It's time to d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-duel!

[waitforsuperman]

Who: Alfred and Ivan
When:  October 15th, midnight
Where: The Room of Requirements
What: A five year long rivalry has finally come to a head. Alfred F. Jones, Gryffindor's golden boy, versus his arch nemesis Ivan Braginky, one of Slytherin's most Machiavellian students. Who will come out on top? literally

Comments

[das_vedanya]

The Slytherin prefect waved his hand at the charging patronus to dispel it. The bird gave a mighty screech and dissolved into the darkness

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred rolled his eyes, tossing his wand up and down, watching Ivan climb up onto the platform. His feet unconsciously moved him into a more ready position, his eyes flicking from the wand to the lilac gaze and icy smile. "Yeah, deduct points like a big scary prefect." he shrugged, "It would just prove you're a coward anyway. And I know you won't. I know you wanna fight me just as bad as I wanna fight you so let's just cut to it."

In the split-second it took for his wand to complete a rotation and fall back into Alfred's hand, the smile was gone from his face. The wand whipped through the air, the tip brandishing a dark red- almost black light, the magic's edges fringed with the gold of the torches. "Confringo!"

[das_vedanya]

He arched a fine silver eyebrow, muttering something about the dignity of a Gryffindor to sacrifice custom - bowing to your opponent - for the sake of his own foolish pride. His hand moved in an upward curve - "Protego!" - and a thicket of pale blue light curved in a crescent around him, the fury from Jone's wand colliding with the impenetrable shape, and firing at every which direction - but Ivan - into the walls around them.

"Incarcerous! a different curvature of his arm brought several snakelike objects sprouting from his wand: brown, beige - ropes snaking through the air toward the Gryffindor prat's limbs.

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred stared at the ropes, grumbling and quickly cast the fire charm numerous times, watching the ropes burn up in seconds. One managed to escape his flames, curling up around his thighs and knees, squeezing slightly, almost causing him to topple, but he fought to stay standing, teeth grit.

His wrist snapped, wand aiming for Ivan's ankles. "Levicorpus!"

[das_vedanya]

A horrible sensation built up in his stomach when he suddenly found his hair dangling mere centimeters from the floorboards and all of the blood rushing to his head. His arms, finger pads caressing at the floor for his godforsaken wand... ah! "Liberacorpus! All at once, he felt the blood rush to his feet again as he met the floor in a mangled heap of Russian, emerald and ebony, and fury. Without getting up, he sighted down his wand and pointed between Alfred's eyes.

"Stupefy!"

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred's shield spell was only half-made and the curse hit the tip, ricocheting down, pummeling into Alfred's stomach and throwing him off the platform and into a wall. He struggled between falling unconscious and remaining awake, hand pressing against the stone to hold himself up.

He tried to blink away the exhaustion plaguing him. "S-Silencio!"

[das_vedanya]

It was as if someone had reached through the skin of his throat and closed a fist around his voice box. With no voice to command spells, he could only stand there with teeth ground and brows furrowed as the American slowly recollected himself.

If there weren't a formidable distance between them, Alfred would be able to read lips - lips stringing together words of insult and frustration aimed at shattering that delicate Gryffindor pride.

[waitforsuperman]

Laughing and sputtering out a cough at his bruised ribs, struggling over to Ivan. It felt nice to not have to look up to meet Ivan's eyes. He bent over, hovering and smirking. "Looks like I win again Branginsky."

His hand moved down to flick his nose before jumping off the stage, staggering a bit. As soon as he reached the door, he paused, looking back, the smirk turning sinister. "Wait a second... I need a prize for winning!"

[das_vedanya]

Already now he could feel the tension in his throat loosening. "Don't you think for a minute that I'm awarding you points for this, Jones," he rasped, slowly arching onto his elbows once the excess amount of blood had sprung to life in his toes.

Humiliation. Hatred. Frustration. "Go steal some pumpkin juice from the kitchens!" Ivan hissed as the mascot on his crest would as he rose to his knees.

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred walked over, leaning on the edge of the stage. "I don't want points," he said, shaking his head slightly. Fingers drumming against the stage, the only sound besides Ivan's shifting and his rasping breath. Carefully, he heaved himself up, kneeling on the stage.

"I want an answer from you," he smiled, "An honest answer, to a question of mine."

[das_vedanya]

Whatever feeling originally planted in his stomach from the levicorpus jinx could not compare to what he felt when seeing that smile on Alfred's face - oh, how he hated that smile. It was the same one he flashed Ivan when wishing him a 'good game' ('you loser'), swarming the fourth floor corridor with the light of his patronus charm, that 'I'm better than you smile'--

--"...the answer is 'no' to whatever the hell you're planning on asking me. There were no rewards in this duel if it's already cost me my pride."

[waitforsuperman]

"Then you haven't been watching me?" Alfred quirked his head before standing up, sinking hands into his pockets, looking down at Ivan again, into the defiant and wicked eyes. What a weird kid- Always treated everything so seriously... They were at a magic school. MAGIC school.

Oh well. Alfred liked being serious once in a while. "Because I'm pretty sure I've caught you watching me, like, a billion times. At least." the last part was added on with Alfred's foot nudging Ivan's knee.

[das_vedanya]

"In your wildest fantasies, Jones," he scoffed as he rose dutifully to his feet and brushed his robe of of any decontaminates from Alfred's spells. Disgusting. This whole affair was just disgusting. He wanted to drive his wand up through Alfred's jaw until it reached that empty space between his ears.

"Now, if you'll excuse m--" but Alfred would not let him pass. When Ivan moved right, Alfred moved left; when Ivan moved left, Alfred moved right. "...what do you want?"

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred reached out two fingers, poking them into the Russian's chest, driving right into the crest on his chest. "I want you to admit that you've been watching me," he said simply, "And I have noticed. Other people have noticed, I've had them watching you watch me so why don't we save everyone a lot of time and you admit it."

He waited for an answer, the fingers digging into his chest now working over to curl into the opening of his robe and up towards the emerald lined hood resting on Ivan's shoulders. God why couldn't he be kneeling again?

[das_vedanya]

This was... different. If the definition of different meant something involving your arch rivals fingertips in the fabric of his robe and his palm almost touching his cheek. They were... touching. His fingers tightened around his wand, yet he could not muster the ability to lift it and hex the seeker's face full of boils. It was as if Alfred had put him under the petrification curse.

"Know thy enemy, da? I must learn my enemy's tactics and what better way to accomplish it than to study first-hand?" A pause. "Are you happy now? I answered your question. Now move."

[waitforsuperman]

Alfred hand tightened in his cloak and he slowly slipped his wand up so it was resting against Ivan's jugular. "Incarcerous." The ropes slunk over Ivan's neck, around the scarf and down to his body, wrapping around him tightly. He reached over and snatched Ivan's wand from his hand and stepped back.

His fingers drifted into the pockets of his trousers, curling around the small vial there, pulling it out. "You know," he said, holding it up to the light, "Sometimes having your uncle as the Potions Professor... He really lets me get away with a lot. Especially when I tell him I need a truth serum for finding out if a girl likes me." -a snort- "Sometimes he's really gullible. Kind of like you."