"Hey mate, you're a bit late, aren't you?" Ron greeted when Harry appeared after his usual workout – he had started on Water Walking today and had got completely soaked the first few times in the shallows of the lake. He had had to take a shower to get rid of the pond weed smell from him, otherwise, he would have beaten Ron to the table by now.
"Yo!" Harry greeted with a lazy two-fingered wave, ignoring the question as he dropped next to the redhead, piling his plate full of food. Well, Hogwarts food wasn't Ramen, or Dango, but it was quite good, especially after some hard training. Harry snatched up a newly baked roll, and sank his teeth into it. "Mmmmm!"
Ron laughed. "And you say I love eating"
"You do though, much more than me, I bet you even have dreams of eating food," Harry said, flashing the boy a smirk.
"Shush! You're supposed to keep those things quite!" Ron hissed at him, as if it was a secret as great as the Hokage being an avid Icha-Icha reader. He gave Harry (who was now choking on his bread) a surprised look. "How'd you know anyways?" Ron said quickly.
"You mean you do have dreams of just eating?" Harry asked incredulously as soon as he could breath again. He burst out laughing. "Hey, Ron, I was kidding!" Harry choked out past his laughter.
Ron pouted, slumped in his seat, his face turning as red as his hair, "Oh, shut up"
Harry calmed himself down, except for the occasional snicker that escaped him. Ron glared, but it looked more funny than scary. Not even at Snape level. "Okay now that you're done laughing at me," Ron grumbled, "Are you ready for flying lessons this afternoon?"
"Oh yeah! I forgot about that! It's right after lunch isn't it?" At Ron's nodded, Harry grinned. "Heh, so I'm one step closer to seeing how this Quid-Itch thing works!"
"Dammit, Harry, Its pronounced QUIDDITCH!"
"Good morning, Ha…" Hermione, who had just arrived, a large book tucked under her arm, trailed off as she saw Ron almost jumping up and down on his seat, while Harry was grinning like an idiot, his hands behind his head, occasionally dodging a flailing arm with apparent ease.
"Hermione," Harry turned to her with a polite smile when Ron had run out of energy and had dropped back in his seat panting heavily. "Good morning."
Hermione, despite her competitiveness when it came to spell work – especially in Transfiguration and Defence Against the Dark Arts – Harry's best subjects – and her occasional bossiness, was actually one of the few girls at Hogwarts that Harry could actually tolerate. (Hey, I mean, if he could become best friends with Hyuga despite a blood feud between the two families…). Perhaps it was because she reminded him so much of Neji and Iruka that first time they had met, but Harry didn't mind her too much. Or it might have been because Hermione was the only girl who hadn't been among those who stared at him during his first week until they found this was a dangerous hobby to indulge in. They weren't exactly friends, per say, but they were on speaking terms.
His red headed companion, on seeing Hermione, just frowned and grunted.
Ron, on the other hand…not so much.
"What's that book?" Harry asked, leaning over slightly to see the title half-hidden under her arm.
"Oh, this?" Hermione held up the book, "Its Quidditch Through the Ages. I borrowed it out of the library to see what it says about flying." He paused slightly before the word 'flying', something Harry easily picked up on.
"Something wrong, Hermione? You seem kind of nervous?" Harry asked.
"Umm, it's nothing really, just not to fond of flying very much." Hermione admitted, fidgeting slightly.
"Wait, you're scared of flying!" Ron practically shouted.
Harry bonked him on the head. "No need to yell it, moron"
Hermione flushed slightly, but picked up her usual bossy attitude. "No, I am not scared of flying, just… not fond of it"
"Yes! You are afraid of flying!" Ron said excitedly, finally finding something to use against Hermione.
"I am not afraid of flying! And I'll prove it to you!" Hermione yelled with a determined look in her eye before storming out of the Great Hall.
Ron had a smug look on his face and turned to look at Harry, who had a frown on his face.
"Yes! Finally some payback for all those lectures she has given me" Ron said. However Harry didn't look pleased at that.
"You know she only lectures you because she is trying to help" Harry said some what sternly.
Ron stared at Harry unbelievably, "Helping? You're kidding right? She just thinks she's better than everybody and likes to show off."
"Some day her advice could be useful, you know," Harry pointed out.
Leaving Ron to mouth wordlessly like a fish at Harry's words, Harry turned back to eating his breakfast, to see Neville frowning and muttering to himself, tinkering with something in his hands. As Neville's hands moved, he thought he could see a flash of a red gleam as the sun from the window struck something in his fingers.
Curiosity getting the better of him, Harry leaned towards the boy, looking over his shoulder. "Hey, Neville what you got there?"
Neville jumped a mile with a squawk, almost dropping the thing he was holding ands hand to juggle with it to stop it from hitting the floor. He spun round to look at Harry with wide eyes, his hand on his chest in an effort to stop his heart's rapid beating. "Oh, Harry, its you!" he squeaked. "You scared me!"
"Sorry, my bad. Didn't mean to scare you." Harry said apologetically.
"Oh, n-no, its okay," Neville laughed nervously.
"So…what you looking at?"
"Oh, this?" Neville asked, holding up what looked like a small, glass ball, only about half an inch long in diameter, which was currently filled with a sort of crimson smoke. "It's a Remembrall! Gran sent it to me. She knows I forget things you see. If it turns red, then it means you forgot something." Neville said, looking back at the glass ball filled with red smoke with a sigh. "Thing is, I can't remember what I forgot…"
"Well, that's…a bit unhelpful, huh?" Harry laughed slightly. Neville was normally an extremely shy boy who reminded him a lot for both Sasuke and Naruto – Sasuke because of his shy personality at home when it was just the two of them and Naruto because of all the trouble he seemed to unintentionally get into. "Nevile, can I see" Harry asked peering at the ball curiously.
"Sure!" Neville nodded with a shy smile and handed the ball to Harry. "Maybe you forgot something too?"
Harry looked at the ball in his hands totally enthralled by the magical object, which had now cleared of crimson smoke. Of course he has seen his fair share of strange objects – those Portkeys being prime examples - but this is the first time he had an explanation for the object that wasn't about to drop him from a great hight.
"Hey, Potter what you got there?" a sneering voice behind him said. Harry sighed and turned ever so slightly to face Malfoy, flanked by his two goons.
away from anything, and abandon their companions or mission at the slightest bit of danger. Then there were the type that could not seem to learn from what they had experienced and, like an idiot, continue to face someone when they were clearly outmatched without having trained themselves to become better than their opponent first. It seemed Malfoy had this rather annoying trait.
However, Harry was in a good mood, so he decided to humour the brat.
"It's considered polite to ask before you take something," Harry said, absently dodging the grab, when Malfoy tried to snatch the Remembrall from Harry's hand.
"Huh?" Malfoy said intelligently, making another vain attempt to grab the trinket in Harry's hands.
"And I thought we had already been through this that my name is Uchiha, Malfoy." Harry elaborated still playing with Neville's Remembrall as if he hadn't moved at all.
"What are you talking about Potter? Your parents were Potters, so your name is Potter. And the Professors call you Potter." Malfoy sneered once again trying to grab the Remembrall.
"Actually, only Snape calls me Potter, And it's not Mr. Potter isn't totally wrong, I just rather would be called by my clan name, Uchiha." Harry explained, dodging another grab from Malfoy.
"Look Potter, I really don't care… AND WILL YOU JUST GIVE ME THE STUPID BALL!" Malfoy said, yelling out the last part thus gaining the attention of the teachers and other students. Harry fought back a wide grin. He enjoyed getting under Malfoy's skin, it was just too easy!
"Nothing wrong here, I hope?"
A shiver suddenly ran up Malfoy's back and he spun round to see Professor McGonagall looking down on him sternly. After Malfoy had mumbled something unintelligibly and stalked off, followed by his companions, Harry turned back to Neville, who was looking at Harry with a mixture of shock and appreciation, as he carefully despotised the Remembrall into Neville's outreached hands.
"Um…thanks…you know, for not letting him get it," he shuffled. "I mean, it was a present and all…but you didn't have to…"
Harry just smiled. "Don't worry about it, Neville."
Flying lessons. Harry had been intrigued by them ever since the Weasley's had spoken to him about Quid-Itch, which he insisted on calling it, since it seemed to drive Ron crazy ever since the train-ride to Hogwarts.
Harry chuckled in remembrance. Yes, Harry was quite interested to see how this flying-on-a-broom worked – especially after he had finally been able to hang upside down on the highest tree-branch at the edge of the Forbidden forest by the chakra-charged balls of his feet only a few days previously. So when the poster appeared in the Gryffindor Common Room, Harry decided that he would put his incredulous-ness behind him about the whacked out game and check it out, even if it was just to learn how to defy gravity one step further.
The only down side would be that he would be spending an entire lesson with that Malfoy brat. Oh well…
When they arrived at the appointed time, Harry ignored the Slytherins that were also there. Malfoy and his goons kept their distance, since it was, by now, widely known around the school that Harry was handy with feet and fists, never mind the nice stock of spells he knew. What they didn't know was that Harry always had a stock of weapons hidden away on his person. He was sure that, if they did know, his Shuriken and kunai would have been on the list of Filch's banned items – if they didn't think they were just 'Muggle toys'.
The flying lesson had started well, but a moment of panic on Neville's part caused him to fall off his broom and break his wrist, the crack quite audible and almost everyone had winced, if not from the noise, then from sympathy. Harry remembered when he had broken his wrist once training when he was five and grimaced slightly with empathy, but there was nothing he could about it, especially since he had no Medic-nin skills. Thankfully, Madam Pomfrey would be able to fix it in no time.
However, now that Madam Hooch was gone…
"Did you see his face, the great lump?" Malfoy sneered through his laughter.
"Shut up, Malfoy," Parvati, one of the Gryffindor girls, snapped.
"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?" Pansy Parkinson, a hard-faced Slytherin girl, said. "Never thought you'd like fat little cry babies-"
"Parkinson," Harry snarled, glaring up at her through dark bangs. "If you don't want to follow Neville to the hospital wing, you'd better shut up."
Parkinson immediately froze, a look of fear passing over her face. If there was one thing that Harry knew the Slytherins had as well as ambition and slyness, it was a good sense of self-preservation.
"Look!" Malfoy said, picking up Neville's Remembrall. "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's Gran sent him."
Well, almost all of them.
"Hand it over, Malfoy," Harry said, his eyes narrowing. Since meeting up with Naruto, that tolerance for bullies he had had before had plummeted way into the minuses.
Malfoy smirked and grabbed the nearest broom. "You want it? Come and get it, Potter!"
Harry looked at him, contemplating what to do, on one hand he could throw a shuriken at Malfoy and let him fall, but than had a number of issues on its own.
He would reveal his weapons and have them confiscated, Malfoy could die, and other really bad situations he had no care to get into.
So he did the sensible thing
He flew up to him
That started the chase that would be talked about for days to come. Both boys flew at top speed around the castle, through it, and up and down. Finally, Harry decided enough was enough. Jumping up slightly so his feet hooked around the broom, he pulled upwards, causing the broom to flip over Malfoys head. He dipped slightly and pulled up, causing Malfoy to make a hasty stop before he crashed into him. Harry grabbed Malfoy's broom mid turn, swinging him to halt. Harry's eyes met Malfoy's, who was suddenly looking far less confident.
"No bodyguards up here to save you, Malfoy," Harry smirked, although his frowning emerald eyes blazed coldly. "Are you sure you want me to make you return the ball?"
Malfoy's pupils contracted slightly at what seemed to be the promise of a lot of pain to come that seemed to flash in the genin's eyes, but his face purpled and he pulled back the hand that held the Remembrall in his hand and hurled it downward. "Catch it if you can!"
"Shit!" If that thing, as fragile as it was, hit the ground, it would definitely smash into pieces he was sure would be easily scattered to the winds. Without even pausing to think, Harry pushed Malfoy's broom away and bolted after the object. Malfoy could wait.
The wind flashed bast his face at a speed matching the Gringotts carts, vertically, his eyes narrowed in concentration, his hand stretching out to grab it. the ground was jumping up to meet him, the tiny ball just barely out of reach.
"Just…a little…more!"
Fifty metres, forty, thirty, twenty, ten –
Fingers closed around cold glass.
"Yes!" Harry cried. However, his joy almost immediately plummeted. "Oh shit!" There was almost no way he'd be able to pull out of this dive!
Unless…
He leaned back and threw his head forwards, as if trying to head-butt the broom, using his forward momentum and sudden shift in weight to throw him and his broom down resulting in a quick front flip, ending with the broom facing upward, Harry gripping it with Chakra-charged feet. His hair brushing the ground as he pulled himself back onto the broom as it slowed to a halt in front of the class. The Gryffindors stared in shock, then cheered. Ron whistled in admiration.
"HARRY POTTER!" the woman's voice carried across the field. Harry turned to see a very angry McGonagall storming across the field towards them.
Oh God!
It didn't end that bad to he honest,
was all that harry thought as he fell asleep after a long day.