GREAT prank
a story co-written with IhaveAbadfeelingAboutThis
Prologue
A red-headed wizarding couple, the man holding two red-headed boys in his arms while the woman's face contorted in pain. Possibly she was once again in labour.
A wand shop, not the one belonging to Gregorovich, and an ice cream parlour not far away.
A short witch talking to Dementors.
Something blue flying around a train with a red engine – he couldn't make out what it was.
A brilliant explosion without any context.
Albus Dumbledore, trying to look serious and angry, but finally failing, bursting out laughing. That beard looked horrible on his face, as did the ridiculous glasses on his nose.
A wedding, a tall blond groom and a bride in a stunning silver dress, clearly both of them of the purest blood of Wizardkind. A witch similar to her, moving into a house littered by muggle filth, laughing, and crying, then laughing again.
A dark wizard, sometimes with black hair, sometimes bald. The snake that accompanied him looked familiar, but she hadn't always been a snake.
A house he recognized from his youth – he couldn't remember where exactly he'd seen it. A rat and the Killing Curse were involved, and a giant, flying away on a muggle vehicle.
A family, perhaps the one he'd seen before, with both parents and several sons displaying various shades of red hair, and a child with emerald-green eyes entering their home. A young woman with the same red hair, catching a tiny Snitch. She was good looking, a warrior if he'd ever seen one.
Intentionally peering into random aspects of the future had once been an idle amusement, a way to kill time during a boring class at Durmstrang Institute; now it was the only entertainment in his captivity. He'd long since given up on any attempts to break out of Nurmengard – he had already thought of every possible way out when he had still been the lord of the castle and not its sole captive. Clearly, he had done his job too well. And now there was nothing else he could do but stare at the future of other witches and wizards, and wait for his own demise.
He'd caught sight of another warrior female, this one with crazy black curls and an even crazier laugh. She looked identical to the one that married into the muggle household. He had seen one of these, he couldn't tell which one, holding a small child with purple and pink hair, and a werewolf, apparently sane, playing with a boy of turquoise-blue hair.
He kept watching, as there was nothing else to do.
Chapter 1 - Albus Dumbledore
It was a quiet morning at Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. The loss of Sirius Black had cut everyone to the bone: Remus had lost his one and only true friend, the Weasley twins had lost a mentor they'd idolized before even learning his true name, his true identity. The rest of the Order had lost their host, the owner of the house they used as Headquarters – a safe place and a shelter to return to.
Albus Dumbledore wearily sat down in the kitchen, eyeing the glass of fire whiskey Black had left on the counter. He couldn't help but blame himself for the loss - he should have joined the battle sooner.
He should have acted sooner. He was late.
Again.
He turned his gaze away from the glass, from the reminder of a life cut short. So many things that Sirius had left undone – would now never do. He slowly looked around the table, mentally populating each seat with the members of the Order. No one would sit in Sirius' seat now. How many other seats would stand empty before this war was won?
Albus had nearly finished his census when he saw it – a bottle of fire whiskey and a tumbler. He sighed. There was no one here but himself and Sirius' half empty glass. And Sirius would have been the last person to judge him for having fire whiskey for breakfast. He poured three fingers and held his glass up towards the glass on the counter. "To sacrifice." And he drank.
Odd, that fire whiskey tasted watery, but its effect was more burning than the undiluted drink. It made him feel guiltier than he'd felt in decades. Who was he fooling? He'd arrived too late to save the one man young Harry could turn to. He had let Harry down, of all people; he had known what Voldemort was planning, and he had done nothing to stop it. Now the child had inadvertently caused the death of his own godfather. Not that the fact that it was unintentional would make his guilt any less, as Albus knew all too well.
'I let Harry make a scapegoat out of himself,' he thought, and refilled the glass once again.
'I have not been this honest with myself since the Aurors came for Dad,' was his next thought, then he stared at the fire whiskey in the large bottle, and noted that it contained enough for the entire Order.
Well, it wasn't like there were many drinkers, these days. They couldn't afford themselves the luxury of not being battle-ready at all times. Even Sirius had refrained from indulging in more alcohol than what could be (no, could have been) compensated for with one dose of sober-up potion. But today... today would be a quiet day after a defeat for both parties. Not even Voldemort would attack - he needed to reorganize his troops.
It wouldn't hurt to have another glass. Or two.
Albus couldn't have said how many glasses he had had, alone in the kitchen, when he heard footsteps, belonging to four feet in total, and he felt the tickle of a Hominum Revelio charm. He wasn't worried about it - why would he try to hide himself? He didn't even put down the half empty glass he'd been nursing. There was no reason to make it look like it was somebody else who had drunk that much of the whiskey. Sirius wouldn't have minded...
Wait, no. If he had heard right and the last official Black heir would be Harry, then he'd been drinking the whiskey of his own fifteen-year-old student. This was bad. Wasn't it? Not that Harry was old enough to have a use for fire whiskey. But still…
The Weasley twins entered the kitchen, a mixture of pride and grief clear on their face. When they spotted their headmaster with the half full tumbler, they exchanged curious looks, before one of them stepped closer. "Umm, Professor? Were you the only one who drank from this bottle this morning?"
"To the best of my knowledge, yes."
This was the most accurate answer he could give.
"Did you talk to anybody since you took the first gulp today?" asked the other twin. How irritating it was that he couldn't tell which one was which.
"No."
"Did you take any of the antidote cookies?"
"I have no knowledge of antidote cookies, but the last thing I ate was last night's dinner, prepared by the Hogwarts elves as usual."
At the mention of that, the twin on the left suddenly remembered to ask, "Have you seen Kreacher today, or do you know where he is now?"
"No and no." His mind was running wild. Antidote cookies? Antidote to what?
And then he understood. He glared at the bottle on the table, as if he could make it not be what it clearly was. How had he not noticed? Its contents too thin and too pale, as if it were watered down... His own peculiar honesty, especially to himself...
Veritaserum.
"How much did you put in that?" he asked, his trepidation rising, settling in his thickening throat.
"Well, Professor, it's not like we are compelled to honestly answer you..."
"Especially not after our little adopted brother just pointed out how little you told him..."
"...or us, now that we think of it."
"But you were our favourite teacher at Hogwarts,"
"Among those who never taught a single class to us, anyway,"
"So, you deserve an honest answer. We found it in Sirius's room."
"Thought he might have been looking for a way to clear his own name."
"His own or Harry's. 'The Boy Who Lies,' have you read what the much renowned Rita Skeeter wrote, backed up by Cornelius Fudge?"
He nodded, and the twins continued after casting anti-eavesdropping charms.
"We thought it would be a proper way to honour his memory if we shared it evenly with the Order. Too bad that you came along and drank half the bottle alone."
"What you drank should have been enough for a dozen of us,"
"A werewolf included," the one leaning against the kitchen door pointed out.
The other cast a complicated spell on a woven basket holding cookies that he'd not even noticed until now. It had to be the same spell Gringotts used to block summoning in some of their vaults. Or at least some variation on that spell. Their older brother Bill must have brought the knowledge home from his job at the bank.
With the antidote out of his reach, the twins sat down on either side of him, as if for a friendly chat. He tried to mute them somehow, but the alcohol he'd consumed prevented proper spell-casting.
"Don't worry, Professor, we won't make unfair use of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," the twin closest to the door promised.
"But there's one thing we've been wondering so many sleepless nights."
There was a moment of silence as both Weasleys looked at each other, as if encouraging the other to speak. Eventually, the one guarding the cookies spoke up, "You have always helped us out, no matter what pranks we played at school, no matter who we played them on."
"Including you! There were those phoenix feathers we glued to your scarlet and ruby ceremonial robe, so that it looked like you had sprouted a tail! That was the night of the Sorting..."
"...in our fourth year. The one Ronnikins and Harry missed. Do you remember?"
How could he have forgotten?
"Yes, of course."
"Why do you let us get away with everything?"
Now there was silence again, no other question that could be answered instead of this one.
"Because you remind me of someone," the Veritaserum eventually forced out of him.
"Family of yours?"
"Close to you?"
"Not anymore."
The twins replied with "Aww..." in unison, before the one with the cookies asked, "Love interest?"
He only fought for a moment before he admitted, "You could call it that."
"But you never got married!" the other yelped. Then, "Did she die early?"
"No."
"You loved a married witch?"
"No!" he replied vehemently.
"A muggle?"
"I wish..."
"Then what ha..."
"George, it's just getting interesting!" the one at the door, so possibly but not necessarily Fred, interrupted. "So, a love interest, not married, not dead, not a muggle... And yet, unknown..."
"Not a witch?"
"Not a witch."
"And not a muggle. Not even a squib girl?"
If he had not been so inebriated, he may well have just turned the boys into brooms. What were they thinking, drugging him with truth serum and now playing Twenty Questions? Not that the twins were likely to stop at twenty… And they were not trying to figure out what spell he was thinking of. No, they were unearthing his most private feelings – feelings that he didn't admit to himself, even on a good day.
It was George who figured it out, after half a minute of silent musing. "Wizard."
"Yes."
"Come on, professor, that's nothing to be ashamed of, unless, he is, I don't know..."
"Not You-Know-Who, is it?"
Ha! If only things were that simple. If only he loved a man so easy to despise, a man whose true nature was so transparent...
"If only..."
There was a second round of "Awww."
"There's no call for you to mock me," he quietly pointed out. Apparently, the Veritaserum allowed him to talk about something other than what'd been asked, and what he had stated was the purest truth.
"But we want to help you, Professor."
"You cannot."
"Is he dead?"
"Did he reject your company this year?"
"No and no."
Fred scratched his head.
"We're on the wrong track."
"Maybe. Professor? If we manage to figure it out, would you prefer for us to obliviate you so that you won't feel bad for telling us?"
He was not concerned about his feelings as much as he was with what these boys would think of him. But since they had already found him inebriated, and heavily dosed with Veritaserum, there was no saving his dignity or his reputation. And, as they'd pointed out, there was a reason he'd never stood in their way.
"That would save me some embarrassment."
After a relieved sigh from both young men, the one still guarding the cookies asked, "Have we ever met him?"