Chapter 6 - The Game

The next morning dawned very bright and cold. The Grand Hall was full of the delicious smell of breakfast foods cooking and everyone talking about the game that would happen that day. 

“You’ve got to eat some breakfast,” Epiphany said.
“No thanks,” Tails said.
“Just eat something, just one bite,” wheedled Epiphany.
“I don’t have much of an appetite,” he insisted. In fact, none of the five really did. 

“But you need to keep up your strength,” said Cain. “Especially you, Tails, as Seekers are always the ones who get clobbered by the other team.”
 
“Big incentive,” Sonic said flatly.
 
“Ok, thanks,” Tails said.
 
By eleven o’clock the whole school seemed to be out in the stands around the pitch. Many students had binoculars. The seats might be raised high in the air, but it was still difficult to see what was going on sometimes. Epiphany and Cain made their way up in the top row. With the help of other Dragonthorns, they hung a banner, to cheer the team on.
 
The team members had changed into their orange robes (Demontail would be playing in grey). Elijah, the captain of the team cleared his throat for to quiet everyone down.
“Okay, men,” he said.
“And women,” said Leticia Johnson, one of the Chasers. 
“And women,” Elijah agreed. “This is it The big one, the one we’ve all been waiting for. This is the best team Dragonthorn’s had in years. And I see we have five new members. We’re going to win. I know it! Right. It’s time. Good luck to all of you.” 
As Tails followed and out of the locker room, hoping his knees weren’t going to give way, walked onto the field to loud cheering crowds.

Ms. Partridge was the referee. She stood in the middle of the field waiting for the two teams, her vacuum in her hand.
"Now I want a nice fair game, all of you,” she said, once they were all gathered around her. They noticed that she seemed to be speaking particularly to the Demontail Captain, Michael Gin. The fluttering banner high above, flashing Dragonthorn Dream could be seen in the corner of one’s eye over the crowd.
"Mount your vacuums, please.” They all climbed onto their Smoover Two Thousands. Ms. Partridge gave a loud squeal on her whistle. Fifteen vacuums rose up, high, high into the air. 

“And they’re off. The Wiff is taken immediately by Leticia Jones of Dragonthorn!”

Lee Sampson was doing the commentary for the match, closely watched by Professor Grimley. 
“And she’s really belting along up there, a neat pass to Sonic the Hedgehog, — back to Jones and — no, the Demontails have taken the Wiff, Slytherin Captain Michael Gin gains the Wiff and off he goes — Gin flying like an alert hawk up there — he’s going to sc— no, stopped by an excellent move by Dragonthorn Keeper Elijah and the Dragonthorns take the Wiff — that’s Chaser of Dragonthorn there, nice dive around Gin, off up the field and — OUCH — that must have hurt, hit in the back of the head by a Bludgeoner — Wiff taken by the Demontails — that’s speeding off toward the goal posts, but he’s blocked by a second Bludgeoner — sent his way by Coconut Ted, can’t tell which — nice play by the Dragonthorn Beater, anyway, and Jones back in possession of the Wiff, a clear field ahead and off she goes — she’s really flying — dodges a speeding Bludgeoner — the goal posts are ahead —come on, now,  — Keeper  dives — misses — DRAGONTHORNS SCORE!” Dragonthorn cheers filled the cold air, with howls and moans from the Demontails.
 
 “No sign of the Globe yet?” Epiphany asked still trying to watch. “Nope,” said Cain.  

“Keep out of the way until you catch sight of the Globe,” Elijah had said to Tails. “We don’t want you attacked before you have to be.” When Cream had scored, Tails had done couple of loop-the-loops in celebration “Oh, yeah!”.

Now he was back to staring around for the Globe. Once he caught sight of a flash of gold, but it was just a reflection from Leticia’s bracelet, and once a Bludgeoner decided to come smack dab in his way, like a cannonball, but Tails dodged it and Amy came chasing after it.
“You all right there?” she had time to yell, as she beat the Bludgeoner furiously toward Michael Gin. 
“Demontail in possession,” Lee Sampson was saying, “Chaser Fleet ducks two Bludgeoners, two Dragonthorn Beaters and Chaser Jones, and speeds toward the — wait a moment — was that the Globe?”

A murmur ran through the crowd as Fleet dropped the Wiff, too busy looking over his shoulder at the flash of gold that had passed his left ear. Tails saw it and rushed to dive after it. Demontail Seeker Gin had seen it, too. Neck and neck they hurtled toward the Stitch — all the Chasers seemed to have forgotten what they were supposed to be doing as they hung in the air on sitting on their vacuums to watch. Tails was faster than Gin— he could see the little round ball, wings flouncing, darting up ahead — he put on an extra tinge of speed —WHAM! A roar of rage echoed from the Dragonthorns below — Michael Gin had blocked him on purpose, and Tails’ vacuum spun off course, holding on for dear life.
“That’s a Foul!” screamed the Dragonthorns. Ms. Partridge spoke angrily to Gin and then ordered a free shot at the goal posts for Dragonthorn. But in all the confusion, of course, the small Globe had disappeared from sight again. 
Down in the stands, a Dragonthorn named Bean was yelling, “Send him off, ref! Give him a red card!” 
“What are you talking about?” Cain said. 
“In soccer you get shown the red card and you’re out of the game!” 
“But this isn’t soccer, Bean,” Cain reminded him. Grimley, however, was on Bean’s side.
“They oughta change the rules. Gin coulda knocked Prower outta the air.”
Lee Sampson was finding it difficult not to take sides. “So — after that obvious and filthy bought of cheating —”

“Sampson!” growled Ms. Partridge.

“I mean, after that open squalor of...”

“I’m warning you—”
 
“Fine. Gin nearly kills the Dragonthorn Seeker, which could happen to anyone, I’m sure, so a penalty to Dragonthorn, taken by the rabbit, which puts it away, no trouble, and we continue play, Dragonthorn still in possession.” 
It was as Tails dodged another Bludgeoner, which went spinning dangerously past his head, that it happened. His vacuum gave a sudden, jarring heave. For a split second, he thought he was going to fall. He gripped the vacuum tightly with both his hands and knees. He’d never felt anything like that. It happened again. It was as though the vacuum was trying to buck him off. But vacuums did not suddenly decide to buck their riders off. Tails tried to turn back toward the Demontail goal-posts — he was about to ask Elijah to call time-out — and then he realized that his vacuum was completely out of his control. He couldn’t turn it. He couldn’t direct it at all. It was zigzagging through the air, and every now and then making violent swaying movements that almost unseated him. Even if he could just fly back up, it would probably disqualify him. Sampson was still commentating on these events. 

“Demontail in possession — Gin with the Wiff — passes the rabbit —passes Rose — Demontails score — Ano...” The Demontails were cheering. No one seemed to have noticed that Tails’ vacuum was behaving strangely. It was carrying him slowly higher, away from the game, jerking and twitching as it went. 

“What do you think he’s doing?”  Cain asked.
 
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say he’d lost control of his vacuum,” Epiphany said, “but he can’t have...”
 
Suddenly, people were pointing up at Tails all over the stands. His vacuum had started to rollover and over, with him only just managing to hold on.
 
Then the whole crowd gasped. Tails’ vacuum had given a sharp jerk and he swung off it. He was now dangling from it, holding on with only one hand.
 
“Did something happen to it when Gin blocked him?” Epiphany whispered. 
“Can’t have,” said Cain, “nothing can interfere with a vacuum cleaner except powerful Dark magic — no kid could do that to a Smoover Two Thousand.”
 
At these words, Epiphany seized Cain’s binoculars, but instead of looking up at Tails, she started looking frantically around the crowd.

“What are you doing?” Cain asked.

“I knew it,” Epiphany gasped, “Look at Penders!” Cain grabbed the binoculars. Penders was in the middle of the stands opposite them. He had his eyes fixed on Tails and was muttering a whole string of words under his breath.
 
“He’s jinxing the vacuum,” said Epiphany. “What should we do?” 
“Leave it to me.” Before Cain could say another word, Epiphany had disappeared. Cain turned the binoculars back on Tails.
 
His vacuum was shaking so hard, it was almost impossible for him to hang on much longer. The whole crowd was on its feet, watching, terrified, as Amy and Knuckles flew up to try and pull Tails safely onto one of their vacuums, but it did no good, as every time they got near him, the vacuum would jump higher still.
 
They dropped lower and circled beneath him, obviously hoping to catch him if he fell.
Bricker seized the Wiff and scored five times without anyone noticing. Epiphany had fought her way across to the stand where Penders stood, and was now racing along the row behind him. Reaching Penders, she crouched down, pulled out her wand, and whispered a few, well-chosen words. Bright blue electric jolts shot from her wand onto the hood of Penders’ robes. It took perhaps thirty-five seconds for Penders to realize that he was on fire. Several shrieks told her she had done the job right. She scrambled back along the row —Penders would never know who was responsible for his sudden ignition. It was enough. Up in the air, Tails was suddenly able to climb back on to his vacuum cleaner. 

“Nigel, you can look!” Cain said. Nigel, a small boy who was in Dragonthorn, had been sobbing into Grimley’s jacket for the last five minutes. Tails was speeding toward the ground.
He was about to grab the globe, but tumbled off of his vacuum cleaner as it crashed into the ground without him. He sat up for a while, seemingly not catching the thing.
Sonic floated to Tails' side. "Are you alright little buddy?" he asked.
"What?" Tails said. 
-"I said are you alright?" 
-"Did you say something?"
Everyone was in suspense. Tails tapped the right side of his head, tilting his head to the left, and with a few taps, the thing came out of his left ear.
"Miles Prower has earned 150 points for catching the Globe!" Epiphany and Cain, as well as the other students and staff of Dragonthorn cheered for the team.

"I wonder if anyone else managed to pull this off so well?" Tails asked himself.

Later, inside the dorm room of Dragonthorn house, the five had some visitors, who were none other than Epiphany and Cain.
"Congratulations on winning the game!"
"Well, he had no trouble playing by ear, didn't he?" Sonic said as he grabbed Tails by the head and gave him a friendly noogie.
"Speaking of trouble," said Epiphany, I'm writing a riddle about that Lerich person you told us about, but don't have good enough description to come up with one.
"Maybe one day you can publish it," Tails suggested as encouragement, "maybe even write books to exploit how evil he is."
"That would require printing presses," Epiphany said.
"I think that shouldn't be too hard," Tails said," Their designs are simplistic enough."
"We could start our own publication, Cain said, "We could call it Wizard Publishing!"
"I bet it took you a long time to come up with that name..." Penders' sneering voice was heard, "I'm sorry to interrupt your very important business meeting," he said, not sounding a bit sorry, "The new gym teacher who we recently hired was interested in meeting the seeker of the winning team,"
"I saw your performance in the game today and loved your skills," said an official looking man, appeared to be a coach.
"This is Coach Kahn," Penders introduced him "he has been hired as the replacement for Mr. Finch. What are you waiting for? Show some manners. Greet the new coach," he ordered.
But something didn't seem right to the mammals, and they were right. The familiar eyes stared at them in the same predatory manner.
"Oh, certainly," he said. He was tall, thin and wearing sweats, sneakers a whistle hung around his neck and a sports cap. And also had a fu manchu.
"I liked that boy's hustle out there, and I am glad to see what other fine specimens are here as well."
"I'll have to inform you," Penders said to Kahn, "that Jones and Elijah reside in different dorms.
"These five members seemed to do most of the work," said Coach Kahn, "the other two members seemed to have just hung back. I see potential in these youngsters."
"Don't just sit there," Penders said, "get up and say hello to Coach Kahn."
"Good evening, Coach Kahn," Epiphany and Cain immediately said.
"Yes, good evening, sir!" Amy piped up, causing the others to look confused. Was she the only one not getting bad vibes from this coach?
"It's a pleasure to meet you," Coach Kahn smirked.
"So, do you really see potential in them?" Penders asked.
"Yes," Coach Kahn replied, "But nothing in the other two in the room."
"That's what I though as well," Penders replied. "Now it's time for my performance," he continued, "I will be paying a piece I composed myself."
"What instrument do you play?" Coach Kahn asked.
"Why, a clarinet," Penders said," and I must say that I am quite the talented musician."
"That's the quality that inspired me to work here," Coach Kahn said, "Talented staff to influence the students."
"I am glad to hear that," Penders said, "Not everyone can appreciate my genius."
"I understand your pain, " Coach Kahn said, "I am the finest gym teacher the world has to offer and I get no fanfare."
"What a shame," Penders said, frowning.
"Yech," whispered Sonic, "I don't know who's more full of hot air, the round one, or the skinny one!" And apparently the rest of them agreed with him, as they had similar facial expressions.
They arrived at the auditorium, and made sure to sit as far as possible from Caterina and her rotten friends.
Penders squawked away with his clarinet and the students talked amongst themselves, having no trouble, due to how loud the squawks were.
"Some composers are inspired by nature, some by the sounds of the city. Apparently, Penders was inspired by someone strangling a crane," said Knuckles.
"Our new gym teacher is creepy-looking," said Epiphany.
"No question," Cain agreed. "It's the look in his eye."
"That devious look," Amy said, "but I can't quite put my finger on it..."
"You seemed happy to greet him," said Knuckles.
"I was just trying to keep up appearances," Amy confessed, "so they wouldn't think we were suspicious and to give us time to figure him out."
"I'm sure you'll find out. Don't worry your pink head about it," Cain said, patting Amy's hand.
And they said no more for the rest of the night.

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