THE DESCENDANT OF CAERBANNOG
WARNING: CONTAINS MASSIVE PLOT HOLES, SHERLOCK HOLMES REFERENCES BECAUSE THAT TV-SHOW IS AWESOME AND LACKS SENSIBLE PACING! (I started this some time ago with another plot in mind, didn't write on it for some time and when I started writing on it again it got a new plot. )
Part 1: The dare.
It was a lovely and sunny late autumn day. The sun shone brightly and the sky was blue and plenty of flowers were still in their colourful prime. Lovely day to scrimshank and instead just doodle obscenities on the greenhouses.
"Let's do something fun" said James, capping his pen.
"Do you want to steal McGonagalls' crossword puzzles and solve them all?" Sirius asked.
"Not really"
"Come on, she'd be so annoyed!"
"I thought that maybe we could just steal Slughorns' firewhiskey or something"
Sirius tossed his pen and the issue of Playwitch he had used as pose reference in the compost heap.
"Fine"
And so they broke into Slughorns' office. The office was empty, because Slughorn was teaching at the moment. The interior design of the room was very dark and classy, with dark wooden panels covering the walls and maroon velvet curtains framing the window.
"Look, cigars!" Sirius said, having rummaged through several cabinets and drawers. He took a cigar from the box he had found, put it in his mouth and lit it.
"Give me, give me!" James urged, and missed the cigar that Sirius threw his way.
"You suck" said Sirius.
"No, you suck" James picked up the cigar from the carpeted floor.
"You couldn't catch a piece of iron, even if your hands were magnetic"
"Well, you throw like my armless grandmother, so no wonder" James lit the cigar, inhaled and coughed.
"Evans doesn't think I'm sophisticated. If only she could see me now"
When James tried to blow a ring, a fly flew into his mouth and nearly choked him. Sirius put down his cigar when he found a pipe. He proceeded to stuff the pipe with tobacco and then lit it.
"You don't get more sophisticated than this" he said as he went across the room to fetch a velvet robe from the wall.
"Another case closed, my dear Watson" he said, putting it on.
Slughorns' room was full of all kinds of grown-up goodies. A half empty bottle of cheap brandy stood on a small table, for example. Sirius lost interest in the pipe quickly, poured some brandy in a snifter glass and intended to chug the entire content in one sweep, but he could barely swallow a measly teaspoon before he started spitting the rest out.
"That was disgusting." he grimaced.
"You are such a sissy" said James. "Why don't you have yourself a juicebox?"
Determined to save his pride, Sirius downed the brandy that was left in the glass. A moment later he was already having difficulty maintaining his balance and had to support himself on the small table.
"Stop" Belch. "Spinning around, Prongs"
"I'm not spinning"
"Yes you are, and so is the room"
"You mean you're already drunk after that tiny splash of brandy?"
"That was no tiny splash!" Hiccup. "That was a large splash!"
"You are such a baby. Go lie down and let me tuck you in!"
"Shut your face! Go on, you try to drink one cup of brandy in one sweep! I dare you!"
James accepted the dare and did so.
"Oh God, that was terrible" he said, still having half of the dared volume left.
He finished the rest of it. "I don't feel a thing!" he said, tripping on a bearskin rug and dropping the glass so the few remaining drops got spilled out. Sirius pointed and laughed at the clumsiness. When James rolled over onto his back, he was met by a gruesome sight.
"What the hell is that?" he blurted out, pointing a shaky finger at the wall above the liqueur cabinet where several heads of dead wild animals hung in a neat row. A couple of them were of the antler-sporting variety, and one of them was, of course, a pretty stag. Sirius saw it, took it down from the wall and put it in front of his face.
"Prongs! I am your father!" he said eerily, and made Darth Vader-y breathing sounds.
James looked away, not amused in the least. "Quit it!"
"But son! Avenge me!"
James dug into his pockets and got out a roll of fire crackers. Sirius put the trophy down, suddenly slightly paler looking than normal.
"Ok. You win" he stammered.
James produced a flame from his wand and held it threateningly close to the fire crackers. Sirius backed away frightfully.
"I said you win. What more do you want?!"
Then James lit the fire crackers. Several loud bangs followed. Sirius started running around in circles, whimpering in panic as if New Years had come early before he disappeared under the bed and stayed there until the sound stopped.
"You can come out now" said James, getting up from the floor.
But Sirius didn't come out from under the bed. Animagi didn't normally adopt traits from their animals, unless they had been neglectful and not bothered use a scale that worked properly, for example. But a strong sense of kinship was a common side effect.
"The crackers are gone!"
Still nothing. James was about to bend down and pick up the trophy head when Sirius suddenly attacked him from behind and wrestled him to the floor. Several murder threats were shouted.
"You will pay for that!" Sirius yelled.
"What about you? You desecrated my equal!" James hit Sirius over the head with the trophy.
Punches flew. Some were hits, some misses. This continued until they could hear the door handle being pressed down. They fled the room, tripping over each other in the process and escaped through the window. The castle was a very climbing friendly place, as well they knew.
"Why did you take that thing?" Sirius asked once they had made it to the ground.
"I don't know. I want to give it a proper burial" James replied.
"I was just joking when I said it was your father"
They were heading towards the forest. As they passed the green houses, James grabbed a shovel to bring along. On the outskirts of the forests they bumped into Remus, who appeared to not be in the library during recess for a change. He was carrying a large book in one hand and a magnifying glass in the other, with which he closely examined a flower.
"What are you doing?" Sirius asked.
"I decided to pick up botany. Does this look like chives to you?"
"Not in the least"
Remus threw away the blue flower. "What are you doing with the head of a dead animal?"
"Prongs wants to give the thing a burial"
Since they both reeked of fire whiskey, Remus asked no further questions.
"It's not a thing!" James objected.
"Sorry; 'your equal'"
Then James got tired of his equal and threw it away, along with the shovel.
"Padfoot?"
"What?"
"Do you think I should get a girlfriend?"
"If you want?" Sirius searched his pockets for cigarettes.
"Who, do you think?"
"What? You want me to set you up or something?" He stared sadly into the pathetically empty box he found.
"I don't know… Although I know you've always wanted to"
"Can't one of the chicks from the team be your girlfriend?" Sirius searched the pockets in Slughorns' robe next, finding the lack of content more interesting than his lack of cigarettes and James' angst. "Oh, that is just messed up. Hello, full marks on all my potions homework from now on…"
"No, that might jeopardize things. Out of the question"
"Hey Prongs? You wanna put your hand in my pocket?" Wiggly eyebrows.
Sensing an ulterior motif of a perverted nature, James dug up some soil from the ground and rubbed it in Sirius' face.
"What about Janine?" Sirius spat some dirt out. "She's a redhead, too"
"It doesn't have to be-"
"Or do you suddenly want a girlfriend as some ploy to make Evans jealous or something?"
"No!" Although, that would be a bonus.
"That is a very tried and true method, but you should probably stop trying to secretly drug her tea first-"
"Now hang on! When have I ever secretly drugged her tea?"
"I saw you drugging a cup of tea. Then I saw you giving her an identical cup of tea a week later"
"That's because all cups here look the same. The cup you saw me drug was for you!"
"You drugged me? How could you?"
"Anyway, I've kind of given up hope where she is concerned. I honestly don't think it's meant to be"
"No such thing as 'meant to be'" said Sirius, quite reluctantly participating in the tedious discussion. "Your problem isn't that it's not 'meant to be'. Your problem is that you're doing it wrong"
"I'm not doing anything"
"And you're doing it wrong. Did you even read the book I wrote, 'Doctor Love's Guide to the Land Down Under'? I kind of regret the title. People keep thinking it's a travel book"
Remus had a copy of it in his bag, conveniently enough. He gave it to Sirius, since it was taking up too much space anyway and making it difficult for him to find the small spade that he had actually been rummaging for.
"Well, it does have a map of Australia on the cover" he said.
"It's not Australia. I tried to draw a pair of knickers with my left hand"
"I read the back of it" said James. "And concluded it was bollocks and left it at that"
"It is not bollocks. It is based on my empirical studies and experiences"
"Well, I suppose I didn't by your claim that you have a fool-proof program, customized after the over-simplified types that you've mapped out, that 'even the Elephant Man couldn't fail'"
"Maybe that was an exaggeration, but you don't look that bad. If you had read as far as to page 16 you would have seen that all you need is contact lenses"
"I honestly doubt that your shallow book can help me. I don't see how Evans could fit into any of your 'types'"
"For your information, she is type 4: the Ice Queen. All you have to do is follow the program customized for the type"
"That program wouldn't even work for you"
"It so would"
"It so would not"
"Would"
"I dare you"
Accepting dares was Gryffindor code. Bros-Before-Hoes was another. Seeing as this therefore caused Sirius much internal conflict, he decided to pretend he hadn't heard.
"Oh look, chives!" he said, pointing at a daisy. Remus attacked it immediately with his magnifying glass and botanic encyclopedia.
"So you're not accepting the dare, then?" James asked. "Well, I don't blame you"
"I'm sure that the rules state that if the dare-giver shows signs of mental instability, it is ok to pretend it never happened"
"You coward…"
Another Gryffindor code was that if you called another Gryffindor the C-word, you would so regret it. A glare fest ensued.
"If you say that again" said Sirius. "You will be so sorry"
Gryffindors had a lot of pride-and-honour based codes. For example, you did not back down just because somebody else gave you a threat. There for James did say the c-word again. The game was afoot.