Chapter 73

The New Definition of Solemn

"You know, I think my life would be a hundred times easier if I became nocturnal." Remus complained resting his head on the small table in the Gryffindor common room, Sirius rolled his eyes as he doodled on them map some more. They couldn't think of a good passphrase to open it, the old one sounded a bit childish to them.

"It might make going to classes a bit more difficult though." James replied, trying to not laugh at Remus' problems, but the difference between how people saw Remus and how he actually was always put a smile on his face. Sirius had asked Evans one time about what people saw them as, just as an off conversation they were having during divination (which James was finding himself very jealous about. Though he hid it better than Sirius had when it came to transfiguration.) First Evans told him very bluntly exactly what she thought of them as a whole, and then, after he explained himself, she told him very bluntly what she thought of each of them, after which he explained his question again, and only then she told them about how everyone seems completely in love with him and James...

And that Remus just looked like a bookworm tag-along along with Peter who just looked like a tag-along.

When Sirius told him James spent a full ten minutes laughing at the thought. Sirius had been pretty amused too. Remus had just rolled his eyes (before returning to practice an enlarging a chocolate frog for their Christmas prank.)

Bookworm is not a word James would use to describe Remus. Sure, Remus reads more than most people but usually it's because he's looking for something, rather than just because he feels like it or he's bored. Remus' free time was usually spent doing the same thing the rest of the Marauders were doing, usually planning pranks or playing games.

Remus hardly ever even got bored, which Sirius noticed very quickly. Remus said it was because he never really had anyone to play with when he was little so he found ways to entertain himself, now that he actually had friends he had more than enough to do and anytime he found himself with nothing to do he could always find one of his friends and do whatever they were doing with them. Between the four of them at least one of them were always doing something, all he had to do was join in.

Sirius had always had Regulus, so he really didn't ever have to entertain himself for very long, and James had all kinds of friends growing up, so despite being an only child as well, he didn't have to entertain himself either.

"It was your idea, James. You think of a phrase." Sirius complained, interrupting James' thought process.

James gave him an irritated glare. "It's your spell."

"Why don't we just keep the old one." Remus interrupted them before they started bickering. He was too tired to deal with them right now.

"It's boring. By the way Moony, James and I want to learn to cast a patronus charm... wanna help?" Sirius asked only half changing the subject because he knew they'd just carry on both conversations at the same time.

"It was better than the nothing we've got right now. And you two are nuts, you know that's like an auror level spell right?" Remus replied, not even looking up. Ridiculous comments were the norm for Sirius.

"Come on, it's worth a shot, besides working hard helps a person sleep at night, it might help you too." James added.

"Whatever." Remus mumbled, "But not right now."

"Well duh. We're trying to find a password for the map right now."

"Sirius, your voice irritates me sometimes."

"That would probably be because he uses it so often." James added, Sirius just smirked at him. "What if we just replace some of the words with something that sounds cooler. Like maybe I swear I'm despicable... or I promise to be a deviant... or I seriously swear I'm being bad... or something."

All three of them looked at him as though he was a moron.

"What?" James looked around, and at the sound of his confusion the laughing began, even Remus momentarily lost his fatigue and replaced it with the tears now running down his face as he attempted to control his breathing.

"You... are such... a loser!" Sirius choked out.

James just sighed and waited for them to either pass out from lack of oxygen, or finally calm down.

"I commit to being bad!" Remus yelled still making fun of James ridiculous names.

"Ya! Well, I'll sign a contract saying I'm atrocious!" Sirius replied, and it went back and forth between the two, their phrases getting sillier and sillier each time. Unfortunately for James, Sirius and Remus both had rather large vocabularies. Eventually James began to think it was going too far.

"Sirius, if you're going to make fun of me don't do it in French." He attempted to save a little bit of dignity. Remus clearly wasn't paying attention though...

"I solemnly swear I'm just a dirty rotten villain!" Remus' continued laughing his head falling to rest in his arms on the table.

"Solemnly swear?" James repeated, pretty sure that Remus was the exact opposite of solemn right now.

"He solemnly swears, James. Solemnly." Sirius said wiping tears from his eyes. "Don't you know, Remus is like the definition of solemn right now." He barely managed to finish his sentence before the giggles began again.

"If that's the case then so are you, mate." James said looking at his best friend, who was now clutching his chest as his lungs begged desperately for air. His comment didn't help any. "You know we should use that. I mean it completely describes all of us, perfectly." He said unable to resist letting out a chuckle as well. "We're like the most solemn people on the planet."

"Okay, but I am not calling myself a dirty rotten villain every time I use it." Sirius replied managing to finally get some oxygen into his system. Remus just giggled some more into his arms.

"How about I solemnly swear I'm up to no good." James suggested.

"I like it." Sirius said tapping the tip of his wand on the map.

"No!" Remus said real quickly causing Peter to jump.

"What? You don't like it? It was your idea." Sirius lifted his wand.

"If we're going to use solemnly swear we have to do it right."

"Do it right?"

"It has to sound like we solemnly swear... duh." Remus explained, still a little giggly.

"And what exactly does solemnly swearing sound like." James said extremely amused by the entire conversation.

"No contraction... It has to sound, like... professional." He said taking a moment to find the right word. "It is a map after all it needs to look professional."

"Umm, why? We're the only ones who are going to see it." Sirius didn't get it.

"No, Si, Moony's right. It needs to sound professional, and old-fashioned... that's what solemnness sounds like. Right?" James looked at Remus and the werewolf nodded.

"Okay, so what do you suggest?"

"I solemnly swear I am up to no good." James said.

"No.. I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." Remus corrected emphasizing the word 'that'. "That's the proper way to say it."

"Oh, yeah, do that." James agreed looking back to Sirius who nodded and put his wand back to the paper. "Any objections, Peter?"

Peter just shook his head.

"We're going to leave the password to hide it the same right? Mischief Managed?" Sirius confirmed.

"Yeah, it sounds fine. It should be like our motto or something."

Sirius recited a spell and wrote the two phrases in the top left and right corners of the paper, the words faded first and then the map itself followed until Sirius was holding nothing but a blank piece of parchment. He poked the map with his wand again...

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." He said, words and lines shot from where his wand had touched filling the map with everything they'd accomplished so far. He pointed at it again...

"Mischief Managed." This time the words and lines shot back to where he pointed his wand and faded.

"That is so cool!" James explained excited at their own talent. "Let me try." They passed it around, each of them summoning the map to the parchment and then making it retreat, before students began climbing into the common room just now getting back from the last Hogsmeade trip before Christmas. The Marauder's had come back early in an attempt to find the common room empty so they could work on their Christmas prank, as well as the map.

All the students came back with bags of Christmas presents for friends and families. Some even took some out to show their friends, or even beginning to wrap them. The common room became very noisy pretty quickly as the evening turned into night.

James didn't mind the noise, he actually enjoyed being around so many chattery and happy people... What he did mind though was seeing Sirius watch all of them. What he hated was the obvious attempt Sirius made to hide how he felt when he saw one sixth year girl telling her friends about the awesome Christmas present she got her brother this year... and how she just knew it would top the really cool present he'd got her last year.

And James knew exactly what he was going to do about it.

Remus gave him a curious look when James stood up.

"I'm going up to the dorm to do something, I'll be right back." He explained. Sirius turned to look at him, his poker face near perfection.

"Here, take this with you." Sirius said handing him the blank map. James just nodded and headed up the stairs. He put the map in its usual place in the desk, but made sure there was no other parchment in that drawer, it would be really bad if they mixed it up with like their unused parchment. He pulled out one of the spare bits of parchment before putting the rest in another drawer and took out a quill and began to write.

Dear Mom, and Dad

This was going to be the best Christmas ever.

A/N) And thus the Marauders map becomes a secret to everyone. (That's a reference btw.) This chapter was pretty silly. ^_^ I was in a good mood when writing it.

I always wondered how these three (er... four I guess if Peter must be counted) managed to come up with a password like 'I solemnly swear that I am up to no good'... I find it hard to imagine James feeling solemn for any length of time. ^_^