A/N: This part skips to when "our faithful Marauders" plus Lily, Sarah, Carrie, Liz, and Mary are in their fifth year. This is because I want to get to the part where the guys become Animagi as soon as possible, and I am quickly running out of ideas. So bear with me, the chapters will get better as I get to the more interesting parts of the story.
Chapter Theme Music (So I don't have to write any more damn songfics!):
Evan and Jaron's "Crazy for this Girl"
Dedication(s): To Alyssa (because of the music!), Carrie (my inspiration/muse), Liz (Go anti-PFS! Except by the time I put this up, it'll be over…), and "~Emily~" (she sent me my first email from a reader! I was so excited!)
*~*~*~*
"James!" I spun around, grinning as Lily ran into my arms. "James! How were your holidays?" I smiled, kissing her softly on the neck.
"Same as usual, Lils. I trust you haven't blown Petunia up yet?" Lily grimaced at me.
"No, unfortunately not." We were entering our fifth year at Hogwarts. The years were passing in an alarming blur; it seemed like only yesterday that we had been first years, giggling over our own intelligence as we snuck around the school after hours, skillfully evading Filch and the Professors. Not that we didn't still do that. The Animagus plan was still in full swing. Remus had estimated that the potion would be finished by the end of September. All summer I had been practically giddy with anticipation of finally becoming able to change into an animal at will. My mother had become especially exasperated with me when I had failed to be appointed a prefect. Speaking of prefects… I noticed Lily trying to surreptitiously pin a shiny badge onto her shirt. I held her an arm's length away from me so I could see what it was. Unfortunately for Lily, Sirius realized before I did. "A prefect! My dear Lily, that's simply spectacular! How marvelous…"
I shoved him, though I was quite in shock myself. "Lily? Why didn't you tell me?"
She shifted uncomfortably. "Well… I thought you might be disappointed… you know, like I was going over to "the enemy" or something…"
Deciding to be supportive, I scoffed. "Whatever would make you think that?" She raised her eyebrows in typical Lily-fashion.
"Maybe because over the summer you said (and I quote) 'To become a prefect would be to go over to the enemy!'" I smiled, remembering. Lily's look shook me out of my reverie.
"Er, well… I didn't mean it about you, I meant for ME to become a prefect would be to go over to the enemy. However, I think it's perfectly fine for YOU to be a prefect…" Sirius smirked.
"What he means is, get us busted and you don't get anything…" I punched him. Hard. Lily, however, frowned.
"I hope you know that your, er, position with me does not let you off the hook for rule breaking…" She was cut off as Sarah skipped over, looking ecstatic. She pecked Sirius on the cheek.
"Hey everyone! Guess what?" Sirius groaned.
"Don't tell me. You've been appointed a prefect also." She shot him a grin.
"How'd you know?" Lily, however, was jumping up and down excitedly.
"Oh my gosh! Me too! I was gonna owl you to tell you but I didn't want to disappoint you if you didn't get it and now this year is gonna be so awesome, I can't wait until…" She and Sarah, chattering excitedly, rushed off to find some other prefects. Sirius grimaced.
"Two of our number, over to the dark side." I smiled at him.
"Come on, it won't be so bad. Plus, we have you-know-what to look forward to…" Sirius brightened.
"Oh yeah! I decided what animal I want to be. I even got the hair." He retrieved a long black hair from a capsule in his pocket. "There was this huge black dog wandering around our house a couple weeks ago, and he left a bunch of these lying on our front stoop." I grinned as a vision of a huge, shaggy Sirius romped through my imagination. "Hey, did you decide what you want to be?" I shrugged.
"I haven't really given it too much thought. Though it might be cool to be something big… maybe a stag or similar…" Sirius smiled.
"Cool. James as Prongs." I grinned again.
"I like the sound of that. Prongs… and you can be Padfoot." Sirius raised his eyebrows.
"Padfoot?" I shrugged.
"You know, dogs have padded feet… well, it's better than Smelly or Shaggy or something." He shrugged.
"I suppose." Remus chose that moment to rush over in flight from his mother, who was brandishing a bottle of aspirin.
"Muuum! I'm fine!" He ducked behind me as she approached us.
"Darling…" He winced. "Darling… I don't want you to be sick on the first day of term." He groaned.
"Mum! I'm not sick! Now leave me alone!" She stalked away looking quite put off. Remus breathed a sigh of relief.
"You don't know how happy I am to get away from her! All summer she kept trying to cram pills and antidotes and the like down my throat. Stuff she buys of the WWN shopping channel and those vending carts in Diagon Alley… Rubbish. I can't stand it!" Sirius gave him a sympathetic glance.
"Hey Moony, it's all right. Pretty soon we'll all be out with you at 'that time'. We can even plan adventures! Hmm… where should we go first?" I nudged him.
"Let's not count our chickens before they hatch, Padfoot." Remus looked confused.
"What's this? Padfoot?" I smiled at him.
"We've decided you're not to be the only one with a nickname, Moony. Sirius has christened me 'Prongs' due to the fact that I think I want to become a stag as an Animagus. Therefore, I have decided that we will call our dear friend 'Padfoot', as he has procured a hair from a large black dog." Remus laughed.
"That's great, guys, but aren't you forgetting something?" I shrugged.
"Are we?" Remus rolled his eyes.
"Peter. He's sure to have a tantrum when he finds that we all have nicknames and he doesn't." This was true; Peter had proved to be a bit of a brat over the past few years, though 80 percent of the time his intentions were generally good. Sirius groaned.
"I'd forgotten HE was in on this too." As if prompted, Peter pranced over at this moment and pulled me by my sleeve towards the train.
"Look James, I've reserved us our own compartment!" He looked up at me as if for approval. I sighed. He acted more like a ten-year-old than a fifteen-year-old.
*~*~*~*
Lily was bouncing on my bed. I sighed and pried my eyes open.
"Happy birthday, sleepyhead!" she chirped, bending down to kiss me on the cheek. I groaned.
"Shouldn't you be 'setting a good example for the younger students'?" I asked wryly, as she laid back and settled her head on my shoulder. Sirius, coming in from his shower, grinned at the sight of Lily lying on the bed next to me.
"Oooh! Prongs and Lily… getting it on…" I threw my pillow at him.
"Not funny. Besides…" Smirking, I tossed my head towards his bed where Sarah was curled up, snoring lightly. "How do you explain that?" Lily elbowed me.
"Silly, I dragged her out of bed and brought her here with me. She was awake…"
Sarah opened her eyes sleepily. "What? What?"
Sirius tackled her. "Aha!"
There was a short scuffle as Sarah, shrieking with laughter, tried to disentangle herself from her boyfriend and the blanket. She rolled off onto the floor with a thud.
"Ouch." Lily and I smiled, shrugging; we had long since given up trying to figure out our best friends' relationship. At this moment, Remus entered, leading Mary, Peter, Liz, and Carrie, all bearing birthday presents.
HALF AN HOUR LATER…"Phew." The only presents left for me to open were the ones from Lily and my parents. Lily handed me a small box wrapped in gold paper. She grinned slightly as I unwrapped it. Inside was a small crystal figurine of a stag. Like all other wizard art, it was moving. As I held it in my palm, it pranced around, nuzzling my fingers. I looked up at her.
"It's beautiful, Lily. But why a stag?" She grinned even wider.
"Come on. Prongs? It wasn't that hard to figure out." I was awestruck. I wasn't sure if she knew about the Animagi Potion, but she had figured out that I was planning something involving a stag. We gazed into each other's eyes for a moment, but then I turned to open my parents' gift. It was a soft package wrapped in purple tissue paper. Figuring it was clothes, I pulled the paper away. Something made of silvery-blue, translucent material slid to the floor. A note fluttered down. I reached for it.
James-Happy birthday. Use this well.
-Mum and Dad
P.S. Don't get into trouble. -MumLily had picked up the garment.
"It's a cloak…" she said, mystified. Reaching for it, I turned it over and over in my hands. It felt something like water woven into fabric, slippery and fluid. I grinned and threw it around my shoulders.
"So, does this make me look dashing or what?" I asked, turning to Lily. But she didn't answer, just stood with her mouth open and her eyes wide. I turned to Sirius. "What's her problem? Doesn't flatter me?" But Sirius too just gaped in frozen awe. "What is up with all of you?" I finally turned to the mirror and looked at my reflection. What I saw made my stomach turn somersaults. Everything from my neck down was completely invisible. Staring, I took an involuntary step backwards. With a little thrill of horror, I pulled off the cloak and watched myself reappear. As I did, Liz spoke up in barely more than a whisper.
"It's an Invisibility Cloak." We all spun around to look at her.
"Are you sure?" She nodded.
"Yeah. I saw one in a textbook when I was researching Concealment Charms last year. It looked just like that." I recovered from my shock.
"This will come in very handy." I grinned at Sirius and Remus.
*****
Sarah looked up, pushing Sirius' face away from her neck rather roughly.
" What did you say?" I grinned.
"Oh, nothing important. Just that McGonagall's called an emergency prefect meeting. She said something about a student riot down in the dungeons, but I could have heard wrong…" Sarah leapt up, accidentally elbowing Sirius in the chest.
"Oof." Sirius put on his saddest puppy-dog face. She turned apologetically.
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Siri! I'll be back soon, I promise, and we can get back to, er, things…" She gave him a quick kiss and dashed away, pulling Lily after her. Remus, from his position in a chair nearby, raised his eyebrows.
"Riot, huh? Sounds serious." I grinned at him.
"Yeah, won't they be surprised when they show up and McGonagall doesn't know why…" Sirius snorted.
"Don't tell me. You made the whole thing up." I grinned even wider. "You mean you interrupted me and my girlfriend for A JOKE?" I smiled slyly.
"Of course not. I've just been to check on the potion. It's ready." The effect was instantaneous. Remus and Sirius sprang out of their chairs. Peter, eavesdropping from behind the couch, jumped out, looking elated.
"Yay! Now we get to become Anim-" I covered his mouth quickly.
"Shhh! It's meant to be a secret, remember?" He nodded, his eyes wide. "Good. Now let's go." I threw the four Cloak over the four of us and we slipped silently out of the common room and down the silent corridors. Eventually we reached the old broom closet on the fifth floor, where our painstakingly prepared Animagi Potion had been simmering since our first year. It was a miracle that no one had found out about it after four years. Sirius and I had been researching the incantation over most of the past year, and had finally finished it and written the entire verse down. There were three goblets on the shelf above the caldron. Trembling with excitement, Sirius reached for one with shaking hands and carefully filled it to the brim with the steaming potion. He dropped the long, black hair in, and we watched as it fizzled, turning a deep violet colour. I filled my goblet next. Remus had somehow managed to obtain powdered stag antler from somewhere, and I added a pinch of it to my goblet. The potion hissed, turning a bright emerald hue. We turned to Peter, who was clumsily attempting to ladle some potion into his goblet. Remus hurried to pour for him. We waited expectantly as he stared at it.
"Well? Where's your hair or whatever?" asked Sirius impatiently. Peter bit his lip.
"I- I forgot to get one-" he whispered. Sirius looked enraged.
"You mean we worked for four years on this potion, and you forget the most important ingredient?!?" I touched his arm.
"It's alright, Sirius," I soothed, looking around. "Look, Peter has some hairs from his rat on his robes. He can use one of them." Sirius glared.
"All right then, hurry up." Peter quickly dropped one long grey hair into his cup. I handed the parchment with the incantation to Remus. He motioned us to an empty classroom nearby.
"We'd better do this in here, just in case…" He began to read, and we repeated his words.
"Lli wym ta lamina na emoce bot em timre pesa elp, gniebym fot raeh ethat si lamina siht, lamina nae moce bot erise di…." The incantation was very long and tiring. Twice Peter messed up and we had to go back and start over again. Sirius was almost shaking with anticipation. Finally we managed to get all the way through without any mess-ups. Remus looked at the list that we had made.
"Next you have to drink the potion." Sirius looked at me.
"You first, Prongs." He grinned. "I want to make sure it isn't poisoned before I drink mine." I snorted.
"Thanks a lot." I held up the goblet. "Cheers." In one motion I poured the entire contents down my throat. I almost gagged as I felt something inside of the deepest part of my being rearrange and form. Sinking to the floor, I held my head to my knees. After a moment, the sensation passed and I stood, shaking slightly. Sirius, Remus, and Peter were looking at me, their eyes wide with anticipation.
"Well?" Remus whispered. I smiled shakily.
"It worked, I think." Sirius barely concealed his whoop of delight and wasted no time in gulping his potion down. Peter hesitantly followed. Observing their near identical expressions of nausea, I knew that they were experiencing the same feelings that I had. After a few moments, both straightened shakily.
"Now what?" asked Sirius. I looked at Remus, who smiled slightly.
"Now you try it out."
A/N: Hehe, a sort of cliffhanger! Well not really, but still, you can't blame me for trying.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything or anyone except for Sarah, Liz, Carrie, Mary… and any other unrecognizable characters that aren't in the books.