What Part of Party Don't You Understand?

[JAYCEN NATHANIEL TATE]

Jayce was pumped. Completely, entirely exhilarated. It was like he was on some sort of high off of drugs, though he'd rather say he was high off of life right now. How freaking fantastic was this? Jaycen Tate, Ravenclaw Champion... the words seemed to be so easy, flowing right off the tongue- or rather, the imaginary tongue of his thoughts seeing as he didn't actually say the word out loud. To tell the truth, when he'd entered his name in the middle of the night after one of his prefect, or rather head boy, patrols, he hadn't been expecting to be chosen. He didn't know how much the goblet took into account, but he was involved in plenty around the school. Head boy, one of the top students in the school, beater on the Quidditch team, and he was thinking of joining a few clubs in and around the school, too. If it had been a human being choosing the champions he was pretty sure that he would have been written off immediately as having too much on his plate already. Someone else should be given the glory of being champion. Thankfully, though, it hadn't been one of the teachers choosing the champions and he had been eligible and chosen.

The eight chosen students split off from the room in the side of the Great Hall after Kingsley came and spoke to them, each moving to their own house commons room, presumably to celebrate their 'victory', though no victory had been made yet. Jayce walked out of the great hall with his fellow champion, Claire, pausing outside of its large doors. "Hey, I'll catch up with you later, kay? I'll be in the commons room soon," he promised, giving no more explanation to his destination as he separated from her, twisting down the corridors and stairs in a direction that would eventually lead to the Hufflepuff commons room. Before he reached it, however, he paused in front of a large painting of fruit. Lifting a hand, Jayce brushed his hand over a pear in the painting, tickling it, and it immediately formed into a doorknob before his eyes. The head boy grinned and turned the knob, stepping inside to the enormous kitchen that fed the entire school of ravenous teenagers.

There was a loud crack and immediately one of the pale house elves appeared beside the seventh year, bowing deeply as the cheery house elves always did. "Something I can get you, sir?" she asked in a squeaky, high pitched voice. Other house elves nearby turned towards them, listening for anything Jayce wished for. The little beings were always so helpful, it was pretty great, especially when Jayce wanted a snack during a patrol or something of the sort. Of course, he tried not to take advantage of them, he really did, but in situations like this it was hard to not ask for their help.

"House champions have been announced," he grinned, though he knew the house elves probably all knew. "And there's going to be a party in Ravenclaw if I have any say in it. So do you think you could get some food up there...?" He always felt awkward asking them for things, knowing that they would get him whatever he desired no matter how he phrased the question. He just never knew how to ask.

"Of course, sir!" the house elf squeaked again. "Very soon!"

"That's great, thanks," Jayce smiled at the elf, backing up to the door and placing his hand on the knob. "Really, thanks a tonne. A party's not a party without food. So I'll uh... leave it up to you, then." He turned the knob and stepped back into the quiet hall outside of the kitchens, stopping for a moment to watch the doorknob fade back into a pear before he started on his way back to the Ravenclaw tower.

He walked into the commons area to see... well, nothing really. A few kids here and there, a few excited conversations about the proceedings of the night, but nothing exciting in itself. Music was playing quietly in the background from some sort of magical device, seeing as muggle electronic devices didn't work at Hogwarts. Pulling out his wand from his pocket, Jayce silenced the music player to get the attention of people in the commons room with a wave of his wand. "All right, kiddos," he grinned, easily projecting his Irish accented voice so that everyone in the room could hear him. "We've got two damn good champions, if I do say so myself, and we'd better start this tournament off well, which is to say partying until Miss Swanepoel comes to shut us up. If I see a single person being a negative Nancy or a wallflower, they cost Ravenclaw two hundred house points 'cause I can do that, so-" he was cut off by a crack, and suddenly the various tables throughout the commons room were overflowing with food and various assortments of drinks. At the same time, or very shortly afterwards, the Irish boy waved his wand again at the music player and it began blaring a louder, more upbeat tune. "Let's get this party started!"

[RAYCHEL MAE ENTWHISTLE]

Sitting by the fireplace having lit it up, she sunk into her favourite comfortable chair with Hogwarts: a history book. She had read it countless of times and yet every time she read it she found something new and interesting. Nothing was happening in the common room, in fact it was just another normal night it seemed, the sound of quills scratching on parchment, the rustling sound of a page turning in a book, the usual Ravenclaw common room sounds. It was peaceful, and to her it was quiet. The head girl turned back to her book, oblivious to what was about to happen.

Of course how could she concentrate when Jaycen was in the room irritating her. Kiddos, who the hell did he think he was talking to? Just because he was a seventh year didn’t mean he was the only one. Oh he had a lot of nerve to call himself good even before he knew what the first task was, or when. She hoped he would fail at the tasks and would bet he would quit the first one within 5 minutes.

A party, now that was something she knew nothing of, since when did this place look ready for a party, in fact there was no food, not even a single decoration. Yup right, party she could laugh. He wanted to dock 200 points from their house if someone was being negative. Alight, she thought, she wanted to test him, see if he would really take those house points away. Slamming the book shut, she turned her head to look at him.
"Oh please..." she paused as she watched as food and drink appeared, "you think you're so good just because you got chosen, get over yourself Jaycen," she spoke, "I should give you detention for the rest of the year which could make you miss the first task just for suggesting to take two hundred points from our house. We want to win the house cup, not hand it to another house, idiot."

[SEIZEL AURA CAPPER]

Seizel was finally rounding up a few of the students that were trying to sneak away from the party, and even so he found this champion thing to be rather boring. Plus he had to consider the fact he had too much time to spend on Quidditch practice instead of partying. So he was going to go to the common room, hang out for like ten minutes and then leave to get away from all the stupidity that was about to occur. The two champions...great, good luck to them, for all he cared, the only person who would really win it for them was probably Claire in the long run. Having caught the last of the sentence that Jaycen had said as soon as he walked in. Placing his hands in his pockets, and just ignoring the usual speeches the so-called leader was making.

"Keep it down, party animals, you might end up starting a riot," he joked as he walked by in his Quidditch robes. It was obvious where he was headed, and he really didn't feel like talking to anyone else right now. Even with the threat to take away 200 points, he really didn't mind, if he wanted to, go right ahead, and if he tried to stop him. Well, Seizel was more than glad to teach him his place by just convincing him once again how he was the smartest boy in Ravenclaw. After all, getting straight O's was easy, and everyone knew he barely studied for most of the assignments as well doing them off the top of his head.

Shrugging slightly he made a one-time appearance, and would be back later when everyone was asleep since he'd rather not deal with the prefects. Raychel was okay, but the others he wasn't so sure about. Even the captain of the quidditch team had to practice, but he was out there almost every day...not giving himself a break ever. The only way he would stop was if one of his close friends stopped him from disappearing completely out that door. Seizel really didn't see anyone he wanted to interact with besides Raychel at the moment. Even if he did, they'd just end up talking about Quidditch and how her job was harder than his while he organized teams as she made sure students behaved.

In all essence, he figured Quidditch was way more important, but their philosophical arguments usually got them butting heads against each other. Thus where the rivalry began, but he held great respect for her position. Even with all of this stuff on his plate, he kept walking hoping to make it to the portrait without being labeled like usual. Seizel did have a good excuse though, he wanted to practice moves to make sure his team was in top condition.

[/blockquote][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

[CLAIRE LINDY GABLE]

Claire was still speechless after the meeting with the rest of the champions and the Headmaster. She was so glad to be away from the Slytherins though, so when Jaycen went his own way, she immediately walked herself to the Ravenclaw Tower. When she entered, she was greeted by some of her house mates and a few pats on the back. Excusing herself from them, she went to her dorm and sat there for a good ten minutes. She was one of the champions and it felt amazing! A little scary too, but she wasn't about to start doubting her ability to do this. She was Claire Freaking Gable! Well, technically, in reality her middle name was Lindy, but that is another story.

After a long silence, she slowly got off her bed and proceeded to change out of her robes. Out of her trunk, she pulled out a comfy looking long sleeve shirt and some denim shorts. Claire stood in front of a mirror was a minute, still not sure whether or not she was dreaming. That's when, from all the way down in the common room, she heard Jaycen's voice. She didn't know what was going on, maybe a couple of third years had tried to sneak a love potion into his drink again, that wouldn't be surprising to Claire. But when she got there, he was talking about a party. A big smile formed on Claire's face as the food appeared all around them. She was about to go talk to Jaycen when Raychel, the Head Girl, began to speak to him. Claire decided it wasn't a good idea to interrupt her and she will just wait until she was done.

That's when Seizel made his appearance. Claire noticed that once again he was wearing his Quidditch robes and that wasn't surprising either. The boy lived to play. Was he sneaking off? Claire saw him inching his way to the exit and she quickly caught up to him, blocking his path. "Oh, hey, going somewhere?"

[JAYCEN NATHANIEL TATE]

How the hell did she ever get named head girl when she had the humor of Professor Binns or Moaning Myrtle. Of course she had to challenge him. 'Perfect' Raychel Entwhistle couldn't let anyone just enjoy themselves without raining on their parade, could they? He wanted nothing more than to hex her and show her exactly how much of a bitch she was sometimes, but they were in a room full of students who probably expected their heads to get along well, so sadly he couldn't do what he'd been tempted to do every day since first year.

This should be a pretty happy time for him. He was a house champion. He should be able to enjoy himself without being nagged and bitched at. All he was asking for was one evening without her nitpicking at what he did. That was all. And apparently it was too much to ask. The backlashes of some sort of karma, maybe? He couldn't have two good things happen to him in one day? Not for the first time he cursed the fact that Raychel was in the same house as him. She might be a little bit easier to put up with if she weren't able to be around him even in his own commons area and 'rain on his parade' as it were. Yeah, it'd be pretty awesome if she were in some other house cheering on that house's champions than here to cause trouble for one of hers.

"I don't think I'm good just 'cause I got chosen," he replied cheekily. "I think I'm good because I'm good." He wasn't entirely serious, the guy wasn't that full of himself, but he thought he did deserve a hell of a lot more credit than Raychel gave him. If he weren't going to be a good champion, why would he have been chosen? "Jealousy isn't very attractive, you know. Kind of makes you resemble a troll, actually, in personality if nothing else." And of course she was as incapable of taking a joke as she was of just letting him be and not challenging him front of the commons room full of students. "You might want to lighten up and stop taking the world so seriously. There's this thing called 'having fun'. You should try it sometimes." Would it really be so terrible if he 'accidentally' cast a babbling curse on her? Well, on second thought, that wouldn't really make much of a difference. Silencio, maybe? Yeah, that sounded good. It'd bring at least a few seconds of blessed silence. But how to make it look like an accident?

[SEIZEL AURA CAPPER]

Seizel frowned slightly as he was now forced to actually engage in a conversation that would forcefully involve him in the process, and it was obvious he shared a distasteful glance towards Jaycen for a moment. Speaking to him fondly, "Don't get me wrong, great party and all, but I need my practice, sorry mates, of course I welcome any challengers to having a party out there by playing a celebratory game," he spoke to the common room. Oh yeah, Seizel could steal the thunder if he wanted to, even with Claire in his way he soon looked into her eyes, finding them incredibly irresistible as always, and smiled warmly to her.

"Just out for some quidditch practice, why you want to join?" he asked leaning in like he was attempting to figure out if she liked him or not, but backed up a bit. Easily moving around her of course would have been easy to do, however, he decided to amuse himself with her for the time being. Especially since he could have easily left without even having said a word to her in the first place, and was unable to really think of anything else to say now. After all, Claire was one of the few women in Ravenclaw he could stand being near without having to hear them talk nonsense about all of their classes nonchalantly as if he didn't give a damn, which he usually didn't.

Shrugging his shoulders, even as he admired his chasers, but Claire, he thought was one of the top chasers he had on the team, next to Mikah of course. It was hard to say who his favorites were on the team, but he was pretty equally fair with everyone. Even Raychel, while him and her butted heads over many things, Quidditch seemed to be rather nice to them. Yet Jaycen was head boy, and Seizel had forgotten how bad Jaycen had wanted his position. Maybe one day he'll treat Jaycen to a nice day out on the town in Hogsmeade for having made it before him.

[/blockquote][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

[RAYCHEL MAE ENTWHISTLE]

Ha, he believes he's good; oh he had another thing coming. All it took was for her to say the magic words and she could make this place party free. Oh yes, he wasn’t the only one with power. Ravenclaws were to study not party. She rolled her eyes at him, her jealous. Well slightly but she wasn’t going to let that show.
"Whatever Jaycen," she brushed off his troll comment like it was nothing and in fact it was nothing.

Having fun, oh she knew about having fun but when Jaycen was concerned, well that was a completely different story.
"Oh I do know how to have fun, however you tend to suck the fun right out of the air whenever you're around," she replied. She unfolded herself out of the chair and pulled the hem of her shirt, getting any creases out of it. She saw Seizel in the corner of her eye in his quidditch uniform being blocked by the other house champion. He heard him ask if Claire wanted to join him for quidditch practice. Well Raychel thought practice would be a hell of a lot more fun than this dull party.
"Hey Seizel, might if I join you for practice?" she asked before turning back to Jaycen, stalking up to him and glaring.
"I hope you die," she hissed at him, loud enough for only him to hear before backing off and turning her back to Jaycen, walking towards Seizel and Claire. Her words were harsh, she knew that but it felt good saying them.

[CLAIRE LINDY GABLE]

Claire was indeed trying to keep Seizel away from the Quidditch field. It was getting late and soon it'd be her duty to go out there and get him. A lot had happened in the past few hours so Claire wasn't up for the task of retrieving or serving out a detention to one of her own. She depised giving detentions, unless, of course, the person deserved it and they usually did. Seizel, however, was always able to get away with in and that was cool and all but Claire was tired and wasn't up for her round of prefect duties.

When Seizel leaned in a bit, Claire was a little surprised. How scandalous! But not really, though she was surprised, because she wasn't sure what was going on through his mind. Was something wrong with her teeth, was that was he wasn't trying to say without really saying it? Claire closed her mouth, her hand going up to cover it. It was impossible, she had been too nervous to eat at the ceremony, something could not be stuck in her teeth!

"I don't know if tha-" Claire's reply to Seizel was cut off by none other than Jaycen and Raychel. Claire's eyes grew wide as she turned to look at them. Normally, they would keep their bicker down and only get heated at the prefect meetings, so Claire didn't know what the hell was going on. She looked back at Seizel for a minute before taking a step forward, still too timid to speak up and interrupt them, but someone had to so she did.

"Really, guys, this is suppose to be fun." She looked at Jaycen, wanting him to back her up, after all, it had been his idea and now he was ruining it by arguing with Raychel? What were they, four year olds? She took another step forward, but kept the entrance blocked, just in case Seizel tried to make a run for it. That's when Raychel's last statement was heard throughout the whole common room. Everyone went quiet and Claire could feel everyone staring their direction.

"Raychel, what the hell?" She turned to the Head Girl, no longer caring if Capper left or not. Her anger was building up inside. "You're acting like a child. You too, Jaycen." Her glanced traveled to her fellow champion and she she shook her head. "You two are suppose to lead us and instead you're clawing each other's eyes out? Last time I checked, we weren't in the dungeons. Leave that to them. And you, Raychel, that was so uncalled for."

[/blockquote][/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]