The Gryffindors began to play very hard, trying to knock out the Hufflepuff chasers, applying pressure, ramming carefully without making the fouls too obvious. But Hector did not need protection. He was far too nimble, impossible to get close to, as if he could see players, Bludgers, and everything else behind his back. This allowed Hufflepuff to delay, but not prevent, reaching a one hundred sixty point difference.
This morally decisive goal was scored, unsurprisingly, by Hector. They tried to box him in, and he even allowed it. Two chasers pressed him from one side, and the twins sent a Bludger from the other. But the boy literally merged with the broom handle, sharply and without any visible reason dumping speed. For some reason, no one expected that. The Bludger knocked Katie Bell, a Gryffindor chaser, aside.
Wanting to catch up and prevent another goal, the Gryffindors chased Hector again. He let them sit on his tail, weaving, gaining altitude, allowing his pursuers to close in. He still had the Quaffle, after all. Against expectations, he smoothly transitioned into a dive and acceleration.
"What is Granger doing?!" Lee Jordan was getting increasingly worked up. "Why is he performing the Wronski Feint, and aiming it straight at himself?!"
"He is playing on excitement and emotion," McGonagall restrained her own excitement with difficulty. "Even I feel the desire to win such a chase at any cost."
Meanwhile, Hector reached a very respectable speed, allowing his pursuers to almost grab his yellow uniform, angered and taunted by the Quaffle in his hands.
As Lee Jordan expected, Granger pulled out of the dive at ground level and raced at wild speed toward the Gryffindor penalty area. Angelina lost control of her broom and plowed into the ground. Alicia came to her senses, or rather simply got scared, braking down to the ground and exiting the dive gently, but slowly.
"He is not flying, he is skimming!"
Along the very ground, Hector flew to the central Gryffindor hoop, then sharply shot upward, twisting like a snake right next to the hoop's post, thus nullifying all threats.
At the hoop itself, Wood lunged to intercept, seeing no other chance, but Hector veered aside too sharply, sending the Quaffle into the unguarded hoop.
"And Hufflepuff leads with a score of one hundred seventy to ten! But what is this? It seems Cedric Diggory has spotted the Snitch! He and Potter rush after it straight into the clouds! Those clouds are so low!"
Lightning flashed between the clouds, and a moment later a tumbling Cedric fell out on his broom, but quickly stabilized and returned to the clouds, vanishing from sight. The game on the pitch meanwhile intensified to the limit, but the Gryffindors had only Alicia left, covered by the Weasley twins. But their cover was not enough. Hector caught up to them like an invisible shadow at the moment the Hufflepuff Beaters sent a Bludger each and thus distracted the Gryffindor Beaters.
"Cedric Diggory catches the Snitch!" Lee Jordan screamed, looking at the special signal lamps in front of him. "Even though we cannot see it, ladies and gentlemen, but…"
At that moment, another lightning bolt flashed in the clouds, illuminating the outlines of numerous Dementors spiraling downward. A moment later, a tumbling unconscious Potter fell out of the clouds without his broom, followed by one of the Dementors.
All spectators jumped to their feet, gasping and exclaiming. Dumbledore did not waste time drawing his wand. He simply pointed a hand at the falling boy.
"**Arresto Momentum**…"
Potter's falling speed began to decrease, and he touched the ground at roughly the speed and force of a fall from two or three meters, not critical. The Dementors, however, slowly "falling" from the cloud, caused far more concern among spectators and professors alike. Now Dumbledore did take out his wand, silently conjuring a wave of Patronus. It was so powerful that it went far beyond the pitch, drove the Dementors back into the cloud and farther, away from the surrounding area.
The referee ran to the unconscious Potter, and a moment later a couple of professors and members of both the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff teams joined her.
"Unconscious, light bruising," Madam Hooch stated, the white haired witch with yellow eyes.
Stretchers were conjured, Madam Pomfrey arrived, and the bustle of evacuating the injured boy began.
"He had a chance," Diggory approached Madam Hooch. "If not for the Dementors, he could have caught the Snitch before me. We need a rematch…"
"Everything was within acceptable limits," the referee cut him off. "Proceed to your locker rooms."
---
Fatigue is a terrible feeling. Especially when both physical and mental fatigue are present. Flying for almost an hour and a half under such conditions and such tension is exhausting. What is surprising is that my mind was not tired at all, but on the contrary, had only warmed up a bit. And the tension was no joke. I was tired as a person. Yes, tiny fragments of information from the pilot memory shard suggested that such loads were nothing. But they would only be nothing if I had an integrated neural network in my brain, a pile of implants, a couple of years of adapting the mental component to physical capabilities, and a mass of knowledge bases optimizing the entire flight process.
Our team reached the locker room in a subdued mood, and the reason was not only the presence of Dementors, but also the fact that they ruined the game. After all, aside from the fact of victory, the annual Quidditch tournament also considers point differential per match. Cedric's words that Potter could have struggled more compensated for the joy of point superiority, but did not negate the fact of victory.
"Well done, Hector," the guys and the girl smiled, patted me on the shoulder, and even Cedric did not press the issue. What happened, happened.
"Yeah, buddy!" Keeper Herbert was the most cheerful. "Not for nothing did we organize all this with the broom! It turned out really interesting and cool!"
"And most importantly," Cedric smiled, "we finally managed to implement tactics from a higher league than school level."
"Is there a big difference?" I could not hold back the question, sitting down on a bench.
Some of the players went to change, including Tamsin, while Cedric, Herbert, and I just sat.
"You bet!" the keeper jumped up. "First, a professional pitch is a quarter larger. Different speeds, different tactics… even the stands create a larger field zone, meaning more space."
"True," Cedric nodded. "And if you compare to youth leagues, you have to consider player experience. You understand, Hector, with experience come broom handling skills. Let us say, if you give a pro player two brooms, one of which is twice as good as the other, the quality of his play will increase by only about fifteen percent. That is a lot, but not critical. But if you give those brooms to juniors, the difference can be even greater, but unstable, dangerous, unpredictable."
"Yeah," Herbert nodded. "And also, in pro Quidditch you will not see a player on a bad broom, or one unsuited to them. For example, there will not be a single keeper on a Firebolt, but a Seeker, easily. In school Quidditch, brooms really do play a big role, but handling them properly is not easy."