AN: Sirius/OC = the bombs. Just a cute, fluffy fic about romance and revenge, centred around a witty Gryffindor with brown hair, freckles, and killer amounts of sass.

Please review and I'll love you more than pumpkin pie! It only takes a moment, and it motivates me, so I promise it's worth it!

I own nothing other than Franky. Alas, I don't own a single part of Sirius, and it's a hard life to live.

xx

This wasn't supposed to happen.

It had all been going so damn well, too. Everything had been perfect, bloody perfect, going just the way she had wanted it to. Francesca Pond had managed to turn Hogwarts upside down and backwards, and it was brilliant, bloody brilliant, and now it wasn't.

"I think I should just inform you all of the fact that this whole situation," she waved her hands in frantic circles in the air, gesturing to the disastrous ruin that was the room around them. "Was, in no way, shape or form, my fault. Well...I suppose it was partially my fault, but I mean, come on. No one person could cause this much destruction, right? I mean, you'd have to be seriously incompetent to botch something up this bad, and I don't think what I did was really all that terrible."

The words were supposed to make everyone a little less furious about the whole disaster-that-must-not-be-named, but as she stood at the front of the room with hundreds of angry eyes trained at her Franky had the slightest inkling that it hadn't worked all that well.

Clearing her throat and shifting on her feet awkwardly, the brunette gave her classmates a half-hearted smile, not all that shocked when no one returned it.

Right. Time to switch tactics.

"If you're going to blame anyone, blame him!" She jabbed her finger to the right corner of the room, where Sirius Black was giving her his why-do-you-even-try-you-know-they-love-me-most smirk. Git. Franky returned the look with a you're-going-to-get-what's-coming-to-you-you-stupid-wanker sneer before focusing back on the task at hand - scapegoating. "Sirius Black is the one who started this whole thing! Him and Potter and their stupid band of merry men are the cause of every damn thing in this school, and you guys just let it happen! And now...now this!"

This indeed. The Great Hall was a mess, tables overturned and plates smashed. A couple people were bleeding, injuries ranging from random cuts and scratches to broken noses and black eyes. There was even a girl in the corner sobbing hysterically, but come on, clearly that was an exaggeration and what a freaking baby, must be a Hufflepuff.

"All of this happened because the stupid Mauraders couldn't keep their stupid noses out of everyone else's business! Don't you all get it? They're evil, the freaking plague destroying our school! And they think they can just get away with it, and who's the man perpetrator in all of their stupid, cruel jokes? None other than Sirius freaking Black. Well, to him and all his little butt-buddies, I say this!"

And the entire crowd waited with bated breath - either that or they just didn't really care all that much what she had to say, which was much more likely, but Francesca chose to ignore that possibility and do what she did best.

Dramatize.

"For long you sodding, ugly gits have messed with this school! Giving people wedgies, stealing homework, shooting random hexes," Franky paused, directing her glare back to Sirius and giving him what she hoped was a gut-wrenching, guilt-inducing pout that the crowd would simply devour. People loved that kind of thing, didn't they. "Breaking the hearts of innocent girls."

And with those six words, she had half of the population of Hogwarts hooked.

Specifically? The female half.

Angry murmurers filled the hall, and as she glanced back at Sirius' face she gave him a triumphant smirk. Gotcha. Now he actually had the wits about him to look a touch scared (and, if she dared to believe, rather guilty, actually upset. Was that possible? Not likely), shaking his head at her as if begging her to stop. No way was that going to happen - no, nothing stopped Francesca Pond from reaching her goal once things were started. Because the good people of Hogwarts were finally beginning to forget that 1977's Battle at the Great Hall was more-than-partially her fault; now they were simply remembering that it had all stemmed from the Marauders, namely Sirius Black himself, being a no-good, self-centred, waste-of-space prick.

Maybe this was supposed to happen after all.

"Aren't you tired of them going around and crushing people? Making you feel like the most wonderful person in the world and then having them treat you like dirt the next time they find a plaything more interesting?" She was speaking to Sirius and only Sirius now, eyes firm and voice steady as there seemed to be no one in the room but the two of them. "Aren't you sick of them messing with you, playing their immature little pranks that are fun to the observer, but miserable for the victim, a part which I'm sure we've all played at least once?

"Don't you just wish that you were powerful enough to get revenge, real revenge, Marauder-style revenge, and give them a taste of their own medicine? I know I do."

Franky could see it in their eyes - she had them, hook, line and sinker. This was it, this was perfect, this was what she needed to rip herself off the hook and shove Black on it, arse first. He would rue the day he decided to make Francesca Pond the next victim of his charms; nobody messed with her and simply got away with it. The poor sods she went to school with actually thought they were doing what they wanted, and Franky almost felt bad with how she was playing them.

Because now they were doing her dirty work. Where just moments ago they had been livid with her for causing the disaster of the century, now they were gaping up at her with awe and listening to her words with what could only be described as reverence. It was almost pathetic how gullible people were, her own gender especially, but she supposed that when it came to the topic of mutual heartbreak, at the hands of Sirius Black, these witches were carrying a lot of grudges.

Grudges that she was now fully planning on using to her advantage.

Wasn't supposed to happen? Merlin, this whole thing is bloody fate at work. At the end of this battle, I'll have Black's arse handed to me on a silver freaking platter.

"Well, in this hall I can count hundreds of people alone who feel the same way I do. And I'm pretty sure that with a hundred against four...well, I think the lot of you can do some pretty significant damage to these ones, can't you? Not physical, because we're better than them. But we can tear them down, stop them from having the power and the pull they're so ruddy convinced they have, and make them putty in the palms of our hands."

The boys in the hall looked disinterested, save for the nerdy ones that Potter, Black & Associates had spent countless hours harassing, but the girls had whirled around and immediately fixed their eyes on the shaggy-haired Marauder, looking incredibly innocent but also scanning the area frantically for his fellow pricks, only to spot none. Smirking, Franky graced him with a look-who's-won-this-battle-you-over-confident-twit, a look which he clearly did not appreciate but didn't even bother offering retaliation.

Holding up his hands in a sign of defeat, he backed out of the hall slowly, the doors slamming shut behind him with an echoing thud.

Franky should have been feeling brilliant, on top of the world, as she had just moments before. But now that feeling was replaced with the same sense of dread that she had experienced when the whole castle was accusing her of starting the disaster, but stronger, and much more infuriating. The feeling that she could shake for ages, and the feeling that she was sure Sirius Black was more than aware of, based on the smile he directed her way as he exited the hall.

The feeling that no matter what she said or what she did, she was horrendously, irreparably, entirely in love with Sirius Black, and the feeling that he was fully prepared to use said knowledge against her.

She may have won the battle, but Merlin knew the war was far from over.

~ five months earlier ~

Franky sat alone in her compartment on the Hogwarts Express, desperately awaiting the arrival of Lily and the massive supply of chocolates that always seemed to accompany her. The redhead was as much of a sweets-fiend as Franks - likely more, based on the way she carried around boxes of treats in her bag with her wherever she went. It was a little known fact, because Evans was usually seen as so uptight and studious that sweets would probably be revolting to her, but the witch was one of the few people who knew her best friend well enough to know that she actually had a schedule of treats that she rotated, based on the day of the month.

And seeing as today was the first of September, the first day of school, their seventh year no less, it only made sense that their sweet of choice was both of their favourite: chocolate.

Humming lightly to herself, Franky tried to remember the last time she had seen Lils - it had to be in the middle of July, when Potter had claimed to be 'hosing a rocking party' which turned out to actually be a massive set up, leading to the two best friends being trapped in the basement of the wizard and co-troublemaker Sirius Black on what was some sort of awkward double-date set up.

Needless to say, it hadn't gone well at all. Lily had nearly hexed James into oblivion and after Franky had managed to disentangle himself from Sirius pawing at her in a pathetic attempt to try to get her to hook up with him, the two had disapparated back to the Evans' residence and had a nice long rant session about how the Marauders deserved to rot in a tub of their own filth.

James and Sirius had both sent overly-kind, suckup-y letters of apology to the two girls, begging their forgiveness and asking for another chance, but Lily had insisted to her mother that they go on a vacation for the rest of her summer to try and avoid contact with Potter all together, and Franky...

Well, Franky just didn't get Black.

Not just him, but the appeal behind him either. He was smart, but he acted like he wasn't to try and impress people, which was quite frankly one of the stupidest things the girl thought someone could possibly ever attempt to do. After all, who would be less attracted to someone because they were smart, ormore attracted to someone because they were a complete idiot? Maybe that was a completely normal thing, but the inner workings of the normal girl's mind were a complete mystery to Francesca and Lily both, so they simply tended to leave such pressing matters alone.

Then there was the fact that he was so obviously good looking. Not just, wow, that's a pretty nice looking person good looking, but the holy crap I don't think I can be in that person's presence because after just look ing at them I want to run home and look in the mirror kind. Flawless bone structure, deliciously scruffy hair, enchanting grey eyes that were always alight with an air of mischief...

It was just plain creepy.

Nobody was that perfect. Nobody. Nobody who planned on using their fabulous looks for good, at least. Because the only people who were that attractive were super villains and vampires, and they only used their looks to try and get people to think that they were actually good so that they could lure them into a false sense of security before they destroyed them completely.

And that fact led her to the last reason she simply just didn't get all the fuss about Sirius Black - he destroyed people. Well, girls specifically. He courted them, sent them flowers and snogged them in the hallways and made them feel beautiful, and then he ripped out their hearts and stomped all over them for everyone to see. Either he found a new toy to play with, or he forgot about them, or he found some massive character flaw that he just had to point out to them, or he simply got bored, Sirius always ended up breaking the heart of whatever witch it was that he had chosen to take up with, and that was the most likely reason why Franks simply couldn't bring herself to be enamoured with the witch.

Which was probably why he was trying so desperately hard to get under her robes - she was a challenge.

Having got herself all worked up with the topic of her mortal enemy, the brunette witch huffed and sunk into the seat, closing her eyes and attempting to calm herself down before Lily's arrival. Her friend detested the Marauder boys as much as she did, Franky knew, which meant that it was bad to get the two of them into a conversation on the topic; they would go on ranting about the twats for hours, and that certainly was not what the Gryffindor wanted to spend her train ride doing.

What she wanted to do was eat chocolates, laugh with her best friend, and forget entirely about the grey-eyes prankster who had made it his mission to turn her life into a living hell.

Finally the door slid open, and Franky let out a sigh of relief. "Thank Merlin you're here Lils, I've been craving chocolate like mad - Mum's convinced I need to go on a diet so she's thrown all of ours out and for the love of all that's good and delicious, I'm going mental."

However, she was surprised to learn that the voice which answered her wasn't lilting and light, gushing over how she had bought the most delicious kinds of chocolate that money could offer. The voice which answered her wasn't even a she, but rather a familiar velvety purr that, despite Franky's knowing better, sent a shiver through her bones and caused a warm flush pink flush to spread across her tanned cheeks.

"If really you go on a diet, Pond, I'll kill you myself. Curves like that need to be protected at all costs."

Honestly, the fact that Sirius had flopped himself across from her and was grinning, grinning at her like what he thought he had said was actually clever, was enough to make Franks forget all formerly imagined attraction to him all together and remember what she had just been reminding herself of - that Black was a complete and utter idiot, a womaniser and someone who often mistook sheer stupidity and nonsense for clever wit. Was there even a word to sum him up entirely? Prat was the closes she could come up with, but even that was too broad, too generic.

No, she decided, there was a word that could sum up Sirius Black perfectly. Doubtful he knew what it actually meant, but Franky was rather proud of herself that she had managed to nail him down so perfectly with just one little word, twelve small letters.

"You're incorrigible," she spat, nose crunched up in disgust as she fixed her gaze on his cocky grin. Why did he have to look so damn good when he was doing that? Detesting Sirius would be so much less of a task were he not heart-meltingly gorgeous, but Franky reminded herself that his looks were simply a mask for the arse that lay beneath, and again she flushed out all inappropriate thoughts of Black from his system. No way was he going to break down her barriers, and especially not with a charming little smile.

"And you're beautiful," he responded, grin widening as he leaned back, sinking into the cushions as he stared her down. "I'm going to go ahead and assume that by incorrigible you were meaning to say that I'm a charming, handsome bloke with a wonderful sense of humour, and for that wonderful compliment I would like to thank you, Miss. Pond, from the bottom of my heart."

As he placed his hand over his heart and graciously mock-bowed, Franky let out a huff of annoyance. "Actually, I was meaning to say that you're an infuriating twit with no sense of modesty and an ego so large that it surely must be compensating for something," she raised an eyebrow knowingly as she spoke, allowing herself a self-satisfied smirk as Black scoffed, cheeks reddening slightly. "But why don't you go ahead and stick with charming, if it makes you happy."

Take that, you self-assured prick.

"You wound me so, my dear."

"And you revolt me so, my darling."

Each wearing matching smirks, Sirius' slightly more good-natured than the witch's across from him, the two stared each other down until it was clear that the Marauder wasn't planning on moving any time soon.

Accepting the situation with a reluctant sigh, Franky picked up the book that was laying next to her, and pointedly started to read it (although she was sure he could clearly see that she was faking) in an attempt to ignore his presence to the best of her abilities. But Lil still hadn't shown up, and instead Black was there in her place, and it was all so strange that she allowed curiosity to get the better of her will power and the question had slipped between her lips before she was even aware of it.

"Where's Lily, then? She should have been here ages ago."

Now was his turn to cock an eyebrow at her, clearly surprised about something, although Franky honestly had no idea what it could be. Was there something she was missing? Likely, as she hadn't seen her red-headed friend in over a month, but she couldn't have missed something so big that Sirius Black knew about it before she did...could she? That would just be shameful, and Franks already felt her cheeks heating up with guilt at the thought.

"I would have thought she wrote you about it. Lils and Prongsy are co-heads, so they're at the meeting talking about all that Official Hogwarts Head Business and rubbish." Clearly Sirius was unenthused with the idea of his best friend being a symbol of authority, but the witch couldn't care to ask about that - now she was just mentally cursing herself for forgetting something so important to her best friend.

"Of course she wrote me about it," Franky snapped defensively, feeling the need to assure him that their friendship was just as strong as every, thank you very much. "I've just been a little scatterbrained over the past couple of days. Shopping for school and all that - it's been horrendously hectic." Merlin, why had she told him that? It sounded like she actually wanted to start a genuine conversation, and that was the last thing she wanted.

So before he could add anything in about Diagon shopping, which she could see he was clearly about to, Franky tossed in a quick question. "So why are you sitting with me, then? Obviously you know I don't want you here."

Actually, she wasn't quite so sure he did know that, but she supposed he had to now.

"You looked lonely, sitting in her all by yourself," Black replied with a simple shrug, as if that was the obvious answer. "Everyone knows that a pretty girl should never be lonely, so I felt the need to come in and save the day. You should be thankful - I'm sure that spending hours on a train ride in an empty compartment is miserable; just ask Snivellus, I'm sure he'd be thrilled to tell you all about it."

His words were meant to be funny, she knew, but Franky couldn't help but feel annoyed when Sirius made fun of the greasy-haired snake. Yes, he was a racist and a tosser, but he hadn't done anything to James, Sirius and the rest of the Marauders to deserve their horrible treatment of them. It was awful, the thinks that they did to poor Snape, and she knew that it killed Lily to see them done, but the brunette stopped herself from snapping at the wizard across from her. Merlin knew the last thing she felt like doing was arguing with him - all Franky wanted to do was sleep and forget that he even existed.

"First of all, don't ever call me pretty again. And second," Pausing, the girl took a breath to calm herself down before continuing, voice much more level and calm than before. "I wasn't lonely, and I certainly didn't need your rescuing. Unlike some people, I can survive more than thirty seconds without the uncontrollable urge to say something idiotic. Some people meaning you, of course, although it's rather shocking how much you actually do talk, considering you've got your foot in your mouth ninety percent of the time."

There. That should shut him up.

But rather, all it managed to do was send him into peals of laughter, a booming laugh that she was sure could be heard from outside the closed carriage doors. Merlin's beard, what was he laughing at? Franks didn't think her speech had been all that funny- rather the opposite, and now her eyebrows were creased together as she attempted - and failed - to determine what it was that was wrong with Sirius Black.

"You're so weird," he managed to choke out finally, wiping tears from his eyes as he did so. Catching the murderous glare on her face, however, the wizard began to backtrack, holding up his hands in defence. "No, no, that was a compliment! You're not Snivellus weird, you're cool weird. I like it." And then, as if Sirius thought that this was the most brilliant thing he had ever said in the history of his lifetime, his face broke out into a massive grin that most definitely did not send a shock-waveof energy up her spine. "I like you."

For the love of...

No. Just no.

Huffing and choosing to pretend like she didn't hear his last words at all, Franky slammed her book shut and gave him her most intimidating glare. Really, what was it with her today? It was like he had decided that he was going to make her life even more miserable than usual, and it was infuriating her to no end.

"Would you mind leaving? I'm exhausted."

Of course, he didn't move. Rather, he lay across the bench himself, head resting against the wall near the window, and shut his eyes. "Same here. No worries, I won't say another word. I promise - once I'm asleep there's no waking me up."

And he wasn't kidding, as less thank thirty seconds later the Gryffindor prat was sound asleep, snoring quietly as he cuddled himself deeper into the plush cushions of the bench he was sprawled across. Oh, well...seeing no other solution, Franky arranged herself in a similar position, shutting her eyes and sighing contentedly. She could almost pretend that he wasn't there at all, almost like she was alone, relaxed and not in the presence of someone whose face she wanted to rip off.

An incredibly gorgeous someone...

No. A someone who she hated, who was a prick and completely untrustworthy and evil and self-centred, a totally tool who just happened to have a lovely smile.

Merlin, this was going to be a long year.