The Hufflepuff Parade
"I think you're lying!" Peter Puffalump, Head Boy of Hufflepuff, made an angry face.
"No, it's totally true! I swear!" Malfoy put his arms up defensively. "Why would I lie to you?"
"That's a good point." Peter conceded, easily swayed. "You always let me know the mean things that other people like Harry have said about me. I couldn't possibly doubt you."
"That's right!" Crabbe laughed dumbly.
"Mr. Malfoy's awesome!" Goyle seconded the motion.
"So what do I need to do?" Peter asked, all too willing.
"Well you see, it's like this!" Malfoy began, then whispered inaudibly for several minutes.
"By jinky! That sounds swell! Off I go!" Peter shuffled off, hoping the forty-some steps to the Hufflepuff common room would burn off that extra steak and kidney pie he had had at second lunch.
Peter arrived at the portrait of a ham that guarded the seeeeecret entrance to the common room.
"Smork smork! What is the password?" The ham asked.
"1 2 3 4 5." Peter recited what was written on the back of his hand.
Peter was the most popular Head Boy that Hufflepuff had ever seen, what with his understanding of the taxing nature of most passwords that were even somewhat long or complicated.
The portrait swung away, leaving Peter with a secret feeling of longing. Entering the common room, he picked his way through the piles of dirty laundry and empty pizza boxes as he waded to the boy's dorm. He passed the fish tank full of rotting fish corpses and ascended the hazardous staircase that was laden with old assignments dating back to twelve years ago. The sight filled him with warm feeling of nostalgia and joy at the potential for plagiarism.
As Peter slowly climbed the staircase he spotted the lone house elf assigned to the Hufflepuff lying trapped under a pile of old gamer magazines. The children of Hufflepuff had been unable to remember the elf's name, so they just called him Biscuit. Biscuit looked up at Peter with round, imploring eyes.
"Please master! Squeaker is trapped under master's literature! Please help Squeaker, he hasn't eaten in days!" The elf begged for his life.
"My God, that's awful! How could this happen?" Peter yelled.
"Well, Squeaker did speak to master about this yesterday…"
"I don't remember that. Poor thing! Don't worry, I'll help you out, Biscuit!"
"This is not Squeaker's name!" Squeaker sobbed.
Peter waddled off and returned with a dish of cat food and a glass of milk which he set down on the step beside Squeaker.
"That ought to tide you over until the house elves come to clean it up!"
"I am the house elf!" Squeaker sobbed. "If master isn't going to help Squeaker, would master please end his suffering instead?"
"Stiff upper lip, old bean! You won't pass your O.W.L.S. with that attitude!" Peter continued up the staircase, whistling "God Save the Queen".
Peter eventually made it to the top of the staircase. Once he was certain he wouldn't fall prey to altitude sickness, he removed his bottled oxygen and entered the boy's dorms.
Peter's heart soared with joy to see his fellows relaxing after a hard days' failing school. The surprisingly large boys lounged around on their beds, snacking on boxes of Bertie Bott's Every Flavoured Pork Chops and throwing magical darts at a large poster of oatmeal.
"Oy, Peter!" A skinny, pale boy who Peter hadn't noticed at first, waved.
"Why, if it isn't my good friend…ummm…"
"Edgar Oraface!" The boy offered, laughing until he coughed weakly from hunger.
Edgar, having been small for his age, was not able to keep up with the house's daily feeding frenzy and, as such, seldom got his daily required caloric intake. Since he was clearly the runt of the litter, everyone ironically called him Scrappy. The Professors even had a pool going on how long he could survive.
"Ah, Scrappy! Good to see you. Boy, have I got news! I just finished speaking with Mr. Malfoy." Peter grinned, the folds of his face parting enough to reveal a mouth.
"Isn't he the one kind enough to let you know that Harry Potter called you a gay boy behind your back? And that Hermione was telling everyone your mother was a telephone operator? And that Hagrid found you to be too small? And that Neville-"
"Yes! The very same." Peter cut him off. He was about to continue on with his story but suddenly stopped himself and quickly glanced around.
The rest of the boys in the room, being extremely apathetic, continued their daily regimen of not doing their homework and contentedly thinking naughty things whilst splitting their infinitives. Still one couldn't be too careful with the kind of news Peter had to enpart.
"Just gotta nip down to the common room, then, Scrappy. It's top secret, dontcha know!" Peter smiled, giving a little wink.
"Righto!" Edgar followed his slow alpha male down the staircase, past the sobbing Squeaker who had polished off the cat food and milk. They found the common room empty and sat down on the Hufflepuff couch, which was inexplicably covered in dog hair.
"What's so secret then?" Edgar's eyes shone at the potential for something involving moving actually happening in his house. He really should have taken the hat's advice and gone for Ravenclaw, but Hufflepuff had just seemed so much easier…
"I have it on good authority from Mr. Malfoy that there is a creature of great interest lurking in the Forbidden Forest." Peter gave a hearty chuckle and then licked his lips. "A very delicious creature!"
"What?" Edgar felt his insides go cold. There were only rumors of the terrible, terrible things that lurked within the forest, and those tales usually made his pants a good deal wetter... and were usually imparted by Mr. Malfoy, who was only looking out for Edgar's well-being, yet never had a spare pair of trousers handy. Edgar couldn't imagine any of the monsters he had heard described as being very delicious.
"He told me," Peter lowered his voice and leaned in close, smelling like carnation-flavored pork chop, "that there is a unicorn!"
"…You want to eat a unicorn? I don't think that's a good idea, what with them being innocent and all. Maybe we should just find and slaughter a horse. I'm sure it will taste the same." Edgar looked nervous, knowing full well the implications of drinking unicorn blood and assuming eating it was even worse.
"You fool!" Peter hissed. "The unicorn is MADE OF CANDY!"
There was a pregnant pause through which the only sounds were the burbling of the algae-choked fish tank and the quiet sobs of Squeaker.
Edgar, his hunger-starved brain no longer fully-functional, smiled at his one chance to taste candy and get more than his fair share of it.
"We must be careful not to tell the others." He greedily patted his sunken stomach, his mouth salivating. "If too many know, then there won't be enough for us!"
"True." Peter conceded. "So all we have to do is-"
"Did someone say, 'MADE OF CANDY!'?" Jordi Jerkinson jiggled up to their private conference.
"Where ever did you get that idea?" Peter asked, while Edgar hissed and made slashing motions at Jordi and his horde of listening followers.
"Don't try to talk your way out of this! We are Hufflepuff's elite Hearing Club champions! We hear all, especially when it is all caps and related to food!" Jordi snapped.
"You can't keep it all to yourselves!" Flora Faunason, Head Girl, shrieked while pulling her own hair out in clumps.
"Okay fine! I've heard tell of a coveted candy unicorn that has been spotted in the Forbidden Forest. There should be enough for all of us to share I suppose…but I call dibs on the horn because I'm the one who had the information." The gathered Hufflepuff's let out squeals of excitement at this news but Peter raised his hands for silence and continued. "But now that there are so many of us going, we need a plan to get past the faculty, since it's after curfew." Peter checked his watch.
"Why not ask Hannah Helpings? She is the Hermione of Hufflepuff!" Jordi suggested.
"She's the smartest girl in our house!" Flora slowly caught on.
"But I'm second-smartest for having the idea to ask her." Jordi puffed out his moobs proudly.
"I'm already here!" Someone drifted to the front of the crowd.
Hannah 'I Want Second' Helpings was the scourge of Hufflepuff. Not only did she have a much-envied high metabolism, but she also maintained a B- average, much to the chagrin of the grading curve. Due to these facts she was not well liked despite being thin and pretty-ish.
Hannah stood silent for a minute as she pondered the situation.
"I have a plan!" She suddenly pounded her fist into her palm. "Children are allowed out after hours on holidays. If we dress up like we're in a parade and dance our way out of the school, we'll surely make it past whatever faculty member we encounter!"
"Brilliant! That will trick them for sure. You certainly are the Hermione of Hufflepuff." Peter gave her a meaty pat on the back.
Edgar went silent and sullen, knowing he was not to sup on a single piece of the candy unicorn.
Everyone was jubilant as they wheezed up the staircase, past the dying Squeaker who was being devoured by rats. Making it to their beds, the out of breath Hufflepuffs set about making their wonderful parade costumes. However, being lazy and lacking in talent, every single one of them pulled the sheet off of their bed and cut eye holes into it. Because Squeaker had been unable to do his regular house-keeping, each sheet was dyed in festive colours from various food stains. To mark his status as Head Boy, Peter tied a neat-o house elf skull that he found under a pile of gamer magazines to his head.
"All right, everyone! Let's go!" Peter cheered, leading the heavy and labored dancing.
Professor Severus Snape was patrolling the hallways, doing his required supervision duties. He found it extremely irritating and hateful. He had much better things to do than to ensure the safety of the students. He was counting down the minutes until he could go to sleep. Suddenly, he heard a quiet shuffling and stomping accompanied by winded cries of "Happy Wizard's Jubilee!" growing steadily and slowly louder. Rounding the corner, a parade of colourful bed sheet ghosts waddled in what he assumed was a Hufflepuff approximation of dancing down the hallway. He stared in silent horror for a few moments. He was about to open his mouth to end the nonsense when his watch suddenly went off.
"Fuck this. I'm going to bed." He moaned, rubbing the bridge of his nose and shuffling toward his quarters.
"It's working! We're almost there!" Peter huffed in triumph. "Onwards! To the candy unicorn!"
A short hour later found them at the edge of the forbidden forest.
"Did Mr. Malfoy mention where we could find the candy-"
"CANDYYYY!" All of the Hufflepuffs screamed, and flew into a berserker frenzy.
Knocking down small trees, they charged into the forest and spread out in a desperate search for their just reward. Edgar, afraid of missing out of the spoils, charged in as well. The noise attracted a herd of hungry bear-lions. Hunting had been slow for the bear-lions since the term break. With horrible roars and screams emanating from the Forbidden Forest until the dawn, the majestic bear-lions feasted on the flesh of obese children.
"You know, I must admit that I'm getting a little bored." Malfoy sighed, feeling rather depressed at the thought of giving up his favorite past-time.
"How so, my love?" His latest squeeze batted her eyelashes.
"It's just…the Hufflepuffs are so stupid! It's too easy to trick them. Sure, it was funny the first few times, but now I'm starting to lose my self-respect. I dunno…I guess I'll have to start picking on first year Gryffindors." He sighed heavily.
"Oh my God!" A Slytherin third year named Hale Snidely burst into their common room, destroying the painting of satan protecting their privacy. "Did you hear what happened?"
"What?" Everyone responded.
"It's the Hufflepuffs! For some reason they went into the Forbidden Forest at night wearing bed sheets and were slaughtered by bear-lions!" He gasped.
"What?" Malfoy felt his stomach drop a foot.
"They're all dead! In the Forbidden Forest!" Hale looked around wildly.
"WHAT?" Malfoy put his hands on his head, scarcely believing what he was hearing.
"They're DEAD!" Hale responded.
"OH MY GOD!" Malfoy yelled." WHO THE FUCK WOULD BELIEVE THERE IS A CANDY UNICORN?" He dropped to the ground in a dead faint.
The school recovered from the tragedy of the Hufflepuff Bear-lion Massacre by declaring June 17th a day of remembrance. In future years students would dress up in blood-stained bedsheets going from classroom to classroom begging for candy. All in all, everyone agreed that it was a welcome improvement and Malfoy was declared a national hero, much to Harry's irritation.
The End