Nerida hated this game...SHE really did and she usually never hated anything..But this game she hated! It was hurting her and ack!! She couldn't catch a rock in her stupid cauldron even if her life depended on it. She looked down and saw Ella puke...Gross... Erm she would have asked her if she was okay but it looked like Ella has two perfectly good friends down there for her... Hopefully she did and not just two enemies....That would have sucked...but also been really funny since she had puked on them...

"THUNK!!!" Nerida sighed...It always happened when she didn't try. She definitely did not like this game. Suddenly she felt something hit her shoe. Looking down she realized it was a rock...Now rocks were attacking her shoe, great..She kicked off the rock and went down a bit to see if she could catch it but that didn't work...

She was off by where it would hit and instead of landing on her cauldron it landed on her hands..."Ouch..." Nothing like a good hit on the hands to tell you to play fair...You couldn't do that...She rubbed her hands...Owwie they were hurting...Yeap it was a fact officially the worst game ever!

Lex zoomed through the students so quickly that at one point she almost lost control of her broom. Correction, she did and found herself headed straight for the Slytherin Prefect.

"LOOK OUT!" She screamed, while trying her hardest to pull up before the girl had a chance to rearranged her face. Pull up! Pull up! Pull up!

When she realized that pulling up wouldn't work she shifted the broom and barely managed to whoosh by her, feeling the bristles of the girl's broom as she passed. The rocks falling from her cauldron didn't go unnoticed but she would sulk about those in a minute. That was too close! With a bit more effort she slowed to a stop then turned to look at her. Seeing as she wasn't Laura she figured she would bother to make sure she was fine. "Are you okay??" And like...not upset?

She was in the air again! Yup, she totally was. And it didn't matter that it had taken her AGES to get up to the height she’d been flying at before. O-HO NO! She was being a trooper and that’s what mattered here, yeah? YEAH. And this time she was prepared foranything, eyes darting all around crazily in case anyone else felt like crashing into her. Oh! And she was eyeing the rocks too! ‘Cause she was down 9 now and she had some serious catching up to do. Oh yes, yes she did.

Slow and steady, like an awesome slow ninja turtle, the small blonde headed towards a large cluster of rocks ahead and to the right. Looking right and left as one might do if they were trying to cross the street, Ella headed straight for them.

Tongue between her teeth, the fourteen year old adjusted the position of her neck a bit and waited. Any minute now they’d be falling. Any minute…
Clunk. Plunk. Kirplunk

BEAM!Wince. 3 more rocks! Yesssss. Ouch.

Squirm.

He was in an area that had a lot of people in it. And that really did mean a LOT. Usually, he was used to being around fifteen people at once but... now... there were a lot more. And as much as he liked being around people... he felt the need to fly away and get some space. You know, so he could fly around and catch these Snitches rocks properly.

And so WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH went the fourteen year old. He was FLYIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING towards an empty space where there were more rocks than people. Because... well, that meant that he'd have more chance of catching those things and ending this brutal experience.

Yeah... despite catching rocks... he still didn't really like this. People kept on getting hurt and that was MEAN.

CLUNK!

OH THAT WAS A ROCK. CUE SUPER MAJOR WIDE GRIN FACE.

And... and... another rock had JUST about missed him. But since he was fairly high up, he could catch that one right? Grinning, the Hufflepuff SWOOOOOOPED down, trying to keep his head up so that no rocks fell out. Which... was actually harder than he thought it was.

...

And... CLUNK!

Twelve down. Twelve to go.

The more she thought about the lost stones was the more upset she got. She had actually worked hard to get those!! It wasn't easy getting the headache she did and she didn't like seeing her efforts getting wasted.

Lex flew a bit higher, waiting for them to float back up and when they did she tried grabbing them with her hand...you know...so she could slip them back in her cauldron but not only did that NOT work, it also nearly made her fall right off her broom; because she wasn't doing enough of that with the help of other students. Finally giving up on trying to take the easy route she simply flew around in a circle hoping one would plopped in her direction.

At the moment she was far from 22 and this was discouraging.

Was it even possible to get so much anyway? She was beginning to think not. Half way through another circle she heard that all too familiar clanking noise--only one?! What about the other one she'd lost??!! She wanted that one back tooooo!

You know what is really nice? Ice cream with gummy worms. Ella couldn’t help but want that right now…and really, having some food up here wouldn’t make this game any less dangerous so she didn’t see why it couldn’t happen. Could a girl get a snack break or something?

Turning on her broom, the third year headed to the far end of the pitch for what seemed like the thousandth time, being careful to avoid her classmates. She had to dodge a few who were more occupied catching rocks than paying attention to where they were going and she frowned a bit. People had to be careful! She didn’t want to see anyone get hurt…or more hurt.

PLUNK.

O.O Really? Ella raised an eyebrow as she felt a small smile threatening to form. This was quite funny…the way the rocks managed to find her cauldron when she was least expecting it. She was thankful for that two as she was severely behind after her last fall. Keep it coming, rocks. Nod.

Lex's celebration over getting one of the rocks back was cut short when she started getting dizzy from all the circling she was doing. Stopping quite abruptly, she moved a hand to her cauldron, feeling like it might have tipped over any minute, getting rid of everything she had worked so hard for.

She sat perfectly still for a moment, waiting for the pitch to stop spinning so she could fly around on it again but just when things started getting back to normal she felt something whack her on her other shoulder. How considerate. SCOWL. No sooner than when the rock hit her then fell to the ground did she feel another one whack her on the side of the head.

What the--

Weren't they falling DOWN. How in merlin's beard did one of them end up knocking her in the side of her head. Jeesh, if she didn't know any better she'd think they had it out for her!!--They did...didn't they????

She was about to ponder this when she heard another loud noise. She would have deepened her scowl but then it occurred to her that the noise meant she now had another rock and that was supposedly a good thing.

Ella was tired…and sore…and wondering when this final was going to end. Not that she didn’t love flying or anything, that wasn’t the case at all. She just really wanted to sit somewhere comfy and get some ice for her eye, yup, and maybe her head too.

Oh! And she couldn’t help but wonder as the various rocks clanged and kerplunked off her cauldron if the old players ever considered using umbrellas during this game. Wait! Did they have umbrellas then? Oh! And if so, they could have used umbrellas to block other players from getting rocks into their cauldrons! Yeah! That would have been quite cool. The umbrellas would have to be made of really strong material, though. Mhm! Anywhoo…

…

Flying towards the middle of the pitch again, the fourteen year old noticed a rather large rock in the distance. She eyed it curiously before checking the area around her. Yup, it was safe to go for it…so she did.

The blonde dived down just a bit and maneuvered herself so she was right under where she expected the rock would fall. She didn’t dare look up for fear of getting yet another black eye. Instead she closed her eyes and willed the rock to land in her cauldron.

Come on you rock, right here. You’ll be nice and cozy with the other rocks.

PLUNK

BEAM. YES! Yes! Yes! Yes!

CLUNK

O_O YESSSSS!

Maybe it was the fact that he was halfway through his rock count or the fact that he knew that this would help him in some way but Alec couldn't help grinning wider now than he did before. Sure, this game was TERRIBLE and given the choice, he actually wouldn't play it.

Or... well... probably not? Because... if it was like this where the cauldrons were lighter and the rocks were lighter as well, then he might not mind too much.

...

WHAT WAS HE THINKING?!

CLUNK!

... So... rocks approved of his idea, yeah? At least they were happy with this. You know, if rocks had feelings and all that.

...

Kind of glad that no one could read his thoughts, Alec zoomed off again, flying over towards a place where rocks were zooming back towards the sky. He swivelled around them and then DUCKED underneath them, trying to keep his head and the cauldron perched on top of it as level as possible. Because... if it was level... the rocks would be able to fall in pretty easily, right?

RIGHT.

CLUNK! CLANG! CLUNK! CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!

Two! His plan was working! AWESOME.

Accepting the good thing for what it was she decided not to grumble this time when her head started acting up. She couldn't wait to take the cauldron off; it was making things louder. Granted it was saving her from what had the potential to be a nasty concussion but she didn't care right now because her ears rang everytime there was a new rock and she was starting to dread catching them.

If one looked close enough at the 11 year old they'd noticed she had actually begun avoiding the falling objects for a while. Everything above her neck was begging for a break and she would be more than happy to oblige.

She swerved and zig-zagged and did just about everything to make sure she didn't catch any more for now.

Yeah...no more for now--

CLANG!!

Owwwww.... It wasn't even the rock hitting the cauldron's bottom so much as it was the loud noise it made that hurt her ears and consequently her head. She dove a bit, hoping to avoid anything else like that when suddenly...

CLANGGGG!

"Merlin! Leave me alone you bloody things!" She yelled at no rock in particular. It was meant for all of them.

As Belle was done having four rocks. She realized the rocks were falling harder than ever. It was starting to hurt her hands a little bit. She wished she had her gloves she had in her room to stop the impact. As Belle was done grabbing the two rocks off the ground, she felt more coming down in the sky.

Then Belle saw Minnie and Ella around and she noticed they were focused on the game. Belle did not want to distract them. She was more focused on the game. Belle felt another rock hit her hand.

"OUCH!"

Belle said and was waving her hand. This game was getting dangerous. Then she heard swerved and was dodging other students. Then she steered right and almost fell off her broom. Belle was not catching any rocks so far. She was starting to have a headache from the cauldron. She wanted to get this final done. As she swerved again she found a nice empty spot to catch a breath.

WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

Swivel.

SWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

ZIGZAGZIGZAGZIGZAG.

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

This was fun! Flying in itself was FUN. And he really liked the idea of flying around the other people and putting his broom through its paces. Except... it did like stopping every now and then. Frown. He also didn't really like the idea of flying around on a school broom. They seemed to be... well... slower. And older. And not as great as his own broom.

And... CLUNK!

Oh rock! GRIN. And OH! There were a couple down... well... there! He could do this, right? RIGHT.

ZOOOOOOOOOO-

Huh?

Alec BLINKED as his broom started stopping. He bent down and flew a little bit closer towards the rocks... and then stopped. Weird. Maybe the broom didn't like him...? "Broom, do you need ice cream?" he whispered, bending his head forwards.

AND ZOOOOOOOOOOOM forwards.

And stop. Again. This was annoying. But the good part of it all? CLUNK! PING! PING! CLUNK! ... AWESOME. But... he had to do something about his broom...

Pao was beginning to get sick of this game. It felt like he'd been at this for hours already. And I've only got what, eight rocks now? CLUNK. "Make that nine!"

THUD.

GROAN.

The rock hadn't actually gone inside the cauldron, apparently. It'd just hit the rim and then hit Pao. "And I've got the lump to prove it," he said ruefully. Back to eight. The Keeper took a minute to rest and massage his leg at the site of the impact. Yup. He definitely liked Quidditch better. There he could at least usually see what was flying towards him, ready to hit his body.

Oh well. The fastest way out of this misery is to catch as many stupid rocks as fast as I possibly can. He zoomed off. Two seconds later he heard a CLUNK and then a CRACK, quickly followed by a CLINK-CLINK and several pebbles hitting his nose. "What on earth..?" Curious, he flew over to a spot under the hoops, which would afford him some protection. He swiftly loosened his chin strap and peeked in the cauldron. Now he had... "TEN?" What had just happened?

I wonder if... yeah, it has to be! A rock hit the lip of my cauldron and split in two. My momentum was going forward, so both chunks of the rock went into my helmet.. er, cauldron. And the pebbles were debris from the break. Score! Talk about getting two gnomes with one stone!

It was like she'd flown right into another hotspot. What was with these rocks? Did she have some kind of rock attraction charm on her or something--that was it wasn't it...? Some older kid must have hexed her or something while she was flying and now she was being attacked!!

For a second she was inclined to believe that she might have been overreacting but then THREE more rocks found their way into her cauldron.

So it was true! Something WAS wrong and it was probably one of the ones she'd cussed that did it. Could no one take constructive criticism any more? She was only trying to make them into better flyers so they wouldn't hurt anyone else!!! Hmph! Some people!

Trying to get away from the falling rocks she tried flying higher than they were but quickly gave up because of all the rocks hitting her in her face. SIGH. There was just no avoiding it and perhaps the most disappointing part...no one was getting seriously injured...how did the game end up having an 80% mortality rate?!

FROWN.

Well, back to the start it seemed...once her eyes uncrossed that is.

Oh, wait, that was the voice of Ella coming close to her. "Ella?" Oh, why were there about five Ella's coming near her? Kurumi shut her eyes tightly and lifted both hands off her broom to rest them on either side of her head for a moment, sort of steadying her brain or something. "I lost my marbles...erm...I mean my stones."

She may have lost her marbles too by this point. They WERE inviting concussions after all.

"But I'm fine. You?" But Ella was sort of already off collecting stones...which SHE really needed to do or else she really was going to end up this lesson with zero. So, the seventh year pulled up on her handle and rose a little higher into the air when *PING* she caught on in her cauldron. Pushing the handle to the left, Kurumi took off towards a less crowded area and *PING* caught another! Okay...this was progress. NO MOROE DROPPING.

Hopefully.

Rightttttttttttttt. So the two were alright. So ariana can leave with her puke filled shoesss

WHEEEEEEEE

she flew off in the air and saw a clump of rocks rising back towards the sky and she soarrreddd to be under them and waited for the group of 6 or so to fall and.......

CLANK

CLANK

CLUNK

only 3...........

all of that for only 3/6 rocks to fall in.. BOOOO!

At the start she thought this game would be more fun than it actually proved to be and she was not impressed. Before she left the ground she had the idea firmly planted in her head that this was a game of danger but it was just really annoying. There were rude rocks that didn't care where they hit you and there were even ruder students who felt it was okay to simply knock you off your broom then smile about it afterwards!

Lex flew to a section of the pitch that had very little in the way of falling rocks and decided she would chill out. She would have stayed there two but then something collided with her cauldron!

CLANG!

-___-

Was no where safe?! Ugh! This was getting ridiculous!

Turning to face the class again she decided to be productive while she dodged the rocks that seemed to like her so much. Quite randomly she selected on of her classmates and started circling them with a curious look. "How many stones d'you have?"

Minerva went flying to the left to try and find more rocks. As she leaned to go she felt something hit the back of her broom not sure if it was a rock or a person Minerva's broom started to spin as she felt herself loose control of it. Letting out some screams she didn't think she was going to get it back into control and feeling the rocks hitting her was not helping. Grabbing the front of her broom and slamming her hands right to try and stop the spinning her broom finally slowed and she pulled on it to get it to stop.

Looking around feeling very dizzy Minerva tried to get her feeling of where she was facing. The pitch was spinning so she closed her eyes feeling the rocks hitting around her. She knew she had to get the dizzy feeling away so she could get these rocks into her cauldron. Minerva opened her eyes and glanced up seeing a rock coming her way. She got ready and tried to get her head in position...cling..cling Minerva smiled as she heard the little rock fall into her cauldron.

SO. MUCH. EXCITEMENT. HE WAS GOING TO BURST.

But he felt so HAPPY. Literally. This may have been the worst version of a sport ever and his broom may be starting to act up AND he may have fallen on the ground... TWICE... but... he was finally doing this! And that was something to be happy about, yeah?

OF COURSE. GRIN.

While he was internally celebrating a bit of a victory, his broom seemed to be a little more focused than him. It JERKED forwards, pulling Alec out of his happiness and make him concentrate on what he was supposed to be doing. And it also helped with a certain something else...

CLUNK!

Yeah? Rock? Yeah?

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

This was an AWESOME feeling. Really, truly, magnificently AWESOME. So much so that it made Alec grin at the person closest to him, whether he knew them or not. People liked it when people grinned at them... right? ... They HAD to. Nodnod.

... WINCE.

Rubbing his shoulder, the fourteen year old looked down... and then up... and then down quickly again. Rocks were okay. Dull. Whatever. Flying rocks were slightly cool and a little scary. Flying rocks that ATTACKED you were the scariest things EVER. And that's what was happening now. He was right in the MIDDLE of this group of flying rocks and now... well...

CLUNK! PING! PING! PING! CLUNK! PING!

...

At least he had twenty now? Wince. ... Mean rocks were mean.

"TWO!" Kurumi beamed. What? She really WAS proud of having some stones after the rubbish of a flyer she had been ever since her Seeking accident in her 4th year. THIS was an accomplishment. And then she realized who she had just spoken to.

Ug. Yep. There was bound to be some snooty comment coming back from this one. Best move away before she heard it. So, down on the handle it was and into a slight dive the Gryffindor went, veering slightly to the right and making a wide U turn so she was facing the other side of the pitch. Kurumi leaned forward and picked up some more speed when she felt another stone fall into her cauldron.

THREE! Okay...this time she was NOT going to drop any of them for kneazle's whisker's sake.

Belle was hovering on the ground for a bit and could not find anymore rocks. Then Belle was going to fly upward. She steered her broom upward and was where mostly the students were. WOAH! Belle eyes widened and she could not believe how many students were playing. Then she was swerving and trying to dodge. She felt more rocks onto her shoulders. She even felt one hit her eye.

Then Belle heard the familiar....

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! BANG! PING! PING! PING!

There was rocks hit the outside of her cauldron and then one hit on the side. Then her head was starting to pound. This sport was starting to hurt. She felt like she had two rocks. Belle did not know how people liked or even play this sport. Belle even saw Alex. Belle was even riding fast and she caught one more. CLANG!

Belle was going WEEEEEEE!!!! This was fun flying and feeling the wind in her hair. Then Belle did a flip on her room. Then one rock fell out. "DANG IT!" Belle said to herself. She should not have done that.

Zigzagging...that had sort of worked in the past, right? Kurumi remembered a time where she could zig zag properly and not feel terrified of potentially falling off her broom. Not that she really thought she would this time...

Remembering Vivi's words about being bold, Kurumi leaned forward and picked up some more speed before she began moving her handle back and forth to perform some very simple zig zag patterns in the air. Hey...this wasn't so bad! In fact...

With a small smile on her face, Kurumi pulled up on the handle and rose into the air again. She didn't even bother to look down this time because, for the first time in a while, she didn't care how high up she was. *PING PING* Oh! And two more rocks into the cauldron! That meant that Kurumi had reached her first small goal of five stones! Could she make it to ten?

Time to find out.

Two?

Boy, Kurumi most have been having a hard time too. She couldn't blame her. These rocks were terribly rude and had a mind of their own.

In the split second she paused her circling to avoid a rock she saw the girl flying awaaaay. Now THAT was rude! Very very very rude and the 11 year old didn't appreciate it one bit. Sigh. Then people wondered why they got pranked. Was it really any wonder?

For now she wouldn't let it bother her too much. Planning revenge while in the air was a dangerous thing and she'd have plenty of time to plan after her picnic with Vivi. Taking a sharp turn she headed off in her own direction and ran right into another stone. Well not right into it but it fell in her cauldron so she wouldn't complain.

Finally the dizzy feeling was leaving and Minerva could see straight again. She started looking for another rock to try and catch. Noticing one behind her she knew she wouldn't make it in time by turning, so Minerva started flying backwards to try and make it to catch the rock. Smiling she thought of a semi backing up.. "beep.... beep... beep" She pretended to be a semi as she backed up and then just as she went to glance at the rock again she noticed it was ready to hit her. Moving left just an inch she heard the sound of the rock falling into her cauldron.

Still hearing the rock rattle she noticed another one up ahead and leaned into her broom to take off forward towards the rock. Getting right under it Minerva moved to try and be ready. She felt it hit the edge of her cauldron, but not go in.. Oh no you don't Minerva thought and pulled down on her broom to beat the rock from falling. She moved under it again and felt it fall into the cauldron this time. Minerva smiled knowing she wasn't going to let that rock go.

Back out in the middle of the field, Jory soared around looking for more rocks. He had just made a failed attempt at catching another one. The result was the rock just bounced off his shoulder. talk about bad aiming.

He swerved to avoid Minerva who was looking pleased with herself for catching another rock. "Miiinervaa!'' the boy called as he went by with a sudden burst of speed. For up ahead, he had spotted three rocks! He slowed down as he came closer to them and finally stopped altogether.

THUMP THUMP THUMP! Three more!