A/N: Enjoy!

Title: Of Elephants and Silly String

Summary: Minerva wasn't expecting Lily Luna, Roxanne and Lucy to be the next generation of pranksters of the Potter-Weasley-Granger-Lupin family…

Characters: Minerva M., Lily Luna P., Roxanne W., Lucy W.

Genres: Humour, Family

For IWSC – Round 5 – Hogwarts: War

Mandatory Prompt: [Object] Silly string

Optional Prompt: [Animal] Elephant

Year: Four

WC: 2,835 (wordcounter . net)

Minerva had thought long and hard about retirement. When her bones creaked as she walked up the stairs, she wondered if she wasn't too old. When she spoke to Professor Longbottom, she wondered if he wouldn't make a good replacement. When there was an ad in the newspaper for a little cottage by the sea, she wondered if she wouldn't be better there, rather than in her office reprimanding always the same students for always the same things.

But every year, she couldn't bring herself to leave, and therefore faithfully continued her duty as Headmistress of the school. After all, Hogwarts was her home in more than one way, and she was far, far too attached to its walls, its students, its teachers to leave.

There was a moment, however, when she seriously doubted whether or not she had made the right decision or not. Minerva had lived through generations and generations of pranksters, but never any as bad as the self-proclaimed 'Marauders' and Fred and George Weasley. Which was why, when Fred Weasley II and James Sirius Potter turned up on the first of September 2015, she started to worry.

But she was stressing for no reason, as the two of them did definitely not live up to their namesakes, which she was immeasurably glad for. On the contrary both were quiet, good-natured, hard-working students she barely heard any complaints about.

As the years went by, Minerva wondered if the Potter-Weasley-Granger-Lupin family had actually failed to produce the next generation of pranksters, something she would never have imagined, given the trouble she had had with the whole lot of them. But Dominique, Rose, Louis, Albus, Victoire, Hugo, Molly and Teddy all turned out to be perfectly lovely and somewhat well-behaved.

Which was why, when the last of their tribe turned up, she had truly let her guard down. Lily Luna Potter, Roxanne Weasley and Lucy Weasley marched into the Great Hall on their first day at Hogwarts, with three identical pairs of pigtails and three identical mischievous smiles, which Minerva unfortunately didn't identify at first.

Lily Luna went to Gryffindor, Roxanne ended up in Ravenclaw and Lucy landed in Hufflepuff. Minerva didn't think much more of it, as she watched them wave at each other from their new House tables. Actually, she was wondering if maybe after these three graduated, it wouldn't be the right time to step down from the role of Headmistress. She would be able to take her well-earned rest after a calm seven years.

Boy, was she wrong.

It had started off fine. The girls were sweet, polite with adults and got reasonably good grades. About a month in, she started hearing little comments in the staff room about innocent pranks played on one another, but didn't think much more of it. After all, she'd had a little trouble with Albus, Rose and Scorpius but nothing too major. They were children: they were allowed to have a little fun.

In November, teachers were reprimanding them a bit more, and she saw a fifty point loss for each of them. A good scolding from their Head of House was usually enough to calm down any student, so she left it at that.

When they came back from the Christmas holidays, that was when the real trouble started to happen. The elves reported that each of the girls came back to school with a trunk-load of goodies from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes and all three of them were ready to unleash them upon each other. This time, she really started to worry.

It wasn't that the Potter-Weasley girls didn't like each other. Quite on the contrary, she had heard from their professors that they got on marvellously well, that they truly did love each other and that they shared a tender familial bond. It was just that they thought playing pranks on each other was the most hilarious thing ever.

By February, she had called in every single one of the girls to talk about their behaviour: why it was not appropriate to put hair-colour-changing potion in your cousin's pumpkin juice, why you shouldn't attach whoopie-cushions-with-included-smell to your cousin's robes, why convincing Peeves to pelt your cousin with home-made spit balls was not considered acceptable behaviour, etc. etc.

Two months later, she found that her school had become the battle grounds for a full-blown prank war between Lily Luna Potter, Roxanne Weasley and Lucy Weasley. Minerva heard so many complaints, noted so many detentions and took away so many points she was pretty sure that the three of them were worse than the Marauders and the twins combined.

And while most students were greatly amused by this war, as the pranks made on one another often disturbed the professors' lessons, a few of them had been in the wrong place at the wrong moment and had ended up soaking wet or covered in paint or both. The upper years especially, were complaining more and more, as these constant disruptions were disturbing their revisions.

It was a bright Monday morning in May, nearing lunchtime. The birds were singing sweetly of the beautiful spring day outside. At a first glance, everything was calm, peaceful: studious, the way a school should be, especially as the exams were going to happen soon.

Minerva finished straightening up the papers on her desk, and began to make her way downstairs for lunch. Albus had been away too often from the Great Hall, especially in his last years, which she thought was a shame. Whenever she could, Minerva would always make the effort of going down to exchange with the students.

As she walked through the corridors, things suddenly started to get… less calm. There was a faint noise in the background. Nothing unusual, though perhaps it was slightly louder than usual. But then Minerva realised that lunch hadn't started yet, that the students were still in class, and therefore there shouldn't be any noise. This made her start to panic, just a little.

A portrait to her right was sobbing. Minerva stopped and frowned. A sixteenth-century witch was sobbing in the arms of a half-naked Venus. Clearly, something was going on, as the two did not belong in the same painting.

"There, there, Maria, it's going to be okay," Venus said.

"But—But," Maria said between tears, "My poor painting, my poor painting!"

"I know, they'll fix it, they always do," she soothed.

"What's happening?" Minerva asked.

Venus looked up at her. "Oh, Headmistress. It's absolutely terrible, in the Great Hall."

"What?" she exclaimed.

"Look at what they did to my dress!" Maria cried and showed the front of her apron.

Much to Minerva's surprise, it was stained hot pink, neon yellow and acid green; definitely not colours usually found in Renaissance paintings. She'd never heard of anything from the exterior that could stain the inside of the painting. Pens and paint usually didn't leave a trace, as the portraits were enchanted, and yet she had the proof of the opposite here.

"But the Headmistress will fix it," Venus reassured her friend. "Won't you?"

"Of course," Minerva said, but she knew she needed to leave immediately.

She started walking briskly through the corridors. The noise was getting louder and louder. Wait—What was that noise? Something animal? She was now almost running, something that made her old bones groan, but she had a feeling this was going to be bad.

She suddenly saw a student come running towards her. "Bukhari, what's wrong?"

The Sixth-Year Ravenclaw Prefect stopped in front her and struggled to catch their breath. "Lily Luna—" they managed through puffs, "Lucy and Roxanne, they're causing havoc in the Great Hall. It's been fifteen minutes now!"

"But why hasn't anyone taken care of this yet?" she demanded.

"No one can seem to open the door!" they told her.

Minerva blanched. Oh, Merlin. What was going on?

"We were desperately trying to find you, you've got to stop this!" They were almost begging her.

The noise sounded in the corridor again, and Minerva identified what animal was making it, but could barely believe her ears. An elephant? How the heck had they gotten an elephant in the castle?

"Thank you, Bukhari," Minerva told her student and continued to run down the corridor.

Finally, she was in front of the Great Hall. The doors were sealed shut but Minerva could very literally hear explosions and an animal stampeding around in there. She tried to open them, but they wouldn't budge for her. Somehow, these First-Years had managed to get the doors to stay fast shut.

Thankfully, she was Headmistress, and that had some advantages; her magical core was deeply linked to the castle's. She paused for a moment, and asked the castle politely—it was very insistent on politeness—to open the door. Thankfully, she heard the lock click and she managed to wrench them open. They seemed to have been stuck together by something very… yellow? The same yellow that had been on Maria's apron?

But Minerva quickly stopped focusing on the sticky substance when she saw just exactly what was happening in the Great Hall. Lily Luna, as well as all of the walls, floors, cutlery and tables were covered in the pink, green and yellow slime. Lucy was running around yelling at the top of her lungs with three strange looking cans, though she could see a lot more of these littering the floors all around. And Roxanne seemed to be riding a baby elephant?

It was chaos. Pure and simple chaos and it was probably going to end very badly.

"I'm going to get you, Lucy!" Lily Luna bellowed at the top of her lungs, chasing after her cousin.

The baby elephant, alarmed by the shout, suddenly began to barrel out of control. "Watch out!" Roxanne yelled, as she did her best to hold on to the poor creature.

"Ahhhhh!" Lucy screamed as she saw the elephant coming straight at her. Out of panic, she pressed down hard on the can in her hands and a sticky substance came streaming out of it and all over the paintings, and Minerva, who was standing right in front of the girl.

Minerva yelped as the green goo descended upon her. It smelled absolutely horrible and tasted even worse.

"WHAT," she shouted, "IS GOING ON HERE?"

The girls stopped yelling and running around. Even the baby elephant stopped, shocked by Minerva's fury. All four of them stared at her, looking positively surprised at seeing her there. Lucy's can gave a pathetic wheeze, rendering the last of its green stuff on the floor. She glared at her three students.

"Headmistress—" Lily Luna said pathetically.

"My office. Now," she growled.

Minerva glared at the three students in front of her. They were looking guilty, which was what she wanted, but there still was the occasional snicker from one of them, which had the three shoot each other conspiratorial glances and smile, quite pleased with themselves.

"Headmistress," Lily Luna started, as she often did. She was usually the one who tried to get them out of their scrapes, being the most confident to speak up. "We really didn't mean for this to happen."

"Miss Potter, I hardly believe that," Minerva said.

"Well, it was only supposed to be a little harmless prank..." Lily Luna tried to justify.

"Yes!" Roxanne agreed. "It's not exactly our fault if we had to run away from Lucy, and she chased us into the Great Hall."

Hearing this, Minerva couldn't help but notice once again how Roxanne had been the one to inherit her father's look of perfect innocence—how naïve she had been to believe that Fred II would be the prankster. Roxanne usually was the one out of the three of them who was the mastermind behind their pranks, a real Ravenclaw through and through.

"Hey!" Lucy exclaimed. "You're making it sound as though it's all my fault!"

"Well… It kinda was," Roxanne pointed out.

"No, it wasn't. I didn't ask you to run into the Great Hall. You could've gone outside."

"But—" Lily Luna started.

"Girls, you will sort this out later between yourself," Minerva interrupted. "For the moment, you are all just as guilty to my eyes."

"What!" Lily Luna and Roxanne agreed, while Lucy looked quite smug.

For someone who had been raised by Percy Weasley, Minerva had been most surprised by Lucy. Her older sister Molly, was perfectly well-behaved and was probably going to be named Head Girl. Lucy, on the other hand, was mischievous but also the most anxious not to hurt anyone during their pranks. Still, it made Minerva wonder just exactly what Audrey Weasley was like.

"Do not argue with me!" Minerva exclaimed. "Do you know how much damage you have created?"

The girls looked up at her, their brows creased, worry painted on their faces.

"The Great Hall is a wreck, and lunch will have to be delayed. You have stained most of the paintings there too, which we may not be able to restore, and some of the others have been severely damaged because of the baby elephant! And you have even covered me in this horrible substance!" She glared at them. Evanesco had not been enough to rid herself entirely of the not-found-in-nature green goo. She was sure the fact that some of it was still stuck in her hair was diminishing her authority.

The girls lowered their eyes, after such an accusation.

"What is it anyway?" she demanded, picking up one of the cans that were on her desk. Silly String it read. She frowned; she'd never heard this name before.

"It's Silly String, ma'am," Lucy explained. "It's a Muggle thing they use at parties to have fun."

And that's when she let out a nervous giggle. The other girls quickly caught on and the three of them were now doing their best not to giggle outright in front of her.

"This is no laughing matter!" Minerva scolded, but the girls barely stopped. They were still trying to suppress their smiles, but with difficulty. "Where did you get them?"

"Mum gave them to me for Christmas," Lucy admitted quietly.

Minerva decided that she really needed to meet Audrey Weasley. "Very well. I'm very disappointed in you, girls. I've decided to remove one hundred points from Ravenclaw, Gryffindor, and Hufflepuff. Each."

This wiped the smile off the girls faces and they looked positively stricken.

"But Headmistress-"

"No 'buts', this is my decision. You'll be serving detention until the next holidays."

The girls nodded solemnly in front of her, looking positively horrified.

"And I'll also be writing to your parents."

The girls looked absolutely pale now. Well, that was until Lily Luna whispered: "Just imagine what Uncle George is going is to say."

The other girls giggled. "And Aunt Audrey," Roxanne added.

Minerva sighed. "Girls, please get out of my office before I put you in detention next year too."

The girls quickly filtered out of her office, but they couldn't help themselves from laughing. This was exactly the problem. How could she punish them when their parents were probably just encouraging this type of behaviour? Hopefully the points and the detentions would be enough.

Thankfully, when she went back down half-an-hour later, everything seemed to be back to normal. There were still some green, yellow and pink traces here and there, and some of the portraits still seemed to be stained or ripped, but she knew Filch would tend to them soon. All of the other casualties of their little prank war seemed to be okay again, including herself, even if she had a feeling her hair would still be stained slightly green for the next couple of days, if not weeks, which she wasn't too happy about.

She sat down at her place for lunch and turned to Professor Honeysuckle next to her, who had apparently taken care of the whole situation.

"Thank you for cleaning everything up," she told her.

"No problem, Headmistress."

"I just have one question, what happened to the baby elephant?" she asked.

Professor Honeysuckle smiled. "Turns out it was actually a Transfigured table."

Minerva raised an eyebrow. "You're telling me three First-Years Transfigured a table into an elephant?"

The professor nodded.

Minerva smiled, quite impressed. Though she didn't always show it, she had a real soft spot for any of the so-called 'pranksters'. They were usually sweet, fun, and creative, and were her most memorable students. Though they often created havoc in the halls, she definitely didn't wish for a school full of perfectly well-behaved students.

And they had managed a very difficult Transfiguration in their first year at Hogwarts! Lily Luna, Lucy and Roxanne were probably going to turn out to be three of her most brilliant students if they continued such feats.

But now she was quite decided that after these three graduated, it was going to be time for her to retire. She wasn't sure her back was going to be able to take this havoc much longer!

A/N: Please review!