, so the new Quidditch Season was ready to begin.
The sun was bright, the sky was blue, and a few fluffy white clouds provided intermittent relief from the sun's blinding glare. Right this moment, though, Amelia was squinting a little and shielding her eyes from it with a hand as she looked up first toward the stands and then toward the teams. "Today, we start the new season with Aladren, led by Captain Wilkes, facing off against Teppenpaw, led by Captain Melcher. Will the two captains shake hands?" She waited for the two to complete the request before continuing. "The game begins on my whistle. It ends when a Seeker catches the Snitch."
She released the Snitch, and the bludgers, and lifted up the Quaffle. "Ready? One. Two. Three." She threw the ball into the air and blew into her whistle.
The game had begun.
Subthreads: This is it. by <font color=yellow>Captain Kirstenna,Keeper</font> with <font color="blue">Arthur Carey, Chaser</font>, <font color=yellow>Carter Browning, Chaser</font>, <font color="blue">Captain Wilkes, Keeper</font>, <font color="blue">Russell Layne, Chaser</font>, <font color=yellow>Carter, Chaser</font>, <font color="yellow"> Laurie. Beater </font>
Girls, gold, and glory are all on my mind by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font> with <font color=yellow>Derry Four, Beater</font>, <font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>, <font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
From the bench... Again... by <font color=yellow>Brielle Thornton,Reserve</font>
Recentering (nm) by <font color=silver>Coach Pierce</font> with
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<font color=silver>Coach Pierce</font>
Game One: Aladren vs Teppenpaw
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<font color=silver>Coach Pierce</font>
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
October 06, 2012 9:40 PM
Girls, gold, and glory are all on my mind by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Teppenpaw was the first team Arnold had ever played against at Sonora, so going up against them again felt – especially given how strange the rest of this year had been – almost like a homecoming, of sorts. He still remembered that game fondly, usually with a smile, when he thought of it. Their Seeker had been his first introduction to the idea of girls playing Quidditch, their Beaters had inflicted the first of the long list of Sonora Quidditch injuries he had sustained on him, that had been the first time he’d played Quidditch in the rain and Seeker for an audience and caught a real Snitch…Good memories, all. He was in a genuinely good mood as he got ready and went down to the Quidditch Pitch, shielding his eyes against the bright sun and guessing that this was going to be a long game because of that alone.It had been a long time since they’d played Teppenpaw, now that he thought about it, even in spite of that time Coach Pierce had rearranged the schedule and made them play Crotalus in the first game. Looking over their team, he saw Kate Bauer was still the Seeker and gave her a friendly wave. He liked her; she’d given him a hell of a good game back then, and while he hoped he was the one who won today, he couldn’t think of many scenarios where he lost where he wouldn’t think that she had earned it fair and square.
When the whistle blew, Arnold went as straight up as he could, then made a few loop-the-loops and a figure eight once he got to fifty feet before settled in for the long business of looking for the Snitch. The light was bright enough to hurt his eyes, and he rubbed them for a second before squinting down at the green, his brown eyes flicking from place to place around the Pitch very quickly as he looked for any sign of the Golden Snitch. He didn’t really want to catch it just yet – that would take all the fun out of the game – but if he could spot it, he would know if he needed to catch it fast, and he wasn’t going to just fly around too much without doing anything.
After a few moments of not seeing the Snitch, though, his mind started wanting to wander, and he had to drag it sternly back to the task at hand, and not to whether Fae was watching, and how he wanted to impress her with his performance today and not get hurt too much in the process if she was, since his mother had said her mother had specifically mentioned that as something that bothered her, and how surely even he didn’t really believe she’d sit with the Teppenpaws. She’d said she still wanted to at least be friends, too; there was no reason involving that for her to go to the other side, since she wasn’t in Teppenpaw and didn’t, that he knew of, have any family in Teppenpaw and her best friend was dating an Aladren and not a Teppenpaw….He shook his head. No girls, or at least not girls who were not on brooms and therefore in a different category than regular girls, much less girls who were special girls for him and his teammates. He was out to get the Snitch today, not the girl.
He looked around, with unusual caution, for the Bludgers. He really hadn’t thought about her getting upset about Quidditch injuries before, but he didn’t want her to now.
Far below, he saw a blue robe – Arthur, he thought, from the hair; Kitty also had dark hair, but would be a smaller figure than his brother – heading toward the Teppenpaw goals and grinned, speeding up to fly past Kate. “Nice day for it,” he called, just as a greeting and acknowledgment. It was important to do that, and he had developed a superstition about being sure to speak to the opposing Seeker anyway; the one time he hadn't had been the one time he'd lost. He might change policies if he played in the World Cup or something, but he really didn't think that was ever going to happen.
A second later, as he flew away from the Teppenpaw Seeker without paying nearly as much attention to his direction as to the rest of his surroundings, a cloud covered the sun for a moment, taking away from the glare. Arnold made the mistake, though, of blinking at that time and seeing dark green for a second. Rubbing his eyes again, he started flying toward the Aladren spectators, all the while looking, as best he could, for the gold speck which would mean victory or defeat.
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Girls, gold, and glory are all on my mind
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
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<font color=yellow>Derry Four, Beater</font>
October 06, 2012 10:41 PM
A new thing to think about by <font color=yellow>Derry Four, Beater</font>
Derry Four was the oldest beater on the Teppenpaw team now, and had been last year as well. As such, he often took the lead on the beater practices when Kirstenna didn't have him and Laurie working with everyone else. They'd trained well this year, and when he had learned that the first team they would be up against this year would be Aladren his first thought had not be dread over facing the returning Champions, but elation that he and Laurie would get to go up against the two beaters they new best in the school, even though Teppenpaw had not played against Aladren since Derry and Preston had been first years.Derry knew exactly what Thaddeus's strengths and weaknesses were. He'd taught Thad a lot of what he knew about being a Beater. More than that, he knew Thad didn't like being a beater, and that was perhaps even more of an advantage than the size and strength that age had granted Derry over the younger Aladren Pierce.
Preston and Laurie were also cousins and had probably played with sticks, brooms, and bludgers at home together before. Unfortunately, Preston did not have Thaddeus's dislike of his position (rather the opposite; Preston seemed even more dedicated to being a beater than Derry was) and Preston was bigger and older than Laurie, and may have also taken a hand in training his little cousin. The advantage was not as clearly in Teppenpaw's favor on the Stratford side, but Derry knew Laurie was a strong player, and better and bigger than Thad at least. Thad had many talents but the greatest one he had in Quidditch was mostly a stubborn refusal to give up.
Derry had considered several strategies for how the Teppenpaw beaters ought to deal with Aladren. It seemed to make sense to put Laurie up against Thad since they were both the less experienced players, but there was a glaring problem with that. In the recent Aladren games that Derry had watched, where Thad was a beater, they had played him as Edmond's replacement for guarding the Seeker. Derry wasn't quite sure he understood the logic of this, but he would readily admit that he wasn't as smart as most Aladrens and they probably had a very good but complex reason for doing so. However, the logic that Derry liked to follow placed the larger, older, and more experienced beater into contention with the Seekers; protecting Teppenpaw's only way to win and sabotaging the opposing team's opportunity to do so.
So instead of telling Laurie that he was on Thaddeus, Derry instructed his teammate that Laurie was to cover the Chasers and Keepers while Derry handled Kate and Arnold. It would then be in Aladren's court whether they set Pierce against Pierce and Stratford against Stratford, or if they mixed it up. Derry was fine with it either way. Kate and victory were safer if Derry faced Thaddeus. The rest of the team was safer if they put Thad up against Laurie, and Derry was sure he could hold his own against Preston. Preston might be more blood-thirsty than a Teppenpaw was normally capable of, but Derry had wanted to be a Beater for as long as he could remember and had learned to fly and bat well before he had learned to read and write.
He didn't think any Aladren could say that, even Thad, despite Derry's best efforts. Though, to be fair, that was partly because Thad learned to read and write way earlier than Derry did.
Kirstenna gave a solid speech, and he really hoped they'd win this time. Teppenpaw was about due for a victory, he thought. Aladren might have won all but one game in the last four years while Teppenpaw hadn't won any, but that really meant only two things: Aladren was sure to underestimate them, and Teppenpaw really wanted to their turn to win. Derry was optimistically sure they could do it and chance would surely favor them now that the scales of fairness were so terribly unbalanced. Pecari had won out of nowhere two years ago, and now it was Teppenpaw's turn to do the same.
He watched the bludgers fly off after Amelia - er, Coach Pierce - let them go, and when the whistle blew, he flew after one of them. He captured it and then looked around for Arnold. He couldn't tell yet whether Aladren was fielding Thad or Preston as the guy's protector and decided that meant he had an early opportunity for an easy shot. He flew in closer, lined up his aim, and swung his bat with a loud crack, sending the bludger right for the blue clad seeker just as Arnold removed one hand from his broom to rub at his eyes.
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<font color=yellow>Derry Four, Beater</font>
A new thing to think about
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<font color=yellow>Derry Four, Beater</font>
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
October 08, 2012 7:42 PM
It's also never far from my mind by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
His eyes weren’t completely clear, but there was nothing wrong with Arnold’s ears, and he caught the whistling sound of the Bludger just in time to, still with only one hand on his broom, fly out of the way, swaying on his broom as he did so before he got his grip back. He could fly one-handed and had practiced no-handed more and more over the summer, but he was usually expecting to when he did, rather than having to do it on the fly like that, and without taking a second to adjust his seat on the broom first. He was glad to have both hands on the broom again once he did.Glad, though, was something he only had the luxury to be for a few seconds before the Bludger swung around and was back after him; he had not gotten far enough out of his way, and had then paused to adjust, so he was still the closest person to it, and that meant he was still its target. Ducking to avoid its second attack, Arnold flipped his broom around – another move he had spent more time practicing since the last game – and dove for the ground.
If he was incredibly lucky, Kate would think he had seen the Snitch, and he might just pull off a Wronski Feint without even meaning to, or at least get the Bludger to switch its focus to her instead. He thought it was more likely, though, that he would give one of his team’s Beaters time to intercept it, or else that he’d lead it into the main game. Either way, though, he would get it off him, which meant he would be able to play uninjured a little longer and have a better chance, in that condition, of finding and then, once he had found it, winning a race to and maybe small fight over the Snitch. Winning with a broken arm – and leg, and head, and anything else that happened to get in a Bludger’s way as he pursued his goals – was more romantic and dramatic, but it was a lot harder.
Thoughts of Fae were, for the first time in a good long while, about the furthest thing from his mind as he pulled out of the dive and flew, his head pointing more toward one bank of seats than toward the sky, toward the side of the Pitch he hadn’t been on when the Bludger had been aimed at him. He was grinning to himself, thinking that he liked playing Derry Pierce, his fellow fifth year was a good Beater who kept things interesting. His head was all in the game now, at least for right now, anyway, and he went first higher, then lower a few more times, to make himself at least a harder target to hit if he couldn’t really make himself less of one, and he squinted against the sun as he refused to let his eyes or body stay in any one specific spot for more than a few seconds. The Snitch would be near-constantly moving, as would the Bludgers.
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
It's also never far from my mind
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
October 08, 2012 10:16 PM
It shouldn't by <font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
Preston couldn’t really remember playing against Laurie in Quidditch before, which meant that it probably had never happened. The fifth-year knew that his cousin was mad at him for what he had done last summer, but he couldn’t really blame him for it. The Stratford’s were trying to expand and they needed good acquaintances to do so, not lowly muggleborns. The redhead was just looking out for the family and his cousin. Laurie hadn’t seen it that way and now glared at him every time he got. The Aladren didn’t take it personal, but he sometimes got annoyed by the infantile reaction of his younger cousin.The Aladren didn’t know how Laurie was going to react to this friendly game between them, but he was sure his team was going to win. There was no doubt about it. They didn’t have a change in the line-up and by now they had become a very good Quidditch machine. Aladren was unstoppable. It was an honor being part of something so big.
The sun was very bright, he realized as he entered the pitch to join the rest of the Aladren team. He was a little bit late, due to a small mishap. He couldn’t find his beater gloves. Preston had been sure he had left them in his trunk, but they ended up being under his bed. He had been surprised to realize this little lack of memory.
The redhead cracked his neck while waiting for the game to start. He had been having trouble with sleep lately, and he was sure it was due to stress. It was still early in the year, but Pres was already reviewing everything. He didn’t want to get more stressed due to irresponsibility. No, he wanted to ace every single exam.
Coach Pierce finally gave them the go to start the game, but Preston didn’t fly out right away. He stood there assessing the players before going up. One of the Teppenpaw Seekers started trailing Arnold, and Preston immediately zoomed after them. The Teppenpaw beater aimed a bludger towards Arnold, but his teammate evaded it like a pro. Preston grinned and followed the wayward bludger towards an enemy player. They couldn’t have an injured seeker, even when Arnold had a knack for playing in not the best conditions.
He finally caught up with the bludger, he aimed and swung his bat to hear the familiar crack that meant he had hit the murderous ball and it was on its way towards the Teppenpaw seeker. They were here to win and they were going to. They couldn’t lose to Teppenpaw, because that would be beyond humiliating.
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
It shouldn't
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
October 09, 2012 5:34 PM
Yeah, Bludgers are kind of hard to ignore. by <font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
Kate was, for a pleasant change, actually in a good mood as she put on her yellow Quidditch robes and headed for the Pitch. She had been waiting for three years for the rematch against Arnold Carey, and now that the chance was in front of her, she was determined to be the one who was just half a second faster, or less injured, or whatever had happened last time this time. She had come closer to beating the famous Arnold Carey than she had anyone else in her entire career, basically, and had been dreaming of really doing it since her second year. It was time to make those dreams a reality.The brightness of the sun wasn’t a completely welcome sight, but there were a few clouds in the sky, here and there, so she just had to have faith that they were going to favor her and help blind Arnold. She smiled when Kirstenna assured her she was a great Seeker, knowing it was probably more because the captain was nice than because she believed it but still feeling confident that she was going to prove the point today. She hadn’t, in the long picture, been a great Seeker, but she thought she might have a chance of being remembered as one if she could just beat Carey, at least for a few years, until a few more of her teammates graduated. Maybe a little longer, if she could somehow do it again next year. Being the second person to do it instead of the first would, after all, be a little less impressive on its own….
The sheer Layneishness of the thought was something that barely bothered her as they headed for midfield and the handshake. Kate had long since recognized and accepted her own hypocrisy on that point. Nothing wrong with it, she thought. Everyone was a little bit of a hypocrite, deep down. She was self-aware enough to admit it, and that was what counted. When Arnold waved at her, Kate smiled and waved back, picturing the look on his face when he realized she had the Snitch at the end of the game, and resisted the impulse to change the wave into a rude hand gesture just before kickoff.
“Not for you,” she shouted back when Arnold announced it was a nice day for it, and then took up ignoring him in favor of looking for the Snitch. Confident or not, if she saw it, Kate planned to go straight for it, rather than waiting to give the game time to be played. She wanted this over as quickly as possible.
She did, though, see it when Derry hit a Bludger at him and cheered quietly…just in time to see Arnold dive. She hesitated, wondering if he was trying to avoid the Bludger or if he’d just seen the Snitch, but she finally decided to follow him, just not to get too close. That didn’t work either, though, because she guessed she’d gotten closer than she meant to, because the next thing she knew, a Bludger was heading toward her, and by the looks of it, Aladren had finally noticed that it might be smart to put the bigger of their two current Beaters in their big former Beater’s place. Great.
Kate flew up, higher, to avoid the Bludger, trusting Derry to catch it and hit it toward Arnold again. Meanwhile, she had a glitter of gold to look for, and curse the way she couldn’t see something the size of a walnut clearly across the whole Pitch even in good light about.
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
Yeah, Bludgers are kind of hard to ignore.
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
October 10, 2012 8:47 PM
But that's why I've got Preston by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Turning, Arnold saw Preston hitting the Bludger toward Kate and he nodded to himself. The game was on, and the Beaters were all playing to win, which was, of course, as it was supposed to be. Half the fun of the game would be gone if there weren’t competent Beaters who were playing as hard as the Seekers; he’d rather play lousy Beaters than a completely lousy opposing Seeker, of course, but it was better when everyone was good and the winner deserved to be, well, the winner. Winning too easily was never as much fun as a good fight.At least for now, anyway. A few times, he’d gotten injured enough, or been playing long enough, or just been in a bad enough mood that day that he’d wanted the game over with and he really hadn’t cared if it was a good game or not, but by and large, Arnold enjoyed playing Quidditch and wanted to do it right. Today was one of the days when he felt that way.
Glancing at the rest of the game just in time to see Arthur get hit by a Bludger made him think his twin might not agree with him – Arthur didn’t like rough games as well as Arnold did, much less ones where the ball seemed to be spending a lot of time with the other team – but at the moment, there wasn’t much Arnold could do about that, so after silently echoing David’s earlier exhortation for the Beaters to give Teppenpaw hell, he ignored them again and flew in a new direction, looking around for the Snitch or for any suspicious movements from his opposite number.
Not finding it, and getting tense as things stayed at the Teppenpaw end of the Pitch for a longer time than felt right, without any movement away from the goals even if the Teppenpaws were constantly getting the ball and throwing it at the goals over and over again, Arnold made a few extraneous, fast loops, just to break the monotony, and then, coming out of the last one and feeling a little dizzy, he spotted it, glimmering on the grass twenty feet below him: The Snitch.
Which brought up, of course, the critical question: to go for it, or to let it go?
He glanced toward the goals. Go for it. But as he dove, he blinked, just at the wrong second; when he looked again, it was gone again. Pulling his broom upright, Arnold smacked the handle in frustration, though he did pull the blow before it landed, and looked around the surrounding area in the hopes of spotting it again before it got far away, rising back up in the air to get a better view.
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
But that's why I've got Preston
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
October 12, 2012 8:36 PM
And here I am by <font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
One thing Preston loved about Quidditch was the quickness in which it passed. There was never a dull moment in a game and Merlin this one had surpassed his expectations. He had never had any respect for the Teppenpaws, but today they were actually playing quite well. It was a surprise. Now, when they won it would be more satisfying victory. The Aladren could already savor the well deserved victory.Even when Teppenpaw had stepped up their game they weren’t a match for the Aladren team. They had the best beaters, chaser and seekers at school. Their constant winning streak was a beacon to their awesomeness. No one could deny it. They basically owned the Quidditch Pitch.
It was weird that the two beater groups were a Pierce-Stratford team. The Teppenpaw Pierce was bigger and older than the Aladren Pierce, but the Aladren Stratford was more experienced than the Teppenpaw Stratford. It was weird how Preston had never played Quidditch with his little cousin, which would have given him an advantage over Laurie, but they weren’t in speaking terms. And besides, his cousin had played Chaser for a while. No, he had the upper hand over Laurie, but Derry had it over Thad.
The redhead wasn’t really paying attention to the Chasers or the other beaters, since his job was focused on taking Kate out of the game. Without a seeker Teppenpaw would suffer a great loss.
The Teppenpaw Seeker dodged the bludger he had sent her way. Preston frowned at that turn of events and went looking for a bludger to send towards her again. He spotted one flying not far from where he was and went after it. He swung his bat and made direct impact with it. The force and aim were considerable as he saw the bludger flying to where Kate was. He was not going to make this easy. He wanted to win. He was going to win.
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
And here I am
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<font color="blue"> Preston. Beater </font>
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
October 18, 2012 2:26 PM
Yes, there you are. by <font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
Deep down, Kate was somehow sure this was it. She had a whole year left at school, during which it seemed very likely that they were both going to keep playing the game, but she just had a feeling that just as she and Aladren had first played each other in her second year, they were playing each other – with her and Arnold as Seekers, anyway – in her second to last year for the final time. There wasn’t going to be a rematch next year. For her, anyway, beating Aladren was something to do now or never.Well, game on. Knowing Arnold’s proclivity for distracting the opposing Seeker, she avoided him for the moment, flying to look for the Snitch, not to engage with her enemy. She was a little worried about it, since most of his games did end with neck-in-neck races for the Snitch, which implied he was at least a little better than average at spotting it, but if she could find it on her own first, then she would be okay….
Assuming, of course, that she didn’t get hit by a Bludger. She looked up, and there one was, soaring straight toward her – and doing so too fast. It caught her a glancing blow, which threw her off-course as she accelerated at the same time and the forces went against each other.
Spinning, her shoulder aching, Kate forced herself to grit her teeth and grab her broom with both hands to get herself back in control and back on the hunt. Once she was pointing entirely in one direction again, she looked around for – she didn’t even know for sure. Arnold, the Snitch, something she could work with here.
Arnold was what she spotted first, and he seemed to be looking intently for something. Was the Snitch in that area? He wasn’t too high in the air. Maybe he thought he had seen it and was looking for it again now. Or maybe he’d just lost it and decided to concentrate heavily on one bit of the Pitch at the time. The big game – the one they weren’t part of – seemed to be getting dirty, so she was guessing he’d want this over at least as much as she did, for his brother’s sake (and, she thought grimly, for Aladren’s sake in general; they weren’t looking so good this time around). She decided to go over there and see what was up.
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
Yes, there you are.
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
October 18, 2012 2:43 PM
Isn't he awesome? by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Still moving up, his eyes darting all around the grass immediately beneath him and just around it, Arnold bit his lip in frustration, realizing that the Snitch had gone again. Maybe it had gone behind him when he was still too close to the ground to see in every direction, then off at an angle, or maybe he was just looking so hard for it that he wasn’t finding it, he didn’t know, but either way, for all purposes which were at all useful to him, it was gone again, which meant the game was still on, and from what he was picking up, that wasn’t a good thing. It was all right for him and Preston right now, but they had to live with two of the Aladren Chasers, and Arthur, at least, was going to be in a killing mood if what Arnold thought was going on was going on and kept going on much longer.He remembered another game where the Chasers had sat around one Keeper for a long time, a really long time, though he hadn’t played in it – Crotalus versus Pecari a few years ago, he didn’t even remember which year, but he did know it had gotten kind of boring watching in the stands. If he remembered right, one of the Crotalus Chasers had finally broken it off herself, even though her team hadn’t yet lost possession of the Quaffle; presumably, they had all gotten kind of bored with how things were going, too. There was a point at which messing with the rival team was fun, but then, after a while, especially if they weren’t able to fight back, it just got boring, or – at least for him – made you feel like a lousy human being, but both ways were something less than fun.
What he was doing at the moment wasn’t much fun, either, so when he saw Kate heading his way, he decided he might as well have some fun if she didn’t seem in immediate danger of catching the Snitch. Hopefully, they would be able to give the audience something entertaining to watch, too. Arnold did see that as an important part of the game; there were other things on the line, including House pride and House points and maybe the occasional romance, but really, at the end of the day, the game was supposed to be about enjoying themselves and entertaining a crowd. Looking one last time, hard, around the area for the Snitch, he determined that it almost surely wasn’t there, then looked up, frowned intently, and then shot straight up in the air, his hand held out as though to grasp the Snitch.
A momentary diversion, but it would give people something to get excited about for a minute, and get him to another part of the Pitch, and who knew. Maybe they could even have an exciting finish when one of them did find the Snitch. The final chase was half the fun, after all. He felt a little disappointed if catching the Snitch was too easy.
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Isn't he awesome?
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
October 18, 2012 3:02 PM
'Awesome' is not the word I had in mind. by <font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
Kate wasn’t too far away from Arnold when he looked up, then shot off as though to go catch the Snitch. It tickled the back of her mind that maybe he was feinting, but her mind wasn’t overly involved in things by that point; when he’d sped off, her heart had given a great leap in her chest, and she had been following him even before he extended his arm, furthering the ruse. She had to catch him; that was the important thing, the only thing she thought much about for a second.After she gained some of her ground back, though, she got on with the conscious process of looking, and she didn’t see the Snitch anywhere. It didn’t make much sense – why would he want her on his tail going up? It was kinda hard to try a Wronski Feint without any ground for the opponent to plow painfully into, though she honestly didn’t think either of them was good enough to pull that maneuver off the way it was supposed to be pulled. Now, if he saw it, she was right in there with him to get it. The only thing she could think was that he was trying to get her Bludgered again, but they were close enough that she might manage to catch him with it, too, and even if she didn’t, then Derry would probably be able to deflect it without too much trouble.
Or he was just cracking up, or just trying to confuse her, or…Kate decided it was in the best interests of her mental health not to try too hard to understand Aladrens. It was a lesson she thought she should have learned a long time ago, given that she had an uncle and a sister in that House, but what could she say, Uncle Geoff hadn’t even been a name until Momma suddenly informed them she had a brother just before Rachel’s first year and Alicia was…a riddle. Kate had always privately figured her little sister for a Crotalus of the frilliest type before she started school and started wearing blue even more than that wacky Classics tutor of hers and Isaac’s did, so she didn’t think it was too safe for her to speculate about Aladren behavior based on that relative, either.
For now, she decided to see if she couldn’t get him to plow into the ground, or at least split off from her again. “Oh!” she cried, as though very surprised, and then dove for the ground, copying the move of acting as though she were reaching for the Snitch…only, just as she started the dive, she thought she saw it for real and felt, for the second time in far too few minutes, a sensation like she was definitely having problems of a cardiac nature as she registered what she was seeing, but this time, she was already moving in one direction as she tried to reorient herself and be sure of what was really what….
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
'Awesome' is not the word I had in mind.
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
October 18, 2012 3:36 PM
It was 'fantastic,' wasn't it? by <font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
Arnold grinned when he saw that Kate had followed him, but figured out quickly enough that she knew he didn’t have the Snitch, so he lowered his arm so both hands could be back on the handle of his broom as he continued to fly, looking for the Snitch for real. At least there had been a bit of a thrill there, in running fast, and maybe the spectators had sat on the edges of their seats for a moment. The rest of the players didn’t seem in any hurry to go home, and he didn’t really expect to lose to Kate if she stayed close by, so he thought he could afford his moment of fun.Looking all around, he thought he saw a glint from the corner of his eye, but it turned out to have been either his imagination or a reflection of some kind, and he was completely distracted from it by Kate’s sudden exclamation. Turning quickly, Arnold looked in the direction she was going, looked again –
“Huh,” he said, then dove, too.
Part of why he had done it so often in the past few months had definitely been to help work off some of the stress that Fae and CATS and everything else was causing him, that had really even been the bigger part of it, and another part had been because he just enjoyed the exercise and the risk a lot, but knowing that it was a useful skill to have was definitely a chunk of the reason why Arnold spent time practicing very fast, steep dives. With enough practice, he stopped noticing the blur that was the ground so much, and learned to see through the wind in his eyes, and barely thought at all about the possibility of falling off and maybe breaking his neck just from the force of being caught, even though he thought that was about as unlikely as actually hitting the ground would be. It could be fun, just on an evening when he thought his brain was going to gently drip out of his ears if he tried to cram one more theory into it, but during a game, it let him focus on what he was doing when he needed to focus on that, let his world pretty much narrow to the objective, which was usually always the same: get there first.
Kate had a bit of a head start on him, though, so this time, the goal had been slightly adjusted, so that part of it was catch up and the next section was get there first. He wasn’t concerned about it, he knew he could catch up to her, but he was focused on doing so just the same, because not focusing would mean messing up, and he was not going to mess up. He was going to get there, and if the Snitch was there when he got there, he was going to catch it and Aladren would go home with another win, simple as that.
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
It was 'fantastic,' wasn't it?
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<font color="blue">Arnold Carey, Seeker</font>
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
October 18, 2012 3:55 PM
You aren't much good at guessing games, are you? by <font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
For a second, Kate worried she was going to unseat herself in her alarm, but then, under the pressure of knowing that this might well be it, everything clicked together, and she entered the dive as planned, then began to change direction as she went, quickly enough that she thought she had some hope of getting there first but not so fast that she thought she was in danger of coming off the broom. The coach would catch her if she fell, she knew, but from what she remembered from the good old days when they’d all been newer to the game and falls had been a regular occurrence in games, that probably wouldn’t stop the game, which would mean that Arnold would just be able to basically stroll over to the Snitch and pick it up at his leisure.That sounded fun. If by ‘fun’ one meant ‘not remotely fun at all.’ If that happened, Kate thought she might very well get killed tonight, but if she was, she would beg for the privilege of doing the same to Arnold Carey before it was done to her. Her Teppenpaw ideals knew it wouldn’t really be his fault if she fell off her broom and he took advantage of the time to catch the Snitch without opposition – she knew perfectly well that, in that position, she would catch the Snitch and not feel one bit bad about not giving her competition a fighting chance – but this wasn’t Teppenpaw, this was Quidditch. It was not a game really designed to bring the best out in people.
The Snitch was, she could see now, fluttering, not darting. It might stay in the area another minute, which would make it a lot easier to catch, or it might shoot out of sight at any second. She had a theory that they could tell when the Seeker was approaching and actively ran and hid when they sensed it, though she had never bothered looking it up to see if she was right or not. Now, she sort of wished she had, but it wasn’t like she’d really have time for a subtle approach anyway….
Her shoulder twinged, and she turned her head that way half-instinctively, only to catch a glimpse over it of Arnold Carey gaining on her. Nope. Definitely on time for being subtle. She pushed her broom to go faster, her eyes darting back to the Snitch and locking onto it, willing herself to get there by a margin of just seconds, that was all she'd need....
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
You aren't much good at guessing games, are you?
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<font color="yellow">Kate Bauer, Seeker</font>
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