Though she had been growing slightly more comfortable on a broomstick, Fina was still slightly uneasy as she made her way out to the pitch, holding the borrowed broom at her side. For one, she was out at the pitch without any experienced players and two, she was going to help a colleague get on a broom for the first time.

Perhaps she should have bothered Treyen or Ellie to come with her; no doubt they would have, but they needed to study. She knew that much and didn't want to disrupt that.

"You ready?" she said, giving a half-smile to the dark-haired woman, as she swung her leg over the broom and gripped the handle.

As the topic had come up, she didn't really expect to find herself out here walking out onto the pitch so soon. Of course, flying wasn't necessarily a foreign topic to her, though the actual act of doing so completely was. This field though looked so much bigger up in person. So did these brooms for that matter. And those stands...

Medea had stopped nearby the Professor, who was surely more experienced at flying than she was. Was she ready? No. "Of course." she nodded, taking in just what they were supposed to do. Alright. One leg over the broom and...

Right. This seemed good enough. "How long did you say you'd been flying for again?"

Oh good. Medea was ready. They were just going to do a few laps, warm up, and then call it a day. That was the plan, wasn't it? Nothing to serious, but just attempt to get more comfortable in the air. On a broom. "Good."

She blinked at Medea's next question though. "Um... technically? Like three years. On and off. It was in my second term teaching here, that I developed certain relationships with quidditch players and I vowed to learn more about flying and try to understand more about the sport's growing excitements. In exchange for helping with numbers, they helped me fly." Fair trade-off, no? Maybe?

"So. We kick off from the ground. And then we pretty much point the handle in the direction we want to go."

A slacker.

That's what Ellie was. She was a lazy, neglectful, someothersynonyms, SLACKER.

Which was why she emerged from the Locker Room with her broom slung over her shoulder ready for some intense practice sessions. Not with the Snitch directly, because she didn't feel like being out here for HOURS and Merlin knew how long it would take her to find the Snitch in an empty Pitch all by herself, so she was just going to practice turns and different gripping techniques and those kind of things.

Apparently, though, she WASN'T alone. Though her company wasn't the usual students. The Quidditch players who, like her, wanted to practice more. Or the ickle firsties and Muggleborns who wanted to try their hands at flying outside of Vindictus' lessons. No, there were PROFESSORS.

One quite familiar one, whom Ellie spoke to once close enough. "Hey Hadley!" FLYING Hadley. It was weird. But Ellie liked it. It was an amusing sight. Also, the yoga professor, whatever her name was. Her eyes slid back to the more familiar face, "You're out flying? Unsupervised?" That was the key thing missing here. No Vindictus. Nor anyone else.

You know, unless Miss Yoga was a pro flyer.

Three years on and off didn't sound too horrible. In fact, in the light of the moment, it sounded as if Josephina could be a professional at this. Especially if taking learning from quidditch players themselves, forgetting for a moment that those players were still kids. "Fair enough." she smiled.

She'll apparently see just how well these quidditch players could teach.

Hmmkay, from what she heard, "Sounds simple enough." Ready to give this a try!

...

An audience while doing this wasn't what she was quite hoping for.

Especially from one of the more stubborn students she was fortunately, or unfortunately, had in her class so far. "Miss Stone." she greeted. The unsupervised part momentarily had her eyebrows raising. Someone needed to explain what that meant.

Before she could actually kick off into the air though..... she heard a voice. A rather familiar one too, one that she was sure should have been doing other stuff like studying, rather than out hear honing her quidditch skills which more than likely didn't need honing.

"Last I checked... I was a Professor and didn't require supervision where I went," Fina said, a smile playing on her lips. "Besides, I've got Professor Romanos here, so we've got the buddy check system going should something go awry." Like you know, bad braking charm or something on the school broomsticks. Who knows how well Vindictus kept to the safety features.

"Shouldn't you be studying though?" She eyed the redhead.

"It is actually surprisingly simple," Fina nodded, turning her attention away from the captain and back to the Defense Professor. With that, she kicked off into the air, pointing her broomstick upward until she was about 10 feet in the air. The breeze actually wasn't too bad for November.

Her eyes immediately went back to Miss Yoga when she was addressed. "Ellie, actually," she corrected the professor. Not that she had been wrong, the girl just preferred not to be referred to as such. So 'Ellie' it was. Or 'Captain Stone'. She liked that. Hehe.

Lookit, Hadley was smiling. So Ellie pressed on. "Last I checked, you're not exactly the best flier." And many things could go wrong on a broomstick for a novice.

Oh! Romanos? Was that her name? "Oh is she..." You know what, Miss Yoga was right there, so Ellie turned to talk directly to her, "Are you a flier?" Was Romanos Hadley's supervisor?

Hadley had her smirking. "I am studying. Quidditch. We have a match in just a few weeks, you know." She needed practice. She hadn't been doing so as often as she usually did.

And then Hadley was off. Ellie kept an eye on her as she slung a leg over her own broom. She'd wait for Romanos to make a move before she took off. Just in case she needed to keep an eye on BOTH of them. Miss Yoga hadn't answered yet, after all.

Yeah, she appointed herself their supervisor regardless.

Ellie? "Of course, Miss Stone." Yup...

All this talk about not needing supervision, the buddy system, things going awry, and worst of all, her buddy in the buddy system not being the best flier in that tone of voice, Medea was ready to go back inside. Or at least move to another portion of the field where she didn't feel like she was being watched like a hawk already. How this girl could do that was beyond her.

Medea blinked in Ellie's direction, just after watching Josephina kick off from the ground. Hmmm.

"Nope." Grinning a little, she looked back up to the sky and gripped her broom tighter. Right, simple enough. SIMPLE, ENOUGH. With a kick off the ground, a tinge of pink graced her cheeks as she wobbled a little, not exactly as high as Josephina was at the moment but high enough. Right. Simple.

Her yoga and meditation practices were of no use to her in the air.

Fina snickered in amusement at Ellie's feistyness. The girl was really something. BUT what was that comment directed at her?!? She pointed her broom down a bit and directed it toward flying toward the sixth year. "Look missy, just because I didn't play at Hogwarts doesn't make me a bad flyer. Besides, this is a Practice pitch, meaning I don't have to be the best flier." Obviously.

Studying quidditch. Hmph. "And if you're so good then you wouldn't need to study." Nope. She could be spiteful too.

Right, back to Medea, because she was going to watch the woman, even if she wasn't the "best flier" herself. "There! You've got it. It takes some getting used to... the wind and all." She had yet to try flying in some really adverse weather conditions, like rain or snow, but at the same token, she wasn't sure she really wanted to.

........

Did Ellie NOT just correct her on that? The Sixth year blinked at the so-OBVIOUSLY-new professor before looking at Hadley for help. She was ELLIE, okay? No Miss Stone nonsense. That made her sound old and formal and she wasn't either of those things, okay? "Just call me Ellie." Seriously. Please?

Romanos kicked off before Ellie even had time to drop her jaw. TWO inexperienced fliers unsupervised? Merlin.

ANDSHEWOBBLEDOMM!

WHAT do they suppose she do if they BOTH got injured, HUH?! It wasn't like she could send a Patronus or something. She didn't even know how to produce a NORMAL one, let alone a TALKING one!

However, Miss Yoga caught her balance so....they were safe. For now.

Ellie gently kicked off herself, rising slowly in case she needed to catch a falling professor or something.

Then Hadley came and she smirked MORE. And though she could have, she didn't comment. Fine, Hadley, if you want to feel good about yourself because you're not TOTALLY a lost cause on a broomstick, go right ahead. Ellie still thought it was silly to not have supervision, though.

Then again, Vindictus was probably always watching, right? He was creepy protective of the Pitch like that.

So after a final comment, she gave the teachers a bit more space as she worked on what she came here to do. "You can't practice too much." Wasn't Hadley the one reading an Arithmancy magazine last term? So surely she understood.

We're still watching you two.

Indiana had made the teaam! She was soooo happy. She wasn't just a little reserve anymore. She was a big beater! Although she couldn't help but think of what Spike would think. He had been a beater last year! That wasn't really on her mind right now though, because she was going to go and do some practicing. She needed to get her swinging good, so she could hit those bludgers nice and hard. So she was skipping towards the practice pitch right now. She was going to try and get as much practice in as she could, so that there team could do really well.

Ooh. There was already people in the practice pitch! Indy couldn't really tell who they were, because they were pretty far away. Someone had pretty red hair though. Maybe it was Ellie! Ellie had red hair after all. Mmm. Better mount her broom, that she'd borrowed from the broom cupboard, then she could see who these people were!

Ella walked down to the pitch, stopping by the broomshed to borrow a broom. She was overjoyed that she was able to practice flying as she loved the feel of being up in the air. She headed out onto the pitch, noticing some students and even professors in the air. She smiled, waving shyly.

Cardigan smiled as she breathed a breath of fresh air.Today was a good day for a round of flying!She skipped on over to the broomshed to find the perfect broom to borrow.No,Nope,Not that one,she thought as she shifted through the brooms.Aha!At last she had found the perfect broom to ride that didn`t look....uncomfortable.Cardigan whistled as she grasped the broom`s handle and walked toward the pitch.She immediately saw someone who looked familiar.It was that Ella girl she met at The Three Broomsticks!She continued on skipping untill she got to Ella."Hey Ella,"She said with a wave as she leaned casually against the broom,carful not to fall.Today was a good day to fly!

Zhenya thought she would have to practice her flying before the big match coming up. She made her way down to the practice pitch and found a good broom in the cupboard. When she went to mount it she noticed a fellow snake. A fellow slytherin quidditch player too.

"Hey Cardigain," Zhenya said walking up to her. There was another person there, a hufflepuff Zhenya recognised from some lessons.
"Hia," she said to her with a smile.

Ella turned when she heard footfalls behind her. She smiled when she saw a girl she recognized from somewhere. Where on earth had she met her before? As the girl skipped closer, Ella remembered. Right, the Three Broomsticks! She smiled at the girl, returning her wave. "Hi, Cardigan right?" She was pretty sure she was. "Nice day huh? I'm pretty excited we get to practice on our own now!" Ella was excited. She was in love with flying and being free to do it whenever she had the time was nice. Better than nice, it was great.

Ella smiled at the girl she had seen around the castle. "Hi, I'm Ella." She waved shyly.

A free day, to do whatever Logan wanted! And that was Quidditch of course. Logan's favoritest thing ever! He walked from the broomshed, a alright looking broom in his hand. He looked around the pitch. It looked like a few others had the same idea. He frowned. He kinda wanted to be alone...without anybody here today. Just by himself, flying around the pitch. But it wasn't his pitch...so he didn't mind. He just hoped he wouldn't bump into anyone familiar. He got onto his broom and took off immedietly, smiling as the wind swept his hair back. Ah, the feel of flying. It was so amazing!

"Hey Zhenya,"Cardigan said back with a smile.She didn't really know anyone on the team,seeing she was one of the only firsties on the team.That was good in a way and bad in a way.But whatever!She still had most of the year with the team;and Zhenya seemed really nice!So,she was off to a good start.
"Yep,yep,and yep!"Cardigan said with a grin.Ella remembered her!Well of course she remembered Ella!Needless to say, remembering faces AND names was one of her good qualities.Not to brag or anything......

Ella saw Logan out of the corner of her eye and frowned a bit when he took off flying. She was sure he would of said hi had he saw her...right? She shrugged it off, figuring maybe he needed a break from everyone.

Ella smiled at Cardigan, not really sure what to say to her. They had only met once and Ella wasn't great at making conversation. "So um-are you practicing cause you like flying or are you on the quidditch team?" Ella wished she had had the guts to try out for quidditch. She really wanted to play but figured she should get some flying experience before she tried out.

"Both actually.I just wanted to get outside and do something useful.And,I need to brush up on my flying skills for the Ravenclaw game,"Cardigan replied to Ella's question with excitement bursting in her voice.It was her first match ever!She'd dreamt of the day when she would be flying out on the pitch,seeking for the snitch,for loads of cheering 'fans'.It was her lifelong goal since the first Quidditch match of the Chudley Cannons at the age of 3!"You wanna fly now Ella?"Cardigan asked,getting in position so she could zoom off once Ella replied.She wanted as much flying time as possible!

Ella smiled, both happy and jealous that Cardigan was playing quidditch in her first year. "Congrats on making the team." She said cheerfully. She nodded when Cardigan suggested they start flying. She positioned herself on the broom like she'd learned to do in class and kicked off gently from the ground. Now Air-born, she smiled at Cardigan. "Yup, time to practice!" She leaned forward a bit, picking up speed. The wind on her face, though chilly, felt great. She smiled widely. Flying really was brilliant.

That request to be called 'Ellie' had been missed by Medea as she grasped the broom as if her life depended on it. As did the exchange between Miss Stone and the Arithmancy professor, but nevertheless, she was back with taking in her surroundings in no time.

Like Josephina had said...it took some getting used to.

"Thankfully vinter has yet to officially hit then." Unless this WAS winter. She wasn't used to the climate changes yet, but that was going to change! She was fully intending to stay inside and observe in the warmth or cool depending on the temperature and conditions outside.

Now that Miss 'Just call me Ellie' was a little further away and hopefully was doing her own thing, Medea glanced towards the other Professor, a semi-questionable look on her face. So, she was in the air. Moving forward...

Literally. How did one do so?

"Thanks!No biggie though,"Cardigan said with a shrug as she took off into the air,the wind blowing her loose hair back and forth.It felt great to be soaring through the sky.It was as if it was just her and the sky.But it could never beat the feeling of flying in front of a crowd full of cheers and chanting,seeking for the snitch.She'd always dreamed of that particular moment,reaccurring more and more as it got closer to the game,the game that could change the path of her life.Liesel would be so proud!

Zhenya smiled at Ella and said "nice to meet you! I'm Zhenya by the way Are you on your quidditch team too?" then looked around to take in the pitch.



Zhenya smiled back at Cardigan and said "oh I'm starting to get nervous about our first match. I didn't try out last year so obviously I wasn't on the team but now she was she had no idea how she would go.

Logan kept on flying, enjoying it when he spotted Ella. And Cardigan. He smiled and flew up to them. "Hi guys!" he said with a smile.