Chapter 3
Halfway through October, Harry, Ron and Hermione corner Fred and George, and say, "Okay why are the two of you being so strange around the American transfer student?"
Fred and George communicated silently with each other, then George said, "Fred here made a deal with her, that if we manage to prank her, then she will tell us her name."
"Okay." Hermione said, as she took in this new information. "First, why weren't you two paying attention to the Sorting Ceremony, when her name was told to the whole school?"
"...We were planning a prank." George said slowly, thinking that the sooner that they tell them, the sooner that they can go back to planning their next prank on ''Wit'y girl'. But also kicking themselves. Her name was so close, and they missed it.
Hermione sighed in annoyance, "Second, why haven't you just asked one of us what her name is if you want to know what it is so badly?"
Fred mumbled something.
"What?"
"It feels like cheating." Fred said more clearly.
Hermione stood there for a moment, staring at Fred and George.
Finally, she threw her hands up into the air, shouting, "Unbelievable! You would rather waste your time and energy on all of this, when you could be focusing on your studies, than ask someone what her name is? Unbelievable!"
"Leave them alone, Hermione." Ron said, "There's nothing that we can do. They get like this sometimes."
"If they want to find out her name the hard way, who are we to stop them?" Harry said, shrugging.
"But-" Hermione said, her mouth flapping.
"Leave it be, Hermione." Ron said, grabbing one of her arms.
"Let's go do our charms homework." Harry said, helping Ron to drag Hermione along by her other arm.
"Remember," Ron chuckled in remembrance, "it's 'Wing-gar-dium Levi-o-sa'."
As Halloween approaches, Fred and George still haven't gotten her with a prank, and they are becoming desperate.
Two weeks before the Halloween feast, they begin to plan this elaborate prank to get her after the feast, thinking that after she's eaten she would be too full and sleepy to evade them.
Oh, naive fools.
It came down from the north. A great cracking sound like thunder. It was a fire dra-
Oh, w-wait. Wrong fandom.
But it did come from the north.
Fred and George made sure that they were the first through the portrait hole, and then rushed up the stairs to their dormitory. They leaned over the railing to watch.
The other students poured into the common room. Near the front of the group is where they saw her. They waited for her to fall right into their trap. Only, nothing happened. She just kept on going up to her dorm.
Cursing themselves that their prank didn't work, they turned around and went inside their dorm in defeat.
The rest of their dorm-mates came in behind them, only to walk into their backs.
"Fred, George, what the hell, mates?" Lee said. He looked around them along with their other dorm-mates. It was something out of a nightmare.
"She got us." George said. "She got us good."
Their dorm has never been this colorful before. There were toys and memorabilia and posters that they had never seen before. Their beds were covered. The blankets, the sheets, even the bed frames and curtains hadn't been spared. The floor even, was covered in a new rug.
George walked over to one of the rather creepy posters, and asked, "What's 'My Little Pony'?"
Fred walked into the bathroom, "Really? Here too?"
"What?" George said.
Fred walked out of the bathroom and just pointed at the door.
The others cautiously walked inside, two seconds later they came back out at a brisk pace.
"Well," Lee said, "I don't need to use the bathroom anymore."
After trying, and failing to get rid of the nightmare fuel, they decided to just do their best to just ignore it, and get some sleep.
As Fred was pulling back his covers, he noticed a note had been on his bed, and it was dislodged as he pulled the covers back. Reaching down to pick it up, he read it as he stood up.
Chuckling to himself, "She is good."
"Fred, what is it?" George asked.
Fred handed over the note, and let George and Lee read it.
Happy Halloween, my Hobbits ; P
The next morning as Fred and George were heading to their dormitory to relax after a stressful night sleeping on the floor of the Great Hall after Sirius Black had attacked their little brother, they couldn't help but to notice the paint. The glitter. And everything else that they had set up to prank her, had gone off.
But not on the stairs leading to the girls dormitories.
But to the boys'.
"How?" Fred said, bewildered. "How did she manage to move our prank to this staircase, and place her own prank on us. Without us even knowing it? And delay it?"
"I don't know, but I want to find out? Don't you?" Fred said.
But George wasn't paying attention.
"Fred, come take a look at this." George waved his brother over.
Fred walked over to George, to see what he was going on about. Looking at the ground, at what George was pointing at, he stopped and took a closer look.
For there in the paint and glitter, were footprints. Footprints that they hadn't noticed last night appeariently.
They were the first ones back to Gryffindor Tower.
Following the footprints lead to a very strange discovery. Half way out of the portrait hole, they turned into pawprints. Following them, lead them down the stairs until they stop in the entrance hall, as if the paint ran out or had dried out right there, before going any further.
Fred and George turned to see who had stopped them, and they saw Professors Lupin, McGonagall and Dumbledore.
"You boys head up to your dorms," said Professor Dumbledore grimly. "We'll look into this."