AN: HI, I'm back and not dead. If you've read my stories before, I took I long break because I was just juggling many things and some of my interests have changed. I'm now writing HP fics instead of ATLA, and this is my first one, so please be kind. I'm also looking for a beta if anyone is interested. Thanks and please enjoy! (and review)
Disclaimer: I don't not own Harry Potter at all. All rights should go to their respective owners.
James Sirus Potter was an interesting boy. Some might say that he was interesting due to his family. He was the eldest son of the famous Harry Potter was not one the public overlooked. Others may say he's interesting due to his likeness of his Uncle Ron. But the thing that he felt made him the most interesting was his constant pursuit for trouble. No matter how many detentions he was given or how many howlers he received, James Potter always found a new and creative way to get into mischievous. That was the exact reason why he was out of bed, after curfew, lurking around the fourth floor corridor.
He had received a package of new Weasley Wizard Wheezes from his uncle earlier that week, and he felt it was his duty to try them out. James knew that this was to be one of his best pranks ever, so he felt he needed to share the love to all the houses. So far he had set up the ones for the Slytherins and Ravenclaws, so the next one was the Hufflepuffs. Glancing down at the Marauder's Map, that his father had given him as a going away present, to check for teachers James silently groaned. No it was not any of his teachers, not even the ancient Filch; it was one of the prefects, the one called Albus Severus Potter. Al had become a prefect just this year due to him turning 15 and it only caused James more trouble. Now instead of just looking out for professors on his pranking outings, he had to look out for his perfect prefect brother. Silently cursing that he was not the brother with the invisibility cloak James backed into the dark wall, hoping that his brother wouldn't notice the 16 year old boy out of bed. Holding his breathe while Al was passing, James thought he had gotten away with it. Only after Al was a good 10ft past James then did he hear, "I know you're there James."
Cursing under his breath, he stepped out of the shadows. "How did you know I was there?" he asked innocently.
"Contrary to what you may believe, you aren't as sneaky as you seem," Albus replied smugly.
"Are you suggesting that I'm not as good as pranking as you?" James said, trying to steer the conversation away from the elephant in the room.
"You know that's not what I suggested. But just so you know I was responsible for Halloween 2019 and…wait that's not even the point, James what are you doing here?"
"I was just getting some water."
"Halfway across the castle," Al asked raising an eyebrow.
"Well, you do know that the Hufflepuff's bathroom have the coldest and best water."
"I thought you had sensitive teeth."
"Damn," James muttered, he had lived with his brother for too long to outsmart him. Well almost. "Fine I give up. If you must not know I was heading over to the Hufflepuff dormitories to….."
"Sorry, didn't catch that last part. " Albus smirked.
"To set up a prank! There are you happy!"
"Very," He replied. "Now, what does this prank involve?"
"I can't tell you. It has to be a surprise," James whined.
"The last time you told me that, Hagrid's blasted ended skwerts were found wreaking havoc on the school. Burning anyone who got in a five foot radius of them."
"Aahh, good times," the older boy said fondly.
"No, it really wasn't. Abby Bones was in the hospital for a weak, with a burn on her entire arm."
"OK, I'll admit maybe that wasn't the safest prank," Al rolled his eyes, "But I can promise you this one is completely harmless. So why don't you just run off on your little prefect way and forget that this even happened."
Al looked exasperated as he often was with his brother. He decided to take another approach, "James, just because I'm your brother, doesn't mean I can let you off when I catch you on prefect duty."
"But Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaal."
"But Jaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaames," he mocked
"C'mon just this one time. I'll totally owe you. Please don't be a fussy prefect like Uncle Percy. Just let me off this one time, "James said, pulling a puppy dog pout.
"That hasn't worked since you were seven," Al responded. James however continued to do this. "Fine," Al said exasperated, "But only if you do my chores for a month when we get back home."
"Deal," James agreed readily, and he continued to look at the map checking for any teachers who wouldn't let him off so easily. Al walked over so he was side by side with his brother.
"And look who comes this way," Al said, noticing the black dot creeping towards them. James panicked for a minute until he saw the elegant label Lily Luna Potter.
"Why is she out here?" James wondered out loud.
Before the former could respond, the girl in question turned the corner and instantly spotted them. "Hi guys!" the cheery third year Gryffindor called out.
Her oldest brother immediately ran over to her and clamped a hand over her mouth. "Keep it down," he hissed. "Do you want us to get us caught by Filch?"
"More like you don't want to get caught," she said, pushing James' hand away, and trying to get the awful taste of it from her mouth. "What are you even doing here?"
"What are you doing here?" James countered. She mumbled an inaudible answer. "Could you repeat that, I couldn't understand," Her older brother asked playfully.
"I was just getting out of detention," she said blushing just as red as her fiery hot hair. Little Lily Potter mirrored her mother as Albus mirrored his dad. In addition to receiving her mom's looks she inherited her temper, along with her dad's stubbornness. Her two brothers learned quickly that whenever she was mad, to stay away. This thirteen year old was not one to be messed with.
Lily trying to change the subject, moved over to her brothers, "What'cha looking at?"
"The Marauder's Map, you've seen it a million times," James said, not paying attention.
"I just wanted to make sure, because Filch is coming towards us," Lily pointed out.
Both James and Al muttered a few choice swear words, and James began to look around for possible ways to escape. He spotted a very old tapestry on the wall that hung from the top to almost the floor. "Here, get behind this," he said panicking because he could now hear footsteps.
He quickly ushered everyone behind it but he quickly realized that there hiding space was quite obvious. James started looking for alternatives and found that there was a door on the wall. He opened it and ran inside indicating for his siblings to follow him into the small space. "No way am I getting in there with you. I don't know when the last time you showered," Al protested.
James groaned and dragged his brother in anyway. His brother still protested but was quickly silenced by a "Shut up! " from Lily.
The trio waited in silence for the footsteps to fade away. James whipped out his wand and lit up the Map just to be sure. He must've found the contents sufficient because he whispered, "Lily, the coast is clear."
Al huffed, "Finally, I never want to be that close to James again."
"HEY," James cried indigently
"Guys," a panicked whisper came from their other sibling, "I can't find the exit."
"Here, let me try," James said from the back.
The sixth year slowly made his way up to the front (with much objection from Albus). He felt all around the beginning of the tunnel, but it was like Lily said, the path was sealed up. James started to panic, but tried to wear a mask of calmness for his younger siblings. He took deep breathes and thought 'what would Dad do'. After a minute of calm thinking, an idea struck him. "Al, shine a light down the other end."
James' suspicions were confirmed. What, he originally thought was a solid wall in the back was an endless passageway. Summoning up his Gryffindor courage he said, "Let's head down that way."
Al looked shocked, "You can't mean down an unknown passage where we have no idea where it leads?"
"Oh, c'mon Al, are you too much of a big baby to go on a tiny adventure."
" No, it's just that I don't think it's a good idea to head down a path in which we don't have the vaguest idea where it goes."
"You've been spending too much time with Aunt Hermione. Besides where's your Gryffindor sense of adventure? Dad did this kind of thing hundreds of times when he was here."
"And nothing ever went wrong," Albus muttered sarcastically, rolling his eyes.
"So, you agree," James said, patting the younger boy's back. "What about you Lily Billy?"
"I'm always up for an adventure!"
"It's decided, now let's get going."
The three siblings started to make their way down the unknown passage. James led with his wand out and lit. Albus followed constantly looking from left to right as if something were to jump out at him. Lily brought up the caboose and kept telling Al to pick up the pace. Cobwebs tangled each of their heads as the time went by. All though James would never admit it, this sort of outing his family and only hoped it wasn't into danger. Not only would his mother kill (or at least have a have a heart attack) if any one of them was to get hurt, he would never forgive himself. James tried to push those thoughts out of his mind while climbing deeper into the now extremely narrow passage. "I bet were almost there," he reassured his younger siblings.
"Are you sure this is a good idea? We've been walking for a long time. Maybe we should turn back?" Lily suggested.
Although the idea tempted him, he said, "How would we get back? It's sealed up, unless you want to blow up a wall and get into a huge amount of trouble. This is probably just like the changing staircases."
They continued to walk like this for quite some time, until James put his foot down and discovered that there was no floor beneath it. Unfortunately, this discovery came a moment too late because he had already started to fall into the pit. On a stroke of luck, James caught a rock that jutted out of the wall, so he was dangling above the endless pit. Lily heard James scream and stopped, but Albus did not react quickly enough and proceeded to fall the same as his brother. When Albus felt like this was the end for him, a strong arm caught him and pulled him back to a rock. He looked over and saw his savoir was his brother and was dangling on the same rock as him. "You ok?" Al whispered.
"Oh, you know just hanging in there," James replied with a smile.
"GUYS!" Lily screamed.
"It's ok Lily, we're fine," Albus replied.
Lily hurried over to the edge and looked down to see both of her brothers still intact. James gave her a small smile. "Lily, I need you to go back and get a professor. Just try to go back the way we came, if you can't get through, try the spell bombarder."
"No, I'm not leaving you two," she replied stubbornly. "Here let me get closer to try a pull you up." Lily inched closer to the edge and both of her siblings yelled, "No!"
"Please Lily, just try and get a teacher. We can hang on," Al pleaded.
"Fine, but if it takes too long, I'm coming straight back."
The red head turned to leave while also trying not to take her eyes off her brothers. Therefore, she ran smack into a stone wall. Lily fell back on her back and rubbed her nose which had collided with the wall. "That definitely was not there before, "she muttered.
"Evert all right up there?" James called feeling the vibrations of her fall.
"Yeah, everything's just great. I just ran straight into a wall."
"Even in a dire situation, Lily never loses that wonderful sense of humor," Al commented.
"Very funny Al," she said forgetting the critical situation for a minute.
She turned back to try to head down the path again, but where there wasn't a wall, there now was. It was if it was slowly creeping towards her, pushing her to the edge and eventually the pit. "The wall's moving," Lily cried in surprise.
James' head shot up as he tried to get a view of Lily, "What do you mean?"
"I mean, where the wall was a foot ago, it is now closer."
James kept muttering, "This is bad, this is so bad."
Albus for once kept his head calm and realized the very possible outcome of her sister falling into the pit with them. He instructed, "Lily, you need to try to destroy the wall with bombarder. It will hopefully blow the wall out, but you need to have a strong footing. It's the only way."
Lily took a deep breathe, bent her knees, spread her feet apart, and yelled, "Bombarder!"
A bright jet came out of her wand and struck the wall dead center. The spell didn't have the desired effects thought. Instead of it blasting through the wall, the spell blaster her back, into the pit.
She screamed, while she fell into the endless pit. Her brothers watched in horror as she came closer to them. Lily out of desperation grabbed both Al and James' legs as she went down. Al hissed in pain when thus additional weight was added. His fingers began to slip as he strained to hold onto the ledge. "James, I don't think I can hold on for much longer, "he whispered.
"C'mon Al, just a bit longer. I'll figure something out. All you have to do is hold on," he said with tears starting to form.
"I'm sorry," Al mouthed.
To his disbelief he saw his only brother fall down into the pit. "Albus!"Lily screeched, now dangling from just James' leg.
James too numb to say anything stared in shock as the form of his brother grew smaller. "James, James?"
Lily's voice snapped him out of his daze. "I'm slipping."
"No, you can't. You have to be strong for mom and dad, ok. Try to climb up my leg.:
Lily did what she was told, but when she was about halfway up his leg her hand slipped. She fumbled for about a minute trying to get a grip. James only looked down to see his second sibling fall. His stomach plummeted when he thought he would never see his family again. It was almost as if his will for life disappeared when he felt his grip slip, and fall the same was as his brother and sister.
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