Come Show Ya Support for the Martlesham Maulers! Open

Whatever Jo had thought camp would be like, it was defying expectations in just about every way. For instance, she would've never imagined that a random kid would be allowed to install himself in the grounds with his very own pop-up shop of Quidditch merchandise. It was the sort of thing that Jo would've normally noted with a bit of amusement and moved on, except that the kid was making some bold claims about the merits of their team of choice, and Jo was just not having it.

"Stupid not to take a look, huh?" She told them, glancing around all their boxes with raised eyebrows. "Tell me, why should I care about the 'best team in England'--" She mimed quotes. That had been a bold claim in itself. "When Irish teams are clearly better. I'd take the Kestrels or the Bats any day."

Having spoken her piece, she was about to turn on her heel when the full scale of the kid's enterprise really hit her, niggling at her curiosity.

"Where did you even get all this stuff? There's no way it's official."

She didn't know that much about Quidditch as a business, but even if a team got permission from the organisers to sell their merchandise, sending someone who couldn't be older than Jo made no sense. Yet the kid barely looked like he could haul one of the boxes, so they must've had help. The more she thought about it, the stranger this whole situation was.

Ah! A potential customer! Well, really a heckler if Rascal was being honest, but every heckler was merely a fan needing encouragement! Besides, Rascal wasn't going to let their family's honour be besmirched.

"The Bats or The Kestrels is it?" Rascal smirks with that signature look of superiority. "Ya mean you can't even decide ya favourite? They can't be that good then."

"'sides, whole Irish League might as well be the Chudley Cannons compared to the Maulers. When's the last time the Bats even won the cup? '99? And have any of those teams invented the iconic 'Ragg's Razor?'" They leave a pause, just long enough for Josephine to attempt a word in response, though she would be cut off. "Didn't think so."

"Oh right, where's me manners?" Rascal dramatically slaps a hand against their forehead before extending the same hand out towards Josephine. "Rascal Ragg, future Quidditch champion and child of the Mauler's Captain Rapscallion Ragg! I'll forgive ya little remark about my merch. All official, all licensed, all at a very generous price!"

They reach into one of the boxes, pulling out one of the many scarves and holding it out for Josephine. "Feel that? Proper quality, soft but durable too. You'll have many a jealous eye on you if you wear this."

"I could even throw in me signature, be worth a lot someday soon. But only because I can tell a discerning customer when I see one." Rascal grins proudly.

It was the word “free” delivered with the cadence of a carnival barker that stopped Alfie in his tracks. He had always been a sucker for free things so naturally he was interested. However, Alfie also prided himself on having the ability to read a room, or in this case, a footpath. The apathy / titters from his fellow campers as they continued on their way had given him pause.

Was this something considered inherently comical or guache in magical society, he wondered. While Alfie aspired to stand out among his peers, it was not as a subject of mockery. Until he had a better handle on what constituted a faux pas among witches and wizards, it might be better just to play it safe.

Alfie would have moved on at that point, had he not noticed Jo, one of his cabin mates, approaching the table. Alfie admired Jo. He liked her quick wit and enjoyed hearing her quips and insults at the expense of others. Acquiring her as a friend would be a social coup for Alfie, if only to make sure that the majority of her caustic observations were directed away from him rather than toward.

He approached the table and was not at all surprised to find her heckling the young entrepreneur. Alfie listened for a moment and was pleased to find that, aside from the particulars, the conversation wasn’t hard to follow. He may not have known the first thing about magical sport, but apparently trash talk was a universal language.

A smirk formed as he listened to the banter and when Jo noticed him Alfie nodded his chin toward her with an expression of conspiratorial approval. “I’m afraid I have to agree with Jo here. When it comes to playing against England my money's gotta be on the Irish.”

“Now if Wales were involved,” he continued flashing a grin, “that would be a different matter. It’s Harpies all the way for me no matter who they're playing.”

Alfie leaned in, as if considering the sales pitch, before insinuating himself. “May I?” he asked, eyeing both of them for permission before sampling the feel of the proffered scarf.

“Proper tidy,” he concluded in an impressed tone before turning to Jo. “Mate’s right. Quality’s lush. It’s just the wrong color, neh?”

Alfie grinned. He felt good about that exchange except for a niggling worry that the Harpies’ colors might actually be pale blue and yellow. Afterall, he knew nothing about the sport except the name of Holyhead's team. They might all be racing donkeys for all he knew and he certainly didn't know the colors of the Harpies' jerseys. Alfie suppressed the fear with an inward smile. ‘No worries’, he told himself. ‘It's Wales. What's the chance that it isnt red? No proper Welshman’s gonna wear he anything but.'

What was it with people in this camp and wanting to give out autographs while having accomplished nothing of note? The offer made Jo's eyes roll so hard it felt like they wanted to come out of their sockets.

"I think I'll wait to see if you even make your house's Quidditch team. Stealing a bit of your da's merch to hawk it doesn't seem that impressive to me yet." Depending on how the merchandise had been acquired, Jo might've been impressed at the gumption. Except that the little Maulers fan had already irritated her with the comment about the two Irish teams.

"I can pick a favourite. I'm just saying there are many teams that are better than the Maulers, and giving examples of teams I would prefer to them." She couldn't understand whether Rascal was thick not to follow her logic, or was being deliberately obnoxious. If the latter, she hoped the slow cadence to her explanation would prove equally annoying.

Her team, of course, was the Kestrels, but generally the Bats outperformed them, which meant Jo frequently had to root for them. Jo blamed it on bad management. The Kestrels' owner hadn't hired one decent manager for at least thirty years. "Even if they haven't done quite as well recently, the Bats are literally the most winning team in the league." She didn't think not having invented one random Quidditch move detracted from that.

The Harpies were her third favourite team, and she normally would've been quite enthusiastic about Alfie's support of them (and about his impeccable timing, arriving just in time to slag off the English with her), except that the last time she'd discussed Quidditch with him, he'd pretended to know more about it (or about Gwenog Jones, at least) than it seemed like he did. A fact that needled at Jo. It just seemed rude to act like you already knew somebody's fun fact. And pointless. Did the lad even like Quidditch?

She stared at Alfie for a second or two after he finished speaking, trying to find a sign that he was lying or exaggerating. She did have to give it to him, if he was lying again, he seemed to be much better at it than Jeremy.

"Yeah, I'm sure it's all class," she said, with a nod at the boxes. "And you're right about the colour. Green's much better. I wouldn't even say no to a jersey of the Harpies seeker." The Harpies had not recently been performing so great, whereas their keeper had recently saved a couple of games. If Alfie was as enthusiastic about Quidditch as he made it seem. He'd surely know that.

She could've, of course, just confronted him point blank. But as a future spy, she needed to work on being subtle.

"Oi now, stealin' is an accusation and a half. All this was given to me to try and supply all the Maulers' fans and fans to be at this camp!" Rascal would counter, they were many things but a thief was not one of them.

"Ah yeah winnin' this winnin' that. Lackin' any bloody showmanship I tell you what." Rascal counterpoints to the brag about the Bats' winstreak. Tactics and victory were one thing, but who cared if someone could easily fall asleep during your match?

It was then that a boy approached and Rascal had to immediately roll their eyes at the second person to approach their stall and point out that it was a stall for an English team and not for their preferred nation. "Do you lot go to Olivanders and demand he sell crumpets or something? This is a Maulers stand, go set up your own stand if you wanna root for the Harpies."

"Least you got a sense of the quality." They concede, nodding to Alfie as he compliments the scarf quality. "No reason you can't support the Harpies and the Maulers, a good scarf's a good scarf." They grin. "We're not far off from wearin' the League down to give us association status I tell ya. Then East Anglia can finally 'ave a team again! Proper justice!"

"Anyway Cheap an' Cheerful. They address Alfie with a nickname. "You plannin' to buy that or what? Only eight sickles!"

Rascal would study Jo for a few seconds, her perpetual scowl. The fact she didn't seem happy that Alfie had turned up even though he was mostly on her side. "You one of those lot that don't know how to smile?" Rascal asks curiously, a playful smirk appearing on their face. "You know the ones? They try to crack a grin and they look more like someone sucker-punched a butthole? You've got one of those faces."

@Josephine Byrne
@Alfie Owen

Jo held Alfie's gaze a bit longer than he liked. Long enough that he was reminded of his first assessment of her. Dangerous. Too observant. Hadn't she almost called out his lying once before? What had made him think he could get away with the same sort of lie again?

Hubris, he answered himself. He thought far too much of his own ability to dissemble. It would be his downfall one day. Hopefully this wasn't that day.

"Green, oh aye. A splendid colour that," he said, while wondering if that was really the Harpies' colour or if she was setting a trap for him. He had no idea what a 'seeker' was either, so guessing a proper response to the last bit was impossible. Was he meant to agree? Or should he compliment her team's seeker? That was far too risky, but so was every other response he could think of.

Luckily the salesman in the Maulers' hawking boy did not allow for long awkward silences which relieved Alfie from having think up a response for Jo.


Cheap and cheerful? Alfie snorted. Well, he supposed he'd been called a whole lot worse than that.

"I'll hang onto my silver for now," he said, with the same cheerful cheapness. "Not much call for scarves in August, is there? Quality or no."

But then the bloke turned his quips on Jo and Afie found himself amazed not just by the brashness of the observations, but also the total disregard for consequences.

"Oh mate. You are not going to make a sale."

If Jo was hoping to make progress into the question of Alfie, she was sorely disappointed. All she got was a noncommittal response before the boy's attention was taken up, once again, by their amateur Mauler salesman. Jo felt a flare of irritation at the kid. Not just because Alfie had been distracted from commenting on the Harpies seeker at all, but because there was something a little bit infuriating at the way they couldn't seem to hawk their wares without insulting their prospective costumers. First, calling them 'stupid' if they didn't stop by. Now, calling Alfie 'cheap'.

And then comparing Jo's face to an arsehole.

It took a second for the words to sink in, a second in which Jo just stared, disbelieving, tiny red pinpricks beginning to warm her cheeks.

Up until that point, Jo had thought they were just involved in a bit of banter--of the kind that was inevitable when Quidditch was involved. The bits about the Kestrels rather lacklustre few years, or the Bats' lack of showmanship, and the bit about how the Mauler's surely would be part of the league now, all had seemed perfectly normal. Tame, even. But, really, Jo grinning looked like someone had sucker-punched a butthole? That went way beyond banter.

Her immediate impulse was to set his entire pile of merchandise on fire. Unfortunately, despite her carrying a wand in her pocket, she did not technically know how. The same went for hexes and curses. She'd learned a couple of incantations, but she'd hadn't gotten to try it, and this did not seem like the appropriate moment to risk it failing.

So words it was.

"Merlin, you're an idiot. If your da's so thick, it's no wonder he can't make a real Quidditch team that can afford actual salesmen. You're rubbish at it."