Open The Stands

[Nicole Fisk]

Nicole had to cover her mouth as the game carried on. There were so many bludgers and despite Jasper doing well keeping them on the board, Ilvermorny was still in the lead. When Blake was removed from the game, Nicole had to turn away. She liked Quidditch, but she hated to see people get hurt, especially someone so talented like Blake. If anyone asked if she felt the same seeing Daintree go down next she would have replied she thought he deserved it, but it was still unpleasant to see. "Oh no, poor little Ruben's in charge now," she fretted, leaning forward a bit to get a look at their back-up seeker. "I hope he catches the snitch soon."

 

[Celia Vu]

Celia's eyes widened. "Wait, are you also American?" she asked, now paying closer attention to his words, trying to see if she could detect an accent. It was strange — she'd never considered herself a patriotic person. But ever since moving last year, it felt like she was always looking for traces of home. At Elliot's observation, she shrugged and looked back out towards the pitch, trying to act nonchalant. "My mom went to Ilvermorny. I was supposed to go there too," she said, the faintest trace of bitterness in her voice.

She gave Elliot a skeptical look when he tried to claim Slytherin still had a chance. "You're just saying that because you're the head boy." For a few minutes, it looked like Slytherin might actually start mounting a comeback. But any progress they made was quickly wiped away when first Blake and then a Slytherin beater were taken out. Though Celia was glad Ilvermorny was doing well, she had to agree that the hits looked painful. Then again, Blake and what's-his-name probably could have avoided some of them if they were more competent fliers.

"Juniper...?" She was unfamiliar with the name. "The aggressiveness is working. She looks like she's going to fall off her broom any second," Celia said, nodding towards the Slytherin chaser that had already been hit twice. She eyed the lone Slytherin alternate remaining on the bench. "What happens if someone gets knocked out and there are no alternates left?" To prepare her for the magical world, her mom had briefed her on the rules of Quidditch and Quadpot. But their conversations had never covered this scenario — probably because it was so rare for a team to play this badly.

@Elliot Briar

 

[Elliot Briar]

"Half-American, if it matters," Elliot said, nodding and watching as Jasper managed to get another goal. Elliot knew his American accent tended soften a lot, even more so now that he spent most of his time in New Zealand, though he didn't tend to think too much about what it sounded like to non-kiwis. He glanced over again at the girl next to him when she mentioned Ilvermorny again, curious about her tone. "I nearly went too. It was a close call in the end. What made you pick Hogwarts?" He didn't know if he was prying or not, but Elliot was curious. He'd spent a lot of time trying to decide which school to go to all those years ago, and it had taken a few years before he was even close to being sure he'd picked right.

"Well, maybe," He said sheepishly when she called him out for not trying to be too obviously bias. "You can't prove that though," he added, looking back out innocently at the game. Elliot didn't think he was an overly competitive person, and he usually played his own distaste for Blake pretty close to the chest, but he didn't want anyone thinking he was a bad sport.

"Yeah, Juniper Zumwalt, she's on the Ravenclaw team. Can say from first hand experience she's no joke with a beater's bat," he said, grimacing. Elliot didn't want to discredit Minnie or the rest of Ravenclaw's hard work, but he did quietly think Juniper contributed a lot to Ravenclaw's excellent season this year. "If Slytherin has to keep making substitutions, they'll have until they either run out of players or run out of time outs to re-arrange the team," he explained, noting that Aonghas' little sister was now playing beater instead of chaser. "If they don't have at least five able players, they'll need to forfeit." Elliot thought the chances of the game going that poorly for Slytherin were slim, but it'd be a heck of a way to end the Quidditch season. @Celia Vuong

 

[Celia Vu]

"I didn't," Celia said, trying not to feel resentful that Elliot's parents had apparently given him a choice. "We moved, and my parents said I had to come here," she said with another shrug. It was a massive oversimplification of the whole situation, but he didn't need to know all the messy details about her parents' divorce. Or the fact that her dad apparently didn't even want to be in the same country as her. Celia decided it'd be best to redirect the conversation back to him before he tried to ask too many follow-up questions. "Why'd you pick Hogwarts? It can't be because of the athletics program," she added with a smile. After the field trip debacle, her mom had insisted she give Hogwarts a chance, and Celia had tried. She really had. But the gloomy castle in the middle of nowhere was no match for bright memories of roaming Boston with her friends. She wanted to know what Elliot saw in Hogwarts.

She tried not to smile too smugly as Elliot essentially admitted to trying to stay neutral for appearances. Not that Celia blamed him. From what she'd gleaned, the role basically made him the student representative for the school. She listened carefully as he explained the rules and who Juniper was. The Ravenclaw beater sounded like someone she should at least be aware of. "So Ilvermorny needs to knock out four more players?" That was a lot, but the American beaters were continuing their assault with brutal efficiency. "If Juniper's that good, she should get to play. The Slytherin beaters aren't even doing anything." She was pretty sure one of them hadn't touched a bludger all game. "They should pick the ten best players and make, like, an all-star team or something. This is like watching a one-sided dodgeball game against toddlers." Not that she wasn't enjoying it. But after the new seeker took two hits in a row, an Ilvermorny win seemed like an inevitability.

@Elliot Briar

 

[Elliot Briar]

Elliot glanced away from the game when the girl mentioned she hadn't had a choice about school, nodding slowly. "Moving can be uh.. Difficult," he offered. "Honestly? I wanted to be closer with my dad. I don't think it exactly worked out that way but it's alright. Forced me to be a little more independent when I couldn't rely on anything familiar," he said, ducking his head with a little smile. 'Worked out' was maybe an understatement regarding his school career, but things with his dad had never been worse.

Elliot winced as more bludgers went flying, he couldn't believe how rough this game was going. His heart went out to the seekers especially, the stress for them, especially on the Slytherin side, had to be unimaginable. "Only two now. I was going to say it would be unlikely to happen but uh. Maybe not," Elliot said grimly as the game had to be paused twice for new substitutions and now Jasper was lined up as seeker. "Ilvermorny's really flying circles around them. I think I might actually be glad Hufflepuff didn't win the cup this year.." he said. Elliot had wanted Ilvermorny to win, he still kind of did. But he'd much prefer if it was done by a seeker and not any more bludgers. @Celia Vuong

 

[Salem Lee]

Salem liked to think she'd seen a fair few Quidditch matches in her time, but she'd never seen one go like this. She'd taken to trying to boo and hiss the bludgers to see if that would discourage them, but it wasn't working. Once Indi was taken off the field, Salem and slumped back into her seat, feeling it was all very unfair. Poor Indi. The game kept going though, and more and more Slytherin players were taken off the field. Salem felt like she couldn't look away, but she hoped someone would end the match soon, if only so she could go check on poor Indi, she didn't even care who won anymore.

 

[Giselle Rosenberg]

As Giselle had made her way to the stands she was curious what the game today would bring. She watched the game happening but she had one goal. And as player by player got taken out she just could not believe her eyes and her sign went into the air. She felt angry, this was just not normal. “ STOP THIS F*CK SAKE!” She could not understand how this was fun to watch. “ FREAKING ANIMALS! AWAY WITH QUIDDITCH!!” She screamed loud. Lius now hit the Ilvermorny girl. “ HOW MORE VICTIMS DO WE NEED?!” She cursed to herself. “F*KING IDIOTS, F*KING SCHOOL!” She said angry. Her temper was on an high level and she wanted to smash something.

 

[Celia Vu]

It occurred to Celia that Elliot was the first person to acknowledge how hard moving was. The adults in her life always focused on her newness to magic when they talked about her "adjustment difficulties." No one ever seemed to realize how much it sucked to leave everything behind to move first to a country where she didn't speak the language, and then to one that was barely on the map. "It's the worst," she agreed, keeping her eyes on the field and her voice flat. Elliot explained why he'd chosen Hogwarts, and Celia glanced over, her expression softening. "I'm sorry about your dad," she said quietly. He didn't seem too upset, and she wondered if she'd ever reach that point. Maybe one day she'd be so successful, she wouldn't even need to think about her dad. And then, because she was still curious, she asked, "Do you like Hogwarts?" Considering his admission about his dad, she figured it wasn't too personal a question.

It was almost a relief to be able to focus on the game for the next several minutes. The Slytherins were dropping like flies, and Jasper was subbed in as seeker. Seeing as he was the only one who had actually done anything during the game, Celia thought it a long overdue move. At Elliot's Hufflepuff comment, she bit her tongue, resisting the urge to make a snarky comment. She was well-aware of the house's reputation, but even she knew better than to insult the head boy's house to his face. "I'm sure you guys would have done a better job than Slytherin." She doubted it was possible to do worse. A shrill noise broke through the cheers and the boos, causing Celia to flinch. Her gaze quickly settled on an angry blonde girl. "I'm guessing that's Giselle?" she asked, the corners of her mouth curving upward in amusement. She'd heard about the girl's Quidditch protests but had never seen one. "Does she come to every game?"

@Elliot Briar

 

[Professor Yvonne Dubois]

Yvonne had hoped for Ilvermorny to but up a good fight but she hadn't expected them to take out so much of the Slytherin team. She felt her fist clench every time any beater swung their bat and hoped the seekers would finally end the game soon. She had been paying closer attention to the game then she expected until she saw a younger student start yelling profanities and holding up a sign. While part of her didn't exactly disagree with the girl, the outburst was inappropriate all the same. "Hey! Watch your language." she called out as a warning. She didn't want to get the girl in trouble if she didn't have to but she couldn't let the behavior slide either. @Giselle Rosenberg

 

[Giselle Rosenberg]

Giselle was furious and she didn't knew if she wanted to run away now, because seeing the bludgers hit made her flashback her trauma. But in a way she felt like she needed to let people know. This was exactly an game what set an example what she ment. It was just horrible to watch. How could professors just be ok with this? Feeling her hands shaking she than heard professor speaking to her and she looked at the woman frowning. Ofcourse she was explosive and she had an outburst. '' What?! Professor my language is less worse than all that violence on the field!'' Giselle said annoying. She than tried to make the professor see her point. '' Do you approve seeing students get beaten up by that freaking bludger!? If this goes on we don't even have an team left!'' She explained and was wondering what the woman had to say. It was unfair that she was the one getting warned here. When nobody was speaking about what happend, someone had to.
@Professor Yvonne Dubois

 

[Zachariah Ezekiel King]

Zachariah had gone the whole game sitting on the edge of his seat. He was mostly thinking about how he couldn't wait to get the chance to be up there. This game was intense. not as intense as all the others he had silently watched. He couldn't help but start imagining the pain of the Slytherin team. By his count, they had 4 people out now (unless of course, he counted wrong). The Ilvermorny team was brutal and he wasn't sure if he was maybe secretly happy Slytherin wasn't winning. He was sure that he didn't want Hogwarts to lose though (he would have preferred if Ravenclaw was playing).

Somehow he had managed to zone out the rest of the noise around him throughout the game. Until now. So it came as a shock when he suddenly heard a girl shouting profanities nearby. He had almost jumped out of his seat. Zachariah rolled his eyes and turned back to concentrate on the game. "Come on just get the snitch already," Zachariah mumbled.