The opening minutes of the European Inter-Schools Quidditch Tournament were less a magnificent display of magical sport and more a clinical demonstration of failure. The stark reality was that the Hogwarts Unified Team was utterly outclassed, not in talent, but in execution.
From the referee's starting whistle, the sky became an immediate canvas for Beauxbatons' lethal, graceful synergy. Their movements were not aggressive or showy; they were simply perfect. Each pass was a magnetic transfer of the Quaffle, the players moving as a three-headed organism, predicting their teammates' velocity and trajectory with chilling accuracy.
In contrast, the Hogwarts Chasers—Charlie's two co-Chasers, Langdon and Paul—flew like independent missiles.
The moment a pass reached them, they would immediately tuck the Quaffle against their hip and try to blaze an individual trail toward the Beauxbatons hoops, relying solely on raw speed and superior broom technology.
Their attack routes were single-minded, simplistic vectors that the opposing Keeper read with contemptuous ease, often catching the Quaffle with a casual flick of the wrist.
Charlie, rocketing above the chaos, felt a cold knot of dread twist in his gut. He was the Seeker, tasked with the singular goal of catching the Golden Snitch, but his peripheral vision told a devastating story of his team's disintegration.
The three Chasers never once executed a proper Wronski Feint as a unit, nor did they utilize the simple Porskoff Play that Sebastian had drilled them on repeatedly.
Meanwhile, the score became a rapidly climbing monument to their collective inadequacy.
40:0. A collective groan rippled through the home stands, quickly smothered by the jubilant, melodic cheers of the French crowd.
70:0. The Beauxbatons Keeper, a statuesque young witch, looked less like she was defending a goal and more like she was simply intercepting packages mailed to her directly.
By the tenth minute, with the score standing at a crushing 100:0, Charlie's vision blurred with pure, incandescent rage. He abandoned his search pattern, banking his Comet to execute a blistering dive toward the cluster of Chasers.
To the Pit with the Snitch and the live broadcast! he thought savagely. I'm going to personally administer a strategic psychological collapse on these self-serving blockheads!
He pulled up sharply beside his two co-Chasers, his voice ripped raw by the speed and fury.
"Langdon! Paul! Are your brains made of Bludgers?! You are passing to the space where the opposing Chasers were ten seconds ago! We are not training in the Hall of Forgotten Plays! You are moving like two lone, territorial hippogriffs! Why did you ignore Cedric's beautiful reverse pass just now—it was a wide-open shot!"
He wheeled on the Beaters, his voice laced with venom. "Marcus! Debbie! You two are hitting the Bludgers with all the lethargy of a sleepy gnome! Their Chasers are walking their way to the goal! You're supposed to be running interference, not offering them polite, aerial escort services! If I see another single-minded solo run, I swear by my mother's knitting needles, I will personally throw the next Bludger at your heads! I told you: synchronize the defense!"
The effect was immediate and jarring. The team froze, shocked into momentary submission by Charlie's uncharacteristic, blistering tirade.
In the faculty box, Professor McGonagall winced, adjusting her glasses. "Oh, dear. Mr. Weasley's language is becoming rather... un-Gryffindor. Perhaps I should intervene."
Sebastian, who was calmly watching the chaos with the keen eye of a surgeon, only smiled—a faint, knowing curve of the lips.
"On the contrary, Minerva," Sebastian murmured, never taking his eyes off the pitch. "That is precisely the sound of a Captain finally learning to lead. Charlie is a kind boy, perhaps too kind. He treated the team as a social club, not a fighting unit, fearing that strictness would offend the delicate inter-house relations."
He adjusted his charmed glasses, noting the reaction of the two Gryffindor Chasers, who had instantly snapped back into a defensive posture.
"He needed a genuine crisis—a public, crushing defeat—to realize that politeness is not a tactic. He is using anger as a tool of cohesion, something he previously avoided, especially with the Slytherin and Ravenclaw players. Notice how Cedric, the innocent, is already mediating. The tension is necessary. He is no longer asking for cooperation; he is demanding synchronized survival."
Indeed, the sharp, aggressive rebuke acted like a magical defibrillator. For a glorious, chaotic ten minutes, Hogwarts looked like a Quidditch team. Charlie's demands forced the Chasers to look at each other, and the Beaters—Marcus Flint now motivated by pure spite and self-preservation—began to hammer the Bludgers with genuine, directed malice.
But the deficit was simply too large, and the conditioning of years of solo play too deeply ingrained. The initial shock wore off, the teamwork fractured, and Beauxbatons, like a well-oiled, beautiful machine, continued its steady, relentless accumulation of points.
The final score was a devastating, deeply embarrassing 310:70.
Hogwarts had been crushed.
As the players descended, their shoulders slumped in collective shame, Sebastian's faint smile never wavered. The loss was a tactical triumph. He had witnessed the pressure successfully fracture the complacency and expose the structural flaws.
Langdon and Paul had momentarily sought out each other's help. Marcus and Debbie had found a fleeting, coordinated rhythm. The foundation for future growth was now laid, cemented by the shared, visceral memory of failure.
A sharp, almost violent hiss drew Sebastian's attention.
"Look at you, grinning like a half-witted house elf who just found a misplaced sock!" Professor Snape spat, approaching with a furious stride.
"You predicted this outcome, didn't you? How can you look at that scoreboard and not be consumed by a dignified, appropriate level of scholarly fury? The reputation of Hogwarts is currently being broadcast across the continent as incompetent and disorganized!"
Snape gestured sharply toward the VIP box. "Cast an eye at the Minister of Magic, Swann. Fudge's face is currently exhibiting a fascinating, purely political blackness, a veneer of sophisticated disappointment layered over a core of incandescent rage. It is a masterpiece of passive-aggressive performance art! And you laugh?"
"I am merely satisfied, Severus," Sebastian replied calmly, his eyes twinkling. "I am satisfied that my students have learned more about the necessity of teamwork in one hour of public defeat than they could have in a hundred hours of polite practice. The wound, though painful, is a necessary surgical incision."
He patted Snape on the shoulder again, enduring the Potion Master's deep scowl.
"Now, as the person in charge of this entire event, I am obligated to offer cordial, diplomatic excuses to Madam Maxime and the Ministry. As Head of Slytherin, I trust you can shepherd the students back to the castle? Ensure the team avoids the press and, more importantly, ensure that Marcus Flint does not spontaneously combust from the shame of a failed public display."
Snape narrowed his eyes, clearly debating whether to hex Sebastian or reluctantly agree. "I am not a glorified chaperone, Swann. But fine. For the sake of the school's structural integrity—and only for that reason—I will maintain a perimeter around your pathetic, weeping athletes."
Sebastian watched Snape stride off, his black robes billowing in dramatic resignation, a strange sense of gratitude warming his chest. Snape was, predictably, in crisis management mode, a task he performed with ruthless efficiency, even if he pretended it was a crushing burden.
Hours later, deep in the Gryffindor boys' dormitory, Charlie Weasley lay in the impenetrable darkness behind his bed curtains. He was suffering from a profound case of insomnia by shame.
He had returned directly from the pitch, avoiding the Great Hall's celebratory (and now painfully awkward) feast and the inevitable questions. He was entombed in the silent cloth cylinder of his curtains, refusing all offers of food or commiseration.
His heart throbbed a slow, heavy rhythm against his ribs. He could still hear the ghost of the crowd's disappointed sigh, the sound more crushing than any roar of anger. Worse still, he kept seeing Penelope Clearwater.
When he had flown back to the ground, he had seen the Cheerleading Captain—not openly weeping like some of the younger girls—but standing ramrod straight, her face a mask of utterly devastated, composed betrayal, Percy Weasley's hand resting gently on her shoulder.
Penelope, who had screamed herself hoarse for two hours, coordinating sixty students in relentless, optimistic support, had put her faith in him. And he had failed her most of all.
Charlie desperately wanted to scream a defense into the silence: I did my job! As soon as the Snitch had appeared, he had out-flown the Beauxbatons Seeker, always maintaining a crucial lead. He was closing the distance, the metal wings glinting in the sunlight, the victory within his grasp.
But then, the calculated move: the Beauxbatons Chasers and Beaters—abandoning all pretense of offense—had executed a synchronized, aerial cordon. They hadn't tried to hurt him; they had simply clogged his airspace. Every direct route was blocked by a body, a Quaffle, or a perfectly placed, menacing Bludger, slowing his pursuit just enough.
He felt the injustice of it burn in his throat. He had been so close, and they had cheated him out of the catch through superior team defense. He clenched his right hand, scratching the air above him, reliving the moment he should have caught the Snitch.
I gave my best! I was the best Seeker on that pitch!
But a voice, cold and ruthless, whispered back in the darkness, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Sebastian Swann: "Is it really so, Charlie? Did you give your best in the capacity that truly mattered?"
The voice struck him like a rogue Bludger to the chest.
Charlie, the Quidditch Captain, hadn't given his best. He had seen the lack of coordination for weeks. He knew Langdon and Paul preferred solo glory. He was aware that Marcus and Debbie only truly synchronized when they were angry. He understood the deep-seated, subtle house-based contempt that prevented them from forming a unit.
But because he valued personal relationships—because he wanted everyone to like him, because he didn't want to jeopardize the easygoing atmosphere of his diverse team—he had always substituted polite requests for non-negotiable orders. He had confused the friendly camaraderie of the four houses off the pitch with the necessary, ruthless discipline on the pitch.
He wasn't an inadequate flier; he was an inadequate manager of talent.
The thought brought a rush of bitter realization. He thought of his previous complaint, the one he had held onto during the game: Why didn't Professor Swann just use the Gryffindor team?
The shame intensified. What did that have to do with Sebastian? Sebastian had provided everything: the best brooms, the strongest training, the most advanced tactics. He had constantly preached the mantra of teamwork until he sounded like a broken record. Sebastian had given him the best tools, but Charlie had been afraid to use them correctly.
He realized his fundamental error: the school team was not four houses temporarily united. It was one single entity—the Hogwarts Quidditch Team—created to compete against the best.
The moment they stepped onto the pitch, their House affiliation was meant to be dissolved, replaced by a single, focused Hogwarts identity. He was their commander, but he had acted like their anxious friend, a mistake that cost them everything.
Charlie suddenly sat up, ripping the curtains open. The realization was a brilliant, painful flash. He wasn't supposed to be an amiable Gryffindor Captain; he was supposed to be a ruthless professional Captain who forged a weapon out of disparate parts.
He slid off his bed, sinking his head into his hands. He finally understood the gravity of the position he held.
"This is not just about flying," he whispered to the cold dormitory air.
"It's about making people do what they need to do, even when they don't want to. It's about taking the best from Slytherin, the loyalty from Hufflepuff, the analysis from Ravenclaw, and the courage from Gryffindor, and forcing it all into a single, cohesive strike."
He stood up, his body trembling, not from cold, but from the magnitude of the task ahead.
"Oh... by Merlin's beard, this is going to be exceptionally hard." The thought was accompanied by a strange, fierce exhilaration. He had failed, but he finally knew why, and that was a victory in itself.
The real work, the true test of his captaincy, was about to begin.