A/N: all's fair in
love and war
Disclaimer: yeah, I
own nothing, yada yada yada
Chapter 4: Meet
the Marauders
The next day at breakfast, the girls told Dennis and
Charlie about what they had found in their room the night before.
"That's peculiar.
I wonder who could have done it," Charlie said in a supporting
manner. Babs glared across the table at
Charlie. "What?" he asked, although it
didn't take him long to realize Babs thought process. "No! It was not me! Don't you even think that, Hannah Marie
Brinkman, because I would never do that!"
Babs didn't break her gaze.
"Stop it! Lily?" he said desperately. Lily sighed.
"Babs, it probably wasn't Charlie. Come on, give the guy a break." The group continued eating their breakfast
in silence, Babs never looking away from Charlie. Occasionally, Charlie would glance up at her, but because he was
too scared of what she might do he would just look back down at his food. "Alright, we've got double potions, and we can't
be late. I want you two to stop this
right now." No matter what Lily did,
she knew that Babs wouldn't forgive Charlie for whatever he didn't
do. Soon enough, she had ushered them
out of the Great Hall and down into the dungeons for potions.
"Okay, now that they have brewed overnight, we will be
finishing and testing the potions we concocted yesterday afternoon. Pair up, I will be circling the class to
help," said Professor Apollo as the group waltzed into class. Lily and Babs
walked over to their brewing potion, light steam emitting from the
greenish-gray substance.
"Smells like… Charlie.
Gross," Babs said as they began measuring out their Newt spit. From across the room, Charlie looked up and
stuck his tongue out at Babs' back, Lily noticed but of course didn't say
anything. The class passed slowly, with
very few jeering remarks on both Babs and Charlie's parts, much to Lily's
surprise. The rest of their classes passed
slowly as well, and by the end of the day the group was more than glad to
return to the common room.
"I am so tired," Lindsay whined as she fell back
onto a couch.
"You're tired?
I'm the one who lugged your stupid book bag all the way upstairs after
you begged and pleaded with me!" yelled Dennis. "And furthermore, don't you think I deserve the chair for
being ever so kind?"
Lindsay sighed and began to stand up. She then looked at Dennis, and immediately
sat back down.
"Anybody have their Defense Against the Dark Arts
textbook?"
"Nah mine's upstairs."
"Yeah me too."
Babs gave out a deep, distressed, overly dramatic
sigh. "Alright… I'll be right
back." Lily saw her run up the iron
staircase at the end of the common room from the corner of her eye, just barely
taking her attention away from Fantastic Magical Creatures and Where to Find
Them. A moment later, Lily could
hear from a distance a loud cry in their room.
"NOT AGAIN!!" Babs' figure
reappeared at the top of the stairs. "I
do not believe this! Somebody ripped
apart our room, again! Charlie,
you are going to pay!"
The girls all ran up into their room, the boys close
behind them. "It wasn't me, I
swear! I was with you guys all day, you
know it wasn't me!" As soon as the
girls had all entered their room, Babs shut the door in Charlie's face. Lily looked around the disheveled dorm. Trunks were pulled apart, bed sheets left in
disarray. Like the day before, none of
the items were missing. But today there
was something different.
" 'Ha Ha Ha.'
What's that supposed to mean?"
Lily looked to the floor where her friends were all standing. Written in brushes, quills, pillows, and
other random items were the words 'Ha Ha Ha' written in perfect cursive. Babs stormed back over to the door, and
opened it to find Charlie standing in exactly the same position they had left
him. He opened his mouth as if to say
something, but before they could find out what it was the door was slammed once
more.
"Babs, you have to calm down. I seriously think that it wasn't Charlie."
Babs slowly turned her head to look at Lily. A mixture of anger, hatred, and confusion
was apparent in her face. She sighed
and sat down on her bed, defeated. "I
know. But who better to blame?"
****************
The next few days passed slowly, each day getting worse
than the one before. Every night they
returned to their room to find it a mess, with different words written on the
floor. These words varied daily, some
being small but long others being short but huge.
" 'Beware of Moony.'
I am so sick of this," Lily said after finding the new message on the
floor. She sighed, and began picking up
her things.
"We have got to stop this. I mean, if we let this go long enough I'm sure that they will
find our underwear. Wouldn't that be a
funny prank," Lindsay said, rolling her eyes.
"Nah. Being by far
the most intelligent of our little group, I hid all of my underwear after day
three of the turds' torture. Rephrase:"
Babs cleared her throat, " 'I mean, if we let this go long enough I'm sure that
they will find everyone but Babs' underwear. Now that would be a funny prank.'"
The next day, Babs and Lily were walking down to
transfiguration with Dennis when Lily's bag split, making the contents fly
anywhere. "Alright, I'll catch up. You guys get to class, Ralph had some big trick
on McGonagall planned. No sense missing
that over me."
Dennis' face lit up.
"I'm guessing you know what it is?" Babs said. Dennis nodded his head
with a big grin on his face.
"I'd suggest we run.
It's going to be good." Lily
watched as Dennis and Babs sprinted down the hallway. Lily sighed and continued picking up her books and papers. Before she could completely finish, though,
something hard whacked her on the back.
"PEEVES!
STOP! NOW!" White dust was flying everywhere from the
chalkboard erasers that were incessantly hitting Lily. She stood up and screamed, attempting to
stop the erasers and clear away some of the dust constricting her
eyesight. Peeves stopped abruptly.
"Awe, poor Lily-kins!"
"Stop it Peeves, this is not funny." She began to walk away and he flew in front
of her, blocking her path.
"Poor little first year, I heard that somebody has been
breaking into your room." Lily stopped
dead in her tracks.
"How do you know about that?" Peeves flew above her head.
"Heard those mean boys talking about it. Bad, bad, bad, sneaking into little first
year's rooms. Talking about moving
their stuff, making you scared. Picking
on the prettiest first year, thought it was funny." Peeves began swirling down the hallway, cackling evilly.
"Wait!
Peeves! Who was it? Who was in our room?" Peeves stopped and turned around to her.
"Why it was those bad, bad, boys. Always up in Dumbledore's office. The one who sneaks off every month, and his
little friends… Lupin, Pettigrew, Black, and Potter." Lily starred at him, stunned at what she had just heard. Peeves flew off, cackling. Lily dropped her things where she was
standing, and ran down the hallway.
Before she could get very far, however, she ran into Professor Apollo.
"Professor! I need
to see Professor Dumbledore! Somebody
has been sneaking into our room, and I think I know who it is!"
"Calm down, Miss Evans!
Professor Dumbledore is in his office…" she raised an eyebrow as Lily
swept passed her and ran back down the hallway. 'Strange girl,' the woman thought. 'Perhaps I should ask the house elves to put less sugar in the
pumpkin juice. It's going straight to
the students' heads.'
Lily continued running down the hallway, but stopped in
front of a large statue. Lily remembered
seeing Professor McGonagall leaving here with Dumbledore once before, in the
first week of school, and she could only guess that this had to be his
office. After pulling, pushing,
tugging, hitting, smacking, and beating the statue for nearly ten minutes, she
decided that there must be a password.
"Er… toadstool?" she said to the statue. 'Of course it's not toadstool, moron, that's
the Ravenclaw password.' She scanned
her mind, trying to think of what would be the most obvious…
"Quidditch? Daily Prophet? Er… open please?" She was getting annoyed as
her stomach began grumbling. It had
been hours since her meager breakfast, and she was starving.
"Treacle Tarts?"
The statue jumped open. "You
have got to be kidding me…" The statue began to close again. "No, no!
Wait! I'm sorry, I didn't mean
it!" The statue opened again, and she
walked through, up the stairs to the door of Dumbledore's office. She found him sitting at his desk, reading a
current issue of the Daily Prophet.
Lily scanned the headlines: Muggle
Town Bombarded by Hail Storms:
Coincidence? I Think Not; Yittlesmount Burned Down: 5 Wizarding Towns Remaining; Are our
Children Safe in the Hands of Bumbling Dumbledore? As she reached the door,
he put down the paper and looked up at her cheerily.
"Ah, Miss Evans!
What can I do to help you?"
"Yes, er, Professor, I'm sorry to disturb you but we've
been having a little problem in our dorm lately. Er, somebody has been breaking into our room and throwing around
our things." Lily paused and looked
into the jolly old man's eyes. He was
looking directly at her, and urged her to continue.
"I'm all ears. You
have my complete attention." He gave
her a little wink.
"Well, sir… it's been happening for about a week now. Everyday we come back to find all of our
things moved around, and words are written on the floor. Dumb things actually, things like 'ha ha ha'
and 'girls smell.' And, er, the reason
why I came to you, sir, is because I think I know who did it." Dumbledore was still looking straight at
her, massaging his long white beard.
"Er, Peeves said—"
Dumbledore interrupted her at this. "Now Miss Evans, may I remind you that
Peeves is very well known in this school for getting people into trouble and
rarely tells the truth. I don't believe
that we should be accusing people just because of what Peeves may tell or not
tell you." Lily looked around the old
wizard's office, deep in thought. She
glanced from the portraits of old headmasters, some sleeping others listening
to their conversation. She then looked
at the phoenix lightly dozing next to Dumbledore's desk. It was beautiful, it's feathers going up and
down to the steady beat of its breath.
"Lily?" The young girl looked up
at the Professor, her emerald green eyes singed with tears. "Alright, Miss Evans. Who was it that you think did it?"
************
Lily ran back into the common room, panting from her
sprint from Dumbledore's office.
"T-toadstool!" she yelled at the dozing pirate. She entered the common room and sat down on
one of the couches, to be bombarded by her friends.
"Where were you?"
"You never showed up for fig, we were so worried!"
"I swear, it thought you were right behind me!"
"What happened? Is
everything alright?"
"STOP! Let the
girl breath for a moment." Babs looked
down at Lily.
"Thanks Ba—"
"Don't you 'thanks, Babs' me! I was worried sick! What,
did you think that was funny? Because I
didn't think it was!" Lily couldn't
help but laugh at Babs. Her face was
flushed red, and she was screaming so loud that everyone in the common room had
turned to them to see what was the matter.
"Don't worry, I'm fine.
Actually, I am really fine.
We got them, Babs, just like you said."
"Got who?"
"The little gits who decided to prank us for the past few
days." Babs looked at her in
shock.
"No! Really? Who was it, I'd like to give them a little
piece of my mind!" Babs began to storm
towards the door, but Lindsay held her back.
Lily giggled. "Dumbledore told me to come get you guys, they are up in his
office."
"Well then let's get going! What are we waiting for?"
The five girls left the common room, and headed towards Dumbledore's
office. When they reached the gargoyle
blocking the entranceway, Lily made sure to thank him before continuing up the
stairs. She paused in front of the
closed door, the other girls stopping close behind her.
"Well?" she said.
"After you." Babs cautiously
walked up to the closed door, and opened it slowly to see the backs of James
Potter and Sirius Black directly in front of her.
"YOU!" The two
boys turned around. "I knew it! I knew it had to be you!" As the girls began piling into the office,
the other two boys came into view. One
had shaggy dirty-blonde hair and was very skinny, the other was rather short
and chubby with brown hair. They were
both cowering in separate corners, looking very upset. Black and Potter, on the other hand, seemed
to be having the best of times.
"Well hello! How
truly spiffing to be of your acquaintance!" said Sirius. Babs walked right up to him and shoved a
knuckle right under his chin, not being tall enough to actually punch the tall
boy. Lily heard her mutter something
that sounded like 'Why I oughta…' but she couldn't be entirely sure. Sirius looked down at the fist in disgust,
and then lifted her hand as if she was a princess and kissed her knuckle. "Your highness," he said, and went down into
a deep bow.
"You… you…" Babs ran towards him as if to attack, and
Lindsay jumped forward, blocking her.
Sirius gave a deep yawn.
"Now, Miss Brinkman, I'm sure that we can settle this is a
mature manner," said Dumbledore from his seat at the desk.
"A mature manner? Do you call what they did 'mature'? I'd call it childish antics by immature
morons…" Dumbledore giggled. Babs
blushed and glared at the floor.
"Miss Evans, would you like to tell the rest of these
lovely ladies what we have in store for our 'immature morons' as you so, er,
nicely put it," said Dumbledore, motioning towards Lily. James laughed at this. Babs glared at him, and he looked up at the
ceiling.
"Why I would love to, thank you professor." She walked in front of the line of students,
looking at each respectively as a man in command would to his or her
inferiors. She resisted the urge to say
'straighten that tie, soldier!' and continued with her speech. "Now, Babs, how would you say you felt every
night when you returned to your room to find it ransacked?"
"How do you think I felt?
I mean, come on, Lil!"
"Babs, just answer the question."
"No, this is stupid!"
"Babs!"
"Alright, alright!
I felt… vandalized!" She
glared back at the boys, causing Peter to sink lower in his seat.
"And?"
"HORRIBLE!
ATROCIOUS! SABOTAGED! OUTRAGED!
HUMILIATED!" Lily stopped her at
this.
"There! That's the
one I'm looking for! Humiliated…. Now how do you think these little scoundrels
over here would feel if they found out that they had to scrub the girls'
toilets from now until the end of the year?"
Babs' face lit up. "And how
would you think they would feel if they were told that they couldn't use
magic?" Babs' tongue brushed against
her teeth, and turning into an evil grin.
"And how do you think they would feel if every time they entered the
toilets, they had to put a little sign on the door?"
"A sign?" Babs
gave her a look of disgust. Lily pulled
a little piece of cardboard out from behind her back. Babs looked back up at the sign, and grinned so evilly Lily was
sure that even the devil himself would be proud.
BEWARE!
Do Not
Enter!
A
Meeting of
The
Marauders
Is
in Session
A/N: that was
kinda… stupid… oh well. Anywho, next
off to chapter 5
MEFFLES: don't worry,
I will forgive you! I'm just glad to
see that you are still reading!!!
