A/N: Reader response (much appreciated! Merci! Dankie! Ndatenda! Etc!) to this story is the only thing keeping this fic going. That and the fact that I can't resist making professors piddle in public corridors ...

I should also say in advance that no kittens were beheaded and brutally mutilated during the writing of this chapter. Just so you know. If you're of a nervous indisposition and all.

Numbered references are explained at the end of the chapter. I've also added explanations to the previous chapter.

Minerva McGonagall piddled in the corner.

The biggest advertisement for having an Animagus form was the freedom it offered. Though she still had to achieve her new Life Purpose of piddling in Albus' slippers.

She hadn't been sleeping much the last two weeks. Guilt bred insomnia.

It had been around their fourth year that the Marauders' pranks began going beyond mere prankery. While the victim was usually Snape, first or second year Slytherins were sometimes caught in the crossfire or as part of House-wide pranks that they didn't know how to counter. Itching powder in bog rolls sounded quite funny, unless it was your arse on fire, and Merlin help you if you were allergic to the stuff. Two second years had to be sent to St Mungo's before the Slytherin prefects were able to counter it. She'd wanted to suspend the quartet for two weeks, but Albus laughed it off and turned it into a week of detentions.

Just because Albus Porkpie Wuggles Jesus (1) Dumbledore was a prankster in his youth didn't mean everything was a prank. She liked a good prank herself, but there was such a thing as consequences. Albus must surely have forgotten the number of times his pimply bum had been exposed and paddled in his Headmaster's office when he pulled off a prank. (Incidentally, it was forty two - she'd checked the records and asked the Fat Friar.)

All the Marauders had learnt from their Headmaster was that pranks aimed at Slytherins - especially those with greasy hair and big conks - could be as harmful as they wanted.

Of course, the final prank wasn't completely their fault. Someone had cast an Aggression Ward, and it had raised their intentions from 'Hex Outnumbered Greasy Gits' to 'Kill The Snape! Cut His Throat! Spill His Blood!' (2). She had considered the possibility that it was Snape himself who cast it in an effort to commit 'suicide by bullies', but that only made her feel worse - did a child truly see Hogwarts as such a terrible place that he'd rather commit suicide than continue learning in it? Did Snape feel that this was the only way he could bring some attention to his situation? And she was the head of the Marauders' House.

Which was why she'd been sleeping in her cat form within sight of the Gryffindor tower for the past two weeks. Even if they went under that bloody cloak of theirs, she'd smell them. They were staying locked up in the tower where they belonged. The rest of the school would be protected from them.

Lily Niamh Evans was sitting under a tree, reading a book in the traditional way. This tradition was that followed by generations of Mudblood bookworms before and after her - disguising it as 'Hogwarts: A History'.

The previous weekend - when she was spending a day with her parents after Sev's funeral - she had slipped away to Knockturn Alley. Her destination was Whore's Words, the well known bookstore and 'Repository of Genuinely Ministry-Disapproved Items'. She'd been wondering if Dark Magic was really as Dark as it was made out to be. After all, she was a Mudblood and her only source of information were Muggle prejudices and pontifications by Gryffindors like Sirius Black and Albus Dumbledore. She still believed it was a Bad Thing, but she was allowing for the possibility that the situation was greyer than she'd imagined.

All of which led to her current reading material 'Sur la Magie Sombre' ('On Dark Magic'). It was written by a Moor witch called Sama in the early 1800s. Sama was in hiding while she wrote it, and was eventually caught burnt to death by the Spanish Inquisition. She'd been expecting to die (3), and the first ten pages of the book were poignant messages for her twin daughters. She skipped those bits after the first page, since crying while reading Hogwarts: A History was suspicious behaviour.

It was surprising, to say the least. She'd never realized that the best botanical gardens in Paris had used Dark spells to keep pests out. She'd have to check that...

Severus Snape liked Chicago. Bellatrix, using her not inconsiderable Trust Fund, had procured an alias for him before his staged death. Unfortunately, she had thought that Fido Dogsbody was a regular Muggle name, which made the alias somewhat less useful than he'd like.

Still, he supposed that if he ever learnt to drive, he'd never get a ticket since the copper - wait, they were called cops here - would be too busy laughing his head off to issue him one.

Fortunately, he was able to get a nice non-documentation-requiring job quite easily, brewing illegal potions to use in drugs for Muggles. It twinged on his conscience a bit, being involved with helping others on the road to hell, but he told himself it was their fault for being on the road in the first place. Besides, it was only for a few months. His conscience protested again, and he ceded his brain to experienced security troops that gunned it down.

He'd also managed to escape having to show his atrocious identification to his new landlord. All he wanted in exchange for Sev's room was a fistful of dollars. Snape noted that the man's fist looked a lot bigger and more menacing than his own.

Needing a name, Sev called himself Mark Thatcher, after an individual of whom he had heard nothing positive (4).

He communicated with Bella using a pair of Charmed notebooks. Ironically, he'd learnt the Charm from Lily. Merlin knew where she'd got it from.

Bella hadn't liked calling him Mark. She liked Fido. Severus patiently explained to her that Fido was a dog's name. She suggested Flipper ("His snout is as big as yours, Sevvikins"), followed by Dumbo, Skippy, and Thumper. He'd been rather relieved by the absence of Bambi on her list. He'd also been very surprised by the existence of the list in the first place - what did she know about Muggle children's stories?

Ah, the hidden depths of Bellatrix Black, pureblood princess... he had a nasty feeling that he was going to learn some of them. It was even possible that undernearth Bella's harsh stone-cold bigoted shell was a soft creamy center (composed of pureed kitten heads, no doubt).

Three weeks after Snape become an ex-Snape, Lily was brewing in the student Potions Lab. She was making a shampoo for the Marauders, one that would cure all their hair problems. (Their hair was a problem.)

The door opened, Bellatrix Black walked in, and Lily's wand was in the Slytherin's hand before Lily could say 'Aaargh!'

The Gryffindor prefect was still holding the knife she was using to cut asphorgusite stems, and she pointed this out to the older student.

Bella tossed her back her wand.

Lily grabbed it, surprised.

Bella took a white handkerchief and placed it on the table where Lily was brewing.

"Pax, Mudblood Filth," said Bella.

"Pax, Product Of A Thousand Years of Inbreeding," responded Lily in kind, after the requisite eye roll.

Bella seemed marginally impressed as she put down her wand. "Eight hundred, actually. If you think I'm bad, you should have seen my great great grandmother. She died of eating oysters."

Lily warily put down her knife and wand as well. "Allergies?" she inquired politely.

"She left the shells on. One caught in her throat, saving the remaining oysters from a gruesome end. Till my great grandfather ate them, I suppose. That's when the Black line began importing Purebloods from the continent."

With this scintillating piece of smalltalk out of the way, the two witches cast an uneasy eye on each other. The Mudblood wasn't sure she could trust the Pureblood because the Pureblood made it quite clear that the Mudblood was an inferior life form. The Pureblood wasn't sure if she could trust the Mudblood because inferior life forms might not be cognizant of proper Magical customs such as Pax.

Still, they hadn't Hexed each other yet.

"How long is this ceasefire going to last?" asked Lily.

"Ceasefire?" Bella had no idea what that meant. Must be a Muggle term. Why was the Mudblood talking about stopping fires now? There wasn't anything burning in the room, was there?

"Cessation of hostilities?" offered the Gryffindor. "The Pax?"

"An hour?" suggested Bella, relieved to see that inferiority did not imply ignorance.

"Yeah, alright. I hope you won't get withdrawal symptoms from not calling me a Mudblood for an hour."

"Calling you a Mudblood isn't hostile, it's a fact."

Lily slapped her head with her forehead. "Look, I find that term really insulting. I consider its use a hostile act."

Bella cocked her head, bemused. "You Gryffindors are crazy. You just admitted to saying that you were unnerved by the use of a single word. That is a weakness. A Slytherin would never admit to a weakness."

"Really?" said Lily after a moment. She couldn't understand how a system built on hiding weaknesses could survive. Surely it would collapse on itself? Weaknesses were meant to be exposed so they could be allowed for and protected against. Though it did explain a lot about Sev's behaviour.

"Fine," acquiesced Bella after watching Lily muse. Inferior humanoids were so difficult to negotiate with. It was easy negotiating with other members of Slytherin. They knew they were below her in civilized society and/or Hexing ability. She told them the deal, they accepted the deal. Simple. Straightforward. Convenient. Witness her deal with Sevvikins. Now, Gryfifndor Mudbloods on the other hand had no sense of the obvious and required persuading.

"Say, can I keep brewing?" asked the Mudblood.

How unspeakably rude, thought Bella.

"I'm brewing a potion to sabotage Potter's and Black's shampoos so that all their hair falls out."

Bella decided this wasn't rude at all. "By all means, proceed," she said without hesitation. "I do hope it's permanent."

"Alas, no," replied Lily with a frown. "It's just for a week. Besides, irreversible effects wouldn't be - er - wouldn't be right. And," she added ruefully, "I don't have the coelecanth scales I'd need to make the permanent version."

"We should talk about that," proposed Bella with an evil grin. "Regrettably, it will have to be at a future date."

"I would welcome that," said the inferior creature with a grin. "So - what did you wish to discuss?"

Bella reminded herself that she wasn't dealing with someone who knew the Right And Proper manner of speaking. Her copy of 'The Pureblood's Illustrated Guide To Dealing With Mudbloods' said that she would have to reduce herself to more plebian speech to keep the Mudblood at ease and more likely to assist. Right. She could do that.

"I need your help," said Bella, with an internal wince.

Lily almost dropped her ladle, but rescued it in time.

"Er - what? Sorry, I'm a little surprised. How can I help you?"

"I find myself in need of a guide to the Muggle world. With all due Pax secrecy, you understand. Including accompanying me to various locations at my expense for a months in the upcoming summer. With the option to extend the - " Bella paused, trying to remember the correct term. "- field trip."

Lily's mouth had a lovely little miniature cottage in it with a sign that said 'For Sale. Immediate Occupancy. Flies Welcome.'

"If it makes you more comfortable, we won't be the only ones on this trip. I'll bring a friend along. I call him Fido."

References:

(1) According to certain interpretations of interpretations of interpretations of fact, Brian was the Important One and Jesus was the guy born next door who got all the credit/blame. For more on this, see the published works of Chapman, Idle, Gilliam, Jones, Cleese, Palin, Innes, and Cleveland.

(2) See William Golding's Lord of the Flies, a wholesome children's tale of boys killing boys in a confined environment. The bad little boys worshipped a Hog kebab and sang 'Kill The Beast! Cut His Throat! Spill His Blood!'. The truly terrifying part is imagining how much more scary the story would have been if they'd all been little girls instead. (PS: Has this been done already?)

(3) Contrary to the assertions of the individuals referred to in (1), some people did expect the Spanish Inquisition.

(4) Mark is the only son of Margaret Thatcher (and the reason why he remains an only son). I may have messed the years up a little, as I'm unsure of whether rumours of his notoriety had begun by 1976. But Mark-bashing is always fun. Poor Denny and Maggie...