53 Chapter 51 - Reactions

***** Bonus Chapter #3 ***** A/N: Went out to lunch with my coworkers, and got a little buzzed. So my apologies, but this is unedited ahaha. Also.... Ya I had to use the Gladiator quote LOL. Fit the situation too perfectly not to ahahaha (^.^). Anyways, next chapter coming later. Hope you all enjoy! *****

The task had started out quite exciting.

Khan had begun with a cool bit of transfiguration, turning a piece of stone, into a live animal! It looked like he was trying to get the dragon to chase it, and lure it away from the eggs, but to no success.

Harry then watched in awe, not noticing that Fleur and Krum had joined them outside the First Aid tent, as Khan showed off his movement skills, flashing back and forth, dodging the fireballs and fireblasts launched by the angry dragon.

But the task went on it's head, as Khan slipped, mid 'flash' dodge, and wiped out.

Both Harry and Hermione were quite nervous for their friend, as hopefully he did not injure himself during his wipe out.

Cheering along with the rest of the spectators, as Khan got to his feet, Harry didn't notice the Thunder clouds until it was too late.

Lightning fell directly into the enclosure, temporarily blinding everyone watching.

When everyone got their vision back, what they saw was a giant red lightning construct, that looked like a strange mix of a horse with a dragon head and antlers.

"Is that a Qilin…." Harry heard Hermione mumble, wonder evident in her voice.

"What is a qilin?"Harry followed up, interested in Khan's new spell.

"Its an ancient magical creature, even popular in muggle Asian folklore and mythology." Hermione responded, having of course, read a book on ancient magical creatures previously. "Although, it's rumored to be extinct, as one has not been seen in the wild in 100s of ye-"

*ROOOOOAAAAR*

Hermione was interrupted by the Hebridean Black Dragon standing up to her full height, spreading her wings out wide, and roaring at Khan and his new magical lightning construct, in a clear attempt of intimidation.

Fleur meanwhile was getting quite hot watching Khan, and his display of elemental magic. To harness Lightning, and manipulate it into a construct was an incredibly complicated bit of magic, especially when you consider the volatility of that element.

Hermione, Harry, Fleur and Krum all let out a collective *GASP* with the crowd, as the dragon then suddenly took flight, flying to the opposite end of the enclosure, far away from her eggs.

What followed was 2 magical blasts, that were nothing short of legendary.

The Hebridean Black let out a humungous Fireblast from her mouth, blasting Khan's Lightning Qilin into smithereens.

At the same time, the Qilin was able to let loose its own Lightning Blast from its mouth, literally shocking the dragon, and sending it crashing down to the ground.

"He did it!" Harry screamed in clear excitement. "Did you see that Hermione!? He just took down a dragon!"

Hermione meanwhile was jumping up and down, cheering along with the rest of the crowd, as they all chanted their friend's name.

"Khan! Khan! Khan! Khan!"

They both watched excitedly as Khan, who had triumphed in direct combat against arguably the deadliest of the 4 dragons prepared for the champions, slowly made his way over to the golden egg, to collect his victory spoils.

Fleur meanwhile, was imagining herself as a Princess, with Khan heroically battling a dragon to win her hand, and take her in marriage. With Khan's legendary showing and powerful magic display just now, Fleur felt herself falling even more for the Asian student, her intentions moving from simply being romantically involved with him, and jumping straight to marriage.

Krum meanwhile, was secretly watching Hermione jumping up and down out of the corner of his eyes, cheering for Khan, right beside Harry.

Harry and Hermione then watched Khan, to the sounds of the crowd reaching an all-time-high in terms of noise-level, as he picked up the Golden egg with a frown, before shrinking it, and placing it into his pocket.

Harry looked at his own rather large golden egg, sitting on the floor right beside himself and Hermione. He didn't even think of shrinking it....

"Reducio!" It seemed Hermione was thinking the same thing, and was copying Khan, casting the Shrinking Charm on his egg.

"Thanks Hermione." Harry bent down to grab his now shrunken egg, putting it into his own pockets for safe keeping.

When he got up, to look back at Khan, he noticed the dragon eggs had gone missing, and Khan was using his 'flashy movement ability' to move closer to the incapacitated dragon.

Harry watched, stunned as Khan took out that magical Sack of his that transported all his battle beasts, and proceeded to put the dragon inside of it, before turning back to stare at the Judges across the Enclosure.

Harry and Hermione had already stopped clapping and cheering, stunned into silence by Khan's current actions.

And it seemed, the rest of the crowd, was soon following suit, stunned into silence by Khan, and his uncomfortable stare down of the tournament judges.

"The storm clouds haven't dispersed yet..." Harry heard Hermione comment, in observation of the thundering storm-clouds still overhead.

"L-L-Lord K-K-Khan...." Bagman stammered out.

He had previously casted a 'Sonorus!' on this voice earlier as the commentator for the first task, so naturally, everyone heard him.

"The d-d-dragon-" He began to ask, before ruthlessly getting cut off by Khan.

"Is now mine, as are her eggs. I will keep her and her kind safe since clearly, it was a mistake trusting you all with their care."

Hermione and Harry's eyes met, staring at each other uncomfortably, as they could tell, their good friend was quite pissed off.

He had spoken quite softly, but Harry could hear him quite clearly, even from the first aid tent, the rage bubbling underneath his voice quite evident.

And it seemed, from the deafening silence from the surrounding crowd, that they too could tell, Khan was quite angry.

In fact, Khan appeared to be working himself into a frenzy, thunder and lightning echoing his mood, crying out in anger.

"Nothing to say? No laughing? No smiles? Why aren't you laughing Bagman?"

Harry watched as Khan used the same spell that he himself had just used in the First task: the Summoning charm, summoning the broken pieces of the dragon egg, and holding it high over his head.

"Oh shit....." Harry now realized why Khan was so upset; it was the same reason he had ambushed and attacked the Dragon Tamers that previous night after all.

Khan had used the Imperius Curse last time as well, and that was just from the Tamers stunning the Mother Dragons.... Would he escalate even more, now that actual dragon eggs were destroyed?

"Is this not why you ORGANIZERS used real using mother dragons, with their real dragon eggs, or this task? A crushed dragon egg, all simply for your entertainment.... this is what you all wanted right???"

Harry and Hermione were slightly shivering at the display, Khan's magic raging out of control, arcs of lightning shooting out of the Storm clouds above, echoing Khan's mounting rage.

Fleur meanwhile, felt herself getting hotter. Subconsciously she started to release more allure, her magical Veela core reacting to the strong display of magic put on by Khan, and her Veela instincts screaming at her to mate with him.

Krum himself a flight master, could feel the changes in the atmosphere, and knew this storm was more than a magical display; it affected the very weather itself.

While himself and Harry were currently tired for first, Krum had no doubt that his biggest competition would be Khan.

"WELL WHY AREN'T YOU LAUGHING??? WHY ARE YOU CHEERING??? ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED? IS THIS NOT WHY ARE YOU HERE?"

Khan's voice boomed out with power, thunder and lightning echoing his emotions, crashing into the enclosure from the storm clouds above.

Harry, quite intimidated now, with Khan's display, decided to glance towards the judges, to see how they were reacting.

Bagman appeared quite terrified, looking pale with his body slightly twitching in spot, especially with Khan seemingly targeting him as one of the organizers of this tournament.

Crouch as usual lately, appeared bored with the entire thing, even with Khan's magical outburst.

Madame Maxime seemingly appreciated Khan's actions, as Harry spotted her next, sporting a large smile, especially at Khan's aggressive showing when claiming the dragon and her eggs.

Harry supposed that made sense; with her being Half giant like Hagrid, she too valued strength and power.

When looking at the final 2 judges however, Harry was slightly puzzled.

Dumbledore of course, appeared unfazed by the outburst, outwardly anyways. He had a small smile on his face, and his eyes were shining bright with his ever-present twinkle.

Karkaroff meanwhile, appeared quite upset and uncomfortable with Khan and his actions.

Looking back at Khan, Harry watched as he fired the Dragon egg remains at the judges with an overpowered depulso, covering them in silver egg shells and green slime, before calling out "You disgust me." and teleporting away in a bright flash.

While Harry was somewhat used to Khan's angry outbursts, having witnessed him verbally dismantle the ministry and Aurors during the World Cup, as well as angrily attacking the dragon tamers, misunderstanding their hard-handed actions, this most recent outburst shocked Harry to his core.

He was used to viewing Dumbledore as an all wise, all knowing, and omniscient type of person.

But listening to Khan's words, and looking upon Dumbledore now, covered in eggshells and slime, looking quite ashamed, Harry was beginning to realize that perhaps Dumbledore made a few mistakes sometimes as well.

A mother dragon protecting just the golden egg would be just as exciting after all. There was no need to endanger baby dragon eggs simply for realism, or entertainment.

Hermione meanwhile, was having a similar revelation to Harry, only hers was somewhat more impactful, herself overly respecting of authority previously.

Not just with Dumbledore, Hermione tended to trust and overly respect, those in positions of power, never questioning and immediately assuming they are correct/deserving of respect.

But after spending time with Khan's beautiful magical beasts, and listening to his angry rant, she too felt disgusted with the tournament organizers, as well as Krum, who had been the culprit to destroy the dragon eggs in the first place.

Speaking of Krum, he had grown a lot paler listening to Khan's angry speech. He had been the one to destroy the dragon eggs after all, shooting the dragon in its eyes, causing her to subsequently crush her own eggs.

While he was previously considering joining Khan's Summoners Court tournament, he now was silently planning to avoid Khan the rest of the triwizard tournament, not to mention also hoping that one of the tasks would not be a dueling event.

Although he knew dark magic from his Drumstrung education, in addition to being a world class athletes, he was not confident of his chances to survive a direct confrontation with Khan.

The remaining champion Fleur, found herself falling even more in love with Khan, if that were possible.

As if his looks, family house power, magical power, and gentlemanly demeanor wasn't good enough, Fleur found herself falling for his protective nature, especially over magical beasts.

The magical world being quite literally racist, Veelas were often considered magical beasts, and a lesser species to wizards, similar to goblins and centaurs.

To see someone so magically and politically powerful, so protective of magical beasts, like Khan was, to the point he risked offending the not just the English Ministry, but the 3 headmasters of europes biggest magical schools, caused Fleur to completely fall for Khan.

This would unknowingly cause her Specialized Veela magic to even begin changing her, in order to make her a more suitable mate for Khan.

In the next few days actually, Fleur would begin to lose her French accent, her Veela magic making it easier for her to speak and understand English, as to better communicate and attract Khan.

*** A/N: got tired of writing Fleurs accent. So this is my quick solution. Gotta love magic ahahaha ***

Back at the Judges table, both Madame Maxime and Crouch appeared quite uncaring about the Dragon egg remains, Maxime due to the fact that she too was unhappy with the English ministry's usage of live dragon eggs, France being especially protective of magical beasts, and Crouch due to his being under the Imperius curse, cleaning them off quickly with a wave of their wands.

Dumbledore meanwhile, appeared quite embarrassed with the entire situation, cleaning up the mess on himself quickly, with a bit of windless magic. Although it had not been his idea to use dragons, the headmasters being uninvolved with planning the tasks, due to possible risk of cheating, he had known about it, being the hosting headmaster.

Although Khan was quite disruptive just now, Dumbledore understood his anger, especially with his friend Poppy Sweeting being the last rumoured dragon rider.

Karkaroff meanwhile, appeared quite pensive, not even bothering with the mess of dragon egg remains on him. Nobody knew what was going on in his head.

Bagman unfortunately, was still quite shaken, especially being named directly by Khan. Unfortunately for him, it had also been his idea to use live dragon eggs, to add to the realism and truly make the dragons protective over the golden egg. He secretly hoped that Khan would never find that particular detail out.

"Dumbly-dorr, we never got to give Lord Khan 'is scores." Maxime who had grown fond of Khan, especially after his care shown towards her students on the first day, inquired about Khan, still wanting to continue and finish up the first task, despite Khans outburst and subsequent disturbance.

"Yes, of course!" Dumbledore, once more playing host, was happy to get the show on the road. "We can give our scores now, and I trust that Prof. Flitwick, his mentor, will pass it along to Khan himself."

Looking at Flitwick pointedly, as the diminutive Professor nodded his agreement, Dumbledore then turned to the rest of the judges.

"I would ask you all to consider Lord Khan's outburst not part of your judging evaluation criteria. The task had been adequately completed at the time of his outburst, and he was simply voicing his displeasure, as is his right, as head of an Ancient and Noble house." Dumbledore requested of the the other judges, hoping that Jordan would not get penalized.

Nodding their agreement, the judges proceeded to then shoot their scores into the air, ribbons blasting out and twisting themselves into numbers.

9, 10, 10, 9, 8!

A perfect score Dumbledore and Madame Maxime.

9s from Bagman and Crouch.

Even Karkaroff had given an Khan an 8, the other champions (other than Krum of course who received a perfect 10 from him) receiving no higher than a 6.

"Well, there you have it folks! Jordan Khan from Hogwarts leads the way after a spectacular first task, with a score of 46!" Crouch announced back in his commentator mode, eager to be finished of this task, and leaving Hogwarts grounds. "Right behind him, tied for 2nd place, we have Harry Potter and Viktor Krum, with a score of 40 points each. And in last, but certainly not least, we have the lovely Fleur Delacour with 39 points!"

Turning to address the remaining champions, all located just outside the nearby medical tent, Dumbledore continued.

"Well done all of you!" Dumbledore announced. "Now just a few quick words for our champions. I trust that one of you, will share this with out other champion, Lord Khan?"

Both Fleur and Harry nodded immediately in agreement, before Dumbledore continued.

"Excellent… now you will all have a nice long break before the 2nd task. It will take place at 9:30 on the morning of February 24th, and those golden eggs each of you have rescued, will be your clue for the next task. Do you see those hinges on the side there? Well that's where they open to reveal the clue for the next task."

"Is everything clear as mud?" Dumbledore finished with a smirk on his face at his little 'dad-joke', happily watching as the champions nodded the understanding in response. "Excellent. Well off you all go then!"

He clapped his hands, dismissing everyone and officially ending the first task.

Harry left joined by Hermione, as they started to walk back around the edge of the Forest, towards Hogwarts.

As they rounded the next clump of trees however, where coincidentally was the place Harry had first heard the dragons roar the previous night, a witch kept out in front of them.

It was Rita Skeeter, wearing acid-green robes, her Quick-Quotes Quill in her hand, ready to finally talk to Harry Potter privately, especially with the annoying Lord Khan now gone.

"Congratulations Harry!" She started off quite friendly, beaming at him. "I wonder if you can give me and the readers at the Daily Prophet a quick word? How did you feel facing the dragon? How do you feel about the fairness of the scoring?"

Grabbing Hermione's hand, he turned to Rita to state before leaving.

"Yeah, you can have a word." Said Harry savagely, learning from Khan's frequent outbursts, not to take BS from people, especially those you care little for.

"Goodbye."

He turned and marched away, hand in hand with Hermione, back to the castle.